A random thread for small computing things that don't really warrant a thread of their own

[Mr Larrington]

CPU fan!  What do you mean by not working, then working again after a crash and reboot?  sort it out u muppet!

[Polar Bear]

The usb-c port on mllePB's surface pro babbage engine (one of her two different work-supplied machines) stopped working after a micro$haft software update.  Their own update fubar'd their own steaming pile of crap.

Anyway, the solution which I googled on my android phone is:

Shut down the machine.

Wait at least ten seconds.

Start the machine keeping the power button held down for at least 20 seconds and observe the windows startup logo appear, disappear then reappear.

What a thoroughly unintuitive malarky but it worked.  Gone are the days of the BRS interrupt to reset such anomalies.  🤔

[MattH]

My broadband deal needs to be renewed before Christmas. Plusnet sent a reminder, so I went and had a look what they are offering. Their "upgrade deal" is to drop to the lower speed FTTC package and lose my landline. Not quite sure how that qualifies as an upgrade.

Got plenty of time to decide what to do, though as I need a static IP choices are a bit limited.

[Gattopardo]

Have a geobook 1e, if you worked for school IT you probably had these to play with. As a 4gb memory machine and 64gb ssd all built in and not upgradeable has gone to win 11.  Remember Roger mentioning removing lots of spyware/tracking stuff from win11 and was wondering what I should remove to get a less intrusive experience.

Also any of you guys have the chargers as these didn't come with chargers.

[Kim]

I've just discovered that there's an IRC client in Thunderbollocks, and it's about as good as the one that used to be built into Mozilla, which is to say 'not very'.  (Credit where it's due for giving the option of displaying messages line-by-line as well as supporting the stupid space-consuming speech-bubble user interface that all IRC-like things have to have these days.)

This TIL sponsored by a "WTF is Matrix?" rabbit-hole.

[DaveReading]

The keyboard on my Asus Zenbook has been slowly giving up the ghost for the last few months, and it got to the point where remapping keys with AHK no longer did the trick - it's surprising how many words need the letters C, D, K, Q, etc.   

I searched high and low for a replacement keyboard - not as easy as I thought because most of the ones on eBay for my model have a slightly different layout with a rectangular, rather than L-shaped Enter key, so I was preparing to have to do some surgery on the panel to get a replacement to fit.  One supplier flat refused to sell me one as he said he didn't want to get the blame if it didn't work.

Eventually, I found a French(!) keyboard, complete with front panel, touchpad, etc at a reasonable price.  I've been putting off the actual replacement, because pretty well all the innards of the Asus are screwed to the back of said panel, but I bit the bullet yesterday and managed it without too much trouble, apart from an issue where I refitted the SSD incorrectly and I wouldn't boot past the BIOS screen (eventually resolved).

My problem now, never having learned to touch-type, is that pretty well every non-alphanumeric character, plus some of the numeric keys, has a different legend from previously, even though it will still produce the same character.  I did think about simply printing some stickers for the rogue keys, but I'm now trying to summon up the courage to lever off a dozen or so keycaps and replace them with the originals from my failed keyboard - after all, what could possibly go wrong?   

[MattH]

If you're doing that, I'd try it first on some "sacrificial" keys that you don't want to move over, just to be sure it's possible. Often they have tiny little plastic pegs that are quite easy to damage, but you may be able to figure out the technique before trying your critical keys.

But for a total brain-mess keyboard, I have one a bit like this (except in a nice wooden case)

Blank keycaps, because it's set up a bit like the mirrorboard - https://blog.xkcd.com/2007/08/14/mirrorboard-a-one-handed-keyboard-layout-for-the-lazy/

I mainly use it when my RSI is playing up in my right hand, or for ease typing when on the turbotrainer. You just use the left hand, which is fine for QWERT, ASDFG etc. Then, when you want to do YUIOP, you press a key with your thumb that changes the layout so T becomes Y, R becomes U, Q becomes P. It's really quite bizarre, but you pick it up quickly as there's some weird brain stuff going on that means your left hand can mirror what you'd normally do with your right - so you're still typing Y with your first finger, or P with your pinky, just on the other hand. But there's no point having printing on the keys because the whole thing changes depending upon which modifiers you are pressing (I can also put it into a mouse keys mode, so not needing to use a mouse or trackball and can open browser tabs and navigate between them with single key presses).

[Kim]

My problem now, never having learned to touch-type, is that pretty well every non-alphanumeric character, plus some of the numeric keys, has a different legend from previously, even though it will still produce the same character.  I did think about simply printing some stickers for the rogue keys, but I'm now trying to summon up the courage to lever off a dozen or so keycaps and replace them with the originals from my failed keyboard - after all, what could possibly go wrong?   

If you can't touch-type, you could always tell the computer that it's got a French keybaord^[1], then at least the keycaps would match?

Or take this as an opportunity to learn to touch-type...


_{[1] Compulsory typo.}

[DaveReading]

Thanks, I'm too old to learn how to touch-type.   

As an aside, I've concluded that it's not actually a French keyboard, as the vendor advertised (it's a QWERTY, not an AZERTY) - in fact it's Italian, not that it makes much difference (don't tell my Italian teacher!).

I've chickened out on my keycap swap plan - a fair bit of tugging on the new kdb failed to free a keycap, and I didn't want to pull too hard, so plan B is to photograph the old keyboard, clean it up in Photoshop, then print a bunch of stickers on some label stock that I have kicking around somewhere.

Given that said laptop already sports a screen attached by a bunch of assorted nuts and bolts after being attacked by my grandson, I'm not too precious about it.   

[Ham]

I haven't looked since forever, but I find myself pleased that the God FAQ on 400monkeys is still online - a hangover from the very early days.

[woollypigs]

Arrgghh stupid mickey$oft, I go and tell it do not update, I don't need an update ever, if I do will tell you, capiche, thanks bye.

Main reason is that I don't want to end up downloading loads of bytes when we are on slow and metered SIMs.

What did the little fecker of an OS do today ... arrgghh

[Kim]

Arrgghh stupid mickey$oft, I go and tell it do not update, I don't need an update ever, if I do will tell you, capiche, thanks bye.

Main reason is that I don't want to end up downloading loads of bytes when we are on slow and metered SIMs.

What did the little fecker of an OS do today ... arrgghh

Windows should have the option of defining a given network as 'metered' so it doesn't do that.  No idea if it actually works.

[woollypigs]

But also that I used a few setting in regedit etc to tell it, oi! No updating OK.

But yet the fecker did it.

I use Linux more, just the odd time I need Mickey for some work or faff, I just need to remember to check and stop it's silly ideas

[Mr Larrington]

Disable the update services from services.msc?

[MattH]

Taking on a new volunteer role with an organisation, they've provided me with an Outlook.com email address as there is some public facing stuff.

So, setting it up today I forwarded some bits from my personal email to it. This evening I noticed that there were two items in my junk folder already. Quick look showed one was the email I'd forwarded, so I marked that as not junk.

The other, amusingly, was one from Microsoft welcoming me to Onedrive. Good to see they think their own unsolicited email is junk!

[Wowbagger]

I have just deleted my brother's facebook account.

[Afasoas]

I haven't used Audacity in years. We've bought a Toniebox for our friend's daughter, which as well as working with pre-recorded content, will work with content that you make yourself. Which means I'm writing/producing some children's audio stories that balance out that very car-dependent Peppa Pig.

[andyoxon]

I don't think Cyber Monday is a thing any more.  PC deals seem to arrive early as pre-black friday deals, & then sell out, or not.

[Bledlow]

The keyboard on my Asus Zenbook has been slowly giving up the ghost for the last few months, and it got to the point where remapping keys with AHK no longer did the trick - it's surprising how many words need the letters C, D, K, Q, etc.   

I searched high and low for a replacement keyboard - not as easy as I thought because most of the ones on eBay for my model have a slightly different layout with a rectangular, rather than L-shaped Enter key, so I was preparing to have to do some surgery on the panel to get a replacement to fit.  One supplier flat refused to sell me one as he said he didn't want to get the blame if it didn't work.

Eventually, I found a French(!) keyboard, complete with front panel, touchpad, etc at a reasonable price.  I've been putting off the actual replacement, because pretty well all the innards of the Asus are screwed to the back of said panel, but I bit the bullet yesterday and managed it without too much trouble, apart from an issue where I refitted the SSD incorrectly and I wouldn't boot past the BIOS screen (eventually resolved).

My problem now, never having learned to touch-type, is that pretty well every non-alphanumeric character, plus some of the numeric keys, has a different legend from previously, even though it will still produce the same character.  I did think about simply printing some stickers for the rogue keys, but I'm now trying to summon up the courage to lever off a dozen or so keycaps and replace them with the originals from my failed keyboard - after all, what could possibly go wrong?   

Keyboards round here randomly re-set to Japanese. Only happens when Mrs B's around. She seems to have no difficulty hitting the right keys, but it always disconcerts me a little when I start typing & kana appear on the screen.

[chrisbainbridge]

My wife cannot change keyboard layout but her ability to completely scramble all computer functions simpy by walking past them is legendary

[barakta]

Quantum bogodynamics. My mum's level is high as well. She's slightly less awful on the Apple ecosystem.

I also use TeamViewer a free (but now requires login) app to remotely connect to Mum's iDevices and see what the fuck she's talking about directly as dyslexic-stressed reporting is hard to decode even for me with my experience.

[Kim]

We just burned a DVD.

[TheLurker]

We just burned a DVD.

Yule logs are more traditional at this time of year, but with heating bills going the way they are who can blame you.

[Kim]

Barakta, in her $ork capacity, keeps getting unsolicited emails from third-parties requesting personal data.  These are, unsurprisingly, due to the useless work-shy twats in HR outsourcing the boring bits of their job [All of them? - Ed], and a cause of swearing of a type that should normally be reserved for the products of Redmond, USAnia.

She's taken to forwarding the to the IT helldesk dedicated phishing reporting address^[1].  Malicious compliance is the best form of compliance.



_{[1] What's the email equivalent of a hotline?}

[barakta]

I think most of the phishing style emails ARE actual phishing.

The legit one was apparently legit but HR are too fucking thick to send an email from a known human on the local domain to say "You'll get this email from Org Fu for reason and it's legit".  It was IT who said they thought it was legit, but by that point I'd deleted the fucker and emptied my deleted folder.

I then got an email from Name@EmployerDomain to RandomName asking urgently for my special category data which I replied to in a "I'm not RandomName" and "This looks well like spam with urgent urgent data demands wtf". HR minion then replied to say she'd used BCC and her boss's name. I said "Mailmerge exists and is more secure" to which the minion (incapable of Google or LinkedInLearning which her dept manages) asked me how to do that then...

My boss happened to ping me at about the same time to ask "Have HR asked you for Thing" to which I said "yes, but fuck me spam-looking-tastic" to which Boss agreed and said normal for HR. I didn't snark too much at HR minion cos she sounds like she's about 12 in her first job given bad orders and inadequate training by her management.

I figure if they still want me to do the third-party thing, they can resend it and try having a longer response time than 36 hours. Their lack of planning (for Ofsted) is honestly not my problem given how much they ignore us trying to flag up questions and they ignore us. I'll not make people's lives more nastily difficult, but I'll also not apologise for being spam-cautious given how often they scamshame us by saying how often their test phishes catch 4% of us out each time.