* Posts by Steve Todd

2644 publicly visible posts • joined 19 Sep 2007

PayPal's fizzog-based payments app rubbished over reliability worries

Steve Todd
FAIL

Re: "the transaction comes from an identifiable device "

Identifiable as in "has an attached telephone number and IMIE code". Is that confusing to you?

Steve Todd

Re: The purchaser has to know the PayPal account ID and password first

Different argument. No one is stopping you using Chip & Pin, cash or whatever else you currently use to pay. This is an option if you don't have those handy, and its no less secure than them. The argument was that it was somehow wildly insecure.

Steve Todd

Re: The purchaser has to know the PayPal account ID and password first

The user has to log in to the PayPal app on their phone, and then "check in" to the store they want to purchase from. This transfers their details to the store's checkout computers. When the person arrives at the checkout the sales person identifies them by their picture and the account is debited. The account details are wiped if they are not used within a set time.

Steve Todd

The purchaser has to know the PayPal account ID and password first

Then look enough like the account owner to pass casual inspection, plus the transaction comes from an identifiable device (a mobile phone). As far as I can see that's two if not three factor authentication and should be good enough for practical use.

PEAK Apple: Cupertino's hopes died with Steve Jobs, says Larry Ellison

Steve Todd
Stop

Even when Jobs was at the helm

You didn't get major new products every year. The run rate was about 1 major new product every 3 or more years. Where did this idea come from that they have to reinvent everything every year?

New blinged-up 'iPhone 5S' touted by Jobs FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: fingerprint scanner?

Not so much a case of making it harder to steal stuff as making it easier for the legitimate user to get in.

Rather than having to type your PIN number/password in (and perhaps getting it wrong or forgetting it) then the act of touching the home button with your finger of choice would recognise you and let you in. Minimal intrusion into the task you had in mind and maximum time doing what you wanted.

This all comes down to how well they've implented the technology (I had an old iPaq with a fingerprint scanner that was a liability because it was so slow and fussy about the way it read your prints), but it could be quite handy.

Bigger frames make Wi-Fi a power miser: boffins

Steve Todd

Sensors send data infrequent, in small amounts and at low data rates

The design philosophy behind BLE is to keep airtime down to a minimum, so this kind of change would have little to no effect on it. As it stands a Bluetooth 4 LE module will run for more than a year from the energy in a button cell, so I doubt there's much need to improve on that.

Don't trust us? Try these Office 365 stats, says Microsoft

Steve Todd

Re: Kind of ignores the fact

And do we not see regular articles hereabouts saying how such-and-such mobile network has gone tits up? It's one thing to optionally allow uses to save/load data from the cloud, it's something else entirely if the whole damned thing runs there.

Steve Todd

Kind of ignores the fact

That your Internet connection may also fail, so even if they had 100% up time then users would get somewhat less than that availability.

Apple wins Samsung import ban, loses 'Battle of Rounded Corners II'

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: RC II??

And you still don't understand the difference between a regular and a design patent. Apple do not, as is regularly claimed here, have a patent on rounded corners. What they have is a design patent (which in other jurisdictions is called a registered design or a comunitity design) which describes what makes their devices distinctive. This contains a long shopping list of features (one of those being corners rounded in a specific way), all or most of which have to be duplicated before the courts will regard it as infringed.

That design was most certainly developed, that's what the companies industrial design department does for a living, and there's been plenty of evidence in court of hundreds of prototypes before they settled on the designs they have used.

Moneybags pour shower of gold on new mega-precise GPS system

Steve Todd

Re: But you need two of them to get that accuracy

Checking further it seems that RTK is only accurate to centimetric accuracies for RELATIVE positions. It needs at least two GPS receivers, one of which is a fixed base station. The accuracy of the fix for the base station limits the total accuracy of the system.

Steve Todd

But you need two of them to get that accuracy

And I don't see how they can compensate out ionospheric effects to that level of accuracy using only a single frequency band. Better to use the Galileo signal, which runs on both the L1 and E5 bands at the same time.

Differential GPS relies on a reference base station in the local area, so you don't get coverage in large chunks of the world. IIRC the clocks on board of the GPS cluster aren't accurate enough to go beyond that (though the latest block satellites may have fixed that).

Canonical: Last change to Ubuntu Edge phone price – we promise

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: We all know that penguinistas don't like spending money

And humble bundles are soooo expensive aren't they? And you have to wait 6-9 months for them to be delivered don't you?

Steve Todd

We all know that penguinistas don't like spending money

So trying to get them to part with the thick end of $700 for a phone is bound to fail, especially when they have to pay in advance and wait 6-9 months for the results.

Apple: Of course we stalk your EVERY move. iOS 7 has a new map to prove it

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: Catch 22 - iPhone GPS so useless it only works with wifi augmentation

You seem to have confused the GPS receiver with Apple Maps. Maps needs work on the data set. It is however not the only option, Google have a version of their Maps for iOS for example. The GPS is a match for most mobile devices (and turning off WiFi doesn't disable it. Turning off cellular data does, but that's common to many aGPS devices.

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: Catch 22 - iPhone GPS so useless it only works with wifi augmentation

Time to first fix. If you have an in-car nav system then it can take anything up to a couple of minutes to get its location locked down. The iPhone, like most cell phones, has something called aGPS, which uses cell tower location information as well as WiFi base station data to bring that time down dramatically. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assisted_GPS

Android approaches 80% smartphone share as Apple's iPhone grows old

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: @AC 08:18 (was: apples & oranges .)

You're splitting hairs again. The only thing users of BSD can't do without additional certification is stick a POSIX or Single UNIX Specification sticker on it. It's full name is Berkley Standard Distribution UNIX, it runs UNIX code, it's UNIX in all but the eyes of the Marketing department.

There are two classes of UNIX systems these days, UNIX derived (ie. branched from UNIX at some point in the past, even if all the original source has been replaced) and UNIX-like (ie. designed to have a broadly similar set of APIs, but built separately from the ground up like LInux).

You also seem not to understand what "hybrid" means. Just because it contains fragments of code that you wrote doesn't mean that large lumps of it are not now, nor have they ever been derived from BSD. It's a bit like you claiming that two Ford cars are the same because they share the same steering wheel.

Steve Todd

Re: @AC 08:18 (was: apples & oranges .)

That's a bit like saying that Windows 7 isn't Windows because all of the source is different to Windows 1. Other than branding (ie. being able to stamp "UNIX certified on the box") BSD is a UNIX distribution. It runs UNIX code and follows the UNIX APIs. Its full name is BSD UNIX, or Berkeley UNIX.

OS X using Mach as a kernel (not a microkernel version BTW) means that at best it's a BSD hybrid. The core OX is available as an open source package called XNU, it's definaly not just another BSD version. It's also just a small fraction of the OS X environment.

Steve Todd

Re: @jake

Better check your facts. Firstly BSD is a branch of the original AT&T UNIX source, so yes, it is a true UNIX. Second OS X is actually based on Carnegie Mellon's Mach kernel (which was designed as a drop-in replacement for the standard UNIX kernel) with BSD user apps.

Patent tank VirnetX fires 'secure domain name' design claim at Apple

Steve Todd
Stop

You've completely failed to understand what the veto did

If the ITC ruling had gone through then no money would have changed hands between Apple and Samsung, Apple would have been baned from importing certain devices into the USA, which would have given Samsung a stronger negotiating position and perhapse allowed them to force an out-of-court settlement.

There are still court cases underway over these patents. Apple may still lose, and may have to pay Samsung, but there will be no presidential veto over that. The same applies to this case. Because the Samsung patents are FRAND however the court will not require Apple to stop using them, and will decide how much any licence fee should be. VirnetX have the option of requiring Apple to remove any infringing parts (though as they want cash this is unlikely) or charging as much as they can get away with as their patents are not, to my knowledge, covered by FRAND.

The ITC case was over patents that were FRAND, that is Samsung had promised the standards setting body certain things about them. These promises included that they would not be used against competitors to force licensing terms that were not Fair, Reasonable and Non Discriminatory. The only power the ITC have is to ban import, so it's pretty easy to argue that they should never handle arguments over this type of patent, leaving those to the courts. Obama's administration seem to agree with that view.

Tough luck, bumpkins! Blighty broadband speed gap misery worsens

Steve Todd

So you're stealing next door's WiFi?

BT seem to be utterly useless at providing fibre connections. I live in a London borough, literally 5 minutes walk to a fibre enabled exchange but they won't provide me with Infinity. Fortunately we're cabled up so I've gone the Virgin route, and so far it is performing up to spec. at 60Mbits/sec.

Seagate goes back to ASICs, slurps upstart's brains in return for cash

Steve Todd
Boffin

Re: It looks pretty much like an FPGA

Because with a fixed pattern of gates across a given silicon estate you don't have the same ability to optimise trace lengths by moving units about, which at that scale have a major effect on propagation delays and hence maximum speeds.

Steve Todd

It looks pretty much like an FPGA

But they've removed the programable part and hard-code it with a single metal layer mask during fabrication. It should be quick and comparatively cheap to spin new designs, but won't be as fast as a true ASIC.

Apple will swap fanbois' killer phoney phone chargers for legit adapters

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: A good opportunity to sell stock at cost and look big'n'caring

Oh look, this years latest and greatest Android models are, on paper at least, better than last years iPhone. That and a phone that is 3G only and sold at near cost (if you can lay your hands on one) by Google as a loss leader is a direct competitor? Think again on that one.

Try again, but using logic. The current model iPhone competes in the same range as the top end Android devices. Last years iphone competes in the mid range and the year before that in budget. In 3-6 months time no-doubt people will be looking at the specs of the S4 and HTC One and sneering at them compared to the latest and greatest at the time. Does that mean they are currently overpriced?

Steve Todd
FAIL

Re: A good opportunity to sell stock at cost and look big'n'caring

Fandroids seem to like to ignore the fact that directly competing Android phones cost about the same or more than the iPhone (the Galaxy S4 was more expensive than the iPhone 5 last time I looked). Just like PCs you can buy cheaper phones, but with a reduced specification and/or quality. They also like to ignore the fact that on contract (which is how most folks still get their phones) you can get the iPhone 4 for the same price as cheap Android phones (i.e. nothing to pay up front).

All you're saying here is "I'm too cheap to pay for a premium phone", not that the iPhone price is priced beyond most people's means or budget.

South Korea: We're 'concerned' that Obama saved Apple from ban

Steve Todd
Stop

Firstly if you bother to check, the opinion was written by one of the ITC panel members, so it wasn't universally agreed by the whole ITC that Samsung had been negotiating in good faith. Secondly allowing owners of FRAND patents to get injunctive relief via the ITC (when this would not be allowed in a court case) is a bad precedent to set. FRAND/SEP patents should not be used offensively like this, it's part of the undertaking a company gives when they commit a patent to a standard.

Steve Todd

The ITC isn't a court

It's being used to try to short-circute the legal system and get a fast ruling to disadvantage a competitor.

Samsung have these same patents included in a court case. They are FRAND encumbered, so at worst the court can decide that they are infringed, that Apple have to pay damages and a court decided licence rate.

The real reason that the ruling was vetoed however is nicely described over here http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2013/08/05/apple-samsung-itc-pinkert/ and is down to a dissenting opinion by one of the ITC judges involved.

Buy a household 3D printer, it'll pay for itself in months!

Steve Todd

Interesting you should mention that

Take a look over here http://makibox.com

Starting price of $200 for a PLA only printer, or $300 for one with a heated bed that can manage ABS, nylon etc as well.

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: Ithings indeed

Interesting that my last post was voted down. Do Android owners not need cases and docks, or are they complaining that they can't find STL files for their device?

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: What a lot of rubbish.

Depends on the version of the technology you are talking about. Laser sintering is good enough to make parts for jet and rocket engines so I wouldn't hurry to write it off. As it happens the patents for that type of manufacture expire next year, so expect to see it get rapidly cheaper.

Steve Todd

While I've seen some really crappy 3D prints

They don't have to be bad. There's a trade-off between speed of printing and quality, and finishing can improve the results (acitone vapour gives ABS a nice, smooth, shiny finish for example). They also don't have to produce uninteresting utilitarian crud, there are some rather artistic example (see http://richrap.blogspot.nl/2013/07/3dr-reprap-delta-printer-part-1-release.html for examples).

I think the authors overstated the usefullness of these devices to normal members of the public, but for creative types and people building their own devices they're a useful tool.

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: Ithings indeed

You can equally well make parts for your Android device of choice, it's not iPhone specific.

Steve Todd

Re: Spoon holder...

@Tom - not sure where you got those numbers from. The two common 3D printed materials (PLA and ABS) have melting points well above 100C (160-170C for PLA and 200-220 for ABS), through PLA softens at between 60-65C and ABS at 105-110C.

Roses are #f00, violets are #00f. This witty code is a boffinry breakthrough

Steve Todd

Roses are green?

Anyway the two classic programmer jokes are :-

There are 10 types of programmers, those who understand binary and those who don't.

God is real, unless defined as integer (FORTRAN knowledge needed for this one)

Move over, Freeview, just like you promised: You're hogging the 4G bed

Steve Todd

Re: 4g iPhone in UK

There are in fact multiple version of the iPhone 5 depending on which LTE bands it needs to work on. Expect Apple to increase the number of bands supported per model, and hopefully make a single handset that supports them all, but that depends on both the baseband chip and being able to do fancy things with the aerials. It's an issue common to all LTE phones because of the number of possible variations of frequency, channel size and spacing in the standard.

Steve Todd

Re: Clear800 anyone?

"Who's paying"

The cellular companies who bought 800MHz spectrum. If the budget doesn't get used up then they get a refund.

Steve Todd

Re: Ultra Fast?

Where do people get the idea that "they can make 3G work here first"? Part of the point of 4G is to fix the problems and limits of 3G, two of which were range and building penetration. Allowing 4G to run, in part, on the 800MHz band fixes those two. If you've not got good 2G coverage in a town then it's probably an issue with NIMBYs rather than the cell networks not being bothered.

Google menaces Apple's 3-year-old toddler with its cheap stream tech

Steve Todd

Re: what a load of old bollocks

Quoting from my second post in this thread :-

"The lack of MMS was an issue pretty much only to Android fans. They'd scratch about for some unlikely use case and make like it was pretty much the only thing they did with their phone. MMS was expensive and only ever had a limited number of users."

Did this make out that MMS was pointless? No, only that it didn't have a big audience and that there were work-arounds for most users. As such making it the major plank of an argument that the iPhone was backwards is a ridiculous line to take.

Steve Todd

Re: what a load of old bollocks

And my point was that ANY manufacturer can't put all the features they can think of into a new product. There isn't enough time (and normally capacity either). Apple didn't bother with MMS because it was of use to only a small proportion of their target audience. Fandroids seem to think this is somehow a grevious omission and like to point it's lack out as some sort of sign that Apple was somehow backward.

Google likewise skipped features from early Android versions. This is normal and trying to mock fans from the opposite camp for something that wasn't included in an early version (but is included now) is pointless and stupid.

Steve Todd
FAIL

Re: what a load of old bollocks

AT&T, Apple's home market carrier, didn't support MMS on any phone so it absolutely wasn't needed in their most important market. They finally added it to their network at the point that Apple also added it to the 3G.

I'm still amazed that the Fandroids don't understand the basic concepts of software development. When you're building a system you prioritise features. As you approach deadlines low priority features get dropped. This isn't an opinion, it's the way that the world works.

The original iPhone didn't support Airplay either, it wasn't added until, IIRC, iOS 4, after MMS. You add features to subsequent releases. The point is not that no one need them, but that you cater to the majority of requirements first and add the outlying requirements when you have time and resources. Software is something you can update in the field at a later date (which is what happened), so holding dates is more important than making sure that every last feature is included.

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: what a load of old bollocks

Apparently beating ideas into your skull with a large stick is what is required.

My point was and has always been that most users couldn't give a damn if the iPhone (or any other smart phone of the period) did MMS or not. It wasn't a popular feature. The numbers sent prove that. I owned MMS capable phones before the iPhone (various O2 XDA phones and the LG Viewty to name a few), and never used the feature. Making it out to be a hideous omission is beyond ridiculous. All manufacturers reach a view over which features are required and which they can leave 'till later when designing new devices. The lack of MMS in the iPhone was at best a minor annoyance rather than a fatal flaw, but the fandroid community like to make out that it was a basic feature that every phone should have had. Android also lacked many features when it first shipped, it seems to have survived the experience also.

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: what a load of old bollocks

MMS was around and in use, but in nowhere near the numbers that SMS was. It wasn't something that most users bothered with, partly because of the cost and partly because you needed a camera phone to make use of them (and cameras were't a must-have feature back then). Keep screaming all you like, but MMS wasn't a killer feature that all phones MUST have, the very fact that the IPhone survived proved that.

The original iPhone was an incomplete product, but what it did it did pretty well. It was the first mobile phone I've used with a really good mobile web browser (which was how it was originally planned to run apps lest we forget, it wasn't like Apple forgot about them). It was also the first mobile to put touch together in a way that was natural and fluid to use.

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: what a load of old bollocks

As at least one party here would have to have an iPhone and the other party would need a dumb phone with MMS capability, no internet access and a pressing need to spend £1.50 on an MMS then yes, it's a limited scenario.

For most people the lack of MMS was a non-issue. It was a minor feature that Apple hadn't got around to building in and not worth making a song and dance about.

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: what a load of old bollocks

Do you see me complaining about Android and Screenshots? The point here is that when a new product comes out it will have gaps in its feature set. Providing those gaps aren't grievous (and if you can work around them) then early adopters generally won't mind.

The lack of MMS was an issue pretty much only to Android fans. They'd scratch about for some unlikely use case and make like it was pretty much the only thing they did with their phone. MMS was expensive and only ever had a limited number of users. As its pretty much impossible to own a smart phone and NOT have an email address then you've suggested a pretty limited example once again.

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: what a load of old bollocks

And MMS was so popular wasn't it? It wasn't a core feature and you could do the same thing (for less money) by sending an email.

Steve Todd

They've pulled the Netflix offer

so that's something you don't have to worry about.

Selfridges dreaming of a snot-themed Christmas

Steve Todd

Re: Hit and miss

Depends on your definition of precision. I doubt you'll see carpenters working to that accuracy, but a decent metal shop making small components should be able to beat that by at least a couple of orders of magnitude. The big problem with plastic is that it changes in size noticeably with heat, you have to compensate for that when printing. That variation is going to result in inaccuracies.

Steve Todd

Re: Hit and miss

If you've calibrated the printer correctly then you can print parts to tolerances of less than 0.1mm. The range of different plastics & colours is one way to differentiate the copies, deliberately changing output size is another. If you have access to the original design files as well then you've got infinite scope for variations.

'Fat Wallet Bob' leaves Apple tech chief spot for Special Projects Bureau

Steve Todd
Stop

He's been trying to retire since June last year.

He was tempted back for, what is thought to be, astronomical sums. If you wanted to retire and had the cash in the bank to do so I suspect you'd need a lot of coaxing to stay on also. He'd also have no need to be moved to "special projects" as a home for the unwanted, he'd just go if they weren't happy with him. More likely he's shifted to working part time managing projects that interest him. Good luck to the man I say.

Apple crushes all competition in US Brand of the Year survey

Steve Todd
Stop

Re: Newegg. Never heard of them

Sorry you've blown any credibility that you have. I don't live in the US but even I have heard of them.