Posts by GreenOgre

NHS England claims it will be all-digital within the decade

all-digital ...

and paper-less too!

LESTER gets ready to trundle: The Register's beer-bot has a name

Starter kit

I'd suggest starting off with a base model Roomba or their open robotics version (without the brushes, etc).

Good solid mechanics with an open interface for control. Solves the mechanical issues and lets you concentrate on navigation and avoiding spillage.

Four-pronged ARM-based Mac rumor channels Rasputin

Re: Difficulties and Implications

Who cares if it's not as fast as xyz processor?

My car isn't as fast as an Aston Martin but can carry Wife, kids and Mother-In-Law across town in a third the time it would take in the Aston. (Hint: the Aston would need two trips)

I don't mind carrying an ARM Chromebook in my carry-on, I prefer to leave my quad-core i7 "laptop" on a desk that's braced to support it.

ARM is plenty fast enough for 90% of day-to-day tasks, though perhaps that i7 laptop can save you a bundle on your gym membership?

Re: Analyst = STUPID

> "because half of Mac laptop buyers want to run Windows apps at least once in a while"

So? Push them up the margin curve to the MacBook Pro. If they NEED S+MS Windows, they will willingly pay through the nose

Re: Hmmm....

The difficulties between iOS and MacOS are in the screen size and input methods.

For most Linux apps I have tried to compile for ARM it has simply been a case of changing an "available architectures" flag.

For applications running on Unix-like OSes such as iOS, OSX and Linux, changing architectures is almost trivial once the compilers are available for that arch.

However, there is still the Human Interface element of making your windows and dialogue boxes usable on both an iPhone and Thunderbolt display! But then, that's why you developers get paid the big bucks! :-)

Re: ARM vs. x86

> I just don't really understand what that reason is.

"It's not what we're used too"

Most IT folks and "power users" are still mired in the limited and restrictive Wintel "ecosystem".

Viewing the comments above shows that even fairly knowledgeable people are entirely unaware of how easy it is to port code from a modern operating system between architectures. Binaries for ARM systems can be compiled on Intel platforms (or vice versa) alongside their native versions FROM IDENTICAL CODE.

An OS vendor (e.g. Apple) simply has to provide the tools and a couple extra check boxes in their SDK.

Build package for ?

1: MacBook Pro

2: MacBook Air

3. iPad

4. MacBook Vacuum

5. All of the above

Upload to Apple Store? Y/n

Job done!

Windows 8.1: So it's, er, half-speed ahead for Microsoft's Plan A

Re: Search as primary means of navigation?

> "A lot quicker typing a few characters..."

just like the BASH shell?

Same problem too, If I don't remember the name of the executable, how do I find it?

Let's face it, "search" has the same purpose as Firefox's "Awsome Bar". It's not there to help YOU, it's there to provide statistics for targeted ads and steer you where they want you to go.

YES, Xbox One DOES need internet, DOES restrict game trading

Re: hmmm? @Auyagi Aichou

> "Sure, I'm the one who supports paying them [developers] for their efforts"

Unless each game is written entirely from scratch with zero re-use of code then, using your logic, each sequential title from a developer should be progressively cheaper. e.g. If the first title developed using a specific "engine" sells for $80, the price of the second (and subsequent) title(s) should not include the cost of developing the "engine". This is obviously not the case.

If the developers can re-use code, then users can "re-use" games.

Boffins build ant-sized battery, claim it's tough enough to start a car

Re: ... a power density of 7.4mW cm−2 μm−1 ....

Yes,

mWh / m3 = energy density

mW / m3 = power density

e.g. How hard it can kick, not how many times it can kick.

Re: 3-dimensional electrodes

<over simplification>

The conventional electrode is 3D but the part that reacts (the exposed surface) is pretty much 2D - think "outside surface of a tube", surface = 2 x Pi x radius x length.

"3d" electrodes have much more complex reactive surfaces - think "lots of hollow spheres with both inside and outside exposed", surface = 8 x Pi x radius(squared) x number of spheres.

</over simplification>

Still pitching to CIOs? You're living in the PAST

Re: Sure!

Couldn't agree more but remember this article is aimed at THE CHANNEL.

When it comes to "selling Cloud", why reduce your chances of success by including someone who UNDERSTANDS your "product" in the process?

Netbooks projected to become EXTINCT by 2015

Re: eee-901, still going...

Hey, me too!

added a 128GB SSD and it's been solid since 2009.

Now looking at an Asus Chromebook to replace it.

I've got servers with horsepower, why stretch my arms (and wallet) carrying a ton of battery and screen around?

Bye, bye PC, you were fun in the 90's.

Library ebooks must SELF-DESTRUCT if scribes want dosh - review

Re: What’s the point?

or they could stop living in denial and accept that times have changed, make less money because they are providing less value (to both authors and readers) and if they don't like that, they can go get a job elsewhere. Wasn't it a Conservative MP who famously said "On your bike, Pal."?

Gartner: RIP PCs - tablets will CRUSH you this year

Re: Hey El Reg

"Every year we see these predictions that the PC is dead. "

With a patient this sick, it isn't a prediction. It's the inevitable outcome for an advanced cancer patient.

No pressing need for hardware upgrades,

Microsoft Windows Vista shattered the "latest is greatest" myth.

MS internally gridlocked by ladder-climbers.

Real competition for Intel on hardware.

Apple presented an alternate to the wintel model and Samsung are taking it to the masses.

The game has changed and MS can't.

WAKEY, WAKEY, Wintel Fanbois!!

Review: Intel Next Unit of Computing barebones desktop PC

Re: Celeron version

or, for much better value, the Core i5 version.

2.5GHz i5, 4GB RAM, 500GB HDD, FULL thunderbolt, HDMI, 1G ethernet, 3 x USB3, SD card slot, Firewire 800, built in power supply.

Only 100 quid more than the NUC tested here.

Vendor? The fruity one.

ARM, TSMC tape out 64-bit Cortex-A57 chip on 16 nanometers

Re: A ARM-PC?

If users accept the "iPhone-ization" of OS X that has been trending with Lion and Mountain Lion and all apps come through the "app store" then it wouldn't be an issue at all.

With Unix-like systems (e.g. OS X and Linux), there are no technical barriers to compiling apps on multiple architectures. My experience (with ArchLinux) suggests that >90% can be ported without any changes at all.

Of course, Intel won't like it and this is another area where MS's legacy OS is completely fscked.

LOHAN fans drawn to magnetic coupling

Re: MY shed includes ELECTRO-magnets.

Sodding great battery already present to supply heater. A coil from a small solenoid would draw less than the heater.

Gravity would do most of the work but a small latch-plate on the rocket (sprung to allow some movement) would stick pretty well. I will see if I can find some current ratings ...

MY shed includes ELECTRO-magnets.

In MY shed I have relays and other electro-magnetic devices.

Small electromagnet on the truss retains a ferrous contact plate on the rocket. Triggering the motor igniter would drop the current to the electromagnet (via relay or other, more devious, means) allowing the rocket to depart with zero friction or magnetic drag and zero trailing wires.

Cheap, simple, effective. What more could a ballocketeer ask for?

Drilling into 3D printing: Gimmick, revolution or spooks' nightmare?

@Dave 126

"How many people do you know currently own a Dremmel rotary tool? .... I know of two people who own one- a professional sculptor and and a hobbyist jewellery maker. I can't see the market for consumer 3D printers being much bigger."

... and there's only a world market for about five computers.

Microsoft Surface Pro sales CANNIBALIZING Surface RT

Re: years too late

"Except with a more powerful CPU/GPU, a better OS, a better screen, an injection moulded magnesium chassis, a 3mm thick touch keyboard cover and software inc Microsoft Office."

... So those "improvements" would be reflected in the sales figures then?

Microsoft exec: No 'Plan B' despite mobile stumbles

Re: OSX versioning stuff @ AC

Hint:

"Save a version... " can be used to keep versions.

It really is a shame how Windows allows users to _do_ things without developing an _understanding_ of what they are doing.

@ GBL Initialiser

Hmmm, I think the point is that re-arranging the user interface IS the same thing they have always done.

See http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/rearrange_the_deck_chairs_on_the_Titanic

Re: Sounds familiar

Isn't it a sign of insanity to repeatedly perform the same action while expecting different results?

Re: Or with Windows CE @ Ragarath

... except there's nothing new here, just a shrunk down version of the "tablet" they've been punting for 10 years or more. Laptops are laptops, tablets are tablets. It was Microsoft's failure to separate the two that gave Apple their opportunity.

Go on, buy one. I'm sure it will make a fine conversation piece in years to come.

Windows Vista woes killed MS Pinball

Re: Good job no-ones using Win 8 then!

Oops! You're a little behind the times aren't you? Goldman-Sachs stats for consumer market share:

Windows = 20%, Apple = 24%, Linux > 42% (all versions, including Android)

Who's laughing now, eh?

ref: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/12/13/windows_market_share_just_20percent/

Upping your game with Windows Server 2012

Yawn.... Why bother?

All that effort to follow the dodo?

Titans of tech: Why I'll never trust 'em

Re: Business is king.

> I'd move towards FOSS if it wasn't for one little issue: the users.

On the few occasions where I have given users a PC running Linux instead of Windows, they didn't actually notice. They noticed that their mail app was different or that Office looked a little different but they had no clue that they weren't using Windows.

Users have problems with changes in the way apps work, you get the same reaction moving them (on Windows) from MS Office to OpenOffice/OfficeLibre as you do from, say, MS Office 2003 to MS Office 2007. There is no difference in the learning curve, they don't really notice the different brand. Microsoft have numbed them to the pain with their "shuffle the deckchairs and pretend things are better" approach to UI "upgrades" between versions. Take advantage of this end-user training by Microsoft and upgrade your users to something that greatly lowers your company's IT costs.

Moving to Linux won't be any more painful than "upgrading" Microsoft Windows.

GPS-equipped sheep prove herd mentality exists

@NumptyScrub

" then check the model against observed data and correct accordingly (the model that is, not the data)."

so this isn't climate science then?

Forget internet fridges and Big Data. Where's my internet fish tank?

Re: Alternatively ....

at least the carbon emission would be deferred until spring .....

Surface: Because Microsoft does so well making hardware?

Re: iPad?@David Webb

Get yer head out the sand! We're well aware of the traditional view. The same view that HP, RIM, et al had when they created their wildly successful tablets.

The world has moved on. The point of a tablet is that it DOES NOT have what you call a "full OS". (Let's face it, they don't come much "fuller" than MS Windows, how can you pack so little into so much code?) It's "lite", it's simple, you don't have to fiddle for days to make it useful. Come to think of it, it's kinda like a book. Open it, read it, put it down and it's just the same when you pick it up the next day.

Same old wintel business model that had served so well, churning along for so many years. Bloated software requiring faster hardware enabling more bloated software requiring faster hardware, ad nauseam.

Post Y2K, the model faltered. Microsoft maintained their profits by sucking margin out of the channel that had made them rich. Everyone in denial until Vista burst the bubble in spectacular fashion.

Business won't care about Microsoft Windows 8. Microsoft knows they will stay on Microsoft Windows XP and Microsoft Windows 7 so, in desperation, they are taking the risk and ignoring business in this latest application of pig lipstick.

Remember Novell? They got out-flanked by Microsoft and retaliated by trying to copy them. Bought WordPerfect to compete with Microsoft Office. Where are they now?

Microsoft have been out-flanked by Apple. They too are retaliating by copying their successor. Guess where Microsoft's gonna be in a few years.

PS. Microsoft are making much more sense on the server side as they try to emulate UNIX. A scripting tool that kinda works and GUI-less servers.

Nokia after the purge: It's so unfair

Re: Sad

It's tough on people in the short term (been there, done that, got the dole cheque) but those thousands of very talented people have had their bureaucratic shackles removed.

There must be a pile of open-source code that Nokia's engineers, freed from Nokia, can leverage into a very bright future.

I need to multitask, but Windows 8's Metro won't let me

Re: Multi-tasking includes proof-reading?

Hey Trevor!

Amazing how we can produce "minor errors without out conscious attention", eh?

Pirate island attracts more than 100 startup tenants

Re: 18 lifeboats for 1000 techho-entrepreneurs

There will be 18 dedicated lifeboats,

any additional demand will be fulfilled by "The Cloud".

LOHAN ideas..

Stiff rod with lube should do it ....

My minimal experience with ground-level rocketry and extensive experience repairing fine mechanisms would suggest that if you lube your rod very lightly, (more to repel moisture than reduce friction) frozen droplets will be easily dislodged. Judge the size of the tube just right, too tight will build up lube and bind, too loose will just bind from offset thrust. (Talk to Goldilocks ...)

Should get LOHAN off like shit off a shiny shovel.

Why Windows 8 server is a game-changer

Re: Call me cynical but...

Brings to mind the words of George Santayana:-

Those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it.

and while we're there:-

Skepticism, like chastity, should not be relinquished to readily.

Election hacked, drunken robot elected to school board

Re: Forgive me if I'm wrong...

Perhaps, but it does't protect you from the group with the most to gain from tampering ... those on the INSIDE

Mutant heroes to rescue Ultrabooks from price trap

cheaper WITH the Windows Tax?

On hardware that ships without Windows, major manufacturers replace the Windows Tax with an "I don't want to upset Microsoft and lose my discount" tax. (Unless it'd from Job's lot)

Royal astro-boffin to MPs: Stop thinking about headlines

Eureka!

Great idea!

1. Remove all those dangerous additives from the food supply.

2. With lower quantities of less nutritious food available, life expectancy will plummet.

3. No-one will live long enough to get cancer.

4. Problem solved.

Graph life expectancy for the past 200 years and tell me again how dangerous those food additives are.

Poll: Linux's big data guzzling worries melt away

The data is there, you just have to ask for it!

The data is there, you just have to ask the system.

WMI, IPMI and good ol' SNMP (depending on the h/w manufacturer's tools) are the languages to talk.

A solid tool like Zabbix or Nagios will do the heavy lifting for you and combine ALL your monitoring, trending and alerting into one open system.

Got a few minutes to help LOHAN suck?

Ensure plenty of air supply to the liquid hydrogen to ensure complete combustion and remove the requirement to dispose of the waste hydrogen (or any thing else for that matter).

Light blue touch paper and retire....

It's time to end the Windows Wait

Well, maybe on Windows ....

Have a look at Apple's OSX Lion. YOU don't need to save to disk, that's done automatically. You can save "versions" of a document that you can revert to after thoroughly screwing everything up yourself.

ARM to wrestle quarter of laptop market from Intel

iphone/ipad/android have changed the landscape

Thanks to Mr. Jobs, consumers now accept non-MS Windows devices. Focus has shifted towards function and "looks".

In this "mobile" market, MS have much reduced clout to hold the manufacturers back, a factor that capped the success of earlier netbooks.

Cost of ARM v Intel and android/ios/linux v MS leaves higher margins on lower volumes for the manufacturers.

Apple and ARM have sidestepped the Wintel Cartel on our behalf.

Umbrella-wielding Steve Ballmer gets cloudy with Office 365

Cloud is good... if you own the cloud.

Your logic is somewhat flawed.

popular = improved ?? (Crazy Frog, anyone?)

SaaS and subscription WAS the way computing was done in the '60s. It was good for vendors, bad for customers. Nothing has changed in that department except that now you have a choice NOT to follow the lemmings.

Those who do not learn from history are bound to repeat it. (Who DID say that?)

HP rocks Redmond with webOS PC play

Physical Pedantry

Momentum in the wrong direction _IS_ inertia.

A body at rest is just one that is not moving in the direction or speed we would like it to.

Get the blinkers off, KiwiAndy!

There are already several F/OSS office apps/suites available that are written to be portable across architecture and OS. Who would bother with an immobile lump like MS Office? (which must be going to ARM at least.)

SAN vs NAS: Spelling out the differences

Recipe for a SAN...

A SAN is just NAS on a dedicated network with a larger price tag. Fibre Channel was largely a means to keep the vendor margin up.

DIY SAN:

Take 1 x86 server with a bunch of disks (recycled server is fine, it has the horsepower)

Add OpenFiler.com or FreeNAS.org and enable iSCSI

Add one or more application servers with dedicated NICS for storage network (any OS, even MS Windows does iSCSI now).

Mix all together through a Gigabit switch.

Prep time: 1hour

Bake time: 0

For that little extra something, use two NICS per host and bond the channels to get 2Gb/s and reliable connections.

Sales show WinPho 7 off to a flying start

Sales to the Faithful?

Since those are US figures, I suspect that most were bought as tokens of fealty to the fading Church of Windows. The rest because they were BO-GOF?

Enterprise fanbois yawn at death of Apple Xserve

Yeh, it sucks...

We were a signature away from a pilot project for a 5k mailbox "Exchange Replacement" project when they made the announcement. (could have been worse, could have been AFTER the pilot!)

That would have opened a crack in the Microsoft facade allowing cheaper and better alternatives into the company. X-Serve as a loss leader?

Hey Steve, how may other opportunities did you blow off with that decision?

No icons with Jobs in a clown hat?

Apple bars radiation nanny from App Store

When to gather moonbeams?

> "you only gather moonbeams whilst the moon is waxing. Gathering moonbeams whilst the moon is waining is just silly"

When to gather moonbeams? I'm sure there's an app for that.

NASA: Civilization will end in 2013 (possibly)

Hmmmmm, who's right?

Well, let's see,

Which publication is widely read and respected by scientists and which one has a history of misquoting scientific papers and refusing to correct the mistakes when requested by the original author?

Answers on a postcard ...

Here's a hint:

http://www.badscience.net/2009/01/the-telegraph-misrepresent-a-scientists-work-on-climate-and-then-refuse-to-correct-it-when-he-writes-to-them/