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5551

Living Room / Re: Losing my e-Book religion

« Last post by IainB on February 22, 2012, 05:34 AM »

I'm going to try Kindle to see if it has the same limitations.

-wraith808 (February 21, 2012, 03:10 PM)

This looks like it could be rather good technology:
Look Out, Kindle Fire: Barnes & Noble to Launch Cheaper Nook This Week [REPORT]

Are you absolutely sure you want to switch to Kindle? I know B&N didn't seem to work out for you, but that does not necessarily mean that it couldn't work out for you in the future - especially given your increased level of knowledge and understanding from the experience you have already been through.
There's often some truth in the old adage that begins "The devil you know...".

You could otherwise risk ending up playing the impossible game of catch-up as these suppliers keep leap-frogging their technology.

5552

Living Room / Re: PrECISE - It's the New SOPA/PIPA/ACTA

« Last post by IainB on February 22, 2012, 04:00 AM »

Senator Orrin Hatch says the Government should blow up a few hundred thousands computers to help combat piracy on the Internet.
http://www.dethroneh...end-of-the-internet/

-antelopemeat (February 21, 2012, 03:22 PM)

If this is serious, these guys have lost it.  Without even addressing how right/wrong it is, to me it just demonstrates someone who is totally out of touch, especially given the authority that he is trusted with: an authority that directly affects the lives of a hell of a lot of people.  Where are the intelligent people?  Where are they?  Where can I go to find them?  Are they all running away and hiding?

-superboyac (February 21, 2012, 05:20 PM)

Well, I'd be inclined to agree with you, but, just because I do not agree with an argument that seems stupid to me doesn't of itself necessarily make it an invalid argument.
What Senator Orrin Hatch says actually could makes sense if you look at it from a different viewpoint:

If the objectives are (say) "cyber-security on the Internet" and the combat of piracy on the Internet, then lock the internet away from all users so that the medium can no longer be used for breaching security or copyright piracy. Problem solved?

Then let the users back on to the Intenet via a user-pays fully censored account only, and charge them a high rate for notional resource utilisation - including those resources used for the censors' logging/analysing your traffic data. For example, CPU-seconds, disk I/O operation counts, network data transfer throughput volumes and bandwidth utilisation. And don't forget to tax the net consumption. Cost recovery at the source and a potential gravy tax train. Redolent of the old mainframe time-sharing days. Let resource price and the propensity to buy be the controlling factors for demand, as they are in most well-organised capitalist markets.

Alternatively, ban the use of the Internet except for an elite. The latter would be those who were deemed "responsible" enough or have a proven critically important service that necessitates using the Internet.

On a project where we were planning to connect the Defence network to points in the Internet, a Defense network engineer said (thinking aloud) to me, something like:

We really need to expand the secure Defence CUG (Closed User Group) network so as to communicate with our own and other countries' Defense/Police agencies on a regular basis around the world, and controlled by us. Ideally, we would want to turn the Internet into our proprietary, enlarged Defence CUG, with no other (non-Defence) users connected to it without our authority and control.

I guess the trouble with Open Systems is the fact of life that, by definition, they are likely to be less secure than closed ones.

This presumably  won't stop some people - e.g., including Senator Orrin Hatch and others - who will persist in trying to implement an almost Fascist-like control over freedom of access and use of the Internet.
We have too much freedom and it has to stop?

5553

Living Room / Re: Losing my e-Book religion

« Last post by IainB on February 22, 2012, 02:49 AM »

@wraith808: I am sorry if you didn't like my comment - I wasn't sure you would. And I do apologise if you feel offended in any way. It was meant in good faith and intended to help. I really dislike seeing people being made a victim of and always want to help, but when they seem to invite victimisation I find it terribly frustrating.

What struck me as odd was the apparent act of complaining about risks that eventuated - "There is something seriously wrong with this" - without articulating things more clearly. It seemed that you were demonstrating the behaviour of an external locus of control, whereas the unpleasant outcome (which you described at some length) apparently arose from your own (i.e., internal) buying decision(s). Whether wittingly, you had already effectively accepted the potential risks by the act of purchase, and established a legally binding contract with the suppliers - for both the hardware and the media to be loaded into it.

I can quite understand people wanting - or even being determined - to buy (say) e-book tablets regardless of the implications or potential risks (caveat emptor). The psychology of selling tells us that most purchases are irrational, which is why things are marketed the way they are - you just have to help the buyer stack up enough "want" to overcome any spoken/unspoken sales objections they may harbour.
So we justify buying the thing. But to whinge after the risks eventuate could seem to be shirking responsibility for the outcome - probably a form of displacement.

So I would recommend that people buy e-book tablets for the purposes you intend - e.g., including for reading books with greater facility/ease/convenience than (say) lugging a library of hardcopy books around. But always the caveat.
If you wanted to take the risks, then what could you lose in the gamble? Probably not an awful lot really - not a serious loss, anyway. And you'd get some bother if/when it did go wrong, prompting you to spend your valuable cognitive surplus attempting to resolve the issues with "customer services" - and (say) working out your annoyance by posting about it on a blog - rather than perhaps something more positive/constructive. And then spend more of your cognitive surplus finding a potentially better alternative.

But that's one of the principles in operation here - deciding to take a gamble, and accepting responsibility for the consequences and working through them. Life is a succession of problems and us working through them (per M. Scott Peck in The Road Less Travelled).

Here is the same principle in operation, but with much higher stakes:

Sometime in the late '70s (I think it was), there was a very sad case in the UK of a 5-year old little girl being mauled to death by two alsatians (German shepherd dogs). The dogs belonged to an experienced police dog-handler. They were friendly, highly-trained and child-friendly creatures. The police officer had decided to keep them at home when he was off-duty. I think the dogs both attacked and killed his little daughter in a short interval when she was quite alone with them whilst any adults were variously outside/upstairs. So nobody quite knew how or what had happened that made the dogs attack her.
At the inquest, the father said he "could have staked his life on the dogs being safe with the child" (OWTTE).
Well, of course, he didn't stake his life on it - he actually effectively staked his little girl's life on it, and she paid with her life for her father's loss of the bet.

The father's act of wanting or believing the dogs to be harmless could not affect or improve the little girl's inevitable statistical odds.
Not so easy for the father to displace responsibility in that case, I think, but it doesn't seem to deter others from  getting dangerous dog breeds in their houses, and children/adults paying for it by being being savaged or killed by them. Happens all the time. It was an absurdity then, and it still is.

By the way, writing in what could be a veiled threatening way, of having only just managed to control yourself from venting your anger on someone:
"... and indeed I've kept this post civil by the skin of my teeth in the face of a condescending reply to the situation, rather than a rational discussion of the salient points."
- is a common form of verbal bullying, and I would normally take exception to it. Furthermore, it does nothing to make or substantiate a rational point, so it is not of much use in a rational discussion of the salient points of an argument.
However, if you really are at your wits end, then just go for it - self actualise away and "knock yourself out" as they say. I shall quite understand!    
(Sticks and stones shall break my bones...)

I should stress that, though you may have interpreted my comments as condescending, that was not my intention and I am categorically not responsible for any mis-interpretations that other people may place on my comments. Rest assured, I would always be happy to have a rational discussion of the salient points of an argument - if and when I come across one, and especially if I think I may be able to contribute something useful or helpful.

5554

Living Room / Re: Losing my e-Book religion

« Last post by IainB on February 21, 2012, 04:54 PM »

There is something seriously wrong with this.

-wraith808 (February 21, 2012, 03:10 PM)

You post reads like a complaint, but I don't see why it should be a complaint.
Maybe you are spot-on in calling this discussion:

Losing my e-Book religion

In the discussions elsewhere in the forum you had indicated that you had invested in this kind of e-book technology.
However, for the life of me, I have so far been unable to understand how people could actually buy this technology without serious misgivings up front, because there is nothing to say that the suppliers will not tie you (the customer) up in knots like the ones you describe. Certainly, some customers' early experience of Amazon's Kindle indicated that that was precisely what they seemed to be seeking to do. So you are buying with the caveat emptor.

I think it probably requires the user taking a "leap of faith" to do that - so "religion" could be an apposite term to apply here.

You say:

I've never complained about their need to use DRM.

I cannot understand your lack of skepticism of such business practices, when all you need to do is look around enquiringly, including, for example:

• Why are they doing it, and what benefit do they derive from it? ($$$)
• What benefit does the user derive from it? (None at all. It's a disadvantageous constraint.)
• How Microsoft years ago surreptitiously forced DRM into Windows Media Player - you couldn't turn DRM off at first, and it's still difficult for the inexperienced user to do that - e.g., monitor and control outbound traffic through the firewall. The default is that DRM is "ON", and the player "phones home" - a lot.
• How DVDs were so artificially geographically "zoned" for supposed (but arguably quite unnecessary) DRM purposes.
• Why Sony paid an estimated US$500M to the Big Studios to get them to standardise on Blue-Ray.
• Amazon's well-publicised games with Kindle customers' property.

The bad ripoff experience with Barnes & Noble that you describe apparently follows your earlier decision to standardise on their e-book platform.
That apparently hasn't worked out too well, so you are now intending going to the Amazon Kindle platform to see how that works out.
There's a rationale for this:

I'm going to try Kindle to see if it has the same limitations.  It already has a leg up on Barnes & Noble because... [insert justification here]

You have already been seemingly suppliant in allowing B&N to make a victim of you, and now you are apparently going to give the same opportunity to Amazon to do similar, when all the evidence (QED) indicates that they probably will oblige. Their knots will probably be different in specifics, but similar in type.

I have to ask: At what point do you make a stand for yourself and refuse to allow suppliers any leeway or opportunity to rip you off, making you a victim once again?

You post reads like a complaint, but I don't see why it should be a complaint - because it seems to me that you asked for this situation.

5555

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by IainB on February 21, 2012, 07:27 AM »

5556

Living Room / Re: Google: Do no evil (once you're caught)

« Last post by IainB on February 20, 2012, 04:10 PM »

Still it's us, yes us, who are voting for these people and refusing 'alternatives' and 'third parties' with a convenient excuse that either 'they will become the same' or the perhaps worse 'other options will never be viable'.

-rgdot (February 20, 2012, 03:57 PM)

Yes, there is some truth in the statement that "People get the government they vote for, and thus deserve."

As an edit, I have just posted this into the review:
EDIT: 2012-02-18 0026hrs

Google Circumvents Safari Privacy Protections - This is Why We Need Do Not Track
A signal weakness of the DNT+ approach would seem to be that it relies on trust, and that trust has apparently already been breached by Google in the case of the Safari browser's DNT approach.

-IainB (February 17, 2012, 05:24 AM)

DNT+ is a bit like that tinfoil hat referred to in this thread, but it will likely only be effective in the short term, because the longer term has apparently already been planned out for us:

Well, this ARS Technica article seems like quite a good summary of how ACTA forms what looks rather like just a part of a decades-long subterfuge to wrap up "intellectual property" and copyright as an American asset: ACTA is part of a multi-decade, worldwide copyright campaign
(Go to the article, which contains embedded links, and the user comments are worth reading. The spoiler below contains just the text.) This would seem to be the ideology of capitalism in a serious play for position over the long haul, and there's probably not a damned thing you can do about it.

-IainB (February 20, 2012, 03:50 PM)

5557

Living Room / Re: PrECISE - It's the New SOPA/PIPA/ACTA

« Last post by IainB on February 20, 2012, 03:50 PM »

Well, this ARS Technica article seems like quite a good summary of how ACTA forms what looks rather like just a part of a decades-long subterfuge to wrap up "intellectual property" and copyright as an American asset: ACTA is part of a multi-decade, worldwide copyright campaign
(Go to the article, which contains embedded links, and the user comments are worth reading. The spoiler below contains just the text.)

Spoiler

ACTA is part of a multi-decade, worldwide copyright campaign
By Timothy B. Lee | Published February 20, 2012 10:30 AM

Last week, we observed that major content companies have enjoyed a steady drumbeat of victories in Congress and the courts over the last two decades. The lobbying and litigation campaigns that produced these results have a counterpart in the executive branch. At the urging of major copyright holders, the Obama administration has been working to export restrictive American copyright laws abroad. The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) is just the most visible component of this ambitious and long-running project.

Ars Technica recently talked to Michael Geist, a legal scholar at the University of Ottawa, about this effort. He told us that rather than making their arguments at the World Intellectual Property Organization, where they would be subject to serious public scrutiny, the US and other supporters of more restrictive copyright law have increasingly focused on pushing their agenda in alternative venues, such as pending trade deals, where negotiations are secret and critics are excluded.

The growing opposition to ACTA in Europe suggests this strategy of secrecy may have backfired. But the US is not giving up. It has already begun work on its next secret agreement, ealled the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Geist told Ars that restoring balance to copyright law will require reformers to be as determined as their opponents have been. He said that donating to public interest groups that focus on international copyright issues is the best way to make sure that the public interest is well-represented.

Exporting copyright law

Countries have been negotiating international copyright treaties for more than a century, but the passage of two treaties in the 1990s represented a turning point in international copyright law.

The Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement, signed in 1994, made protection of copyrights a requirement of membership in the World Trade Organization. Countries that failed to meet international copyright standards could face trade sanctions. The 1996 World Intellectual Property Organization Copyright Treaty further ratcheted up the minimum requirements for copyright protection—requiring, for example, that signing countries regulate the circumvention of digital rights management schemes.

WIPO's relatively open structure meant that major copyright holders didn't get everything they wanted in the 1996 treaty. For example, Geist said, the United States was unable to get the strong anti-circumvention language it preferred into the WIPO treaty.

"WIPO is a place that's more open than it used to be," Geist told Ars. "Because of the consensus-based approach, there is a necessity to engage in negotiating." Indeed, in recent years reformers have begun to make headway themselves. Treaties to liberalize copyright in ways that benefit libraries and the blind are now under consideration at WIPO.

So, Geist said, the US has increasingly engaged in forum-shopping, bypassing WIPO and pushing for stronger copyright protection in a wide variety of other venues. For example, the United States has negotiated a series of bilateral trade agreements with nations such as South Korea, Australia, and Chile. While they're branded as free-trade deals, they also require the other country to adopt the more punitive copyright regime favored by the United States.

The negotiations over the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement were part of this trend. In contrast to the relatively open WIPO process, ACTA was negotiated in secret by a relatively small number of mostly wealthy countries. The developing nations who would be the most likely to object weren't invited to participate. The plan was to present the finished treaty to the world on a "take it or leave it" basis.

Unfortunately, the plan didn't work as well as its backers had hoped. Early drafts of the treaty leaked, giving opponents time to organize against the most extreme provisions in the treaty. And the secretive and non-representative nature of the negotiation process created a bad taste in the mouths of many stakeholders. Concerns over ACTA's secretive drafting process may have been as important as any of the treaty's substantive provisions in generating European opposition. If Europe fails to ratify ACTA, it will dramatically weaken the treaty.

Try, try again

But the US isn't giving up. To the contrary, the US and its industry backers seem to have concluded the problem with ACTA was that they didn't try hard enough to lock down the negotiating process. So they're now plowing forward with the Trans-Pacific Partnership. This time, the US has cut the leak-prone Europeans out of the process, limiting negotiations to eight countries such as New Zealand and Peru that are much easier for the United States to intimidate. Presumably, the goal is to enshrine the US's preferred copyright policies in the TPP and then use the TPP as a template for future agreements.

Once the US gets a critical mass of countries to sign a deal, it can then use other carrots and sticks to pressure additional countries to sign on. Geist said one important tool is the so-called "Special 301" list, an annual watchlist of countries Washington considers to have insufficiently strict copyright laws. Not only will countries be pressured to sign onto ACTA, the US may also press them to implement even those provisions of ACTA that the agreement itself labels as optional.

Geist believes that the interests behind SOPA and ACTA are likely to view recent defeats as temporary setbacks. "They're not playing for next year," he said. "They're playing for 10 years and 20 years in the future."

He said that reformers can resist their agenda, but only if they play the same "long game" as their opponents. Ordinarily, the most important thing a citizen of a democracy can do to stop bad public policies is to call their legislators. But in this case, most of the action is occurring in international organizations where individual legislators have little influence.

To fight agreements like ACTA requires organizations with the sophistication and resources to navigate the complex world of international diplomacy. Geist pointed to Knowledge Ecology International, Public Knowledge, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation as examples of organizations with a track record of resisting the drive toward ever-stronger copyright protection.These organizations are "WIPO regulars" well positioned to stay in the trenches and ensure the public interest is well-represented regardless of the venue. Geist said that donating to these organizations is the most effective way for ordinary voters to help resist the worldwide trend toward ever-more-extreme copyright laws.

This would seem to be the ideology of capitalism in a serious play for position over the long haul, and there's probably not a damned thing you can do about it.

Good quote from the article:

"The World Intellectual Property Organization is a relatively representative body. Which might be why the US has been avoiding it."

5558

Clipboard Help+Spell / Feature request for CHS - "Detritus" database(s)

« Last post by IainB on February 18, 2012, 11:17 PM »

Not sure how much of this is possible at present.

Detritus:
  1. rock in small particles or other material worn or broken away from a mass, as by the action of water or glacial ice.
  2. any disintegrated material; debris.

Feature:
(a) As an alternative to deleting the Recycle Bin clip contents, have a switch to remove those clip records (on manual or automatic deletion events) from the Recycle Bin, at periodic intervals, placing them into date-referenced "detritus" databases. ("Nothing ever lost.")
(b) Have the ability to search detritus databases selected individually or as a group, on an ad-hoc basis.
(c) Have the ability to copy selected clip records from detritus into the current/active "main" database.
(d) Have the ability to select detritus databases for maintenance - e.g., searching and weeding-out (permanent deletion) of clip records.

Regards,
            Packrat

5559

General Software Discussion / Re: I spy...with my little eye...on my hard drive...

« Last post by IainB on February 18, 2012, 10:47 PM »

I'm very interested in this discussion.
Desktop or NAS/Network, index/search seems to be a perennial problem.

I too was desolé when Google Desktop Search (GDS) was killed off by Google.
I have found nothing to replace it. It's departure has left a vacuum.
At one time GDS could find pretty much everything,. including inside archived files, Gmail, Outlook, and your other PCs.
Mind-blowingly powerful search of the virtual unified desktop - cloud and client-based. But then, because cosporate users raised objections, Google started to lop off its limbs.
It was always in ß, sometimes locked up the CPU or needed to have its indexing restarted from scratch to work around some internal bug.
But nothing else quite like it.

On the other hand, where search should arguably been one of its strongest features, Microsoft Windows indexing/search was a singular weakness. Whether it even did what it was designed to do was not the issue - it never worked effectively/efficiently in XP - it was simply infeasible. It was such a resource hog that it was the first thing you had to turn off to restore your computer's performance potential.
Then, in Win7 it began to look as though Microsoft Windows indexing/search had finally been rebuilt using modern technology. Oops, wrong. It starts off really well, but then, after a while, you can't find those files that you know you have and which were originally showing up in searches. What gives?
Microsoft seems to be silent other than offering the useless suggestion that you reset your settings or rebuild the probably corrupted index. The thing is, it shouldn't be failing so easily in the first place. Not fit for purpose.

What are/were the options for search?
Just to kick things off, I put up this list here at EditPad: Summary of Search Tools

It's open to public use (read/write access).

Might this be of use as a running tally of what we know about the various search software for this discussion? Update it as you see fit.
I am also looking elsewhere (e.g., incl. Wikipedia) for a summary of search tools that we might be able to add to the discussion.

5560

Screenshot Captor / Re: Feature req: add-your-own endpoint text border shapes...

« Last post by IainB on February 18, 2012, 06:07 PM »

+1 from me for that feature requirement.
In terms of priority:

• "Mandatory"
• "Highly desirable"
• "Nice-to-have" <--I'd place it here.

5561

Mini-Reviews by Members / FreeFileSync - automated backup - Mini-Review

« Last post by IainB on February 18, 2012, 08:51 AM »

Original post:	2012-02-18
Last updated:	2016-12-15 (re: latest version; extended list of features.)

Basic Info

App Name
Thumbs-Up Rating
App URL	http://freefilesync.sourceforge.net/
App Version Reviewed	$FREE (with Candyware) or $Donate (without). The latest version is 8.7 (and still an excellent backup tool)
Supported OSes	Windows macOS Ubuntu 16.10 Ubuntu 16.04 Debian 8.6 openSUSE
Support Methods	http://sourceforge.n...freefilesync/support Comprehensive Help file Introductory video (quite good)
Upgrade Policy	$FREE (with Candyware) or $Donate (without)
Pricing and Versions Available	The developers put a forced option on users - you either get FFS $FREE with Candyware, OR you start paying periodically recurring licence fee $donations (each time the "thank-you period" ends) - that gets you the temporary FFS Donation Edition with "bonus" (hah-hah) features including: ad-free installation without Candyware auto-updater portable zip package

SCREENSHOT OF APP INTERFACE:



Introduction:
I had been trialling several backup alternative solutions and started to trial FFS as a result of reading @Curt's post: FreeFileSync (Open-Source) « on: 2011-04-19, 16:23:00 »
I quickly discovered that FFS was a superb backup system, and continued to use it.   

I felt I had to consolidate my thoughts on FFS after reading this excellent comparison and review of 2012-02-17, between FFS and Microsoft SyncToy: Is FreeFileSync Better Sync Software Than Microsoft SyncToy?
The above review is well worth reading, and I shall not duplicate it here.

Overview:
FreeFileSync is a folder comparison and synchronization tool providing highly optimized performance and usability without needless user interface complexity.
It is highly customisable and includes real-time monitoring capability and maintenance of versions in the backups.
The website at https://sourceforge....ojects/freefilesync/ lists these features:

• Synchronize network shares and local disks
• Synchronize MTP devices (Android, iPhone, tablet, digital camera)
• Synchronize via SFTP (SSH File Transfer Protocol)
• Detect moved and renamed files and folders
• Show disk space usage with directory trees
• Copy locked files (Volume Shadow Copy Service)
• Detect conflicts and propagate deletions
• Binary file comparison
• Configure handling of Symbolic Links
• Automate sync as a batch job
• Process multiple folder pairs
• Comprehensive and detailed error reporting
• Copy NTFS security permissions
• Copy NTFS extended attributes (compressed, encrypted, sparse)
• Copy HFS+ extended attributes and ACLs
• Support long file paths with more than 260 characters
• Fail-safe file copy prevents data corruption
• Cross-platform: Windows, Linux, Mac OS X
• Expand environment variables like %UserProfile%
• Access variable drive letters by volume name (USB sticks)
• Native 64-bit support
• Manage versions of deleted/updated files
• Prevent disc space bottlenecks via optimal sync sequence
• Full Unicode support
• Highly optimized runtime performance
• Include/exclude files via filter
• FreeFileSync portable and local installation available
• Handle daylight saving time changes on FAT/FAT32
• Use macros %time%, %date%, et al. for recurring backups
• Case-sensitive synchronization
• Built-in locking serializes multiple users synchronizing the same network folder
• ... download and use for free!

Who this app is designed for:
FFS would be an ideal automated backup tool for any computer system where the user wished to have a "fire and forget" backup strategy to minimise/avoid risk of data loss.

The Good:

• Simple and highly flexible at the UI (User Interface). The user can select 1 of 4 Variants of backup, and within Variants 2, 3, and 4, the user can select Synchronisation Options (Categories and Actions) to establish precise backup procedures. Variant 1 necessitates FFS building a control database to manage the backups, and specifying the rules for that backup, using that database. That same database approach can be selected for the Variants 2, 3, and 4, if required to detect moved files. Refer separate section at the end of this review, entitled Details of Synchronisation Options.
• An excellent piece of software that so far has done its job very well (as above) on my laptop.   
• The software can automatically check for updates to cope with improvements and new hardware and drivers.
• The good points of FFS are comprehensively covered in the excellent comparison and review of 2012-02-17, between FFS and Microsoft SyncToy: Is FreeFileSync Better Sync Software Than Microsoft SyncToy?
• Real-time syncing works perfectly, and is a breeze to set up (I used the Help document). Really good.   

The needs improvement section:

• I have not observed that anything needs improvement. No annoyances. In any event, the software is updated periodically, to implement improvements and bug fixes.
• Not so much an improvement as a suggested alternative set-up approach: The user could consider using reparse links (folder junctions) to set up a library for FFS to backup, rather than spell them out individually - as I have done - in the FFS configuration.
• WARNING: @PhilB66 reminded me that the install now included OpenCandy, so make sure you pick the right setting: (relating to this, see also the Review notes posted on the https://sourceforge....reefilesync/reviews/ - those notes have been copied to the foot of this review, for ease of reference.)
  
  
  

How it compares to similar apps:

• SyncToy: Read the comparison/review: Is FreeFileSync Better Sync Software Than Microsoft SyncToy?
• Handy Backup: FFS was certainly good enough to shift me from Handy Backup, which I had been using for years, and with FFS' RealTimeSync module (Handy Backup didn't do that), I am very happy with the outcome.
• BeyondSync: I had posted a very brief note/review about BeyondSync Standard 4.3, which product worked OK for syncing, but I could not get its real-time syncing to work, and so uninstalled it from my laptop.
• Other: There was also an interesting discussion on DCF re various backup software (not necessarily FreeFileSync): backup software - file-by-file sets

When I can put aside the time for it, I intend to trial and report on the backup functionality mentioned in AOMEI Backupper FREE + AOMEI Partition Assistant FREE - Mini-Review, and refer to the report in this FFS review.

Why I think you should use this product:
My experience of FFS is that it is a superb backup software tool, and with it's RealTimeSynce module it seems to be a real winner.

Conclusions:
Superb backup tool.
Note that the list of key features given above does not provide a comprehensive list of all the functionality of this software. There are many other features.
Does what it says it does, and very well.
This is a picture of a backup disc (note the VERSIONING directory):




This is a progress report just prior to completing the sync/backup:



Links to other reviews of this application:
If you Google FFS, you will find various reviews, but, as above, this one is good: Is FreeFileSync Better Sync Software Than Microsoft SyncToy?
_______________________________________________

Details of Synchronisation Options:



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Review of FFS posted at https://sourceforge....reefilesync/reviews/

by Slartibartfarst (5 Stars rating)
2016-12-14

FFS is an excellent $FREE backup tool. It also has one of the most sound ergonomically-designed GUIs that I have come across. I recommend it to anyone who is looking for good, reliable backup software. Why would you NOT want to use it?
As a regular and committed user of FFS (FreeFileSync) since 2012, I wrote a very favourable mini-review of FFS at the DonationCoder.com Forum. That review is periodically updated. Only read it for the information it might give as an introduction to using FFS and/or especially for the comments from people on the forum, who are generally keen fans of using good and innovative software - such as FFS, for example.

FFS is an excellent $FREE backup tool - BUT, the single biggest downside to the tool seems to be the Candyware approach that insists on installing PUPs (Potentially Unwanted Programs).
I fully understand that the Candyware is done out of necessity for funding and that it may also explain the high frequency of updates/changes released for FFS. However, Candyware is simply a huge PITA - it upsets the AV (Anti Virus) software and MBAM (Malwarebytes) - and rightly so. Goodness knows what CR#P it is trying to install.

Unfortunately for FFS, Candyware seems to be the single biggest negative reason that many potential and existing users have mentioned to me for NOT using FFS and for instead using some other (and possibly inferior) backup software. I just thought I'd mention that, because it drives users away, which is not a good thing and the developers would presumably know that - so it is probably all done with deliberate method.

So, FFS is an excellent $FREE backup tool - but the $cost?
Well, you either pay for it with your time and inconvenience from the repeated PITA of Candyware installs and then (say) stop using it because you get sick of that, OR you stump up a $donation.

I actually consider that having the forced option to donate and thereby getting a Candyware-less and also a PORTABLE ZIP installer that auto-updates is a relatively smart and sane way to go - so, all kudos for doing that However, no-one likes being coerced by having their arms twisted, and this will therefore probably antagonise some people (I know it does me) and may even put them off and who otherwise could be giving positive WOM (Word-Of-Mouth) advertising - rather than negative - about FFS - to their friends and relatives. This is reflected in some of the comments in the DonationCoder.com Forum.
____________________________________________

[/list]

5562

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: Do Not Track Plus (Firefox add-on) - Restore your online privacy - Mini-Review

« Last post by IainB on February 17, 2012, 07:18 PM »

Just so as to help clarify things, I have made this edit to the opening review post:
EDIT: 2012-02-18 1410hrs

DNT+ is not an ad-blocker. It blocks personal data tracking cookies that are used to track your online activity on the Internet.
(It is thus similar to the Firefox Ghostery add-on.)

5563

General Software Discussion / Re: Fork webpages?

« Last post by IainB on February 17, 2012, 06:54 AM »

I have a similar requirement. The way I approach this is currently using Firefox:

• Scrapbook: Capture pages and save them "frozen in time", by copying them with the Scrapbook add-on. These copies create files which form part of my laptop's hard drive Library and can be indexed/searched using desktop tools as well as using the Scrapbook add-on's index/search.
• Update Scanner: Monitor those web pages where I want to be notified of changes, by using the Update Scanner add-on - I haven't needed to use this very much so have not got much experience with it.

Google Reader may be of help as well:

• I have often found that most/many web pages have an RSS feed if you hunt for it. I subscribe these into Google Reader (a feed aggregator). If there is no RSS feed, then Google Reader tries very hard to find an RSS feed for each of the URLs that you feed it with, and tells you if it can't find one. If it can't, then there are also several web-based tools which can be used to generate an RSS feed URL for a given web page URL, so you can use those RSS feeds in Google Reader instead.
• Once you have the RSS feed in Google Reader, you will be able to see new posts or content for those web pages in Google Reader. There are add-ons for Google Reader that enable you to filter out and hide duplicates, so that you can be presented with just the most recent changes/posts to a given web page. You can then either get a Google Reader view revealing all the hidden posts, or bring up the actual web page and scroll back to see all the changes - whichever approach you prefer.

Hope this helps or is of use. None of it is really an ideal answer.

5564

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: Do Not Track Plus (Firefox add-on) - Restore your online privacy - Mini-Review

« Last post by IainB on February 17, 2012, 05:24 AM »

As an edit, I have just posted this into the review:
EDIT: 2012-02-18 0026hrs

Google Circumvents Safari Privacy Protections - This is Why We Need Do Not Track
A signal weakness of the DNT+ approach would seem to be that it relies on trust, and that trust has apparently already been breached by Google in the case of the Safari browser's DNT approach.

5565

General Software Discussion / Re: ZOOM setting reminder ?

« Last post by IainB on February 17, 2012, 02:27 AM »

...if you go into IE 9's Settings --> Advanced tab --> Under the Accessibility section, you have 2 options:

• Reset test size to medium for new windows and tabs
• Reset zoom level for new windows and tabs

Enable both and you should be good, other than having to manually increase zoom level every time.  I suppose this would be most beneficial if you rarely increase the zoom level and least beneficial if you always increase the zoo level.

-johngalt (February 17, 2012, 12:36 AM)

Ah! Thanks for the tip @johngalt! That was what had been nagging me in the back of my mind when I wrote:

(... I seem to recall having read somewhere that there might be a way to change this default behaviour.)

-IainB (January 27, 2012, 07:09 PM)

@crabby3 might be able to make use of that tip.

(I rarely use IE9 and am relatively ignorant about such tips.)

5566

General Software Discussion / Re: Time Clock Software

« Last post by IainB on February 17, 2012, 01:52 AM »

My response deleted. I had not noticed this was probably spam.

5567

Mini-Reviews by Members / Do Not Track Plus (Firefox add-on) - Restore your online privacy - Mini-Review

« Last post by IainB on February 16, 2012, 10:29 PM »

Basic Info

App Name	Do Not Track Plus (DNT+) by Abine.
App URL	Mozilla add-ons
App Version Reviewed	Freeware Firefox add-on version 2.0.6 (as at 2012-02-17)
Test System Specs	Here is a comparison table of features between different versions of Firefox privacy management tools/add-ons (e.g., including Ghostery): Note: Detailed features and a concise 2-minute guided tour video are here.
Supported OSes	Current versions of the Firefox browser.
Support Methods	FAQ Blog Support Online Chat
Upgrade Policy	Automatic free upgrades to newer versions of the add-on. (Other paid-for tools also available.)
Trial Version Available?	This is an uncrippled FREE/trial version.
Pricing Scheme	(Not applicable.)

SCREENSHOT OF APP INTERFACE:
(No screenshot - not necessary.) The 2-minute guided tour video explains it very concisely.

Note: There is a green DNT+ icon (button) in the top RHS corner of the browser menu bar.

Introduction:
A Firefox add-on for enhanced privacy management.
EDIT: 2012-02-18 1410hrs

DNT+ is not an ad-blocker. It blocks personal data tracking cookies that are used to track your online activity on the Internet.
(It is thus similar to the Firefox Ghostery add-on.)

Overview:
This is a privacy improvement/management tool and seems to be quite sophisticated.
It replaces "Do not track me" cookies in place of cookies set in your browser.
(For example, similar to, but not as flexible as, what you could do with the now defunct JunkBuster proxy's "cookie jar", some years back.)

Who this app is designed for:
Anybody who is concerned about the remorseless invasion of privacy by marketing data companie, who collect tracking data about  your personal activity on the web, and sell it to advertisers for targeted advertising - e.g., Google, Facebook, double-click, etc.

The Good:
An excellent add-on.
Seems to perform its job very well. It runs unobtrusively and has no perceptible performance overhead impacting the browser.    

The needs improvement section:
I have not observed that anything needs improvement. No annoyances.
(Automatic updates will cope cope with changes to Firefox, improvements and bug-fixes.)

Why I think you should use this product:
If you are concerned about the remorseless invasion of privacy by marketing data companies, who collect tracking data about your personal activity on the web, then you need this add-on and will be able to put it to good use.

How it compares to similar apps:
My experience is that it overlaps with some of the functionality of the now-defunct JunkBuster, and may supersede the (very good) Firefox Ghostery add-on.
Like Ghostery, DNT+ also provides information about the tracking that you are being exposed to and that is being blocked.

Conclusions:
Superb. AAA+ rating.  
Does what it says it does, and very well.
I found it worthwhile reading the other users' reviews of this add-on on the Mozilla site.
EDIT: 2012-02-18 0026hrs

Google Circumvents Safari Privacy Protections - This is Why We Need Do Not Track
A signal weakness of the DNT+ approach would seem to be that it relies on trust, and that trust has apparently already been breached by Google in the case of the Safari browser's DNT approach.

5568

Living Room / Re: Anatomy of a Tear-Jerker: Very cool article on why songs give you chills

« Last post by IainB on February 15, 2012, 06:21 PM »

Thanks for that mouser. Very interesting.

5569

Living Room / Re: Products designed to fail, a documentary

« Last post by IainB on February 15, 2012, 05:56 PM »

Yes, you probably have been lucky. This sort of cynically venal practice seems to have been going on in computer technology for years.
I think my first experience of a deliberately crippled product was back in the mid-'70s, when I was programming on a DEC PDP 15/30 (I think it was that model).
We needed to push through our production runs faster as there was a backlog of work building up, so the Ops. manager ordered a hardware system upgrade for about UKP2,000 that doubled the CPU cycle speed.

A DEC engineer arrived and went into the computer room, followed by the Ops manager. The latter watched as the engineer took a screwdriver out from his pocket and turned a screw (rheostat) in the CPU block, then returned the screwdriver to his pocket. That was the "hardware system upgrade".

If the Ops manager had done that for himself, it would have breached the contract and/or maintenance agreement with DEC and we'd have been in a ton of legal trouble.

5570

Find And Run Robot / Re: Latest FARR Release v2.107.04 beta - Sep 23, 2012

« Last post by IainB on February 15, 2012, 05:09 PM »

Is anyone else getting new exception errors under win7 with one of my plugins installed?  I have a feeling that

-mouser (February 14, 2012, 11:25 PM)

Just wanted to note that I have not been getting any exception errors, so far.

5571

Find And Run Robot / Re: Latest FARR Release v2.107.04 beta - Sep 23, 2012

« Last post by IainB on February 15, 2012, 04:46 PM »

No, I think the discussion is suggesting that the Tablet PC Component feature needs to be turned ON.

Spoiler

http://www.sevenforu...ng-tool-missing.html

Maybe that will help some thats missing it from system32 directory.

-hamradio (February 14, 2012, 10:46 PM)

as advised in the thread above, i checked and found that the tablet pc component is turned off on my pc. however when i tried to turn it on, explorer crashed so i'm leaving it off.. so is anyone else willing to try?

-lanux128 (February 14, 2012, 11:05 PM)

In any event, it is not true in my case, as this feature was already turned ON, but the Snipping tool still does not launch from FARR (I get no error messages when it fails to launch):

Conclusion: a .lnk for SnippingTool will execute [from FARR] only if it is outside of the C:\Windows\System32\ directory.

-IainB (February 15, 2012, 01:29 AM)

5572

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: Hard Disk Sentinel PRO - Mini-Review

« Last post by IainB on February 15, 2012, 04:12 PM »

@stq: There's quite a bit of information/discussion on the Speedfan site about the criteria necessary for Speedfan and S.M.A.R.T to work on some PCs/hard drives.

Also: Please note my edit to my last post above re getting disk Performance Monitoring to work. It doesn't seem to "stick" and has to be re-set.

5573

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: Calibre - e-Book (Personal Library/Document) Management - Mini-Review

« Last post by IainB on February 15, 2012, 04:01 PM »

• Ability to "pull" metadata from many different sources is very useful.
• Ability to "harvest" online content-sources and convert them to e-books is a brilliant idea (not yet tested by me).

-IainB (January 23, 2012, 08:32 AM)

@40hz has had a look at this feature (copied from another thread):

re: calibre: Ok, I just gave it a workout. What it does (i.e go out and get a feed at a scheduled time, download it, and create an ebook out of it) works quite well.

per the developer of calibre:

The news downloading feature, one of calibre's most popular, has an interesting story behind it. I used to subscribe to Newsweek, back when it was still a real news magazine. But one fine day, Newsweek simply stopped being delivered to my house and no matter how much time I spent on the phone with various sales reps, it simply would not start again. Since I'd just got my first e-book reader at the time, I decided to add the ability to download and convert websites to calibre. From the beginning, I decided to make it as modular as possible, so that other people could contribute "recipes" for different news sites. The calibre cookbook has kept on growing and now calibre has recipes for over three hundred news sources in many different languages.

The limitations, however, are annoying. Each feed gets made into its own book. You can't combine feeds using the standard scripts provided by calibre. I'm guessing you could if you were to combine them in you own script. But that defeats some of the convenience being sought.

The other problem is that a new book gets created for each source each time the "get news" button is pushed. So if you were tracking 10 feeds daily, on Monday you'd find 10 books in your library list. When it ran again on Tuesday you would then have 20 books in your library unless you deleted Monday's run. Not a real problem since you could just select all and delete. But what happens when you add something in that only gets checked weekly - and for which you want to keep a few back issues on hand? Since calibre doesn't allow you to set up folders, it starts getting excessively "manual" keeping your newsrack pruned. Which, in all fairness, may only be a problem for tech news junkies like me.

I'm in the habit of closely tracking about 30 feeds daily - and well over a hundred additional between those I peruse on a weekly or monthly basis. So having somewhere between 100 and 150 "books" in my library just for that doesn't really work for me. I suppose I could do it using a portable installation of calibre which would be used just for feeds and act as a super-newsreader. But it's kind of a kludge. And it still doesn't combine multiple feeds into a single book. I don't want a library's periodical room. I want a geek's version of Reader's Digest.

What I was hoping for was something that could support a few different collections of RSS feeds. Something that could take three different feed lists and use them to produce a daily newspaper, a weekly journal, and a monthly magazine, all on an fully automated basis.

calibre can't do that. But it's soooo close it makes me want to scream.

But that won't accomplish anything worthwhile.

So now I'm firing up my email program and composing an extremely polite message to calibre's developer Kovid Goyal to ask what it would take to get that capability added.

-40hz (February 15, 2012, 03:07 PM)

5574

Living Room / Re: How the heck did she capture my phone display?

« Last post by IainB on February 15, 2012, 06:19 AM »

Is it possible the screen capture happened accidentally?  The following links suggest that some Samsung phones have some combination of key presses that lead to screenshots:

  http://www.technixupdate.com/how-to-take-screenshot-screen-capture-on-samsung-wave/
  http://opensourcehacker.com/2011/02/27/taking-a-screenshot-on-samsung-galaxy-s-and-other-samsung-android-devices/

Didn't see any mention of Samsung GT B2710 though...

-ewemoa (February 15, 2012, 03:23 AM)

Yes, she definitely took the screen capture accidentally. My son at 14 months old found out how to dial SOS (911 emergency services) whilst the phone keyboard was locked.
Thanks for the links. I tried equivalent key combinations to what they mentioned, but that didn't do it for this phone. Though there was no mention of the Samsung GT B2710 in those links, there was mention of the ability to do panoramic (stitched) photos, which I discovered the GT B2710 can do also - VERTICAL and HORIZONTAL!
The GT B2710 is not a fancy Android device, and does not have a touch-sensitive screen, but it does seem to be packed with tons of features, some of which are frustratingly buried in the non-intuitive tree of menus. One review of this phone that I read (PC World or something like that) said that they could not find its photo editing and retouch features! I eventually found them after quite a bit of hunting around.

All those features were just a bonus for me. I got the phone mainly because it was being sold at a special discount and is a good basic phone and is a "solid immerse" - i.e., TOUGH - device. You can drive a car over it, drop it on concrete from 2 meters, dunk it in water and it works fine. I haven't driven a car over it yet, but it bounces without harm on concrete and even rings clearly if called when it's under water! It has a highly scratch-resistant screen and well-spaced keys that accommodate my spatula-like finger-ends.
By the way, it is also a GPS device, a compass and a pedometer (no kidding).

All these features are mentioned in the documention. Screen capture was not one of the documented features though!

5575

Living Room / Re: Products designed to fail, a documentary

« Last post by IainB on February 15, 2012, 02:26 AM »

Interesting and relevant post from ARS: Wasteful and unethical: why we hate crippled products

Spoiler

Wasteful and unethical: why we hate crippled products
By John Timmer | Published February 14, 2012 5:06 PM

In the world of consumer electronics, it's common for companies to create a range of products that are all variations on a theme, containing slightly faster processors or a bit more memory. These products serve two important functions for their producers: they put the price of entry within reach of more consumers, and they induce those with a bit more cash to take steps up the product ladder and purchase a more expensive version. However, a study that has just been released by the Journal of Consumer Research suggests that the companies that take this tack have to be careful about how they go about things. Creating a product range by crippling an existing product can work against the company if word filters out.

The study was motivated in part because of a classic example that backfired. IBM once produced a pair of laser printers that differed solely in terms of their rate of output. The lower page-per-minute version, however, actually required that IBM install a specialized chip that throttled the normal printer's output—it took more work to produce, and cost more to make. That approach did not go over well with purchasers, and the authors are able to cite a history of similar products that resulted in a distinctive (and derogatory) vocabulary: "crippleware," "product sabotage," "anti-features," "defective by design," and "damaged goods."

Nevertheless, there are clearly products on the market—Apple's various i-products, to give a prominent example—that sell well despite the same sort of product differentiation. What explains the difference? The authors hypothesized that it comes down to a matter of perception. Consumers are willing to accept this sort of tiered pricing if they feel it's fair, but tend to frown on it if they feel the method of producing the difference was unethical or unfair. The study they conducted indicated they were right, but that the perception of what's ethical could be influenced in some unexpected ways.

To start with, they simply confirmed the effect by describing a new instance of IBM's approach to crippling a product to a study population, while creating a control group that was told the higher output printer was the one that required more effort to make. People generally felt that paying for an enhancement was reasonable, but responded poorly when it took effort to reduce a product's capabilities, rating that process as not only unfair, but unethical. In fact, they found it so bothersome that they preferred a competitor's product.

Through a series of experiments, however, the authors found a number of ways that companies could reduce (though not eliminate) the negative perceptions of their action. For example, the "everybody's doing it" excuse worked; when people were told that most manufacturers crippled features of low-end phones via software, the study's participants were more tolerant of the practice. Keeping the high- and low-end products distinct, even if it was purely through a cosmetic feature (case color on an MP3 player), also cut down on the sense of dissatisfaction.

It was also clear that people cared a great deal about how the difference came about. For example, simply cutting an internal connection to cripple the low-end product was worse than removing the hardware that supported the feature entirely. The timing of the disabling also mattered. The study's participants were more tolerant of a DVD player that had a high-quality video chip disabled early in the manufacturing process than they were when the chip was disabled as the last step.

In addition to providing some sense of the subtleties of consumer thinking, these studies helped eliminate an alternative explanation for the negative response: consumers don't like waste. It's more wasteful, for example, to remove and destroy a component than it is to leave it in place and cut the connection. Yet the latter approach bothered the study's participants much more.

It's easy to think that little details like this would never make their way into a consumer's brain, and thus are irrelevant to product marketing. But the sudden attention paid to the conditions at places like Foxconn (which manufactures products for Apple and other consumer electronics companies) suggest that companies can't take this for granted. The authors also point out that social media has the potential to take obscure details and turn them into widespread public outrage.

All of which suggests that companies should probably expect that their approach to creating a product range might eventually become the subject of online discussion. And, if they have chosen a process that violates some of the principles laid out by the experiments above, they might end up facing a consumer backlash.

Journal of Consumer Research, 2012. DOI: Not yet available.