Posts by Jaruzel

PUNISHMENT gluttons: The Dr Who monsters that come back for more

Re: So Bored...

Oh I'm sorry, I must have missed the 'no negative comments allowed' clause in the T&Cs. The whole point of a comment system is to air one's views both good and bad. Or did you swallow the rubbish from school where everyone has to agree with each other?

I've refrained from commenting on the other umpteen pointless Doctor Who articles on The Register but I'm am now really getting tired on how The Register has de-proritised it's IT coverage for more pop-culture articles. It's starting to feel like the Daily Mail Online...

So Bored...

... with all this DW @ 50 coverage on The Register. I'm a avid [classic] Doctor Who fan, and I quite like some of the modern stuff as well, so I'm one of the last people to complain about over-coverage of Doctor Who.

'Biting the hand that feed IT' - that's the el reg slogan... what has that got to do with Doctor Who? - if I want Doctor Who coverage I could just sit over at the BBC who seem to be carpet bombing the world with 50th Anniversary DW events and shows right now :(

I'm beginning to think that el reg is getting paid to post these articles...

I am a recovering Superwoman wannabee

1. If you are not being seen as equal in the workplace, then it's the men with the problem, not you. Work some place else.

2. Shame on you el-reg for picking the 'superman' bodypainted breasts on the sidebar for the image for this article. Totally inappropriate. :(

-Jar

So you want to be a contractor? Well, here's how it works

Re: What about being a sole trader?

"And what about setting up a company in another EU jurisdiction?"

Most UK Agencies will not work with you if you are not a UK Ltd, or UK based umbrella. :(

Ltd Co. ?

This is spot on the money. Although I would argue that a Limited Company these days in the UK is more trouble than it's worth.

Up until a few years ago I contracted for over 12 years (at most of the major UK financial houses), and the overhead of running my Company (all the tax paperwork etc) became so burdensome and expensive in accountants fees, that it was one of the main drivers to become a poor permie. For anyone thinking of going contracting I'd seriously suggest the Umbrella/Managed-Service company route - yes, you'll lose about 10% of your max earning power, but not having to worry about an IR35-style knock on the door makes for less sleepness nights.

-Jar

The IT Crowd returns to Channel 4 for a final episode

Damn You, Matt Berry.

Matt Berry ruined it.

When he joined, the writing became more focused on the relationship between him and Jen, than on the actual 'IT Crowd' of Jen/Moss/Roy :( Less IT focused jokes too.

Due to that, it just became another so-so low-budget sitcom. The Chris Morris era was SO much better (and I hate Chris Morris usually).

Six things a text editor must do - or it's a one-way trip to the trash

My Preferred Editor is...

(And this is just MY opinion and I'm NOT saying anyone else should be swayed by it.)

UltraEdit-32. Version 12b to be exact. On Windows.

Yes, it's old, Yes it's a bit clunky in places. But it loads massive files in a flash, has user configurable syntax and colour highlighting, and the must-have feature for me... the ability to add a button or menu entry to launch other programs with the currently edited file (or automatic temporary copy if not recently saved) as a parameter.

I'm also very lazy, and after 12 or so years using UltraEdit, I'm not inclined to use/learn anything else.

-Jar

RBS and NatWest FAIL downs services across UK

Re: FAIL felt as far as Oregon

Or, HSBC Bank. Same people as First Direct.

HYPERSONIC METEOR smashes into Russia, injuring hundreds

Re: Ten Tons?

10 Tons is about 10.67 fully laden Citroen AX's or approximately 2,000 buckets of fish*

There you go. Now if only you had the internet, you could have worked that out yourself ;)

-Jar

(*depending on fish and bucket size.)

BIS, bash, bosh: El Reg solves BlackBerry 10 email bafflement

It's not that bad...

For smaller companies who have one or two Exchange servers, and didn't want the hassle of adding BIS to their infrastructure, adding ActiveSync to the clients makes the Z10 (and Q10) viable options. Say what you like about RIM/BB, but if it's primarily email you need on-the-go and a massive battery life to boot, then the classic blackberry handset form factor is hard to beat.

Help us out here: What's the POINT of Microsoft Office 2013?

Re: "The ribbon makes more features visible"

'Customise the ribbon' wasn't there in Office 2007 (when the ribbon debuted) it wasn't until Office 2010 that you could do it. By then of course, all the users who NEEDED to customise the ribbon had defected to OpenOffice or downgraded back to 2003 (and are probably still using it).

PDFs

Word 2013 can open, edit and save PDFs.

Saying goodbye finally to Adobe Standard is totally worth the upgrade.

Cameron defends U-turn on web filth ban, leaves filtering to parents

Re: adviser on preventing sexualisation and commercialisation of childhood.

I just gave this a go:

1. Went to the daily fail website

2. Typed 'all grown up' in to their search box

One of the pages returned was this:

"Elle Fanning looks all grown up at 13 as she shares a red carpet hug with Tom Cruise at Super 8 premiere"

All Grown Up. At 13!!

If my opinion of the daily fail could sink any lower, it would.

Skype for Windows 8 is coming: Always on, always in your contacts

Re: Can you kill it

I'm sure you'll be able to put the name of the EXE in the restricted applications setting in Group Policy. I also reckon that someone will knock up a custom ADMX template to allow you to control Skype centrally.

However... MS already have a corporate conferencing system - it's called Lync Server. Does everything Skype does, plus it integrates into Office/Sharepoint/Active-Directory.

But then this new Skype is for Windows 8, which we all know will never ever be rolled out in offices.

Look back in Ascii: Computing in the 1980s

Ahhh....

1. I learnt to program during my final year of primary school on a ZX81, complete with wobbly RAMPack.

2. I eventually was bought a VIC-20 by my parents, to whom I immediately demanded it be replaced with a more usable C-64.

3. A short time later, I got a modem for the C-64 that plugged into the cartridge slot, and opened up the world of fledgling BBSs, Prestel/Micronet and of course Commodore's own Compunet.

4. I became addicted to Shades (a MUD type game on Prestel).

5. I lost all my pocket money for about 5 years due to MASSIVE phone bills. ;)

6. Graduated to an Amiga 500, then 500+. Got heavily into the Amiga demo scene.

7. Moved over to an Amstrad 1512, which I slowly added an ISA based HDD, a 3.5" floppy drive for drive B: and a new NEC V30 CPU to replace the Intel 8086 and double it's speed. Also added an ISA modem card to continue my Shades addiction.

These days, I have a 42U rack of servers in my garage, and practically a laptop/tablet or desktop in every room of my house, plus a pile of unused kit, just... in... case...

Getting in to computing in the early days created a feeling that even the purchase of today's latest shiny phone or gadget cannot even hope to re-create.

Matt Groening reveals location of Simpsons' Springfield

Re: Indeed

This may help:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_of_a_Kind_%28TV_series%29

Baffling barcode-on-steroids stickers plaster the Earth

Re: Hands up everyone who...

I was hoping the codes in the article actually contained some secret URL or message :(

Powerful, wallet-sized Raspberry Pi computer sells out in SECONDS

Re: Re: Re: hopes to similarly jumpstart interes (like the BBC micro)

I wasn't aware that the EDU version would ship fully configured from a software point of view thank you for enlightening me. :) This of course mitigates much of what I said.

I saw in an earlier thread that you are part of the Pi team?

Re: hopes to similarly jumpstart interes (like the BBC micro)

This is the nut. It wasn't the BBC Model B that lit up students imagination, it was the BASIC ROM that came with it. All of sudden, within 30 seconds of typing you could run a program that actually did something.

For the Pi to provide the same instant gratification, you first have to install a Linux distro, configure it, install source libraries for your chosen language (none of which are as easy to learn as BASIC), and then jump through several more hoops to input your program and run it.

For example, on the BBC:

10 PRINT "HELLO WORLD"

RUN

On the Pi:

(1. Open a text editor)

sub main () {

printf("hello world");

}

(2. save file)

(3. open console)

(4. navigate to file location)

(5. run a compiler, if you even know what one of those is).

(6. run your program)

Steps 2 to 6 assume you already know the basics of how Linux works.

Because of this, I see the Pi failing to make an impact in schools. Also, students don't want a 'Hello World' program, they want 'Angry Birds 2012' and don't understand that it takes WAY more time than a typical ICT school lesson to create even the most basic of games.

Re: Earth to Grinch.....

Not to mention all the home automation tasks it could be doing - heating, lighting, feeding the cat etc.

Re: Re: Re: Pre-Order

So it wasn't just me that NEVER got the email saying when they'd be launched then ?

Scroogle unplugged for good this time

DIY Option

It's all too easy to knock up a semi-anonymous Google proxy:

http://www.jaruzel.com/projects/anonymous-google/

It's no where near as good as DuckDuckGo, and was written to prove a point (or for when I'm searching for something I REALLY don't want Google to tell Doubleclick all about).

Happy to share the source code for those that contact me.

The Register Comments Guidelines

No.

You choose to be anonymous. By definition you don't have an identity.

First Post... Not.

Now that comments auto post, can we at least have a a policy to auto ban anyone who does a pointes 'First Post!' type post on articles ?

Starship Voyager dumped into skip

Nope...

It's been on the market for years, and garnered a fair amount of publicity - No-one wanted it.

I would guess it had something to do with its location, and that it's a tiny one bedroom flat that no longer has anywhere for a bed.

Trojan Bidders

When it came to actually paying up, none of the bidders were serious. :(

'Why would I make any more Star Wars movies?'

...

If urinating in a bottle was good enough for Howard Hughes, then it should be good enough for the rest of us. :)

Virgin Media to push out nimble new broadband speeds

What about Virgin Media Business Customers?

I switched from VM Residential to VM Business simply so I could have up to 5 'reserved' IPs - I wont say static because they are still in the dynamic pool, they just never ever change. The switch over involved swapping my blue VM modem, for an identical black one (!) and dropping from 20mb/s to 10mb/s because you can't have reserved IPs on the 20mb/s or 50mb/s service.

So my question is - is this speed doubling also being offered to Virgin Media Business customers?

Darth Vader dies peacefully in hospital

..

Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, DZ-Jay. :)

Voyager 2 finally agrees to a long hard thrust

You seem to completely forget that the voyager crafts are getting on to being 40 years old. They simply do not have the processing power to parse any type of command script. I would presume that the commands are simple short single byte chains. Hence the repeated round robin of messages.

Google dumps + from Boolean search tool

I've always thought...

... that a 'front page only' search engine would be pretty cool.

All it indexes is the text and links on your main page (i.e. the first one that appears when you go to a domain on it's own). I think this would make 90% of common searches SO much more accurate and useful.

Thoughts?

Fujitsu installs Windows 7... on a phone

Ignorant

Windows gets security updates once a month on a Tuesday - it's easy to predict. You can also turn of the auto reboot if you prefer to manage that part yourself.

I'm all for OS rivalry (else there'd be no innovation) but at least get your facts straight first.

-Jar

Akira Blu-ray remastered disc set

Not just you.

I like Ninja Scroll too. :)

90% of visitors declined ICO website's opt-out cookie

Totally Agree

As a small web-shop owner, I've had google-analytics installed since day one, but once the cookie monster law appeared over the horizon I looked into replacing what GA does with my own bit of code. After about 1 hour of fiddling with a bit of javascript and some backend ASP I ended up with almost the same data being collected but as an integrated (not third-party cookies) function in my site. It also ran much faster (at the page load end) than GA as well.

My point being, there are many Analytic systems out there but people continue to use Google's because it's free. Which is a shame, because bit by bit Google are strangling web innovation with their one-size fits all solutions. Most people don't bother looking at alternative ways of doing things because there's almost always a Google product that will do most of it for them...

Welcome to the turn-key Web, leave your ideas at the door.

London Ambulance Service downed by upgrade cockup

Business as Usual

"But technical problems forced 999 operators to use a manual system by "recording calls on paper and passing information to ambulance crews over the radio.""

So, like they used to do for several decades before they were computerised in the first place? Hardly an outage then.

IT upgrade failures are unfortunately a common occurrence. This sort of problem is simply a day-at-the-office for many large firms, if it hadn't have been the 999 service it wouldn't have made the news.

NASA kills comms with deceased Mars rover

Joan Baez

I recently bought Silent Running on DVD (it's dirt cheap on all the major DVD webshops) to re-live my childhood memory of watching it, and I'm glad to say that although VERY dated it is still very emotive. I'm glad I re-visited it.

Remastered 4K, 3D Titanic steams towards cinemas

You are missing one MAJOR thing.

If you have Titanic on DVD (is it out on Blu-ray?) put it in your player and skip to the night shots of Titantic on the ocean. What you'll see is a seriously bad low-res render of a CGI ship. It's as bad as something I rendered up on my Amiga 1200 during the early 90s. Accepting that CGI in the late 90s still had a long way to go (some of the CGI in Phantom Menace is just as ropey) it's still a very bad render - If Cameron is doing this then he MUST re-render all of the ship shots else it's all pointless waste of time.

Steve Jobs screws my wife (out of $944)

The REAL Question is...

...where can I get one of those wonderful el-reg Coffee Mugs?

The Register and Australia-New Zealand

Ditto

Whereas I welcome this extra bit of news sourcing, I hope to god you are not planning to 'localise' the UK feed to promote UK based news in favour of global stories. As everyone knows, the UK has no IT industry to speak of and we'll end up just reading about failed Government IT upgrades day in and day out.

I want an uncensored feed of ALL your stories please, I read initially via RSS and then click through to the main site to read any articles of interest so please keep that feed unadulterated and full content.

Thanks.

HTC 7 Pro WinPho 7 smartphone

HTC have many...

I currently use a HTC TouchPro2 and before that a HTC TyTN II - both of which have slide out and fold up keyboards. Unfortunately they are also WinMobile 6.5 so completely lacking in useful apps and large finger friendly icons...

Thankfully, HTC seem committed to keeping usable (unlike some of the android models I've seen) keyboards on their high end phones, so much so that I *may* be tempted to go the WinPhone7 route after all...

Seriously?

It's the Euro symbol: €

Over here in the place where the history comes from, we have no need for your funny monopoly money.

Google opens curtain on 'manual' search penalties

Almost Impossible...

As small web-trader with a custom written web-shop and blog we've found it almost impossible to sit in a good place in Google rankings without purchasing adwords space. Our main problem is our core Google pagerank, which since the last algorithm adjustment is now back to zero.

Our site is fully optimised for the products we sell, all the meta tags are correct, the urls are friendly, the images have full titles, the body of each page is keyword heavy, the sitemap is current and auto-submitted, the rss feed is fomatted correctly, and the youtube account (as that's Google too) is linked to the site. From an SEO point of view we've done everything we can to increase our visibility.

All of which is utterly pointless if you can't get any of the big-hitter sites to link to you. Incoming links feature so heavily in Google's ranking system that without them you may as well give up.

Their index is dominated by high ranking sites who will not link to you unless you are also a high ranking site, making it a closed members-only group - good luck breaking into that.

We're a small outfit, and don't have £100,000s to spend on advertising or 'bribing' for non adword links. We're 3 years into trading and our web visibility has just taken a nose dive.

This is why I hate Google. They are not a search engine, they are the Gatekeepers of the Internet; They fully control what you see and what you don't. Thinking that they are offering you a (free) service is pure folly.

RoboCop statue fundraiser hits $50k

DVD Movies...

Yup - I got it wrong. It's the Prime Directives Miniseries which on DVD is 4 'Movies' - I watched them back to back - which is why I thought it was 2 not 4. My bad :)

Decent Movie Sequel...

... One can only dream.

Robocop 2 was bad in a second-movie kind of way, but the kiddie friendly Robocop 3 was a travesty in sequel making equal almost to Highlander 2.

Although, the two Made-for-DVD movies weren't THAT bad.. And the Graphic Novel IS Awesome...

-Jar

Terminator coz theres no Robocop icon! (el reg, please add one!)

In defence of Comic Sans

I <3 Comic Sans

There I said it. I set the default font in all the chat apps I use, to a dark purple Comic Sans 11pt. By doing this, I am saying I'm friendly and easy going, please talk to me. Nothing will stop me from using it, and group chat, I stand out, because I'm the one with the friendly font...

National Rail tweaks departure board API, 'orders' coder to kill site

The mobile pages aren't too bad...

The main National Rail pages are awful now - slow to load and full of overkill Ajax requests... but the mobile portal is still usable (until National Rail kill it off in favour of an overprices iPhone-only app)

Official National Rail Mobile Site: http://pda.nationalrail.co.uk/

-Jar

Indiana judges dismiss girl's nipple exposure appeal

Surely...

The correct ruling was to ban topless exposure of both genders ?

Naked woman demands cab ride to Michigan

The title is required, and must contain letters and/or digits.

You mean Billy Connolly's wife, the clinical psychologist, and writer of his biography?

The art of desktop deployment

However..

Scripted Install takes way longer than dumping an image on. To be honest I would argue that a scripted install loads the system any more than imaging does - all a scripted install is, is a bunch of copy commands and bit of hardware interrogation.

Hardware failure is such a minor risk on proper OEM equipment, that the speed options of imaging totally out weigh the safety of a scripted install. Lest not forget also, that WDS and SCCM also support a hybrid of both approaches where a base 'image' is dumped onto the hardware and then a set of scripted tasks tailor the install to completion.

Even Microsoft have left the scripted install behind, with post-Vista OS's all using an image dump from deployment media onto hard disk as the first phase of the OS install.

Man uses meat cleaver to fashion UK-ready iPad

Are They ?

As I'm left handed, I find that all nail scissors come convex. Most Annoying. My toenails look very odd indeed.