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Medlin Software, Dennis

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Posts posted by Medlin Software, Dennis

  1. To be translucent: It seems there will be no Windows 12 per se later this year, just a major upgrade to the current Windows 11. So for me, even the upcoming new surface machines did not get my attention. But, what did, was the ASUS ZenBook Duo 2024, which was just left at my door. The dual screens are perfect for me, maybe even to rid the separate monitor. The Surface Pro convertible is a great machine, but it does not work well as a laptop itself (meaning on an actual lap). I dis look at a competing dual screen, but I could not get past the country of origin of the competitor.

    I have always preferred portrait orientation for what I do, and this new machine looks perfect. I'll still likely use my old trusty keyboard, but they have a similar layout (option) which has lighted keys and mouse area which has caught my eye. I like a track ball for most use, not the pad, so I'll stick with that too. As with the surface, the pop out "leg" has a raised edge, which is a great for a special cable lock when I need it. I will likely miss the convertible aspect, but if the screens are as nice as I think, the screens will be in place of my monitor, so I will actually gain some desk space in the corner of the visitor/granddaughter room which used to be my office. The new intel chip is a good part of what got me to be willing to go through a computer move yet again. I opted for the core ultra 7, as it is more than enough for my needs, and the core ultra 9 uses more power/produces more heat, and may not even be able to function at full song because of the form factor of the device. The screens are not so bit I needed the extra resolution with the upgraded model, as I tens to use either lower res or more mag anyway, so I can work without special specs.

    • Like 1
  2. 3 hours ago, Lee B said:

    Just think of all of the unemployed attorneys and accountants

    And their lobbyists and those who have a featherbed position (such as overseeing a local tax), etc. Thus the (un)common sense rule tax simplification will NEVER happen.

    We face this all the time, and no one wants it - simplification. CA passed a rule for utilities to be more fair, which essentially means an access fee, then rates (lower) per usage. I suspect anti solar (the utilities themselves) were in on this as lowering the usage rates helps kill solar adoption.  Fair?, likely, assuming all were to play nice and really come up with a realistic access fee. BUT, the rule was also tasked with paying for discounts, not increasing cost for certain groups, etc. So even what could have been a straigt access/usage plan got "played" with, and now, most of the people subject to this new rule want it to be revisited - the old dance with what you know because of fear you will be the one skewered by that nasty old "change".

    • Like 1
  3. As a 2x admin, I communicated only through the JD I retained. While it was cold, it prevented any sort of direct arguments. It was awful, including having to force one relative out of a home they essentially were using as a squat. The squatter has at least 1mil of ready cash, and for about three years now, has not cashed a check from the estate, or made attempt to convert, >100k.

    But it did help get me to revisit my own plans and clean up a few things. We went with a plan which allows editing on the fly (sort of a subscription) as it fits us for the next decade or so. No worry about how much a small revision would cost.

    • Like 3
  4. Real estate on the coasts, vacation areas, and other high demand markets, bears no relationship to reality. Multiplied by real estate in areas which limit growth. Exponentially if said area is desirable. Then multiply again if politics are involved (such as CA Prop 13).

    Many of us boomers who scrimped and ramen'ed our way to home ownership are equity (and for those who were wise) interest rate locked into our homes.

    Home ownership, post pandemic, is likely going to drift to something none of us have seen before, with the remote work aspect reaching many who cannot afford to air commute.

    There is a reason small towns are having a tough time, and the ability of affordable homes and a lower cost of living has zip to do with it.

  5. Pick any reasonable online company to get something in place ASAP., Then, if you wish, take some time to find something else, engage, then cancel the "temp" policy. Having a gap is likely costly compared to "changing".

  6. 4 minutes ago, tom777 said:

    Doesn’t work for me .  I am so tired and want to retire.  It works , why fix or update ? 

    Maybe think like a one baker bakery (like I used to be for three years). When the mixer broke, the call to the repair shop was made while we were on the way to Tahoe or to the beach. It was amazing how fast we could hit the road, even if it was for 24 hours. I swear, it always broke on its own, and we were never pre packed up!

  7. Ugh. I know many devs use revision numbers, and I used to as well (as it is easy to auto increment in the dev tool being used) but I went back to the revision DATE, as it is plain language anyone can understand. Devs need to accept users are no longer computer experts and to not get things such as major, minor, revision, and build numbers. For me, it is much clearer, and less likely to raise a support issue, showing a message saying something like "your revision is 97 days old", rather than "your revision is 2.23.45 builds old".

    • Like 1
  8. I suspect ATX is more complicated, but the process is likely similar. For me:

    There is an online file which contains the information which tells the latest revision. The software reads the file and compares it to the EXE data, and if not current, handles the out of date issue as needed.

    When I make a change, I first upload the new software, then update the data file. But, on occasion, I might miss something, or upload something incorrectly (as binary instead of ascii, or the reverse, proving yet again I am human). As soon as I am done, I test the new revision indicator and download myself. I usually catch errors before anyone else downloads, but not always.

    There is also an issue with caching, as the user computer could not be reading the actual current revision info, as their browser or connection is reading a cached copy of the file. This is a REAL issue, and is one of the reasons I allow manual download, and have s system in place to try to keep the download from ever being cached.

    I also usually leave the prior revision on my site, but not directly accessible, in case there is some need to install the prior revision (I can send a link). Has not been needed in years, but I still allow for human error.

    OTOH, over the years, I have had to get stricter and stricter, and do have "stops" in place for cases where the user is not keeping current. Just a thing one must do not that computers and software are treated like appliances, and are expected to do all for the user, and insulate the user from any responsibility. When I started, 90% of my programming time was for the software functions/improvements. Now, 90% of my programming time is trying to prevent user errors.

    • Like 1
  9. I have to paper file my personal return as the personal provider I use does not have the PTET form I need. No big deal. But, I think I remember here that there are pro preparer software which try to have all forms, and that the standard ATX (IIRC) sometimes does not have every possible form.

  10. Not a user of ATX, but I have simlar warnings in my own software.

    If you can manually install, try that (the check for update process may not have been updated fully). It could be a case of the process having the "update needed" flag set somewhere (likely online) and the new software not yet being automatically (or however they do it) installing.

    I might power cycle my computer and try again, in case there is some sort of cache which needs clearing.

    • Thanks 1
  11. 14 minutes ago, mcb39 said:

    Try being left-handing and learning cursive in a parochial school in the 40's and 50's.  I did it and am proud of it.  All of my life, I was told there were things that I could not do; and I did them.  I learned to knit by watching my mother-in-laws hands in a mirror.  I can spell, I can type, but I can also make homemade bread and can tomato juice.  I am computer savvy and can use a smart phone.  I have never believed in cutting corners when it comes to education.  I am pretty good at tax law, but still learn something new every day.  I'm not bragging but just stressing the importance of learning.  At my age, I still thirst for knowledge; be it scholastics or hands on.

    I wish more would be done early to encourage use of both hands - which typing does. My first typing class was so foreign, to use my non dominant paw (other than for wrenching, which I did as soon as I could hole one).

    It is also a bit fun, as last week, we made our first Scholastic Book order for our grand (pre school). Something powerful about her picking her own books, and having them to touch.

    • Like 2
  12. It is arguably called uncommon sense these days.

    Our toddler grand likes me to use air tools. She is good with hand, ear and face protection, so I let her help me. She compares it to photos of her uncle in his medical garb, she wears her car doctor getup. Different times, I learned to use the old long screwdriver as a stethoscope, and nor I have a mechanics stethoscope, and a borescope. We have 5 oil changes and safety checks coming up this weekend.

    • Haha 1
  13. 22 hours ago, BTS said:

    I can relate to kids not being able to sign in cursive.  Even some young adults in their early 20's cant.   Fortunately our school system has brought it back and my gkids are learning how to write in cursive. 

    I'd rather a school do nearly anything else. Art, music, drama, choir, ethics, more math (not the calculations, the "is that close" common sense stuff), etc. Or even training in trades, or just how to check air/oil levels (or battery charge). One which is missed is how to compare prices at the grocery (the look for the unit price, not the price per package). I learned that in grade school.

  14. As a programmer, I can tell you accurately and proven, when I used to try to recompile when some AV program was giving a false positive on my public software, changing something from upper to lower case, or moving one function in the order (so it would compile slightly different), would cause the AV program to consider the software safe.  Even worse, depending on the compression level I select (in my setup program), some AV's would trigger. (They are often looking for a pattern, not actually opening the file and examining it, so compression, which most use, can easily fool/trigger AV.)

    That tells you how reliable the heuristic wild rear end guesses are, and how useless they are for the public to use. If I can cause the AV to safe my software by such simple means, a scammer pro can do so likely with automation. One can also ask an AV vendor to safe all of their software, by reputation, which is also alarming (if one wants to trust AV software).

    Now, I don't bother. I know there is no garbage in my files, so I do not give in. When a person says I have an issue, I refer to then to virus total, which proves a current AV shows no issues, or the issue is a random AV (and not the 50+ others virus total uses to compare). Inevitably, it is a case of heuristics, or lack of checking daily or AV updates.

    While I am fine with the opinion of many top experts, that modern AV is pointless with just modest safe hexing, I am good with using the AV from the OS maker (in case someone here uses my computer).  The real issue these days is preventing access to restricted folders (like ransom issues) and watching your incoming/outgoing internet hits (firewall). The modern OS can help protect from ransom issues, if one enables it. For email, I let my provider wash the mail through whatever AV they use and I don't open attachments I did not ask for. For firewall, I use a really "cool" product, Firewalla.

    I am also of the experience and opinion one should, at all times, be ready to recover, prepared to find your computer/office missing or unavailable every single day.

    • Like 1
  15. 2 minutes ago, Randall said:

    I'm seeing a lot of employers reorgainizing or changing names or whatever.  Even if the client didn't change jobs, they would get two W2s.  I think this may have happened with my client.  I was just a little surprised it would be this long for something like that to just now be caught by IRS.

     

    Besides the usual UI dumping scenarios, there seem to have been more than usual changes requiring a new FEIN (and thus, more than one W2 from the same "employer"). Also, with more and more ER's catching on the the rules for remote work, there are more issuing multiple W2 forms when an EE has more than one work location state (since the EE should, for many reasons, be setting up a new entity for each state, and in come cases, each work location).

    The TP should have handled this, but this is another questionnaire scenario for preparers, something like "Do the W2's you have show all wage income for the year - is there any chance you may have received more than one W2 for any job?"

  16. 5 minutes ago, Lee B said:

    I would really like to see free efiling of 941s.

    Of course they will probably run it through IRIS like the 1099s🙄

    IRIS would be fine, anything really at this point (free). I suspect there is some lobbying somewhere to hold out as long as possible, as there is a good amount of $ being made filing for others at a cost, or charging in software per form. I look at a service every year, and it always seems to be to be about $5 per form at the customer level. I do not want to get into submitting for customers, since it tacks on responsibility for monitoring and relaying status, but IRIS worked well for my customers handling 1099 (and me too, I had one this year!).

  17. 26 minutes ago, mcbreck said:

    2022 is just last years tax return. Seems very reasonable to still be processing returns since W2s are often paper filed.

    Starting with 1/1/24, the threshold triggering efile was reduced to an aggregate of 10 of the specified forms. With some of the rules requiring efile at 1 form, the only prudent advice at present is to efile W2 data. The IRS is said to be working on free 941 efile, which is the long missing piece for employers. Matching is one reason for the change in threshold.

    The client should be able to log in and at least see the total income the IRS has, maybe by comparing against their records, they can figure out what the difference applied to (if it was "real").

  18. "Turning off your anti-virus software is like walking outside naked....no one wants to do it and no one wants to see you do it."

    Somewhat.  Turning off save and accurate AV is not wise for most. Not turning off the heuristic garbage foisted on unsuspecting users is worse than going outside nekkid.  Heuristics are simply wild guesses as to what someone might create in the future. They are the cause of most false positives, and issues like Tom likely had. The ability to correct an issue by turning off something proves the something was worse than useless.

    How much time has Tom spent on this issue, caused by lousy AV? Worse yet, AV which does nothing all year is good, since most don't do stupid things, but AV which is often popping up "warnings" (usually false positives), just to get renewals, is robbery.

    I will say it forever, use the AV which is part of your OS provider's offerings, which is updated almost daily by the OS, and don't waste a cent on third party AV. OR, at least, update your third party AV daily, and hope they are not defrauding you (and everyone else too) with their false positives.

    • Like 2
  19. We did not force cursive on our kids. We sent them to school with a typing device (can’t remember what it was called) and when they were ready, a laptop. It raised a ruckus at the school, but we did not give in.

    As crawlers, we gave then keyboards to play with. 

  20. Not bad at all in this case. Calling about a CP 220. The issue, from what was shared by the person on the other end of the phone was not receiving a Q2/23 941, and two Q3/23 941. Whether or not I believe that is not material, they gave me a quick solution (file a copy of the Q2 form, and a Q3 941x.

    On the other hand, I don't believe the information was actually accurate, but I did not press (as I usually like to do for "fun"). I suspect they somehow read the Q2 form as for Q3, and the Q3 as a second form (which is absolutely allowed, mult forms for the same time from one FEIN).

    The phone rep did know about the lack of free 941 efile, and agreed with me folding 941 into IRIS or similar would be great. She actually listened when I told her what it takes to offer 941 efile (I have explored it several times), and understood why it is not currently free.

    Ironically, I will likely be paying someone else to efile these needed items, for expediency.

    • Like 1
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