Posts by werdsmith

ZX Spectrum Vega+ will ship on time, developer claims amid doubts

Re: You can't go back

I rarely play video games, but when I do it is always those old 80s coin operated games on an emulator. Because the new stuff seems to be all about visual effects instead of fun.

For me, Galaxians remains the peak of gaming (though there never was a faithful repro of it on a spectrum).

I like these Vega+ things, it is their second project so I am sure it will eventually find its way into backers hands. I will buy one too, but some months after the start shipping for a lot less money.

British Gas wins pre-paid smart meter patent lawsuit

Indeed, not only are they wasting the court time, they are helping to create an overhead that will be passed on the rest of us, the legal costs. And they were hoping to get British Gas to pay a royalty, which effectively will be the British Gas customer paying them. For some nebulous idea. I've no idea how it was patented in the first place.

'Geek gene' denied: If you find computer science hard, it's your fault (or your teacher's)

Yes, you are right that some achieve great things through working at it and it is easier to do that if they enjoy it. But there are people who progress much more quickly with less work.

Usually people who reach the top have the talent and aptitude "gift" and put in the hard work to get ahead of the other people with talent and aptitude. Those without the talent and aptitude won't get there, like a jockey is never going to be a prop forward in the six nations and a prop forward is never going to win the Derby.

Do you remember kids at school that have beautiful handwriting? They didn't practice handwriting more than me with my scrawl. In fact I practised like crazy trying to improve it, but my fine motor control just wasn't going to do it. Our central nervous systems vary as much as our physiology.

That pianist is just saying what they all say, it's good PR and they want recognition for their work.

Re: lack of genes or lack of trying?

Aptitude. Different people have aptitudes for different things. I had to work seriously hard and practise for hours on end over several years to learn the guitar, but I've seen people pick them up and become very competent in a few weeks. My son is doing further maths at A level after getting a GCSE A*, yet he never spends any time studying. It just all comes naturally to him.

Same with developers. There are those that can hold a picture of pointers and multi-threads and in their head and some that just cant think beyond the loop that they are in. Some will get there through hard work, some will do it naturally.

I don't know where the ability comes from, but our minds vary just as much as our physiology does.

Personally, I've been in this business for decades, but I only fell into it because there was nothing else I could do. I don't even like it, but I make it work, much like a 7 stone hod-carrier would develop into the role. But a 15 stone of muscle hod carrier would adapt much quicker.

Oh Snap! How intelligent people make themselves stupid for Snapchat

Re: Snap!

The UI on the phone app is abominably poor, which is how the young'uns like it.

I use it because a snapchat message will reach my daughter when all others fail (because they are ignored).

Re: It's not rocket science

It's now about Stories. Stories are the thing on Snapchat.

Sinclair fans rejoice: ZX Spectrum Vega+ to launch October 20

Re: Excellent!

The micro controller in an SD card that does all the Flash wear levelling will have more grunt than the original Spectrum, probably.

In terms of clock speed it will have several times more grunt than an Clive's old Z80.

Will be an adapted ARM core or 8051.

Matt LeBlanc handed £1.5m to front next two series of Top Gear

Clarkson, Hammond and May were quite prepared to play the idiot and happy to look stupid for the show (an act that took a lot of people in judging by the indignation). LeBlanc is unlikely to let himself be anything but a cool guy. And that's why he's a bit shit at the job.

I was a kid when Saville was all over TV and always found him to be a bit repulsive, and find that most other people felt the same. I think he was one of those people that forced and manipulated into where he wanted to be and wasn't actually talented in anyway at all.

Turing, Hauser, Sinclair – haunt computing's Cambridge A-team stamping ground

I pass the old ARM offices on Market Hill often. There often a pie stall opposite and down (opposite M&S) that I can't leave alone.

M&S in Cambridge is split into 2 separate shops and joined by what feels like a secret passage.

I must take a little walk and have a look at the Sinclair offices, the seeds of my entire future were sown there. I will see if the people will let me look upstairs.

Virgin Media costs balloon by MEEELLIONS in wake of Brexit

Re: VM Television is fairly pants

The TiVo is slow, but it's not the same as a BT TV box. Tivo gets cable TV up a coax cable, whereas the BT box uses the broadband ADSL line and gives the ability to record 3 channels at one etc.

VM users are free to use whatever available service they like with the 100Mb+ broadband that VM deliver - NowTV, Amazon, Chromecast, Apple etc.

Re: Another Illustration of the Fact...

The company doesn't tell employees how to vote. It tells them what result it believes would be best for their business.

The employees can vote for whoever they like, it's a secret ballot after all.

Zuckerberg to spend $3bn+ to rid world of all disease by 2100 (Starting with Facebook, right?)

Re: Nice

Facebook is getting a stigma, not only for its users being vacuous morons, but also for its image as a giant corporate evil monster. $3billion over 80 years, which probably won't all get paid anyway is a small price to pay out of the marketing budget to try and change its poor image.

Re: Good Nutrition

Yes I have a garden that yields a lot of good food for most of the year.

Re: Why not cure entropy while we're at it?

I can't bear the thought of the inevitable losing any of my elderly family. But that's me being selfish and wanting to keep them, wanting them to always be there, not really considering their needs.

Re: Try paying some fucking taxes...

You currently have the NHS, the railways, the social services and the research grants you deserve, because YOU voted for them...

You have no idea which way I cast my vote so suck that sanctimony right back in.

Lenovo denies claims it plotted with Microsoft to block Linux installs

Is there a virtualbox fork, like MariaBox or something, so that I don't have to contaminate with anything Oracle?

She cannae take it, Captain Kirk! USS Zumwalt breaks down

Re: El Reg unit

Red Osprey, Red Falcon and Red Eagle are refurbished, but not by any means new.

The Lymington ferries, Wight Sun, Wight Sky and Wight Light are not that small, 1500 tonne, 65 cars + HGVs, Wight Sun sometimes works on the Portsmouth service.

St. Cecilia, Sl Clare and St. Faith do the Portsmouth-Fishbourne (not Wootton Bridge) route.

Latest F-35 bang seat* mods will stop them breaking pilots' necks, beams US

Re: @Wommit

Pilotless fighters would probably deploy in batches of half dozen per enemy human piloted adversary, and loss of a couple would be acceptable. The humans won't stand a chance. It will be most interesting when it is drone versus drone fighting it out. Then air superiority will be down to the geek tech and manufacturing capacity.

Re: Helicopter Ejection

Yes, this: Kamov Ka-50 has the helicopter ejection system. One crashed in 2013 in Moscow after the ejection system activated itself unnecessarily during normal flight.

Re: Handling the G's

the pilot is actually more valuable in real terms than the plane

I think a lot of the F4 pilots that were rinsed by Mig-17 and 21 opposition in Vietnam spent the rest of the war in the Hanoi Hilton anyway.

Microsoft sues Wisconsin man (again) for copyright infringement (again)

For at least a couple of decades Microsoft turned a blind eye unlicensed copies of its desktop products for the end users if they are domestic users. And it still does to some extent although the HUP allows people to have the stuff for next to nothing anyway and give MS a way of keeping track.

The reason they let this happen was partly because it was impossible to control anyway, but also because they wanted it to become ubiquitous and de facto. That kind of worked, but now Microsoft can't get the cows back into the field. It's a problem of their own creation. If they go after home users too much, then they will push more toward Open Office.

Re: Third timje lucky?

I would think software piracy would cover using software and not paying for a license. Theft would be taking money from a licensee that should go to the licensor. So the software can be pirated, the money can be stolen. Or is that fraud?

Now I've confused myself and I wish I'd never started this comment.

Re: Maybe he can...

That would be like the amazing discounted admission tickets for the museums that people sell to gullible tourists in London.

Special multi-entry 7-day admission pass covering the British Museum, Natural History Museum, Science Museum, V&A and a bonus National Gallery, only £20! Bargain for gullible tourists.

either the guy is stupid to keep doing this

Or his customers are stupid. People are paying for pirated activation keys when they are available all over the web for free?

People must know that he is not a legitimate vendor, so they know they are breaking the law, yet they pay him?

Is Tesla telling us the truth over autopilot spat?

the only message i ever got from the "blame shifting" as it was called... was that the system as a whole was (as designed at the time), insufficient to handle the circumstances it found itself in. period.

Those circumstances are mostly a driver ignoring all the warnings in the manual, on the big screen in the car and from a human briefing when it is purchased. Quote:

"Warning: Traffic-Aware Cruise Control has limited deceleration ability and may be unable to apply enough braking to avoid a collision if a vehicle in front slows suddenly, or if a vehicle enters your driving lane in front of you. Never depend on Traffic-Aware Cruise Control to slow down the vehicle enough to prevent a collision. Always keep your eyes on the road when driving and be prepared to take corrective action as needed. Depending on Traffic-Aware Cruise Control to slow the vehicle down enough to prevent a collision can result in serious injury or death.

That comes from two pages of similar warnings.

Re: What about Drive Pilot

There are enough warnings and instructions thrown at the driver of a Tesla who uses Driver Assist, ignoring them has to be a willful act. I've never driven a Tesla and it is plain obvious to me that Driver Assist has to be closely watched.

It's getting all a bit Stella Liebeck, and we are all having to pay for business overheads because they have to cope with the lowest common denominator.

FBI overpaid $999,900 to crack San Bernardino iPhone 5c password

Re: Built in Obsolescence

There is no motive for Apple to hobble the lifespan of the NAND to promote sales... the finite lifespan of the battery already does that.

The battery replacement is a 5 minute job. At least it was before 7 came out with its waterproofing.

Skype shuts down London office, hangs up on hundreds of devs

Re: Demise of Skype: best thing that could happen

Well "Skype for Business" what used to be called Lync is almost ubiquitous and does actually work.

Their basic app screen shows the active status of all contacts, meaning work from homers have to move their mouse at least once every 5 minutes or so.

Audi works with Chinese technology companies to develop intelligent cars

Re: Audi Intelligent cars.

Audi indicators get used all the time. Exclusively on Audis, use of the indicator lights in hazard mode exempts the driver from parking restrictions.

Audi adaptive cruise control code sample:

if ( dist_to_car_in_front >= ONE_METRES) { accelerate(MAX); headlights_Full_Beam(TRUE); };

Non-doms pay 10 times more in income tax than average taxpayer group

I wonder how many of the critics here, at least those living convenient to cross-channel services, have made trips to France to buy booze and/or fags. It's the same thing. If it becomes possible to make international choices then tax rates become a competitive market.

You don't even have to do that. You can just buy something at a really competitive price, delivered quickly to your door ..... from Amazon. Amazon can afford to offer low prices and efficient delivery because they are "better at dealing with tax" than their competitors.

But ultimately, the customer is benefiting from that tax position.

Re: Pretty meaningless metric

A rich person:

Uses private health care instead of the NHS, minimal burden on NHS, However, private medicine is VAT exempt.

Uses private education, no burden on states schools. Again fees are VAT exempt

Buy expensive houses and pays shedloads of stamp duty.

Pay their personal staff and are often business employers, therefore responsible for a great deal of income tax and NI.

Spend a lot of money and pay a lot of VAT.

And many other examples of indirect contribution.

So, the effect is that despite avoiding all the tax that they can, their net contribution is going to be an order of magnitude greater than yours or mine.

And although it may grate on some people, if taxes become what they would consider to be punitive then they will go somewhere less punitive and make that contribution there and our Inland Revenue will get zero where it was previously getting millions. So to compensate, the IR would need to increase tax on the less well off instead of letting them get away with 20%.

Re: So in summary....

But the poor plebs at the bottom of the rung do, from day 1.

No the people at the bottom earning within their personal allowance pay zero.

Post-Brexit UK.gov must keep EU scientists coming, say boffins

Re: "attracting European students and staff members to the UK was necessary"

It's not democracy as we have come to know it. We vote at general elections knowing that if things don't work out the way we want then we can have another go in five years. So we can take one bunch of idiot narcissistic sociopaths out and put another lot of the same in if our consensus chooses.

This EU thing is a plebiscite to get an indication of the majority of public will. Any decision made on the basis of that reference to the people will take decades to fix if it turns out to be wrong. That's not democracy, that's putting the passengers in charge of flying the plane.

In democracy we choose people to make decisions, and if we don't like their decisions then we show them the door and get new people to hate. The EU referendum is the population making the decision, and evidently most of them hadn't a clue what they were doing.

May not having a clue is also a trait of the elected government, but that's another discussion altogether.

Re: "attracting European students and staff members to the UK was necessary"

"Bwahaahahahahahaa! Another whiney, bitter Remainderer, resentful that democracy gave The Wrong Answer, eh? And let's try and sum up all the Leave campaign as Little Britain rascists, because the EU has been such a huge success?"

Your written demeanour here tells all that is needed about your position.

The people of the UK generally don't dislike immigrants. There is a sub-layer of fucking idiots that have a problem with immigrants, but there is also a few more who, amongst other concerns about the EU, are concerned with unabated population growth and its effect on the nations ability to handle those numbers.

The problem is that we can't discuss population growth abstracted from the origins of the population, because there is another layer of virtue signallers who beat down any constructive addressing of this matter using their weapons and trump cards of emotive words and guilt.

Reasons for the vote to leave the EU are manifold, suggesting it was because the nation "dislikes immigrants so much" makes you just about as guilty as those you accuse.

Personally I voted remain, despite there being a lot that I dislike about the EU.

Yelp wins fight to remain morally bankrupt

Re: A plausible sequence...

Consumers become aware that Yelp hides bad reviews for money?

Consumers don't trust Yelp so consumers don't use Yelp so Yelp becomes extinct.

Trust is really very important. Even if it is misplaced.

Using a thing made by Microsoft, Apple or Adobe? It probably needs a patch today

Re: Whoah, Black Betty!

Does if you are old enough to remember Ram Jam.

UK oversight body tipped to examine phone snooping tech in prisons

Yes, the Zanco Bee also has voice disguising tech built it. It's like it was designed for the rectum/prison market.

VW Dieselgate engineer sings like a canary: Entire design team was in on it – not just a few bad apples, allegedly

Re: It seem to me

No Jemma, it's NOX that is causing the toxic atmosphere in the town centres.

Re: Disgusted

It's very obvious if I go out for an early morning run (4:30ish) before things have got moving. Overnight the quiet roads have become cleaner as the breeze has wafted away the miasma, and I can tell a diesel or petrol car passing by the stink of the diesel. Later when the roads are busy it all merges into one stench and I stop noticing it.

Modern petrol cars don't normally stink much, but if a classic petrol car passes then there is a mighty stench of emissions that takes me back to my childhood days when there were manual chokes, no catalytic converters and carburettors were usually badly set up.

Re: It seem to me

But Jemma, the point is the pollution produced where the vehicle operates. Fossil fuel power stations don't blow their concentrated emissions into the faces of children walking to school on the High Street. They don't blow their output into town centre streets with high buildings on the sides to contain the filth in a little micro-atmosphere.

Fixed power stations can use equipment, that would be too heavy to carry on a vehicle, to clean up emissions.

Fixed power stations are creating emissions to make electricity that is used to make car fuel, that produces emissions anyway.

So, cars running on electric power in congested urban areas are already cleaner for their immediate environment than conventional cars regardless of where and how their power is generated.

I thought that most of them had issued statements saying as much.

How long has it been? A year? That's plenty of time for alerted authorities to discover similar defeat device programming. But there's none.

Anyway, so they guy says there were a lot of people involved. I don't think there are any great surprises there.

Tesla to stop killing drivers: Software update beamed to leccy cars

Re: Radar is well proven, why has it been ignored by Tesla ?

Can we please persuade Audi to change the setting on "Adaptive Cruise Control" to something further than 1 metre at 80MPH?

Re: "start slowing a car down if they see something that they suspect may cause a collision"

Its just common sense. If you are driving down the road and see a couple six year olds playing catch by the side of the road, you slow down in case one of them throws the ball out into the street and the other runs after it without looking.

It's more than common sense, it's due care and attention. And if something happens and you are lacking due car and attention you can find yourself in hot water.

Re: Light bulb moment?

""By marketing their feature as 'Autopilot,' Tesla gives consumers thickos a false sense of security," said its VP of consumer policy and mobilization Laura MacCleery."

Fixed it to say what it should say but she couldn't say.

Re: @bazza "...what's the business plan?"

But they won't just use radar, they will use multi-sensor sources and process the combined data.

Re: I'm waiting for...

What happens when the vehicle finds a nice ice patch (difficult to see black ice!) and fumbles around trying to just keep in the lane. THAT would be a good test of autonomous vehicles.

They crash of course. Same as a human.

Re: Mansfield bars

I'm pretty sure that there are engineers in the USA that could solve the problem of the side protection bars on trucks grounding on rail crossings.

Peccant pwners post 670,000 Pokémon punter MD5 passwords

Devise a formula that creates a unique password from the context of the account that you are using.

Then you only have to keep this formula secret, and each time you come back to the account you haven't used for a month, the password can be deduced again using a formula.

For example (simplified):

<Name of service in caps> + <common secret word> + <15 - (number of letters in name of service) >

So:

REGISTERpassword7 would be the password for The Register.

The secret word (password) would be common to all accounts.

Obviously this example only for illustration, the formula would be a bit stronger.