Posts by Bob Scrantzen

When forgetting to set a password for root is the least of your woes

I never needed to hack our shiny new £50,000 UNIX Server, it was left completely open.

Full rwx permissions and privileges. Just change directory to another user

I was angry at our 3rd party supplier's incompetence but never said anything

It was too useful knowing the salary of everyone in the company

And the secret plans to geographically relocate to a cheaper part of the country, 150 miles away

Four of us, in the know, went to the Managing Director and complained and the plan was kiboshed.

(most of our customers were in the South East)

We set up a meeting at his house one evening

"How do you know all this?"

"Can't say, sorry"

The loophole was never closed

The Ministry of Silly Printing: But I don't want my golf club correspondence to say 'UNCLASSIFIED' at the bottom

ISO9000/9001 was a pain with the Inspectors demanding Calibration on our High Precision Machines.

Only me and a Senior (female) Secretary were prepared to do it and the company processes and departments,

Goods In/Out, Complaints etc etc.

In addition to our Normal Jobs

I ran the Service Centre and decreed that most test equipment was Calibration Not Required.

We tested our machines to a certain standard (with power meters that had to be calibrated and the PAT Testing)

But general multimeters, feeler/block gauges, Verniers and micrometers were Outside the System.

The Inspectors, used to inspecting Military and Aerospace places, were initially sceptical but had to accept my explanation of our operation.

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The Millennium Bug / Y2k was a different matter for our Corporate Customers

I had to fill in a Declaration for hammers, pliers, cables...

Hundreds of bloody non-affected products that their purchasing compuuter said we were responsible for.

Re: Back in the early 90's

Our HQ Manageress was responsible for the main accountancy, HR, Wordprocessing, etc UNIX system.

She was sold an upgrade by some Snake Oil Salesman for £50k ish.

Us Windows hardware and Software Engineers were involved and consulted at a late stage, once the deal was almost done.

"Will it interface with Excel, vBasic, MS Access etc?"

"Oh Yes! Said Mr Snake Oil."

But those modules were an extra £20k and we never got them.

However, we did get a shiny new UNIX system where all the Permissions had been left open.

We could read everything (for those of us who knew how to change directory)

Memos, salaries etc

Interesting stuff.

But then a bombshell between our Accountant and Managing Director.

Our stupid Accountant wanted to close our London HQ and relocate to a small Industrial Estate in Shropshire.

I was aghast, my colleagues were aghast.

Our customers mostly within the M25.

We all had young families, schools, mortgages in SW London.

We went to our MD, at his home, with permission, for a Special Meeting.

Him and his wife were very hospitable anyway. We knew them well.

"How do you know the relocation plan?"

"Can't say, but it's a very bad idea for the Company and our Customers"

It was all kiboshed and our wanker accountant left soon after.

Phew.

We're all at sea: Navigation Royal Navy style – with plenty of IT but no GPS

Re: I like electronic navigation systems

I live in Exmouth in the Exe Estuary, south of Exeter.

There are a couple of Pubs a few miles up the river.

It is possible to drive'ish/cycle/walk but it's a long way

A River Booze Cruise is much easier. We did it a few times in our twenties

My friend was actually qualified as an Exe Pilot.

The sandbanks do shift and you have to zig zag to miss them.

You can't see them

On his first solo trip with 20-30 customers/tourists he grounded the boat

They were stuck for 4 hours and I think the story even reached the Daily Mail

Anyway, on one of our piss-ups he was just a passenger.

But our hired driver got very drunk.

On the way home, my friend said sotto-voce to me, "He's pissed, lost and going to ground the boat

I told my qualified friend to take over

"No. It's not the Etiquette"

We made it back eventually

I giggled when watching https://www.google.com/search?q=ch5+tv+submarine+series

The Russians continually probe our waters and we must be on a state of high alert

HMS Trenchant, a silent Nuclear hunter-killer was monitoring and tracking one possible incursion

But the Galley stoves were all decrepit, the steam oven leaked and the crew were getting fed up at the lack of proper hot meals

Then all seven toilets on board became blocked at the main pipe and were ruled Out of Order

The crew were cross legged for 5 hours until fixed

(they were about to start using binbags)

I did wonder about all the wonderful LCD screens on board.

Surely one missile or depth charge breaks them?

I've broken 2 phone and 2 laptop screens in my time

Always wise to have backups

So the data centre's 'getting a little hot' – at 57°C, that's quite the understatement

I was a PCB designer for Dealing Rooms. You know, the Mission Control, Apollo 13, rooms for the Bankers in the City of London. Buy, Buy, Buy, Sell, Sell, Sell

Our biggest was the £15 million Broadgate, Union Bank of Switzerland dealing room on Liverpool Street.

3000 miles of coax in completely full false floors and false ceilings (no room for airflow)

About 30 x 19" cabinets served the 600 dealers. All with 4 x RGB CRT monitors on their desks.

I specified the power supplies in the Machine Room cabinets. 4 x 500W, 2kW each.

We needed it and I hadn't designed all the boards. Not my fault, honest!

A Dealing Room Cannot Fail. But ours was reaching 50C.

I had my only Site visit (I was a Designer, remember. I wasn't involved with the Installation)

At Reception they directed me to the first floor from the lovely, posh granite foyer.

I went to the stairs. The door was locked! Reception said I had to take the lift.

So I went up one floor and was trapped in the Elevator foyer while my host came to escort me.

3 revolving doors we had to go through. Tiny, one person at a time.

Very Secure.

On arrival at their team's Den, I asked where the toilets were. He rolled his eyes, handed me his magnetic security key and pointed me back out the way we had come.

Anyway, I measured temperatures and recommended what the Broadgate Building Manager and our Installation Manager should do

Pi calculated to '62.8 trillion digits' with a pair of 32-core AMD Epyc chips, 1TB RAM, 510TB disk space

MAME (Multi Arcade Machine Emulator) is probably a cinch

But my chance to relive the 80s on my bog standard PC a few years ago. All those great Arcade games that could be found in Pubs, as well as Arcades, Service Stations, Launderettes,,, everywhere!

I spent a lot of money, and drank a lot of beer, with a friend on this one...

Taito's Flying Shark, a much better 2D/3D Scroller than '1942'

https://www.google.com/search?q=taito+flying+shark

We got very good at it, clocking all 32 (?) levels, playing for an hour, but being killed before we could clock it twice.

It was exhausting, because in spite of Power Ups (increased firepower bonuses) you still had to hammer the fire button very quickly.

(Daley Thompson's Decathlon style. Service Engineers must have replaced the buttons very regularly.)

And then, the machine finished its Tour of Duty in that pub, but a neighbouring pub had just got a modern Real Life Pinball Table. Specifically 'The Adams Family'.

We got really good at that. And really drunk.

And then we both met women, fell in love and had babies...

And now the babies are grown up, and I am middle-aged, my hand-eye co-ordination is shot to pieces.

I'm lucky to get to Level 2 on any game

The direct Great Circle route from Athens, Greece to Vilnius, Lithuania may be subject to Supermassive Fighter Jet disturbance and distortion to Minsk, Belarus

Re: Sorry to disappoint

Geometric Progressions...

We learned about 1+1/2+1/4+1/8....etc

"It never actually gets to 2, but it is EXACTly 2 "

This had us in strong uproar and non-understanding with our Teacher.

Later, Quantum Physics did my head in too

Douglas Adams and "Hitchhiker's..." is at least enjoyable and my greatest read ever.

Re: they are now the last known digits of Pi

I know it from my Casio Scientific Calculator days of the 1980s.

3.1415926535

One of my classmates, my geeky friend, memorised it to 65 places.

But we were soon distracted by the joys or Rubik's Cubes and Collossal Adventure and programming in Machine Code (Z80 or 6502) or BASIC.

In normal life, in my head, I use "about 3" or "22/7" perhaps if I only have pencil and paper and lacking electronic assistance

(all my batteries are flat or my bags have been stolen at the airport, for instance)

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I'm dismayed by the waste of resources for all these groups to calculate Pi to such precision.

We have shortages of chips and boards regularly.

Prices are inflated for us mortals. Bitcoin miners! I'm looking at you as well!

For Proofs of Concept, how about modelling, the Weather, Climate Change, COVID-19, "The Travelling Salesperson" problem?

Magna Carta mayhem: Protesters lay siege to Edinburgh Castle, citing obscure Latin text that has never applied in Scotland

Re: Just tell 'em to

Surely only the good folks of Morningside would say that?

The Chanty-mouthed Big Yin might suggest "Getifubasas!"

(I know he's from Glasgow. I don't know Edinburgh slang)

Thunderbird 91 lands: Now native on Apple Silicon, swaps 'master' for 'primary' password, and more

I have always loved TB which I initially chose as a free replacement for MS Office Outlook.

On my latest home laptop, I see I switched off TB Updates and notifications more than 2 years ago.

Was I trying to save Data Allowance? No idea.

Anyway I'm now fully up to v78 and have signed up for the Newsletter to see when I could upgrade to v91

Even v78 UI looks great to me and I see ReminderFox is there too.

Since no longer using Firefox I missed ReminderFox and forgot it could also be a Thunderbird add-on.

I hope I can continue in this unfairly maligned, "dated" Eco-system till I'm pushing up the daisies.

https://www.thunderbird.net/en-US/thunderbird/91.0/releasenotes/

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I don't like modern UIs with hamburgers, context sensitive unavailability or even disclosure of options.

I've been very computer literate for decades. I can tolerate and use W10 but not going to bother with W11, even if I could find workarounds for the hardware requirements.

I am a beginner with Mobile Phones - Android.

Recent examples to annoy me:

Q: Where is the '$' key/symbol? Answer: Press And Hold any currency key. Doh!

Q: How do I set the Countdown Timer?

Answer: I accidentally found it on my new phone. On the Clock/Timer screen, Swipe the digits up and down the screen! Not Left/Right or try to edit the Field.

Xiaomi builds a robot dog out of smartphone cameras and an Nvidia edge AI board

"Terminator: The Dogs are Out!"

My first thought too. <shudders>

Xiaomi, please give it a cute, friendly face and different colour scheme.

The new Xiaomi Redmi Note 10 series of mobile phones come in a range of colours.

I love my Nighttime Blue one, although it's more of a (pleasant) Dusk Blue!

Activist raided by police after downloading London property firm's 'confidential' meeting minutes from Google Search

During Thatcher's 1980s reign, 'The Miners' Strike', some Miners were arrested.

When they came to Court, the ONLY Charge was 'Resisting Arrest'

84-year-old fined €250,000 for keeping Nazi war machines – including tank – in basement

Re: Das ist der Weltkriegs-Panzer aus dem Keller in Holstein

The Old Man was lucky.

Some people have been known to get long jail sentences for doing the laundry and mowing the lawn

https://www.google.com/search?q=switzerland+laundry+regulations+day

Re: WTF?

He'd have to have put some tracks on those 34 wheels too.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-57965260