* Posts by Keith Doyle

116 publicly visible posts • joined 26 Apr 2007

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Memo to iPad mimics: No one wants a $799 knockoff

Keith Doyle

Cheap price to compensate for...

... the lack of an app store with a few hundred thousand apps. Thats a significant feature, even if 99% of those apps are crap. And as someone else observed, Apple's piece of that action allows for smaller margins on the hardware if necessary. Apple has a good thing going, and may be as hard to unseat as eBay, and for similar reasons.

Flash drives dangerously hard to purge of sensitive data

Keith Doyle
WTF?

Jeez...

It's pretty clear the confusion here is that some are talking about overwriting ALL the files on the disk, where a reformat (as long as it's not "quick") or complete sector overwrite enough times would likely do the job, and others talking about a single file erase, where all unallocated sectors would also have to be overwritten to insure wear levelled copies are hit as well. Wear levelling need not include "extra" space, only the smart reuse of the space you have. Extra space is only necessary if you expect a high failure rate. In any case, a whole filesystem erase is somewhat simpler than a single file erase.

Sony threatens to ban PS3 jailbreakers from network

Keith Doyle
Grenade

Consoles have been using anti-user business models for decades...

I don't know why anyone would want to play "over the network" anyhow-- it was just an excuse for game programmers to get lazy, and rather than implement a challenging AI, resort to faceless dweebs over the net instead. I have no interest in playing ANY console games that have to be connected to the network, period. Consequently, I haven't bought a console in years. I do buy PC games, to play in a non-networked box, and that suits me fine...

Mozilla: 'Internet Explorer 9 is not a modern browser'

Keith Doyle
FAIL

Both of them are total bloatware

I stopped using FF after 2.0, when it went from being "lean and mean" to the same old crap that made the original Mozilla browser and the Netscape browser before that useless. And I had gone to FF from IE years before that for similar reasons. And now we can see why, they're in a feature war. Sorry, but count me out, I want a browser that boasts *fewer* features than the competition, not more. When it comes to browsers, "less is more." I do keep a copy of FF around just for some of the debugging or special purpose plug-ins, but it's too slow and unstable for daily operations...

Facebook trains self to recognize your face

Keith Doyle
FAIL

Source of entertainment...

There's an easy fix for this, simply start tagging random people as you, and totally confuse things. Should be fun...

Microsoft wades into interwebulator chat about Hotmail

Keith Doyle
FAIL

The reason...

The reason they're not as good as gmail is, they can't see why they aren't as good as gmail.

Microsoft's powers of observation have always been, ... um, ... shall we say, ... myopic?

Apple patents glasses-free, multi-viewer 3D

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

Overkill...

Seems like they're 130% of the way to implementing a dynamic lenticular system, but that wouldn't work any better than an 100% dynamic lenticular system. Why not just leave it at 100% and you don't have to worry about tracking the viewers at all?

WikiLeaks re-taunts feds with US Amazon mirrors

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

What "Honest Democracies"?

"Honest Democracies" may have something to hide, but dishonest ones deserve the light of day shown on them. The US gave up any rights to privacy when they failed to hold AT&T accountable for illegal wiretaps-- if you can't trust your country to protect your privacy, then you can't trust your country to protect your security either. Dishonest Democracies need to be rooted out like the cancerous vermin they are.

Wikileaks taunts Pentagon with server mirrors in USA

Keith Doyle

Counterstrike? Ya never know...

Acting irrationally may be an effective deterrent, but when it comes the US gov, often they're not just acting...

Doctors' appointment system goes tits up

Keith Doyle
FAIL

It makes you wonder...

How many other SaaS services have single points of failure? Looks like we'll be finding out, sooner or later. The popularity of implementing them as an array of VMs increases that likelihood too, I would think.

Sussex police try new tactic to relieve snappers of pics

Keith Doyle

A solution for that...

Just make sure you can make a dupe right on the spot. You can give the cops the original, just make sure you have one too. Perhaps they'll start making cameras with dual media that will automatically record everything twice-- and charge a lot extra for that feature...

Jailbreak hole in iOS 4.1 will be hard to close

Keith Doyle
Alien

Apple's motivations...

There's probably a couple of reasons that Jobs + Apple are motivated to block jailbreaking.

1- The AT&T contract probably requires it, as they are the ones with the most to lose. A jailbroken phone can run homebrew apps and features that they don't get a piece of. And features they might not want you to have, such as tethering or unmetered phone calls, or downloading media from unapproved sources, whatever, need to be blocked.

2 - Apple doesn't want potentially buggy iPhones out there, as it reflects badly on them even if wasn't their fault. The whole reason that Apple products are more stable than, say Microsoft's, is Apple has complete control over the hardware, and significant control over the software. Hack-apps that were to catch on but either are buggy themselves, or aggravate bugs in iOS, can make Apple look bad-- and of course, to Steve Jobs, image is everything, just like with any other narcissist.

The only question is, can they do it, can they really lock out jailbreaking? The answer is probably yes, eventually, though it could easily require a hardware upgrade or two before they get there.

Fear as motivator: why Intel acquired McAfee

Keith Doyle
Thumb Up

Makes perfect sense.

Intel undoubtedly found out that it's cheaper to buy Mcaffe than licenses for all the AV software on their in-house machines. Strictly economics.

Unlike many of the rest of us, who've realized that AV signature detection is a scam technology. We instead save the money by uninstalling the AV programs and using other technologies (the ones you may not be aware of because they're not associated with slimy scare-tactic marketing). Technologies like execution protection, signaturing and whitelisting all known executables, etc. Better permissions controls, not running as Admin, etc. External firewall appliances. You know, technologies that can actually prevent a virus invasion from happening in the first place, rather than just attempting to detect it after it already has...

Anti-virus defences even shakier than feared

Keith Doyle
Stop

Old news

It's been apparent for quite a few years now that any self-respecting virus program would be tested against current anti-virus programs before its release. Long before a new attack is in the signature databases, it's obsolete. The whole concept is close-the-barn-doors-after-the-horses-have-bolted flawed and has become further corrupted by scare-tactics from Mcafee and Symantec in order to boost their flagging sales. There's much better ways-- keep your os up to date, as the latest features help more than any virus program-- those DEP and UAC features you curse are far better than anti-virus programs as long as you pay a little attention when those popups come up and don't just click OK on everything. Proper anti-virus needs better OS integration anyway, so that it doesn't just become a collossal drag on your system. Avoid using IE, keep your system up to date. Features like NoScript for Firefox and other means of using whitelists to restrict scripting on web pages is a big help, and speeds things up as well.

Liberal Google, Yahoo!, Apple hurting America claims Reagan

Keith Doyle
Terminator

bedtime for bonzo

Now we see the true reason that we are stuck with a two party system-- corporate donations would have to split themselves more than two ways, and would lose influence all the way around. Can't have that now, can we? Tweedledum Republican or Tweedledee Democrat, it's the corporations that run the US.

Ballmer and Softies sacrifice sleep to catch iPad

Keith Doyle
Happy

Should be pretty entertaining...

Ballmer thinks that he can just throw money (or chairs) at the problem. How clue-deprived can you get? You have to have something that Apple has that MS just doesn't-- appliance device cred-- where ease of use, aesthetics, and solid end-user testing and debugging trumps everything else.. MS has never had that, always a clumsy imitation of Apple products, and late-in-the-game to boot, which business had no real problem with since they aren't terribly interested in aesthetics or ease-of-use or bleeding edge. But individual users (the ones that buy the iPhone and iPad) DO care about that, and MS has a long history of missing the boat on that repeatedly, whether under Ballmer or Gates, both just don't get that and never have...

So the results ought to be, as usual, hilarious...

Keith Doyle
FAIL

iPad for the Coffee Table

That's where I do want my ipad-like device, as a whole-house entertainment/security system control panel. But the iPad isn't it. Actually, MS efforts to get into this market might help things there, though I don't see any way MS themselves will actually benefit from it-- it will be a money pit for them.

When was the last time MS actually broke some new ground? Apple is constantly doing that, bleeding edge with innovative new products that everyone thinks are going to go down in flames and are often proven wrong. Bill Gates loved to talk about innovation, but I've yet to see any out of MS-- absolutely none of the MS products were creating new markets that everyone thought would go down in flames. Look at MS's most successful products-- Mice, Keyboards, Word Processor, Spreadsheet. See anything new there? You have to have a track record of pioneering in order to succeed like Apple does, and that's a track record that MS not only doesn't have, it doesn't have the cojones to develop either, because it's risky, and requires a fearless true believer or two (such as Apple has in Steve Jobs). MS instead has always tried to be a fast-follower/imitator, stumbling over themselves to get their greedy fingers into markets that other people have launched. In some consumer product areas, late and/or imitation equals dead.

Microsoft should starve on radical penguin diet

Keith Doyle

MS Must port the office apps.

If MS does not port Office to Linux, it risks losing any influence they could possibly have over Linux. Right now, Open Office has one feature that MS office does not, and is becoming more and more important-- sufficient cross platform compatibility. More and more users are switching to Open Office, EVEN ON WINDOWS, not because it's free, but because it's more compatible with their entire enterprise-- which has begun to include Linux on the desktop. And even where it does not, many servers (often which are Linux) have need for compatible office tools, for importing database information into spreadsheets and documents, etc. Servers are used to generate and distribute documents, even if users don't normally type them in on them.

MS has an opportunity to influence Linux on the desktop, by running with it themselves. If they do not (and their egos suggest they will not), they will be dragged kicking and screaming there, late to the game again, once the exodus towards greater interoperability finally hits them in their wallets hard enough for them to take notice.

3D films fall flat

Keith Doyle

I love 3D stereo, but...

I have a collection of 3D stereo. Viewmaster reels, realist format slides, and a couple of stereo cameras. I know how to make stereo still images from any digital camera. I've messed around with stereo projectors, and written software to render computer generated 3D in stereo for viewing systems and projectors.

But in commercial movies, it's just one more thing to go wrong. Which means, it adds additional risk. And risk is something to which the film business is averse. Unfortunately, that's not likely to ever change, at least in a system that's based on capitalism. Color may have seemed that way as well at first, but it's benefit was significant, required less special preparation (when in fact, B&W needed special color consideration itself, as a red dress in reality could end up looking black on screen, or the same 'shade' as a green one when it's supposed to be different). Sound too, brought immediate benefit and actually may have made it easier in some ways to make films. Stereo is always extra work, and extra risk, and the benefit is uncertain. If the business ever gets around to preferring uncertainty, perhaps then 3D mainstream movies will be allowed to get to the point where they consistently do well...

Google discovers Chrome can (really) block ads

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

Ad Blockers...

If you want my eyeballs, you will have to pay ME. My eyeballs are not FREE, you freetards. Can't make a business model out of that, then cry me a river and go away...

Treasury pulls plug on Wiki-cutback site

Keith Doyle

That's what you get for rolling your own suggestion box...

If you want a robust suggestion box or forum system, perhaps rather than rolling their own, if their IT guys don't have much experience with it, they ought to consider using an existing service that has a track record of dealing with such attacks, and may be a little better at keeping up with such things-- Yahoo groups, Google groups, Facebook-- while these are by no means perfect either, you can bet that "my first suggestion box program," is going to be festooned with security gaffes.

You may be able to get away with this sort of thing if you're Joe Schmoe and are putting together a personal site, or some rinky-dink small business page, but Treasury Dept? Get real. You need an IT network that has a 24/7 security staff and lots of experiencen dealing with attacks...

MS confirms Windows shortcut zero-day flaw

Keith Doyle
Stop

@Paul Crawford

Chances are, the CD you have does not maintain separate permission information on its files, and Linux can't read the mind of whoever burnt the CD to determine what their intent was. On such disks, you have to decide if you want all the files to have execute permission, or none of them. If you want to execute any file on the CD, you'll have to mount it with exec permissions, and you get the 777 permission on all files as you have observed.

The alternative is to not have execute permission on ANY of the files on the CD (since all files will be treated the same if the CD filesystem on the disk does not support file-by-file permissions)-- and guess what, that's what happens if you don't specify execute permission when its mounted. If the mount is specified in /etc/fstab, remove the "exec", or set the option -o noexec when doing the mount command...

This is different than Windows, which keeps a crude method of file permission based on the filename itself-- if it ends in ".exe" or ".bat" or various other things, than it has "exec" permission, etc. Linux doesn't normally treat filenames as being special in this regard-- I suppose it could map permissions based on such logic, but it wouldn't want to to that by default because what if a typical shell script that either ends in .sh or perhaps has no extent at all, is stored on such a CD-- you won't be able to execute it from Linux. And if it does have an .exe extension, it's probably not a Linux executable, but a Windows executable, which you probably don't want to execute on Linux anyway, so that kind of logic wouldn't really apply in Linux...

Why we love to hate Microsoft

Keith Doyle

What would it take?

Well, let's see...

- pigs flying

- hell freezing over

- removing all DRM from their products

- porting Office, IE, Silverlight, SQL Server, etc., to Linux

- stop throwing chairs and otherwise terrorizing and sweatshopping their own employees

- learn to compete on merit rather than with lawyers, intimidation, and incompatibility

That'll do for starters...

F*ck you, thunders disgruntled fanboi Apple user

Keith Doyle
Jobs Halo

It's quite simple, really...

"fanbois" are knee-jerk religious fanatics about their computer. This guy just proved he is one...

Javascript guru calls for webwide IE6 boycott

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

A bad precident...

ANY web-wide attempt to enforce browser selection should be soundly DISCOURAGED. I'm going to use whatever browser I please and if you don't like it, BUGGER OFF! Yahoo complains that my browser is "old" because it doesn't support some crap that they want to feed me advertising-- and frankly, that's just how I like it. Fortunately, they do provide the option of using their "old" interface which is fine by me. The thing is, my browser isn't "old" it's just outside the mainstream. We do NOT want to start dictating what browsers people should be using. Does that mean that site designers have to code to the least-common-denominatior, well, in a word, YES, and that's the way it should be. The whole POINT of HTML is to provide content that browsers can decide FOR THEMSELVES (and users, in turn) how to render or not render the content. GET USED TO IT. New devices, such as cell phones, or touch-only devices like the iPad, may just have to do things differently, and if that's incompatible with someone's invalid javascript assumptions, so be it. The visually impaired need everything to render via text-to-speech devices and allow for their interaction as well. I still use Lynx from time to time from a dumb terminal, and can surf most things just fine. Do not assume that you can just force new browser features down peoples throats.

SCO: jurors too busy Facebooking to rule on Unix claim

Keith Doyle

Consistent with only one thing...

Obviously, the lawyers are getting paid by the delay, and nothing else. Possibly somewhere down the road, Microsoft promised to pay them for every minute they can stall, and they're ideas for keeping that up are now getting so thin it would seem the only place they can go after this is to outright contempt of court-- as they've tried everything else by now, most of which has already danced out to the edge of contempt...

Palin email witness decries 'dog and pony' prosecution

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

@Apocalypse--

Nahh-- Palin is just the Republican equivalent of Nancy Pelosi. Both are the favorite extremists for extremists on the other side to hate. She might have a good chance to make it into the House of Reps though, combined with the right gerrymandering...

iPhone, IE, Firefox, Safari get stomped at hacker contest

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

Busy bloating the OS you mean...

"Always love the "if I can find this bug, why couldn't Apple/Microsoft/Linux kernel developers" questions. Because they're busy building the o/s, that's why. "

And this is what is fundamentally wrong with commercial products. The most important feature of any software product is to be completely secure. But when security isn't there, it's a bug fix to correct, not a feature upgrade (since it's supposed to be there in the first place). Commercial vendors need to get you to pay for an upgrade, which they can't really do for mere bug fixes, so they have to add fancy features that you probably don't need, inevitably making the products even more complex and even more insecure in the process. If they weren't in such a hurry to sell you a new version, they could spend more time getting it right before they change it into something new. "build an os?" what a laugh, they need to SIMPLIFY the OS, because an OS doesn't need to be that complex, and it's easier to secure a simple design than a complex one. Examples-- we didn't need ActiveX, or .NET, or Silverlight, or Vista, or IE for that matter, Microsoft did. Less is more.

FBI cyber cop says 'very existence' of US under threat

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

Uh-- the least credible source, eh?

I wouldn't expect this guy to say otherwise any more than I would ever expect to hear an anti-virus company say that viruses are no longer any threat. My 85 year old mother would be more credible on the subject than someone who's job is dependent on the "existence" of the US being under threat...

Microsoft confirms IE9 will shun Windows XP

Keith Doyle
Coffee/keyboard

Nice to know

That Microsoft's Windows 7 has finally made it to the advanced world of the 1980s with the "modern graphics" of a 2D API.

IE9 - the big questions and Microsoft's half answers

Keith Doyle
Gates Horns

Modern Browser?

"Building a modern browser requires a modern operating system."

What a joke. The feature we're talking about here is Direct2D-- a 2D API? Give me a break. 2D APIs have been in "modern operating systems" long before Windows even existed. And some reports show that code written for Direct2D is larger and more complicated than code designed to do the same operations with Direct3D, so the only need for it is purely artificial. This is clearly a bogus limitation in order to kludge together some reasons to upgrade XP. But sorry, the only reason to upgrade from Windows XP is stimulus for Microsoft, which IMHO, needs to earn it with something other than chair-throwing subterfuge such as this.

And sorry MS, my upgrade of XP is going to be to Ubuntu, not W7. The only thing holding me back from doing it sooner rather than later is the availability of a certain application which is currently being ported to Linux, so it won't be long now.

Mozilla gives passive-aggressive missive to pre-Firefox 3.6 hold-outs

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

Already gave up on FF

Some time ago I dumped FF for another browser. I don't quite understand why an open source project has acquired the same bad habit that the closed source products do-- an incessant need to upgrade. Fix bugs, yes, but the feeping creaturism I can do without. The reason I went to FF in the first place, is it was supposed to be so much leaner and meaner than Mozilla/Netscape (which I had already dumped). Not anymore it's not, time to move on...

Experts reboot list of 25 most dangerous coding errors

Keith Doyle
FAIL

Coding Malpractice Insurance anyone?

If you're going to treat coders like doctors and sue them for malpractice, you have to give them the absolute authority to do it right. That means the authority to determine how long it will take, and what techniques and tools will get used. The coders don't make those decisions now, except in a few rare instances, management does-- in the name of "getting the product to market in a timely fashion."

Not only that, coding is a team effort, and often ancient preexisting code and libraries are foisted upon coders who have neither the time nor expertise to fully understand what risks may be contained in their newly-found inheritance.

If you're going to treat them like doctors, they have to have the same sort of authority, the authority to actually make the decisions relevant to their responsibilities. And you'll have to pay them about three times as much. Any takers? I thought not.

Apple's Tablet won't save Big Dumb Media

Keith Doyle
Go

Changing notions of authority...

I think it may be a little more than just "notions" that are changing in that regard. And that is something that even the advertisers are eventually going to have to face. Content filtering applies to them as well, perhaps most specifically to them. With the contraction of "brick and mortar" shopping given online alternatives, advertisers are simply less able to parade their wares in our face if we don't want it. And many of us don't, spam is simply not acceptable anymore, no matter what the source. Even "approved" robocalls from political organizations will get a disconnected number recording from many of us. Empower individuals to screen out advertising, and advertising will get screened out by anyone who actually has a life. Pontifications about the downsides of donning such blinders aside, it is a sign the chickens have come home to roost, and found the roost has moved away while they were gone.

The advent of the shopping mall provided retailiers the ability to better control their space-- you can't picket on private property for example, so it rendered such movements useless. But the internet provides individuals better control over their own space, and the shoe is now on the other foot.

Google to flog unlocked phones in January

Keith Doyle

Unlocked? Hardly.

To me, "unlocked" means, "works with any carrier." Wake me up when that day comes...

MS kills 'Bing buys the news' furore, but Google could still lose it

Keith Doyle

Easy...

Why not use meta tags to block Google indexing?

Because that doesn't generate sympathy coverage in the press from all that whining, that's why..

Sony to bring Risk to the big screen

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

Lamest game ever

Every game of Risk I've ever played ended up as a three-player stalemate, until one of the players got so bored with playing it they'd intentionally throw the game. As soon as one player started to get large, the other two would gang up on him and whittle him back down to size, and in that process one of the others got to be the big guy who was then the next target.

Feel free to use that description as the synopsis for the movie...

Mozilla plots Firefox interface overhaul

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

Too much time on their hands.

FrankenFox has been going the same way of the old Mozilla for the last few years-- to total bloatware. Tabs are completely redundant on Windows (ever see the Taskbar? What do you think that is? And IT supports tabs from multiple applications at the same time!) Vertical footprint indeed. Years ago I had started using FF because of it's small memory footprint and minimalist features. Looks like that was just because they had just started over once the Mozilla source base had gone unmanageable. Time to do that again, guys, and put it out of it's misery. I stopped using FF after version 1.5 when it turned into the same old bloated monster.

Windows 95 to Windows 7: How Microsoft lost its vision

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

Why upgrade?

The problem is, progress isn't what's been needed so much since W95-- STABILITY is. But you have to get users to upgrade if you want to stay in business so there has to be at least some appearance of progress... Users don't upgrade without a reason-- and I have several friends still happily using W98SE. Their experience isn't much different than mine on XP, nor, apparently, yours on W7.

AT&T savages Google Voice

Keith Doyle
FAIL

A workaround for Google

All Google has to do to fix this is to implement two versions-- a "free" version that won't connect to numbers that cost, and a "non-free" version that passes the costs to the consumer and charges his credit card. Then, when the consumer opts to have the "free" version, it is the consumer deciding not to connect with these numbers, not Google imposing it on them. Certainly, if you develop your own personal phone service via VoIP or something, YOU are not required to implement access for YOURSELF to every "valid" number if you don't want to, so you can decide to restrict yourself to a subset of the available numbers if you want without penalty. So if the consumer opts for the restriction, it's not Google's fault if noone wants to pay to connect to these numbers anyway. I suspect AT&T would find that solution to be worse for them than the problem they have now though, so if they were smart they'd keep their trap shut...

Apple breaks jailbreakers' hearts with iPhone 3GS patch

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

just for noobs and the dim-witted

Apple's great, as long as you don't have any ideas of your own, what features you want in a phone or a computer, and how you would want ot use them. Choose Apple, and there is only one way to do things-- the Apple way. I've been around too long for that, and when I want to do something, I usually already know how I want it done-- with Apple, I might as well bang my head against a wall. In my book, computers MUST follow MY workflow and adapt to ME, not the other way around. Consequently, Apple has "bricked" all Apple hardware as far as I am concerned.

The rest of you can say "ooh, look-- shiny," all you want, I'm just not impressed with your pretty toys.

Google strips Pirate Bay homepage from search results

Keith Doyle
Thumb Up

Oh, I don't mind the DMCA

It just makes it easier to locate banned content-- I just google for "dmca takedown"...

How to run Mac OS X on a generic PC

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

Why bother

Mac software may be "better designed' than WIndows (whatever that means-- the lazy bums don't work with as much hardware), but EVERY time I try to use a Mac I find myself fighting with it because it is so inflexible. I expect software to conform to MY workflows and not make assumptions about how I want to do things-- I won't conform to "Mac" workflow, but I find hacking their sortware to suit to be a near-impossible task, as it is far more "closed" than Windows. As much as I curse Gates & Ballmer, at least XP I can hack into pretty much whatever workflow I need.

Better to show us how to run XP on Mac hardware, if their hardware is as good as they say...

Sharp creates true-hue five-colours-per-pixel LCD

Keith Doyle
Thumb Up

I want one...

I've seen a 6 color projection system-- which as this LCD system promises, looks WAY better than standard RGB fare. It was able to effectively reproduce scenes illuminated by ultra-violet light, among other things. Sure, it'll require new cameras, and current transmission technologies won't do it, nor will film technologies, but once you see how great it looks you'll want all of those things to get with the program!

Hack suspect challenges privacy of Palin emails

Keith Doyle

Expectation of privacy?

If postal mail was as secure as email, all letters would be sent as 8x10 pages out in the open (not in envelopes), and transferred to the recipients via bucket brigade through thousands of independent hands (not the postal service). Regardless of the legal status of email, anyone who thinks email from a *practical* standpoint provides any expectation of privacy has no idea how it works. Sending email is only slightly less public than posting it on your blog.

Intel hit with largest ever EU fine

Keith Doyle
Unhappy

Old news

This sort of thing has been going on for decades in the US. 20 years ago I was working on a graphics terminal project. At that point we were basically an Intel shop, but we had National Semi & Motorola in to show their new CPUs. As a programmer, I much preferred either the Nat Semi or Moto parts, because they were much cleaner designs and were not limited to 64K memory segments for a product that needed more than 64K for screen memory. But our preferences got vetoed by the head of hardware engineering, and I ultimately found out why-- Intel engineers stepped in and gave them the complete hardware design fror the project so our engineers didn't have to do anything but put their name on it. Intel made it totally easy to be a hardware engineer for intel products, as they would do your work for you, so no wonder they always chose Intel. Is that anti-competitive? I'm not sure, but it always did seem to me to be a bit underhanded, and at least, we could have fired all our own hardware engineers if upper management had known about it...

Symantec hit by massive goodwill impairment

Keith Doyle
Stop

What's wrong with this picture...

"Goodwill" doesn't mean what you think it means here.

Windows 7 gets built in XP mode

Keith Doyle

It better run in 256MB on slow HW...

If W7 XP mode will run on low-end hardware I'd really be impressed, but I doubt that's the case. There's plenty of old computers out there that are still perfectly serviceable providing you *don't* try to run Vista or later MicroBloatSoftWare on it...

Harvard Prof.'s hearing against RIAA can't be streamed online

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

So much for "transparency"

When American justice cannot withstand the "light of day," we can be certain it serves not the people, but special interests.

Mozilla considers dumping Firefox support for Win2k, early XP

Keith Doyle
Thumb Down

That's why I dumped Firerfox...

If it don't work on W98SE, forget it. There's no excuse for dumping compatibility -- while I use XP/SP3, most of the people I know are still on W98SE and have been running FF 1.5. Their hardware WON'T support XP, otherwise works fine, and I'm recommending they use other browsers who's updates still run on W98.

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