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"Outside of Sunday morning I don't read the news at all."

Excerpt from comment submitted to Hacker News, an online news aggregator

On Wednesday


Where can one read the source code of setup.exe

That's, e.g., how I would determine what these commands do

I have had HN replies in the past that argued Windows is open source and thus comparable to UNIX-like OS projects where _the public_ can read the source code and make modifications, _for free_

Absent the source code, we can read Microsoft's documentation

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/manufactu...

It seems like WinPE is the most useful version of Windows, e.g., it allows more options to setup.exe

How does one quickly and easily download and install a copy of WinPE, preferably on removable media


The windows assessment and deployment kit is what you need, with the windows pe add-on: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/manufactu...

You should be aware there's a 3 day limit to uptime, then PE reboots. You can work around that: https://lsoft.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360011128377-I-n...

The other thing to tell you is that this is not a live version of windows with all the features of the full desktop. It is the windows that runs the windows installer application, so enough windows to do that and no more.

I would personally recommend linux instead.


Who would argue that Windows is open source? That's hilarious.

Funny how HN discussions about the development of encrypted messaging apps often include remarks from commenters about the need for a "group chat" feature

In some cases, popular messaging apps that initially did not provide "group chat" have since added this "feature", apparently in response to "user demand"

The so-called "tech" companies that control these apps from Silicon Valley and Redmond have aligned with one political party, generally whichever party is in power, for "business" reasons, e.g., doing whatever is necessary to ensure their continued profits free from regulation

Surveillance is their core business


If the Signal Messaging LLC is compromised, then "updates", e.g., spyware, can be remotely installed on every Signal user's computer, assuming every Signal user allows "automatic updates". I don't think Signal has a setting to turn off updates

Not only does one have to worry about other Signal users being compromised, one also has to worry about a third party being compromised: the Signal Messaaging LLC


"Carrying this speculation a step further, it is possible that the available tools have been compromised either in individual instances or en masse. Even where security products are open-source, adequate security evaluations are difficult to conduct initially and difficult to maintain as the products evolve. Typical users upgrade their software when upgrades or packages are offered, without even thinking of the possibility that they may have been targeted for a Trojan horse."

Whitfield Diffie and Susan Landau, Privacy on the Line: The Politics of Wiretapping and Encryption (MIT Press: Cambridge, 2007), 372

Italics are mine


Signal Messaging LLC is US-based and needs to follow CALEA[1] by law.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Assistance_for_...


But does it? In what way?

"for what? to save a second of boot time"

Doubtful the motivation was /etc/rc being too slow

daemontools, runit, s6 solve that problem


The only parties that really cared about boot time were the big hosting providers and container schleppers. For desktop linux it never mattered as much.

"“If the bubble bursts we will be fine,” he said. “We’ve got an amazing business that we can add AI features to and get more productivity out of.”"

And what is that "business"

Is it data collection, surveillance and ad services targeting website, browser and Android users


"TAR vs ZIP: Sequential vs Random Access"

https://199.233.217.201/pub/pkgsrc/distfiles/dictd-1.13.3.ta...

Wikipedia:

"In order to efficiently store dictionary data, dictzip, an extension to the gzip compression format (also the name of the utility), can be used to compress a .dict file. Dictzip compresses file in chunks and stores the chunk index in the gzip file header, thus allowing random access to the data."


"Google's long term strategy with Android is baffling to me. "

How does one know there is a long-term strategy

History has shown that so-called "tech" companies often act in a reactionary manner^1

1. Often, the act is of one of copying what someone else has done. Other times it might be response to regulation

One could argue Android itself was a reaction to iOS

This is one example of the reactionary copying phenomenon but HN replies may choose to focus only on this one example and not on the overall "tech" company phenomenon of reactionism as exhibited through endless copying


> One could argue Android itself was a reaction to iOS

It quite literally was a reaction to iOS considering it was originally a copy of the BlackBerry OS (the older one in their keyboard phones) until the iPhone came out and they pivoted to copying iOS instead.

EDIT: to get ahead of any negative replies about them copying iOS, I’m fully aware that they work quite differently under the hood and Android has had various features before iOS, etc. I mean they were creating from a UI/UX standpoint a copy of the BlackBerry when Google bought them, and then when the iPhone came out they completely changed the UI/UX paradigm to match.


IDK what you could possibly mean by saying it was "a copy of the BlackBerry" and further I don't see how that validates the claim that "Android itself was a reaction to iOS".

The actual truth seems to be that "Android's introduction of touchscreens was a reaction to iOS", which is WAY different than saying that the entire operating system was spun up just to compete with iOS.


Android was in development well before iOS was released, really the only big change was the touchscreen, which is obviously revolutionary, but that's a long-way from "Android is a reaction to iOS".

What's the long-term strategy with Android. How does one know it exists

> One could argue Android itself was a reaction to iOS

and it definitely was, to mitigate the risk of losing sight of the web users behaviour


I run customised NetBSD on the Model B. Fits in 512MB

I never use a wall plug as I can easily power it from other computers' USB ports

It came with a WiFi dongle but I prefer to connect it to a WiFi travel router via Ethernet if I need wireless


"But also, surely, because it is fun. Plagiarism stories follow a perfect tragic arc: a flawed hero suffers a whopping comeuppance. It is a wonderful spectacle."

The so-called "tech" company, flawed hero?

It does not produce content, only intermediates access to it

Now it can produce content

But to create a system to do produce content, "Generative AI", the so-called "tech" companies needed to use copyrighted material on massive scale without a license

Was that use infringing. The courts will decide

The intermediary (middleman) companies no longer need longer need "user-generated content" to attract an audience

Of course they will still intermediate and collect data from and conduct surveillance on anyone that uses their software, which generally they can use for any purpose


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