Posts by Yet Another Anonymous coward

Post-Brexit economy SAVED: Posh-nosh truffle thrives in Wales

Re: does anybody know why people don't grow them in greenhouses?

It's really difficult to cultivate a lot of fungi.

They often need a specific tree root with specific soil bacteria as well as very fussy conditions

How we fooled Google's AI into thinking a 3D-printed turtle was a gun: MIT bods talk to El Reg

Re: I've occasionally wondered how much fun could be had

Modern half-decent x-ray machines image at different angles so they get a 3d-ish view of the object.

This is mostly to stop you hiding a suspicious shaped object behind a dense reasonable shaped one

On the other hand a doctor 'trained' on a few images of a cancerous cell from a textbook 20years earlier does much worse job of screening a million tumour scans than a machine trained on millions of images

Paradise Papers were not an inside job, says leaky offshore law firm

That's rich - when Ireland isn't enough of a tax haven for you

Re: Live by the sword, die by the sword

Or in this case live by the sword, die by a couple of large men with AK47s and Russian accents saying - "Mr Putin is very disappointed in you"

For fanbois only? Face ID is turning punters off picking up an iPhone X

Re: Apple Targetting Jim Henson's People.... "the Queens English"

It was presumably the English of other Queens as well

Take off, ya hosers! Silicon Valley court says Google can safely ignore Canadian search ban

Re: Hmmm...

That's different, Google is a US registered company it is subject to US jurisdiction and so can argue in US courts about whether a US warrant for overseas data is legal.

This is Canada trying to say that a Canadian judgement against a US company in Canada is binding on the US company's operations in the USA and the US company is saying - no the USA law (free speech) applies there.

It isn't always automatically that only the foreign law applies in the foreign country. A US (or UK) court can prosecute a US (UK) citizen or registered corp for doing things abroad which are illegal at home - even if legal in that country. So if the search results were appearing on the .com site of a Canadian search company then Canada might have more power to stop them.

The company alleges the infringement is in Canada, its trademark is in Canada. It wants Google to remove ads which would be illegal in Canada from everywhere else in the world.

Imagine if Saudi Arabia was allowed to order Google to remove ads for products which would be illegal in Saudi from Google results in the rest of the world ? Now repeat for every jurisdiction.

The company could ask the US court to remove the ads from Google in the USA but IIRC either they didn't have a trademark in the US or the counterfeit goods weren't sold in the US. Their complaint was only that Canadian buyers were searching on Google.COM for the fakes.

A similar case came up where Canadian election results are banned until the poles are closed 5 time zones away - but are of course available on US sites.

Equifax execs sold shares before mega-hack reveal. All above board – Equifax probe

Re: Directors sell shares all the time

Except they didn't know that prices would only drop 25% - the company could (should?) have been wiped out.

This was hardly a blind sale, unless the IT security director had a policy that he wasn't to be told of any hacks it has to look suspicious that they put in a sell order just after the hack but weren't officially informed until a month later.

Aren't there rules that you can only sell after results are published?

At least in the UK, there is a presumption that directors and senior staff have inside info and are only allowed to sell in a brief public window.

(or at least there was when I briefly worked for a PLC)

OK, we admit it. Under the hood, the iPhone X is a feat of engineering

Re: "it comes with a beautiful notch"

I assumed it was a euphemism for something - in these more sensitive times you can't go around complementing somebody's notch without all sorts of HR issues

Would a lower resolution screen of the same size necessarily use less power?

Is the current draw dominated by per-pixel switching or is the pixel capacitance + backlight (in which case would depend more on total area)

I think there are problems doing conformal coating with the highest density BGA packages.

I can't remember if this just stops rework/testing or if the coating can actually detach/damage components - somebody here must be an expert

Beware Paris Hilton's investment advice, SEC tells investors

That would be as ridiculous as taking medical advice from the "star" of sliding doors

Giza geezers' muon-geyser visor reveals Great Pyramid's hidden void surpriser

Re: Done before?

The original experiments were by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luis_Walter_Alvarez

US says it's identified six Russian officials as DNC hack suspects

Either it was criminally negligent security on a crappy home email server that would let any GOP script kiddie in or it was super military grade system that only a crack team of Russian government cyber ninjas could have broken into.

Unless of course that's what the Belgian Illuminati want you to think

TalkTalk glitch causing mobiles and landlines to go off at the same time

Talk Talk

The clue is in the name.

If you wanted only one phone to ring you would sign up with just "Talk"

Slashing regulations literally more important than saving American lives to Donald Trump

Re: All vehicles within 4 years?

Apart from the crash in India where 2 planes were put on the same route and their GPS navigation was so accurate that they crashed exactly nose-nose with 1m. Or the Russian charter crash in Switzerland/Austria where TCAS told one pilot to dive but ATC told him pull up and they crashed.

Or the numerous US Navy vs container ship where one followed AIS and the other followed rank.

Even though these systems are much more extensively regulated and operate in a much slower and sparser space environment than a rush hour freeway we still don't let flights operate totally autonomously based on ADS

It's not clear that wifi is even the best technology.

Since you principally care about line of sight targets (the car in front / behind you) it would seem that photonics would be a better solution.

Cars could be equipped with wavelength division multiplexed signalling transmitters with eg. red light signalling I am slowing and yellow light signalling a lane change request. Many cars already have the equipment fitted even if it is disabled in most premier brands

Re: All vehicles within 4 years?

But even to send the data (not be self driving) any car more than 10 years old doesn't have the data to send. There is no steering angle sensor, no brake data, no computerised engine management to know the speed and no canbus to collect the data. Even newer cars with canbus might not have steering and braking data if they don't have power steering or ABS.

It also seems to be one of those technologies that isn't useful unless nearly all cars have it. Like marine AIS - it's great but you can't base a course on it if that crowd of sailing boats in front of the harbor don't have it.

All vehicles within 4 years?

So every vehicle needs GPS and a cell phone fitting and older vehicles need some sort of steering, brake and throttle angle sensors and the associated comms bus - in 4 years

And how do you trust this data?

Even if it is encrypted, authenticated , unjammable and unspoofable - how do you know that the other car isn't maliciously steering you out of it's way or into another?

And then even if it did work as advertised. That means if eg. an Audi driver turns in front of - it signals your car to brake to let them in ?

Hardware has never been better, but it isn't a licence for code bloat

Re: Very good points!

Shared libraries were very important when your machine had just a few KB or MB of memory, and disk space was small too, but far less important today

Although ironically we now have to run apps inside containers inside VMs to cope with different apps needing different versions of some shared system component

Re: "The important thing is to have a way to measure"

The most effective debugging tool is still careful thought, coupled with judiciously placed print statements.

That was perhaps true when you had the source to the operating system in front of you.

There are several APIs I use where the only way to get the format of the input data correct is to send something random and step into the call in a debugger. The code is so obfuscated with macros and inline assembler that you can't even look at the source and work out the format

Re: "The important thing is to have a way to measure"

printing the contents of a variable to the terminal?

A terminal ! It's not debugging unless you are blinking LEDs with morse code

So, tell us again how tech giants are more important than US govt...

Re: Perspective

No, only by Russian fake news.

More than $3bn spent by both main candidates and the lies published by them and their supporters had absolutely no effect on the electorate, but $100,000 of Russian ads totally swayed it.

Ex-Facebook manager sues biz after getting 'Zucked out of overtime'

Re: @Tom38

I've worked for universities, consultancies, startups and the only job I remember clocking in and out in a way which the company could record how many hours I worked was a student holiday job in a warehouse.

Are you saying that every university or startup that doesn't have signed timesheets is breaking the law?

Crisis? What crisis? Samsung is raking in $109m profit a day

A good precedent

Just like companies have to pay $100M bonuses to attract the best CEOs - who then perform worse than average. Why don't we try imprisoning more CEOs to boost profits

A draft US law to secure election computers that isn't braindead. Well, I'm stunned! I gotta lie down

Re: What's wrong with the exiting system?

Or just put it on ebay.

Surely the free market suggests that the party that deserves to win is the one that spends most - just make it official

What's wrong with the exiting system?

Jut count the number of "likes" for each candidate on Facebook

Actual accountability to a secret 3 letter agency that will ensure that any flaws are now classified at the highest level, it will be a serious offence to try and expose any flaws in your machines and any mention of any flaws in the media can be quashed for national security reasons.

Plus you get to charge defense company levels for these new "critical infrastructure" machines - while presumably being as late and buggy as a typical fighter jet project.

I suspect that there are conga lines forming in boardrooms at voting machine makers.

Verizon whips out Big Johnson to lure FCC into axing US states' net neutrality, privacy rules

The real counter to this is going to be from the even bigger bullies.

The ISPs want to charge Netflix and Amazon for bandwidth then they can charge ISPs for access.

So the govt says that Facebook and Google are media companies ? Then the cable providers can pay the same for access to gmail, google search and youtube that they currently pay for HBO and ESPN.

Verizon, how much is your business worth if your subscribers suddenly can't get Facebook, search or you-tube?

Car insurers recoil in horror from paying auto autos' speeding fines

Re: Try a sensible design?

Just be grateful that the speed limit signs aren't in a locked filing cabinet...

It's an interesting point whether the displayed speed limit sign is the definitive legal limit, or that is the speed limit assigned by the local authority ?

If somebody puts up a fake speed limit sign or a variable one malfunctions are you currently responsible ?

Re: So I'm liable for my Volkswagon exceeding CO2 emissions?

You can be if you mess with the pollution control systems.

But that was the point of the article - the insurer is on the hook for safety, so long as you install upgrades.

But you are responsible if the automated car breaks the law.

i suppose you are currently legally responsible if your phone doesn't meet CE/FCC regs - but I can't imagine a regular owner being prosecuted because the manufacturer had a bug in the modem

Surely the owner of the device would be liable?

So I'm liable for my Volkswagon exceeding CO2 emissions?

Fresh bit o' Linux to spruce up that ancient Windows Vista box? Why not, we say...

Re: Windows7 / 10 look+feel

Thank you, the Q4OS manager in the link (http://dailylinuxuser.com/2016/11/make-q4os-look-like-windows-with-xpq4.html) looks promising

Windows7 / 10 look+feel

Are there any current desktops with a very close Windows7 (or Windows10 ) look and feel?

I want to replace a Windows machine for a highly-non-technical user and don't want them to realise anythinn has changed. As long as web pages open and they can have libreoffice open word docs they will be happy.

Fine, OK, no backdoors, says Deputy AG. Just keep PLAINTEXT copies of everyone's messages

Re: OFFS

Not the US govt. he wants the authorities to have the plain text.

So if the message goes through a cable in international water - every govt get a copy.

The Russians, the Cubans, the Iranians, the Belgians ....

Fake tech support 'scam' husband and wife banned FOR LIFE from computer repair world

Re: Outrageous sums of money?

I paid $1.5M for a payroll system and then IBM called and claimed I had to pay another $150M over the next 6 years to make it work.

Fortunately this wasn't a criminal scam - just a government IT contract

USB stick found in West London contained Heathrow security data

Re: sounds a bit far fetched to be honest.

The Queens 'route' ?

Wouldn't she take the Piccadilly line to Green Park> She could then pick up a Horse to back door of Buck Palace. Alternately she could sell the Crown jewels and get a Heathrow Express ticket.

Now that Uber is out of the picture

Re: Someone tell Amber Rudd.

She will take immediate action to ensure that USB keys containing sensitive data can no longer be found under piles of leaves.

A major defoliation campaign involving spraying Agent Orange over west London

Re: How as this even possible?

The fact that a USB stick exists with open documents tells us plenty about that organisation.

That in the current climate of austerity they can no longer afford to lose entire laptops

Seagate's 'AI' disk drive: Just put slightly higher numbers on the specs

This new one is even better. It can store an infinite amount of data and when you try and retrieve it - the AI argues you out of wanting that particular file

F-35s grounded by spares shortage

Re: F-35 Normal state is TITSUP

Would you really want to base the UK's defence for the next half century on the assumption that a few UK-based bearded god-botherers are the only threat we need to prepare against?

No we must prepare for a simultaneous land war in Russia and China.

Obviously bringing the Brigade of Guards upto a fighting strength of 1 billion will require some extensive breeding programs in the home counties.

Chinese whispers: China shows off magnetic propulsion engine for ultra-silent subs, ships

Re: Yamato 1?

Couldn't they follow historical British tradition and name them after famous historical naval figures?

I'm sure the US would welcome a goodwill visit to Hawaii from the Admirial Yamamoto

Re: Wait, what?

Couldn't they just use a big magnet on a rope to stick onto another ship - that sounds like a silent (and economical) propulsion system

Re: I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again...

But there can be only one prototype

Unless we are embracing cuddly-feely engineering where every design gets to be first and a special little snowflake

Brave Twitter axes Russian media ads 11 months after the fact

In post-soviet Russia ad influences you ...

Biz quadruples value overnight by adding 'Blockchain' to name

If only Watson had suggested that - they might have a business .

Man: Just 18 Bitcoin babies and my home is yours

Re: This bit always confuses me....

But the Swiss newsagents also accept bars of gold with swastikas on them.

The Swiss restricting high value notes to prevent criminal money laundering by Swiss banks would be like handing out speeding tickets at the Indi500