The Technology Vent and Rant Thread

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by Toxaris

I am amazed that I see people use such old versions of programs that have known security flaws and are susceptible to all kinds of nasty stuff... That alone should be a reason to upgrade or replace. For most common programs there are low-cost/free alternatives that are being maintained and actively solve security issues.

I have some sympathy with your point of view, but there are times when finding feature equivalency is either impossible or expensive, e.g:

Developers who made use of the well documented by Microsoft Column Handler feature in XP's shell were stranded when Vista came along. Vista replaced it with the Property Handler feature, this wasn't a case of enhancing what was there and giving it a new name - Column and Property handlers are chalk and cheese.

Same with the document history feature that was available in all editions of Word 2007. Sometime between Word 2007 and Word 2016 that specific feature was dropped from all editions. There is a similarly named feature in Word 2016 - but it relies on SharePoint or OneDrive for Business, which are only accessible from Office 365 for Business, not from Office 365 Home/Student or Personal - and once again it's chalk and cheese compared to the old one.

And don't get me started on Mozilla's dropping of the XUL-extension support and introduction of their WEB-extension feature - afaik without any conversion aids. I know of two people who enjoyed a modest supplement to their income from donations related to their XUL-extensions. It plummeted to near zero soon after Moz announced that future versions of Firefox would not support existing extensions - i.e. they would not work and may (would) crash Firefox. The effort to develop feature equivalent WEB-extensions was, by their estimation, either not doable or enormous. I noticed Moz added a boatload of developer enhancements in version Firefox 63 - that's about two years too late.

I believe some Windows AV vendors continue to release products for XP, and some of the bigger extension developers (e,g, Lastpass and UBlock) are still releasing new versions of their XUL extensions.

I've used a particular duplicate image finder for decades, it was abandoned in 2010. I have looked for and failed to find an equivalent product. Given it has no internet connectivity, and that I've been using it trouble free for almost 25 years, my continued use of it has zilch security implications - IMO. Would I recommend it to anyone - probably not - the UI is disconcertingly wonky these days But it it has features I've not found in other free or modestly priced products - I did find something that claimed to have similar features - for hundreds of usa-bucks.

BR

[FizzyWater]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Which ones do you have in mind?

But never underestimate the attraction of clinging to something long used and familiar. I interact elsewhere with people still using PCs running MSDOS and DOS programs as their main computing devices. I admire the fact that they can, but it gets more difficult as time passes. The biggest issue is Internet access. There are browsers that run under DOS, but none will provide a good experience (largely because of little or no support for JavaScript.)

Even if they are using more current technology, familiarity trumps. They want to spend time using their systems, but are reluctant to invest time in learning new stuff. (I've been around that one as a corporate IT guy supporting facility wide upgrades. "I haven't got time to do all my work now, and you want me to learn a batch of new stuff too?")
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Dennis

I have to completely agree with this. It's one of the reasons I haven't wanted to "upgrade" to Windows 10. I know how Windows 7 works for the things I do with my computer.

I'm still using Microsoft Money 2004 (or the patched version that Microsoft made available when Windows 7 came out). It works to help me balance my checkbook and other financial accounts and gives me reports I can use to do my taxes. I never used it to actually interface with the internet (e.g., investing or downloading through the application from my bank). I looked into the only other program available that I can find (Quicken) and it's massively expensive and I read bad reviews on the current versions. As Blossom said, complaints of lots of bloat and non-value added crap to justify the cost.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by FizzyWater

I have to completely agree with this. It's one of the reasons I haven't wanted to "upgrade" to Windows 10. I know how Windows 7 works for the things I do with my computer.

Upgrading From Win7 to Win10 wasn't a major issue here in terms of Windows itself. (The issues were hardware related, as the box I originally did it on did not fully support Win10. The new box does.)

The usual problems in upgrades are UI changes. Win10 brought back the Start Menu which had been removed from Win8.1 (which I carefully avoided), but as usual, MS fixed something that wasn't broken and the New! Improved! Start Menu was rather different from the Win7 version and required a learning curve. <shrug> Things like that are why I run the open source Classic Shell product, whose default is a Win7 style Start Menu.

I'm still using Microsoft Money 2004 (or the patched version that Microsoft made available when Windows 7 came out). It works to help me balance my checkbook and other financial accounts and gives me reports I can use to do my taxes. I never used it to actually interface with the internet (e.g., investing or downloading through the application from my bank).

Security becomes a question if whatever it is does go online. If you can avoid that, worries lessen.

I looked into the only other program available that I can find (Quicken) and it's massively expensive and I read bad reviews on the current versions. As Blossom said, complaints of lots of bloat and non-value added crap to justify the cost.

My SO has been a full charge bookkeeper, and has knowledge of Quicken. If your needs are great enough to justify it, it's what you get. I think of Quicken as a company tool, not a personal one. An ordinary home user likely does't have that need, and something like MS Money is more than adequate.

(There's a chap in the MSDOS circles I mentioned who still uses the Quattro Pro DOS spreadsheet for his taxes. He's got it customized with macros to do just what he wants. He probably could do the same things in Excel, but it would mean learning a whole new program and rewriting his macros in VBA. He's loathe to do that and I can't blame him, but what else he might do if he can no longer run DOS programs is a good question.)
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Dennis

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by FizzyWater

I have to completely agree with this. It's one of the reasons I haven't wanted to "upgrade" to Windows 10. I know how Windows 7 works for the things I do with my computer.

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Upgrading From Win7 to Win10 wasn't a major issue here in terms of Windows itself.

-

Like Dennis I dodged Win 8 and 8.1. Within a day of upgrading from 7 to 10 I wondered what the 'fuss was about' - leaving aside the Settings/Control Panel schmozzle, everything I had worked as it always had and it looked much the same.

Biggest change I noticed in going from 7 to 10 was File Explorer - for the better. The Start Menu changes did not bother me because I never used it much. I quite like the new one, I pin shortcuts to it that i used keep in a desktop folder - things I don't use much, things I don't want to start blithely in the dark, etc

Watched a video the other day on Win 10 1809. There's some enhancements I'll be interested in - Extended Clipboard, Snip'n'Sketch, Bash Shell, Tabs in File Explorer (maybe), separation of Region and Language in Settings (that's been tripping me up for decades).

BR

[Terisa de morgan]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

Watched a video the other day on Win 10 1809. There's some enhancements I'll be interested in - Extended Clipboard, Snip'n'Sketch, Bash Shell, Tabs in File Explorer (maybe), separation of Region and Language in Settings (that's been tripping me up for decades).

BR

I'm interested too, but I'm afraid Tabs have not been included (according all the news I've read around).

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by Terisa de morgan

I'm interested too, but I'm afraid Tabs have not been included (according all the news I've read around).

Yeah reports have been tentative on Tabs, but I'm happy to wait for something that works than have something that's half done.

I'm hoping their enhanced clipboard will enable me to jettison Clipboard Fusion, not that there is anything wrong with it, IMO it's best in show. But I only use about 10% of it, and what's coming in 1809 looks a pretty good fit for that 10%. I cast WizMouse adrift when they introduced their equivalent in 1803, there was nothing wrong with WizMouse either, used it for years.

They won't push 1809 my way until Jan/Feb next year.

I noticed they've snaffled some more WinKey+ sequences, I think I've gotten rid of the Winkey sequences I had filched for 3rd party programs.

---

Another reason some people prefer to use old software is sentimental loyalty. I've never felt emotionally attached to any software, including that which I had a hand in developing.

BR

[Terisa de morgan]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

Yeah reports have been tentative on Tabs, but I'm happy to wait for something that works than have something that's half done.

I'm hoping their enhanced clipboard will enable me to jettison Clipboard Fusion, not that there is anything wrong with it, IMO it's best in show. But I only use about 10% of it, and what's coming in 1809 looks a pretty good fit for that 10%. I cast WizMouse adrift when they introduced their equivalent in 1803, there was nothing wrong with WizMouse either, used it for years.

They won't push 1809 my way until Jan/Feb next year.

I noticed they've snaffled some more WinKey+ sequences, I think I've gotten rid of the Winkey sequences I had filched for 3rd party programs.

---

Another reason some people prefer to use old software is sentimental loyalty. I've never felt emotionally attached to any software, including that which I had a hand in developing.

BR

1809 will come in my way earlier I think (personal Win10), and I am only partially attached to the software I developed at the beginning of my career, nothing else.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

Like Dennis I dodged Win 8 and 8.1. Within a day of upgrading from 7 to 10 I wondered what the 'fuss was about' - leaving aside the Settings/Control Panel schmozzle, everything I had worked as it always had and it looked much the same.

I was a bit annoyed by the Settings/Control Panel split, simply in terms of remembering where to find stuff. I believe MS intends to migrate it all to Settings and make Control Panel go away. As long as it's all in one place, fine by me.

Watched a video the other day on Win 10 1809. There's some enhancements I'll be interested in - Extended Clipboard, Snip'n'Sketch, Bash Shell, Tabs in File Explorer (maybe), separation of Region and Language in Settings (that's been tripping me up for decades).

Tabs in File Explorer would be part of Sets, and that doesn't look like it will make 1809. What I use is a freeware utility called Clover. It adds tabs to Windows Explorer, and can use Google Chrome themes. Freeware, and works fine here.
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Dennis

[cc_in_oh]

Tabs would be nice, especially if pinnable like Firefox. But robust file tagging and annotation features would be far more useful to me...

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

I cast WizMouse adrift when they introduced their equivalent in 1803, there was nothing wrong with WizMouse either, used it for years.

One of the habits I developed a long time ago was using the middle mouse button on three-button mice to generate a double-click.

I generally used Logitech mice, and their software would let me program the middle mouse button to do that. But it required the Logitech keyboard and mouse software, which was large and complex, and the only thing I used it for was making the mouse generate a double click. The Scroll wheel when pressed rather than spun was a middle mouse button.

I found an ancient utility called Mbutton from an Aussie named Darryn Davis that dates from 1996. It's a small EXE and a DLL, does what I need, and seems to work on any mouse with a scroll wheel. (I have no idea where to find it online, so I've attached the Zip archive if you want to take a look. It's all of 53KB in size.)
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Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

And don't get me started on Mozilla's dropping of the XUL-extension support and introduction of their WEB-extension feature - afaik without any conversion aids. I know of two people who enjoyed a modest supplement to their income from donations related to their XUL-extensions. It plummeted to near zero soon after Moz announced that future versions of Firefox would not support existing extensions - i.e. they would not work and may (would) crash Firefox.

Here, they simply don't work. I haven't seen trying to use one crash the browser.

The effort to develop feature equivalent WEB-extensions was, by their estimation, either not doable or enormous. I noticed Moz added a boatload of developer enhancements in version Firefox 63 - that's about two years too late.

XUL going away was expected here. It couldn't make the jump to mobile when Mozilla began focusing on mobile devices. XUL was deprecated for a while in any case. The preferred model was extensions in pure JavaScript. It was easy to see which those were, as the Mozilla Addons site labelled them as No Restart. Extensions using XUL required a browser restart after installation.

It's going away on Firefox on the desktop among other reasons because Mozilla is very focused on security, and XUL executes on a higher privilege level than plain JavaScript. (And what JavaScript can do is increasingly locked down. Among other things, it runs in a sandbox in the browser and can't write to the local file system.)

Firefox Quantum had a goal of far greater speed. It does this via parallel processing. Instead of a single main browser process, it spawns sub-processes. There is a main process, four (by default, though changeable) content rendering processes, and an extension process.

Chrome already did that - in Chrome, everything is a separate process - the browser, and open tabs, and any extensions you have installed. (Chrome is lighter weight than Firefox, but start adding extensions and watch what happens. The size advantage drops precipitously.)

Spawning and killing processes is expensive in computer terms, and Mozilla didn't care for Chrome's approach. Their Electrolysis project began by breaking the browser UI and the content rendering into two separate processes, and then further divided content rendering. Along the way, they began rewriting a chunk of the core C++ code in a Mozilla developed language called Rust.

I maintained a Firefox ESR installation so I could continue to run XUL based extensions while I waited for WebEx versions to fill in the blanks. I did not expect it to be quick or easy. Several things I ran simply couldn't be done as Web Extensions, because the WebEx API did not include basic functionality those extensions used.

At this point, enough of the holes have been filled in that I use Firefox Quantum as my production browser. The two big missing pieces are a password manager that will let me list stuff that uses passwords and see what they are, and a facility to dump a list of currently installed extensions. An API that might make a password manager possible was under security review by Mozilla the last time I looked. I don't know about an extension dumper. (There is a third-party program from Nirsoft that will dump a current Firefox password list in a human readable form, but there is no way to import the result into a new profile. I do a lot of playing with profiles here, and dumping a PW list using a password manager, and then installing the password manager in a new profile and importing the dumped list made life much easier.)

I've used a particular duplicate image finder for decades, it was abandoned in 2010. I have looked for and failed to find an equivalent product. Given it has no internet connectivity, and that I've been using it trouble free for almost 15 years my continued use of it has zilch security implications - IMO. Would I recommend it to anyone - probably not - the UI is disconcertingly wonky these days But it it has features I've not found in other free or modestly priced products - I did find something that claimed to have similar features - for hundreds of usa-bucks.

Which one? I've looked at an assortment, and still use an ancient one called Doublekiller. The main use is finding duplicate image files, and it can use file size and CRC32 checksums and ignore file names.
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Dennis

[BetterRed]

Attachment 166756

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Which one? I've looked at an assortment, and still use an ancient one called Doublekiller. The main use is finding duplicate image files, and it can use file size and CRC32 checksums and ignore file names.

This one



It only does the common image types like jpg, tiff, bmp, png and gif.

It's a pity the developer didn't put the source into the public domain when he abandoned it, but the same could be said of many abandoned programs.

There should be a law - either put your abandoned s/w into the public domain, or pay a 1% forfeit of company profit for ten years - per product. That might even stop the big players buying up innovative products so that they can kill them.

Wizmouse is free too, it comes from Kiwis who do BID, but I don't need it since MS added wheel scrolling on inactive windows. I 'discovered' that feature in the early 90's when I ran a thin-client project using Tektronix X terminals - took MS more than a quarter century to catch up

Over time more and more sites don't like my old Firefox with XUL-extensions browser. I've tried a couple of forks, Pale Moon, Waterfox etc - but they crash even more. When Firefox 54 becomes unusable I'll probably switch to Edge, its performance is much better than Chrome. I use Falkon as my bare bones local only browser.

BR

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by cc_in_oh

. . . robust file tagging and annotation features would be far more useful to me...

In Windows world those features were within the scope of the ill-fated Longhorn (WinFS) project - maybe they will bubble up again - probably not in my lifetime though.

BR

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

In Windows world those features were within the scope of the ill-fated Longhorn (WinFS) project - maybe they will bubble up again - probably not in my lifetime though.

IIRC, Longhorn looked at replacing the standard hierarchical file system with one derived from SQL Server.

Back when, I worked on mainframes, and IBM OS/VS1 and OS/MVS "knew" about various file types and handled them differently. (I assume DOS/VSE behaved similarly, but I never worked on it.)

The converse was Unix, where a file was a file was a file. Unix knew about three kinds of files: standard files, directories, and "special" files. Those were actually devices, and the entry in a directory didn't point to a file on disk - it pointed to an entry point in the kernel address space. Opening the file accessed the device. Files could be created, opened, read from, written to, closed, and destroyed. A program was simply a file with the execute bit set in the file's permissions mask. If it wasn't actually an executable program or shell script, you got an error trying to run it.

Longhorn reminded me a bit of MVS, and of Dick Pick's PickOS, which included a relational database manager as an OS component rather than a layered product, and a variant of BASIC as the built in programming language.

I could see the attraction in what Longhorn was looking at doing, but didn't see a way to get there without "throwing out the baby with the bathwater" in migrating from a hierarchical file system.
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Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

Attachment 166756
This one

<...>

It only does the common image types like jpg, tiff, bmp, png and gif.

Thanks. I grabbed it to take a look.

It's a pity the developer didn't put the source into the public domain when he abandoned it, but the same could be said of many abandoned programs.

I'd settle for it being released as unsupported freeware. I don't see source availability as meaningful - how many folks could do anything with the source if they had it? (And I have some old stuff here written in languages no one has heard of these days. Even if you had the source, you don't have a compiler to build an executable from it.)

There should be a law - either put your abandoned s/w into the public domain, or pay a 1% forfeit of company profit for ten years - per product. That might even stop the big players buying up innovative products so that they can kill them.

I would not hold my breath waiting for that law to be passed.

Over time more and more sites don't like my old Firefox with XUL-extensions browser. I've tried a couple of forks, Pale Moon, Waterfox etc - but they crash even more. When Firefox 54 becomes unusable I'll probably switch to Edge, its performance is much better than Chrome. I use Falkon as my bare bones local only browser.

I haven't run across sites that don't work in Firefox ESR, but it's been a while since I've looked.

I looked at things like Pale Moon, but don't see them as viable long term prospects. Gecko is huge and enormously complex. I follow various bugs in Bugzilla, and half the fun is figuring out where the reported bug is in the code, and then identifying the developers who understand that part of the code well enough to make a fix.

I just don't think the developers of Pale Moon have the resources to be able to maintain Gecko and XUL, and still stay compliant with constantly changing web standards.

I'm actually impressed by Edge. It invokes nearly instantly, appears to support current web standards, and doesn't seem to be riddled with the security holes that plagued IE. It even supports an extension capability, but there isn't a lot out there for it I might use.

(An attraction to Mozilla anointing Web Extensions as the API for extensions is that the API is pretty much the same as that used by Chrome and Edge - pure JavaScript - and it's possible to create extensions that will install and work in all three browsers with minor code changes.)

And since I play in the Linux sandbox, I need a browser that operates in both places. Firefox does, and with a little fiddling I can get it to use the same profile on both OSes.
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Dennis