* Posts by Chris--S

17 publicly visible posts • joined 11 May 2013

Apple's quest for modem independence from Qualcomm is going nowhere fast

Chris--S

Re: Bad deal, that's why

They don’t get their modems from Qualcomm. My figures come from googling, so they could be wrong … but it is a sensible justification for trying to produce their own. From somewhere else, “About 21% of Qualcomm’s fiscal 2022 revenue of $44.2 billion came from Apple, according to a UBS estimate”, that’s more than just modem chips, but there is plenty in $8B for at least $2B on modems..

Chris--S

Re: Bad deal, that's why

Reputedly it’s ~ $10 per unit. 200 million+ iPhones a year, so $2B/year. So, not such a bad idea by Apple if they can manage it.

Safari is crippling the mobile market, and we never even noticed

Chris--S

Re: Any examples?

Not really the point. Supporting iOS Safari is pretty well a must, at least in the west. You’re shooting yourself in the foot if it doesn’t work right on iOS, and risking your invoices not being paid. It’s not as pad as the log IE6 days, but Safari is the outlier, most bugs to work around and most often holding back some “new thing” until all browsers support.

Chris--S

Re: Lousy web design

Agree. Safari is the new IE, both most buggy and slowest with new features. Not necessarily shiny ones, e.g. last with webp support.

Qualcomm takes a swipe at Apple's build-not-buy culture (because it wants to sell stuff to Apple)

Chris--S

Intel being schooled in abusive monopolist behaviour … how far it’s fortunes have fallen. No leadership in processors, no leadership in modems, no leadership in nodes AND no leadership in abusive monopolist behaviour. Put the Engineers back in charge!

Thales launches payment card with onboard fingerprint scanner

Chris--S

Re: "There are concerns over using fingerprints as an authentication system"

Let’s get real, this isn’t to get you into the bowels of the NSA or MI6, we’re really talking convenience and reduced crime & fraud.

Your card has a pin 1 in 10000 of a correct guess, that’s the “gold” standard here. Only that’s not the really what you have to beat, since tap & pay requires nothing more than possession of the card.

I’m already on board, I hardly ever tap, I much prefer fingerprint + tap via my phone.

Shock: Russian court says Russian court is right in slapping down Google monopoly

Chris--S

Russian monopoly?

In case anyone else wants to know if Google/Android does actually have a monopoly of the mobile OS market in Russia. From what I can gather, Android is at about 75% in Russia (Kantar, 2015) and Russian antitrust law goes goes with dominant position (monopoly) at 50% or more of the market (Wikipedia).

Prof Hawking cracks riddle of black holes – which may be portals to other universes

Chris--S

Re: Plasma Spewing

This sort of stuff is believed to come from its accretion disc, the dose, infalling matter outside the event horizon.

DEEPENING MYSTERY of BRIGHT LIGHTS on dwarf world Ceres

Chris--S

Where did this bit come from, "and the dwarf planet may have picked up its ice from the impacts of water-rich asteroids on its surface."?

Ceres composition is generally reckoned to be a large part ice, at least it's current location is about right for ice, its orbit being being around the ice line. The sort of thing Dawn's investigations will support or reject.

Tax dollars well spent. Go Dawn!

Cray-cray Met Office spaffs £97m on very average HPC box

Chris--S

which double deckers?

I make it ~9 cabinets per (old routemaster) DD bus. According to the marketing blurb[1], it's up to (initially*) 75TF per cabinet. So, 7.5PF, or more if they're the new buses.

* are these like windows PCs, they get slower with age?

1. http://www.cray.com/Products/Computing/XC/Specs/Specifications-XC40-AC.aspx

BENDY iPhone 6, you say? Pah, warp claims are bent out of shape: Consumer Reports

Chris--S

Re: Headline should read "Note 3 Twice as Strong as iPhone 6"

I don't know about this bending issue, but apple typically (at least in my experience) don't quibble, they just check the fault is real and then fix or replace the phone. No drama. For my iphone5 (no AppleCare), that's a new screen, then a new unit. As a side issue, it does raise questions about the durability of the things.

Bash bug: Shellshocked yet? You will be ... when this goes WORM

Chris--S

Ok, it's early and I haven't finished my coffee yet. Isn't this an injection vulnerability due to not escaping the remote input before using it to set the environment variable?

What is crafting the command which is setting the env with a function using the remotely supplied value?

Crypto boffins propose replacing certification authorities with ... Bitcoin?

Chris--S

So could a botnet hearder subvert this system, and how many bots would it take?

Malcolm Turnbull throws a bone to FTTP boosters

Chris--S

Surely, he means, where there is existing copper TTP infrastructure (brownfield) do FTTN, because digging up and replacing that last km is ludicrously expensive. Where new infrastructure for new connections is being built, stick in fibre not copper.

Money really does GROW ON TREES say boffins

Chris--S

Have you seen most of Australia? Good luck finding a tree. Maybe if it worked with spinifex or termites!

Brazilians tear strip off NSA in wake of Snowden, mull anti-US-spook law

Chris--S

They can do it with profits

I'm sure if they can develop structures to keep taxable money out of a country, proprrly motivated, their laywers can do the same to keep data at arms length.

PayPal security boss: OBLITERATE passwords from THE PLANET

Chris--S
FAIL

Biometrics are identity only

I want my authentication to include a secret.

Surely authentication needs to include identity + secret. Biometrics start being used to protect big amounts of money and you can bet a whole heap of ingenuity will be focused on forging/fooling biometric scanning devices.

The more flexible biometrics are made to cope with natural variations due to age, environment, injury and disease, the easier it'll become to fool the reading devices.