service providers

AppWizard
July 31, 2025
Users expressed frustration on social media about outages affecting banking applications, particularly on payday. Lloyds Bank acknowledged the issues and asked customers to be patient while they worked on a fix. Outages were also reported by HSBC, Halifax, and the Royal Bank of Scotland. A Treasury Committee report revealed that nine of the UK's largest banks had experienced over a month of unplanned technical outages in the past two years, with 158 incidents of IT failures reported between January 2023 and February 2025. Common causes of these outages included problems with third-party suppliers, system changes, and internal software issues. Downdetector is a platform that tracks service disruptions across various services, allowing users to report issues.
TrendTechie
July 31, 2025
A novel method for downloading torrent files using Google Colab and the download utility aria2 has emerged, allowing users to mask their real IP addresses from peers in the file-sharing community. This technique involves executing scripts in Google Colaboratory to install aria2 on a virtual machine, enabling downloads from torrent files via magnet links. The user's IP address is replaced by Google's, and completed downloads are typically stored in the user's Google Drive. However, this method does not make illegal downloads lawful, as downloading copyrighted materials remains a violation of the law in many jurisdictions.
Tech Optimizer
July 22, 2025
Recent research shows that 82 percent of PostgreSQL users are concerned about cloud region failures, with 21 percent experiencing such failures in the past year. In the first half of 2025, PostgreSQL gained over 13 points in database popularity rankings, becoming the fourth most popular database. A survey found that 91 percent of organizations using PostgreSQL expect no more than four minutes of downtime per month, with 24 percent aiming for less than 30 seconds. Microsoft Azure, AWS, and Google offer various PostgreSQL services, while alternatives like CockroachDB and YugabyteDB focus on reliability. PlanetScale recently launched a PostgreSQL service that is 100 percent compatible with open-source PostgreSQL. Convex is transitioning from AWS Aurora to PlanetScale for better performance. pgEdge offers a multi-master distributed database for high availability. AWS claims its Amazon Aurora DSQL is designed for up to 99.999 percent availability, while its Aurora for PostgreSQL guarantees 99.99 percent uptime.
Winsage
July 21, 2025
Windows administrators need to keep their systems updated for security and performance, with control over the timing and type of updates being crucial. There are three primary methods for managing Windows updates: 1. Per-client updates: Default for standalone clients, offering minimal control. 2. Windows Server Update Services (WSUS): Centralized management since 2005, allowing extensive control but requiring more administrative effort. 3. Windows Update for Business (WUfB): A cloud-based model providing greater control through tools like Group Policy and Mobile Device Management (MDM). WUfB offers several advantages, including policy-based management, granular control over deployments, and the elimination of on-premises WSUS servers. To implement WUfB, organizations must meet specific requirements, including using Windows 10/11 Pro, Enterprise, or Team editions, Azure AD joining, and having the necessary licenses such as Microsoft 365 Business Premium. Administrators can defer feature updates for up to 365 days and quality updates for up to 30 days using Group Policy. They can create servicing rings for managing update deployments, such as testing, pilot, and rollout rings. Configuration involves creating Group Policy Objects (GPOs) linked to the appropriate Organizational Units (OUs) and setting relevant policies. WUfB reporting is available through the Azure Portal, allowing administrators to monitor update statuses and troubleshoot devices.
AppWizard
July 9, 2025
Google is rolling out an update to its Android operating system that allows its Gemini AI to access third-party applications by default, overriding users' previous privacy settings. This change, effective July 8, has led to confusion among users, as many received unclear email notifications regarding the update and how to disable the new feature. Google has stated that human reviewers may process app data, and conversations could be stored for up to 72 hours, even if users opt out of activity tracking. The update is part of Google's strategy to integrate Gemini more deeply into its ecosystem, replacing the Google Assistant with Gemini on mobile devices. The company plans to open its Gemini Nano model to third-party developers, further embedding AI into applications.
TrendTechie
July 1, 2025
A new method for downloading torrent files using Google Colab has been developed to avoid notifications from internet service providers and copyright infringement penalties. This method uses the aria2 utility to mask the user's IP address by executing scripts in Google Colaboratory, which runs aria2 on a Google-hosted virtual machine. Users can download files via magnet links while their IP address remains hidden, displaying the Google server's IP instead. Downloaded files are stored in Google Drive for later access, enhancing privacy and simplifying file retrieval.
TrendTechie
June 26, 2025
Western users have discovered a technique for downloading torrents that helps evade warnings from internet service providers and financial penalties for copyright infringement. This method uses Google Colab with the aria2 downloader to mask the user's IP address. The process involves running programs in Google Colaboratory, which installs aria2 on a virtual machine, allowing users to download torrent files via magnet links. The downloads occur on Google’s servers, displaying a Google IP address to the torrent network. Files are stored in Google Drive for retrieval. Although this method conceals the user's IP address, downloading copyrighted materials remains illegal in many jurisdictions.
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