Re: Next step: sue God?

>Damn, we so need a Douglas Adams icon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Adams#Technology_and_innovation

-from Wikipedia, though I got the same impressions from reading The Salmon of Doubt. Just saying.

Re: Much as I love...

XP had Shadow Copy, but your Aunt Mary would still have to seek out a 3rd party utility for actually making image backups. Win 7 has a TimeMachine- like image back up utility built in, but it fails halfway through if you don't turn off MS's own AV software first! FFS, how difficult would it be to add a notification window telling the user: "Before making this backup, first run a virus scan and take any recommended actions" - if not have the backup system do this itself?

There are a lot of Aunt Marys out there, and many of us who might be called upon to provide tech support for a cup of tea and a slice of cake... and we might not want to have to receive a phone call every time the OS throws an esoteric message at them. Having the user's computer make backups of itself without their input makes life easier for everyone involved.

Re: Wonder if I actually used it??

In an effort to learn about these Banda duplicators of which you speak, I tripped over this gem:

"In grade five at Tyler Street primary school, Preston, my first newspaper, The Weekly Trumpet, was hand lettered on quarto paper and pinned to the class notice board. About this time my mother bought her first washing machine, a Hoover with a fold-away hand-wringer. "What a perfect way to run off a few copies of the Trumpet and sell them to the kids" I thought! But something went terribly wrong. Instead of the violet hectograph-inked paper-master soaked in methylated spirits transferring onto white paper, it ended up on the wringers of mother's new pride and joy! The Weekly Trumpet appeared on whites and coloureds for weeks until the image disappeared."

-http://www.metaltype.co.uk/stories/story38.shtml

The author continues to describe his career in printing, from 1949 to present... a parallel story of business and information technology.

Re: Am I the only one..

I've noticed that toddlers are more attracted to cameras, spectacles, mobile phones (even when the phone is turned off) and wristwatches [in short, expensive stuff designed to appeal to adults] than they are to toys. They seem to instinctively know what you don't want broken, and make a beeline to it.

You would have though that toy designers would have noticed this too, but no.

Fortunately, the whole post-a-jam-sandwich-in-the-VCR-door experiment is a thing of the past in most households.

Re: iPads feeling expensive now

>There are some Android tablets which have a different aspect ratio screens, e.g. the Archos 80 has a 4:3 screen.

And that weird 5" Android LG phone is 4:3. I dislike 16:9 on laptops, but on tablets its not quite as irritating because I can rotate it by 90º.

Re: Crowbars

Bill Murry? Zombie Apocalypse? I politely suggest you're either thinking of Zombieland (2009)... or possibly Coffee and Cigarettes (2003) if you mistook Iggy Pop for a zombie.

Re: "Give me it."

>"Give me it!" is not grammatically incorrect, and is fairly widely used.

Should have written "Gimme it!"

Can't believe it took so long for someone to point out the exhaust chute design flaw.

Re: Shock Horror

@Annihilator

If you have physical access to the disk, you're right: it's easy. Another reason to have a Linux Live CD or memory stick, always worth making one when your system is working- 'just in case'.

Re: Missing a Trick

You're too late Velv, sorry! Samsung already make TVs with swap-in modules. Still, great minds think alike etc

"As was demonstrated at CES, the TV will feature a dual-core CPU that can be swapped out using an upgradable module in the future. Voice and gesture controls are also on board, although the picture quality is the real star of the show. Samsung say the TV has 20% better color reproduction that existing TVs, and the use of OLED means you’ll get true blacks and a near infinite contrast ratio."

Re: Last weekend

>I'd downvote you for jumping on the 3dtv bandwagon, but by the same token you already have enough problems.

3D TVs are just normal TVs that can output at 120Hz, plus a cheap widget for synchronising with the goggles. Even before being sold as 3D tvs, most mid to high-end sets were capable of this. Being 3D was probably a side-effect of his choice of TV, not his primary consideration.

Re: What would I do if I was running Apple's TV project

>Joseph, I fully agree, building in tuners would require too much localisation.

Tricky... if they take that approach, then why bother selling the screen? Samsung are experimenting with a half-way approach- TVs with replaceable modules. Who knows.

Re: See, this is where pissing off Samsung really comes home to roost.

There is room for TV UIs to improve. It wouldn't require anything too drastic, though. Even that £16,000 4K Sony set that RegHardware looked at lately was noted as having an unpolished UI.

I'm not sure that it would require a new TV, though... many, if not most people already have a set-top-box (cable, satellite, Blu-ray, network streamer), and tablets provide an easy way of browsing Electronic Programme Guides and VOD services

Re: Tennis Elbow

You tend to move your arms as you walk, to keep the body in balance. This is also why sprinters have well-developed upper bodies, when at first thought one would assume they only need muscles in their legs.

Re: I'll get downvoted, but...

I won't downvote you. I will suggest that Dvorak users have been able to match their Qwerty speeds, but not surpass them. http://www.mit.edu/~jcb/Dvorak/

That's not to say I think QWERTY is the last word in Human Text Input, though.

Re: As a medical professional

Was it in El Reg that I read of an epidemic of RSI amongst men of a certain age? What was puzzling medics about it was that it was symmetrical- present in both wrists- so IT use didn't appear to be the culprit. The leading theory was that use of Viagra was causing these older gentlemen to engage in an activity in which their wrists would be supporting a large fraction of their body weight.

Was it El Reg? If not, it was probably New Scientist. Sex-obsessed, that rag...

Re: Health & Safety at Work Act

@I ain't Spartacus

Yep. Which is why I like the look of the Lenovo Yoga - that 'Ultrabook' that can be used a 'tent' position, or inverse 'L' position. This would make it easier to arrange on the desk for use with a separate keyboard, because its own keyboard can be rotated out of the way of where you would want to put a separate keyboard. i.e, you wouldn't need a fancy stand, just a pile of books and separate keyboard and mouse. It can also work as a tablet, allowing you to mix up the way you interact with it (by the touchscreen, or using the webcam to detect hand movements); as my old design lecturer was fond of saying: 'The best position is the next position'- don't stay in one position for too long.

http://shop.lenovo.com/gbweb/gb/en/learn/products/laptops/ideapad/yoga/yoga-13/index.html

If one is choosing a conventional laptop to be used in a stand, models that don't have audio ports or card readers on the front face work better.

Re: Health & Safety at Work Act

>it's virtually impossible to position a laptop so both the screen is at the right height AND the keyboard.

Which is why tablets* could prove to be a blessing- the screen can be placed in the correct position, independently of the separate keyboard.

*I'm including any device, ARM, x86, without an integrated keyboard as a 'tablet'.

This issue of the screen being mounted too low on laptops is even worse on 16:9 screens than it is on 4:3 or 16:10 displays, since it is the pixels at the top of the screen, not the bottom, that are lost.

Re: new shapes for computers and ways of interaction

@loan- points for considering alternatives, though it does sound a bit 'Minority Report'.

Doctors need to make notes on the hoof... how about a chorded-keyboard? Held in the hand, or on a belt clip perhaps, it doesn't require your arm to be held in the same position.

Re: To whine or not to whine

>I see people who do hard physical work

Physical work is good for you, as long as you work up to it. It is what our bodies are designed for; sitting on our posteriors with our joints moving repeatedly through the same narrow range of movement, they aren't. Back pain, for example, is almost unheard of in developing countries.

I for one would rather be treated by a doctor who wasn't distracted by their own aching neck, or suffers pain in their wrist.

Re: Where the big bucks are ...

Yeah, when you think of the tens of thousands of engineers, scientists and mathematicians employed for military ends... not to mention analysts, linguists, strategists...

Re: There has to be a movie in this story..

An interesting treatment... I was more thinking Terry Gilliam could direct 'Belize' as a sequel to 'Brazil'. The director's trademark themes of imagination, paranoia, fantasy etc etc... Seriously, Gilliam is currently filming 'The Zero Thereom', with Christoph Waltz as reclusive computer programmer in a future totalitarian state. Life/art.

Re: Headphone recommendations

@Cliff

agreed, Sennheiser HD 202-II. Available from Argos for £23. I have the HD-212s, which appear to use the same parts, and they're great. Replaceable cables, and they are impossible to break cos the cups just 'click-off' the head-strap. I've seen so many other cheap headphones with broken plastic parts.

Re: Lo-Fi earphones

> What we need are whole body 'phones

It's been done, kind of. There were these waistcoats available for gamers, that had low-end speakers (or possibly vibration units, I can't remember) integrated into them, that were supposed to make games more immersive by making you feel that frag grenade explode.

Re: Headphone recommendations

@JDX

As another poster has noted, you need to consider portability, comfort, and sound leakage, besides sound quality. With regards to comfort, consider whether you prefer 'on ear' headphones, 'over ear' headphones or ear buds. Some 'over ear' headphones (especially high end ones) have an open back that leaks noise, so are best kept at home.

Ear-buds (AKA 'in ear monitors' IEMs) are inherently more portable, but can start to feel uncomfortable after a while, though Klipsch phones are elipsoid in cross section, rather than circular, and some people get on well with them. You can also fit third-party Comply tips to most brands of ear-bud, a foam like material, for a better fit and greater noise isolation. I would probably go with some Senheisers at around the £35 if it were me, from Richer Sounds and many larger supermarkets- I personally don't spend much more on something I take out and about and inevitably lose. Some good things are said about Logitech's 'Ultimate Ears' brand as well, and Logitech have a 'blemished box' part of their website, with discounts on products that have damaged packaging.

Next up on the portable front are folding 'over ear' headphones. Avoid kiddie 'fashion' brands such as Skullcandy etc. Akai are a safe bet. Sennheiser, too (when they decommissioned Concorde, there were plenty on eBay, with 'British Airways' screen-printed across the headband!)

I have found cheaper Sony headphones and earphones to have unreliable cables. A shame, because I found one pair that were light, comfortable, reasonable sounding, and only £20 from a supermarket near you. I can't speak for the pricier models. Headphone cables are a bugger to solder because they are so thin.

I do like my old Senheiser HD 212 'over the ear' headphones, with replaceable cables. They have closed backs, so are commuter-friendly. A bit warm sounding, and a naff 'plastic silver' finish to them, but bombproof - the cups 'click off' the headband instead of breaking, and so are good to sling in a bag for travelling. Daftly, AFAIK, the replacement cable is only available in a 3m (10') length, when a 1.2m cable would be handy for portable use. The Sennheiser HD202-II headphones (very positive review here: http://www.whathifi.com/review/sennheiser-hd-202) seem to be of identical solid build (in a more tasteful black finish), and are available from Argos for £23. You can't go wrong.

Those Grado phones noted above are highly regarded by everyone, it seems, but are more suitable for home use.

One more thing- there have been more reports of counterfeit earphones in recent months, so buy from a reputable source. HotUKdeals.co.uk often feature good 'phone bargains, and their comments section may contain some good advice.

Re: And...

To paraphrase Homer Simpson "I'm just old fashioned. I like my beer cold, my TV loud, my homosexuals flaming [and my billionaires eccentric]"

Re: Kutcher haters can start getting their rotten tomatoes ready now

On film forums, it is the 3-acts in real-time structure that is raising eyebrows, not the subject matter. For some weird reason I'm thinking of the first act of The Producers.

Re: Bait and swtich

Absolutely. If it doesn't fry the brain of the Ono Sendai jockey, it is not Black ICE but merely plain vanilla ICE.

Re: Other app markets?

Exactly. It would seem the best solution would be a walled garden, but with a gate that the more tech-literate can use to exit, if they take appropriate precautions.

>They don't half stock a lot of crap on top of the stock Android.

Not on my Sony Xperia they didn't, but my last Orange feature-phone was full of it. YMMV.

Re: "the gesture" @ Ole Juul - Shame some of you can't read!

In China, an iPhone is a multiple of the average monthly wage, not a (chunky) fraction of it.

Perhaps a better analogy (though still a hugely inadequate way of trying to understand this story) would be: would you in the UK hire a graduate driving a brand new BMW hatchback? It would raise an eyebrow... make you ask "what's the story here?"

Re: Obviously!

I don't know why the student didn't claim his phone was actually a Chinese knock-off of an iPhone- there are a few to choose from!

Re: Where's the Smoking Man!?

Ah, the old X-Files black oozy stuff, not the District 9 black oozy stuff or the Prometheus black oozy stuff.

Re: Monkey?

>Why on earth is monkey so popular? Are they reshowing the old TV series or something?

Possibly Damon Albarn's stage adaptation is responsible:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey:_Journey_to_the_West

Re: Doesn't work...

>on many foreign keyboards!

My` old webmail password was along the lines of: 'orwell 1984' > 'o1r9w8e4ll' (jumble letters and numbers)> 'O!r9W*e4LL (alternate Shift, two on, two off)'... so when on holiday and faced with a Spanish keyboard, I had search for an image of a UK keyboard to remember which symbols to use.

I guess I'm not ready for one of these: http://www.daskeyboard.com/model-s-ultimate/

Re: the charging unit will only work with identified devices

>one would purposefully design a system to be incompatible.

Er... the current situation is that each device requires its own charger. This system allows several devices to be charged (in sequence or in parallel as desired) so I'm not sure why you are criticising Apple for being 'incompatible'. Re-read the linked source, the Reg article appears to have got the wrong end of the stick.

Re: Like Wow ... NOT!

Some mice can last months on a single AA cell, but not all- including the Logitech mice that charge over USB, since they are mostly the power-hungry 'Darkfield' models. Multi-touch devices such as Apple pads are similarly thirsty, lasting about 20 days on two AA cells.

Besides, not all computers are used in sunny rooms- indeed, users of shiny-screened computers actively avoid daylight!

Re: Apple branded.

No, that is not what it means. The proposed system is for having a single charger for multiple devices, and managing the power each receives, according to battery level and device priority- amongst other things.

Because:

Qi has a small range, and requires the device to be placed on top of a mat in the correct way, whereas this proposed system has a range of around a meter, and allows devices to signal when they no longer require power, so that a another device can then be charged, according to a priority system.

If you had read the linked source, you wouldn't have needed to ask.

Re: It's not easy being green

"[0003] However, it has been discovered (see "Efficient wireless non-radiative mid-range energy transfer" by Karalis et al., Annals of Physics 323 (2008) pgs. 34 - 38) that useable power can be transferred wirelessly from a power source to a receiver located within a distance referred to as a near field. By near field it is meant that within a distance a few times larger than that of both objects involved in the transfer (about one meter or so for most applications) a relatively large amount of power (at least on the order of a few watts) can be transferred between a wireless source device and a receiver with an acceptable efficiency."

-linked source

the andromeda strain.

Lovely piece of dialogue about a male character finding the installation's voice sexy.

"Oh, you can meet the lady who recorded the voice for us, if you want to. She lives about five miles away, but she's 72 now" (paraphrasing)

Re: Cake, and grief counselling, will be available at the conclusion of the test.

What was the name of the computer from System Shock?

(he asks, using more characters than it would him to Google it)

Re: Mistake Not...

When asked how he would like one of his books to be made into a film, Iain Banks replied "With a fucking big budget".

I had heard rumblings of a short story "A Gift from The Culture" being developed for film, but it seems to have died off- google search results seem to date around 2009. My fantasy director would be Neils Blomkamp or Duncan Jones.

Re: re 2001

HAL becomes best space-ghost buddies with Dave Bowman in 2061 and 3001...

Re: Not a self aware computer...

Whilst doing Arthur C Clarke:

"Dial F for Frankenstein"

Re: Thankfully you forgot

Garth, from Wayne's World: "That's a Unix book"

Girl who looks like Garth: "Yeah"

Garth: "Cool"

Re: If we're talking badass....

None as 'badass' as the ship AI Falling Outside The Normal Moral Constraints, a Culture Mind that controls the Abominator-Class General Offensive Unit from Iain M Bank's Surface Detail.

Though they all have good names: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spacecraft_in_the_Culture_series

Re: Worst computer

...until Lister destroyed it with a 14lb lump-hammer.

He was good, but he was just a retelling of the doors with personality joke, from H2G2.