[conspire] Website biggotry: was Using Linux with AT&T internet service.

[Steve Litt]

Maybe I'll make a website that not only refuses to run Windows, but
mocks the windows computer owner for running Linux :-)

SteveT


Rick Moen said on Fri, 16 Jun 2023 23:19:23 -0700

>Quoting Steve Litt (slitt at troubleshooters.com):
>
>> So then, just as a Hail Mary, I went on a Windows computer and the
>> web banking worked perfectly with both Firefox and Chrome.  
>
>User-Agent string match?
>
>If so, it's classic dumb-company behaviour, but the easiest thing
>around to fix.  If your favourite browser lacks a function to adjust
>User-Agent per user desire, find a browser extension that will do
>that.  (ISTR that modern browsers _general_ come equipped with an
>array of predefined popular User-Agent strings claiming to be on
>various desktop and mobile OSes.)
>
>
>That aside, to my knowledge the only other way such fsckery can be
>implemented is through one of the rare ways still around to make the
>browser (or the user) do an external call for native code execution.
>
>E.g., many years ago, there was some Citrix-issued Web-conferencing
>software that I knew was a pure Java app (I guess it must have been
>GoToMeeting), but people were saying that it literally would not
>execute on a Java-extension-equipped Linux Web browser.
>
>Out of curiosity, I got ahold of the client-side Java code, and, holy
>jumping Jehosephat!  Citrix had indeed built something into it that
>literally required running ancillary Win32 code _before_ running
>GoToMeeting.
>
>Ah, found it!  It was wrapped delivered (pointlessly) in a Win32
>_installer_ program.
>
>
>
>Date: Sat, 18 Jul 2009 14:55:23 -0700
>From: Rick Moen <rick at linuxmafia.com>
>To: svlug at lists.svlug.org
>Subject: Re: [svlug] Fwd: Open Sesame: The Rise and Acceptance of Open
>        Source Solutions
>
>Quoting Don Marti (dmarti at zgp.org):
>
>[Some webinar broadcast using "GoToMeeting" software.]
>
>> Practical recommendation 1: Don't do open source if
>> you want to participate in "webinars!"  
>
>If you dig determinedly into their documentation, you find this only
>_somewhat_ misleading information about system requirements for
>"attending a meeting" on
>https://www1.gotomeeting.com/en_US/pre/faq.tmpl :
>
>  Internet Explorer 6.0 or newer, Mozilla Firefox 2.0 or newer
>  (JavaScript and Java enabled)
>
>or:
>
>  Safari 3.0 or newer, Firefox 2.0 or newer (JavaScript
>  and Java enabled)
>
>So, it's basically some proprietary Java app that Citrix's "Citrix
>Online, LLC" subsidiary developed and is selling to customers on the
>streaming-out side.  And they certainly _could_ have offered a variant
>of the codebase without gratuitous dependency on proprietary OSes, but
>unfortunately they've instead bundled it with "launcher" apps such as
>"g2m_download.exe" for the Win32 variant.
>
>It's undoubtedly possible to pull that apart and undo the corporate
>brain damage, but frankly it's not in my experience worth the payoff.
>
>[...]
>
>
>
>Anyway, sure, the banking industry has long been notorious for such
>fsckery.  But only specific pathological players.  Most, no.
>
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SteveT

Steve Litt 
Autumn 2022 featured book: Thriving in Tough Times
http://www.troubleshooters.com/bookstore/thrive.htm