Because…
Posts by Sir Lancelot
63 publicly visible posts • joined 11 Sep 2009
Apple throws shade on pokey AI PCs, claims its maxed out M4 chips are 4x faster
German defense chat overheard by Russian eavesdroppers on Cisco's WebEx
Boeing goes boing: 757 loses a wheel while taxiing down the runway
United Airlines’ patience with Boeing is maxed out after repeated safety issues
RIP: Software design pioneer and Pascal creator Niklaus Wirth
Friday 5th January 2024 16:49 GMT
RIP professor Wirth
Thanks for making me realise I did not want to be an electrical engineer after all!
First Pascal, Fortran and Commodore PET Basic at technical university, then on to CHILL (CCITT High Level Language) and 808x assembler on ITT's public S12 telephone exchanges.
Later on to C on Apollo workstations and that was end of my professional programming track - I wonder why ;-)
And yes, I can still read and understand the Pascal programs I wrote a long time ago without major mental contortionism!
War of the workstations: How the lowest bidders shaped today's tech landscape
Canonical intros Microcloud: Simple, free, on-prem Linux clustering
Friday 17th November 2023 11:45 GMT
Re: Unix doesn't have anything like this
Even HP didn’t manage to port the Tru64 clustering and the Tru64 cluster-enabled AdvFS file system to HP-UX after acquiring Compaq/DEC. Proper share-everything clustering requires deep integration of the cluster code into the OS and file system(s) so it is not trivial to port it from one system onto another one.
Want to feel old? Ethernet just celebrated its 50th birthday
Monday 3rd July 2023 10:33 GMT
Re: Rings
“ TCP/IP didn't have a field to indicate other protocols so we used an illegal length to indicate the other protocols.”
An Ethernet II frame does have a upper level protocol field (as have TCP, UDP and IP) but in the IEEE 802.3 Ethernet standard this field was redefined as a ‘length’ field creating the problem (and solution) you described.
Monday 3rd July 2023 09:56 GMT
Re: Rings
DEC used its own MAC addressing scheme to ease DECnet to MAC address mapping. Given the destination DECnet address the sending computer is simply able to compute the MAC address used by the destination without having to use an ARP-like broadcasting system. It does not have anything to do with the MAC address size. The embedded MAC addresses were used by for example the DEC cluster protocols which ran quite happily and simultaneously with DECnet.
Quirky QWERTY killed a password in Paris
Fancy trying the granddaddy of Windows NT for free? Now's your chance
Thursday 13th April 2023 09:39 GMT
Re: The modern museum
“ About all I remember of VMS is that every time the team dealing with it got a new hire someone would have to deal with a machine clogged up by a full disk because VMS defaults to creating new versions of files instead of overwriting.”
So the team didn’t seem to know about (proactive) version limits available on files and/or directories? I remember teaching that in the “VMS Utilities and Command” course when working at Digital.
PanWriter: Cross-platform writing tool runs on anything and outputs to anything
Wednesday 24th August 2022 09:54 GMT
A plea for AsciiDoc i.s.o. Markdown
Use whatever editor you like with or without extensions but rather try to write in AsciiDoc and not in yet another non-standard extended Markdown dialect. And yes, AsciiDoc is Markdown compatible (for the 'standard' Markdown bits).
https://opensource.com/article/22/8/drop-markdown-asciidoc?utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=weekly&sc_cid=7013a00000383eXAAQ
Buggy code, fragile legacy systems, ill-conceived projects cost US businesses $2 trillion in 2020
What was Boeing through their heads? Emails show staff wouldn't put their families on a 737 Max over safety fears
Monday 13th January 2020 14:15 GMT
Re: "the FAA remains focused on [..] returning the Boeing 737 MAX to passenger service"
Firts: MCAS is not about fuel burn. It's about correcting unwanted aerodynamic behaviour in very specific circumstances such as being in a banked turn with high angle of attack close to a potential stall.
Secondly, the "AoA Disagree" alert does NOT signal MCAS activation. It simply reports an excessively different AoA being reported by the left and right AoA sensors of the 737 Max.
Recommended reading: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/times-watchdog/the-inside-story-of-mcas-how-boeings-737-max-system-gained-power-and-lost-safeguards and https://www.satcom.guru
Facebook crushes Belgian attempt to ban tracking of non-users
Singapore Airlines 777 catches fire after engine alarm
Monday 27th June 2016 11:43 GMT
Re: camera phones
The Qantas Flight 32 Airbus did not have an engine fire. The Qantas crew was correct not to evacuate because of the hot brakes (they landed fast because of degraded flap functionality), the fuel leaks and the inability to shut down engine 1.
In the SA scenario people were not evacuated of a plane with an engine and a wing on fire. That wing carries a lot of fuel on a 777 ER (extended range). My guess is that SIA crew will have a bit of explaining to do as to why they did not immediately evacuate via the left side exits. The crew and passengers were very lucky to escape as they did!
Oracle, Intel team on server with a dimmer switch
Streak life: Oz woman flashes boobs at Google Street View car
Apple boots Windows 7 out of Boot Camp
Can someone please standardise cloud standards?
Filthy – but sadly frothy – five door fun: Ford Focus 1.5 Zetec
Jaguar F-Type: A beautiful British thoroughbred
Monday 16th February 2015 19:37 GMT
A trend? Tesla vs Panamera revisited
"There are two very good reasons to buy an F-Type, the first is how it evokes the spirit of Malcom Sayer’s original, and the second is that it’s not the Porsche Boxster."
Pretty cheap shot. I'll have the Cayman, preferably the new GT4. Would love to see a shoot-out between the Jagwire and the Cayman on the Nordschleife.
Microsoft's patchwork falls apart … AGAIN!
Oracle adds Osama Bin Laden's NEMESIS to board
Twitter complies with Turkey's 'national security' blackout demand – BLOCKS newspaper's tweets
Monday 19th January 2015 11:03 GMT
Erdoğan is the Prez, not the PM.
"the Turkish government led by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan": wrong. Currently, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is Turkey's President. Turkey's current PM is Ahmet Davutoğlu who attended the pro free speech "marche Républicaine" in Paris on 11 January 2015, joining an impressive number of other political hypocrites.
Police radios will be KILLED soon – yet no one dares say 'Huawei'
Thursday 8th January 2015 12:44 GMT
Re: Why change the system?
Unfortunately the TETRA standard only covers the interface between the TETRA network and the TETRA handsets/devices. Internally (i.e. in between the TETRA switches) the TETRA network uses vendor-specific, proprietary interfaces. So you'll need to rip out all your TETRA switches and replace them with new gear supporting the required functionality. Nicely played by the TETRA vendors!
'Open' SIMs, brain chips and Google's Nest: What to expect in wireless in 2015
Thursday 8th January 2015 14:24 GMT
It does needs a bit more
Remember the SIM (soft or hard) is pricipally used to store the IMSI(s) i.e. the handset's identity. Currently in the large majority of countries (ITU members) the only organisations allowed to manage and distribute IMSIs are MNOs owning an operational wireless GSM/LTE network. So even with softSIMs or handset vendor provided SIMs you would need to have an agreement with a MNO to get the IMSIs for your SIMs. Organisations thinking about rolling out M2M applications are also confronted with this problem and so far the MNOs are doing whatever they can to retain control over IMSI distribution. The critical part is not the SIM (hard/soft/reprogrammable), it's the IMSI.
Tuesday 6th January 2015 16:10 GMT
This would require (1) existing M(V)NOs to abandon their SIM-based network approach - rather unlikely - or (2) new SIMless networks to be established - any takers? I'm afraid the GSMA/ETNO train has left the station quite some time ago and will be hard to stop. The whole operator-centric SIM/IMSI approach has been engineerded into the GSM standards with the complicity of the ETNO and ITU and they are not in the habit of listening to what the end user wants.
Tuesday 6th January 2015 12:13 GMT 
An Apple SIM is not a soft SIM and it requires a non-Apple network
"...and Apple included a "soft SIM" option in its latest iPad. This allows the user to select from a list of operators (and switch between them) when activating the device, passing the control from the carrier to Apple."
Wrong - Apple's SIM is not a soft SIM, it's a simple physical multi-IMSI nanoSIM (with limitations e.g. AT&T swap restrictions) still requiring network and suscription support from a participating MNO. The Apple SIM can still be replaced by whatever SIM you prefer so control has not passed from the carrier(s) to Apple. Apple has other means to put the pressure on carriers such as 4G network certification and commercial terms for the promotion and sales of handsets. Or is Apple thinking about becoming an M(V)NO?
Brit smut slingers shafted by UK censors' stiff new stance
New Euro digi tsar 'H-dot' Oettinger to host sort-of-live Twitter chat
How iPad’s soft SIM lets Apple pit carriers AGAINST each other
Monday 27th October 2014 15:05 GMT
Re: SIM
"Carriers and manufacturers would love to kill the SIM, which has made the consumer king for over 20 years."
You might want to talk to the GSMA about this. They actually fiercely object to the idea of a soft or virtual SIM according to them for security reasons: http://www.gsma.com/connectedliving/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Embedded-SIM-Toolkit-Oct-14-updated1.pdf
And as mentioned before: for mobile devices it's not about the hard, soft, virtual or embedded SIM (the vehicle). It's about the IMSI and the encryption keys (the contents of the vehicle) stored on the SIM. In the large majority of countries currently only mobile network operators and mobile virtual network operators are allowed to issue IMSIs which are preprogrammed into the SIMs and distributed to the network users. There is no particular good reason why IMSIs should be controlled by M(V)NOs. Only very recently the GSMA has released an architecture and standards for "Over The Air" reprogramming and switching of IMSIs on embedded SIMs because they were pressured to do so by the growing M2M community that does not like its devices to be tied to a specific M(V)NO during the typically long contract period. Mind you there currently are no wide-scale implementations available of this OTA embedded SIM nirvana.
By the way: in the past the GSMA also opposed the idea of the OTA SIM reprogramming!
One other thing: the currently launched Apple iPads still allow you to replace the Apple SIM with the SIM provided by an operator of your choice so make sure you target your arrows at the proper villain. It's a bit silly to condemn Apple for something they might be able to do in the future I think. Predictive crime analytics at work?
But there is hope: maybe in a number years from now babies will be born and will come with an embedded SIM and IMSI supplied by 'fill in whatever organisation or company you dislike and/or distrust' which can then be linked OTA or good old dipswitches with its preferred M(V)NO ;)
Fiat Panda Cross: 'Interesting-looking' Multipla spawn hits UK
Monday 4th August 2014 13:35 GMT
But...
Two comments on this article:
1) a Porsche Cayenne doesn't need to descend a hill. The Cayenne has a magical characteristic called weight that flattens the hill when at the top so that it doesn't need to descend ;)
2) I'd prefer this over the FIAT and the Cayenne: http://youtu.be/wdy8CG09rSU Sit back and enjoy the Vorsprung durch Technik as presented by the mighty Walter Röhrl. Those were the days!
Montana loses data on MORE PEOPLE THAN LIVE IN MONTANA
Apple iOS 8 'will put end' to crap map app rap flap misery
Passenger jet grounded by two-hour insect attack
Brit boson boffin Higgs bags Nobel with eponymous deiton
Boffins build ant-sized battery, claim it's tough enough to start a car
Inside Adastral: BT's Belgium-sized broadband boffinry base
Windows 8: An awful lot of change for a single release
The iPHONE 5 UNDERMINES western DEMOCRACY: 5 reasons why
Larry Ellison buys island 1000x bigger than Branson's
Flying Dutchman creates dead cat quadcopter
Playmonauts could down airliners, Canuck flyboy warns
Tuesday 31st January 2012 12:54 GMT 
Please check your facts before posting
"Bird into engine results in a bit of a cough out the back, and the engine casing being lined with overcooked finely minced bird. A cleaning job for the apprentices...."
You are a bit optimistic. Bird ingestion can cause major damage to the compressor section of a jet engine eventually leading to compressor blades breaking away from the compressor disk.
I hope in that case the repair is not left to an apprentice...
BTW Jets have multiple pitots at different locations on the hull. The only single bird able to take out all of them in one go is the ... flying elephant. Wasn't he called Dumbo?
SpaceShipOne man, Nobel boffins: Don't panic on global warming
Apple dishes out cheap, tasty Macs 'n slabs to staff
New account of Flight 447 disaster published
Sunday 11th December 2011 21:18 GMT
B166er:
Why don't you read this first concerning the 'accuracy' of the Popular Mechanics article:
http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/466259-af447-final-crew-conversation-36.html#post6891763
"You accuse people of posting nonsense with nothing whatsoever in your spew to demostrate that."
One example but there are many more: using GPS-derived ground speed in an analysis of the aerodynamical state of a stalled airplane descending in a tight right-hand turn!
"I think most intelligent readers can determine from the flight recorder cockpit transcript roughly what happened to those 228 people without being pilots.".
Of course they can (the plane crashed and the people died, didn't they?) but determining what the probable causes and contributing factors of the accident are, is an entirely different thing, isn't it?
"By the same logic, are you unable to grasp concepts that don't fall squarely within your area of expertise?"
I really think you need a bit more than grasping a few concepts about flying to be an accident investigator...
"If you ARE a qualified pilot, perhaps you could answer an earlier question: Why is it that the low altitude alarm doesn't sound until 2000 feet during midflight?"
A simple one to answer: it was not designed to measure heights larger than 2500 ft above sea/ ground level (the range of the radio altimeter). You do know the RADALT is part of the Groud Proximity Warning System, don't you? This system was designed to prevent CFIT (controlled flight into terrain) accidents. The chances of encountering terrain are rather slim at flight level 350 don't you think? The RADALT is only used by the GPWS and by autolanding systems. Pilots are not allowed to use it as a primary altitude measurement system. Your primary altitude measurement system is a barometric instrument with a selectable reference height/altitude/pressure.
On top of that: in IMC pilots are expected to scan a number of essential flight parameters including altitude and vertical speed. From the interim report released by the BEA (did you read it yet?) it is clear that all AF447pilots where perfectly aware of the plane's altitude and vertical speed during the decent. You do know that altimeters and VSIs use the static pneumatic ports which were not iced up, don't you? In others words: pilots should not be dependent upon altitude alerts to know what altitude the airplane is flying at! Scanning your instruments is one of the primary pilot tasks!
Better stick to simming...
Biting the hand that feeds IT
