Posts by eionmac

UK advertising watchdog raps ruler on O2's hand over misleading ads for iPad and Surface Pro deals

Re: After 2 wraps in 3 months ...

Al ISPs and mobile operators and sellers of air time / phone services should be subject to this, so adverts with price headings can be taken as like for like.

Micro Focus COVID-19 costs: Carry the one, decimal 9 places to the right... hmm. Holy cow, it's a $1bn+ loss

Re: Complete the transformation to reduce overheads

Never mix business and pleasure as any faults or tracing or resultant criminal actions for fraud, misuse, business intent can be a problem as you are operator and owner by paying bill.

Make sure the phone ( second landline?) or Mobile (smartphone) for business is not supplied by you or owned by you or you pay the costs for mobile phone. Business phones should be supplied by the business and fully paid for by business accounts folk or purchasing department.

This is one reason P R China mobiles can take two SIMs, one for work, one for own use.

Do not do personal stuff on a business phone.

Only allow your home router to be used for business, if your employer pays ISP costs, or a substantial amount of them as an re-reimbursed expense to you.

Capita Consulting ditching more than a quarter of its workforce 45 days after consultations with consultants

Re: AIrcrew redundancies willbe far higher than reported so far

Sorry about your daughter's problem. It will be tough for her due to much smaller job opportunity now any where in world.

However I was told when starting as an Ex Pat, "Put aside at least 30% of gross salary/remuneration against day you are 'persona non grata' or firm cuts staff or business". A number of my colleagues did the same, we did not live up to 'spending ex pats' style.

Also some invested this in homes (houses) in UK as ultimate bolt holes.

I was screwed over by Cisco managers who enforced India's caste hierarchy on me in US HQ, claims engineer

Re: Good luck sir

Caste = Colour . Linguistically. Works in Hindi and Saxon

If Fairphone can support a 5-year-old handset, the other vendors could too. Right?

Fairphone or any phone over GBP £100 out of my reach.

Fairphone or any phone over GBP £100 well out of my reach.

So I stick with non-smart phone and do internet stuff only on laptops (second hand and running Linux)

A memo from the distant future... June 2022: The boss decides working from home isn't the new normal after all

india?

In my cousin's day as a banker some time ago. "working from home" meant a repatriation to UK from India to allow "breeding time" with wife, about every 3 years one got a 12 month 'at home". His last home period was in 1960s (12 years or so after partition) when he left to settle in Australia, with his very pretty local acquired wife.

Re: New Normal?

Here of course 'prove' is in its original sense of "test" as a proof mark on Gold items which pass assay.

Only true boffins will be able to grasp Blighty's new legal definitions of the humble metre and kilogram

avoiding errors by use of inch/ft & mm/M

In my working life our firm from about 1832 (founded 1820) (until I retired in 2005) always all used on engineering drawings both imperial and metric systems.

All internal diameters were in mm. All external diameters were in inches to nearest thou (1/1000 inch). Thus verbal reference to diameter listener was always clear if internal or external diameter. Likewise if units were off sketch. So 5.001mm in 1 inch meant a bore of 5.001 mm in a bar of 1.000 inch.

Re: As usual, the USofA is even worse

'twas defined in my army manuals for engineering.

Re: Me too

L (Libra =Pounds); Shillings S =12 pence, Denarius d = Pence Hence

LSD £1/12/10 one pound, 12 shillings and 10 pence

Brilliant for computer work as no rounding errors ( 1.0000... 001) in sums on computer.

For accountancy accuracy, we avoided ten. somethjing in spreadsheets remember 64,000 error?

Owr lang Scots miles

See R Burn's poetry in Tam o'Shanter

Whatsapp blamed own users for failure to keep phone number repo off Google searches

Re: Another App That Can Stop FAILing

On Windows or Linux (in any browser) meet.jit.si ?

Re: It's an unknown

Regret, My family refuse to use Signal, as THEIR friends do not use it and have never heard of it.

Logitech G915 TKL: Numpad-free mechanical keyboard clicks all the right boxes

No wire, USB option?

How do you get it to connect if Wi-Fi or Bluetooth is inactive?

Ex-Dell distributor in Lebanon ignored ban on suing US tech giant. Now four directors have been sentenced to prison in the UK

A company can set any forum for lawsuits in a mutually agreed contract.

Working for a UK exporter, manufacturing in England, selling to USSR (Russia) often contracts set Swedish Law and Swedish courts as forum. Likewise English manufacture selling to P/R. China we set law of Singapore and only courts of Singapore as the law forum. This Choice of Law and Forum) is very normal in many international contracts. Likewise English company selling to Scotland made English Law and English courts as sole remedy (mercantile law in Scotland can be much more severe, as law basis is very different).

Snapping at Canonical's Snap: Linux Mint team says no to Ubuntu store 'backdoor'

Re: @AC - Amen

Tovarisch is best. My Latin teacher used it to describe his learned pupils. I got in trouble using it in Russia.

While waiting for the Linux train, Bork pays a visit to Geordieland with Windows 10

Re: Need a bit of Raspberry Pi action

Not to the user. Fault is outside our control, is a considerable defence to some in front of their boss.

Lenovo certifies all desktop and mobile workstations for Linux – and will even upstream driver updates

Best not to have USB devices plugged in at start up.

This is an old problem. I find it best on some machines not to have USB devices plugged in at start up; unless I am booting from an external USB hard drive with GRUB on that external hard drive.

Ever felt down after staring at your phone late in bed? It's not just you – mice do too

999 in power cut

So, you are glad you have never had to make a 999 call during a power cut. (Land line unused)

Laughing UK health secretary launches COVID-19 Test and Trace programme with glitchy website and no phone app

Efficient T&T sytem workin in a part of UK (in Far North).

Shetland have an efficient track & trace (HUMAN facing) system working. Have had experience with a previous disease

IBM Sametime could rise again as HCL makes shortlist for India's home-grown Zoom clone

A jitsi server in India would suffice.

A local server(s) in India using Jitsi would suffice. They could improve (whiteboard?) to it and pass back to Jitsi.

Not going Huawei just yet: UK ministers reportedly rethinking pledge to kick Chinese firm out of telco networks by 2023

Any foreign souced item can be useful against the buyer. Tarrifs once Brexit is 'in force'?

I remember the problems where the UK was forced by others to abandon space rockets, UK economy and lack of investment in UK by committed UK 'cash investors' will always make UK vulnerable. Chasing 'interest rate' by UK savers from Iceland banks, who had no backing from UK (Manx registration was not an appropriate 'backstop') and general idea that UK folk and always buy cheapest without thinking stops UK investment and ability. UK wage levels in firms are not wanted by UK buyers. This problem was 'solved ' for years by tariffs , but Cornwall etc. made it big by smuggling.

Will 'effective Brexit bring 'free trade and buy cheapest' or "tariffs and buy, design and make in UK"?

Answers on a small post card please!

Notable that Switzerland maintains an arms industry even though its home market is small.

Beer rating app reveals homes and identities of spies and military bods, warns Bellingcat

Years ago , got a hotel bill for many thousands for a seven day stay in a Middle East place. With a number of uncommon forenames but a common surname, it turned out I had an identically named UK 'Official' in same hotel organising a trade conference. Umm, found we were distantly related, but four identical forenames is unusual as two of them are not English names.

A real loch mess: Navy larks sunk by a truculent torpedo

"O" ring cost to replace

One time many years ago during 'cold war', I was in Canadian office of a USA pump company when the phones went red hot. Do you have in stock two "O" rings for xx pump. Answer yes and a spare pump. OK, then go immediately to airport with them we will ring police, and airport, a plane will be awaiting you! Thus off to Arctic Lands to replace pump for oil flow to engine which drove generator which supplied a NATO (read US) RADAR installation covering 15 degrees of arc over Russia. Cost of "O ring" about 2 Cda Dollars (at inflated spare parts prices), new oil pump less than Cda $ 300. Cost of personal planes (3 of them, at different airport changes, one a biplane ice lander on sled runners) about Cda $70,000. My salary as a P Eng in charge then was about Cda$2200 for comparison.

Later I understand the small planes carrying me and "O" rings were given flight clearance and stopped commercial flights for about 2 hours. It was a 'hot line' telephone call from USA to Canada. Lesson do not store elastomers in a dry but unheated hut in Arctic at 45 to 50 degrees below!

Capture the horrors of war in razor-sharp quality with this ruggedised Samsung phone – or just lob it at enemy forces

Re: Vocab

I used the word ChaeBol in the 1970s when in English language discussions in S. Korea.

If you're appy and you know it: The Huawei P40 Pro conclusively proves that top-notch specs aren't everything

Re: reviewer uses Google extensively

Doro will suit you. Seniors Phone.

Xiaomi Mi 9 owners furious after dodgy Vodafone software patch bricked their mobes

Re: Android One

Just (6 weeks ago) replaced battery in 6 or 7 year old phone.

Re: Android One

Our second car (For SWMBO) is only 23 years old. Mine is 12 years old. I bought this to replace my 27 year old car. Mother's house is only about 220 years old still works, walls 4 foot thick stone plus rubble, cold in winter but works.

Re: To be fair

Downvote , as main brand in internet search other than Samsung.

Stop tracking me, Google: Austrian citizen files GDPR legal complaint over Android Advertising ID

Re: The clue is the name, Google

Try changing name and report. please.

Openreach boss denies BT selling stake in UK's national broadband plumber

They were forced by HMG to sell O2.

Mirror mirror on the wall, why will my mouse not work at all?

Brilliant. Our office got an (IT supplied) pre-set left handed mouse, it took ages before we worked it out.

NHS contact tracing app isn't really anonymous, is riddled with bugs, and is open to abuse. Good thing we're not in the middle of a pandemic, eh?

I thought instructions were to switch OFF Bluetooth when wearing PPE as in a hospital setting.

Re: symptoms of covid-19 compared to common cold, flu and asthma

Will the app ask if user has lost sense of smell? (while also for common cold it appears to be a useful indication when taken in conjunction with the others)

Re: Old ladies

Some of us on this site have age related macular degeneration. Why screen on laptop is set to 500% area.

Re: Masks are working

You need to compare stats going back to at least 1970, to see how infection ramped up annual deaths , not just last two or 5 years. There is a great graph showing a real pandemic of 'Spanish Flue' with a 20 to40 times death rate increase. Covers years 1900 to 2016.

Re: Iceland and genetic tracing

This has proved very useful. Their database allows a great deal of medical tracking and for inheritable diseases has been most useful. See also reports of its use for Covid-19. They hope to incorporate it into database. Database also knows all relatives over 4 to 5 generations.

Re: Why, oh why...

Concur. I spent many years travelling in Japan, Asia, PR China, R.O. China etc. Masks were your way to HELP others.

UK finds itself almost alone with centralized virus contact-tracing app that probably won't work well, asks for your location, may be illegal

Re: And what about the people ...

Likewise in East of Pond. My street has 24 houses. only two have smartphones. 'Some' of rest have text/phone only old 2G phones. (I use a 2G phone. no internet capability, no apps)

UK COVID-19 contact-tracing app data may be kept for 'research' after crisis ends, MPs told

Re: False Positives

but funerals and weddings did

Hugs, much handshaking, kissing etc. Difference between an 'audience' and a funeral reception.

Re: No chance

Staying Home. No mask, but wearing scarf and gloves on shopping "expeditions". Expeditions due to long wait in a queue.

As Brit cyber-spies drop 'whitelist' and 'blacklist', tech boss says: If you’re thinking about getting in touch saying this is political correctness gone mad, don’t bother

Re: Irrelevent

But my ginger has faded with age.

I was brought up to associate Indian word "Caste" as referring to colour of skin. Higher castes had lighter skin. Lower castes had darker skin. Skin colour is deep inside the Indian thought processes.

Meaning of higher and lower being social rankings.

Three is the magic number, unless you're Apple. That's how many million iPad shipments it was down in Q1

Re: Overpriced

Linux phone ?

HP Ink to compensate punters for bricking third-party ink cartridges

Re: It's better to get a Japanese brand printer

Oki desktop Laser black & white printers are good. I changed first one after 7 years of 400 odd pages per month years ago for a second one. Present one in on 3rd set of ink at about 45,000 pages and about 8 years old.

Guess who's back, back again. SE's back, tell a friend: 2020 reboot looks like an iPhone 8 and even shares components

Re: but how is it selling?

Concur. Two of us in this household use old DODO phones. Does what we want phone calls and texts. In house there are about 4 large 15" - 17" laptops with Windows 10 (unused) and USB hard discs with about 8 Linux distros in use (Main driver openSUSE LEAP 15,1 with a Ubuntu 18.04 as spare). Knoppix, Linux Mint, Debian etc. on smaller (< 64 GB USBs).

Forget tabs – the new war is commas versus spaces: Web heads urged by browser devs to embrace modern CSS

Re: WTF

Can humans in ordinary speech define these colours?

Can humans eyes detect these colours as discrete unique colours ?

We have enough problems with humans not agreeing on 'blue' / 'green'.

Is it of any use to humans viewing a screen?

SE's baaaack: Apple flings out iPhone SE 2020, priced at £419

Re: iphone upgrade

GBP £90 pe ryear pocket money? UMMN! No on a state pension.

Samsung calls it a day on liquid-crystal display, says quantum dot is really hot

Re: So, QLED is best ?

You have the lights *on* when watching TV? or (!).

OK brainiacs, we've got an IT cold case for you: Fatal disk errors on an Amiga 4000 with 600MB external SCSI unless the clock app is... just so

Mechanical Druidic Magic

In times long gone, We reground to 'flat' (a specific very accurate specification in microns over 5 metre length) a large 'bed plate" for a very large bed grinder (about 3m x3m square bed area), as 'grinder developed errors' about once per month. Much to and fro with manufacturers who paid for this as warranty. By co-incidence, one day I was looking at moon-earth positions relative to calendar, and suddenly realised errors always and only occurred when the moon was closest to earth. I enabled stop work on that machine when The Moon was close to earth (perigee). It worked no errors when working and of course no errors when not working! Later after investigation we found foundations for machine was a 600 odd ton concrete pillar. The moon's gravity distorted the machine when close, relative to overhead machining arm supports, which were fixed independently to factory floor outside grinder base so the many motor rotations & vibrations did not effect grinding fixtures! We called this work routine 'this machine does not work when druids walk'.

Memory is fragile, but big foundations do distort with gravity relative to surrounding shallow machine beds.

Link: the words 'Druidic Magic' took me back to that problem of my early working days as a 'gentleman apprentice'.