* Posts by Paul_Murphy

707 publicly visible posts • joined 22 Sep 2009

Page:

3-million-km-long comet plunges into Sun

Paul_Murphy

Tail - not comet

The tail was 3milkil long - the head (ie the solid bit) of the comet was probably not more than 10 miles or so across I would think.

more here:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100524203306.htm

ttfn

Google's encrypted search casts shadow on web analytics

Paul_Murphy

What happens if EVERYONE uses SSL?

Would the info be passed from one https site to another https site?

If so then problem solved!

The beta seems pretty fast I must say - haven't used it too much, but it seems to do the job.

ttfn

Color ebook reader for 200 clams? Yup

Paul_Murphy

Getting there.

A better screen (not fussed about response time, but daylight reading is a must), and - the biggie - a longer battery life and it would be the best so far.

I like the fact that at 7 inches I can probably slip it into my pocket during my commute.

I would also like to know that it can play music at the same time as reading.

ttfn

Copernicus reburied with full Catholic honours

Paul_Murphy

So in 500 years time...

The church will be supporting the use of condoms,

The church will be supporting womens rights to abortion,

The church will be exposing child-abusers to the legal authorities,

and so on,

and so on,

and so on.

Why do we have to wait so long? why are they still around? religion should have died out in the middle ages - it's just not relevant to people anymore.

ttfn

PARIS flashes some radio goodies

Paul_Murphy

Launch sites...

Since Woomera is a little too far to use, maybe you could go down to the Needles on the Isle of Wight for the test flights.

Since the UK did it's rocket testing there, there is a certain symmetry.

ttfn

US boffins synthesize self-replicating bacteria

Paul_Murphy
Coat

Another step in our history.

When I first read about this yesterday I had two conflicting feelings, the first was amazement that ths has been achieved - particularly in the US, and the second was worry over what this will mean for the future.

I agree that we need to pursue these, and other, lines of research - carefully and with adequate oversight.

All our (ie. human) efforts have been built on the earlier 'shoulders of giants', and there are so many developments that have been good and bad at the same time, machinery makes production of goods cheaper and faster, but puts people out of work, atomic energy is both deadly and life-saving, ever better weapons are still used for both attack and defence.

This topic is so huge it's hard to know how to boil it down, but so many of our recent discoveries are inevitably heading us towards a better understanding of ourselves and our universe - just as a caveman would treat a mobile phone as a magical device, so our decendants might be looking back at us and wondering how we could possibly live in our brutal world, where pollution, starvation, diseases, energy shortages, deformity, ill-health and so many things that we take for granted are still the reality - maybe in their world these things and more have been wiped out, 'simply' because _we_ dared to explore what was possible.

I must say that since my child has cerebral palsy my level of interest in these sorts of things is maybe a little more personal that it might otherwise be.

With the right controls and understanding this is another small step towards our childrens future - lets not let them down please.

ttfn

Pirate Bay now run from Pirate Party 'mountain bunker'

Paul_Murphy

@fraser - from here:

http://www.wolfire.com/humble

------excerpt -----------

Total contributed $1,273,593

- Number of contributions 138,812

- Average contribution $9.17

<Win> $8.05

<Mac> $10.18

<Linux>$14.52

------/excerpt -----------

Big Yin was saying that the average spend per user was higher for the linux users that windows (or come to that apple) users.

I suspect that they were talking about the 'cost' of the OS, not browsing habits, since the two are not necessarily connected.

The old argument about having money left over from not paying for the OS is rather tired, but the other sort of free is more relevant -do you want an OS where you are tied into certain codecs, programs, DRM etc. or not?

ttfn

Paul_Murphy

Because

The bittorrent search engine only handles legitimate traffic (as far as I can tell anyway).

Now this is a good thing since it goes to show that the BT system isn't all about the pirates - it's about sharing files, and files like games patches, free ebooks, reference documents, certain device drivers, peoples home-made movies etc. can all be swapped back and forth with no worries.

If someone wanted to make their files available to anyone at any time, quickly and easily then one of the very best ways to achieve this is to make a torrent of it and let it loose.

It does depend on not minding who can get hold of it of course.

ttfn

Best Buy tech finds 'child abuse' wallpaper on broken PC

Paul_Murphy

I guess if you wanted to stitch someone up

When PC boots, go into bios and change date/time,

Boot off a linux cd, disk or usb drive,

check date/time is sufficiently in the past,

copy the files to wherever you please, c:\windows normally for desktop backgrounds, the desktop itself, 'my pictures' or 'temp' or whatever,

restart pc and reset bios date/time,

remember to take out the boot cd, disk or usb.

hmm - what have I forgotten?

ttfn

Grow-lamps roast Yorkshire dope farmer in his sleep

Paul_Murphy

Peak vs constant and humidity

The problem with the lights scenario is that the temperature will be constant - no matter the time of day the temp will be 38 deg (or higher).

Normally a body gets to cool down at night. If the temperature never gets below a certain level (I think it's 24 degC) then the body will eventually overheat.

There is also the matter of humidity - if the air is dry and very hot a body can sweat to keep itself cool - if the air is hot and humid then the body cannot cool itself.

ttfn

Norks 'have answer to humanity's greatest problem'

Paul_Murphy
Unhappy

False advertising

Now I'm sad :-(

I'm sure that real norks hold the answers to quite a few of lifes problems, just not the norks in the article.

For shame.

ttfn

Software piracy rates fall

Paul_Murphy

I suspect that Linux

And similar open source software are also a good game changer - especially on older and slower systems.

It would be nice to have the likes of Microsoft and Apple not worrying about piracy, but only because nobody wanted to use their software since people were using open source instead.

ttfn

Voting chaos in not-fit-for-purpose electoral system

Paul_Murphy

Where to start?

What IS the best system of voting?

Boundary changes determine the mix of people in each area - as far as I am aware the boundary is changed by the in-power government, and I doubt they are changed arbitarily, so they will always reflect the best results for that party.

Why do we need boundaries anyway? maybe using post codes might be a better bet?

First past the post? how is that useful? how about just counting the votes?

Apparantly the constituency that the house speaker is in is not challenged by the other main parties - how is that fair on the voters in that area? they simply cannot vote for anyone else? I would suggest that the speaker cannot be an MP, since as a speaker they need to be independant of any party. I cannot see the rationale of them standing in an election - in fact wouldn't a professional speaker (ie as a paid seperate post) be a better idea?

Paper - well I must say that of the various ways of doing things having a physical bit of paper may be archaic, but far less prone to tampering than any electronic system could be (well until we all get our ID cards/Barcodes on our forearm/implanted chip anyway) and more straight forward to check on later.

Postal votes and sending out the registration forms via the post? well I suppose it's got to be done somehow, and couriers would be too expensive, but there must be a better way. The problem with that of course is that it's got to deal with people with no computer, so email and websites are out of the question, who are out of the country (soldiers etc.) or have emigrated (why are they even allowed to vote in this country if they have left it I wonder?) and so on.

All in all it's developed mess - there is no simple answer and though there are many ways of making things better we can hardly go around changing things arbitarily.

ttfn

UK polling stations turn away 'hundreds' of voters

Paul_Murphy
Stop

Maybe

The voting districts should be organised by the number of people in each district - say one polling station per 2000 people or whatever.

I voted last night with no issues whatsoever, arrived @5:45 after getting off my train and a 10-minute walk to the voting place - no queue, in and out in around 4 minutes, including a little natter to the officials - there were 4 official people in there, so well staffed as well.

ttfn

Vote Lib Dem, doom humanity to extinction

Paul_Murphy

I can't let you do that Dave..

... is by voting against the Lib Dems.

Since I can only vote FOR a party - not against ones I don't want.

I wonder what the elections would be like if we were able to pick the parties that we didn't want - it would at least make the 'X' useful, since we could also select a tick mark for parties we do want.

ttfn

DVLA off-road system seriously off-message

Paul_Murphy

A better idea maybe?

Put the costs of tax and a basic third-party insurance onto fuel, after all the more miles you do the more you use the road and the more likely (roughly) you are to have an accident.

You would need to purchase additional insurance if you wanted better coverage.

You driving license holds the reg. numbers of cars you are permitted to drive (aside from rental which is managed seperately via the hire company) or (as in america-land (tm) I believe) you have a set of personalised plates which you fit onto the car you are driving to prove legality.

I suppose if you were really thinking ahead you could even disallow owning a car at all, but the means of allowing the car to be driven legally are controlled in some way - for instance fuel pumps _needing_ to be paid by plastic, which of course can be cross-referenced.

Discuss.

ttfn

Paul_Murphy

Has your car been 'ringed'*

Since rung didn't sound right.

Sounds as though _proving_ anything will be impossible, so you should be able to get both nulled.

good luck

ttfn

Paul_Murphy

'Lose support of the motorists'

Yeah - it's not too late for that is it?

Honestly - they make it so difficult to be honest, and so heavy-handed when things don't go their way it's surprising that people are even bothering to inform them at all.

When looking at the protests and riots in Greece and other countries I wonder how long before it happens here.

It's not as if the establishment seems to be trying to help matters is it?

ttfn

Google borgs 3D desktop

Paul_Murphy

One OS to rule them all.

So - Win and Mac already done, just solaris/SunOS and Linux to go - then we can all use just the one GUI layer, regardless of the hardware and underlying OS that it runs on.

I can't wait.

ttfn

Asteroids the source of Earth's water, NASA suggests

Paul_Murphy

Space water?

Is that trademarked yet?

And I'm guessing that it would be dirty, cold and possibly lumpy, a far cry from a nice can of Brawndo.

ttfn

Global warming dirt-carbon peril models are wrong, say boffins

Paul_Murphy

That sounded...

Too much like you're interested in science - prepare to be turned in to the authorities, you enemy of nature!

Good book that - though of course I read it, many years ago, on my palm pilot rather than on paper.

ttfn

Paul_Murphy

Of course we won't know the real problem(s) until it happens.

Models are only so good and, almost by definition, cannot be as complex as the thing that are trying to model and, lets face it, the earth is a pretty complex object.

I hope my children (etc.) won't judge us too harshly.

ttfn

Spotify adds Web2.0rhea

Paul_Murphy

I would like the local mp3 file playing.

But not the other things - so I might as well stick to mediamonkey for playing my mp3's (until I re-encode all our CD's to flac or something else) and use spotify for the occasional music exploration.

thanks for the trying to second guess what I want though guys and galls.

ttfn

Acer Easystore H340 2TB Nas box

Paul_Murphy

If it has any.

After all a NAS is not a computer - it's a storage system.

See here for a rear-view (ooer missus):

http://images.trustedreviews.com/images/article/inline/12870-img4428s.jpg

ttfn

The iPad will doom humanity to painful bog-roll horror

Paul_Murphy
Flame

A powder room

Is where you store black powder (and, later, other explosives) though of course 'to powder your nose' would not have been a good idea.

Similarly a fire is to be avoided in a powder room.

ttfn

Reverse-engineering artist busts face detection tech

Paul_Murphy

Kiss and make-up

So lets all look like refugees from Kiss shall we?

Actually it's quite interesting, 2000AD (the comic) was predicting all sorts of things, and I'm sure that something like this form of makeup would have been in it, maybe more for the looking strange than defeating face recognition, but maybe we are going to see this sort of thing soon - after all if you are looking suspicious with a hoody up, the next best thing would be to lose the hoody and look less suspicious, but still be unrecognizable.

If makeup becomes more mainstream, at least the future won't look boring.

ttfn

Paul_Murphy

LED around the face

already been done:

http://www.wonderhowto.com/how-to-infrared-mask-hide-face-from-cameras-201280/

ttfn

Police send Reg hack CRB check database

Paul_Murphy

The truth will come out.

Ye gods - thank goodness it was sent to someone who knew what to do about it, and I salute your stance - hopefully it will get some proper data handling in place.

We can' t have police forces (or indeed anyone else) expecting silence as a way of covering up mistakes.

I'm starting to like the conservatives more open approach, it will hopefully make things like this more transparant.

Right - i'm off to see it's appeared on wikileaks...

ttfn

AMD tempts gamers with multi-monitor Eye candy

Paul_Murphy
Joke

Ha ha - April Fool

Well done - I look forward to the 'x2' version with support for 12 monitors.

Wow - you lot start early don't you?

ttfn

Paul_Murphy
Joke

Ha ha - April Fool

Who needs 6 monitors? it's a silly idea.

Well done - I look forward to the 'x2' version with support for 12 monitors.

Wow - you lot start early don't you?

ttfn

LHC particle-punisher in record 7 TeV hypercollisions

Paul_Murphy

emergency dumps at 16:30

Hopefully planned! - the comment is:

'emergency dumps ...

end of the first physics fill

preparing for ramp down'

ttfn

Paul_Murphy

http://twitter.com/CERN

As always at:

http://twitter.com/CERN

good going guys & gals - keep hitting those rocks together!

ttfn

Royal Navy starts work on new, pointless frigates

Paul_Murphy

In my day...*

It was all battleships around here...

Then the aircraft carrier came along and all those nice shiny hunks of metal became pointless, easy targets. Interestingly now that AA defences are more advanced (and 'missiles' tend to hit things) having a big, very well armored battleship to pound shore targets and provide a really stable platform, lots of troops and a lot of missiles makes some sense, but it's a lot of money.

We are looking at a range of scenarios for modern fighting craft - and, unless we are looking at fighting the USA or China, none of those will have much in a big-ship to big-ship fight.

Nowadays the fighting will be far more likely to revolve around small boats, somalie pirates and the like.

Therefore helicopters capable of anti-sub ops, carrying troops and/or missiles would be a very good way to go.

So maybe a container ship with the choppers stored in the containers (to keep them nice and dry/protected) and with it's own defences would be a far more practical way of supporting current needs.

As you say though Lewis - it's not a big shiny ship for people to get excited about and run up that promotion ladder on.

We used to have a Navy that was dedicated to the protection of the nation - not the progression of it's officers.

ttfn

*not that I have ever been in the navy, but that doesn't stop me form having a viewpoint.

Why the Google antitrust complaint is not about Microsoft

Paul_Murphy

Just tried mapquest.

Not as good as google maps at least. Aerial and street level photography entirely missing for my neck of the woods, just a simple comparison shows that it doesn't fulfill my primary aim.

Mapquest does look better for route planning, but I have a sat-nav for that.

I might start using ask.com again and see how I get on, maybe it's time to start balancing my search engine use.

ttfn

Lads from Lagos pose as US troops to snare unwary ladies

Paul_Murphy
Flame

And

Nigeria would make a really good place to make the worlds largest lens.

Just think of all that fused sand!

The Army can do something - several things probably (aside from setting their cyberwar guys loose on the scamming b'stards) they could at least try an education/outreach programme on these various sites, pose as a blatent 'soldier seeking rich lonely and gullible woman' and give them an idea of what to look out for.

ttfn

flames - since there isn't a mushroom cloud icon

Whitehall coughs £250k for Bletchley Park pothole repairs

Paul_Murphy

Blatchley Park didn't save us from invasion/speaking German.

Radar was more pivotal than decrypting for that task.

Hitlers' invasion plans would not have been sufficient without massive air superiority, and maybe not even then. Compare operation SeaLion (Seelowe) with Overlord to see the differences.

But..

They saved many lives - anyone whose parents or grand-parents that fought in the second world war may not be around today since they may not have lived through it.

They shortened the war, probably by at least 2 years. This could have made a big difference to us Brits, since the V1s and V2 may have been operating for some years before being stopped.

Another thought is that if Overlord was not successful then Europe would, more than likely, have been taken over by Russia and that would have led to a very different post-war world. One where we would not have been an equal partner (which we were at the time).

The need for code books and other paraphanalia needed to break the various codes led to many different operations being carried out, many of which are just not known about, but Norway was very much involved in a lot of those activities.

Without the work at Bletchly Park our world would not be as we have known it, whether that is for the better or worse is debateable of course, but incidents like the Cuba crisis in the 60's may have been a lot worse.

We owe a lot to Bletchley Park and the people that worked there.

ttfn

Train rebrand costs us dear

Paul_Murphy

A better way.

Would be to have all logos and company name references linked to seperate files/text variable names, so that whenever a franchise gets lost it would be a much more simple case of changing the lookup sources.

Would only work on the website of course, email, stationary, carriages etc. would still need to be worked on manually.

ttfn

Bill Gates goes (mini) nuclear

Paul_Murphy

And why not?

>No TWR's on every street corner.

Supposing there is one per street? or even one buried in each garden (depending on size)? we could all have a stable, non-polluting (for 50-100 years at least) power supply that would be able to wean us off oil, gas and coal rather quickly.

How long before electric vehicles wipe out the internal combustion engine?

Rather than having a national grid it could be managed on a far more local level.

ttfn

Paul_Murphy

Yes we will

>We will all eventually succumb to the heat-death of the universe

But it will take some time.

ttfn

Police reject Tory plans for elected chiefs

Paul_Murphy

wot's a title?

The politicians are responsible for making laws that govern the country - the police for enforcing them.

The two houses of parliament are there to balance each other - one is elected and changes form on a regular basis, whereas the other is composed of people who are regarded as having contributed to the good of the country and are deemed to be working to the best interests of the country, not folding to whatever political pressure is paramount at the time.

It's all a system of check and balances, and Ok it doesn't work perfectly all the time, but welcome to the real world. Anything that has people involved will be succeptable to human interests - the best that can be done is to ensure that there are non-interested parties performing an over-sight function, with the power to intervene if the situation calls for it,

Why is it that the politicians feel that the police force would be better off having voted-in chief constables, rather than ones who have worked their way up through the ranks and know what the job entails?

Silly politicians - leave the police to manage their own hierarchy, unless you would want the police to decide who can stand as an MP? no - thought not....

ttfn

Verizon to launch less than brill billing service

Paul_Murphy

Please call me when

mobile phones have a fingerprint scanner or similar - maybe a 6-digit pin or some other way of making sure it's me thats doing the purchase.

They are just too likely to get lost or stolen, and I don't want mine to be used by anyone else but me.

ttfn

Dedicated Vi device vies for buyers

Paul_Murphy

Apecs from http://sharism.cc/specs/

---------------

technical specifications

* 336 MHz XBurst Jz4720 MIPS-compatible CPU

* display: 3.0” color TFT

* resolution: 320 x 240, 16.7M color

* dimension (mm): 99 x 75 x 17.5 (lid closed)

* weight: 126 g (incl. battery)

* DRAM: 32MB Synchronous DRAM

* headphone jack (3.5 mm)

* SDHC microSD

* 850mAh Li-ion battery

* 2GB NAND flash memory

* mini-USB: USB 2.0 High-Speed Device

* speaker and microphone

* full qwerty keyboard

本: běn. The Chinese character 本 signifies an origin or the beginning place; It signifies exactly what the first version of the NanoNote is: a beginning.

The 本 version of NanoNote is an ultra small form factor computing device. The device sports a 336 MHz processor, 2GB of flash memory, microSD slot, head phone jack, USB device and 850mAh Li-ion battery. It boots Linux out of the box and also boots over USB. It’s targeted squarely at developers who see the promise of open hardware and want to roll their own end user experience. It’s the perfect companion for open content; we envision developers turning the device into a music or video player for Ogg or an offline Wikipedia or MIT OpenCourseWare appliance. Or you can simply amaze your friends by creating an ultra small handheld notebook computer. You choose the distribution. The 本 Nanonote is the first in a line of products that will see the addition of other hardware capabilities. Get your NanoNote and start a Nanoproject today. Or join one of the existing projects in our developer community.

---------------

ttfn

Paul_Murphy

Hmm

Well, if a remote console/VNC link could be supported over a USB cable, that would be neat (though the idea of using a remote PC on a 3inch screen is worrying).

And of course administrators have been using scripts to do all sorts of things that this device could store and run just as well as a full sized machine.

Unfortunately a simple question such as what browser it uses will put off most people, still, I hope they get enough buyers to keep it going.

ttfn

Are West Bromwich Borg pliers actually side cutters?

Paul_Murphy

More info found!

This shows some more details of the mysterious pliers-like object:

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?layer=c&cbll=52.472714,-2.086625&cbp=12,106.02,,0,-46.04&ved=0CBUQ2wU&ei=w2GaS8j9Ode2sgbzop2-Aw&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Cradley+Heath,+West+Midlands+B645BB,+United+Kingdom&t=h&panoid=hyEWyeTOWGhrtLF4NBQ6xQ&ll=52.47273,-2.086458&spn=0,359.985301&z=16

and if you follow to the end of the road the object is still following the poor targetted google-car!

They suddenly change direction:

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?layer=c&cbll=52.472714,-2.086625&cbp=12,106.02,,0,-46.04&ved=0CBUQ2wU&ei=w2GaS8j9Ode2sgbzop2-Aw&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Cradley+Heath,+West+Midlands+B645BB,+United+Kingdom&t=h&panoid=hyEWyeTOWGhrtLF4NBQ6xQ&ll=52.47273,-2.086458&spn=0,359.985301&z=16

and then are gone!

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?layer=c&cbll=52.472714,-2.086625&cbp=12,106.02,,0,-46.04&ved=0CBUQ2wU&ei=w2GaS8j9Ode2sgbzop2-Aw&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Cradley+Heath,+West+Midlands+B645BB,+United+Kingdom&t=h&panoid=hyEWyeTOWGhrtLF4NBQ6xQ&ll=52.47273,-2.086458&spn=0,359.985301&z=16

I'm guessing the smudge in the sky is where the object was making it's hasty getaway after being spotted.

Fascinating stuff!

Definitely pliers though!

ttfn

Paul_Murphy

It's obvious..

They are definitely pliers, since the side of the tool has the profile of pliers, rather than side-cutters which are far more smooth-sided.

And of course who could possibly believe than an advanced civilisation could be built on side-cutters, which are entirely biased towards cutting - wheras the plier is a far more functional tool, that can tighten and un-tighten, cut and pinch.

So there you go - it's a pliers-based galatic civilisation we are dealing with here, now please excuse me I'm off to the bunkers.

ttfn

Boffins builds lithium battery that can't explode

Paul_Murphy

Whats' the betting...

>The biggest hurdle is the low charge-recharge cycle count

That the answer to this will start with 'nano'?

Good going people - keep banging those rocks together.

ttfn

Robot mini space shuttle is go for April, says US air force

Paul_Murphy

And for those looking at the picture

And wondering why it says X-40 on the side, try a mouse over (or source code read):

title="The X-40 unpowered test model, used to gather data for the design of the X-37. Credit: NASA"

Anyway - quite a useful little device, although it's a small payload it's bound to be cheaper to launch a dozen of these rather than a shuttle, and less likely that a stray cloud will stop the launch either of course.

Staying up for 270 days seems rather a long time to me - though I guess a payload of spyware kit would be a useful substitute to a satelite or AWACs plane.

hmm

ttfn

UK is safer from al-Qaeda 'bastards', says security minister

Paul_Murphy
Coat

Land fit for heroes

Just saying.

Those that died for our freedom, and the dwindling number of those who are still alive. would be wondering why they bothered.

Comments above this cover areas far more thoughly then I, and I am reminded of the phrase 'All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing', it's particularly ironic that this is being done to protect us.

Oh - and of course:

“Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”

from Hermann Goering.

ttfn

Microsoft boffin scoops Turing Award

Paul_Murphy
Coat

Argh!

>'expressed surprising at receiving the award'

>'before going on to focus of developing a'

This article is like a beta release with a note to the testers to report the bugs!

fume fume

Only popped back to see if the first line had been corrected - I don't know why I bothered.

Ok, Ok, I'm going....

ttfn

Google goes cycling

Paul_Murphy

US option to walk?

Isn't walking in the US taken as a sign of insanity or something? Maybe a segway-mode might be more appropriate.

ttfn

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