# OT/NT - Violent RANT!



## Semper Vaporo (Jan 2, 2008)

Well, okay, I'll tone it down. 

I don't mean to denigrate anyone, nor discourage anyone from doing with their computer whatever they wish to do. 

I just went to a garden railway supplier web site and it immediately attempted to show a movie to me... or at least that is what I assume it did. My anti-virus, anti-phishing and anti-spyware software all came up with warnings and dialog boxes saying that some entity was trying to modify my Registry and inserting new entries into my computer's Start-Up lists. 

I started canceling and/or denying permission to alter my PC setup and they just kept coming! Then my PC locked up and I could not get control of anything. I had to pull the AC power plug and battery (its a laptop PC) to get back to being able to make the mouse respond. 

It took over an hour to get the PC rebooted and calmed down to the point where I could get back to my e-mail and the MLS site. 

The software that I KNOW causes this is Apple's "QuickTime" and it happens way TOO often. Their programmers (possibly at the direction of their superiors) seem to believe that if you so much as peek at their software then you must believe it to be the absolute best-est in the whole wide world and just cannot live without it being installed deeply into the recesses of your computer and thus they attempt to make your computer awash with it. 

I DON'T WANT IT. 

It may be a fine piece of software and it may present movies and play sounds well, but I utterly HATE the conceit that they seem to have about it. Oops! Sorry, I said I'd tone it down, didn't I? 


I would like to make a request to the various web site owners and developers... I know that you want your website to be attention grabbing and memorable... but... 

PLEASE, 

for the sake of those of us that don't like to have to install this junk, as well as those that are still on slowspeed dialup... 

Make the opening page of your web site to be VERY BENIGN! 

Don't play music (some folk might not like YOUR selections) or railroad sounds (a loud whistle is cute, but when it is unexpected and the volume knob is all the way clockwise it can be a rather RUDE interruption to others) nor immediately open a movie (folk with slow dialup access will cancel your site before it gets loaded). If you absolutely MUST use QuickTime, (and I am trying very hard not to use obscene adjectives in front of that product's name) you may do so, but give us a chance to SEE your web site BEFORE you inundate us with unwanted and totally undesirable junk. 

From the glowing recommendations presented here on MLS, I was considering the expenditure of my hard earned CASH on some products of the company whose site I went to, but I am unable to see the company's products nor even see how to contact them due to the home page of their site being one that plays a QuickTime movie as soon as the page opens. Their site is now on my DO NOT VISIT list and they have lost a possible sale today and maybe others in the future. 

I'll shut up now and go away.


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## Mik (Jan 2, 2008)

When I designed my website I purposely excluded all stuff that I found annoying about other sites. I have no animated graphics. No garish clashing neon colors. No cutesy little slogan that follows the cursor. No sounds and no movies...in other (customer's) words it is "staid", "plain" and "boring".... seems even though people complain about all that crap, it still grabs their attention...


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## wchasr (Jan 2, 2008)

When i go shopping online i already ahve to jump thru security hoops please do NOT make me suffer your cute pretty impossible to read colored fonts and colored backgrounds with flashing things and bells and whistles (literally) that alert everyone at work that I'm shopping on my break. 

Sheesh! 

Chas


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## Jerry Barnes (Jan 2, 2008)

Firefox tends to block a lot of that. Jerry


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## ralphbrades (Jan 3, 2008)

Well after three attempts I think that I have got my web site to the state where I like it. 

256 colours 3 sizes of font and 1 font. 

I think this makes it easy to read and fast to load. The biggest load to the bandwidth is the main page which does have some embedded HTML code, (but I didn't write that). 

regards 

ralph


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## Semper Vaporo (Jan 2, 2008)

Unfortunately, Firefox tended to throw up its hands on other web sites that I could find nothing special about and IE-7 handled okay. It also just froze my PC while I was reading a page that had been displayed for several minutes. So I tossed it also. I guess it works for most folk, but not on my PC. Too bad, too, I would like to divorce myself from IE-? someday.


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

I just redid my website--it's in my profile and here 

http://chnm.gmu.edu/courses/magic/westover/ 

It seems to me that the number one thing you want in a web site is consistency--consistent colors, consistent themes, consistent image sizes and placements, consistent themes. The nav links have to be consistent and visible. And no auto-opening music of video, I agree


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## SteveC (Jan 2, 2008)

Charles

Don't know if the software firewall that you're using has the same type features as ZoneAlarm Pro, which is what I'm using. In ZoneAlarm Pro there are two features _*"Internet Lock"*_ & _*"Stop"*_.[*]*Internet Lock:* Stops all traffic except traffic initiated by programs to which you have given pass-lock permission. Clicking the Internet Lock instantly blocks DHCP messages or ISP heartbeats used to maintain your Internet connection.[*]*Stop:* Immediately blocks all network activity including Internet access.[/list]I've encountered the same type of problem that you've described, in which case I just engage the _*"Stop"*_ feature, which has always allowed me to gain control, at least thus far anyway.

I find it useful, since I know good and well I'm not going to change the manner in which web developers design their respective web sites.

My suggestion is check and see if your firewall has a similar feature to ZoneAlarm Pro's _*"Stop"*_ and learn how to enable and use it. Maybe it will save you some frustration.


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## Torby (Jan 2, 2008)

Oh yea! Quicktime installs bunches of other stuff has a *most* annoying updater, and insists it's the program you want to use for all sorts of unrelated things. I hate it.


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## chooch (Jan 2, 2008)

Charles, 
How about at least a hint on the website to stay away from! I sure don't want to go through what you just did. You can PM me if you prefer. Thanks.


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## Skip (Jan 2, 2008)

SV, I would guess you are using win98. if you are, make sure you upgrade to win98 second edition. There are a whole bunch of patches for win98 too... If you're running XP, You should have NONE of those problems, unless... XP's firewall is turned on, and you have other antivirus and firewall software going. Make sure you're runnig service pack 2 for XP. Firefox should pretty much work without a hitch. On my websites I advise people that I won't correct code for IE... too much trouble. I won't run IE, except for code testing. It lets too many critters in the back door. If you're running Vista, you're on your own. Vista doesn't work for anybody... 
If you're on dialup, you don't need a firewall - you're not broadband, and you're behind an ISP proxy to the web. Just run a good virus program. Most websites will no longer work on dialup, btw. Too slow to use the flash animation that is now the standard for commercial websites. 

All software installed has to make registry entries when it installs. Normal, otherwise the operating system won't know the new software is there and what resources it needs. Quicktime is stable (has been for a decade), its your computer, or the "anti" software that causing the problem. Be wary of overlaying too many different "protection" programs - they'll interfere with the normal operation of the computer.


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## Semper Vaporo (Jan 2, 2008)

I am using Windows XP Professional with all the updates set to occur as they are made available. And, yes the firewall is on, as well as an Avast! antivirus and Spybot Search & Destroy, and ParetoLogic Anti-SpyWare. 

P.S. I am a software professional (retired), I have designed operating systems and developed specialized computer languages for everything from the biggest Mainframe super computers to Mini-computers to Micro-computers. I have written programs for all of them. In the latter years of my employment I specialized in DOS (Oh horrors!) and Windows (up through XP), but I will admit that the Internet is a bit mystifying and getting out of the realm of my expertise. (When I was doing computer "networking" it was LONG before the present muddle was invented by the non-communicating ad-hoc committee that scrabbled it together... heck it was before most of them were even born!) 

As for naming the site that ate my PC... I suppose I could get a definitive OK (or a quick "shut up") from Shad, but I have not even asked him and I am not sure I will. I do NOT want to name the place, because it is not necessarily a "bad" place... they just use a particular method in their home page that I find particularly "disgusting". I don't want to start an argument amongst the members here, nor detract from any company's sales... nor open myself to possible lawsuits akin to defamation of character. I am sure there are many others that have accessed their site without any hint of a problem and they are probably quite unaware of my feelings and may not care one way or the other... then again, if they happen to read this thread and recognize their fax paux then they just might decide to alter their site to accommodate the users that have problems with it. And it might just make more than one web site do so!!!!  

If I knew how to contact the owners of the site about it, I would certainly have done so instead of venting here (well, I might have vented here, too), but in the past I have contacted other vendors of various products about what I perceive as failings (minor and major) in a web site and been informed that "there is nothing wrong with [their] site." One voice crying in the wilderness is often ignored, but since I blubbered publicly here, there have been several "me too"'s that might convince some vendors that an opening web page that jumps down the viewer's computer's throat is something that is not the best to do. 

I reiterate my earlier comment; I understand the desire to have your web site to be attention getting; and distinctive and memorable, but if you have ever been on a date with someone whose breath and body odor was "distinctive and memorable" you may have an idea of what some web sites incite in the vistor... i.e.: it doesn't have to be good to be "distinctive and memorable", but it does have to be good to be something that one wants to repeat.


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## rdamurphy (Jan 3, 2008)

You are SO right! I detest Apple Quicktime with the utmost contempt, it's nothing but a nuisance! Ditto for RealPlayer. No, I don't want the Google Toolbar either! Or the eBay toolbar, or any other toolbar! I don't need my home page changed, I don't need new features, and I don't need my registry checked or my hard drive defraggged. 

Flash is another annoyance, our computers at work have an older version, the company tightly controls what is installed, and anything that uses the "latest and greatest" crashes IE. 

Robert


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## bryanj (Jan 2, 2008)

Thought I knew, Sorry ! 


Posted By chooch on 05/06/2008 5:42 PM 
Charles, 
How about at least a hint on the website to stay away from! I sure don't want to go through what you just did. You can PM me if you prefer. Thanks.


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

I know this is kind of like battery vs track power, but every time threads like this show up I think "get a mac." Yes, Apple is smug and annoying. But I have no firewall, I have no adware blocker, no virus software, none of that stuff. I've never had a virus. None of those headaches 

The only thing I can't do on a mac is run the sound editing programs for Phoenix or QSI. I could, because you can install windows on a mac and toggle between operating systems. But why install Windows? The I'd need to get virus protection, and spyware protection, etc. etc. 

That being said, I think I know what site you're talking about and it was just as annoying on my mac


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## bobgrosh (Jan 2, 2008)

I just bought a HD camcorder 
To edit HD, one needs a lot of power. 
And a lot of new software. 
So I just bought one of those HUGE laptops. 
Won't fit n any laptop case, but it has a full blown processor, 3 gig of ram and 400 gig of fast disk space. 
It edits HUD video in half the time of my high end desktop. 

So I go to some web site and the idiots managed to slip in a quick time installer that did it without even asking me. 
Got all the google toolbar crap too. 

The real surprise was that the video editing software stopped doing high def. 
And when it did compose a video, all the transitions simply came out as blank white screens between scenes. 
Video I previously created would no longer play, titles cam out without shadows behind the text. etc.etc 
QUICKTIME hosed all me software, an thousand dollars worth of Adobe, Pinnacle, Vegas, and Sony video editing programs. 

I tried to remove QUICKTIME. 
Still nothing worked right 
I reinstalled my software. And quicktime automatically reinstalled right over it. 
I had to do a complete rebuild of the new portable. 
Finally, success. 

Yea, I have always hated the way quick time takes over the registry, the codecs, the tool-bars, etc. But the web sites that do "silent installs" have reached a new low. 

Frankly, I think using Adobe PDF files is nearly as bad. Seems like every time I need to read a on line manual, the PDF reader has to update and install a useless tool bar. 

If you make a web page, stick to HTML code. Pass on all that other junk.


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## Torby (Jan 2, 2008)

Hate quick time, and it's awful that it installed itself. Must be an Apple plot


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## Pete Thornton (Jan 2, 2008)

A "well-behaved" website will give you the option on the home page to 'skip the intro'. If it doesn't, go elsewhere (but tell the webmaster anyway - email to [email protected] will usually get through.) 

Apple is responding to Microsoft's blatant attempts to take over media distribution using that aweful Windows media player. Very soon you will be able rent new movies from the iTunes store (or similar online retailer) and play them on your PC + HDTV, and they think that's the next source of big profit. 

In general, Apple software is WAY more elegant and user-friendly than anything Microsft produced. I have iTunes and Quicktime on my XP machine and nothing has happened to my other software - yet.


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## SteveC (Jan 2, 2008)

I guess I shouldn't mention anything about Google Analytics then. /DesktopModules/NTForums/themes/mls/emoticons/hehe.gif


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## Skip (Jan 2, 2008)

Well, the first computer I wrote programming for was an IBM1620, long before any pc, and I still maintain your problem is not QT. (Dialup is another matter). QT file tagging can be set by the user. I also run Avast and Spybot (I do not run Spybot's realtime monitor - it is extremely problematic in XP). Most software installers will place a start file entry, and of course, make registry entries. Changing permissions on the fly in XP pro is asking for trouble, especially when an install script is in progress. Life would be simpler to just install a QT viewer and be done with it. Same with Flash. Properly set up, both will sit quietly until needed by the tagged extension. 

The battle between IE and Firefox exists because IE uses a non-standard html interpreter for deprecated html code, and tries to interpret standards the way Microsoft would like them to be, not the way standards are written. Firefox's deprecating html table (the one it uses when it encounters non-standard or outdated html code) is more closely based on the web standards, and will actually interpret more pages than IE. Microsoft has tried to redefine the standards for its own purposes, and web designers that design for IE write code that no other browser can properly interpret because IE's interpretation of standard html is non-standard. Throw in java, javascript, flash, cgi and others, and you have a mess. What Microsoft couldn't obtain through dialogue they've tried to bully through using non-standard code. This is a large part of the reason why pages that work fine on IE sometimes don't work well on Firefox. 

Anyway Semp, I think you're over analyzing XP/QT (too much knowledge is dangerous, I do it too  ). The best firewall protection for Microsoft boxes is a router with a hardware firewall, even if you don't run a network. Software firewalls trip up XP all the time (incl XP's own abomination of a firewall) and interfere with all kinds dos-ops.


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## nkelsey (Jan 4, 2008)

Its not quick time, but....the other player..... 
If you want to install Real Player and avoid all the junk that comes with it, here is the BBC UK site http://www.bbc.co.uk/webwise/categories/plug/real/newreal.shtml?intro2 
Where, because of EU rules, they cannot stick in all the junk we get in the US.


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## Semper Vaporo (Jan 2, 2008)

I have no idea what "QT file tagging" is or what it does or how the user can set it. 
Spybot's monitor has not caused any problems in other web sites. 
Yes, SOME software installers place a start file entry, but if they do so on MY computer I hate them just like I would hate the contractor the built my house if he stuck extra doors in my house just so he could get in whenever he felt like it! i.e.: NOT ON MY COMPUTER! 
I have seen no problems with other software that is in the middle of an install and I deny it to modify the registry or start up lists. 
I have TWO version of a QT viewer presently installed on my PC. I would rather have just one, but each of the two I have will display certain .MOV files that the other one won't. Why each web site requires me to install yet another one, which then tries to make itself the primafacta "any kind'a media" player is without merit. 
I won't get into the argument of whether IE is "standard" or "non-standard", I don't care, I just want web sites to recognize that they are a GUEST in my PC and they had better play nice, or I'll kick 'em out. 
I have no idea what a "Hardware firewall" is. Is it not just another computer running yet another set of reconfigurable software that is yet again filtering address tags that cannot be filtered because I deliberately called for the web page to be delivered to my PC, not knowing that the said web page would attempt to install yet another copy of a program I already have and in the process alter what I want to allow my PC to do and do so without my permission. 

My argument is not with QuickTime per se... it is with the unmitigated conceit that just because someone else likes it that then I must accept their vision of how my PC will work and what it will do. I won't let unknown folk come into my house to redecorate it to their likes, nor rearrange my furniture on their whim, and I will thank the QT folk the keep their @(*$*&! hand off'n my PC!


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## Skip (Jan 2, 2008)

Ok, a few points. "QT file tagging" - my bad, some. in Microsoft DOS, file associations - what resident software runs what files with specific extensions, ie .mov, .avi, .mpg, etc. This is user customizable. All of the viewers (especially media viewers), when installed, attempt to to "capture" the range of extensions they're written to handle. Sometimes the user gets a heads up that the associations are changing sometimes they don't. In any case, its a user function to be able to reassign these as desired (but not necessarily simple or uncomplicated). 

In regard to the website being a guest in your computer, well, no, not quite... The internet, while fundamentally structured the same as a contained network, is not one. Think of it as a collective (the Star Trek Borg, comes to mind). When you log on, your machine joins the collective (on broadband) and participates, as a server (you have some, but not complete, control of its function as a server). You only get to regulate a certain amount of this interaction. This is why its called "the internet", not the "intranet". Networks you will be familiar with are intranets, with constrained "users" and "administrators". 

On the internet, there is no "administrator". The price of admission to the internet is, to a large degree, the submission to it by your hardware. This is why people with sensitive networks do not permit internet access directly by stations in their networks. Maintaining a private intranet within the structure of the internet is very difficult. 

A hardware firewall is a user configurable ROM based permissions/exclusion table built into a router that regulates the private IP network (by int'l agreement, IP 192.168.0.0 and its user assignable subnets, and the hardware default 127.0.0.0) that the router sets up between your computer and the internet (or any other IP addressable devices in your private network). Unlike software firewalls, its virtually unassailable from without, AND, is independent of the processor of any computer attached. Hence no conflicts between application software permissions and system software permissions that regularly occur. 

Even if you only have one computer, if you have a broadband connection, a router with a hardware firewall (or a hardware firewall only) provides a much better protection service than any software one. The 192 IP domain address does not appear in any domain name servers serving the internet, hence internet routing protocols cannot forward to your computer without being screened by the hardware firewall. All that the internet DNS servers see is the IP address assigned to your ISP. The hardware firewall controls the access to your computer from the ISP assigned IP. 

With software firewalls, the screening isn't done until the code has already arrived in the computer. This makes the computer vulnerable to code which has the ability to use the computer's processor to bypass the software firewall. This can't happen in a hardware firewall - not enough addressable processor in the router. 

SV, email me the name of the vendor - you've now got me curious as to what their site is doing.


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## SteveC (Jan 2, 2008)

Well, while I realize the reality is, it's a total waste of time in stating this because it won't change anything.

However, the basic underlying problem is that "whoever it may be doing it", they just don't wish to honor the fact that it is *MY COMPUTER* and not their's. Which from their twisted perspective justifies doing whatever they can figure out how to get away with on my computer. Under the ploy of providing the user with an _*"enriched experience"*_. /DesktopModules/NTForums/themes/mls/emoticons/sick.gif

Then from the _"general users"_ side of the coin, most are both too ignorant and lazy, to be inconvenienced with learning what tools are out there and how to use them to protect and maintain control of their computer.

On another subject that has been touched on, i.e. Apple's operating system and associated programs. The truth is, their code is no more or less fraught with error and vulnerability than any other out there. There just aren't enough out there for the hackers to bother with (i.e. a very low ROI).


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## Semper Vaporo (Jan 2, 2008)

Two more points... 

My computer is actually not a PART of the Internet. It is a client on the end of ONE long wire after a "DSL Modem" and a "Router" (I recognize the addresses you specified as those of that equipment). My PC knows nothing of any other members of ANY network, i.e.: it does not receive messages from one computer via one wire attached to it, destined for any other computer dangling from another wire attached to it. It sees no "in transit" messages that are not specifically addressed to it. 

Revolutions and wars have been fought over dictatorial practices and invasions of sovereignty. It may take a while but Fascists will ALWAYS on the losing end. And, yes, I consider these invasions of my computer to be Fascist practices.


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## Allan W. Miller (Jan 2, 2008)

"On another subject that has been touched on, i.e. Apple's operating system and associated programs. The truth is, their code is no more or less fraught with error and vulnerability than any other out there. There just aren't enough out there for the hackers to bother with (i.e. a very low ROI)." 
------------------ 

Thank God for that! I'm using PCs/Windows at the office and at home these days; used PCs at my former employment at Virginia Tech for six years (with a Mac at home); and was fortunate enough to be using Macs in all the years prior to that. 

My next computer will be another Mac, even if they do cost an arm and a leg. There is no better operating system made, in my opinion (and experience). I don't want Apple to dominate the market. I just want them to continue producing the great stuff they do for "the rest of us."


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

And, yes, I consider these invasions of my computer to be Fascist practices. 





Off topic maybe, but "fascist" is the wrong word. These are not invasions at the behest of the state, they are invasions at the behest of, and in the interests if, private industry. Fascism was a political movement that consciously rejected the tenets of classical liberalism--it argued against individualism and the idea of equality, and insisted that people only reach thier full potential when submerged in the state by strong leaders. Mussolini coined the term "totalitarian" to describe the fascist state, the government. You may think I'm splitting hairs, but I'm not--if you're going to throw a term like "fascist" around, be precise. If you want to fight something, understand it fully. What you're describing might be more like old fashioned monopoly capitalism, a la Rockefeller and Standard Oil. For what it's worth, it's extremely irritating to me as well. 

But what you are describing is very different from fascism. It's not state directed--Apple is not a government, it doesn't want the responsibilities of govt. 

A interesting fact is that in today's world private corporations know more about me, more intimate details of what I like and desire, than Mussolini ever contemplated. People who worry about govt. surviellance ar emissing the pbig picture--Amazon.com knows more about me than any govt. ever even imagined.


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## Semper Vaporo (Jan 2, 2008)

Maybe the wrong word, but the net result is the same... my PC has to become a part of and submit to the whims of some entity that does not have my best interests at heart and was neither permitted nor elected by the majority to perform the actions they are doing.


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## ralphbrades (Jan 3, 2008)

Speaking as a professional computer geek... I prefer UNIX to any other OS this is why I use MAC OS at both home and work. I use the X.11 libs and link to the (somewhat secondhand) central computer at my office. The system at work uses BSD 4.3 (it is our own port). I have found the DARWIN kernal to be very robust. As to there being a very low Return on Investment trying to build a MAC OS virus -there I would have to agree with you. This is because "Mac People" tend to be into highly personalising their Macs in how they like the sound, vision, even the kbd. etc. Of the 25 Macs in the office I doubt there is one that is the same as mine. Even the one I use at home is set up differently to the one at the office. This is because the home environment requires things that would not be found in an office environment, such as my sons + wifes camera links -so that they can nag me!!! 

regards 

ralph


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