The computing stuff rant thread

[Feanor]

Don't think I've had reason to use 'netsh' since the Elder Days when I had to tunnel my IPv6 to AAISP using arcane witchcraft.

It's all native now, so that's all in the past.

[Kim]

I was turning off the make-up-a-temporary-ipv6-address-so-you-can't-tell-what-anything-is-in-the-logfiles 'privacy' setting which is the default in most things, and Windows makes particularly irksome to disable.

For those playing along at home:

Code: [Select]

netsh interface ipv6 set global randomizeidentifiers=disabled
netsh interface ipv6 set privacy state=disabled

[Feanor]

I've not had to do that, because you can have multiple IPv6 addresses on an interface.

From memory, my servers have a manually-configured address ( like 2001:8b0:b7:1::3 ), and also a MAC-based address, and also the seekrit sql address.

The address I publish in external DNS is the manual one, and that's what's allowed in through the firewall.
On connections I make outbound, it will prefer the seekrit sqrl one as the source address.

But yes, if you are making outbound connections from a machine, and want to be able to identify those connections from the target machine, then you'd want to disable that.

[Gattopardo]

Is there any particular reason why an x220 running a modified version of windows 11 would crash and revert to a former time so no longer have work i haves saved from libraoffice.

Fuck

[Pickled Onion]

My electronic orange cardboard has been announcing itself a day late since the beginning of this month.

I thought it was just a glitch to not see it on the Home Screen on the day I travelled, then a bit disconcerted the next day "your train is at 13:06" ?? oh shit did I buy the wrong ticket and get away with it ?? but the pattern repeated.

My best guess is the leap year. Why do programmers find calendars so hard?

[Feanor]

My electronic orange cardboard has been announcing itself a day late since the beginning of this month.

I thought it was just a glitch to not see it on the Home Screen on the day I travelled, then a bit disconcerted the next day "your train is at 13:06" ?? oh shit did I buy the wrong ticket and get away with it ?? but the pattern repeated.

My best guess is the leap year. Why do programmers find calendars so hard?

Times and dates are actually quite hard.
The problem is people trying to roll their own, when there are perfectly good libraries which can do this stuff properly.

Re-inventing the wheel is a huge problem.

Another example is webforms which require an e-mail address.
The web designer just applies their own idea of what constitutes a valid e-mail address.
With no regard to the RFCs which actually define this.
It's almost like 'if it doesn't end in .gmail.com then it's not valid".
If memory serves me correctly, the owner of AAISP has a valid address of a@e.gg and this was rejected by several webforms.

They don't have to do this.

[Polar Bear]

I like my "media" NUC* enough that I bought a second one for use in a cramped office space where we share desk time but not computer time as I cannot use mllePB's work machine.  Fired it up over the weekend only to discover that the helpful builder / supplier had registered me with a Microsoft account. I have always avoided this.

I haven't investigated the necessary fuckwittery required to un-Microsoft myself now that Microsoft has one of my email addresses.  I feel slightly violated.  🤔

* It sits beneath the television with the Blu-ray player and we use it primarily for friends and family Zoom calls and I use it as a very large screen PC

[chopstick]

I'm not up to speed with Micro$oft/Windows (except having a works machine, that I take as it comes), but aren't they very much into a subscription/cloud account model now, where things don't function unless you're logged in with them (thinking especially licensing, Office & Onecloud).  I suspect that if it is possible to not be logged in with them, then they will badger you with nag screens and frustrate your attempts to ignore them.

[Feanor]

It's completely possible to be not-logged-in.
During installation of Windows, they do make it very difficult to proceed with the installation without setting up or logging in to a Microsoft account, but is is possible.

But yes, if you want to use their online services like Office 365 or Onedrive, then you will need to be logged in.
I don't use any of these things, and am not logged in to a Microsoft account on my own Win11 machines.

[Kim]

During installation of Windows, they do make it very difficult to proceed with the installation without setting up or logging in to a Microsoft account, but is is possible.

You can of course ask Elon Musk for advice on this, as he's been through the process recently

When I set up Win11 on the BHPC's jam-filled Babbage engine^[1], it was sufficient to deny it an internet connection until everything was set up without a Microsoft account.  I think actual command-line-fu may now be required.


_{[1] Where I also sourced a licence for whatever the last standalone version of MS Office was, the computer having to operate - and run macro-laden Excel files - in The Big Blue Room without an internet connection.  We got shafted by Office 365 refusing to run because it hadn't phoned home for weeks on a previous machine.}

[Jaded]

Teams.

Pile of horse manure. 30 minutes of an hour meeting taken up with "Can you hear me?" "I can't get screen sharing to work" "I'll restart the meeting" "I'll restart my Teams".

[Feanor]

The old dropping-the-Internet-connection trick has, I think, been clamped down on.

That would previously cause it to continue to create a local account, which is the desired effect.
I think it now sulks and refuses to continue till it gets an Internet connection.

The simplest way to work around it is to use the Rufus tool along with the installation ISO to remove this requirement. It pre-tweeks some settings in the ISO before letting the installer run.

[TheLurker]

The simplest way to work around it is to use the Rufus tool along with the installation ISO to remove this requirement. It pre-tweeks some settings in the ISO before letting the installer run.

MrsL needs a new machine.  I have not persuaded her of the merits of a Linux box.  Any advice on dealing with this on a retailer supplied machine that will come with the festering pile of shite installed gratefully received.  "Take off and nuke it from orbit." is, alas, not a viable solution.

[Feanor]

The simplest way to work around it is to use the Rufus tool along with the installation ISO to remove this requirement. It pre-tweeks some settings in the ISO before letting the installer run.

MrsL needs a new machine.  I have not persuaded her of the merits of a Linux box.  Any advice on dealing with this on a retailer supplied machine that will come with the festering pile of shite installed gratefully received.  "Take off and nuke it from orbit." is, alas, not a viable solution.

No, not really.
You either have to work with what you have, or nuke-from-orbit.

The thing about nuke-from-orbit is that the machine will already be licensed, and a windows re-install will pick that up automagically, so that's not a problem.

[liam_whippet]

@The Lurker:   'XAIPETE'

I've just set up a couple of new Win11 Pro laptops, straight from the box, avoiding Microsoft Accounts [which in my case, I have not got].

When you power it on, it asks to connect to the internet - so let it.

The trick seems to be that when it asks for a MS Account, there's an option below [in smaller letters] saying 'login options' - choose it.

You then want to choose 'School or Workplace'; 'Domain Join' is the same thing.

It asks for the name of the machine - which you can skip.

It asks for your name. My name is fred; my password is fred; my pet's name is fred; I was born in a city called fred; my nickname at school was fred; etc.

It's connected to the internet, so goes off and downloads the latest release of Windows and installs it ...

You can then log on as fred; password fred ..

What I then did was enable the local administrator, who then logged on, killed fred, and installed Office2019 [hint: you have to uninstall 'Office' from the Apps first].

Et voila - new machine, Win11 Pro, Office2019 and not a Microsoft Account in sight.

Hope this helps.

[drossall]

Another example is webforms which require an e-mail address.
The web designer just applies their own idea of what constitutes a valid e-mail address.
With no regard to the RFCs which actually define this.
It's almost like 'if it doesn't end in .gmail.com then it's not valid".
If memory serves me correctly, the owner of AAISP has a valid address of a@e.gg and this was rejected by several webforms.

The RFCs actually leave quite a lot of scope for unclarity. Nearly every algorithm for validating an email address, including those in standard libraries, is wrong. For one thing, the username part can be "anything that the recipient system will accept", and that you can get through various servers around the Internet so that that recipient system gets a chance to accept it. Which leaves quite a lot of latitude for addresses to be acceptable sometimes and not others. Add to that that a lot of the things that some programmers believe they know about email addresses are also wrong, and you get a recipe for confusion.

But do no validation, and you're guaranteed a pile of duff email addresses, especially given the number of people who don't seem to know their own addresses, don't realise that (usually) it really, really matters whether you put .com, .co.uk or .org.uk (for example), and so on and so forth.

[TheLurker]

@The Lurker:   'XAIPETE'

Σας ευχαριστώ πολύ, 'ειστε πολύ ευγενικός.

Thanks for that, it is a great help.  Any idea if that would work for whatever they call the "domestic" version?

[Feanor]

I'm pretty sure the domain joining menu is only in the Pro version.
I don't think those options exist in the Home version.
But I've never installed the Home version, so I'm not 100% certain.

[Feanor]

@The Lurker:   'XAIPETE'

I've just set up a couple of new Win11 Pro laptops, straight from the box, avoiding Microsoft Accounts [which in my case, I have not got].

When you power it on, it asks to connect to the internet - so let it.

The trick seems to be that when it asks for a MS Account, there's an option below [in smaller letters] saying 'login options' - choose it.

You then want to choose 'School or Workplace'; 'Domain Join' is the same thing.

It asks for the name of the machine - which you can skip.

It asks for your name. My name is fred; my password is fred; my pet's name is fred; I was born in a city called fred; my nickname at school was fred; etc.

It's connected to the internet, so goes off and downloads the latest release of Windows and installs it ...

You can then log on as fred; password fred ..

What I then did was enable the local administrator, who then logged on, killed fred, and installed Office2019 [hint: you have to uninstall 'Office' from the Apps first].

Et voila - new machine, Win11 Pro, Office2019 and not a Microsoft Account in sight.

Hope this helps.

Out of curiosity, having created a local account (which is the desired outcome here), why did you then log on as Administrator and delete that account? Why did you not log on and use the freshly created local account?

Are you logging on as Administrator for your day to day use?

[liam_whippet]

Yes, GPWM. I have a slightly different desired outcome to The Lurker. I'm wanting to become Local Admin of an otherwise empty machine, so I can join it to a domain - so that any Domain Users can log on to it, and so that my colleagues can manage it remotely.

And for the domain stuff, you need Win 10/11 Pro - which lets you log on without the Microsoft Account. [Win 10/11 Home has to be upgraded to Pro in order to do networking.]

So, if the desired outcome is to avoid having a Microsoft Account, then you need Win 10/11 Pro, not the 'domestic' version; and - yes - there's no need to create an account and delete it, you can just create a 'MrsLurker' account [and she can create any other accounts..]

Apologies for any confusion!

[Feanor]

Understood, and yes, that's perfectly reasonable.

I've not tried that exact workflow with my Win11 pro.
I presume you can't log into the Domain account in the first instance, during initial setup, because at that point the machine is not a member of the Domain.
Unless there are Domain-joining options exposed at that point?
So you need to make a temp local account, from where you can then join the machine to the Domain using your Domain Admin credentials, and then once that's done, you can use a Domain account, and the temp local account can be binned.

In order to create a local account on Win Home versions, it's been made intentionally harder, indeed almost impossible.
As I've said earlier, the simplest way is to create the bootable USB stick from the downloaded ISO using Rufus, it can adjust the installer defaults on the fly, and allows for the installation without a MS account. It's not 'hacking' anything, it's just exposing supported options which MS don't expose in their Out-Of-Box installer for the Proles with their Home version.

I used this even when installing Win11 pro on my home Domain, and I highly recommend it.

[orienteer]

Referring to validation of email addresses, nothing annoys me more than, as soon as I type the first character, a great big red message comes up demanding I enter a valid email address

[barakta]

Oh I hate that too, the validation before you finish typing. Or worse a system that once it's had a validation issue won't then recheck and validate the correction properly.

[Kim]

And when it fails to validate it inevitably puts up an error message in red, so you don't notice it until well into trying to work out why the form isn't submitting.

[Mr Larrington]

And when you DO notice it you then find it’s blanked everything you’ve already entered and you have to start all over a-fucking-gain