Posts by Alan W. Rateliff, II

Hyperspeed travel looks wrong: Leicester students

How the Kessel Run was run

Maybe this is enlightening.

http://scifi.about.com/od/starwarsglossaryandfaq/a/Star-Wars-Faq_Why-Did-Han-Solo-Say-He-Made-The-Kessel-Run-In-12-Parsecs.htm

Paris, just because.

The 10 best … Windows Server 2012 features

System Center may be nice, but MS has its head up its arse

I started a massive virtualization project earlier in the year. I decided we would go with SCVMM and called Microsoft for pricing. I was directed to a distribution partner and given some information on existing 2008 pricing, but as of 2012 the who shebang gets integrated into a single, much higher-priced, product.

But no pricing was available. Well, maybe, but it's gonna be like $36,000. Or less. Or more. Wait, what exactly did you need?

Six flapping months. SIX MONTHS of back-and-forth between me, distributor, and Microsoft to finally find out Microsoft wants to CHARGE ME engineering time to design my already-design solution for me. I raged. I've already designed the solution, I just need a flipping SKU for the proper product so I can get a price and quote this project which is now six months old.

I called into VMWare and had SKU and retail price quote the same day. Haven't looked back.

I like Hyper-V. I'm not completely sold on 2008's way of redundancy which uses Windows Clustering (server-level) versus VMWare's way (virtual machine-level.) But, it's free and it works. But if you wanna fly, you gotta buy, if you can get the pricing.

Paris, first hits free, too.

USB 3.0 speed to DOUBLE in 2013

NorrisSpeed USB

Norris is a unit of force, but could it be extended to a speed?

Paris, should be a unit, too.

Up your wormhole: Star Trek Deep Space 9 turns 20

Excellent list. I have to agree on "The Sarah Connor Chronicles"; I think it could have developed into something much better, especially considering how it looked like it was set to work its way toward "Salvation," which I think was also a bit under-rated.

As for the new "V," I found it interesting enough to keep watching. I think one of its biggest failings was ABC yanking it from Hulu.

Paris, I don't have anything useful for her.

Re: More than a B5 Ripoff

Hear hear.

Re: Babylon 5 dissappointment

You missed out. The Earth Civil War had me absolutely captivated, and pretty much made the series for me. The Shadow Wars seemed a little played out, but still somewhat enjoyable. Then with the Centauri return to power via an unholy alliance with the Shadows and Molari's seeming self-sacrifice. The first season was horrid, IMO, and things picked up with the second season. Even under what's been mentioned as a constant threat of cancellation, it was pretty bold and I would have loved to have seen it go further than it did before the decommissioning, and I believe JMS had it in him to go another decade. I have such a deep place in my heart for B5 that I was genuinely saddened to hear of the passing of Richard Biggs (Dr. Franklin) and Jeff Conaway (Zack Allan, also Kenickie in "Grease,) both incredible actors playing compelling characters. Andreas Katsulas as G'Kar was another which caught my imagination. And I'll round it off with my never-ending crush on Patricia Tallman (she's STILL a looker at 55!)

Anyway, DS9 came out around the time I was distracted by a number of other offerings in my life, so it found little room in my television repertoire. Having been able to view a number of episodes later in life, I find two things: first that I'm not certain I would have been able to appreciate DS9's real-Earth grittiness at the time, and at the same time I certainly missed out on the ground-floor of an excellent show. I think the little bit I caught of it at the time made me feel as though it was the inferior competitor to B5, but looking back I have to say they both clearly stand apart and strong on their own merits.

Ten badass brainy computers from science fiction

Re: Any Heinlein fans about?

I may have posted a little later than you, having not seen yours. Though I couldn't recall that his name was "Mike" but rather "Mycroft," but the MYCROFTXXX was the secret number to reach "him" by phone.

I never did read "The Cat..." though I have meant to do so for years.

Since we're throwing in some random stuff amongst the pearls...

What about SID 6.7 from "Virtuosity"?

Re: re 2001

So, um, HAL was a Postal mail sorter?

Re: What about written SF?

Hear, hear. I would have voted for the computer from "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" by Heinlein. Old girlfriend got me reading him, and it's a good read. IIRC, the computer called itself "MYCROFT." It started out as a bureaucratic tool which suffered "feature creep" of getting tied into one system after another until one day it woke up and was terribly bored so it started playing practical jokes, including mucking about with government payroll. Not evil, but it did ultimately lead the lunar colony revolution against Earth.

Paris, loonier colony.

MIDI: 30 years old... almost

Re: Game port

That would be it, then. DMX definitely sounds familiar. I am going to double-check this over the weekend when I have access to the equipment, but I recall seeing MIDI triggers available in the control program, and the controller board does seem to communicate via MIDI over USB (per something which popped up at one point or another.)

None of this withstanding, the system likes to lock up and crash. Frequently. Its poor behavior has earned it its own machine to hopefully quell its fiendish and cruel appetite for watching liquored-up patrons stop dancing and stare around in dismay when the lighting system suddenly conks out. What really sucks is it also controls the lighting for the stage shows.

Paris, another staged show.

Re: Game port

Amiga, Golden Hawk MIDI, Bars and Pipes, FTW. Before that my Commodore 64, the Dr. MIDI (I think) interface and Stereo SID Editor (which could output to MIDI, IIRC.) I feel the need to set up the latter again just as a show of my geeky-manhood.

I set up the digital TV and IT infrastructure at a local bar this summer and the lighting guys use a USB lighting control panel which is actually MIDI, and the lights are controlled by MIDI. Neat stuff.

Paris, MIDI-compatible.

Just bought an Apple product? Need support NOW? Drop an F-BOMB

Re: It pays to be nice

I'm glad that worked for your Mac. I tried that with my Dell Latitude D430 with a 1.8" hard drive. I was on my third hard drive under warranty, the previous started making loud clacking noises and the system would hang, occasionally bringing about a BSOD. I tried being cheery with Dell up to the point where, even though the drive's own SMART was telling us it was dying, they refused to replace the drive as the increase in the number of bad blocks on the drive didn't trigger Dell's diagnostics (and as I later found from the Office of Michael Dell, Dell does not work pro-actively.) At that point I lashed out and got my replacement hard drive.

Up until last December. In September I decided I would go through the regular process of troubleshoot, diagnose, send out a tech to replace a part, repeat. After about a dozen tech visits only to encounter the same problems, tech support offered me a system replacement. Unfortunately, the system they sent me came with no expansion capabilities while I have a stack of PC cards which I use regularly (I know, outdated, but the system even lacked a PC Express slot.) I had to send it back and spoke with the tech who "owned" my case about a more viable replacement, which we found but I had moved into a period when I could not afford to spend more time and an occasionally crashing computer was better than no computer for a week.

In early December I phoned in again and asked if we could continue the process. I was handed off to the Office of Michael Dell where a very nice lady told me Dell would not be replacing my laptop, I would be required to send it in to the depot to check, and I could be without it for up to two weeks. My warranty was due to expire on January 3 or 4, and I was desperate to just get a good hard drive, so I complied. I received it back within a week to discover Dell's depot had it in-hand just long enough to reload Vista (and not all the drivers, mind you,) box it and get it out with the day's FedEx, along with a note stating that no problems had been found. Of course, the hard drive SMART still showed increasing failures.

At this point I realized I wasn't getting anywhere and would just have to wait for the drive to fail, so I went online and purchased an extension to my warranty. To which I later that day received a call from Michael Dell's office telling me my system was no longer qualified for a warranty, my order was cancelled, and I would be receiving a refund.

Fine. So I took my refunded money and went on eBay, found the same model hard drive but faster (a "C" version at 5400 versus the "B" version at 4200) and LO! A better hard drive which hasn't given any signs of failure in almost a year, much better than the previous provided by Dell.

My next laptop won't be from Dell. As well, after relating this experience to several customers, I've been able to move them away from Dell and in some cases have made laptop sales myself, pretty well making up for the aggravation I experienced.

Paris, does not qualify for a warranty.

Texan schoolgirl expelled for refusing to wear RFID tag

Re: I was all for this protest..

So you'd be happy just letting this slip because the loudest voice against it is someone who's religious? By this logic, even if you believe abortion is murder you would not speak out against it because the loudest voices against abortion are religious.

Pretty damned sad, IMNSHO. The religious and privacy angles notwithstanding, as I feel these get addressed fairly well, let's look at some numbers. The school system is spending $500,000 ($.5 million) to wrangle students in order to win a $2 million grant, a net gain of $1.5 million. I posit that the $.5 million could be spent on mechanisms which work to entice students to desire participation in an educational environment like, oh, better teachers, better trained teachers (good and dedicated teachers, you know I'm not talking about you,) better curriculum, better extra-curricular activities which can only be enjoyed if the student is fully attendant, and so on. $500,000 goes a long way to encourage and entice rather than coerce, bully, and buy-off.

Net gains in this scenario are a better school, happier and more capable students, students who retain dignity and privacy and develop a sense of doing right for its own merit rather than because they have to, less stressed teachers and administrators, more productive individuals going out into the job market, and $1.5 million. Hell, for that matter, the school might not need $1.5 million in pocket-padding if the $500,000 was put to better use.

Paris, could be put to better use.

Medical scan record that the NHS says will cost £2k to retrieve: Detail

Re: Just a thought

"Because old scans aren't medically important and thus it would be a waste of public money?

That would depend. In my case, I'm being denied an insurance claim on a severe accident which has left me with injuries to my back because I have no proof that the injuries shown in a recent MRI weren't present long before as I never had an MRI on that region. An MRI from just five years ago would settle the argument. Fortunately I have the recourse to sue the insurance provider and am doing so.

Paris, obsolete eight years ago, as well.

Microsoft's 'official' Windows 8 Survival Guide leaks

Re: How do I distinguish bugs from features?

"Microsoft are far more patronising and arrogant than I believed."

The satirical article notwithstanding, I'm of this opinion. For me it started around the time Office 2007 was being released and in a TS2 seminar a Microsoft rep says to us, in similar terms, "our focus groups have allowed us to determine that the Ribbon interface is more ergonomic." The entire audience queried, ergonomic for whom?

I have a number of ideas swirling around in my head right now, about keyboard obsolescence, Kinect for Office 2013, multiple screen switching being the same as multiple maximized windows (on 2400x1500 screen you maximize your browser?!) and so on. But I'm just don't have the wherewithal to bother right now. Have to go pretend to do some work today.

Paris, slightly less ergonomic.

How Bodyform's farting 'CEO' became a viral sensation

Well done, Lester!

Thank you for not saving this as a boot-note for Friday. I desperately needed this pick-me-up and have started my hump-day with a hearty guffaw.

Paris, starting off hump-day.

Payment protection tops list of SMS spam scams

txt STOP 2 optout

Much like the days of olde when spam was a periodic nuisance and not a massive deluge, when I receive text spam I notify my carrier. The number may be forged but their system can trace it back to its source if its within their network, or to the network from which it was delivered. It takes a couple of minutes if you can get someone who knows the process. Otherwise, I get some silly twit who tells me to just answer "STOP" to the original message, to which I answer I am not going to validate my number by doing such a thing.

It would be nice if carriers would provide an easy mechanism, such as an online form, to automatically report text spam. It couldn't be as simple as forwarding the message as, like email not forwarded as an attachment, doing so loses its "headers." That is, the original number is lost. The online form has its weakness, too, as people tend to make mistakes and the contents of the text may not be exactly what was sent.

The delivery conversation made me think of someone's signature in another forum about UDP jokes: I don't care if you get it or not.

Paris, a periodic nuisance.

Game over for legendary 1980s games designer Mike Singleton

Cheers, Mike.

Many fondly remembered hours of non-productivity and inspiration to write my own games.

'Hypersensitive' Wi-Fi hater loses case against fiendish DEVICES

Re: Think of the Children!

Sadly, if ever "proven" (being that plenty of research fails to prove) or simply accepted as reality, this could very well become another child welfare issue. We're already seeing how parents are inadequate at raising their children: not providing the proper nutrition, not providing a proper learning environment, not providing proper supervision and locked entries around pools so other unsupervised children don't break into your property and drown, not providing proper warnings to children to not question the missives of so-called authority and eat competitive foods like (gasp) sour cream and onion crisps at lunch.

Soon we'll add not providing a electromagnetic-free environment for the child.

Paris, mutated by bag phones while in the womb.

Fossil reveals spider in mid-strike

Extinction

"The spider is an orb weaver, Poinar said; relatives still exist today, although the kind in the amber is extinct."

It's extinct. Must have been global warming or anthropogenic climate change. *tsk*

LASER STRIKES against US planes on the rise

Re: Ironic Punishment - use MIRRORS

And here you have it. Asshats who point lasers at aircraft because it's cool and/or fun wind up getting the government involved and screw everyone else who have non-menacing uses for lasers and laser pointers.

Paris, menacing asshat.

Top admen beg Microsoft to switch off 'Do Not Track' in IE 10

No method of compliance checking

Unlike a phone call which clearly informs you who is honoring the "Do Not Call" list, there is (currently) no way for the end user to determine whether or not a web site is honoring your "Do Not Track" request. Once such a mechanism is in place, or some individual or investigative journalist sets out to make these determinations, said violators can be publicly shamed.

But the real question is, will they (the violators) care? The answer is, in all likelihood, a resounding NO. At least unless someone or a group of someones can prove damages and therefore sue the violators. I believe this is due to a large number of consumers having given in to the warped sense of commerce which tells them that the lowest price or best discount, irrespective of the reputation of the entity providing the offer, is the one to choose. In corollary, a smaller number of people -- which do exist, just in comparatively smaller numbers -- genuinely vote with their dollars and will pay a higher amount if it means not dealing with shady characters.

Paris, violating the violator.

Dead business models soon to see legislative protection

MP3 and DivX encoding enable hereto unseen personal distribution to chip away at the music and movie industries' physical methods of distribution because both failed to foresee and adapt to changing consumer demand. Rather than investigate the new digital age of media distribution which formed without and in spite of them they sought government protection.

Newspapers seek legal copyright protection against "deep linking."

The broadcast flag is designed, in part, to prevent commercial skipping. Those damned Disney DVDs which do not allow you to skip previews and commercials. Advertisements in movie theaters while ticket prices continue to rise.

Telemarketers protest the federal "Do Not Call" list which, in essence, provides marketers with the phone numbers of people to whom a call would be a waste of time.

Protests against junk fax laws. Protests against CAN-SPAM.

Now I suspect marketers will lobby legislation to "protect" their latest invasive, intrusive, and annoying marketing practices rather than move on to the Next Thing(tm) as the current thing is being soundly rejected by its victims. Excuse me, "targeted recipients."

I use ABP in Firefox. It's a treat. I choose to white-list some sites, and I even white-list sites which ask me politely to do so. (Even my friggen bank puts adverts in its on-line banking site.) Dell, AT&T, news sites, and the like could easily remind visitors, as Hulu does, that their experience may be greatly increased by allowing advertisements on their pages. Perhaps going so far as to offer different levels of advertising: a few static and motionless, a few animated, or a shit tonne of annoying full-motion and non-muted audio to wake up your partner while browsing in the middle of the night. Oh, and not forgetting to PROMINENTLY mention (not in a privacy statement elsewhere on the site which references yet other pages in a convoluted web of various pages of statements) that other sites will know you've visited here and may offer partner-based promotions on those sites as well.

(In one of those JavaScript pop-ups which darken the rest of the page and you cannot get around) "Hi there! We see that you have your {Internet Explorer|Firefox|Chrome|Browser} set to 'Do No Track.' Did you know that this prevents us and our partner sites from offering you better discounts and special promotions? Perhaps we could ask you to allow our sites or turn this feature off completely? _Click here to find out how this works_ [ ] No thanks, please don't show this again. _Close_"

IMNSHO, what "they" plan to do with DNT is akin to kicking in a locked door rather than knocking and politely asking for permission to come in.

Paris, just when you think she's leaving you alone she goes and kisses a girl.

Bloke jailed for being unable to use BlackBerry Messenger freed

Re: The article did not specify the age of his 'girlfriend'!

Son of a ... you friggen got me. I was gonna tell you that you can re-vote a post, but then I saw what you did there.

Dreaded redback spider's NEMESIS: Forgotten Captain Cook wasps

Re: Not that dangerous

I've been bitten twice by the damned things visiting in the general area you mention. Both times the bite produced the ugliest of weeping sores at the bite site -- my calf in both instances, which makes sense given how I sleep when I do sleep. The timeline for me was a large pustule in the middle of red ring of rock-hard swollen skin, followed soon by little pimple-like nodules growing randomly on and around the swollen ring. The central pustule was weeping within hours of discovery and during the day it and its smaller companions had ruptured and the following two days were perpetual changing out Gauss bandaging, wiping up weeping liquid, removing dried up fluid (really not dry, more like a tree-sap,) and general cleaning to prevent infection.

Within a couple of weeks the weeping had all but stopped and was being held back by a scab just barely capable of holding in fluids, and barely capable of staying in place. Meanwhile the swelling had spread out more but the protrusion from the leg was reduced. About a month after the bite the site had no more swelling, no more oozing, and was just a thick scab about 1/3 inch across. This one remained more resilient to transient abrasions and annoyances, and stayed in place for about another two weeks.

In short, spider bites suck even if they don't kill you. Oh, and did I mention that for an entire month the damned thing itched like nothing I had ever felt before? (Except for the second bite, since I had obviously experienced similar itching the first time.) Oh, God, how it itched, but I experienced no illness associated with the bites. And for the curious who are still here, I did seek advice from my physician who said that so long as I wasn't getting sick, the only thing to do would be an optional course of antibiotics to help prevent infection. The first time I opted for a short course to be on the cautious side, the second I flew solo with no adverse results.

Paris, oh, God, the itching!

Events in stratosphere can affect Earth's entire climate

Re: I hate to piss on anyones parade but...

"Presumably that's why they are no longer at NASA.

Every single scientific representative to the UN from every country in the world agrees that global warming is at least party a man made problem....There simply is no credible doubt anymore."

Your fallacy is lending so much credence and credibility to so-called authorities. At one time authorities told us the world was flat, the Earth revolved around the Sun, you could buy your relative's way out of Hell, and my grandmother swears killing spiders in the house brings about bad things.

To your quick dismissal of these 49 ex-NASA scientists, I find it equally reasonable to presume this small group of scientists left or were pushed out of NASA merely because of their stance against the ruling "consensus" of AGW. Considering various schemes to commit world governments to the behest of a single ruling body and the prolific ideology of wealth redistribution, I am not at all surprised that scientific representatives to the UN are preaching the End of the World and that we must all repent by way of de-industrialization (or something damn near it.)

While I fail to accept the size of a group is by any means a measure of its credibility, given that the natural state of Man is tyranny and not freedom, I tend to err on the side of the lesser voices who take the more difficult stance to question authority than those who take the easy route to simply accept the "consensus."

Paris, man-caused warming.

Smartphones may soon listen in on you while they sleep

Top voice recognition system in the market place...

In the phone system realm, in terms of voice recognition systems into which I must call and speak to get service, I have found that the FedEx system works the best of any other vendor I must call. I can have conversations with others and say what I want into the phone during the conversation and it will ask me if what it thinks it heard is correct. And most of the time it is. It also understands a number of equivalent phrases, such as "complaint" is understood as "customer feedback," and there are more. As well, I believe it can understand full sentences and not just short descriptive terms of what you need: "I want to ship a package over-seas" and "international shipping" are the same, and so on.

Much unlike systems many of us know so well, like Microsoft and Dell. The latter makes me want to jab a white-hot railroad rail (not the spike, the full rail) into my eye. You so much as let wind while the damned thing is talking and it comes up with some outlandish thing it thinks it heard you say, or just simply interrupts itself with an apology and an offer to try again. God forbid you're calling in a noisy environment as you're likely to make it feel uneasy enough to instruct you to call back later.

More on-topic, I suppose: I am very interested in how they plan to over-come some of the technical hurdles of getting a phone to discern the difference between a casual conversation amid background noise and properly determine what you want it to do. All while not draining the hell out of your battery like other active technologies such as Bluetooth and WiFi already do. Not to mention that, in reality, I cannot think of anyone who actually turns his phone off or puts it into a sleep state other than the phones default stand-by mode, in which the operating system, background applications, and radios are still functioning. The said, maybe it won't be such a technical hurdle.

Anyway, good to hear you're doing better, Rik. Back injuries are serious business.

Paris, uneasy enough to ask if you might come again later.

HP boss Whitman: 'We have to offer a smartphone'

Re: Stupid

"Taught by Professor Basil Fawlty"

I refuse to sit idly by while you ruthlessly attack the great Basil Fawlty. In my not-so-humble opinion his greatest mistakes were caused by not listening to his lovely wife.

Take it back this instant, sir.

Re: Stupid

I will reiterate my prior-posted beliefs as: if HP *does* jump back into the smart-phone market, build it on WebOS and manufacture with QUALITY rather than that Fisher-Price bullshit it continued from Palm (with apologies to Fisher-Price) and I believe it will do well.

Otherwise HP will be producing YAWP or YAAP (Yet Another Windows/Android Phone) and be completely unable to distinguish itself from the rest of the field. Well, other than quality. Though not knowing what the Pre app catalog was like in the hey-day of WebOS, the thought strikes me that if HP can graft a bunch of WebOS-like features on top of Android it may have something there, particularly with the apps available for Android.

Yeah, I know, I'm starting to sound like a WebOS fan-boy. I went from a Sony-Ericsson whore (really loved Java Platform with all its short-comings, mainly SE-related) and need a new home.

Paris, like me, whore to homeless.

Congress report warns: drones will track faces from the sky

Re: New Headline...

Tongue-in-cheek, I realize. I am compelled none-the-less to mention that I have seen this technology in action. At an NSA conference within the past year I, as well as any other participants interested, was shown a sample scenario which went something like this:

"Locate a man in his 20s with this tattoo driving a red car. Follow this car noting all of its stops. If it meets a white truck, disengage the car and follow the truck. Make note of the direction the red car takes."

Best of all, this is near the exact plain language fed to the drone's control system, along with pictures when appropriate. The drone performing this action is capable of circling and monitoring a large metropolitan area to accomplish its task. As well, the video it uses is extremely hi-def. While the actual fidelity is classified, I was informed it is well above what is capable with home entertainment equipment.

The video was incredibly impressive and frightening at the same time. This is immense power, and with such power comes responsibility.

Paris, does she watch the watchers?

Day-long outage 'not a hack,' claims GoDaddy

Re: Again...

Taken for face value, remember that it wasn't Anonymous who took credit for the outage, but rather an individual who identifies with Anonymous. More of the "lone wolf," if you will.

With everything going on, there could be a number of lies and trolling happening right now so none of us can really speak with authority on what transpired.

Paris, speaking without authority.

Yahoo! bureau! chief! sacked! for! Mitt Romney! racism! jibe!

2/10, you got me to respond. You know, there is such a thing as The Weather Channel. And every local market I visit has some kind of local antennae-based weather channel. To fall, for a moment, into tongue-in-cheek stereotyping: Fox had to gush over the token Republican female subservient to her husband trying to gain power, and the rest had to spend time bashing and mocking her and her husband and his party for the blatant sexism and racism on display.

There's a reason people hate politics.

Paris, there's a reason for her, too.

Re: So what's he expect MR to be doing?

Let's not forget that Mr. President was still campaigning and fund raising during this event. Lest we also forget the Evil Republican governors of the affected states (Jindal, Bryant, and Bentley) returned -- or never left -- home, giving the convention a miss to be on-hand for the impending disaster.

For perspective, let's remember, too, that while Mr. President may have worked behind-the-scenes during the Tennessee floods, it took several days to make a public statement other than a White House web site posting. Perhaps he'll tweet a supportive shout-out to LA and Miss. while he's having breakfast with Joe or during his campaign meetings in the afternoon.

Paris, she points fingers, too.

And the whole dog thing; my family traveled quite a lot across the mid-west when I was young. Am I alone in recalling seeing people travel with dog carriers on their cars way back when? I didn't see it often, but frequently enough at that young age to take the practice as acceptable. Not to mention the jealousy... riding on the roof of the car at 55 MPH must have been much more fun than the bed of a truck!

Re: ATZ

Hayes clones, in particular. Real Hayes modems waited for a break in the data stream of about 1.5 seconds (the guard time, IIRC) before accepting ath or ath0 to hang up the modem. If no break in the data occurred, the ath was ignored and treated as part of the stream.

I recall running into that problem with a Hayes-"compatible" modem when uploading a document which detailed AT commands. It turned out that having any data between the +++ and the ath0 command did not matter, the modem still interpreted it as a switch to command mode and *click*. (I don't remember if this was my Emerson 2400 or Wang 9600.) Switched over to a real Hayes and the problem went away.

Ah, the good old days.

Paris, because she misses the BBS days and QWK readers, too.

Leaked Genius Bar manual shows Apple's smooth seductions

Re: Breaking news: Stores teach employees to sell stuff

Yeah, to some degree. Back in the old days when I sold shoes, tacos, and computers, I was trained, taught, and learned to know my products and understand the customer. That never included not admitting that a product could be flawed nor power tactics which put me in charge of a sale. Take ownership, yes; give guidance and advice, yes; but never to seize a position of power over the customer. Nothing pisses of a customer more than realizing at some point they were duped or manipulated.

Provided they ever realize it at all. In my current life I have dealt with customers who believe the salesman of MegaMiniSoftwareCorporation, Inc. is actually their friend and confidant and said salesman would never tell them an untruth or statement lacking in fact.

Paris, taking power over us all.

Impervious

"... if Apple's retail sales are anything to go by, the techniques certainly work."

Except on those of us who are MOSTLY immune to bullshit and possess the intrinsic ability to detect empathetic patronization, or patronizing empathy, a mile off. Though, I would wager any with said ability would generally avoid the Genius Cave altogether. We're not the Apple target demographic, anyway.

Paris, perfume makes me gag; Genius P needs a shower.

Ice core shows Antarctic Peninsula warming is nothing unusual

Re: Options

I up-voted you because I believe you are very artfully trolling by playing on human arrogance.

"...being in control reduces more risks than it creates."

Paris, she sees what you did there.

Relatively speaking...

"No doubt this is true but we haven't always had to live in it."

Indeed. We've not been here but for a fly's fart-worth of time relative to the age of the planet, and only been massively industrialized for around a couple of hundred years. Our own existence as a modern human species has survived many changes in climate and we've been forced to adapt. Perhaps old times were simpler when we accepted that nature and Gods were out of our control and adapted to meet the demands put upon us rather than assume that our scientific understanding or faith in such makes us more knowledgeable and powerful than the universe, nature, and various Gods. With great hubris comes great cost.

From what I can tell, our industrialization is simply coincidental with natural climate trends of a planet we've known for only a small percentage of its life, the history of which we have to make conclusions which have tendencies to change over time. Given this potential, I recall a phrase from methods: "Correlation is necessary but not sufficient for causation."

Paris, neither necessary nor sufficient.

HP to take one more stab at consumer tablets

Spectacular failures

Thinking about the TouchPad and Nokia and a possible second HP go-'round with tablets reminded me why I was so angry with Palm and how HP managed to keep that anger alive.

A number of years ago I decided it was time to replace my aging Palm IIIx. It had been a trusty device but I needed something which could be more of a replacement for my laptop in times when carrying my laptop was not really practical or just cumbersome.

I first picked up a Palm TX which ran the new Garnet operating system. It was quite functional, fast, and had great media capabilities. What it lacked, however, was WPA. At the time all of the new wireless I was rolling out was WPA (or maybe it was WPA2, the memory fails but whichever it was the TX did not support it.) I called Palm to ask them about the missing wireless standard and was told there were no plans to support it on the TX and that I should look at the Palm LifeDrive. The LifeDrive was a few clams more, but an interesting device and it supported the wireless standard I needed.

The Palm LifeDrive is, taken for just the hardware, an impressive piece of kit for the time. A 4GB CF form-factor micro-drive, a large touch screen, rather nice built-in sound, a 400MHz XScale CPU, Bluetooth, wireless, SD card slot, and a newer Garnet OS than the TX. With the Bluetooth I could "tether" to my phone to get Internet access when no wireless was available (something the TouchPad is unable to do unless you "tether" to a WebOS phone) and with a couple of inexpensive applications I was able to convert full DVDs to watch in the device, and DocumentsToGo was a breeze to work with business documents I needed.

But the operating system was abysmal. Garnet was PalmOS. And it crashed. A lot. Often. Frequently. Always when I needed it not to crash. It was mostly unusable and I simply could not rely on it. Palm issued a 2.0 update around Christmas of that year and within a couple of months afterward the device support was silently discontinue, or at least the lack of competent support made it appear that way. In six months this really sweet device was rendered into a $500 paper-weight.

Enter HP. I was quite impressed by WebOS inherited by HP, but my bad experience with Palm as a manufacturer coupled with the recent massive loss of quality kept me away. Being purchased by HP gave me hope that things would change, and by the time the TouchPad was finally released I had been considering a tablet but was not happy with the options at the time, which were for the most part iPad or an Android-based tablet. Neither one whets my whistle for various reasons. But WebOS, now here is an operating system and interface I like, my customers like, and I rather enjoy supporting. Given many months wait from announcement to release I had been able to make my decision, though unable (perhaps unwilling) so drop $500-ish on the device at its launch. Giving it time to experience a price drop was probably one of my few good ideas.

To be fair to HP, I purchased by TouchPad during the fire sale after the discontinuation announcement, so I knew what I was getting into. I had high hopes that HP would realize how the TouchPad could be a viable platform if it would also realize that you cannot sell a non-iPad device at iPad pricing. $300 was the sweet-spot for the 32GB TouchPad on eBay, and it would take a good plan to make it a go. Obviously events did not transpire as such, WebOS is, by various insider reports, a tangled mess internally, amongst other issues. Had I adopted the TouchPad at release, after being keenly interested since its announcement several months prior, I would have been scorned again by the Palm Curse.

That said, I like my TouchPad for what it is. At least it boots, which is more than I can say for the LifeDrive. The reality for me is that I cannot see HP making a go at another device. At least not doing so with my support. The smell of the Palm Curse is just too heavy right now.

Paris, once bitten, twice shy.

El Reg probes pregnant Playmobil lass

Time for another ElReg Playmobile recreation?

I'm waiting for two-page expose complete with recreation of how the glowing ginger got the way she is.

Paris, just because I can.

AT&T to mothball 2G network by 2017

Re: The 12%

At 12% we are definitely within the minority and in a business sense I believe we do actually represent a liability. I still have a couple of GSM and an EDGE phone on stand-by for when my more advanced phone takes a dump. Mind you, when I say "advanced" I speak of a Sony Ericsson C905a, which is not a smart phone but is at least 3G-capable. (And it has not crapped out once, though it is becoming physically well-worn.) But they are just that, backups and not primary use phones.

I can probably find similar arguments about the transition from AMPS to TDMA, TDMA to EDGE, and so on. Most arguments were about change itself, and I know I did not desire to purchase a replacement for my TalkTime 850 which worked just fine. The arguments did not appreciate that the movement from one technology to the other was between phones of equal reliability and operation. There were very basic phones tasked with very basic operations: making phone calls.

My concern is as mobile devices become "smarter" and the number of smarter phone users increase, so will the chances of being stranded without usable service. I am not aware of any smart-phone with a dumb-phone fall-back feature. That is, if a smart phone cannot boot due to file system corruption or a bad application, then the user is completely locked out of making a phone call. I ran into this problem with a phone loaded with too much media for its media database to handle: it took two boots and almost 20 minutes before the phone was usable. In an emergency situation this is not acceptable. But then, mobile phones are, IMO, by design supplemental to emergency situations not accessory.

Mobile phones have several inherent unreliability factors. While many of those factors are mitigated, making them more complex increases the impact of unreliability as well as introducing new ones. An increasing number of people are abandoning land lines for home service in favor of mobile phones, and for practical reasons. But in the event of all but the most devastating disasters I can pick up my copper service, hear a dial tone, and place a call to someone -- although, it is a bit more difficult to reach an operator in some areas.

I can bash my princess phone and still make a call. Try that with a 'Droid.

Paris, inherently unreliable princess.

Oracle hurls MySQL at Microsoft database wobblers

Re: I think..

It depends upon the application. I'm working with a medical practice management vendor who is moving from MS SQL to MySQL. They've reported to me that the move has gone perfectly including stored procedures and they're into testing with only three weeks development time. This is a particularly attractive venture when considering that Microsoft does not offer upgrade paths from existing SQL licenses. 55 users on SQL 2000 cost about $8,000 in the day (give or take) and "upgrading" those 55 users to SQL 2012 (with 2008 down-grade rights IF you purchase the installation media for another $70 or so) gave a price of around $12,000.

MySQL seems the more attractive offer. And, honestly, amongst all of the "free" database engines out there, I much prefer MySQL over Firebird or Pervasive. I've never seen PostgreSQL used in an application environment, but I can imagine it performs in the "meets or exceeds expectations" category.

Paris, needs improvement.

Yahoo! fixes! password! leak! vulnerability!

Re: "We have fixed the problem" says Yahoo Spokesperson.

For added security, we use FOUR ROUNDS of ROT13. Crack that one!

Paris, crack.

US county named 'area of outstanding natural stupidity'

Re: Washington?

Leon County, Florida, is heavily Democrat, liberal, and urban with smatterings of rural. No strip clubs here.

Paris, smatterings.

Re: Locus of natural stupidity

Now a-days SCOTUS is apparently in the business of re-writing laws for Congress.

"TAX. FTFY. -- J. Roberts."

Paris, no fix.

Re: The last tale...

"Agreed, but wouldn't stricter gun control work better?"

No. See Kleck, et al.

Microsoft tightens squeeze on TechNet parasites

Re: The point is...

That is the point. I've had a couple of angry discussions with Microsoft over their MAPS sales assessment requirement to buy my subscription. I sell their product and support it on a daily basis. It costs me $400 a year to rent their software which allows me to do so (and it's a lot of software, so that's not a bad price.)

They want to crack down on illegitimate distribution of their software. I get it, but a better way must exist. The developer above notes that he can use his Enterprise license to set up multiple virtual instances for testing before deployment which will use the customer's actual license. This is exactly what these subscriptions are for, though I'm not certain that an MSDN license wouldn't be better for him (some of the subscription purposes are a little blurry.)

By cracking down on the pie-rats, Microsoft is also clamping down on legitimate people doing legitimate things. Meanwhile, real pirates don't have to deal with the licensing and activation crap. Just honest people. You know, the whole locked door keeping out an honest man thing.

Paris, keeping men out.

Re: Microsoft is restricting the software available on IT-pro hangout TechNet

Both aspects are wrong, here.

TechNet was never a freebie, though it does come as part of the Action Pack. Both are paid annual subscriptions. What is "free," however, is the multiple uses of various software allowed for internal use only. What's happening a lot is TechNet and MAPS subscribers are using the software to install at customer sites or on computers which are outside their company purview, and some are charging the customer full retail value. I admit that I have installed some of my MAPS software on my parents' machines as they work VERY well as a real-world test bed -- if I can fix what my dad screws up, I can pretty much fix anything.

But the supermarket "freebies," I'm hoping that was a joke. If it was, you've used the incorrect icon. Those aren't freebies. The free food samples on Friday afternoons and weekends are the freebies. Sometimes the vendor pays for them, but most of the time it's a treat from the actual store. And, yes, I've found that when a particular store or chain starts having problems those freebies tend to wane. What you're talking about is flat-out theft, which would relate if Microsoft starting putting the kibosh on pirates.

Paris, waxing.

ISPs step in to supply DNSChanger safety net

Re: If it was up to me...

Should have done this from Day One. In any case, I still cannot subscribe to the idea of putting in resources to keep infected machines operable. The sooner they "break" the sooner they'll be fixed.

Paris, long broken