Posts by John Sturdy

$deity already gave us a warning

For is it not written in the Proverbs of King Solomon, It is better to meet a mother bear robbed of her cubs than to meet some fool busy with a stupid project.

Someone saw that one coming a few millenia in advance.

Re: Meh

Yes, powerful phones have helped make such computing power a commodity, and the same technology might as well be embedded in the devices. But interfacing with the phone identifies you to the embedded technology, and gives it your profile / preferences / settings.

Re: Don't want to rain....

No doubt the Finns will be able to make a variant of salmiakki from it.

Whatever the downsides are, it's refreshing to see a government paying attention to someone competent in a field, rather than the usual crowd of bootlicking cronies.

Re: Don't buy US kit

China seems to be a threat primarily to its own citizens, and the Taiwanese, Tibetans and other neighbours. In the west, we're more likely to be troubled by western spying.

Re: I'm liking this Dutch MEP Sophie In ’t Veld

Even more encouragingly, she's on the USA's Secondary Screen Selection list: http://www.expatica.com/nl/news/country-news/Dutch-MEP-a-security-risk_157801.html

Perhaps that's just for supporting privacy, though.

Re: bbc pi is 8bit amtelmega 32u4

The limitations may actually be the point. When kids see something as "a computer" in the modern sense, and think they're going to learn to make it do things like the ones they see computers already doing (e.g. modern games) there's a lot they have to learn to get far enough to stop them thinking that programming is beyond them; and then they will have only just scratched the surface.

But give them something which inherently limits their expectations (for example, having a small grid of LEDs instead of a full colour screen) and they'll have much more chance of taking it as far as their expectations, which is much more rewarding, and likelier to get them to continue to larger systems.

I think the Beeb succeeded because at that time the limits of what you could expect of a computer were much more approachable. Modern desktop systems have so much more in them that making progress that looks significant enough to give encouragement is much harder, and is going to be above more people's thresholds for getting disheartened and giving up.

This wasn't a "mistake"; it was as deliberate as you can get, and they should be made an example of.

As for them not doing it again: at best, it's a matter of them not being able to get away with doing it again. A burglar who is not currently burgling just because he got caught and is in jail is not the same as an honest character.

Unfortunately, even that's optimistic: I expect they'll try again as soon as they can. I hope that enterprise buyers will also avoid their enterprise equipment; after all, who knows what's preloaded on them, that simply hasn't been found and exposed yet?

Re: Antivirus collusion?

I'm disgusted by the BBC's description of it saying it "offered shopping tips"; that's too close to collusion for me.

Re: I'm wondering

Linaro have announced a standard for form factor and connector layout for credit card sized SBCs: http://www.linaro.org/news/linaro-announces-96boards-initiative-accelerate-arm-software-development/

And the first board available in this shape is quite decent: https://www.96boards.org/products/hikey/ (8-core A53 (64-bit) at 1.2GHz).

Re: Reading books - wats dat ?

Unfortunately, it seems to have become a manual for some sections of the public sector.

Amateur? Professional?

I suspect you're trying to imply that Linux is written largely by hobbyists, with a low level of skill.

In fact, the standard of its developers is high, and many (probably most: http://www.infoworld.com/article/2610207/open-source-software/who-writes-linux--corporations--more-than-ever.html says 80% of kernel patches) are employed to work on it. And many who aren't paid to work on it will be people who are paid to work on some other software.

Not that the correlation between being paid to work at something, and being good at it, is perfect anyway.

The timing is right

Perfectly timed for her to oversee her country falling behind its competitors, just like she did at HP.

Re: Why was Ireland 3rd most heavily targeted?

Because corruption in Ireland is pretty blatant, but there's probably a lot more material not yet public, that would be excellent for blackmailing senior politicians into compliance with external interests.

Or possibly just to make up a price list to see which ones to buy.

Re: In defense of data slurping

I doubt they're just "logging" the data, for inspection after an incident. They'll be analyzing it continuously as it comes in, looking for things they think should be prevented or at least watched suspiciously (as in McCarthyism).

Re: Good, but not good enough

I'd be surprised if detecting missing clips visually at that kind of speed is that easy. Some kind of proximity sensing might be better (sonar?)

Re: Here's how a rational attempt behaves

Yes, publishing a file for use with CNC mills and lathes is more of a threat, but I don't think that the home-priced mills are up to the accuracy required. So you'd need fairly pricy equipment; but the G-code files would reduce the skill needed.

Re: 3,520 pints a day?

Alternatively, they could put a lot more hops into the beer... just a way of saving time in drinking it, of course.

Re: Don't forget it's a carbonated fluid........

The CO2 gas may be topped up at the bottling plant, so this can probably be worked around.

Payphones in airports

So anyone other than your own agents using an airport payphone will come under increased suspicion of being someone else's agent, too?

Frankpledge may have limited privacy

The frankpledge system (mutual legal responsibility in a group of households) may have encouraged people to keep informal surveillance of each other (although at least that would have been P2P).