* Posts by Mat Bettinson

9 publicly visible posts • joined 28 Mar 2008

Chrome 70 flips switch on Progressive Web Apps in Windows 10 – with janky results

Mat Bettinson

Re: Fixing a problem that no longer exists?

> There's no reason to believe PWAs will survive.

Actually, this isn't the first time Google have done this. Chrome Apps but those were locked to their store and exposed a number of Chrome specific APIs because web standard APIs at the time had some shortcomings, like being able to obtain unlimited storage. I wrote a substantial Chrome app for annotating speech, only to have Google make the entire platform redundant.

While that might seem that Google could just axe PWAs too, PWAs are not a Google thing, it's a web-standards thing - and lots of the key parts of these new standards are already deployed widely. Notifications, for example. All depend on the background JavaScript code called a service worker, and now you'd be hard pushed to find a popular site that doesn't use this.

The 'progressive' part of PWA means an app that progressively takes advantage of any exposed modern features. There isn't any difference between a Javascript web app and a PWA.

If I have a criticism of Google, they retired Chrome apps two years before they introduced the same basic feature for regular web-standard apps, and that sucks.

We should applaud PWAs. One-click near instant installs, inherent cross-platform compatibility, and inherent sandboxed security. They wont do everything you have a native app, but most of the apps we run for things are well within scope. The Chrome PWA proposition is really just a convenient wrapper around conventional web apps, letting you launch them directly from your OS without loading a browser bookmark. Where's the problem?

Samsung Galaxy A9: Mid-range bruiser that takes the fight to Huawei

Mat Bettinson

I've flirted with Samsung devices. The last one was an S8, and that will be my last Samsung. The hardware was brilliant, though it ended up being more fragile than I'd like.

The problem with Samsung is the software. I don't mean the usual raft of crapware pre-installed, although there certainly is that - like some `flipboard' thing shoved onto a swipe-left screen. It's the proliferation of Samsung services of dubious value, and which the phone constantly nags about, set up an account, log-in rah rah rah. It was a constant source of annoyance, and it was very confusing to the missus when I passed it to her.

In my midrange phones are basically good enough. So I'd much rather get something that has a light touch. I had a lot of luck with a OnePlus 5, best phone I had in years, but I hear the Android One devices are good too. It seems to me a big chunk of the Android ecosystem treats their phones as an opportunity to upsell you on a load of digital services which ... really wouldn't be compelling in any way unless it was forced down your throat, preinstalled on their mobe. And you want me to pay you for that?

Python wriggles onward without its head

Mat Bettinson

Re: Raymond's right

There was a fairly short lived effort to support dynamic languages including Python via a project called SL4A, or scripting layer for Android. It was great, but it was sadly abandoned early in the piece. Google hasn't shown any interest in the concept.

You mentioned parallelism, and that's probably why. The Java (or Kotlin) dev pattern is inherently event-based, which is the essential paradigm for low power mobile computing.

Python's relationship with asynchronous programming is .... challenged shall we say. For years people used third party frameworks like Twisted to get things done. Now there's this standard library called asyncio which is just about the most bone-headed appallingly complex and error prone async programming scheme I've ever seen.

I'm quite fond of Python, but there's some things it's a bit crap at, and this is one of them.

GitHub looses load-balancing open-source code on netops world

Mat Bettinson

Picture of the Amiga juggler demo is amusing.

nbn™'s problems were known – in 2008, a year before its birth

Mat Bettinson

What surprises me is the degree that the media has let the LNP off on their misdirection where the NBN's sole evaluation criteria is whether it generates a direct return on investment. Only 3%, Turnbull says, so it's a massive 'mistake'.

In fact, many of the current woes stem from this. The pricing of peering bandwidth reflects this constraint of generating a return in short order. That is of course not what it should have been about. It was a bloody investment. The peer pricing should be lower, the NBN should be making a hefty loss because of the cost of deployment. Then we'd not see ISPs short changing on ordering the exy up stream bandy, and the whole thing might actually represent some kind of upgrade of the order that would actually help the digital economy and other buzz words the government is fond of using for things that are their idea.

All the other sort of shit the government throws billions at doesn't get measured by this yardstick. What's the return on investment of those bespoke French submarines? How will those stack up against the stock market Malcolm? Some shit just needs to be done, the NBN is a total win-win, eventually the tax payer gets their money back and we get a nice fibre network. Unless you cock it up. Oh...

Uni profs: Kids today could do with a bit of 'mind-crippling' COBOL

Mat Bettinson
WTF?

Learning a language at uni for a job?

Ah yes, another story brought to you by the department that thinks university is for teaching vocational skills. When at university, students are learning how to be computer scientists. They'll be exposed to a number of languages and rather a lot of stuff about how you actually conceptualise problems as a programmer. The idea that one should be taught because they're going to get a job in it... it's just wrong on so many levels.

They're there to be learn how to be programmers. Picking up a new language isn't hard for a fresh faced grad. I'm struggling to think why any employer would be that interested in exactly what you did in your course work. As always, what they'll most be interested in is seeing a bright flexible student, hopefully with a bit of initiative to learn something about <insert vocational language here>.

Of course it seems rather unlikely someone is going to go off and learn COBOL off their own bat?

BBC defends iPlayer against Murdoch Jr's 'anti-competitive' claims

Mat Bettinson
Coat

No tax?

Internet bloke innit. Just makes stuff up. They shelled out £250M of tax last year by the looks of it,.

Creative climbs down over home brew Vista drivers

Mat Bettinson

PR own goal by irrelevant company

Having used Creative products since the original Soundblaster it is remarkable how they've managed to descend to the situation today where they pretty much fail to deliver any new technology with decent features and quality that you would fork out money for. These days I have an X-Fi in my Vista gaming rig for the entire reason that the 3.5mm audio jack being 15cm lower is handy. Yes, it's that useful.

There's genuinely no point buying an add-in card these days. There might still be, if these guys produced high quality drivers and features that would be mildly useful but Creative are spending less and less on R&D as they shovel out cheap speakers and web-cams by the truckload. It's not a brand I think we'll shed too much of a tear for.

Ofcom climbs on Byron bandwagon

Mat Bettinson

You can't shove this on the plate of the BBFC

"A film style rating on Games would be fine IMO game\console developers could be doing more."

Well, the developers, more accurately publishers, are doing plenty. There's a perfectly fine industry self-regulated system for coming up with age ratings for games. It's called PEGI. The problem with the report talked about here is that the government wants some legally enforced entity such as the BBFC to handle it.

The thing is the BBFC don't know their arse from their elbow concerning games. They need to tool up with the people who do, the resources to look at the ever increasing volume of games being produced etc. It's no good just shoving it on their plate. I do think it's right that there ought to be a system where if PEGI fails for whatever reason, the BBFC (or someone) can step in and make sure a title gets tidied up and described adequately. That'll keep the game publishers on the straight and narrow (just like Manhunt did before the cowardly u-turn).

Concerning net censorship stuff. I fail to get the big deal. If you as a parent are worried about your kids seeing 'stuff' then put systems in place or supervise their Internet time. If, however, you think that maybe the Internet is a pretty good way to experience everything good and bad that the world has to offer in the safety of your own home, and prefer to be a guiding light to explain anything they might find.... well then, nothing to do here.

The only argument seems to be from people who don't want their kids to see 'stuff' but then wont take responsibility via the countless ways they could take responsibility, and would rather point the finger at the Internet? Well then, the only real shame there is that they managed to breed in the first place.