* Posts by Graham Wilson

890 publicly visible posts • joined 14 May 2008

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Internet use ‘rampant’: ASIO boss

Graham Wilson
Unhappy

@Richard Cottrill's reply--Perhaps I have but the events of this week suggest otherwise.

Perhaps I have but the events of this week suggest otherwise.

(My long-winded post was deemed too long by the editing system so it'll have to wait until I edit it, that's if I bother).

Graham Wilson
Headmaster

ASIO's David Irvine -- A Translation.

Quoting from Irvine's speech:

1. "Non-state actors are assuming greater importance in national security considerations; be they Islamic terrorists, cyber hackers, transnational criminals, or people-smugglers."

READ: 'And to get them, we'll have to hold the rest of you doubly under the thumb. We can't discriminate, now can we? Anyway, bugger your democratic rights (that's the way we like it).'

2. "The rampant use of the internet, the democratisation of communication, has resulted in new and effective means for individuals to propagate and absorb unfettered ideas and information and to be radicalised – literally, in their lounge rooms."

READ: 'The normal system of state-controlled propaganda is breaking down, we'd urgently better try another approach before the rabble gets an irreversible taste for too many additional freedoms.'

3. "Information and communications technology is now often progressing faster than the accompanying legal and regulatory framework that governs its use in any one country, meaning the gap is widening between current ICT capability, and the controls and frameworks governments rely on effectively to use that capability for law enforcement or security purposes."

READ: If too many experience the freedom that the Internet provides then we'll have a damn hard job putting the genie back in the bottle. As it is, we're already chasing genie around the room and it's already too tiring for us fat lazy public servants.'

4. "Nation states, as well as disaffected individuals and groups, are able to use computer networks to view or exfiltrate sensitive, private, or classified information for the purposes of espionage, political or diplomatic gain, or commercial advantage."

READ: 'The hackers are and always have been smarted than us. We're probably going to have to do a lot of footwork or we might eventually lose our jobs. However, it's nice to know that we don't have to worry about investigating corporations A,B & C. They currently run the country, so in reality they're already our masters.'

5. "Our increasing reliance on communications technology to conduct the business of government, of daily commerce and of living our daily lives opens up vulnerabilities to malicious attack for criminal or other purposes."

READ: Despite good security advice nearly two decades ago, we in government found implementing it was far too onerous. For starters, PCs we'd have to use in the government environment might have to work more like terminals attached to a mainframe. Developing a mainframe type security mentality and a more structured work environment is not conducive to futzing and or playing games on our PCs. And besides we're hopelessly addicted to our PCs, and to YouTube, Facebook etc. which would all have to go in a secure IT environment. Even texting might be a security risk, and we'd rather die than give that up.'

6. "Globalisation has made possible, and complicated, a new rash of policy issues that governments did not have to consider in as serious a manner until relatively recently. Here I’m talking about the potential spread of weapons of mass destruction, the uncontrolled movement of people from unstable, poor countries to stable, democratic, prosperous ones, governed by the rule of law and respect for human rights; climate change, which has threatened our traditional assumptions about life and development; the threat of pandemics (as evidenced in recent times by the avian and swine flus); the international drug trade; and, of course, terrorism."

READ: 'We acquiesced and rolled over to the large corporations and other proponents of totally free trade even though we're far from being on a level playing field. These international players come and go as they please, so do their sycophants and anyone else they please. For over 50 or more years, we've bowed to all sorts of special interest groups, especially those from overseas. The told us we needed 'affirmative action' here there and everywhere in a multitude of spheres and we really didn't have the resilience to resist them. Now they run the country and we're their lackeys.

Oh, and as part of this international arse-licking, we've also signed just about every and any international treaty and trade agreement that's been on offer since about WW-II, irrespective of whether it's in our own interest or not. Some treaties go back to the 19th C. but we've absolutely no interest in seeing how relevant they still are today. Besides, it'd be a tragedy if we failed to sign our sovereignty away to nearly every treaty going, as afterward at the big celebratory party, we'd miss out wanking with all the other international dignitaries. Still, we've some worrying niggling concerns about them--as for hundreds of years, entering into, signing treaties and giving our sovereignty away under them has been the strict province of the Government executive and privileged hangers-on. Recently, however, there's worrying signs that the great mass of unwashed swill are taking an interest in such matters and some have the damn hide to hint that they want certain treaty provisions changed. Urgently, we must quell such rebellious and treasonous notions before our world and whole way of life caves in.'

There's more translation still to come but I've yet to receive my fee.

Graham Wilson
Thumb Up

@jake -- Correct, especially education in matters of democracy, citizenry and one's governance.

...And why would they bother?

After all, your extra knowledge would further threaten their power base.

Graham Wilson
Flame

@Richard Cottrill -- So what? Isn't this just democracy at work?

"For the first time in history, a huge swathe of the global population has the *potential* to be heard globally, no matter how silly, frightening, unique, or banal, their views are."

So what? Isn't this just democracy at work?

Perhaps technology has given democracy a much-needed shot in the arm.

Perhaps, too, the 'old democracy'--'owned' for over 200 years by notable ratbags such as Edmund Burke, Tony Blair, John Howard, Julia Gillard et al is going the way of the dodo by giving way to a newer MK-II model.

In case you've forgotten, Edmund Burke (1729-97) was notable for setting in concrete the slimy deceitful way politicians have done business for the past couple of centuries. When elected to parliament by the electors of Bristol in 1774 Burke's acceptance speech strongly favoured representative government over that which was expect of him as their elected delegate.

Instead of doing what he promised and what is electors wanted, he used 'national interest' arguments to override and discard promises he made to his electorate. Whilst Bristol electors booted him out next election, since then, sleazy politicians have had a fielday at their elector's expense by lapping up this infamous Burkian argument. Going against electors' wishes is now a commonplace norm for politicians.

The Internet and the ordinary citizen's ability to bypass or 'neutralize' their politicians has, in some small part, redressed the problem. Nowadays, politicians are more mindful than ever about what the electorate is thinking.

Of course, if you don't like what the ratbag rabble electorate is saying and doing then you may wish to contemplate another system of government altogether.

Totalitarianism perhaps?

Seems, too, ASIO's Irving is having similar thoughts.

EMF notches up another health-scare

Graham Wilson
Headmaster

@Arthur Dent -- There's no doubt I'm deluded or I wouldn't waste my time writing here...

"I am somewhat amused by your strange idea that EMR is caused by EMF flowing through a conductor."

Ok, let's have your better description in one sentence. And please explain what's strange about it (I've many critics but I don't think anyone has ever previously used the term 'strange' in connection with any of my technical descriptions. Oversimplified yes, but not strange).

Only the pedantically obsessed who mark physics examinations for a living would reply like you have. When marking them do you consider the student's work an exercise in physics, English or both?

Next time I write such a post perhaps I should define all SI units up front from here: http://www.iso.org/iso/home.html. I'd then carefully engineer my reply to ensure there are no ambiguities, by resorting to formal logic, truth tables etc.

In my reply, I was careful at no time to use the words 'coulomb', 'joules' or 'volts' or any other precisely defined SI unit(s) or definitions(s). If I had then you might have had a case for complaint. Instead, I intentionally stayed away from formal definitions, as I usually do in such posts to avoid a slanging match over technical details. Instead, I used a normally accepted colloquial technical description (or it is where I come from).

Using colloquial language and brevity is not the same as an error, and it's the error that was the subject of my point, and that error still remains. No matter how you twist the argument, the crux of the story is about people who are concerned about what escapes/is radiated from the circuit as opposed what's left behind and thus safely contained away from humans.

'EMR', in the strict sense, is an informal abbreviation that describes that radiation whereas 'EMF' is used, albeit even more informally, to describe the contained/potential energy. As you'd obviously know, the EMF definition is sometimes used as a 'trick' question. It usually remains irrespective of the state of the circuit, loaded, O/C or whether it has measurable I^2R losses etc.

Grinding fine formal definitions is nonsense when the elephant in the room is a genuine nomenclature error that has serious potential to lead to a false understanding of the problem. There's no doubt that this is certainly so here.

You've failed to realise that my post is acerbic specifically because I am concerned that across the West we've an anti-science movement that's large enough to change politics with its vote and that a hijacked education system is mostly to blame although scientists themselves must accept much of it for having ignored the problem for 35-40 years until the problem's gotten out of hand.

__________

BTW, I've spent time on standards committees, I know well what it's like to fight over nomenclature or to mull so long over one word in a standard that it might take a year before a consensus is reached.

Graham Wilson
Unhappy

@Magani -- Ha, I was wondering something similar myself.

Thanks, I will have one.

There's several things for certain that have changed over this time:

- Precision and exactness have left the education system, often good enough is near enough and this is the teacher's response, not that of students.

- Science is often taught by teachers whose first subject isn't science. It is made worse by the fact that anything that's guaranteed to keep a student's attention has been deemed by the OH&S police as too dangerous or too poisonous or is so environmentally unacceptable that the effect cannot be demonstrated. A once keen science student, even I'd fall asleep in today's classes.

- Many students can go through a complete education and manage to avoid science altogether. Over the last 30 or so years we've bred a large part of the population that's ignorant of science and frightened of anything technical.

Oh, well it's Asia's turn now, they've yet to catch these hangups.

Graham Wilson
Facepalm

@Anonymous Coward -- Correct, and I'll bet...

"You need to pay close attention when dealing with the crowd-against-stuff ;-)"

...And I'll bet ten quid to a brick the crowd-against-stuff are still contentedly and blissfully addicted to their smart phones.

EMR be-damned. As we'd expect with this mob, hypocrisy and smart phone addiction take precedence.

Graham Wilson
Flame

Let the ignorant worry themselves shitless over EMR.

"frightened the living daylights out of half the western world"

We the other half couldn't give a fuck about EMR because we've actually studied science!

Let the stupid, ignorant and scientifically illiterate worry themselves shitless over EMR! For a while, it might give us a break from their incessant whingeing and worrying over climate change.

----------------------------

EL REG:

A CORRECTION -- IT'S EMR, NOT EMF!

The correct term is EMR (Electromagnetic Radiation), not EMF (Electromotive Force).

EMR, according to Maxwell, Heaviside et al, is caused as a consequence of EMF flowing through a conductor. Electromagnetic Radiation results and radiates away from the conductor as described by Maxwell's equations.

(You're slow learners, I've previously made this correction.)

DIDO: snake oil or wireless salvation?

Graham Wilson
Flame

@acbot -- Australian politicians are stupid enough already without feeding them this gobbledygook!

Sounds as if you are an anti-National Broadband Network (NBN fibre) punter who's looking for any 'evidence' and anything's OK to feed politicians who wouldn't know facts from crap anyway.

It's 04:30 or thereabouts here and half of my neurons have already closed down for the night but there's enough awake to know that this is (a) huge misrepresentation/oversimplification of a much more technical document, and/or propaganda concocted specifically to mislead/deceive and produce even more FUD in the light of the current NBN controversy, or it's written by a non technical person who has hardly a grasp on the subject.

I'll reread the doc again in the cool light of day just to be sure. However, irrespective of unscientific BS, mumbo-jumbo and political ideology, physics is still physics and it doesn't change its spots for anyone--not even marketing types, spin doctors or politicians.

Facts are facts and here's a few:

1. Shannon's Law applies to any channel no matter how it's disguised, re-badged or what colour it's painted.

2. Repackaging of channels, bundling of them or sending them across different mediums is permitted but Shannon still applies:

3. Restated, this means YOU CAN'T GET SOMETHING FOR NOTHING. IF THE AVAILABLE BANDWIDTH IS INSUFFICIENT FOR A GIVEN DATA STREAM/CHANNEL THEN IT WILL NOT FIT. CODING THEORY SAYS THIS. You either slow the data rate down to suit or you increase the available bandwidth (or, if inefficient, improve the coding/modulation).

4. Modulation systems/schema are not all the same. Just because some encoding schemes are common, it doesn't mean that they are efficient. AM and FM radio use coding schemes that are inefficient, especially so for FM. This means that the same info if coded with a more efficient coding scheme could be fitted into a narrower broadcast channel without losing any info of suffering any loss of signal-to-noise ratio.

5. The same physics applies to Wireless Internet channels as it does to those of radio or TV broadcasting. The difference is that the type of info carried and the efficiencies of the coding (modulation) are different. Newer schemes usually make better use of the available bandwidth but the fundamental rules remain identical. Better encoding allows more info to fit down a channel of a given bandwidth.

6. Newer and better encoding techniques are now possible because of cheap electronics, fast microprocessors etc.

7. In recent years, encoding techniques have been getting better. Nevertheless, Shannon still applies. We are now at a point where squeezing more data through a given bandwidth has just about reached the point of diminishing returns (the Shannon limit).

8. An example of the point of diminishing returns is the 56k dial-up modem. They're now ancient and we've still not seen faster ones of this kind. Simply, getting more info onto an audio telephone line has just about reached its upper limit with this technology (theoretically and practically and so into the future).

9. BEFORE YOU EVEN DREAM OF MENTIONING IT, DSL/ADSL DOES NOT CHANGE THOSE RULES, THEORY AND SHANNON ARE STILL INTACT. 56k modems work WITHIN the audio bandwidth of a standard POTS telephone line whereas DSL/ADSL does not. Like the radio spectrum but to a very much lesser extent, copper telephone lines are capable of carrying channels that use different encoding techniques. The traditional telephone audio consists of a baseband around 300Hz to 3kHz whereas ADSL uses an encoded carrier technology in a similar way a radio station does. Moreover, for various reasons too detailed to mention here, DSL/ADSL is a fudge or kludge, it only works up to about 5km from the exchange whereas the baseband telephone can work 10 perhaps even 100 times that distance. Essentially, the granularity of POTS versus DSL are totally different. In communication terms, we're not comparing apples with apples but with oranges.

10. The same analogies can be applied to wireless. The radio spectrum is capable of carrying any type of encoding--from 10 words-per-minute Morse Code to huge data rates of satellite links etc.--simply, the spectrum is blind to coding techniques.

11. Just because the spectrum is blind to coding techniques it doesn't mean that all spectrum is the same. Higher carrier frequencies are best suited to wide bandwidth channels because there's more spectrum to fit channels within. However, in practice the higher the frequency and the wider the bandwidth the shorter the circuit distance.

12. Existing radio schemas (bandplans) are not perfect and can be improved. Whether DIDO actually does this or not, or whether it's cost effective to do so is unclear as there's no proper engineering data available to us. Mumbo-jumbo will not suffice here, only quantitative specs will do that.

13. The PDF article is extremely sloppy in its nomenclature and terminology. Cellular radio technology (a) reuses the same frequencies repeatedly, (b) where channels are doubled up, wireless devices can slide along to other clear channels, and (c) wireless today uses spread spectrum techniques. Oversimplifying somewhat, this technique allows cell phones to share the same channels but to simultaneously interleave themselves with each other so there's little or no mutual (same/co-channel) interference.

14. There are many ways of packing more channels into a given amount of spectrum but such schemas are not infinitely extensible. Interference, cross-modulation and Shannon's Law guarantee that it's not. In this respect, the PDF article makes outrageous, unjustifiable claims that border on something that a charlatan would write.

15. The ionosphere is a very useful physical phenomenon, but it's a very unpredictable one. Channel (bandwidth) availability is very restricted, path/skip distance cannot be relied upon and fade and noise margins are highly problematic issues. Heavens knows how it would be properly integrated into the proposed schema (we've over 100 years experience of using the ionosphere for communications and these issues are extremely well known).

It seems to me that most of the protagonists in this argument need to get out of the way and let experienced radio engineers set parameters and devise new systems.

An elementary course in radio theory for most rest of you would do much to cut the speculative and unjustifiable claims--most of which seem to be more in keeping with science fiction than having any basis in physical reality.

Google waggles free* Android phones at Americans

Graham Wilson
Devil

Still far too expensive.

But then I'm not smart phone addicted.

Nearly everyone in SOUTH KOREA HACKED IN ONE GO

Graham Wilson
Flame

Call in the Pros.

China might desist if we use real pros to retaliate.

Perhaps it's time to wheel LulzSec into return the attack.

Quantum crypto for consumer GPON

Graham Wilson
Happy

@Nigel 11 -- A few question re your TDM proposal.

The whole concept of the Young, Townsend et al 'Quantum information to the home'/FTTH paper is indeed extremely intriguing. Your reply implies the method as presented within the paper is more complex than necessary and I think I agree with you.

Synchronously interleaving entangled qbits at an RXed power of about -88 dBm [p7 & Fig 7, p10] in what is effectively the intermodulated noise (Raman scattering) region of the fibre seems to me to be a daunting if almost impossible task. Thus questioning if there are simpler/alternative ways of tackling the QKD/key problem makes sense. Moreover, the effective data rate of the key distribution is ridiculously low--a little over 1kbps--given its context. Although the QKD data rate is sufficient for purpose, it nevertheless is exceedingly close to margins of unacceptability--at least in practical engineering terms--hence another reason to look for alternative methodologies.

Perhaps their approach was adopted to maintain FTTH compatibility/standards thus your TDM proposal would be unacceptable from this perspective. I may be way off-beam here (sorry no pun intended) but I'm unclear how your 'Time-coherence between the ends is a problem solved by NTP and/or GPS' is actually supposed to work in practice.

1. With your TDM system it's unclear to me why one needs to adapt time-coherence in the same way as that proposed in the paper.

2. If so however, then how would NTP/GPS time-coherence fit into the picture given the Inter-Symbol Interference (ISI) is limited by the ~35ps jitter of the single-photon detectors which operate within a window period of only 100ps? (The short-term GPS jitter at the RX-end would be substantially more than 100ps given proximity effects, TX/RX/pulse jitter, dialectic variations and ionospheric delays over the long TX/RX path length. Remember, c(v) is ~0.3m/ns, and correction schemas such as Carrier-Phase Enhancement (CPGPS) would, if used here, be ineffective through latency/delays.

3. Why would you use a small mark-space ratio of only 10%? If TDM dedicates clear-channel time to QKD exchange then why couldn't the exchange take place in orders of magnitude less time?

'Tis a fascinating issue, perhaps you may wish to reply.

UK, Dutch cops cuff 5 more in Anonymous-LulzSec raids

Graham Wilson
Meh

@Field Marshal Von Krakenfart -- But check the counties where arrests were made.

These counties piss in each other's pockets when it comes to the exchange of information.

Russia has yet to pay the group's entrance fee.

Graham Wilson
Facepalm

Shame really, who's now left to check Internet security?

Clearly, the kids are more competent than the so-called pros, but then we can't have kids showing up the security industry's utter incompetence now can we?

Of course, catching such hackers--the amateurs and little fish--is mainstream establishment think, it always has been.

Closing security loopholes against professional state-sponsored cyber attacks is seemingly less important, but then mitigating circumstances do apply as the establishment's demonstrated it's incapable of doing that.

To keep their jobs, 'tis better to catch kids and amateurs than no one at all.

Meanwhile, huge cyber holes go unchecked.

MPs probe science behind bogus gov booze guidelines

Graham Wilson
Mushroom

'Safe Level' of C2H5OH inversely proportional to the number of 'evaluating' wowsers is a certainty.

The only certain conclusion thus far from all the studies taken from different countries over many years is that the 'safe level' for the consumption of alcohol is set inversely proportional to the number of evaluating committee wowsers. Lately, science is coming off the rails through the meddling of partisan researchers who are pushing one political barrow or another and the gullible non-scientific sensationalising media only amplify the distortions. 'Tis time science is reclaimed by competent scientists whose a priori motives are first and foremost science, not politics.

I'm fed up with this pseudo science. With the millions of alcohol consumers worldwide, and concomitantly the millions of statisitcs gained over many years, then why isn't there a definitive answer to this problem by now? Science either finds meaningful results or we ignore it, the corollary being that we ignore science until it produces statistically acceptable results using the Dalton Scientific Method.

Even before modern science, we'd at least 2000 years of historical and cultural evidence to get a good statistical inkling of human longevity versus alcoholic intake. Anecdotal evidence this may be but the sample is so huge and time frame so long that we ought have had a decent handle on the matter before considering science.

Yet, since applying science we're still no better off in coming to a satisfactory conclusion. Results depend on the era, country and study--seems from existing science we'd get a similar prediction by tossing dice. Just weeks ago we had another study that concluded there is 'no safe level of ethanol consumption without an increased risk of cancer', yet we're now told once again that moderate drinking increases one's lifespan (not to mention the well-known French Paradox).

Etc., etc., etc., on go the contradictions with which the poor long-suffering public has to contend. As with 'Climate Change', it's nigh on impossible to cut to the chase--i.e. reach a reasonably predictable, statistically significant conclusion about the consumption of alcohol--because of the partisan politics of damn do-gooders, wowsers and the religiously inclined whose beliefs pit them against any established norm. After all, they're the most likely to worry about such surveys in the first place; moreover, they've 'tweaking access' to the results.

Thus, such researchers are not scientifically neutral, even if they don't deliberately change the results. It's nevertheless the case they're likely to contaminate the results through beliefs, biased methodology etc. Their actions may only be subliminal yet they can be detrimentally influential on the results and conclusions.

Until this experiment is repeatable by all and sundry and the results statistically uniform, then logically we can only conclude that such experiments are just pseudo science.

The message, which goes back to Galileo, is to completely kick politics and religion out of science's way, otherwise we'll most likely end up with only pseudo scientific crap.

LulzSec hacker Sabu: Murdoch emails 'sometime soon'

Graham Wilson
Happy

Didn't LulzSec say it was going Bye-Byes?

Obviously, Murdoch's crisis has been far too tempting.

UK top cop: Coulson 'blindingly obviously' mixed up in hacking

Graham Wilson
Holmes

Today, Being an Effective Public Sector Bureaucrat is Difficult.

These days, rules, regulations, probity checks and probity committees etc. ensure that public sector employees are forever looking over their backs and thus are often too timid to make effective robust decisions--the days of Sir Humphrey's 'flexibility' after landing in compromised circumstances having long since passed.

Being both flexible and effective in the public sector can be likened to walking around the edge of a swimming pool whilst balancing at a high angle towards the water--the slightest thing goes wrong and you fall in. Whereas 'safe' public sector employees--those more mindful of their superannuation balance than their service to the public--will always circumnavigate the same pool at a safe distance of several metres from the edge.

Normally, I'm a harsh critic of incompetent and inefficient bureaucracies but here I've considerable sympathy with Stephenson (assuming what he has said is truthful).

All bureaucracies seem to possess this severely debilitating 'initiative problem' property. Seems to me that for a modern, efficient and effective state to exist that much more effort should be thrown at finding an effective solution.

As clearly modern management theory has failed here, perhaps we need to resurrect Machiavelli to provide us with a workable formulation.

Russia’s space telescope in orbit

Graham Wilson
Thumb Up

Seems scientific rot's set in except for the Russians.

"Science is kind of like breathing. If you stop doing it, you die."

Correct! However, unfortunately, much of what passes for scientific research today is little more than alchemy aimed to fool the public and funding bodies.

Science is on a precipice, especially in the English-speaking world. Unless there's better general funding of science--more science for science's sake, knowledge for knowledge sake (as was once the case 40+ years ago) instead of monies being dished out for hyped-up, trumped-up projects etc., then we're likely to descend into a scientific dark age. Science must have continued rigour or interest in it will die.

Some recent examples of the rot setting in in science are the lies, exaggerated claims and bullshit coming from both sides of the climate debate and the closure/lack of funding for NASA's space shuttle. We wouldn't see such instances in a more scientifically enlightened world.

The public is becoming bored with hyped-up scientific pronouncements about science especially when there's little real result. For instance the cure for cancer, where for more than 60+ years, seemingly never a week goes by without a 'promising cure' announcement coming from the scientific establishment, yet in practice bugger-all real cures being delivered within this time. It doesn't bode well for science that promotional exaggeration by scientists is all too commonplace.

To give scientific research a new breath of life we should begin with school science. Turning the dumbed-down mumbo-jumbo that passes for today's classroom science into the rigorous exacting subject that it once was and making it compulsory for every schoolkid to study at least some basic science would be a good place to start--having a scientifically literate public will ensure science is kept on course not to mention better scientific outcomes for society.

BTW, when I was a kid the thought of having to train NASA astronauts Russian because NASA could no longer deliver them into space would have been absolutely unimaginable. Alone, this ought to be an excellent rot-level indicator.

Give thanks the Russians still have some interest in the subject.

MS security centre search poisoned with infectious smut

Graham Wilson
Angel

Lost for words...

...all I can do is laugh.

Office 365: Can Microsoft replace Microsoft?

Graham Wilson
WTF?

I still use Office 2000 and I've no need to upgrade. Why you ask?

O2K's wonky in a few places but with sp3 it's reasonably reliable and stable.

Why would I bother changing as nothing much has changed in 12 years that I would use? Moreover, there's been no change to the grammar checker, little to the speller and negligible changes to page formatting, headers and footers etc., which is where I'd like to see improvements.

I will continue to use O2K with the Sun's ODF plugin v 3.2 for MS Office until LibreOffice comes of age (which I also have on my machine but only occasionally use as the 12-year old O2K is still significantly better than L.O. in many regards).

When Microsoft finally gives me what I really need instead of what it thinks I might need, then I might consider upgrading.

---------------------

An afterthought:

Seems to me that M$ would do much better if it provided a truly useful and functional feature such as a proper virtual 3D filing system that's fully integrated within MSO itself.

M$ failed to deliver the database filing system, WinFS, with both Vista and Windows 7 (and there's still no hint of it in Win 8 either). Integrating it, or part of it, into Office on a limited scale would make sense as it'd mean that years worth of files could be properly named, dated, indexed and cross-referenced by subject etc.

Moreover, a cleverly designed system would also mean that this additional metadata, which would be normally be lost when exported to a flat folder/directory-based file system such as XP/Win7 or Linux, could be integrated into both the file as additional metadata as well as into a section of the file name by some smart shorthand naming protocol.

For me, this would be the killer new feature.

Graham Wilson
Facepalm

@lglethal -- Why is the ribbon so useful?

Too lazy to remember the shortcuts, eh?

50 day lullaby of Lulzsec is over .. for now

Graham Wilson
Mushroom

@Anonymous Coward -- Another one who's happy with cyber security as it is. Shame!

Your comment, and similar 'script kiddies' comments in posts by others, are the reasons why cyber security is in such a shambles (and why software generally is in such a mess).

Fucking hell, can't you understand that none--THAT MEANS NOT ONE--of these major sites should have been vulnerable to script kiddies.

What you and others are blatantly saying (admitting to) is that major systems can be attacked by amateur script kiddies, yet your only real response is that they're naughty to have done it. Unfortunately, this sloppy unprofessional attitude permeates the IT security industry (and IT generally) and primarily it's the underlying cause of the longstanding IT security problem.

If bridges were designed to such sloppy engineering standards then there would be deaths every week from bridge collapses. However, unlike the very public lives of bridge designers, those who write the code for security systems, hide their sloppiness and mistakes in the compiled code. Compilation and proprietary (secret code) not only hides mistakes but gives programmers anonymity (and thus after disaster a means to escape the wrath of harmed users). Tell me, in all the publicity about all those systems breached by Lulzsec where were all the names of those responsible for designing and programming them. Correct, there were none. Yet again, unscathed, the true perpetrators have escaped to repeat again and again!

Perhaps the details of breaches ought to be the subject of a Wikileaks investigation.

I have considered for quite some time that significant improvements to security systems would result if the designers and programmers were publicly responsible for their code. Programming in Ada and such--where programmers' details are properly logged and embedded in the code module by module--would help to enforce better security. Then, every time a security module was compromised or breached, the name, rank and serial number of the designers/programmer(s)--the perpetrators--would be available for all the world to see. Public disgrace and humiliation not to mention future employment being put in jeopardy would quickly enforce better security standards.

This is not without precedent either, and it goes back a long way in civil engineering. Take for example the Tay Bridge disaster of 1879 where the bridge designer--the notoriously tight-arsed, cheapskate engineer, Sir Thomas Bouch--cut corners everywhere which resulted in the loss of 75 lives. A subsequent inquiry exposed him when it summed up the bridge as being "badly designed, badly built, and badly maintained". Bouch died in disgrace shortly afterwards. A similar fate befell the famous and very successful bridge designer Leon Moisseiff--the still-standing Manhattan Bridge amongst his achievements--but whose Tacoma Narrows bridge (Galloping Gertie) dramatically failed in 1940. Moisseiff became too cocky and failed to attend to minor but significant details that would have prevented the collapse. He too died in disgrace several yeas later with his wonderful career in tatters.

Today, any bridge designer knows that a collapse means disgrace, humiliation and end of career. So too should be the fate of the system designers/programmers of large security systems that fail and are breached by hackers.

If the incessant level of security breaches continue as they have in recent years, then sooner or later legislation will mandate acceptable standards. And rest assured, as with similar legislation elsewhere, it will require the publication of all those involved both with a security system's design along with those involved in its deployment/implementation.

Seems to me you (and others) wouldn't have publicly expressed this attitude if you'd not been Anonymous Cowards; but, no doubt, you'd still have thought it.

Graham Wilson
FAIL

@A. Coward -- Re: "self centred little tits with no empathy..."

"self centred little tits with no empathy..." they may be. But it's better to find out security weaknesses now than during an all-out cyber war by a foreign power that has unlimited resources.

At some future time you may thank Lulzsec for the opportunity to fix things in advance.

Graham Wilson
Holmes

@LOL @ lulz -- Are you really saying all it takes is script kiddies?

Are you really saying all it takes is script kiddies to wreak such hacoc?

If so, then security is even in a more chaotic state that I outline in my earlier @ClareCares post.

Lulzsec's a bit more than script kiddies methinks.

Graham Wilson
Flame

@ClareCares--Right, he won't get a fair trial because he's embarrassed the IT Establishment.

Whether the kid is responsible for his actions remains to be seen, however there's no doubt that those caught hacking become scapegoats for a failed, totally inadequate, security system--especially so when their primary purpose is just to hack rather than premeditated cyber crime.

It's clear to me that the IT Establishment has set out to make an example of such kids and throw the book at them because it is embarrassed by its sheer longstanding incompetence and utter inability to protect its IT systems. It's a classic case of 'blame anyone but yourself' and amateur hackers are the obvious target.

It seems revenge is a lot easier than being professionally competent. Over the years, we've witnessed the deliberate revenge the Establishment has handed out to those that embarrass it--from hackers and crackers such as Kevin Mitnick and Jon Johansen to music downloaders like Joel Tenenbaum, all are held up as Satan incarnate. When caught, these people are severely punished and ostracised worldwide yet a bank safecracker is likely to get little more than page-3 notoriety in the local press.

That for many years kid hackers have continually outwitted and made fools of the world's best security experts points us to the REAL culprits--the IT Establishment itself. It's the so-called IT security experts and the manufacturers of Swiss-cheese code such as the Microsofts of this world who are truly responsible for this problem, not a few amateur hackers; yet, as they control establishment power, they not only all get off scot-free and avoid imprisonment but they've real power to shift the full blame onto those who ought to be just bit players.

Those with power can and do and have always set the agenda here; it's never been set by what's morally and technically right or correct.

Users are responsible for protecting their own IT systems in the same way I'm responsible for protecting my wallet. If I don't button up my back pocket or I throw banknotes in the street then it's silly for me to expect that they're going to remain there indefinitely. Banks have long understood this when it comes to locking up and securing cash but it seems that after 50-plus years the IT world has yet still to learn this fact let alone understand how to fix the problem.

The reaction and indignation to Lulzsec by those in the know is the hight of hypocrisy. And that to ordinary citizens, legislators etc., the IT Establishment can hide behind the mumbo-jumbo world of IT security doesn't make it any less so. In reality, the spotlight ought to be focused much more on the IT security profession than on Lulzsec.

Furthermore, that IT security is in such tatters is both serious and alarming. Clearly, if a bunch of amateur hackers can, at will, bring large corporate systems to their knees then just imagine what would happen in an all-out orchestrated cyber war carried out by a foreign power with unlimited resources at its disposal. Frankly, it's hard to believe IT security is in such a shambles but it can't be denied as Lulzsec's provided the necessary proof.

With proper well engineered IT security commonplace, Lulzsec would find something more interesting to do than to show how flawed IT security really is. Pride aside, we ought to take our hats off to them for showing us the way forward.

Presumably, all the thumbs-downs to your post have come from second-raters who don't have a good handle on IT security; clearly they're jealous of Lulzsec's superior IT security skills.

China Tel gets busy Down Under

Graham Wilson
Thumb Up

Good -- Another step closer to Telstra's demise.

Good -- Another step closer to Telstra's demise. Another step closer to true telco competition in Oz.

One day in the distant future we may even have a level playing field for telco services.

Telstra goes hi def for voice

Graham Wilson
FAIL

Shame Telstra doesn't try 'High Definition' service. Customers would much prefer that.

Hi-definition audio it may well be, shame Telstra doesn't have high-definition service.

High-definition service would be where one didn't have to wait 2 or more hours on the phone every day for the better part of a week, be shoved from continent to continent between call centres and where the customer wasn't treated as an amoeba with a minus-10 IQ.

Australia toughens cybercrime laws

Graham Wilson
Black Helicopters

@Stuart Longland - Unless it's all in GPG will attract State snoops like flies around a shitcan.

Snoops mightn't be able to read your email etc. but the fact you're GPG-ing it alone will single you out for special attention.

Ideally, M$ should public-key Outlook and Outlook Express as the default then everybody's in. Individuals would simply be lost in the noise. But State pressure on M$ would see this never happens--perhaps also it's the reason it's never happened previously.

Existing email standards are now almost archaic. Seems to me we need new email standards where privacy is intrinsic. Perhaps a standard based on torrents where the recipient's [first] email address is 'parametric'--a partial or random address which is only completed with the full (real) email address after it is obtained from metadata decrypted with the recipient's public key--the real address part being VPNed to the recipient.

Alternatively, the public/private key combination would automatically set up an on-the-fly VPN which would both obfuscate the sender and recipient.

Either way, the nett effect for snoops would be torrent streams filled with useless pseudo email addresses or copious seemingly-random data.

Oh, one great side effect for users would be that it'd nuke spam stone dead.

Graham Wilson
Black Helicopters

Just another example of the Australian dog--err sorry mongrel--wagging tail to internat'l pressure.

Does anyone really believe the Australian legislature will get this right?

Not bloody likely! It's fucked up every other bit of legislation to do with the internet and the NBN etc. to date, so there's a snowball's chance of it acting intelligently now.

However, what we can be absolutely certain of is that whatever law Oz ends up with is that it'll be in total alignment with what the US and EC told it to do.

These gutless whackos wouldn't be game to do anything else other than to implicitly obey their masters.

International treaties and secret alliances have fucked up democracy but unfortunately the populous are yet to realize it.

The real reason most source is closed? Open is hard

Graham Wilson
Thumb Up

@A. Coward -- Re: 'Is it any wonder they then get less-than-stellar results'

Precisely correct. It's a never-ending battle with accounts/CFOs and executive management who've little to no understanding of the issues but who've always a razor poised to cut the IT budget at the slightest excuse. Thus, more often than not, internally-generated code simply ends up as a means to an end.

The result is that programmers resent that they end up having to code something more akin to a Heath Robinson/Rube Goldberg contraption than that expected in a properly managed project.

Whilst their coding may be ok for what it is, what's there is hardly adequate to do the job in hand let alone be let loose as a general purpose app.

Earth may be headed into a mini Ice Age within a decade

Graham Wilson
Devil

@Gary Heard -- Now, now...

Careful,

You've too many fuming religious down-voters, it might be dangerous.

Graham Wilson
Thumb Up

@ubtastic1 -- But you won't be able to alter it anyway...

...So you may as well laugh now.

>:-)

Graham Wilson
Devil

@Disco-Legend-Zeke -- Be careful, we don't want the sun to choke and go out.

Be careful, we don't want the sun to choke and go out.

Graham Wilson
Thumb Up

@John 78 -- Absolutely!

"Thats because they don't want you to think the sun has anything to do with climate change, it might interfere with their anti C02 religion"

Religion has much more to do with the politics of global worming than does any science. Tragically!

Graham Wilson
Flame

@Gareth Gouldstone -- There's absolutely no way we could burn all the coal in 70 years.

There's absolutely no way we could burn all the coal in 70 years, it'd be impossible. Even 700 years wouldn't touch it (if you want a debate over this it's dead easy for me to win, as facts are facts).

Unlike global warming, there's no doubt about that discussion.

Graham Wilson
Devil

Absolutely correct. Scientists aren't really helping any cause other than their own.

"It is also a sad fact of life that screaming "catastrophe" is more likely to get you funding and published than saying "no problem here, move along". This is not just a problem in climate research, but in all research. Just think back over how many times you have heard of one imminent catastrophe or another only for it never to materialise."

Absolutely correct.

Take the Big-C for example. If say we'd seen an actual 0.1% 'improvement' prognosis for every one of those new or proposed cancer treatment, or cures, or proposed cures etc. that I've actually heard of in the media or read about in science journals such as 'Science', 'Nature' etc. since I first became aware of the dreaded disease in the 1950s, then Cancer would have been eliminated years ago.

Fact one is that most of these claims are bunkum, and fact two the population at large has awoken to them--if you can't believe claims about fusion, or cold fusion, or cancer, or any other number of similar bullshit claims then why should one believe claims about climate change--even if they're true?

More often than not, the fact is that someone who is on the 'funding circuit' makes outrageous claims about a cure then absolutely nothing comes of it. And scientists don't seem the slightest bit worried about getting funding by crying 'Fire' or 'Wolf' as clearly it often works. The trouble is that with an increasingly interconnected population, increasing numbers of people are becoming aware of this deception.

Thus, it's little wonder that climate scientists, Jones et al, have been targeted as liars and so on. For not only have they been crying "Wolf" for far too long but also their extraordinary claims--whether correct or otherwise--require extraordinary proofs but they've none except a few trends and possibly inaccurate models. Exemplary proof they've none.

The best they can do is some inconclusive modelling and rough measurements which may well be correct but it's not enough to help very much, as science has had a spectacular fall from grace from about 1960 because of the disingenuous behaviour of many scientists.

Even if science could deliver, it's credibility is shot. Trouble is, none of these scientists has sufficient altruism for him to enter politics or such where he could make a difference. Right, scientist have locked themselves away from realpolitik and there's stuff-all indication that a sufficient number of them will enter the real world to make any real difference anytime soon.

iTunes Match is iPiracy, claims loopy Oz industry troll

Graham Wilson
Devil

@LaeMing -- "The first thing we do..." wasn't done!

"The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers."

2 Henry VI : Act 4, scene 2 / Shakespeare, W.

'Twasn't done!

5C later we've still the problem. Even in Oz. they run feral like rabbits.

Unique imagery of Shuttle docked to ISS released

Graham Wilson
Pint

Wonderful.

Just wonderful.

NASA et al, Arthur C. Clarke, Kubrick and Strauss, thank you.

Shame Clarke and Kubrick didn't live long enough to witness this.

Farting death camels must die to save the world!

Graham Wilson
Flame

I wonder what tree/flora Dr Moore has in mind to actually collect carbon credits.

Next Dr Tim Moore will be suggesting that humans should be eliminated from the planet. And I wonder what animal--err sorry tree/flora--he has in mind to actually collect the carbon credits.

Whether Dr Moore is a Greenie or just an opportunist has yet to be determined, but listening to his voice the former is more likely. Deep Greenies are already hell-bent on eliminating elements 17 and 80 from the periodic table, so does Dr Moore intend to add element 6 to the list as well? Perhaps, he's even dreaming of ways to stop the triple-alpha process in stars so the universe doesn't produce this filthy putrid carbon* stuff.

Camels are a pest in Australia but to put a bounty on them because of carbon credits really shows how Deep Greenies truly think. In recent years they've sniffed a little power, now their true colours are beginning to show

Had Dr Moore been born 50 years earlier his intrinsic psychopathology probably had seen him become a minister of religion but today such people enter the next best thing--eco science/administration or Greenpeace etc. Tragically, such people are just debasing environmental engineering/science, which incidentally, should be properly integrated with many other scientific/engineering disciplines. This 'traditional science and engineering is against us' mentality only isolates them from mainstream technology and only slows down many solutions to the world's many problems.

With the exception of the U.S., the failure or very substantive down-cline in the West of traditional religion is a serious and much unexpected problem as there's few places for the religiously-inclined to be absorbed or employed. In the past, the vagaries of and inconsistencies in doctrine could occupy such people for a whole lifetime. Now they're foist upon the world to right it. If I'm counting correctly, it's as if a 10th Crusade had started and all we carbon-lovers are its victims. (Incidentally, it's very informative to compare religious belief in Europe with that of the U.S. In Europe where only 20% of the population have strong religious beliefs, environmentalism has an enormous following, whereas in the U.S. where the reverse applies--80% strong religious belief--environmentalism is comparatively weak. The loss of traditional religious belief and concomitant strengthening of environmental beliefs is uncanny, and I'm far from the only one who's noticed it).

Sure, there are some excellent environmentalists who are rational, educated and who actually examine data but others run purely on feeling and or instinct. And to boot, many are down outright ignorant of anything scientific. Science and technology frighten them. I live in Sydney and about a decade ago there was a strong push to ensure the Olympic village was developed with eco-friendly materials, no PVC etc. Well, I had a woman actually tell me that it wouldn’t be many years before environmentalists had chlorine banned from the planet--she said it could and would be eliminated. And there was no mistake, she wasn't referring to Cl compounds rather elemental chlorine. I call this the Element-17 problem, one daren’t mention the 'Cl' word when Deep Greenies are around but one can generally mention 17 in hushed tones without attracting too much attention.

In recent times, it seems too that element 80 and now 6 have been similarly stigmatised. (Think back some months to the El Reg news story about Bletchley Park and the banning of mercury delay lines; much the same stuff was covered by many in the posts.)

Such beliefs are becoming commonplace; and it's almost a certainty that the downturn in science education over the past 40 or so years is largely responsible. When a person is able to go completely through schooling without any science subjects we should not be surprised

Unfortunately, Greenies have an unusually strong hold of our politicians for two reasons: most politicians have stuff-all knowledge of science and engineering as politicians are mainly lawyers, accountants and economists and thus are more convinced by the wistful plaintive rhetoric of Greenies to that of hard dull facts of techies.

As I see it, techies of all persuasions, especially those from traditional engineering and science really do need to speak out loudly against such nonsense before it's too late.

--------------

* Hey, a nice pristine planet, but there's a minor problem of having no universe to support it (unless he also wants to tweak a few universal constant too). >:-)

Citibank hack lifted 200,000 names, emails, acct numbers

Graham Wilson
Flame

It seems as if supposedly secure banking details are busted everyday

It seems as if everyday we hear of supposedly secure systems being compromised. Whether it's Sony, Citibank or whoever the headlines are almost identical and seemingly too so are the break-ins. If banks lost cash through safe-breaking to the same extent then it'd be declared a national calamity--the national guard or the army would be in the streets.

However, no one seems to care much other than customers whose records have been stolen. And the banks or other institutions just get a wrap over the knuckles--for, as we all 'know', cyber crime outwits everyone. Such cocky shit seems to becoming mainstream mantra these days.

The sooner these irresponsible bastards, banking CEOs, execs etc., are made directly responsible the sooner the problem will be fixed. If one's electronic bank gets broken into without a really good excuse then it's the slammer where one can compare notes with those who broke into the system.

These irresponsible management bastards could well begin to fix the security of their systems by truly acknowledging and understanding that electronic databases are not the same as paper records. Electronic records exhibit a completely different dynamic to paper ones--stealing a single paper file is probably harder than stealing a complete electronic database--thus, at a high level, the whole notion of electronic security must be treated very differently to that of paper.

Innovative thinking is needed but going harder on cyber crime is far from the complete solution.

50 years on with electronic records and we've still a paper-records security mentality. Moreover, the convenience of electronic records and love for the technology seems to have overwhelmed everyone industry wide.

Just improving or tightening security is not enough, nothing other than a complete paradigm shift in keeping with the granularity or extent of the change from paper to electronic records will be sufficient to fix the problem properly.

Antimatter hangs around at CERN

Graham Wilson
Boffin

@AGirlFromVenus -- Sorry, wrong! Yuh need a good bang for yuh buck but not blindness too!

CH3-OH is methanol. It's excellent for racing cars but terrible for the eyes etc., blindness ensues upon imbibing.

Anti-C2H5-OH [CH3-CH2-OH], ethanol, would be a safer option but the gamma rays pose a shielding problem; hence, I'd strongly recommend it only be consumed on extra special occasions.

Shuffling off this mortal coil being perhaps the very best example.

>:-)

Graham Wilson
Angel

@johnf -- No!

Because that's how nature is, unfortunately.

Intel enlists universities in security wars

Graham Wilson
Boffin

And...

I hope they also develop a better, more secure, file system that automatically incorporates encryption, authentication and extended file metadata--all of which would be an intrinsic a part of the file, whether it's inside or outside the O/S.

As said, this schema would also include 'transportable/exportable' files--those used for data interchange etc. which leave one O/S environment and eventually end up in another. As such, they would travel with their authentication/encryption etc. fully intact (encoded within its extended metadata etc.).

If file environments, O/Ses etc, were to adopt such a scheme then bogus files would be more easily detected, eliminated and or excluded, hence much improved security.

Microsoft goes bot herder hunting in streets of Russia

Graham Wilson
Devil

...And it would also really help...

...if Microsoft actually made decent, secure, botnet-proof, hole-proof code. And leave Swiss cheese making to cows and the Swiss.

Methinks Microsoft protest too much (but don't blame it for attempting to deflect its critics).

Google acting as a 'political tool', says China

Graham Wilson
Facepalm

@Vega et al -- Have you ever studied control theory [as in electronics--not politics]?

>:-)

If you have, then you'd well know that once a system has broken its servo/feedback loop then its state is irreconcilably out of control from within.

As with systems with broken feedback loops, your position, together with those of several of your diametrically opposed protagonists, are so polarised that no logical argument--or any number of them--would ever budge any of you from your respective positions--even if given absolute proof that any of you were wrong.

For everyone's sake, desist. Bothering to put your positions just wastes time and antagonises others to act similarly.

_______

Can anyone tell me why over the past 40/50 or so years that debating and formal argument has gone the way of the dodo only to be replaced with protagonists' utterances that border on the sociopathic?

What's made the world so polarised in recent times that, by comparison, even Hitler and Churchill are beginning to look like bedfellows--at least, they've seemingly more in common?

Graham Wilson
Flame

@Veldan -- The trouble with your argument is...

...that the present Chinese Politburo isn't communist! Nor's it been so for years.

Today, you'd get a much better match between the Politburo and Ayn Rand than with Communism.

In China, that old communist bogeyman's long since dead; however, being in love with power and hanging on to it at all costs--as everywhere--isn't.

Graham Wilson
Facepalm

You'd reckon security at Google would be substantially higher.

As I said in a post at the FBI/LulzSec hack story:

"...by now you'd think that two-level authentication/certificated/encrypted 'passwording' schemes would be commonplace when the stakes are high."

One would like to think that when someone's human rights are potentially at stake then 'password' security would automatically be of such a high order.

...But then, as it seems, perhaps not.

FBI affiliates hacked by LulzSec

Graham Wilson
Facepalm

Imagine if this were 1942-44 and such slack security standards applied.

Imagine if this were 1942-44 and such slack security standards applied. Abwehr--German WWII intelligence--would have gained such a foothold on US wartime secrets that they may as well have been broadcast direct to Berlin by NBC or CBS.

How is such incompetence possible? Right, 'tis a rhetorical question, as we're almost certainly the answers.

As with the other current security story--the Google/China hacks--by now you'd think that two-level authentication/certificated/encrypted 'passwording' schemes would be commonplace when the stakes are high.

...But perhaps I'm wrong, maybe the stakes just aren't high enough for anyone to bother.

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