Posts by Wensleydale Cheese 1381 publicly visible posts • joined 28 Jan 2011
"If something can't be fixed with a Swiss Army Knife, then it doesn't deserve to be referred to as a machine."
The last hardware engineer I shared an office with was never without his Swiss Army Knife and used it for everything from hardware to opening stubborn cellophane food wrappings.
Yes, he had a full toolkit as well, but that Swiss Army Knife was always to hand.
"But then people complained that not only was it two keypresses instead of one, but it also involved finding the shift key - adding "short hand" to programming languages has a long history."
On a recent personal project which involves the manual entry of lots of time stamps, I decided to drop the colon mainly because it requires shift. I simply use HHMM format rather than HH:MM.
It's my data and if I want to use it in other applications which expect a colon, it's a simple enough matter to let the computer do the work (via an extra workflow step, if necessary).
There, saved myself a lot of keyboard work, and a useful by product is less typos which need correcting.
"I had a discussion once about the concept of doubling the time between login attempts:
start with a 1 second re-try and double the time for every wrong login attempt. Has anybody ever implemented this?"
VMS introduced an intrusion detection system back in 1984 (VMS V4.0). It would automagically disable logins when the number of login failures exceeded a predefined limit within a short space of time, and there was a random element to that, to make life a bit more difficult for attackers.
It filtered on login source, so for example network logins from a particular workstation or a modem line could be disabled while logins from a local serial connection weren't. It was parameter driven so you could customise its behaviour
By default logins would be re-enabled after some random time, so you weren't locked out permanently, again configuration parameter driven.
Early versions of the documentation omitted or carefully hid the command to re-enable logins manually (e.g. after a user rang up to say they'd locked themselves out), which led to much frustration when the Messages User Guide had it that the remedy was "Contact your System Manager", and you were that person.
"I wrote an incorrect PIN on it in pencil, just to be evil."
I used to know a chap who worked in a bank and one of his duties was taking the phone calls where holidaymakers had had their cards swallowed by ATMs.
His comment was that when the cards made their way back to HQ, it was surprising how many had the PIN written on the card itself.
"Except that piece of paper is in their house, in their basement, in their office area, in a drawer near their iMac. Literally no one other then them or I will ever look in that drawer and see that piece of paper, and they never have to worry about forgetting a password. "
I once attended a Neighbourhood Watch event where a policemen gave tips on securing your home.
One thing he mentioned was that thieves would look in the right hand* drawer of desks because this is where people would put things like spare car keys, burglar alarm codes and so on.
I got home and investigated my own right hand drawer, and was surprised how much stuff like that I had there.
* presumably that would be left hand drawer for left handed folks
"it's the labelling of jars 'Kitchen Utensils' (with spatulas and whisks poking out the top) that I don't understand."
My kitchen utensils are in a jar intended to store spaghetti.
I leave my spaghetti in its wrapper in a cupboard, protected from the smoke from burnt toast, smoky grills, flies etc.
"1Password is OK."
"- you don't HAVE to store stuff in the cloud. if not, no syncing, but that's ok"
You can sync without the cloud but it's a bit fiddly.
In the Likes section I'll add that it has a record type of Software Licence. I've got all mine stashed in 1Password, nicely in one place.
"There used to be a Dexion shop in N London, long gone, of course. It's right what they say: the variety has gone out of the High Street these days"
Twenty years ago I moved to a small town in which all the non-food shops were devoted to ladies clothes. Seemingly nothing at all for the blokes, at least not at the weekend.
Then I discovered a small corner of a department store devoted to car accessories (not needed once my banger days were over) and more exotic things like Dremel drills. Ah Bliss.
Unfortunately that place was eventually taken over by a large chain and the blokes' options diminished significantly.
"Early in my IT support career I learned that a way past O/S security constraints was to treat the media as data to a different O/S."
I recall a certain Word document which had some "interesting" history, but hidden from view for Word users.
I forget what protection was in place, but dropping it onto a non-Windows O/S and dumping the raw contents of the file revealed all, in clear text.
It's also a good technique for discovering files which Windows hides.
"Yes, during the trip I was able to use the same "pick" to open a room door and the door to the bus. Fun times, that was."
I had a friend at college who always carried a screwdriver and would unscrew tables, chairs, anything held together by screws.
I kept very quiet about my lock picking abilities when he was around in case he picked up on that idea. There was nothing worse than having to unpick a bike lock when you were cutting it fine getting to a lecture on time.
"I've been through this once. You do a pile of paperwork and don't end up with a lot to show for it at the end. "
I was very happy to get my payout, because nobody was forthcoming with the information that it was possible until my accountant pointed it out.
As such, it was a pleasant bonus at a time I expected to receive nothing,
"People stopped dual-booting 20 years ago."
Not true. More like 7 years ago for my home rig, the problem being the cost and RAM limitations of consumer grade gear.
For example bumping my 2010 PC from the supplied 2GB RAM to 4GB cost USD 50, but 8GB was going to cost USD 200. Yes, I did manage to run a few VMs within 4GB but it was a tight fit for the stuff I was trying to do.
Roll on to 2014 and things got a lot better. I was able to stuff 16GB into 3 systems which only officially supported 8GB and affordably too.
"I don't know about the R.O.W. but in the UK if you own a vehicle with fully comprehensive insurance you usually get what's called a third party extension"
In various bits of Europe (Holland, Germany, Switzerland to my knowledge, maybe more), the legal minimum for insurance includes any driver.
"The speed limiter was badly designed, as it caused a backfire and thus damaged the Mass Airflow Sensor. "
I had similar with a car which had an LPG conversion. When using LPG, the rev limiter could trigger a backfire, damaging a seal somewhere, resulting in a distinct performance drop until the next time I visited a garage to get it fixed.
The rev limiter was way too easy to trigger in first gear, so I ended up running it on petrol in town traffic, and using the much cheaper LPG only on motorways.
"I'm a career consultant. I want neither the false sense of job security nor the complacency a so-called permanent job produces. I've no patience for office politics and find performance reviews condescending."
Similar feelings here. My father really hated me getting a contracting job in the late 90s but that one turned out to give me the dual accomplishment of:
a) longest time in any one job, so-called permanent jobs included
b) longest time ever occupying the same desk in the same office
and all without the office politics or "performance reviews"...
"When we wanted to accept credit cards for our online business the processors said they wanted 8% and NO online sales, only sales in person."
I bought a load of bed linen in the late 70s from a market trader. He really didn't want to touch a credit card because of the charges so it was off to the bank for cash and we split the difference.
"You're only allowed to be truly clever after you're dead: think Alan Turing, Louis Le Prince, Hedy Lamarr. How Einstein slipped through the net is anyone's guess."
He lived in a different age when scientists were respected. Mind you, in their day, the privileged classes probably also thought that the relative who spent all his time in a homemade lab or exploring jungles was probably bonkers.
The wild hair probably helped.
"I have for years ignored all kinds of adverts especially for things like cars, which I've never owned."
In contrast, I enjoy a good car advert, if only for the artwork involved.
Many of these are for stuff that's out of my price range or for vehicles I wouln't consider buying from a practical view, but I still enjoy them.
In the old days of paper magazines, that was definitely a factor in buying the magazine itself.
"Full fibre services are where the profits will be made."
I'll just leave this here:
eff.org: The Biggest Cost For An ISP is the Initial Deployment, Not Internet Usage
"they'd "only" have to replace or upgrade EVERY SINGLE TELEPHONE LINE in the country. "
Time to study the obstacles British Gas faced with the conversion to Natural Gas, and see how that translates to the telephone system.
Granted, BG didn't have to replace the pipes to each dwelling or commercial premises, but plenty will have been condemned during the process, and therefore replaced.
Late 1974, the oil crisis and inflation had sent the Bursar into skimping on the heating mode, and our bedrooms were pretty cold by the early hours of the morning.
Some rats would regularly come back late from drinking session somewhere and decide to have a water fight with a firehose. Activating a firehose naturally set off the fire alarms, which woke everyone up, and they didn't get turned off until a very grumpy caretaker dragged himself out of bed.
It was bloody agony trying to get back to sleep when you were frozen stiff and had a bad case of the flu.
The only saving grace was that the firehose-happy bunch were in another block
so we didn' t have to evacuate the place.
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