Posts by Ian Joyner

RISC-V business: SiFive and CEVA join forces to enable the development AI-amenable, edge-oriented processors

Processor security

Processor instruction sets won't be interesting until they have security built in. The main support must be support for structured memory with bounds checking. Building such facilities into hardware is the fastest way to do it. Without this, personal devices can never be secure.

The claim here is that RISC-V will support AI. But AI is being used more and more against the individual. Security protects the individual.

Computing is moving in the wrong direction – support for anti-individual AI while ignoring and denying individual security.

Samsung’s aspirational Galaxy Chromebook: Shell out $1k for a fast beaut (and remember to try Linux if you're into that)

Microsoft losing to Chrome?

Well, it was good to see IBM toppled by Microsoft (after being loosened by Apple). But Microsoft replaced IBM with something just as evil (they inherited IBM's practices). But are we in danger of Google displacing Microsoft with something just as bad or worse?

Seems instead of people being in control of computing and the world, computing giants have found ever new and pernicious ways to control us. Mind you Satya Nadella does seem to be changing Microsoft into a more reasonable company.

So how do we escape this trap of computing?

How do we force computing to be the servant of all, rather than just for the benefit of the few?

Looks pretty

I suspect it looks like a lot of Samsung gear in the shops – looks pretty and enticing in shop, but not so good when you get it home. The few Samsung things I bought did not last long (TV needed replacement after just one month), external computer monitor lasted for about two years.

If at first you don't succeed, pry, pry again: Feds once again demand Apple unlock encrypted iPhones in yet another terrorism case

Re: Apple should respond to the lawful request

Exactly. If one government can do this then other repressive governments can do it. If the government can do it, hackers can do it.

No backdoors should be provided – if there are backdoors, all bets are off, everyone is vulnerable to anything.

Samsung says sorry as union-busting chairman and VP head off for 18 months in the chokey

Re: Another reason…

IBM was the originator of dirty tricks. Thomas J Watson senior learned the tactics of Patterson of NCR. Patterson would denigrate all competitor's cash registers spearing FUD. Patterson was gaoled, Watson got off, but then learned how to apply dirty tricks more stealthily.

All this can be read about in Thomas DeLamarter's "Big Blue: IBM's Use and Abuse of Power".

IBM were truly a nasty company.

Another reason…

why Samsung is one of my least favourite companies along with IBM and Microsoft, companies that want to take over everything. But at least I can name very relevant researchers with IBM and Microsoft – Samsung has no one. It obviously likes its employees to be anonymous – that way they contribute nothing to the scientific world, only to Samsung's profits.

What’s that Skippy? Google’s coughed up $330m in tax Down Under?

Waratah National Park

I took my relatives from Southampton to the locked gates of where the Skippy park was last week. Glad to know Skippy has defeated the wicked empire! Shame everything was blanketed in smoke for them. I remember after a bushfire burnt out that area when I was young ending up in the Skippy park overlooking the valley with small fires still burning.

In tribute to Galaxy Note 7, BBC iPlayer support goes up in flames for some Samsung TVs

Tribute to Galaxy Note 7

Where is that in the story? It seems this is bad news about Samsung, maybe BBC does not like Samsung's spyware? But Register seems to try to bury the story in its love affair for this incredibly aggressive Korean Company, 'Sammy'.

Larry leaves, Sergey splits: Google lads hand over Alphabet reins to Sundar Pichai

When did Google (Alphabet) become evil?

So when exactly did Google become evil? Is it when advertising became the big revenue, and advertising corrupts? Is it because of the lies advertising and propaganda spread, and Google's (and Facebook, etc) revenue now depend on that? Is it because when you are funded by advertising you don't have to have good products anymore because that is not where your revenue comes from? Is it because the majority of people want to have the bad beliefs propped up by the lies that can be propagated on these platforms?

European smartphone market rallies but Apple didn't get the memo

Re: Nike shellsuit owners like their Apple's

For a start Apple's advertising is much more subtle that many others. You have no point there apart from Apple bashing.

As far as Apple marketing goes, the strategy is put into making great products. The others copy what Apple does (even the advertising).

Apple analyse the usage of these devices – that is how they set the form factor that the others have followed with inferior products based on off-the-shelf software of Linux and Android. They others are just hardware companies that copy, but really don't have an understanding.

The others also subsidise their prices from other markets in electronics and white goods as well as selling your details to other advertisers. Apple protects users from that – but this is obviously resented by the advertising industry who want your details.

Not just adhesive, but alcohol-resistant adhesive: Well done, Apple. Airpods Pro repairability is a zero

Two things about small

If you want small, things are not repairable and reliable at the same time.

The smaller you want something the more expensive it is, until enough people buy to get economies of scale and thus cheaper manufacturing.

(I'll stick to the inconvenience of wired earbuds for now.)

Samsung sadly sings of memory, all alone in the moonlight, as downturn slashes profits by 56%

Only one 'Sammy'

The Register is slipping in its gushing love for this aggressive company.

Any finger will do? Samsung Galaxy S10 with a screen protector reportedly easy to fool

Marketing over technology

Yet again marketing wins over technology at Samsung and a 'revolutionary' technology is raced to market without sufficient testing.

Welcome to the World Of Tomorrow, where fridges suffer certificate errors. Just like everything else

Fridgy Frigerator

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRq_SAuQDec

Visual Studio Code gets more touch-feely, new Windows Server builds arrive for brave admins

The Register is wrong (and childish) again.

"We're a little surprised not to see either the inexplicable Apple mark-up, nor the stupidly expensive Xbox Elite Controller, which, at $179.99, would have been more the fruity firm's style."

The Register's surprise is due to the Register's misconceptions and continual spreading of garbage about Apple. Waiting for your next fondling and loving article about 'Sammy'.

MacOS wakes to a bright Catalina sunrise – and broken Adobe apps

More patronising guff

"Apple fanbois were all a-quiver this morning" – just patronising guff from register. Many females use Mac as well. Most people use Apple because they appreciate good design and devices that work well – not because they are mindless 'fanboys'.

Got a pre-A12 iPhone? Love jailbreaks? Happy Friday! 'Unpatchable tethered Boot ROM exploit' released

Re: Walled Garden

"Your total misrepresentation of my ability is due to your total miscomprehension of my post."

My comments on your ability are based on the explicit misunderstandings in your post. All you want to do is throw around lazy phrases like 'walled garden' as if they prove something. But these phrases come from lack of understanding of security.

Re: Walled Garden

"A platform and OS has no right to force its boundaries against the *owner* of a device against their will."

I don't know where to start on your lack of understanding. Computers are about whatever a person can do, the computer can do. So if an end user can install something from anywhere (at great risk) someone else can as well – that is how viruses and worms spread.

Hackers have no right to your device and it is the OS's duty to protect the device and its owner. That is about enforcing boundaries.

You really don't understand what security is about.

Strange how you are protecting yourself by using the 'walled garden' of 'anonymous coward'.

Walled Garden

People keep throwing in this now pejorative phrase 'walled garden'. This is nonsense.

The basis of security is to set boundaries and respect boundaries.

Actually, it is more than respecting boundaries it is enforcing boundaries. A platform and OS must enforce boundaries.

Some spread this myth that such controls are against freedom. For some this is childish, others naive, some dishonest – at the very least it is a complete misunderstanding of security.

(Now, I must go, I have to lecture on the topic of security for 8 hours today.)

It is not about blocking the customer – it is about blocking the malicious forces out there and protecting the customer. Protection is the most important part of OS security.

Four-year probe finds Foxconn's Apple 11 factory 'routinely' flouts Chinese labour laws

Foxconn is NOT Apple

Foxconn builds electronics for many companies, not just Apple. Maybe people attack Apple because they are the most influential and they do care about their image. But remember many other companies are complicit as well.

In fact the whole issue of widespread almost-slave labour is what gives the west so many cheap products, especially clothing and shoes which we might get cheaply, or pay $100s for when the labour costs a few dollars.

Re: When the Communist Party of China thinks your labour camps are inhumane...

"And they always lie to us." Do they? You must be very paranoid if you think that is true.

That ad was based on a truth that there were two opposing views of computing 1) computers were there to control people and a workforce 2) computers are the servants of people.

IBM was there to control people. Silicon Valley took view 2, and this was the philosophy behind the Macintosh – it was no lie.

Even IBM's PC were still about controlling the office environment, and I still see that in Windows today.

Samsung Note10+ torn apart to expose three 5G antennas: One has to pick up something

Re: Typical Corporate Greed

Anonymous Coward

Re: Typical Corporate Greed

"You don't need a headphone jack, so it was removed. To support old devices, they included an adaptor. I use it all the time."

Then YOU do need a headphone jack.<<

No, I told you I don't, and why I and others don't. This headphone jack thing is just a typical anti-Apple beat up.

Re: Typical Corporate Greed

"They have taken a big leaf out of Apple arrogance"

Right, Samsung steals from Apple. But arrogance. Apple broke the arrogance of the computer industry. IBM and then Microsoft's arrogance (the arrogance that says when you start up an application, it takes over the whole screen). The arrogance of 'boffins' – well it is still around. With Apple you have far less dependence on support people. Of course those same boffins and support people don't like that and they put it around it is Apple's arrogance, not their own.

"Headphone jack removed."

You don't need a headphone jack, so it was removed. To support old devices, they included an adaptor. I use it all the time. It does what is needed. Saying otherwise is just spreading FUD.

Re: Make them repairable...

"Besides, reducing customer choice is TM Apple Inc."

In one sense you are correct, but I fear not in the way you mean. Ridiculous choice is what the market people want to give you – keep the consumer confused. Apple did that in the 1990s until Jobs came back and reduced choice to a table with four cells. He identified what people need, not what they think they want.

“I find out what the world needs, then I proceed to invent it.” Thomas Edison

Note he says “needs” not “wants”.

RIP Danny Cohen: The computer scientist who gave world endianness meets his end aged 81

Technically born in Palestine

No such country as Israel in 1937.

He was certainly very accomplished.

Dropbox would rather write code twice than try to make C++ work on both iOS and Android

Re: C#

"Stay light; stay portable; C++ is often horrific but it is the best we got."

C++ is hardly light. If it's the best we've got heaven help us. Fortunately, Karl's assertion is not true.

Karlkarl: "But that's just the thing, C++ isn't hard, you just need to not waste time faffing with other languages."

That is exactly why programmers should learn other languages. C++ makes things inordinately difficult. Every workplace will have different style guidelines of what to use or not use depending on their understanding.

Even for languages that were perfect and simple I'd still say learn another language. But if the languages are simple that will be easy to do.

Of course if they not simple like C++ there will be a lot of resistance to doing that – just as karlkarl does.

Re: High level GC languages increase productivity

I object to being called shill. And 'big language' you completely misunderstand what I'm saying. I'm saying C++ is such a big language and we should replace it with small, powerful and to-the-point languages.

Read this paper for John Backus' comments on fat and flabby but weak languages:

http://worrydream.com/refs/Backus-CanProgrammingBeLiberated.pdf

Another point in addition to my long comment on karlkarl's nonsense is that when Apple changed MacApp from a nice language (that they developed in conjunction with a real language designer – Niklaus Wirth) Object Pascal to C++, MacApp descended into the C++ mess and mire.

They are wise to develop their own language in Swift. In fact, vendor languages seem to be very useful – they program the platform directly without descending to hardware level.

Re: What the hell is C++, Java, C# and the other drivel?

"Proper blokes use assembler."

I take this as a humorous comment – women program as well.

Real programmers provide a layer above which higher layers don't need to be concerned about lower layers.

That C and C++ people insist that these system languages (which provide leaky layers in themselves) is an admission by system programmers that they have failed in their job.

Re: High level GC languages increase productivity

"That's a myth created by the language companies."

The premise is complete nonsense.

"abstractions just get in the way"

Not complete nonsense – some abstractions are just wrong. But abstraction as a whole is the basis for all computing.

C++ the right answer to the wrong question

"To be fair, if Apple stopped wasting time with Swift on iOS and moved to C++" says karlkarl.

You are right C++ is the right answer, but to the wrong question.

C++ is heavily based on a bad system language C with all its flaws.

It is C++ that has wasted nearly 40 years now trying to fix the problems with C and introduce a bad implementation of OO with its horrible versions of multiple inheritance and generics (templates).

As the obvious C++ zealot that karlkarl obviously is, it is not C++ that is broken, it is the platforms.

Actually, most platforms are only broken in the sense that they support C and C++. A good platform would reject these languages and most programs in them would cease to work (at least without a good deal of modification and bug fixing).

This is because such devices as pointers and the ++ operator (after which C++ is named) are the right answers to the wrong question. The right answer in small off-the-network systems that don't require correctness and security.

C and C++ are not the right answer in today's highly-connected and security sensitive environments and have cost the world trillions of dollars in data breaches and attacks.

Good security is based on languages that respect memory boundaries (no out-of-bound indexing, buffer overflows, etc). C and C++ cheat the industry of good security. There are many other reasons to move away from these languages.

http://ianjoyner.name/C++.html

https://www.quora.com/Why-is-the-C++-language-so-difficult-to-learn

https://www.quora.com/Do-the-programming-languages-which-do-not-support-the-use-of-pointers-in-code-leave-much-to-be-desired/answer/Ian-Joyner-1

It is time to move past languages like C and C++ and the weak CPU architectures they are based on.

(I'm not enamoured of the fact that Swift, C#, and Kotlin try to look something like C either. The continued use of () to call a (misnamed) function breaks the uniform access principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uniform_access_principle. Or that it uses the mathematically universally accepted equality symbol '=' to mean something as completely different as assignment ':=' and this then has to be explained to learners to be careful. Silly perpetuation of the mistakes of C.)

Apple's WebKit techs declare privacy circumvention to be a security issue

WebKit more widely used

To start with Safari it is the most used browser on Mac and iOS (and still seemingly the best).

But Chrome on iOS also uses WebKit, and Google used WebKit to actually get Chrome started. Thus it is hardly minor.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Chrome

Many other things can use WebKit as well.

I could throttle you right about now: US Navy to ditch touchscreens after kit blamed for collision

Silly idea

Who thought using a touch screen for controlling a ship was a good idea. As someone else said they are not good in cars either.

This is not a good USAGE (notice a good English word instead of the pretentious 'use-case').

It is not the fault of iPads (could be any manufacturers, but Reg picks on Apple). When I play iTunes in the car, it is very difficult to control. I'd much rather the feel of physical buttons. Screens are logical rather than physical – the buttons can move on the screen depending on what mode you are in.

The usage of any touch screen for such a function is not good usage.

Rust in peace: Memory bugs in C and C++ code cause security issues so Microsoft is considering alternatives once again

Finally the industry is catching on C and C++ are terrible languages.

While many of the problems in designing languages were known in the 1960s, C ignored that wisdom. C++ came along and exacerbated the problems.

http://ianjoyner.name/C++.html

It is about time companies like Microsoft did something to educate their developers better.

Re: Eh?

While you need to get all levels right, C and C++ are big factors in bad security and incorrectness. While C aficionados have long defended C as you need to know what you are doing without the ‘training wheels’ of other languages, they are wrong.

Oz watchdog claims Samsung's leak-proof phones ad campaign doesn't hold water

Samsung doesn't have what Apple doesn't have

Typical Samsung. Apple honestly says their phones are not water proof. Samsung claims they are when they aren't. Marketing BS.

You should really get an Android or iPhone, says Microsoft: No more app updates for Windows Phone 8.x holdouts

Re: Ballmer laughed

Thanks. No it was one with less talk and he more openly mocked the iPhone.

Ballmer laughed

Remember when the iPhone came out and Steve Ballmer laughed about "they call that a phone?". Ballmer didn't get it. As Steve Jobs said the iPhone is your life in your pocket.

Alas I can't find the video of Ballmer now.

It's now officially the WhackBook Pro: If the keyboards weren't bad enough, now MacBook Pro batts are a fire risk

Re: Cupertino Idiot Tax Operation is an insult to the CUSTOMERS

Hans 1 put in an opinionated post

"Only idiots would buy laptops with soldered RAM and storage.

You can cry all you want, you are an idiot and as such your opinion does not count."

Hans 1 is wrong on several levels so I said

"Soldered components are much more reliable than replaceable."

Hans 1 replies "Bullshit. Ever heard of faulty RAM "

Again more abuse and misinterpretation. What I am talking about is soldered connections are more reliable that pluggable – that is their fundamental nature. Hans 1 does not know what he is talking about.

Hans 1 "The only way to break through a "reality distortion field" as strong as Apple's is to make use of strong words."

Hans 1 does not understand the origin of the "Steve Jobs reality distortion field" which was not a pejorative comment but a comment made by his friends that Jobs was able to see things in different ways contrary to accepted (but wrong) thinking.

Hans 1 claims that he has to use strong words. Only those who really have nothing to say resort to abuse. The way to counter inaccuracies and wrongness is to quietly point them out as I have done here – and hopefully do most of the time.

"In summary, thanks, but sorry, your opinion does not count." Not opinion – solder is more reliable than replaceable. The need for replacement is mostly historical, but there might be cases where that is wanted. Hans 1 wants a typical industry religious debate, rather than considering the pros and cons and situations where either is applicable (like the connection-oriented and connectionless debates in networking).

These anti-Apple rants of most people (fanned by the reg) are just such religious debates. They ignore what Apple has done and how Apple was very much responsible for taking computers away from the white lab coats and put them in the hands of people – something still resented by the white coats.

So Hans 1 take your blowing off elsewhere.

Re: Cupertino Idiot Tax Operation is an insult to the CUSTOMERS

"Only idiots would buy laptops with soldered RAM and storage."

Apart from the rudeness of this comment, it shows you really don't understand what you are talking about. Soldered components are much more reliable than replaceable. These days replaceable components are no so important because the machines are cheap – if you need an upgrade trade it in or sell to someone and get a new one.

But usually, one gets enough memory and storage these days to last for years. Yes, I got more memory and storage in this 5-year-old iMac, and sometimes it gets pressured, but I'm running with heaps of web pages open, numerous PDFs open, development environments, etc. But I don't see any reason to upgrade soon.

So from this 'idiot' - you are wrong.

>>"Because customer safety is a top priority.."

No it isn't. Making money is a top priority<<

Not true. That is what the rest of the industry is doing. Others sell your information to make money. They can copy Apple's designs and save lots on R&D. So your comment is trite.

Get some perspective

Electronics can develop faults, even in very well designed devices (as Apple's are). Apple tests all components very carefully and uses the same components for the manufacturing run – others don't.

The only report I can find of a fire was on May 30. Seems Apple have quickly swung into action identifying the problem and issuing a recall because of 'some risk of overheating and fire'. Compare that to Samsung, where they quickly bring product to market and they had a far more serious fire risk.

So it is a matter of perspective and scale.

Help the Macless: Apple’s iPadOS is a huge update that will enable more people to do without a Mac... or a PC

Re: The Long Game March ......

amanfromMars 1 - what planet (drugs) are you on. I can't make any sense of your comment.

mistergoodbytes1

"Google spies on me rather than Apple"

Apple does not spy on its users. At least not like Google does, and not with the same intent. (But from the rest of your post, you seem to prove that.)

"It is all relative, and I like what I have accomplished."

That is good. As someone who teaches computer skills now, I'm interested in getting students to do things and understand how computers work ... underneath.

But they are doing so, so that others won't have to. There has always been the 'home kit' assembly people who have computers as a hobby. That is how Home Brew Computer Club worked, but Jobs and Wozniak found they had a hit with people who did not want to solder together their own components. Yes, Linux and Raspberry (and others) allow people to do it themselves – and that's great.

But most people don't want to and should not need to.

It is like C system programmers insisting that C is used everywhere (maybe disguised as C++) – that is system programmers fundamentally admitting they have failed at their job of providing abstractions that don't need 'drilling' through.

Although MacOS has the same Unix underpinnings as Linux, most Mac users know nothing about Unix, yet Android users seem to know about Linux (says me staring at a Terminal bash shell with a bunch of gobbledegook from fighting with MacPorts).

It seems most of the criticism of Apple comes from not understanding this paradigm.

1 hrJonL722

"I, like so many others, have found that it is rubbish at being a proper laptop"

Because you are trying to use it like you have been trained (and brainwashed) to use a computer. Users should not have to think about filesystems and such manual tasks.

"supports a mouse, has a proper filesystem, and has a reliable multitasking environment"

Again, you are thinking in terms of what you expect a computer to be. Like in the past when Apple killed the 5 1/4" floppy and used the superior 3 1/2" hard-case disk - outcry "Mac isn't a real computer". Then Apple killed the floppy altogether - oh you can't have a computer without a floppy.

Again Apple has shown it is innovating, far beyond what most people's indoctrination in how to use a traditional computer.

Mouse?

Apple get this right. They have one good way to do things using touch. Some users cannot use touch, so as a concession, mouse facilities are provided.

Note with the Windows pad the keyboard includes a trackpad. Um, for what purpose? Just for sales. Innocent customer comes into store – iPad, no trackpad, Windows tablet - "ooh, trackpad, it has more". Case of more is less.

Apple spends time getting things right and useful.

Re: iPadOS?

"Can I save files and access the filesystem on iOS? No. Android: Yes."

That comment shows you don't understand the paradigm. Users should not have to think in terms of files and 'having to disk'. That just exposes the computer memory hierarchy.

Google and Android are thinking in terms of traditional operation of a computer. Apple are innovating in this area. No need to save your work – it's just there.

"Android wins. iOS is just a toy for media consumption, nothing more."

That comment shows you are only thinking in terms of what *you* understand about computing. It is a rather silly statement.

Still sniggering at that $999 monitor stand? Apple just got serious about the enterprise

Re: Shiny, shiny

Evil Auditor

Great response.

"They didn't invent graphical user interfaces"

Actually, Jef Raskin at Apple was working on this the same time as PARC and before with his graphics work in 1960s. When invited in by PARC, he sent Jobs around to look.