Posts by Cucumber C Face
183 posts • joined Tuesday 29th July 2008 20:46 GMT
Re: STOP THE ROT
Pity you posted anonymously - I want to have your babies
Re: If more proof were needed...
True - but there are people out there dumber than the politicians.
The average child murderer or terrorist bomber does seem incapable of emptying (much less wiping) their Internet browsing history and cache - let alone fathom VPNs, anonymous proxies, MAC obfuscation etc.
This does give the illusion that a mega-log of everything an ISP sees could be trawled for suspicious activity.
Re: Another PR stunt by MPs
change the law OR change the tax rate to compete with Ireland.
Why should UK based businesses pay more than any business based (nominally or actually) in Ireland?
Re: the efficiency of plants converting sunlight to fuel is abysmally low
Hmm... efficiency not the whole story.
When solar panels have renewably sustained 99.9999999% of life on Earth (excluding hydrothermal vents) for a billion or so years AND while doing so laid down as much fossil fuel - get back to us.
Re: In a mental institution..
No actually you're wrong there.
"Care in The Community" (National Health Service and Community Care Act 1990) a.k.a. all but eliminate inpatient mental health - neglect or underfund community care - came in right around the end of her administration.
Research is no defence...
One assumes they'll catalogue any terrorist manuals (and worse) out there on .uk
I assume the legal framework must give them specific immunity from the default assumption that copying to local storage='making'
zOMG - you can only learn to program on a Pi
>Running Ubuntu means there’s no reason why the NUC can’t be used to learn programming the way the Pi can<
Is there any reason that one can't learn most second or later generation languages on just about any mainstream OS running on any piece of hardware?
Triple whammy
Brilliant marketing concept -
1. managers can get hard ons playing directly with 'Big Data' until the next buzzword comes along
2. they never understood RDBMS and SQL anyway
3. they never figured how to create a table in Microsoft Word
So as long as the graphical user interface looks like Excel these BI guys have a license to print money
Re: Popping Clogs
>hobble an old vista pc to continually boot loop, until only a handful of people survive.<
Vista booting eh - your would be victims will likely die of old age before it gets there
Re: Login cookie for TOR
>nonces in the TOR authentication protocol<
Double entendre intentional?
@Peter 26 VPN
Don't know why you're copping downvotes on this. I have to use a VPN on BT ADSL at my parent's place to get access to certain ports >at all< never mind BT's throttling, the obvious monitoring of URLs you attempt to visit etc.
I also use the VPN to get past T-Mobile oh so helpfully reducing image resolution and rewriting all the javascript on web pages you visit through their 3G service.
FWIW I use VyperVPN. Being a US company this probably also saves the CIA the effort of requesting my traffic logs from gov.uk ;-)
Thought experiment
If the malware had placed a picture of a murder being committed onto your hard drive it would be an evil and unpleasant act.
However would you thereby be placed in a position where you would be accused of murder?
Re: What about UK?
Why bother with the porn?
For the UK they could just plant a random data file with a size evenly divisible by 512 on the victims hard drive.
"That's a True Crypt file - open it if you're not a drug-ped0-terrorist"
Nothing to hide nothing to fear. Guilty until proven innocent.
Re: On Radio 5 Today ....
>some young men now prefer anal sex as they think pubic hair is disgusting<
Non-sequitur - what about the young men who prefer anal sex with hairy bums?
Well I would
I think Diane A's kind of sexy.
I think her politics stink but I imagine she'd have her mou** (cont. page 69)
Doing the maths
Say there is a 1 in 100 chance that a serious sexual assault on a child will be brought to justice - a depressingly low proportion but probaly not far from the mark IF you take within family offences into account.
The probability that 200 independent serious sexual offences will be committed with none being brought to justice is 99/100 to the power of 200 or about 0.13
So how lucky was Jimmy Savile feeling - or are a fair proportion of the allegations poppycock?
Re: What was more shocking was
Even in 2001 when this Tweenies episode was made, its audience would not have known who Savile was - at least in this context. He stopped being a regular TOTP presenter in the mid-1980's.
Re: Commentards Unite
Hmm - many a true word spoken in jest.
Paris? Because we haven't seen enough of her on The Register of late.
Re: 9mm?
I've owned a Browning Hi-Power and fired Glock 9mm's. I've also shot .357 and .44 magnum handguns.
Both the 9 mm's allowed me to put 2-3 times as many bullets into a man size target at 20 metres per unit time.
If you get to draw, lift and perfectly aim your weighty Desert Eagle - and make that first shot count - fine. Otherwise you may achieve little more than deafen yourself and your target. But once you start trying to rapid fire the magnums you struggle with the recoil and getting the thing back on target.
Posted in Which qualifications are worthwhile?
Heathcare sector in the UK
I do work in UK healthcare IT - and have done for 15 years. I have no formal IT qualifications just clinical ones.
UK healthcare IT
1. Is totally dominated by one utterly ignorant, imbecilic and fickle customer - the NHS (or in fact the DoH)
2. The money is cr@p unless you can get on the increasingly elusive consultancy circuit. Gone are the heady days of Nu Labour and management consultancies throwing zillions at morons.
However that doesn't mean you shouldn't try this sector given your background.
Robet Helpman makes an excellent point. Domain knowledge is helpful and even valued by most sensible IT companies.
Also IT work is not restricted to taking a monkey wrench to hardware and cutting code. Good systems analysts, people who can read and write functional specs and documentation, trainers etc AND have worked in the industry the software is being supplied to are few. If you set out on that path you may find yorself with plenty of choice of work in this sector - but as I said - don't plan on retiring to the Caribbean at 35.
And don't kid yourself it's an escape from the NHS. If you work for a supplier to the NHS - you'll still be at the sharp end of the Political BS.
Organic != Produced only by organisms
These are the simplest kinds of 'organic' chemicals - a single carbon atom with a variety of covalently bound functional groups. These can easily be (and have almost certainly have been) produced by mundane physical processes.
If they find polypeptides, chains of nucleic acids be impressed. Even an effing long chain fatty acid would cause one to raise an eyebrow - but this? Nothing to see here - move on.
Legislation needed
Apparently phone hacking and bribing policemen was legal before Leveson noticed it wasn't.
Like killing patients was legal before Shipman.
Like hijacking and murder were legal before 9-11.
It's always easier to pass new legislation, launch a few new QUANGOs and implement new red tape at the taxpayer's expense, than enforce existing safeguards and laws.
I'd argue Cameron is possibly showing some balls for the first time.
All the bank's fault
Yeah - I save all my sympathy for the muppets who thought taking out 125% mortages of 7 times their income on properties worth 50% of what they paid on the expectation their property's price would treble per annum in perpetuity.
I also deeply respect the politicians who decided to exclude property prices from realistic contribution to inflation indices, ignored the unsustainable boom because it was a vote winner and ran with the absurdly low interest rates fuelling it.
Duty Free at the airport anyone?
All the hypocrites who decry legal tax avoidance [not criminal tax evasion] while doing it themselves feel free to downvote me.
All it takes...
.. is for less intelligent people to breed faster and leave more offspring than more intelligent people.
That would never happen in our society would it?
Re: Show me where the tibetian suicide bombers are
I can't - but don't stand too close to them when they set themselves on fire
https://www.google.co.uk/images?q=tibet+self+immolation
Re: ownership of all Class A addresses should be re-evaluated and then re-distributed.
You cannot be serious. Trash the 'intranet' of each and every kindergarten, District level government office and business with more than 2 employees in the United States?
That's fighting talk boy.
Re: A brilliant consumer experience in Windows
Techs UK
Are you a car driver?
The basic user interface for automobiles coalesced fairly early - drivers from the 1930's or even earlier would have little difficulty adapting to the controls and instrumentation of a modern automobile.
Similarly a near optimum desktop computer UI paradigm was set in the 1980s by Apple.
The UI paradigm for tablets is different - arguably Apple nailed it first again - but it's nothing like the optimum 'power' desktop design!
Say when skateboards came along, car manufacturers had mandated that automobiles could henceforth only be steered using your feet and brakes applied by leaning backwards and clenching your buttocks?
Perhaps if you want to be have the option to drive your car with a flaky interface and it suits you - then brilliant. However why are UI designers (and it's not just MS) abandoning the rest of us?
Only half the story
Government 'outsources' to a multi-national consultancy, then change requirements and take their eyes off the ball. Heard that one before? When will these f****rs learn?
Sir Humphrey and the ministerial spinmeisters will pleased all the media flung mud is sticking to Buckles.
<snip>
06 December 2011
The Department of Culture, Media and Sport's Olympic progress report reveals that, following further consultation, the costs for security are likely to be £553m and the amount of security personnel required, 23,700. The report identifies "a significant recruitment challenge".
As a result, the Home Office begins discussions with the Ministry of Defence about the provision of military personnel "to act in security roles". The MoD is already seeking to cut its budget by 8 per cent as a result of the defence spending review.
</snip>
http://www.channel4.com/news/from-cheers-to-jeers-chronology-of-the-g4s-cock-up
Posted in How to screw LIBOR and alienate people
But the BBC told me...
"Bob Diamond is a very naughty man. It's all the nasty Tories fault. Labour MP says 'They should be sent to prison'. And now a three hour interview with Mrs Miggins whose mortgage was foreclosed on in 1991"
More quality reportage like this article on the Register please.
Bring on the iSpanner set
Tablets at one inch intervals between 3 and 80.
Re: Gun ownership.
If he'd wanted to kill the guy and hadn't had a gun he could have run him over with the pick up truck.
In fact therefore probably just as well he did have a gun.
Homicidal psychopaths are homicidal psychopaths. They will kill with a plastic spoon if nothing else come to hand. End of.
Did the Lego cost more than the Pi?
The post is required, and must contain letters.
Re: Wait and see...
Your point about restrictions on jacking up prices on the exact spec within 90 days is well made.
However natural disasters in the Far East aside [and suppliers have a get out clause for this], in IT and telecoms the "exact spec" is usually cheaper on the open market within 90 days. So these suppliers are granted license to shift obsolete gear for years at premium fixed prices and have any risk underwritten by the taxpayer.
Trebles, 50 quid floppy discs and directorships all round.
I have a cunning plan minister
>All of the suppliers hoping to get onto the list have been through e-auctions, held by the government, to determine which ones are offering the best prices<
And shall continue to offer the best prices once they are on this list for 3 , 2 , 1 , zero seconds. Too slow you missed it. Locked into the same old expensive suppliers yet again Sir Humphrey.
You could not effing make it up!
Steve Job's death clears way for Apple 1 auction
TFIFY
Coding by non-professionals "impossible" since the early 1980's anyhow
Microsoft probably figured the 'amateur' developer market was lost to the Raspberry Pi platform anyway.
Only in Nevada
You must hand it to them - they walk their libetarianism like they talk it.
They have decriminalised marijuana, legalised prostitution and gambling. It's also home to gun ownership laws which stop just shy of allowing juveniles to pack tactical nuclear weapons.
Now driverless cars - excellent!
It's also one of the States with the lowest population density. Perhaps it's just as well.
Still it's high on my list for a fun holiday. See you at the Burning Man maybe.
No gravity well - but asteroids are moving targets
To exploit asteroid resources wouldn't one have to bring the asteroid into Earth orbit and/or mount the mining gear etc. on the asteroid and fire the products back at Earth?
Either of those would be technically (and energetically) challenging..... I can't see the economics squaring up on this in any practical timeframe.
Let's hope they do btter than the NHS
CSC have taken billions from the NHS in both real money and opportunity cost ...
http://www.ehi.co.uk/news/EHI/7666/csc-and-dh-talks-will-drag-on-to-june
Like Accenture they were seduced by iSoft in the procurement stages... that worked out really well
http://www.ehi.co.uk/news/EHI/7688/isoft-trial-told-of-%27forgery-kit%27
Only CSC were so impressed they subsequently bought the company....
http://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240105223/CSC-closes-acquisition-of-iSoft-ahead-of-NHS-IT-contract-renegotiations
There is however b*****r all to choose between the big management consultancies.
Basically IMO - if the answer is BT/Accenture/CSC/HP/Capita/etc - you're asking the wrong question. Unless the question is "how do I advance my personal PHB career from a undeserved six figure salary in the upper tier of the Public Sector into seven+."
Did Browsium realise..
.. that by winning a UK Gov contract they are thereby obliged to give highly paid jobs for an unending stream of failed ministers and clueless senior civil servants.
But how many 1980's papers were wrong?
There are large numbers of predictive models and a relatively small range of plausible outcomes (i.e. a trend of at most a few degrees C either way over decades or nothing). Inevitably, in retrospect, some are bound to have been 'right' whether their model was valid or not.
[No axe to grind here either way. Personal opinion is that C02 is smoke not the fire. If we could seal the excess CO2 in a box and magic it away we still have to address f*****g the planet with over-populatation, pollution, over-exploitation, deforestation etc.]
re: Tor, PGP, VPN etc.
So everyone will be using these then?
No they won't be, because the use of encryption etc must inevitably be made a criminal offence also.
Won't happen eh? It's already an offence not to know the password any encrypted file (or maybe just a file containing random data) found on your computer.
Whoever you vote for, Sir Humphrey always gets in.
Wot - no ribbon?
Be thankful for great mercy.
re: Idiots all around
<snip>Tor has been easy to slow down/block for quite some time simply because so many idiots running Tor servers give them domain names like "I_am_a_tor_server.net"</snip>
More simply anyone can go to sites linked to the organisation and download CSV files containing the IP addresses of all Tor exit nodes and relays e.g. http://torstatus.blutmagie.de/
Posted in Cloud proves that OldSQL is still cool
No future for RDBMS in the Cloud?
I think that would imply a major limitation of the Cloud rather than RDBMS.
Posted in Berkeley boffins crack brain wave code
A doctor writes...
Speech reception, interpretation/comprehension and production are located in structurally and functionally distinct domains of the brain.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broca%27s_area#Broca.27s_aphasia_vs._other_aphasias
After strokes or other brain injury, you can commonly find people who can't understand speech, but can speak reasonably well and vice versa. Deaf people can often learn to speak etc.
These brain regions are interconnected. However there is no reason to assume that your brain assembles what you either 'think' or about to say into the same encoding as what you are listening to.
Maybe it's not because GP's are crap...
Perhaps GPs oppose it because they realise that iGimmicks aren't what keep people out of hospital.
At least not until they can get people out of bed, give them their medicines, wipe a**es and share a cup of tea with them.
Also - just like in hospitals - each gizmo will raise false alarms, run flat, fall off the patient etc n times per day. Only instead of the nurse walking ten feet down a ward to switch the thing off - he has to drive out to the patient's house.
Still - offering glitzy high tech but futile NHS services gives great press releases to politicians. Plus we'll need to appoint more NHS admindroids to support them and pay management consultancies to roll them out. So trebles all round eh?
Smart TV=PC?
A desktop PC is smarter than any consumer TV is likely to be.
Am I the only person in the World who doesn't bother with a "TV" per se at all any more? TV cards and DVD playback on PCs has been around since the 90's.
Caveat - small apartment renders massive flatscreen pointless - albeit that doesn't stop most people in our neighborhood squatting 20 inches from their 80 inch status symbols.
