Posts by Miko

SpaceX's Starship explodes again ... while still on the ground

Re: Return Journey

Also, SpaceX is becoming expensive and inefficient now that it is the de facto NASA replacement

The googlification of SpaceX is eventually inevitable and inexorable if the competition disappears

The 'End of 10' is nigh, but don't bury your PC just yet

I have to admit that I have been considering the least-hassle option of some manufacturer with official Linux support for their hardware. Dell, Lenovo... I don't want to deal with them. But Tuxedo?

Anybody have experience with Tuxedo laptops or desktops? Is it a trap?

Now Windows Longhorn is long gone, witness reflects on Microsoft's OS belly-flop

Re: A company with virtually limitless resources ... can get in over its head

Definitely sounds like the IBM Future Systems project from the 1970s. AFAIK that also involved world domination goals and a fancy new type of storage abstraction.

Tiny Linux kernel tweak could cut datacenter power use by 30%, boffins say

Re: Kernel

Your mention of the device tree parser reminded me that on Windows, disabling the Microsoft Device Association Root Enumerator is reported to fix many Elden Ring microstutters...

I have no idea what that thing is actually doing in the background, but kernel interrupts being somehow involved would not surprise me

Interpol wants everyone to stop saying 'pig butchering'

First time I hear the term - which led to me idly thinking the "pig butchering" in the headline might have something to do with violent attacks against the police. Interpol not liking that made some sense, too, though them framing it as just a terminology issue would have been surprising.

The end is in sight for Windows 10, but Microsoft keeps pushing out fixes

Did all old hardware receive fixes to every one of the discovered TPM vulnerabilities?

Hands up if you want to volunteer for layoffs, IBM tells staff

That's one thing that never makes sense to me (except from a company looting perspective)

Stock buybacks should only be allowed if management compensation is *not* tied to the performance of the stock, neither directly nor by explicit bonus metrics.

Otherwise you create an absolutely massive moral hazard. For a long term investor, it seems to me that any benefits pale in comparison to the hollowing out that clearly results over time because of this.

Windows 3.11 trundles on as job site pleads for 'driver updates' on German trains

If you ask me, it would be kind of pointless to upgrade the OS on some embedded system on a 30 year old train with 20 more years of expected service life from Windows 3.11 to, say, Windows 11. Even without considering the ISA cards and such, there would be at least another major OS upgrade required to keep the OS supported anyway.

Although on the upside, an OS upgrade *would* create an opportunity to insert the DRM that bricks the trains if not serviced by the original manufacturer, allowing Siemens trains to keep up with Newag in innovative fleet monetization... sorry, I meant modernization, strategies. And you could always explain the intentionally-created issues away with the complexity of maintaining Windows 11!

Intel offers $179 Arc A580 GPU to gamers on a budget

Why the snark? A $179 graphics card that you can actually game on poo-pooed simply for being marketed realistically - and yes, gaming at 1080p is very much a realistic proposition, you don't actually need the $1790 Nvidia card.

Microsoft suggests businesses buy fewer PCs. No, really

Must mean the businesses are no longer replacing their PCs as frequently as they "should", so time to push a subscription model to combat this.

General Motors charges mandatory $1,500 fee for three years of optional car features

Re: Just another manufacturer to ignore for the duration.

The satnav software on my Yaris has updated its look quite a bit since I got it. Seems to work a bit quicker, too.

The touch interface is not great, though.

tz database community up in arms over proposals to merge certain time zones

Multiplying the problem

Simplifying timezone database handling by introducing a compile time option to build a different database, one for normal use and one for historians that need actual accuracy?

What genius - now there are two databases to maintain! Ok, it's not so bad - you just have to run the full test suite twice, as well as making sure to have test cases that separate the differences. Uh... there *are* suitably complete test suites for something as important as this, yes? Especially with the sources obviously complicated by global compile flags that change the behaviour all over the place, and with the project goal of merging some of the timezones apparently touching quite old stuff with most every release, the expected results will also change with every release?