Posts by MyffyW

Linux 6.18 arrives as the year's final drop and likely next LTS

Only came here to say that.

Diolch, Owain

Apply here to win a Microsoft Ugly Sweater. It's uglier than ever

2001: Peak MS = Slough of Balmer?

I think Balmer referring to Linux as "Cancer" has to be the point when MS realised how dangerous Linux was to their server OS business.

I mean, seriously Steve, at least SNAP! got a useful rhyme out of using the "C" word.

He might have lacked Charisma, Uniqueness, Nerve and Talent. But Balmer sure knew how to look like one.

MS-DOS - Version 6.x

Controversial, I am sure, but hear me out:

This was the pinnacle of MS-DOS.

Yes, future versions came out tied to the 9x products, but with built in utilities covering automation of memory management (MemMaker), disk compression (DblSpace, sorry DrvSpace), PC-to-PC file transfer (Interlnk) and an anti-virus engine (it was a nice idea), this felt like a fully evolved product. Albeit a technology cul-de-sac for 386 and above PCs.

Run Windows for Workgroups 3.11 on top of that and it was about as good as you could get in 1993.

Windows NT was definitely a better operating system. But everything that came after MS-DOS 6.x took away the personal aspect of personal computer and put the long arm of corporate policy on top of your desktop.

Windows 11 needs an XP SP2 moment, says ex-Microsoft engineer

Kohl-black eyeliner and crystal-cut vocals set to an ethereal synth-and-guitar set up. Always going to brighten your day :-)

Re: Windows 11 is pretty bad

Honestly, exactly this. I'm actually happier troubleshooting a Linux desktop than anything post-Windows 7

Re: Windows 11 is pretty bad

My Win11 corporate device was just off the other day after returning from a 10 minute tea break. Not "simple press of the button starts it up" nor even BSOD, but properly lights-out, hung and unresponsive*

[* I am aware, after typing, that "hung and unresponsive" has miles of comedy potential, so off you go, have that one on me]

Proud to have been one of the girls rocking NT4 on my desktop whilst I shook my tresses to Dubstar back '96

Cheaper 1 GB Raspberry Pi 5 lands as memory costs go through the roof

That, unfortunately, has a non-zero chance of happening

Re: I see the future and it's some very thin clients

Yes, AI or otherwise, we are well and truly back into the era of rentier capitalism.

It'll be feudalism next, and we'll look back at even these days as some sepia-tinged bliss.

Re: a1

I'll be honest it was my first year university lecturer (god rest his soul) who properly put me off fluid dynamics of the computational or any other kind. We used to call him Dr Death, because he was such a happy, cheery man. But I digress.

Yeah, Raspi is not really peak AI bullshit, as evidenced by their we're-definitely-not-nvidia share price.

70-hour work weeks no longer enough for Infosys founder, who praises China’s 996 culture

I am coming to see much of our current strife in the context of older, wiser statesmen:

Either poverty will use democracy to win the struggle against property, or property, in fear of poverty, will destroy democracy

- Aneurin Bevan, from an idea by Thomas Rainsborough

Zoomers are officially worse at passwords than 80-year-olds

Sorry, Nigel, repeating characters. That's the password equivalent drowning on somebody else's vomit.

Typing Llanfair P G out in full is absolutely ofnadwy though

Britain's first small modular reactors to be built in Wales

Re: Sounds dystopian.

I've done my bit in creating two lovely human beings, thankfully without Elon The Sperminator.

I think it's a good thing that we have agency to decide when we want to conceive whilst those with an Act 2, Scene 3 problem only have to pop a pill to perk things up.

Re: Sounds dystopian.

Properly long term storage (of the order of thousands of years) is theoretically possible, and the Scandinavians are doing it. In the UK "kicking the can down the road" is a fair summary.

In the UK the first generation of nuclear power stations were designed to produce plutonium (for far less benevolent purposes), with power generation a nice side effect. We have been decommissioning these since the 1990s, so the process is at least established.

The second generation were to be a standard pattern, even sharing generator tech with contemporary coal-fired stations. In practice each reactor had differences from the other as experience of build and use dictated. They are also CO2 cooled, which in a nation that has a limited number of pure CO2 manufacturers might not be the best idea.

The third generation (just one, Sizewell B), is a more standard approach (internationally) but suffered from being built just as a certain part of Northern Ukraine embarked on a radical rewilding experiment.

The SMRs are supposed to be based on similar tech to that used in our nuclear submarines, where size is an obvious constraint. To the extent that we have experience in this domain, and folk who live months on end no more than a couple of dozen yards away from the reactor, I suppose it makes some sense. Within certain definitions of the word "sense".

Re: Sounds dystopian.

Depends how you judge it, Seven.

A world-weary, slightly cynical riff on Britain's relative decline down the years will usually get you an upvote or two, especially if you reflect on past glories.

Nuclear power? Well us commentards are largely led by the evidence. The attitude to the last 70-odd years is generally "2 Level 7 incidents - not great, not terrible". But in my view all opinions are welcome. Even those Russian trolls I seem to attract.

I rather liked your tongue-in-cheek encouragement to have my country men take up Viagra (they did their bit in proving it's efficacy in the first place, after all). That said since my preference is for Cymraes rather than Cymro, I'm probably not the best person to opine.

OpenAI’s viability called into question by reported inference spending with Microsoft

Indeed ... and "Capital" is a curious thing to call revenue expenditure on Azure fees.

I'd call it smoke and mirrors, but the mirror would imply a tangible asset.

MS Task Manager turns 30: Creator reveals how a 'very Unixy impulse' endured in Windows

No Swap

It is a real mindset change when coming to Linux from Windows. No Virtual Memory! What none?!

Yes, because if you're running out of physical RAM, you're going to get truly rotten performance. Far better to manage the use of the memory better - buy more or run less - than pretend swapping to disk is going to be anything less than painful.

SpaceX and Musk called on to rescue China's Shenzhou-20 crew

Re: A bit opposite from "The Martian"

I'm not judging, just glad it was you who went there

Re: Wake me up when China calls in need of assistance

SpaceX is allied with Eastasia.

SpaceX has always been allied with Eastasia.

War is Peace etc. etc.

Re: A bit opposite from "The Martian"

I must have seen the opposite episodes, Bob, because it seemed to me we saw lots of Thunderbirds 1 - 3 and very little of Thunderbirds 4 and 5.

Always felt sorry for the chap stuck up on his own on Thunderbird 5. Although I suppose he did have his strings for company.

Tesla board wants to grant Musk $1T in stock, Norway wealth fund says nope

Re: Random thought...

Well done @AC... it is this level of intellectual honesty (as well as the toilet humour) that makes me keep commentarding on El Reg

I love you, awesome nerds.

Re: Hybrid Theory

Consider also "One piece at a time" by Johnny Cash and his a description of the Psychobilly Cadillac

Re: Hmmm "the world's largest such fund,"

The Thatcher "tax cuts" were also illusory. Yes, the very top rate of tax was cut from 98% to 40%, but the base rate of tax was a more modest change from 33% to 25%. The Major government introduced a very narrow 20% band too.

But VAT increased first to 15% then 17.5% (and has since gone up to 20%). And VAT extended to more of the necessities of life including electricity and gas.

Mortgage income-tax relief at source was scrapped by the Thatcher / Major administrations.

The overall tax take in 1979 when Thatcher came to power was 31.2%. The overall take when the Tories left in 1997? 31.3%

In short our North Sea wealth was squandered on a one-time shift of the UK away from productive to speculative endeavour. Something we have never recovered from.

My opening gambit: $0bn + the horse you rode in on.

Hybrid Theory

Upvote for making me giggle.

Seriously, there are better looking candidates to do that to, even from the risible recent history of American automotive adventures.

A Tesla with an internal combustion engine would be ugly meets obsolete.

Win10 still clings to over 40% of devices weeks after Microsoft pulls support

Re: Benefits for Microsoft (spyware), not users

I'll be absolutely honest: XP did everything I needed from a Windows PC. I'd still run it save for the absence of patches.

It's a good writer that saves the most pertinent advice to their last sentence. You, sir, managed to do it in the last four words.

Ministry of Defence's F-35 blunder: £57B and counting

Re: Again why beancouters

The assessment (by BAE, who built the carriers) concluded that it would be too costly to convert them to cats-and-traps (which would enable them to fly the F-18 or Rafale or any other naval variants such as E-2 AEW not built by BAe). This had the unfortunate, entirely coincidental, side-effect of only BAe fixed-wing aircraft (and maybe the V-22 Osprey) being able to be flow from the BAe built, BAe reviewed, definitely-nothing-dodgy HMS Queen Lizzie and HMS PoW.

Network operator ponders building a new submarine cable – on land

Re: "parts of the route are only accessible by helicopter."

A railway sounds eminently sensible, not least because "then you'd have a railway", which is almost always a good thing.

Grabs coat. The anorak, with a copy of Ian Allan Motive Power in the left hand pocket.

Re: Political instability nixes it

In the UK we continue to get imbeciles dragging up fibre cables believing them to be copper. And though I would love to see their disappointed faces, I only know when my train is delayed.

Claude code will send your data to crims ... if they ask it nicely

Re: So basically ...

I would suggest it is theoretically possible to secure generative AI within a walled garden of a single vendor for a single customer (for example within an Office 365 tenancy), with some loss of usefulness.

But experience (particularly with the clusterfsck that is Sharepoint permissions) demonstrates that the word theoretically here is being pushed beyond it's elastic limit.

I think the precautionary principle strongly argues for switching the whole lot off.

Microsoft gives Windows 11 a fresh Start – here's how to get it

Re: The problem

I think coming down from the trees may have been the start of things going wrong.

Re: I have a question

No - it's one half of a Sunday league results table:

Fulchester Rovers 0 - Borcester Windows 11

Worked in a few different industries this past decade and their EUC teams all seemed quite capable of setting this where necessary :-)

Shudder

Well that's four people I'm not going hiking with :-)

Abandoned the start menu years ago as it got crapper with each iteration.

Windows + Q and then type what I'm after is far quicker.

[The value of my advice can go down as well as up. Some unsettling of contents may have occurred in transit]

Smile! Uncle Sam wants to scan your face on the way in – and out

Re: Aliens!

"no comprehensive system in place to collect biometrics from aliens departing the country"

Well, duh! Of course not, they scarper off in their flying saucer right after putting probes up your various orifices. In my experience. Probably.

Flight simulator fans revive a classic Boeing 747 cockpit

Re: Absolutely brilliant

The future will always belong to bicycle mechs, electronics hacks (in the older sense of the word) and anybody whose idea of a "workshop" involves light engineering not whiteboards and teams calls.

IBM Cloud stops signing and seeking new customers for its VMware service

Re: It's IBM, let's pretend that "old" IBM did this, what would you think?

Indeed. The noise you hear is the water circling the outlet, gurgling down the pipe and carrying the last of our 1980s hopes and dreams off into the overcapacity storm drain of diminished expectations.

You have one week to opt out or become fodder for LinkedIn AI training

Re: Hookers

Make sure you mention both Rugby and the oldest profession. Something like:

"The hooker must be a powerful, flexible, and technically skilled player who combines the attributes of a specialist forward with the mobility of a back-rower. The position requires a unique skill set to excel in the two key set-piece functions: the scrum and the lineout. And the ability to suck-start a leaf blower"

AI investment is the only thing keeping the US out of recession

Re: When the bubble pops...

@AC your details have been logged and you will contacted in due course by our correction officers. In the meantime, here comes a candle to light you to bed...

Marks & Spencer swaps out TCS for fresh helpdesk deal

Re: What's the saying, "penny wise and pound foolish"?

Add to that the fact companies often outsource a right mess of an estate and the supplier charges extra for all the deviations and you've pretty much described my career experience with outsourcing. Interestingly my current employer, keen to cut costs during COVID, chose to insource key services.

Chatbots parrot Putin's propaganda about the illegal invasion of Ukraine

Re: Shocked

Profoundly disagree that there is any equivalence between Russian state-back media and free, independent journalism.

Even the mess that is media ownership in the UK is subject to scrutiny, regulation and occasionally has to actually remedy it's mistakes. Not so Pravda et al.

The Chinese Box and Turing Test: AI has no intelligence at all

Re: So much hype

Or the current favourite variation: Trump, Pump and Dump

It's a good wind-up. Whilst I have often questioned Boris's parentage, it is only in as an expletive.

Anybody who has seen Stanley Johnson will see a very clear familial resemblance to the thankfully deposed former PM.

Everything you know about last week's AWS outage is wrong

The cascade of failures is the aspect that should concern AWS. That tech will fail is almost a given, but an estate that can't cope with erroneous behaviour in one part is essentially a house of cards.

Re: Almost a direct contradiction…

Indeed - has the real Corey been abducted by Amazon and replaced with a Synthetic Stepford Scribe?

A single DNS race condition brought Amazon's cloud empire to its knees

Re: Ouch

Your mention of Wolvo and Bilston has just given me PTSD to a datacentre outage from more than a decade ago. Thanks for that :-)

Shield AI shows off not-at-all-terrifying autonomous VTOL combat drone

Love the AI Rendering

I really wanted them to go the extra mile. Show a picture of the X-BAT doing the school run in its PJs. Or maybe on the beech, or parked in the Sainsbury's car park by the bottle bank, or maybe giving it large with a whistle and glow stick in a '90s nightclub.