Posts by David 132 5506 publicly visible posts • joined 1 Mar 2010
Excellent pun Sir, have an upvote. Minor pedantry: I believe Dai Electric would be the correct Welsh spelling.
I recall my Dad taking me to Dinorwig many years ago when I was just a wee lad. Can't remember too much of it as time has clouded my memory, but I do recall that it was cold, wet (duh, it's North Wales) and yet very impressive.
Voip-Pal, who insists in a company Q&A (PDF) that it is not a patent troll,
....
Voip-Pal.com does not offer any products or services of its own, but rather seeks to make money by buying and licensing patents. In this case, the patents were originally assigned to Digifonica, whose portfolio Voip-Pal acquired in 2013.
If it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck...
Sure looks like a duck, or rather an NPE, to me.
...Never, ever, EVER delete files from a user's device (phone, PC) without a) authorization and b) creating a backup (e.g. quarantine).
Example: for a short while, there was a version of VLC on the Apple iPhone app store. I grabbed it immediately, because, well, it's VLC and it knocks every other media player program into a cocked hat.
But - as I recall - one of the VLC developers complained that the Apple store Terms of Service weren't compatible with the GPL license of his code, or something like that, and so it got pulled.
According to the reasoning of this study, Apple should have immediately yanked the VLC app from my phone, too, I guess?
Another example - the "Magical Jellybean Key Finder" tool, which for many years on Windows was the best way to extract your Office / Windows product key from the Registry. Always got detected by Defender as malware (because OMG IT READS PRODUCT KEYS FROM THE REGISTRY) and deleted - although at least Defender had the decency to place it in Quarantine for subsequent whitelisting and restoration.
I am so sick of OS and device vendors thinking they know best. Let me make my own decisions and go to Hell in my own way.
I had to call Apple yesterday as I didn't know the answers to my security questions to login to one of their websites.
Been there, I feel your pain.
Similarly: I lost my iPhone a few days ago (as in, I knew it was somewhere in the house/garden/car, but couldn't figure out where I'd left it). No problem - I have the Find my iPhone service set up.
So on my Mac, I went to the icloud.com Find-my-device page, to be greeted with
YOU HAVE A WEAK PASSWORD. YOU MUST CHANGE YOUR PASSWORD NOW. RIGHT NAO!!1!. IMMEDIATELY!!
Yeah, great, perfect timing Apple... when someone has lost their phone and is mildly freaking out, is EXACTLY when you should insist on changing their password to suit you (note: I don't keep anything sensitive on my iCloud account because I hate all things cloud, so a "strong password" is for Apple's convenience, not mine).
Why not something like "Your password doesn't meet our latest requirements. Please change it at your earliest convenience"???
So, anyway, muttering and grumbling, I changed the password. As most people in this situation do, I just capitalized the first letter and added a symbol and a number on the end e.g "Sesame^1"... that'll teach them...
Then got hit with a blizzard of system prompts on the mac.
ICLOUD needs your new passsord NOW!!
MAIL needs your new password NOW!!
ITUNES needs your new password NOW!!
..one after the other, appearing as fast as I could deal with them.
Once I found the phone, I got similar modal, non-skippable prompts. "Your password needs to be updated - go to settings NOW".
What. A. Shitty. User. Experience.
Seriously, Apple, WTF?
What has happened to all the tech companies, that they now think THEIR requirements and way of doing something trumps anything up to and including user convenience?
By freely swapping all our stuff, we collectively back each other up, whilst avoiding the additional cost of redundancy.
Me too.
But a better solution would be:
- take all your MP3s, videos, confidential documents etc and encrypt them into one big archive. Then encrypt that again with a different key.
Then upload it to Torrent sites as something like "TTIP_Full_Text.doc" or "Trump_Blackmail_Material.ppt".
It'll be mirrored and distributed and seeded for evermore, even as no-one can ever figure out how to decrypt it.
You can then pull it back down at your leisure.
Even easier - remote control of your car, via a low latency link, from a drone control centre in Bangalore.
Driving-as-a-Service. You read it here first. None of that tedious and complicated AI stuff, just globalization and cheap labour at work.
"Hello Sir, my name* is 'Steve', I will be your driver today, please be sitting down and not touching the controls."
(* - as in, my fake name assigned to me by the computer for this week on the assumption that stupid Westerners can't cope with a name like "Prakash" or "Gurvinder")
Vee
Are ze rowboats
As it's Friday, I shall insert here a related but very old joke.
Scene: a council boating lake. Jobsworth with megaphone:
"Rowboat Number 9, come in, your time is up."
"I said, come in Number 9, YOUR TIME IS UP!"
*thoughtful pause*
"...Number 6, are you in difficulty?"
My girlfriend at the time was somewhat disillusioned when I explained that the lyrics to one of their biggest hits were simply "We drive, drive, drive on the motorway."
I remember reading somewhere once (can't be bothered to google it) that a large minority of listeners to that song thought the lyrics were "Fun, fun fun on the autobahn".
I'd never thought of Kraftwerk as a Beach Boys tribute band, but there you are.
I clicked, expecting to read an interview with a sysadmin in this place describing his success (despite being born out of wedlock).
I'd have written the headline as "Frustrated IT manager creates hellishly cruel and funny phone queue for sales weasels".
Probably a good thing I didn't go into journalism.
Then move underneath bridge. From on high.
Misquoting Pratchett from memory:
"How long can you hold your breath?"
"Is that relevant?"
"It is, in the case of being nailed by your kneecaps upside down under the Brass Bridge for two whole high tides, which is, I'm afraid, the traditional punishment for this..."
And of course, the electrons escape out of the bottom legs of the 'm' much faster, whereas they're trapped in the 'w's until enough of them amass and they can climb out. Which slows down the page loading even more, as any fule kno.
Unless you're in Australia, where the opposite applies. Trust me, I have MCSE certification and DevOps qualifications and know about these things.
Reading about the same thing elsewhere, I note that a non-trivial proportion (I think it was 7%?) of the vinyl buyers don't actually own a deck.
Which makes me wonder, are they just buying vinyl because it's cool? For collecting only?
Or are they putting the records on a flatbed scanner?
http://archive.wired.com/entertainment/music/news/2003/02/57769
A tanker containing hair restorer has overturned on the motorway. Police are combing the area.
A tractor carrying onions has spilled on the M25. Drivers are advised to find a hard shoulder to cry on.
A lorry belonging to a snooker supplies store has tipped over. Motorists are being warned of many queues in the area.
(from long-neglected memory, but probably (C) The Two Ronnies or similar)
JJ Carter - your posting history shows a consistent pattern of sneering at anything on this site that criticizes Microsoft. You regularly impugn the motives and trustworthiness of anyone who makes adverse reference to Windows 10.
So please, enlighten us with your fair and balanced response to this article.
Point out, with credible sources if you will, the specific items in Andrew's review that are inaccurate.
Or are you merely content to continue your de haut en bas pronouncements, with nothing constructive to add?
So, is that just the federal rate, i.e. it doesn't include state and city taxes?
Probably. As you suggest, there are federal taxes - which operate in bands, similar to the UK - then state, county and city taxes. For example, where I am in Oregon, I pay federal & state income taxes, but no sales tax or city ordinance taxes. However, my property tax (roughly analogous to UK council tax) is pretty high - approx $12K/year, and of course there's healthcare costs too. If I were to move ~10 miles down the road to a different community, I might get lower property taxes, but then incur additional city taxes levied for things like (additional funding for) law enforcement, schools, etc. that have been voted in by local residents. Those tend to be minor, but they add up.
It's swings and roundabouts. Personally I think it's great - it empowers communities to decide their own priorities, and also imposes a degree of financial discipline. As in, make taxes too high, and people will simply vote with their feet.
Overall, I'm paying a lower proportion of my income as taxes compared to the UK. And when I've had to deal with the local, State and Federal bureaucracy, I've found them to be incredibly helpful and a real pleasure to deal with. Mindblowing.
Caps Lock is Cruise Control for cool.
I am not cool, and have never claimed to be.
But I do agree with the last sentence of the article:
THE LATTER FOR WHEN THE WEATHER IS SO BAD THAT YOU REALLY DO NEED TO SHOUT.
Somehow, the ALL CAPS approach seems more suited to dramatic weather events. Compare:
04/11/16 0800Z: SERIOUS HURRICANE FORCE 9 BUILDING, HIGH RISK OF PROPERTY DAMAGE AND RAINS OF BLOOD
...sounds portentuous and demands attention. But:
04/11/16 0800Z: GENTLE SPRING ZEPHYRS WILL CARESS YOUR UPTURNED FACE LIKE A DELICATE LOVER WHILE THE LIGHTEST OF APRIL SHOWERS BATHE THE FLOWERS IN LIFE-GIVING WATER
...just doesn't sound right.
Getting my coat because the weather.
My startup - an afterschool club where children learned to play the violin - failed.
Well don't be disheartened; pick yourself up and move on to the next winning business opportunity.
May I suggest a national chain of shops where parents can hock their kids' unused toys and outgrown clothes in return for money?
"Kiddie Pawn".
That bezel, as seen in the final picture, reminded me very much of OSX10.2.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/zh/4/4a/Jaguar_on_G4.png
Yes, I'm trolling just a little bit, I'm aware that Apple can in no way claim exclusive ownership of the concept of horizontal pinstripes (but I'm sure they'd try).
No, you have to get the Hovercrapped there.
Ah yes. And because obscure 1960s Isle of Wight folk songs don't get nearly enough exposure on the Reg:
"What's this rumbling that I hear, what's this roaring in my ear,
What's this racket driving everybody daft?
Well it's not artillery, or the start of World War Three,
It's the Westland SRN Super Noiseless Hovercraft.
Oh the hovercraft is coming, can't you hear that crazy humming,
You can see the fishes scatter fore and aft,
With its mighty engine pushing, floating on its own air cushion,
It's the Westland SRN Super Noiseless Hovercraft.
It's like a mobile goldfish bowl an' when it screams across the Solent,
The duration of your journey will be halved,
If you don't mind being cramped on, your visit to Southampton,
Take the Westland SRN Super Noiseless Hovercraft..."
(C) Lauri Say, 1968
Icon because he looks like a folkie.
Because if they move it, nobody will know about how Old Soulburys villagers bravely fought Lucifer 250 million years before the village was formed
To paraphrase Pratchett - if we stopped traditions just because we forgot how they started, we'd be no better than foreigners.
We know we're SUPPOSED to slow down for the damned things, but whom can resist the urge to hit the gas & give a delighted whoop of glee at the sudden feeling of seeming weightlessness?
This post is sponsored by the Society of Shock-Absorber Manufacturers, Coil-Spring Suppliers and Sump Guard Fabricators.
...they are by no means another AT&T.
I have Frontier DSL at my home halfway up an Oregon mountain - other than carrier pigeons, it's my only option.
I've always found the Frontier customer service to be excellent. If I have an issue, they solve it quickly, and they're totally cool about me using my own equipment rather than the modem they supplied.
If they have a fault, it's that - by their own admission - some of their back end systems for billing are erratic. It took several calls to get an over-billing corrected on a family member's fiber connection; the call center staff knew immediately what was going on, and wanted to be helpful, but were stymied by the billing system's obduracy.
Further thoughts to my comment above - because I have a keyboard, this is a forum, and I Will Speek My Branez...
1) Apple/Google/Microsoft: "There's too many rootkits and viruses out there. We're reducing the power of the root/administrator account and locking down areas of the system to ensure its integrity."
2) Me: "But that makes you the ultimate arbiters of control over "my" computer. I don't trust you, partly because your recent actions have shown that you care more about collecting telemetry or monetizing everything I do, rather than giving me the best possible computing experience. You remove my software without my permission. You foist unremoveable crap on me that I don't want, and never will want."
3) A/G/M: "You might be tricked or misled into installing malware. If it inherits your permissions, and you have total control, your system is toast. You don't want to be a victim of ransomware or identity theft, do you? Best to let us be the super-root. It's for your own good."
..repeat items 2 & 3 ad nauseam.
It's a circular argument (OK, with a soupçon of Straw Man), but I think both A/G/M and I have valid arguments. What's the solution?
That's my problem with this. The rational part of me accepts that in our modern, connected world where our computers contain so much financial and personal information, there's a need for security.
Yet the anti-authoritarian side of me bridles at the idea that "my" computer isn't going to be under "my" control. If I want to delete every single darn file in the root filesystem, or edit every PLIST, I should be able to. Screwing up the system so it doesn't work is a risk I can accept. But being baldly told "computer says no" (or, more accurately, "Cupertino/Redmond says no") just infuriates me. UAC, TrustedInstaller and all similar mechanisms just make me see red.
Security researchers read of exploit mechanisms like the one in this article and see a vulnerability. I read the same thing, and see a chance of freedom.
Unfortunately, I'll admit, I am in the minority view on this and I don't think it's a solvable problem. How do you differentiate between "infurated geek wants total control over the filesystem because it's his computer, dammit" and "clueless user wants total control over the filesystem because he wants to run Nude-Karsashian-Pics-Not-A-Virus-Honest.JPG.EXE"? You can't, and so security has to win versus control.
I can't think of a bigger growth market for Microsoft to enter than the design of radial aero-engines.
I knew some pedant would pick up on that.
It was, I believe, just a handy - and rather cool-looking - 3D model that Autodesk-or-whoever had given them for demo purposes.
To most people there it probably just looked like something vaguely engineering-y and techy, replete with lots of curved pipework and complicated-looking valves as it was spun round and manipulated on the Surface Hub display.
Only a mis-spent youth wandering round the Science Museum and reading Biggles books allowed me to recognize it for what it was.
Adding my own data point to this discussion, because we all know that "data" is just the plural form of "anecdote"...
OSX 10.9.5 here, Firefox 44 with uBlock Origin (I second the comments above about ABP being a known memory hog).
34 open tabs (OK, one of which is just a "problem loading page" error), 1.63GB of memory in use according to Activity Monitor.
As I have 24GB total I'm not particularly fussed.
