Posts by 45RPM

Is iOS 9.3 Apple's worst ever update? First it bricks iThings, now Safari is busted

Re: Lies, lies, lies.........

@jaffa99

‘over the years’? Dude, you sound like you’re seventeen years old, and picking your zits in a PC World call centre. What do you know about ‘over the years’ in IT? Get some experience, and then make the jokes*

The sad truth is that software updates sometimes go wrong - even updates from Microsoft. Linux isn’t perfect either, and Android has its fair share of bugs. And damn, if all software companies (like every other type of company) don’t claim to have invented everything from the wheel onward. It’s called marketing - you don’t have to believe it.

The thing is though that Apple does have a certain amount of right to make claims of innovation in the field of personal computing. I do remember the PET, TRaSh 80 and the Apple II, and believe me - the Apple II is the only one really recognisable as a personal computer today. I remember the Lisa - and whatever the Xerox boys say, the Lisa was the first GUI which worked in the modern way you’d recognise now. Newton was innovative (if massively flawed), and you couldn’t buy a candy coloured device for love nor money before iMac - and then they were everywhere. Come to that, USB was scarce before iMac and then common as muck afterward. You might not like Apple, or want one (and you’d be a bit of dipstick to buy any device without considering whether its right for you), but you’re a colossal fucktard if you dismiss Apple completely out of hand. Where Apple goes, others tend to follow.

*for bonus points, see if you can make them funny too.

Ditto. It's working fine for me too. Although it doesn't speak well of the sandbox and other security features of iOS if a badly written app can bork the whole OS. Of course, if the affected phones are jail broken then all bets are off.

This chap's maintained an Apple game for 32 years – from Mac to iOS

Re: Zork

…not by the original developer though.

This was one of the first games that I got on the Mac. It was diverting enough - until I got my first colour Mac and I was able to play Seahaven Towers instead. Seahaven never made it past PowerPC (68k & PPC Classic, and PPC OS X only) - but the original developers are working on an updated version right now.

More interestingly (for Mac Geeks) is that one later version of Klondike was delivered as a SuperFat Binary that worked on everything from 1985’s 512k ‘Fat’ Mac all the way up to 2003’s G5 with OS X. Clever stuff.

Apple stuns world with Donald Trump iPhone

I wonder if the sex-toy industry will follow Apple’s lead and release a Donald Trump edition flesh light?

Computer says: Stop using MacWrite II, human!

Well if it's PCs you're after, my first was a 4.77 MHz 8086 equipped Compaq Deskpro with 256K RAM and 5 MB hard disk.

40MB? Luxury! My first Mac was an SE, which rocked a whole MB of RAM, System 5 (I think - it may have been 4), and a 20MB hard disk. I later bought an 80MB external drive

Microsoft's done a terrible job with its Windows 10 nagware

Re: I've had a rather productive weekend.

Yarp. I built a hackintosh. I wiped it fairly soon afterward and installed Ubuntu instead (my self build tower is currently multibooting Ubuntu, FreeDOS and Windows 8.1). The problem is that a Hackintosh, in my experience, doesn't really approach the ease of use that Mac at its best can be*. It wouldn't be reasonable for it to, I suppose, since Apple hasn't tested OS X to run on the hardware that you pick. For my money, the best bet for OS X is an old style Xeon powered Mac Pro tower (get one second hand with guarantee from vendors like Scrumpy Macs). If you can't bear that then just use Linux of your choice.

* In fairness, Yosemite wasn't Mac at its best either. El Cap is much better in my experience.

Sexism isn't getting better in Silicon Valley, it's getting worse

Re: Feminazis? FFS

@drewc

It's worth reading Bahboh's other posts. I think that 'Bahboh' might be a synonym for 'Troll'.

Re: Meanwhile, in the real world

I'm not sure that you understand your point. Education, at least in terms of the three R's and in the west, is not sexist - boys get taught the same as girls. Developmentally, though, boys do advance slower at this stage - it's normal. Do you feel that boys should be given a leg up over the girls? Or, are you saying that, in a true meritocracy, girls are winning at this age - and therefore, in the pre-higher education age bracket, they should have the balance of power?

Or are you just insecure and confused by a matching pair of sex genes?

First working Apple Mac ransomware infects Transmission BitTorrent app downloads

Re: Arggggg

@Andy629 - I agree. My apologies - my point wasn't that you should run Anti Virus and you'll be safe if you do - my point was that you should run Anti Virus, FireWalls, a healthy degree of paranoia and mistrust - and try not to use piracy sites (because that's just asking for trouble).

The internet is like Detroit*. It's a dangerous shithole, but some parts are really very dangerous and other parts are just a bit sketchy. Steer clear of the dangerous parts, and treat the rest of it with suspicion.

*apologies to residents of Detroit. There may be some very nice parts - but I had to pick on somewhere, and it makes a change from picking on Glasgow**

**whoops, I did it again.

Re: Arggggg

Worryingly, a signed application can launch an unsigned application without troubling Gatekeeper (if I've understood correctly). Hopefully Apple will fix this rather glaring oversight - and, when they do, you can be sure that it'll be lauded with much trumpeting as an advanced new feature in the next version of Mac OS X!

In any case, and regardless of your preferred OS, everyone should be running an Antivirus app, and ensuring that the definitions are bang up to date.

Microsoft releases Windows 10 preview for Raspberry Pi 3

Re: teaching computing to kiddies.

@Symon - Nah. 12" EP.

Re: teaching computing to kiddies.

Ahh! OS/2. I had OS/2 for Windows - it came free from somewhere and, when installed on a computer with MS-DOS 5 and Windows 3, replaced it with OS/2. I had to wipe my computer and start again to return to DOS and Windows, which I inevitably had to do when it turned out that some of my more demanding software wouldn't run on 'a better DOS than DOS and a better Windows than Windows'.

Re: teaching computing to kiddies.

^ This. What @Richard said.

Back in the 90s, Apple was marginalised (and boy, were they marginalised!), Atari ST was dead, Amiga was dying and Linux users all had beards and eschewed soap. In the minds of the general public, Microsoft was computers - and a computer without 'Microsoft' was unthinkable.

The world has changed a little since then. It's a UNIX* world, in all its different flavours. Add up the installed base of iOS, Mac OS X, Linux and Android and its Windows that is looking a bit marginalised now.**

Raspberry Pi is part of this trend, although it's installed base is a drop in the ocean (even at 8 million) compared with all the other UNIX systems out there. Windows IoT isn't going to help Microsoft reverse the tide either - if anything, it might push more users into the welcoming arms of Linux. A noob might buy a Pi for a dabble (it happens - it's so cheap that why not?) on the strength of Windows. On discovering that it doesn't really have Windows they might give Raspbian a bash - and discover that it's familiar enough that they don't need Windows anyway. Certainly, that was Mrs. 45RPMs experience.

If Microsoft really wants to join in with the Pi fun then surely the way to go is with Windows RT and a lightweight version of Visual Studio on the Pi. With that, who knows? They might even tempt some users back from Linux***

*I know that Linux isn't UNIX. But it's so UNIXalike that the distinction is irrelevant.

**fanboys, don't blow a sphincter - this isn't a comment on the merits of a particular OS - just a reflection on the current state of play in terms of installed base.

***Probably not many though.

Raspberry Pi celebrates fourth birthday with fruity version 3

@Peter Mount

I take my hat off to you, sir. You're a bigger Pi fanboi (flanboy?) than me. I only have the B's, no compute boards, no A's and no Zero (yet). I'm considering getting a Zero to build a robot around though.

I'm afraid to say that I've bought all the Bs so far, including both versions of the original logic board. I think I might be a bit of a Pi fan boy. They're all used too - some of them as loaner units for my friends. Will I be buying the 64 bit version? Hell yeah! I only wish that decent cases like the Plusberry were easier to come by.

Donald Trump promises 'such trouble' for Jeff Bezos and Amazon

@Roq D. Kasba

I think that a lot of business is luck - you have to have a good idea, but then you need to have a spot of luck too. And yes, Sugar has a smaller net worth - but look what he started with. He's vastly increased his wealth.

Trump, on the other hand, might have more than any of us (including Sugar), but he still has less now than he started with. Not only is he a worse businessman than Alan Sugar, he's a worse businessman than most of the people who read The Register.

By this measure, he's about on a par with the chap who sleeps on the bench in the park by my office, and who pisses in his sleeping bag. Except I'd rather spend time with him than with Trump.

I don't think Trump did copy Sugar. Sugar is a highly successful businessman who is many orders of magnitude richer than he was when he started. A self made man.

Trump inherited it all from daddy, and is poorer now than he was when he started. By any definition, and no matter how rich he is, he's a failed businessman.

If he objects to Amazon then they might refuse to sell his book "My Struggle".

Gopher server revived after 15 years of downtime

Gopher is awesome - and makes the Internet useful for users of elderly computers. I'm delighted each time a new server for this venerable but efficient protocol is (re)started.

Microsoft acquires Xamarin: An obvious move not without risks

Barring a few hiccoughs, I'd say that Nadella's Microsoft is getting more open and collaborative every day. Sure, if it was Ballmer's Microsoft I'd be worried - but Ballmer is almost as mad as Trump.

With Nadella though? I think (and I hope I'm right) that this is all good news. Mono is a great project - and I hope that, under Microsoft, it's IDE will be further improved and have vastly greater compatibility with Visual Studio*

*never gonna happen! I can wish all I want, but…

Q: How many guns to arm nine coachloads of terrorists?

Surely it isn't only necessary to define the coach load, it is also necessary to define the standard unit terr'ist. I believe this should be defined as equivalent to two pistols, one semi automatic and a vest / rucksack. Half a terr'ist is equal to one shoe.

On this basis, I'd argue that there's only one busload in this stash.

Apple must help Feds unlock San Bernardino killer's iPhone – judge

Lack of joined up thinking?

It seems to me that weakening a devices encryption, or mandating the provision of a back door, does little to assist law enforcement - and nothing to protect the personal details of everyday users.

The reason that law enforcement isn't hindered by encryption should be obvious. If a back door is mandated then any reasonably intelligent crim or terr'ist will roll their own, backdoorless, encryption system - and the forces of law and order will continue to be stymied and will have to work a little harder at gathering evidence.

If the crim concerned is rather dimmer, and hasn't taken precautions, then they'll also have left a trail in the form of other evidence like a blundering elephant, and the evidence contained on the device will be unnecessary - there being more than enough to convict without it.

If we allow our lawmakers to mandate a backdoor into our devices then we usher in a new age of fraud and theft from our bank accounts.

We should laud the device makers for making their devices so secure - not criticise them for it.

iPhones clock-blocked and crocked by setting date to Jan 1, 1970

Testing is a thankless task. It's dull, it's repetitive, and it's not as glamorous as coding. So it isn't surprising that bugs like this sneak through in anyone's software (Apple's, Microsoft's, Google's, yours, mine)

It needn't be this way though. Automated testing, with intelligently designed scripts, can take care of all the boring repetitive tasks of ensuring that every function works the way that it is supposed to and regression testing. Those tests can be left running every night.

This frees up a lot of human tester time, not for redundancy (before all the accountants get excited) but to do the vital, interesting, and often overlooked task of what I like to think of as vandalism.

Vandalism is interesting testing because it's devious. It's imaginative. It doesn't concern itself with whether the software works as designed (the automated testing and UAT will take care of that). All it does is try to smash the software, crash it, break it by any means. And once a good exploit has been found, of course, it gets added to the test automation suite - and the tester goes back to be deviously destructive again.

I imagine that most of the big software companies do this already - but perhaps they should do it more. And I might point out that before you snigger too much at the 'notorious wobbliness' of Apple software, bugs like this are everywhere. Yes. Even in your own preferred OS.

Motorola-powered Mac from 1989 used to write smartphone apps

Re: Pascal on a Mac

And don't forget the Gaelic Pascoe - common in Cornwall.

Re: Keyboards

That keyboard (Saratoga) is a proper mechanical one, with Alps key switches. Which might explain why they're so sought after.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Extended_Keyboard

@davidp231

Apparently, if you use A/UX then A/UX replaces the dodgy 24bit code with a 32bit alternative of its own - permitting use of the entire address space. I haven't tried that configuration though - so I can't confirm.

A better alternative to using the ROM from a IIsi or IIfx (the IIx and IIcx had more or less the same ROM as the stock SE/30, and IIci's ROM was soldered to the board) is to use a custom ROM specifically for the SE/30 - but 32bit clean. You can buy them (with a natty skull and crossbones silk screened onto the board), and they work very well - even with A/UX (or OS 8!). In fact, using modern chips, there's even enough room for an OS (just like a Classic) if you so choose.

GCHQ’s Xmas puzzle proves uncrackable

Yup. I suspect that the people with the intellectual wherewithal to break the code have better things to do with their time. Solving the mysteries of the universe, for example, trying to cure cancer, designing the next Raspberry Pi…

Whatever Android-ChromeOS mashup looks like, it's gotta be better looking than this

That EULA! This milk is sour, and I ain't the kind of pussy to drink it.

Intel admits Skylakes can ... ... ... freeze in the middle of work

Re: Re : BIOS issue?

@malle-herbert

Of course it is. I'll get my brown paper bag. My parser is clearly a bit off this morning.

Does the problem also occur with EFI or is it strictly a legacy BIOS issue?

Boozing is unsafe at ‘any level’, thunders chief UK.gov quack

Consider for a moment, if you will, the danger to the economy of this quackery. Consider also the damage caused by ‘Dry January’ (and every other dry month - there are a worrying number).

I’m not saying that everyone should drink - some people might have very good reasons for abstaining (not least that they don’t like booze very much). I’m not saying that some people shouldn’t cut back a little (but, on the basis of this report, it seems to me that some people could do with upping their intake rather a lot). I am saying that, provided what I do affects only me, the government should butt the fuck out and leave me to get on with it. I’d hate for pubs to have to shut because of all this foolishness.

Join with me in a New Year Resolution - make 2016 the ‘Support the Publican’ year. Don’t drink at home. Don’t abstain (well, unless you’re teetotal - in which case, carry on). Go down to your local boozer at every opportunity and sink a couple. Your stress levels will go down - and your enjoyment of life will improve immeasurably - even as its duration shrinks infinitesimally.

chin chin!

Lovelace at 200: Celebrating the High Priestess to Babbage's machines

Re: Sexist shite

Bit part? Jesus! Are you serious? Go away and research what she did - her genitals have nothing to do with it. She was a genius, and is rightly lauded for her acheivements. If her sex has been celebrated latterly, that’s just out of necessity - as a society we do need to get more women into STEM, and giving them heroines to look up to might just be a useful tool to do that.

Ada Lovelace was not only one of the very few who could understand what Babbage was on about (and presumably you believe that we should celebrate him, right?), she was also able to extend his ideas beyond anything that he had dreamed (not least looping) - to the extent that a Babbage / Ada machine (if built) would likely have been Turing Complete. Sure, it would likely also have ripped itself to pieces (steam not being the ideal power source for a computer) - but the principle was sound.

Having done all that she went on to propose a means for programming the damned thing. And you have the gall to suggest that she shouldn’t be celebrated? Seriously, dude, you have a lot to learn.

You might also want to read up on other mathematical luminaries such as Emmy Noether, Mary Lucy Cartwright, Florence Nightingale, Julia Robinson, Shafi Goldwasser, Sofia Kovalevskaya… I could go on.

Swiss try to wind up Apple with $25k dumb-watch

I can’t help thinking that Swiss Made is to watches what Apple Made is to computers. There may be very good reasons for choosing a Swiss watch (just as there may be very good reasons for choosing an Apple computer), but one size does not fit all and it seems to me that most purchases are made for reasons of fashion - and not because the merits of the device have been carefully considered by the purchaser.

Besides, if you want the very best, the apogee of damned expensive mechanical watch fashion then you need to buy English (http://www.robertloomes.com/robin-gents-watch/). I’ve considered the merits and decided instead to have a house and an old Seiko.

Longing to bin Photoshop? Rock-solid GIMP a major leap forward

Re: Luxury!

Dad? You knew who dad were? Reet posh you must be. Mam dunt knaa who us were. Tho t'munnys on er faatha or uncle Derek.

The Register's entirely serious New Year's resolutions for 2016

More of Lester Haines. More Worstall. Less Page. And don't forget the post pub Nosh and space articles. Get that right, and you've got it made - whatever else you may do.

Apple had more CVEs than any single MS product in 2015, but it doesn't really matter

Re: People?

The problem, perhaps, is that many (most?) managers have little or no understanding of the work that they're supposed to be managing. They're drawn from colleges with no more than an MBA to their name - rather from the ranks. And they've heard that measurability is good (and it is) but, since they don't understand their subject, they just grab desperately at any old number - no matter how meaningless.

Cache-astrophic: Why Valve's Steam store spewed players' private profiles to strangers

Re: Good idea.

At the risk of being downvoted into a smoking hole in the ground, this problem seems to be particularly prevalent on Windows - and I'm at a loss to see why consoles (other than, perhaps, Xbox) are similarly affected.

Taking one (admittedly small) example, when I installed Trine on my Mac I was able to start playing immediately. I installed Braid and the gameplay experience was the same. I did the same on Linux (with Trine and Braid) - install, and then play. No further messing.

When attempting the same on my Windows 7 PC, I needed to update DirectX (and a load of other stuff - it was a while ago, and I can't remember the specifics) immediately after installing Trine before I could play. I installed Braid and, despite just having done a major update of shared components, I had to wait while more components (often the same ones) got updated again. Wtf!?

Now I concede that Windows is the better system for gaming in terms of variety and performance, but in terms of user friendliness and immediacy Microsoft can learn a lot of from Linux and Mac OS.

Adobe: We locked our customers in the cloud and out poured money

Re: There is an alternative…

@Steve Davies 3

Fanboys everywhere on el Reg. It's a very partisan site.

I know that there are people who still swear by Adobe - my sister's business for one, and she's happy with the subscription model. I'm not even saying that the subscription model is bead for everyone - just that it's bad for me. I like to have a perpetual licence.

I like the way that JetBrains do it - you buy a subscription and, after each year, your license changes to being perpetual for the major version that was current when the year's subscription started/renewed for you. If Adobe did that too I'd have no quarrel with their subscription model.

There is an alternative…

If you don’t like being locked into the cloud, there is a viable alternative - and I speak as one who not only once used Photoshop and Illustrator, but was also paid to teach other people how to use it.

Affinity Photo and Affinity Designer are both viable alternatives, and they require remarkably little in the way of retraining in order to use. Sure, there’s some functionality missing - but since the missing functionality is largely in the field of automation (building panoramas and so forth) it’s stuff that you may be able to do without. Personally, I’m happy to make do without and abandon the subscription model at the same time. I’m sure that Serif will be adding in the missing functionality in future versions (fingers crossed).

Adobe does still have one worthwhile tool - Brackets. That one’s free. Download it now.

Apple finally publishes El Capitan Darwin source

Re: Job's the marconi of his day!!

@Simon Hobson

With regard to Microsoft's views of the GPL, I think that mainly applies to Steve Ballmer. But Ballmer wasn't the smartest tool in the shed (which explains Microsoft's precipitous decline in his tenure). Now that Nadella chap is an entirely different kettle of cleverness - and we don't know what his views on the subject are.

My problem with the GPL is that it explicitly states that the source code must be published - and there are times where that might be undesirable for competitive reasons. Attribution, I have no issue with - but source code publication? No - that's not for me. LGPL 'fixes' GPL - but I tend to prefer the BSD license (which didn't need 'fixing' to begin with.)

That said, I can also see the point of GPL for some - and so isn't it wonderful that we have a choice of license, and we can choose the one that suits us best?

@kryptylomese

I was looking at Darling just the other day - but this probably doesn't make their work any easier.

You see, this isn't really anything all that new - the source code for Darwin and the kernel for Yosemite has been out for a while now - and, if you go back as far as Leopard, you even used to be able to download an image of the full built OS. So, as you can see, this doesn't give Darling anything that they didn't have already (it just gives them a newer version)

I used to use Darwin on my PC, and I liked it a lot. Scarcity of software, and lack of time to build for myself from the sources, pushed me into the arms of Ubuntu - and there I've stayed. The CLI isn't quite as nice (there are tools and ways of working on Darwin that I prefer), but the overall experience is a great deal better.

Donald Trump wants Bill Gates to 'close the Internet', Jeff Bezos to pay tax

You shore do have a purty mouth. Fer a city boi.

Seems to me that you can gauge the IQ of a merkin, to some extent, by the party that they support. If it's GOP then you might be looking at someone called cletus who screws pigs and whose idea of foreplay is to say "wake up, Ma". An evolution denying moron whose only talent is the ability to play the banjo very quickly. In short, probably not the sort of person you'd want to trust with the biggest economy and military in the world.

Hello Barbie controversy re-ignited with insecurity claims

Hi! I'm Barbie. I love you very much.

Question is, will this new cutting edge technology be resistant to the best efforts of Mr. Snodworthy? Better yet, will it be able to get one over Mr. Snodworthy with, perhaps, a carefully placed arm?

We should all watch these developments most carefully.

Top Android app devs found exfiltrating mystery stealth packets

Re: Comparison of android, iOS, Windows

The trouble is that when research of this type is published, concentrating on only one platform, it doesn't provide enough information for purchasers to make an informed decision. At worst, it provides more grist to the mill of adherents (fan boys) of other OSs that theirs is somehow better. Safer. And it may be - but there isn't enough data here to make that kind of judgment. Equally, it may not be - it may be worse.

I would genuinely be interested to see this research but covering all the major mobile operating systems.

How does this compare with Windows or iOS?

Reg reader achieves bronze badge, goes directly to jail

Err… Yes. But you also need to have a certain number of upvotes - and this isn’t a great way of getting those.

Must try harder, I’m afraid. Quality as well as quantity.

I visited a friend in chokey once. I got frisked and x-rayed for drugs - which I, as a tweedy kind of a bloke, thought was hiliarious. I don’t do anything stronger than whisky, tea and bacon.

They took dabs too. So presumably I’m on record somewhere.

GCHQ 'smart collection' would protect MPs from spies, says NSA expert

Re: Who has more power?

@strum Since Parliament is supposed to be democratic, our politicians must be subject to the same protections and laws as the rest of us. That includes encryption and privacy on the net.

The ideal solution is just to forget about this whole sorry mess, and permit hard to break encryption.

The next best solution is to educate everyone how to use Tor, and write off the public internet as a sorry fucked up mess.

Finally, if we must have broken encryption, politicians must have broken encryption too - and whistleblowers will have to fall back on the old, non electronic methods.