Posts by CrazyOldCatMan

IBM kills Global Technology and Global Business Services: It's all ‘IBM Services’ now

Re: Services is tough

it's tough going for IBM, DXC, HCL etc.

Hang on - I'll get out my violin.

Nope, can't find it. It's been downsized to match and now needs a scanning electron microscope to spot it.

Re: Trusted to sack project staff half-way through the project.

Do what Bain & Company should have done. Display your exponential intelligence by staying well clear.

Well - I suspect that they made several tanker-loads of cash out of providing (essentially) meaningless soundbytes so they are going to be laughing all the way to the bank. Followed by a swift renaming so that the pervase stench of failure doesn't follow them. Either that or blame it all on a rogue intern..

nd attended the right schools and university

And/or has bought the right-sounding degree..

is this something to do with Crufts?'

Sadly, Crufts has also ceased to mean "the best of breed". It's more about "closest adherance to breed standards" even if that breed standard results in dogs that can't breathe or breed unaided.

(CF: Pugs or bulldogs for the former and miniture dachsunds for the latter)

- Who writes this crap?

Someone with an MBA in Marketing. Universally recognised as adding no value whatsoever to a company.

Re: IBM “has the most skilled, [..] IT and business consulting professionals in the world.”

Its not the PC that killed IBM; its the competition

And the failure to actually put into practise what past heads of IBM came to realise: "adapt to the new market or die".

Re: Itsy Bitsy Mismanagement

Idiots Become Managers

To be fair - this is fairly pervasive throughout corporatia..

IBM have their own cloud? Gosh.

Well - they had to do *something* with all those old mainframes that other people are no longer using..

Users clutch refilled Box boxen after 'empty' folder panic

And those who have lost irretrievable data, but it was a long time ago and therefore couldn't possibly happen again

And those that still use tape as a backup medium despite the fact that restores from tape regularly fail..

Not that I'm bitter or anything (one past workplace used to store tapes in a locked storeroom. Unfortunately, said storeroom was over the plant room and tapes would regularly get corrupted by the magnetic fields from the large pumps on the ceiling of the plant room..)

Childcare is a pain in the bum and so is HMRC's buggy subsidies site

Re: I'm running out of clever titles for FAIL

that's why they are teaching kids html so they can build websites that work

HTML is the simplest, most trivial parts of a website. Security and authentication are a tad more difficult.. (although if bloated plutocrats like Saisburys can get it right why can't the Government? They (theoretically) have the ability to throw vast resources at the issue..)

Cue the usual whining from the 'childfree' brigade about how 'their' tax money is being spent

Speaking as a happy member of the childfree brigade I'm entirely happy for my taxes to be spent on childcare. Likewise the NHS, support for foreign countries and social services in general.

What I object to is spending vast wedges of cash on a totally dysfuncional MoD. Armed forces - yes, MoD, no.

Re: Define response...

Technically a 404 error is a response

"Chicken not found[1]"..

[1] My wife[4] and I were doing our weekly shopping[2] and say a chicken priced at £4.04. We both looked at each other and (simultaneously) said "Chicken not found!". You had to be there[3]..

[2] Such is the exciting and crazy world of the COCM household. All those cats don't feed themselves[5] y'know.

[3] Or not. It was mildly amusing.

[4] A minor web-monkey.

[5] Well - theoretically they could[6] but with 7 cats in one household it would be somewhat of a strain on the local wildlife. And there are a couple of them who I suspect would not be terribly good hunters.

[6] Apart from the young one - she's not allowed out yet - not had her second immunisation and hasn't been spayed. And, much as I like cats, we really, really don't want any more kittens.. (well - I would - but I'm under orders from a greater power[4] to not allow any more.)

Ecuador tried to make Julian Assange a diplomat

Re: It's a weird world...

that I dont consider myself a part of this stupid species

Whether you consider yourself a human is irrelevent. The fact is that you are one - and all the wishing in the world isn't going to change that.

Reality - it sucks but it's all we have.

Re: It's a weird world...

because he published unpleasant material

He's free to publish whatever he wants just as we are free to form an opinion about him based on that.

Free speech can have consequences.

Cortana. Whatever happened to world domination?

How many abortive projects has MS had over the years

Pretty much everything other than Windows (all types) and Office.

Re: "cleverness by Microsoft"

Now THAT is an oxymoron if I've ever heard one.

Oh I dunno - they are quite good at buying cleverness. Of course, by the time the aquisition is complete the cleverness has been homeopathically diluted by the Microsoft Water[1] of Stupidity..

[1] Which almost certainly *does* have a memory. Unlike real water..

-ex OS/2 user

It would be nice if IBM wrote a version of WPS for linux - I'd use that as a GUI in a heartbeat..

(Gnome is OK but relies on systemd and so is a non-starter. KDE is (last time I used it) just not good enough. I've never tried Mate/Cinnamon)

Re: Standard action - turn Cortana off...

My initial configuration routine is a single step.

"format c: /y"?

Or "boot from linux USB and install"?

Cortina^B^B^Bana

Having owned a (pre-disastered) Ford Cortina I can see the resemblance:

Handles like the suspension is made of marshmallow, bits drop off at the slightest opportunity and the whole thing leaks fuel and is only one spark away from firey death..

Re: I know what it is

put a humanizing face on an incredibly invasive spy infrastructure

Like all voice assistants. Once they get to be locally executed I might start to get interested.

can't even remember when it started...

OS/2. A decent collaboration between IBM and Microsoft that ended with Microsoft deciding to concentrate on Windows 3..

(And it's no suprise that the programmer API for NT 3.5 was remarkably alike to the OS/2 API..)

Cabinet reshuffle leaves UK digital policy and GDS rudderless. And now the news...

Re: What?

or just make them up for a laugh

Well, senior Civil Service types need to get their laughs somehow.

Re: re: PPE Grads

How did such a gormless cow get to be prime minister?

Have you not seen "Yes, Prime Minister"? The selection process is well outlined there.

For the unfortunates who haven't seen it, the process is thus:

1. Two strong candidates with ability stand for the job. Each has rabid followers who will never, never vote for the other to be PM.

2. Deadlock ensues

3. A compromise, third candidate is put forward - someone who no-one really strongly objects to - usually on the basis that they haven't actually done anything that anyone objects to (the last 4 words are probably redundant)

4. Everyone involved holds their noses and votes for the compromise candidate on the basis that at least they are not candidate A or B.

Thus, the strong candidates of proven ability don't get to be PM whilst a candidate that is such a non-entity that no-one objects to them gets elected.

Here endeth the lesson.

Re: Digital what?

but aren't these people meant to be smart

Well they have a degree which (usually) indicates some sort of..

PPE you say?

Oh.

Beer hall putz: Regulator slaps northern pub over Nazi-themed ad

Re: The problem here is bigger than one pub...

Can I say "colonial boy" without offending?

Yeah - but which colony? The naughty one that kicked us out 250 years ago, the slightly-less-naughty one that beats us at sports[1] or one of the nice ones?

[1] Not exactly an exclusive club this.. depending on the sport of course.

Re: Germans are pretty sick of war jokes and I'm not surprised. They did start it though.

Mosely and his blackshirts were mildly popular here, supported by the Daily Mail

I'm shocked I tell you, shocked that such an upstanding organisation like the Daily Heil would ever support a facist organistion.

Next you'll be telling me that they dislike immigrants!

Carphone Warehouse cops £400k fine after hack exposed 3 MEEELLION folks’ data

Re: GDPR

START at £500,000 and then reduce it to show where good practice was used

Ah - the (alleged) HMRC method of assessing fines. Unless you happen to be a large multi-national company or the CEO happens to be the brother of someone you went to Eton with..

Fines should be realistic and punitive

And will be under GDPR..

Watt? You thought the wireless charging war was over? It ain't even begun

Re: Surely unidirectional wireless is an incredibly inefficient approach to transmitting energy?

Yes, I'm cynical, very cynical.

Or, as we prefer to call it round here, a realist.

Russia claims it repelled home-grown drone swarm in Syria

Low tech is often very effective

Indeed. A bow and arrow can kill you almost as easily as a rifle.. Just ask the French!

WikiLeave? Assange tipped for Ecuadorian eviction

Re: He may regret waiting

I believe Trump has a reputation for valuing and rewarding loyalty

Where said value is asymptotically approaching zero?

MPs sceptical of plan for IT to save the day after UK quits customs union

Can't we go back to the system of bartering?

OK - now, how many unborn children does it cost to get a new car?

Re: Hmm

The second one failed in a cloud of managerial infighting for the fourth time in a row

NPfIT?

Re: but they took a clear decision

MPs who claim the referendum was binding to be blatant, deliberate liars

Objection! Tautology..

technology by cramming 'blockchain'

With their advanced level of technology knowledge they probably think that 'blockchain' is the big metal thingy made of lots of links that can be raised to prevent ships coming into a harbour..

How are the shares, Bry? Intel chief cops to CPU fix slowdowns

Re: What Annoys Me...

FOUR different hardware manufacturers have EXACTLY the same flaw

The phrase "convergent evolution" springs to mind. They set out to solve a (mostly) identical set of functionalities and ended up with a (mostly) identical set of solutions.

The (mostly) bit is why AMD are not vulnerable to one of the exploits..

No paranoia or conspiracy theories required. Although I'm sure that the existing TLAs are more than happy to take advantage..

Sky customer dinged for livestreaming pay-per-view boxing to Facebook

Re: I'm Guessing Russian Hackers

If he has Sky TV, he probably has Sky broadband

Not always. I have Sky TV but wouldn't touch Sky Broadband with someone elses bargepole..

(Mind you, I'm kind of an edge case.. in oh, so many ways..)

paying for Sky in the first place

Some people don't have much of a choice.. (especially if, like me, you live in an area where the FTA transmitters are all shadowed by tall buildings/hills.

Sure, there is Freesat - but you can't get the NFL on Freesat..

Re: Card Number?

third party sky decoder with a real card

Are there any available now? I remember haunting the various forums about 5 years ago where a lot of people were bemoaning the lack of *legal* 3rd-party boxes that can get Sky

Re: THAT Price for one View?

If no one payed

The word you are looking for is "paid"..

Mystery surrounds fate of secret satellite slung by SpaceX

Re: the 45th Space Wing?

A platoon of "M3A1" could be as well a platoon of peashooters in a tin can, as a platoon of serious battle tanks

WW2 US[1] tanks were very much a case of quantity over quality. Who cares if you lose 10 Sherman tanks in order to kill one Tiger 2? We had thousands of the things and the Germans only had hundreds of theirs.

Bit of a bummer for the tank crews though.

Things did improve later (mostly post-Normandy landings) though.

[1] British tanks were not much better - you had the 'really heavy armour but only a peashooter of a main gun[1a]" ones that could barely manage 15mph or the "no real armour and a peashooter of a gun" ones. The best[2] UK tanks were made by taking some of the US designs and putting a BFG on them so that they actually had a chance of shooting back at the panzers..

[1a] As in the Matilda tanks.

[2] This is, of course, like every Internet comment, a gross oversimplification.

Re: Probably the work of SPECTRE

I thought digital watches were a really neat idea

Likewise. I had a (Timex? Casio?) red LED watch sometime in the late 70's or early 80's. The thing was, if you kept pushing the button to see the time (the display blanked after a couple of seconds), the battery life was somwhat similar to that of a modern Apple Watch.

Progress eh?

Boffins use inkjets to print explosives

Re: This might not bode well

how difficult is it to make normal thermite in large quantities

Pretty easy - we did it in O-level chemisty. We had a slightly mad lab-tech who had a favourite phrase: "put a bit more in"..

We melted the suspended ceiling tiles. Apparently, we were supposed to use the smallest size of crucible and not the largest..

Some were quite pretty, a few exploded (no injuries).

Everyone goes back to the drinking.

Shortly after there is a nee-naw and blue lights

Much like a friend and I playing with crow scarer fireworks (along the lines of open up, scrape out all the black powder, put into empty baked bean can, put in magnesium strip, light strip, run) in Hadley Woods in Barnet in the late 70's..

We were not to know that it was only about 100ft away from a Conservative ministers back garden fence..

Cue a somewhat embarrasing episode involving a slipper after the police made house-to-house enquiries and my dad putting two and two together (the other two being the empty box of old crow scarer fireworks in the garage..) I was (maybe) 10 at the time.

laser toner itself is pretty damn explosive given the right environment

Any fine particulate that can be oxidised rapidly is going to be dangerous in the (wrong) environment. Sawdust, coal dust and fine sugar have all caused major fires when mixed into a sufficient volume of air while a heat source is present..

Memo man Damore is back – with lawyers: Now Google sued for 'punishing' white men

Re: Funny how...

What does SJWing even mean?

It means that the person who used it can't compete on an intellectual basis with those he/she/it denigrates and so chooses to label them en-masse instead..

IMHO of course.

Who's that at Ring's door? Why, it's Skybell with a begging cup, er, patent rip-off lawsuit

Re: Patents critical to a smart doorbell?

What security tests did the Skybell research and development department perform on the smart doorbell?

Don't be silly - that's what customers are for!

Re: Prior Art

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sci.... blah, blah, blah

You know you're on a sticky wicket when[1] even the Daily Fail gets there before you..

[1] Also when English cricketers go to Ozland. And vice-versa.

Re: They have a case?

a quality, keyed deadbolt is cheap and fairly easy to install

Get with the century daddio. Physical locks are *so* last millenium. And don't have flashy lights!

So there.

PS: Of course, they also lack the ability to make lots of money for 'disruptive' companies..

US Senators force vote on Ctrl-Z'ing America's net neutrality death

Re: Likely won't pass, but...

Socialisation of the Internet

I'm assuming that you are not talking about the rise of vapid, self-centred abominations like Facebook here..

(And FYI - what you seem to refer to a 'socialisation', the rest of the free world calls 'essential regulation to stop corporate monopolies breaking the internet'. There is a vast difference between regulation and state ownership..)