Posts by Simulacra75

I love the Linux desktop, but that doesn't mean I don't see its problems all too well

Re: Chicken and egg

Could be mistaken, but doesn't Thelma Schoonmaker use Lightworks on Ubuntu for "video editing" ? She seems to get on alright.

Thinnet cables are no match for director's morning workout

Re: Full names please.......

In my home town in Ireland there's a solicitors firm called, Argue & Phibbs. I kid you not.

New Chinese exascale supercomputer runs 'brain-scale AI'

Can it play Crysis?

UK government responds to post-Brexit concerns and of course it's all the fault of those pesky EU negotiators

Analogy

Quoting a Twatter feed;

"I knew a guy in his late forties who was convinced his wife was the only thing stopping a debauched life, sleeping with 20 year olds. So he left her and found himself alone in a bedsit washing his pants in the sink. I've yet to think of a better analogy for Brexit"

Ring, Ring, why don't you give me a call? Amazon-owned doorbells aren’t answering after large-scale outage

Escalator/Elevator Rule

Have a few bits and bobs "automated" at home, no Ring doorbell though. Whenever I'm setting something up I always try and think of the Escalator/Elevator rule.

If an escalator is broken, you can still go up and down the stairs, not so much with an elevator, so any lights/blinds, etc I've setup, they work via a hard switch, in case online stuff is inaccessible.

BlackBerry KEY2 LE: The first budget Android QWERTY for years

Cobalt "soft" keyboard for Android

Look it up. Blackberry keyboard functionality on my Samsung S7. Absolute godsend. Well worth a test drive, if you haven't tried it out before.

The opsec blunders that landed a Russian politician's fraudster son in the clink for 27 years

Re: For some $17m would have been enough.

@John Smith 19. That's debatable. My shite maths tell me you could stay in the hotel for over 16 years with $17 million.

User lubed PC with butter, because pressing a button didn't work

Several years ago I had to travel to our French office to try and fix a mail DB that had gone titsup. After fixing the problem the manager there claimed IT had corrupted the DB on purpose so that we'd look like "knights in shining armour" when we came in and fixed it. Complete and utter Twunt.

BlackBerry's comeback: El Reg gets its claws on the QWERTY KEYone

Re: Blackberry keyboard on Android

Erm, don't drink and Mrs. Sim might object to the kissing! Enjoy the keyboard. Only way to type once you get used to it.

Blackberry keyboard on Android

If anyone would like to experience the Blackberry "soft" keyboard on Android, check out Blackberry keyboard by cobalt. Have it running on my Samsung S7 and it's a joy to use, especially the predictive "swipe up" feature. YMMV

IPv4 apocalypse means we just can't measure the internet any more

Genuine query

I read this article with interest, well, more the comments section. Something i was wondering, are there genuine tools (pen test i suppose) that i could use to test that my home setup is secure/insecure, from a WAN perspective?

I'm not a complete novice but i'm certainly no firewall/NAT/routing expert either and if there were tools i could get my hands on that would give some pointers as to whether my setup was good/bad, etc i think it would be useful. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Italians rattle little tin for smartmobe mini lenses

DIY it!

Take a jewellers loupe, a 10x is a good place to start. Unscrew the lens out of it and blu-tac it onto the lens of your phone. Did this with my S5 and was able to take reasonable macro pictures of flowers and other items. Results are okayish, a little blurry at the edges but does the job.

Outsourcer didn't press ON switch, so Reg reader flew 15 hours to do the job

Infrared printing tale

About 15 years ago the company I worked for bought a HP Laserjet. It came with an Infrared port that was on a lead that plugged into a serial port (it looked like a small mouse). The idea being that a user could maneuver the IR port to line up with their laptop to send a print job (not that IR printing ever worked!).

Anyhow, I was setting the printer up whilst a colleague was configuring the network queue (Novel as I recall). While I was plugging it in and filling it with paper a Senior Design Engineer saw me tinkering with the IR "mouse" and asked what it was. With tongue firmly in cheek, I said it was a voice-recognition device for the printer. She didn't believe me until I said "print test page" whilst holding the IR port up to my mouth. She didn't know my colleague had already queued up said test page on the Novel queue so, sure enough, out popped a test page once the printer had warmed up.

She was gobsmacked.

Absolute true story.

'One Windows' crunch time: Microsoft tempts with glittery new devices

Camera specs

"20MB camera"

That's a new one on me!

ALIEN EARTH: Red sun's habitable world spotted 470 light years away

Re: BFD....the Earth and Moon are the same distance from the Sun....

Is this a fucking bot?

Alfa Romeo Giulietta Quadrifoglio Verde: Fun, but not for all

Alfa ownership

Having owned an Alfa in the past, there's a price to pay for all that fun and it's not what's on the sticker. Constant trips to the garage for suspension parts, amongst other things and a hefty wedge to pay each time. Very hard to shift on second-hand too.

Pity really given how fun they are to drive.

Yotaphone 2: The two-faced pocket-stroker with '100 hours' batt life

Re: Chile

@Mephistro

That "Granada" invasion. Was it the Mark I, Mark II or Mark III?

Ta.

Microsoft shows off spanking Win 10 PCs, compute-tastic Azure

slightly off-topic

Wish they'd sort out the wireless access at TechEd. Shockingly bad. Connections constantly dropping on laptops and mobile devices. Heard dozens of people complain about it.

Will It Blend? Maybe. BlackBerry’s secret comeback weapon

Re: What it is for....

I managed to install a leaked version of the 10.3 OS onto my Z10 and there's a placeholder icon for Blackberry Blend. Once opened it gives a brief blurb as to what it's about. According to it, Blend will connect with your computer/tablet using USB, WiFi or your cellular network, once it becomes available. Personally, i hope that the software is a lot better than BB Link, buggy as hell in my experience.

I like the look of this, if i'm honest. When i had a BB OS 7.x device the Blackberry Bridge link with my BB Playbook was a very useful feature, see incoming calls on the tablet, reply to emails and texts, etc. Was annoyed when this functionality kinda stopped when the BB device itself was not on OS 7.x. This seems to be a more polished version of that with support for any (?) tablet. I'm looking forward to giving it a shot once it comes out with my Z10. Thanks Blackberry!

Looking forward to the end of Tuesday? You've patched this month's 37 Microsoft bugs, right?

Re: Adobe update headache

If you happen to use ConfigMgr 2012 you can do this using SCUP but i have found this method to be a real "hit or miss" affair. Sometimes works, other times not. PITA.

Dear Windows Journal, today I got owned: 29 security bugs swatted

adobe patch

Nice work Adobe. Now if you could get your software update catalog to actually work with SCUP 2012, like it's supposed to I'd be grateful.

Home automation while it's hot: Winter warmth for lazy technophiles

@Ledswinger

Just a "thank you" on the laser thermometer tip. That is all.

Failover in FOUR SECONDS? HP's SAP-specific iron hits the streets

Wow!

The SMB version( presumably cheaper) running 256TB per node! Sign me up!!!

New dashboard gives eagle's-eye view of Microsoft's security flaws

Feedback given

Gave feedback, filtering out "Itanium" related patches. They really grind my gears! Does anyone use Itanium these days (or ever)??

Shockwave shocker: Plugin includes un-patched version of Flash

Updating Adobe Shockwave, or Flash for that matter - nightmare

We have ConfigMgr 2012 in our company and have SCUP integrated with it. The theory being that you can import Adobe updates and deploy them like a security patch. Only a theory though, in my experience. Have never successfully deployed an Adobe Flash patch. Constant errors when doing so. I don't seem to be alone in this either. Adobe need a good kick in the arse, IMO.

Multiplayer Elite to debut on May 30th

Re: Software house employees here, clearly...

@Joerg To paraphrase another twat (Microsoft lover/Linux hater), "Troll FAIL"

Reg man builds smart home rig, gains SUPREME CONTROL of DOMAIN – Pics

My own experience

I've had a Vera 2 setup for a couple of years (Z-Wave based automation) and have found it to be pretty hit-and-miss in terms of connectivity between the Vera unit and the remote Z-Wave devices (plugs and relay switches). About a year ago i found that i could buy an RFXtrx433 transceiver (£80 approx) that would plug directly into my Vera unit and this could control Lightwave RF devices.

Haven't looked back since then. Lightwave RF devices are generally cheaper than their Z-Wave equivalents and they are a piece of piss to setup with little or no faffing about. I've also found them to be 100% reliable in use, i.e., when you turn something on, it actually comes on. My Z-Wave devices were not as reliable at all (Fibraro relay switch been the only exception). Using the Home Buddy app on my BB Z10 I can control all of the devices on my network from anywhere. Personally I would recommend Lightwave RF to anyone wanting to dabble in this(do not work for, nor am I affiliated with them in any way).

Cheers

Haribo gummy bears implicated in 'gastric exorcism'

My favourite review, personally.

http://www.amazon.com/review/R2X2TB3S4O5I60

Facebook throws servers on their back in HOT TUBS of OIL

Cooling with oil? Not exaclty new

Green Revolution Cooling have been at this stuff a while now. (I do not work for, or am I affiliated with GRC)

http://youtu.be/EZmm7P1mPZs

Wouldn't fancy "servicing" a server though, messy me thinks.

Leaping SpaceX GRASSHOPPER ROCKET jumps 2,500ft, lands safely

Re: re. the observing video camera

It is a hexacopter. Clue is in the title of the youtube vid.......

Google Glass: Would you pay a mere $299 to plop one on your brow?

Re: Glasses - no

You have DSLR? What colour is it?

Oi, trolls, BEHAVE! Twitter tweaks rules to tackle abusive twits

Twatter

IMHO, if you're going to have an online presence like Twitter or a blog then accept that you'll get flamed from gobshites. If you don't go ex-directory in the phonebook you will get plagued from insurance/broadband/$whatever. Get over it or just delete the feckin account.

New NSA tool exposed: XKeyscore sees 'nearly EVERYTHING you do online'

Re: "xkeyscore sees nearly everything"

Keep thinking that. Obvious Foggot.

INVASION of the UNDEAD ANDROIDS: Hackers can pwn 'nearly all' devices

@RyokuMas

"Yeah, what happened to Eadon while I've been out of things? I saw all his posts got deleted - did he finally get himself banned?"

Think he/she/it may have done so. Read an article about a week ago or so and he made some comment that was removed by a Moderator with the parting "you're out of here, have had enough" type message with it.

Re: Surprise!

Crawl back under your bridge, Eadon. There's a good little boy.

BBC-featured call centre slapped with hefty fine for unwanted calls

One of my favourites

From Tom Mabe

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttrzG5F4R3o

Windows NT grandaddy OpenVMS taken out back, single gunshot heard

How Windows NT got its name.

I remember an urban myth that the reason that Windows NT was called so harked back to the 2001: A Space Odyssey thing. HAL been called HAL because it was one step behind IBM (a major sponsor/product placement partner in the movie).

Roll on a few years and the chief bod behind VMS names an OS WNT, in this case, WNT been one step ahead of VMS (as the story goes).

Would have been quirky if it were true (was it?)

BlackBerry OS 10.1 leaks its secret goo over all the web

Re: Slightly Irritated from Tunbridge Wells

Not really the "full" OS, if you mean released to market. It's a dev. OS that has been modified by an outside BB developer to allow a "full" install. Will it break your phone? How long is a piece of string? No idea if it will or not. Can only say that it did not break my own phone.

When you say "security restrictions" I assume you mean that you're on a BES? Difficult to answer your question without knowing what policies your BES admin has or hasn't put in place. You'll find more information at crackberry.com with a full list of what's new and what does or doesn't work after installing it.

If you're not comfortable installing it then just wait until your carrier pushes out an OTA update.

10.1.0.1429 OS upgrade

Performed the upgrade on my Z10 this morning. Went without a hitch, very straightforward and took about 10 minutes. The UI "fluidity" does appear to be faster than before. Still messing about with it to see what other improvements are there. A very nice phone to use, IMO.

Maggie Thatcher: The Iron Lady who saved us from drab Post Office mobes

At least..

Now that she's brown bread, she have countless chats with Jimmy Saville about screwing miners.....

A lightbulb that does IPv6: You know you want it

Z-Wave (Kinda like ZigBee)

I have a Z-Wave mesh network in my gaff and its controlled via a Vera 2 router. I find it quite handy been able to turn on my boiler/furnace from my phone (an hour before getting home) or if away on holidays, turning it on because temperatures drop back home. Can also control a "plug" in the house (currently connected to the radio in the kitchen). Accessed via SSL at the moment. I quite like it to be honest but it's not the holy grail either.

This 320-gigapixel snap of London is size of Buckingham Palace

Not convinced

It's claimed these photos were taken "just after the olympics" I spotted an advert for a magazine outside a newsagents that indicated it was the November-December issue of said mag. Just saying.....

Get up, shake off the hangover: These 57 Microsoft holes won't fix themselves

Are you that concerned?

Just curious about others experiences, but in our organization of about 12,000 machines, all of which are windows, we have had 0 issues with being hit with malware/viruses since about 2002 (that was Blaster IIRC, date might be off somewhat). We use SCCM to deploy patches now and it's been pretty good from what I can see. Still use WSUS on servers though, which is very good for what we need.

Wad of BlackBerry OS 10 pics 'leaks' from RIM's inner circle

@ AC 20.24

Yes, troll. I would take odds (if you offered them) that they certainly will be making hardware in 2 years from now. Antiquated OS on BB10? You're an ill-informed gobshite.

Anti RIM sentiment

Just curious as to why there appears to be an anti-RIM sentiment on this? They're only a company that produces devices, just like Apple or Samsung (or whomever). Personally I think BBM10 looks good and at least it's a change from what's already out there. Why not wait to see what its actually like in "real life" before flushing it down the toilet? Think BES10 looks promising personally.

Do not work for RIM. Just happen to have a Berry Bold. Solid unit IMHO.