Posts by damiandixon

Security vets rally around $4 paper password books for sale in Australia

In the fire safe. The keys on top of the safe.

Allstate Insurance quits Broadcom, alleges vengeful license audit on the way out

Re: Its not like an auditor drives to the data centers, and...

I have and it's why the employee handbook says not to install any Oracle product without sign off from legal.

Changing AI math could reduce the hardware burden, researchers show

Re: Please don't tell me they use floating point !

I'd like to have an example or two as well.

At a previous place we had a fine tuned fixed point library. It was a pig to debug.

Years later we took a different approach and used the GPU to do the same in a fraction of the time (like 1000s of times faster). We used 64bit floats and emulated 64bit with two 32bit floats when 64bit was not supported. Even the emulated version out performed the CPU library (emulated used cos/sin/tan etc which needed to be as accurate as 64bit).

I never saw any benchmarks for the original fixed point library vs a FP solution. Mind you writing an FP equivalent would have not been worth the effort just to compare performance.

What I would say is that optimising the algorithms should always be done first before picking a solution; FP, fixed, GPU, SMID...

Signal says UK plan to scan devices for nude images 'endangers us all'

Re: Impossible to have a reasoned discussion

Not passing proper sentences and ignoring grooming gangs is the problem.

If the police, cps, judges, magistrates and politicians really meant to deal with the issue they would pass real long sentences and follow up all allegations regardless of political correctness.

Re: Doolally

If China and North Korea can't block all communications with the outside world then I doubt the UK would have better luck...

One has access to VPN and Tor...

The genie is well and truly out of the bottle.

It's not as if the age id stuff is working particularly well for anyone that's remotely technically minded.

Whitehall seeks lone C++ coder to keep airport passenger model flying

It's a contract designed for a specific company

100k over 3 years. But only if they ask for a fix or change.

In reality that's only 4.5 months of total work over 3 years at low consultancy rates.

The cost of complying with the bid documents would consume a significant chunk of what's on offer for nowt.

This is not worth bidding for as it is specifically designed for a company that is already doing work for that department and has already done the box ticking.

I'm seeing quite a few of these types of smallish contracts from the government portals.

GhostBSD to ditch Xorg for XLibre as Red Hat's Wayland crusade leaves X11 fans out in the cold

Re: I've been using Wayland on FreeBSD for over a year, but some things are still an issue

I've systems with 3 to 4 monitors connected using xorg.

I've not had to fiddle with any configuration files for a decade or more now.

The monitors are not allways the same resolution nor are they always the same refresh rate.

My usual issue is shuffling the order so the mouse moves between the monitors as expected to match the physical layout.

There's a on graphical app that lets change monitor order and it also lets me change the monitor resolution and refresh rate.

HMRC spares 661 from Making Tax Digital as rollout nears

The software is a legitimate business expense.

I'd be tempted to talk to an accountant to see how I could minimise my tax bill.

How one developer used Claude to build a memory-safe extension of C

Interesting read.

I've noticed the same issue of fear, trepidation, decades ago when letting lose undergrads on powerful machines particularly when they have little experience of programming or administration. I always wondered why they had chosen their specific course without playing/trying.

"I'd not expected or intended to have Claude make any change to that block of code".

One thing I've noticed with all the LLM's is that they will change more then expected unless told to do the minimal changes.

I always check each step with a diff tool. If I'm unsure I'll question the change and ask for the reasoning.

I've found that you have to describe what you want in a lot of detail and take small steps. It helps if you have the right mindset and are used to writing detailed requirements.

I've found LLMs are quite good to find hard to reproduce bugs as they are able to better focus on large amounts of information and are less likely to ignore a section of code just because I think it's ok.

Court tosses appeal by hacker who opened port to coke smugglers with malware

Use a search engine to find the common uses of those ports. Though TBH you can use any port for any service if you really want to, though I'd not recommend playing with common ports in such away.

UK tribunal says reselling Microsoft licenses is A-OK

Re: Common sense prevails?

Dell given you an option to not have an OS installed or Ubuntu if buying direct. It's a reasonable saving.

Snap out of it: Canonical on Flatpak friction, Core Desktop, and the future of Ubuntu

Re: My opinion of snap

I've had too many snaps snap. If given the option I don't use a snap. If I don't have an option I build from source.

OpenAI says models are programmed to make stuff up instead of admitting ignorance

Re: However

I've been watching Dr House on netflix.

Been interesting looking into diagnosis of medical issues.

Re: Oh yes

Not all LLMs check the internet for new information.

They are essentially a snapshot in time.

Re: "Even a wrong answer is right some of the time"

One of my timepieces is a sundial. It's on my balcony where I goto think... Time passes differently and it's only approximately right, locally, to the nearest 15 minutes, when the sun's out.

Older developers are down with the vibe coding vibe

Re: But...isn't it all just bollocks?

I've been using paid for LLMs; Gemini 2.5 pro, copilot plus the ones accessible via clion.

I've found that you need to start small, writing a concise well defined brief (requirements). Then iterate, refining the requirements, checking, testing.

If you don't know how to program, define requirements and test then you will struggle.

I've found asking an AI to find issues to be helpful as long as you don't make the scope too large.

I've occasionally posed the issue I've been having and asking it to look for why in an area of code to be useful.

I've found asking it to document something that has no documentation to be helpful.

Asking it to review and suggest updates to documentation is helpful.

I've also sketched out a simple stand alone program that does the minimal and asked it to fill in all the checks and robustness, by iterating. I've then pointed the AI at the files I want updated with the new approach and told it to apply the same approach. It worked surprisingly well. Everything compiled after a couple of small fixes.

I've also had to scratch some chats and start again.

I do know some are struggling to use AI.

I do believe it's a useful tool and the trick is figuring out how to use it effectively.

I was taught to program by my uncle at the age of 10. He had his own software company back then. A couple of years later he gave me a computer of my own to use.

I'm now 58.

I've never stopped learning. Regardless of what some managers may have said when I hit 50!

I'm currently playing with an NVIDIA Jetson Orion nano.

Wikimedia Foundation loses first court battle to swerve Online Safety Act regulation

Re: There's far worse than Wikipedia

It was interesting watching and reading my daughters University internet and AI acceptable use introduction. All first years had to go through an online induction process before they arrived. Covered everything from plagiarism, citation, validation of sources, truth or not so truthful, AI use and limitations.

Wayback gives X11 desktops a fighting chance in a Wayland world

Re: Love Wayland

I find my 3 monitor setup fine on X11.

One 4k at 250Hz, one extra wide display 250Hz, one 1920x1080 @ 144Hz.

If I drop the refresh rates I can run 4 monitors... Hardware limitation.

All the current posts are missing the point that accessibility is extremely lacking in Wayland.... plus the ability to stack windows, place them and move them programmatically.

Xlibre fork lights a fire under long-dormant X.org development

Re: Firmly in the X11 camp

I've built X11 for embedded hardware several times. It's just time consuming because the build system needs updating.

Google's memory safety plan includes rehab for unsafe languages

Re: Crap programmers make C/C++ unsafe

Adopting the approach of no raw pointers, encapsulation, use of bounds checking, parameter checking, static analysis, multiple compilers, all warnings errors, testing and the use of tools that check memory and coverage it should be very very rare to have any memory related issues in production.

In my experience the main issues are around interpretation of requirements and implementation of those requirements (design, algorithms, knowledge).

It's expected that you can use C libraries from C++ with no effort.

Capita wins £135M extension on much-delayed UK smart meter rollout

Re: A solution to a problem that didn't exist

Energy storage would help... Either battery, gravity or hydrogen.... 19bn spent on smart meters would have helped develop such infrastructure.

Re: £5 a month saving

> meter spinning backwards

Once they twig the meter is spinning backwards you will be given no option but to have your meter replaced...

It happened to me once the reading went back well before the last non-estimated reading.

Technically you are committing fraud...

Re: Had two calls in one day...

I have a similar setup : Solar PV, House Battery. Solar on an older fit tariff.

I had to have a new meter fitted as my old meter ran backwards. Only found out after it had run back past the last meter reading ...

They fitted a new SMET2 meter it works fine.

I can now take advantage of topping up house battery when my supplier gives me cheap electricity time slots...

Your generator feed will be after the supply meter on the house electrics side and there will be an isolator switch to disconnect the whole house from the supply in the case of power failure on the supply side.

So I don't know why they said it was too complicated to fit a meter as I have neighbours with exactly this setup...

I live in a rural area that suffers from a lot of power cuts. My approach is to use multiple UPS and one large portable battery as a generator, cost of fitting the feed in equipment for it and it's maintenance could not be justified as the power cuts rarely exceed a few hours.

Oracle's Java pricing brews bitter taste, subscribers spill over to OpenJDK

You can still use openjdk to run commercial software.

The code for openjdk may be GPL V2 but there is an exception that allows it's use.

IMNAL so if you really need to satisfy legal t&c pay for legal advice.

Re: Oh Man

Anything other than Java...

Rust is not always the answer...

Got an old Raspberry Pi spare? Try RISC OS. It is, literally, something else

I had a DAI personal computer. My uncle had a software house back in the late 70s and 80s. He had been buying lots of different computers to play with and decide which one to standardise on for development.

It's in the loft. Sadly it has a power supply issue.

I lived in a council house at the time and my mum was a war widow... so money was very tight.

When I could finally afford a replacement I got an atari 130xe.

Support contract required techie to lounge around in a $5,000/night hotel room

Scotland and back in a day...

I had to go to Edinburgh to fix a software issue.

I flew up from Gatwick on the first morning flight via BA in business class. Made full use of the fast lane and BA lounge facilities.

I had a seat booked on every easyJet flight back that day.

Took an hour to fix the issue so I did some sightseeing and a leisurely lunch before catching a flight home later that afternoon.

Which makes up for krap trip to Sweden where my flight was late leaving Gatwick so I missed my connection in Copenhagen and spent 12 hours waiting for the next flight.

After that one I refused any arrangements with connecting flights unless they were truly long distance... and had a decent amount of slack in the timings.

Forgetting the history of Unix is coding us into a corner

Re: Also...

The one bit they seem to have done well is control of services...

The rest I'm not so sure about.

HP customers claim firmware update rendered third-party ink verboten

The last time I bought ink for my epsom was 2015. Then it was 3rd party. Since then ink has been obtained from the local neighbourhood free sites... I've probably got 4yrs worth of ink in a box.

Why pay for a subscription?

The only other cost has been replacing the printer potty content and resetting the print count...

Boris Johnson's mad hydrogen for homes bubble bursts

Re: Capacity

"(also, incidentally, in many places where it's humid, a dehumidifier can work as well as a heater)"

I'd suggest looking at heat recovery and ventilation units. I've 3 in-wall units. Way cheaper to run then the two dehumidifiers I used to use and way more effective.

I did look at the whole house solutions but they were difficult to retrofit and would have cost significantly more to fit (pipes to a large number of rooms).

The key is to significantly reduce your heating input requirements by insulation, draft proofing and effective ventilation.

That will reduce the load on the boiler meaning it will last a lot longer, cost way less to run and when it finally dies years later there might be a better heating solution available.

I've only turned the heating on for two hours so far this autumn...

As it prepares to abandon its on-prem server products, Atlassian is content. Users? Not so much

Earlier this year I was looking at using Jira, Confluence and bitbucket for a small team.

We have to have on premises or under our control due to security requirements from customers.

So I've gone with gitlab premium...

While the majority of the functionality is fine I can't quite get the Wiki"s to be as good as confluence. I'd love to see a tutorial or write up on how to achieve something similar or just a more feature rich wiki with the ability to export as a document.

Apple demands app makers explain use of sensitive APIs

Re: Oh the irony...

Having the referrer as the register makes us reasonably unique at 0.02% of visitors.

English as a language, particularly GB gives a reasonable uniqueness. Not as good as Dutch...

Interesting that device specific reasonably static data is not being used such as IP address. Forget Mac address as mine changes more frequently than IP address.

The choice: Pay BT megabucks, or do something a bit illegal. OK, that’s no choice

Re: QWERTZ/QWERTY.

I like my M$ ergonomic keyboard (I use Linux for work by choice...)

Before WFH it kept the odd desk surfer off my work machine...

I remember the fun using Sun keyboards, which had a subtle different layout from the standard qwerty pc keyboard.

Three signs that Wayland is becoming the favored way to get a GUI on Linux

Re: How to do this with Wayland? Don't know!!

I use nomachine when I can install it on the server (windows & Linux).

I use remmina for windows remote desktop otherwise. Windows RDP turns off graphics acceleration and the only way to turn it back on is reboot or local logon.

vnc I've not used in a long time.

This malicious PyPI package mixed source and compiled code to dodge detection

Re: The more things change the more they stay the same

ChatGPT, Bard... Google, bing... You should always check the references to make sure they make sense.

I've used ChatGPT and Bard for reasech into how to program an area that I'm unfamiliar with. I did not copy any of the code snippets as I had no idea where they came from. I did do searches on the library calls though which helped a lot in understanding call sequencing.

They are an interesting tool and came up with more relevant information than Google/bing search.

However the way the material is presented as an authoritative narrative is seductive.

I've added a policy at work to ban the copying of code from the internet without a clear copyright, licence and attribution that is acceptable to the project manager and legal.

Asahi Linux developer warns the one true way is Wayland

Re: It's worth reading the Mastodon thread in full

Try nomachine for accessing a remote desktop.

Re: Nope

I've been using nomachine for almost a decade for windows and linux. It's way better than vnc and does not muck up accelerated graphics .

Rust Foundation so sorry for scaring the C out of you with trademark crackdown talk

Rust treatment

I always treat rust when I find it so it does not cause perforations.

More ads in Windows 11 Start Menu could be last straw for some

I tend to use Libra Office from day to day.

However for a release I have to check the docs using Microsoft Office.

The online Office 365 is still not quite there IMHO for large content rich docs.

Libra Office has it's issues and so does M$ Office. I often use one or the other to fix broken docs.

Ideally I'd like to stick with Libra Office as almost all my development is on Linux now but customers require docs to be useable in M$ Office...

Energy efficiency starts to rock telcos' 5G infrastructure choices

Re: Still waiting for 5g at my house

So far every time I've managed to connect to 5g I've been disappointed at the apparent available rate. Yes it's reported as fast by it takes forever so there is either a bottle neck or high contention.

Either way where I live 4g is not great even standing on the roof of the house. 5g no chance anytime soon, I'm more likely to get fftp.

John Deere urged to surrender source code under GPL

Re: Has there been any progress on the chipped parts?

I've an epson that's run into the pads problem.

It's actually a real problem that has to be dealt with.

You can get 3rd party replacement pads and reset software. It's not expensive.

Look for printer potty.

The quest to make Linux bulletproof

Re: Snap is a single compressed file,

I've run into problems on a number of occasions with permissions and defaults while using a snap package.

The normal package worked fine.

Alphabet reshuffles to meet ChatGPT threat

Re: ChatGPT

I've had a play with a couple of topics.

It did provide some additional interesting points and links. However more than half the links were useless or very much out of date.

The risk was that the presentation of the information was very good and that if someone was naive they may not double check the results or if not sufficiently verse in the subject or similar subjects may be fooled by the results.

I do think it's a useful tool though and it is likely to get better. I'm just not too sure what I mean by better. I hope it's in the results rather than the presentation.

No, working in IT does not mean you can fix anything with a soldering iron

Re: Customer pushback

Yes Mum's are a special case. I'd buy a new cable and do the 100 mile round trip to make sure it was all working.

Wind, solar fulfill 10% of global electricity demand for first time

Interesting web page.

The UK equivalent is: https://gridwatch.co.uk/

Wind: 45%

Solar 4%

Renewables: 51%

Nuclear 13%

Gas 33%

Coal 0%

Exporting 2GW to France and Nsl

Here's how 5 mobile banking apps put 300,000 users' digital fingerprints at risk

Re: Here's the list of safe apps:

LOL in spades.

PowerShell pusher to log off from Microsoft: Write-Host "Bye bye, Jeffrey Snover"

Re: Powershell is very good

I'm only automating builds so I stick to bash or CMD.

I don't need to use either that often so learning powershell has not interested me.

I've occasionally used powershell but only when CMD is not upto it. I can understand why admin's like it though.

Graphical desktop system X Window just turned 38

Xlib mapping to wayland & gpu's

I'd like to see a document or written tutorial on how to migrate from using Xlib to using Wayland. Along with code examples that work.

It's dead easy to do a lot of simple things using Xlib that I've wasted way too much time trying to figure out how to do in a wayland environment.

Remote X is however the killer USP. ssh can be used for security if needed.

VNC/RDP has is it's place but I find neither satisfactory.

I tend to use nomachine but only with Windows and X servers. Not tried with a wayland session.

I use also use Nvidia graphics cards and I'm not changing. The reason is that I need the graphics debuggers. The debuggers for other gpu's just don't cut it. I've also bumped into too many issues with both AMD and Intel implementations of modern OpenGL, so I develop for Nvidia first then fix elsewhere.

I am however very impressed with Intels development of thier Mesa drivers. I wish Nvidia would move quicker to embrace a similar approach.