Posts by happygeek

Looks like Reddit was our friend. The story hit the front page for a while...

Hey ardav, you do know you are only 20 posts away from earning your "Sarcastic Superstar" title don't you? ;)

Blimey, 32K views in less than 24 hours!

It would appear that a Florida bank has been the victim of a $13 million ATM heist, but just how did the cyber-robbers pull it off?

Although the security breach which led to the ATM fraud itself seems to have taken place in March, and was disclosed in the first quarter earnings statement for Fidelity National Information Services Inc (FIS) back in May, details of exactly what happened are only just starting to leak from the FBI probe that followed.

FIS, based in Jacksonville, is one of the world's biggest processors of prepaid debit cards with more than 775 million transactions every year. These cards, preloaded with a cash value, can be used at ATMs to withdraw that cash until the preloaded balance is exhausted. You might have thought that a company at the very top of the prepaid debit card business would also be at the very top of the security business as it applies to those cards, but as information leaks from the investigation it would appear that wasn't necessarily the case.

If it was, then how could a total of just 22 of these prepaid debit cards, issued by Efunds Sunrise in Florida, be used to perpetrate a staggeringly simple yet ingenious $13 million robbery? FIS, as is common practise in the financial sector, has issued a statement assuring customers that it has "taken steps to further enhance security and continues to work with Federal law enforcement officials on this matter" …

Did you escape with minimal impact Dani? The news reports on the UK channels seem to suggest New York escaped pretty much unscathed from Irene save some localised flooding and the obvious pre-storm preparations disrupting things.

If he hasn't worked out in the five years since he asked, then there's no help for him...

Pop to your nearest computer peripherals retailer and I'm sure they will have one for you to play with, they seem to have launched pretty much everywhere now.

If you are a Windows 7 user then maybe you have longed for a mouse designed just for you and your Operating System, but somehow I doubt it. What you want is a mouse that just works the way you expect and doesn't leave your wrist feeling like you've been shaking hands with Hulk Hogan for a fortnight at the end of the day. So what was Microsoft thinking of when it decided to launch a Windows 7 only mouse into the market that's unlike any other in the way you use it?

Actually, Microsoft was trying to push the envelope a little when it comes to PC mousing, and maybe play a little bit of catch up with Apple at the same time. Neither are necessary bad things, and nor is the resulting Touch Mouse per se.

How can a mouse be different? Good question, and best answered by grabbing hold of the Touch Mouse (with either hand as it's a totally ambidextrous device) and stroking it. A single finger stroke becomes a scroll wheel, use two fingers and you can maximise, minimise and restore windows, while a full three-fingered swiping in an upwards motion tiles all open applications on-screen. It is, without doubt, very cool. As cool as the Apple Magic Mouse which does a very similar thing in a fairly similar way, it has to be said.

The BlueTrack technology built into the mouse enables it …

Sorry to hear you have had problems with this, have you tried submitting a support ticket at: http://www.reimage.com/submit-ticket/

Fingers crossed it all passes by without major cause for concern.

Erm yes, I believe that's what I said. And your point is?

[ATTACH=RIGHT]22094[/ATTACH]Facebook Vice-President Chris Cox has announced the latest in a seemingly never ending run of privacy updates for the worlds' biggest social network. The improvements can be summed up as tightening up the question most often asked by those users worried about their privacy, namely "who can see this?" Unless the users asking that question happen to be using an iPhone it would seem.

According to Cox the privacy updates, which will be rolled out to all users during the next few days, will make it "easier to share posts, photos, tags and other content with exactly the people you want." In order to accomplish this, Facebook is tweaking the user interface so as to move existing privacy option toggles from a settings page into an inline system. In other words, the privacy controls will be available at the point of content be that a posting, a photo or a tag.

Inline profile controls will show you, via a drop down menu, exactly who can currently see the part of your profile (photo album, home town etc) you are looking at and, importantly, enable the user to change this with a single click rather than having to navigate through a series of somewhat confusing settings pages. The controls for who can see your individual postings are also moving inline, with the use of icons and labels to make it clearer who those posts are being shared with as well providing the option to change those share settings right …

In an unusual take on the usual 'my smartphone is better than your smartphone' debate, a new survey has revealed that when it comes to the amount of time we spend using our handset of choice, iPhone users are the biggest addicts. So addicted, in fact, that many iPhone users cannot bear to be parted from their smartphone no matter where they are: and that includes the loo.

According to digital banking provider Intelligent Environments which commissioned YouGov to undertake the research of British smartphone users last month, some 43 percent of iPhone users spend more than two hours a day using their handsets compared to 33 percent of Android smartphone users and 31 percent of BlackBerry users.

iPhone users are, so the research tells us, also most likely to pick up their handset as soon as they wake up in the morning and last thing at night. Slightly more worrying was the discovery that 35 percent of iPhone users regularly take their smartphones into the toilet with them and continue to use the things while going about their, erm, business.

Of course, the Intelligent Environments research was geared towards financial usage of smartphones so here are the boring banking statistics:

Sixty nine percent of iPhone users are happy to check their balances, 62 percent will transfer funds and 46 percent pay their bills from their handsets. Seventeen percent admitted their main bank account is always overdrawn, which is higher than the average of …

A new survey conducted by Newzoo for casual gaming developers PopCap Games has discovered that, as far as European gamers are concerned anyway, there simply is no one platform that is dominant. I appreciate that may come as something of a surprise when you look at the money that gets spent on console games compared to other platforms, but the fact is they split their gaming time between many different devices.

The survey revealed that European gamers will split their available gaming time pretty much down the middle, allocating the same amount of playing between consoles, web-based casual gaming sites, social network games, mobiles phones and portable consoles and PC games. No one single games platform could muster more than 50% of playing time.

According to Paul Breslin, General Manager for PopCap Europe, the results should quite clearly fire a warning shot to developers that "a one size fits all strategy for Europe doesn't work as there are quite different platform gaming habits, needs and expectations between France, Germany and the UK". That said, Breslin admits that the games market is clearly still maturing and has by no means finished evolving yet. "From a publisher's perspective, this shows the importance of having diversity and multi-platform solutions" Breslin says, in order to "reach individual markets in these important regions".

Other findings from the National Gamers Survey that may be of interest to games developers include:Half of all adults in the United Kingdom, France and Germany play …

That's odd, Herbert. Your IP says you are from Maharashtra, India...

And what is all the Android stuff about???

Biffy Clyro - Machines

The latest in a series of round table industry events held in the UK, and featuring a panel of experts in the field of commercial software development, has warned that ignoring the popularity of casual and mobile gaming is a big mistake for any successful digital development strategy. Interestingly, it also suggested that using the iPad as a TV games controller could be the key to ongoing success for games developers.

The panel of experts at the event dismissed the relatively poor sales of the Nintendo 3DS portable console as being an indicator of failing interest in the sector. Stuart Howarth, co-founder of KOKO Digital, instead blamed the poor sales on "the popularity of smartphones and the changing attitudes amongst consumers to buying cheap games". Indeed, Howarth insisted that consumers are "buying phones to buy games cheaply" which means they "aren't buying consoles because they would then have to spend £40 on a game. They want to buy games for 69p instead". Citing the launch of the new Sony PlayStation phone as an example of how to embrace market trends, Howarth went on to warn even the biggest businesses of the dangers of ignoring the mobile gaming sector. "Companies as large and powerful as Nintendo simple haven't embraced the mobile phone quite like Sony has" Howarth concluded, adding "If they don't play catch up soon they might suffer the same demise as Sega".

Of course, nobody in their right mind would suggest that console gaming …

You need to post that query in the appropriate forum, certainly not here in the community introductions forum, if you want to get help with it. I cannot move it as I don't have the slightest idea from your posting as to what it relates to in terms of code or application...

lol... looks fun
can you share that file here?

the file was just a couple million lines of cr-lf

Erm, NO!

:)

New Model Army - No rest for the wicked

Perhaps it was because you spammed them like you are spamming DaniWeb, and they wanted revenge? Why ask for help from a site where you are flagrantly breaking the rules?

Oddly enough, I have switched back to using FB more than Twitter. The 140 character limit is just too restrictive and I found most of my family/friends were using FB. Google+ is doing a good job of trying to clone FB, but failing as while many of my social network are there, few are participating. FB is, for now, too big and has too much social and cultural momentum to be troubled by anyone else it seems.

I suspect that the price of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 units already in UK shops will go up as retailers cash in on the curiosity/scarcity factor for the time being.

Sad thing is, from what I've seen of the latest Galaxy Tab (and a DaniWeb review will be published shortly) it's actually right up there as pretty much the best of the Android-powered bunch right now, and not a million miles away from iPad 2 territory either.

No wonder Apple is running scared...

OK, so Apple has successfully persuaded a German court to ban the sale of the Galaxy Tab Android tablet on the grounds that Samsung has copied the design of the iPad. The legalities of which revolve around certificate of registration number 000181607 in the Community Designs Register that protects the ownership of design within the boundaries of the European Union.

DaniWeb can reveal exactly what it is that Apple thinks Samsung has copied, and we hope you are sitting down because the actual community design images contained within that certification are basic to say the least. In fact, we would go so far as to say that it looks remarkably like every tablet every to hit the streets and we are, frankly, amazed that the certificate was ever granted in the first place. What it doesn't look like, in any really meaningful way, is an Apple iPad. It looks like something my son would do with an Etch-a-Sketch, which ironically also looks like this interpretation of an iPad!

This has to be one of the most bizarre court cases we've seen in the tech sector in recent years. And that's saying a lot considering how daft most software patent cases are. DaniWeb would love to know what you think. Why not tell us using the comment box below?

What I find rather hard to understand, let alone believe, is that one court in Germany can effectively ban the sale of an item across the entire rest of the European Union (with the notable exception of the Netherlands but, as I mentioned in the article, that's only due to some complexity courtesy of another court case being ongoing there apparently)

Apple thinks that the Samsung Galaxy Tab looks a lot like the iPhone and the iPad, from the appearance of the device right down to the packaging it comes in. Now it seems that the courts agree. Well, one of them at least. The Dusseldorf District Court in Germany has awarded a preliminary injunction in favour of Apple which, get this, bans the sale of Samsung Galaxy Tabs throughout the European Union (with the strange exception of the Netherlands where a separate court action is underway). Customs officials have apparently been given orders to seize shipments of the tablet, and tens of thousands of them are understood to have been seized so far today.

The injunction is unusual in that it does not refer to alleged software patent violations, as we are used to in the world of hi-tech gadgets these days, but rather a design. Apple maintains that the Samsung Galaxy Tab is a blatant copy of the iPad and iPhone in terms of design, and has insisted it will take any necessary measures to protect itself when other companies steal Apple ideas. Samsung, on the other hand, has said it is disappointed by the ruling and has vowed to defend itself in the on-going proceedings in order to get the ban lifted as soon as possible.

The preliminary injunction could be a costly gamble as far as Apple is concerned as it is far from meaning that the case is cut and …

Just let us know what username you want to change to and, assuming it is not already in use, Naure or myself will make the change.

A colleague of mine points out that while technology isn't to blame for the rioting it is to blame for the shops being set ablaze. Apparently the looters are making sure that no CCTV evidence of their illegal activity is being left behind.

Hey, welcome back Duki!

While it is always easy for 'the media' to blame technology for whatever bad stuff is currently filling the front pages of the newspapers, could it actually have a point as rioting and looting rip apart the streets of London? The answer might appear to be a tentative yes as Blackberry manufacturers Research-in-Motion (RIM) take to Twitter to confirm it will help the police in any way it can. But appearances can be deceptive.

Why a smartphone maker should choose to post such a statement right in the middle of an ongoing riot (as I write, my old stomping grounds in South East London have been set ablaze including the likes of McDonalds, Debenhams and Argos stores) becomes a bit clearer when you understand that Blackberry users appear to have been behind much of the 'organisation' of these riots.

You might not immediately associate unemployed and disaffected inner city youth with Blackberries, but anecdotal evidence over the weekend has certainly suggested that much of the rioting and looting that has spread across London has largely been co-ordinated using BBM, the Blackberry Instant Message service. Not such a surprise when you note that recent statistics showed 37 percent of UK teenagers cite the Blackberry as being their smartphone of choice. Mainly thanks to the free and confidential BBM service which teens are leaning towards instead of SMS text messaging.

The official RIM Twitter account has today tweeted that "We feel for those impacted by the …

Did you not read the news story you are commenting upon? The Sun was hacked, breached, attacked - it has admitted as much. Read the story before commenting...

Rancid - Red Hot Moon

Yes, that's right.

The Geeks' Lounge is not the place for this anyway. It's a non-support forum, somewhere to kick back and relax. Ask questions about computers in the appropriate part of an IT forum and 1) you will get better answers, 2) you won't get voted down as much...

...
I get voted down because I asked a question about boolean logic in the Geeks Lounge, and then again for answering my own question?

Edit: Thanks, trying to figure something out is mindless posting, and then answering is just lots of babble. Ill keep that in mind next time I ask questions about computers on an IT forum.

I am guilty of taking my iPhone to bed with me, and checking news/email last thing at night and first thing in the morning. I also listen to the radio on my iPhone when bathing, and have been known to check my email/texts at the dinner table.

However, I do not answer calls during meetings, or interrupt conversations to check my iPhone. In fact, it spends more time on silent/vibrate than it does otherwise and what's more I spend more time using it when I am alone than when I am in company. But then I'm quite sociable for a grumpy geek...

Users of the iPhone have stood accused of many things, from being more interested in form than function through to having more money than sense. However, the iPhone bashing has taken an unexpected turn as new research suggests that smartphone users are becoming increasingly rude both at home and in the workplace.

The study of more than one thousand workers in the UK, conducted by social email provider harmon.ie, suggests that the abundance of iPhones and other "electronic devices for collaboration" is directly leading to poor office etiquette and often downright rudeness.

The research revealed that 41 percent of workers continue to use their smartphones during face-to-face meetings in order to send instant messages, reply to text messages, check email or listen to voice-mail.Seventy percent do the same if those meetings are virtual rather than face-to-face. Thirty one percent will disrupt those face-to-face meetings to answer an incoming call, although 40 percent readily admitted it was considered rude to do so. Nineteen percent will ignore direct instructions from senior colleagues at work to disconnect calls.

Eighty five percent will stay connected to work stuff during the weekend, 79 percent during the evening, and 74 percent while on holiday. If you thought that was intrusive, 48 percent said they stay online in bed. Apparently, 35 percent of those asked claim to be permanently connected to the office and never disconnect their devices no matter what. A third of those asked thought that they might lose their …

Quite...

When you walk on - Eliza Gilkyson

And to get that rep may require more than the current scattergun posting approach methinks...

Cancer - My Chemical Romance

Jar of Hearts - Christina Perri

And WTF has that got to do with anything? Seriously...

I got mine at age 17, earliest possible in UK, having passed my text first time.

3am by Scooter

As a writer on all things IT security related, but also someone with a political mindset which is most certainly not aligned with that of the Murdoch media empire (despite, or perhaps because of, writing for them myself many years ago) I feel somewhat conflicted about this story. Part of me is sad for the people whose data has been compromised, part of me is happy for Murdoch to take another blow to his business sphericals.

The Sun is the biggest selling newspaper in the UK, and famous for some truly scything political headlines over the years. Today the Rupert Murdoch owned red top tabloid finds itself on the wrong side of the headline writing tracks after it admitted that reader data may be at risk following a security breach.

According to The Guardian , News International has sent emails to "thousands of people to warn them" that their personal details may have been compromised if they entered competitions and polls on the official Sun newspaper website.

The director of customer data for News International, Chris Duncan, has sent those emails and states that the breach took place on the 19th July when The Sun appeared to publish a story that Rupert Murdoch was dead. In fact, LulzSec claimed responsibility for hacking the Sun site and planting that story.

Now News International is saying that some customer information was breached, although in the email Duncan insists that "no financial or password information was compromised". That said, names, addresses, dates of birth, email and telephone number data was accessed.

That data has now been published by someone claiming no affiliation with LulzSec, which is confusing as it was that hacking group which certainly did claim responsibility for the breach itself. How Batteye, the hacker in question, got hold of the data is unknown at the time of writing. What is known is what Batteye says himself when …

You clean out your loft becuase you are moving house and find that 90% of the stuff up there comes under the category of 'old computer stuff'.

???

Sorry AD, I really do not know what you are finding offensive in the post you mention.

The username is Farouk (a pretty common name, and the tenth ruler of Egypt from the Muhammad Ali Dynasty) not f**k as you seem to be implying.

The post itself refers to a place in Nigeria, simple as.

Neither are in any way offensive...

Than I guess you won't mind if I post a link to www.fuckfrance.com or the brainfuck programming language.

Why does your profile say Canada then?

I reckon that's a good idea. What do you think Dani?

Erm, Niger State is the largest state in Nigeria. Look it up AD... :)