Random Software topics

[Brian Boru]

Probably not worth a separate thread:

Splinternet—35+ Countries Are Leaving the Global Internet

Good 15-minute video on the trend towards governments implementing blocking, filtering, isolation, self-sufficiency etc.

 

[Brian Boru]

Getting controls in YouTube Shorts

I rarely watch these, partly because all the control you get is stop and play. Finally looked it up, and a tip on Reddit worked. Here's my version for my notes:

Paste https://youtu.be before /ID—example:
Short: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/KGHC_3A7oWo
With controls: View: https://youtu.be/KGHC_3A7oWo

…notice the video ID is the same.

 

[Brian Boru]

Anyone know how to get rid of the waving smiley GIF in Skype's main interface?
Alternatively, replace it with a static—it's the animation which distracts.

I can use the split interface, and minimize the smiley part, if there's nothing better—but that uses 2 Taskbar slots and hides list of chat people.

 

[Brian Boru]

5m video about alternative browsers, ignoring the top 5.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rygocALniik

 

[Brian Boru]

Is the world prepared for the coming AI storm?

'Among the countless panels at South by Southwest, there was one titled "How Congress is building AI policy from the ground". After roughly 15 minutes of waiting, the audience was told that the panel had been cancelled because the participants had gone to the wrong venue.'

Oh dear. A microcosm of why I answer a resounding "NO!" to the question.

 

[Brian Boru]

AI in Bing

♣ It doesn't seem to work in other browsers if you make Bing the SE—but I only tested Opera GX, where I got standard SERPs to my searches.

♦ So I launched Edge and got invite to try the new AI-powered search. Sure, why not? Just yesterday Anton Petrov—my fav science YTer—found a tricky answer using it. Typed following in address bar:

video game, open world, first-person perspective, no platforming, single player

Got a bunch of "searching for…" lines, but nothing else—ie no results of any kind. Hmm.

♥ Okay, Anton had used a natural language query—ie as if he was talking to a human—so I tried this variation:

list of video games which are open world and first-person perspective, have minimal platforming, and are single player

Bingo, now we're suckin' diesel, here's what I got:

— … —

Here are some open-world first-person perspective single-player video games with minimal platforming that you might be interested in:

• Dying Light is an exceptional open-world survival title, which is also a first-person adventure game. Players engage in parkour to complete objectives as they stave off an attack of zombies1.
• The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is an action role-playing game that takes place in an open world environment. The player can explore the world freely and engage in combat with various creatures2.
• Far Cry 5 is a first-person shooter game that takes place in an open world environment. The player can explore the world freely and engage in combat with various enemies3.
• Fallout 4 is an action role-playing game that takes place in an open world environment. The player can explore the world freely and engage in combat with various creatures2.
• BioShock Infinite is a first-person shooter game that takes place in an open world environment. The player can explore the world freely and engage in combat with various enemies2.

I hope this helps! Let me know if you have any other questions or if there’s anything else I can help you with.
Learn more:
1. gamerant.com 2. en.wikipedia.org 3. gamerant.com 4. gamicus.fandom.com 5. techradar.com 6. store.steampowered.com

— … —

♠ Interesting the difference that couching the query in natural language makes. I'll definitely try this again when I have trouble finding an answer to one of the 5 Ws—altho Anton warned that he got one wrong answer during his trial, and the AI was very sure its answer was right. So it's not there yet, but very promising start.

 

[Brian Boru]

Alt Codes

Anyone here use these for typing shortcuts? Like Alt+0163 gives pound symbol £ or Alt+4 gives the Ace of Diamonds ♦

For me, the codes which have 4 digits, with the first digit being 8, don't work. Such as for sevenths and ninths fractions—eg 3/7 and 5/9—don't work, I get different output. Others work fine, eg ½ ¾.

Any ideas?

 

[Colif]

¿ I don't know what you mean
I had forgottten code to this - ¿
168 = ¿
alt + numbpad works best

Alt Codes List of Alt Key Codes Symbols

www.alt-codes.net

 

[Brian Boru]

I don't know what you mean

Mmm yeah, I could've made that clearer ¿

Can you type 1/9 as a single character? I can't.

alt + numbpad works best

Yeah, it HAS to be numpad.

 

[Brian Boru]

Windows 11 & Anti-cheat systems problem

Might be an issue when troubleshooting games at the moment.

 

[Colif]

That program has a dumb file name for its driver, as one guy pointed out. Naming a driver dump_wmimmc.sys is just asking for confusion as the windows memory dump files are named similar. Name driver anything else, not that... I assume they trying to hide its name. Vanguard swapped its main driver after too many people learned vgk.sys = Vanguard.

anti cheat programs expect too much access to windows kernel. Only thing that should have that much access is windows, not some anti cheat for 1 program on PC. They can stop other programs running.

I see them as viruses more than useful tools. I wouldn't play a game that requires them.

 

[Brian Boru]

I see them as viruses more than useful tools. I wouldn't play a game that requires them.

I agree with your assessment and noble stance, which sadly I didn't have the spinal fortitude to maintain when a game I lusted after included one of these dreckwares

♣ Denuvo—Far Cry New Dawn
♦ Securom—Red Alert 3, Bioshock
♥ StarForce—don't recall specific titles
♠ SafeDisk—various CD/DVD games

Wiki:
"Richard Leadbetter of Digital Foundry compared the performance of a pirated version of Resident Evil Village which had stripped out Denuvo and Capcom's additional copy protection against the release version for Windows, and found that the DRM-stripped version performed far better than the released game."

I got lucky tho, DRM never affected my PC in a bad way.

 

[Brian Boru]

Got the current 2nd-Tuesday MS Update for my Win10, and checked it in O&O's ShutUp10—no settings changed, nice that MS continue to behave on that front.

 

[Colif]

WIn 10 is retired, its not going to get any new changes, just security patches.

 

[Brian Boru]

Win10 going to 22H2 next month, whether you like it or not. I've been on 22H2 for a while, no problems.

Microsoft will force all Windows 10 users to upgrade to 'version 22H2' next month

Windows 10 21H2 is out of support, meaning it's time to upgrade.

www.windowscentral.com

 

[Brian Boru]

Windows 11

Win11 getting a bunch of updates in 23H2 later this year:

Windows 11 version 23H2: Microsoft previews BIG new features coming later this year, including a new AI assistant

AI, RGB, and Taskbar ungrouping are on the way.

www.windowscentral.com

Win11 Features Update starts rolling out tomorrow:

The next feature drop for Windows 11 is coming TOMORROW, here's everything that's new

The Windows 11 May 2023 feature drop is official

www.windowscentral.com

 

[Colif]

23H2
Windows Co pilot AKA you don't get any privacy with the bot "helping" you along
https://blogs.windows.com/windowsde...developers-with-windows-copilot-and-dev-home/

I don't need help thinking really...

I wonder if its just Bingchat in disguise. That thing is invading all my spaces.

Features update:
Now to find a way to disable the MSN feed part of Widgets screen without just disabling entire thing.
I only use at max two of the widgets and I don't care to see the feed at all.

I wonder if the update will fix a graphical bug I had with it last week that led to a blank screen and me logging out of user and back in to fix. Its possible restarting explorer would have fixed it too.

 

[Brian Boru]

blank screen

Dunno if either of these are relevant to you, but for what it's worth:

How to Fix the Screen Going Black While Gaming on Windows

Gaming gets a lot harder if you can't see what's going on. Fix your black screen woes with these Windows tips.

www.makeuseof.com

Does Your Screen Goes Black When Pressing Alt + Tab on Windows? Here’s How to Fix It

Alt + Tab is meant to speed things up, but if it's leaving you in the dark instead, here's how to fix it on Windows.

www.makeuseof.com

 

[Colif]

I doubt it.

What happened was I opened widget panel and clicked on the little X in 1 article to close it, and the panel didn't respond. So I clicked on desktop to close the panel and instead it left ghosts of the widgets on the screen.
I was going to take a screenshot so I closed Firefox to get it out of the way. At this point screen turned black.

I don't remember if taskbar was showing. As if it were, restarting explorer probably fix. Logging out and back in also refreshed screen.

Desktop Windows Manager had issues probably.

 

[Brian Boru]

Win11 Widgets more is good, right?

Windows 11 gets widgets for monitoring CPU, GPU, RAM and more

You don’t have to be a Windows Insider to try out these new monitoring widgets

www.windowscentral.com

RIP Cortana—gonna miss her nearly as much as Mr Clippy:

Microsoft is killing Cortana on Windows 11 and Windows 10 later this year

Microsoft will no longer support the Cortana app starting this fall.

www.windowscentral.com

 

[Brian Boru]

DuckDuckGo’s Privacy Focused Web Browser Is Finally Available for Windows

I use DDG for search, so it'll be interesting to see where their browser gets to in a few years.

 

[Brian Boru]

We haven't had any problems here with 2 x Win10 2nd-Tuesday updates, but some clearly have—so a possible for current troubledhooting posts:

Windows 10 update looks like bad news for PC gamers

Reports are coming in that some gamers are experiencing lag after the latest patch

www.techradar.com

 

[Brian Boru]

AtlasOS

AtlasOS is a severe tweak for Windows 10, which trims Win10 down to the bare bones for gaming—nor recommended for a dual-purpose PC which is also used for work, but could be useful for an older PC which is feeling the gaming strain.

Revitalize Your Old Gaming PC With AtlasOS

Can you squeeze more life out of your old PC before an upgrade without moving to unfamiliar Linux territory? Meet AtlasOS.

www.makeuseof.com

 

[Colif]

In particular, it removes Windows Defender and Restore Points, and System Reset. So it might be a worry for security and restoring your system.

Is Atlas OS worth it?

If you're looking for an operating system without the bloat and performance hindrance of many others. As you look into other options you might look at

www.wepc.com

another one that slims down by removing security... been here before?

 

[Brian Boru]

Windows 11

Newer features added which you may not know about—7m video.