Posts by JohnFen 5648 publicly visible posts • joined 20 Feb 2015
"The main reason PWA are being pushed Google (and Apple in some respect) are pushing these is that they don't have to go through an App store for the user to install them"
You don't have to go through an app store to download and install applications on Android anyway, though.
"If you're not willing or amenable to running an app in a browser, you end up with everyone + dog having to push their own - usually pisspoor, ill thought out and containing goodness-knows-what-mularkey "app" onto your device. Which is surely worse ?"
I don't think that's worse at all, personally. If a company can't produce a good native app, they certainly can't produce a good web app, since making a good web app is a much more difficult task.
"That doesn't mean that a web app can't look and feel almost as good as a native app"
I think it does mean that. At least, I have yet to see anyone write a web-based application that is anywhere near as good as a native one. If it's possible (which I doubt), then it appears to be so difficult that nobody has managed to pull it off yet.
"Offline capability exists and in many cases would run just as fast as a traditional app."
Yes, and those cases are when you're comparing them to poorly written traditional apps. Regardless of that, the ability of PWAs to run offline is not a selling point for me. Just the opposite. I don't want the risk of mistaking a PWA for a real application.
"This is the exact thing that Bush and Trump have held up as why the US no longer wants to participate in these environmental treaties."
That's right, because the Earth can go fuck itself if the alternative is that I have to pay a bit more to stay comfortable in my car.
"When quantum computers capable of breaking asymmetric algorithms come over the hill, that is it for the security of current IoT devices."
Those same quantum computers will also be used to produce crypto that can't be easily cracked with quantum computers. If/when this technology becomes small and cheap enough to actually be deployed against targets who aren't of exceptional interest, it will be small and cheap enough that it will be available on the consumer market for crypto (and other) purposes.
In essence, on this count, quantum computing changes nothing. Codemaking and codebreaking have always been a give-and-take thing, with one side on top for a while, then the other, and so forth. It's how it has been for as far back in mankind's history as we can see, and there's no reason to think it will be any different moving into the future.
"If IoT software breaks (or a vulnerability becomes known) then I can only go to the manufacturer"
Which is one big reason why, although my home is heavily automated, I have never, and will never, use a commercial IoT "solution". The biggest reason, though, is that commercial "solutions" invariably require talking to a cloud server somewhere. The next big reason is that there is no way commercial solutions can be considered anything close to secure.
" is now saddled with cameras, microphones, an OS (usually based on that famously secure platform Android) and my faith in it still working, being secure and compatible with everything else a decade from now is in the low %"
The easy way to avoid the problems with new TVs is to simply never connect them to your network. Then issues like security are nonfactors. Or, even better, don't buy a TV at all -- buy a large monitor instead and connect it to a media system.
"most consumer goods won't survive beyond 10 years - at best"
I hear this a lot, but am I the only one who hasn't personally noticed it? Consumer goods that I buy routinely last more than a decade, and I expect them to.
But then, while I don't often buy high-end, I am equally unlikely to buy the cheapest ones as well. Also, when things break, I tend to fix them rather than replace them (90% of the time, whatever broke is easily fixed, even with consumer electronics and even if they're labelled "no user serviceable parts inside"). Perhaps that explains the difference?
"If it's easier and quicker to go through small claims, why not do that?"
It requires a lot more time and effort on the part of the claimant (and a lot of people have no idea how to go about it or that it's an option, sadly). The time thing is a big deal if you're a working stiff -- it means you have to take time off work to go stand in a courtroom all day.
"I suspect the main reason is that lawyers have very little to gain in small claims"
Lawyers are not allowed to represent you in small claims court, so very little to gain indeed! The most they can get is whatever fees they may be able to charge you for helping you to prepare for the case. But for most cases in small claims, there really isn't a lot of preparation needed. This is not a court where people bring complex cases. The entire purpose of small claims court is to provide a means of quickly resolving simple cases that don't involve a lot of money.
"I suspect you're just being snarky"
I am not. I don't think Material Design is a good thing.
"If you compare apps before and after Material I think you'll find more recent ones are more consistent."
Well, sure, but I'm also bitten by the downside of that. If a design you find to be suboptimal becomes "standard", then sure, you get consistency -- but all that means is that most of the apps you want to use are irritating and hard to use.
In other words, UI consistency across applications is a serious downside if you find that UI to be objectionable.
"The FCC really has entered cloud cuckoo land"
It only looks that way if you're thinking that the FCC is actually about properly regulating the telecoms. However, when you accept that they're really about ensuring, to the best of their ability, the profit and power of the telecoms for as long as possible, then their words and actions make perfect sense.
This. I probably actually talk on my phone once a week. If someone is calling me and they haven't arranged to do so via text first, then I know that it's a telemarketers, friend or family that is having an emergency, or one of my two friends who refuse to adapt to the new social more that you don't call someone without arranging it first unless it's an emergency.
"The results are only the result of testing. No smoking gun in the form of documents."
The results of adequate testing beats documents any day of the week. The real question you raise (and it's valid) is was this testing adequate, and is anybody attempting to replicate the results?
"The experience may have made some consider alternatives that do not need Microsoft's licensing infrastructure to tell them what they have bought"
It's been 20 years since I stopped using Windows on my personal machines, and licensing was one of the reasons why. Not the biggest reason (that was that a Windows malfunction caused me major data loss), but it certainly was a big factor.
I have never regretted that decision, and the decisions Microsoft has made about Windows since them continues to make me ecstatic about dropping it.
" mass production is due to start over the "next few months"."
Are you basing that on the claims in the sales pitch? If so, you might be forgetting that you can't rely on anything said in those things, particularly claims along the lines of "we're beginning production soon".
"Through more professional channels you can find plenty of PCs without Windows pre-installed"
True. Or even better, pick up an old case from a second-hand store, buy the components you want, and assemble it yourself. It's really easy to do these days.
"Only if the hardware you've bought has been advertised as being "open" to any old OS. "
I don't follow this logic. Can you explain? If I've bought hardware, I own that hardware, and I have the right to do anything I want to it, including installing any OS I want. What it's been advertised as is irrelevant in terms of what I do or do not have the right to do with it.
"They have the right to sell anything they want configured any way they want. There is no law obliging Apple to make computers that are PC2017 compliant "
Indeed, I never said otherwise. Also, I am talking about rights, not the law. That absence of such a law means nothing.
"Apart from your mistaken belief that Apple are somehow legally obliged to build a machine to your own tastes"
You're putting words in my mouth. I never said (and don't believe) that Apple is legally obligated in such a way. I am asserting that intentionally restricting what I can and cannot do with hardware I own is wrong. I never said "illegal".
"Apple would probably say something about secure boot being a benefit to their customers"
And I agree with that stance. I'm not arguing against secure boot. I'm arguing against making it impossible to disable it or install your own certs for it.
"That means someone like me could read the sauce codes, and go and replace a load of programmes with insecure ones. Once I'd uploaded the change, literally immediately every Linux installation would become insecure because of the Linux auto update scheme and because of systemd"
Wow, just about everything you've said here couldn't possible be more wrong.
"that was when the US learned that what goes around comes around and that terrorism wasn't just something that happened on an island across the Atlantic"
No, we already knew that from all the terrorist actions that came before 9/11. What the US re-learned from 9/11 was how easy it is to amplify and leverage fear in the population so that the government can get away with performing atrocities that would have otherwise been politically impossible.
"However, Google don't actually sell on personal activity or personal data as far as I can tell."
So? That's not quite as bad as selling the data outright, but it's close. However, personally speaking, that issue has no importance whatsoever. I object to Google collecting data about me without my knowledge and/or consent, regardless of what they do with that data.
"I really wish websites would give me the choice of a micro-payment or accept ads."
I pay money to some sites that offer the choice, but I've seen too many sites the just say "pay money to not see the ads". That doesn't address me issue, and unless there's clarification beyond that, it won't get me to pay money.
What I want in exchange for paying money is for the site to ensure that they aren't tracking me. Even that is irritating, as it amounts to extortion, but that's the world we live in now.
"When you start talking about adding thousands of new small cells in each market the approval process could stretch out for years if you don't have some kind of expiration on the process."
And why is this a problem that requires federal interference? If this causes an unacceptable delay in 5G deployment, and if the general public really wants 5G, then the citizens of those towns will absolutely force a change to reduce those delays.
In the citizens don't care, then there's no problem.
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