With mobile devices, it’s all about the data. If you’ve ever had an Android or iOS device, you know that there’s questions about where the pictures and other data are stored, if it’s backed up, if it’s copied to the cloud, how you get your pictures on your computer or printed out, and how you make sure your pictures, texts, contacts etc. don’t get spread around the internet to places you don’t want or released to people you don’t want. If you haven’t considered the data on your phone important, you might want to think about all the “stuff” you probably have on it, how you store it, share it, and access it from other places.
Windows 10: Controversy and Should I update?
June 3, 2016 By
We’ve discussed the Windows 10 upgrade in the past, and suggested a wait and see approach. Well, now it’s been out for a year, and we’re approaching the deadline to get a free update. Unfortunately, Microsoft has been forcing rather than enticing users to upgrade. We discuss the controversy below, and then give our current recommendations.
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Beware “Locky’s” Malicious Macros.
March 10, 2016 By
Ransomware has been common for a while, and it has been somewhat simple for users to avoid it by not opening random .exe’s from the internet. However, this sort of malware continues to increase in sophistication, and now has brought back the infected Microsoft Office document. So you should now increase your suspicion of attached .docx etc files. This sort of attack is spreading across OSs as well, some are out for Mac OSX and Linux, so don’t think you can’t be infected because you don’t use Office. It’s a good idea to scan any files you download from the net and save and scan, rather than directly open, any e-mail attachments.
Beware! ‘Locky’s’ malicious, macros is a new crypto-ransomware that could be arriving in your inbox today. Recently, security researchers have discovered that a new type of malware exists, named ‘Locky.’ One way that ‘Locky’ installs itself and its components on your computer is through e-mail, in the form of an attached invoice. The e-mail’s subject line is an invoice number beginning with the letter J.
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RetroGaming: Catching up on games you missed at a reasonable price
November 5, 2015 By
If you’ve been playing computer games for a while, you’ll have a number of games that you didn’t get a chance to play when they came out but since have been highly rated. AAA games keep going down the path of sequel, reboot, etc for ever higher purchase prices and ever growing DLC so gaming on a budget can be hard. So why not go back to some games that were great when they came out and are now available for a steal? You won’t need additional hardware or a new console (or an old one for that matter); these games can run on whatever you currently have in many cases.
Scientific Linux Desktop at Home
September 28, 2015 By
Why are we talking about using Scientific Linux at home and work? Well, see our previous posts about Windows 10 which lays out why some of us are taking these steps. One thing we have seen mentioned is run Windows 10 and use a Virtual Machine (VM) running Linux for all your “important” or private activities. This gets things exactly backward. If you cannot trust the OS, you cannot trust it to not access network traffic or memory of a VM it’s running. Instead, you are much better served running the VM Host OS as one you trust, in this case SL7, and as a Guest OS VM the OS you don’t trust, in this case Windows 8+. While VMs do not provide perfect security, it’s a lot harder to break out of a VM than for an OS task to peek inside a process or hypervisor or VM system running under it.
Previously I talked about using Scientific Linux 7 at work. Now I’m going to talk about home use. First, I’ll break down what you would expect to use this OS and configuration for, and what you wouldn’t. Then I’ll talk about what I use to accomplish various tasks, and a little helper we’ve created for new installs.
Scientific Linux 7 desktop at Work
September 2, 2015 By
I’ve been using Scientific Linux 7.1 at work for a couple of weeks now. If you’ve been using SL7 as a desktop, or are interested in moving this way, the CLASSE IT Group can help you with some of its configuration. This post will also give some ideas of tasks that are useful at work and at home. I’ll post about using it at home a little later on.
In general, one of the great things for me personally while working in the lab, is getting experience with this recent operating system on my desktop. There are many tasks that are just as easily performed on Linux as they are on Windows. Therefore, I am going to document my process, overall issues and solutions in this blog post. Although I won’t be providing step-by-step instructions, you can contact the CLASSE computer group if you would like help configuring your Linux desktop at the lab.
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