Nothing In Particular

[pre65]

Haptic buttons.

Whilst viewing online car tests I have recently come across reports mentioning haptic buttons.

Seems they are (sort of) touch sensitive buttons, or sliders that impart a degree of "feel" to the user.

Has anyone got a modern enough car to elaborate on them ?

[Daniel Quinn]

My 23 Hyundai Kona as not got them because Hyundai refuse to fit them . They think physical is best

[Ali Tait]

Haptic buttons.

Whilst viewing online car tests I have recently come across reports mentioning haptic buttons.

Seems they are (sort of) touch sensitive buttons, or sliders that impart a degree of "feel" to the user.

Has anyone got a modern enough car to elaborate on them ?

Not on a car, but Macbooks have haptic mousepads. Feels like you get a click similar to pressing a button. Quite clever.

[simon]

Is Defender still recommended for antivirus etc.? I seem to recall Jack was pretty positive about it in the past but someone who runs a college IT department told us it really wasn't and we should consider Kaspersky or Trend. Not sure I fancy Russian anti-virus really, but what's the current state of play like?

[Mike H]

It's been alright for me. Also got McAfee with a new lappy, which hasn't found anything Defender didn't. Also got antimalware, ditto.

[jack]

Although Defender is pretty good, I actually use AVG behind a very good firewall

[Max N]

Although Defender is pretty good, I actually use AVG behind a very good firewall

Hi Nick
Could you give us any quick tips on what to look for in a home firewall solution?
Should I be looking at a hardware device behind my ISP box?
Cheers
Max

[jack]

Although Defender is pretty good, I actually use AVG behind a very good firewall

Could you give us any quick tips on what to look for in a home firewall solution?
Should I be looking at a hardware device behind my ISP box?

Generally, its the quality of your router/main firewall that counts. I cheat in that I use Ubiquiti kit that is not generally for domestic use as a) it's expensive and b) relatively complex to set up. It's expensive as it's very actively supported (regular normal updates and very fast response to new threats) and very fast throughput - basically it's as fast as the data you put into it. Many domestic firewalls can have issues keeping up with lots of packets.

I honestly can't speak for any domestic products as I haven't used any for many many years. I suspect that a BT SmartHub etc. is fine - I just object to them hijacking your DNS and monitoring it, plus having remote access into your network (though they call that a feature, not a bug).

Any firewall that is from a reputable source and allows you to block (not respond to) any unused ports, i.e. it won't respond to any ICMP etc. requests from bots probing the interface for open ports to attack, should be fine.

I rarely if ever open incoming ports on the firewall for forwarding as that is a chink in the armour - you are then relying on the resilience of the destination application. Stopping everything at the front door is a good approach.

Again, I can't recommend a h/w appliance behind the ISP's router as I simply have no experience of such things, though in practice it would seem to be a decent approach. There are some issues that might need careful thought though, specifically if network address translation (NAT) is being used int the appliance - it would need to be turned off else "double NATting" would take place and that's not good.

"NAT" is the technique used to allow multiple devices behind a firewall to access the internet simultaneously - e.g. you may have several devices in your domestic network browsing the web, however there is only one IP address that your router presents to the web, so the NAT protocol keeps a map of your request going to the internet and the local internal IP address any reply needs to go to. Without NAT you can't have more than one device on an internal network accessing the internet. NAT should be a single layer - having a NAT box behind a NAT box can lead to a world of pain!

[Max N]

Thanks for that very comprehensive reply Nick

I just checked my ISP router settings and I'm not forwarding any ports so that's good!

[Nick]

I use a pfSense based box both here and at work. Very flexible. The one at work sits behind a 10Gb line. If you have a old PC sitting about that can have two network interfaces it can be reused as a perfectly good firewall. The pfSense box here is on a tiny single board computer, and uses a TP Link router as the modem to the BT line. The TP Link router would probably do most of the job itself but the pfSense box is used to provide ipSec VPN into work and a lot of other useful stuff.

[Max N]

I use a pfSense based box both here and at work. Very flexible. The one at work sits behind a 10Gb line. If you have a old PC sitting about that can have two network interfaces it can be reused as a perfectly good firewall. The pfSense box here is on a tiny single board computer, and uses a TP Link router as the modem to the BT line. The TP Link router would probably do most of the job itself but the pfSense box is used to provide ipSec VPN into work and a lot of other useful stuff.

Thanks Nick, I’ll do some research. We do have some unused PCs, but they are either laptops (only 1 nic) or ex-gaming computers (huge).

[jack]

There are some rpi etc options too.

[simon]

Network config stuff makes me nervous, it seems like it could be very easy to do something inappropriate or even dangerous through lack of knowledge. Are there any simple solutions that are a bit more "plug and play" that don't need you to be a Comp Sci person?

[jack]

Network config stuff makes me nervous, it seems like it could be very easy to do something inappropriate or even dangerous through lack of knowledge. Are there any simple solutions that are a bit more "plug and play" that don't need you to be a Comp Sci person?

Very good point. IPFire on a Pi 3B+ or pfSense, or for that matter pretty much any "proper" firewall, is going to require some networking knowledge to set up correctly.

You can get a small pfSense box readily configured from companies like Netgate, e.g. their model 1100 box, for about USD 180.

[andrew Ivimey]

Shingles - sounds like fun Dunnit! It isn't if course but I trotted round to the local surgery and a jolly nurse laughed and told me she didn't know why oldies get it but it was a jolly good idea to get jabbed. It was hilariously funny that I said left arm. She nearly screamed with joy at my choice... most people say that- she quipped. It was with great humour that she squeezed in the liquid concrete, as it felt and how she squealed when I said ' that's no little prick!' How she did laugh too with great abandon when she told me I had to come back in about a month for a booster which I asked - does this convey immortality? She fell off the chair - such joy-, jollity and great amusement.

And now I feel like shit. No vaccination so far has conveyed such evil unpleasantness - moan groan groan moan, more wine! I did have a brief encounter with shingles about 25 years ago - not old - not 37! It was a very nasty prickly pain that came out of my scalp and travelled towards my left eye. My admittedly sanguine GP threw a packet of acyclovir at me enjoining and encouraging me to chew and swallow pdq. Worked bingo!

Nevertheless shingles/ herpes/ chicken pox is happy to live in the spinal chord and come out to play everyso often so no matter it is highly recommended to go for the jab.