Posts by Will Godfrey

Google killing Basic HTML version of Gmail In January 2024

What happend to...

plain text?

That's how my email client is set up. Anything else is treated as spam.

UK-US data deal could hinge on fate of legal challenges to EU arrangement

Has it happened yet?

When the US says 'Jump' does the UK demurely ask 'Please sir.. how high?'

Airport chaos as eGates down for the count across UK

Re: Current problems

Maybe there's a dark pattern here and it is, in fact, working exactly as designed.

Re: "The gates use facial recog technology"

It's wrong anyway. They use farcical recognition.

GNU turns 40: Stallman's baby still not ready for prime time, but hey, there's cake

Saved me from Microsoft Hell

I remember a quote (can't remember where from)

"It is foolish to expect ordinary behaviour from extraordinary people".

Stallman certainly fits that on both counts.

Re: 1991

Whereas Microsoft versioning is a model of clarity

/s

Chap blew up critical equipment on his first day – but it wasn't his volt

It never gets old

If I had a penny for every time I'd either been a victim (or perpetrator) of this I'd have a few more quid in my back pocket. It cuts right across from complete novices to (supposedly) seasoned professionals.

Techie labelled 'disgusting filth merchant' by disgusting hypocrite

Re: So let me recap...

You made I larf!

China caught – again – with its malware in another nation's power grid

In the words of the song...

They would not listen,

They're not listening still.

Perhaps they never will,

Watt's the worst thing you can do to a datacenter? Failing to RTFM, electrically

I never lent tools to anybody

Even my boss knew better than to ask.

Oh, and when one guy tried to filch a screwdriver I slammed the lid down on his hand.

I I be a-goin there, I be-n't start from here

To me, part of the blame lies with the manufacturer of said very expensive kit.

Anything of that nature that requires external power should have at least basic safety 'crowbars' fitted. It's not difficult or expensive.

Save the Children hit by ransomware, 7TB stolen

Utter Bastards

I don't usually agree with extreme responses but this group needs to be taken out permanently and very publicly.

Arm's lawyers want to check assembly expert's book for trademark missteps

Sad

This certainly isn't the Acorn Risc Machines company that I remember with the new, exciting Acorn Archimedes.

What a terrible descent this has been from a well respected platform to a filthy gouging monster this has become.

If you like to play along with the illusion of privacy, smart devices are a dumb idea

Re: Why would a Washing Machine require my Date of Birth ...

it's amazing how many people were apparently born on the first of January

not here

The only smart stuff in my place is between my ears - and these days that's a bit debatable.

GNOME 45 formalizes extensions module system

They can get on with it

The rest of us will run Gnome free

IT needs more brains, so why is it being such a zombie about getting them?

It's all upside down

The whole of IT is about problem solving. First finding out what the problem is really is, and then using a methodical way of resolving it. HR don't have clue about that, and neither do most managers.

Ideally you want someone who not only has those skills, but also enough experience to chose the best way to solve it - the quick fix isn't usually the one.

P.S.

An extreme example.

The network went down every Tuesday morning - that's when the dust cart came round and the vibration rattled a switch that had a bad joint inside.

Farewell WordPad, we hardly knew ye

Re: Never even heard of it

Oh dear. I guess ironic humour doesn't travel well.

PS: Neither does the word 'humour'

Never even heard of it

I wonder why :P

Sure, give the new kid and his MCSE power over the AS/400. What could possibly go wrong?

A bit unusual

These are normally stories where the "offender" gets away with it - just!

NASA's OSIRIS-REx spacecraft is returning with its first-ever asteroid sample

Re: Long term weather forecast

I went across to France on a ferry to see it - similar experience, although the cloud cover wasn't total so we got to see a bit of it. I remember all the seagulls went absolutely nuts at totality.

I'll see your data loss and raise you a security policy violation

None of my machines have a recycle bin

I know that if I delete something then it's gone - teaches you the 'measure twice, cut once'.

Germany's wild boars still too radioactive to eat largely due to Cold War nuke tests

Coincidence?

The Leclanché cell was invented in 1886

waitaminit

Sorry, that was 1866 :P

USENET, the OG social network, rises again like a text-only phoenix

It never went away!

I've been using it since I first heard about it in the early 1990s, although the number of groups I'm on has dwinded somewhat.

Southern Water to drink up tech deals worth up to £358M

More funny money

... and castles in the sky.

I'd like to say I was surprised, but, well, you know.

Want tech cred? Learn how to email like a pro

Re: Don't write me a damn book, pick up the phone.

Wow. What a coincidence!

Mine is 01234567890

Oi! Split you text up into readable paragraphs.

UK flights disrupted by 'technical issue' with air traffic computer system

So NATS went NUTS

Actually I'm rather surprised nobody got there before me.

Come on commentards keep up!

Huawei reportedly building 'secret' semiconductor fabs

Yawn

Best get used to being also-rans. That's what the incumbents are likely to become if this stupid trade war continues.

China's top EV battery maker announced a breakthrough, but top boffin isn't convinced

Did nobody spot a problem with this?

"Transportation, typical home, workplace and public level 2 chargers can take a battery from full to empty in anywhere from four to ten hours."

Last rites for the UK's Online Safety Bill, an idea too stupid to notice it's dead

Re: Computer MOT

The one that made me lose my rag was when explaining that when it rained the phone line got so noisy it was unusable. I was told there was no fault on the line. I pointed out that it wasn't raining. They suggested that i call back when it is raining. I asked how could I call back when it was unusable. After a few rounds of this sort of thing I was asked to try a different phone and in the master socket, at which point I said (somewhat emphatically) It doesn't rain inside my house.

I actually knew what the fault was, and when I eventually got a an engineer to turn up. I pointed at the overhead cable and he immediately agreed to replace it. It was one of the ancient figure of 8 ones. The plastic had become brittle and cracked so when it got wet there was a nice path between the wires.

Re: Computer MOT

Keep these coming folks... I've not laughed so much for years.

(we need a bouncy ROTFL icon)

Not holding my breath

Our government has never been known to limit it's stupidity. I wouldn't put it past them to decide computers needed regular 'M.O.Ts' where they were tested for only having {cough} healthy {cough} software. Oh, and the ISPs would be dumped with the task of ensuring that.

Version 5 of systemd-free Debian remix Devuan is here

Re: Being based off ...

Great minds think alike!

Or should the be:

Grate mind fink rightly?

Not had any problems here

Skipped over to Devuan with the first release, Initially just the laptop to check it out. Had no issues at all and one at a time moved my other machines over. Since then I've upgraded with each new release. Works fine for me with no highly invasive mess crawling through everything. Oh and I also kill that other Poettering disaster, Pulseaudio - delete the server and no more snap, crackle and pop when I'm doing serious audio work.

US tech titans say a heads-up about India's PC import license would've been nice

As a kid I quickly learned that "My dad is bigger than your dad" just doesn't cut it.

Lesson 1: Keep your mind on the ... why aren't the servers making any noise?

Sequential switches are your friend

In the dim distant past I worked for a firm that built complete bespoke Audio/Video systems in 6ft racks for people with more money than sense. If the whole lot came on at once it would take out quite hefty contactors, so each rack was fitted with these switchers. For one rather large auditorium we even have to have built a 'slow' sequential switch for the lighting system.

Resilience is overrated when it's not advertised

Re: Failover backup redlining

Well, the backup performance was certainly arrested!

30 years on, Debian is at the heart of the world's most successful Linux distros

Devuan User here

As far as I'm concerned, debian accepting SystemD was just about their only mistake. I'm not sure, but I heard somewhere there are moves to make it optional. Hope that's true.

80% of execs regret calling employees back to the office

Re: Idiocracy

Nono. Big government would never do a thing like that... Not without getting permission from big industry first.

Re: unpopular opinion: no, WFH and WFO are not the same.

Indeed. However good managers are few and far between. When I found one I stuck with that company for over 20 years until I retired. I still drop in on the company office If I'm going that way, and recently visited the old boss (also retired) when I was on holiday to where he had moved.

Let's play... Force off the power to someone else's datacenter systems

Again?

Is there anyone out there paying any attention to these things?

Actually, this topic itself suggests the answer is NO.

Amazon's rumored investment in Arm's IPO might be good insurance

Here be dragons!

I would regard Amazon being interested in anything I was involved with as the final nail in the coffin.

Co-founder of Yandex – Russia's Google clone – denounces war on Ukraine

Re: I doubt a lack of a law

I think that applies to the {cough} security {cough} services of any country.

Nearly every AMD CPU since 2017 vulnerable to Inception data-leak attacks

Re: Yes, a divide-by-zero fault can end up leaking some value.

The thing is, divide by zero is such an easy mistake to make it should be handled safely by the processor.

GNOME 45 beta: Less buggy, more colorful, and still not your grandma's desktop

G no me

I left before V3. I've always preferred lightweight desktops, you know, ones that get out of the way and so you can actually do stuff.

Have you ever suspected your colleague doesn't hope this email finds you well?*

The AI quesation has a missing option

'It's irrelevant to what we are doing here'

Ukraine's Victor Zhora: Russia's cyber 'war crimes' will continue after ground invasion ends

Re: cyber "war crimes"

EXACTLY

Also, disrupting power systems in the middle of winter is also very likely to result in deaths.

Palantir lobbied UK pensions department for its software to tackle fraud

I hate being wrong

but I keep thinking it couldn't get worse... then it does.

NASA's ice-hunting cubesat lunar mission is over, thanks to a stuck valve

Seems to be a common problem

Several SpaceX failures have been due to this, and I vaguely remember it turns up with some of the others from time to time. I wonder if there is some sort of conceptual issue.