* Posts by VinceH

3483 publicly visible posts • joined 26 Nov 2009

Apple, Samsung call off all patent spats outside United States

VinceH
Trollface

Re: or maybe ...

... SamsungApple has realised that they are not making enough moneywinning enough fights with Samsung elsewhere on the theft their on-a-mobile-device-etc guff to warrant the continued litigation and are retiring from the ring?

FTFY!

What's the point of the Internet of Things?

VinceH

Re: No, Trevor...

" >I think a person would be more useful.

They're called domestics. Maids, butlers, housekeepers, etc. Rich people have them."

I was thinking a girlfriend... preferably one who (given I was talking about my ability to forget to take my tablets, even with an alarm to remind me) would be willing to dress up in a sexy nurse's outfit.

VinceH

Re: No, Trevor...

I think a person would be more useful. Rather than remind me, plonk the tablets in front of me, so that I don't have to interrupt what I'm watching/writing/whatever to take them. Reminders are a waste of time.

Speaking of which, it's apparently tablet time. Being on the subject makes this pair a little harder to not take. :)

VinceH

Re: No, Trevor...

Exactly that.

Trevor, It's pure wishful thinking that this fabled smart-house will be some kind of panacea for the spectrums you mention.

Instead it'll be a security nightmare, with a multitude of incompatibilities between different installations within, not to mention buggy, badly written software, be that in the main computer that controls it all, or in individual devices.

It'll advertise at you at the most inconvenient times - because those are the times you're most likely to see the advertisements - such as the cooking instructions; you walk into the kitchen, expecting a meal suggestion based on what you have and like, but before you get that, you'll be shown an advert for a restaurant or take-away (so, rather than no more trips out for fast food, it'll be encouraging exactly that).

Perhaps it could help me by reminding me to take my tablets... except that I already have an alarm set to remind me because I tend to forget - and I'd guesstimate one time in four, I still manage to forget, even with an alarm. That'll happen even if the alarm is rounded up to the size of a damned house. Seriously, what's it going to do? Keep me awake nagging me if I haven't taken the evening one by the time I go to bed?

Thin naked model slips out of Apple's secretive lab ... it's an 'iPad Air 2'

VinceH

Re: All bar genius

Surely, Shirley, that's 1Sheet, not iSheet!

VinceH

Re: All bar genius

They could supply that in rolls.

VinceH

Re: meet the new iPad ...

"Assuming that most people who want a tablet have already bought one, there isn't a pressing need for people who already own a tablet to upgrade to a new one."

Apart from it being the new shiny from Apple. While not everyone - not even all Applytes - have that mindset, there are plenty of them.

BAD VIBES: High-speed video camera records your voice from trash

VinceH

Re: Er....

"The real question is, now that this is public what did the spy agencies just invent that's so much better?"

The sooper dooper pooper scooper. That's the nickname given to a device in an old Piers Anthony novel, IIRC, which can be focused on any point in space and time, allowing the viewer to see what happened at that point. Things like walls, distance, etc are completely irrelevant.

Aha - a quick search reveals it's called Macroscope.

UK WhatsApp duo convicted of possessing extreme porn

VinceH

Re: unsolicited

" However, if you don't completely delete every trace of it "beyond your own ability to recover it" (as I believe the legal standard currently is) then that defence fails."

And who determines a person's ability to recover a file?

To delete something, most people will just use the delete option their systems offer. Is that enough?

If your system puts such deleted items in a recycler of some sort, which means it can be recovered, then it's arguably not beyond those means. But not everyone (IME) seems to know they can recover deleted items - or that they might need to go to this tool to expire it from the recycler. So that's a grey area.

Then there are temporary files - caches and the like - which systems and software may not clean up properly after themselves. Who decides if any given user will be able to access files in those locations?

VinceH

Re: Possessing an image likely to cause injury

"Psychological Injury? "What has been seen, cannot be unseen?"

That would make the two blokes the victims.

Robot snaps on yellow RUBBER GLOVES, preps to invade Canada

VinceH

"That's the question posed by the creators of a new mechanised hitch-hiker, which is set to travel from coast to coast across Canada on a mission that will test how friendly people will be towards a robot."

So it's some kind of experiment to see how people react and deal with a hitch-hiking toaster, but by publicising it ahead of actually doing it, they're gong to bias the results, making the whole thing pointless.

Oh, wait, no - my mistake; it's not pointless, this 'experiment' is being done for the publicity, rather than the other way around.

Also:

"Also like most other people on the other side of the Atlantic, he has more than 20,000 Twitter followers."

Most people over there have more than 20,000 followers on Twitter? Some might - but most people? Really?

Sony reads the future, quits e-reader market says German report

VinceH

Re: <shakes head>

"That time is not wasted."

I agree - and have therefore upvoted you - but do note that the AC deliberately put the word 'wasted' in quotes.

NASA tests crazytech flying saucer thruster, could reach Mars in days

VinceH

Hmm. Ignoring the many bits I don't understand (I'm no rocket surgeon), I am minded of what I wrote on these very forums two weeks ago:

"Or a fantastic new means of propulsion (that doesn't involve lots of mass to weigh the rocket down at launch) so you can accelerate the rocket at 9.8M/s^2 for half the distance and flip it around and decelerate it at the same rate for the other half. (And back again)."

Okay, we're not talking 9.8M/s^2 in this case, but still. Neat. If it really works.

(Also, on the bonus side, if microwaves are involved, that's a handy way to heat up the astronauts' meals: Just hang 'em out of the back of the ship. Job's a good 'un.)

It's War: Internet of things firms butt heads over talking-fridge tech standards

VinceH

Re: @VinceH -- Why?

Yes, that sums up what we're supposed to think quite neatly, I think.

VinceH

Re: Why?

"I still remain to be convinced how the Internet of Things would benefit me."

You're not supposed to think like that. You're supposed to think how innovative and brilliant it all is, and how useful it'll be to be able to start the tumble dryer from the comfort of your arm chair without getting up (even though you got up to load it), to be able to see that you're out of milk (because you won't have noticed that using your eyes when you made that last cuppa), or whatever, even though all of this stuff is really a crock of shit. That way, if you're one of the gullible twats the IoPT companies' valuable target demographic, you'll lap it up and embrace it and buy new stuff to replace perfectly functional old stuff - and...

... and the reason the IoPT companies' target demographic is valuable, is because that target demographic are really the product; their real customers are those who will be able to use all that lovely data they collect for advertising, etc.

Crumbs! Holiday phish based on genuine hotel booking surfaces

VinceH

Re: just go to your bank and send a wire transfer to our account below

"...and it doesn't seem strange to buy a holiday in Spain and pay to Poland?"

The problem is that a hotel might be part of a chain or group, and in such cases its the parent company that really takes the money (even if the hotel itself handles the transaction), rather than the hotel itself - so a hotel in one country might be part of a chain owned by a company in a completely different one.

Booking.com don't help matters with their approach: They don't take your money, only your card details, and pass that information on to the hotel so that they have your card details ready in order to process your payment, and they charge the hotel commission which is usually taken (in one lump sum for all bookings in a month) by direct debit from the hotel. This simplifies things greatly for booking.com, since they don't have to process card payments.

It's a clumsy approach because it means when making a booking you aren't just talking directly to a payment processor/gateway; you're trusting two companies with your card details: booking.com, who you hand them over to in the first place, and the hotel - and because payment is therefore not taken straight away (even a partial payment, such as a deposit), the system is ripe for a scam of this sort.

As mentioned in the article, it seems unlikely booking.com are the source of the details here, otherwise there'd be a lot more noise about it - so it's likely to be the hotel, but the question is: is it details of bookings stored at/by the hotel that have been compromised, or is it the hotel's connection (i.e. access details) to their booking.com account? (I'd presume the former, otherwise the card details themselves would have been compromised and the problem would be CC fraud).

Windows 8 market share stalls, XP at record low

VinceH

Re: Why won't they sort it out?

"What kind of dog is it?"

Probably this one, because (if you watch enough episodes1 you'll conclude...) he can read, drive and all sorts.

1. I've reached s4e18 so far. And over 30 years after first watching and loving it as a kid, I'm thoroughly enjoying it again!

Mozilla gaffe exposed 76,000 email addresses, 4000 passwords

VinceH

Re: Apathy

I therefore propose the following, less apathetic reaction:

HOLY SHIT! Who the hell knew that El Reg publishes stuff on a Monday morning?

We sent a probe SIX BILLION km to measure temperature of a COMET doing 135,000 km/h

VinceH
Alien

Re: Impressive and I'd expected it to be *much* colder

It's being heated up ready for its passengers to come out of stasis - just in time for an invasion next year.

Facebook goes down, people dial 911

VinceH

Re: GADSLBI

"for those of you not old enough to understand the reference

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRUhjFF5a6Y"

Before I paste that link into an address bar, I'm going to warn you that if it isn't a link to something relating to Why Don't You, I'm going to hunt you down and feed you to a very hungry gerbil. (I don't actually have a gerbil,hungry or otherwise, but I'll find one when I need to).

[Nine minutes later...]

Legend!

Apple's iWatch may be DELAYED over sapphire glass supply problems

VinceH

Re: Delayed?

I believe this may also be why we don't have hover boards and flying cars.

The Register editorial job ad

VinceH

Re: Commentards ?

AC certainly posts an awful lot, doesn't he? (Or she. Or it. Or something.)

fist-bumping is good for your health, says respected surveyor

VinceH

Re: I only ever use the Vulcan salute

I prefer to give people the birdie - but I am a bit anti-social.

Nice computers don’t need to go to the toilet, says Barclays

VinceH

Re: Self service checkouts

"I'm a big fan a technology, but I'll always choose the person over the machine. Especially if that person is particularly appealing to look at."

And it's possible to have a conversation with the person. Have you ever tried to do that with an automated system? It just gets you funny looks from other customers.

VinceH

"Anyone know why paying in slips require you to fill in the amount at least twice and write the name of the cheque signatory in a strip about 2 cm wide? "

IME, you only have to write the amount once for each cheque, and the total is written in the box on the front. If you're only paying in a single cheque, it might seem like duplicated effort, because then you really are writing the amount twice. (That's on the paying in slip itself, of course; if you're using a 'stub' format paying in book, rather than one in which carbon copies are kept) you have to write everything twice.

What I find annoying is that some banks' paying in books seem to unintentionally be designed for left-handed people. These are where the cheque details are written on the rear of the paying in slip, but it remains oriented the same as the front, so you're writing on the left hand side when writing on the rear. If you're paying in a lot of cheques (as you might if you are a business and your customers refuse to greet modern technology), you end up filling in both columns of cheque details - and the column closest to the spine, especially the amount, can be awkward to fill in with your right hand at certain depths in the paying in book.

FFS, print the reverse of the slips so that there is one (portrait) column, rather than two (landscape) columns.

"It's like they had 200 years supply of the things printed in 1950 and they have to use them all up."

That's my bank with cheque books on my business account.

My use of cheques is rare, and most years I write only a single cheque. Several years ago, I reached the point in a cheque book where a replacement is automatically sent. They sent two - each containing 100 cheques. And earlier this year they sent two more, for no apparent reason. I now have enough cheques to keep me going until something like 2410. Perhaps the late 2300s if I ever get extravagant and sometimes write two cheques in one year.

AVG stung as search revenue from freebie scanners dries up

VinceH

Re: I feel a vote coming on...

"Does the starship need any antivirus? (NCC-1701)"

ISTR an episode of TNG in which NCC-1701D's computer was exposed to a virus (which had already led to another starship being destroyed), so I think it probably does.

Thirteen Astonishing True Facts You Never Knew About SCREWS

VinceH

Re: How do they do that?

"Is there an unwritten rule that states 'you will always have left over screws' or do they multiply overnight if left unattended?"

The answer to that question lies here.

'Things' on the Internet-of-things have 25 vulnerabilities apiece

VinceH

Re: Not surprised, but...

"The internet of things is more than just home automation devices or intelligent appliances, smart mobile phones are a big part of the IoT for example."

Taking the term 'Internet of Things' literally, my computers, my NAS, my tablets, my PS3, etc are also a part of the 'Internet of Things'. It remains a stupid term - but I think most people think of computers and other, more recognisable computing devices (i.e. smartphones) as things on the internet, rather than on the 'Internet of Things'.

The 'Internet of Things' - or as I prefer, the Internet of Pointless Things - is, IMO, more about connecting other crap to the internet, that you wouldn't normally think of as a computing device (and on which you probably wouldn't play Doom), pointless things such as light bulbs, fridges, and iPhone users1. You might use your smartphone to monitor and control these things ("Oh, look I can be a lard-arse and switch the light on from the couch instead of getting up and taking a few steps to the switch on the wall"), but that's the only real connection the smartphone has to the IoPT.

As someone upthread has said, it's a solution looking for a problem, and those of us who choose to can ignore it and just do what we do now, because what we do now works.

Bah humbug!

1. Sorry. Haven't had a good dig at Apple users in at least a day. I'm having withdrawal symptoms...

Facebook: Want to stay in touch? Then it's Messenger or NOTHING

VinceH

Re: His site, his rules....

When I used Facebook, I adopted the AC's view - and occasionally posted a comment along the lines of "Don't contact me via Facebook: I'll ignore you. There are other, better methods to contact me. Try the phone. If you don't know my number, try email - my address is easily found."

"The obvious question would then be : So why not completely remove Facebook ?"

Eventually, of course, I did.

Microsoft bakes a bigger Pi to cook Windows slabs

VinceH

Re: re. Sharks Cove apostrophe

"And no frickin' laser beams."

And that's just wrong.

VinceH

Re: Irrelevant

"it makes reminds pi-owners feel like that they got a bargain."

FTFY!

CAPTCHA challenges you to copy pointillist painter Seurat's classic

VinceH

Re: Another Tech That Should Die

"/WTF JUST HAPPENED"

Just keep checking the news for signs of an apocalypse.

Forgot About Dre? Not us. Euro bods give nod to Apple and Beats deal

VinceH

Re: But Dre has the right to be forgotten in the EU.

I'm quite happy to forget him.

Bose says today is F*** With Dre Day: Beats sued in patent battle

VinceH
Trollface

"Then, in 2014, it gets bought by a company with very deep pockets, and Bose asserts its patent claims."

For all we know Bose and Beats have been discussing this matter behind closed doors, and it's only now that Bose have given up on negotiating and turned to the courts. (Might as well with that sugar daddy around - so, yeah, you;re right that on the face of it there is an interesting coincidence of timing).

Meanwhile perhaps Beats have been talking to Apple, and Apple thought "Awww, look, how cute, a fledgling IP abuser, a teeny-weeny version of us. Let's take 'em under our wing." (In which case, that timing may not be so coincidental after all).

Stand by for a claim from Apple that Bose is infringing on something non-technical of theirs, but which is worth far more than what Bose is claiming from Beats.

Need a US visa, passport? Prepare for misery: Database crash strands thousands

VinceH
Black Helicopters

Someone, somewhere agrees that Overpuddle needs to be shut off from the rest of the world, and this is step one in their (ahem) "nefarious" plan.

Teardown gurus iFixit play with Fire – Amazon's new mobe

VinceH

Re: proprietary screw

" that and the half dozen screws that were left over..."

You're supposed to have screws left over. If you don't have screws left over, you're doing it wrong - and for this very reason, I find that if I need a screw of some sort, I just need to find something that will probably have that sort of screw, take it apart and put it back together again.

That's how screws are manufactured, in fact. In the factories around the world that make screws, they just constantly dismantle/reassemble things, and the resulting left-over screws end up packaged and sold on in DIY stores, or to other companies who need them for things they're making themselves.

ICO: It's up to Google the 'POLLUTER' to tidy up 'right to be forgotten' search links

VinceH

Re: Why have I vanished?

"So I have nothing to hide, but may well be treated differently by others due to the way Google has handled this."

Not if, as I suspect will happen (if not already), the warning appears for all searches for names. If that happens, Mr HR Bod from the company you had an interview with will either think all of the candidates have something to hide, or he'll put two and two together and realise the warning is effectively meaningless.

FWIW, I've just fired a fictitious name into Google's search box, and it gave me the warning.

VinceH

Re: Why have I vanished?

"No, this isn't about blocking search terms, this is about removing links. If you are mentioned on the same page as someone else whose request to remove that page was granted, then that removed page won't show when you are doing a search for yourself.

I didn't suggest it was about blocking search terms. Blocking a search term would result in them saying "There are no results available for [what you searched for]" - and that's not what they do.

They 'forget'/remove/de-index a page for the name of the person requesting it (if they agree it's correct to do so). That means that when you search for that person, the page doesn't show up: it's no longer linked, in their vast amounts of data, to that person's name1 (and by extension, any search term that includes that person's name). The link remains in that same data, though, for every other search term that might lead to it.

That this is what happens was demonstrated only a few weeks ago - where the forgotten link could demonstrably still be found by searching on Google. It was clearly still indexed for the person the article was about, so the only likely explanation was that it was de-linked from the name of an unidentified person in the many comments.

1. In reality, the link is probably still there for the name of whoever asks for it to be forgotten, but with a flag (or some other mechanism) to identify it as a 'forgotten' link - otherwise it risks being picked up again by the Googly spiders.

VinceH

Re: Why have I vanished?

"I have quite an uncommon name - there only appears to be 2 of us in Internet land.

Recently, a search on my own name returns a list of results with a message at the bottom saying that some results may have been removed under EU data protection laws."

I have a very uncommon name - I'm 99.9 recurring percent sure that there is only one of 'us' in internet land, and I get the same message.

"I've never requested this, I'm going to check "the other me", but I suspect my name has appeared in articles along with someone else's name, who themselves have asked for the articles to be removed from Google's results."

No, if this someone else asked for something to be removed from the results, it wouldn't affect a search on your name (unless you searched for your name and theirs. I think Google are (or were) gradually adding that message to its search results when they include a name.

I suspect it's so that it becomes a generic warning and can't be used to infer that any given individual has asked for something to be removed. (Although another possibility is that they're doing it to make people wonder, and to try to reinforce the belief that this whole business is breaking the interwebs.)

It's Google HQ - the British one: Reg man snaps covert shots INSIDE London offices

VinceH

"While we'd imagined we'd give tissue samples here"

They probably did that surreptitiously at some point, and will be dragged through the courts at some point in the future with the defence that it was a rogue engineer that added tissue sampling to that door handle (which, naturally, is a part of the Internet of Pointless Things).

FRIKKIN' LASERS could REPLACE fibre-optic comms cables

VinceH

Re: But sharks can't fly...

"Sharknado!"

I have recorded that documentary, but have yet to watch it. I shall do so very soon, because I am sure there is much to learn from it.

And I'm sure I've seen another in recent years that involved flying sharks. There may or may not have been time travel, as well - but I can't remember.

Apple fanbois SCREAM as update BRICKS their Macbook Airs

VinceH

Re: Donelson has a numbers problem.

@flatpackhamster

You're forgetting to account for the Apple RDF when considering Donelson's claims. Thanks to the RDF, all of those contradictory numbers can be true to a true believer.

REG MAN penetrates GOOGLE'S LAIR

VinceH
Pint

Re: Daily Show Reviewed the Google Glass

That has set me up for the day's work ahead. Ta.

Reg Latin scholars scrap over LOHAN's stirring motto

VinceH

"And I'm not sure if I should be happy or sad that my own entry (in Latin - a subject I never studied at all being just a poor plebian) didn't get a mention or argument either."

In the case of my offerings it should probably be Google Translate that is unsure if it should be happy or sad. :)

MPs to sue UK.gov over 'ridiculous' emergency data snooping law

VinceH

Re: Bloody hell!

"It's possible, true, but both Davis and Watson seem to be fully paid-up members of the awkward squad, so I wouldn't bet on it."

In that case, it's quite possible that the spooks are doing their best to create dig up some dirt on them to persuade them to be a little less awkward.

Major problems beset UK ISP filth filters: But it's OK, nobody uses them

VinceH

Re: TalkTalk blocked my site

Okay, in that case I'll make a point of checking again in a week or so (and then perhaps fairly regularly - every month?)

Of the three WP sites, one does have a couple of instances of swearing in it, so depending on the different filtering levels, there may be a small amount of validity in blocking that one.

Apple gets patent for WRIST-PUTER: iTime for a smartwatch

VinceH

IMO, a better way to put it would have been: "I think it's iTime the rest of the world got a divorce from the USA"

Games industry set for $5 BILLION haircut, warn beancounters

VinceH

"I don't understand the question."

Hey, who the hell has been secretly filming me?

Kickstarter tin-rattlers offer reboot of '80s Integrated Space Plan megagraphic

VinceH

Re: Boots on Mars and break a leg

Or a fantastic new means of propulsion (that doesn't involve lots of mass to weigh the rocket down at launch) so you can accelerate the rocket at 9.8M/s^2 for half the distance and flip it around and decelerate it at the same rate for the other half. (And back again).

Back of the envelope: the rocket will hit somewhere in the region of 730,000M/s by the mid-point. Best be careful not to bump into anything.

Report: American tech firms charge Britons a thumping nationality tax

VinceH
Coat

Re: Tax????

"They don't pay Corporation tax, as apparently they don't make any profit in the UK."

In that case, they need to increase the prices - they're obviously too low.