OT: Anti-virus and the bad hair day...

[NewsArchive]

As a Windows software installation system vendor with customers in 80
countries worldwide, I can't say it often enough: an anti-virus system is
the dark side. It is THE DARK SIDE <g> !!!

Do you want to know what a "bad hair day" is?

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/03/11/panda_antivirus_update_self_pwn/

Today, we have received quite a few emails from customers asking for their
SetupBuilder installation keys (serial numbers and logins). They all had in
common that they were Panda Security "protected". And they "lost" their
computers and have to completely reinstall Windows and start fresh. That
really is a bad hair day.

With this episode, Panda has joined the ranks of anti-virus vendors who have
mistakenly detected their own products or core system files as malware and
taken user-crippling remedial action. Happy Security Day.

By the way, that's why we at Lindersoft are using VMWare Virtual Machine
(VM) environments and a VM backup and restore strategy to avoid any kind of
fatal damage.

Friedrich

[NewsArchive]

Ouch!

I came to the conclusion only yesterday that given how many weird things
happen to those mostly using at least one VM, I would never use it. I'm
re-thinking that now.

--

Russ Eggen
RADFusion International, LLC

[NewsArchive]

> Ouch!
>
> I came to the conclusion only yesterday that given how many weird
> things happen to those mostly using at least one VM, I would never
> use it. I'm re-thinking that now.

I have been using VMs for many years now and I am not doing anything on
"real" machines. I have two VMs for software development and 16 VMs for
software testing purposes.

IMO, VMs (I am a huge VMWare fan) is the best since sliced bread. Let me
tell you why <g>.

On my VMs for software development, I have Windows and the software
installed on virtual drive C:\. No data files installed here. On my
virtual drives E:\ and F:\ I have all the data files (including source
codes, emails, license registration databases, etc.). Four weeks ago
"something" crashed my main development machine (I think it was caused by a
Windows update in combination with an ESET protection software update). A
few years ago this would have been a disaster. But not today <g>. Turn off
Windows (the VM!), copy the virtual disk file C:\, which stores the contents
of the virtual machine's hard disk, from the backup to the VMWare folder,
and simply restart Windows. And you are back in the game, in only 1 minute!

Two weeks ago, I completely switched from HDD to SSD. To be on the safe
side, I have three SSDs (2 internal and 1 portable) from three different
vendors (Samsung 850 1TB, SanDisk Extreme Pro 960GB and Transcend SSD370
512GB) in my Dell Precision Mobile Workstation. Within 30 seconds, I can
backup the VM from the main SSD to the 2nd internal SSD. It takes two
minutes to copy it to the external (portable) SSD. BTW, I can copy the same
VM files to my MacBook Pro Retina and use them in Fusion when I am working
at home. I love it!

Okay, and what happens when my Dell "physically" dies? Well, no problem
today. A few years ago, a disaster <g>. I buy a new computer, install
VMWare (three minutes), copy all the VMs from the backup to the new machine
and in under an hour I am back <g>

Have I already mentioned that I love, love, love VMs <g>. I've never had a
VM related problem in the last 6 years! And the latest VMWare versions
really rock!

Friedrich

[NewsArchive]

Well, if you put it like that! <g>

--

Russ Eggen
RADFusion International, LLC

[NewsArchive]

>
> Well, if you put it like that! <g>
>

<G>

Friedrich

[NewsArchive]

Friedrich,

> IMO, VMs (I am a huge VMWare fan) is the best since sliced bread. Let me
> tell you why <g>.

You're preaching to the choir, my friend. My VMware renewals will only
run out once I do!<g>

--
Lee White

RPM Report Viewer.: http://www.cwaddons.com/products/rpm/
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Windows 8 brings us "The Oval, Bumper Car, Roller Coaster of Wait!"

[NewsArchive]

>> IMO, VMs (I am a huge VMWare fan) is the best since sliced bread. Let me
>> tell you why <g>.
>
> You're preaching to the choir, my friend. My VMware renewals will only
> run out once I do!<g>

<ROFL> Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha :-)

Friedrich

[NewsArchive]

Hi Friedrich!

I think you were the person who recommended VMWARE Workstation to me
years ago, and I have always been happy with that product. I use it now
for C6.3 support and all testing. :)

Craig E. Ransom
Tracker Software Products, Ltd.
http://tracker-software.com/

[NewsArchive]

Amen!

Jane Fleming

[NewsArchive]

Well what happens if Panda (or the devil A/V of the day) is on all of
your VMs and converts them to BMs?

How recent of a complete backup of all of those VMs could you possibly
have? How how recent of a snapshot could you have?

It would still be a bad hair day, chasing turds all day long.

Fewer turds (because of the VMs) though.

Jeff Slarve
www.jssoftware.com
www.twitter.com/jslarve
I'll search help files & Google for you.

[NewsArchive]

Jeff,

> How recent of a complete backup of all of those VMs could you possibly
> have? How how recent of a snapshot could you have?

All my crucial VM's are backed up daily to 3 offsite services. I sleep
well... once I GET to sleep! Maybe I should hold my breath?!<g>

--
Lee White

RPM Report Viewer.: http://www.cwaddons.com/products/rpm/
RPM Review........: http://www.clarionmag.com/cmag/v11/v11n06rpm.html
Report Faxing.....: http://www.cwaddons.com/products/afe/
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Creative Reporting: http://www.CreativeReporting.com

Product Release & Update Notices
http://twitter.com/DeveloperPLUS

Windows 8 brings us "The Oval, Bumper Car, Roller Coaster of Wait!"

[NewsArchive]

Not to be argumentative, but after you restore a VM to the point
before the nasty update happend, I bet that A/V is going to want to
update itself before you get a chance to intervene.

Maybe booting in safe mode would help with that. Or (duh) unplugging
the internet.

Jeff Slarve
www.jssoftware.com
www.twitter.com/jslarve
I'll search help files & Google for you.

[NewsArchive]

Jeff,

> Not to be argumentative, but after you restore a VM to the point
> before the nasty update happend, I bet that A/V is going to want to
> update itself before you get a chance to intervene.

If an AV caused the problem it will not BE on this computer to do it
again. I think Friedrich can attest to that!<g>

And, before you ask<g>, I don't run AV in my development VM's, just
the host and the VM I use for browsing.

--
Lee White

RPM Report Viewer.: http://www.cwaddons.com/products/rpm/
RPM Review........: http://www.clarionmag.com/cmag/v11/v11n06rpm.html
Report Faxing.....: http://www.cwaddons.com/products/afe/
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Product Release & Update Notices
http://twitter.com/DeveloperPLUS

Windows 8 brings us "The Oval, Bumper Car, Roller Coaster of Wait!"

[NewsArchive]

Ok, but you don't know when an A/V will ever do this so by that time
it's too late to make that decision not to put it there.

And, IMO, you should definitely run AV on every PC whether it's a VM
or not, especially if you connect to the internet anyway at all.

Jeff Slarve
www.jssoftware.com
www.twitter.com/jslarve
I'll search help files & Google for you.

[NewsArchive]

Jeff,

> Ok, but you don't know when an A/V will ever do this so by that time
> it's too late to make that decision not to put it there.

It's never too late NOT to put it in there!<g>

> And, IMO, you should definitely run AV on every PC whether it's a VM
> or not, especially if you connect to the internet anyway at all.

I don't where I have no AV. I do have a firewall in each that's sealed
up water tight in case of floods!!! It takes Clarion a bit longer to
fail when it tries to verify the certificate or whatever it's doing
but that only happens the first time each day.

I -do- have AVG on my Cisco VPN/RDP VM for current contract work since
it IS "out" there in the cold, cruel and carnivorous world!<g>

I use AVG in all these instances, not the free version, and in all the
years I've used it I've never had it step on my toes so I feel pretty
secure in using it without reservation. I've had a multi-use license
since back in the day when I hand multiple servers doing hosting.

--
Lee White

RPM Report Viewer.: http://www.cwaddons.com/products/rpm/
RPM Review........: http://www.clarionmag.com/cmag/v11/v11n06rpm.html
Report Faxing.....: http://www.cwaddons.com/products/afe/
---Enroll Today---: http://CWaddons.com

Creative Reporting: http://www.CreativeReporting.com

Product Release & Update Notices
http://twitter.com/DeveloperPLUS

Windows 8 brings us "The Oval, Bumper Car, Roller Coaster of Wait!"

[NewsArchive]

Need some help?

Maybe I should hold my breath?!<g>
>

--

Russ Eggen
RADFusion International, LLC

[NewsArchive]

> I have been using VMs for many years now and I am not doing anything on "real" machines.

Since you got me started with it years ago - I work the same way.


> IMO, VMs (I am a huge VMWare fan) is the best since sliced bread.

+1000


I work using Virtualbox instead of VMWare, but have had zero problems and
would never consider working on a machine without them again.

Switching to VMs was the single most productive thing I have ever done in
programming!

THANK YOU Friedrich for pointing the way!


:-)

Charles



--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Charles Edmonds

cjeByteMeSpammers@lansrad.com (remove the "ByteMeSpammers" to email me)
www.clarionproseries.com - ProScan, ProImage, ProPath and other Clarion
developer tools!
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xDataBackup Manager and more!
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[NewsArchive]

> With this episode, Panda has joined the ranks of anti-virus vendors
who have
> mistakenly detected their own products or core system files as
malware and
> taken user-crippling remedial action. Happy Security Day.

ROFL!

There are others?

J André Labuschagné

[NewsArchive]

Hi Jeff,

> Well what happens if Panda (or the devil A/V of the day) is on all of
> your VMs and converts them to BMs?
>
> How recent of a complete backup of all of those VMs could you possibly
> have? How how recent of a snapshot could you have?
>
> It would still be a bad hair day, chasing turds all day long.
>
> Fewer turds (because of the VMs) though.

This is a good question. Here is some information about my environment. I
am using two machines on a daily basis: my Dell Precision M6600 Mobile
Workstation workhorse (32GB RAM / 2TB SSD) and an Apple MacBook Pro Retina
(16GB RAM / 1TB 4-channel PCIe SSD).

The Dell M6600 (my main development machine) is powered by Windows 7
Ultimate x64. Only two programs are running on the host: Intel Rapid
Storage Technology and VMWare 11. No anti-virus, no nothing. This machine
is rock solid, military grade, with excellent performance.

Because I have learned my lesson...the hard way...I have three virtual disk
drives in my development VMs. Virtual drive "C" is always the Operating
System drive (with no "data" files on it). Virtual drive "E" and "F" are my
data file drives.

First of all, to be on the very safe side, I have a backup of the "clean"
Operating System (drive "C") with all my main software installed (EXCEPT
anti-virus). This is my absolute emergency backup and I only pull it out
when it's completely necessary. This backup lets me restore and boot up a
VM back to production state in a few minutes.

Then I have daily backups of my two development VMs (on SSDs) and a weekly
backup (on HDD).

The cool thing is, I can copy the VMWare Workstation virtual drives from my
Dell to my MacBook Pro VMWare Fusion (and vice-versa). This is brilliant.

Neither a fatal A/V failure nor a very bad Windows update (with endless
update loops or bluescreens) can bring me down <g>

Friedrich

[NewsArchive]

I got vmware so I could create my old xp machine where my Clarion6 is..
and about 8 drives. Anyway, I was wondering how you do a backup for your
VM? Is it just a file?

Also, with XP, I had a lot of trouble with licensing... so I had to quit
using my REAL XP machine... which I don't need as long as my VM XP
doesn't have a problem.

So would I need to get a new Win8 license if I create a VM for my real
Win8 machine... on my Win8 machine.

Anyway, I like the idea of a VM for testing...

Ray
VMT Software

[NewsArchive]

Ray,

> I got vmware so I could create my old xp machine where my Clarion6 is..
> and about 8 drives. Anyway, I was wondering how you do a backup for your
> VM? Is it just a file?

It is comprised of several files but the core of the virtual HD is
either one or multiple files. I use multiple vmdk files so that my
offsite backups only have to update those that have changed instead of
one HUGE file.

Windows7x64-cl2.vmdk 1,927
Windows7x64-cl2-s031.vmdk 131,072
Windows7x64-cl2-s030.vmdk 327,680
Windows7x64-cl2-s029.vmdk 327,680
Windows7x64-cl2-s028.vmdk 327,680
Windows7x64-cl2-s027.vmdk 327,680
Windows7x64-cl2-s026.vmdk 327,680
Windows7x64-cl2-s025.vmdk 327,680
Windows7x64-cl2-s024.vmdk 1,757,675,52
Windows7x64-cl2-s023.vmdk 1,761,345,53
Windows7x64-cl2-s022.vmdk 2,146,762,75
Windows7x64-cl2-s021.vmdk 2,146,500,60
Windows7x64-cl2-s020.vmdk 2,146,762,75
Windows7x64-cl2-s019.vmdk 2,146,762,75
Windows7x64-cl2-s018.vmdk 2,144,337,92
Windows7x64-cl2-s017.vmdk 2,146,697,21
Windows7x64-cl2-s016.vmdk 2,145,845,24
Windows7x64-cl2-s015.vmdk 2,145,779,71
Windows7x64-cl2-s014.vmdk 2,146,435,07
Windows7x64-cl2-s013.vmdk 2,132,803,58
Windows7x64-cl2-s012.vmdk 2,145,779,71
Windows7x64-cl2-s011.vmdk 2,144,993,28
Windows7x64-cl2-s010.vmdk 2,016,346,11
Windows7x64-cl2-s009.vmdk 2,145,976,32
Windows7x64-cl2-s008.vmdk 2,138,439,68
Windows7x64-cl2-s007.vmdk 2,146,566,14
Windows7x64-cl2-s006.vmdk 2,146,762,75
Windows7x64-cl2-s005.vmdk 2,144,600,06
Windows7x64-cl2-s004.vmdk 2,142,896,12
Windows7x64-cl2-s003.vmdk 2,143,158,27
Windows7x64-cl2-s002.vmdk 2,143,617,02
Windows7x64-cl2-s001.vmdk 2,137,587,71

> So would I need to get a new Win8 license if I create a VM for my real
> Win8 machine... on my Win8 machine.

I wouldn't have a clue since I have an Action Pack subscription with
MS and have multiple licenses for a bunch of stuff.<g>

--
Lee White

RPM Report Viewer.: http://www.cwaddons.com/products/rpm/
RPM Review........: http://www.clarionmag.com/cmag/v11/v11n06rpm.html
Report Faxing.....: http://www.cwaddons.com/products/afe/
---Enroll Today---: http://CWaddons.com

Creative Reporting: http://www.CreativeReporting.com

Product Release & Update Notices
http://twitter.com/DeveloperPLUS

Windows 8 brings us "The Oval, Bumper Car, Roller Coaster of Wait!"

[NewsArchive]

Pretty much exactly my situation this week.

My main machine is an i7 laptop with 32GB.

Monday it decided not to power on.

The couple of older laptops I have kicking around are 4GB with older
processors.
I do have a Dell server in my bedroom (because I don't have a life) that
runs a Server2012 Hyper-V environment with a domain, SQL, and Sharepoint.

But my development VMs on my laptop are VMWare. I've googled about
converting to Hyper-V, but don't want to mess with them.

Took a couple of hours to install Win 8.1 on the Dell server as a dual-boot
with the Server2012 (most of which time was the 2GB or more of Windows
updates after the clean install from DVD). Install VMWare in the 8.1
machine. Attach my primary VMs (Win 8.1 Clarion VM, Win 10 test machine,
Android emulator for another project).

Of course, the spinners in the server box feel really slow compared with the
SSD in my broken laptop. But not too much suffering, overall...

I believe in VMs!!

Jane

[NewsArchive]

> I believe in VMs!!

Me too!

I am on the road for a while and when I left I simply copied the VM folders
I needed to my laptop.

Then all I had to do was run them, let Virtualbox tell me that the network
adapter was different (and offer to fix it) and I was up and running.

No re-installing, forgetting some program or data that I might need (or any
such potential problems).

When I get back it is simple enough to reverse the process!

I would never even consider working outside a VM again.

:-)

Charles


--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Charles Edmonds

cjeByteMeSpammers@lansrad.com (remove the "ByteMeSpammers" to email me)
www.clarionproseries.com - ProScan, ProImage, ProPath and other Clarion
developer tools!
www.seal-soft.com - The xProduct Clarion templates - xWordCOM, xToolTip,
xDataBackup Manager and more!
www.ezchangelog.com - "Free ChangeLog software to manage your projects!"
www.setupcast.com - "A revolutionary new publishing system for software
developers - enhanced for SetupBuilder users!"
www.pagesnip.com - "Print and Save the Web, just the way you want it!"
www.ezround.com - "Round Corner HTML tables with matching Banners, Buttons
and Forms - Now with PNG support!
www.lansrad.com - "Intelligent Solutions for Universal Problems"
www.fotokiss.com - "World's Best Auction Photo Editor"
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------