The computing stuff rant thread

[Feanor]

They should have got rid of the semi-colon instead; no-one uses those.

[ian]

Press two entire keys! Together! Oh my. Poor thing.

[DDCyclist]

Press two entire keys! Together! Oh my. Poor thing.

Looks more like a First World Problem than a Computing Stuff Rant.

[Zipperhead]

Oy, you cheeky gits. If I were using it just to sit in a coffee bar with all the other Hoxton Twats the lack of keys would be fine, but I was having to use it for some development work (why? because all our developers like poncing around with macbooks) and trying to correct coding and config typos was a pain in the arse.

[ian]

I confess, I've never missed any of those keys. Of course, I just draw stupid cartoons all day and believe the delete key is merely a restraint on my creativity. Delete is such a negative event.

Where the hell is my skinny flat white?

I resent the Hoxton accusation. I work in Clerkenwell.

[DDCyclist]

The delete key is for people who used to use Tippex by the bucket load and don't know about spill-chuckers. 

[Afasoas]

I'm with you Zipperhead.

[ian]

I suspect you people make corrections to documents by crossing out words on screen with a marker pen.

I have a nice Olivetti typewriter somewhere which I think may be more suitable.

[Afasoas]

I suspect you people make corrections to documents by crossing out words on screen with a marker pen.

No, don't be silly.
I print the documents first.

In all seriousness, as a photographer and a system administrator, :/

[simonp]

New computer. OS X El Capitan installed at factory. Download Citrix receiver. Latest version as older versions are not supported on El Capitan. Connect to webvpn at work. Nope. Try Java client. Nope. Contact helpdesk. Nope. Why did you* provide this server for personal computer access to company systems if you're going to refuse to help get it working when it fails? Look on Cirrix forum and find others with same problem. Receiver 12.1 is more picky about server security. Try turning down security setting via rune as suggested.  Nope.

In desperation, try the older unsupported 11.whatever version of Citrix Receiver. Yep.

 

* helpdesk operator is a contractor. DGAF most likely.

[Jaded]

BBC News Video items.

What the chuffing heck are you doing? Why do you think I want to watch the next video news item automatically after I watch the one I want to watch?

Why do you keep turing the setting back to AutoPlay = On ?

Up Next? Up yours!

[Mr Larrington]

YouTube sometimes does that.  Bad Swears usually fixes it but sometimes it will insist on showing you high school foopball videos immediately after something bicycley, because they both happened in the same town, the monkey-brained oxygen thieves.

[davelodwig]

Fired up the imac and switched on the second screen to a resounding crack as the power supply gave up.

I'm now left working on just one 27" screen, I'm not sure how I will cope.


TBH the second screen was a 21" NEC professional from the days when LCD screens came 2 inches thick and with many ports for connecting stuffs.

The replacement will at least be cheaper.

D.

[Mr Larrington]

Goofbid, you knuckle-dragging boneheads.  That e-mail, the one I received just now, was time-stamped 14:04.  That's seven and a half hours ago.  The eBay auction to which it refers finished at 11:00.

On Saturday.

Sixty hours ago.

There appears to be no easy way to grink you via e-mail and I'm not surprised.  Fools.

[Mr Larrington]

Acronis True Image Backup, wot the blazes are you dribbling about?  This is 2015; how about some error messages that go some way to telling me what the problem is?  "The specified file does not exist".

WHICH FILE, YOU FUCKNUCKLES?

No, I don't want to trawl the fucking Internet to find out what's wrong.  That's your job.  You doctor, me patient.  You Tarzan¹, me Cheeta.  You High Priest of Rational Thought, me Donald Trump Tyson Fury Katie Hopkins Benny out of "Crossroads".

I suppose this will mean another tedious round of tinkering under the bonnet

1: No, Alicia, not that Tarzan

[Mr Larrington]

No, Adobe, I do not wish to install your poxy app on my fondleslab, that I might edit PDFs in Dropbox.  Not now, and not ever.  So where is the "fuck off and leave me alone" wossname on the screen that keeps popping up?  There isn't one, and "not now" is a piss-poor substitute for one.

Bastards.

[Afasoas]

I didn't realise Spamhaus listed entire IP ranges in their black lists. 
My VPS providers /23 has been listed because one IP is "hosting Russian dating botnet spammers" and other IPs in the range have form.

Thankfully they are responsive and advice they're working on getting de-listed.

Blocking IP ranges seems nonsensical.

[ian]

bigshiny:~  ian$ install microsoft office
[bigshiny] sure thing, shall we sing a song in the meantime?
bigshiny:~  ian$ let's not
[bigshiny] you're no fun, we can do Taylor Swift
bigshiny:~  ian$ later
[bigshiny] Microsoft Office 1888 for Mac Installed. I feel dirty
bigshiny:~  ian$ me too
bigshiny:~  ian$ go ahead and run it
[bigshiny] it says it needs a 68 character product key
bigshiny:~  ian$ sigh. i'm typing it in.
[bigshiny] it says the code is wrong
bigshiny:~  ian$ fucknuts. here we go again. and again.
[bigshiny] apparently you haven't got an internet connection
bigshiny:~  ian$ really?
[bigshiny] not really, no
bigshiny:~  ian$ try again
[bigshiny] oh now it says you've used up all your activations
bigshiny:~  ian$ ok, maybe. how about we deactivate the one on the old machine
[bigshiny] what a great plan. hold on
[bigshiny] erm, there's no way to do this. It says you can call an office on Mars and speak to someone whose eighth language is related to English
bigshiny:~  ian$ but i have a stinky cold and no wish to hang about on the telephone
[bigshiny] i believe the technical term is 'fuck off then'


and thusly, this is why I'll never fucking buy another piece of product code protected or subscription-based crud again.

[Feanor]

Orifice activation by phone is handled by a robot.

It will ask some questions a bit like the I-94 form.
Moral Turpitude, Nazi sympathiser, and have you downloaded it from a Wares site.
Answer these sensibly.

Then you get to key in a long number.
Then the robot answers with an activation code which you write down.

[ian]

Ah, I might give it a try then. My head is mostly a highly pressurized snot vessel at the moment. Everything I say sounds like it's been channelled through Birmingham. Still annoying though, I mean seriously, how hard would it be to add a deactivate option?

I'm still very glad I did that big stinky poo in their office toilets.

[Afasoas]

and thusly, this is why I'll never fucking buy another piece of product code protected or subscription-based crud again.

glwt

[mrcharly-YHT]

I think it gives you 3 activations and that is it.

MS has always had an issue with the idea that people might need to replace a hard disk, or replace their computer. I've used my activations on my work copy with one PC replacement and one installation on laptop at home (since I work from home some of the time).

[ian]

Indeed.

So I enter a 54 digit number. Yes, 54. Because that's a not thermonuclear usability fuck up at all.

Twice.

And no, it won't let you copy and paste. That would be too easy.

Unfortunately, we cannot complete this transaction. Microsoft does not recognize this as a legitimate product. Please verify you are using a genuine product key when attempting to activate your product. You may be able to return the software to your reseller for a new product.

Thank you for contacting Microsoft, and fuck off.

Now I presume that's because I have installed it three times, so I'm back where I was before, with no way to revoke a licence that I don't want. I only want the three I legitimately paid for.

I hope they all die in a freak turd storm.

[Feanor]

Hmm, it's not barfing because you've used too many activations ( you just tell the robot it's installed on 1 machine when it asks ).

It's barfing because it can't identify the product you are trying to activate.
It divines this from the Product Key ( the number on the sticker ).
Are you mis-reading one or more of the characters?
Put your specs on

The stupid long number is the 'Installation ID' which is basically a hardware fingerprint of the PC to tie the activation to.

[ian]

I checked all 16 digits of the Product Key and they looked right to me. Anyway, it's my wife's new shiny, she can sort it out, before the anger they've ignited inside gives me command of the mighty turd storm. I'm calling it the Brown Fury. Behold the loose stools of intemperance.

It ought to be rule number 1. Do not ask humans to type 16 digit sequences of characters. Do they really need 10¹⁶ combinations and 53 bits of entropy?

Put seriously, 54 digits is laughable (that's about 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 possible combinations and I may have missed a few zeros, they probably got tired of lining up and wandered off for a pint or three). Really, they can't create a unique hardware key with a few fewer digits?

Mind you, Microsoft may have simply opted to disown Office 2011 for the Mac. I think it was only invented to give Steve Jobs indigestion.

I've met Bill and Melinda Gates. They never mentioned this.