Posts by DCA

America's cyber defenses are being dismantled from the inside

Rocking back and forth.

Everytime I read one of these stories I find myself curled into a tight fetal position on my office chair rocking slowly back and forth. I am trying to take comfort from the fact that American voters are "special". It can not happen here. Here our voters are different, they are educated and not prone to misinformation. It can not happen here. We have checks and balances. Sure the USA has judges and a 'Congress", but they only get away with ignoring their responsibility in the USA? Right? The USA is "special"! I consider while rocking back and forth if sucking my thumb will help. Wondering where I can move to where the voters are not "special"...anyone want to go partners into building an O'Neil cylinder with a fusion drive? (Nobody "special" need apply.)

The sound of Windows 95 about to disappoint you added to Library of Congress significant sound archive

Re: Does the library feature

I am fairly certain that it would already contain the modem connect sound, but which version?

BOFH: There's a fatal error in the blinkenlights

Re: "English language keyboard license"

Don't forget you need the Tr!mp language pack add-on now to ensure that if you are in the Excited States of America your spellchecker will correct common misspellings like Mount Denali and the Gulf of Mexico.

Woman stuck upside down under rock for hours after trying to retrieve dropped phone

There are no mountains in Scotland.

Ben Nevis is not even the height of the Grouse Grind in North Vancouuver and would completely disappear if placed in amoungst the North Shore mountains.

Space nukes: The unbelievably bad idea that's exactly that ... unbelievable

I will keep the biscuit tin handy.

After reading the comment section I think I will continue to keep my smartphone in a biscuit tin. Besides, my wife does not like biscuits so she will never look for my smartphone there.

WTF? Potty-mouthed intern's obscene error message mostly amused manager

Regicide?

I saw Regomize and "Chuck" and did not think it a typo. Just thought you were advocating regicide.

I did once get an error message that told me to buy a pound pastrami, can kraut, six bagels–bring home for Emma.

It's been 230 years since British pirates robbed the US of the metric system

I think the craziest thing is what I have found in the Canadian building industries.

Here, the university educated architects design in metric.

The trade school educated erectors insist on working in feet and inches.

The beams and column drawings for the cutting and prefab shop are done in metric.

The site layout drawing has elevations done in metric.

On the same drawing the location of the beams - it is done in inches.

Don't even get me started on the 'standard' distance tolerance over the length of a 20m steel beam being +/-1/16" on the site layout. It would start a whole new argument as to whether the reference temperature should be the 20C of the architects office or the balmy 45F of the site.

'What's the point of me being in my office, just because they want to see me in the office?'

In a meeting on fifth floor.

Simple solution: Went into my office. Set up a 360 camera and took a few shots of office with various house plants in different positions and trimming. Now whenever I am in a meeting I am "in" the office. Set up a small webcam and a post-it note on the back of the monitor: "In a Meeting on the fifth floor!" That way I can monitor if someone is looking for me 'in' the office so I can call them up and meet with them "in" the office.

First steps into the world of thought leadership: What could go wrong?

I said it first!

Alistair, I think you stole those suggested LinkedIn posts from my profile. Or at least that is what I will say whenever anyone accuses me of plagiarism.

A proposal to beat below-the-belt selfies: Crowdsourced machine learning using victims' image stashes

Now how do I send someone a duck picture?

It would seem there is one problem I am going to have here. Every morning I take a walk to the local duck pond and feed the ducks. There are these three sisters that come running up to me to be fed and I often send people pictures of the ducks. In fact my social media page is a close up of a duck's head with my reflection in the eye.

So now, every time I send one of these pictures, post one of these pictures...the recipient is going to think I did not send them a duck picture!

'No' does not mean 'yes'... unless you are a scriptwriter for software user interfaces

Politically correct menus

Could not be called Personus.

Persimus?

And perhaps drop-down menus will be replaced by raise-up persimus.

Re: Well - spare?

I assume that there would be a series of "Spare" in storage?

Would they all have the correct shade of case colour?

You only live twice: Once to start the installation, and the other time to finish it off

I have flown to Germany twice. Each time with luggage packed with EPROM burners, Z80 boards, wire, transformers....

The first time was November 9th 1989. Yes the Wall fell while I was in the air.

As I went through customs I was greeted by a nice German with a nice German Shepard and a nice machine gun. Seems my luggage was "of interest!"

I did another trip to Germany with roughly the same luggage roughly two years later. My luggage was of interest again.

Since then I have made a point of landing in Paris and driving to Germany.

Be still, our drinking hearts: Help Reg name whisky beast conjured by Swedish distillers and AI blendbot

Now how do I adjust those pesky human's program?

Reboot.

Harvard freshman kicked out of US over OTHER people's posts on his social media

Re: So to gain entry into America you MUST......

It can get crazier than that. A few years back I was an owner at a company that provided services to the US Department of Energy. When the "Buy America" stick was started we were asked by the US gov to set up a wholly owned subsidiary in the glorious USA. We did. So now we had a US registered company but no employees and no facilities. So the logical thing to do was to fly to Chicago, lease an office and hire some US citizens to work there.

I am fish-belly white, born in Canada, english speaking, have both Canadian and US security clearances, had a business, house and family in Canada which should indicate stability, and in any case I am in the 1%. As the final icing on the cake I had the hard copy of the letter from the DOE asking us to set up a business in Chicago and the resumes of the US citizens I was going to hire.

I was denied entry. The reason: "I believe the purpose of your trip is to try to take jobs away from americans. Why did your company not send an american on this trip?"

Intellisense was off and developer learned you can't code in Canadian

Incorrectly.

Boffins spot LONE PLANET roaming interstellar void

Re: Naming of astral bodies

You are very, very cruel. I must now implant a worm to remove that from my head.