Posts by John Brown (no body) 25427 publicly visible posts • joined 21 May 2010
Back when Optane first began to appear in some computer, our service manager sent all us field engineers special instructions on what do when dealing with an Optane fitted PC or laptop. I forget what they info was now, something about doing a proper shutdown or something because otherwise pulling it would irretrievably lose everything. The main reason my memory is so hazey is because a) my memory isn't as persistent as Optane and b), I never, ever saw one out in the field :-)
"If persistent memory means, for example, it can be just switched off and on again it will continue without making the necessary driver adjustments."
Probably the HellDesk didn't want it as it would put many of them out of work.
Have you switched it off and on again? Whatdymean, the BSOD just came straight back up?
Windows, and many apps, still suffer from memory leaks. How do you deal with them when everything is always "running", even after a power cycle? New ideas and especially radically different paradigms in hardware is severely restricted by most of the world being locked into Windows. If Windows "breaks", doesn't support the new hardware properly or simply can't be changed to support it without breaking other stuff, then it's only ever going to be niche. After all, Windows can barely support existing changes and updates without constantly breaking stuff that is already well understood :-)
Agreed, entirely.
But the "first" interracial kiss thing seems to be disputed. It seems to depend on what is meant by "race" and how big a deal it is in any particular country. The Uhura/Kirk kiss was a big deal in the US because she was of Black African decent and he was of White European decent. That seems to have been a much bigger deal than white+any other race in the US, probably related to the outlawed but still often practised segregation at the time. (only outlawed a few years before "the Star Trek kiss".)
Watching it back in the day, here in the UK, it never crossed my mind that she, George Takai and Walter Koenig were anything out of the ordinary for me. It was a united world, so obviously there would be people from different parts of the world in it, let alone actual non-humans in the crew. It all seemed entirely natural to my young mind. This from someone growing up in part of the UK with very few non-caucasian faces around so looking back, it should have seems odd.
Not defending them, but I would imagine there are many more updates required to running Sage. Tax rules change relatively frequently, especially if dealing with cross border jurisdictions. On the other hand, none of the private, commercial or sensitive data from an on-prem perpetual licenced install should be leaving the LAN and heading off to Sage central. At most, a licence authentication before receiving the same data updates everyone else is getting.
On the gripping hand, if a licence is "perpetual", why does it need regular and/or frequent authentication in the first place?
Clearly there is an ulterior motive, given away by "Providing temporary patches is not the most effective solution in this instance,". If the patches for the on-prem, perpetual licence s/w are temporary, then that is a clear statement that they will no longer be supporting or selling that as a product. After all, any patch they produced would, by definition be permanent since it would be rolled out to any new sales of on-prem, perpetual licenced releases. Except that they won't be doing that.
With so many companies moving to subscription"...as a Service" models, I wonder if one of the incumbents could make a killing by NOT going that route and using that as USP money-saving marketing tool? Ot are they ALL stuck in the "short term profits/growth at any cost before moving on to the next company" model, no matter the long term consequences? Have they not learned from the great Chinese outsourcing "problem"? All the eggs in one basket never work out well, That's why the saying exists in the first place.
Likely the same as happened with buying non-crispy, no actual cream, doughnuts from Krispy Kreme in the UK. People, especially the 20-30 age group, will go "Ooooh...Americain[1], must be good"
[1] Most Brits will neither know no care that Hortens is actually Canadian,
"So that is ten million times a buck fiddy - assuming that everyone with the app takes up the offer. Although I'm guessing that fifteen million dollars still isn't much of a deterrent."
Then subtract the cost value from the retail value for all those who go "oooohhhh....FREEEE!!!" and take that as an extra rather than just the usual purchase. Those are not "lost" sales and so only a "loss" of the cost price.
"Neko is back! Thank you ever so much! Now I can waste even more time on lockdown!"
Hi,I was directed here from an El Reg article published in 2022. I just came here to let you know that lockdown never ends. Make the best of it you can, it only gets worse. Much worse.
The hazmat suit --------->
Like with ISPs, mobile phones etc., the "smaller"[1] ones will eventually merge or be eaten by the "bigger"[1] ones and we'll end up with two or three behemeths.
[1] In terms of library size and/or customer base. Amazon and Netflix are big studios, but Amazon can but $billions into becoming one. The big studios have the libraries and productions, but not yet the customer base. How it will end up is anyone's guess, but I suspect Netflix will be one of the losers in the long run.
"In fairness to TT and Gamin etc, they do say on the box in small print that the lifetime updates is only the lifetime of the product"
My long EOLed Garmin with Lifetime Map Updates, still gets map updates. I just did it last week. It does need an SD card nowadays because the map data will no longer fit in the internal storage. I'm quite happy with it. I think it's about 10 years old now. If and when it breaks, I'll probably buy another Garmin.
"and you *still* had to watch a load of ads every 5 minutes (yes, really every 5 minutes)."
And this is why streaming took off in the first place, especially in the US. It was less of an issue here in the UK, but since we do as we are told by our US "big brother", it's been catching on more and more over recent years such that a few years back, advertising breaks and lengths were "adjusted" to allow for more. OFCOM are currently discussing relaxing the ad break rules even further because the streaming has affect uses of and advertising revenues for broadcast TV.
In other words, where in the US streaming was seen as a solution by consumers to too much broadcast advertising, on this side of the pond it's the cause of more broadcast advertising. And to top it off, the steamers are now looking at "cheaper" packages subsidised by...adverts. The reality, of course, won't be cheaper packages. It will more expensive packages without adverts, the existing lower tier ones getting adverts. And thus the cycle of video "piracy" will rise again.
It depends on your storage method. Sometimes I want to watch a film or TV series again, but usually year later. So I make sure I have and keep it in a form where I'm not worried about running out of storage space, so not on a PVR, especially not provided and controlled by my cable/sat company. (I found out to my cost a few years back, recordings made from channels on a higher package all become unavailable if you switch down to a lower package that doesn't include those channels)
You were lucky. DVD players, even before BD came out, were already trying to restrict how many times you could region switch, often to as few as five times, the last one becoming permanent. Most of us here would be aware enough (especially after being bitten once) to chose one with either unlimited region changes or which could be "hacked" for either unlimited switched or just made "region 0" once and for all :-)
"and none of the choices was being made by algorithms or advertising bots."
Local, independents, yes. But if you ever went Blockbuster or similar, then they were constantly moving stuff around, getting rid of less popular title and "nudging" you towards to "popular" titles which they had 50 copies of.
It does make a sort of sense, so long as when you buy a bottom of the range car, you still pay the bottom of the range price for it. And if you pay for some of the extras at purchase time with a "lifetime" outright purchase, not a subscription (still currently an option), those items remain enabled when you sell it and therefore are part of the resale value.
On the other hand, if you buy outright with all the extras and then find you have a bottom of the range car, no extras to sell when time to change cars, then you've been ripped off!
"Looking through Netflix, saw the trailer for Squid Games that was dubbed - but it didn't match what was being said with the subtitles!"
ISTR reports that the dubbing and subtitles were so badly done on that show in particular, that native speakers were pointing out that anyone not a native speaker was getting, in effect, a different story from the dubbed or sub-titled "mistakes".
"They're going to befoul themselves when they see what the car industry has in store."
I've been considering a new car, maybe for next year, and so looking at what is available and it's quite hard to find a purchase price. They all seem to be pushing leasing deals, which get into silly prices for high mileage drivers :-(
"a kettle on the stove."
I don't think I've seen one of those since I was a nipper some 50 years ago. And they were pretty rare even then. Whistling kettles used on a gas hob. You'll occasionally see them around now, sold as nostalgia items along with "stove top" coffee makers. The US, being the "home of the labo[u]r saving gadget", it still amazes me that an electric kettle is so rare in the US considering the many uses there are for boiled water over and above making tea. They even tend to call them "tea kettles", with "tea" commonly pronounced in a slightly higher pitched voice in an attempt to sound "English" :-)
It's always struck me as odd that political parties in many countries, but particularly the USA, seem to be exempt from advertising law when advertising their candidates, policies, whatever and seem to be able, quite literally, to lie as much as they like and get away with it, even down to the level of personal accusations, often founded only on rumour, against their opponents. All sides are equally guilty of this.
An interesting article on the BBC re climate change denial and where some of the foundations for it originated
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-62225696
Big money influencing world events isn't new, sadly. The deniers, of course, will claim "MSM!!! LIARS!!!" naturally :-)
Better than currently (pun intended) where the existing stuff already goers to landfill with a more toxic battery. I'm pretty sure I've seen examples of printed components directly on to things like paper too. Maybe another step to literally printing circuits AND a power source for even cheaper, disposable sensors.
Yeah, basically, they've improved/invented/discovered a new application for what most of us will have seen as a high school physics demo/experiment. I don't mean that to denigrate what they have done. They've potentially come up with something useful, but not actually invented a new technology. Good on them for thinking outside the box.
But I do have a slight snit with the article where it reads "the lead wires". I'm assuming they meant "the wire leads" and not that the wires are made of lead. Just badly worded IMHO since we are discussing electrochemical reactions and lead/acid batteries are a thing too so being precise with words which are spelled the same and could be confused is important. Is it "leed" or "led" :-)
Maybe ATOS need to be brought in for an interview to assess their "fitness to work" possibilities? I'm sure the commentariat can come up with good ideas to make it as difficult as possible for ATOS to even attend the meeting and some even nastier ways to make the meeting, should they manage to attend, as much "fun" as possible.
"Anyway, in 'ix' systems"
FWIW, the usual abbreviation is *nix systems. Ix Systems is a US company founded on open source and building commercial stuff, which I what I immediately think of when I see the fairly rare use of "ix systems" as an abbreviation if Unix-like.
Considering they have one of the highest inheritance taxes in the world, it does make one won der how these huge chaebols manage to stay in the family. With inheritance taxes of up to 50%, they must use some clever tactics to slowly pass on the wealth to the next generation before popping their clogs.
ISTR at least one chaebol stumping up c$10b in inheritance tax in the news a while back.
Ah, here it is. It was Samsung, just last year.
"I think it may be simpler to just build artificial manipulators one time, and be able to use them for a very long time afterwards."
That may well end up being the case, but copying the design of the spider leg might be the best design solution. On the other hand, for very small micro manipulators, it may be cheaper and easier to use dead spider legs, even if only for one off jobs. There may not be all that many applications for something like this where the manipulator needs to work for many 1000's of operations or a period of week, months or years.
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