Posts by Tromos

SkyMapper turns up oldest star ever found

Alternatively the lithium has gone into batteries used by a race of alien scrap merchants for powering the electromagnets that they use for sucking the iron out of stars. That's my theory and I'm sticking to it.

James Dyson plans ROBOT ARMY to take over the world

"Gadget boffin wants an android doing the ironing and washing up in every home"

Never mind Android, if it can do the ironing, I'd even consider iOS!

Friends don't do tech support for friends running Windows XP

Most of my friends that really need a full-blown desktop or laptop are perfectly capable of their own support and have trodden the path from XP to 7 and then applied the brakes. The rest are just occasional browsers, e-mailers, and online shoppers and only got desktops/laptops because that was all there was at the time. They have mostly now got Nexus 7s and require less hand-holding than they did with XP. One got persuaded by a shop to get an iPad, so I've told her to go back to the shop to sort out her lost e-mails or any other problems as I don't speak the language. Just over half of the tech savvy group on 7 also dual boot Mint, with a lone Ubuntu holdout (actually likes the default colour scheme!!!).

15,000 London coppers to receive new crime-fighting tool: an iPad

Numbers needed, not percentages

"property crimes in the area under test dropped by 12 per cent in one year, while in nearby neighborhoods where more traditional policing remained the order of the day, it rose by 0.5 per cent"

Unless the test area was significantly large, all this shows is that property crimes moved to another area, not that they were any better off.

Also, I predict a rise in the crime statistics as a direct result of this - mainly in stolen iPads.

UK spooks STILL won't release Bletchley Park secrets 70 years on

Re: In the 70's

No, the Population Count instruction was definitely present in the CDC machines and apart from any spook uses got occasionally used in arcane pieces of highly optimised code as it executed in its own functional unit and hence in parallel with other instructions (provided none of these were using the same registers).

Jean Michel Jarre: Je voudrais un MUSIC TAX sur VOTRE MOBE

Collecting societies

I wouldn't mind betting that most of the money collected in France stays in France despite the music being mostly listened to derives from outside. A goodly chunk no doubt doesn't make it much further than the collectors themselves.

Optical computing a step closer with SINGLE-MOLECULE LED

Re: Bad science

Even worse science. Trying to pass a current having a worse heating effect? Utter bollocks. A typical LED needs only a small forward voltage and will have a leakage when reverse biased of maybe a microamp. Total energy available for heating is of the order of 3 microwatts. Forward biased and lit, the voltage drop across the junction is around half a volt and the current may be up to a few Amps for a Cree LED but for a more typical variety will be maybe 50 mA. Definitely thousands of times as much energy being dissipated.

In case there is still any doubt, I did know that an LED is a diode. What I took issue with was dismissing heating as a possible source of the light for the reason stated in the article. I sincerely hope this was not present in the scientific paper, otherwise I shall have to reclassify my 1N4004 rectifiers as LEDs as they too will emit light (albeit briefly) when plugged into the mains supply!

Bad science

"No light was emitted when the current was reversed (which demonstrates it's behaving like an LED and not merely getting hot enough to glow)."

Actually, that only demonstrates that it's acting like a diode, and only gets hot enough to glow when current is passing. I hope they have other justification for classing it as an LED.

Apple's nonexistent iWatch to bag $17.5 BEEELION in first year alone – analyst

Re: The iWhatEver

13: the iThermal underpants (using Lithium Ion batteries with the patented iHeat short circuit technology).

Re: Can't wait to not buy this one!

Why wait? Don't buy one today! Personally, I'm holding out for the "don't buy one, don't get one free" offer.

Google opens up data on secret data collection orders

Of course these numbers are correct. No way they could have been ordered to only state one tenth of the actual amount. Is there???

Yes, HP will still sue you if you make cartridges for its inkjet printers

Given up on inkjets

I've tried inkjet technology a couple of times in the past. My printer usage is fairly light and I may occasionally go a week without needing to print anything. With inkjets, it usually then requires depleting any ink cartridges that are installed and wasting a ream of paper to get the nozzles unblocked. Switched to (non-HP) laser and never looked back.

Bonk to enter: Starwood Hotels testing keyless check-in via mobe

Bonk to enter and...

...enter to bonk.

Google patents ROBO-TAXIS to ferry punters into advertiser's shops, restaurants, etc for free

Re: Prior art

Making it free isn't new either. About 20 years ago on the Greek Island of Poros, I got a free ride in a speedboat taxi to a nice fish taverna down the coast. Pleasantly surprised to get a free ride back after the meal too.

Prince sues 22 music file-sharers for ONE MEEELLION dollars each

Chuck a sueball back

Sue him for persistently passing himself off as an entertainer.

China cuffs 60,000 pirates in 2013 crackdown

BSA statistics

They probably include everyone running Open Office under Linux. Didn't pay anything for it, must be a shoulder-mounted parrot merchant. Chalk up another couple of thousand smackers lost due to piracy.

Alcatel-Lucent and BT unveil super fat pipe, splurt out 1.4Tb per second across London

Another way of looking at it...

...is hitting your monthly usage cap in just milliseconds.

Facebook will LOSE 80% of its users by 2017 – epidemiological study

Re: Yoof

Not like a herd.

Indeed, more like a flock.

Those NSA 'reforms' in full: El Reg translates US Prez Obama's pledges

Good article, but I'm not sure Obama's verbiage needed filleting. It seemed to me to be totally boneless from start to finish. Mind you, he'll probably get another Nobel for this.

Apple's iPhone did not rip off Googorola's wireless patent – US appeal judges

Re: it all depends ...

Step 3. Raise prices.

Step 4. Watch all the competitors flood back into the market.

When it comes to e-books, it doesn't need huge investments in warehouses, stock and staff to get going. It isn't the same as selling at a loss to close a competitor's factory. Nobody can keep selling at a loss to maintain a monopoly. I see nothing wrong with reducing prices and margins to an extent others can't match.

Why can't they match them? Is it greed, inefficiency or what? It's an all too rare win for the long-suffering consumer who would otherwise end up paying more for the privilege of reading electronically (and never mind the loss of the tangible paper asset that can be sold or given to a friend after reading).

Virgin Media spanked by ad watchdog over 'in your neighbourhood' fibs

Useless ASA

Yet again the ASA step in way too late and do absolutely nothing to discourage similar acts in future. As a minimum they should be able to force Virgin to distribute a retraction containing the true coverage figures and actual percentage share for each neighbourhood to every household that the original campaign covered (4 times over in my case).

A further step would be to allow anyone who received this advert and signed up with Virgin to terminate their contract with no penalty as they were potentially misled.

Both these measures would serve to undo the advantages gained from the false advertising without recourse to punitive measures such as fines which some companies could just shrug off as cost of advertising. I have seen no improvement in the standard of advertising under the auspices of the ASA, hence regard them as a complete waste of space.

Defamation expert: New '1 year after publication' rule means EASY LIFE for UK libel judges

It would appear that you can get away with serious defamation if you are prepared to bide your time. Publish publicly but very low key (e.g. small print ad in the South Turkmenistan Herald) then follow up a year later with the same text up to billboard size on every street corner.

App to manage Android app permissions

I'll just stick to my tried and tested (and free) solution. As soon as an app upgrade asks for a permission I'm not comfortable granting it, there is a handy 'Uninstall' button that gets pressed.

As far as permission management goes, the solution has to be open source given the permissions that the management app itself obviously requires. Until one shows up, just tap on the button that isn't marked 'Upgrade'.

Time travellers outsmart the NSA

At the time of writing, no such posts have turned up

OK, but what about last week?

Only iPhone fondling rose at Xmas: Were non-Apple fans in a turkey coma?

Conclusion...

...Apple ad-blocking isn't as good

How the NSA hacks PCs, phones, routers, hard disks 'at speed of light': Spy tech catalog leaks

All that money and all that effort...

...and all we've got to show for it is a Lolcat. At least it's a bloody good one.

Want access to mobe users' location, camera, phone ID? EXPLAIN YOURSELVES - ICO

Retention

For all the cited 'weird and wonderful' things the apps can do, I still see no need for the data to be retained at all. Yes, it will need some contact info if you are to chat with a friend, but it doesn't need to hang on to that data beyond establishing the connection. It obviously needs your location if it is to find your nearest restaurant but after the bit of co-ordinate number crunching, it can be discarded. Any and all retention of data beyond the minimum required to do just what the user requested and no more should require FULL disclosure of what data is being kept, for how long and what it is used for.

Ho, ho, HOLY CR*P, ebuyer! Etailer rates staff on returns REJECTED

All in the phrasing

If they had rated their tech support people on 'customer problems solved' I bet the picture would still be there but El Reg would be down one article. If the NHS were to do similar and publish figures for the number of people 'sent away from hospital' rather than 'discharged' it would become a national scandal.

Samsung: Men, our Gear smartwatch will make you a hit with the sexy ladies

Re: UK Advertising

Advertising Standards Authority filters? Oh, you mean those things that kick in after 29 days of a one month advertising campaign.

It's the dream: Bill Gates chucks cash at WEE-IN-YOUR-PHONE project

2.5 billion people practice open defecation

With all that practice, some must be pretty good at it by now.

DisARMed: Geeksphone's next high-end mobe to pack Intel x86 inside

Re: OS of your choice

VMS and NT4. Both well known phone operating systems NOT. That's going to be the main problem with this phone, the attraction of X86 opening up interest from people wanting to run certain operating systems only to come down to earth with a bump as there is no support for phones available. Apart from Android, Firefox and Phubuntu (or whatever it's called), what choices are there?

Macbook webcams CAN spy on you - and you simply CAN'T TELL

I'm safe

Can't catch me out by messing around with the LED status on my lappy. The Samsung RF511 doesn't have a LED. So there!

Datawind's low cost Aakash tab comes to UK, US

For people with less sense than money

At last! A serious rival to the Apple iPad.

Feminist Software Foundation gets grumpy with GitHub … or does it?

Chauvinist pig wants to know...

...will the byte storage be big-boobian or little-boobian?

Santa brings Dixons £31m profits as ghost of Comet is laid to rest

@StripeyMiata

Doesn't work. At step 5 it all goes wrong. Automaton at till makes mistake of not taking cash but launching into "I recommend getting the extended warranty...". I tend not to hear the rest as I immediately execute step 6 and use Amazon or similar instead.

Zuck you! Facebook introduces 'Dislike' button... in Messenger

Do I like that not

Well, do I?

Apple iWatch due in October 2014, to wirelessly charge from one metre away – report

Battery data meaningless

100mA. At what voltage and for how long?

China's 'Airpocalypse' forces pilots to learn BLIND landings in smog

Don't travel on a Chinese airline

"The training is very expensive, and the low visibility was not a normal condition".

Yes, training is expensive. Single engine failure or hydraulics problems etc., etc. aren't normal conditions either. I'd like to be certain that any plane I boarded had a pilot well versed with abnormal conditions.

Thought of in-flight mobile calls fills you with dread? Never fear, US Dept of Transport is here

@AC 06:29

I rather think the annoying callers don't mind their calls being listened in on, after all, they make great efforts to ensure every single one of their fellow passengers can hear.

The difference

One can't remedy the situation by snatching the offending phone and chucking it out of the window.

Heart part more art than state-of-the-art: Shine wearable activity sensor

Friends

I used to have some until I started sharing how far I'd walked and how long I'd slept.

Ghosts of Christmas Past: Ten tech treats from yesteryear

Am I alone...

...in desiring most of that list even today?

Evil Dexter lurks in card reader, ready to SLASH UP your credit score

PoS

Aptly named.

Microsoft: Don't listen to 4chan ... especially the bit about bricking Xbox Ones

Consumer protection

Time the EU stepped in and made vendors warranties cover any non-destructive actions a user might perform. The manufacturers would soon be forced to provide a reset to factory settings facility.

It just isn't reasonable that an expensive piece of equipment can be rendered useless by simply pressing a few buttons on it. Can you imagine having purchased an 80 inch OLED 4K television and it being consigned to the scrapheap because you shouldn't have changed channels in a 2 - 4 - 6 - 8 sequence?

OMG, Andrex killed the puppey! Not quilty, exclaim bog roll boys

Re: Online toilet paper lovers? @Piro

That's the stuff - Izal medicated. They also invented the method of strengthening paper by perforating it such that it will only tear elsewhere.

IBM turns plastic bottles into life-saving 'ninja' MRSA, fungus fighters

Up with this sort of thing

If this is what IBM working with IBN can come up with, the sooner IBO and IBP are also brought in, the better!

Seriously though - good stuff, antibiotics seemed to be slowly losing the battle.

How UK air traffic control system was caught asleep on the job

Re: Let (s)he who has failproof software cast the first stone.

There have been several complaints that MS Solitaire frequently deals repeated hands, so maybe not quite as resilient as it first appears.

iSPY: Apple Stores switch on iBeacon phone sniff spy system

Avoidance

I wonder how long it's going to be before we get an Android app that sounds a warning klaxon that an 'Appley' area is about to be entered.

SHOCK! US House swats trolls, passes patent 'extortion' bill

@Charles 9

Bad example. The IBM BIOS was more an API than a technique. What the clean room guys got was information such as Interrupt 13 is for disk I/O and what registers contain buffer addresses, flags, and other stuff associated with the request. The code to implement this may have used a wildly different TECHNIQUE as the disk controller chip used by Compaq may well have been completely different. I seem to remember that Compaq often had little tricks up their sleeve to ensure you only purchased replacement drives from them.

There would have obviously been many similarities to the IBM code as the 8086/88 architecture determined the addresses for the interrupt vectors and would influence the code in various ways, but the various clone BIOS teams basically had to do all the work barring the initial spec.

If you think this is worthy of patent protection rather than copyright you are siding with Oracle in their spat with Google regarding the Android Java affair. As a developer my choice is copyright (which doesn't preclude FOSS) and never patents for software.

Microsoft researchers build 'smart bra' to stop women's stress eating

As with all the newer MS products...

...I presume it has a touch interface.