Posts by Robigus

'Windows sucks,' former Microsoft engineer says, explains how to fix it

"suggeation"

Firefox is fine. The people running it are not

Political or philosophical?

Accepting your point, it’s dilution of purpose, so my point about sublimation remains. Especially so in an organisation with limited resources.

I realise that this may well be an unpopular opinion - I'm a Firefox user since v1 - but I dislike organisations joining social or political causes; whatever the cause may be or of whatever nature.

I wish everybody well, but to be quite frank, I don't want to be patronised or have to read about how wonderful organisations like to think they are - and we know this because they feel the need to tell us. Might this energy be put to better use being sublimated into the product's quality.

I've known enough people over the years who are brutally cycnical about the causes they espouse, but in public, they gush. I find it odd.

But, for all of that, I do like Firefox - uBlock Origin still works and I hope they can recover their mojo.

Forked-off Xlibre tells Wayland display protocol to DEI in a fire

Re: Your statement of faith

Will written and an example of a good human.

We all know people with curious ways. As decent people we get along.

Less so on the Internet, sadly.

37signals is completing its on-prem move, deleting its AWS account to save millions

Re: I have this Debian server at home...

Ubuntu 24.04 server

Birth: 2011-07-19

Even Netflix struggles to identify and understand the cost of its AWS estate

Re: Get a Dog, Learn to Bark

I've just finished some work for a major bank. They have their own data centres with their own cloud, so they can Kooby-Nooby up instances of whatever they want.

Trusting Johnny Cloud to look after these things is deemed bad form.

Microsoft starts boiling the Copilot frog: It's not a soup you want to drink at any price

Similar

I ask AI how to save my tmux windows, layout, programs and settings and it just plain lied.

It was utterly incorrect twaddle.

Meta spruiks benefits of open sourcing Llama models – to its own bottom line

Re: Come again?

Despite never having had any Meta accounts, I have been told in the past "Didn't you get the [item]? I WhatsApp'd you."

I imagine somewhere there's a shadow account waiting to be activated and were it to be so, much pointless guff would pour forth.

It's good to be conciously apart from such things. The sort of people who say "Did you see on Facebook.." are generally the sort of people I'm already wary of.

LinkedIn started harvesting people's posts for training AI without asking for opt-in

Turn it off

Turn off permission for the voyeuristic clowns here:

https://www.linkedin.com/mypreferences/m/settings/data-for-ai-improvement

Our close your account. It really is an awful place.

Endless OS 6: How desktop Linux may look, one day

Liam

I always enjoy reading your articles.

Have a pint.

How a single buck bought bragging rights in the battle to port Windows 95 to NT

Re: Windoze NEVER worked well.

I used to download Linux from the University of Helsinki FTP site onto a tawdry* of floppies, circa 1993. No desktop, but stable.

Recollections of Schrodingers Windows at the time were less stable. Simply by observing the desktop something would change in the kernel and it would turn to soup.

* That may, or may not, be the collective noun for floppy disks.

'We had to educate Oracle about our contract,' CIO says after Big Red audit

Re: Move away

I've done PostgreSQL migrations for some critical systems in multi billion pound companies. It's fine.

Saturnian moon Mimas: Crunchy on the outside, sub-surface ocean on the inside

I clicked the link to this story because I thought the accompanying picture was a carburettor.

New glasses required.

Microsoft seeks Rust developers to rewrite core C# code

En R. Gee

C/C++/Rust use less energy (when running as opposed to compiling) for the same unit of work than the higher level languages. I saw a table demonstrating where they consumed about 1/3 of the energy of C# and 1/75th that of Python - https://storage.googleapis.com/cdn.thenewstack.io/media/2018/05/3730357d-results-energy-time-and-memory-usage-screenshot-from-research-paper.png

I would have thought that on Microsoft's data-centre scale, this would be well worth doing. Going the Rust route, rather than the usual C++ will give them memory safety, (if they leave the guards in place)

Atari 400 makes a comeback in miniature form

Re: BBC B

I blagged a Dragon32 from the local college. My dad's mate "over-ordered" by 1 and I got to use it for the year.

Keyboard was very good.

You had assembly? Luxury!

Being a peasant, I couldn't afford the games to go with a bequeathed Atari. I wrote my own in (hand assembled) assembler (Hello girls!). The sprites were the full height of the screen, as I recall, and had to be painted in sections. It was a while ago, but it seemed surprisingly quick. Lateral movement was faster than vertical repaints.

The tape decks were ruinously expensive for this quarter of Four Yorkshiremen, so I soldered cables to the motherboard and ran a household tape deck that I'd been using on my ZX-81.

My cousin, on the other hand, was to The Manor born and had games-a-plenty, which were quite impressive. Wretched keyboard aside, a good machine, I felt.

Google rings in 2024 with sweeping layoffs

Genuine question; is that a thing?

Freedom for Tooting, Comrade.

Google dragged to UK watchdog over Chrome's upcoming IP address cloaking

Re: Child protection

Perhaps a system like 2024 spec vehicles in the EU/UK? Take your eyeballs away from where they are mandated to be (such as when overtaking a bicycle) and set off an alarm. You need this, because they say so.

Look away from adverts/leave the room and automatically crank the TV volume up to 11, so viewers at least have the audio pleasure of adverts whilst in the kitchen making a cuppa. Perhaps the phone in your pocket could mirror the adverts everywhere you go too.

Isn't our controlled future marvelous?

Intel stock stumbles on report Nvidia is building an Arm CPU for PC market

With respect to power consumption, it may not mean much to desktop users, but if new environmental regulations come into force, then it will mean something.

Business' marketing divisions will get wind of the lower consumption devices being implemented will be able to spin that "Hey, we really care about the environment.", just as they do whenever they're forced into complying with new regulations.

Cisco: Don't use 'blind spot' – and do use 'feed two birds with one scone'

The New Puritanism

I keenly await the Restoration.

Parts of UK booted offline as Virgin Media suffers massive broadband outage

Re: Zen FTW

Likewise.

Top support and a static IP. Stick that in your pipe Virgin.

Moving the oldies to it imminently.

A new version of APT is coming to Debian 12

Re: APT

Thanks for that.

It’s interesting that I know nothing about it, but have the impression it’s “crap”.

I contacted a friend of similar vintage and mentioned it. He thought it was “crap” too, at least, that was what he “remembered”.

It goes to show, I know not what, but it shows it anyway.

Re: APT

I saw a crap leaning train.

Arm, Microsoft at pains to say this CPU arch can be trusted with real server work

Few mention power consumption

Anecdotal evidence shows that ARM cpus have a much lower power consumption that Intel on the same workload (look at the comparisons with M1 vs i9).

I would have thought that this fact alone is enough to get the data centre flingers positively vibrating with excitement.

But why that VPN? How WireGuard made it into Linux

Painless

I run it in a Docker container on an RPi4 at home and in an X86 VPS - Very effective. The clients for Android/iPhone/Linux and MacOS work well too.

Colleagues inform me that it was trivial on Windows too. Unless looking for particularly arcane use cases, what's not to like?*

* Rhetorical. Don't bother.

MySQL a 'pretty poor database' says departing Oracle engineer

Nuts to them all. MongoDB is web scale.

Why not MongoDB? It's web scale : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2F-DItXtZs

Google's 'Be Evil' business transformation is complete: Time for the end game

Who'd be a priest of Neptune?

"Beware of Geeks bearing grifts"?

Re: Better the devil, you know...

About 10 years ago I met with Manchester Police who wanted to see a mapping system I'd written. They told me a similar tale to that of your aquaintance. They indicated areas over a map where the policy was containment, and not to create any kind of crime-vacuum by removing a gang/family/Women's Institute* group.

* I made that up.

Analogue tones of a ZX Spectrum Load set to ride again via podcast project

That loading noise

As a young spotty Herbert, I and my fellow Herberts would yell “Bagpipes!” when the loading noise changed on the loading screen. At that point, you knew that the monochrome image was about to be coloured. It was competitive. Call it too early and you’d receive a dead arm.

Like biblical numerologists looking for decipherable patterns, I would listen to the loading noise trying to discern the “meaning”.

One pre-pubescent Herbert mimicked the loading screeches and patterns into a cassette recorder to see if he could fool the machine. I recall the sum total was intermittent rolling blue and yellow lines around the screen edge.

Happy naïve days.

1Password unsheathes Rusty key, hopes to unlock Linux Desktop world

Self host

Bitwarden, Docker container, RPI4, home hosted.

Bingerty bongerty boo.

Privacy activist Max Schrems claims Google Advertising ID on Android is unlawful, files complaint in France

Kudos to him

That is all.

If you're a WhatsApp user, you'll have to share your personal data with Facebook's empire from next month – or stop using the chat app

Being a refusnik is not difficult.

I don't have WhatsApp. I do have Signal.

Most of my family now have Signal. Those that don't can text me. Or ring.

Signal works fine on an e foundation phone. Firefox/Signal/Mail Client. That's all I need.

From the conversations I've had about privacy with friends - the general impression I get is that we like to talk about privacy and it's importance, but we are, in fact, prepared to do nothing about it. They'll keep their Facebook stuff (we can all find a reason why we "need" to). This won't change anything, but they're OK with that.

The ones who brought you Let's Encrypt, bring you: Tools for gathering anonymized app usage metrics from netizens

Re: Not a wedge, just a service :-(

Perhaps if it's incorporated as a not-for-profit outfit (in the same manner as Signal operates in the U.S.) then it will keep it out of the hands of the perverts, as they can't buy it.

Android 11 lands with plenty more privacy preferences for Pixels and special Google friends first

Sir dictates

Spokesman: "Sir, they're saying that this is a company data land grab"

Sir: "Hmmm, Miss Smith, take a note: Something something something - Privacy - something something something"

Spokeman: "Shall we pass that on to Weasel in marketing to complete?"

Sir: "Excellent"

The Honor MagicBook Pro looks nice, runs like a dream, and isn't too expensive either. What more could you want?

Re: Decimated

Fair enough. The joke icon was perhaps a too subtle indicator of not entirely pedantic intent.

I was referring to its original meaning (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimation_(Roman_army) ). In a world of righteousness and relativism; anything can mean anything you want it too.

More importantly, other websites report that this laptop runs Linux very well.

Decimated

I read that Huawei's business has been decimated. Is that exactly 10%, or is it thereabouts?

What if everyone just said 'Nah' to tracking?

Re: PiHole

You don't even need a Pi to run it; I run it as a docker container on an old Linux PC that acts as a the household file server.

I agree with other's sentiment expressed here that the web is almost unusable without these protections.

Surveillence Capitalism can't be smothered fast enough.

Mozilla shaves down Beard to a luxuriant mustache, looks for new CEO by end of year

This became darker than I intended.

Frankly as it's an open source browser that doesn't belong to one of the unhealthily voyeuristic self-respect euthenising behemoths of a whitened-teeth "connect and share" dystopia, it gets my vote.

As I just wrote that I have visions of Richard Attenborough holding a mask over a victims face in "10 Rillington Place" saying "Just relax, relax. Connect and share, connect and share".

Multi-account containers are excellent.

I need a pint.

If you're ever lost on the Moon, Ordnance Survey now has you covered for Apollo 11 anniversary

My recollection of Haynes manuals was that any manufacturers special tool requirement could be substituted by a knitting needle and a house brick.

Microsoft buffs up its open-source halo to fine sheen with PostgreSQL GUI in Azure Data Studio

PgAdmin everywhere

Ever since it moved to a web-based interface, things have become much simpler.

Running it as a Docker container has meant it's anywhere we want it. Mac/Win/Linux and yes, Raspberry Pi.

Croydon school rolling in toilet roll after Brexit gift deemed unfit for the Queen's Anus Horribilis

Say what you like about the Germans

They look after their own.

What today links Gmail, Google Drive, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram – apart from being run by monopolistic personal data harvesters?

And nothing of value was lost.

Return of the audio format wars and other money-making scams

New phrase. Thank you.

same old shit + infantile spelling = disruption

I see this, you see this, my colleagues see this. Very few of us say this.

I will use your form of the phenomenon from now on.

Have a beer.

The eulogising of The Mother Of All Demos at 50 is Silicon Valley going goo-goo for gurus again

Fighting the slide towards hagiography.

"Silicon Valley is much more Gwyneth Paltrow than it is Ayn Rand"

For that, have an early beer.

Ex-Cisco chief John Chambers: Tech biz bods are 'too arrogant'

Irony

Arrogance? He calls his company "JC2" after the first JC who "died for our sins"*.

* Did/Didn't/Whatever and it's not Jeremy Corbyn. Or Clarkson for that matter.

Where can I hide this mic? I know, shove it down my urethra

Penetrating Kim Jong-il's inner circle.

"His task in the late 1990s was to infiltrate Kim Jong-il's inner circle"

What's the point of a microphone up there? Surely a it's a job for a camera.

Skype Classic headed for the chopping block on September 1

Now using Signal protocol

With more than 2 on the line, Skype has problems. But it's MS, so work think it must be used.

The new Skype, like WhatsApp, Allo and Facebook Messenger will use Signal's protocol, with Microsoft's added ... er ... magic.

So why not use Signal*? No slurping, open source, non-profit. As recommended by security nerds. Works a treat.

* I know, I know. Power, control, brand, the ability to read everything out of your phone and report to the Mothership etc

One two three... Go: Long Pig Microsoft avoids cannibalising Surface

"It's an office runtime for students"

I think I would have killed myself when I was student if I thought my life was going to orbit around Office.