Posts by Radio Wales

Smart TVs are spying on everyone

Re: Buy a non smart TV - if you can find one

I have a 'smart' TV that is constantly trying to insert itself into our home network to complete its duty to make itself the new communications hub. And I am likewise, endlessly endeavouring to prevent that from happening, It wants speech imput recognised and 'needs' my Social Media' passwords. completely ignoring the basic fact that I don't have any.

Unfortunately, during my brief absence from home, a family made the decision to indulge it and answered some of it's demands. I erased all that as soon as I got back and reset to back to dumb.

I soon knew who the guilty party was by their sudden sharp uplist in their junk mails, 'Serves them right', said me, as I congratulated myself from keeping my own credentials secret even from my own family.

It is not networked, or so I thought, as I discovered an undocumented Wi-Fi connection. Now, I know it is isolated, as it has stopped trying to override my wishes, and I am, mercifully, still relatively free from junk mails and the like.

X accused of taking money from terrorists by selling checkmarks to US enemies

In the real world.

I used to be a Tweeter and had fun.

They along came X and the fun died when it became obvious that all X wanted was the money - from anybody who'd pay.

It has its uses though, we now know that 'verified' accounts are nothing of the kind - it's just another cash grab.

He paid too much and wants his money back and the only way that's going to happen is from us.- or rather those who haven't read the memo and left.

Reports of the PC's death are greatly exaggerated, says IDC

In the real world.

Like an awful lot of people I know, I used the Co-19 lockdown to invest in new kit as I was spending much more time online. I bought kit much grander that normal for home use, because I anticipated using it for a wider range of tasks, and it is Windows 11 ready,

So, it is going to need to be in service for longer before replacement is envisaged. Especially so while high prices are being asked. I am a PC fan, because I like several large displays with massive memory and storage and a comfortable environment while using it.

Cunningly camouflaged cable routed around WAN-sized hole in project budget

The optional length of wet string.

My mother lived close enough to Alexander Palace to throw stones at the transmitter.

She was unable to receive any signal without receiving the lot! In a colourful blaze of jagged lines and a cacophony of merged soundtracks.

I found that whoever had installed it had used a hi gain antenna, So just wondering about hyper gain, I pulled the antenna plug out of the TV, and it resolved into a poor but watchable signal.

Feeling a bit foolish, I put a four-inch length of damp string into the socket, and to my amazement, got a perfect signal.

I experimented a bit and found that dry string of six inches worked too, without the worry of leaving my mother loose to water her TV daily. Off I went, and later learned she sold her aerial to a friend ten miles further away and kept the loot.

China to stop certifying fax machines, ISDN and frame relay kit

Re: Do they still exist?

Life being as it is, there will always be someone who will prefer or even need to stick to the tried and tested old stuff like faxes.

Personally, I tend to stick with what has always worked well, regardless of peer or commercial pressure to 'keep up'.

Re: PABXs

That's odd. I wanted a replacement recently and found myself knee-deep in options at give-away prices.

Admittedly, most of them were new Chinese stock. Perhaps they are dumping in anticipation of - um - shortages?

Truck-size asteroid makes one of the tightest fly-bys of Earth ever recorded

There's no need to panic. All these near-misses are just previously commissioned space rocks dropping in for an update to their operating systems. IBM OS 2.a

Three billion objects, 10TB+ of data – yup, it's the largest-yet survey of our galaxy

Re: A lot of things have come a long way

A top tip: Don't use an Excel spreadsheet to catalogue the galaxy.

Twitter data dump: 200m+ account database now free to download

Twitter is not responding.

Re Twitter.

There was no response from them because there is nobody qualified left to reply. All public comment needs to be personally cleared by the CEO.

Currently, there is a backlog of approx' 2,455,879 items in the queue for release.

If Mr. CEO works 38 hours a day 'till he dies, he should be able to manage to stop it from expanding beyond control.

Poor Mr. CEO (whoever that might be)

FYI: BMW puts heated seats, other features behind paywall

>If the car is registered in your name then it's your car legally and you can mod it.<

The registration confers nothing of the kind, at least in the UK. It only means you have legal authority to keep it.

I.E. Registered KEEPER.

I think you are missing the base point here, The car has all the extras already built in, but are inactive until an extra dollop of cash allows some or all of them to be activated on a rental basis.

US weather forecasters triple supercomputing oomph with latest machines

Low tech.

I still look out of the window.

Our main problem is not usually being able to see the horizon's. When I lived in the open countryside, my weather forecasting skills shot up by 60%

UK's Defra and Ministry of Justice facing £120m IR35 tax bills thanks to inaccuracies in assessing contractors' status

Re: Can I get all my Tax back

Bullying is something that government is very good at.

It's a pity that they can't deploy that skill over to other issues where they are not even sure that they exist.

But then, accountability has never been a strong point of our government that constantly expects - nay - demands, that everybody else exercises - or else face the penalties.

Maybe we, the Great British public, should consider a mass class action against the rule-breakers?

Anyone using Alibaba or other Chinese clouds?

Re: Anyone using Alibaba or other Chinese clouds?

I have used Alibaba in the past and while I have found it to be useful for shipping lists and hard-to-source items and other contacts, I have one real grumble which arises from purchasing something from a random supplier.

It seems Nobody notices that I have bought what I wanted and exited the arena.

From then on, I am pursued relentlessly by countless vendors who are intent on selling me the item I have already purchased, which continues until I change my mail address - again.

There seems to be no system that works, to advise the wider field of vendors that I am done buying.

The repeated experiences have led to an aversion to the site because I don't need the hassle, in my experience, support amounts to an endless stream of assurances that it is fixed, when it isn't.

I liken the experience to walking through a market in Shanghai and having everyone yelling at me and pulling on my sleeves all the time. I survived it, but emerge weakened by the experience.

The worst part is I don't wish to be rude to those merchants because there is a chance that at some future point I may wish to work with them. All I need is a universal transaction completed flag that works on my profile across the whole sphere of Alibaba.

China's hypersonic glider didn't just orbit Earth, it 'fired a missile' while at Mach 5

Re: @Version 1.0 Best way to win a race.

They meant CCP Chinese Communist Party

And either had a sticky key or became over-excited.

Judging by the way your face lit up, my inbox just got more attractive

Equality

I'm avidly awaiting the unavoidable follow-up of "You've got femail"

... And the inevitable explosion of various opinions ricochetting across the known universe.

Not too bright, are you? Your laptop, I mean... Not you

Re: Ah, a first time user

When replacing kit for aesthetic reasons, I have learned from experience, that it is a wise move to delay chucking the old stuff until you have determined whether the new kit is actually better or worse than the original it was meant to replace.

I keep such old stuff in my garage for the frequent evaluations of the new and supposedly better stuff, when it shows that a return to the old is often a marked improvement.

I have no idea what vintage the IBM 88 key-board that I favour is, beyond the fact that it does not know what a Windows key is, and is connected with a 'domino' 5 pin DIN plug.

Woman sues McDonald's for $14 after cheeseburger ad did exactly what it's designed to

Re: Can I make a suggestion?

You have a sadistic mindset. I'm disappointed - that I didn't think of it first.

I would hesitate to recommend that McD use that entirely reasonable argument.

It would be cheaper to pay her $1 million and keep the illusion intact.

Probably offering two thousand rubles attached to a NDA would be best all round for both of them.

Boffins find an 'actionable clock' hiding in your blood, ticking away to your death

Re: So? What's his secret?

It doesn't take long to discover there is a right way up when ingesting these cones and a wrong way up.

London Greenwich station: A reminder of former glories. Like Windows XP

Are we allowed to submit suggestions for improved system stability at the concept stage of Windows 12?

Stale and past its best. Are you talking about Windows or the pizza you're waiting for?

Re: Pizza toppings

Sorry, that is anatomically incorrect.

(

SNOT is the accidental discharge associated wid der Olfactory protuberance (NOSE).

PHLEGM is der stuff emanating from a Throaty Malfunction.

At least, that's wot 'appened to MY Pizza.

PS. I don't like Pizza no more.

So it appears some of you really don't want us to use the word 'hacker' when we really mean 'criminal'

Re: ...-boffin

In my neck of the woods, hackers are seen as either criminals or destroyers.

However, when they want you to salvage your computer after it collapsed they want a Techie.

Re: Hacking is honourable and the Print Media

Please tell me if you discover a reliable, accurate and trustworthy news feed (in English) anywhere

Re: Hacking is honourable

Stop splitting hair particles.

The 40-Year-Old Version: ZX81's sleek plastic case shows no sign of middle-aged spread

Re: Retro-Wreckers

We had a family BBC B which predated the school issue by a year. Our son took it to heart and so he and my wife became programmers of note which led to our boy being the class lead on computers.

I went for hardware, and came up with some grotesque builds, and some elegant ones now and then.

It was about then that my family and I stopped talking computers because we didn't know what the other side was talking about.

Looking about me, I fear that divide has permeated wider than I ever thought through the industry.

Australian government fights Facebook news ban by threatening 0.01% of Zuck's ad revenue

Re: Just goes to show how out of touch our politicians are

Yes agreed.

When Facebook declared British users to be Californians on the first day of Brexit, I decided to part ways, and being cautious suspended my account to think through the ramifications before deleting it altogether.

Bad move. FB reactivated it every day - citing doing me a favour as a friendly act.

Upshot? I had to delete it completely.

Then I began getting messages inviting me to re-engage with no loss of data. Which I took to mean the account wasn't really deleted at all. Lesson? What lies in the cloud stays in the cloud FOREVER.

Ring, Ring, why don't you give me a call? Amazon-owned doorbells aren’t answering after large-scale outage

Cut and come again?

A & E visit satisfaction survey.

Yes. I enjoyed the attention and abundant supply of nurses and painkillers so much that your excellent facility is marked down in my diary for a regular monthly visit.

European Commission redacts AstraZeneca vaccine contract – but forgets to wipe the bookmarks tab

Re: And the EU still can't understand why the UK left.

Looking at the situation like this, I conclude that I am an evolved intelligent unit that is successful (so far) in keeping clear of the CV-19 (and new friends) infections - meaning I think about what I'm doing.

Every time the government advocated a course of action to take, I ran that scenario past my own senses and experiences. If they agreed, I complied. If they didn't (Ex: Eating out) I declined to accept their take on it and continued to do it my common-sense way.

I am helped in my decision-making exercises by the existence of large (but shrinking) numbers of people milling about outside my front-door who are convinced of their own immortality and happy to share any infections they may have.

As long as these people continue to thumb their noses at the pandemic, so it will continue to thrive a situation aided by the diminished numbers of police to do anything about it. so for sensible people only their own common sense (and a few jabs) will see them through this latest scare.

Re: And the EU still can't understand why the UK left.

He is not responsible for those strains existence, but he is responsible for their existence within our borders by not connecting international travel with the amazing ability of the virus to travel internationally.

Re: And the EU still can't understand why the UK left.

Strikes me that the EU must be extremely bloody remiss by trailing the world-class torpidity of Boris in anything at all.

Nevertheless, I always wanted to use this icon.

Video encoders using Huawei chips have backdoors and bad bugs – and Chinese giant says it's not to blame

Sub-Prime confusion

Little wonder it was an anonymous coward that posited that.

I'd like to complain: I specifically asked for middle-eastern petrol when I filled up at a previously reputable petrol-station.

Yet they supplied me with Russian stuff - complete with post-ignition backfires. IT'S - A - DISGRACE !!!

I shall sue Saudi Arabia.

No you're not. I'm Spartacus.

Huawei mobile mast installed next to secret MI5 data centre in London has 7 years to do whatever it is Huawei does

Re: You've heard of Tempest?

Its's not that they are thick per se,

It's more that if they are utterly incapable of turning their hand to anything that will earn them a crust - the route ahead is clear. Be a politician.

Britains top-secret hidey-holes.

I have worked out that 'Extremely top-secret' means in effect that we poor British people, don't know what the rest of the world is intimately acquainted with.

If we want to know what's going on in the UK. we need to ask a foreigner. Preferably, an enemy foreigner - or an American.

Watch out, everyone, here come the Coronavirus Cops, enjoying their little slice of power way too much

Re: Those people in Britain and America...

Well we wouldn't know, the 'MSM' is not reporting any news these days that does not begin with with "In other Coronavirus News..."

We could have lost a world war for all we know.

"We're all in it together"

I could swear I have come across that little pass-phrase before somewhere.

If only I could remember where - although to do believe it ended well for some but pretty badly for the rest of us.

I would be much happier if I never heard it uttered ever again.

Now Internet Society told to halt controversial .org sale… by its own advisory council: 'You misread the community mindset around dot-org'

Re: Corruption

Only if the 'meme' is set upon verifiably accurate facts. Any 'meme' presents a picture, it is up to us to check the facts - as always.

If we are sensible about things like accuracy, we should always check the facts.

Curse of Boeing continues: Now a telly satellite it built may explode, will be pushed up to 500km from geo orbit

0737 MAXO problemo

They figured it would last out until the people responsible were drawing their pensions.

The Emergency escape plan was drawn up with that in mind, i.e. Someone elses problem.

I wonder if it is fitted with some kind of unexpected climb defeat sensor?

What could possibly go wrong?

Boeing comes clean on parachute borkage as the ISS crew is set to shrink

That's good business, isn't it? Something learned from the US code of ethics.

What failed?

Yes, and all that culminating in the end result: The Parachute failed. The cause was immaterial.

One cannot take any part of a system in isolation because it was the end result that mattered.

I can speculate that it was the built-in redundancy that led directly to the lackadaisical application of constructing the project. It's not really that important that I do my job correctly - there's back-up.

Just imagine the fuss has there been three such failures all happening at the same time - possible.

My MacBook Woe: I got up close and personal with city's snatch'n'dash crooks (aka some bastard stole my laptop)

If it had been worse - eg: Losing his life. He would not be caring about it at all right now.

I beg to disagree. The very worst did happen. It was stolen in broad daylight from a 'safe' environment' under the noses of god knows how many people who wouldn't lift a finger and will spend months worrying about how some lowlife might figure a new way past all security and steal his life.

No. the worst did happen. He has lost trust in his fellow man and will never feel the same about people ever again - both thieves and honest but inactive fellow citizens alike, probably permanently.

I know I did.

One person's harmless japery can be another's night of LaserJet Lego

Re: The invisible button

Yeah. I have one of those. Presented during my quieter days of employed and paid consultations

Re: ORLY?

> I've seen people print stuff out so they can scan it in.

So you have been to my office then?

I once caught my wife trying to insert a 'stiffie' into the VCR because there was a video on it.

Re: That bloody BSoD Screen Saver

That 'fundamental tenet' was broken years ago by M$ tech support honestly insisting that 'There is no error in the programming - it must be you' for the three-month period before a patch was silently released to everyone in the world - except you - which resulted in another three-week period before stumbling across it on some chat forum.

That causes one to instinctively question everything and everyone IT related, until concrete verification is obtained and caused one to wholly reject automatic updates until the sheep have real-world tested it first.

It will never be safe to turn off your computer: Prankster harnesses the power of Windows 95 to torment fellow students

Re: More chaos

Bastard! I remember that (im)patient wait being perpetrated on me.

Net result was to get my own computer (kings ransom in those days) so I could learn revenge.

My favourite was replacing the Windows 95 shutdown sound with: "Argh, You are trying to murder me - someone call the police" on a government computer - which for embarrassment reasons was never ever shut down until it died.

World recoils in horror as smartphone maker accused of helping government snoops read encrypted texts, track device whereabouts

Re: Nope I'm lost

I'm fresh out of facets this week. I will have to repurpose some taps in order to pour some scorn on the well-disguised sarcasm - or was it really irony?

I'm losing the ability to discern.

Parliament IT bods' fail sees server's naked OS exposed to world+dog

Re: it's probably a job for MI5

Maybe the trusty techhie has a slightly foreign look about him/her and put on fat-finger gloves to avoid leaving incriminating DNA.

Just a thought...

It's the curious case of the vanishing iPhone sales as Huawei grabs second place off Apple in smartmobe stakes

Re: SE sized devices

Hey! It's 0 : 48 Now.

'Software delivered to Boeing' now blamed for 737 Max warning fiasco

Re: Evidence in a trial?

Did it ever cross a mind to fit an 'OFF' switch to the offending sensor circuit and fall back on the usually reliable Mk I eyeball?

Accident?

It is high time the aircraft industry took a leaf from the road traffic book and stopped calling this sort of thing 'Accidents'.

It is quite clear that given the usual human failure syndrome that 'Incident' is a far better descriptor - and far more accurate.

Plus - the practice of blaming underlings obviously means that the error-prone senior staff are left alone to go on committing the same old errors forever more.

In this case: If it's Boeing - I'm NOT going will prevail - at least until they stop wriggling around trying to protect their friends-in-high-places.