Posts by Pascal Monett

Whether to move off Oracle is the $100M+ question for Europe's largest public body

Oh, I see. Birmingham is incapable of delegating, so it's the largest administrative nightmare.

Funny how, even after Brexit, things in the UK have to be compared to Europe. It's the old "Fog over the Channel, the continent is isolated".

As for biting the bullet, guys, you were incapable of managing an upgrade, what makes you think you'll be able to handle a completely new system ?

There's something seriously wrong in UK Government circles. I'm starting to wonder if there is a single project that has ever gone live without catastrophic issues. It's like they couldn't plan their way out of a paper bag.

Test, people. Test. And get your bloody specifications right. If you don't know how to do that, hire an expensive consultant to tell you that you're idiots and listen to him.

It'll cost you less in the long run.

Unless the consultant is the Mayor's nephew . . .

Two of India's most prominent startup tech giants are in deep trouble

"pointing to past efforts to curtail money laundering"

Well it would seem that those past efforts were insufficient. Money laundering is a well-known phenomenon, it's not rocket science.

Either you stop it, or you don't. There's no "we tried but it didn't work".

Dell said to be preparing broad Return To Office order this Monday

"if they want to keep their tax breaks"

Ah HAA ! A sliver of understanding makes its way into the mind.

Nobody cares whether the drones WFO or not, but the beancounters definitely care to keep the tax breaks (and ya canna blame 'em there).

Tesla power steering probe upgraded after thousands more incidents reported

So, can't even get power steering right

I'm sure Musk is going to claim that the technology is brand new and has teething problems.

Sheesh. Tesla is going ever further down on the list of cars I might wish to purchase.

Building a 16-bit CPU in a spreadsheet is Excel-lent engineering

Always impressive

The amount of work some people will go through to make stuff that works where you'd never think of doing that is impressive.

A CPU in Minecraft. DOOM on bacteria (okay, it's the bacteria that are working, but still). The list goes on (and on).

It seems that there is always someone who looks at a thing and thinks "hey, can I make it do <some entirely insane idea> ?".

I think that is the definition of art. It's useless, but it can be beautiful.

Windows 10 users report app gremlins after Microsoft update

Deep Freeze

Interesting tip, thanks for that. I'll be looking into it.

Wikileaks source and former CIA worker Joshua Schulte sentenced to 40 years jail

"one of the largest unauthorized disclosures"

One of ? You mean there were others ?

How many, and how large ?

I did a quick search and I only found two : the Sterling case, and the Kiriakou case.

Both of these cases seem minor to me as far as volume is concerned. A catastrophe for the people whose identities were revealed, to be sure, but we're not talking about thousands of documents.

I can't seem to find any other case that even begins to approach the damage Schulte did. That he's an asshole just makes it all the better that he's going away for a long time.

And I don't think there'll be much "good behavior" to get him out sooner.

Mozilla slams Microsoft for using dark patterns to drive Windows users toward Edge

"with the added trust of Microsoft"

Sorry buddy, but that is not an argument that will sway me.

I don't trust you, I just have to use you.

8 more years . . .

Techie climbed a mountain only be told not to touch the kit on top

A wasted trip

Yeah, but 12 hours of overtime.

This is what would happen in the days before smartphones. Then again, in this case it wouldn't have helped since the numpties mangling this job were idiots.

I suspect that the one competent guy was the one who sent him out to power cycle the router. Then he went home and the night shift came in without instructions, so they bungled the rest.

I call that a lack of internal communication.

Congress told how Chinese goons plan to incite 'societal chaos' in the US

"50 to one"

Really ?

Because we know how many hackers China is using at this point in time ?

No, we don't. That is just a throwaway phrase destined to further the message of fear. It is a gratuitious attempt to bolster an argument that does not need such shenanigans.

Stop fearmongering and start pushing the solution : don't have your critical infrastructure accessible from the Internet.

Yes, it'll cost money, but it will make your country secure.

So, what'll it be ? Security, or keeping the masses in a constant state of fear ?

I think I know the answer to that . . .

Scientists don thinking caps in wearable tech breakthrough

A beanie and a sweater with batteries

For the beanie, the article states that it had a mainboard in the tip. I'm guessing that's where they put the battery, because I did not read that the beanie generated its own electricity.

I'm also guessing that the sweater had a (probably larger) board, also with a battery. From the image, it seems to me that the board could be on the shoulder.

The watch is obvious, the battery and control circuit are inside.

So we're going to be getting clothing with mainboards ? Is the fashion industry aware of this ?

I think this is going to be a nightmare as far as every day wear and tear are concerned. Maybe not for the beanie - after all, you don't bang your noggin all that much - but for the sweater ? In the Metro ?

Sounds like it's control board is going to be running the gauntlet every time it goes outside.

How not to write about network security – and I'm speaking from experience

I would really like a good book on network security

I would like to have a compendium that I could consult easily and that would answer some specific questions like :

- what do I need to check to ensure that my computer is not an open book for the Internet ?

- what do I need to check to make sure that my firewall doesn't have a sneaky port assignment in it ?

- where do I need to look to ensure that Windows is only starting up the stuff I want it to ?

and so on.

I know some of these things, but having an authoritative reference would allow me to be sure that I've done all I can.

'I’m sorry for everything...' Facebook's Zuck apologizes to families at Senate hearing

"I’m sorry for everything..."

Now please excuse me while I go pick up another billion at the bank . . .

Honestly, Senators, you still believe his bullshit ? Haven't you had enough examples ? Or is it that you're looking for job ?

A nice, cushy job . . .

Microsoft posts another set of bumper results. Market's response? Meh

"In 2025, it will be the year to execute."

Sure. I'll get my Glock.

Who do I start with ?

Investors threw 50% less money at quantum last year

"part of broader venture capital trends"

Yes, the broad trend that wants to make money sooner rather than later.

Quantum might be a valid process in ten years, or not.

Statistical analysis machines (called AI by the clueless) can be put together now and make money within a few months.

Sure, the VCs aren't abandoning quantum, they're just padding their nests for future investments while building machines to make deepfakes of some pop idol.

That stuff brings revenue.

ESA salutes Galileo satellite system meeting aviation standards

"We improved [..] Galileo purely by retuning the software in the ground segment."

In other words, some programmer hacked the code to force the return of an acceptable result outside of any hardware control.

I'm not sure that I'm reassured.

Leaked email: Unit4 ERP system leaves some school staff with 'nil pay'

An inconvenience ?

So not getting your monthly salary is an inconvenience ?

Let me educate you on what an inconvenience is :

An inconvenience is when I go to the supermarket to get Appenzel for my cheese fondue and they don't have any.

An inconvenience is when I want to go to a traffic website and their cameras are down.

An inconvenience is when my alarm clock is set for 5:45 and my intestines wake up at 5:20.

THOSE are inconveniences.

Not getting paid at the end of the month is NOT an inconvenience, it's a bloody catastrophe.

It's hours talking to the bank, trying to avoid getting redlisted on credit bills, getting angry letters from another fucking administration threatening you because your monthly payment did not go through.

An inconvenience. Really.

I wish all those at the head of that county council would not get paid until this whole sorry mess is resolved.

THEN they might understand what the word inconvenience means.

UK biometrics boss bows out, bemoaning bureaucratic blunders

"at times frustrating"

Only at times ?

Let's face it : this whole thing was a facade, a fabrication to make people think that oversight was being implemented. You never had the full complement of staff to do your job ? You didn't have a job, you had a theatrical distraction for the masses.

Just watch V for Vendetta to know where we're going.

Then watch Idiocracy to put the final nail in the coffin of the future of Humanity.

Sorry, I'm a bit depressed at the moment . . .

Cory Doctorow has a plan to wipe away the enshittification of tech

Re: Would you not expect things to go wrong as well as right?

Good question. Just one thing : what exactly has gone right ?

Re: Root Cause

Totally agree.

The stock market needs to stop being the one-stop money-making machine for a few privileged people.

We need to relearn the term investment. An investment is you putting money in a company because you believe in it and want to participate in its future.

As such, anyone buying stock should be mandated by law to hold onto those stocks for ten years. If you don't believe the company will improve in ten year's time, you have no business buying its stock.

That will put to rest all the useless drama around the Dow Jones and build a society where Capitalism regains some amount of laurels, which it has utterly trashed these days.

As for CEO bonuses, that is not public money. If the shareholders are stupid enough to award them, it's their problem.

Re: Bog Zech?????

No, that was a nice spin on Big Tech having reached the bog zone.

I liked it.

Microsoft confirms Windows Server 2025 is on the way

Thanks for link.

Pretty much what I was expecting, a monstrosity that couldn't possibly fit in my tower :)

Impressive though.

"tops out at 6TB of physical memory"

I really would like to see a motherboard that can handle 6TB of DDRx RAM.

Cruise being investigated over car crash that dragged victim along the road

Re: set a precedent for what AI is allowed ingest and then spit out

While I totally agree with your general message, I would have preferred you say that it will set a precedent for what fleshbags are allowed to throw into their statistical analysis models.

AI systems are just obeying their programming. It's the humans in charge who are responsible for what goes in and what comes out.

"The system, nicknamed Vista"

Ooh. I sincerely hope that that will not bring bad luck to the whole thing.

Or maybe it will finally wash the name of its sour aftertaste ?

Native Chrome arrives fashionably late to the Windows on Arm party

Re: re : OS nobody cares about

Of course. Because the OS is all that matters.

Never mind that 95% of all business applications are on Windows, that's just a detail. Let's switch everyone over to Apple and world peace will ensue, right ?

Nope.

ICANN proposes creating .INTERNAL domain to do the same job as 192.168.x.x

Well that's in the article.

Take it up with the author.

"DNS, however, can't prevent internal use of ad hoc TLDs"

So basically, ICANN wants to make a standard out of something everyone can already do and some are doing it, but ICANN wants to put a specific name on it which will make everyone already doing it wonder if they should go through the hassle of changing and decide not to. But future network admins may buy into the "standard", except if that contradicts some business requirement, in which case they'll just go with whatever they need and it'll work anyway.

Did I get that right ?

That runaway datacenter power grab is the best news for net zero this century

Additional points for going with Thorium

Civilian, and safe, nuclear power production means Thorium. If we are to imagine a world where a datacenter is something that sits on or near a nuclear power plant, Thorium is the best bet.

Thorium reactors produce the least amount of radioactive waste, and doesn't last as long a PWRs. Additionally, you can take waste from PWRs and use it in a Thorium reactor, which has the potential to vastly reduce the amount of radioactive stuff we already have lying around.

Until we get fusion reactors (and that seems to be on its way now), Thorium is our best, safest bet.

And you don't need dozens of operators 24/7. You need one engineer with a beeper, who gets alerted when the reactor auto-shuts-down for some reason. Because the Thorium reactor cannot explode, nor melt down. When it gets too hot, the salt plug simply melts, the radioactive slurry is deposited in reservoirs and the whole reaction stops. After that, it's just a question of putting in a new salt plug, scooping the slurry back into the chamber and starting up again.

If datacenters could push for that design, that would be real progress.

Linus Torvalds flames Google kernel contributor over filesystem suggestion

THAT is Torvalds being shouty ?

I'm guessing that we don't have an exhaustive rendition here, but what I read in this article seems rather tame to me.

He's been in better form before.

The Land Before Linux: Let's talk about the Unix desktops

Thank you

Thank you for that link. What a video.

As a programmer, I have found proof of why I should be happy to program in LotusScript because dear God, writing to the metal is an awful experience.

I'm certain that I will be going back to this video, if only to remind myself that there are people out there who are vastly more intelligent than I am.

Re: the official kernel effectively only gets the changes that Linus permits

And, in this case, that is a Good Thing^TM

Microsoft sheds some light on Russian email heist – and how to learn from Redmond's mistakes

"Midnight Blizzard targeted other organisations"

Oh, so that's your excuse. You, a multi-trillion-dollar company, got targeted at the same time as other, insignificant entities, so it's not your fault ?

Really ?

How's about your internal network is an open invitation to attack ? Why was your test account able to create admin-level access and why was that server allowed admin-level access to production servers ?

Because I suppose that high-level corporate email servers (dare I say, Exchange ?) are production ?

I understand though. Some developer in your group (a "rogue developer" maybe ?) needed to test something, gave himself all the permissions (because really, security is for everyone else, I need to work here), and left the account as is.

And the developer is not necessarily the one to blame. No, the network administrator is. You want admin on a test server ? Fine. You want that test account to access production servers ? Why ? For how long ? To do what ? You get that window, then your access is shut down.

It's called security. It's difficult.

It's necessary.

Snow day in corporate world thanks to another frustrating Microsoft Teams outage

Re: if your net connection goes down, so do you

Or, if your provider's network goes down, so do you.

I can't help but be thankful for all this downtime because that means that, one day, some bright MBA spark might actually start spreading the gospel of "Cloud is bad for your reliability, in-house means you control things".

And we'll get back to in-house servers that don't need fat-fingered admins from another company to fuck things up. Because the wheel keeps turning.

Once upon a time, if your network was down, you and your clients were the only ones impacted. Today, we're all on the bandwagon of "we hope Borkzilla won't fuck up today because otherwise, we're toast".

And to think that the people who pushed for this earn at least 10 times the salary of the people who actually work . . .

Hubble telescope spots tiniest water-rich world in orbit

"settle the question of water worlds once and for all"

I remember a time where the question was : are there planets around other stars ?

Yes, there are. We have basically gone from wondering if other stars had planets, to knowing that they are extremely common and the exception would be a start without planets. I am confident that we will find out that there are water worlds around red dwarfs.

The problem I have with the current state of planetary detection is that we are not detecting Earth-like planets. A rocky planet that is twice Earth's diameter will have a bigger gravitational attraction that will not be without consequence (supposing we find a way to get there).

I would really like Science to be able to detect Earth-like worlds, rocky planets with water and a gravity well that is withing 10% to maybe 20% of Earth, in a goldilocks zone favorable for life. I guess the astrophysicists would as well.

Ah, what a time to be alive.

Google's AI-fueled IDE Project IDX tries to show you how your app runs on Android, iOS

Hoo boy

"IDX workspaces now can auto-detect network ports when applications need to make firewall adjustments. They also allow command-line tools, scripts, and utilities to be run in workspaces without local installation."

I sincerely hope they've nailed the security on that, because that sounds like a hacker's dream tool.

BOFH: Looks like you're writing an email. Fancy telling your colleague to #$%^ off?

Another one bites the dust

Ah, I have the feeling that "AI" is going to have a certain importance for BOFH this year.

Can't wait to find out how the bosses will be ground into paste . . .

The EU-US Trade and Tech Council sounds fancy but, really, what's the point?

"what's the point?"

Simples, the point is some people are going to polish their CVs for upward mobility.

This "Council" is just a network thing. If you know the right people, your future is assured.

That only works for mouthpieces who can't bring anything of value themselves, of course, which is a species that seems to be multiplying like cockroaches these days.

IBM talks up cost savings, including 'workforce rebalancing'

"workforce rebalancing"

So that's the new term these days at IBM ?

I wonder when IBM is going to be "rebalanced" to the dustbin of history.

'Cause I don't see it going anywhere else.

Tiny asteroid's earthly fireworks predicted with pinpoint accuracy by NASA

Given that large asteroids have already only been spotted after passing Earth, the question is not entirely without merit.

Given that we still can't do anything about it, one can only wonder if the question is worth asking . . .

Missed expectations, zero guidance: Tesla's 'great year' was anything but

"focus the team on the launch of the next-generation vehicle"

Why does that remind me of a certain Sinclair ?

Amazon Ring sounds death knell for surveillance as a service

Re: Police have always been able to ask for evidence without a warrant

They can always ask, but without a warrant, you can refuse without consequence.

It's just that Ring, apparently, has never refused a request before, with or without a warrant.

A warrant is not just a word, it is proof that the police has determined that specific data would help a specific case, and a judge has approved. Thus, a warrant has the force of law, you cannot refuse to hand over the data.

There can be no warrant for gratuitious surveillance without cause. That's called snooping, not police work.

Tech world won't have long to fall in line when EU signs off on AI Act

Agreed.

Regulating R&D that only exists in a lab and cannot be accessed by the general public ? Obviously not.

But you put your lab rat on the open market and I don't care what your excuse is, it needs to be under control.

What Microsoft's latest email breach says about this IT security heavyweight

"The attack was not the result of a vulnerability in Microsoft products or services"

Hmm, that is subject to discussion. You let a test ID get password spammed. That's a service, is it not ?

Because if there was no human who mistakenly clicked a link, then it's your products or procedures that are at fault.

And we all remember Borkzilla's zeal at renewing its own domain names, right ?

I hope there will be a bit more fallout on this, but hey, Windows is unavoidable, so . . .

Apple has botched 3D for decades. So good luck with the Vision Pro, Tim

Amiga had 3D capabilities ?

In that case, my trusty old 8086 also had 3D capabilities. And I remember seeing them with the one wireframe game I had at the time : Starglider.

Less than 80KB on the floppy, it's premise was that the dangerous radiation of the environment prevented you from just looking through a cockpit window. Yes, the world was limited and, when you reached the edge, you continued from the other side, but that was hardly an inconvenience.

It was a great game, an absolutely tiny one, and terrifically efficient and engaging.

If only I still had a working copy . . .

Huawei prepares to split from Android on consumer devices with HarmonyOS Next

"the platform could become a de facto standard behind the Great Firewall"

Oh but it will. And Beijing will be "working" hand-in-hand with Huawei to ensure that the HarmonyOS is a good pupil, ready to upload all the data Beijing requires to its surveillance servers.

There is an open-source version ? I would scour that with a fine-tooth comb to ensure that nothing pointed to Beijing's servers before trying that out.

The Post Office systems scandal demands a critical response

We need more articles like this one

Keep jabbing the finger at the sore until someone decides to fix things - and not just the code.

This kind of conversation is needed at a global level. Why do private companies like Fujitsu or Capita never seem to be held accountable for their shambolic performance ?

Why do they continue getting awarded new contracts ?

Yes, I know Fujitsu has declared not answering tenders until this matter is resolved, but that does not change the fact that, if it hadn't made this decision, somebody would have awarded Fujitsu a new contract. Who is that somebody and why is that person not under fire for continually awarding gobs of money to companies that do not actually provide a good service ?

I really do hope that public opinion is, for once, going to sit up and take notice, and demand action from the elected gobshites that surf as far away from trouble as they can.

Your hard-earned money is being wasted and the people in power don't care. It is high time you remind them that they work for you.

For a moment there, Lotus Notes appeared to do everything a company needed

Re: Have fun with the Exchange server that can't manage more than 500 accounts.

I'm happy that you have a nice mail product, but you are basically demonstrating why Notes did not take off like it deserved.

Can your open-source assembly also do document management, order processing, manage the company website and a thousand other data management things your company needs ?

I'm guessing not. It's not Notes. And if you try, you're likely to add a host of other open-source tools to your assembly.

Not saying it can't be done, but Notes does it all already.

Zuckerberg wants to build artificial general intelligence with 350K Nvidia H100 GPUs

"super keen on more factories to churn out processors"

Um, no. You don't need more factories. You just need to wait until your order has been fulfilled.

We need to stop this "I want it NOW !" mentality.

Your needs are not strategic for the survival of the human race. You can wait until it's done.

HP's CEO spells it out: You're a 'bad investment' if you don't buy HP supplies

"third-party cartridges with reprogrammable chips"

The problem is not with 3rd party reprogrammable chips.

The problem is with the nutjobs that thought that joining an ink cartridge with a chip was a good idea in the first place.

It's ink. It doesn't need a chip.

Not unless you're a Nazi.