Root Access

studiohack

20:06

> IRS decides to audit Grandpa, and summons him to the IRS office. The IRS auditor was not surprised when Grandpa showed up with his attorney.
The auditor said, 'Well, sir, you have an extravagant lifestyle and no full-time employment, which you explain by saying that you win money gambling.
I'm not sure the IRS finds ...that believable.'
I'm a great gambler, and I can prove it,' says
Grandpa. 'How about a demonstration?'
The auditor thinks for a moment and said, 'Okay. Go ahead.'
Grandpa says, 'I'll bet you a thousand dollars that I can bite my own eye.'

5

lol

Luke

20:18

@studiohack That was an old one, but I couldn't remember till the punch line... So awesome

Blog bot

Blog - Stack Exchange: Podcast #44 – This Should Have Been #43

Alex Miller on March 06, 2013

Welcome Back! Our guest today is the one and only Robert Scoble – blogger and video maker extraordinaire. He’s joined by the usual Stack Exchange crew for a packed hour of fun.

Robert is a geek who gets around and meets startups and tech innovators. He’s calling from Flipboard‘s headquarters in Palo Alto, CA. Joel wonders if Flipboard is just kind of an echo chamber, but it certainly is not! As with much of the internet, your experience with Flipboard depends on who and what you choose to Follow and Like on your social networks. …

studiohack

wow, @nhinkle makes an appearance. /me waves

nhinkle

I'm still kickin', just busy as all get-out.

studiohack

Good to hear

allquixotic

@nhinkle Heh... Hinkle. I haven't heard that name in weeks

Hi!

nhinkle

20:26

Hi :)

allquixotic

can someone approve this edit (by somebody else) so I can edit it and make the images stack.imgur? superuser.com/q/561887/144607

Basil

I just learned about this place.

Because of studiohack's joke :)

allquixotic

@Basil welcome! we're a lot more timid than SF, so hopefully you'll help to keep us rated PG-ish in here ;)

I used to only hang out here but @Tanner suggested the comms room...

Basil

@allquixotic I'll do my best. The implant in my head from sysadmin school starts to heat up sometimes, but I'm a storage admin, so it's a lot smaller and probably does a lot less damage than, for example, @mdmarra's.

allquixotic

@Basil haha or ewwhite's

Basil

20:31

@allquixotic Heh, yeah, either of those guys. Heck, all of them. (heck- see that? :P)

allquixotic

we're all as pure as snow in here. snow that's fallen on Steve Ballmer's head.

Basil

I started this job as a storage admin, but have been spending entirely too much time writing shell scripts in AIX

Luke

The Comms room scares me :(

Basil

I like it there :)

It's a nice casual break from the chaos of work

allquixotic

more are always welcome to come hang out. typical topics include PC/laptop building and speccing out parts (and finding good prices); desktop software; and occasionally light sysadmin stuff (usually Linux).

also, gaming. almost as much as arQade

Basil

20:33

Ok, not what I expected, but I'll take it :) I do a lot of that stuff too, but for some reason, thought this was a unix-topic room

allquixotic

nope, this is Super User's channel, so we tend to discuss things here that would be off topic for a SU question, like shopping for software or hardware, or sometimes we do live technical support for things like "my hard drive made a bad noise", etc

I specced out a whole system adhering to a stated budget for a guy a few weeks ago and he came back and said he loves it

Basil

Fun :)

Oliver Salzburg

Can someone explain to me (again) why Microsoft has to pay $500m for providing a browser with Windows?

allquixotic

@OliverSalzburg they had some kind of contractual agreement to provide users with notification that they could choose alternative browsers, as part of a settlement of an earlier antitrust litigation due to the Netscape browser wars in the early 2000s

Basil

@OliverSalzburg As far as I understand it from briefly reading the headline, it seems that they were given explicit instructions on how to offer their users a choice at installation and they didn't execute what was stipulated there.

Oliver Salzburg

20:35

What is so special about the browser? What don't they have to pay a fine for not providing an alternative text or bitmap editor?

allquixotic

it's a 10 to 15 year old protracted legal battle and the whole thing stems from them failing to adhere to a contractual agreement

Oliver Salzburg

@allquixotic Ooh, so it was a breach of contract kind of thing?

allquixotic

yeah, the half a billion Euro fine boils down to them explicitly agreeing, in writing, to do a specific thing, and then not doing it for 14 months

Tanner

@allquixotic I try to muddy it up a bit now and then with strong language like "hell" and "damn" ;)

Basil

@OliverSalzburg the court hasn't been asked about those things yet and probably won't be unless someone tries to make an alternative and is seriously hampered by the OS

allquixotic

20:36

@Tanner OH MY. I'm going to flag your post.

Oliver Salzburg

Oh well then, I guess they should have kept their stuff in order :D

allquixotic

kidding ;-)

Tanner

@allquixotic Have you seen everybody's favorite 55-gallon drum in the Comms Room yet?

allquixotic

@Tanner huh? no

Oliver Salzburg

Thanks @allquixotic @Basil

Basil

20:37

@allquixotic heh heh...

allquixotic

@OliverSalzburg if this were new litigation I'd be stunned at the price tag, but this is something that started a long time ago and MSFT signed on the bottom line to make amends and take a specific action until 2014

it's a hefty slap because they were already convicted of antitrust violations, told the court they'd do better, and then stopped short... you would expect that if you are trying to correct the behavior of a flippant and monopolistic corporation and they keep on breaking the law (and doing contrary to what you tell them to do) that you're eventually going to charge them a HUGE fine as a "come on now, really, this has to stop NOW"

Desmond Hume

Someone just has downvoted almost all of my questions for some freaking reason. Keep it up SuperUser..

allquixotic

as for the principle of why they don't also get accused of antitrust for things like text and image editors, I have no idea, I guess it's because nobody has complained to the EU about it

technically, Adobe could raise hell with MSFT for shipping Paint and blotting out sales for Photoshop because some users are happy with Paint and don't need to look for alternatives

but Adobe is basically Microsoft Southwest, in that, the two companies have been tied together at the hip for a decade or more

Tanner

@DesmondHume It's because you stopped pushing the button!

allquixotic

@DesmondHume if one person downvoted more than a small handful of your questions and/or answers, the system will catch it as "serial downvoting" and reverse all of it

they haven't said what the serial voting threshold is, but I'd imagine it's somewhere around 3, so if they did much more than that, you can be fairly certain that all of that rep will be refunded to you in full

Desmond Hume

20:43

@allquixotic It's not about rep, it's about sending the ugly message..

Tanner

@DesmondHume Hm, I only see the mass downvotes on your "I don't feel like trying" comment that was misunderstood, and then two downvotes on other questions.

Which not everyone feels like unplugging their computer while it's in sleep mode just to test a theory...

allquixotic

21:30

knowyourmobile.com/google/nexus-x/19675/…

Tanner

21:41

@allquixotic Weird. I can't load it.

allquixotic

@Tanner it's slow, they probably got reddited or some other large news site

studiohack

question: if I let this drive format before I access it, can I recover the data I format afterwards, and in theory get the Windows key back?

@allquixotic, @Tanner thoughts?

Tanner

@studiohack ...huh? why would you format it before trying to access it?

studiohack

@Tanner the failed drive shows up in 'Computer' after a long time, but wants me to format first

Tanner

Just photorec it now

studiohack

21:45

photorec?

Tanner

@studiohack cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec

Or some kind of file recovery

studiohack

@Tanner just found it, thanks! any good?

will it do a failed drive like that?

Tanner

well, you won't get any files names >_< so good luck finding the relevant data...

studiohack

@Tanner really?

Tanner

you might have better luck with another file recovery program

studiohack

21:46

all I need is the system32 folder

Tanner

I forget which actual file the windows key is in...

but it probably has no file extension either =\ so you might be digging through ridiculous amounts of worthless data

studiohack

@Tanner doesn't even recognize the drive

allquixotic

it might be actively in the process of dy*ing*

Tanner

@studiohack Linux won't recognize it either?

allquixotic

I don't honestly know what to do in this case because anything you do might break it

studiohack

21:49

@Tanner Slax wouldn't show it mounted

@allquixotic I needs to be taken out behind the building and beaten.

Journeyman Geek

@studiohack: a livecd might be able to read a 'broken' NTFS drive. DO NOT FORMAT IT.

Tanner

I agree. I see no advantage to formatting it...

Journeyman Geek

good news is, I've had drives like that be formatted, and work afterwards

but data recovery first, try mounting in linux, grab the hive, check for key

slhck

Aw man.

My regular internet connection is crappy again, and I suddenly find an open NETGEAR network with a router that has admin/password access.

How do I let these poor people know that they should secure their network?

studiohack

@JourneymanGeek already tried Slax Live CD

@slhck "secure" it for them. :P

@JourneymanGeek how would I mount it when I don't know where it is?

Tanner

21:58

Yeah, you should definitely admin it for them. =D

studiohack

shouldn't it mount on it's own?

slhck

I'd like to triangulate them to see where they live. Can't be more than 30m away.

studiohack

@slhck 30 meters? just knock on doors :P

allquixotic

@slhck do like Comcast and inject a popup into their http traffic saying "your network is unsecure!"

slhck

@studiohack Not at 11 PM :P

allquixotic

22:00

do Six Strikes for unsecured wifi -- if after 6 attempts to tell them it's unsecure they still persist, then start throttling the connection speed... slowly

slhck

@allquixotic I'd love to do that. Or install a parental control filter that blocks the most common English and German words.

allquixotic

then use firesheep to sniff their credentials to some forum they use and post as them on their favorite forum saying "I'm running an unsecured wifi network!"

slhck

This chat was sponsored by your neighbor's free WiFi

allquixotic

or (a bit more friendly) register your own account and PM them

Journeyman Geek

@studiohack: nope

I usually check the contents of /dev/ , then look up how to force mount

allquixotic

22:02

you can also try ntfsfix to get it mounted properly

it likes to eat data though

nom nom nom

studiohack

that hurts... I hate this.

I hate NOT fixing things. Bugs me more than anything else in the world

@slhck or that script that turns everything upside down

Oliver Salzburg

22:30

> Cover photos just got bigger

O__o Woah :D

I'm liking this new Google+

Big surprise!

Rudá Almeida

23:05

NO JAVA I WON'T INSTALL ASK TOOLBAR!!!

2

studiohack

@RudáAlmeida I install Java many times in my IT environment. I'm so sick of that.

Rudá Almeida

@studiohack Give them Oracle guys a break, they're so poor, they need the toolbar money!

studiohack

Java needs to stay in the coffee biz.

Tanner

ninite.com

install that stuff silently with no toolbars :P

studiohack

@Tanner I forgot about that - that would be awesome for mass deploys of Flash and Java at once

Rudá Almeida

23:29

How can I find the individual paid storage usage for each Google service I use?

Rudá Almeida

23:40

@OliverSalzburg How long will it take for personalized URLs? It's about time!

Tanner

@RudáAlmeida The Oatmeal already has one :P http://plus.google.com/blergasdf1234thimbleturdorgasm99meatpoopypoopxv9donkeypi‌e

Einsteins Grandson

hey

any Netbeans and Java programmers here?

allquixotic

@EinsteinsGrandson yep

Einsteins Grandson

Thank God

So, do I have to have JRE installed before I install NetBeans?

allquixotic

23:56

@EinsteinsGrandson yes; I think they used to distribute the JRE with netbeans but no more

Einsteins Grandson

So, 1. install JRE

2. install JDK

3. install NetBeans

right?

allquixotic

@EinsteinsGrandson the JDK isn't needed anymore, I don't think

you can install the JDK instead of the JRE if you want

the JDK comes with a JRE environment

Einsteins Grandson

so, do I need JDK or JRE?

allquixotic

oh. Eclipse has their own compiler so they don't depend on the JDK, but I think Netbeans still uses your JDK's compiler, so it does need the JDK

just download the JDK, and not the JRE

it can't hurt

JDK = JRE plus development stuff

Einsteins Grandson

ok

I will only download JDK

thank you

Luke

23:59

-1

A: File manager for Windows

what a dumb question, just use the one it came with it!!!

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