On 11/20/14, 12:44 PM, Ted Roche wrote:
The malware keeps getting nastier.
A coworker who only surfs People Pets and yahoo (network admins know these
things) came down with a Google Search replacement malware that replaced
search engines and start pages and embedded a Windows service to keep them
that way on *all three* browsers. On a fully-patched machine with firewalls
and virus scanners. This stuff gets nasty.
My rule of thumb is to only use Windows when forced to. Practically
speaking this is:
1) At my day job (multinational company has adequate IT and procedures
to keep it safe)
2) When testing my applications - fire up my Windows VMs that aren't
network-connected. If I happen to still get infected with something, can
restore from the last snapshot.
3) I provide IT services to a company in town that runs various Windows
flavors on their workstations and a couple servers. They need Windows
for the VFP app I wrote for them over a decade ago, plus other
off-the-shelf and accounting software. I keep their systems patched, use
multiple layers of firewalls and anti-malware, and implore users to be
smart about what they click on. Still, I probably bill them 20 hours a
year on malware removal.
4) My mom runs Windows because of the VFP app I made for her a decade
ago. But she does little else, so there haven't been too many issues.
Even though #3 is only 20 hours and is readily absorbed and forgotten
about, it sucks because I'm not billing them for time that adds any
value to their business processes, it takes away from the available time
for me to provide the same, and it is annoying, tedious, unenjoyable
work for me.
There really isn't much reason to *use* Windows these days, other than
for legacy VFP apps. Apple, Chrome, and Linux pretty much have the user
experience nailed. Even for my #1, I do all stuff save Outlook (yech)
and Office (yech) in a VM running Linux.
Nobody's still making new stuff in VFP, right? ;)
Paul
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