Posts by Johan Bastiaansen

How one techie ended up paying the tab on an Apple Macintosh Plus

stupid is as stupid does

How about people who mail a foto

...

in a word document.

Or an offer,

in a word document.

How about someone working in administration in a school, who was sent a list of pupils in a word document (of course) pouring over pages and pages looking for one student. I leaned over, pressed CTRL F. She shrugged and said, learn something new every day. And yes, that school does provide computer lessons.

How about meeting someone working in administration in a school who's showing you she's going to send you an email and you sit there as she's indexfingering the entire email and she finishes by making three typos in her own name, and each time she DELs out all the way to the typo and tries again. Someone could literally have tripled her productivity by setting up her signature in outlook. This was they same school that provides computer lessons to anybody ... but their own staff obviously.

How about getting and email from your bank, containing a PDF file that you had to print, fill in and sign by hand, scan and mail back to them. I'm assuming someone would have to type it into their computer on their end. Then getting an email from them a couple of weeks later asking to vote for their website and declare it was the best banking website in the country?

This was not in the previous millennium. One of those was only a couple of months ago.

Foreign Office IT chaos: Shocking testimony reveals poor tech support hindered Afghan evac attempts

Re: Organisation

We didn't have computers then.

Scam-baiting YouTube channel Tech Support Scams taken offline by tech support scam

Really? Drunken rage would have been my cover up as it is only temporary.

Stupidity lasts a life time.

What is your greatest weakness? The definitive list of the many kinds of interviewer you will meet in Hell

No no, this can't be true

There's on war on talent going on remember?

Sorry, war for talent. For, not on.

Waymo self-driving robotaxi goes rogue with passenger inside, escapes support staff

it tries to escape?

The technician has to chase the car. It looks like they can't shut it down remotely or order it to stay put. How is that not a problem?

Ex IBM sales manager, fired after battling discrimination against subordinates, wins $11m lawsuit

But we saw you do it ! ! !

""IBM does not condone retaliation, race discrimination, or any other form of discrimination."

Docking £500k commission from top SAS salesman was perfectly legal, rules judge

Judge Holmes wouldn't recognize "wisdom" if it bit him in the pussy.

You worry that I make too much money.

So I worry that you make too much money.

Now no neither of us won't.

Happy now?

It is 60 years since the first cosmonaut reached orbit and 40 years since the Shuttle first left the launchpad

Re: Also see also...

So a sloppy maintenance engineer killed him instead.

IBM so very, very sorry after jobs page casually asks hopefuls: Are you white, black... or yellow?

optional

So the options are insulting but the question is not?

Suunto settles scary scuba screwup for $50m: 'Faulty' dive computer hardware and software put explorers in peril

Can not be true

No no no, this can not be true.

The Fins are a very ethical people.

So no.

It's been 5 years already, let's gawp at Microsoft and Nokia's bloodbath

But, but, but . . .

These Scandinavians are so very ethical

...

and competent.

IBM bans all removable storage, for all staff, everywhere

Who knew

Who know IBM would worry about "possible financial and reputational damage".

Your software hates you and your devices think you're stupid

Re: Genuine Senior Management Quote

My friend told me this. The company he's working for is being "integrated" with 2 others. They all use different software and it will be replaced by completely new software. As the firms have different maintenance contracts for their current software, management has cleverly optimized the transition, so they will save 30.000 € on maintenance invoices.

This means that nearly 100 people will have to be trained with the new software twice. You heard that right, they're going from software A to software B, then finally to software D in a period of six months.

Oh, and also the database will have to be converted twice.

Don’t fight automation software for control, just turn it off. FAST

Re: Turkish Airlines Flight 1951

"The historic accident record would indicate that, as far as aviation is concerned, that is in fact correct. The problem is you don't see the accidents that would be happening if all landings were made manually."

Why would you say that? You seem to think that most landing are done on autopilot. That's not correct, most landings are done manually. Usually, only landings in poor weather conditions are done on autopilot.

Also, take into account that pilots are blamed, even when it's blatantly obvious that it's the precious autopilot who crashed the plane. So you can't trust the historic accident record either.

Re: How is the insurance industry taking all this?

So, after reading the article, you decided that the problem is that AVs would be TOOOO safe???

Turkish Airlines Flight 1951

Another fine example of pilots fighting the automatic controls, losing the fight and paying with their lives.

And finally being blamed by the people who designed and/or approved the faulty system.

What makes this even more bitter is that pilots were ordered by management to use autopilot while landing. Because every non-techie knows that complex automated systems are for more trustworthy than trained professionals.

Re: We had crashes because the autopilot disengaged without the pilots noticing...

"It can't really be blamed on the averaging."

No, it can and should be blamed on averaging. Averaging two similar inputs is appropriate. Averaging two very different or even opposite inputs is clearly a mistake. This was an error in the system.

Because the system was designed and approved by people who were later asked to decide who was to blame, they decided to blame the pilots. But they shouldn't have been allowed on de judges seat, they should have been in the booth of the accused.

It seems we humans are simply not capable of building complex and robust systems.

Yet non-techies, like politicians, managers and other fools, are very impressed by complex systems, probably because they are very expensive.

Re: We had crashes because the autopilot disengaged without the pilots noticing...

"This is a bit like the Air France flight 447 crash. Where the aircraft was "averaging" the inputs of the two pilots - whose cockpit discipline had broken down and were both trying to fly the plane at once. This is a situation that can't be allowed - and the automation shouldn't allow."

This really is a no-brainer. One of the pilots is called the captain, the other is the called the co-pilot.

The software must be designed by morons, there is no other logical explanation.

Find them, throw them out of a flying helicopter.

NEXT!

You will see the quality of the software increase dramatically.

The e-waste warrior, 28,000 copied Windows restore discs, and a fight to stay out of jail

Re: Oh, come on

"The prosecutor was quite open about this, he said that "Microsoft wants his head on a platter"."

That's an admission of guilt right there. The prosecutor is not working for Microsoft, he's working for the state.

If he's taking orders from Microsoft, he should be fired and prosecuted.

'Please store the internet on this floppy disk'

Tech support chap: The one connecting the computer to the printer.

You guys sold him the entire system, set everything up, but didn't hook up the printer.

You had one of these "ooh, I'm so smart" techie guys over there who just knows for sure he doesn't have to test or explain anything. Didn't you?

Microsoft's foray into phones was a bumbling, half-hearted fiasco, and Nadella always knew it

Re: Lack of "cool"...

Indeed. I remember having an Ipaq 3970 15 years ago. With the GSM/GPRS sleeve and TOM TOM it did exactly what any smartphone does now.

Oracle sues its own star sales rep after she wins back $200k in pay fight

Re: Oracle Corporation

"Exactly. Every company I can think of would be tickled and gladly pay for someone exceeding quota by more than 250%. Or does Larry need a new sailboat?"

You would think that, wouldn't you. But no.

Re: Oracle Corporation

"Exactly. Every company I can think of would be tickled and gladly pay for someone exceeding quota by more than 250%. Or does Larry need a new sailboat?"

You would think that wouldn't you. But no.

Those online ads driving you bonkers are virtually 'worthless for brands'

Re: Puzzled

You say that, but.

They're morons who are making lots of money behaving like morons. So not so stupid after all.

The real morons are the companies who give them their money to piss of their customers.

Are these the same morons who explain to us that the reason the economy is in a slump because our wages are too expensive?

Yes, but they only only do that because they think we're even bigger morons.

How stupid do you have to be to think that we're morons?

Pretty stupid indeed.

You say that, but.

These morons are also making lots of money.

So who's the moron now?

Virgin America mid-flight panic after moron sets phone Wi-Fi hotspot to 'Samsung Galaxy Note 7'

CE

The Samsung Galaxy Note 7 carries a CE mark doesn't it?

Well then!

RAF Reaper drone was involved in botched US Syria airstrike

Most unfortunate

We can question the ethical standards of our allies (technically they are not), but such is the nature of compromise.

This will set back a diplomatic solution, if it doesn't make it impossible.

Why were we carrying out this airstrike so deep in Syrian territory, with Syrian military in close proximity, just days after the agreement? Surely the Russians were in a better position to deal with this as they probably have a direct com link with these Syrians.

Microsoft: You liked Windows 10 so much, you'll get 2 more in 2017

Windows 7 and prior to that, XP and 2000 and even NT4 have been quite good

ah yes, we were younger then, weren't we.

You deleted the customer. What now? Human error - deal with it

not human error, but sheer stupidity

One of my clients was a company, run by two brothers. One of them died. I made a note of that in our CRM software, indicating he shouldn't be contacted anymore. That comment got removed by HQ and they continued to contact him. The company complained to me and I put the note back in. Again, it got removed by HQ and they continued to contact him.

I put the comment back in with a warning to a Dutch twat and the physical damage I had in store for him if he removed the note again.

So they deleted him as a contact person and with that went all information, emails, visits and contracts that were linked to him.

We're not looking for MH370 in the wrong place say investigators

the problem with stupid people

is that they have all very logical and sane explanations on why they have come to such a stupid decision. And they are determined to repeat their mistakes if given the chance. That's why a firing squad is an optimal solution, also because we don't want them to procreate.

1. It DID override the pilots, it should have automatically disengaged when the pilots throttled up, instead it throttled back down. You admit as much, but you blame the pilots for "neglecting to disengage the commanded autothrottle and let it resume control, not noticing that the thrust levers moved back to idle when they took their hands off." So you're expecting the pilots, in a very stressful situation, to actually FIGHT the system that is supposed to support them. While letting off the hook the people that have designed a basically flawed system, sitting comfortable at their desk. POOR DESIGN.

2. So sending the correct invoice is more important to these companies than knowing where their plane is. Again, only to crazy people this makes sense. Just because they wear a tie and are able to speak coherent sentences in English, that doesn't make them any less crazy, just more dangerous.

3. "the warnings triggered as designed but because the horn sound used isn't unique it confused the flight crew into debugging the wrong problem". Confusing error messages eh. Well I guess that makes it alright then. No it doesn't. Are you saying there is no digital screen in this entire cockpit where they could put this vital information on. In big red blinking letters? So they're drowning the pilots in useless information and obscuring the most urgent information available. But somehow that is pilot error, instead of what it obviously is? POOR DESIGN.

4. What is more likely, a single mad men at the controls or the only sane person at the controls.

Let's face it, it's designed by a committee. All the good pilots are flying the planes, and all the crappy pilots, and a couple of accountants and MBA types are sitting in the committee. And they are also the ones shouting "pilot error" when everything falls apart.

Re: Who designed this?

Very clever? I wonder.

I remember a Turkish airliner where the pilot was effectively overruled by the automatic pilot who decided the plane had already landed so it simply refused to continue flying. So it crashed short of the landing strip in Schiphol. Of course, that was decided human error as well, because hey, the pilot is always in control right. In my opinion: poor design.

Not squawking useful information like location, heading and speed: poor design.

No warning when the automatic oxygen system isn't activated: poor design

The autopilot deciding the plane has already landed because an altimeter shows a reading that's blatantly wrong: poor design.

Deciding to shut the cabin door with only one pilot at the controls: stupid! Whoever decided this should be put in front of a firing squad. Live ammo for me please.

Blaming the pilot for this: incompetents covering their ass.

Who designed this?

"the lack of a squawk that said something useful about location and status is something that is trivial to remedy" Why is it squawking only gibberish and not something usefull then. Surely a couple of coordinates, heading and speed every 15 minutes doesn't take to much bandwidth?

Helios 522 "the pilots hadn't seen that the oxygen system was not activated" Gee, and nobody ever considered putting a warning on a vital system?

"and the remaining pilot turned the pressurisation mode to manual". A "kill all the passengers button" can be very handy indeed. Could I get one installed in my car you think? Or would that raise eyebrows?

So again, who designed this?

Facebook ‘glitch’ that deleted the Philando Castile shooting vid: It was the police – sources

Re: Guns don't kill people....

Civil war is all fun and games, until the enemy starts to shoot back.

The Windows Phone story: From hope to dusty abandonware

Re: Pocket PC

Exactly. I used to have an Ipaq 3970 with GSM/GPRS sleeve and GPS with TimTim. It was a bit of a brick, but it basically did then what a smartphone does now. Except 15 years ago.

Terrified robots will take middle class jobs? Look in a mirror

Terrified robots will take middle class jobs

Stop scaring the robots then!

Microsoft struggles against self-inflicted Office 365 IMAP outage

who could have thunked?

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ... [wipes away tears] ... ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha...!

Five technologies you shouldn't bother looking out for in 2016

6. 3D printing

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ... [wipes away tears] ... ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha...!

Death Stars are a waste of time – here's the best way to take over the galaxy

But . . .

wouldn't that make for a rather dull movie?

IT bloke: Crooks stole my bikes after cycling app blabbed my address

it was bad design

I'm so old, I remember when cars came without safety belts. But hey, you could add them yourself.

Kids pyjamas would be so inflammable, they would turn your offspring in a burned crisp in seconds. But hey, a parent should keep them away from open fires right?

It is bad design. And the only way it will be corrected is to enforce it by making them pay for the damages caused by their stupidity.

Re: Common sense

It should have been the default setting!

In all fairness to Strava, that's just bs, giving their lawyer some legal ammunition.

Bad design.

Drivers? Where we’re going, we don’t need drivers…

Re: Get a grip on reality

Exactly. At the moment we see careless drivers explaining to the judge that the accident really wasn't their fault but the judge won't believe them.

In the future we'll see careless coders explain to the judge that the accident really wasn't their fault and there's a big chance they'll get away with it.

Volkswagen blames emissions cheating on 'chain of errors'

edged out of the company

"The executives that pushed for SCR were edged out of the company, and those in favor of NOX traps won out."

Turning a technical problem into a political game, sure sign of a toxic company culture.

Tablet computer zoom error saw plane fly 13 hours with 46cm hole

Re: A tablet in a cockpit is a recipe for disaster.

Such an incident is always a combination of mistakes and misunderstandings.

Communication from the tower was confusing. From GavinCs post: "They were instructed to depart "Runway 09#T1", which is used to refer to a full length takeoff. It seems they may have confused this with a take-off beginning from taxiway T1."

Also, airports have radar, yet nobody noticed they didn't start take off from the start correct spot? Why isn't the remaining length of the runway indicated at each taxiway?

Who sets up these fragile systems and keeps getting away with it?

Better not ask these questions and blame the pilots.

Re: Goooooooo Bill

"They were instructed to depart "Runway 09#T1", which is used to refer to a full length takeoff. It seems they may have confused this with a take-off beginning from taxiway T1."

Well, that's confusion terminology isn't it. They could have called the departing aircraft T1 and the control tower also T1 I guess.

We don't need these sloppy systems that are so prone to error and misunderstandings.

We need robust systems, where an error is corrected.

Surely the airport has radar as well. Didn't anybody notice that the plane didn't take off from the start of the runway?

Why doesn't the runway count down in big numbers the remaining length of the runway at every 500 meters? Noooo, we have a smart system with coloured lines. Off course you do. And when the aircraft reaches the coloured lines, it's too late to abort the take off. How very smart of you.

No doubt they will attribute it to human error again. They've got that right, but they're aiming at the wrong humans. They are the ones who pile mistake on mistake and refuse to accept any responsibility.

These systems is set up by fools who see no problem in losing a plane fully loaded with crew and passengers in mid-air and see no reason to install a simple GPS system like the ones installed in company owned vans and trucks.

Can't we give them a rubber dinghy and make them search the seas for that missing Malaysian airliner?

Ex-IT staff claim Disney fired them then gave their jobs H-1B peeps

Re: This will end ...

Either way, we should demand that prosecution gives it a try. Even if it ends in a stalemate, the masks will have to fall.

This will end ...

when rats are put behind cold steel bars...

Don't just fine the company. Find the people who ok'd this and jail them.

One-armed bandit steals four hours of engineer's busy day

Re: you turn it OFF and THEN you turn it ON......got it?

Sometimes you just turn it on.

This is a few decades ago, and it didn't happen to me, but to a colleague. I know, I know, it always happens to a colleague, but this time I saw him drive away, return the next day and I saw the visitors report.

So the customer is in a frenzy because they want the printer to print, and it doesn't print. Is the green light on? We are assured the green light is on. Are any other lights blinking? Is there enough paper. No, yes, yes & yes.

So we send someone over. The green light is not on, the printer is not on, it is turned off. Also, the plug is disconnected from the socket. Customer explains that perhaps he saw the reflection of the sunlight. Except there's no window in the room. Anyway, 2 days work and one embarrassed customer.

A couple of months ago I visited a customer and had to print a report there. He insisted that the report should be printed on that thare printer. Since it was the default printer that everybody used in the office all the time.

Printer was turned off, the electrical cord was missing, there was not a single sheet of paper in it. It was covered in dust, it was clear it hadn't been touched in at least year.

Took me 1 hour to get it working again, changed to report to charge the extra hour. Customer pretended to be surprised. I pulled procedure on the prick with enthusiasm.

Flawless Dutch does for cuffed duo in CoinVault ransomware probe

huh?

There's no such thing as flawless Dutch.

Ahmed's clock wasn't a bomb, but it blew up the 'net and Zuckerberg, Obama want to meet him

Re: A picture at last

I hate to say this, but I'm afraid the police got it right this time. At least, looking at the picture, it looks like a hoax bomb.

Of course, it also looks like a clock. And it is a clock. But can it also be a hoax bomb?

It's definitely not a time bomb. A time bomb is an explosive with a clock to set it off. Since there's no explosive, it's not a time bomb. But the police never claimed it was a time bomb, they claimed it was a hoax bomb. And a hoax bomb doesn't require an explosive. Or to be more accurate, the mere presence of an explosive would disqualify it as a hoax bomb, it would have been a time bomb.

So the police is right, it looks like a hoax bomb. To be more precisely, it looks like a digital clock and that's exactly what a hoax bomb looks like.

However, does that make it a hoax bomb? In my opinion no.

According to Cambridge English Dictionary: a hoax is a ​plan to ​deceive someone, such as ​telling the ​police there is a ​bomb ​somewhere when there is not one.

So for it to not be a clock, but a hoax bomb, Ahmad would have be running around in the school shouting "Bomb Bomb". But probably "Die all you infidels" would also qualify.

I don't know whether he did that, we can't ascertain looking at the picture. But since there are no reports he did, we must assume he didn't.

There fore, the object in the picture looks like a clock and is a clock.

It also looks like a hoax bomb, but it is not a hoax bomb.

Glad I was able to clear that up for you.

Pro tip: Servers belong in dry server rooms, not wet cloakrooms

Re: I am just amazed by the original "IT contractor" doing that.

It is quite possible that the morons decided to hang their coats in the server room and they felt cheated when the IT contractor warned them not to do that.