Posts by Robert Carnegie

Dilettante dev wrote rubbish, left no logs, and had no idea why his app wasn't working

Re: Vibe AI

Afterthought: in Clarke's 1946 story "Rescue Party", his first sale to "legendary John W. Campbell, Jr.", space travellers discover a planet whose evolutionary and scientific progress was extraordinary... until the star got ready to explode. At slight risk of spoiling, I don't remember that the story includes any suggestion that this was done on purpose.

Clarke also wrote "The Star", which I do spoil, in which explorers from Earth discover a formerly inhabited planetary system whose star's explosion was seen on Earth at around the time of King Herod. The system's inhabitants were philosophical, and their library was carefully preserved at a safe distance, but that's all that's left.

Re: Divers log

You're quite right. And quite confusing, unfortunately. Weight varies with gravity, although to make gravity vary significantly isn't easy, e.g. travelling to the Moon, to Mars, etc. And I was just thinking of quantities in my grocery shopping. So, a mass which weighs one pound - (1) on planet Earth and (2) "close enough" - is 454 grams.

Re: The flip side of the coin

Remembering the initial state of the Hubble Space Telescope, you could have got a ride up to the sky to fix your work if you hadn't done it so well the first time! But then again, remembering "Independence Day", it isn't purely a pleasure.

Re: Vibe AI

Arthur C. Clarke revisited the subject in "3001".

Apparently the apemen absolutely weren't meant to do that with their new tools. Big black rectangles are judgemental. I'm not sure exactly how the timing works, but when news got back to the Great Rectangle, 500 light years away, it concluded that we were trouble. And you don't want to be on the wrong side of the Great Rectangle.

I think it's that the documentation for this reporting requirement comes with specimen program code and/or a binary executable standard implementation, and that was all that the job needed, or was 90% of it. So that the consultant-written version was completely unnecessary. Though if the consultant was asked and told to write it, then that's what a consultant does.

Re: Divers log

"And some colleagues still treat his code as gospel."

I think a word that came to many of our minds after your description is "Christ!", so, not far off. ;-)

"I would like to do some "maintenance" using a stake and holy water."

Should work, that's what holes in the top of the server are for. :-)

"And on the data base as well."

Ah, I assumed... well, you have reason to set your priorities that way around.

Re: Divers log

I'd forgotten about that style of decimal.* And mostly, about ÷. On the other hand, I think that what can be written in "Roman" characters has been affected by what is provided on a typewriter or computer keyboard. And mechanical typewriters particularly were built economically, each key added to the price. I remember typing .' ! together to make ! And actually using O because the machine didn't have a 0. And lower case L for 1.

* According to Wikipedia "Numerals in Unicode", either Unicode or its locales eliminate a special decimal point - mostly. I quote -

"Unicode has no dedicated general decimal separator but unifies the decimal separator function with other punctuation characters. So the "." used in "0.25" is the same period character (U+002E) used to end the sentence. However, cultures vary in the glyph or grapheme used for a decimal separator. So in some locales [most or all of Europe], the comma (U+002C) may be used instead: "0,25". Still other locales use a space (or non-breaking space)" ...

It's quite interesting, and Arabic actually does "still" have in Unicode - this says - a special mark for "decimal". Unicode also has a special "fraction slash" division symbol which looks like / and theoretically allows fractions to be written like ½ but I think the symbol that I have here isn't that, it is one symbol which looks like 1/2.

Re: Divers log

Your explanation puzzled me a bit. You mean that Australia was switching from Hogwarts money to an Australian decimal dollar, when you left there. But a pound weight is 454 grams, and 14 pounds makes one "stone". I think the U.S. still uses pounds, but only pounds. And pints are funny, and maybe ounces are funny, A British pint is 568 grams of water and a not very quiet word with the barman. :-)

Automatic UK-to-US English converter produced amazing mistakes by the vanload

The introduction to the "King James" bible gives similar credit - to King James, obviously. The translators being very grateful that he wasn't Catholic, if I remember right. Or else they'd have to... change the title, I suppose.

Re: Static HTML pages

I'm imagining something vaguely like reading a foreign language web page - as you can - through Google Translate. When I did it last, anyway, a lot of it worked, but it really felt like an Alice "Through the Looking-Glass" experience.

Re: Whoops

It looks like no one's mentioned yet the American conservative web site "One News Now" which was caught in 2008 "translating" articles from Associated Press with automation, when American sprint athlete Tyson Gay made the headlines. Their version of the story was about an athlete named Tyson Homosexual. Who mostly was referred to only by his surname.

Not quite an opposite error happened when I think an authority figure in the Roman Catholic church shared his concerns about sexually permissive lawmaking with a newspaper, which ran an article including a photograph of the great man above the sub-caption "Homosexual Bill".

Google tells me that over the years, the New York Times has run stories "City Council Committee Rejects Homosexual Bill" but also "Marchers Back Homosexual Bill". Times change, though not always for the better.

How sticky notes saved 'the single biggest digital program in the world'

Re: "assumptions don't turn out to be what humans look like when you hit them"

Described here https://www.moneyhelper.org.uk/en/benefits/universal-credit/universal-credit-an-introduction

Universal Credit is a British government benefit paid to people who are in need because low paid (including self employed and it isn't going well), looking for work, unable to work due to an illness or disability, or who have caring responsibilities. More caring than the government which invented it. It has several nasty traps to catch claimants out, or throw them out. Of course this is intended.

Microsoft tries to knife passwords once and for all - at least for consumers

Re: M$ Wants Biometric ID - Sure Hold-on a second ... - NOT.

I'm intrigued that those are "words". In any supported language.

Re: M$ Wants Biometric ID - Sure Hold-on a second ... - NOT.

sodth.atfor.alark

People find amazing ways to break computers. Cats are even more creative

A legendary piss artist.

Re: rotating cat

But you get the infinite fury of a harnessed cat. :-)

I'm not really being fair. Some cats accept it when their mad human housemate puts them in a harness. Maybe if it it is within their envelope of tolerance for fools and children. Other cats behave as if they're being hanged, even while lying on the ground.

The 12 KB that Windows just can't seem to quit

I think I've used vaguely appropriate moricons.dll icons in scenarios like the icon to run a script.

Curl project founder snaps over deluge of time-sucking AI slop bug reports

Re: It's the bug bounty

One or more excluded blood donor groups demanded to give blood as by right, even without being paid AFAIK. Said it was discrimination. Would it be better to say excused not excluded?

I suppose that a scenario is if your workplace encourages giving blood, you are in an excluded group but you fear being discriminated against if the employer knows.

Brain-inspired neuromorphic computer SpiNNaker overheated when coolers lost their chill

"And so

We

Had a cup of tea,

And - "

Signal chat app clone used by Signalgate's Waltz was apparently an insecure mess

Re: A quote from Forrest Gump comes to mind.

Do you actually need an Ambassador to the U.N.? It's just a building in New York City.

Soviet probe from 1972 set to return to Earth ... in May 2025

Re: Oddly enough...

I think there's a one or two part "Return of Death Probe"... ah, yes, described. (Someone just built a copy and turned it loose.)

If you don't think it looks and acts like a fat Dalek without a speaking hole, then your education is incomplete.

I too thought of that Venus mission manque (I don't think it was returning or meant to be, it never got there?) while reading this Register story. But the dates don't work for Death Probe to be related to this rocket. But plenty of other rockets went wrong.

Disney Slack attack wasn't Russian protesters, just a Cali dude with malware

Re: Something to consider next time.

That's my screen name at work, comrade. (Da. Comrade. I am old.)

What the **** did you put in that code? The client thinks it's a cyberattack

It was this "Who Me" published in mid January 2025: https://www.theregister.com/2025/01/13/who_me/

Updating "the customer ticketing system" - having read *some* of the manual -

"It wasn't in bold or caps, there were no warning symbols or information boxes. It was just another sentence in the paragraph: 'Enabling LDAP authentication will delete all existing users'."

Be fair, this doesn't say "Lorem ipsum", and recently Pope Francis has passed away, so people might have something to say in Latin. But if Google is correct, this Latin is indeed gibberish, and not even complete sentences, mostly. There is a religious tone to it, I think.

Just before I went to Google Translate this into English, I noticed that a few words of English are already included. And I think I remember that story, yes. And I assume that the original document wasn't in Latin, it was just unrewarding to read.

Windows profanity filter finally gets a ******* off switch

Re: Paging Dr. Doctor

An awkward moment if somebody addresses a team meeting, "Ladies and Gentleman".

Steve Jobs (was) a

Is "clever dick" such a naughty thing to say?

Microsoft pitches pay-to-patch reboot reduction subscription for Windows Server 2025

Re: I'm torn

Wasn't - isn't - this Cloudstrike's business model? The latest software updates, installed immediately, untouched by human hand - or brain.

Developer scored huge own goal by deleting almost every football fan in Europe

Re: Deleted nearly every football fan in Europe

Confusingly, that's if you're driving IN the UK... or in GB anyway.

Luckily it is an isaland and yet......

Reading carefully, your "UK" car registration-number plate can contain the "GB" or "UK" symbol, or neither, or others. Possibly "GB" is allowed when you've got it already and you don't want to change it, I don't know.

Except for Ireland, it says that for driving a UK car anywhere else in the world - apparently - the car must have a separate "UK" sticker if it doesn't have "UK" and the flag on the number plate - and in a few countries, the "UK" sticker is always required. Spain, Cyprus, Malta - countries which have history with the UK, one way or another. And maybe have more UK cars driving around than they really like - that may be the real point.

Re: Deleted nearly every football fan in Europe

Do check whether the code for British is not "GB", with "UK" representing Ukraine - but that is a different issue.

I think if you put a sticker on a car to indicate a British driver on holiday, it's "GB". Best be on both front and back, as the car may be driving in the wrong direction.

Team Trump readies national security card to justify taxing Americans for foreign chips

Re: i want my own chips

I think there actually was an effort already to stop "good" AI chips going to China - the top of range Nvidia products - and a bit of a disappointment when a Chinese AI chatbot was unveiled anyway. And, yes, a "popular" application of AI is military equipment that can go out and kill people with little or no involvement by a human commander. Of course, the AI will make mistakes, maybe very often, or even all of the time. But so do human human-killers.

I say that the science fiction future scenario where robots fight robots while no humans are left alive any more is quite achievable. There will come soft rains, and all that.

Re: Tariffs, the tax that keeps on hurting

Instead of tarts?

I think the valid logic of treating trade in products which contain semiconductors as the same as trade in semiconductors, is, someone can buy the products in order to get the semiconductors from them. For instance, the chip in an Apple iPhone 17 which reads the user's thoughts, in order to generate acceptable advertising. You could extract that chip and just use it to read thoughts.

Wikipedia has an article on "Chicken tax", which I heard about recently. This obviously is a tariff on certain trucks imported to the U.S. Workarounds, apparently eventually defeated, included fitting a truck with full passenger seating and calling it a minibus. Once the minibus was on U.S. soil, the seats were removed, and the truck was sold tariff-free. If you still want to know about the chickens, see Wikipedia.

Re: Taxiffs on everything.

Just rhetorical questions, answers not required: if the U.S. gets that bad, then where will you go to, and what will you do about money? And language?

Previously, Americans have fled to Canadia. Maybe that won't work this time, because of... the things.

Don't delete that mystery empty folder. Windows put it there as a security fix

Re: Wow....

But how would you know that it really came from Microsoft?

New SSL/TLS certs to each live no longer than 47 days by 2029

Re: Why not...

I'm not up to speed on the technology, but the incident comes to mind in "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" where access control by password was strictly enforced and updated within Hogwarts School... and then one student copied out the list of passwords for the rest of the year - and lost it. Luckily I suppose, a senior teacher found the copy. Passwords were changed, and I think I remember that that particular student wasn't told what any of the new passwords are.

If one certificate can be installed on your server and then stolen by people up to no good - then twelve certificates for the rest of the year can be installed on your server and then stolen by people up to not good.

Static electricity can be shockingly funny, but the joke's over when a rack goes dark

Re: Two of these- not as dramatic tbh

Specifically leaving our office building - we're on floor 14 - after taking the lift to the, er, ground, I find it's best to slap the metal door handle, to get a quick electric discharge which doesn't come as a nasty surprise.

Re: A static story from the ether.

Well, there was a chain. But I take your point.

Dev loudly complained about older colleague, who retired not long after

Re: Bah!

I think arguably this counts two ways, or not: "Aidan" designs a simple task which Graybeard is expected to turn into a minor disaster, and then Graybeard delivers exactly that. But I think the first part doesn't quite count after all, because if the job was given to anyone else in the team, then it would be done satisfactorily.

To avoid disaster-recovery disasters, learn from Reg readers' experiences

Re: Backups...

Tell 'em you've got grandfather, son, grandson, great-grandson?

Re: Old skool data recovery

Everyone. (?)

Tech trainer taught a course on software he'd never used and didn't own

Re: The best way to learn something is to teach it

Correction from - https://media.pluto.psy.uconn.edu/Quantum%20Mechanics%20quotes.htm

"Those who are not shocked when they first come across quantum theory cannot possibly have understood it." - Niels Bohr

"If you are not completely confused by quantum mechanics, you do not understand it." - John Wheeler

Also, five paragraphs from Richard Feynman, with, emphasised: "I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics."

And some plain insults against quantum mechanics by other famous names.

She could touch-type? I'm not entertaining any other basis for her title.

Re: Not quite the same experience, but still a seat-of-the-pants flyby

Were you teaching Java to the Javanese in this exercise? ;-)

Re: been on many courses where the trainer has no answers

You poured the mercury straight onto the bench? You didn't use a protective asbestos board? :-)

I don't know if the presumably fireproof tiles we got at school to put tripods and Bunsen Burners on actually were asbestos. They were dull, grey, concrete-looking and feeling but a little too thin to be that, probably.

Weeks with a BBC Micro? Good enough to fix a mainframe, apparently

Re: hot plug

At work I'm not seeing the video.

My practical experience of fuses where I fully understood what was going on, was where I'd made an British extension cord rated 5 amps for some reason, with a 5 amps fuse.

Then for some necessity, I used it with an electric fan heater. Rated 3 kW, but I set it to 1 kW, and that worked.

Till someone had the bright idea to turn the heater onto 3 kW. The 5 amps fuse died while I was telling them "no, don't do that".

The other thing was home lamps with an incandescent bulb, 60W or 100W, and a 3 amps fuse because that was the smallest rating of household fuse. But somehow, quite frequently, a bulb would fail, and the fuse would go with it. I'd like to know why; my best guess was that the tungsten wire in the bulb snapped, and twanged around, and made something like a short-circuit. Anyway, I got used to replacing fuses as well as bulbs.

Re: hot plug

Of course the UK plug also contains a metal fuse wire which is designed to be melted by current of 13 amps. Maybe just over. So, close to that, it gets hot.

Tech support session saved files, but probably ended a marriage

Re: > I did learn never to offer out-of-hours help to people I work with

"How about a rubber duck? No it's not a euphemism"

User complained his mouse wasn’t working. But he wasn’t using a mouse

Re: The mouse doesn't work in the afternoon..

Up vote, and darn it :-)

There is a Windows option to swap the function of the mouse buttons for left handedness - but I expect that if they got you with that, then you'd have included it in the story. And it may be built into some mouses, too.