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Show of 09-26-2020

Tech Talk September 26, 2020

Email and Forum Questions

  • Email from Bob in Maryland: Dear Doc, Jim, and the phenomenal Mr. Big Voice, I loved last week’s show. It was quite a thriller, actually. I listened intently until the very end. During lockdown I have been doing a bit of web surfing instead of working like I should, doing some procrastinating. I found an interesting fun Australian website about cybernetic critters of various sorts. Here is the 1952 article about Claude Shannon’s robotic mouse. The show keeps getting better all the time! All the best, Bob in Maryland.
  • Tech Talk Responds: This is one of the first examples of machine learning. It used mechanical relays in the computer, the same ones that were used for telco switching. Thanks for the article, very interesting.
  • Email from Ken in St. Louis: Dear Doc and Jim. I have an laptop that only has two USB 3.0 Type-A ports. I need those for my external hard drive and printer. I have been looking for a good Bluetooth mouse since they don’t need to be plugged into a USB port. I have tried three different Bluetooth mice and found all of them to be too small to be comfortably used for extended periods. Do you know of one that is larger? Ken in St. Louis
  • Tech Talk Responds: Most Bluetooth mice tend to be smaller than a standard-sized mouse because they are most often used with mobile devices. There are indeed a few full-sized Bluetooth mice on the market. One of the best TechNet 2600 DPI Bluetooth Mouse. It is $14.99 on Amazon. This mouse is very close to full size,.
  • However, I recommend that you consider another option: You could always get yourself a powered USB hub. Depending on the number of ports it comes with, a USB hub would allow you to use your external hard drive, your printer, your mouse and another device or two all at the same time. That use a hub with my laptop because it also only has two USB ports. I use the Sabrent 4 port USB Hub. It is only $9.99 on Amazon. I use it to plug in an external WiFi antenna so I can stream the show reliably.
  • Email from Cheryl in Baltimore: Dear Tech Talk. I started dating a guy a few months ago. He had an annoying habit of picking up my phone and looking at my called logs. I didn’t like him spying on me that way and I told him so. I finally put a PIN on my phone so he wouldn’t be able to get into it. We recently broke up so I no longer need the PIN. The problem is it won’t let me remove it. What do I need to do to remove the PIN from my phone? It’s an Android phone (an LG from Straight Talk). Cheryl in Baltimore
  • Tech Talk Responds: This is a fairly common issue with Android phones in general. Luckily, it’s almost always pretty easy to fix. However, you should reconsider your decision to remove it. It is good to have it in place, if you phone is lost or stolen.
  • First of all, if your phone is encrypted you’ll need to turn off the encryption in the Settings app before you’ll be able to remove the PIN. But if all you did was put a PIN on your phone without enabling encryption, that’s probably not the problem.
  • Another possible cause of this issue is having a Virtual Private Network (VPN) enabled. Any time a VPN is enabled on an Android phone the user must also enable a “secure lock” method such as a PIN or Lock Screen Pattern. If that were the case you would have to disable the VPN before you’d be allowed to remove the PIN.
  • The final possibility is that your phone could be storing one or more security certificates that are preventing you from removing your PIN. I recommend that you clear them and see if that resolves the issue.
    • Tap the Settings icon.
    • Scroll down and tap Security.
    • Scroll down and tap Advanced.
    • Scroll down and tap Encryption & Credentials.
    • Tap Clear credentials.
    • Exit the Settings app and then restart your phone.
  • If all is well you should now be able to remove the PIN from your Android phone.
  • Email from Robert Tyler: Dear Dr. Shurtz: I have been reading about hacker groups attacking companies, websites and in some cases country’s internet systems via DDoS or Distributed Denial of Service attacks. My question is not about DDoS attacks but rather what IT departments have to do to strengthen their systems against these attacks so a DDoS attack doesn’t bring down their website or their company’s computer system? Thank you again for the great podcast you and your team produce each week. I’ve learned so much over the past few years. I hope you realize (and I know you do) what a quality podcast it is. Robert Tyler
  • Tech Talk Responds: DDOS attacks are difficult to handle. The short answer is monitor response time so that you know if something is happening, over provision your servers, ask upstream providers to configure routers to incoming data stream (limit certain packet types, verify IP address), use IP Anycast to distribute the load.
  • IP Anycast is an Internet standard that enables the global mirroring of critical resources. When DNS networks use Anycast, identical name servers advertise the same IP address from multiple, strategically distributed locations. This can also help during DDoS attacks, by spreading the unwanted load between multiple sites based on network topography. Depending on the distribution of sources used in the attack, this can mean that the effects of the DDoS are felt by users in certain geographic areas but not others.
  • Email from Lauren: Dear Tech Talk, I own a HP G85 All-In-One fax/copy/print/scan printer. It has worked Great for many years. I have VoIP Phone service. I use to have Vonage and Could Send Faxes without any problem. I never had to do any adjustments with the fax settings. Just started a new account with a new phone company, NetTalk. When I asked if I could send faxes, they said Yes!! But, they said I needed to set fax machine Baud rate to: 9600, and I did. They told me I needed to change the error correction mode to OFF. I did. Still not working. Please help. PS The tech support at NetTalk seems limited. Thanks, Lauren
  • Tech Talk Answers: VoIP has compression algorithms that interfere with faxing. In order to get the fax to work on Ooma, the VoIP service that I have, I must turn off VoIP compression by entering *99 before the number that I am faxing too. Without *99, the fax will not go through.
  • I went to the NetTalk support website. They said that you can use a fax machine. If you are keeping a landline just for your fax, get rid of it! Keep in mind, you must have fax machine that supports VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol). They also have a footnote at the bottom of their home page. * Faxing on best effort basis due to VoIP technology.
  • Email from Ken: Richard Shurtz I am amazed of just how much information you pack into your summary each week on the Email and Forum Questions web page. Do you have some type of program that takes what you say on the show and converts your words to text in a nice outline format? I can’t believe you do all this manually. Anyway it certainly is a great way to catch what the show was about without listening to it! Ken_In MD.
  • Tech Talk Responds: Thanks for the feedback. No automation here. Just very fast scribes.
  • Email from Beverly: Doc, I am having problems opening files created on a Mac on my PC. What is the problem? The file is unreadable. Thanks, Beverly
  • Tech Talk Responds: This gets at the difference between MS Windows and Macintosh OS. Microsoft uses the file extension for program association (i.e. what program can open the file). Apple does not used extensions for this purpose. It stores program association as metadata in the file name. Mac users sometimes add file extensions so that Windows users can open the file. In this case, the file extension selected by the Mac user was not correct and the Windows program that opened the file could not read it.
  • Email from Betty in Oakton: Dear Doc and Jim. My Gmail account was recently compromised and I was able to recover access to it and changed my password? Is changing my password enough. What else should I do? Love the show. Betty
  • Tech Talk Responds: While someone else has access to your account, they have access to everything related to that account. As a result, changing your password just is no enough. You need to do more.
  • Gmail an ;alternate email address. This email address can be used to reset the password. Some sites also have challenge questions like your mother’s maiden name. Some systems can use a mobile phone for password reset. Make certain that none of these have been changed. Finally, I would implement two-factor authentication.

Profiles in IT: Robert William Taylor

  • Robert William Taylor best known as an Internet pioneer, founder of Xerox PARC, and founder of DEC Systems Research Center.
  • Robert W. Taylor was born February 10, 1932 in Dallas, Texas.
  • His adoptive father was a Methodist minister and the family spent an itinerant childhood, moving from parish to parish.
  • In 1948, he enrolled in Southern Methodist University at 16, but was not a serious.
  • In 1952, he enlisted in the US Naval Reserve during the Korean War.
  • In 1954, he enrolled in UT Austin under the GI Bill. At UT he was a “professional student,” taking courses for pleasure.
  • In 1957, he earned an BS in experimental psychology with minors in mathematics, philosophy, English and religion.
  • In 1959, he earned a MS in psychology from Texas. He completed research in neuroscience, psychoacoustics and the auditory nervous system as a graduate student.
  • He elected not to pursue a PhD in the field because he was not interested in taking the required psychology courses. He wanted more neuroscience.
  • After leaving Texas, Taylor taught math and coached basketball for a year at Howey Academy, a co-ed prep school in Florida.
  • In 1960, with a second child on the way, Taylor took engineering jobs with aircraft companies at better salaries. He helped to design the MGM-31 Pershing as a senior systems engineer for Martin Marietta in Orlando, Florida.
  • In 1962, he was invited to join NASA’s Office of Advanced Research and Technology as a program manager assigned to the manned flight control and display division after submitting a research proposal for a flight control simulation display.
  • During this period, Taylor also became acquainted with Douglas Engelbart at the Stanford Research Institute. He directed NASA funding to Engelbart’s studies of computer-display technology at SRI that led to the computer mouse.
  • Taylor met J.C.R. Licklider, who was heading the new Information Processing Techniques Office of the Advanced Research Project Agency (ARPA).
  • Licklider had done his graduate work in psychoacoustics as Taylor, and wrote an article in 1960 envisioning new ways to use computers.
  • In 1965, Taylor moved from NASA to ARPA to fund large programs in advanced research in computing at major universities and corporate research centers.
  • Among the computer projects that ARPA supported was time-sharing, in which many users could work at terminals to share a single large computer.
  • Taylor’s office in the Pentagon had a terminal connected to time-sharing at MIT, another to UC Berkeley, a third to Systems Development Corp. Each system developed a community of users, but was isolated from the other communities.
  • Taylor hoped to build a computer network to connect the ARPA-sponsored projects together and to let him communicate to all of them through one terminal.
  • By June 1966, Taylor had been named director of IPTO; in this capacity, he shepherded the ARPANET project until 1969.
  • Taylor had convinced ARPA to fund a network project earlier in 1966. A million dollars was transferred from a ballistic missile defense program to his budget.
  • Taylor hired Larry Roberts from MIT Lincoln Laboratory to be its first program manager. Licklider continued to provide guidance.
  • At a 1967 Symposium, Donald Davies’ team presented their research on packet switching and suggested it for use in the ARPANET.
  • ARPA issued a request for quotation (RFQ) to build the system, which was awarded to Bolt, Beranek and Newman (BBN).
  • In 1968, Licklider and Taylor published “The Computer as a Communication Device”. The article laid out the future of what the Internet would eventually become.
  • By 1969, he knew the project would be successful, so he was ready to move. He took a job University of Utah doing research on computer graphics.
  • In 1970 Taylor was hired by Xerox to manage the Palo Alto Research Center.
  • Technologies developed at PARC between 1970 and 1983 focused on reaching beyond ARPAnet to develop what has become the Internet, and the systems that support today’s personal computers. They included: personal computers, Ethernet, Internet, laser printer, graphical user interface, WYSIWYG.
  • In 1983, Taylor was hired by Ken Olsen of Digital Equipment Corporation, and formed the Systems Research Center in Palo Alto.
  • At DEC’s Research Center in Palo Alto, he oversaw development of electronic books, modern work stations, and the precursor to the Java programming language.
  • Taylor retired in 1996 and lives in Woodside, California. He sometimes played computer games, he had no cell phone, copier, FAX or scanner.
  • In 1999, Taylor received a National Medal of Technology and Innovation for visionary leadership in the development of modern computing technology.
  • In 2000, he voiced two concerns about the future of the Internet: control and access. In his words:
  • On April 13, 2017, he died at his home in Woodside, California. His son said he had suffered from Parkinson’s disease and other health problems.

Observations from the Bunker

  • In the early days of Microsoft, Bill Gates was notoriously tough on his employees. Not only did he memorize license plates so he could tell who was still at work, he made a habit of sending 2 a.m. emails that started with, “This is the stupidest piece of code ever written.”
  • Steve Jobs could be an even tougher boss. According to one former employee: “Steve, like Napoleon, had two faces. On one side he was a brilliant genius and a true misfit. And the other side–his lack of care and sensitivity for people, his disrespect and dictatorial behavior–were all real.”
  • Then there’s Vince Lombardi, the Pro Football Hall of Fame coach for whom the Super Bowl trophy is named. Hall of Fame lineman Jerry Kramer said of Lombardi, “He shouted, bullied, drove us, underpaid us and refused to spoil us.” Henry Jordan, another Hall of Famer, famously said, “He treats us all the same–like dogs.”
  • They were all jerks at times. But then again, Gates built Microsoft. Jobs built Apple. Lombardi’s Green Bay Packers won five NFL championships and the first two Super Bowls.
  • More importantly, many people reflect fondly on the time they spent working with Jobs, Gates, and Lombardi. The experience taught them to prepare. To think critically. To work harder, work smarter, and put their teams ahead of themselves.
  • This illustrates the rule of formidable expectations. The rule of formidable expectations is simple: The more you expect–OK, demand–from others, the more gratitude you must display for their effort, dedication, and loyalty.

Clever Idea of the Week: Inverted Circles on Milk Jugs

  • If you’re a milk drinker you’ve probably noticed the indented circle on the jug.
  • It turns out that it’s actually an ingenious addition to the milk jug and serves a very important purpose: keeping the jug from exploding.
  • The circle on the side of the milk jug provides structural integrity for accidental drops. The inverted circle actually warps outward when the jug hits the ground and expands to give the milk inside the jug a place to move.
  • While the circle prevents explosions when the jug is dropped, it also keeps the jug from exploding while it’s simply sitting in your fridge.
  • Milk expels gas over time, and more gas as it approaches its expiration date as you can tell by the sour smell the liquid gives off.
  • With this expulsion of gas, pressure builds in the jug and the circle, again, expands allowing more space inside the jug as pressure builds.
  • For anyone who has ever put a milk jug in the freezer, you’re able to do so without an explosion thanks to the inverted circle.

How to Break Out of your Social Media Echo Chamber

  • Social media companies rely on adaptive algorithms to assess our interests and flood us with information that will keep us scrolling.
  • The algorithms focus on what we “like,” “retweet,” and “share” to keep feeding content that is similar to what we’ve indicated makes us comfortable.
  • Confirmation bias is the natural human tendency to seek, interpret, and remember new information in accordance with preexisting beliefs.
  • The scientific method, legal system, and judicial process are all inventions humans created to get around our tendency to jump to conclusions.
  • Here are five steps we can take today to fight back against the algorithms and reclaim our social media feeds.
    • “Like” everything. Algorithms can’t categorize you if they can’t determine what you really like.
    • Actively cultivate prestige media on all sides. Follow prestige publications across the political spectrum. A profile searching for The National Review and The New Yorker means you will keep your newsfeed clear of the most polarizing stories pushed by trolls.
    • Pay attention to the amount of followers the people you follow have. Individuals who have a great disparity between their amount of followers and the number of people they themselves follow often acquire outsized influence on social media.
    • Change feeds to focus on recency rather than personalization. Both Facebook and Twitter allow users to view the most recent posts first, but the setting is difficult to find and often reverts without warning. Changing this setting is worth the effort.
    • Create space for new voices. Consider temporarily muting celebrities whose accounts share your perspectives to make room for the rest to break through.
  • Try to keep the platforms wondering what you really think. The ripple effect will keep confirmation bias away and help build an environment that makes it possible for others to achieve the same result.