Posts by Pascal Monett

NASA finds Orion heatshield cracks won't cook Artemis II crew

Re: financial and time constraints are also real

So nice to know that they take precedence over actual security when lives are at risk . . .

Badass Russian techie outsmarts FSB, flees Putinland all while being tracked with spyware

"Always keep a second passport"

I would venture that, in every country that delivers passports, having a second one is against the law.

Of course, in democratic, civilized countries, you most likely don't need one unless you are a foreign agent (aka spy) or a hardened criminal. In Russia, however, I fully understand that perfectly innocent citizens might need one other magic want to ensure the safety that the Kremlin does not.

Now, I'm glad that this guy got out with his wife - very happy for both of them. It's good that he was techno-proficient. The ham-fisted way his phone was compromised speaks volumes about how poor the FSB is in true technical ability. Gosh, I guess Tom Clancy was wrong about a few things.

But saying that you should no longer trust your phone if it has been confiscated by a tyrannical regime is like saying brush your teeth before going to bed.

Duh, man. That thing is burned. Throw that shit away and get another one.

Huawei handed 2,596,148,429,267,413,
814,265,248,164,610,048 IPv6 addresses

Now that's an interesting answer.

Thank you.

Good for Huawei

I still don't understand why IPv4 + NAT wouldn't work.

Huawei has 18 regions ? Each region could use the full IPv4 range and, with NAT translation between regions, business is done.

IPv4 + NAT scales to any size you want. IPv6 seems to me to be just an administrator's excuse for a good idea.

Veteran Microsoft engineer shares some enterprise support tips

Re: Been the problem myself before

I know that feeling.

I once came to work at customer site, turned on the laptop and couldn't get a network connection. I was sure the WiFi was working, so I called the Helpdesk (oh, and I knew the guys).

Helpdesk drone came over and plugged the Ethernet cable back in.

I have never felt so ridiculous.

I bought him a croissant for my sins.

No, I can't help – you called the wrong helpdesk, in the wrong place, for the wrong platform

He deserved them, obviously.

It is managerial duty to oversee that helpdesk contacts go where the appropriate resources are. This one failed to do his job.

I hope he liked getting woken up.

I'm also pretty sure that, after a day or two, he finally updated the helpdesk phone roster.

That said, I absolutely agree about personal/professional phone difference. My customers have my professional number, which is available from 8 to 19.

My personal number is none of their business.

Day after nuclear power vow, Meta announces largest-ever datacenter powered by fossil fuels

"burning more fossil fuels"

Of course.

Meta has done the ultimate in PR : make great announcements, then act within reality.

And I just love how the locals are wondering if Meta will keep its 15-year activity promise.

Hint : it won't, and you will be screwed.

The only way to ensure that multi-billion-dollar corporations keep their word is to include astronomical penalites in the contract if they don't.

Otherwise, they just prance away as soon as they consider that they have used up their benefits on site.

Altman to Musk: Don't go full supervillain – that's so un-American

Good luck with that

Sounds like the kid during recess begging the bully to be a nice guy for once.

His Muskiness has only ever been about himself. He's not going to pay more attentiont to you than to the snail he steps on when it's raining outside.

Windows 11 24H2 rolls out to more devices – with a growing list of known issues

A new stage of availability

So Redmond has lowered its requirements in the face of its dismal performance in order to shovel its shitware to more poor, unsuspecting users.

How unsurprising.

There is nothing in Windows 11 that requires new hardware. Anything running 1 0 can run 1 1, aside from Borkzilla's stupid shenanigans.

Redmond still hasn't understood that the days where it could push everyone to upgrade are gone. Today's entry-level hardware is capable of running Windows and Office - not quickly, for sure, but those who buy entry-level hardware don't do it for speed.

Somebody at Redmond should create a nice Excel chart with the speed at which each new version of Windows has been adopted since XP. Then someone should bang some heads together to get the Board to think about what they've been doing wrong all these years.

Oh, who am I kidding. The Board ? At Redmond ? Think ?

Never gonna happen.

Google DeepMind touts AI model for 'better' global weather forecasting

"requires only modest quantities of compute resources"

Define "modest".

Does that mean only one 400MW nuclear power station ?

Ransomware hangover, Putin grudge blamed for vodka maker's bankruptcy

Extremists

What a joke.

They make vodka. Putin, you do not have a worldwide grip over vodka. It's fermented potato. Anyone can do that.

You really need to get over yourself.

Beijing wants Chinese outfits to seek alternatives to US silicon

Re: them reporting everything back to Uncle Xi

I'm sure that a properly configured router would solve that problem.

What ? Trump backing down ?

When have you ever seen that clown back down from whatever bullshit statement he's ever made ?

He'll "correct" a map with a Sharpie if he has to, but he will never back down.

If he really has to, he'll let an underling do that, then claim he was never aware of it and he's still right.

Temporary printable tattoos could be the future of EEGs

Interesting tech

So, what's the security on this ? Are you going to be broadcasting your brainwaves for anyone to read them ?

I have to wash my hair every morning. What's the impact of that going to be ?

And how long do you need to read an EEG anyway ?

Cost of Gelsinger's ambition proves too much for Intel

Re: a totemic company

Boeing ? That supremacy has already demonstrably disappeared. Boeing is doomed.

Intel is not - yet. But foundries cost billions (aka real money) and take time to get returns from. Time that Gelsinger was not given.

I'm not sure that Gelsinger deserves this, whatever remarks he may have made about TSMC.

I am sure that it is beyond stupid to build a foundry in a state that has no water - but hey, who am I to complain ?

Apple's backwards design mistake and the reversed capacitor

Just goes to show

. . that knowing what is actually happening electricity-wise is still something that needs to be taught.

To think that we're going toward a future where electrical components will be designed by computers . . . if ever there is a glitch, there will be one hell a big puff of smoke.

The words "measure twice, cut once" come to mind.

Musk seeks injunction to stop OpenAI morphing into for-profit company

A capped for-profit arm ?

Far be it from me to endorse anything Musk, but hell ; you're either non-profit, or you're profit.

What is this bullshit structure and how on Earth has it been endorsed ?

Have the balls to do things right. You want to make profits ? Say so and do so. Don't pretend to be non-profit while trying to skim funds behind everyone's back.

That's called cheating. Cheaters should get stiches, not profits.

Windows 11 market share falls despite Microsoft ad blitz

By the way

Anybody know if there is some way to prevent those Win11 ads from appearing ?

I'm sick of Redmond's endless push to make me change my working environment for no good reason.

Russia arrests one of its own – a cybercrime suspect on FBI's most wanted list

Russia

When you're a criminal in a country managed by criminals, you can't count on due process to ensure your safety.

Broadcom loses another big VMware customer: UK fintech cloud Beeks Group, and most of its 20,000 VMs

So, Broadcom, how's that new billing working out for you ?

You ignore the small customers, and the big ones find that your billing is outrageous, your quality insufficient, and they are ready to rewrite their own tools to move away from you.

Remind me again why the hell you bought VMware in the first place ?

Because if it was to kill it, you're doing a brilliant job.

NetAdmin learns that wooden chocks, unlike swipe cards, open doors when networks can't

How typical

Manglement gets a "bright" idea and goes about spending money without any analysis whatsoever.

The new kit cannot be installed without yet more kit, so another round of spending because hey, manglement is never wrong, right ?

Finally, new kit is installed at x times the cost, hits another hurdle and manglement gives up.

At least you got a nice server out of it.

Cryptocurrency policy under Trump: Lots of promises, few concrete plans

"strategic Bitcoin reserves"

The amount of intellectual masturbation around funny money is absolutely astonishing.

There is nothing strategic about Bitcoin (or any other funny money scam). The only strategy is to get idiots to buy in and then sell high (or just disappear with the real money).

TSMC bets big on 2nm by 2025 – but can it deliver?

2nm

I seem to recall reading, years ago, that we were approaching the scale of the atomic width, and would soon not be able to go any lower.

Yet, every year there is an announcement that the next generation will be even smaller.

How low can they go ?

Are we going to be told that we now have the tech to use quarks instead of atoms ?

Is this all just one big joke in the Matrix ? If it is, do I really want to take the red pill ?

Chinese boffins find way to use diamonds as super-dense and durable storage medium

Wow

Is that a USB key, or a marriage proposal ?

Tech support chap showed boss how to use a browser for a year – he still didn't get it

"learnt many things about how not to run a company"

It is truly amazing how people can confuse power with ability.

You have your own company ? Good for you. That doesn't mean you're a success.

Panasonic brings its founder back to life as an AI

"making the AI necessary"

There is nothing that makes pseudo-AI necessary.

Write it down in a book and publish that, if you must, but do not start artificial shrines to the memory of what was nothing but a CEO.

Are you going to start worshipping it every morning before the management meeting ?

What a crazy world we live in, and this AI bullshit is just making it worse.

Microsoft patches the patch that broke Exchange Server

"Microsoft did not explain precisely what it fixed"

Oh, too embarrassed to own up ?

That's funny. I'd have thought that you were way passed the point of being embarrassed about anything . . .

Australia passes law to keep under-16s off social media – good luck with that, mate

Re: Fat Chance

They don't mind looking like idiots.

It does not keep them from being re-elected.

Re: a workable age verification system

I'm still waiting to see something that actually works.

In the absolute, it could, but at the condition that you have every birth recorded in a government-held database (that is inviolate), and that you are sure that the person requesting verification is the person who's record is in the database.

Good luck on that last part.

Google earns fresh competition scrutiny from two nations on a single day

The pressure is rising

Sooner or later, the tide will come in. Corporations have no right to make decisions like that. Either they accept external software developers, or they don't. The only thing Google has the right - and the obligation - to do is ensure that apps on its Store are not malicious.

For the rest, Google has no right to choose. If it needs a cluebat to the face to understand, so be it.

Fine print in Intel's CHIPS Act deal includes requirement to keep control of its foundries

Tough

Intel has long been a leader in the silicon industry. Hell, without Intel the computing landscape we have today simply wouldn't exist.

I have no empathy for a corporation. The US Government has, rightly, decided that it needs to guarantee the country's independance concerning critical technical products. The Board at Intel needs to toe the line, however much that might not be financially interesting for them right now.

'Best job at JPL': What it's like to be an engineer on the Voyager project

Re: "I know I do."

Audentes Fortuna iuvat

If you don't try, you will never succeed.

It is better to fail than to do nothing.

If you fail, at least you tried.

The only thing worse than being fired is scammers fooling you into thinking you're fired

Waiting for them to try me

I am self-employed.

Good luck convincing me that I'm firing myself.

No, Broadcom did not just end VMware's flagship VCDX certification program

Broadcom

Continuing digging the hole it has created for itself.

Congratulations on supporting your investment so well.

Investors just can't pull the plug despite datacenters facing AI power crunch

"Investors are increasingly concerned"

. . that their investment is not going to give the returns they expect.

Do not tell me that they give a fig about sustainability or energy consumption when they continue to throw billions into this pseudo-AI malarky.

The workplace has become a surveillance state

"there is a growing desire among"

employers Nazis.

They are Nazis. It's easy to become one, apparently.

I have one question : when has your job been to watch what your employees are doing ?

Your job is to manage, to forecast, to plan.

Not to be slave driver.

Telco engineer who spied on US employer for Beijing gets four years in the clink

"Ping Li, a US citizen and Chinese immigrant"

It sure seems that employing a first-generation Chinese immigrant in a position that has access to key critical data is starting to look like a losing proposal from a security perspective.

Let them create restaurants and settle down, make children and live in the West.

Then employ the 2nd-generation, or the 3rd, who have not been endoctrinated by Beijing and are less susceptible to immediately send everything back to a home they no longer know.

Because I'm sorry, but the number of Chinese immigrants who have been caught stealing secrets is more than I care to count.

CrowdStrike still doesn't know how much its Falcon flame-out will cost

"customers can't find a better security product"

That is sad.

Failure should not be rewarded with better revenue.

On the other hand, experience can only come by learning from one's mistakes.

In that case, CrowdStrike has just become the most experienced security vendor on the planet, so . . .

UK council still hadn't fully costed troubled Oracle project 2 years in

Not a problem, people

It's just another round of wasted money.

You have too much of that anyway, right ?

Kill Oracle's 'JavaScript' trademark, Deno asks USPTO

"This outdated legal relic"

Wait, are we talking about Oracle now ?

China sends cloud powered by homebrew Loongson CPUs into space

Wait, widely accepted legal precedents ?

What accepted legal precedents ?

You're being sued several times over your practices, I think you should wait for the results before stating that they are widely accepted.

That they are widely used is another matter entirely.

Imagine a land in which Big Tech can't send you down online rabbit holes or use algorithms to overcharge you

I have to admit

Apart from the censorship, there are a lot of things concerning the Internet that rather like in how China is trying to shape it.

Of course, there's the unfortunate fact that China is shaping it for political reasons only, but still, there are some good ideas there.

So-called "social media" sites will have to be reigned in one day. Things have already gotten out of hand with tracking and they're getting worse.

It might be good to analyze Beijing's decision under the eye of freedom of expression and freedom from tracking.

Network engineer chose humiliation over a night on the datacenter floor

Re: Murphy's Law also *loves* demos

Well, the search worked . . .

Now’s your chance to try Microsoft’s controversial Windows Recall ... maybe

Yeah, but that would violate Redmond's Golden Rule : never let the user think for himself.

Mega defense corp Thales faces Anglo-French bribery and corruption probe

So, Thales is being investigated

Isn't that an again ?

What happened to the last investigation ?

I'm sure the same thing will happen to this one. With a company like that, there are too many people in important positions that prefer not to get their feathers ruffled.

Whomp-whomp: AI PCs make users less productive

"Organizations [..] must [educate] in order to truly showcase the potential of 'everyday AI' "

Aka : please help us sell this new generation of bullshit.

Techie left 'For support, contact me' sign on a server. Twenty years later, someone did

Re: Passwords

I feel that you gave him way too much phone time. He says the head demands that you give the password ? Nope. He has the password. Go ask him. Have a nice day.

And then I'd hang up. Forever.

Microsoft flashes Win10 users with more full-screen ads for Windows 11

Re: Win10 will be the last OS from Microsoft I will ever use...

Amen to that.

I will drag my Win7 home PC and my Win10 work laptop for the next few years until my retirement.

At that point, I will have the time to erase everything Borkzilla from my personal universe and move to some version of Mint.

I'm sure it will be quite refreshing to have, once again, a Personal Computer.

Pakistan's tech lobby warns that slow internet is strangling IT industry

Because you're bothered by pakistani programmers ?

What on Earth is your work domain ?

Brazil hooks up with Chinese satellite broadband service that doesn't operate yet

"China could use them to impose censorship"

Well I don't see that that is much different from Musk. He cuts off service on a whim.

At least, with China, you know what you can expect.