Posts by Richard Wharram

Linehan turns IT Crowd off but NOT on again

Like almost all of Red Dwarf :)

Robot resolves Rubik's Cube in record time

That's how speed-cubers solve the cube. They don't invent new algorithms on the fly every solve.

/ex-cuber

FSF takes Win 8 Secure Boot fight to OEMs

Missed the point

Live USBs are intended to make Linux installs as easy as possible. Distributions such as Ubuntu aim to make everyday usage of Linux possible for non-techies.

Having to go into BIOS and 'Disable Secure Boot' would scare off most potential newbies to Linux I'm sure.

Smut oglers told to opt in to keep web filth flowing

The porno bush...

...is unlikely to re-appear. ISPs will make it as easy as possible to get round such measures or revenue will move to other ISPs who do.

Who would pay for a phat 50MB connection in that has no pr0n ?

(please don't answer that)

This Dianamania is a slur on Jobs

See you in court Andrew !

I started calling him the "CEO of hearts" yesterday so plainly you are slavishly copying the look and feel of my commentary.

Yes, and that downvote button has rounded corners too so DON'T TOUCH IT !!!!

Gay-bashing cult plans picket of Steve Jobs funeral

Doesn't work that way.

They don't protest at people they hate. For example, when they protest at soldiers' funerals it isn't because they have anything in particular against the soldier. They claim to believe that God is punishing America for 'allowing gayness' and any funeral can just be seen as part of God's punishment. The logic is always tenuous.

Anyway, that's the purported logic, the real reason of course is to offend people and get publicity.

Ballmer: Uninspiring performance and a small package

Perspective

He's hardly Leo Apotheker.

Ten... Androids to outshine the iPhone 4S

SEXPlay

Can be had for less than £200 unlocked now if you can find one in stock.

Accelerating universe expansion discovery snags Nobel Prize

Dark Energy ?

Why invent new stuff just to explain things ? Surely the simplest explanation is usually correct.

I would postulate that benevolent noodly appendages are pushing those nasty novas away from His chosen people.

Keeping that 2005 vibe going...

Huawei gets charged with juicy Android handset

What ?

I like mine but it's hard to get more than a day out of it.

Virtual cloud monkeys go bananas writing Shakespeare

Yes - except evolution isn't random. Things that are good at surviving, survive. Things that aren't don't. Rather important, totally non-random, aspect.

Hey Commentards! [This title is optional]

\o/

Ultra-cheap HP TouchPads to hit UK at 6pm

Me too

In Huddersfield this morning. Waited an hour for it to open and was told they'd got my reservation and I would be getting one. When I got in the store I was told they had no record of it on the system.

Lenovo chiefs chortle over decision to buy IBM's PC biz

title

They make decent, sturdy, reliable kit, even the consumer kit. That makes me pick them over their rivals.

Explaining the Chocolate Factory's Patent Panic

As I said...

I still think this deal is less about the patent portfolio than forcing Apple to take on Google's fat lawyer pool instead of it's Android partners who will be more easily bullied by Apple. Google could sell the hardware business on in a couple of years after it's had the fight with Apple it wants.

Apple changed shape of Galaxy Tab in court filing

roffle

Have you even read the other comments ? Apple DID NOT invent tablet computers. They've been around for years. They made them popular sure because technology had advanced enough to make them more practical. So your argument is "the first corporation to popularize something should be granted a legal monopoly."

There is not enough palm for this face.

What were Samsung doing ?

Apple's case is pathetic. DId Samsung just give up ?

Has Google wasted $12bn on a dud patent poker-chip?

I would suspect...

That since Apple is suing phone makers using android rather than Google and bullying it's partners Google is trying to make the fight more even by forcing Apple to sue Google itself.

With Google's money and lawyers they might even fight Apple's patents directly and get them invalidated, one by one.

Maybe...

Scottish TV news pumps goatse link

You *%"*&^%

I'd pretty much forgotten the waffle. I shan't eat tonight now thanks :(

Bug-Byte Manic Miner

Oh,

and then press 6, 5, 2 and 1 together and you can see what The Final Barrier looks like on the Speccy.

Is it sad that I didn't have to Google for any of this ?

Remember

6031769

(must contaIn letters)

Dungeon Siege III

Title

I still have Diablo II until Diablo III comes out thanks.

Multinationals out themselves as big Aaas fans

TLA ?

TLA is an initialism not an acronym (unless you pronounce it as one word) and is therefore not self-describing, which I thought was rather the point.

Modern Warfare 3 teaser trailer reveals terror on the tube

Must disagree

I'm well aware of the developer history of the CoD games. BO's problems on the PC were mainly caused by the fact that the PC QA team comprised of two of the cleaning staff and one of the junior manager's offspring on a 'bring your daughter to work' day. The PC version always had problems with Windows 7 on about half of all configs but the sales had been made. There was never any priority given to fixing the rendering pipeline issues. The only issues that got fixed were those in common with the XBox and PS3. I can't believe they couldn't have fixed these problems if Activision were willing to fund it or if Treyarch had had the balls to demand something should be done, but nothing was done. The coding duties passing back to, in part, a team which still calls itself Infinity Ward but without the clout it used to have is not likely to fix the slap-dash approach the franchise has to the PC market.

In short, I paid £40 on Steam to get a game, promised to me at midnight on release day, which unlocked after retail shoppers were already playing the game, and which hasn't been playable (except it's half playable if you build a Windows XP partition for it) in the whole 6 months since release. As it was a Steam purchase I can't even get a refund.

I don't need to repeat then that I won't be purchasing this until it costs £10 and I have hand-written confirmation that it cooks a mean full-English and can bring a man to a knee-shattering-climax from 400 yards.

No thanks.

Given that Black Ops is STILL unplayable on many PCs (including mine) I think I'll skip this.

Euro report slates wireless comms, recommends smoke and mirrors

Randi's $1,000,000

Anyone who is 'electro-sensitive' would surely be able to get a nice, free million from Mr Randi if he can re-produce his feat under controlled conditions.

If not then it should be given all the credance due to magnet-healing, dowsing and Uri Geller.

Anecdotes != evidence.

Five amazing computers for under £100

Nope

It's available for £99.99 OR LESS on PAYG including a free £10 top-up. You don't ever have to use that SIM again if you don't want to.

You should check HotUKDeals more often. If you don't have a modded-SF and a giffgaff SIM then you aren't cool :)

title

Another thumbs up for the SF. Should definately have been on the list. It's £99 BRAND NEW. Cheaper if you already have an Orange SIM. It can be modded easily into a very capable Android phone for all kinds of tweaking, and you don't need to scour eBay for it.

2011 Ford Focus

Boot space

My Mk 1 ST170 is a little light on boot space but that's partly because of the woofer on the left hand side. It's still not bad though.

The wife's Mk 2 (post 2008 re-style) Titanium has a HUGE boot though. I'm sure it was biggest in class at the time.

The Mk 3 is a little smaller apparently. Should still be decent though but not experienced it myself.

Sanity saver: Fedora 15 answers Ubuntu's Unity

GRUB2?

see title

Child protection website insecurity fixed

a title

I wasn't aware I needed evidence to ask a question. Since you haven't actually answered my question then I give up. You win at internets etc...

Well actually

I did say "other than".

You don't work for/with them do you ?

wtf

Any evidence to support this assertion other than Jim Gamble's press releases ?

Official iSteve biography gets 2012 release

Patent application

Apple's lawyers are attempting to patent something called a 'biography' which is a collection of writings detailing the life of an individual, or less frequently, more than one individual, written by a third-party.

Apple is firmly convinced this is something that will catch on and will likely be emulated by Apple's competitors without paying Apple due royalties for the invention and fostering which it spent many thousands of man-years working on, unless it is granted the protection in law it deserves.

HTC Android tablet priced up for Blighty's shoppers

none

10 days late with this I think.

Vatican hails hacking culture, Wikis

no title

Irony overload.

Out of shape? Not had sex for years? Watch out

Title

So a slow manage-a-une whilst out on gentle walks before going straight into a reverse-dutch-steamboat ?

Black Ops is the best selling videogame EVER

Never again !

5 months on a Black Ops is still unplayable on Windows 7 for me. I just can't be bothered booting into XP just for one game that looks very dated anyway. If I hadn't bought through Steam I would have got a refund. Won't repeat the mistake.

And oddly enough the return of dedicated servers actually makes this game even more crappy than MW2. So many servers with crap rules (no jumping ? knife only ?) or with admins who kick anyone who kills them or with stupid map lists (Nuketown only servers abound). On MW2 you could choose whatever playstyle you liked and hardly anyone whinged about it because there was nothing anyone could do about it. In BO people try to get you kicked and whinge at you for practically anything. Back in MW2 all you had to do was get the vote to skip Estate passed and you were sorted.

Will try a different game that actually uses my graphics card in future.

Lady Gaga puts the squeeze on breast milk ice cream

Under what law ?

I don't understand the charge.

Anti-religious campaigners smack down census Jedis

@Dr. Mouse

A servicable definition of God that would be amenable to all parties is indeed a major problem. Let's try looking at your argument from another angle.

You are suggesting that any conceivable proposition which can't be proved by someone must require faith. There are an infinite number of such propositions which any of us would immediately dismiss as nonsense without being able to actually prove it. To say that all of these require 'faith' is to trivialise the concept of faith to a meaningless truism.

@Steven Knox

"An Atheist believes there is no god."

That statement is ok an a normal piece of English that isn't going to be analysed too deeply but if someone is going to get prissy enough about its meaning to use it in two syllogisms then I'll have to cry foul. It's a 'common-sense' phrase but the meaning taken from it is different to what it says on the surface, like so much of natural language.

Closer to the truth would be something along the lines of:

"An atheist does not believe in God A"

"An atheist does not believe in God B"

"An atheist does not believe in God C"

"An atheist does not believe in God D"

ad infinitum.

To then say that any of those requires 'faith' because they are, by definition, not provable is obviously twisting the meaning of the word 'faith' outside that where it serves a useful purpose in the language.

Write your argument in formal logic and I'll consider it. Otherwise I'll just treat it as sophistry exploiting the multiple meanings that English words and phrases can have in the service of a bullshit argument.

@Dr. Mouse

"An Atheist believes there is no god."

OK - you've already b***sed up on the first premise of your argument. It goes downhill from there.

Shuttleworth sees fewer clouds in Ubuntu's future

I should imagine it will be...

Queefing Quoll

New 'supercritical' generators to boost nuclear output by 50%

Brayton, Selby ?

Like...

why ?

Feeling heat from Macs, Microsoft sells PCs sans crapware

I have no problem with crapware

If companies are willing to subsidise my hardware for stuff that I will never see due to decrapping or fresh Linux installs then I'm happy to let them.

Prepping the great Windows 7 migration

If...

It worked all the time.

Missing the big issue

Which is that Win7 comes with IE8. Re-writing every 'browser-app' is the biggest hurdle to ever getting a business case.

Microsoft rallies IE6 death squads

(untitled)

Rolling out new corporate IE6-only apps throughout this year :)

Health experts flip over McD's burger-flip toy

Miserable ********

It's a toy !

Taking your kids to McDonalds once in a while is not going to make them fat and will provide Mummy and Daddy with a stress-and-effort-free dinner for the family at minimal cost.

Why are interfering busybodies like this allowed to express opinions when they could be more usefully minced up into patties ?

Apple to Microsoft: 'App Store name is not generic'

Doublethink time

The words App and Store were both invented by Apple using completely new phonemes, never heard by human ears before. They were a technical innovation. Any memory you think you have that contradicts this is punishable by Big Lawyer !