Posts by JeffyPoooh

A larger solution...

Electric power used for computation, generating waste heat.

Electric power used for space or water heating.

Integrate these.

I've already (repeatedly) suggested that we're very close to the point where ~$100 1kw baseboard heaters (or Heater Bars in UK-speak) could be cost effectively replaced by $1000 1kw CPU Arrays, built into the same form factor. The extra cost of the hardware is profitably recovered by the value of the CPU cycles.

Everything is falling into place. Widespread broadband. Auction sites, to sell off the CPU cycles. Coin Mining. Protein Folding for charity to balance supply. Just requires mass production of $100 100-watt CPU modules, to be clicked together. These new economics would re-optimize the design of the CPU Heater brick. Older and cheaper designs might be optimum, maybe.

It's (just about) time.

June-August remains an issue. Not enough land mass and population in the Southern Hemisphere. Of course, Domestic Hot Water is needed year round.

"Hello? Hello? Hello?"

El Reg, "The Register asked Google to weigh in on the matter. A spokesperson was not available to comment."

Actually the spokesperson *did* answer your call. It's just that they were using a company-issued Pixel phone.

El Reg, "Hello? Hello? Hello?"

Google, " "

El Reg, "Hello? Hello? Hello?"

Google, " "

El Reg, "Hello? Hello? Hello?"

Google, " "

El Reg, "Hello? Hello? Hello?"

Google, " "

~CLICK~

Tables, nearly Code-Free State Machines, and future Requirements Compilation

Once upon a time (early 1980s), there was a coding contest to see how much functionality could be crammed into one line of BASIC code; limited to about 240 characters. I arrived at a way to have a one line 'engine', and then as many subsequent DATA statements as you wish. With the extra DATA lines, it wasn't really a 'One Liner' winner, oh well.

Each DATA statement was conceptually a row in a table, and each row effectively encoded a machine 'state'. The data elements were: State ID#, assigned action or output data, then an extensible list of condition values with their next state ID#. The program inputs caused the engine to jump around the table based on those inputs, as designed and listed in the table.

Essentially all the states of the machine would be coded into a big dumb table, and the actual code was simply a very tight little loop.

It's a powerful concept, in applicable circumstances. Put your machine states into a trivial table format, automatically transcribe it in, and then add the one line engine. Done.

The same thing could be done in assembler. A wee tiny bit of actual code, and then a huge table making it sing. The big silly table could be prepared in MS-Excel, even by a manager.

It's a small step from the above concept to that (soon to be here) future of Requirements Compilation directly into code. Spec writers become coders.

This sort of Table Driven State Machine coding method is very nearly code free. In case that helps.

"...sold a blank laptop, Which? said."

Which? is a silly name.

Imagine if other organizations were named Who?, What?, Where?, and When?.

Refer to this: http://www.psu.edu/dept/inart10_110/inart10/whos.html

...

Costello: Well, then who's playing first?

Abbott: Yes.

Costello: I mean the fellow's name on first base.

Abbott: Who.

Costello: The fellow playin' first base.

Abbott: Who.

Costello: The guy on first base.

Abbott: Who is on first.

Costello: Well, what are you askin' me for?

Abbott: I'm not asking you--I'm telling you. Who is on first.

...

Legal Name Change, with optional sealed record

"NT2" is quietly renamed "2000" and then released....presumably equipped with NTFS 3.0.

It worked for MS Windows, so it should work for them..

Getting closer to Ice-Nine...

"...The boffins detected ice VII..."

Oh noes...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat%27s_Cradle

Once upon a time...

Decades ago, we had a large system with several HDDs. To give you an idea of how long ago this was, I believe that the HDDs were 5 MB (not GB, 5 MB). Anyway, it took me about 1.3 seconds to realize that we could install the boot code and OS onto *all* of the drives, and then set it to boot off the primary. If anything ever went wrong with the primary, then we could *instantly* switch it to boot from another HDD, and then gleefully carry-on with our day.

If I were running a server, then I'd install at least four HDDs (or four arrays). If anything went wrong with the primary drive (e.g. MS Updates), then I'd poke a button and boot it from the other HDD with the previous stable OS and then go for lunch. It'd be equivalent to 'Restoring' to the previous Restore Point, except being a hardware swap it would take mere minutes instead of rudely interfering with my coffee break.

There would be some details to sort out, such as ensuring that as much of the OS data as possible is stored on a different "Data" drive. So that the settings and such (Login) survive the switch to the alternate OS drive. One may have to do daily backups of the OS from one drive to the other. It might need like 6 or 8 HDDs to keep things organized, but they're cheap.

I can only imagine that MS Policies and OS design make this sort of thing very difficult these days. Too bad. Because the basic concept would make it nearly trivial to survive such disasters, while not missing lunch.

HDDs are fast, but not as fast as changing a C: to a X: and rebooting.

"...or from short circuits within the battery..."

Thank you for mentioning this point about internal shorts within the cells. Too many fail to consider this internal failure mode (internal to the 18650 or pouch cell), as they add on yet more protection for external shorts and such. Li-ion safety must include strict QA at the cell factory.

Compliments to the chef.

"Servers require security patches"

Notice: "Server will be off-line tonight from 8PM until approximately 5AM."

Click-click. Click-click. Click-click.

Coffee.

Click-click. Click-click.

Yawn.

Click-click.

"...can my air-gapped PC be compromised by a speaker?"

The way things are programmed these days (promiscuous execution of anything not tied down), you could probably infiltrate malware into a PC by merely reading out its source code using your mouth.

This very comment itself will probably lock-up a fraction of the world's IT devices. Ready?

10 GOTO 10

Ad-vice

First thing each morning, browse for skimpy bikinis (<- adjust to taste).

For the rest of the day, your ads will be lovely.

"royalty model"

Silly gooses. Everybody knows that "Royalties" are now exclusively used *within* multinational corporations to export their profits from any given jurisdiction to their IP Holding company in the Cayman Islands.

"Hey boss. We made $17,234,517.23 taxable profit last year here in Duhland, What's the royalty owed for our use of your valuable and exclusive trademarked brand 'Tax-Dodgers-R-Us'?"

"Let me calculate it. Ah. Carry the three... Ok; it's $17,234,517.23. Okay?"

Nobody uses "Royalties" to actually pay any *other* corporation. That's why we have great collections of patents about such things as "Using a Plurality of Photons to Make Visible One's Surroundings", to fend off any nonsense such as other corporations wanting our money.

After all. We have no money. It's all stashed in the Cayman Islands

Geesh. Kids these days...

Estimating the unknowable

Example: if a given something (like a Risk item) that might, or might not, happen, and there's zero information about the odds, then the odds may be assumed to be "fifty / fifty". A more experienced manager would actually set the assumed odds to "one-third / one-third / one-third", because they'd already know that in addition to 'might' and 'might not' happen, there's also the distinct possibility that 'something else entirely' could happen instead.

Using this basic method, and given "75 Microsoft bugs squashed this month", then how can we estimated the number of bugs remaining in Windows?

If you casually walk past a huge (mile-high) haystack, look down and can see 75 needles, then you might be able to extrapolate to guesstimate the total number of needles in the haystack.

Somebody somewhere (a Statistician) must have the skills and info at hand to produce a reasonable guesstimate of the number of remaining bugs in Windows. I would have guessed about three million, but now it must be closer to 2,999,925.

Hammond and May

Amazing that your country is being run by Hammond and May, but you failed to include Clarkson.

(Joke concept credit goes to somebody on Friday Night Comedy on BBC 4.)

"...backups taken some three months ago..."

Isn't that -^ (ancient backups) an offense worthy of immediate termination?

Mistakes happen. But months of intentional negligence is inexcusable.

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding...

Tides

I wonder how long until it's discovered that the dynamically variable seashore environment caused by tides are a critical part of life's eventual rise to intelligence. A similar point might be made for seasonal temperature extremes caused by a tilted axis. It'd be funny if both (the Moon and the Earth's tilted axis) were caused by the very same collision.

Perhaps boring planets only have green goo.

Jim Harris tweet, "My first hand written boarding pass ever..."

Jim must be quite young.

"AI taking over the world."

I'm going to have to come up with a lovely stock photo to license out. But I can't be bothered. So I'll just toss this concept out there, public domain concept.

Here's the image:

The LCD monitor in the background is displaying a large friendly message about the CMOS/BIOS battery urgently needing to be replaced. The high power server computer case has been opened, with the screwdriver and case screws strewn about. The CR2032 battery package has somehow been torn open, with a shower of cells rained across the table. The selected little battery is firmly gripped in the robot arm. Those attentive to detail may notice that the robot's claw is made of metal, the lithium cell in the claw is faintly glowing due to the dead short circuit of the metal paw. The robot arm is poised over the motherboard. A HAL 2001 style large red glowing eye peers into the computer, and somehow manages to convey a subtle expression that indicates a deep concern about its chances of success.

That's the image. Help yourself.

Obviously...

Obviously these Certificates should be Certified.

I won't be happy until, "It's Certificates all the way down."