Posts by Callam McMillan
163 posts • joined Thursday 7th June 2012 09:39 GMT
The flaw?
Given that multiple sources have said that the software does not need an always-on connection and only phones home occasionally, how long before somebody makes a fake activation server that tells the software all is fine with the world?
I am well aware of the fact that companies need to make money in order to continue existing, so surely a business model which positively encourages people to pirate will always be less successful than one where you can buy a copy of CS6 Master Collection for personal/educational use for say £100, as opposed to the £2800 a professional user would pay. In that case, most people would say fine and pay the cash and Adobe has £100 instead of nothing. Of course there are those that will never pay for anything, but they will always be there.
No sympathy for the current user of the device. Surely the first thing you'd do is format and reinstall - doubly so on a second hand computer.
Re: Please explain
I would imagine that they mean they are selling older equipment that they don't need but is still extremely valuable in order to offset the cost of buying newer 14nm equipment. As for a finger in every pie, one would have to assume that they're not totally selling up their older lines?
Re: You can't libel the deceased
Or, alternatively?
She gave the country the bitter medicine it needed by readjusting our economy away from dying industries
She gave the common man power by freeing them from reliance on the state. Or doesn't being allowed to own your own home at a subsidised price count. Plus, even after the recent financial crisis, anybody that bought their house as a result of Thatchers actions would be quids in.
She didn't screw industry, they did that themselves by being rigid and inflexible in the face of greater overseas competition. Car Manufacturing was dying, Coal was dying. She cut off the sick bits to allow the whole to recover. As a result, look at how much Jaguar is now contributing back to the economy?
She pandered to the people who would help her deliver what she set out to do. Is that right? Possibly not. Is it sensible? Absolutely.
She took back what some jumped up Argies tried to take from us. Which is better than rolling over and then crying to the UN.
She was more intelligent than most politicians - they don't just give out chemistry degrees... As for the social housing crisis. It wasn't her fault that councils failed to reinvest the money they made from selling properties back into new housing.
Even now she's dead she's said she does not want a state funeral, which she would have been entitled to.
I can see you, and quite a lot of other people don't seem to like her, yet ultimately everyone has benefitted from what she achieved. Thanks to her deregulation of the financial sector, I have a job that pays me a wage every month. If you're rich, she made it easier to get richer. If you're not, she made it easier to own your own home and move up in the world. If however you're a lazy, workshy slacker who thinks that the state should support you above all else, then yeah, you can be angry, but please be so in another country.
Re: @Gavin re Nigella Lawson
Read the article. Her Great Grandfather was a managing director of the company!
I once did an application for a similar type of organisation. There was a very clear warning at the beginning. If you got the password wrong three times, your account would be locked out. And there was no password recovery option. That's how you do proper security, and weed out applicants who can't remember a password.
Re: Point?
They forgot to mention that "Highlights in the History of Concrete" was a complete blockbuster also!
I'm one of the first to defend companies when they're protecting their own interests (And I'm certainly no fan of eBay or Paypal), however surely this is something that would rightfully raise a few eyebrows at the competition commission, and perhaps that's why it's not coming to Europe yet?
Does anybody actually buy Adobe software
I thought a huge percentage of the running copies of their stuff was pirated?
Going round in circles?
Surely, even if they revoke and issue new keys, now the technique for obtaining them is known, it's trivial for the new keys to be published (a la the PS3 firmware hacks)
Posted in First C compiler pops up on Github
Re: Or a PDP-11 emulator in javascript
Is it me or is there something ironic about running a C compiler in a javascript emulator of an ancient computer?
Re: The problem with Cisco
I will stick up for Cisco somewhat... And I say somewhat because I'm not a Cisco engineer, I just happen to know someone who is and have picked up a bit of knowledge about their devices. In what you get for the money, they are stupidly overpriced and underpowered.
Where the Cisco switch comes in useful is scalability across a large organisation. That you can write a router config for an entry level router say, then when you need to grow onto a larger unit, you can load the same config on a much more powerful device without having to start from scratch.
Beyond that, I don't mind using Cisco stuff when I can get it cheap on eBay, but for my own use I'll take whatever I can get cheap
Not really, a small business is just one that has very few employees. It doesn't mean that don't need access to high performance networking, and compared to the cost of a big Cisco switch, this is much more realistic way of getting that performance.
Or more simply, why does being small mean you have to be cheap?
I can see both sides of the argument here, but this is a bit stupid. There should be provision to give away electronic equipment without warranty so that servicable equipment does not just go in the bin.
Re: Serious competition
I suspect it would end with the KZZZZERT of the "Insulation Tester" the BOFH forgot to turn off!
It's back
My Friday mornings are once again complete. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to add a few buzzwords into my job description ;)
Re: Sweeney
You're actually the perfect example of what they author was going on about. You're trying to defend something, but you're not willing to do it openly and with a real name, instead hiding behind anonymity. If you posted with a real name, I might think you're an idiot, and tell you you're wrong, but when you post anonymously, I simply have no respect for you.
Posted in Boffins spot Luna-sized exoplanet
Hot and Nasty...
... Does that mean Ryanair will be flying there soon?
This could be a sport
Why can I now imagine people attacking Apple shopfronts with rocks on a regular basis. Bankrupt the company through replacing glass doors?
Re: We should be told...
No, the day before they turn it up to full, we should buy shares in whoever their electricity provider is ;)
Re: We do have the skills
It's just that the skills aren't willing to work for £25k per year (Referring to the MI6 codebraking challenge the other year) when they can get several times that working in the private sector.
Re: Unfortunate that...
Do you think the BOFH would tolerate a rock where the internet connection has a multi-day ping time?
Re: Attention Michelin Guides
... and next time round, don't forget to renew the domain!
Re: Physical security of server room ?
Your company is doing it wrong also! Any self respecting BOFH would never let the boss have access to the server room... Unless of course it was to eliminate him in some unplesant manner!
Re: A bargain
"(I've not used it but been told)"
Becuase people who go on about how great/crap a product is never have a hidden agenda?
Would I buy one of these for myself? No. I love my Galaxy Note with Cyanogen on it too much. Would I buy one of these phones for my wife? Possibly, as all she wants is a phone that makes calls, does texts and runs skype.
Re: Global banking runs on Excel!
That pretty much explains why nobody will challenge Office any time soon. As you rightly said, none of the other office packages support this level of integration. When I'm out and about on my Linux netbook, I might use LibreOffice to knock up a basic spreadsheet or document (and then go take a shower to get clean again!) but if I need to do any serious work, it's all done in Office.
VBA is one of the standouts - With an office app + VBA you can build hugely complex applications with a fraction of the complexity of trying to write a native application using VB and Visual Studio. I just wish Microsoft would do a VBA.NET and expose the .NET framework to Office so you can do some of the advanced stuff like on-the-fly crypto and I/O etc.
Re: 7.x?
No, this phone is WP8, but they have also released a 7.8 upgrade to older models.
Re: Limited capacity
I'm not sure of the exact mechanics of it, but the S in SD stands for Secure and if memory serves, a card can be quite securely locked down.
Re: Insulation will help.
Not necessarily. Go to any skyscraper on a cold day and you'll see the clouds of steam pouring out the top. In an office, there is an abundance of energy, which if left untapped would make it rather hot and nasty, as such you need to move that heat elsewhere via air-conditioning. Then you have data-centres which also dissipate a lot of heat. So in these cases, insulation is actually useless, since you're actively moving energy outside. As for domestic buildings, then they should absolutely be insulated.
If I get asked to fill out an online form like that, I am known as Mr. Mickey Mouse - email: mickey@mouse.com and a similar style of phone number. Works wonders for keeping spam away!
Re: "Now you can get plugged in to the wireless revolution"
Like "Wireless... With strings attached"
"If Obama is unwilling, we can elect someone who is."
Step forward Newt Gingrich
<< WTF being the response most of Newt's suggestions elicit
Re: "Apple has not replied to our request for comment."
The day they do give a reply is the day the central heating repair man will be going to fix the devil's boiler
That argument only works where all the prototype kilograms (And the mass of everything ever derived from them) lose or gain mass at the same rate.
Re: RE: 100 amp 3-phase supply installed
Im not sure about the US, but in the UK, three phase is 415 volts phase-phase and 240 volts phase-neutral for all three phases. The 4-bed detached house I live in for reference gets by just fine on a 60A single-phase supply.
If I was building a house though, I would want to add in certain luxuries that require three-phase power such as heat-recovery A/C (You can cool one room and heat another using the A/C system) and a workshop with professional tools (Decent metalworking lathes tend to be 3-ph even where they only have a 3hp motor)
Re: Inverters for Buffering / Storage
Ditto on the APC UPS's. I have a 2200VA one powering my PC setup and will only ever buy APC now.
Re: That's 100A per phase...
Aside from distributing the load across the phases, the other advantage is that you can get more power through a given size of cable. Take the 100A vs. 300A discussion. Using a table I found at http://www.energy-solutions.co.uk/cable_conductor.html, If I want to move 100A over a standard 70 degree armoured cable then I would need a cross section of 25 sq.mm but to move 300A over the same cable I would need a 95 sq.mm cable. Nearly four times the area to carry three times the current. This would be extremely expensive and would make wiring stuff very difficult (Try manipulating even a 35sq.mm cable into a distribution board)
Re: That's 100A per phase...
The other consideration is that while you can probably fit a 100A supply onto the existing grid, with a 200A supply, unless you live next door to a substation or industrial park, it's highly likely that you'd need to have the local transformer upgraded at (partially) your expense. Plus as I understood it the last time I looked, if you have more than a 100KW supply, then you have to have half-hourly metering.
When you say 300A equivalent, that's assuming 300A of phase-neutral loads which is insane, although I would love to see it in a domestic property! I would want it so that I can run a small workshop with proper equipment and perhaps a heat recovery A/C system.
1.5KW will barely run my computer setup... And printing using my laser printer would definately be out of the question. If I was rewiring a house, I would be looking to have a 100 amp 3-phase supply installed because running out of capacity is just primitive!
Re: Any recommendations for...
IPS and LED are two totally different things. IPS I don't entirely understand (Someone on here may be able to explain) but it is to do with the display panels construction. LED refers to the backlighting of the display. Thus you can have a display from either Dell, Samsung or a number of other manufacturers with one, the other or both of the features you mentioned.
One thing to caution you with. Avoid cheap Samsung IPS monitors. A friend of mine bought five and had three go wrong within a matter of months!
Re: No portrait-mode?
Dell Ultrasharp U2412M. A proper 1920x1200 panel and you can use it in portrait mode. It also comes with lots of inputs and you can get it online for a little over £200.
Unfortunately I cannot remember where I read it, but I remember once reading that in modern electronic hardware, the quantity of valuable metals is actually being reduced. Where once a circuit board would have significant amounts of gold on connectors, and lead in the solder as you pointed out, now there is very little to make recycling economical, and I have to wonder if ironically that has actually countered the increased concern in recycling old equipment?
As for my earlier point, I am not disputing that some regulation is both necessary and good, I too expect to be able to use my laptop and phone to get reliable connections to all manner of wireless signals. However I also have to wonder how bad things would be in an unregulated environment. I mean, when these devices were being produced (literally in sheds and garages to begin with) and there wasn't huge amounts of regulation, I don't hear stories of how they destroyed TV and radio transmissions. Nor do I necessarily see the need for CE marks, since electrocuting your customers or burning their houses down tends to be bad for business!
What I am really suggesting is perhaps a lighter set of regulatory requirements that allow inventors to come up with new products for minimal overheads, although perhaps only where these do not involve the use of Wireless RF components.
While I understand the need for some regulation of the EM radio spectrum, this kind of thing is disappointing. Once upon a time, anybody with the knowledge necessary to build a circuit and shove it in a box could then go and put it on sale. Nowadays it looks more like you'd need a legal qualification more than the electronics knowledge to put something on sale. You have EM Compliance, you have the god damned WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE directive and no doubt another few regulations I am not aware of!
I wonder how many innovative products are left rotting in peoples sheds because they've looked at the cost and effort of taking them to market and have turned round and said sod that for a laugh...
Did you know...
How long before the emergency services are getting messages "Did you know you can get a refund of up to £3333 for missold PPI..." ?
Not a very good BOFH
He would have set the numbered accounts up BEFORE trying to nick the secret information and sell it, and he certainly wouldn't have got caught! It would have been the boss, who would be found in the server room after an unfortunate halon discharge!
Re: Compliant with the law?
You've just proved my point. "Upper management and shareholders spend it on 'luxury' tat, like shiny watches that can't keep time and two-grand handbags." Which is a far better way to redistribute money in the national and global economy than giving it to the government who will promptly waste it on the next thing they read in the Daily Mail that they think will get them reelected.
As for VAT. They have to charge VAT on the goods and services they sell. Where the goods or services are bought by the end user, VAT is payable to the Exchequer. If they're purchased by a (VAT registered) company, then the buyer can reclaim the VAT, but will need to charge VAT to its customers. So the likes of Starbucks and Amazon will no doubt pay significant amounts of VAT. Admittedly, Google which mainly sells to businesses, less so.
Compliant with the law?
Whenever I read stories like this, where some politician is talking about what is morally right blah blah blah, I instantly know they don't have a leg to stand on and they're just grandstanding to make themselves look good in popular opinion.
The facts of the matter are that it is not the responsibility of a company or individual to structure their affairs for the benefit of the taxman, nor is there any imperative, either legal or moral to pay more than you are required to do so. As such, if a company can structure their affairs in such a way as to pay no tax, then good on them.
Also, what we're talking about is corporation tax on profits. This doesn't take into account the VAT they have to pay on the goods they sell, nor does it take into account the Income Tax and NI (Both Employers and Employees) that they have to pay for every member of staff they hire.
Finally, and this is a personal thought. If I go to Starbucks and give them my money, I get a cup of something that resembles coffee (kind of). If I go to Google and give them my money, I get web services. If I go to Amazon and give them my money, I get just about any item I need. If I give the government my money - sorry, when the government helps itself to my money, I get sweet f-all because they've pissed it up the wall on pointless crap. On that basis I think I'll only use companies which give the government the middle finger!
Re: MS is missing where business desktops are headed
While general enterprise desktop computing might be heading this way, ask the kind of people who use high powered workstations to do CAD or design work in a remote desktop session and they will very quickly tell you to bugger off.
I can also see this being useful in smaller companies that don't have large back-office systems. My dad's company would be a perfect case. The sales manager would find something like this perfect when out on jobs since he can still use Outlook and the VPN to the office, but doesn't have to lug around a laptop, case, charger etc etc.
