Lorne: My little prince. Oh…what did they do to you? Angel: Nina…tried to…eat me. Lorne: Oh, you're--medic! You're gonna make it Angel. Just don't stop fighting. Doctor! Is there a Gepetto in the house?

'Smile Time'


Buffistechnology 3: "Press Some Buttons, See What Happens."

Got a question about technology? Ask it here. Discussion of hardware, software, TiVos, multi-region DVDs, Windows, Macs, LINUX, hand-helds, iPods, anything tech related. Better than any helpdesk!


Ginger - Sep 02, 2014 7:37:59 am PDT #24016 of 25496
"It didn't taste good. It tasted soooo horrible. It tasted like....a vodka martini." - Matilda

A friend's niece is on a trip to Hawaii, and her MacBook died. This is not good, particularly since she's missing the first week of school because of an apparent inability to read a calendar. Anyway, she took it to an Apple store, along with copies of the receipt and the AppleCare agreement that my friend e-mailed her. The niece is a flake, but my friend is not. She bought the computer for said niece, watched the store person scan the box in setting up the AppleCare agreement and kept up with the paperwork.

The Apple store said the serial number on the computer doesn't match the serial number on the AppleCare agreement, and the warranty is probably void anyway because there are screws missing on the bottom that make it look tampered with. (The niece is not the sort of person who would tamper with a computer or, for that matter, even think about the fact that a computer has insides.) This is a computer that was purchased about 18 months ago.

Has anyone dealt with something like this?


Typo Boy - Sep 02, 2014 9:54:00 am PDT #24017 of 25496
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.

Can someone click on this link to see if the Naomi Klein blurb appears on the top. I'm not seeing it, but I think may just be caching issue.

[link]


Jon B. - Sep 02, 2014 10:11:06 am PDT #24018 of 25496
A turkey in every toilet -- only in America!

see if the Naomi Klein blurb appears on the top

I see it.


Typo Boy - Sep 02, 2014 10:14:25 am PDT #24019 of 25496
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.

Thanks. I thought that was it. I can see it on my local copy but not over the web , not even on another computer. So I'm guess I have to reboot my router to clear that cache. And if thats not it. I have to wait for my isp to refresh its cache.


§ ita § - Sep 03, 2014 6:58:54 am PDT #24020 of 25496
Well not canonically, no, but this is transformative fiction.

Can your phone be GPS tracked if you'te turned the location functions off? If you remove the battery? If you remove the SIM card?


Typo Boy - Sep 03, 2014 8:21:33 am PDT #24021 of 25496
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.

Not if you removed the battery. Dunno about the rest. In terms of turning off gps I speculate that if phone is on software could turn gps back on without your knowledge. If you turn phone off, can software keep phone from really being turned off, so that you only think it is off? Also if your phone is physically altered that could make a difference, though nothing can be done if it is not powered. so unless a 2nd battery has been installed I think pulling the battery works in all cases. But I don't think phones really have room for hidden xtra battery at least not one that will last very long.


Typo Boy - Sep 03, 2014 8:25:25 am PDT #24022 of 25496
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.

Though if this is for a fic, a hearing aid sized 2nd hidden battery that let the phone be tracked for 20 minutes after the main battery was removed could be a plot point.


Typo Boy - Sep 03, 2014 8:28:49 am PDT #24023 of 25496
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.

I seem to remember privacy experts saying software that turns your gps back on when you turn it off, provided your phone is still on definitely exists and is used by police and intelligence agencies. Don't remember about the rest.


tommyrot - Sep 03, 2014 8:30:56 am PDT #24024 of 25496
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

If you turn off your GPS does your phone still use GPS to give your location when you call 911?

eta: Phones are required to have GPS to assist the 911 folks in finding you.


Typo Boy - Sep 03, 2014 9:22:00 am PDT #24025 of 25496
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.

Incidentally -the backup battery thing is really unlikely. The infrastructure to develop it is expensive, continuing expense to keep up the infrastructure is expensive but unlike software only things the marginal cost to add it a particular phone is expensive too. And if you know far enough in advance you want to do a backup battery to a particular phone the odds are you are looking for long term patterns. Xtra 20 minutes or so of tracking is least likely to be worth it in the case where you have it in place. All the rest is pretty much software only -meaning that once you have the expensive infrastructure in place the marginal additional cost of using it on a particular phone is close to zero. Whereas the backup battery in cell phone idea has few economies of scale in deployment. So unlikely that anyone will develop it and deploy the expensive infrastructure in the first place.