Posts by Avalanche

Experts warn of steep increase in Java costs under changes to Oracle license regime

Those companies should use Java from a different vendor than Oracle. Problem solved.

Musk: Twitter will have 1 billion monthly users inside 18 months

Re: 2 million sign ups daily average

That was the number of bots that were found in manual samples *after* automatic detection of bot accounts had been applied. It said nothing about the total number of bots that signed up.

W3C's planned transition to HTTPS stymied by legacy laggards

That depends on which Java distribution you use. There are still Java distributions available without any licensing costs (e.g. Temurin from Eclipse Adoptium).

Gmail and Outlook sitting in a tree, not t-a-l-k-i-n-g to me or thee

"The problem appears to be related to POP3 and IMAP access; if you're connecting to Google's servers using those services, then sending and receiving email could be a challenge."

Especially sending email would be a challenge that way, as neither POP 3 nor IMAP is for sending email. That would be SMTP.

Thunderbird is go: Mozilla's email client lands in a new nest

Re: Cooperate with LibreOffice

OpenOffice/StarOffice used to have a mail client back when it was just open-sourced. It is good that thing was killed.

if dev == woman then dont_be(asshole): Stack Overflow tries again to be more friendly to non-male non-pasty coders

Re: Might the very thing that makes it so successful

You are aware those are links to other sites on the Stack Exchange network, with different topics than Stack Overflow? If not, you may want to familiarize yourself with how Stack Overflow (and Stack Exchange in general) works.

Brexit has shafted the UK's space sector, lord warns science minister

Re: EU big, EU right

The specific projects in question are EU projects that are contracted out to the ESA. So it is not an ESA project, and as the EU foots the bill, they decide who works on it. There are also some security-related issues which they only want EU members to handle.

Email proves UK boffins axed from EU research in Brexit aftermath

Re: Is anyone surprised?

You do realise that this 'consortium', is a research collaboration between university research groups: they work together on projects and to obtaining funding. They decided they didn't want to bother with the headaches of the brexit, and they therefor decided to kick the UK-based scientists out of their collaboration.

So this isn't about EU funding tiself and some 'unelected' bureaucrat deciding that the UK doesn't get funding. It is about researchers deciding they no longer want to work together with researchers in the UK because of the uncertainty of the timeline and the effects on the cooperation and funding.

Star Trek Beyond: An unwatchable steaming pile of tribble dung

Great movie, more Star Trek than previous ones

I watched the movie last night in a marathon with the previous two movies. I entirely disagree with this review.

The pacing was good, the story clear and well-told, with the right humour at the right time, and it was a lot more "Star Trek" than the previous two movies (maybe even the previous four).

I might just go and watch it again next week.

UK's climate change dept abolished, but 'smart meters and all our policies strong as ever'

Re: smart meter

"Oh, and my current washing machine uses hot water from my hot water tank, heated directly by gas... more efficient than the EU mandated cold fill on modern machines..."

Citation needed. As far as I know there is no such EU mandate.

Discworld fans stake claim to element 117

Re: A Wizard's Staff Has A Knob On The End

Better to be off by 109 than off by 110 ;)

Flawless Dutch does for cuffed duo in CoinVault ransomware probe

The Dutch "een" doesn't sound identical for "one" and "a". They sound different, but are written the same (optionally you can use accents to stress that you mean "one", although usually the context makes this clear already).

Ahmed's clock wasn't a bomb, but it blew up the 'net and Zuckerberg, Obama want to meet him

Re: A picture at last

That picture suggests the case is +/- 10cm by 20cm (based on comparisons with a US powerplug I have here, and the 9V battery socket). Usually briefcases are larger than that.

Slashdot, SourceForge looking for new owners after parent dumps them on the web's doorstep

Re: SourceForge is so dated

That is quite simple: inertia. Having to move your project(s) to another hoster takes time and effort that you can also spend on developing new features. If your project is relatively large it requires coordination (which adds discussion). If you don't have a good reason to move (or the reason is not urgent enough), then you stick around until it does become urgent enough.

White House forced to wade into Oracle vs Google Java bickerfest

Re: Considering the number of languages that are built upon the JRE, yes - this is a major bork

Languages running on the JVM are not an issue, as they are **using** the API and implementation as provided by the - licensed - JVM implementer (for example Oracle itself, or IBM). As such they are not in breach of copyright.

Google on the other hand **copied** the API and made an unlicensed implementation. That is the issue at stake here.

In other words your post is FUD.

FREAK show: Apple and Android SSL WIDE OPEN to snoopers

Re: keyword: either

You are missing the point: older versions OpenSSL will happily accept the export RSA when it didn't ask for it.

Ugly, incomplete, buggy: Windows 10 faces a sprint to the finish

Re: looking for apps

> OS X handles this by displaying the most recently (or most frequently?) used app first.

> Doesn't surprise me that Windows does it in a way that's inconvenient and bad.

And so does Windows 8... Why do people make negative assumptions about software they don't use?

Mom and daughter SUE Comcast for 'smuggling' public Wi-Fi hotspot into their home

Re: Hope they win.

Usually, talking about cable, the potential bandwidth is larger than the bandwidth provisioned to your account. The bandwidth for these free wifi hotspots are usually provisioned separately from the bandwidth of your account.

So apart from potential increased congestion in the local area, or signal problems degrading the available total bandwidth, these free hotspots do not have any impact on the bandwidth of the subscriber.

Holy sh*t! Amsterdam man in pop-up public toilet shock horror

Re: He was on a Moped/Brommer

No, according to https://twitter.com/020centrum/status/538643078157193216 he was a custodian or maintenance tech (the word used is "beheerder", which translates to administrator but in the context it is probably maintenance tech, or maybe a street-supervisor/custodian).

The twitter link (https://twitter.com/020centrum/status/538643078157193216) referenced in the article says he was a "beheerder" (custodian, maintenance technician?). So it likely happened when he was working on removing the scooter (moped) or servicing the loo itself.

Apple, Google mobe encryption good news... for TERRORISTS – EU top cop

The ECHR describes a minimum set of rights assigned to all. Countries can have (and do have) laws that assign more rights to their citizens. Your claim that ECHR would cancel out broader and more inclusive rights is bullshit. More likely UK politicians used it as an excuse to remove rights.

Latest Firefox and Thunderbird updates plug CRITICAL SSL vuln

You can configure it to update automatically (I believe that is even the default).

Mozilla gaffe exposed 76,000 email addresses, 4000 passwords

Re: "Mozilla gaffe exposed 76,000 email addresses, 4000 ENCRYPTED passwords"

From the linked article "The encrypted passwords were salted hashes"

Microsoft parades Windows 8.1, the version you may actually want

Re: Start Icon != Start Menu. This the problem.

Then just hit the "charm" in the lower left corner (I believe, could be the upper left).

Microsoft: YES! You can have your desktop back again for FREE!

Desktop 'dumped'?

Windows 8 didn't dump the desktop; I have it in front of me right now. Yes, it is bothersome to have to press Windows+D or click on the desktop tile, but except for this and the missing start button it works exactly like before.

So saying that Microsoft dumped the desktop is an exaggeration.

Sony Xperia T Android smartphone review

Plastic

I don't see why the plastic should be a problem or be considered a negative point. My Xperia X10 has a plastic backside and after 2+ years it still looks good, no scratches or other signs of wear and tear.

Now if I would buy a Sony again is a totally different question though... Their handling of upgrades for the X10 was annoying to say the least, and the 'eye-candy' is mostly useless IMHO.

Dutch unleash intelligent robot bins: No ID, no rubbish

Re: Aaaah, the bins

Depending on the cities, there is usually no paper bin, instead a recycling company does a weekly round to pick-up paper. You just leave it boxed or bagged by the side of the road (some cities do provide a paper wheelie bin if you have a lot of paper or don't like boxing or bagging).

With regard to the council tax: you usually do get one bill (eg single or multiple household waste processing, council tax based on the value of your house etc).

Hipsters hacking on PostgreSQL

@Hieronymus Howerd

Maybe my sense of the English language is flawed, but where do I uses 'childish namecalling'? I state that [I think] "Matt Assay knows nothing" and qualify that further. Nowhere do I call him names in my opinion.

Matt Assay knows nothing

I think this article clearly illustrates that Matt Assay actually knows nothing about software development, databases and actual usages. In the real world, relational databases are still the norm and NoSQL solutions are virtually non-existent.

People running around in the VC world or hipster communities may think otherwise (as indicated by this article), but those are the facts. For most data storage problems in software development relational databases are just fine and usually a hell of a lot more trustworthy and future-proof than NoSQL solutions.

Yahoo! bureau! chief! sacked! for! Mitt Romney! racism! jibe!

Re: Hoooooo-lee Shitttttttt

You know: not everyone here is a native speaker. In some countries, America is spelled 'Amerika'... maybe you should get off your high horse.

Why Java would still stink even if it weren't security swiss cheese

You can do that with the proper java.policy file, but it is really a pain in the ass to configure correctly.

Oracle won't pull plug on Java SE 6 until 2013

Switching to Java 6 to Java 7 has nothing to do with language

The problem for most companies to switch from Java 6 to Java 7 has nothing to do with changes in the language, but mostly with having a new version itself. I am not aware of any language change that is not backward compatible (as in code written for Java 6 will still work in Java 7).

Most of the problems are with resistance to change or lack of corporate reasons to change, and platforms that only (formally) support running on Java 6. Also for some reason companies are a lot less weary of updating point release than updating to major release. Add to that the lack of exciting new features in Java 7 (with the exception of try-with-resources), and there is no real good reason to spend time and effort to switch.

All-in-all Java 7 was a disappointment, and now it looks some of the exciting things which mere delayed to Java 8 will be delayed to Java 9....

MIT boffins play BUILDING-SIZED Tetris

This news is so 1995...

It was done in 1995 on the Delft University of Technology, faculty of electrical engineering: http://web.archive.org/web/20080119060815/http://www.etv.tudelft.nl/vereeniging/archief/lustrum/90/english.html

Billionaire astro mining venture long on hype and timescale

Re: Protector

They are talking about "Protector" the book by Larry Niven and related (short) stories in the 'Known Space'-series.

Euro climate probe Envisat silenced, boffins baffled

Re: Poor planning...

ESA is not part of the EU (although the EU is a member of ESA). So this has nothing to do with 'EU bureaucracy'.

Iranian coder faces execution 'for building smut websites'

Re: Oh dear

The guy lived in Canada, he was only in Iran to visit his sick father. Even then: is writing a tool to upload pictures, which is subsequently used by others to upload porn really a good reason to imprison let alone execute someone? (IMHO there is never a good reason to execute someone).

Lets execute Vint Cerf for creating TCP/IP as it is used for transferring 'orrible things around the world (and not to forget: IP infringment), and lets not forget Tim Berners-Lee for creating that abomination called the World Wide Web! Put them to death for all atrocities other people committed with their inventions/products!

EU asks why credit cards are so expensive

Two different machines

As far as I know there are two models of train ticket machines in The Netherlands, one type does not accept creditcards, only debit cards, the other type does accept creditcards. The machines only taking debit cards are more widely available. This is largely not a problem as people in NL are more likely to use a debit card than a credit card (only a minority has a credit card here).

Dutch clog up The Pirate Bay (again)

@ShelLuserBrein not funded by government

Brein is an organisation funded by the (Dutch) Entertainment Industry, not by the Dutch Government

Former coder, NASA 'naut to lead DARPA starship dream

@Boltar

The whole idea behind the project is:

1) fund research into relevant technology and sciences,

2) get money out of spin-off products and patents,

3) invest that again in more research,

4) ...

5) profit!

Do that until there is both 1) the technology for intersteallar flight and 2) the money to build a ship.

I believe something similar was proposed in several classic science fiction books.

Where can I invest?

I might not see its flight, but I want to invest! Where can I apply?

Swedish college girls now twice as slutty as in 2001

Skewed results

It is a survey under students that used the University's health service. Maybe there is a correlation between 1) slutty behavior, 2) non-use of condoms, 3) contraction of STDs and 4) contacting the university health service as oppossed to people not needing health services at all or contacting their GP instead?

Army raygun to boost power with starlight de-twinkling tech

Nothing new here, then

I remember Tom Clancy mentioning adaptive optics in the context of astronomy and laserweapon research in his novel The Cardinal of the Kremlin from 1988. In that novel both the US and the Soviets attempt to build an anti-ICBM laser and the US side uses adaptive optics to solve the problem of dispersion. The book even mentions that this is the same solution used in astronomy to prevent twinkling.

I can't believe it took 23 years for this to trickle down into actual weapons research (especially not because Tom Clancy sometimes uses scientists and military sources for inspiration).

Samsung pulls Galaxy Tab Android 3.2 update

As a tester, I guess they focussed to much on testing factory images (ie re-imaging the device everytime with the newest test version), and that they did not perform sufficient testing with various upgrade scenarios (or if they did: they did not test sufficiently after upgrading the device).

Post-pub nosh deathmatch: Kapsalon v quesadillas

Don't forgo the lettuce, it is crucial to the taste sensation of a kapsalon. BTW: if you want something it a bit more spicy: include sambal sauce as well.

Also some kebap shops also include (red) onion, tomato and a variety of other vegetables.

Can a user really do BI from the desktop?

Earlier this year I did some BI using Pentaho BI, worked perfectly for me and the fact that part of it can be done using point-and-click construction of the dataflow makes it relatively easy (although it still requires some knowledge of your datasources and basic programming concepts).

DNS hijack hits The Register: All well

Repair internet connection?

Just use ipconfig /flushdns ...

Hey dumbo, Facebook isn't sharing telephone numbers

Read the security info

If you sync with Facebook, of course your phonebook gets sent to Facebook as well, not just info pulled from facebook. It isn't called sync for nothing. On Android when you first enter your account details, it explicitly asks if you want to sync everyone, or just the people you already friended. You also have the option to say it shouldn't sync. This is not rocket science people.

Also anyone who installs an app that ask permission to look into your contact list should know it is bound to use that info in some way. Buyer (or downloader) beware I'd say.

BTW: I did remove the synced contacts from facebook, but just because I think having it in one place (as in Google) is sufficient.

Putting the Square Kilometre Array on a Cloud

Not the biggest

LOFAR has a larger area, see http://www.lofar.org/ and http://www.astron.nl/~heald/lofarStatusMap.html

Glasgow cammer not thrown in slammer

And I'll never understand

Why people even watch some of the drivel coming out today (and clearly, I am one of them)...

Chess crown stripped in plagiarism furore

@What the hell happened to presumption of innocence?

Presumption of innocence only applies to penal law, not to civil law or dealings between civil entities (as this is purely a case between a committee of some computer chess org and the programmer).