Posts by ilithium

Need a Linux admin? Ask a hair stylist to introduce you to a worried mother

Ah, I miss those days...

Back in the 2000s I was "Technical Director" of a small digital agency in London and our "Chief Exec" was too cheap to pay decent salaries so when we hired people, they were on barely above minimum wage because "people with experience are more expensive". So we hired young kids and I had the task of training them up, on the job, to be able to do the DevOps stuff we did.

Twenty years later, I still occasionally look them up and feel proud of "my kids", what they've become and that I had a part to play in their journeys.

Oh Brother. Printer giant denies dirty toner tricks as users cry foul

Completely agree - particularly now that I've been seeing a fairly large number of cheap colour laser printers on places like Facebonk Marketfarce.

The one thing my HP Colour LaserJet doesn't do, though, is print to photo paper.

If there was a way to print like that with a laser printer, I think the (consumer) inkjet printer market would struggle.

Japanese boffins slice semiconductors from diamonds – with lasers!

Re: Are they forever?

That may be true, but they ARE a girl's best friend!

Re: Wot no sharks!?

I was just thinking this...

Virgin Media O2 offers plug-in 5G network in a box

I wonder what it actually looks like - i.e. is it branded with VM02 in a hideous way?

Open Sesame, says Google... to voice identification: Speech ID adds biometric security to call-centre bots

Flashback to the 90s

"Hi, my name is Werner Brandis. My voice is my passport. Verify me." :)

Housekeeping and kernel upgrades do not always make for happy bedfellows

Re: don't understand

I see your point but this _is_ El Reg, after all. And even if it's technically wrong, it's still amusing.

Re: Bloody Experts

Just do cat /dev/null and stare into the void...

Re: Bloody Experts

Totes amuse. There's always one...

Re: Just over a billion years ago ...

What a great story - thanks! :)

What does a Cyberman say?

I remember doing that too, back in't day. Spent all day building a FreeBSD server for our colo.

Set it all up, got it working, really tired. Did "sudo rm -rf .*".

Was amazed to find everything [that was in memory] still running.

Or that Friday at 4pm after a really long week... closing down my workstation, in MySQL Workbench (remember that?). Accidentally click "DELETE DATABASE". Too tired and not paying attention, I clicked YES on "ARE YOU SURE?" and "ARE YOU REALLY SURE?".

Got half way to the door before the boss pipes up: "Where's that relaunch for the big client I just won gone?"

Oops. MySQL binary log to the rescue. And adrenaline.

What could Facebook possibly do next to reassure privacy fears? Yup – make a dating app

Besides the privacy, not a bad idea

So whilst Facebook has lots of issues around privacy (and, frankly it's whole business model as a free content ad network) I actually think Facebook Dating could be quite interesting.

Given they have more data on their users than most other places, their systems will "know" you, your behaviours and interests better than, say Match.com or OKstupid (although the latter's tech is quite impressive).

In particular, they gather data about you which you don't specifically supply so what you might think of as "subconscious" data from your browsing habits.

Whilst trust is a massive issue here, for me the really interesting thing is: how is their algorithmic approach going to work? Could they do this with AI?

Having tried most forms of digital dating, I find the real world much more interesting but I will be fascinated to see how this pans out.

Linus Torvalds won't apply 'sh*t-for-brains stupid patch'

Watch his TED talk

If you haven't, watch his TED talk. It's a very open interview in which he explains, clearly, why he is the way he is and I applaud him for doing it.

Latest Windows 10 build loves up cloud, banishes 'strange grey bar'

Loving SatNad

Even since SatNad took over, I've seen Microsoft change massively - and all for the better. I grew up in an age where I loathed the way Microsoft siloed everything and they're now on a pathway to full interoperability with common systems.

This, together with their openness, is incredibly admirable.

Leak: Euro Patent Office 'court of appeals' rails against King Battistelli

How does one spell...

Narcissus? ;-)

Pretty scary stuff this. The EPO agents should have complete autonomy, otherwise the President basically becomes a version of Robert Mugabe (without all the evil things Mugabe has done).

If I had a vote, I'd vote El Presidente out immediately and call for form. Oh, but wait: the EU isn't a democracy ;-)

10 Gbps fibre-to-the-home signed off, ITU eyes 100 Gbps future

Yeah, right

Like we'll ever get this in the UK

WIN a 6TB Western Digital Black hard drive with El Reg

Now available as a unisex stimulus device: digital pants!

Foxconn to build 1,500-acre, US$5billion complex in India

I wonder what the employment laws in India are like, compared to China's - and whether we'll see a repeat of some of the awful treatment of staff that we've seen by Foxconn (and others)

Obsolescence of food is complete: Soylent now comes in bottles

Version 3.0

I'm waiting for v3.0, when it WILL be made of people

Assange™'s emotional plea for asylum in France rejected

Re: There's no cure...

Shame!

Shame!

Shame!

What's Meg Whitman fussing over: The fate of HP ... or the font on a DISRUPTIVE new logo?

Seen this before...

It's a bit "Microsofty" isn't it? Circa...ooh circa 1987...

Apple's DIRTY SECRET isn't that secret, or that dirty

For me, I completely see the point this author is making regarding the illegal tin mining; the issues of poverty in the region are bad and desperate people do desperate thing.

What I don't like are two things: a) Apple making promises it can't keep and b) Declining to discuss their failings. Tim Cook doesn't need to get involved, just a media rep to say "OK, things're bad, we're working on it" (which they've subsequently said).

I am also, a little narked about the profits they make on things but I'm no place to judge: that's what market economics are all about, right?

What's in your toolbox? Why the browser wars are so last decade

Browser emulator

You forgot Chrome's browser emulator, which allows you to switch between desktop and mobile views pretty easily.

HIDDEN packet sniffer spy tech in MILLIONS of iPhones, iPads – expert

Re: No comment about the article as such...

How about a nice game of chess? ;)

Re: APIs

To be fair, though, if Android contained something like this we'd already know about it, assuming that the version that's put in phones is [almost] the same as the open source version.

Whilst most people are probably not going to give a monkey's nut about these kind of things, it's a bit disconcerting, particularly in light of Apple ranting about how good a company they are.

Google's Pankhurst doodle doo-doo shows the perils of using Google to find stuff out

Can I have my 2k back please?

Seriously? Is this REALLY newsworthy?

Microsoft Surface 3 Pro: Flip me over, fondle me up

Still way too expensive

I've always admired the Surface hardware - I got a free RT whilst at Microsoft (and gave it back).

The hardware's really good - but how can this be a competitor to laptops when the price point is so high?

Brit student locked up for Facebook source code hack

Question is - will Facebook try to extradite him to the U.S?