Posts by AMBxx

UK tells UN that nation-states should retaliate against cyber badness with no warning

Re: Its largely irrelevant

When did Whitby move to Scotland?

Re: Battle-Ready Brexit Britain

If France and Italy went to war, would the French be able to move quickly enough to issue their surrender to the retreating Italians?

UK government bows to pressure, agrees to delay NHS Digital grabbing the data of England's GP patients

>> build a trusted research environment and ensure that data is accessed securely.

Shouldn't that have been done in time for July 1st rather than the new date?

I've now successfully persuaded 6 people to opt out. Now have another 2 months to work on a few more.

Lotus Notes refuses to die, again, as HCL debuts Domino 12

allows business users to create apps and forms

>> allows business users to create apps and forms

Nuke it, now.

Just when everyone thought things might be looking up, Dido Harding admits interest in top job at NHS England

Problem is that if too many people opt out, they'll cancel the program. Then restart it in a couple of years so that we all have to opt out all over again!

SAP's RISE 'yet to prove its worth in practice...' Key German user group offers giant a progress 'reality check'

6 Years!

I can't believe it's been 6 years. In the words of my old SAP Account Manager, "SAP have bet the house on HANA".

Looks like they may be losing their house!

Lack of clarity on RISE: Transformation, implementation and data management all roles for partners. 'So, what's SAP doing?'

Company policy

Lack of clarity has been SAP's company policy since they started. Just look at their awful website.

They shafted their channel partners, now they're working their way towards being a direct only business.

Huawei names first tablets, phones to run its Android-in-disguise HarmonyOS 2

Re: Forked it

I agree with all your sentiments. Problem is, all that matters to most users is the availability of Apps. Without the Play store, you've no chance.

NHS GP data grab: Royal College of General Practitioners urges health body to communicate better

Re: Right to opt out

Keep shouting this very loudly.

Your patient data is not anonymous. Each of us has a unique transaction history. You only need to know a few of those transactions to identify a patient.

I did some work for a company that does scans for the NHS. This was around the time that David Beckham was being scanned for his metatarsal. Wouldn't have taken much to find that in the data. If that had been part of his NHS data, it would have been trivial to have his entire medical history.

Give me a (tax) break: UK broadband plumber Openreach to almost double the number of rural premises to receive FTTP

Nope - it just stops corporates delaying spending until the increase in corporation tax.

Jaguar Land Rover reaches for graph database in search of supply chain knowledge during chip shortage

Re: Solution looking for a problem

Doesn't matter. From my NHS experience, you do the work, roll out the product, then nothing. No users and it's quietly forgotten until someone else comes along with a similar idea.

Visual Basic 6 returns: You've been a good developer all year. You have social distanced, you have helped your mom. Here's your reward

The right tool for the right job. Look how hard 'codeless' development keeps being pushed. VB wasn't that far off the mark, just plumb all the events and off you go.

For small applications fronting a simple database it was ideal.

The problem was when people tried to write stuff that should have been considered beyond the scope of VB.

Stuck in R/3verse: East Sussex County Council struggles to move forward with £25m SAP replacement

Re: Gone sapped?

I'm making good money using REST APIs to fetch data from cloud to proper on-prem databases. All because the cloud stuff is yet another data silo and has crap reports.

Re: Gone sapped?

Compared to moving to SAP's cloud, their on-prem stuff is barely even house arrest!

Mayday! Mayday! Microsoft has settled on a build and Windows 10 21H1 is inbound

Re: I love Windows - update are never an issue

You'll be one of those people who insisted Windows XP was better than 7 for years too.

Microsoft demotes Calibri from default typeface gig, starts fling with five other fonts

Fun with fonts

Where's Brick when you need him?

PCs continue to sell like hot cakes and industry can barely keep up with demand – analyst

Re: Never buy brand new shiny.

Not for business use in the UK. The new 'super deduction' against corporation tax only applies to new equipment. My accountant tells me that to qualify I need to buy a complete computer, not components. That changes my normal calculations significantly.

Current plan is top of range but in a cheapo case, cheapo PSU and small HDD. Then use the internals to upgrade my 'proper' PC.

Looks like my old bits will fetch a good price on ebay!

Emotet malware self-destructs after cops deliver time-bomb DLL to infected Windows PCs

Re: Food for thought

What happens when the government can't fix the problem but is able to disable the PC to prevent further spread or damage?

Would we be happy for our infected computers to just stop working 'for the greater good'?

Very nasty wedge.

British IT teacher gets three-year ban after boozing with students at strip club during school trip to Costa Rica

Re: I am disappoint...

17 years olds drinking with their teachers has much to commend it. Less likely to get bladdered and the kids see that drinking sensibly can be fun.

I used to drink at a sailing club. Barman was a teacher who knew how old we all were. Never any problems and much better than cider in the car park.

Qualtrics posts revenue, subscription rise after leaving SAP's bosom

Please sir

How about floating off the analytics division - the Business Objects and Crystal bit? Currently ignored and wasting away.

We need to talk about criminal adversaries who want you to eat undercooked onion rings

Next to the low fat grill thing and the old dark room kit?

Re: Why?

It gets worse. A friend of mine has some clever boiler thing for cooking carrots at the perfect temperature. He is able to monitor progress from anywhere in the world using an app on his phone.

Worse still, the carrots have to go in a specially sealed plastic bag (single use).

IBM's cloud services echo its Q1 financial results: They're both down

Solution?

It's their own fault - didn't sack enough people last quarter.

Bank of England ponders minting 'Britcoin' to sit alongside the Pound

Could that be just because nobody uses XRP?

God bless this mess: Study says UK's Christian beliefs had 'important' role in Brexit

Re: I find myself saying...

Struggling to feel sorry for someone who has a second home.

Causality vs Causation

People with religious views tend to be older. Older people were more likely to vote to leave.

It's a nice story though.

Lock up your Peloton smart treadmills, watchdog warns families following one death, numerous injuries

Re: I think it's more a design issue

That's why knives are stored in a drawer well away from children. You don't have to lock the kitchen door to keep your kids safe.

To say that your exercise gear needs to be kept in a locked room is disingenuous at best.

India appoints ‘IP Guru’ to push nation towards IPv6

Time to give up on IPv6?

Given the poor take up and continued resistance to adoption, could it be time to admit that IPv6 is a horribly complex academic solution?

Either create a simpler layer to sit on top or give up and start again.

Home office setup with built-in boiling water tap for tea and coffee without getting up is a monument to deskcess

Vitamin C lamp?

Does it shoot orange juice at you?

Ever wondered what it's like working for Microsoft? Leaked survey shines a light on how those at the code coalface feel

I did a fair bit of work for MS about 20 years ago at their UK HQ. At the time, it was always said that 'you never meet ex-Microsoft employees'. Mostly true at the time - it was a great place to work so nobody left.

Not quite so true now due to layoffs but still one of the very few companies I'd consider working for (I freelance, so enjoy the freedom).

Google proposes Logica data language for building more manageable SQL code

Worse than that. What happens when you 'join' multiple bits together - you'll have no way of understanding the efficiency of the final SQL.

SAP's operating profits might be down but cloud-fixated ERP biz thinks things are looking up enough to hike full-year guidance

software support shrank 5 per cent

Would be interesting to know if those who stopped paying switched to SAP Cloud or just went elsewhere.

The COVID-19 pandemic is still going – and so is the PC buying spree: Shipments up 55% on the Before Times

Worst sales jobs for 2022

1) Ventilators

2) PCs

3) Anything related to 'WFH'

UK's National Rail backs down from greyscale website tribute to Prince Phil after visually impaired users complain

Depends upon your target market. If your market includes people that struggle with poor contrast, then grey text is a really stupid idea.

Prince Philip, inadvertent father of the Computer Misuse Act, dies aged 99

Re: forthright with outspoken opinions

He appears to be more restrained than you.

Website maker Wix embarks on weird WordPress-trashing campaign, sends 'influencer' users headphones from 'WP'

Re: Unstable

Only update problems I've encountered have been due to Jetpack. Now I've found alternatives, it's been flawless.

My major complaint with Wordpress is the very open way that plugins integrate - directly reading and writing the database?!?!

British gambling giant Betfred told to pay stiffed winner £1.7m jackpot after claiming 'software problem'

Re: Minimal Viable Product

>>> unnecessarily features

Like testing and documentation?

Mullet over: Aussie boys' school tells kids 'business in the front, party in the back' hairstyle is 'not acceptable'

Happens to every generation

If they want to stop this, all they have to is have a few teachers get their hair cut in the newly cool style. Soon puts the kids off.

Browser tracking protections won't stop tracking, warns DuckDuckGo

Must admit, I like the MS services I use. I just assume they're too incompetent to do much with any data they snaffle.

You forgot "RandomUserAgent"

Wi-Fi devices set to become object sensors by 2024 under planned 802.11bf standard

Re: Stalker's dream

Already easier ways to do this. York City Council are very pleased that their free WiFi network allows them to track everyone using the MAC address of their phones. They talk about it all being cuddly and anonymous but if you start from the same place each day, it's not exactly anonymous.

Needless to say, they claim the benefits such as tracking traffic.

I'm sure they're not the only council using such technology.

I now turn off WiFi when I'm out and about.

No JavaScript, no trackers, no SSL security: Retro computing boffin gives Google News a Netscape 1.1 makeover

Re: Retro?

I don't see any javascript and certainly no Wordpress. You on the right page? Each link is to a php handler but I assume that's just what processes the source page to be delivered cleanly.

Echo

Just finished a refreshing read of 3 articles; what a joy without the clutter. I remember I originally started to use Google vs. Yahoo, Ask Jeeves, and other search engines was Google was clean and fast-loading. Not so much now. We need some alternatives. Clearly Microsoft doesn't get it, as evidenced by MSN and it's click-bait.

Ruby off the Rails: Code library yanked over license blunder, sparks chaos for half a million projects

Re: Last will

I think you could do it with a 'letter of wishes'. Not binding though

Prince Harry, the Count of Montecito, turns Silicon Valley startup exec with first job based in 21st Century

Re: "founded in 2013"

Let's be honest - we're all a bit jealous. It's one thing to get rich by having a great idea. It's a different level of success to get rich by fooling people that what you are doing is worthwhile.

Re: "founded in 2013"

That's why they need Harry. Veneer of respectability, quick float and run.

Re: No, he hasn't.

Given their respective family histories and her acting career, the chances of their marriage lasting more than 5 years must be close to zero.

I'm looking forward to Harry's tell-all book about the nightmare of being married to Meghan.

Being asked to rate fake news may help stop social media users sharing it, study finds

Re: We need

I need to be less subtle next time!

We need

A Ministry of Truth

UBports community delivers 'second-largest release of Ubuntu Touch ever'

Re: Why not fork Android + make it a shell

You'll come back to the same problem that Microsoft and BB OS faced - a lack of apps. Android itself is open source, but the App Store can only be installed with Google's permission. You may be able to sideload it, but how viable is that for the mass market?