Stuff you might want to read.
I ran across this article, also on ZDNet, which digs a little deeper into why getting rid of Internet Explorer may have other implications.
Saying goodbye to Internet Explorer might be more complicated than you realise [sic]
Could this be the beginnings of a workaround for legacy applications like Eudora? Does this even matter? I’m keeping my eye on it anyway because of Eudora’s dependency upon the “Microsoft Viewer”, when it’s selected to display messages.
Someone pointed me at an article appearing on ZD-Net’s Extreme Tech site – “Microsoft Will Put Internet Explorer Out of Its Misery Next Year“ – which states that IE will be sunset for good June 15, 2022.
The article is focused on the aging browser itself but then these sentence appear.
It’s clear Internet Explorer doesn’t have a place in Microsoft’s online efforts with its clunky old rendering engine. After the shutdown, Internet Explorer will no longer be available on any consumer version of Windows 10.
Isn’t that “clunky old rendering engine” what Eudora’s using when Microsoft’s viewer is selected for viewing messages? As it happens, the answer is yes.
So, what will happen in 2022? Only Microsoft knows for sure. I suppose it comes down to whether or not Microsoft will actively remove the files that make up the rendering engine.
I raised the topic this morning on the Eudora for Windows list and some discussion is beginning to take shape. As someone there said, it’s not time to panic.
Edited to add a link to another article that may be related to this topic: Saying goodbye to Internet Explorer might be more complicated than you realise [sic].
This points to a LONG article but it’s something you should read anyway. The title is exceedingly misleading – the author doesn’t actually get into talking about Tesla and Musk and his cars until more than halfway in! On the way there are lots of things to see and think about. Many well-thought-out graphics, links to sources and citations, and good footnotes, too.
Besides being interested in the subject material, something else that helped me breeze through the article is that I liked the writing style. You may or may not agree.
Depending on your interest and/or free time might take you a couple of sittings to work through this. Seriously.
So if the car industry has a cupcake and its parents are forcing it to eat vegetables, the oil industry has a cupcake but its parents are forcing it to eat razor blades. The car industry will resist the veggies and have a little tantrum before grudgingly giving in—the oil industry will furiously try to gouge the parents’ eyes out in resistance because for him, this is life and death.
http://waitbutwhy.com/2015/06/how-tesla-will-change-your-life.html
BASIC is 50 years old!
BASIC was my first computer language. I already had it in my bag of tricks when I bought my first computer, an Apple ][. It cost about $1,400 new, a huge amount of money back then. With that I became the first person I knew that owned their own computer!
My friend Joe who, to this day, doesn’t dick around much with social media, had been doing some CompSci work at college. He couldn’t understand why I’d spend so much on such a bitty box. What the hell could it possibly be good for? He came over to see the thing for himself.
Joe and pulled our first all-nighter programming Conway’s Life – in BASIC – into the box. I think the inspiration came from an article in Scientific American about cellular automata. (There may have been some burnt vegetable matter involved, as well.) By dawn we were watching patterns of dots crawl around on the screen. But hey, they were OUR dots, playing by OUR rules!
(Pam saw it! We go back *way* further than that. I doubt it made much of an impact on her; it would be a long time indeed before computers became generally useful enough for non-geeks to take seriously…)
Soon Joe had an Apple of his own.
We each found our way into lucrative careers in technology that have lasted to this very day. Our professional paths have intersected several times over the decades.
But I doubt either of us have programmed a single line of BASIC for a very, VERY long time. Lemme give it a shot.
1 PRINT “HELLO WORLD”
Now go read this great article from Dartmouth, where BASIC got its start. (Eh, the original link died. This one is an okay substitute, especially if you watch the video.)
This is worth reading. Then go act!
http://boingboing.net/2011/11/11/stop-sopa-save-the-internet.html
Spies, everywhere!
Jonathan Zdziarski wrote this fascinating piece, makes me glad that none of my vehicles have OnStar. Really, REALLY glad. If yours does, you won’t want to miss.
OnStar Begins Spying On Customers’ GPS Location For Profit
Bonus discussion: How soon before such systems become mandatory in every vehicle?
It’s been a while since I ran across a simple article with simple concepts – they all make good sense, by the way – raise a firestorm of commentary. Go see for yourself.
This is why your website sucks by C. Todd Fluhr
Internet Society – World IPv6 Day
How are you faring? Here, I found that we were offline when I tried to log in this morning. We’d been down for a while, apparently, as the servers had stopped their incessant chatter to my inbox. Power cycling the cable modem put things right.
Coincidence? [shrug]
Alas, Optimum Online doesn’t support IPv6. I hear they’re not alone.
Good article in the NY times, talks about what appears to be the best tool for fighting spam which accounts for some 89% of ALL email sent. What is it? Why, money, of course.
A recent study found that a vast majority of the money collected by spammers flows through a small number of financial companies. The best quote from the article is as predictable as it is telling:
Visa, the largest credit card company, declined to comment.
Go read John Markoff’s article, Study Sees Way to Win Spam Fight.
My work as a mentor for the local robotics team puts me in contact with lots of smart kids from all over this rock. One of the (many) things that astound me is the continual erosion of awareness and concern for personal privacy. If there’s one way that I guess I really show my age it’s that I still hold that archaic concept in pretty high regard.
This article, from The Chronicle of Higher Education, is a very astute response to what’s probably the most common retort, “if you’ve got nothing to hide then there’s nothing to worry about.” Actually, the worries are very, very real.
Go read Why Privacy Matters Even if You Have ‘Nothing to Hide’, by Daniel J. Solove.
Do you know what a ‘cinematic scientist’ is? Or what they do? I’ll confess, until just a few short minutes ago I didn’t either.
Apparently one cinematic scientist has hit upon a way to fit an entire movie into one image? Howzat? It works something like this.
Take a frame and stretch it vertically while compressing it horizontally. Take the next frame and do it again. And the next and the next until you’ve processed the whole movie. Stand back and look at your work.
Fascinating!
(How the hell can I get a job like that?)
Old cars never had problems like this.
There’s too much not-necessary-for-driving stuff that you can do with cars these days, and few of ’em are any good. At best, many new features serve to distract you from the task at hand: driving the thing competently.
Even stealing cars isn’t what it used to be. With the demise of discrete wiring in favor of networks, in some cases all you need to do is access the network. Used to be you needed to break off a mirror to gain physical access. Jack in with your laptop and command the doors to open, the engine to start…
But now? Make a “phone call” from your laptop.
How long before we see car-botnets controlled from IRC? Or maybe viruses to cause an accelerator to stick? Or brakes to stop braking? Or, more subtly, stability controls to destabilize? Hmmm, cause your ex to seem like s/he’s driving drunk? For a price, of course, cash, please.
Here’s a NY Times article that ought to shake you up. (But I’ll bet it won’t.)
Researchers Show How a Car’s Electronics Can Be Taken Over Remotely
If it’s not needed or wanted then you probably want to get rid of it. A common problem is that sometimes you just don’t know the best way to go about doing that. Here’s a site that might help. And it’s highly entertaining, too.
http://www.getridofthings.com/
What the??? How the heck can anyone derive figures to estimate something so… nebulous?
Find out. The results may, no will surprise you.
