GeniB

Think it's time for a light hearted debate on where the H**l we are going with computers ,with a side order of praise or curses heaped on the inventor

Having listened with growing concern, then annoyance as my YD tore her hair out .loudly , last night as her computer refused to download El Capitain-after 11hrs of waiting.Then refused to go back to standard settings.

I turned off the BMW PGA Golf comp I had been trying to watch and contemplated the sudden silence after the crashing sounds had ceased in her (temporary) office and our spare bedroom .

Are we really so much better off now than the days of letters and telephone calls,faxes etc.? Or have we become slaves to a bunch of nerds in silicone valley who have to justify their enormous salaries every six months by updating and changing every blessed thing?Can we stop this horror?

How do we know if any of this is actually necessary? Security is constantly given as a reason.yet .as far as I am concerned they can read everything i have on file .They would die of boredom after a week. If it's THAT sensitive it's going in my secret secret diary thank you.ie not everyone needs this height of control

what do you think?

ah207

well...since you asked for a light hearted debate...

I'm going in defence of the machine :-)

Many years a go (cue wavy flashback..) when double decker buses ruled the Earth and the greengrocer had to look twice at the "ten pence" coin you handed over for a slice of ham (because during decimilisation it somehow ceased to look like two shillings) - the world was a very different place. Paying the electricity bill meant putting on gloves, hat, scarfe, waving goodbye to your loved ones, - and trudging a couple of miles in snow - just to get to the bus stop (with correct fare in hand!) - which would deliver you in the vicinity of the electricity shop (in our case it was the MEB - Midland Electricity Board). You had to wait in a queue, then when you got to the window, you had to show the bill, get something stamped, reach into your back pocket, hand over some notes, collect the change - and then wait in the freezing snow for the bus home. Then do the same again next week to pay the gas bill.

So why am I sticking up for computers ? because now, I can pay electric, gas, water and internet with one click of the mouse button - and the only effort involved is reaching over to the coffee table to grab the laptop.

Well...I hope that gets the ball rolling...

scrubbedexpat095

And the winner is ...


ah207

BillBullock

I could not survive in the Algarve without a computer (and a reasonable internet connection). I use it for banking, transferring money, paying bills, arranging insurance policies, online purchases, booking flights, hotels and hire cars, watching catch-up TV and Sky Sports, emailing and Skyping, making cheap telephone calls overseas, looking at weather forecasts, editing home videos and photographs, downloading books, searching for information, etc etc. When something goes a little bit wrong with one of my computers, I search the internet for the solution to the problem.

Don't knock the computer. It's the most useful tool I have in my old age.

ouriquejan

Hate the blasted thing, but needs must - sadly.

Being on wifi, it's very hit and miss. Sometimes super whizzy, sometimes at a complete standstill

But it was my choice to live in the middle of a field, so hey ho. I can always go to the library and ask

GeniB

Love that and agree wholeheartedly -when the blessed thing is working correctly. Altho that picture of snow and freezing tramp to the Electricity board was once familiar to me .(not now i live in the sun thank god) It did also include a sociable stop at the cafe for hot coffee and a delicious Lemon Bun stuffed with thick REAL cream

GeniB

No one's knocking the computer..It's wonderful I couldn't be doing this now without it.. The question is . Where's it going ? with the constant need for these very complicated updates. Some which are simple incompatible and don't reflect our lifestyle (thinking American predicative text here). How much of our time is spent on them actually achieving something.. How much simple wasting our precious time and money.' You sound like a techie sort of guy so that sort of 'fixing' is perhaps fun for you. It's a nightmare for many though .More and more they can't escape it. Wouldn't it be more sociable and better for your health to walk to the village/town to do business now and then with a real person?

Looking at the future do we really enjoy doing our banking with someone in India who we can't understand?.I am reminded of the man in Newcastle who couldn't close his mother's account after her death and was being asked to pay increasing fee's.The computer had not been programmed to accept a client's death.The trauma was enormous and he had to call in a team from the TV to sort it.

Lentisc

I think modern technology is wonderful. The amount of wasted hours of my life waiting, as an assistant spends what seems like hours typing in to a keyboard, only to tell me they can't help you with my problem.

Not only that but what about spending 15 minutes shopping in a large retail outlet only to spend 45 mins queing to pay for it. Then when you get to the till, one or more bar codes don't register. The till worker spends ages phoning around for a price for that article.

I do wonder at times about technology and it's use in general.

algarveandroid

Sad thing really with apple products , its bought by those that think they are the best for easy use , ie immune from virus and are somehow superior to a pc running windows or alternative os like linux and its derivitives.... which is what modern apple operating systems are essentially. Apple products are hipster poseur jewlery.

Updates are needed to all o/ses , due to the constant and evolving attacks from malware makers intent on getting your bank details , or some form of stealing including zombie botnets , due to this all other software has to evolve also ... virus killers need daily updates , as does browsers and extension which are the primary point of entry today.

But this isnt just the problem , people treat their computers like hoovers , plug in an forget.

They perhaps dont keep the antivirus up to date , or do incremental updates , cclean and flush browsers on shutdown , regular defrag and scandisk , or most importantly have backups set - both for the os and personal files. They may even have their passwords saved , a very bad thing for banking or even email , which makes mining for them very easy.

This is where the importance of servicing some in , just like cars , http://i.imgur.com/uftSnDN.jpg , both for software and hardware , if this pic is the hardware , just imagine what the software is like?

But dust doesnt take your bank details , banks wont give you the money back , and with apple going the apple pay route , thus creating the apple bank , gone will be the days of only windows being the choice for hackers - as high street banking disappears and mobile and internet banking becomes the norm.

The same thing applies with mobile phones , with people saying I need a new phone this one is now running slow , however they havent installed serviceware , something that clears out the crap or indeed antimalware. IE downloaded pics and tunes removal clearing up the software , or even flushed the internet cache from mobile internet or prevented those push apps from candy crush.

Worse still they may have changed the settings to allow any app to install outwith the play store , ie for internet streaming expat telly or popcornflix , where it can and does be used to legitimately mine your data on the phone every time you install official software , so just think about what that app is doing that is compromised if you use that tablet or phone for banking.

Even as I type Bank customers could be forced to foot bill for fraud on their accounts in future | This is Money , well they do have top get all that miselling money back , socialised bank failure wasnt enough.

zoff

I don't mean to be argumentative but you start out typing "Apple products are hipster poseur jewelry." and then you have several paragraphs describing all the problems of non-Apple products.

BTW I have 5 Macs and three iPhones in my household, not to mention many family members with Apple products, and I don't have any of the issues you mention.

scrubbedexpat095

peterfc

Algarveandroid

The link below is for you and could you comment.

Ubuntu 12.04 Beats Windows, Mac In GCHQ Security Report - OMG! Ubuntu!

Ubuntu user for 10 years

Peter

MrBife

Its an old chestnut Peter - Linux servers are often used to harbour Windows malware. When you click on a malicious link, the likelihood is that it directs you to a Linux based server. For every article like the one you link to I can find one like this ...

https://blogs.sophos.com/2015/03/26/...inux-security/

Sadly Linux in the workplace gives reduced function - office efficiency requires Windows and the latest incarnation Windows 10 whilst not without its teething problems is totally awesome in terms of its capabilities. Did you try it on a new high spec PC ?

There is of course a place for Linux in the workplace and we have some work stations in our office running Linux Mint which in my view is superb especially as it makes great use of old PC's that still have some life left but because of their older spec won't run Windows 10.

Linux definitely has a big future and for example the new Chromebook devices use a proprietary version of Linux - I use a Chromebook daily and think its great ! Alongside my W10 desktops of course !

algarveandroid

nuff said

But linux is the hackers tool of choice for circumventing the opple and windows network , ie old wireshark for script kiddies as an ubuntu lite OS on usb.

Used many flavours of linux over the years , even to the point of sat and cable boxes , so smaller than nano distro really.

Quite liked the last one I used which for all intent and purpose was windows xp , perfect replacement with no cost if all you wanted to do was surf the net and type off a doc or two on old hardware to upcycle.

But true love lay in the amiga , for art , atari for midi , with BBS pre internet , long before 16 colours dissapeared from pc screens.Hand drawing images pixel by pixel with a mouse took some skill as did handshaking with Swedish and American boards. That hardware was custom , bit like old motorola based macs , and light years ahead of the pc clone as it was called then.

But I will let the overzealous hipsters continue complaining about their great tax avoider being accused of less than perfect , with its offshore assembly , bypassing import taxes , or robbing americans of jobs while flying their flag , that sells everyone chinese made overpriced turds painted gold...or should that be reskinned linux?

I did say the problem with windows is pifoc , the problem with mac is the p stands for posuer.

I also mentioned I dont suffer from the problems most windows folk do , simply because I backup , scandisk , defrag , cleanup , malware check etc on a regular basis.... all it takes ffs is setting it up with a few mouse clicks.

I dont Iphone , I LG G , for half the price. I dont Samsung , the psuedo apple of korea - that supplies most of the important iphone chips , but not for long , as apple are looking to buy up a semiconductor co themselves.

If i want a pc I dont buy one I make it , for half the price or to last twice as long as a mac. My tablets , phone and set top box are android... not cheap chinese clones though. As a side note on the pcs I have built personally nearly all are still working today , for myself and old customers , some units as old as being made in the late 80s , though some off the shelf mac pros used in the field can also claim that sort of longetivity too , ie intel c2 based stuff , but only because of the servicing , ie work machine , no machine working , no income.

AS i sit I am typing this it is on a former ml hackintosh , c2q 3 ghz and near 9 years old , upgraded usb 3 and sata 3 , 8g ddr3 ram , and if mem serves was classed as a mac pro 5.1. I then deleted the tosh and went back to windows 7 , though not as quick as with downgrading from win 10 back to 7. I have avoided completely win 8 , 8.1 and 10 and just because of windows tiles... well thats the deathknell of windows , and rightly so , if I want tiles based oses I will build another android pc rather than buy a mac.

The android os is shaping up as a real contender though , theres about 5 decent distros that are dumbing it down for the L.C.D pc spec , Blustax 2 , remix os etc , the latter looking promising in beta. But if you know your pc history there was always other players that never got a run , Os2 , amigaos , beos , even webos now used by lg as an os in LG tv and set top boxes.

But as I mentioned its only as good as the pifoc , especially if they tick install non playstore apps , opening up that box as a hackers hub entrypoint into thier home network , just like a pc , stealing their bank details from their banking app or zombie bot packet capturing it pre encryption live , right from when login details are saved on the device.

algarveandroid

So you are quite happy to be programmed to defend the american fallacy , that apple is American , where its hardware is made overseas , its assembled overseas with import taxes avoided , American jobs are lost , and tax in general is avoided on an industrial scale through funneling offshore.

Do carry on regadless flying the mcapple flag , in a country that bans another flag for race related gun murders , and not the actual gun.

If you actually took time to read you would see the problem is not indemic to Apple , and you are right I mentioned other os and hardware suffers from the same or worse problems... pifoc. IE lack of malware detection , , system slow downs , all through lack of computer husbandry.

The mac is a pc , has been since ditcing another american company Motorola for intel with its overseas fabs , running a skinned linux or free os , on off the shelf hardware. The iphone is just the same as any android phone. The difference here is price , a premium for nothing more than a lit up half eaten piece of fruit in a shiny case.... ooo shiny.

It is not un American to say apple is crap , its average , but its money making effort on the back of morons and posuers is though somewhat legendary , and at the Expense of Americans.