* Posts by Goat Jam

2482 publicly visible posts • joined 19 Mar 2008

Yes, software can be patented, US Supremes say

Goat Jam
Flame

Cancer

The U.S. is a blight on the planet. It is a cancer that is inexorably spreading to the rest of the world.

U.S. "allies" are forced to enter in to damaging trade agreements that infect their own nations with idiotic ideas such as this whilst their increasingly disaffected and alienated young people are steadily being bombarded with the magnificence of American Ghetto Kulture to the point that all they want from life is a crack habit and a prison tattoo.

Countries that are not allies of the U.S. fare somewhat better, only having to contend with missile strikes, prison camps and squads of jack booted redneck patriots stamping around inside their borders.

At least *those* people have a real enemy that they can fight back against.

'Biggest thing in farming for 10,000 years on horizon'

Goat Jam
FAIL

Grazing animals

have multiple stomachs. They also vomit up what they've aleady eaten so they can chwe it a second time.

If you can do that then be my guest and eat grass

Linux game-time refined with latest Wine

Goat Jam
Thumb Down

Consoles

PAH!

Not so great if you like RTS games. Likewise most sorts of "building" games (Railroads, RCT, SimCity etc)

Then there are FPS games. Yes, I know the younguns seem to like the console controls with the autoaim crap but I simply can't stand it.

Nope, IMHO consoles suck. Big time.

Bring your own PC

Goat Jam

Uh

I assume that the point of the exercise is not to be joining random malware infested PC's to your domain but rather providing each user with a virtualised environment to work within. This virtual environment will be what is joined to the domain.

This also applies to the licencing controls issue you raise. Because the "work" aspect of the computer is entirely virtual, it could easily be argued that anything that is outside that work environment (ie the virtual host PC) is Not Our Problem.

I can see some potential issues with this approach but I can also see quite a lot of benefits too.

What they are suggesting is abstracting the Work environment from the hardware (the "hardware" becomes virtual. Just doing that can give you enormous benefits even iuf you still retain ownership over the fleet of iron it is running on.

But, once you have divorced the work environment from the physical hardware, it is quite valid to ask yourself exactly why you should bother caring about "owning" the actual hardware and all the problems that goes with that ownership.

It's not a huge strep.

Being able swap a virtual image from one machine to another would make life a whole lot easier.

Apple Mac Mini 2010

Goat Jam
Thumb Up

Revo is great

I got one for my TV, running Ubuntu + boxee. Cost me AU$320 and that is less than half what apple are asking for the Mac Mini (AU$699).

As for the keyboard, it is a chiclet style thing. I wouldn't want to type my autobiography on the thing but on the plus side it is small, unobtrusive and light and doesn't take up a lot of space on the coffee table so it is perfect for that sort of light duty scenario.

Indonesia flips over internet rock star smut clips

Goat Jam
Grenade

The West

Western governments are leading the world in inventing new methods to control and subjugate their citizenry.

Terror, paedo and even straight porn are all common vectors used by our own governments to facilitate the introduction of ever more repressive laws and controls upon their people.

These often target the internet.

So, we shouldn't be surprised when less democratically inclined* nations see us using these cheap and transparent tactics and decide that they might have a go at that too.

Sauce for the goose etc etc

* Yes, I know Indonesia is a democratic country, but that is a relatively recent thing. Besides, are there any truly democratic countries left on this miserable rock?

iPad gouges netbook sales

Goat Jam
FAIL

Hardly surprising

Wintel have done their darndest to hobble the netbook market since the original eepc was released. Artificial limitations on RAM and screens along with ballooning hardware requirements needed to support Windows instead of Linux have turned NBs from what were once cheap and cheerful lightweight 'net access devices into overpriced and underpowered mini laptops.

Now apple has come out and created a not quite as cheap but even more cheerful lightweight 'net access device and all the people that could no longer purchase such a device come out of the woodwork and give apple their business instead. Add to that the fanboi's and mom & pop market and you have the makings of a successful product.

I for one expect the trend to continue as more apps are released for the ipad at least until ARM based android/chrome devices become available*.

* If that ever happens of course.

Fail for Wintel and their craven OEM "partners"

Microsoft unveils – wait for it – another mobile OS

Goat Jam
FAIL

A true visionary

"The last time I checked you don't need two client operating systems."

Steve "Monkey Boy" Ballmer

July 2009

Critical and unpatched, Windows XP bug is under attack

Goat Jam
FAIL

Yes

Is that some sort of moronic reference to the fantastically entertaining creation vs evolution debate that is so beloved by our septic cousins?

Evolution: a process in which something passes by degrees to a different stage.

Revolution: a drastic and far-reaching change in ways of thinking and behaving.

What exactly is your problem?

Goat Jam
FAIL

Petard, HOIST!

"It must be a bit of pain for MS - they passed by XP many years ago but to maintain their corporate image they have to be seen to care about it even though it long ceased to generate revenue."

Microsoft are hoist on their own petard. With XP, they spent so much effort on user lockin strategies (using browser > OS integration primarily) that now when it comes time for their poor suffering "customers" to purchase new MS products those customers are somewhat hesitant to do so, just in case a whole bunch of stuff breaks.

It is high time that MS took an evolutionary approach to OS upgrades. Revolutionary "forklift upgrades" may have been acceptable during the '80's and '90s but the industry has moved on from those early days.

Ubuntu fights iPad fever with netbook shot

Goat Jam
Thumb Down

Long time ooboontoo user here

but I'm getting sick of the ever increasing number of bugs and regressions.

I think Mr Shuttleworth should put a lot more effort into the less exciting parts of making a distro for a while. I'm typing this while downgrading a server from Lucid to Hardy due to a horrific memory leak that is evident when running virtualbox.

Aussies rage at 'strings attached' iPad sales

Goat Jam
Pint

Low margin sales

The margin (for retailers) on iProducts is razor thin.

Management hates razor thin margins.

The markup on cables, carry bags, extended warranties and all that peripiheral crap can be as high as 90% however.

Management love insanely high margins.

Hence, the word will be sent out to all the stores that selling iProducts on their own is a losing proposition and that the sales droids had better do their darndest to "value add" the sale and that management will be watching their efforts closely.

Been there, done that. They do the same with cameras and laptops all the time.

There is no "official" edict that says you can't sell an item sans the cruft, but the sales droids are certainly made aware that a failure to value add sales will be looked at in a potentially career destroying manner.

So, next time some poor hapless sales drone is attempting to flog you an extended warranty be firm and say "no" but don't be rude, usually he doesn't want to sell it to you either.

Microsoft's Bing grabs hold of Zuckerberg's firehose

Goat Jam
WTF?

Koolaid much?

Gentle giant indeed.

Mr Ballmer goes to Washington for China pirate gripe

Goat Jam
Linux

I truly hope he gets what he wants

The sooner MS gets a 100% effective DRM scheme working the better if you ask me.

I for one would love to see all those Chinese peasants being forced to pay full price for their windoze hit.

As for those that can't afford to pay the piper, then they can just suck it.

Or look elsewhere for alternatives of course.

http://www.distrowatch.org

Conroy pledges to stop spams infecting Aussies' portals

Goat Jam
WTF?

errm

We only have a population of 21 Million. Even accounting for a few double ups in businesses etc that'd still be a staggering number of PC's for a small country like Oz

Microsoft's Ballmer and Ozzie tag-team on mediocrity

Goat Jam

Nope

"Am I right in thinking that unlike most IT pioneers Ballmer has never had any technical credentials ?"

Jobs was never a coder. He has vision, sure, but he's no techo

Microsoft picks over Google's Windows exit strategy

Goat Jam
FAIL

Vista is *not* Longhorn

"They did - cost $5 billion - was called Vista."

You couldn't be more wrong if you tried.

Microsoft *tried* to rewrite Windows, it was called "Longhorn" and it was huge Epic Fail.

They gave up after 5 years and spent another year doing a slapdash face lift to Server2K3 in order to get something, *anything*, out the door in an effort to stem the rising levels of derision and ridicule being sent in their direction from the rest of the IT industry.

Goat Jam
Linux

Hmmmm

"It is insane not to use the firewall system provided to secure your PC"

Here is a quick question for you. How many ports does a desktop oriented linux distro have open and listening for connections in a default install?

If the answer is less than 1 then there is no urgent need to run a firewall at all.

Don't assume that becauseWindows *desktops* listen on an insane number of ports by default that Linux ones do to.

Ballmer says Windows will shame iPad

Goat Jam
Heart

Yea Verily

For sooth, Ballmer is the best thing going about Microsoft.

While he is there I worry far less about the future of the world.

The guy is one great big sweaty mound of fail.

Albeit one who has more money in his petty cash tin than I will ever see in my life but that's life in the industrialised world for you I guess.

For some reason the shit always rises to the top of the tank.

Microsoft and Novell tag team on HPC

Goat Jam
FAIL

Why?

"there is not really a good technical reason why the vast majority of x64-clusters running Linux could not be converted from static Linux machines to dynamic Linux-Windows images"

Rather than look for technical reasons why Windaz ia not on HPC clusters, perhaps we should be pondering what a HPC cluster user has to gain from putting Windaz on HPC clusters.

If the answer is "nothing" then what exactly is the point?

I have no idea how MS licensing works for their so-called "Windows HPC server" (or whatever it's called) but even if they don't hit you with per core licensing you can bet your bottom dollar that MS stands to make a bucket load of cash from a 64K Core HPC cluster. Or to put it another way, the owner of the HPC cluster will have to give a bucketload of cash to Microsoft.

So again, I ask you, what possible benefit could a HPC cluster operator gain in return for that bucketload of cash?

Maybe they really want to code their stuff in VB.NET or something.

Google tells staff to snub Windows after China hack snafu

Goat Jam
Paris Hilton

Irony

"I do not run Chrome (browser). My first (minor) complaint is it installs itself into Documents and Settings (instead of, say, Program Files)."

The irony here is that Chrome installs into userspace instead of the bowels of the operating system in order to provide the user with a far higher level of security and privacy.

Epic fail indeed.

MSI Wind U160

Goat Jam
Unhappy

Yawn

Yet another boring, overpriced netbook that's infected with Windows.

PC makers, for the love of Dog, show us something different for a change.

P.S. It is a netbook FFS. You buy it because it is cheap and cheerful (well, that used to be the case). What exactly is the point of benchmarking it?

Woman sues Google after highway knockdown

Goat Jam
Coat

The Pied Piper of Mountain View

Strikes again!

Apple iPad

Goat Jam

@Tom 64

"If someone made one that runs Windows 7 for a similar price I'd have one."

hahaha, nice one. That was a joke, right?

So, how would that work exactly? Let's take a look at that shall we?

First, to run Windows 7 we will need some sort of hard drive storage, so we'll have to add that. The pad will need to get a bit bigger of course to fit the drive. Cost a bit more too. Also, a lot more RAM will be required, a minimum of 512MB I expect, perhaps more. Oh, we will also need an x86 processor because thats all Windows will run on so maybe an atom will have to be added to the unit. We will need to bump up the size and cost a lot more to fit all this in of course. Now, all this extra stuff will draw a lot more power too, so we'd probably better triple the battery size, or maybe even quadruple it if we want to get to a 10+ hour battery life. Have to make the device bigger for that too.

Great, so here is our Windows "ipad". It's a lot bigger than the apple one, far heavier and considerably more expensive. The Wimp UI is not suited to touch screens at all but it does run Solitaire great! It also gets real hot and despite the huge amount of batteries we dumped in it the maximum it will run between charges struggles to exceed 5 hours.

Oh well, at least it's not one of those crap apple ones tho!

Here's a clue for you Tom 64, there are already Windows tablets out there, have been for quite some time. People, including yourself, have had the opportunity to purchase them for 10 years now but for some reason that is apparently unknown to you, they simply don't.

I'll tell you why. It's because Windows tablets, without exception, are big, clunky, hot, expensive and TOTALLY CRAP.

You will never see Full Bloat Windows run on a device with the ipads form factor EVER.

Get used to it.

Want nips like church coat pegs? Click here

Goat Jam
Heart

See "Camel Toe Cup"

"What's next? "moundettes" for when your camel-toe is not very well defined?"

http://www.skateboardingsucks.com/images/camel_toe_annie.jpg

Queuing for an iPad? Why?

Goat Jam
Thumb Up

You just don't get it do you

"If the device were less closed I could also benchmark it pretty easily."

This comment alone demonstrates your complete and utter cluelessness regarding this iProduct.

So, you want to benchmark the ipad do you? I find it hard to imagine why you want to do that. No, really I do. What are you going to compare your results to exactly? Oh, and the results you get, just how will they be quantified? FPS in crysis perhaps? Or maybe just good old flops? Do you think grand aunt beryl will really give a flying fuck what your ridiculous benchmarks show when she is reading emails? Or perhaps you are bemoaning the lack of multitasking because you want to see how long it takes to compile c code while you tweet and browse porn?

Whatever. Here's a news flash for you Einstein. The ipad is not for you. It doesn't need to be. You have plenty of toys to load linux on to, and I say that as a Linux fanboy myself.

The ipad is for folks who couldn't give a rats arse about benchmarks. The simply want something they can do shit with. You could do 1000 benchmarks proving that the ipad is the slowest device on the planet to encode a 3 min FLAC and it would make not one fucking iota of difference to it's success or failure because guess what, nobody cares!

DoJ pokes Apple digital music biz practices, says report

Goat Jam
Linux

Sounds strangely familiar

"withdrawing marketing support for certain releases featured as Daily Deals"

Ahh, yes, that's the Microsoft method of keeping their partners from offering other Operating Systems on their hardware.

'Being fat is no worse for you than being a woman'

Goat Jam
Flame

@Female Title

Why is it that, whenever a man dares to speak the truth about things instead of pandering to the PC notions of the ruling elite, the ruling elite (ie Feminists) respond with name calling and accusations of mysogony?

Don't worry answering, 'twas a rhetorical question.

HP to plunk WebOS onto tablet

Goat Jam
Go

Well

You've had 15 years to buy a WinTablet. What's been stopping you?

HP exec confirms WebOS tablet

Goat Jam
Go

Also

They can use a far cheaper CPU (ARM) which has far lower power draw than the Atom hence smaller battery. Plus, having ditched Windows they need to provide much less memory (primary and secondary) and don't need to worry about also providing enough "juice" to cover the additional needs of a real time virus scanner.

With all these savings it is quite conceivable to make a device that is smaller, lighter, cheaper and more usable than could ever be imagined on the Wintel platform.

iPads in short supply as tablets take off

Goat Jam
FAIL

Typing?

On an iPad? I was with you up to there. The iPad is great for the *consumption* of media but is ill suited to *creation*.

You are doing your wife a great disservice if you are recommending the iPad for that particular usage.

Oh, and BTW, Linux does not require "oodles of fucking command line crap" anymore. You need to step out of the 20th century and get with the program.

Goat Jam
Coffee/keyboard

I LOL'ed

Microsoft have been pushing their "vision" for 15 years and where has it got them?

On the fast track to Fail Town is where.

Are you seriously suggesting that Microsoft can take credit for apple succeeding where MS has done nothing but FAIL?

Oh dear, now that's a good'un

Windows 3.0 turns 20

Goat Jam
Headmaster

Actually, kind of

Windows 3 did have 386 enhanced mode but it was not the same thing as 32 bit mode, which was introduced in WFW 3.11, albeit you had to install that capability manually IIRC

World's mightiest supercomputer to design new nuke plants

Goat Jam
Joke

Sorry

Too busy wondering what a Beowulf cluster of those would be like.

FOSS vendors lick chops over ConLib IT plans

Goat Jam
FAIL

BigLolz

<Waaaah> FOSS is *different* to what we are used to!!

<Waaaail> And we're locked into a proprietary ecosystem!!!

<Sniiiiff> and open standards aren't supported by my vendor!!!!!

They carry on as if OSS is the problem instead of seeing it is the solution. It is inevitable that one day they will have to get off the Microsoft treadmill but they will fight it tooth and nail every step of the way! The've let Microsoft back them into a corner and now it is too hard to get out.

THAT's the problem with so many IT types these days, they are just too damned comfy in their plush furnished prison cells .

Epic Fails to IT folk around the world

Security bug bites 64-bit Windows 7

Goat Jam
Troll

Disable Windows Aero Theme

LOL

Isn't Aero the only reason that most people upgrade from XP?

'Completely useless' Windows 3.1 hits Google's Android

Goat Jam
Dead Vulture

Wow!

I notice that nobody has yet done WFW 3.11. Does that mean that if I unpack my old wfw3.11 archive onto my android device* and then go to a DOS box and type "SETUP" I can have my own article on The Reg?

That'd be cool.

* Android device may be imaginary

Cideko Air Keyboard motion controller

Goat Jam

Glide

The Glide requires software to work which makes it a Win/Mac only affair. At least this device doesn't require some dodgy software pack to work despite it getting 10% less in the scoring.

Obama to promote RIAA's favourite lawyer

Goat Jam
Megaphone

The King Is Dead!

Long Live The King!

Obama is a puppet of the same people as all the other recent US Presidents.

Why do you think he appointed a whole lot of people who had previously been appointed by so-called Conservative administrations?

http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/22-obamas-trilateral-commission-team/

Wake up a America, you are all just peons of your banker masters

Biz Linux needs Office license to run MS web apps

Goat Jam
Pirate

Wine

While MS Office mostly works under wine (outlook doesn't play nice) you need to consider that it is not a feasible option for business users as the Windows Office EULA expressly forbids you from installing Office on non Windows OS.

In that case you may as well just not bother buying it at all and use a copy you got off Pirate Bay

Twenty somethings shocker for UK music sales

Goat Jam
FAIL

Buy them again?

Bullshit.

While it is true you have to go through the purchasing procedure to download them again and click the "Buy" button you don't actually have to pay again. iTunes will simply inform you that you have already purchased that material and proceed to download it for you.

Ubuntu Unity interface flashed for speed freaks

Goat Jam
FAIL

bzzzz

Nope. It is intended to be loaded in a PC's firmware and offer a quick booting alternative to booting Full Bloat Windows for those that just want to get in and check emails or surf the web. If it is done right people may find that they need to spend less and less time actually booting into Windows and they may even start questioning whether they really need to have Windows on their in the first place.

This will be especially fun when the Windows install gets itself all tangled up and malware infested leaving people with little option other than doing everything on "that linux thing"

Aussie MP slapped with $10k phone bill

Goat Jam
FAIL

An iPhone without a data plan?

<== See icon

Mafia Wars dons deprived of pit bulls

Goat Jam
Coat

Easy solution

Replace the chained, snarling pitbulls with chained, snarling PETA activists.

Man uses meat cleaver to fashion UK-ready iPad

Goat Jam
Paris Hilton

Huh?

Firstly, agree with the comment re: that being a vegetable knife and quite clearly *not* a meat cleaver.

Secondly, WTF? Why does the iPad require a MicroSIM card instead of the normal ones? Is it space constrained? Somehow I doubt it going by the pictures I've seen of the vast empty spaces inside an iPad, which is basically a bigger screen iphone with a few more batteries inside.

Microsoft calls for IE9 Canvas tag

Goat Jam

Blah blah blah

Microsoft sure know how to talk the talk. Fast this, compatible that but anyone who has been in this industry for more than a short time knows full well that the never fucking deliver.

Ever.

You have to wonder whether guys like this and that other one crapping on about 15 billion windows embedded devices actually believe the tripe they spout

Canonical explains Ubuntu unfree video choice

Goat Jam
Headmaster

"Canonical inferred here"

Ummm, implied perchance?

You imply things with what you say, you infer things from what you hear*

* or read, write, see, do, whatever.

Lindsay Lohan to pull off Linda Lovelace

Goat Jam
Paris Hilton

A title goes here

One would think that a Mcdonalds advert would "take everything Lindsay has to really be able to pull it off"

Microsoft's social lab does 'the impossible'

Goat Jam
Troll

erm

One wonders whether Zuckerberg is gonna throw a lawsuit at their Redmondian sugar daddy like they did to Power?

Pirate Bay dishes up Iron Man 2 ahead of US release

Goat Jam
Pirate

Indeed

"It might actually increase interest in someone who had a look at the poor quality leaked version, but would otherwise have no interest in watching it at the cinema."

Of course, this is self evident to normal, thinking human beings.

It is a problem however, for those who are in the habit of regularly produce worthless dreck. These screeners allow punters to identify the dreck early on thereby avoiding paying money to keep the nose candy flowing into Hollywood.

Of course the big studios don't like that.

No sireee Bob, they don't like that one little bit.