Posts by Uncle Slacky

BOFH: The Boss is right, the applications of AI are truly staggering

Re: the 'sheep' entrance...

It varies from person to person.

So you paid a ransom demand … and now the decryptor doesn't work

Re: Ha

F=mA is equivalent to F=dp/dt (rate of change of momentum (p) over time), in fact that was Newton's original formulation (imagine a dot over the p instead of Leibnitz's d/dt though), which would make it explicitly a differential equation. "A" can of course also be expressed as dv/dt, so F=mA is at least *implicitly* a differential equation.

See also https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/2890262/how-is-f-ma-a-differential-equation-confirmation

Trump taps Musk to lead 'government efficiency' task force

The Repugs were certainly flexible about that with Ted Cruz (born in Canada, though I think his mother was American? edit: just checked, yes, she was) and John McCain (born in the Panama Canal Zone while it was under US control). The problem is that there is no universally agreed upon definition of "natural born citizen".

Frankly I'd take Camacho over Trump as president any day - at least Camacho genuinely cares about his people and country and actively tries to improve their situation.

Of course the Internet Archive’s digital lending broke the law, appeals court says

Why should the family benefit from something they didn't earn themselves? I don't expect the work I do today to continue to give me and my descendants returns for the next 90 years, so why should anyone else?

'Error' causes Alexa to endorse Kamala Harris, refuse to discuss Trump

Re: Conspiracy or ineptitude.

Check out the "Jesus and Mo" comics: http://www.jesusandmo.net/

Chinese boffins advocate nuking nearby asteroids – it’s the only way to be sure

Don't look up.

Where the computer industry went wrong – the early hits

Re: Amstrad?

Because they were successful at almost everything in the sector at the time (the em@iler came later). This article is about the failures and bad decisions.

Looks like she had to cover up the "PET" label for broadcasting on the Beeb, too.

Re: Micro Men

Look out for Sophie Wilson's cameo as a barmaid!

Re: C128 the Hero!

The unfavourable exchange rates of the early-to-mid 80s had a lot to do with the lack of US micros in Europe - the only one of much consequence was the C64 until the era of the Amiga and ST in the late 80s.

Bargain-hunting boss saw his bonus go up in a puff of self-inflicted smoke

Re: London Ontario

In the Concorde days this would have been harder to spot.

Linux Deepin 23: A polished distro from China that Western desktops could learn from

Re: Looks good but

I'd certainly be far more concerned about what the NSA and all the other TLAs could do to me or with my data than what the Chinese might do - as long as I never go there there's not a lot they can do to me, the Five Eyes on the other hand...

Oreon Lime is AlmaLinux with a desktop twist

Re: Who Knows Best????

Could you not just compile your favourite DE from source, though?

Microsoft closes Windows 11 upgrade loophole in latest Insider build

Re: This always works for me

Wine Is Not an Emulator, though...

Missing scissors cause 36 flight cancellations in Japan

Re: Stupid is as stupid does

"pointless" - I see what you did there.

Palo Alto Networks execs apologize for 'hostesses' dressed as lamps at Black Hat booth

Not very Christian of her:

https://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/mt/6.html#5

"And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly."

Pro-Iran groups lay groundwork for 'chaos and violence' as US election meddling attempts intensify

They don't like it up 'em!

America has no qualms about interfering in other countries' elections, turnabout is fair play as far as I can see.

https://kennorphan.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/cover-of-time-magazine-regarding-the-us-influence-on-russian-elections-and-boris-yeltsin.jpg

80 years ago, IBM gave Harvard University one of the world's earliest computers

Re: addition problems in less than a second

Never mind that, can it play Crysis?

50 years ago, CP/M started the microcomputer revolution

Re: Amstrad 6128

ITYM "CP/M+" (really CP/M 3.0 with minor tweaks for Amstrad) and CP/M 2.2 (most people only ever used them to format discs though).

Re: CP/M Gets AC From Idiot To Mostly Competent!!!!..LibreWrite mostly very low use code

Abiword is also better than LibreOffice at rescuing damaged Word files, in my experience.

Re: CP/M Gets AC From Idiot To Mostly Competent!!!!

Mention of TA and weird keyboard reminded me of the (pretty much identical*) TA Alphatronic machines we had at university in the late 80s - they'd been repurposed as terminals for the campus network.

* https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/sec/5078/Triumph-AdlerAlphatronic-Matmos-PC/

US border cops really must get a warrant in NY before searching your phones, devices

Re: What's on a phone anyway?

It's security theatre/theater: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_theater

Re: ‘The land of the free’

ITYM "fee".

Regular reminder of the 100-mile limit

https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/border-zone

HCL's back-to-office plan: Come in three days a week, or forget about holidays

Re: Landlords

Where's Mao when you need him?

Thunderbird is go: 128 now out with revamped 'Nebula' UI

I see the site is stil alive: http://www.asciiribbon.org/

Time to revive the ASCII Ribbon campaign: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASCII_ribbon_campaign

Big Music reprises classic hit 'ISPs need to stop their customers torrenting or we'll sue'

Re: Home Taping Is Killing Music

Obligatory IT Crowd piracy warning: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALZZx1xmAzg

FBI gains access to Trump rally shooter's phone

Re: Fingerprint ?

Might also have to simulate blood flow and body temperature, too.

Trump threatens to send Meta's Mark ‘Zuckerbucks’ to prison if reelected president

Re: Where the Fat Old Crook* is concerned...

> Because if not they have zero chance of winning. Ever.

Unless you live in a swing state your vote makes zero difference to the outcome, so you might as well vote for someone you want. They then have a better chance of reaching the 5% level to qualify for federal funds next time:

https://www.fec.gov/introduction-campaign-finance/understanding-ways-support-federal-candidates/presidential-elections/public-funding-presidential-elections/

"Minor party candidates and new party candidates may become eligible for partial public funding of their general election campaigns. A minor party candidate is the nominee of a party whose candidate received between five and 25 percent of the total popular vote in the preceding presidential election. The amount of public funding to which a minor party candidate is entitled is based on the ratio of the party's popular vote in the preceding presidential election to the average popular vote of the two major party candidates in that election. A new party candidate receives partial public funding after the election if he or she receives five percent or more of the vote."

Twitter grew an incredible '1.6%' since Musk's $44B takeover. Amazing. Wow

Re: Worth so much more than money

Ooh, two nazi downvotes! I welcome your boos, I've seen what makes you cheer.

Re: Worth so much more than money

Yeah, if it wasn't a nazi bar before, it certainly is now.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Nazi_bar

Raspberry Pi OS airs out some fresh options for the summer

Re: Mathematica

It is possible to get it to run under QEMU on a PC - it's slow as a very slow thing, but it works.

Labour wins race to lead UK, but few would envy the load in its tech in-tray

> the Labour left get the knives out

Starmer's just spent the last 4 years purging the Labour left, there's nothing of it left for him to worry about.

Windows: Insecure by design

Re: I'm hard pressed to imagine what practical use it would be for anyone.

See also the "rules" of the "rules-based international order", which strangely enough are never explicitly stated but always seem to align with whatever the US wants to do at any given moment.

Elon Musk to destroy the International Space Station – with NASA's approval, for a fee

Re: Language

Verbing weirds language.

Julian Assange to go free in guilty plea deal with US

That theory assumes that the Nazis would have eventually found the Ark even though they got the length of the staff wrong (presumably they would have dug up the entire site?). Indy did the actual "finding" of the Ark.

Linux geeks cheer as Arm wrestles x86

Hercules was ahead of its time

Did anyone actually ever buy an eCafe? I was tempted briefly, but there was no real update path for the OS:

https://liliputing.com/hercules-banks-on-arm-chips-linux-for-its-latest-10-inch-netbooks/

DuckDuckGo AI Chat promises privacy for bot conversations

Re: Startpage...

Qwant is better if you want a European search engine. Startpage is just a front end for Google that strips out tracking.

London hospitals left in critical condition after ransomware attack

Re: “Cyber” systems are not fit for “cyber” purpose.

Hopefully they're not modelling themselves on Mother Teresa...

Windows 11 tries to escape Windows 10's shadow with AI muscle

Edge is certainly a big number 2...

ASUS creates a substance: Ceraluminum, which fuses aluminum and a ceramic

Re: Wake me up when they have transparent aluminum

It was invented 8 years ago:

https://screenrant.com/star-trek-transparent-aluminum-real/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium_oxynitride

Fancy climbing the peaks of Alpine Linux? 3.20 is out

Re: antiX Linux felt bloated and sluggish ..

There are some distros in between that might be more user-friendly than Alpine but still faster than Lubuntu, for example MX Linux, Peppermint OS, Q4OS or Bodhi. However, if you like to tinker, then go with Alpine - once it's up and running it shouldn't need much maintenance.

Good for old netbooks

I installed an earlier version (3.14 IIRC) on my old eeePC 701 4G, which worked pretty well until an update borked it. Perhaps I'll give it another try.

'Little weirdo' shoulder surfer teaches UK cabinet minister a lesson in cybersecurity

From TFA: "Harman’s username and password were 'harriet' and 'harman'...British computer crime law does not distinguish between technically sophisticated attacks and lucky guesses. “What’s interesting about the CMA is that it doesn’t explicitly bring up the sophistication of a hacking offence, so legally, the defacement here does break the CMA, regardless of the weakness of the credentials of the victim. The problem is the law itself,” said Davis."

Still technically hacking, then.

IT angle: she's also a self-confessed hacker:

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/apr/09/bafflement-over-tory-mps-admission-she-hacked-harriet-harmans-website

Re: Situational awareness is rare

Then rotate the screen...

BOFH: Come on down to the dunge– erm … basement

Re: Plot error alert

> So BOFH has his save games from 30 years ago stored on disk... checks out.

> BIFH was using 8" floppies in 1994.... no way.

But but but 1980 was only 20 years ago, right? Right? (see icon)

Techie invented bits of the box he was fixing, still botched the job

Re: Sleepiness is the Enemy

It's not nicknamed "disk destroyer" for nothing...