Posts by Pascal Monett

Dell CTO shares his hottest trends for 2021: Four interesting technologies, one of which is still borderline sci-fi for now

Quantum and Edge

So it seems that someone has finally levelled the playing field on quantum computing. It's a lab rat for the moment, and when we do get that, you won't run a browser on it. That clearly indicates that we are not going to shift from PC to QC at all. QC will be in addition to the PC. That sounds like the ideal slot for a coprocessor to me. One fine day, Intel will reveal the i21000Q, a 64-core CPU with an integrated 200-qbit coprocessor, all engraved at 0.2 nanometers.

Then we will finally be able to run Crysis.

Edge, then. Edge computing, of course, not that thing you use to download Chrome. So Edge computing is going to go horizontal ? I'm guessing blackhats everywhere are already salivating at the prospect. A powerful CPU and lotsa RAM at their disposal for botnets and whatnot ? They're going to be overjoyed at the news.

Might want to think about security on those things before you start relying on them.

Dratted 'housekeeping', eh? 150k+ records deleted off UK’s Police National Computer database

"destroyed in a Buncefield oil depot fire"

So, they had a backup facility in 2005, which burned down, and nothing has been done about it in 15 years ?

Is there anyone with an ounce of IT competence anywhere in UK Government ?

Obviously not.

Infosys follows flag-waving US hiring spree with quieter Canadian and Mexican hiring spree

"COVID-19 has depressed travel costs in ways that may not prove permanent"

I'm sure the airline industry is fervently hoping for those words to come true.

MIT professor charged with failing to disclose China ties while hitting up US Dept of Energy for research grant

Another China-born immigrant turned traitor

This is far from the first time I read that a person born in China immigrated to the US only to steal research secrets.

Keep that up, guys, and nobody is going to want to work with you any more.

Watchdog urges Tesla to recall 158,000 Model S, X cars to fix knackered NAND flash that borks safety features

Great

A car's entertainment system failure can be a menace for the actual primary function of a car which is passenger safety.

How many times have I already said that the entertainment bus should be physically isolated from the car's command bus ?

I don't remember. I can't count.

In any case, well done Mr Musk. You might be a billionaire, but you still fail Basic Security 101 - all in the name of saving a few bucks.

Well I hope you're happy with your savings now.

Trump's gone quiet, Parler nuked, Twitter protest never happened: There's an eerie calm – but at what cost?

The one and only "benefit" that the Trump era can pretend to is demonstrating is no uncertain terms just how much Republicans are toxic for Democracy.

How about imagining that the President of "the most powerful country in the world" doesn't need to use Twitter to contact his countrymen ?

He's got a fucking Speaker. He's got a room dedicated to recieving journalists. He can have a news conference whenever the fuck he wants, and the journos will be chafing at the bit to get the news out.

Neither Twitter nor Amazon are a condition of Democracy.

Quixotic Californian crusade to officially recognize the hellabyte and hellagram is going hella nowhere

Hella

Yeah. That's the most important thing we have to worry about these days.

Did anyone tell Logitech about lockdown? Biz launches pricey video chat kit for office conference rooms and 'huddle spaces'

What's the point ?

I now have almost a year's experience in "video conferences".

Watching the bland faces of uninteresting people for 20 to 45 minutes at a time while they strive to say something relevant is, in the end, a very painful experience.

It's not surprising that video phones didn't catch on. Everybody hates them.

All we really need is audio. The rest is just selling a solution to a problem that does not exist.

And for the few of you who really do need to see who you're talking to, I'm sure your private jets can get you there without any problem.

Teasing HANA database upgrade, SAP leaves crowd wondering if software giant has lost its innovation mojo

SAP / Oracle - same combat

Extracting as much money as they can from their victims customers for as long as they can.

Samsung rolls out new Galaxy S21 range, including extra-lux Ultra

"starts at £1,149"

I stopped reading there.

No phone should cost more than €150.

I will certainly not pay more than that.

Attack of the cryptidiots: One wants Bitcoin-flush hard drive he threw out in 2013 back, the other lost USB stick password

"Now that the $7.5m is now worth almost $300m"

Oh gosh. What a shame you didn't put your money in a bank. You know, that government-backed, legally-defended infrastructure that would have guaranteed your money ?

Sticking it to The Man comes with risks. You failed. You lose.

As an interesting side note, I wonder what the BitCoin ledger does with lost bits of coin.

Another Rust-y OS: Theseus joins Redox in pursuit of safer, more resilient systems

"There are others, but most are not very active"

Which sounds to me just like most forks of existing projects on GitHub.

There are a lot of people who have an idea and are willing to try to start a project.

There are a lot less people who are willing and capable of bringing that project to term, not to speak of maintaining it in the long run.

The fact that a new OS might have trouble rubbing shoulders with the entrenched versions is not an excuse. When Torvalds unleashed Linux on the world, he had no idea he was the guy who was going to allow the Internet to function, most IoT crap to exist and be the father of dozens of similar distros.

He just did it, and thank God he did.

You make a new OS that actually works and does what is says on the tin, and you make something that will find its way organically into the IT infrastructure of the world.

Take the market into account and you might as well not start.

Fujitsu opens door, invites '200 to 250' staff from UK Delivery team to walk out

"employees fear process will become compulsory"

Oh, there's no need to fear.

It will.

Offshoring is kind of over, says Wipro, as financials surge thanks to offshoring

"other nations just don’t have as much talent for Wipro to hire"

Um, you mean other nations don't have as much cheap talent for Wipro to hire.

FTFY.

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey says Trump ban means the service has failed

"a failure of ours ultimately to promote healthy conversation"

Sorry, you made the platform available and did nothing to prevent people from mouthing off in any way they wanted.

Besides, your whole post is useless because the only way to promote a healthy conversation is put a stop to the unhealthy ones, and that would make you a moderator and that would make you responsible for what was posted - and that is the last thing you want.

So go ahead and cry your crocodile tears, I'm not impressed by them.

Pirate Bay co-founder criticises Parler for its lack of resilience

The Internet is made to allow people to post information and other people to find it.

As surprising as this may be to some, the disappearance of Twitter, Amazon, Facebook and even Google will not destroy the Internet.

Something else will come and fill the void anyway.

Airbnb, or not to be, if you're headed to Washington DC: Biz cancels bookings over fears of inauguration insurrection

Sorry, katrinab, but comparing Coronavirus to a bunch of confederate-loving hostage-taking-planners with Molotov cocktails and pipe bombs strikes me as a bit exaggerated.

How's about you express your figures in the number of people killed in car accidents ? Do you really think that's going to make me scared of cars ?

Nope.

But a bunch of violent, bloodthirsty hillbillies with SWAT-level weaponry ? Yeah, I'd be scared of that.

Want to let an AI-powered doctor loose on patients? Try slapping a food-label-like sticker on it, says Uncle Sam

"help patients understand the technology"

Here's a simple explanation :

It's statistics. We're using math to guess the result, and we don't have a clue why it works when it does.

There is no such thing as AI.

There. Reassured ?

Dropbox basically decimates workforce, COO logs off: Cloud biz promises to be 'more efficient and nimble'

“one of the toughest decisions I’ve had to make"

I'm sure your end-of-year bonus will reflect that.

Oh, and would you mind explaining how "growth" is prepared by sacking people ?

Boss behind 'reset' of delayed, overbudget Emergency Services Network shifts to new 'digital' Cabinet Office role

It's called spreading incompetence. The more you spread it, you thinner it gets, right ?

We didn't collude with Twitter to throw Parler off our servers, says AWS in court filing

"inciting and planning the rape, torture, and assassination"

And there are still people who try and justify that they should not be called terrorists.

Intel CEO Bob Swan is stepping down to be replaced by VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger

Good Lord, he's still alive ?

Not only that, but after 30 years at Intel and a cumulative 11 years being important elsewhere, he doen't retire, he goes back to being important at Intel.

That is definitely an impressive career. Intel can be chuffed to bits to have him back.

Look, we've sent space probes to Jupiter and Mars – makes sense to keep them going a while longer, says NASA

As well it should

They're working and they're on site, why abandon them ?

Given the time it took and the cost of sending them, the missions should continue for as long as they are in working order.

Anything less would be a colossal waste of effort.

UK network Three hikes pay-as-you-go rates by 400% to push punters to buy 'bundles'

Re: Smacks of greedy comms companies to me!

Are there any other kind ?

Salesforce relieves Republican National Committee of its tools citing 'risk of politically incited violence' across the US

They came with the intent of taking hostages and making demands. They had pipe bombs and Molotov cocktails. What do you call that ?

It's not because they did not attain their objectives that they are not guilty of planning terror, ergo they are terrorists.

So this is what we're going to have for the next 4 years

A careful whitewashing of an actual terrorist assault on the basis that one side lost unfairly (demonstrably false), coupled with whining about Freedom of Expression (not the problem) and incessantly repeated falsehoods (we actually won) in order to ensure that the absolute fucking morons stay alert, primed and ready to start this shit all over again.

My message to the USA : you need to take 10% of your military budget and put it into educating your huddled masses, because they have become a danger to your Democracy. Try pushing courses on critical thinking (yeah, I know, as if that'll ever happen).

Re: Picking sides

So you're going to mount a terrorist assault on Salesforce HQ ?

Because Democracy seems to not be your way of thinking, and anyone who even pretends to find an excuse for this shameful demonstration of just how much the GOP pisses on the Constitution is just another terrorist.

That's it. It's over. It's really over. From today, Adobe Flash Player no longer works. We're free. We can just leave

NoScript. It blocks all JS by default.

The best addon I have ever used.

Study: AI designed to detect diabetic eye disease blinks in the real world, makes more work for doctors

Oh really ? You don't say

"This suggests that AI models may be more sensitive to image quality issues than human beings. "

No kidding. A computer that just might be totally incapable of not taking an image input otherwise than pixel by pixel. What a surprise when said pixels have an inordinate amount of impact on the algorithm's interpretation.

Computers do not see. They take the data they are given. Give them flawed data and the result will be wrong.

If there are so many parameters to take into account to do retina diagnostics, then maybe the tool isn't fit for the job.

All it took was a pandemic to revive PCs: Canalys proclaims sales up 25% in Q4 as world+dog stays home

"PCs are here to stay"

I don't think so. The pandemic has just given them a booster shot.

Then again, that depends on the definition of a PC. I'm old school ; to me, a PC is a large box - not too noisy - connected to two very large screens, with a keyboard and wireless mouse on a desk, along with a comfortable chair to sit in and enjoy the power. A PC is the most powerful computer there is, because it has the best heat evacuation ability, so its components can be ramped up.

Yet, the article cites Lenovo. AFAIK, Lenovo makes laptops, not PCs. Okay, the laptop is the modern computer, so in that respect, yes, PCs are here to stay - but nobody has ever said the contrary. Laptops are indeed here to stay, and some models desperately try to replicate the power of an actual PC.

Wouldn't want one of those on my lap, though.

So yes, laptops are the future of computing for Joe Public. True PCs, however, will remain the future of those who need the power that a tower can provide and do not need the mobility that a laptop ensures.

And if you need more than two screens, there is no laptop that can suit you.

Extreme Networks misses death-of-Flash deadline, suggests winding back PC clocks to keep its GUI alive

Re: Wow...

Indeed. Fiddle with the clock to manage your network ?

I have another suggestion : get a proper network management tool.

Pork-tracking website problems add extra crackling to US-Taiwan-China tensions

Pompeo rewrote the rules

I gather that now the USA officially considers Taiwan to be independant.

8 days before changing President.

Should that not have been the kind of thing left to Biden to consider ?

I approve of the fact that Taiwan is officially considered a country by the USA. I despise the pussy-footing around that issue by most governments today, including my own French government which can't even be arsed to have an actual Embassy in Taipei.

But that does not excuse the fact that such a major shift in diplomatic relations should not be made 8 days before the President is replaced.

Trumpt and his administration are decidedly intent on causing as much mayhem as they possibly can.

Shameful.

Linux developers get ready to wield the secateurs against elderly microprocessors

Dear me

Am I to understand that there are still 486s that are in working order ?

Wow. That brings me back.

Thou shalt not hack indiscriminately, High Court of England tells Britain's spy agencies

The words "take back control" clearly indicate Brexit to me, and that means the EU is concerned.

I have read those words enough times in the past two years to not be surprised by that assumption.

Unauthorised RAC staffer harvested customer details then sold them to accident claims management company

Re: it just takes you back to square one

Not if you've already spent the money.

Fearing she had stumbled across a body, dogwalker reports pota-toe to police

"With a little digging"

Are you joking ? Have you not seen all the shows about police investigations ? There really are a lot of them, and most of them emphasize that a crime scene is not to be disturbed.

She was right to call the police. The police were undoubtedly relieved that there wasn't some grim murder to investigate. I'm sure it was just like that time my chimney caught fire and I had to call the fire department. They came, saw what was burning, axed it off the chimney frame and took it outside. When I apologised for the nuisance, the chief answered "Not a problem sir. We very much prefer not to have to drag out dead bodies."

Facial recog biz denies its software identified 'antifa members' among mob that stormed Capitol Hill

Re: I seem to recall truckers in France rioting not too long ago...

Yeah but, it's a tradition in France. We have riots every year, somewhere. Just like we have fireworks every July 14th.

What we do not have is a bunch of idiots storming Le Parlement with the idea that they can change the outcome of a vote.

What we do not have either is a voting system so obsolete that it takes weeks to get results.

We have our presidential election results at 20h00 on election day. I wonder why "the most powerful country in the world" is incapable of replicating that.

Matt Gaetz

Supporting a politician is one thing, actively promoting violence and the refusal of the democratic process is another thing entirely.

I sincerely hope that every single person who is implicated in the shameful attempt at a "coup" will be apprehended and pay for their crime.

And I'm not just talking about the rioters - the politicians who endorse them are fair game in my view.

Linux Mint sticks by Snap decision – meaning store is still disabled by default in 20.1

"not the place to go for the latest Linux innovations"

Good.

I'm looking for an operating system. It's supposed to be reliable, not a top model.

Keep the glitter for the useless stuff, like Twitter.

Lenovo reveals smart specs that let you eyeball five virtual displays, with strings attached

Strings attached

I don't see that to be a problem. If you're connecting to your phone, you're already mobile. It should hardly be an issue to have a USB cable plugged in to your shirt pocket (pants may be a bit far for that - for those of us who are still wearing them).

I do see a problem in having a phone capable of rendering 5 screens at 1080p resolution. And if you're telling me that it's the glasses that are rendering them, I'm going to ask you what universe you come from and how did you smuggle your alien tech in ? Also, do you have gravity modulators, by any chance ?

Linus Torvalds rates his own words 'incoherent ramblings of a crazy old man'

Re: Linus is mistaken...

He was apparently born in 1969, which makes him three years younger than me.

That means he's old enough to know that he's not young any more.

Trust me.

Faster optic fibers and superior laser sensors set to descend from space

The beginnings of space industry, then ?

So, we now have definite potential for industry in space. And there's nothing like industry to lower costs and increase accessibility.

If only we could find a more ecological way to get us there.

Could someone please invent anti-gravity modulators ? That would do nicely.

Dusty passports, smart tops and tracksuit bottoms: Are virtual events better or worse than the real thing?

I get the problem

I give trainings. Excel trainings, mostly.

Since March of last year, those trainings have been virtual.

On the one hand, it's cool. I have a fiber link, so I can work from home. No traffic, no delays, and I have a kitchen that is stocked with everything I like. What could possibly be better, you ask ?

Interaction. I miss being able to see who is struggling to understand. I miss being able to go over to a student's screen and check on how they are managing, what problem they have. I spend the whole day talking to a screen - and it's worse when nobody answers my questions. I don't know if they misunderstood me, don't know the answer, or can't be bothered to respond. When I am standing in front of them, they at least pretend to be thinking about the problem.

There have been good groups. There have been people with questions, interrogating me on the finer points, requesting clarification. It is such a relief to have people reacting to what I say.

But when I have spent a day talking to the void without any reaction whatsoever, it is very frustrating and infuriating and I hate the job.

Thank God I don't only do trainings. I think I'd be going mad.

Pop quiz: You've got a roomful of electrical equipment. How do you put out a fire?

Re: Should read

installed mandated by ignorant manager.

The manager certainly didn't install it himself.

That said, I really would like to see that guy face-to-face to ask him what the ever-loving frak he was thinking of putting sprinklers in a room full of pricey electrical equipment.

He should have a fireplace installed under his bed.

We all know the old saying : give a man a fire and he'll be warm for a day, set a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.

Developers! These 3 weird tricks will make you a global hero

Re: MS Windows started this

Agreed. Windows has done a fine job of formatting user's expectations.

We all know how to copy/paste, we know that Help is one F1 key away, etc.

Before that, we had to learn the decisions made for each and every bit of software we used. Help could by anywhere from a function key, to a CTRL-combo, and you had to remember those particulars for everything.

Thank goodness there weren't as many applications available back in the day.

No, Windows has the merit of having brought a certain uniformity to the functions we require in every application we use, and that is a Good Thing (TM).

However, there is indeed a need for step further, and to make accessibility an integral part of the things we all know where to find and how to use.

Because being blind is shitty enough. If you have to fight your way into every software you need, it must be sheer frustration and utterly exhausting.

UK watchdog sniffs around Google Chrome's Privacy Sandbox as it may give Choc Factory all the sweeties

Re: if I want to deny yourdataismydata.com on one website, I probably don't want it on any

It's called NoScript. Everything is denied by default - you choose what you allow.

Boeing will cough up $2.5bn+ to settle US fraud charge over 737 Max safety

But Boeing is already paying employees at the FAA.

That is the principle reason why this whole fiasco happened. Boeing has people inside the FAA that are paid by Boeing to "streamline" the certification process.

It got streamlined into the ground.

Get those people out - they have clearly failed in their duty to the public. Get Boeing out of the FAA - it never should have gotten in in the first place.

Have the FAA hire new people and train them - at its own expense - and make sure they are trained to never trust Boeing again.

Remember : the FAA has its share of guilt in this as well. No reason to let them off the hook.

The FAA is already being prosecuted, in a sense : countries have imposed their own certification process.

The time when the FAA decided for everyone is over - and that is going to be a hard bullet to bite.

Pizza and beer night out the window, hours trying to sort issue, then a fresh pair of eyes says 'See, the problem is...'

Re: Proof reader

A second set ? On one occasion, it took a third, and fifteen minutes for somebody finally twigged that the server name had been written with commas instead of points.

It had been staring at us for two whole hours !