Posts by David 132

IBM Cloud hit by Severity One incident with the same symptoms as other recent SNAFUs

Re: Obligatory

Uptime? Reliability? Fog-edaboutit…

Hyundai: Want cyber-secure car locks? That'll be £49, please

Re: Keyless ignition

> Then had to look up how you get the car to switch on everything but NOT start the engine

Generally, pressing the start button whilst NOT pressing the brake pedal will do what you want. Holding the brake pedal down at the same time is required to start the car - at least, on the dozens of different keyless-start cars I’ve driven.

You've got drought: UK gov suggests you save water by deleting old emails

Re: I've been saving

Are you Captain Redbeard Rum?

'Suddenly deprecating old models' users depended on a 'mistake,' admits OpenAI's Altman

You mean to say that Stephen Chu didn't invent the Caps Lock key?

Re: “Please use us as a business tool, even though we test and change in production.”

Andrew Orlowski, formerly of this parish, has a thoughtful piece up on the Telegraph about the AI hype machine and its fundamental Emperor’s-new-clothes nature.

With, of course, this being the Telegraph, lots of ranting comments underneath about how AI is the best thing ever and is revolutionizing medicine, genetic science, law, and so on & how Andrew just doesn’t “get” how amazingly world-changing and paradigm-shattering AI is.

Investment portfolio positions of the commenters not disclosed, of course.

Californian man so furious about forced Windows 11 upgrade that he's suing Microsoft

Re: Like to see the Right to Repair weight in

Nuh-uh.

As part of the new Windows development process, every single line of the Windows 10 codebase was carefully examined, and Microsoft's finest minds asked themselves, "how much more evil can we make this line as we go to 11?"

And the answer in most cases was: none. None more black evil.

Re: Being sensible for a moment

Mort, indeed. Death's interview with a job agency.

WHAT DO YOU CALL THE FEELING OF BEING VERY SMALL AND HOT?

Keeble twiddled his pencil.

“Pygmy?”

BEGINS WITH AN M.

“Embarrassing?”

“Yes,” said Death, I MEAN YES.

Re: Being sensible for a moment

They weren't as good after Brian Eno left :)

Re: Being sensible for a moment

Dunno why you downvoted me (if it was you?) because in my comment I didn't express an opinion one way or the other on whether MS should continue to support Windows 10.

Although for what it's worth,

a) I don't think it's reasonable for them to continue to support it after 10 years; operating systems aren't cars or washing machines or houses (the usual consumer goods offered as comparison for warranty purposes), for the principle reason that what you use a PC for changes over its lifetime, from word-processing to gaming to virtual reality to generative AI, and so the hardware must change and evolve too. Whereas a washing machine, say... well, on the first day you use it, you put clothes in and expect them to come out clean, and 10 years later, you're still putting very similar clothes in and expecting the same outcome. Washing machines don't have to evolve to handle, say, 5-dimensional virtual hypertrousers, or underpants that explode if rotated, or clothes that take the form of a 9x4x1 black monolith.

b) But equally, the hardware requirements for Windows 11 do seem to be artificially high for no other reason than to say "fuck you, we can't be bothered supporting older stuff any more". I will never again take any of Microsoft's environmental sanctimony even vaguely seriously. "Windows Update will schedule updates for when your local electricity is carbon-neutral"... yeah, right, after the mountains of e-waste that their actions have created, that's the green-washing equivalent of "no whipped cream on my jumbo extra-thick lard milkshake please, I want to be healthy".

Re: Being sensible for a moment

It was actually 2015; just over 10 years to the day ago.

And if you've blanked out the whole "gwx.exe" nightmare, with Microsoft using dark patterns and "are you sure you don't not want to not decline the opportunity to accept this upgrade, oh you clicked the X button, that must mean YES PLEASE INSTALL 10" shenanigans, then you're not alone.

Hanging up: AOL to pull the plug on its dial-up service after 36 years

Re: Out of Band

Removal of old technology just Spurs innovation.

Re: CD mountain.

Not forgetting "You've Got Mail" which was basically a feature-length AOL commercial with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan.

I do remember the BT Friends and Family scheme, which gave discounted call rates to a list of (5?) phone numbers that you could choose for yourself. And of course, in the pre-0800-dialup days, everyone added their ISP to the F&F scheme. The BT chairman of the time, as I recall, commented that anyone who did so was "sad".

> Although the flash games were fun.

Anyone else remember Joe Cartoon's "Frog In A Blender" and "Hamster In A Microwave" flash animations? Very silly.

And then of course there were such cultural touchstones as Badger Badger Badger and Weebl & Bob.

Truly, an embarrassment of Flash-based riches. Kids today, etc etc.

Behold the wood-block wonder of the Kilopixel display

Re: Yeah but can it play....

DOOM upside down spells “WOOD” (ok, give me the benefit of the doubt on the backwards D) so… “mind blown” as the kids say.

Kilroy?

If someone hasn’t already uploaded the “Kilroy Was ‘Ere” image (a 1940s running joke, or what we would nowadays call a *shudder* meme) then I am disappointed!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilroy_was_here

Infosec hounds spot prompt injection vuln in Google Gemini apps

Old problems are new again

“…the issue stems from large language models' inability to distinguish between inputs which are user prompts and inputs which are for reference…”

Isn’t this just the AI version of the old “persuade the CPU to treat data pages as code” attack vector?

We’ve had NX Bit / Data Execution Prevention support in processors and operating systems for 20+ years; is there really not an equivalent for AIs?

MX Linux 25 loses systemd toggling power as Debian 13 looms

Being of a nasty and cynical turn of mind, my first thought was, "who made that breaking change in the 6.12 kernel, and do they have any relationship with Agent Poettering?"

Re: It definitely reduces the appeal ...

You are Hengist Pod

I wonder how many readers under the age of, say, 50 will “get” that reference?

Re: It definitely reduces the appeal ...

But all the tendrils into other parts of Linux seem infectious

Infectious isn’t the word I’d use. “Metastasizing” would be my preferred term for the unwelcome and unconstrained growth of systemd.

LG ordered to pay £150k after phone defect caused Scotland house fire

Ah, see, if you'd ever watched Demolition Man you'd know all about how to use the "3 cells".

Make Redmond angry by setting up Windows 11 with a local account

Re: Maybe I should mention this on Slashdot

Last time I tried posting to Slashdot, Anonymous comments were disabled (understandably, given the horrendous trolling problems that site's seen), and the "create new account" process was disabled too.

I get the impression it's just home to a dwindling number of older accounts now.

Re: Depressing that this is even necessary.

"Yes, that really is my mother's maiden name. She's [Swedish|Welsh|Klingon]* (*delete according to personal prejudices)..."

Depressing that this is even necessary.

This goes beyond "dark patterns" and into the realms of "what do you mean you couldn't find the Local User option, it was in a filing cabinet in a disused lavatory cubicle behind a locked door with a sign saying Beware Of The Leopard..."

Anyway, thank you for a useful article. The necessary incantations change every few months, as Microsoft slowly boil the Windows 11 userbase frog and make it more and more difficult to avoid using a Microsoft account.

You might also mention that not entering a password during setup is a handy way to dodge the "3 security questions" rigmarole. The article alludes to it but presents it as a Bad Thing. Personally I use a password manager and don't need "security questions" - so I leave the password blank during Setup, and set it after installation.

Lyft and Baidu plan Eurobocab launch, starting in UK and Germany next year

Re: I read that as Euro Bonobo cab

Is there a public APe-I?

Re: I read that as Euro Bonobo cab

It’s the Nanometre-scale micro-chimps I’d worry about.

How to train your robot: Wear a tiny one in a baby carrier

Re: Daleks

I met a Dalek once who'd transitioned into the role after losing its previous job as a T-1000 hunting John Connor.

It was an ex-Terminator.

Windows 10 @ 10: How Microsoft led developers round in circles

Re: XAML yeah right

I still do 99% of my development in WinForms. I've dabbled once or twice with WPF; the results are much nicer (e.g. automatic handling of high-DPI or font scaling) but updating UI elements at run-time is a pain.

The expression I've heard is that "WPF makes complicated things trivial, and trivial things complicated" and I can't disagree.

I dipped my toe into WinUI3 once because I was worried I was becoming a luddite, but when my simple Hello World-level program compiled to something like 100MB of binary and dependencies (unless I wanted to distribute it through the Windows Store), I ran away at high speed screaming "bugger that for a game of soldiers".

Microsoft gives in to Chromebook bullies and drops Windows 11 SE

> not being first mover was often an advantage.

The old adage is, "the settler gets the land, the pioneer gets a hatful of arrows".

Gadget geeks aghast at guru's geriatric GPU

Re: Surely... How many people actually *need* these cards?

Always assumed that integrated graphics was another support chip on the motherboard and not part of the silicon real estate of the CPU.

Used to be, back in the 810/845/915 chipset days (early Pentium 4).

Originally, the Intel graphics were just something to fill up otherwise wasted space on the chipset die (“we can fit 50,000 gates in the empty space, what graphics output can we do within that budget?”)

Then they moved onto the CPU and got gradually more and more complex, as “decent performance” became more important than “don’t increase the die size”.

And if I recall correctly, the difference between Xeon parts and their equivalent desktop cousins has generally (with a few exceptions) been that the former had ECC support whereas the latter had integrated graphics.

I have something in common with Linus!

Me, reading the article: "ooh! I have the same GPU as Linus! That is even more of a claim to fame than my having met Gyles Brandreth back in 1991!"

...and then I reached the line

...At least one Reg commenter this year, "David 132," runs the same thing...

Don't know whether to feel flattered that I've been namechecked, or deeply embarrassed that I still haven't upgraded. ¿Porque no los dos?

In my defence, all my spare cash these days goes on duck feed. And no, that's not a euphemism.

Wasp nest at US nuclear site tests ten times over safe radiation limit

"no wasps were found on the nest"

Well, obviously not. They're now invisible. Duh.

Not so much "Green Hornet" as "Glowing Green Hornet"!

I, for one, welcome our invisible yet also glowing green vespal overlords....

Servers hated Mondays until techie quit quaffing coffee in their company

> turnover increased considerably

Financial turnover or staff turnover?

Re: Condensation

A previous employer of mine had a thermal test chamber for very similar purposes.

One day a colleague spilled coffee on his keyboard. It being a bombproof Model M or equivalent, he rinsed it clean under the tap and put it in the TTC to dry it out.

Which was a brilliant plan except that he forgot about it in there.

He was reminded, when the smoke alarms went off and the entire site got evacuated to the car-park.

Apparently, the keyboard, once retrieved, looked somewhat Dali-esque.

Microsoft removes the whiff of Vista from Windows 11 Insider Preview

I fail to see how vista_startup.wav could "accidentally" have been included in the Windows 11 build process.

The most likely explanation is that a developer put it in the tree as a private joke, and it was inadvertently included in the build.

What next, "accidentally" including the Windows XP Teletubbies wallpaper, or the WfWG3.11 startup logo?

UK VPN demand soars after debut of Online Safety Act

I'm happy with Private Internet Access (privateinternetaccess.com) who have good cross-platform client support, although I fear someone'll now reply to tell me how PIA is actually a front for the CCP/CIA/Mossad...

Re: And as a relaxing

>Bare arms are OK, right?

Guaranteed as a Right since 1791 by the Second Amendment to the US Constitution.

Re: Labour just love legislation...

The odious Peter Kyle, the Science Secretary, has claimed today that Nigel Farage, and all the rest of us who are opposed to the Online Safety Act regardless of how we feel about Farage, are "on the side" of "extreme pornographers" and Jimmy Savile.

So, that's us told, then.

Can we please stop framing this as a Labour vs. Tories, Right vs. Left thing? It's authoritarianism versus the rest of us, and both parties are equally guilty.

Re: Corn Flakes

The Snopes link judges the claim "mostly false".

Sent in by post?

Brings new meaning to "I'll be coming in a jiffy".

(yes, I'm sorry it's an old joke)

Re: "Irritating Traffic Cones of Blighty"

As long as the contract to implement it goes to Fujitsu or Crapita, we're all safe.

The biggest deterrent prior to that law was the social stigma - having a fallout with your friends.

"I suppose the inevitable porn to pwn hitting the headlines in a few months' time will finally make governments start t[h]inking a bit more about the consequences in dabbling in this sort of legislation."

Oh my. Such touching faith in our governments. That's so sweet :)

OK, that got a rye chuckle from me.

There's probably a "de-flouring" pun in there too but I'm far too prudish to make it.

AI don't know: Enterprises slow to pick up on Copilot+ PCs

It's relating to "persona-based marketing", which was the latest greatest most exciting thing in Marketing about 5-10 years ago.

You divide up your customer base by their roles & interests, assign "personas" to each sub-section of the market, and give them back-stories, then craft your marketing messages accordingly.

e.g.

"Rajesh is an IT administrator and often works remotely. He requires fast performance and the latest technologies in a portable thin & light form-factor"

"Alice is a developer and needs a large screen and lots of RAM..."

etc etc.

Pure twaddle but it allows marketing wonks to think that they're being user-focused.

As far as I can tell from the quoted data, the primary reason companies are buying these is as a hedge against future capabilities becoming available.

I’m not sure that FOMO is a good purchasing strategy.

'It looks sexy but it's wrong' – the problem with AI in biology and medicine

Re: It's worse when AI Slop pretends to have medical knowledge

Absolutely. Stop anthropomorphizing them.

They hate it.

Debian isn't waiting for 2038 to blow up, switches to 64-bit time for everything

Re: Hold my birthday beer!

Humans have easy access to two 5 bit registers.

My relatives from Norfolk pity you for being constrained to only 5 bits.

Windows 11 is a minefield of micro-aggressions in the shipping lane of progress

Re: "You can, with some work, rewire things behind the scenes to get rid of a lot of these"

> whilst at the same time making the whole user experience thoroughly miserable and also hoovering up your system resources like a rampant parasitic leech

You forgot “and increasing the attack surface for malware”.

First release candidate of systemd 258 is here

Re: Its a kitchen sink feature

Pretty sure that was robust Anglo-Saxon or possibly the name of an Austrian village, not Français, but what would I know.