bwintx - Slashdot User

Submission + - What is the best way to deal with a team unwilling to do Agile 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 13, 2012 @05:25AM

An anonymous reader writes: I recently started a new job as a developer (non-lead) at a decently well-known software shop that has massive, worldwide corporation as a client. Most work for this client before I joined was a very disorganized form of Waterfall, and now the client is cracking the whip and has demanded that we all convert over to Agile (scrum). I am one of two people on my team that have experience with Agile, and although it's not my job, I've tried to lead the effort in establishing scrum roles, meetings, and backlogs, but have been thwarted at every step by managers on my side and the client side that don't seem to know or care about learning what they're doing, nor any real oversight from top managers that things are a complete disaster. I don't want to give up and search for another job, but I hate the disorganization and chaos that everyday brings. Should I move on or try to fight the good fight?

Submission + - Flash Player Update Forces Installation of Google Toolbar (adobe.com) 4

Submitted by

breakpoint8088

on Tuesday November 13, 2012 @05:04AM

breakpoint8088 writes: "Flash users who don't want the Google Toolbar should avoid updating Flash, at least on 64-bit Windows 7. I finally relented and allowed Adobe Flash to update on my Windows 7 box, and my security solution caught it trying to install the Google Toolbar-- without asking. Other people are seeing this as well. Adobe has not yet commented."

Submission + - Malware starts using the mouse to hide itself (geek.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 30, 2012 @08:37AM

An anonymous reader writes: Security vendors have to analyze and detect millions of potential threats every year. However, you can’t analyze all potential threats by hand, so automated threat analysis systems are employed. These typically look at suspicious files in a virtual machine and test each one quickly to see if it poses a threat.

The malware developers know such systems exist and have therefore employed countermeasures to try and avoid detection. Symantec has discovered that some malware won’t start running unless it detects activity from the mouse. Why would malware writers do this? Mouse activity is done by a user, and in an automated threat analysis system a user isn’t present and therefore no mouse activity is required.

Some malware has also been found to go to sleep for several minutes and then wait several more minutes once active before infiltrating a system. The reason for this is a typical automated threat analysis system looks at individual files very quickly, so waiting to execute helps ensure the malware is on a real system and not a virtual test environment.

Submission + - EFF: Ubuntu v12.10 A Major Privacy Problem (eff.org)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 30, 2012 @05:13AM

An anonymous reader writes: Ubuntu version 10.12 was released and it includes a whole range of new features and updates. However, EFF demands that Ubuntu should disable "online search results" by default. Users should be able to install Ubuntu and immediately start using it without having to worry about leaking search queries or sending potentially private information to third party companies such as Amazon, BBC, Facebook, and Twitter. Let us make sure that you respect your users' privacy and security.

Submission + - House GOP Voted To Cut Disaster Relief In Order To Preserve Military Spending (thinkprogress.org)

Submitted by dishorely040 on Tuesday October 30, 2012 @03:16AM

dishorely040 writes: As part of their bill to void the military spending cuts included in the Budget Control Act — which was passed as a result of 2011?s GOP inspired debt ceiling standoff — House Republicans proposed eliminating a program that helps states and localities respond to disasters like hurricanes.

Submission + - Major Apple shakeup - Forstall out; iOS executive fired for maps debacle? (9to5mac.com) 1

Submitted by noh8rz10 on Monday October 29, 2012 @05:29PM

noh8rz10 writes: Wow, just wow. Apple fires Scott Forstall, who grew iOS from its inception. Rumors say its the Maps, and problems with Siri as well. Jony Ive taking a larger human interface role, which will probably kill the skeumorphic interfaces that he hates. Browett out as well as the retail head; he never won the trust of the community. What does such a major shakeup say about Tim Cook's leadership? Decisive action, or flip-flopping?

Submission + - Water-Prospecting Polaris Lunar Rover Prototype Built (gizmag.com)

Submitted by Zothecula on Tuesday October 09, 2012 @09:46AM

Zothecula writes: Astrobotic Technology Inc., a spin-off company of Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), has debuted its full-size flight prototype of its Polaris lunar water-prospecting robot. Polaris is specially designed to work in the permanently shadowed craters at the Moon’s poles. Scheduled to be sent to the Moon using a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle, the solar-powered rover is a contender in the US$20 million Google Lunar X Prize and is tasked with seeking ice deposits that could be used by future colonists.

Submission + - Fake Bad Piggies App Infects Thousands of Google Chrome Users (pctechtalk.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09, 2012 @09:04AM

An anonymous reader writes: "Bad Piggies" the latest game from Angry Birds maker Rovio has been cloned, infected with adware and sold to unsuspecting users via Google Chrome. Around 80,000 computers are believed to have become infected.

When users downloaded and installed the fake version of the game, a malicious plugin was also installed which started publishing spam adverts.

Security experts at Barracuda who spotted the suspicious activity said 'Seven of these plugins are from the same source www.playook.info, a maker of 'free' flash games,'

The plugins required 'access your data on all websites' permissions. Barracuda says those who granted such permissions may have opened the door to their sensitive data such as credit card details and email address.

If you (or anyone you know) has installed this application, you should remove it immediately. As an extra precaution you should run an adware scan and change any passwords that may have been exposed as a result of installing the app.

Submission + - How to add 5.5 petabytes and get banned from Costco during a hard drive crisis (gigaom.com)

Submitted by

concealment

on Tuesday October 09, 2012 @08:43AM

concealment writes: "“We buy lots and lots of hard drives . . . . [They] are the single biggest cost in the entire company.”

Those are the words of Backblaze Founder and CEO Gleb Budman, whose company offers unlimited cloud backup for just $5 a month, and fills 50TB worth of new storage a day in its custom-built, open source pod architecture. So one might imagine the cloud storage startup was pretty upset when flooding in Thailand caused a global shortage on internal hard drives last year.

Backblaze details much the process in a Tuesday-morning blog post, including the hijinks that followed as the company got creative trying to figure out ways around the new hard drive limits. Maps were drawn, employees were cut off from purchasing hard drives at Costco — both in-person throughout Silicon Valley and online (despite some great efforts to avoid detection, such as paying for hard drives online using gift cards) — and friends and family across the country were conscripted into a hard-drive-buying army."

Submission + - Man arrested for April Jones Facebook joke convicted, sentenced to 3 months (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by Anduril1986 on Tuesday October 09, 2012 @08:35AM

Anduril1986 writes: Following the recent reports that a man was arrested for posting a joke on Facebook, Matthew Woods, 20, has now been sentenced to 3 months in a young offenders institute. Chairman of the bench, magistrate Bill Hudson, said his comments were "so serious and abhorrent" that he deserved the longest sentence they could pass, less a third to give credit for his early guilty plea.

Submission + - Google doesn't support OpenDocument Format (muktware.com)

Submitted by

rysiek

on Tuesday October 09, 2012 @07:20AM

rysiek writes: "After killing off support for old Microsoft formats, Google apparently decided to turn against OpenDocument Format (used by LibreOffice, OpenOffice and many other office suites).

The support for ODF is lacking from Chromebooks, Android phones, Google Drive and QuickOffice. However, Microsoft's controversial OOXML seems to be supported well."

Comment Re:The South Will Rise Again...? (Score 1) 120

by bwintx on Wednesday October 03, 2012 @02:09PM (#41540861) Attached to: Lenovo Building Manufacturing Plant in North Carolina

Perhaps also related to NC's being a "right-to-work" state. TFA didn't mention that as a factor, so I'm just guessing.

Comment Re:FB shares (Score 1) 186

by bwintx on Monday September 10, 2012 @08:32AM (#41286547) Attached to: Mark Cuban Blames Himself For Losing Money On Facebook IPO

and then there was that other one with green background and red letters....horrible L&F. Thankfully I forgot the name of it.

Hotbot?

I don't remember the letters' colors, but the lime-green background -- yeah, that sticks with you like the bad taste resulting from a late-night case of acid reflux. (For those of you not so afflicted, trust me on that part.)

Submission + - Crisis Trojan Makes Its Way onto Virtual Machines (threatpost.com)

Submitted by Trailrunner7 on Wednesday August 22, 2012 @08:59AM

Trailrunner7 writes: The Windows version of the Crisis Trojan is able to sneak onto VMware implementations, making it possibly the first malware to target such virtual machines. It also has found a way to spread to Windows Mobile devices.

Samples of Crisis, also called Morcut, were first discovered about a month ago targeting Mac machines running various versions of OS X. The Trojan spies on users by intercepting e-mail and instant messenger exchanges and eavesdropping on webcam conversations. Launching as a Java archive (JAR) file made to look like an Adobe Flash Installer, Crisis scans an infected machine and drops an OS-specific executable to open a backdoor and monitor activity.

This week, researchers also discovered W32.Crisis was capable of infecting VMware virtual machines and Windows Mobile devices.

Submission + - Class of 2016: No need for TV, CDs or airline tix; can't miss Daily Show (networkworld.com)

Submitted by

coondoggie

on Wednesday August 22, 2012 @08:33AM

coondoggie writes: "In one of the more interesting annual measurement of society the Beloit College Mindset List offers a snapshot of what the entering college class of 2016 likes and dislikes.
This year's report — the 14th annual version — starts out: The Class of 2016 has "come to political consciousness during a time of increasing doubts about America's future, and are entering college bombarded by questions about jobs and the value of a college degree. They have never needed an actual airline "ticket," a set of bound encyclopedias, or Romper Room. Members of this year's freshman class, most of them born in 1994, are probably the most tribal generation in history and they despise being separated from contact with friends. They prefer to watch television everywhere except on a television, have seen a woman lead the U.S. State Department for most of their lives, and can carry school books--those that are not on their e-Readers--in backpacks that roll. ""

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