Monthly Archives: January 2021

How Microsoft is Sucking Today

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I have a LOT of stuff in Dropbox. It’s a great tool, and it’s fairly priced, and as such I’ve been using it across Mac, Windows, iOS and now Linux for a decade. It’s great.

However, I don’t always want EVERYTHING. I’ve realized that while this is great for iOS access, or for keeping my main working files synced across my main, backup, and Windows laptops, it’s a bad fit for temporary working files that I may want across multiple VMs within our virtual environments, so I turned on OneDrive for this.

I figured I’d just pull in files for ClientX and ClientY, because that’s what I’m working with right now. (DropBox HAS selective sync, but i have so much stuff in mine it’s easier to just manage this in parallel.)

Well. Now’s when I remember that MSFT can’t really do ANYTHING that isn’t fundamentally weird or broken or otherwise infected with terrible ideas from marketing. And here’s the example:

OneDrive assumes you want to include your Desktop, Documents, Pictures, and a few other things in your OneDrive sync automatically, and will not allow you to opt out because these folders are “special.” WTF, right?

I didn’t notice this until my CustomerX environment suddenly had a desktop full of other random working files, which was unwelcome. I tried to disable Desktop sync, but was stiffarmed, so I went back to the “master” virtual machine and tired to disable it there. Nope, same message: Desktop is “special” and can’t be unselected.

What I COULD do was unselect everything WITHIN Desktop, so I did that.

And then all the files in my master desktop disappeared.

After some poking around, it turns out OneDrive just took fucking CONTROL and moved all that data into the special OneDrive Desktop. Why? Fuck you, that’s why. Same with Documents, etc. It’s like transparency and predictability are COMPLETELY UNKNOWN in Redmond. Seriously, how did this kind of behavior get past beta?

Dropbox doesn’t do shit like this. You tell it what folder to sync, and go from there. What’s wrong with that approach? I guess, it’s just insufficiently invasive and weird.

It’s not just about OneDrive, though. I spend a LOT of time in virtual meetings. We use GoToMeeting, but we also end up joining client meetings set up in WebEx or Teams or Skype or even Zoom — basically whatever they have, if they want to set up the meeting. (We VASTLY prefer GTM, because it works way better, so mostly it’s that, but sometimes you gotta go to their house, so to speak.)

The new version of Teams is installed on my Windows environments, but, turns out, you cannot use it to join meetings set up by organizations you’re not a member of on Windows or MacOS. The only supported way to join on those systems is to use Edge or Chrome.

WAT.

I don’t have Chrome installed anywhere, so this means it’s impossible to join Teams meetings with customers from my Mac at all. (I use my iPad.)

Again: What the fuck were they thinking here? No other meeting platform is so goofy and limited. Even Skype worked better.

I swear, MSFT has been awful way more often than they’ve been good for my entire career, and that’s nearly as long as MSFT has existed.

Who Is Josh Hawley?

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Well, the Times has you covered here.

Tl;dr? He’s a raging right-wing theocrat indistinguishable from the Taliban but for the flavor of religion.

In multiple speeches, an interview and a widely shared article for Christianity Today, Mr. Hawley has explained that the blame for society’s ills traces all the way back to Pelagius — a British-born monk who lived 17 centuries ago. In a 2019 commencement address at The King’s College, a small conservative Christian college devoted to “a biblical worldview,” Mr. Hawley denounced Pelagius for teaching that human beings have the freedom to choose how they live their lives and that grace comes to those who do good things, as opposed to those who believe the right doctrines.

The most eloquent summary of the Pelagian vision, Mr. Hawley went on to say, can be found in the Supreme Court’s 1992 opinion in Planned Parenthood v. Casey. Mr. Hawley specifically cited Justice Anthony Kennedy’s words reprovingly: “At the heart of liberty,” Kennedy wrote, “is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.” The fifth century church fathers were right to condemn this terrifying variety of heresy, Mr. Hawley argued: “Replacing it and repairing the harm it has caused is one of the challenges of our day.”

**In other words, Mr. Hawley’s idea of freedom is the freedom to conform to what he and his preferred religious authorities know to be right. ** Emph Added

Go read the whole thing.

26 Movies, from Zuckerspace

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There’s a meme on FB asking folks to list their 26 favorite films. Obviously, I complied, but not in the expected way, and obviously too I’d prefer to have the list here.

& so:

  1. Moonrise Kingdom (Wes Anderson, 2012)
  2. Miller’s Crossing (Joel and Ethan Coen, 1990)
  3. The Hunt for Red October (John McTiernan, 1990)
  4. Captain America: The Winter Soldier (Russo Brothers, 2014)
  5. It’s A Wonderful Life (Frank Capra, 1946)
  6. Rushmore (Wes Anderson, 1998)
  7. True Grit (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2010)
  8. Reservoir Dogs (Quentin Tarantino, 1992)
  9. Arrival (Denis Villeneuve, 2016)
  10. Boyhood (Richard Linklater, 2014)
  11. Winter’s Bone (Debra Granik, 2010)
  12. Up (Pete Docter, 2009)
  13. No Country for Old Men (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2007)
  14. Ali (Michael Mann, 2001)
  15. Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (Peter Weir, 2003)
  16. The Shawshank Redemption (Frank Darabont, 1994)
  17. Goodfellas (Martin Scorsese, 1990)
  18. Star Wars (George Lucas, 1977)
  19. The Rocky Horror Picture Show (Jim Sharman, 1975)
  20. Airplane! (Jim Abrahams, David Zucker, Jerry Zucker, 1980)
  21. Sling Blade (Billy Bob Thornton, 1996)
  22. Henry V (Kenneth Branagh, 1989)
  23. The Station Agent (Tom McCarthy, 2003)
  24. Flesh and Bone (Steve Kloves, 1993)
  25. The Long Kiss Goodnight (Renny Harlin, 1996)
  26. Birdman (Alejandro Inarritu, 2014)

Of course, that’s just today; on another day, the list might be different.

However, the whole process reminded me of how much I loved Flesh and Bone, and so I thought ot look at Wikipedia. It was directed, as noted, by Steve Kloves, who also wrote it. Oddly, has directed only one other film — but his filmography is still pretty notable.

He wrote and directed The Fabulous Baker Boys in 1989, and then has writing credits on Wonder Boys and then on every Harry Potter film, which presumably kept him busy and fed for a while. There’s also a writing credit on The Amazing Spider-Man, and producer credits on the Fantastic Beasts films.

Then, at the bottom, is his upcoming return to the director’s chair: an adaptation of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Tim, though that’s been in dev hell for a while. The book is great, though, and it’d be fun to see this guy direct again.