Posts by mhenriday

Frenchman cuffed for naughty lip-slip email to MEP

Considered posting as an Anonymous Coward,

but since so many others have confessed to the same «crime», I decided to post in my own name in the hope that I shall have made it to a better world before the authorities come knocking at/breaking down my door. But perhaps we should all reflect over why we allow ourselves to be manipulated into electing such contemptible persons to feed at the public/lobbyist trough - case in point the mid-term elections in that bastion of liberty, the United States, tomorrow....

Henri

China takes HPC heavyweight title

«[M]ost 中华 are learning to speak English» ?

Can't help wondering what «Anonymous Coward» thinks the above means - and where he/she has obtained information about the percentage of Chinese who speak 普通话. As to innovation on the part of a people subject to «5,000 years of being told what to think», I can only wonder what Anonymous Coward uses as a hygienic product after defecation, or if he/she has any acquaintance with firearms or the magnetic compass. 匿名懦夫 is one thing, 无知 is quite another....

Henri

China takes HPC lead

To my mind, competition in this particular area benefits us all - so long as the computers are not used to devine ever more effective weapons to be used in criminal wars of aggression abroad. These last thirty years, the Chinese have studiously avoided participating in such projects - would that others had done likewise !...

Henri

Chinese regime opens Google Earth rival

Works fine in Firefox and Chromium on 64-bit Ubuntu for me ;

the first part of the message that appears when one loads the web page informs readers using IE6 - a majority of Chinese users - that IE7 or above is recommended and provides links to downloads of IE7 and IE8, respectively. The second part points out that 3D representation may not work with UAC activated and provides instructions for turning it off. The remaining two parts detail how certain features are to be used, i e, standard user information. It will be interesting to see how many users this service gains in China and abroad....

Henri

EU privacy watchdog pans passenger data plans

One day, perhaps, European leaders will decide

that it is no longer in their interests to run their countries as satellites to the US government (and the US motion picture and recording industries) and the continual sacrifice of citizens' rights to integrity and privacy will come to an end. A cynic, however, might choose to point out that these leaders are as interested in curtailing citizens' rights as their counterparts in the United States and are singularly adept at hiding behind claims of a need to acquiesce in the demands of the latter to further their own agenda. So the battle must be fought both externally - against US government claims to jurisdiction over the whole world - and internally - against «our» governments' intrusions into our privacy. Kudos to the EDPS for taking some necessary steps in this direction ; let us hope that the European Parliament will block the worst of the European Commission's excesses....

Henri

Microsoft's fear of an OpenOffice

Despite Matt's characterisation of OOo as «hapless»,

I've never found any reasons why a home user in need of an office suite would need to throw away good money to purchase Microsoft's costly - and buggy - product. Working now as he does for Canonical, Matt should be acutely aware of the fact that market share in a given field does not necessarily reflect performance and/or reliability differentials between the products available there. I agree his general point that Microsoft under the ineffable Mr Ballmer has looks more backwards than forwards, but badmouthing OOo in order to make it strikes me as gratuitous....

Henri

Florida cops tase naked jogger

Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius.

I hold with Abbot Amaury ; tasering - at least when it only leads to cuts and bruises and «incoherences», rather than fatalities - is far too mild a measure in dealing with so horrible an offense as jogging naked in the nude....

Henri

Opera: Can someone free Korea from IE?

According to StatCounter.

Opera presently enjoys a market share of approximately 2 % worldwide (goo.gl/vxAZ) and 5 % here in Europe (goo.gl/QrHs). In South Korea (goo.gl/P3X6), where IE dominates with a market share of about 93 % (but IE8, mirabile dictu, now leads by seven percentage points over IE6) and Chrome and Firefox struggle to maintain shares of 3 %, Opera's share is less than 1 %. In any event, from a consumer's point of view, the issue here is not market share for one browser or another, but rather Microsoft's bundling practices, which by illegitimate means seek to limit competition. I, for one, would very much like to see Opera, together with Mozilla and Google, launch complaints against these practices with the relevant authorities in countries like South Korea, as a small contribution to leveling the playing field in the worldwide web browser market. If they don't wish to start in South Korea, they could always try doing so in the US....

Henri

US demands right to snoop the world

Like one of our «Anonymous Coward[s]»,

I think it's high time to inform Sophie in 't Veld that rather than the US (government) being «friend and ally», to us Europeans, it is the Sparta to our Peloponnesian League - if somebody gets out of line, they are invaded and brought into the fold (see recent history in the Balkans). The EC should have stood up to the US government during the original negotiations on SWIFT ; it has the opportunity to in part redeem its reputation by doing so now. «No taxation without representation» was the watchword of the original Tea Party (in some years, the tax on tea comprised some 10 % of the British government's revenues) ; perhaps it's time for us Europeans to adopt the same measures to deal with US embassies (proconsulates) that were used to deal with the destroyed nuclear reactors at Chernobyl - i e, to build hermetically sealed concrete sarcophagi over them, taking care to see that the residents are unable to tunnel out....

Henri

OpenOffice files Oracle divorce papers

I'm very much hoping for the success of the LibreOffice project

(don't at all find the «temporary name that bad), as even the most myopic should be able to see that OpenOffice.org will soon get the final shaft from open source's friends and allies at Oracle. I install the Swedish-language version of OOo on the computers of retirees who have the wisdom to refuse to pay the Microsoft tax for an office suite ; in order to able to use LibreOffice instead, the language problem (only English-language versions are available at present) would have to be addressed. For my own part, I should want to see deb versions ; as «the old rang» indicated, most of use can find better uses for our time than converting RPM files. But I'm hopeful that the Document Foundation people will shortly get 'round to dealing with these problems - let us hope that the community will support them in their efforts !...

Henri

IBM 'one atom, one bit' storage breakthrough

Don't know what you've got in your pocket, Rik,

but I've got a scanning tunneling microscope in mine ! Cheers !...

Henri

Google Percolator – global search jolt sans MapReduce comedown

Thanks, Cade,

for this fascinating and instructive view of what's behind Google's new search infrastructure ! Articles of this type are the reason why I subscribe to the Reg....

Henri

Microsoft delivers Google Chrome IE9 beta

Having used and continuing to use both MS and Linux OS,

it is not my experience that the latter need to «catch up» to the former. But different strokes for different folks ; I have no problem with JDX preferring and using Windows OS on his or her computers, but I do dislike having to jump through hoops to get a new box without paying the Microsoft tax. I hope that the European Commission will finally acknowledge the importance of this issue, and take a good hard look at the dodgy marketing practices which have allowed Microsoft to gain a quasi-monopoly in the field....

Henri

Thanks, Mozilla, Chrome, and Opera -

your efforts in the browser field have finally pushed Microsoft to devote the resources necessary to make significant improvements its problem child of a browser ! This would hardly have happened if Microsoft had been able to maintain its quasi-monopoly. Alas, we still have yet to see a similar development in the OS field....

Henri

Opensourcers get personal over Ellison's Google fight

Every time I see a headline about Oracle,

I'm reminded of the suggestion of Dick the butcher in Henry VI, Part 2 : «The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers». Opposed to capital punishment as I am, I think 30 years at hard labour would suffice for these transgressors, but please, let us do away with patents on the mathematical algorithms that go under the name «software» !...

Henri

UK agrees copyright cooperation with China

Everytime you chaps who think that technical exchange and so-called «piracy»

is a one-way street, might want to contribute a few pence to the Chinese every time you wipe yourselves. Paper, both to write upon and as a hygienic product, is a Chinese invention. You might also want to consider adding a couple of pence when drinking your tea, hunting your foxes, or using your compasses....

Henri

Google search index splits with MapReduce

Google seems determined to maintain its lead in search -

and is obviously matching this determination with the resources needed to keep its level of technical competence in the field well above that of its competitors. I only hope that these commendable efforts will not be fatally marred by the hubris that at times seems to strikes Google policy makers - to take an example from the search field, users to whom Google Instant has been rolled out will find themselves unable to disable both Instant and Autocomplete. Complaints to the help fora have been met with an attitude all too characteristic for Google - we know best ! Personally, I like Instant and am looking forward to it being rolled out to us here in the Frozen North, but Google's refusal to provide users with an option to disable both it and Autocomplete tells a tale of arrogance which may come to be the company's downfall....

Henri

Safari and Firefox updates plug critical holes

Alternative to what ?

«Tuesday marked a busy day for alternative browser security updates with patches from both Apple and Mozilla.» Given that, according to StatCounter (http://preview.tinyurl.com/2v5odq9 ), Firefox currently enjoys a worldwide market share of over 30 %, perhaps it is no longer apt to characterise it as an «alternative browser» ?...

Henri

What does the Hurd mentality bring to Oracle?

As a user, I can't help wondering what Hurd's Oracle apotheosis

will mean for such former Sun open source activities as OOo. The future looks bleak....

Henri

Wikileaks founder blasts reopening of rape probe

Yes, indeed, we do have laws that should protect journalists and whistle blowers.

But when push comes to shove, our legal system has shown itself to be eminently susceptible to influence by the big guns, whether financial, political, or military. Our laws allow for surveillance of our email messages (but, our politicos say, only if they cross the border, which, of course, they almost always do, which the politicos don't mention), and our beak corps is so full of people who belong to organizations sponsored by content-rights holders that a independent judge couldn't be found for the Pirate Bay trials (if, indeed, one was searched for at all). So neither Mr Assange nor others should be unduly impressed by the state of Sweden ; in reality, alas, it's not much better than that attributed by Shakespeare to our southern neighbour....

Henri

NASA seeks inflatable popup roof for camper vans on Mars

Given the strength of the gravity well out of which we are working,

if there is to be a future for H sapiens sapiens off this planet, it will have to be a joint effort of all interested and capable nations, including, not least, the - in this particular context, the United States' favourite bête noir - Chinese. No more keeping the Chinese off the ISS, no more legal restrictions on trade and other forms of cooperation ; instead we are going to have to keep our eyes on the essential ball : establishing working human colonies on other bodies in our system. Otherwise, we might as well stop playing around and restrict our efforts to robot investigations of these bodies and more and better telescopes in better Earth orbits than the current LEOs....

Henri

Chrome celebrates second b-day with sixth release

I've been running Chrome dev versions

on Windows and Ubuntu OS since they were released and on the later system Chromium nightly versions ; with almost no exceptions, I've found all these releases extremely stable - no blank screens or prone or supine postures. I also find that the extensions work well - so well, in fact, that if I could get my Delicious bookmarks to display in a permanent left-hand sidepanel on Chrome as they do on my Firefox browsers, I'd select the former as my default browser over the latter. My impression is that the developers have come a long way these last two years - kudos to them !...

Henri

Google butterfingers slip jazz hands bug into Gmail

Well, Kelly, I haven't encountered this problem

when opening my Gmail account on Chrome 7.0.503.1 dev or on Chromium 7.0.513.0 (58299) - or, for that matter, on Firefox 3.6.10pre or Minefield 4.0b6pre - all on my 64-bit Ubuntu Lucid box. My difficulty is of a rather different sort - I now have 680 messages awaiting me in my Priority Inbox (shan't tell how many I find in my ordinary inbox, but read the discussion on the échelle longue and the échelle courte in the comments thread to another Reg blog and you'll get an idea), which makes it hard to sort out the «really» important ones. All this is Google's fault, of course, and I expect to be fully compensated for my lost time....

Henri

PS : As for «keeping the beta label on products long past when they have been released to the masses», has the learned commentator compared the time the standard version of Google Chrome was «in beta» with the corresponding period for Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 ?...

Retired joint chiefs chairman dons a Red Hat

Anonymous Coward, they just don't make them like Smedly Butler

any more - no one in high position in the military now tells the truth about their organisations when they retire. Instead they go on to cushy jobs with one contractor or another. Dwight David Eisenhower's warning about the military-industrial complex hasn't lost any of its actuality during the 47 years that have passed since then....

Henri

Next in line -

Richard Bruce Cheny ? Presumably Red Hat wants to join Microsoft at sucking at the teat of the military-industrial-legislator-lobbyist complex, but do they have to make it so obvious ?...

Henri

Court of Appeal challenges parallel import blocking

From the summary of the decision reported in the article,

it seems clear that the court is mainly concerned to see that litigation continues, presumably to prevent unemployment among fellow lawyers. That being said, I hope the judgement (as I interpret it) stands, and the manufacturer's attempt to restrain trade is struck down. We pay far too much to them in monopoly rents, which they continually attempt to manipulate in their favour....

Henri

AMD to dump ATI brand

Why this all this misplaced emphasis on brand name ?

Isn't it first and foremost the quality of the products which should interest us as users ? Or have we all been seduced into believing that putting one label on the product of an assembly plant in China instead of another makes an earth-shaking difference in our «product experience» ?...

Henri

E-voting critic released on bail (finally)

Hari Prasad is a hero -

and if he travels to Sweden, he'd be advised to learn from the experience of others who reveal information the authorities wish to keep hidden and be careful of the honey-pot traps that await him here....

Henri

PS : Paris, because in cases like these, who else ?...

Danish rocketeers poised to reach for the skies

Couldn't this group from København (Copenhagen)

test their rocket with den lille havfrue as passenger ? She looks so lonely sitting there on her rock in the harbour, so she'd certainly appreciate a little excursion....

Henri

PS : Pity there's only Paris as symbol of feminine pulchritude here, but a Tuborg will do....

Boffin-botherer's LHC doomsday case thrown out on appeal

Alas, the real threat to CERN

doesn't come from individuals like Messrs Wagner and Sancho, but rather from the draconian budget cuts (http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/43620) being forced upon the organisation by member countries, a decision in which the present British government, like its predecessor, is playing its typically ignoble part. Money for imperialist wars of aggression or kit with appealing names like «Vengeance» they can always find, but learning more about the basic structure of matter - no, that's simply too too dear and of no immediate relevance. Where do these Ministers get their priorities - or rather, where do we get these Ministers ?...

Henri

More Bull grunt for Blighty's atom-bomb factory

Perhaps those «atom-bom boffins worldwide»

could instead devote themselves to dismantling those weapons of mass destruction, so that the species might stand a sporting chance of making it through the next few decades ? When done, that would, of course, force them to seek a slightly different line of work, but people with that level of education and competence should be able to find gainful employment....

Henri

WikiLeaks readies next release

We need Wikileaks more than ever,

now that the planning for the USA's next imperial war of aggression - that on Iran - is proceeding apace. Now that the political process in the United States has failed utterly - the man who won election as a «peace candidate» in the (deluded) eyes of many is now as president continuing and expanding upon the policies of his predecessor - sites like Wikileaks, which publish all the documents the government so desperately wishes to keep hidden, so that readers can judge for themselves, may well be our only chance to avoid a development which could put the survival of the species at risk. We need more sites like Wikileaks - and with access to more documents from more countries....

JohnG will be interested to know that here in Sweden anonymity is, in fact, mandatory in investigations like that which on-duty prosecutor Maria Häljebo - but in this case, it was «leaked» to a certain tabloid, Expressen, of predictable tendency (yes, not dissimilar to the Daily Mail). Wonder just how, who, and why ?...

Henri

Stockholm schoolgirls fined for bugging staff room

To bad the girls didn't bug the offices of our beloved Minister of Primary and Secondary Education,

Major Jan Arne Björklund ! Now those would be really conversations I'd love to hear - where, Julian Assange, is Wikileaks when we need it ?...

Henri

Danes work up head of steam over manga exhibition

We here in Scandinavia seem to be as readily seized by moral panic

as people in most countries in Europe and North America. Fortunately we - our at least our governments - are equally willing to tag along in the criminal wars of aggression that certain powers carry out throughout the world. Thus we get to play with the rest of the children - all of whom, of course, are well over the legal age of consent - instead of being consigned to the sidelines....

Herni

Microsoft hit by cloudy downtime in US

Perhaps some of these customers

will, in fact, look skyward - but take care that the right ascension and declination of the object they are seeking will better meet their needs....

Henri

Google's Wave flop: Spare us the warm fuzzies

Matt Asay is probably right about incremental change being preferable -

particularly when dealing with a base as large as that of email users, which, if I'm not entirely off base (pardon the pun), was the group to which Wave was directed. Still, I'd hate to see Google give up on revolutionary, non-incremental projects - these are necessary and, if human ingenuity doesn't utterly fail, bound to come, if not from Google than from other quarters. I suspect that the experiment with Wave, in which I participated as a (somewhat confused) user, has taught Google developers many things which will prove useful in other products, not least in further developments to Gmail, of which I am a (hopefully less confused) enthusiastic user. What I hope Google as a corporation will learn from the experience - I don't wish to call it a debacle, as I don't think it was that, even if it has been discontinued - is the need for much more testing out-of-house before releasing such products to the general public. The more revolutionary and creative, rather than incremental, these innovations, the greater the necessity of such testing. As one of them, I know that Google possesses a corps of enthusiastic «trusted testers» ; I hope that they make even more use of us the next time 'round !...

Henri

One in five workers still clinging to IE6

JC 2, the English plural of the word «virus»

is «viruses». The Latin plural would probably have been «vira», but it is not attested....

Henri

Judge trounces Register.com in Baidu.com hijacking case

Cynical as I am,

I suspect that that the reason Register.com is pouring «breath-taking resources» into the defense of «what almost everyone would agree is a massive cock-up» instead of just settling and saving a bundle is that they reckon that in the good old US of A, anyone who does something harmful to a Chinese firm is a patriot. We'll have to see if this calculation holds....

Henri

Apple preps iOS fix as Germany warns of iPhone peril

Peter, you beat me to the punch !

Is that legal ? I'll have to start looking for a fix....

Henri

Microsoft strikes Salesforce patent payola

Agree with Lou Gosselin -

a «no software patents icon» is de rigueur ; my thumb is getting awfully tired !...

Henri

Pentagon Wikileaks probe reaches MIT

«Adrian Lamo,

the hacker who reported Manning to authorities in May, said that two men at the prestigious university assisted in releasing the material ...» One of which, no doubt, is Avram Noam Chomsky. Hope Wikileaks obtains and publishes the full diary of Mr Lamo's contacts with his minders ! As for the Pentagon, where are Justice Jackson and the Nürnberg Trials («We must never forget that the record on which we judge these defendants [the 24 most notorious Nazi leaders in Allied hands] is the record on which history will judge us tomorrow....») when we need them ?...

Henri

HP pays to end kickback probe

Dura lex sed lex -

unless, of course, one is a wealthy corporation (a juridical construction, which, according to the US Supreme Court, inherently possesses all the rights that the US Constitution gives real persons), in which case one pays a minor fine and admits no guilt. Ain't capitalism grand ?...

Henri

Firefox market share drops as IE makes slender gain

Strange, I don't see this declining trend for FF share

when I check StatCounter's worldwide stats (http://preview.tinyurl.com/2dv3o9o ) - FF seems to be holding its own with a market share of 31 - 32 %, IE declining slowly, with a current share of around 53 %, and Chrome increasing at a fairly rapid pace and now enjoying a market share worldwide of over 10 %. For the United States, which always occupies a privileged place in the affections of Reg bloggers, the respective shares are 53 %, 28 %, and 9 %. Perhaps it's time for a discussion on just whose statistics should be used as the basis for Reg articles and why....

Henri

Microsoft gets dirty with Gmail cloud cash fight

Competition ?

One could, of course, compete by offering a better product at lower cost - but that just doesn't seem to be Microsoft's preferred modus operandi....

Henri

Czechs toast Bud-beating beer win

Švejk's favourite pub

served Velkopopovický - good enough for me !...

Henri

NoScript 2.0 beefs border patrol

Thanks, Giorgio -

all users are in your debt ! In particular users running Windows OS - those who surf without NoScript in such circumstances should knot the little «神風» bandanna tighter round their heads and take an extra sip of sake before heading out to sea....

Henri

Broadband advertising speed gap widens

Surprise, surprise !

ISPs - even i the UK, that bastion of truth in advertising - lie about the speeds of the connexions they offer their customers (please, Reg monitor - read the above as synonymous with «make statements regarding the speeds of the connexions they offer their customers which have at best an ephemeral relation to reality») ! What a revelation ! But users in the UK can comfort themselves - solamen miseris socios habuisse doloris - we users everywhere, in particular ADSL users, are all in the same boat....

Henri

Yahoo! Japan! turns! wing! against! Bing! in! Google! deal!

One can understand why Microsoft is feeling like the odd man out

when it comes to search in Japan - according to StatCounter, Bing enjoys a bit over 2 % of the market (http://preview.tinyurl.com/2ugyvld ). But not to worry, Microsoft still has a commanding presence - over 60 % - in that country's browser market. One wonders why....

Henri

Wikileaks creaks under demand for Afghan war logs

A minor correction, Tim -

the Göring quote is not taken from anything he said in court - that would have been a fine scandal, indeed, in particular as the last sentence, which you omit, runs like this (in my English translation from the German) : «This method works in every country» - but from an interview by Gustave Gilbert with Göring in the latter's cell on 18 April 1946. The German original (with ellipses) can be found here : http://de.wikiquote.org/wiki/Hermann_G%C3%B6ring....

In any event, perhaps Den Norske Nobelkomite, instead of sullying their name by awarding the Nobel «fredspris» to war criminals like Heinz Alfred Kissinger and Barack Hussein Obama, might want to consider bestowing it on Wikileaks. But don't hold your breath !...

Henri

EC launches formal probes into IBM's mainframe biz

Good that the European Commission is looking into this -

in the end, it is always the consumer/user who pays for the anti-competitive practices so beloved of both software and hardware vendors. Those who think markets will regulate themselves have neither read their Adam Smith nor learnt from recent experience....

Henri