Posts by Owain 1
36 posts • joined Wednesday 4th November 2009 13:15 GMT
Posted in Drone to deliver beer-as-a-service
Re: Improvements
Hmmm, obviously if you had a 11 foot pole, then you'd be able to steal the can as it came down. Which means the purchaser needs to have a 12 foot pole. And then the 'can rustler' would need a 13 foot pole. Or just a big net to catch the drone and swipe the whole cargo of precious amber nectar.
Re: Size does seem to help but....
"The ultimate aphrodisiac has long been green in colour."
I shall begin working on my lawn right now!
It's quite long.....
Posted in The healing hands of guru Dabbs
Cardboard cut out
I used to work as a software designer and coder in a small part of the HP offices in Reading (now closed). A colleague of mine used to sit in the cubicle behind mine. His job (and he was very good at it) was to sit there, normally silently, and have other people explain their problems to him. Regardless of whether he knew anything about the subject matter or not. Normally about half way through their explanation, the explainer would normally stop. Say "Gaarh!! I've got it!" and walk back to their desk fully armed with the solution. Stuart, I salute you and your ability. I believe he was outsourced to a cardboard cut out :(
Probably ill advised
The link in the article points to the DA's office (or something) and there's more detail there. I quote
" they had sufficient evidence to charge at least 5 counts of Endangering the Welfare of a Child relative to the acts performed on the children by the dancers all at the alleged direction, arrangement, organization and supervision by and of Ms. Viger. As difficult as it may be for us to have to weigh in on these kinds of cases, certainly exposing the unsuspecting children to this sort of "entertainment" goes beyond the pale when it comes to what is appropriate for 14, 15 and 16 year old child. It is important to remember that it is the other kids and their parents who came forward and who initiated the investigation. The police correctly followed up on legitimate, good faith complaints and the police owed it to them to conduct an earnest investigation into the matter."
I guess the invitations didn't read: "Come to my bowling and strippers party".
Re: probably THE most expensive electrical appliance in your house
Why would servicing my SMEG fridge stop my laptop from slowing?
Hell, I probably paid more for my washing machine and dishwasher than my laptop.
Lend him the disc
That is all.
Posted in RISC OS comes to Raspberry Pi
Speedy!
Gosh, that's a quick desktop. You drag the windows and they move in real time. Although it nearly made me cry when I looked at the task manager to find the free pool was 128000K. I remember spending weeks on end cramming my games to make them fit in a 640k free pool to support the 1Mb machines.
Visions of the Impossible.
Triangle
For a triangle I'd give you 1 in 3... and there's the 'stick' to consider too of course. Have you considered taking up the 'shaker'?
Sad
I do struggle to see why offering the product in a different colour would somehow encourage somebody who wasn't already going to buy the console to buy it. Although given that they all do this, presumably its proven to work. "I don't think I will buy a new PS, I'll just wait until the next gen box comes out..... Ohh it comes in Scarlet blue now? Well why didn't you say! I'll take 10."
Some responsibility on the game developer
It might be reasonable for the game server to kick you off for a certain amount of time (say 30 minutes) if your account has been active beyond the safe limits stated in their games terms and conditions: I'm sure they must have some sort of guidance on this kind of thing? Obviously you would need to be (moved to) somewhere 'safe' in the game. Or perhaps all the NPCs should start shouting "You must drink some water" and "Go eat something" or "Get some sleep"
Or is there a fear that this might be the developer accepting some sort of legal responsibility? If somebody dies because they fall asleep at the wheel of their car from driving for too long then I assume it's not the car manufacturer's fault?
Looks like a greenhouse
I'd be a bit worried that that tupperware was going to act like a greenhouse and 'bake' the RPi quite quickly. Although given that it's still raining outside maybe that wont be a problem on a uk duck pond.
Posted in Code glitch floored Reg reader altimeter
Re: @Robert E A Harvey
I may be an idiot, but if we know that the balloon is going to burst due to getting too big, then can't you fit some sort of 'hole' in it so that it loses gas as it rises. Or doesn't that help.
Posted in Aga cooks up phone-controlled 'iOven'
Re: Puzzled...
Always on? Indeed. Ours is. It comes complete with absolutely no user controls what so ever. You want a particular temperature? You use the oven that's already at that temperature. Cooks great pizzas on the floor of the roasting oven. Bake a cake in the baking oven at the same time, while simmering your vegetables in the simmering oven at the same time, and warming your plates in the warming oven at the same time. If you want you can also be ironing clothes by leaving them on the top of the simmering plate lid (at the same time). However I think this is for one of those new-fangled lectrickery stoves. Best kept in the city I think.
Hang on, I think I can smell burning. I'll be back in a moment...
Re: if you shoot me, tough, but I could never shoot you
You mean forcibly install software on somebody elses computer, that has already been compromised by somebody else?
Ah, two wrongs. Yes that would make a right.
On the other hand. I kind of agree with you. If granny's machine is spewing out spam, then it needs to be stopped. Presumably in the real world you can force farmers to slaughter animals if they become infected with certain viruses by law. Would it not be possible to construct such a law to force owners to clean up computers infected by certain viruses, or force cleanup software on them remotely. Presumably you would need some sort of compensation fund in case of data loss or something.
sterilisation or pasturise or desalinate
Presumably more useful to the world in general would be the rapid heating/cooling potential which could be used to pasturise water using (for example) the sun as a heat source. Or perhaps use it to desalinate water. I'm thinking of pushing to heat into one area (used to heat the water) from another area (used to condense it back again). I'm no expert (obviously).
Re: why not have a second "under duress" pin code
I thought that there was some plan to have it as being your existing PIN in reverse. That way you don't have to try to remember it. I.e. if pin = 1234 then panic = 4321. Note ATM gives out the money in any case.
It would seem reasonable to have a low impact panic system such as having the card blocked for the next x hours (after the panic transaction completes), rather than squirting ink in the face of the user. That way, the mugger knows they have the right PIN, but they can't use the card again. They would have to hold onto the mugee for x hours until the card became free, or else Mugee would raise alarm. Also having got 1 'amount' of money out (i.e. the panic transaction) they would be more inclined to just chuck the card away.
So more of a damage limitation for both customer and bank... Also means mugee can give out PIN without having fingers broken etc.
Posted in Archos 35 Home Connect
Tablet?
Presumably you could just run up the clock app on any tablet?
shipped abroad
I was thinking about this, but it would never work. They'd just (and they probably do already) ship it abroad. No way you can catch this at the scrap yard :(
please try and break it
Come on reviewer! Bit more detail please!
Can you give us an indication of what your walls are made from? Mine are 2 or 3 foot thick stone....
Can you push the system to see how far apart you can get it before it starts dropping or doesn't cope etc. would be a good rounding of the review. Also can you review the picture quality using 2 tvs next to each other, but one using the transmitter, and one the 'through' channel. Any difference? time lag? etc.
I find it very annoying when there are two sound sources (e.g. TVs) and they're a fraction of a second 'off' in timing. Does this apply?
Printer requires password/ID swipe to print
I've seen two solutions to this actually used. In C&W you had to swipe your ID card on the printer to print your jobs there and then. We had a big office, but this seemed to work ok.
Or more cheaply: I've seen printers requiring you to enter a password at the printer to print something out. Job is held until password is entered.
Not rocket science.
it probably is 3000k
but that sounded too rounded. So they knocked off 2k to make it seem 'accurate'.
Posted in Mars trips could blind astronauts
Constant acceleration
I thought the mission to Mars would be under constant acceleration / deceleration. Would that provide enough "gravity"? Surely they're not going to coast all the way?
Pictures otherwise it never happened
Presumably you might want some sort of cheap camera and lighting inside just to check for rocket deformation / other problems. Otherwise you've just got a big lump of metal to look at, and a charred mess afterwards. Mind you, not sure how they'd function at that pressure/temperature, but presumably you need a camera etc to work under these conditions anyway since you'd want to mount them on Lohan for the real launch.
Always change your number
I was stupid enough to take the phone-number already allocate to the line to the house we bought. It had been empty for a couple of years and so I thought nothing of it. However 4 years later we are STILL getting calls from debt collectors for the previous but 1 owners. We hear they emigrated to Spain. Swines.
Posted in Vodafone Smart Android smartphone
Why such a low %
65% ? Value for money wise, I would be looking at a much higher rating.
As your last paragraph states, its horses for courses. This is no £400 phone, but it still does everything that your non-hardcore user wants to do. How about comparing it to Android tablets from ASDA etc which cost £100. That would be a good comparison point I suppose.
Posted in Viewsonic ViewPad 7 Android tablet
Stock Android features
<rant>
It does annoy me when the reviewer reviews the stock features of the operating system. "Whoa! Android (tablet) comes with an on screen keyboard? Well shiver me timbers!" What I need to know is, is it More than just stock android, has it any "special" features etc. I need differentiation factors between this and any other Android tablet/phone.
Hardware is important,
button position - important,
the fact that holding the power button brings up the 'power menu' is STOCK!! All android devices do this.
CPU - important.
Battery - important;
Storage - important,
connectivity - important,
Resolution - important.
User experience due to combination of the above - important.
Wallpaper is interchangeable - STOCK
Music player - STOCK
Let me guess? It has google maps? Wow. That is a shock.
... </rant>
Spoiler
You've ruined my 4 year old's day.
princess ??!!
Where did that come from?
eeek
They already have......
Posted in UK ID card project descends into muddle
rat a tat tat
I've tried knocking on the wall. It doesn't work.
No D-pad
Or do they expect me to balance this thing with a really long wire coming out of the back of it to the TV on my lap, rolling my mouse along the sofa. Oh if only there were something that you really could just put on TOP of your LAP, perhaps with a built in display, and maybe someway of moving the pointer. I'm sure there's a catchy name you could come up with.
Posted in Apple preps adaptable gadget adapter
missed point
I believe that the article is about a holder to take the weight of the device, not to actually connect to it. Presumably a micro USB socket cannot reasonably support the weight of a device without breaking after the 100th plug/unplug.
Personally I employ a small trained monkey to bear the weight of my mobile devices.
Eh haw
Are we still talking about the donkey here? Seems a little harsh.
@Peter Gathercole
My vote is for homeplug in an old house. Ours is 400 years old. We drilled through one wall once to take some plumbing outside: Our 50cm long drill didn't break through, and we finally got out the other side after 70cm. Not a task to be taken lightly. Our (original) skirting board goes down to the (original) floor boards. Wi-fi drops out from one room to another. We have ended up with homeplug from the adsl/wifi router, to another homeplug in the attic with our 'server', and another homeplug connected to a wifi router on the other side of the house to get (patchy) wifi in all rooms downstairs. Works a treat. Horses for courses I think.
