Adobe and Microsoft today separately issued updates to fix critical security vulnerabilities in their products. Adobe pushed out fixes for security issues in Acrobat, Adobe Reader and its Flash Player plugin. Microsoft released seven patches addressing at least a dozen security holes in Windows and other software, although it failed to issue an official patch for a dangerous flaw in its Internet Explorer Web browser that attackers are now actively exploiting.Adobe patch here (effects Windows, Mac, and Linux).
Microsoft patches via Windows Update (you have to use Internet Explorer here).
Also, Internet Explorer users really need to get to version 9 or higher, because Microsoft did not patch the IE hole that is currently being exploited. This is a problem for folks still on Windows XP, because that's End Of Life and there are no more security patches, and IE 9+ doesn't run on it. You can use the Microsoft workaround or better yet install Linux. Ubuntu has some wretched advertising (one dare not call it "spyware" but one wants to), and so I recommend Linux Mint. Should run fine on hardware currently hosting XP.
UPDATE 9 January 2013 16:32: It seems that Microsoft's workaround is not much use. Windows XP users who don't want to switch to Linux should use Firefox or Chrome instead of Internet Explorer.
I've just discovered the kde and lxde desktops, lxde runs REALLY well on our very old former xp box. Feels a bit more like xp, too, which My Lovely Wife likes about it. Still no iTunes, though.
ReplyDeleteI just installed the newest version of Mint on my old computer, and it seems to work quite well. Trying to experiment with Linux since I don't like where M$ is going and I don't feel comfortable with cults that like black turtlenecks.
ReplyDeleteOn a side note, why is it that most Linux web "designers" (if you can call them that) are still stuck in the 90's? Eegads, I keep expecting to see a geocities logo at the bottom of the page when I go to most of their websites...
I love me some Linux Mint as well, this pisses me off though: "Flash Player 11.2 is the last supported Flash Player version for Linux. Adobe will continue to provide security updates." Last version for anything other than Chrome that is.
ReplyDeleteBecause 'Don't be evil', ya know?
bluesun: The bright young (and not so young) men and women who spend their free time developing free and open source software love to write code, but they hate to write documentation. That seems to apply to maintaining web sites too.
ReplyDeleteI've been completely on Linux Mint for the last two months. Was pleasantly surprised after the poor showing Ubutu gave me when I flirted with it a few years ago.
ReplyDeleteIf you go with Kubuntu (which is just Ubuntu with KDE instead of Unity), you don't get the advertisements that come with Unity. Plus, KDE is pretty WinXP-like in the way it works, so people switching from Windows won't have to go through the process of learning a new interface just to do the basics.
ReplyDelete