Posts by picturethis

Microsoft 365 invites users to 'Ask Me Anything' – as long as it doesn't require a clued-up exec to deliver clear answers

Well, to be fair...

The event was "ask me anything", they didn't commit to being able to provide answers.... That event would have been called maa (ms answer anything)..

That awful moment when what you thought was a number 1 turned out to be a number 2

The $5000 serial port cable

My best support story:

Back in the late '90s the (East Coast) consulting company I was working for had been engaged by a (West Coast) ASIC manufacturer for creating a dev kit for their product. This involved several sequences of them sending us new hardware, we developed the SDK for it and shipped the software back to them to test/integrate with their solution.

After a couple of cycles, I get a desperate call from the mid-level manager (we call him "Grendle") and Grendle was completely distraught that their developer couldn't debug the latest release we had sent. I asked repeatedly that I be able to talk with the Dev and Grendle let loose with a stream of expletives and denied my request. He demanded that I immediately fly out there in person and fix the problem. After getting a written request from him and confirmation from my manager, I booked the next flight out the following day.

I arrived around 10AM (local), took a cab and arrived. I couldn't find Grendle when I arrived, so I just went and talked with the Developer. He showed me what was happening, I looked down at the hardware, plugged in the 2nd serial port cable (which was laying right next to the kit) and said please try again - and it worked, just as it always had in the past (yes the 2nd cable had always been required and in use). I asked the Dev if there were any other problems, he said no. About that time, Grendle showed up.... I explained what the problem was. He got very quiet and red-faced as I walked over to his Manager's office, explained to him why I was here and that I was now leaving. I caught the next flight home - running through the terminal and JUST as the flight attendant was closing the terminal door to the walkway...

A couple of month's later, Grendle was no longer working for the company.. Twit..

Physicists are rather giddy after creating a rare type of laser using laughing gas

Tuned length laser, hmmmm

By tuning the terahertz frequency, you can choose how far the waves can travel through air before they are absorbed, from meters to kilometers

Hmmm, Now when can I order my light saber?

NASA's first all-woman spacewalk outside ISS cancelled – due to lack of spacesuits that fit

In Case of Emergency?

One a serious note, I thought there were enough space suits (that fit?) for every member on board at any given time.

If there was an emergency (air leak via meteor strike), wouldn't SOP dictate that everyone suits up? What - the women would draw straws?

This seems like more than just a casual oversight.. In fact I would suspect that NASA is likely just putting on a good face while much more serious discussions are taking place privately.

Break out the jelly and ice cream! Microsoft's Small Basic turns 10

"Good luck today competing against the far more portable and useful scripting and programming languages such as python and JavaScript."

This^^. Why would anyone want to start someone young with outdated concepts such as BASIC? I have to think that the entire "team" for small basic is like.... 1 person. Porting to a new .NET framework counts as an entire release? Wow.

Grow into VB? Really? Get a clue MS -> you should be concentrating on hiring more people to test/QA Windows 10, instead of putting out half-baked crud like small basic. MS is so messed up right now, I really have to wonder what Windows will be like 5 years from now...

Look at me! Phone industry contracts nasty case of 5g-itis

What does 5G and 8K TV have in common?

They're both solutions in search of a problem to solve.

I have a difficult time believing that carriers are going to sell this to John Q. Public when faster data will just more clearly demonstrate the "unlimited" data plan and data caps cost to the end-user.

The carriers need this because they dread the prospect of having to compete with each other on BW cost pricing, but hopefully that's exactly what will occur - until industry consolidation occurs at which point there will be one carrier left which will result in a monopoly and no competition to control prices.

I have a difficult time believing that mobile users require this high speed - for what? For updating facecrook pages, twitt messages, sending pics/video?

I just don't see a killer app that needs this?

Perhaps someone can clue me in?

Raspberry Pi supremo Eben Upton talks to The Reg about Pi PoE woes

Okay, I'll say it..

PoE for Pi is Poo-poo

No, eight characters, some capital letters and numbers is not a good password policy

"30 day password policy"

I don't know why this continues to be considered good practice in the industry. Because it's NOT. All's this does is encourage writing down the password on a post-it and then putting it on the bottom of one's keyboard.

Forcing someone to remember a new password every 30 days is ridiculous - In this age of smart phones, most (99%) people can't even remember a new phone number every 30 days.

And why 30 days? Why not every day, why not every year, why not every 5 years? Where's the proof that this does anything to improve overall security?

This policy actually results in less actual security - find a better way, this one has got to go.

To the original poster: (AC indeed is appropriate).

Keep yer plastic, says analyst: eSIMs aren't all they're cracked up to be

One of the rules of capitalism..

Any time a commercial entity (in this case Apple) proposes a change to a current, working system (such as sim cards) it's usually to the monetary benefit (less cost to manufacture & end-user lock-in to vendor) of the entity. One could say the same thing regarding the elimination of the headphone jack or the lightning connector, the list goes on...

Any possible perceived benefit (real or unreal) to the end-user is purely coincidental and seconday to the previous statement - and is used to lauch a publicity war on the users to get them to accept the change without them understanding the true impact and reason it is being made. - Basically most companies don't give a shit about their customers, they only care about extracting maximum profit from the user's personal worth.

You see, it really is just about profit for most companies nowadays - it's not about being the best at something, or providing the best value, it's just about profit anyway they can get it - it doesn't matter how, when, why, who or what.

Do you really think that any cost savings that Apple gets will be passed on to the consumer? I don't think so. More than likely, Apple will turn this into a profit center - after all, specialized software, infrastructure will be needed along with a surcharge - all under the guise of "security".

(non-E) sim cards work just fine, in fact they work too well for Apple's liking..

(As a side note, I keep reading about how millenials can't afford to purchase a home.. I wonder if not spending the $2500-3000 / year that each one spends on having a phone, premium cable, netflix, hulu, CBS, disney subscriptions and the $400/month lease on that brand new car, would help towards a mortgage - you can't have everything - grow up and choose what you really need - and not just something you "want") - For those that are being financially responsible, I apologize.

Flame away, I stand by my convictions..

.NET Core 2.1 – huh, yeah – what is it good for? Bing, apparently

FTFY:

----

Top bing searches:

1. "google" "chrome download"

2. "firefox" "firefox offline installer"

3. "midget porn"

4. "how do i clear history"

----

In the "old" days I used to call IE the "firefox download/installer", it looks like Bing has assumed that role. I run it once only if I don't have a thumb-drive handy with firefox offline installer on it. It's okay if it's out of date, I will update after the install.

I have to admit that lately I have to "hold my nose" with firefox's latest crap because it stinks so much. If there's a palemoon available for the OS I'm on, I will use that instead.

Chrome is not my first choice for a browser due to the auto-updates and because of google data privacy gobbling attitude - I also don't use google for searching (at least not directly). Either duckduckgo or startpage. Duckduckgo actually honors your search term requests, unlike google that ignores them when they have a paid avertiser key word match and then magically all of their products override search terms and show up in the first 5 pages of results..

Using google has become VERY irritating not to mention, very time-consuming having to read and then ignore their "search-vertisements" (you heard the term coined here first :) in the first 10 pages of returned results. Hey google, do you think nobody notices this crap? And I've never liked the fact the returned result link goes back through a google server first before going to the site and they hide this fact by not showing the true URL in the link. "do no evil" - I call BS.

Ever seen printer malware in action? Install this HP Ink patch – or you may find out

internet of tubes?

Is this where they use the "internet of tubes" to delver the actual ink over the internet (which would actually be truly useful) - or is it just another subscription service that replaces the lower cost (to the consumer) of just purchasing the stuff?

inkjet ink has to be one of the worst/best inventions ever.

I am so glad that I use pdfs and tablets now. No paper & no printing costs.. And did I forget to mention that storage, organization and searching of electronic documents is a lot easier than physical media?

Spectre rises from the dead to bite Intel in the return stack buffer

Is it safe?

Is is safe (to connect to the internet)?

Apparently, not yet...

How some might feel when reading about all of these problems:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kzw1_2b-I7A

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marathon_Man_%28film%29

Forking hell. It's summer, and Windows 10 is already thinking about autumn

Re: 17713 is relatively light on features

"I use all versions of Windows from Vista onward every day - and my conclusion is that, from a point of view of getting things done from hour to hour, there's very little difference. Each one has its quirks and they move the various system function controls around but basically, as an end-user, they are all the same."

I think this is kind-of the problem (from Microsoft's point of view, anyways)...

MS needs/wants a continous income stream from Windows and they are trying to get it by:

- Subscription-based Office 365

- Microsoft Store (buying apps, games)

- Inside-OS advertising

In order to enforce this, Window's 10 OS is being used as the jailer (keeps everyone in a narrow user-profile). By enforcing updates, Microsoft can change their marketing and Windows 10 users have no choice but to accept "updates", upgrades all under the guise of better security.

But the problem for MS is the age-old problem of being able to lead a horse to water, but not able to force it to drink (the cool-aid)..

How many "features" has MS put into 10 - Groove, photos, etc? and how many people use them? Hell, I don't even know what 90% of them do and I have no desire to even find out. I just need the OS to run the (mostly non-MS sponsored) apps to get my work done or play games.

And that's really all an OS should do - and that is my primary objection with Windows 10 - that of it being used as a hammer to beat its users over the head with and to spy on them.

I may have to use Win10 at my current job, but the Windows 10 OS is not on any of my 6 machines at home (not even in a dual-boot configuration and includes dozens of VMs). Right now it's 50/50: 3 linux boxes, 2 Win 7 and 1 win 8.1. The win 7 machines are laptops with special HW devices w/ no linux support.

I currently have no plans to ever have a Windows 10 machine within my home network.

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Is it a giant alien space cigar? Whatever it is, boffins are baffled

Re: Rama

"But is it 1, 2 or 3?"

Obviously it's "1". Just look at its shape.

Microsoft says Windows 10 April update is fit for business rollout

Re: Because

"because the download is at least four gigabytes"

It kind of makes you wonder.. 4 gigabyte update...

So, updates typically are not introducing new features, updates remove older functionality and older drivers - why so big?

I guess collecting more telemetry and fixing security bugs would be the majority of 4GB of updates. That's a lot of fixin'... Either way it's not a good thing.

One wonders where this is will be in a couple of years. What's good enough for MS, for an OS? MS still says Windows version 10 is the last OS. How much is our personal data worth to MS & their customers? Is MS's collection of data about everyone worth more than Google's or Apple's or.. Amazon's or.. Netflix's. Me thinks at some point there will be a saturation and at point, these companies will start charging hard currency for access to their systems.

Want to create a Word doc? - 15p per doc or .01p per each word in the doc. Spreadsheet? - 0.1p charge for every cell used. Database? - 0.1p per row of data. 1p for each field. Talk via Teams? 1p per conversation...

Every aspect of every person's life will be owned and we'll have to pay to do anything/everything.

They're already controlling (via fines) water consumption in Ca. If someone can figure out how to control the air we breath, they will.

Just because you don't agree with the conclusion, doesn't mean it can't happen.

Don’t talk to the ATM, young man, it’s just a machine and there’s nobody inside

Reminds me of JAFO

From the movie Blue Thunder (Roy Scheider) - at least that's where I initially heard it.

JAFO = Just Another F'in Observer

In other words not able to contribute anything and pretty much useless...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Thunder#Cultural_references

GNOMEs beat Microsoft: Git Virtual File System to get a new name

Re: EEEVFS

Damn,,, you beat me to it. Have an upvote.

No lie-in this morning? Thank the Moon's gravitational pull

Sounds like a fairly volatile place to be at the time..

Land -vs- Sea

I am imagining 1000 ft. tides every 18 hours washing inland and colliding with volcanoes / lava and the resulting vapors getting put into the atmosphere each time.

Also with that kind of tidal action, there must have a significant portion of sea beds that got exposed to atmosphere at the same time.

Wow, this would be something to witness (not personally of course).

I wonder if some boffin somewhere has put together a video simulation of what the earth would actually look like - it might be kind of cool to watch.

BTW - why are the Earth's oceans salty? - Where the heck did all of the salt come from?

Software development slow because 'Most of our ideas suck'

Re: Precious

"I prefer the one in the title: 'Most of our ideas suck'"

I think that most would agree (that most ideas suck), the very big problem is:

Who determines that the idea sucked and should die a violent death? Because it's certainly not the customers, at least in the SystemD case (or Gnome3, Unity, TIFKAM...the list goes on). As far as I can determine, it's usually someone that has a vested (i.e. financial) interest that determines whether an idea remains or not.

I'm very glad that we (as a consumer and computer professionals) still have at least some level of choice, but that is rapidly disappearing - sadly, that choice may be completely gone within a couple of years.

Systemd-free Devuan Linux looses version 2.0 release candidate

Re: I don't understand...

"Oh and I recently dumped Gparted - guess what, it now requires SystemD"

Say it isn't so!

This is bad. I liked Gparted, but I guess it's time to move on. SystemD is just a cancer that needs to be cut out.

Thanks for the heads up.

Qualcomm, Microsoft drag apps for Win-10-on-Arm into 64-bit world

Re: At last...

"Apple recieved a lot of slagging off for wanting to remove 32bit support from MacOS (even though it has been on the cards for years). Will MS get the same angst and even hatred from the user community?"

I'm not completely sure, but wouldn't removing 32bit support from Windows completely kill VB6 apps? If so, then yes a lot of (legacy) apps would immediately be orphaned - and some of those apps are so old, the code/developers for them may not be available to port.

If you still do work on a PC, you might be surprised at how many apps are VB6-based. I was very surprised when Windows 10 was in preview that VB6 apps were still supported.

Also, it's interesting if you look at Task Manager on a running Win 10 x64 system, how many of the core OS services are still 32-bit - I wonder why? It seems a little strange - probably due to having to support 3rd party 32-bit apps?

Heating up some popcorn to watch this one unfold over the next (5-10?) years.

MacBook Pro petition begs Apple for total recall of krap keyboards

Press release soon..

"It has recently come to our attention that a certain number of users have been using their MacBook Pros in a manner that is not consistent with Apple's profit design parameters. This incorrect usage is causing a complete and total failure due to a design/manufacturing defect an anomaly with their keyboard. To reiterate, MacBook Pros are designed to be only used in environments that have fewer than 83 particles/cubic meter (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleanroom). Using them in anything less clean is not covered under warranty"

Firefox to feature sponsored content as of next week

One word..

Palemoon?

I've been running it on Mint 17.2 for several months now, seems to do the job and installs the plugins that I'm interested in.

McDonald's tells Atos to burger off: Da da da da da, we're lobbing IT ...

Right....

"https://www.mcdonalds.com/gb/en-gb/good-to-know/about-our-food/beef.html"

I read that link.

I challange anyone, anywhere at any McDonalds in the world to purchase a burger, open it and find that it looks anything like those shown in the pictures in that link.

Pictures, or it didn't happen.

Not that any other fast-food joint is any different, but I get sick of the crap that companies are allowed to get away with.

I call MS - (Marketing Speak) which means the same as BS in a more common speak.

Torvalds schedules Linux kernel 5.0, then maybe delays 'meaningless' release

Re: RE: Get the requirements right the first time..

>>"Do you have a current full time career in software development or are you retired or more of a hobbyist perhaps? "

25 year career. 12 as a consultant, 13 as an employee. Hopefully with another 10+ to go.

For me, the difference is as a consultant, someone wants to change something, they pay for my time either way. As an employee, I have some say in the matter as to inputs into requirements and also make it clear how any changes will affect delivery times.

Re: requirements - I version them frequently, eventually they do get tracked back to a version that's released.

I don't really do too much with direct IT type of activities anymore.

I wonder how many organizations that use an agile style of development use contract employees - it's expensive to do so. Agile seems to work for smaller projects and colocation is almost a given, I've never seen it scale well to larger projects and also not on projects where certifications are required. I once worked on a project that involved a combined 600 SW & HW engineers across the globe. To do so without formal requirements would not have worked.

IMO agile appeals to younger coders because it gets them coding almost immediately and away from having to work on (the boring) requirements docs and it appeals to management because they don't have to worry about them as much either. So the end result is code early and recode/refactor often. I kind of get tired of recoding and throwing away code on a monthly basis.

I can point to products that have been out in the field for 20 years that I contributed code to, I get a very large sense of personal satisfaction from that, not something that's going to disappear from the web in a couple of months - but that's just me, some people just want a paycheck..Not that there's anything wrong with that at all - we all need to eat..

Re: why use version numbers at all?

>>"Version numbers are an artefact of the pre-internet era way of doing software development."

Spoken by someone that has done a very narrow range of software development or none at all..

>>"With today's continuous release and cloud platforms (github, etc) they should just dump out the version numbers completely and go for YYYYMMDD-style date stamps."

Out of all the possible reasons for versioning software this has to be the absolute least useful information and format.

Software versioning is used by other software developers, not the end-user (except possibly to identify & report bugs/problem with a specific version).

Software versioning is important if one is maintaining other software packages that may have to be backwards/forwards compatible and may take a long time to release and get certified for use.

The concept that every piece of software is constantly undergoing change and release with every other piece of software is just plain idiotic, not to mention wasteful of developer's time.

Relating the mechanism (continuous releases) to why version numbers are important is meaningless.

You can call me old-fashioned, but I'm not the one rewriting the same code every other week because someone decided to change the story-board. I have better things to do with my time. Get the requirements right the first time..

>>"e.g. "release 20180416-S" has a lot more information included in the version than "release 4.15.whatever-rc3" - it indicates right there in the name WHEN it was the last release and whether it was a Stable or Release Candidate."

Who the fuck cares when a software package was released? Again useless information. Your statement indicates, that you really haven't a clue as to why / how version numbers came into existence.

Obviously, you have never written software for an embedded system where everthing is not always upgradeable in the field, nor should it be.

Not all software developed is the weeny-wanky web-based crap apps used on phones who's only real purpose is to mine your personal data for free.

For those who didn't quit reading (;tldr). Thank you.

Why a merged Apple OS is one mash-up too far

GUI != App

I'll start out by saying: I know nothing about writing/designing software for the Apple ecosystem. So I have no credibility there. Mostly because I don't like the wall-garden (authoritarian) ecosystems.

But I will say that almost any software design that employs loosely coupled systems that provide a separation of concerns (i.e. GUI != App) that are event driven (i.e. communication between GUI & business logic) has lower overall effort and cost during its product lifecycle. Not to mention usually lower number of total defects.

That's not say that it's easier to design, because it's not, but in the long-run it's much easier to maintain and move to newer technologies (NT, anyone?). Hurd notwithstanding, most consumer (i.e. not real-time) apps would benefit from this approach, IM(25+ years of experience)O.

Running on a common core set of software services (OS) on a common core set of hardware (ARM) is a good goal, as long as the GUI-side (another common set of services) of things is left independent so it can provide the best End-user experiences for the specific platform being targeted.

Developers dread Visual Basic 6, IBM Db2, SharePoint - survey

Re: And yet...

"There will come a time when Windows will no longer be able to fully support VB6, probably in 3 or 4 versions down the line, that'll be interesting to watch."

But, but, but.... Microsoft has already stated that Windows 10 is the last version... ever (until it's not ;) )

So what you're really saying is VB6 will be supported forever. Long live VB6!!! (not).

'Repeatable sanitization' is a feature of PCs now

Well, that's because you didn't order the "wipe counter display" entitlement option. Each time the PC is put into "wipe down mode" it increments a counter. When the counter hits 10,000, the PC must be returned to an HP authorized dealer for a reset before it will be allowed to enter the mode again.

OK, who is shooting at Apple staff buses in California? Knock it off

Re: Gun fire triangulation by sound

I wonder if the offender has a cell phone on him/her.

If so, it might be easier to collect the IEN numbers of all cell phones within the vicinity of the buses for a couple of weeks. As incidents occur, just run an analysis and see if there are any IEN numbers that are around each bus (but not on the bus) near the time of each incident - license plate readers would also help (and be effective even if the individual doesn't have a cell phone). Big Data is your "friend". Since pellet guns have a very limited range and lose power very rapidly over distance the person is probably close (my guess would almost have to be in a moving car).

My only concern with this is that I would <hope> that LE has to get a warrant that would only allow this data to be collected for a specific period of time (or until the perpetrator is caught).

Flappy Friday for Stack Overflow as outage woes run on

"Somebody edited their bootconfig in windows notepad, and truncated the file?"

No... they're running a distro with systemd and ~ATDT*&$%QW(&2-390 <carrier lost>

Teensy plastic shields are the big new thing in 2018's laptop crop

Re: Webcam Shield?

How about a small circular piece of black electrician's tape that can be removed when needed?

'Been doing that for 10+ years on my mom's, niece's and my laptops....

Plastic little shutters? - They're probably designed so cheaply that they'll break after 3 activations.

VMware sticks finger in Meltdown/Spectre dike for virtual appliances

vSphere 5.5 unaffected?

Hmmm,

Interesting.

I live to fight another day..

FYI: That Hawaii missile alert was no UI blunder. Someone really thought the islands were toast

I blame it on the EULA

Corporation have so bombarded users with EULA's that I would wager that 99.9% of all people that have used a PC-based computer running a Windows OS have been conditioned to just click any and all "OK" messages whenever they see one without ever reading the details.

That's probably what happened here. You can't really blame the guy..

(I resisted using the much-too-obvious nuke icon)

Boffins discover tightest black hole binary system – and it's supermassive

Re: If two supermassive black holes collide in a galaxy

"Does it make any noise*?"

Only if someone is there to detect it.

Firmware update blunder bricks hundreds of home 'smart' locks

Re: Why an update?

Companies are damned if they don't update their devices, now ones that do are being criticized?

Yes, they messed up during an update, but at least they were updating

Yes, I would never trust an IOT access to my residence, but they seem to be doing the correct thing towards fixing the problem

Who knows what they were fixing with the update - TLS v1.2 support, or as others have said - maybe issues with buffer overflows, etc.

This sort of stuff is just really the beginning (of the tip of the iceberg) in terms of breaches that will occur due to IOT security.

I, myself (which I am usually quick to criticize) am not ready to jump on them quite yet except for the fact that yes the entire issue was caused by updating the wrong device - that does indicate some sort of inexperience where there should have been none.

70% of Windows 10 users are totally happy with our big telemetry slurp, beams Microsoft

Re: No need to change the default settings! Erase all of WIN 10

"This likely makes little difference to them since you still paid for a Windows licence."

I'm not sure that I agree with this where Windows 10 is concerned.. MS has made no secret that they want to move to the OS as a service and along with that Office. The service model requires renewable subscriptions to supply revenue to MS.

If the user removes windows 10 and replaces it with something else, then MS loses the projected revenue from the services over the life of the product. This cost will be significantly more over the life of the product than it was with previous versions of windows products, where the initial purchase price was all the MS received. - MS is moving from product space to services company.

So in the long run, I think it does matter to MS and people should remove Windows 10, if one has to get it in the first place. The cost savings over the long run will be significant - not to mention less privacy issues with alternatives.

Microsoft hits new low: Threatens to axe classic Paint from Windows 10

Re: The end

I just recently started to use Paint.NET (4.0.16 IIRC) and a couple of words of caution:

If using on a Win7 32-bit machine ( 4GB w/ with no other apps running),

- Open 60MB file,

- Copy selection,

- Paste selection into new file.

- Close 60 MB file,

- Attempt to open different 60 MB file ---> Out of memory (WTF)

- Restart Paint.NET

Silly me, and here I thought .NET apps didn't have to worry about managing memory..

This app has been under development for several years (maybe close to a decade) and I can't be the first one to run this use case scenario..

I guess forcing everyone to move to 64-bit windows is an easy way to hide memory problems.

Microsoft drops Office 365 for biz. Now it's just Microsoft 365. Word

Re: Leap years

You'll need to purchase the Office 365.25 plan. This plan will only be announced / available after March 1st, 2020.

(A Fail icon for a failure on so many fronts...)

Robots will enable a sustainable grey economy

Re: Dumb yanks

Public transport does not work for all places in the US. Even if it did, there are still issues with the elderly (I'm getting there myself) with 1) actually getting to the bus/train stop 2) Some of us live miles/kilometers from the nearest stop.

This is what I'm coining as the "last step" (or last wheel-chair?) problem (as opposed to the last mile problem).

The timing may actually be pretty good for me. I figure I will want (or need) something like this in about 10-15 years - by then they <should> have all of the issues worked out.. I hope..

There's also the issue of one's independence which Yanks have shown to value from time-to-time.

Smart burglars will ride the surf of inter-connected hackability

Re: instead, they upload malicious code from a USB stick

"That's why I programmed the address of an house nearby..."

Yes, and they program your home address into their GPS...

(I also do this, but recognize that it's not the clever solution that I thought it was when I first thought it up years ago)

We're not saying we're living in a simulation but someone's simulated the universe in a computer

I just feel sorry for...

all of the people in that simulation. What will they do when they realize that they're in a simulation?

What happens when they break through their virtual container and get to the core OS hypervisor only to find out that it's hypervisor is running one just one of the cores of it's mainframe only to find out that the Source.. oh never mind.. Does it really matter?

Honestly, what would you do differently if you knew the truth - gloat? Who would believe you?

(Simulated) life is too short, go outside and enjoy the simulation :)

Virtual reality headsets even less popular than wearable devices

Re: MS back in the game

Other than Surface 123/Pro, what's the last major hardware product that MS has delivered (either via purchasing or in-house developed) that has stayed around for more than a couple of years?

Their track record is so poor that I don't trust them at all to support anything they make. Period.

The nuclear launch button won't be pressed by a finger but by a bot

Re: I dont trust computers

"Yes, I don't trust computers."

I trust computers (except possibly ones running with the Pentium floating-point bug), it's the humans (for now) that write the software that I don't trust to write code that meets the intent.

Computers do what they've been programmed to do (for the most part), not what the programmer intended them to do.

This will change in the future as the adoption rate of AI increases.

re: the future of AI - what concerns me the most is that researchers claim that the goal of AI is to mimic a human brain - Why anyone would want to mimic something that is not reasonable, completely unpredicatable, selfish and has 100,000 years of self-preservation at-all-costs survival instinct evolved into it is beyond me. Seems to be a catastophe in the making.

It's 2017 and Windows PCs are being owned by EPS files, webpages

Re: Modern software philosophy

Obligatory Dilbert:

http://dilbert.com/strip/1995-11-13

systemd-free Devuan Linux hits version 1.0.0

Re: It's not infighting

"https://github.com/systemd/systemd/issues/5644"

(I encourage everyone to read this thread, really, it's not very long)

OMG.

Based on his response, I can't believe that anyone takes this guy (and systemd) as something that has made it beyond some dead-end fork, let alone in main stream OS's used in servers.

Unbelievable.. The linux distro-world (using systemd) has gone to complete shit.

Ubuntu UNITY is GNOME-MORE: 'One Linux' dream of phone, slab, desktop UI axed

one down, one to go..

Unlike some other comments to the contrary, I DID leave Ubuntu exactly because of the Unity crap (along with phone home AppStore). But I'm not ready quite yet to feel the love again for Ubuntu, First there is one more item that has to go: that Pottering Piece of stinking Excrement called systemd. Only when that has been accomplished, will I start using and/or recommending any Ubuntu variant again.

Is that a Veeam in HPE's eye? IT giant may gobble backup biz

I used to think Veeam sucked, but

I used to think Veeam sucked, but when I started comparing their backup software to competitors, Veeam is okay...

The company I work for uses Veeam for backing up 2 small-mid size VM systems and Veeam (the company) has 2 things going for it:

1) Veeam backup does a reasonable job for what it says it does in a virtual environment

2) Veeam's backup products is one of the few Enterprise backup software solutions that does not charge per volume of data backed up

I truly hope that HPE doesn't/can't afford to buy Veeam. We have HP hardware and dealing with HPE (post breakup) is 10x worse than before (breakup). And that's saying something, because pre-breakup their support sucked. Once you were able to convince Support that you needed new hardware, their Service Organization took care of it within the support contract's specified time, but getting to that point takes all of one's energy (and then some).

Intel reveals Optane SSDs: 375GB to start, at surprising speed

Re: Microsoft will be working weekends...

"Microsoft will be working weekends, reworking their code so that it will still take at least 20s to open any Office file."

Why would MS want to change this? - The longer it takes to open a file, the longer the user's captive eyeballs will be subjected to ads (especially in Win10).

This is a win-win (for Microsoft). I'm sure that somewhere their business model suggests ad payment based on not only placement, but duration of ad as well.