Posts by Pascal Monett

Cloud giants point the finger at each other during regulator hearings

Regulate them

If they all disagree with the measures, then that means the measures are good for the consumer.

Open source maintainers underpaid, swamped by security, going gray

If that's where we have to go . .

I'm glad that industry people are starting to fear that the projects they make money out of and pay nothing for just might end up not being supported any more.

When that happens, maybe industry will think of a remuneration package for new maintainers. Oh, of course, it will be new young maintainers with a vast lack of experience and all the problems that may ensue but hey, you only have yourselves to blame for that.

Despite Russia warnings, Western critical infrastructure remains unprepared

An unfortunate necessity

I absolutely do not approve this internet warfare, but one thing that is apparently even more certain is that critical infrastructure needs to be secured and never has been because nobody ever decided it was needed. So it's been available for attack since forever because who cared ?

Well now, it is needed and everyone cares, so put up the money, get the training, and get those critical infrastructures secured. You've been coasting on ignorance and complacency long enough.

The case for handcrafted software in a mass-produced world

"an LLM bot can write new code"

Maybe it can, but if it hands out the same abominable mess that MS Word dishes out when you wish to save in HTML, then I will do fine without it.

That said, I have seen the results when asking ChatGPT for a LotusScript function that checks all the documents in a Notes view and I have to admit, while I wouldn't have written it exactly like that, the code provided does work, so maybe, just maybe, there might be a possible future where you could ask WhateverGPT for a functional Windows kernel without the cruft and get something that actually works and respects your computer (and allows you to play your games).

Here's hoping.

Python in Excel goes live – but only for certain Windows users

run Python scripts inside workbooks

Yay ! A whole new playground for mischief-makers is now available !

I can't wait to find out how miscreants will be able to subvert this.

New RFC explains how protocol developers can avoid building human rights abuses into the internet

"New IP 'would enable mass surveillance' "

Well it's backed by China, so duh.

It is so duh that experts reviewed it detail because obviously they would.

So I applaud this initiative, but I wonder exactly what good it will do. It's kind of like the wishlist of nice things we'd all like to have but have no way of getting yet.

I hope the ensuing comments will create an outline that could finally become an actual standard. Adding that to my wishlist.

The end is in sight for Windows 10, but Microsoft keeps pushing out fixes

"It's almost as if Windows 10 and 11 were the same thing"

Gosh, it's almost as if Redmond never actually rewrote the Windows Core since XP and just kept piling on the cruft and arbitrarily deciding, via UI "upgrades", which was the next version.

This nonsense with hardware requirements is just the latest in the glaring pieces of proof that Borkzilla is phoning it in rather than actually working on its product.

Of course it wants everyone on Win 11 : that's where The Cloud^TM is, which means more monthly revenue because nickel and diming functionalty instead of providing it out-of-the-box.

Sorry ?

"Can you consider yourself a tech publication"

Why are you blaming El Reg for this nonsense ?

HPE CEO: 'Best interest of shareholders' to pursue $4B damages from Lynch estate

Re: coincidences do happen

Especially when you help them along . . .

Nobody is surprised. HPE (the Board) is a bunch of vultures. Not taking into account their own due diligence is not something that will keep them from looking into the mirror and finding that everything is fine.

And you can be sure that, at the end of this year, they'll find a good reason to give themselves more humongous bonuses after having tearfully announced yet another round of layoffs.

The future of software? Imagine a bot, stamping on a human face – forever

"not concerned whether there'll be anyone to hire in a decade"

Yeah.

We'll see how they re-evaluate that in a decade when there's no one to hire.

Management. Pfft. Couldn't think their way out a paper bag if their life depended on it.

And as for planning, don't get me started . . .

250 million-plus unused IPv4 addresses should be left alone, argues network boffin

"Extensive use of IPv4 NAT"

It works.

And the more IPv6 was foisted upon us, the more we realized how simple (and therefor robust) IPv4 really was.

The academics can bang their IPv6 drum all they want, the rest of us just want to get doing what we need (or want) to do. And, if the IPv4 boot still fits, why change ?

I am adamant about one thing : I do not want to become a full-fledged administrator just to have my home PC, a few laptops and several mobile phones connected to my Orange box and, therefor, to the Internet. With IPv4, it's a breeze. With all I read about IPv6, it would be a nuisance. And I will do well without having to explain to my wife that her normal web sites don't all work today because somebody did something to the IPv6 connection. No thank you.

So I don't want IPv6. Not before you pry my IPv4 NAT out of my cold, dead hands . . .

Thank you, Reg Readers: On Call has turned 500!

Dear me, 10 years already ?

I've been following On Call for ten years ?

Wow.

I don't think there's any other website I have visited so regularly for such a long time.

Congratulations and long live El Reg !

There's always a sourpuss.

China’s quantum* crypto tech may be unhackable, but it's hardly a secret

Very interesting article

These days all you hear about is quantum, AI and financial scams cryptocurrency.

And you rarely ever hear any bad things about the first two.

It's good to learn that there are still pie-in-sky ideas that can be shot down by any person with a sane mind aware of the requirements.

Now that I have learned the requirements of QKD, I will know to not be impressed by the next snake-oil prophet that tries to pull a fast one.

Thumbs up from me for this article.

I don't know what pressing Delete will do, but it seems safe enough!

Re: the time saved [..] will be repaid ten thousandfold

To be sure, except that repayment will not go into Redmond's ample coffers, so why bother ?

I don't know what it will take, but it took over three decades of Windows bugs and snafus to get the DOD to politely hint that enough was enough, so it'll be a while yet before the principle of defensive programming is applied generally (I would say that proper explanatory popups should be included in that method).

AI giants pinky swear (again) not to help make deepfake smut

"non-consensual deepfake pornography"

So I gather that there is consensual deepfake pornography.

What is that ? Is that when some guy (because of course it's a guy) takes an image with a pornstar and deepfakes his wife's head on it ?

Because if it's not that, then I can't image what consensual deepfake pornography is.

Could somebody educate me ?

As Oracle's AWS deal completes Big 3 triumvirate, questions remain over licensing

"a more proximal arrangement"

Wow. Talk about anthropomorphisizing stuff.

Oh, now I get it : an arrangement that suits Oracle's belly button bottom line ?

Sure. Why didn't you say so ?

UK watchdog fears Voda-Three merger will balloon phone bills for customers

"a detailed rebuttal"

If they had a detailed rebuttal ready then they will be ready to publicly proclaim that their prices will not go up for the next ten years.

Right ?

Yeah, thought so . . .

Muppet broke the datacenter every day, in its own weighty way

Re: This kind of semi-random, intermittent error is such a pain to diagnose

Now that is eagle-eyed diagnostics !

OpenAI's latest o1 model family tries to emulate 'reasoning' – tho might overthink things a bit

"capable of emulating complex reasoning"

So, AI is not actually intelligent, it's just pretending to be ?

Thank you for the admission.

Japan to put a small red Swedish house on the Moon

"a small red house on the surface of the Moon"

I wonder how long it will take for that small red house to be completely bleached by the Sun's endless radiation.

Cambodian senator sanctioned by US over alleged forced labor cyber-scam camps

"a romance scam compound"

Dear me. As if cryptocurrency wasn't enough of a warning, they now have romance boot camps ?

Are people really that desperate for companionship ?

Send in the asteroid, please . . .

Australia’s government spent the week boxing Big Tech

"off limits until kids turn 16"

I'm absolutely OK with that idea.

I have just one question : how is a kid supposed to prove that he/she is 16+ ?

As far as I know, no country delivers ID cards to anyone that is not a legal adult in that country, and that generally means 18.

So ?

Boeing to launch quantum comms satellite testbed in 2026

Baby steps

We are slowly progressing towards the HoloNet.

It doesn't matter that it is Boeing that is involved, it's the science that is important. If Boeing screws up true to form, someone else will pick up the job and continue.

For this, I'm ready to wish Boeing good luck.

Google Chrome gets a mind of its own for some security fixes

On my smartphone I use Brave

The interdiction of ads has saved me a lot of bandwidth, and time.

FCC boss starts bringing up Musk's Starlink dominance, antitrust concerns

More competition ? More constellations ?

More tens of thousands of stuff orbiting in LEO and clogging up the night sky ?

I'm not sure we need that. Besides, SpaceX has competition in the Internet space. I don't need it, I have fiber. Starlink may be the only space-based Internet provider, but it is an Internet provider, and there are a number of those in almost every country.

EU kicks off an inquiry into Google's AI model

"The DPC is concerned about whether Google fully complied with its [..] (DPIA)"

Hint : it did not.

NASA engineers play space surgeon in bid to unclog Voyager 1's arteries

Nothing but respect

I have a deep respect for the engineers and technicians at NASA, but one day, people, one day Voyager I is going to die.

Your continued admirable, nay, legendary, service to this bit of equipment that has already surpassed ever possible limit is no less than astonishing, but we all have to face the facts : one day, there will no more response.

Meanwhile, I bow before your dogged determination to keep things working.

You are the best, and that's an understatement.

Nvidia CEO to nervous buyers and investors: Chill out, Blackwell production is heating up

Demand will crater and NVidia will have to find something else to bolster sales. And ?

Pokémon GO was an intelligence tool, claims Belarus military official

"members of the military should exercise caution"

That goes for the basic smartphone as well.

Healthcare giant to pay $65M settlement after crooks stole and leaked nude patient pics

"The healthcare group [..] denied any wrongdoing"

You did wrong.

You didn't adequately protect your customers' data, you failed to do what you could to keep it from being published, and you chuckled when proposing the usual after-the-fact "protection" (okay, we all know it's useless, but still . .).

I am insanely annoyed by this by-the-book refusal to recognize failure by corporate USA. You have no right to say you did nothing wrong, just like a cat who just threw up on the carpet has no right to deny it.

You should be fined just for that.

Domo arigato, Mr Roboto: Japan's bullet trains to ditch drivers

An obvious step forward

In Paris there are metro lines without a driver now. It has been like that for a few years already. A train, technically, is just a metro with longer times between stops. In the metro in Paris, they are upgrading stations to build barriers between the tram and the people, so as to guarantee that people won't be able to suicide themselves by jumping in front of an incoming tram. Obviously, an actual train will not have that kind of protection, much less a high-speed one, but it would seem that there are a lot less people who jump in front of trains rather than trams. No idea why. In any case, I think automating trains is a good idea, because I know that train drivers on France's TGV are basically button-pushers. They have to press a button every minute to prove that they are awake.

There are apparently more interesting jobs out there . . .

Research suggests more than half of VMware customers are looking to move

"I think it's a shame that it's profits over anything else nowadays"

Welcome to the world of MBAs.

SpaceX blasts being stuck in bureaucratic orbit as Starship approval slips

No, really ?

So you paid a ransom demand … and now the decryptor doesn't work

Sounds like it is time to polish your CV.

A project manager who has already decided that backups are a nuisance is a danger to the company and will make it fail at the worst possible time (as if there were any other time).

Windows 11 users still living in the past face forced update, like it or not

You will do as you are told

We are the owners of your PC. We know better.

Submit and comply.

How $20 and a lapsed domain allowed security pros to undermine internet integrity

Re: someone may still be using them

I've heard that argument more times than I care to count.

Kill the server. Wait for complaints.

Online media outstrips TV as source of news for the first time in the UK

"TV remains more trusted news source"

Nope. Not any more. TV news is just the official government source.

If you want the truth, nowadays, you have to look for it, and the only place to look is now the Internet.

I'm not happy about that, but one must never forget that "news" is presented on stations that belong to some billionaire or another, and those guys have multiple agendas, none of which include telling you the truth.

Microsoft exec warns of business functions being sacrificed on the altar of AI

Re: The reason we use it so much is that is is better than man

Apparently, it isn't.

But it is trendy.

For the moment.

AI has colonized our world – so it's time to learn the language of our new overlords

"Best to just suck it up and master Delvish"

I don't know about that. I'm not sure an LLM datacenter can last long when confronted with a few strategically-placed packs of C4.

If that's what it takes, that's what we'll do. After all, datacenters are not T2s. We can beat them easily.

Medical cannabis CTO says vendors would hang up when he called looking for a deal

Oh, it's Australia

Of course it's fucked up then. That's standard and practically mandatory.

Robot enters Fukushima's nuclear core to retrieve melted-down remains

"radioactive hybrid terror pigs"

That sounds like a perfect mob for the next horror game.

Wanna watch a movie? Sure! Lemme just park the lounge room

"fulfill the dream of having one more room"

That must be a purely Japanese problem. I have enough rooms in my house, I don't need to buy a mobile one.

That being said, the day we do get 100% fully secure self-driving vehicles, I would probably not mind one where I can watch something during the trip, since I won't have to pay attention to the road.

Oh, and I don't mean watch ads, Ford.

Microsoft says it broke some Windows 10 patching – as it fixes flaws under attack

"this may break dual-boot system"

What a surprise.

Oracle wants to power 1GW datacenter with trio of tiny nuclear reactors

"pilot projects have not gone well"

Why ? What have the problems been ? How many pilots have there been ?

I'd like a bit more info on that. Until we get actual fusion, I am convinced that nuclear (preferably Thorium) is the way to go. So what are these SMRs based on and why is it apparently so hard to get them working on land when they are working fine in nuclear submarines ?

The future everyone wanted – in-car ads tailored to your journey and passengers

Disabling ? What makes you think you'll be able to ?

ServiceNow moves its backend off MariaDB to homebrew Postgres

the "Pro" version of the database

If I were a customer, I would demand a demonstration on my data before giving up the money.

27 times faster when pulling reports ? I would want to see that for myself.

I hope ServiceNow has something of a solution for that.

Oracle reports rising top line as it hooks up database service to AWS

"When people are actually doing things manually, it's a security risk"

I'm sure the BOFH agrees. When no one is on the network, the network is much more secure.

Top EU court crushes Google appeal against $2.65B Shopping antitrust ruling

You really to go back to where you belong : Twitter.