Posts by Mike Flex 330 posts • joined 6 Mar 2009
"However, I was quite displeased the other day when my printer out of the blue printed a page telling me it now had an email address and I could web print."
If you have an IP-addressable HP printer point a web browser at it; it probably has an internal web server.
If you have a fancy-schmancy HP enterprise printer the internal web server may give you access to a hard disk with a cache of everyone's print jobs since installation. Happy browsing!
"With Unity, you never have to touch the mouse. I mean, using the keyboard is actually faster than using the mouse for almost every task."
Well, there's the problem. Unity is a command line interface masquerading as a GUI. It was originally presented as a new GUI needed for a new wave of Ubuntu tablets and smartphones so we come to it expecting a GUI. If I'm going to have to type in the name of the program I want I might as well just type it at a command prompt.
"Given that we had only three TV channels and the analogue audio was perfectly consistent between them"
Those were the days. In these days of digital wotsits sound levels are all over the place within a single channel. In the case of BBC's Click (supposedly its technology flagship programme in the absence of Tomorrow's World) levels are all over the place within a single programme. (In a bad week, even within a single item.)
Dennis Ritchie isn't available to ask for assistance.
Did they not learn from talkie toaster?
"The Register does not know if the residents have begun emailing each other using the "reply-to-all" function"
Is the Pope Catholic?
Every time we had a reply-to-all storm at a former employer you could look forward to a half-day of r-t-a requests to not reply to all, mixed in with requests to "delete me from this list" even, or perhaps especially, for emails that didn't originate from a list server, all enlivened with sarky comments on the internal newsgroups.
Made me wish for Google Wave. Apparently I was the only one.
"When I check firefox add-ons I have something called Shockwave flash (v19.0 r0). So I don't actually know if this is shockwave or flash or something else?"
Confusing, isn't it?
The Adobe Shockwave Flash product which is at v19.x.x is what's normally just called Flash. While it's buggy there's still a lot of it about, so getting rid of Flash might restrict your ability to see videos.
In Firefox you can set Flash to 'Ask to Activate' so you can turn it on for wanted videos (and see how often you need it) whilst leaving it off for adverts. (Tools->Add-Ons->Plug-ins->Shockwave Flash, choose Ask to Activate in the Activate drop-down.) The ipad/iphone don't support Flash, which drives the growth of alternatives.
Shockwave itself is at v12.x.x. As Psymon noted, it isn't popular now. I deleted the Shockwave plugin the last time it needed updating and I haven't missed it.
"The Abyssmal"
I was surprised that The Abyss escaped the roll-call of SF films in the articles - underwater base, alien, even the shot from above of the base all lit up, like the fleet.
Mind you, at least The Abyss was set at sea. This base appears to be submerged in a reservoir. Why do you need an underwater base and a trillion dollars of drilling kit to drill under a reservoir? Rather a bit too much SF running down corridors as well.
It would be helpful if there was some indication of which Register office was filing each story - perhaps a national flag with the date and time or just the name of the office.
I know this isn't a UK story from the mention of 'federal government' in the first paragraph but I need to wade down to paragraph eight to find out this is an Australian story rather than a US one.
"Despite the extremely loudly publicised free "upgrade"? Fawn on, Gartner."
Yes, despite the upgrade offer. People, especially ordinary, non-Reg reading people, are quite likely to want to avoid the hassle of:
- performing an OS upgrade (with the risk of everything going pear-shaped if the automation fails),
- sorting out any drivers or bundled software that stop working under Win 10,
- having to use Win 8 whilst waiting for the upgrade.
Once you know Win 10 is on its way, it's easier to carry on with your existing kit a bit longer, let the vendors sort out the integration issues and buy something that does what you want when you buy it.
" Linux needs no reboot after applying the patches unless you update the kernel itself."
As almost every time I get an Ubuntu update a new kernel turns up there's no difference for me between Ubuntu and Windows in the number of reboots required.
"...the first screen after setup animates hundreds of swirling particles; it’s vertiginous, like staring at the Pleiades."
If you find the Pleiades look like a vertiginous cloud of swirling particles I suggest you get to an optician. Or a doctor.
"There are alarms and stopwatches and timers, handier than on your phone."
As, indeed, there are on my £23 Casio watch. As a bonus it has a 5 year battery life and doesn't look like it should only be worn by a 1980s gym bunny.
"Excel spreadsheet on TOR.
And... You're going to open a *known* virus vector on your pc after downloading what is very clearly labelled "illegal" material in that format?"
You might choose not to open it in Excel, and certainly not in anything with macro execution enabled.
"And this is what passes for 'entertainment' on Channel 4 these days?"
Regrettably so. In the Flex household this sort of stuff is referred to as a caring, sharing, freak show. Add a thin layer of social commentary and you can apparently serve up any amount of bad behaviour from the less fortunate in society. And to think we look down on Hogarth's contemporaries for going along to laugh at the inmates at Bedlam.
Or perhaps you have an intimate medical problem you're too embarrassed to see your GP about? Why not expose your suppurating nads to the whole nation on one of C4's medical shows? The freakier the better.
Well, now we have dingy LED lamps. The brightest available from my local DIY emporium is only rated at 50 W equivalent, which is rather less than the 100 or 150 W incandescent lamps I used to use in my living room.
That's before you start arseing around getting the lamp to work with your phone, which will pretty much rule these products out for normal people.
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