Windows 7 love/hate checklist

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koan
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Post by koan »

I love that you can do a factory restore from the control panel without the use of multiple discs.

I hate that everything looks different and am having trouble separating what changed from windows and what changed because I have touch screen software.

hmmm. that was a half assed hate so, change that to: I hate that it doesn't come with a version of outlook for mail.

Please add your love/hates to the list.
koan
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Post by koan »

re touch screen monitors:

I love that I can draw with my finger and hate that my cat can start programs with her tail.
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Dixie
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Post by Dixie »

I hated it, it chewed my computer to pieces and did not recognise my peripherals.

Also, - I'm sure it is just me - I find all that gimmickry graphics a bit insulting.

Me and Windows 7, we will not get along...
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Post by spot »

Dixie;1338153 wrote: I hated it, it chewed my computer to pieces and did not recognise my peripherals.

Me and Windows 7, we will not get along...


It's really not intended for back-porting onto older hardware regardless of how fast that might be. New equipment's recognized, it has to be or there wouldn't be a market for the hardware. I'm not sure what benefit there would be to buying a Windows 7 license for a computer already running, say, Vista.
Nullius in verba ... ☎||||||||||| ... To Fate I sue, of other means bereft, the only refuge for the wretched left.
When flower power came along I stood for Human Rights, marched around for peace and freedom, had some nooky every night - we took it serious.
Who has a spare two minutes to play in this month's FG Trivia game! ... My other OS is Slackware.
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Post by yaaarrrgg »

My problem with it has nothing to do with the technical side of it, but the business side. It's closed source, and controlled by an abusive monopoly.
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Post by spot »

What's wrong with closed source, out of interest?
Nullius in verba ... ☎||||||||||| ... To Fate I sue, of other means bereft, the only refuge for the wretched left.
When flower power came along I stood for Human Rights, marched around for peace and freedom, had some nooky every night - we took it serious.
Who has a spare two minutes to play in this month's FG Trivia game! ... My other OS is Slackware.
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Post by kazalala »

i have windows 7, im finding it ok so far, but i only use my computer for leisure now really




FOC THREAD PART1

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Post by spot »

kazalala;1338214 wrote: i only use my computer for leisure now reallyYou can get peripherals for that? Good lord.
Nullius in verba ... ☎||||||||||| ... To Fate I sue, of other means bereft, the only refuge for the wretched left.
When flower power came along I stood for Human Rights, marched around for peace and freedom, had some nooky every night - we took it serious.
Who has a spare two minutes to play in this month's FG Trivia game! ... My other OS is Slackware.
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Post by yaaarrrgg »

spot;1338206 wrote: What's wrong with closed source, out of interest?


There's a couple issues.

One that most affects the typical end user is the securty of closed source projects tends to be worse than an equivalent open source project. Fewer developers can review the code, and fix it when they know of a problem. It's all controlled by one entity. There's also a conflict of interest in that it costs the company money to fix their code, so often they just stay mum, until someone releases a demo of a zero-day exploit, and they are forced to fix it.

To me, it seems like Microsoft in particular is more interested in selling "features" around their poor security (like "easy factory restore") than actually solving the security problems. Which if they had done their jobs, we shouldn't need to restore the box in the first place.

I've never had to restore my Linux machines after they were set up and working. I have, on the other hand, had a Windows MS box wiped out by a virus, and seen a whole Microsoft shop wiped out by a Windows server exploit. I've heard people argue that Linux is only safer because it's not as popular, but this is hogwash. The internet is mostly driven by Linux. The machines have to be secure, because the servers are open to attack 24/7. Unlike a Windows machine, which was designed to be a single user computer, and never was intended to be hooked up the internet like it is today.

For developers, it's a pain if closed source software breaks, since you always have to shell out money, and end up getting locked into a particular platform. At which point, if a major company goes under (like DEC) or decides to quadruple their prices, there's nothing a person can do about it. Like when I replaced a hard drive on my computer, I've had the OEM restore disk say it's not the same computer, and refuse to install.

Nor can you use or look at the code, to actually understand how it really works (versus how it's documented).
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Post by kazalala »

spot;1338222 wrote: You can get peripherals for that? Good lord.


yea,, you can get cream for that too;)




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Post by spot »

Last time I checked, the prevalent view was that BSD has the edge when it comes to constructing a secure server or firewall. Regardless, I tend to think that known exploits exist in every operating system. Fortunately I don't annoy anyone important enough to know a chap who can use them. The set of people knowing them tends to be small because once they're widely known they get closed.

Any package is a black box. For a given input there's a predictable output though whether the output's what you expect is a different matter, that's why computers and systems need testing. My main interest is whether it will allow me to efficiently achieve what I want. I remember life before Microsoft. God bless Bill Gates, that's what I reckon, and all the other nerds who built the infrastructure I get so much out of. I'm standing on the shoulders of giants every time I touch a keyboard.
Nullius in verba ... ☎||||||||||| ... To Fate I sue, of other means bereft, the only refuge for the wretched left.
When flower power came along I stood for Human Rights, marched around for peace and freedom, had some nooky every night - we took it serious.
Who has a spare two minutes to play in this month's FG Trivia game! ... My other OS is Slackware.
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Post by fuzzywuzzy »

Just like to add my bit .

I HATE WINDOWS SEVEN!!!!!!!:-5:-5:-5:-5:-5:-5
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Post by CARLA »

Hate Windows 7 ??? it is light years above VISTA and is nothing more that a puffed up WINDOWS XP.. !! Could it be you just don't know how to use it?
ALOHA!!

MOTTO TO LIVE BY:

"Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand, champagne in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming.

WOO HOO!!, what a ride!!!"

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Post by fuzzywuzzy »

I didn't want it . It was forced upon me . I was very happy with XP I knew XP I can't even post a photo anymore on a forum. and trying to connect any hardware to the bloody thing is ridiculas
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Post by yaaarrrgg »

spot;1338239 wrote: Last time I checked, the prevalent view was that BSD has the edge when it comes to constructing a secure server or firewall. Regardless, I tend to think that known exploits exist in every operating system. Fortunately I don't annoy anyone important enough to know a chap who can use them. The set of people knowing them tends to be small because once they're widely known they get closed.




BSD might be more secure, that wouldn't surprise me. For the record, I used to be a Microsoft fan (back in the day of DOS and Win 3.1). And for work, I still develop for both. :)

Today I'm seeing Vista and Windows 7 currently rated as "highly critical" on secunia's advisories:

Microsoft Windows Vista - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community

Microsoft Windows 7 - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community

In contrast, Ubuntu is all patched up:

Ubuntu Linux 10.04 - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community

And this is a pretty standard snapshot of the systems, over the last couple years that I've been watching them. For a company that charges as much as it does for their buggy software, this is inexcusable.

Just the other month or so, I saw that Microsoft sat on one security hole (insecure dll loading) for ten years, before announcing they were going to refuse to fix the problem, once a zero-day exploit was released. What can anyone do about it? One company controls it all.
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Post by CARLA »

That's unfortunate was it on a new machine our upgraded on an old PC/laptop? As far as hardware you can easily search the internet for drivers that are windows 7 compatiable for your printers/fax/copier/camera's most have them now download and install should work.



Yes it does do pictures, videos etc differently but practice doing it ahead of time. Or find the picture you want and copy it to your desktop then upload it to FG.







I didn't want it . It was forced upon me . I was very happy with XP I knew XP I can't even post a photo anymore on a forum. and trying to connect any hardware to the bloody thing is ridiculas

ALOHA!!

MOTTO TO LIVE BY:

"Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand, champagne in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming.

WOO HOO!!, what a ride!!!"

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Post by koan »

I thought I was going to have a problem using my scanner/printer with Windows 7 as the installation discs resulted in a "fail" message. Just to be sure, I plugged the printer into the USB port without the disc. Instantly an "installing driver" icon showed up in the task bar and a minute later I was printing my document.

Actually said "I think I love Windows 7" out loud.
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Post by Dixie »

I heard on the radio that Microsoft has a very huge budget to promote this Windows 7.

Being just nasty, (because I had a bad experience,) I wonder why this is necessary if the product was good.
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Post by koan »

I'd guess it was because they've had other windows systems that actively sucked.
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Post by Dixie »

A: I hear that if you play the Windows 7 DVD backwards, you get a Satanic message!

B: That's nothing. If you play it forward, it installs Windows 7

(Sorry could not resist)
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Post by koan »

I'm getting used to where they filed everything so I'm feeling more comfortable with it now. Still won't be at ease until I can tell someone from memory how to find all the basic tasks and functions.
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Post by buttercup »

Hmm its on my new netbook, i dont think i like it but i despise all new things for months so i may come round. How do i change all my word documents opening in notebook automatically? Now thats annoying.
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Post by koan »

buttercup;1338736 wrote: Hmm its on my new netbook, i dont think i like it but i despise all new things for months so i may come round. How do i change all my word documents opening in notebook automatically? Now thats annoying.


You have to have either Word or Open Office installed. Word requires setup to get it started, registering etc. When you install the program you want to open with it will ask which file extensions you want to associate with the program. There is another way to reassign extensions but I don't know it by memory yet.
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Post by JacksDad »

Right click on the document and choose "Open With".

It's still Windows. Just with a boob job.
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Post by CARLA »

LOL exactly..!! :)

Right click on the document and choose "Open With".

It's still Windows. Just with a boob job.
ALOHA!!

MOTTO TO LIVE BY:

"Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand, champagne in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming.

WOO HOO!!, what a ride!!!"

koan
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Post by koan »

does that method follow with asking whether the doc type should be assigned to that program?

... so it becomes automatic
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CARLA
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Post by CARLA »

Yes once you select "Open With" it will keep it that way till you change it. Of course if you want it to open with Microsoft Word you have to have it installed on you PC/Laptop.
ALOHA!!

MOTTO TO LIVE BY:

"Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand, champagne in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming.

WOO HOO!!, what a ride!!!"

koan
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Post by koan »

hehe... just remembered why I thought it was more complicated. I spent 15 minutes trying to open a .pages file on a PC lol

just assumed it was .doc
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Post by yaaarrrgg »

yaaarrrgg;1338306 wrote: Today I'm seeing Vista and Windows 7 currently rated as "highly critical" on secunia's advisories:

Microsoft Windows Vista - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community

Microsoft Windows 7 - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community

In contrast, Ubuntu is all patched up:

Ubuntu Linux 10.04 - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community




And more than a week later:

Windows is still rated at "highly critical."

Ubuntu: 0 unpatched security holes.

I'm curious how many weeks it will take to fix the security problems. I wouldn't hold my breath though. Over the last several years, I have NEVER seen a time when Microsoft patched all the known security problems.
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Post by Bryn Mawr »

yaaarrrgg;1339800 wrote: And more than a week later:

Windows is still rated at "highly critical."

Ubuntu: 0 unpatched security holes.

I'm curious how many weeks it will take to fix the security problems. I wouldn't hold my breath though. Over the last several years, I have NEVER seen a time when Microsoft patched all the known security problems.


Do you notice the level of the reports as well? Almost all of the Ubuntu reports are green or amber (more green than amber) with all of the red ones being in third party software whereas nearly half of the Windoze reports were red and almost all in the Micro$oft code.

The other notable point is that all of the Ubuntu reports were within two months of initial release and, as you say, all now fixed.
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Post by yaaarrrgg »

Bryn Mawr;1339804 wrote: Do you notice the level of the reports as well? Almost all of the Ubuntu reports are green or amber (more green than amber) with all of the red ones being in third party software whereas nearly half of the Windoze reports were red and almost all in the Micro$oft code.

The other notable point is that all of the Ubuntu reports were within two months of initial release and, as you say, all now fixed.


That's an interesting point. Also, just from watching it, it seems like Ubuntu patches problems very quickly (less than 24 hours). I've only caught one day when Ubuntu was in the green or yellow. I wish the graphs would show how long the vunerabilities are left unpatched, in addition to how severe they are, since it seems like a night-and-day difference and I know it isn't just my imagination. :)
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Post by Bryn Mawr »

yaaarrrgg;1339820 wrote: That's an interesting point. Also, just from watching it, it seems like Ubuntu patches problems very quickly (less than 24 hours). I've only caught one day when Ubuntu was in the green or yellow. I wish the graphs would show how long the vunerabilities are left unpatched, in addition to how severe they are, since it seems like a night-and-day difference and I know it isn't just my imagination. :)


I work for a big corporation and it sickens me how long it takes to get the smallest change through the bureaucracy of "the system".

Those that act for the love of the product can see the problem and fix it before those working from the profit motive can get permission to look at the code.
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Post by yaaarrrgg »

yaaarrrgg;1338306 wrote: Today I'm seeing Vista and Windows 7 currently rated as "highly critical" on secunia's advisories:

Microsoft Windows Vista - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community

Microsoft Windows 7 - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community

In contrast, Ubuntu is all patched up:

Ubuntu Linux 10.04 - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community

And this is a pretty standard snapshot of the systems, over the last couple years that I've been watching them. For a company that charges as much as it does for their buggy software, this is inexcusable.




And more than a month later... Windows is still running with security holes rated at "highly critical." :)
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Post by Tuxr99 »

I'm not a windows user, (I use linux) but my friend says the Photo Gallery in Win7 sucks bad compared to Vista's. If it wasn't for that, he would be using Win7.
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Post by yaaarrrgg »

Looks like Windows 7 security not getting better any time soon. Security holes have been rated as "highly critical" for the last couple months:

Microsoft Windows 7 - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community
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Post by Tuxr99 »

CARLA;1338301 wrote: Hate Windows 7 ??? it is light years above VISTA and is nothing more that a puffed up WINDOWS XP.. !! Could it be you just don't know how to use it?


I agree that win7 is better than vista, but that's not saying much. It's still windows. :-(

What do I like about windows? I like the fact that most people use it, have problems, then call me. ;-) If the masses were using an actual stable OS, A LOT of people would be out of work.

What do I not like about it? Everything. It's just not for me. Don't take offense windows users, it's OK if you like it. Really, it is.
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Post by spot »

It's rather like watching someone disrespect Einstein on the grounds that anyone who doesn't see ten-dimensional strings is the right answer must be a fool.
Nullius in verba ... ☎||||||||||| ... To Fate I sue, of other means bereft, the only refuge for the wretched left.
When flower power came along I stood for Human Rights, marched around for peace and freedom, had some nooky every night - we took it serious.
Who has a spare two minutes to play in this month's FG Trivia game! ... My other OS is Slackware.
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Post by yaaarrrgg »

If Einstein works at Microsoft, they need to have him fix the security problems. Still at "highly critical" :)

Microsoft Windows 7 - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community
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Post by spot »

yaaarrrgg;1351712 wrote: If Einstein works at Microsoft, they need to have him fix the security problems. Still at "highly critical" :)I don't know of any modern operating system from any source at all which provides both Internet access and an absence of security breaches, do you? And my own opinion, for what it's worth, is that locating and fixing any one of them would be equally difficult regardless of whose operating system it is.

If there were an Internet-accessing operating system with no security holes, you can bet the US government would mandate it for all its departments.
Nullius in verba ... ☎||||||||||| ... To Fate I sue, of other means bereft, the only refuge for the wretched left.
When flower power came along I stood for Human Rights, marched around for peace and freedom, had some nooky every night - we took it serious.
Who has a spare two minutes to play in this month's FG Trivia game! ... My other OS is Slackware.
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Post by yaaarrrgg »

spot;1351723 wrote: I don't know of any modern operating system from any source at all which provides both Internet access and an absence of security breaches, do you? And my own opinion, for what it's worth, is that locating and fixing any one of them would be equally difficult regardless of whose operating system it is.

If there were an Internet-accessing operating system with no security holes, you can bet the US government would mandate it for all its departments.


Well, Ubuntu's still all patched up :)

Ubuntu Linux 10.04 - Advisories by Product - Advisories - Community

Speaking of governments, what I think is interesting is the Stuxnet worm and what it means for other countries who use Windows. The funny thing is, Microsoft's security problems just happened to help the U.S. achieve it's goal of crippling Iran's nuclear program. The worm exploited four unknown security holes in Windows, or at least, unknown to the public.

Governments are switching away from Windows. The U.S. has to some degree:

Linux adoption - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Post by Ahso! »

It's taken them long enough. Why anyone other than people making a living of Windows is still using it is beyond me, though that's an easy accomplishment.
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Post by spot »

yaaarrrgg;1351819 wrote: Well, Ubuntu's still all patched up :)


I'm not arguing whether today for a given operating system there are any known zero-day exploits available capable of maliciously compromising the data content of the computer. I'm saying that in the course of using a computer there are no operating systems I'm aware of which do not from time to time have such a known exploit, and if I have data on that computer then for at least brief periods the security of my data may well be compromised. Some external third party may gain access to my machine by those means and extract information I want to keep private. Not every day, I agree, but it only takes one time for my secrets to never be secret again.

So, I suggest, what I was writing about and what you wrote about are two entirely unrelated matters.
Nullius in verba ... ☎||||||||||| ... To Fate I sue, of other means bereft, the only refuge for the wretched left.
When flower power came along I stood for Human Rights, marched around for peace and freedom, had some nooky every night - we took it serious.
Who has a spare two minutes to play in this month's FG Trivia game! ... My other OS is Slackware.
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Post by Bryn Mawr »

spot;1351831 wrote: I'm not arguing whether today for a given operating system there are any known zero-day exploits available capable of maliciously compromising the data content of the computer. I'm saying that in the course of using a computer there are no operating systems I'm aware of which do not from time to time have such a known exploit, and if I have data on that computer then for at least brief periods the security of my data may well be compromised. Some external third party may gain access to my machine by those means and extract information I want to keep private. Not every day, I agree, but it only takes one time for my secrets to never be secret again.

So, I suggest, what I was writing about and what you wrote about are two entirely unrelated matters.


Given that every operating system will, from time to time, have security issues, surely the important fact is how rapidly those issues are resolved?

That being so, that there are no unresolved issues in Ubuntu and have been none since two months after the latest release came out, the fact that there are several major and many less major issues with Windows7 is a significant indicator of the relative merits of the two systems.
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Post by spot »

We shall have to differ on what's important. Either private information can be safely placed on an Internet-enabled computer or it can't. Mostly safe doesn't go with private, they exist on different levels.

In my opinion private information can't be safely placed on any home PC, Internet-enabled or not, but that's for a whole different set of reasons.
Nullius in verba ... ☎||||||||||| ... To Fate I sue, of other means bereft, the only refuge for the wretched left.
When flower power came along I stood for Human Rights, marched around for peace and freedom, had some nooky every night - we took it serious.
Who has a spare two minutes to play in this month's FG Trivia game! ... My other OS is Slackware.
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Post by Bryn Mawr »

spot;1351839 wrote: We shall have to differ on what's important. Either private information can be safely placed on an Internet-enabled computer or it can't. Mostly safe doesn't go with private, they exist on different levels.

In my opinion private information can't be safely placed on any home PC, Internet-enabled or not, but that's for a whole different set of reasons.


Then we shall have to differ. What is important, in my opinion, is that when there is a known weakness in a system's security those responsible for that system act efficiently and effectively to remove that weakness.

We all accept that a new weakness might be discovered tomorrow and we can evaluate the risk of that happening when we decide to store our private data. The criteria I use to do that include the number of such weaknesses and the speed with which they are resolved - both indicate to me the care which the authors take over their product.

There is no doubting that anything truly private cannot be entrusted to a computer but there are degrees of privacy and acceptable risk, saying "either it can or it can't" ignores that. If you wish to make the decision "I will never entrust anything of any level of privacy to a PC" then so be it. In my world there is a degree of privacy below which, for any given system, I would make the decision that the level of risk was acceptable. That degree of privacy would be higher for Ubuntu than it would be for Windows.

In either event, if I decided that encryption was needed, I'd use my own routines before I'd trust anything commercial.
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Post by spot »

Bryn Mawr;1351846 wrote: In either event, if I decided that encryption was needed, I'd use my own routines before I'd trust anything commercial.
That depends on who you're afraid might read it.

If it's a commercial competitor, he's as little chance of accessing a backdoor as you have.

If it's Cheltenham then I agree, they quite likely could if they felt the need. But who would they tell? The existence of the backdoor is more important a bit of information than what you stored in the first place. They may well know but they can't distribute it widely. Certainly not to your competitor. Nor, I suspect, your local CID or you'd have read about the backdoor in the national press. Well, The Register anyway.
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