Category: Computers, Science & Technology

I don’t think so! Apple iCloud may be a “me to” copy of DropBox, but it is for Apple-only devices. DropBox is cross-platform! I can’t see existing DropBox users leaving them for iCloud!

“There is some overlap, but the two services aren’t really comparable; iCloud is primarily aimed at making iOS devices & iTunes more convenient,” said Drew Houston, CEO and co-founder of Dropbox, in an e-mailed statement. “There’s a big world beyond Apple, and our users love that Dropbox works just as well with your Android phone or PC as with your iPad or iPhone.”

I’d say so! Whether I am on a Mac, Linux box, or my Windows systems, I can use DropBox. Even my JoliCloud Cloud client netbook has Dropbox on it. So, I’d say DropBox is safe!

So, Oracle finally gave up on OpenOffice. Good for them. I just wish it hadn’t been so long a process!

Oracle Donates OpenOffice.org Open-Source Project to Apache

“In a surprising move, Oracle hands over the source code for OpenOffice, the popular open-source office-productivity suite to its erstwhile adversary, Apache.

The open-source office-productivity suite OpenOffice has a surprising new home: Apache. There was some speculation Oracle might donate the project to the The Document Foundation, the group of developers that split from OpenOffice to launch LibreOffice last fall.

OpenOffice will join Apache Software Foundation as an ‘incubator’ project, Oracle said June 1. As an incubator project, OpenOffice must mature and prove its viability and sustainability before graduating to full project status. Oracle has assigned the trademark to Apache, as well.

‘The Apache Software foundation’s model makes it possible for commercial and individual volunteer contributors to collaborate on open-source product development,’ Oracle said.

Oracle had promised that it would fully relinquish control over the open-source project and donate it to the community April 15. The company also appears to be trying to silence its critics who claim the database giant is anti-open source. Donating the code to venerable Apache, home of the popular Apache Web Server, proves that Oracle is committed to the developer and open-source communities, the company said.

“Donating OpenOffice.org to Apache gives this popular consumer software a mature, open and well-established infrastructure to continue well into the future,” said Luke Kowalski, the vice-president of Oracle’s corporate architecture group.

The move was surprising, as Oracle and Apache have had a contentious relationship over another open-source project, Java. Oracle subpoenaed Apache as part of its lawsuit against Google for violating Java patents in the Android mobile operating system. Oracle also blocked Apache’s Project Harmony from getting a Java license, which resulted in Apache quitting the Java Community Process in protest.

IBM relies heavily on OpenOffice and the ODF (Open Document Format) for its own Lotus Symphony office suite. The company, which had been lobbying for Oracle to spin off Open Office in the first place, immediately welcomed Oracle’s decision.

Sony can’t catch a break! They were hacked and lost 1 million more user’s info!

Sony hacked again, 1 million user accounts compromised

“The same group that was responsible for hacking into PBS’ site recently to post fake news claiming Tupac Shakur was alive has set its sights on Sony. Lulz Boat said it had broke into the SonyPictures.com website and compromised the personal information of one million users.

Among the information is name, password, e-mail address, date of birth, and home address. Any other information the user opted to share with Sony is also in the hands of these hackers as well. The hackers were only able to download data on 150,000 of those users, but walked away with admin details and 3.5 million music coupons and 75,000 music codes, it said.

For Sony, it’s only the latest in a series of at least a dozen hacks to various properties over the past two months. The most serious obviously was the hack that took down the PlayStation Network, but smaller hacks have occurred to other Sony properties, including Sony Online Entertainment and Sony Ericsson Canada.

What may be most embarrassing for Sony is again the company has been revealed to have done a poor job with securing data. The hackers said that passwords were stored without any encryption at all — in plain text — making it even easier for them to break into compromised accounts with little trouble.”

Microsoft, in their tease of Windows 8, which looks like Windows Phone, is basically telling businesses to stick with Windows 7 for their standard office desktops. Windows 8 is really aimed at tablets, which are expected to “take over” the world anyway. It is a BIG gamble on Microsoft’s part!

I suppose it may be encouraging to Open Source folks that may see it as a chance for Linux to get a bigger share of desktops. However, even Ubuntu is moving away from “standard” types of UIs with it’s new Unity interface. Not that Unity isn’t workable… but, it is more “tile-ly” as well.

And, of course, you have Google moving toward a Cloud oriented OS with Chrome, where essentially, the browser is the OS. Who will “win out?” What is the future of computing? It gets more interesting, that’s for sure!

This is the second time in three months that Google has had to take apps out of the Android Market due to malware infections. Sigh.

Google faces new round of Android malware

“Computerworld – For the second time in three months, Google yanked dozens of malware-infected smartphone apps from the Android Market.

The 34 apps were pulled over the weekend and Tuesday by Google after security researchers notified the company.

Google acknowledged giving some Android apps the heave-ho. ‘We’ve suspended a number of suspicious applications from Android Market and are continuing to investigate them,’ a Google spokeswoman said in an email reply to questions late Tuesday.

As in the March episode, when Google removed more than 50 apps, the newest round consisted of pirated legitimate programs that had been modified with malicious code and then re-released to the Android Market under false names.

But there was an important difference to this campaign, said Kevin Mahaffey, co-founder and CTO of Lookout, a San Francisco firm that specializes in mobile security.

‘These apps have the ability to fire up a page on the Android Market,’ said Mahaffey, adding that the hackers can send commands to the smartphone telling it which Market page to display.

He speculated that the attackers probably intended the new feature as a way to dupe users into downloading additional rogue apps that would have malicious functions, just as a hijacked PC is told to retrieve more malware.”

Is that good? It is all “tile-based” and colorful, but will it be usable?

Sinofsky shows off Windows 8 at D9

“Microsoft gave an early demonstration of the new look and capability of the next generation of Windows today at the D9 conference.

President of Windows Steven Sinofsky also gave an early preview even before he took the stage in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif., to his conference hosts at the All Things D blog. For now it’s called Windows 8, but Sinofsky says that’s just a code name.

‘We tried with Windows 8 to re-imagine how you work with a PC,’ Sinofsky said on stage during an interview with D9 host Walt Mossberg.

The first noticeable change is the start menu (pictured above), which has been drastically altered to look a lot more like Windows Phone 7. As for other changes, the system requirements for Windows 8 won’t be more than what’s required for a PC to run Windows 7. It will run on Intel, AMD processors, and ARM chips, something we learned earlier this year. The development platform is based on HTML5 and JavaScript. Any applications created for a touch (tablet) interface can also work with a mouse and keyboard. There’s also an option for a split virtual keyboard for typing on a tablet.

He says it will work on laptops, desktops, and tablets, and that everything that worked with Windows 7 will work with the next-generation OS as well. When using existing desktop applications, the interface goes to a very Windows 7-like desktop.

To log in to Windows 8 requires just a swipe up from the bottom of the screen. Applications will be launched from a series of tiles. Included in the the start-up menu tiles is a direct link to a Microsoft Store, which suggests Microsoft will have its own version of an online application store, similar to the Mac App Store.”

It seems that they finally got it back up!

Sony restores all PlayStation Network services

“Sony has completed its restoration of the PlayStation Network and Qriocity music service after a data breach forced a shutdown in April.

Most notable is the return of the PlayStation Store, where players can download demos, videos and other content as well as purchase games.

The official PlayStation blog has a very long list of content that has recently been added. Publisher Bethesda Softworks has also confirmed the second piece of DLC for Fallout: New Vegas, titled “Honest Hearts” is now available for PS3.

The PlayStation Store went down with the rest of PSN on April 20, when Sony took down the services to battle a massive data breach exposing users’ personal information.

Last month, Sony launched an initial restoration of PSN, which brought back user access to accounts and online gameplay.

However, prepare to wait a while to gain access to the PlayStation Store. Destructoid reports users may see error messages as Sony deals with the surge of traffic to the store.”

Huh? Well, I know most of the readers of the Dr. Bill Blog are probably NOT Internet Explorer users, but there IS a “Zero-Day” hack that can hijack cookies if you DO use IE!

Zero-Day “Cookiejacking” Hack Affects All IE Browsers, But Is It Serious?

“A sophisticated new hack has emerged as a zero-day exploit for all versions of Internet Explorer. Dubbed ‘cookiejacking,’ it is a way for hackers to take control of users browser identities and thus be able to impersonate them on Facebook, Twitter or any encrypted bank or retail site.

A play off the now familiar ‘clickjacking’ term, cookiejacking happens when a hacker gets a user to drag and drop an item on a website enabled for the hack. It was discovered by Italian security researcher Rosario Valotta, who presented his findings it at two European security conferences earlier this year before publishing them on his blog. Given the nature of the attack and specificity of the attack, is this something that Internet Explorer users really need to worry about?

Essentially, cookiejacking is enabled when a malicious website gets a users to load a cookie from an Internet zone to a personal zone (one that has access to your cookies).

Valotta told Reuters that he published the game he used to demonstrate cookiejacking on Facebook and was able to get 80 cookies on his server from his 150 Facebook friends.

Microsoft told ComputerWorld that it does not see the attack as serious, given the specific requirements of the hack. Yet, with things such as Facebook games and applications, (think, ‘put the ball in the hoop to win a prize’), cookiejacking could become a very real threat when implemented into the wild of the Web.”

Ouch! A login issue for Skype user’s… it has been a hard week for Skype!

Skype Scrambles to Fix Login Glitch

“Skype issued an update for Skype for Windows to fix a login glitch that locked out some users yesterday, and it promised a new Mac version for today.

Skype’s Peter Parkes reported yesterday in a blog post that a ‘small number’ of users, mostly people using Skype for Windows, were experiencing trouble logging into Skype. Apparently, the problem was caused by a specific xml file, ‘shared.xml.’ To fix the problem manually, Parkes provided instructions for users on Windows (7, XP, and Vista), Mac OS X, and Linux machines, which consisted of quitting the app and deleting the file.

In a later post, Parkes said that the company understands that the manual instructions were ‘fairly technical’ and was working to create updates to fix the problems automatically. Subsequently, a new version of Skype for Windows is now available for download, and Parkes promised an update for Mac today, while Linux users should still follow the manual instructions.

Those using Skype on their mobile phones or TV should not have been affected by the corruption. While this glitch only affected a ‘small percentage of users,’ it brings to mind the system-wide failure Skype experienced last December that paralyzed service for the voice- and video-chatting service worldwide. Skype was able to identify and fix the problem just in time to get the service online for the Christmas holiday, but the outage raised questions about the VoIP service’s reliability.”

It happened to me just yesterday! I logged into my laptop, and, “Yikes!” My profile was “gone!” No desktop shortcuts I had created, no documents in “Documents,” etc. Man! Severe bummer! Of course, the files were still there, I found them in C:\Users\ but I was no longer “pointing” to it in my profile. But, I found an easy fix, so if it happens to you, do this:

• You must have administrative privileges to do this. Run REGEDIT
• Navigate to:
  “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList”
• You should find your profile key, with another named identically except for a “.bak” extension
• Delete the “normally named” key
• Rename the “.bak” named key to remove the “.bak” extension
• Restart your machine

If you do not have administrative privileges, you will need to fist sign on with a user ID that does. Viola! It is fixed! Why did it happen in the first place? Well, it IS windows, Dewd!