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Maybe there was a time when it was true.
Graphic designers used Mac for a long time and it worked.
And it's takes a lot for people to change platforms.
You get used to how things are done on Mac (or on Windows) and switching between platforms can take some time and can be aggravating.
CI/CD = Continuous Impediment/Continuous Despair
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Our county was one of the hardest hit.
120 MPH winds.
Getting the power back on was quite a struggle, involving many people. Because the line coming to the house got pulled down by a branch.
We had to get to get an electrician in the middle of an emergency...Thank god we found one that came right out.
We called the electric company and they said we would have to get it inspected before they would hook it up.
The county seat where the inspector is was totally destroyed, 18 miles from us.
So we called the people that repaired the line and they called the electric company and said that they would hook it up since it was an emergency and they would call us. No Call!
So this morning I say a truck drive by I stopped him and he said sure I'll have a crew here as soon as one is free.
15 min. later a truck arrived, hook us back up and we have power again.
I don't think before I open my mouth, I like to be as surprised a everyone else.
PartsBin an Electronics Part Organizer - Release Version 1.1.0 JaxCoder.com
Latest Article: SimpleWizardUpdate
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Mike Hankey wrote: 15 min. later a truck arrived, hook us back up and we have power again.
Nice!
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Yeah, Mike that was quite a storm. Glad you made it through. Wow, 120MPH is cat 3 stuff. Sounds like you have some experience.
We had similar problem in 2008 when hurricane IKE hit Houston. Our winds were not quite as strong at <110mph. Our houses were designed to handle 115 mph so no roof damage. But power was very tricky. Some here, some there, across the street out, but ours on. The big difference is our lines are underground, so to tie ones line to a break was complicated.
Anyway, glad to hear you have power back. Lots of downed branches though. Chain saw time.
"A little time, a little trouble, your better day"
Badfinger
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Yep,
Here is a small failure you probably won't see in the news media. Recently the FBI and CISA announced the closure of "Operation Duck Hunt". An astute reader might have noticed it being described as a "disruption". While the initial media reports described it as a "takedown". Allow me to shed some light on that.
They basically wrote a DLL that would be loaded by Qbot and issues the QPCMD_BOT_SHUTDOWN command. Then sent a C2 command to around 700,000 bots instructing them to download and execute the DLL. A good and solid plan.
But what you haven't heard is that the FBI/CISA tool authors dynamically linked to the C runtime. Guess what happens if you try to run a DLL (dynamic linked to C runtime) but without the C runtime installed?
Those 700,000 computers will certainly have a large percentage without the Visual C++ Redistributable package installed. I can understand why they left the (persistence modules) WMI and scheduled tasks untouched, but dynamic linking the uninstall library looks like rookie ineptitude.
Luckily the C2 servers were apparently seized so it was ultimately a success. But the client software uninstall was a failure.
"I wrote a C++ program that only runs on my computer" is something you might imagine a high school student asking. But I didn't expect that from our nations brightest security teams.
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It was probably written by ChatGPT and c opy'n'pasted without any thought being involved. 
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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FBI wrote: As a result of this operation, the FBI and the Dutch National Police
The Dutch National Police.
Does anyone else still own a fax machine?
Bastard Programmer from Hell 
"If you just follow the bacon Eddy, wherever it leads you, then you won't have to think about politics." -- Some Bell.
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Boy does that bring back memories. Years ago, many years ago, I had written this app for whatever company I was working for then, and it simply wouldn't run anywhere but on my computer. Yup -- dynamically linked to the C runtime, which nobody else had installed.
Granted the problem was easily fixed, though as I recall it took a few hours to figure out why it failed, no error message given.
And then there were more interesting problems, like different DLL versions (often on the sales people's computers) and somehow the app was loading the wrong, older, DLL or something like that, from who knows what folder, and the solution was usually to wipe any residue of the old app and DLL's off the computer, something of a PITA in DOS days, though del foo.dll /s should have worked - I don't really remember why it was more complex than that.
I still have that problem with the .NET runtimes occasionally, but at least the app is kind enough to tell me that the required so-and-so .NET framework is not installed, and here's the unclickable link to go to. Unclickable because it's a popup message where the URL isn't a clicky and the text isn't copy-and-paste'able. 
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I hate DLL's.
"A little time, a little trouble, your better day"
Badfinger
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Randor wrote: But I didn't expect that from our nations brightest security teams.
But they are responsible for security, not software support. Just because it's the FBI does not mean they employ the best software engineers.
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Probably sourced the engineers from Freelancer site for the lowest price possible. 
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They should have asked me, I have extensive experience of writing bad software.
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They would have hired the lowest bidder who would then have used H1-B’s to write it. Those H1-Bs - brought to you by Democrats and RINOs - are lowering wages and bill rates in IT…all to make the big tech owners richer. If you don’t believe me compare the salary of a cloud engineer from 2020 to 2023.
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A lot of software written in C run on a clean Windows install with no further prerequisite; Windows does ship with a version of the runtime.
I suspect - if the details are true - they might have targeted a newer version, which would result in what you're relaying.
Could've been something else altogether. Just sayin' you generally can't count on mainstream reporters for technical accuracy either.
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I suspect about 50% of my time for the past 20 years has been spent dealing with problems that others failed to account for when they created the software.
Originally I figured that it must be an individual fault. But it just happens too much.
Developers get focused. They see a problem. They fix that problem. They very, very seldom consider what the fix means even within the application they are working on much less other possible impacts.
I don't expect that to change.
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Uh... Where have you been in the past several years?
Since the 1980s the US public school systems have been in decline.
Analysts now warn that as a result of this first decline along with the more recent deterioration of our universities, graduates are demonstrating increasingly their inability to perform properly in jobs.
What else did we expect?
The Taiwanese company that agreed to build a new semi-conductor plant in the US has now put an indefinite hold on the project since it cannot find enough technical talent in the United States who can manage the various job requirements the new plant was expected to provide...
Steve Naidamast
Sr. Software Engineer
Black Falcon Software, Inc.
blackfalconsoftware@outlook.com
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Since the 1980s the US public school systems have been in decline.
More like since the 1950s. By 1960 logic and critical thinking had been removed from curriculums, and then the gradual decline in literacy and mathematics.
Much of what U.S. high school students are doing is what 5th and 6th grade students are doing in most countries. If anyone excels in the U.S. public schools they are either very self-motivated or have strong interest and encourgement at home, where they are learning most of what they know.
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Member 14192382 wrote: and then the gradual decline in literacy and mathematics.
I doubt either of those are true.
Certainly the literacy part is not.
National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NAAL) - 120 Years of Literacy[^]
As for math figuring out what the actual achievement levels are is very difficult. Exams that attempted such measurements varied widely for very long periods of time.
So exactly what objective data are you using to make the claim that math achievement has changed between now and then? What is the name of the test that was used in that period?
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I am European, living in the US of A now for 26 years. And I can only concur that both literacy and math are the worst areas of US general education. I see this with clients, when they are complaining how their word processor is marking so much of the text they write has those annoying red squiggly lines all over the place. Or they don't understand why Grammarly keeps suggesting changes to their sentences, that honestly don't make any sense when looking at them.
And general knowledge in math is abysmal, barely anyone can do any kind of basic calculations in their head but need to whip out their trendy smartphone and then try to find the calculator on it. About 80-90% people fail basic multiplication/division before addition/subtraction rules. Or don't question the results of computer based calculations when the end result is obviously wrong due to bad input. Which should have been obvious as they ended up with a 40% difference. Like in an architects office calculating the usable square footage of a 5 story building but only adding up 3 of those 5 floors...
There is a reason why most students in spelling bees or math Olympiads are South and East Asian or (Eastern) European heritage. But hey, all those math challenged US folks are proud to use those most illogical Fred Flintstones units and don't fail to try to convince you why this is sooo much better than using metric... 
And in regards to "writing software", in the last couple decades, the level of actively applicable knowledge, rather the latest "software paradigm of the week", has indeed significantly dropped. All those Kool Koder Kidz think they are the bee's knees, great in story telling to get hired by yet another failed startup, while lacking even basic knowledge of "algorithms and data structures".
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Ralf Quint wrote: I can only concur that both literacy and math are the worst areas of US general education
Perhaps. But that is different than saying it was better in the past.
Ralf Quint wrote: Or don't question the results of computer based calculations when the end result is obviously wrong due to bad input.
First that isn't really a mathematics problem. Well educated (mathematics) people have either accidently or deliberately misused mathematics for a very long time.
Second there is an ongoing and recent problem at least in the social sciences where studies that have been well regarded (and referenced) for decades have been found to be non-repeatable. Multiple studies. Thus there is a push to make the analysis (mathematics) use a more rigorous standard to find a 'success' result. They used the math correct the first time but it was not sufficient to be scientifically valid.
Ralf Quint wrote: There is a reason why most students in spelling bees or math Olympiads are South and East Asian or (Eastern) European heritage.
Except of course that is not a 'school' problem. It would of course be a cultural (home) problem.
Ralf Quint wrote: in the last couple decades, the level of actively applicable knowledge, rather the latest "software paradigm of the week", has indeed significantly dropped.
What is definitely true in the past couple of decades is that volume of choices has gone up significantly. And attempting to choose the 'best' choice was always subjective. More choices is not going to help with that.
Ralf Quint wrote: great in story telling to get hired by yet another failed startup,
Well known that all companies, regardless of business domain, fail at a very high rate. True now and true more than two decades (maybe three) when I first saw that stats on failures. The small strip mall by my house which probably has 20 companies but less than 5 have been there more than 5 years. And that is not just related to covid. Probably easier for a software company to fail because it is also easier for them to start up. A retail store needs inventory to open and that requires more capital than a software shop.
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Steve Naidamast wrote: Since the 1980s the US public school systems have been in decline.
So, you're born in the fifties?
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Yes... 1950...
Steve Naidamast
Sr. Software Engineer
Black Falcon Software, Inc.
blackfalconsoftware@outlook.com
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Steve Naidamast wrote: Since the 1980s the US public school systems have been in decline.
That of course has nothing to do with it. Whether true or not.
For starters of course, developers as a group, have more education and are more likely to have been better students in schools.
And people creating problems that could have been avoided is hardly something new. Wright 'designed' Fallingwater in 1935. So the premier architect managed to design a house that failed from its very creation. Presumably using the 'best' engineers of the time. Decades later it was determined that the design never would have worked at the time. (Presumably they too were focused on the solution and failed to see the problems.)
Steve Naidamast wrote: The Taiwanese company that agreed to build a new semi-conductor plant in the US has now put an indefinite hold on the project since it cannot find enough technical talent in the United States who can manage the various job requirements the new plant was expected to provide...
Not true at all.
First the problems right now are due to construction problems - not production, not chip design problems.
So no idea what problems might develop when it is online. But reasonable to suspect that they are going to have trouble because they will not be willing to pay the much higher costs for talent versus what they expect in Taiwan.
Second Taiwan is suffering its own talent pool shortage in tech jobs. So obviously their school system is not meeting the demand.
Additionally the Taiwan school system is rigidly controlled by the national government. This includes military training at the high school level. Comparing it to the US is not valid because I suspect if the US attempted the same it would require a US Constitutional Amendment to enforce. Not to mention the cultural ideology that drives performance where the family's public reputation is based on the student's performance. Not even sure how one would attempt to move to that in the US besides generations of forced ideological education, which would be sure to run up against religious doctrine.
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I don't understand where you are getting your facts from...
It is already well documented and a known fact in the US employment market that graduating university students from US universities are not doing very well. In many cases it is being found that university graduates do not even have credible levels of reading skills. And many schools no longer teach "cursive", which was a foundation for writing skills.
As for the idea that many professional technicians are better trained than the majority of other workers does not strike me as really realistic considering the worsening problems with business web sites.
The adoption of stupid development paradigms over the years has made corporate development endeavors a nightmare for many with many professional technicians complaining that web development is becoming an impossible endeavoir to do well.
The advent of Microsoft's push for the use of the MVC paradigm in 2010 began this mess in web development but the original catalysts for that were the ideas that came out of the failed Chrysler C2 Payroll system whose lead developers produced the XP development paradigm and paired-programmming, one of the dumbest concoctions the profession ever came up with. When this failed, they moved to Agile, which attempted to dilute solid software engineering principals for the sake of speed of development.
Recently an article has been written that describes the increasing rates of burnout from the DevOps paradigm, another stupid concept, which attempts to meld quality control with development teams.
All of this is a result of stupid technical management that simply want to support business' even more stupid deadline constructs.
Where do you believe all this crap came from? Stupid people!
As to the Taiwanese education system, on average, Asian students are far superior to their White counterparts in the United States as parenting in the US has taken a serious turn for the worse given that so many parents carter to the children's every whim while allowing them to use technologies with abandon. The result is that many White students are basically graduating from university with the maturity levels of vegetables.
All of this has been well documented in the past 10 years, so I have no idea where you are able to make the statements you do, unless of course you are not well read yourself...
Steve Naidamast
Sr. Software Engineer
Black Falcon Software, Inc.
blackfalconsoftware@outlook.com
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