Posts by Alan Firminger

Steady as she goes at Capita

Spare a thought for Polish dependants on housing benefit

As above.

Bletchley Park opens U-110 Enigma exhibit

There is still an appetite for it

I want to learn how the captured crew of U110 were kept incommunicado. And were they joined by the third, hostile, crew member of the Junkers 88 that flew to Scotland ?

What treasures will the US really find on bin Laden's hard disk?

Information

There will be records of offshore bank accounts and passwords. They may be coded, but probably not. If the CIA find these they can cripple AQ by stealing all the money. But where should it go ?

MIRACULOUS new AIRSHIP set to fly by 2013

Why does it take eighty years to invent the obvious ?

Think of a bit of string round a gas bag. Tension the string to compress the gas.

Woman with 15 IDs gets 7 years for multiple VAT fraud

She can do that so she could make more money legally

The clever bit was the idea of theatre companies. They consume lots of stuff and have nothing material to show for it except ticket sales. Will told us where it goes, "into thin air."

Cell site data sinks into black hole of local bureaucracy

Half way

Mobile 'phone antennae should be plotted by O.S. They are features of the landscape.

The simplest way to achieve this would be centrally. Why are O.S. not required to be given the same as all the local authorities ?

New top-secret stealth choppers used on bin Laden raid

Relevant

The discussion far above about noise ignores the detail that a chopper descending is much quieter than in hover. Could be that the first one in went down a bit too quietly, I can understand why.

Boffins develop liquid crystal solid-state raygun turret

But

A diffraction grating passes more than 90% of the light straight through. And the diffracted beams emerge out on either side. So how does this idea get, say, 80% of the source on to the target ?

Is there anything to find on bin Laden's hard drive?

Cultural baddies are fiction

Osama bin Laden was a source of funds, ideology, strategy and initiatives.

He did not work fifteen hours every day plotting the next atrocity. He occasionally gave someone a cheque drawn on a bank located on a small island in the Caribbean, in the real world enough to settle a decent mortgage, outlined the purpose and said "Get on with it.."

He communicated through a few trusted colleagues.

He had to observe the world, so he read newspapers like you or I.

His hard drives are empty of intelligence.

Fujifilm Finepix X100 APS-C camera

But what about focus ?

With optional manual controls I look for the solution to the nuisance of automatic focus. Take a picture of something beyond a wire fence using a typical automatic camera and you get another dud shot, or a lovely picture of the wire.

ARM jingling with cash as its chips get everywhere

I'm shocked

For about 3 billion processors per year ARM collects 0.1 billion GBP , that is 3 p each.

Boffins devise way to hide secret data on hard drives

Why not ...

... hide our secrets on a USB Flash drive ? Store the drive securely.

Put it another way, has anyone swallowed USB drive ?

Google donates a billion cores to boffins

Don't Google know about this great wired world ?

"You have to pay your own travel, lodging and living expenses while the simulations run,"

Why does the user have to be there, wherever there is ?

Richard Branson to prowl oceans' hadal depths in flying sub

Not quite

Sllght buoyancy means it takes three tears to get to the surface, Better to have a heavy and wet component that can be discarded in emergency. A pressure resistant cabin means that there is no threat of bends.

Operation Ore was based on flawed evidence from the start

M'lud

If a prosecution depends upon the wording on a link then it has to be shown that this wording was present at the time the accused clicked on it.

How can anyone do that ?

No

Sometimes justice gets done but the coppers involved get promoted.

Microsoft, Nokia, and RIM's wasted R&D billions

Why

Most R&D spend is driven by fear in the marketing department, which is not a basis for rational or careful decision making.

UK nuke lab, Korean Air Force buy SGI supers

Comment

You statement is of course true Graham. But this is for long range forcasting, which is normally the job of a government agency so that all arms of government benefit.

Our beloved Met Office is an exemplar, it started as a part of the RAF. The wider value was recognized and it was hived off, but for many years temperatures were reported as read on the Air Ministry Roof. And that was before long range forecasting was in any way possible, and I am not sure that it is.

Odd

I respect that South Korea is rich but nevertheless, long range weather forecasting seems out of character. And why by the military ?

Samsung rolls out 22in see-through screens

Because

You recognize that the signal source, the lcd and its backlight should be separate so that when one fails you don't need a whole new tv.

But you would be locked in forever.

Deleting 'innocent' DNA will cost £5m

Mad

What was the plan when someone, everone, dies ? Was the database to expand forever ?

And what was the intention when it was found that an error, or deception, occurred at collection so that a non person was recorded ?

Pre-release Windows 8 code hits PC makers

Layers please me

A front end to a machine OS is the best way to do it. No one suggests that gnu/Linux is old fashioned. The interface is just another application.

Nokia: Keep codin' for Symbian and Qt!

I told you so

MS are bodgers.

Council loses £2.5m claim against Big Blue

Details

The Chief Executive of Southwark Council, Bob Coomber, was also the Finance Director. And he left recently, watch Private Eye.

And the expense of 2 M could not occur without member's approval. But Southwark have made bigger blunders that this and there was little response.

US Navy to field full-on robot war-jets as soon as 2018

The future is a cornucopia of options

As has been said this is an extension of cruise missile and drone war technology. It is also an extension of the autopilot.

So a good games designer should be able to get this coded for a pilotless Typhoon to intercept mythical intruders within a year and fly home. Then add one year for carrier ops.

Yes, that is possible. The reality is that the contractors would be greedy and the client incompetent. So lets say 2022 for demo, 2032 for service and it would be 2042 for fleet use. So lets not bother.

Libya fighting shows just how idiotic the Defence Review was

Right and wrong

I agree with Lewis, this war demonstrates what we all knew : the Defence Review is an illogical, and dangerous basis for the UK armed forces.

But surely the reality is that we don't need to do any of this.

Israel v Egypt, Mujahadeen v Russia, Serbia v NATO all demonstrated that infantry armed with modern weapons beat ground armour and aircraft up to 15000 feet. I bet modern modern shoulder launched anti aircraft weapons go higher.

So there is a problem with long range artillery shelling a city or high flying bombers. These could be stopped by UN authorized action, but would not require the substantial war that we are now fighting.

We have seen Libyan rebels touting the traditional RPG, and not many of them. We could supply essentially defensive infantry weapons and the conflict would be virtually over. Anything else and we are fighting a war for them. I know, the UN Security Council passed a different resolution, I blame the advocates.

NASA's Stardust set to 'burn to depletion'

Perhaps

We need a skip in space.

Hackers make off with TripAdvisor's membership list

Don't need to

We all know that you are subscribed to The Register.

Southampton Uni shows way to a truly open web

Tesco get rich linking data

I want to as well.

Fukushima one week on: Situation 'stable', says IAEA

One problem

Here is the Fukushima plant on Google maps :

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=&aq=&sll=37.301914,141.043854&sspn=0.22667,0.441513&ie=UTF8&ll=37.315499,141.039906&spn=0.028329,0.055189&t=h&z=14

About last Wednesday the Guardian published a two page spread of a satellite photo of the damaged site. Yesterdays Observer showed a crop of this. I cannot find this image on the web.

The Google maps reference shows that the site is on a totally open coast.

The satellite images show no sign of tsunami. There are tidy lawns dotted with small bushes.

It is reported generally, in particular by the BBC yesterday, that the site was damaged by the tsunami. Where exactly ?

Hadron Collider 'could act as telephone for talking to the past'

An established argument and an observation

Time travel is impossible because we would have met tourists from the future. The same logic should apply to messages from the future. We are still waiting.

Whatever is received from the future cannot change what happens because the source is a result of the message back. There is no worry about killing your father. Back to the Future was wrong.

Sixth Japanese nuclear reactor loses cooling

Sixth reactor ?

I read the message qoted as meaning Reactor number 6 , so third reactor looses coolant.

Japanese nuke meltdown may be underway

So

The best case discussed above is that 30 year old reactors are dangerous. So why do we use them now ? We could switch a few things off.

Nuclear is great provided that it is totally safe from mine to waste disposal, and provided it is economic.

Following energy disaster after energy disaster the problem is : Whose advice can I trust ? Everyone involved gets committed; compare the confident assurances from thirty years ago.

Canonical pares Ubuntu down to 2 editions

Back to basics

Linux is really GNU on Linux, but the generally used name is nicer. GNU is the OS, Linux is the interface to the PC hardware.

So a GNU implementation for anything other that the PC standard won't be Linux, unless Linus Torvalds gets busy.

Republicans believe in 'climate change' but not 'global warming'

That's right

I would have thought that oceanic CO2 would have been a crucial measure, along with the age of the carbon by carbon dating. With all the effort we have to learn that oceanic CO2 is increasing whenever a significant coral gets sick. They are not trying.

But to the main point, 'climate change' is neutral whereas 'global warming' requires a response.

Spooks want backdoor into your network

On the subject of attacks on vital infrastructure

Whatever happened at the recent conference to establish fair play ?

And why have all the sources that told us the conference was starting been silent about it ?

Eurofighter Typhoon: It's EVEN WORSE than we thought

Re unintended consequences

We have been in a no quit contract before, with France - yes Concorde.

Many models of US a/c were bought

But only one was bought in significant number - the Dakota.

We already have

But we call them missiles.

Sheila's Fails? The statistics of biological risk

Does this affect the age sensistivity of life insurance ?

As above.

Apple iPad 2 snapped in all its skinny glory

What does the top pic show ?

I see a laptop, ajar, but with the screen on the outside. Does it open and twist ? Or separate and reassemble for use ?

Dear US gov: Stay the hell out of Silicon Valley

x

I think Obama recognized the coming of competitive Chinese microchips, aeroplanes and power stations, as described in a higher story.

Godson: China shuns US silicon with faux x86 superchip

Now what about Chinese ...

... aircraft and fission power ?

What are the Western economies to do then ? An easy answer is design better aircraft and power sources. I don't believe that will be possible because the Chinese are competing intellectually. In 2030 expect a crisis as state management smashes the free economy.

It does not look good. Should the west invent a new sort of capitalism, or a new sort of society ? Lets talk about it for thirty years.

Google opens curtain on 'manual' search penalties

Humans !

How many people in Google are adjusting weightings ?

If it is not thousands then how can their effect be significant ?

Millennium bugs hit stock exchange

& , more seriously

Capitalism isn't working

Census threatens spies' cover

Not quite correct

They used to ask if we had a bath in the house. Nobody complained.

iPhone 5 rumors: bigger, smaller, cloudy, keyboard-equipped

What about ...

... an iPad with a slide out keyboard, 2 mm thick of course.

Microsoft, Nokia, and MeeGo: Are they all doomed?

Fail

I was shocked by the series of articles about Symbian a few months ago. It appeared that no-one conceived the universal 'phone as extendable interface definitions.

Same now. MS, by their history, like to bodge together something that works. Three years at the most.

Protection of Freedoms Bill is released

Restoring juries for fraud

Remember why juries were abandoned for fraud - because cases were so complex and detailed that trials took over a year.

In that time jury members were off sick with flu, childbirth and all the other excuses, or reasons, that keep us from work. When three jury members were permanently off the bench, perhaps through death, emigration, debilitation or any other reason, then the trial collapsed and had to be restarted. In practice it is impossible to try such complex cases.

So what happens in future, are the spivs to be given a free pardon ?

The law cannot compel a trader to simplify his, or her, activiies. It can't compel simplified accounting of complex business, hundreds of thousands of transactions with mergers and break ups along the way. The issue often hinges on the trivial matters of were individual deals legal or crooked.

I need answers.

More heads roll at AMD

No

Top honcho has to make a few essential decisions - policy, strategy, staff. Results follow.