Posts by bombastic bob

Cookie clutter: Chrome saves Google cookies from cookie jar purges

Re: Case for a new Marx

considering that Marx and Engels were complete morons, but their B.S. "manifesto" was believed by enough clueless people to get MILLIONS KILLED (and BILLIONS oppressed) because of it, makes the idea for a 'new Marx' sound pretty bad.

How about some reasonable anti-trust laws applied directly to Google instead? You know, don't allow the source of an operating system to strong-arm you into using ONLY its services from end to end...

This was tried with Micro-shaft a while ago, like during the 'browser wars', but for some reason it wore off. maybe it's time to resume the countdown... for a 'duopoly' between MS and Google is as bad as a monopoly when both of them do THE! SAME! DAMN! THING!

Google+Chrome+Android

- or -

Bing+Edge+Win-10-nic

choice. wheee.

Re: "what would you do when neither [...] sign of life out of Yet Another Website"

ack on the 'Ignore that site' - and I also 'ignore that site' for anything that uses nginx and returns 'Forbidden' because I'm running 'noscript'.

As far as I can tell, the 'nginx "Forbidden"' problem is due to one or more cloud services front-loading a 301 or 303 re-direct with script in the header, which then fails because you have 'noscript' running. Not only is it *INCREDIBLY LAME* it's *INCREDIBLY IRRITATING*. Web authors that write such [expletive deleted] DESERVE the cat-5-o-nine tails, the cluebat, AND a nice long tongue lashing from an El Reg commenter with a really good vocabulary.

[and because it's always nginx involved, I will *NEVER* use their application, nor recommend it, because as far as I'm concerned, it's "noscript" hostile]

Re: "Why do people still use Chrome?"

if you have an android device, it's a bit difficult NOT to use chrome [in one form or another].

America cooks up its flavor of GDPR – and Google's over the moon

Re: What a shitshow

'corrupt useless ruse' is a distinct possibility. However, let's wait until Trump signs something into law...

also as far as fines go, think of what the FCC will do to a company that tries to sell devices that are 'unintentional radiators' without getting them tested first... MILLION DOLLAR FINES are not uncommon.

That being said, the fines and punishment for spammers, robocallers, and other "irritation crimes" done by businesses [and scammers] can be used as an example of "too weak" enforcement and punishment.

I guess it's time to fire off an e-mail to Senator Diane [pejorative] Feinstein, tell her off about recent events in the news, and THEN suggest she step up to the plate with respect to GDPR and maybe save her own career. [she's a better alternative than 'the other candidate' and I might have to hold my nose, choke down the bile, and vote FOR her aka against the other one]

'Civil Liberties' need to favor the citizens over organizations or corporations (political or otherwise). GDPR-like laws in the USA are likely to help in that regard.

NSA dev in the clink for 5.5 years after letting Kaspersky, allegedly Russia slurp US exploits

what part of 'classified'

was not completely understood? I bet they had a "no personal device" policy also.

just sayin'.

(on a related note, I visited my old sub before it was decommissioned a few years ago. they had a standing "no device" policy in which they told everyone up front, 'leave your phones and devices in your car". I think that was pretty sufficient notification.)

Linux kernel's 'seat warmer' drops 4.19-rc5 with – wow – little drama

Re: "if Linux is permanently destroyed because of this"

ack - Linus will survive too, as will his profanity. he just won't say it where people can hear him.

Re: Is a killswitch possible?

oh, you and your facts and quotes directly from the GPLv2.

heh (oh by the way, good job!)

Re: GPL v2 versus GPL v3

uh, no. you can't suddently GPLv3 what you've contributed. here's why:

a) the version you contributed was covered by the GPLv2 at the time you contributed it;

b) once it has been incorporated it's part of another work covered by GPLv2; Keep in mind that the GPL allows you to do a 'derived work' based on the original, so long as it's covered by GPLv2.

c) any future changes you make are still yours, but it's no longer "the covered work", including the new license [if that's the only change].

"retroactive license changes" can NOT be enforced. They were not 'agreed to'. It's like changing a contract by tearing up the old one and handing a new one to the other party, and saying "this is the new contract, you are in violation of it, and I'm suing you."

And, if the only reason for revoking a work is a petty disagreement over a 'code of conduct', you'll be laughed out of any courtroom. The judge will most likely tell you "if you do not like the new code of conduct, you do not have to participate in that activity any more." But any work you've already submitted is, of course, already submitted. And you did it under the OLD code of conduct, which you may have implicitly agreed to...

Anyway, I'd say "go ahead, @#$%'ers TEST THIS IN COURT and see what happens". I doubt any GPL-related claims would fly, and if they *DID* it will *KILL* open source software.

Amazingly being 'legally tricky' like this isn't the way the law works. If it were, there'd be no standard at all. but hey I look at what various scheisters are trying to get away with in the public eye ALL of the time, like using accusations to ruin someone's reputation/life, being tried in the press, all because of trickery and unsubstatiated 3rd party rumors. A lot of companies and organizations will pay a settlement to shut these idiots up. If you can't, you SHOULD fight them, set a precedent, and make THEM pay the cost. being an asshat like that should have a PENALTY associated with it.

IANAL but I've had to deal with this kind of crap before. I fought it and kept the wolves at bay until it no longer mattered. Also hurt THEM a bit, too [cost them money, laughed at that a lot, except my bill was higher].

Re: Inclusiveness demands tolerance

well, if you haven't been paying attention, it's often the case that those who demand "inclusiveness" and "tolerance" only apply it to what THEY agree with. Yes, they're often HYPOCRITES. They insist on 'rainbow' CoC's defining every possibility, demand others treat whatever behavior they list as 'normal', and seek to PUNISH those who are NOT in agreement with them on any of these *kinds* of things.

TRUE tolerance acknowledges that people will do things that you disagree with. It means you tolerate them and treat them with the same respect, NOT "accomodate" nor "embrace" whatever they do.

And you KNOW they wouldn't "accomodate" nor "embrace" your DISAGREEMENT. Because the people doing "that kind of thing" are ACTIVISTS, NOT satisfied until they _CHANGE_ you. By force. (which IS the problem)

(if you can be tolerant of a bigot, without namecalling nor pejoratives ending in "-phobe", you're tolerant. Otherwise, not so much)

Re: Who are these people

I think the first line of the CoC (one that makes the SJW's happy) is about as palatable as it could be stated without becoming irritating, preachy, nor "activist". I don't really have a problem with it. A lot of corporations have things like that in their handbook because they don't want an unfriendly work environment (or frivolous lawsuits).

That being said, people's personal lives shouldn't be put on parade in a work context, either. If 'the religious guy' foists his religion on you, it's the same as having someone force his 'sexual identity' on you and FORCING you to refer to him with specific pronouns, even when it's grammatically INCORRECT.

So if you must identify yourself, as a Linux contributor, with your race or sexuality [assuming its obnoxious or trolling for 'violations'], THAT should be a 'code of conduct' violation, too. But it probably won't be looked at "that way" because it's CoC [selective/subjective] "enforcement" that is the problem, not the CoC itself.

yeah "what this SJW/Snowflake 'feels'" shouldn't be the standard. But the CoC as written, _IF_ it's interpreted with COMMON SENSE, is fine by me.

/me considers 'bombasticbob at old.white.heterosexual.male.{mydomain.whatever}' as an e-mail address for contributing to the Linux kernel. I could do that... and yeah it IS kinda 'activist' and makes my point.

Re: Who are these people

nothing wrong with 'for profit'. they can typically afford to have engineers develop new code for the Linux kernel, and THEN contribute back to the base. If it benefits everyone, "good job" I say.

Open-source software supply chain vulns have doubled in 12 months

DJango deserves its own category. How many web authors leave it in 'debug' mode to avoid the complexity of identifying everything that's capable of being downloaded...

nevermind it's bloatware on steroids written in python for good measure.

icon for DJango in and of itself. yeah. PHP and CGI for the win!

Re: Software supply chain attacks?

Well since "Several of the problems listed by Sonatype involved messing around with NPM, a utility used by JavaScript projects to install dependencies" I'd say that the problem is NOT open source software per se; it's the reliance on a potentially buggy [and security risk] system for "updates".

Updates are overrated, ESPECIALLY when they result in CREATING back-doors and viruses and trojans [oh my!]. You don't need "bleeding edge" all of the time. It's better to have something STABLE that gets timely security patches. This goes TRIPLE for things that "change the rules" (Firefox 57 comes to mind) on you, even though you REALLY LIKE THE ONE YOU HAVE and REALLY HATE WHAT THEY DID TO IT.

"Just because a buggy application is 'open source' does NOT mean that 'open source' is the problem." - Captain Obvious

Also worth pointing out that Javascript is in and of itself "a problem".

Microsoft flings features at Teams to close the Slack gap

Re: Impressive growth?

"so there's your impressive growth."

yeah like buying a computer with Win-10-nic on it and either installing an existing 7 license on there or putting Linux or FreeBSD on it *STILL* counts as "Windows 10" for their marketeers.

There's Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics. And Marketing Stats.

icon for the facepalm!

Amid Trump-China tariff tiff, Cisco kit prices to resellers soar up to 25%

Mexico - a better alternative than China

How about 'make in Mexico' instead of 'made in China'?

There was an El Reg article some time ago that suggested that if you want labor intensive to be done at a lower cost, Mexico would be a better alternative than China. Just sayin'. The writing has been on the wall for some time now.

/me supports what Trump is doing. watch, you'll see what _really_ happens!

Facebook sued for exposing content moderators to Facebook

Re: You can find right wingers saying the same thing

Origin of left/right

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-right_political_spectrum

Although in the USA 'left wing' is generally socialist or communist, whereas 'right wing' is conservative. However, more recently you can see a shift where 'left wing' seeks more government control on economics, and 'right wing' seeks more government control on social issues. Conservatives are typically right of center and don't seek more government control of ANYTHING, nor do they push a social agenda.

Something like that. left-wing moderates are usually social libertarians, and right-wing moderates are typically conservative libertarians. but not always. there's a lot of 'grey' towards the middle.

What is totally wrong in politics happens when you go too far to the right or left, in which case you end up at some form of FASCISM or COMMUNISM, where everyone (except those more equal than others) are FORCED into 'whatever'. It's the FORCING that shows when it's "gone wrong".

You cannot equalize outcomes - those who 'feel' you can (those who think would not think this way) do NOT understand human nature. 'Feeling' you can means you are a far-left liberal. And you are WRONG. The only equalized outcomes will be EQUALLY MEDIOCRE [except for those 'more equal' than others - see Venezuela]

"hate speech detection algorithms"

so being pro-Trump, a Republican, a Conservative, or a non-Democrat non-liberal gets your content BANNED, right? because EVERYONE that disagrees with a Demo[n][c,r]at politician is a [insert pejorative ending in 'phobe'], right?

Seriously, I think their definition of what 'hate speech' is can ONLY be flawed. And that goes TRIPLE if "an algorithm" is involved. I happen to hate what SJW's are doing on college campuses and in the media, and every ELSE for that matter. So is THAT hate speech? I also disagree with pretty much EVERYTHING Obama did and stood for. Is THAT hate speech? It seems that according to some, it is. And that's my point.

I say let the 'hate groups' say what they want. At least that way you know where they are, what they're up to. When the 'shock factor' wears off, they'll just dwindle into a very small number of fringe kooks, unable to accomplish anything because nobody pays attention to them any more.

but that's not "the agenda" to let them speak so that their folly will be known - instead they, meaning anyone NOT agreeing with 'the left', must be CONTROLLED, or SILENCED, or something similar. This is why censorship is bad. The censors get to JUDGE.

Still holding out on Windows 10? Microsoft tempts upgrade with virtual desktop to Azure

Re: what happend to BING?

'Duck Duck Go' uses Bing. well, internally. and without the tracking and targeted ads, the value of it (to Microshaft) isn't very high any more...

"But I don't want all that"

This reminds me of a scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, the prince who didn't want "all that" and instead wanted to sing...

So Micro-shaft just continues to CRAM Win-10-nic at us, because we don't really want "all that", so they have to CRAM and CRAM and CRAM some more, maybe (at some point) hire some knight to "re-educate" us into 'wanting it' or whatever.

And not only is it cloud-based, it has the potential of being A SUBSCRIPTION, which is where we *ALL* *KNOW* Micro-shaft is headed with Win-10-nic (even though they don't admit it, and are doing it with office). It's easier to monetize light-client heavy-server subscription based models... like CompuServe and AOL were (and also MSN, to some extent), back in the day... [although I admit that MSN had a much better gateway to 'teh intarwebs' than any of the others].

Seriously, this is just more lipstick on the non-oinky end of the boar.

They should be focusing on giving CUSTOMERS what they want, instead of CRAMMING UP OUR ASSES what MICRO-SHAFT wants us to have.

icon, because, BIG facepalm at Microsoft. yeah, I'm a disgruntled FORMER windows fan.

As one Microsoft Windows product hauls itself out of the grave, others tumble in

Re: Wait until the last sentence

snipping tool - is that anything like irfanview? Some people used to swear by that application...

As for "removing features" - wait until Win32API is removed and then EVERYTHING MUST BE *UWP*!!!

"Because, We're Microsoft and *WE* *CAN*!"

(what, you think they don't WANT to do this? And aren't waiting for an opportunity to LOCK EVERYONE IN to the UWP 'new, shiny' [slurp, track, ad] model? HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!)

That syncing feeling when you realise you may be telling Google more than you thought

Re: Automatic Sign-in? How else can Google get us:

at the heart of it all is 'OAuth' and subscribing to Google or Microsoft's services, such that if you're already logged in via google, or 'Microsoft Login' then oauth can silently track you without your knowledge. This article talks about doing this with 'Bing Ads':

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/bingads/guides/authentication-oauth?view=bingads-12

It may be 'bending the rules' a bit (to heavily track you without ANY consent) but I doubt they'd get CAUGHT doing it if they did...

Re: I’m still annoyed that Chrome has gone to mandatory Google login

"It sounds like he might have bought his degree in India."

I'd LOVE to be able to do that! Maybe I'll get a PhD in *intarweb snark*. Or, computer science. whatever.

"breathing down their neck,"

wrong end. I think it's more like a colonoscopy.

The problem isn't "google slurp" alone

The problem isn't the "google slurp" alone. If you log into Google and those cookies are available, then ANY web site that has a 'tracker bug' on it can load the cookies. You know, "3rd party cookies", or maybe just some iframe that collects the data ON THEIR BEHALF (and then 'phones home' or allows direct access at a later time). So WHO is to say you're "not being tracked", when you can EASILY be tracked, just because YOU are "identified" by your GOOGLE LOGIN!

I've had the SAME complaint about the 'Micro-shaft CLOUDY Logon'. ABusing this would be TRIVIALLY EASY, and most likely very easy to TRACK IT BACK TO YOU, perhaps your e-mail address, cell phone number, physical address, and ANY OTHER information that can be purchased from Google based on your "unique identity" in their system.

So maybe Google doesn't track you SPECIFICALLY. But the sites you visit... I bet _THEY_ do!

[and once your IP address for a given block of time can be correlated to your google e-mail address and other such info, I _GUARANTEE_ this information will become available 'as a service' to those who don't deal directly with Google; they'll just be able to plug in YOUR IP and the date/time of access and get YOU and correlate it and track behind the scenes, etc. etc. etc.]

Yeah, this would be EASY to set up. Really. And with all of the IT pros who visit EL Reg, it should be obvious to most of YOU, too.

You're alone in a room with the Windows 10 out-of-the-box apps. What do you do?

Re: If you found yourself in charge of the in-box Windows 10 apps, what would you do with them?

"And security"

/me falls over, and rolls on the floor laughing

When did a program turn into an app??

When they went into "the Store" and actually became CRAPP...

actually Micro-shaft has been using the term 'app' since before XP. I forget when it started, maybe around the Windows '98 time frame. They just haven't forced the REST of us to call it that until Apple's iPhone and Google's Android and their associated 'app stores' became 'a thing'.

Then it's all 'hip' and 'cool' and 'new' and 'shiny' and sounds like your dad trying to use teen lingo when you're 15.

Re: I really don't care

"Except paint. That is still occasionally useful."

The XP version. The 7 version has that @#$%'ing HIDEOUS RIBBON

Re: If you found yourself in charge of the in-box Windows 10 apps, what would you do with them?

well, aside from simply ABANDONING every "new, shiny" concept that came with either 'Ape' or Win-10-nic, here's what I'd do:

a) go back to the simplest method of doing everything;

b) make sure that all window decorations are 'owner draw' and FORCE them to look like 7 or XP;

c) make sure all control windows draw themselves like XP or 7;

d) make sure it uses a TRADITIONAL MENU [no ribbon, no fat-finger-burger]

e) make sure it reminds people of how good Windows *USED* to be at one time, before the arrogant millenial "2D FLATSO" "UWP" "we will SOCK IT TO YOU with ADS" crowd got ahold of it

What sold windows 3.0 in the early 90's: It looked nicer than the 2D FLAT stuff that preceded it, had useful applications _LIKE_ notepad and calc, had some built-in games like solitaire [which probably sold MORE copies of windows than ANY other single application], didn't take forever to load or install (on a 386 SX processor with 4M or RAM!!!) and...

MADE! THE! THINGS! YOU! DID! WITH! A! COMPUTER! MUCH! EASIER! THAN! BEFORE!!!

Now, let's compare Win XP or 7 to Win-10-nic and see if ANY of that is actually TRUE...

SO, ultimately, I'd leverage these applications to *DEMONSTRATE* beyond a shadow of a doubt, so that even the most casual observer could see it, that WIndows 'Ape' and Win-10-nic are ABSOLUTELY GOING IN THE WRONG DIRECTION, and people can *EASILY* *REBEL* against the ribbon, 2D FLATSO, fat-finger-burger UI by RETURNING to these simple yet elegantly useful applications (like notepad) with only the most MINOR of updates (to handle things like lines ending in LF or CR, or optionally being a fully functional scientific calculator with a choice between RPN and algebraic), and NOT looking like it was designed by the ANIMATORS OF 'SOUTH PARK' [which is DELIBERATELY done poorly, and lampshaded in the starting sequence].

Re: A/B testing

"A/B testing is what led to Vista"

Apparently Micro-shaft does NOT know how to run a survey of ACTUAL users...

Re: 'Proud owner of notepad and calc. What should we do'

years ago the source for notepad (and maybe calc) were included in the SDK. One time I compiled an MDI version of notepad that actually worked, using that source, and quite possibly uploaded the binary to an online service with all necessary credit to MS for having written it. (re-distributing binaries derived from the SDK was simpler back then)

These applications are SO trivial I'm surprised nobody has cloned them as some kind of open source "retro looking" versions NOT in the store. Otherwise, we'll have to haul in some gtk or qt-based version, built with cygwin [and distributed with the DLL], etc. etc..

The days of *NON* *BLOATWARE* applications may soon be over...

Re: Oh God

"SteveT is one of the good guys."

If THAT is true, MAYBE he can do something about the !@#$ 2D FLATNESS [and the spyware, and the adware, and the forced updates, ...]

"How can it be in anyone's interest to remove apps like this from the OS "

For Micro-shaft, it's all about LOCKING YOU IN TO SOME SUBSCRIPTION-BASED BLOATWARE for *EVERYTHING*. And with UWP/FLATSO for that "new, shiny" effect.

For the end-user, not such a good thing at all.

/me reaches for the pink liquid

Please no UWP nonsense!

BIG! THUMBS! UP!

Renegade 3D-printing gunsmith Cody Wilson on the run in Taipei from child sex allegations

Re: I'm of two minds about this

It does say one thing: if you're going to flaunt the law or an order of the court, because you're some kind of activist, don't make yourself an even BIGGER target by engaging in other more heinous illegal activities, like having sex with minors. And don't claim "they're just after me" either, because it's pretty obvious to the rest of us what's going on.

Re: Upped the charge...

"guys that met under age girls in bars and still got nailed ."

'sauce' please. I suspect not so much.

But even so, it's really kinda dumb to go screwing people you don't know very well anyway. Maybe that's what people oughta think about, beforehand. Just sayin'.

Re: Upped the charge...

I'd just say (as someone who's WAY older than 18) if she can't get into a bar with you, she's too young. Let _THEM_ check her ID for ya! "Hey let's go grab some cocktails first"

Never mind Brexit. UK must fling more £billions at nuke subs, say MPs

Re: Useful rule of thumb

@Pen-y-gors - you advocating Brexit as well? Sounds similar to me...

/me runs away after saying the 'B' word

Re: Simplistic solution to two problems

who cares about carbon. if it's cost effective, make nuclear reactors. if it's not, don't.

in the case of submarines, a sub's nuclear reactor is a bit different than a civilian one that's designed only to make electricity. One is the cost of refueling. Whereas a civilian reactor a) doesn't have to change power levels radically in a short period of time, b) doesn't have to take odd 'angles and dangles', and c) doesn't have to have "that kind of power density", a civilian reactor can ALSO typically take a MUCH higher fuel load with less enrichment and is a LOT easier/cheaper to refuel because of it. Submarine reactors are typically constructed in a way that's more reliable, but relatively difficult to refuel. however, a sub ALSO may go its entire life without refueling (so it's not really a problem so much).

Anyway, just my $.10 worth.

In a race to 5G, Trump has stuck a ball-and-chain on America's leg

remind me why we need China for 5G...

just saying, why do we need China for 5G anyway? After all, if they're not giong to honor OUR patents, why should we honor THEIRS?

Seems to me that if they're effectively tarriff'd out of business, we can do pretty much anything we want to, in the USA, without them.

I believe OUR engineers are actually BETTER than their engineers [it has to do with the downsides of living under communism and other oppressive gummints], so if they want a techno-war to see who "gets there" first, LET THEM, *especially* given the extra costs involved with having China do it vs having a U.S. company do it. Things might just favor the U.S. companies in the long run. Or UK or any EU companies for that matter.

And why do we need China to build things anyway? 'Lights out' U.S. factories and maquiladoras have a better chance of being profitable solutions as compared to trusting those behind 'the great firewall' not to try and control us at some point, or drive domestic businesses out of existence with 'dumping' tactics.

I like doing things with China when they're operating on the same level. However, when they continue to pay slave-wages to their employees, while a small number of people become super-rich by allowing their gummint to control things, and they ALSO use their market share to leverage the situation internationally, dictate terms, drive others out of business, own nearly all of the supply chains, and ALSO not honor intellectual property and charge unnecessary tariffs on imported goods [while expecting NO tariffs on their exports], I say it's best NOT to involve them at all until they decide to play by the rules.

And if they want to play nice again, I'm sure the import tariffs will go away. But not before.

So: WHY do we need China to develop 5G? I say we do NOT!

Re: Experts

"Oh and the Earth is flat! Forgot that one, too."

/me withholds an additional comment slamming on those who actually believe in man-made....

heh - see icon

Re: Experts

ack on the 'experts'.

Ex = "has been"

spurt = "big drip"

I bet none of them know what their expected yearly dose of ionizing radiation is, just for being on the surface of the planet, and where it might be higher, and under what circumstances, yotta yotta yotta...

[when I was in the navy, it was measured at 80-100mrem per year for just being on the surface of the earth, and always lower than that while on the sub EVEN WHILE THE REACTOR WAS RUNNING. That's right, on a NUCLEAR sub, while underway, ionizing radiation levels were LOWER than what you normally get from Mr. Sun. I forget how to convert that to the new measurements, but who cares. it's like 100REM=1S or something like that]

30-up: You know what? Those really weren't the days

Re: DnD?

drag/drop certainty: right-click 'copy' on source. go to other explorer/caja/konqueror/whatever window. right-click 'paste'. Then, when it's complete, optionally delete source with another right-click maneuver

takes more time, but you're unlikely to drop it on the wrong thing that way

Flying to Mars will be so rad, dude: Year-long trip may dump 60% lifetime dose of radiation on you

Re: Easy solution

on Mythbusters they made a balloon out of lead. ok it was ginormously impractical but still...

Re: Six months?????

" by using a nuclear thermal rocket or an electric plasma drive using a nuclear reactor for power."

science fiction has made this kind of assumption for quite some time. chemical rockets just aren't efficient enough to do it.

The nuclear engine (fission) is probably the best bet at this time. You could use liquid water or liquid H2 to 'fuel' it (i.e. the mass that must be accelerated out the back end to provide impulse). Existing designs could be used or at least modified to fit the purpose. It would be restartable in space and efficient.

I would prefer to see a fusion reactor, one that uses the H2 naturally occurring in water for propulsion and electricity. H2 could also be in a separate tank, but I think having a series of water tanks (where you separate out the H2 as needed) would be a kind of insurance against tank leakage or meteor damage. So yeah you bring extra fuel. In any case, a linear fusion reactor doesn't exist. It could exist, but nobody's trying to build one as far as I know. You just need a way of confining the hydrogen such that at least SOME of it fuses and heats the water to super-hot steam. Ideally you would want to accelerate only the fusion products to near light speed, but that makes a poor efficiency rocket. Better to have an ideal fuel mass instead, accelerated to a much lower speed, but maximizing the impulse. So yeah some kind of fuel (like water) would be ideal for that. And maybe SALT water would be even better... suck it up directly from the ocean. Very cheap that way on earth.

Re: Six months?????

you don't need to surround the people-tank with shielding. the vast majority of cosmic radiation (outside of the van allen belts) is coming directly from the sun. so you just need to shield against solar flares and more generally against the solar output. I've heard of a 'safe room' concept for solar flare shielding. That may not even be needed in the region between earth and mars, depending on the nature of the ejected particles.

Re: Six months?????

water ice isn't a bad idea. but I was thinking liquid hydrogen and oxygen propellant. same idea, use the fuel and drinking water supply as your shielding from the sun.

"The nuclear industry doses are ludicrously low"

Uh, no. The 'low' limits are intended to prevent your life expectancy from being significantly reduced due to a known occupational hazard. It's about safety.

I don't think radiation limits are the problem, here. The problem in the nuclear industry is an UNINFORMED PUBLIC being manipulated by a HANDFUL OF ACTIVISTS, whose agenda may or may not have anything to do with nuclear power in and of itself. THAT is what is so "expensive" about nuclear power.

Take the San Onofre nuclear power plant out in California for an example. After doing a refit on both working reactors [new boilers], that was approved by the various agencies, they discovered a design flaw caused by vibration, causing tube leakage [radioactive primary coolant getting into the steam]. Rather than shut down both plants and do an expensive refit, they wanted to run one at reduced power while fixing the other one, to stay marginally profitable. Regulators (during Obaka administration) said *NO*. So what did they do? They SHUT DOWN BOTH PLANTS and LAID OFF HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE. Now it's just sitting there as a place to store nuclear waste. And ELECTRICITY RATE PAYERS are footing THE BILL!

Looks like the "no nukes" crowd WON on that one. wheee...

It's not the radiation dose limits being too low. It's the POLITICS and the LAWSUITS and the LEGAL OBSTRUCTION by "special interests" who, for whatever is their motivation, don't like nuclear power.

Re: And given the shielding level of and lander you'll get the radiation workers annual dose

the radiation problem is easier to solve than that.

Keep in mind that your average space ship requires FUEL for deceleration once it arrives. Put the fuel, tanks, engine, etc. between you and Mr. Sun and you get excellent radiation shielding! This assumes that the ship CAN be oriented "this way" for most of the trip.

Additionally you'd probably want some kind of artificial gravity in the people-sphere, so the design would have to accommodate 'all of that' while also keeping a large amount of mass [and hydrogen, for neutron moderation] between you and the sun.

/me would go to Mars as long as it's the "wild west" there, not some politically correct "utopia"

Garbage collection – in SPAAACE: Net snaffles junk in first step to clean up Earth's orbiting litter

Re: Getting good at littering

this reminds me of something I learned in biology:

a) all living things eat

b) all living things excrete (even dolphins)

c) all living things make copies of themselves (especially bunnies)

'b' is something that goes with being alive. Yes, we're CRAPPING IN SPACE, too.

What's different about humans: we generally clean up OUR crap, and the crap of OTHER living things...

(none of the OTHER animals are willing to do this, except maybe dung beetles)

GitLab gets it, grabs $100m to become $1bn firm

private gitlab servers

having private gitlab servers, ones that do everything either github or gitlab would do, would be a good thing. Not everything belongs "in the cloud".

If GitLab requires that they be licensed for their revenue model, I'm not opposed to that at all. Assuming GitLab uses private repos for their revenue model, they could just add "licensed servers" as part of that, too, along with the usual support (and maybe private offsite mirroring?) that local repo owners are likely to want.