* Posts by YetAnotherXyzzy

226 publicly visible posts • joined 23 Nov 2021

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Insurance giant finds claims rep that gives a damn (it's AI)

YetAnotherXyzzy

So the CIO announces the success of what is in all likelihood the CIO's pet project. Yawn. Wake me when an objective third party has something to say about it.

Google confirms Gulf of Mexico renamed to appease Trump – but only in the US

YetAnotherXyzzy

I look forward to Mexico renaming the Gulf of California to "Gulf of Mexico 2.0" or something. C'mon commentards, help me out here: what new names for that gulf would annoy the Orange One?

Humans brought the heat. Earth says we pay the price

YetAnotherXyzzy
IT Angle

Re: Poor work, El Reg.

Agreed. There is a place for such opinion pieces, and it is good that they are published and thought about and commented on, but a tech publication isn't the place.

If Just Stop Oil's website is suddenly running opinion pieces on the relative merits of vi and Emacs, then I stand corrected.

Linux rolls out the welcome mat for Microsoft's Copilot key

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Please bring clippy back onkeypress()

and "...can I help?"

Brits must prove their age on adult sites by July, says watchdog

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Age verification

"Unfortunately, that doesn't extend to the mobile phones that so many have glued to the end of their arms from a very early age. I don't know how to fix that."

At the convenience store last evening I saw the owner's 4 year old granddaughter scrolling through short form videos. It wasn't the toddler who paid for the data plan or the ISP at the other end of a Wi-Fi connection. Adam Foxton's excellent point continues to apply.

WordPress drama latest: Leader Matt Mullenweg exiles five contributors

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Pocket Casts

I don't know what features are important to you or what your OS is, but on Android I'm happy with the free and open source AntennaPod. It's in F-Droid.

Edgio bankruptcy results in endpoint change for Microsoft

YetAnotherXyzzy

for CI builds, it is ci.dot.net

Say that out loud. Imagine devs around the world saying that over Zoom calls.

Wubuntu: The lovechild of Windows and Linux nobody asked for

YetAnotherXyzzy

I worked at such a place once. The executive director was a control freak who dictated Thou Shalt Use Windows for no reason other than to remind the serfs who's in charge, but she was a cheap control freak who wouldn't give IT the resources to properly enforce it. Enforcement was thus limited to getting reported if the lone jack of all trades IT guy happened to see a non-Windows DE on your screen. So my screensaver was a static image of a Windows 7 desktop, activated with a keybinding.

Google India probed after driver fatally followed Maps route over unfinished bridge

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Let me get this straight ...

Another way to stop this is to use OsmAnd instead of Google Maps.

https://osmand.net/

Windows 10 given an extra year of supported life, for $30

YetAnotherXyzzy

Yet another Linux music player that lets you browser by album art is Quod Libet.

FCC probes whether it can pop a cap in ISP data caps

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: "Reach out and [throttle] someone."

I guess whether pre-pay or post-pay works best depends in part on who the available providers are. At least in the country where I live (Latin American developing country) pre-pay is the safest choice. It's far cheaper for average use, topping up is easier than settling a monthly bill, and the most you can get cheated out of is whatever airtime or temporary package you last put in. The only complaints I hear are from people on plans. One example: my wife's then-supervisor had frequent arguments over his plan bill, which more months than not had bogus charges or magically increasing amounts. So pre-pay for my household, thanks.

That said, sounds like the opposite is true where you live, so not downvoting you. Do what best protects you in your environment, and never mind what randos like me say.

Missing Thunderbirds footage found in British garden shed

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: What about the animated?

At the risk of hammering away at this topic, I pine for them too.

AI chatbot gets green light to hallucinate your investment portfolio

YetAnotherXyzzy

Robo-advisors have been a thing for over a decade. I wonder how much innovation is here beyond "let's call it AI".

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/roboadvisor-roboadviser.asp

Samsung and pals Hyundai, Kia team for software-defined cars, IoT integration

YetAnotherXyzzy

Pear

Given their appliances' reliability, "lemon" would be appropriate.

Did you hear the one about the help desk chap who abused privileges to prank his mate?

YetAnotherXyzzy

"It's gone through more changes since, and is currently known as Configuration Manager."

What, it's not named Windows Live Copilot Manager 365 Azure Mesh?

NIST: New smoke alarms are better at detecting fires, but still go off for bacon

YetAnotherXyzzy
Pint

Re: Not in kitchen

Hey Richard, thanks for that URL. I'm not in London or even on your side of the pond but there's some great information there. And as I've just moved into a wooden house in the countryside far from the fire brigade I have been wondering where to educate myself on such things.

Skype goes ad-free, which is unusual for Microsoft

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: I have to ocassionaly use skype...

I live outside the US and use it to call US-based toll free numbers. And for nothing else, so no business case that I can see either.

Apple Maps escapes orchard into web browser wilds

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Very risky move for Apple.

It would seem that different map providers have better or worse coverage in different areas. Where I live, it's Google Maps that is uselessly inaccurate. OpenStreetMap (which is a large source of Apple Maps' data) is a lot better. YMMV obviously, and of course you should use whatever gives you best coverage where you need it and not mind what I say.

I'll cheerfully confess that OpenStreetMap is better to at least some degree because when I find an error or omission I pitch in and fix it. OSM is easy to edit and welcomes new editors, whereas back when I gave their map a try Google would quietly ignore my corrections.

Study finds a quarter of bosses hoped RTO would make employees quit

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: is it just me ?

One lesson I wish I had learned years ago is that once an employer decides it needs a dedicated HR person, it's time for me to move on.

Engine cover flies from Southwest Airlines Boeing 737 during takeoff

YetAnotherXyzzy

Southwest flies an all-737 fleet, and in the name of cost cutting has no interline agreements with any other airline. So it would have to be more of the same.

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Is it Just Me??

Another example, and this from the airline industry: US Airways took over "nobody cuts more corners than we do!" America West, but found their board and C-suite taken over by the nickel-and-dimers. Then much larger American Airlines bought them, and the same thing happened. AA has been Always Awful ever since.

As AI booms, land near nuclear power plants becomes hot real estate

YetAnotherXyzzy
Facepalm

Re: Hydro

Yes, it is crazy. Back when I was a young environmental activist, hydro was one of the darlings of the movement, and rightly so. Today's environmentalists trash talk hydro, leading to cases of the perfect being the enemy of the good. The developing country where I live has enough hydropower potential to cleanly provide the nation's electricity instead of what we have now, which are thermal plants burning bunker oil. For some reason our environmentalists think that would be a bad thing.

UN: E-waste is growing 5x faster than it can be recycled

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Or.....

Yes. This.

There is a lot of bashing of big evil corporations but in the end they give the public what it wants, and what the public wants (no not you, dear reader, and not me, but most people) is New Shiny every couple of years. And if most people replace their stuff that often, then it is pointless to make stuff needlessly repairable. This is true not just in consumer electronics but in consumer tat generally. Fast fashion, anyone?

We have met the enemy and he is us.

Oh look, cracking down on Big Tech works. Brave, Firefox, Vivaldi surge on iOS

YetAnotherXyzzy

Every time someone dares say that they liked the old Firefox but have since moved on to Brave, an army of Firefox fans piles on with the downvotes. Every other browser gets its full share of rightful criticism here, but there is a certain kind of Firefox fan that thinks their preferred browser is above reproach.

Have an upvote, Tubz. Everyone ought to be able to report what does and doesn't work for them.

The end of classic Outlook for Windows is coming. Are you ready?

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Confused

"So how good are Linux mail clients, and can they handle Exchange mailboxes?"

Evolution is intended to be a drop-in replacement for classic Outlook, including connecting with Exchange. Although Evolution on Linux is my day to day mail client and I am happy with it, I don't have personal experience with pointing it to an Exchange server, but doing that is supposed to work.

Climate change means beer made from sewer water, says North Carolina brewery

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Wouldn't put me off

Agreed, though I suspect that efficiency isn't the point. Gotta do that posturing.

HP print rental service seeks more users to become subscription addicts

YetAnotherXyzzy

It seems to me that there are two separate issues here that are worth separating out.

One is the question of ownership vs. rental. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with renting, and for some people and some products it makes more sense. While owning my printer makes sense for me, it is a good thing that renting a printer is becoming a more common option for those who would be better off with it. Everyone needs to make up his or her own mind here.

A separate question is, how trustworthy is HP. That's an easier question to answer: HAHAHAHAHAHA!

US politicians want ByteDance to sell off TikTok or face ban

YetAnotherXyzzy

Choice

"This bill is not a ban, and it's not really about TikTok. It's a choice."

Ah, this is obviously some strange usage of the word 'choice' that I wasn't previously aware of.

US accuses Army vet cyber-Casanova of sharing Russia-Ukraine war secrets

YetAnotherXyzzy

All that you describe is the case in the US as well, or at least was in I was in the belly of the beast. Part of obtaining a security clearance is getting The Talk and signing an affidavit. There were periodic refresher talks, though those I had were agency-specific. And upon separation there was another talk and another affidavit to sign which was more or less an NDA.

Yes, I saw a lot of over-classification. Before I saw it myself I believed the commonly held opinion that it was due to craven functionaries practicing CYA, but upon seeing the process it turned out to be merely misaligned incentives. There is no incentive to ask "what is the lowest classification this really needs?" but there is a very high incentive to ask "might I be prosecuted if I innocently fail to recognize some subtle reason why this should have been classified higher?" The answer to the latter question is always yes, so there you go.

YetAnotherXyzzy

I too used to hold a Top Secret clearance from Uncle Sam, and back then I was single and socially active. The vast majority of the ladies had no interest whatsoever in NDI and probably wouldn't have been in a position to formulate intelligent questions about it. So when a lady was able to formulate such questions (yes, it happened occasionally) that stood out pretty obviously and I would report it immediately to the security staff. So from personal experience I find it hard to believe this guy's claim to be an innocent fool.

Lenovo to offer certified refurbished PCs and servers

YetAnotherXyzzy

Lenovo's talking head: blah blah circular economy sustainability carbon footprint.

Reg commentards: Sharing practical ideas on saving money on hardware. Have an upvote, everyone.

On-disk format change beckons for brave early adopters of Bcachefs

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: I don't trust btrfs either...

Me too. I'm big openSUSE fan. I've been told, probably correctly, that I'm as bad as the Apple fanbois. But even I draw the line at their penchant for not-ready-for-prime-time filesystems, having been burnt too many times. Now it's EXT4 on all of two partitions, / and /home. I haven't had a problem in years, and if I ever do EXT4 has more and more robust recovery tools, and more tutorials written about them.

AI comes for jobs at studio of American filmmaker Tyler Perry

YetAnotherXyzzy

Pass the buck

"I just hope … that there'll be some sort of thought and some sort of compassion for humanity," Perry said. "I think the only way to move forward in this is to galvanize it as one voice, not only in Hollywood and in this industry, but also in Congress."

Translation: I and my ilk can't be bothered to do the right thing, so we'll pass the buck to the politicians. Who won't either, but the point is to have someone else to blame later.

Rivian decimates staff to put a brake on spending

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: The end of electric vehicles

Sadly, half or more of my acquaintances consider a new car purchase (ICE or EV, doesn't matter) to be an investment. Not downvoting you -- yes you are right and yes they are morons -- just pointing out that we are surrounded by gullible fools.

Or maybe I'm merely revealing that I hang out with dummies.

Mozilla CEO quits, pushes pivot to data privacy champion... but what about Firefox?

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: "Why hope... Brave... has had this for a long time"

"It is really interesting that whenever a story appears anywhere regarding Mozilla foundation or Firefox, these guys appear out of nowhere advertising that browser."

I can't speak for anyone else, but in my case I was responding to an expressed desire for Tor to be integrated into incognito mode. Firefox doesn't have it yet; Brave Browser does. It was a simple statement of fact and was not intended to trigger anyone.

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: "Why hope... Brave... has had this for a long time"

Although I'm a fan of Brave Browser, this is a valid point. I personally hold my nose and put up with it, but yes it is off-putting.

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Translate

"I hope that the new CEO's push to focus on privacy will at the very least mean that Tor will finally be integrated into Incognito mode."

Why hope? Why wait? Brave Browser has had this for a long time now.

Tech bros are playing God, Catholic Church's AI priest complains

YetAnotherXyzzy

Pot, meet kettle

"There is a paternalism in Silicon Valley, a tendency to play God, meaning a desire to do good for people whether they like it or not, which I want to challenge," Benanti told The Times.

Another airline finds loose bolts in Boeing 737-9 during post-blowout fleet inspections

YetAnotherXyzzy
Headmaster

Re: preliminarily?

I don't like that word either, hence my choice of icon. Perhaps the intention was to emphasize that Alaska and United both performed these initial inspections on their own initiative, given that the FAA hadn't yet gotten off its ass.

Credit where it is due, the FAA did eventually call for inspections, presumably once their masters at Boeing granted permission. Regulatory capture can be a bitch sometimes.

YetAnotherXyzzy

"corporate HQ is elsewhere probably"

That's literally true, yes. Back when Boeing was run by engineers, HQ was a quick drive from the Renton plant that now builds the MAX. Then the same MBAs that ruined McDonnell Douglas took over Boeing and moved HQ halfway across the country to Chicago. That wasn't far enough apparently so now they've moved to Virginia.

YetAnotherXyzzy

Panama's national carrier Aeromexico

Panama's flag carrier is Copa. Aeroméxico is, surprisingly enough, from Mexico. Both have the MAX 9.

Google's Project Ellman: Merging photo and search data to create digital twin chatbot

YetAnotherXyzzy

Thank you Google for reminding me that I need to finish moving from Google services to Murena.

Atlassian security advisory reveals four fresh critical flaws – in mail with dead links

YetAnotherXyzzy

When my previous employer laid a bunch of us off earlier this year, my first thought was "at least I don't have to use Atlassian stuff any more".

SAP faces more accusations of breaching on-prem customers' trust

YetAnotherXyzzy

Atlassian: No one annoys on-prem customers like we do!

SAP: Hold my beer.

Firefox slow to load YouTube? Just another front in Google's war on ad blockers

YetAnotherXyzzy

I'm old enough to remember when most video was consumed via broadcast television. The cool kids started talking about the wonderful new world of online streaming video. "And the best part is," the cool kids said, "there aren't any ads!"

Rocky Linux and Oracle Unbreakable Linux also hit 9.3

YetAnotherXyzzy
Thumb Up

RHELatives

If I could upvote articles, I would for that wonderful word.

DDoS-like attack brought down OpenAI this week, not just its purported popularity

YetAnotherXyzzy

Sorry, that was me

I asked it "do you know why I want a cup of tea?"

Batterygate bound for Blighty as UK court approves billion-dollar Apple compensation case

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Apple shot themselves in the foot over this.

I personally agree with you about user choice, but not everyone does. Indeed, I'd argue that Apple's trying to make things easy for the user by reducing choice is what a fair bit of their user base wants and appreciates. You and I should avoid Apple, but that doesn't mean they're evil, they're just not for us.

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: extend the life of a failing battery

True, but anyone who chose to buy a phone with a nonreplacable battery, whether it be from Apple or otherwise, got exactly what they wanted. As my fellow commentard said, Fairphone.

Firefox 119 unleashes PDF prowess and Sync sorcery

YetAnotherXyzzy

Re: Name one

I feel your pain Liam, having shared that particular boat with you, but that problem would be best solved by more PDF applications on Linux that don't suck. Bolting yet another blade onto the already 100-bladed knife that are modern web browsers takes us yet another step away from the "every tool does one job and does it well" rule that brought me to Linux in the first place.

Reading both your article and many of the comments here does make it clear that I am a minority in that opinion however. So no hate for anyone who is enjoying the new Firefox and its improved PDF support.

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