Posts by Flocke Kroes

Police lab wants your happy childhood pictures to train AI to detect child abuse

I agree, but I am astounded to hear about police and an AI project seeking permission.

The next time your program is 'not responding,' (do not) try these steps

Re: How about not using Windows?

Forget about a Linux port of some commercial software. You will probably find a dozen free software projects promising to do the same thing. Three might work and about 1½ could be good.

Re: OB1 Error

Clearly the consultant mistook some of the sheep for lobsters.

Small nuclear reactors produce '35x more waste' than big plants

Re: much more safer to operate!

Solar causes way more deaths per kWh than nuclear. Coal power pollution kills people down wind. Coal power also releases nuclear waste. There are traces radioactive isotopes in coal and because it takes a huge pile of coal to run a power station the amount released is larger per kWh than the nuclear.

Death reports from non-nuclear power do not make the news because it would be a boring every day occurance.

Re: Does anyone want cheap and reliable energy?

Each fission releases about three neutrons. For a stable reactor you want exactly one of them to cause another fission. Some of your spare neutrons will decay to stable protons. Others will get stuck in other atoms which could transmuted them into short or long term nuclear waste. If you put you long lived nuclear waste in the path of your spare neutrons it becomes either short term waste or fuel for your Jupiter + Saturn space probes, which are sometimes solar powered these days because of a shortage of nuclear waste.

Believe it or not, nuclear physicists have already thought of this. I am surprised it was not mentioned in the counter arguments.

Re: Economies of scale

The economic advantage of smaller reactors is that one module is always down for maintenance so you maintenance team are always productive instead of being active say only one month per year for a single large reactor.

Elon Musk needs more cash for Twitter buy after Tesla margin loan lapses

Re: If "Musk" does eventually buy Twitter...

One reason Tesla was overvalued because Musk fans were buying and not selling. If Musk fans are not Trump fans...

Beijing needs the ability to 'destroy' Starlink, say Chinese researchers

Polar coverge

Starlink shell 4 is at 97.6° inclination. When full it will provide polar coverage. I think there are few few satellites in shell 4 already but lower inclinations are getting priority because of population density. If the US DoD hands Elon a crate of money I am sure shell 4 will become a priority.

Linus Torvalds debuts 'boring old plain' Linux kernel 5.18

Re: feature activation

I remember. At first there was only a 486 - at a really high price. There was considerable push-back against that price. I am sure 486SX was released as a way to off-load partially defective 486s as much as to capture the market for those balking at the price. I doubt it was the original plan because the first generation motherboards had no socket for a 487. Intel went to a lot of trouble to create a market for the 487 which was cheaper than a 486DX despite being essentially the same chip. The lower price of the 487 showed that the refuseniks had a genuine reason to complain about the price. Intel got their money anyway from thinner margins on two chips instead of a thick margin on one.

Re: Turing test

amanfromMars 1's early posts never used to get up/down votes but these days it frequently gets ±3. What has changed?

a) The travesty generator is improving (some of the +4 posts were remarkably coherent).

b) There are more people here unable to recognise a robot.

c) People know it is a robot but up/down vote anyway.

Does anyone know if the up/down votes get fed back into the algorithm?

Re: feature activation

There is a possible use for this that is not awful: Imagine you want your own small custom accelerator integrated with an X86 CPU. You could get a small number of CPUs made to your specification for a large amount of money or you could have your accelerator included as standard but deactivated by default - for far less money. There were rumours that the NSA did exactly this in the past and their secret x86 extension would be available to anyone who could guess how to switch in on, what it was for and how to use it.

On the other hand, this is the company that damaged the FPU on the 486 (486SX) so they could charge extra for an undamaged 486 (486DX) - or sell an upgrade 487 (a 486DX that would only operate if it was connected to a 486SX that was shut down). I fully expect to see CPUs sold with a free time limited speed up - with an expensive license fee to extend the time limit.

Much to my embarrassment, this type of thing has been around for years on the Raspberry Pi. You need to pay extra for the MPEG2 and VC-1 hardware decoders. This is because there are parts of the world where the software patents (spit) have not yet expired.

Clearview AI fined millions in the UK: No 'lawful reason' to collect Brits' images

Re: How are we supposed to know who's British?

Don't need to. Just delete the data for everyone you cannot prove is some other nationality.

The same goes for Google. They do not need to know who I am to delete what they know about me. They can simply delete records for all people they cannot identify. These days, that list must consist almost exclusively of people who do not want to be tracked by Google.

Dell's rugged Latitude 5430 laptop is quick and pretty – but also bulky and heavy

Re: You're whinging about a 6.5 pound laptop?

For years there has been a fashion for making laptops as fragile as possible. This has been presented as a desirable quality in reviews. I consider OP's language to be extremely mild and understated. I can understand that for some people a laptop is a device for demonstrating the owner's style, taste and disposable income. Being busted does not really hinder that purpose. Commentards here are more likely to think of a laptop as a tool for accomplishing work. Repeated whacks with a verbal cluebat have failed to get the message across: many techies would prefer a laptop that can easily survive common accidents. It is amazing that the discussion remains so calm and restrained.

Screwdriver storage solution.

AMD reveals 5nm Ryzen 7000 powered by Zen 4 cores

Re: Goodbye GF

Hello GF! Raspberry Pi 4s are currently 16nm. Perhaps on 2023-03-14 we will see a 10nm Pi 5.

Deepfake attacks can easily trick live facial recognition systems online

Re: Artificial Mimickry

On the other hand isn't this the criterion for being appointed a judge on the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit?

Repairability champ Framework's modular laptop gets a speed boost

Re: tinkerers and developers

High up on my wish list is no CPU > 10W, No CPU > $50, no separate GPU. When a mugger looks at my laptop I want him to think "That is far too cheap to be worth the risk of getting whacked on the head with" - from which you can deduce a use-case I consider important. If I need something that can bootstrap gcc in under 5 seconds I will ssh into a cluster.

If framework come up with something with a screen big enough to match a full size keyboard I will be very interested.

Lonestar plans to put datacenters in the Moon's lava tubes

Re: WTF?

"De la terre à la lune" was written in 1865. The first demonstration of a centrifuge was in 1875. The first centrifuge big enough to spin a human was built in 1933. Despite that, animals died from acceleration in the rockets built to test the viability of human space flight around 1959.

This is way more ridiculous than getting humans to the moon via cannon would have sounded in 1865. A better comparison might be trying to do an orbital launch with a battery powered steam rocket in 2021.

Will this be one of the world's first RISC-V laptops?

Re: Some serious questions.

The most obvious advantage to users is the lack of an Intel Management Engine, AMD Secure Technology or equivalent.

The sad state of Linux desktop diversity: 21 environments, just 2 designs

Re: The curse of overchoice

Choosing a distro: write some distro names on a piece of paper, pin it to a message board and throw a dart. Experienced Linux users probably tried two of three then selected one based on personal preference. They gained more and more experience with that one and now loudly proclaim that their choice (mine=Debian) is the best for all sorts of spurious reasons but the real reason is they know how to use it better than the others. A good choice would be the same as the person who is most likely to help you. If that person does not exist: Heads=Ubuntu, Tails=Mint.

I asked DuckDuckGo for "Mint ISO", and the link below the two pointless adverts was what you are looking for. "Ask a search engine" will probably get you something usable 8 times out of 10. Asking on a support forum will get you a "stop wasting my time" unless you make tiny effort yourself first.

That Mint page gives you a choice of desktop environments. Picking one is exactly like picking a distribution but with the extra bonus that it is even easier to change your mind, install several and try a different one each time you log in.

Once you have picked a desktop environment you can download an ISO by torrent if you know how (saves Mint much of the cost of bandwidth) or scroll down to an https mirror near you.

You got lucky this time as I had a minutes to spare, but next time make a tiny effort or you find other Linux users can swear worse than Linus used to.

Re: Keyboard / Mouse

Personal opinion: Some tasks are best handled with a keyboard. Others are best handled with a mouse.

From the discussion your linked to there was some agreement on "All command-keys should be user-specifiable". If every option has a pre-set short cut the short cuts become multi-key sequences that are no longer short. If the command keys are selected by the user then they are genuine short cuts. Add that into the mix and I think you will find people with stopwatches will discover the mouse/keyboard winner depends on the task, user's experience and user's typing speed.

I use GIMP for simple tasks. Other more experienced users may well have a different opinion but I despise tear off menus. It is not always clear why they tore off. Moving them around is a waste of mouse clicks. I can eventually get the torn of menus to go away but I cannot remember how I did it. Some @$$¤| thought it would be funny to change all the icons to monochrome so now I have to waste time searching for the one I want. There are a bunch of menus that are irrelevant to the current context (as defined by the selected main icon) but if I delete the menu I do not know how to get it back when I change to a context where it is relevant. That being said I suspect I get the occasional image job done more quickly with GIMP than the time it would take to find something different with a sane user interface.

Two? Only if you do not fiddle with the settings

Taskbar? Deleted!

Start menu? Deleted! (Right click on desktop instead)

System tray with clock? Deleted!

File manager: Never use. (CLI means I do not suffer the death of 1000 mouse clicks)

Moving windows: Don't. (Use <ctrl>F[1-12] to switch to another desktop instead)

One of the things I like about XFCE is it doesn't do most of the things I do not want and the off switches for the rest work. I am sure plenty of people would find my choice of settings horrendous but the good thing about Linux desktops is that there is probably one that can be hammered into whatever shape you prefer. By starting with something ≈ W95 there is a fair chance you can work out where to apply the hammer without having to search the net for help at every turn.

China reveals its top five sources of online fraud

Re: Way to go China...

Watch out: references to Winnie-the-Pooh are often taken away by river crabs wearing three watches.

Ad-tech firms grab email addresses from forms before they're even submitted

Re: Autocomplete

I met autocomplete with Brave which is a descendent of Chromium. The first thing I did when I saw it happen was to grep for my address in Brave's files, then disable autocomplete and finally grep again to make sure my address had gone. I strongly recommend doing something similar with Firefox. The only way to be certain that the browser does not leak personal information is if you have checked to make sure that information is not stored.

Re: Autocomplete

If you are not careful, autocomplete will also send your name, address and phone number. So far I have not seen credit card number, expiry date and CVC in auto complete, but I am sure that is only one developer's typo away from happening.

It is tempting to enable javascript, go to the John Lewis website, enter my MP's email address and half complete an order.

Elon Musk 'violated' Twitter NDA over bot-check sample size

Re: What's the endgame?

Musk's legal team must be dusting off their old defence:

The social network is ‘famous for invective and hyperbole’. His decision to accuse Twitter directors of fraud was a ‘gratuitous barb’ rather than an actual allegation in which ‘factual information is conveyed’.

Re: What's the endgame?

There wasn't a sane plan. Dunning-Kruger effect got him into this mess. His brain is beginning to catch up with his mouth but that will be a long and difficult journey with lots of detours. Musk is far better at learning from mistakes with rockets and cars than with social skills.

Arm CPU ran on electricity generated by algae for over six months

Depends...

~1µA is a very thin power budget. Enough to update about 2cm² of E-Ink display. A normal USB keyboard would need too much power but some lap-top keyboards are electrically just a grid of switches which you can scan with the micro-controller. If you do not type too fast you will be able to see what you type with partial display updates but you would have to wait for sufficient charge to build up to update the whole display when you press 'enter'. You are not short of MHz or Mbytes but losses in the voltage converters would kill the project. Use 10 power cells instead of just one and an algae powered adventure would be nearly possible while the sun shines.

Most organizations hit by ransomware would pay up if hit again

Danegeld

[paying the ransom] ... encourages these cybercriminals to do it again.

"Encourages"? I thought it guaranteed another hit as soon as the criminals have worked through their list of previous paying customers.

Confirmation dialog Groundhog Day: I click OK and it keeps coming back

Error messages have sometimes improved a bit

It used to be "FILE NOT FOUND" (or for the really old: 2). Unless told to do otherwise Python3 actually tells you which file was not found. Perhaps in a few more decades software will also tell you where the file was not found so you can put it in the right place. (Or possibly RTFantasticM until you find how to tell the software to look in the directory where the file actually is.)

Re: Effect as a verb

In New Zealand it is the number after five.

Europe proposes tackling child abuse by killing privacy, strong encryption

Re: how can they do their job?

How about listening to children? Giving children clear opportunities to speak? Explaining that is not their fault?

They can take away https, ssh and gnupg when:

Using their own personal money they research and implement defective encryption. They use this defective encryption to protect all their money. When the money is taken they have no legal come-back on the thief and their the defective encryption is not mandated.

Yahoo Japan strives for universal passwordless authentication

Re: They know this how?

The "at least six sites" could be ones that Yahoo acquired and therefore have legitimate access to the hashed password databases. The whole idea of big internet companies is that they track you wherever you go, so they are able to link the different user names of a single user to each of the sites they control. Finally they can run a list of popular passwords through the correct hashing algorithm with the correct salt for each site to test for recycled passwords.

On the other hand, people might use a common email address as the user name for multiple sites and the sites might store the passwords in plain text.

Re: So now the new target will be..

U2F / FIDO1 was reasonably sane with only one popular crippling disaster: many sites did not understand the concept of a backup authentication device.

FIDO2 is an abomination with the following "convenience" features: By default there is only one secret that is shared between all uses. The secret can be copied from one device to the next. Per device secrets are optionally implemented - with the requirement that the per device secret can be copied to other devices. No passwords. Authentication by finger print or facial recognition.

Starlink's Portability mode lets you take your sat broadband dish anywhere*

Re: Why

In any particular place or time there will be up to about one useful Starlink satellite overhead. There may be others near the horizon, but they are not licensed to transmit at that angle and if they tried it would be with reduced signal strength and cause interference with the actual useful one.

Until recently, Starlink satellites needed to be in range of a ground station to do anything useful. Ground stations were built according to demand and demand in the middle of an ocean was limited. The more modern satellites can also communicate with each other via laser links. When not in range of a ground station they can route traffic via laser to another satellite that is.

Mobile use is a new feature based on new satellites and new licensing. It was not offered before because it either would not work, would not work reliably or would reduce access by other paying customers.

Charging extra for mobile use is not a particularly good reason to pile on hate for Elon. There are plenty of much better reasons. I will start you off with FundingSecured's latest cryptocurrency pump and dump via twitter.

Re: Why

Starlink was clearly advertised for use in fixed locations only. There were regulatory restrictions as well as technical, both of which have been relaxed over time.

Inmarsat is a contraction international marine satellite. They started by obtaining licenses for mobile use because most ships do not remain at fixed locations. Back when I worked with their kit ('80s), the satellites were referred to as Atlantic, Pacific and Indian (as in ocean). They have expanded since then, but their main target as always been mobile, with the size of that mobile reducing over time. The kit I worked on would have capsized some of the boats customers hoped could get a satellite phone/fax.

Re: Why

Although there are technical limitations related to the number of subscribers each ground station can support my guess is that the principle concern is scalpers.

I hope that when laser links can connect you to any ground station, there are plenty of satellites to provide bandwidth and there is no waiting list for terminals then the restrictions will disappear. There is a possibility that competition with Kuiper will end Starlink restrictions - in 2050 - if Jeff can manufacture engines.

Switch off the mic if it makes you feel better – it'll make no difference

Thanks

I had not seen that one. I was expecting this XKCD.

Twitter buyout: Larry Ellison bursts into Elon's office, slaps $1b down on the desk

Re: Dickheads?

A pity you chose to be AC. It would be fun to see what your opinion is next year. Will you be bad mouthing Musk for his authoritarian censorship, extolling the virtues of censorship or taking FundingSecured's word for it that he never deletes "Short TSLA now" tweets?

Putin threatens supply chains with counter-sanction order

Re: You want to play hardball?

I smell desperation. Mining and oil extraction equipment require parts for maintenance that Putin can no longer get. Threatening to cut of supplies of what he cannot deliver is already a pattern. He is currently hiding in an impregnable bunker. It won't be long before the strongest oligarchs see to it that he stays their for the rest of his life.

Rocket Lab successfully catches falling rocket booster with a helicopter

Re: Does it work economically

The only way we will know for sure is if Rocket Lab keeps at it. Peter Beck publicly stated Rocket Lab would not re-use its boosters because the cost of recovery was too close to the cost of replacement. He later ate his hat. The problem was that it takes time to make rockets out of composite materials and even longer to purchase the required robots. Rocket Lab could not keep up with demand or buy equipment fast enough to boost their production rate.

Re-using Electron has turned out 'easier' than expected: some extra thermal protection around the hot spots and a parachute. Falcon 9 needed 60% longer booster tanks and much more powerful engines to lift all that extra propellant.

Some bits of Electron have flown again after being fished out of the sea but it looks like the helicopter trick is only a stop-gap. The plan for Neutron is to have the booster return to the launch site with the fairing attached - because boats and helicopters are expensive.

Elon Musk flogs $8.4bn of Tesla shares amid Twitter offer drama

Re: Irony

I would have gone with hypocrisy. Is there a better word for saying what a particular group wants to hear to get their support while blatantly doing the opposite? I think we need a new word: hypocracy - rule by someone acting out.

Interpol: We can't arrest our way out of cybercrime

150% tax on rasomware - to be paid by the victims.

Funding secured.

Your software doesn't work when my PC is in 'O' mode

ID ten T Errors

One peeve with the Raspberry-π is that is does not have a power switch on the device or the official power supply. Now I know why.

Rocket Lab to attempt mid-air recovery of descending booster

Re: I would love to watch this!

RocketLab warned of intermittent radio connectivity in the recovery area so we might not get to see it all.

Blue Origin keeps demanding a competitor to SpaceX. RocketLab delivers.

Microsoft points at Linux and shouts: Look, look! Privilege-escalation flaws here, too!

Re: Ugh! Scripts.

fstat and fexecve do what is required via file descriptors but I could not find a direct way to do fexecve in python. The indirect way is:

with open(x_path) as x:

___ x_fd = '/proc/self/fd/'+str(x.fileno())

___ subprocess.Popen([x_path], executable=x_fd, close_fds=False)

(Replace ___ with spaces because comments do not support the pre tag.)

Fedora starts to simplify Linux graphics handling

Re: If these people made cars ... they would be electric

If I understand this correctly:

Before, if you were writing the driver for a new graphics card you had to implement fbdev, KMS and DRM. For a car, fbdev is the equivalent of adding an internal combustion engine, petrol tank and gearbox to an electric car. In future, you will only need to implement KMS and DRM. Any software that tries to read the fuel gauge will get the answer "full" from the kernel. Any software that tries to change gear with get the response "gear changed" from the kernel which will also modify the way the accelerator pedal position gets converted to required torque from the motors.

User space software will not notice but kernel drivers will be simpler.

Elon Musk set to buy Twitter in $44b deal, promises stuff

Does anyone really believe ...

... Musk will publish the source code for the "Tesla over-valued" tweet deleter?

Debian faces firmware furore from FOSS freedom fighters

Fighting the wrong people in the wrong place

Plan Stupid:

Step 1) Steal under wear Remove firmware.

Step 2) ???

Step 3) All firmware becomes libre.

Plan Sane:

Step 1) Create GPL firmware for devices with documentation.

Step 2) Offer to port firmware to new devices in return for documentation.

Step 3) Create list of hardware with GPL firmware so users can vote with their wallets.

US Space Force unit to monitor region beyond Earth's geosynchronous orbit

Effectively this is micro-asteroid / debris tracking for Artemis with ground base telescopes.