Posts by Pascal Monett

Can it be true? A BIG DATA benchmark? Yes, says TPC

More fun in benchmark land

This is going to be subverted six ways to Sunday. It will be impossible to get reliable data because every vendor is going to criticize the other vendors' results with endless discussions on how a given parameter skews the results and should have been set to something else, with the other vendor replying in length about how that change would only skew in some way favourable to the first vendor, etc. etc.

Of course, maybe I'm wrong and the benchmark results will be taken as canon by everyone, but given the historical battles we have already witnessed in the business arena as well as in the graphics arena, I doubt it.

The agony and ecstasy of SteamOS: WHERE ARE MY GAMES?

Pff, silly me. A Terabit partition, obviously.

Can't wait for it !

Not before 2015, you say ? Well, okay then. I have a GB partition all ready for it on my PC.

Because of course I'll be using my PC.

How to marry malware to software downloads in an undetectable way (Hint: Please use HTTPS)

Ooohhhh! A terrible attack is available in the lab !

But then it is revealed that it needs a man-in-the-middle configuration to work. And even HTTPS can defeat it. Researchers even say only governments can easily implement it.

In other words : carry on citizens, nothing to see here.

UK government accused of hiding TRUTH about Universal Credit fiasco

"failing to adequately admonish ministers and top civil servants "

You don't say ?

I can't believe how hard my gob is smacked.

The only thing ministers and top civil servants fear is not getting their OBE before their retirement. That appears to be the only unknown, if I refer to my extensive studies of the well-known documentary : Yes Minister and the added appendix : Yes, Prime Minister.

The level of detail in these productions is simply astounding - as a matter of fact, I think I need a refresher course.

e-Borders fiasco: Brits stung for £224m after US IT giant sues UK govt

Something fascinates me

I find utterly mesmerizing that they couldn't be arsed to properly plan the cost of the initial project, but they know that continuing would have cost 97 million more than settling.

How did they know that it wouldn't have cost 397 million more ?

Because given the regular cost bloat of government contracts, ANY project is going to overrun in the tens of millions, if not hundreds.

So could someone please explain how the UK Government, who couldn't get a budget right if their life depended on it, can foresee an exact cost figure compared to a settlement ?

Stupid question, I know. They just picked a reasonable one backed by whoever is the friend of the day.

Carry on !

Microsoft: Azure isn't ready for biz-critical apps … yet

What this actually demonstrates . .

. . is that Microsoft is treating a cloud migration like it should : with care, paying attention to all the variables, weighing the pros and cons and evaluating the risks and cost of mitigation.

The cloud is like any other project and must be managed properly. Add to that the fact that Microsoft cannot fail this migration : the reputational cost would be prohibitive. So no, Microsoft is not just gleefully jumping into the cloud feet first, like the cloudy fanboi (wisps ?) would want you to. It is doing so in a reasoned, measured fashion and it is doing it like that because if it fails, it might as well shut down Azure entirely.

Failure is not an option. Proceed with caution.

Seems to me that aviation software is pretty much "business critical".

So someone else does.

I share his perspective. Especially since nothing industrial requiring true real time has ever run under Windows.

Cops baffled by riddle of CHICKEN who crossed ROAD

Why call the police ?

It's a chicken, not a buffalo. It'll move sooner rather than later (case in point, it moved before the cops got there).

I've been stopped by fowl before (geese in fact), it takes them a leisurely 30 seconds to waddle off and let you move again.

Calling the cops for that is about as useful as calling them when Facebook is down.

Think crypto hides you from spooks on Facebook? THINK AGAIN

Masking the headers to the routers is not an inefficiency - it's a full stop.

This'll end well: US govt says car-to-car jibber-jabber will SAVE lives

Re: Gaze into the crystal ball...

And hackers will reverse-engineer the thing to include messages like "your car sucks" or endless "fuck you !"s to be sent randomly and only in presence of at least two other vehicles so as to not be able to trace the origin.

Munich considers dumping Linux for ... GULP ... Windows!

It was "under Bill" that Munich switched in the first place. He didn't spend the money required, apparently.

Re: it's bloated rubbish

It is, but you're missing the point : it's bloated rubbish that people are used to.

Re: The best will leave

I'm sorry, you're talking about functionaries. They don't leave, they just complain louder while drinking more coffee.

Shhh !

Don't mention Lotus Notes !

IBM just might have to <shudder> wake up and actually notice a prospective customer. Then IBM would have to actually go and state that IBM Notes works on Linux, with Calendaring & scheduling and everything. From a browser, even. Finally, IBM might have to go make a business case for Munich.

You don't want IBM to go to all that trouble, now do you ?

IBM certainly doesn't. Better to let Munich lapse back to Windows. IBM can then continue to sleep in peace, dreaming of all the money it never made on products it couldn't be arsed to sell.

Oculus sucked by Zuck? 'I'm over it' – Minecraft supremo Notch

Word of warning, Notch

Make Minecraft work with the Oculus if you wish, but do NOT make Facebook shit appear in Minecraft !

I would accept viewing my Minecraft world in actual 3D. I will NOT accept fucking "Likes" or any other Facebook crap.

And if you allow Farmville alerts, I will <redacted> you.

Microsoft Azure goes TITSUP (Total Inability To Support Usual Performance)

I have a revolutionary idea

Instead of putting everyone's services into a Single Point of Remote Failure, it might be interesting to explore a new venue : Distributed Computing.

Imagine that ? If each service center had its own infrastructure and hardware, it would be isolated from exterior failures. In addition, each center could be able to implement its own rules independently from others, according to its own business case, and could design and implement the best configuration for its needs instead of relying on standards that may or may not correspond best to what it wants.

. . .

What, am I a few years too early ?

Of course there is redundancy. And the redundant one goes TITSUP too, to maintain service consistency.

The Return of BSOD: Does ANYONE trust Microsoft patches?

Let us not forget that Microsoft itself helped foster this mentality by withholding API documentation for the functions it considered critical to its own performance.

So some vendors had to go and guess things, or call "less efficient" API functions, and tried routing around that, all because Microsoft wanted to make their software work less well than Microsoft's own.

Then, when application lock-in installed, Microsoft was stuck with trying to make its own APIs account for all the variations that had happened, because it simply couldn't break with the past given the amount of uproar that would cause.

But it DOES concern Microsoft. A PC with Windows belongs to Microsoft, and it wants you to know that.

Because Microsoft is there to help you (you poor user, you) and, in case you have a problem with your PC, it will gladly aid you in reformatting the entire disk and installing Windows 9.

As soon as that is out.

Chromebook fans are out in strength today

Funny how some people cannot stand that their favourite product is no more exceptional than everyone else's.

Chromebook has other advantages, crow about them and be different. Spouting nonsense about something everyone does and trying to make it unique to your favourite toy is just silly.

Re: until the sheeple move to LINUX

Right. That's scheduled for about 'round when the Sun enters its red giant phase.

So don't worry, it'll only take a few more billion years.

Germany 'accidentally' snooped on John Kerry and Hillary Clinton

Aliens ?

I've gotta see that movie again.

Tonight.

Twitter displays our 'Favorites'. That is, like, PRIVATE, huff naive users

Well done !

Way to go, Twitter. Your users thought they had a private area on your site ? Nada. You showed 'em, and good.

Keep up the good work. When you have disturbed them enough, maybe - just maybe, one day twatterers will finally understand that all their activity is just to grease someone else's wheels (yours and your customers, of course).

Top money men face up to 2 YEARS in slammer for neglecting to spot crim-cash activity

Ah, but Senior Management does not go to prison, ergo had no need for the training.

Rupert Murdoch says Google is worse than the NSA

No problem, we'll get the content from elsewhere.

The NSA has users ?

I thought it had victims.

Redmond stall means IE Java axe won't swing till September

Re: "go back to to cgi-bin and Geocities pages"

Now there's an idea. Have web pages that are once again using text to pass information on, instead of a bad 8 minute video on a subject that could be described in two or three paragraphs - if one could be arsed to actually write. Much easier to flip on the microphone and mumble, ummm and ahh for six minutes until speaking the one or two sentences that are actually useful.

Go back to the days when company web sites were not a mess of Flash pages unaccessible via URL, when restaurant menus were not a flippin' 10MB PDF file containing 2KB of text and a truckload of uncompressed photos.

Actually, I think I would like to go back to that time.

The way things are going now, in a decade or two all company websites will just be an interactive HD video. To check a product listing, you'll have to download a gigabyte of corporate presentation nonsense and wait ten minutes to get to the part where you can see what the company sells.

God I hope I'll be retired by then.

Spin doctors crack 'impossible' asteroid hurtling towards Earth

Something I don't get here

How is it worse to break up a weakly-cohesive assembly of material rather than a solid chunk of rock ? In either case, you get pieces - not only when the material sticks together because of gecko feet.

I've never heard that NASA favoured exploding asteroids. What NASA has always favoured has been pushing the threat to another orbit that does not risk impacting us.

Five Totally Believable Things Car Makers Must Do To Thwart Hackers

Re: "A good hack attack would leave no log entries anyway"

A properly designed system would log everything that happened, with parameters explaining why. Disrupting that trace would be demonstration enough that a hack took place.

The real challenge, I think, is putting all that log data somewhere that is not much at risk of getting wet or damaged in the event of a crash.

Silly me, here I am talking about a properly designed system in this day and age. I forgot all about marketing deadlines and managerial mismanagement.

Marvell: NO WAY should we have to pay jumbo $1.54bn patent judgment

Dilly-dallying lawyers should be disbarred

One side says infringement, the other side says prior art, nobody shows any proof of anything.

If there is prior art, SERVE IT UP then ! And get the patent erased from USPTO by legal order.

What ? Not possible ? The USPTO is only a rubber-stamp organisation serving the interests of wealthy patent holders ?

Pfff.

Snowden on NSA's MonsterMind TERROR: It may trigger cyberwar

"it depends on your definition"

Fine, the definition of lying is not telling the truth. Anything more to say ?

People in positions of responsibility should be accountable for their actions and it is not up to them to serve an excuse not to be. The day accountability went out the window is the day democracy went down the creek without a paddle.

I get that National Security is important, I get that good people are doing dangerous jobs abroad and I get that threats do indeed exist and must be found. Unfortunately, the US government and all its departments have lost the trust of The People they are supposed to be (theoretically) working for, and telling more lies is just digging the hole deeper.

But no matter, the Government actively demonstrates utter contempt for the very notion of democracy at every point - and gets away with it due to public apathy.

Dolby Atmos is coming home and it sounds amazing

Wonderful. Brilliant. Absolutely fabulous.

So we've gone from mono, to 2.0, to 2.1, to 5.1, and now 10.1

I'm glad that the six guys who get a hard-on for this kind of thing will be able to blow their wads (of money) on corresponding equipment.

Meanwhile, could we finally get better stereo speakers on our bloody flatscreen HD TV sets ?

Don't bother - I'll just keep the TV hooked up to my 2.0 stereo.

And if you think I'm going to spend a car's worth of cash to hear Dances With Stars on 22.3 Atmos Ultima Freak sound, I've got a bridge to sell you.

Stanford boffin is first woman to bag 'math Nobel Prize'

She wanted to be a writer ?

Well done on advancing human knowledge. It is a gift not given to everyone.

Naughty NSA was so drunk on data it forgot collection rules

But, ... they were just following orders !

</sarcasm mode>

Sir, sir, my cloud ate my homework: Google touts grading tool to teachers

Re: "the pay is generally quite good, [..], good career advancement, holidays, ..."

Would you mind sourcing that ? You must be talking about university, or college at least. In elementary schools, the picture is quite different.

My wife is teacher, and I have had the opportunity to be in a class of 26 young children for 2 hours at a time.

Never again.

Anyone who thinks that those holidays are a bonus, I challenge them to spend a week in a class, let alone a school year.

As for career advancement, excuse me ? Your career is to be surrounded with screeching younglings all day long, for the entirety of your career. There are precious little positions that take you to a quiet office managing reports or computer files, and those are mostly obtained by judicious relations, rarely by any actual merit.

And the pay rises, now you're simply delirious. In any case, you're not talking about any country I know of.

Japanese boffins invent 4.4 TREEELLION frames per second camera

Re: What's a billion?

There's a Wiki page for that.

And yes, I had to check as well.

Trans-Pacific: Google spaffs cash on FAST undersea packet-flinging

Not even a question - of course they will.

Microsoft: Just what the world needs – a $25 Nokia dumbphone

I like the concept

Finally a phone that responds to my needs - making and receiving calls, and doesn't need to be recharged every single day.

I hate smartphones with a passion, but I have to use one for business purposes.

Once I retire, that is the kind of phone I want. Just give it a contact list that has more than 12 slots and I'll be happy.

DIME for your TOP SECRET thoughts? Son of Snowden's crypto-chatter client here soon

Re: keeping the channel full at all times

Good God, my dear sir, have you the slightest idea what that would do to Verizon's network speed ?

Such a move would turn every second of the day into peak time, and people would use up their monthly quota of "unlimited" GBs in a day.

On the other hand, the chaos generated would hopefully lay the foundation of a law-backed definition of "unlimited" that would finally resemble something realistic.

One can always dream...

Can't touch this! Microsoft joins OpenGL 3D graphics group

Re: Bad News

I agree, bad news. Microsoft does not use open standards, it subverts them.

MS has been attacking Open Source since it was conceived. This gesture only means one thing : MS has come to the conclusion that its attacks have failed.

So now it is Plan B : Destroy From The Inside. And this time, MS didn't even need to hijack a voting process.

Yosemite Siri? Apple might plonk chatty assistant on your desktop - report

Re: Dragon Naturally Speaking

In all honesty, Dragon Naturally Speaking on a mobile would be something rather impressive - even at PC levels of understanding.

CryptoWall! crooks! 'turn! to! Yahoo! ads! to! spread! ransomware!'

servers hidden in the Tor network, eh ?

It feels inevitable that the growing complexity of the communication tools that we have (not to mention those we will get) is going to become a nightmare to secure without destroying their usefulness.

Another step forward for diamond-based quantum computers

You'll understand that by 1 PM ?

Lucky guy.

Anonymous wifi the latest casualty of Russia net neurosis

Enough with the nothing to hide bullshit

If you have nothing to hide that doesn't mean you should bare it all for everyone to see.

Especially if you're over 50 years old, like me. People do NOT need to see that.

That may sound like a loophole, but I don't know if many Russians can easily get their hands on foreign-sourced SIM thingys.

And let's not worry about the crims, shall we ? They'll get their illegally-imported thingamajigs whatever law is in place.

ANU boffins demo 'tractor beam' in water

So, the Empire starts in Australia

We are now on the first step of tractor beam technology. We just might be on the verge of fuel-less propulsion drives for space travel. All we need active shields to complete the picture, and Future Space here we come* !

*served with loads and loads of optimism

US 911 service needs emergency upgrade and some basic security against scumbags

"financially more viable to arrest everyone and let half of them go"

Um, here's a novel idea : instead of arresting a whole family and sifting their trash to find a reason to be there, how's about the officers realize that it was a hoax and transport their unit to the origin of the call to find the dipwad that made the call and treat him to the live-3D version of "these are your new bracelets, feel how tight they are" ?

Or is that too intelligent ?

Yeah, probably is.

Crypto Daddy Phil Zimmerman says surveillance society is DOOMED

I had not really realized that. Thank you for the clarification. I will keep that in mind for future arguments.

Spot on !

I do take his words as a bit of a dreamer. Believing that people will not stand for government encroaching further on their privacy looks a bit optimistic when people have gladly accepted it from businesses that had no right to do it in the first place (yes, Google and Facebook, I'm looking at you both).

And the issue I have with that is that once you have gotten used to being spied on under the excuse of serving better ads, what use it is to complain about being spied on for the overwhelming excuse of National Security ? I mean, I know that the general population has no problem with hypocrisy when applied to their own lives (like white people who don't like colored people but readily employ them because they can pay them cheaply), but I think that even the personal hypocrisy meter would be a bit blown by complaining now on Facebook or Twitter.

The saddest fact is simply that too many people don't care, or are even aware of, what they give up in order to continue farmvilling or twitterating or wall-posting what they had for breakfast.

And that's why it works.

As for editing EXIF data, please. Do you file your carburator intake to improve its efficiency too ? If you have that level of expertise and believe that everyone else does it too, you clearly don't go outside enough.