* Posts by Robert Forsyth

384 publicly visible posts • joined 1 May 2007

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IT for service providers biz Kaseya defers decision about SaaS restoration following supply chain attack

Robert Forsyth

Re: Surely they are finished as a company?

People/Companies/Governments/Doctors need to be allowed to learn from their mistakes, if they don't learn, then bin them.

Scapegoating can perpetuate a mistake, or nothing is done/learnt for the money spaffed.

I've got the power! Or have I? Uninterruptible Phone-disposal Stuffup

Robert Forsyth

Re: "Doing an OVH"

I'll bite

I am serious, and don't call me Shirley

Tired: Linux fans using the Edge browser. Wired: Linux fans using a Microsoft account to sign into the Edge browser

Robert Forsyth

Could be Worse

Why is O365 Excel from Sharepoint on Firefox on Linux using several gigs of swap?

And half a dozen Firefox Web instances?

Classy move: C++ 20 wins final approval in ISO technical ballot, formal publication expected by end of year

Robert Forsyth

Re: The old problem of the programmer perisope view of the world..

From my 41 years of limited experience

Usually when a previous programmer has commented that their hack was to workaround a compiler bug, they have not understood what they were trying to do or the machine could do for them, and the compiler was fine.

I suppose the compiler should protect the programmer when they use a binary floating point variable as their loop counter and increment by the binary approximation of 0.1.

Millimetre-sized masses: Physics boffins measure smallest known gravitational field (so far)

Robert Forsyth

Re: Please

The mass of a bee, 1/15 length of a bee (shame bees aren't 16mm long)

1/9 the force of a blood cell due to gravity, oops.

The force to accelerate a blood cell at 1.09m/s²

Burgers, birds, and Blue Screens of Death: Remember the joys of commuting?

Robert Forsyth

windows damage your computer?

"A problem has been detected and windows has been shut down to prevent damage to your computer."

Hacktivists breach Verkada and view 150,000 CCTV cams in hospitals, prisons, a Tesla factory, even Cloudflare HQ

Robert Forsyth

Re: They told us it would be great

**Fast** Cheap Secure/Reliable

Bill Gates debunks 'coronavirus vaccine is my 5G mind control microchip implant' conspiracy theory

Robert Forsyth

Re: This is a typical method of the secret services

There is an ever-so-long documentary which sort of covers this. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HyperNormalisation

Because we are human, there are many ways or tricks to derail rational thought.

Tech set responds in wake of American protests, police violence and civil unrest

Robert Forsyth

Re: The next step...

Part of the reason, the US was so late to the WW2, is they supported both sides. Also the communist were with the Allies, i.e. on our side.

(Simplistically)

Europe tried to punish Germany for WW1, which leads to the Make Germany Great Again and the use of minorities as scapegoats for the failing of an idea without substance.

As anti-brutality protests fill streets of American cities, netizens cram police app with K-Pop, airwaves with NWA

Robert Forsyth

Re: "Yes, Anon activists are back."

Why torch the place? Or smash up the inside?

Robert Forsyth

Re: "Yes, Anon activists are back."

All at the same time?

Watch an oblivious Tesla Model 3 smash into an overturned truck on a highway 'while under Autopilot'

Robert Forsyth

Re: Didn't notice a person either

I thought that was just a bit of street furniture. You are right, it is waving at the car, and steps back.

5G mast set aflame in leafy Liverpool district, half an hour's walk from Penny Lane

Robert Forsyth

5G Does Spread the Virus

People meet up to set fire to a mast and spread the virus.

Chicago: Why I just grin like a dork... It's my kind of Bork

Robert Forsyth

Re: Jumped up quiche?

We invent the egg and ham tart/torte.

Flan is borrowed from French

Quiche is borrowed by French from German (Kuchen)

Linux desktop org GNOME Foundation settles lawsuit with patent troll

Robert Forsyth

Re: An excellent result

There must be some special hell for them, where they cannot do the most obvious thing like open a door with an ungloved hand.

Verity Stob is 'Disgusted of HG Wells': Time, gentlemen, please

Robert Forsyth

War of the Worlds by Jeff Wayne

Surely they could listen to an audio book or the musical version?

BBC War of the Worlds made the Tom Cruise one more accurate.

Having read the book with its fear of poor people and wonderful scene setting. Did I miss something, the BBC didn't?

You're not Boeing to believe this: Yet another show-stopping software bug found in ill-fated 737 Max airplanes

Robert Forsyth

Re: Those moneychangers...

One the problems with test driven development when the tests do not reflex real use?

What was Boeing through their heads? Emails show staff wouldn't put their families on a 737 Max over safety fears

Robert Forsyth

To the Armchair Engineers

Evolving a design is usually better than starting from scratch (Agile verses Waterfall).

All those old parts have proven infield use and safety.

You can iterate changes to lower the cost of manufacture and fitting of each component while maintaining safety.

You can test each change.

Robert Forsyth

Re: If the FAA can be forced to do its job

I understand your sentiment of FAA testing everything, but that is not how it works (nowadays).

There are companies which crash cars for manufacturers, so the manufacturer can show reasonably low risk of harm or minimal harm to the occupants and conformance to the regulations.

Bulb smart meters in England wake up from comas miraculously speaking fluent Welsh

Robert Forsyth

Re: Gen2 much like Gen1

Someone said Capita run the smart meter to base communications, Bulb and Scottish Power are waiting for them to fix it.

That this AI can simulate universes in 30ms is not the scary part. It's that its creators don't know why it works so well

Robert Forsyth

Re: Skeletons

But isn't that what the fleshy pilot does?

Robert Forsyth

Re: With all due respect

I'm not sure it needs explaining.

The amount of respect deserved based on their past actions or statements, which might be none due.

One of the sentences which sounds complementary to pompous people with inflated self worth.

Nope, we're stuffed, shrieks Apple channel as iPhone shipments enter a double-digit spiral

Robert Forsyth

Re: Have you seen how much a Ferrari costs?

But are you buying a Ford for the price of a Ferrari?

They are not selling a few units with hand stitched Italian leather seats, they are selling a massed produced device made in China.

Refactoring whizz: Good software shouldn't cost the earth – it's actually cheaper to build

Robert Forsyth

Re: Agile

Neither Waterfall nor Agile is one thing, it might be a case of using the right tool for the job.

You build a machine in 3 months, it costs £1000.

After a couple of months, you evolve/engineer its parts to save costs - a hand machined set of aluminium parts assembled into a component is replaced by something stamped out of steel sheet or injection moulded plastic. It now costs £700.

After another couple of months, you redesign the sub frame, so that it can be assembled by robot. It now costs £500.

After another couple of months, a key component has supply problem, you redesign for an alternative.

Alternately, you build a machine in 8 months, it costs £500, but you cannot make any because a key component is not available. Anyway, you cannot sell any because a competitor has the market.

Agile is a strategy to cope-with or manage change. Also it is finding problems early when they are cheaper to fix (LEAN); improve communication...

Robert Forsyth

Re: And what about the proliferation of languages

At the level below the program, the program is data.

A SQL or BASIC program is data to a SQL or BASIC interpreter.

A C program is data to a C compiler.

Robert Forsyth

Re: Confidence to Competence Ratio

Why not just employ typist, instead of expensive programmers?

Or just have a motor and a cam bash those keys?

In your last paragraph, have you discovered the reason for the decline in manufacture?

It is software?

When a probe crashes into a planet, because the sensor has been fitted upside down.

When insulating foam comes loose and knocks some thermal tiles off a wing.

When the angle of attack sensor freezes up.

Tesla driver killed after smashing into truck had just enabled Autopilot – US crash watchdog

Robert Forsyth

Re: What's the point?

I 'love' the truck skid marks across the cycle lane.

Nvidia, King's College train robot overlords to spot oddities on radiology scans

Robert Forsyth

Old News?

I thought this was old news, perhaps I missed something when I skimmed the article.

Some years ago, medical images were being machine classified, but by a less known/respected university.

In the Crosse & Blackwell soup factory, they had a machine to reject the suspect cubes of diced veg.

And in current affairs... Apple recalls three-prong AC adapters after some shocking behavior

Robert Forsyth

Re: FYI

Or a little adapter which plugs into your dump TV HDMI port an makes it smart.

Watch Toyota's huge basketball robot shoot a hoop, and read up on how you should think about AI and, erm, Jesus

Robert Forsyth

Re: I.Geller

Both a dog and a human can predict the future position of a ball in flight, and catch it. Is this differential equation solving? Both a dog and a human dream in their sleep, they both know when they have done something naughty; do they both have a conscience? A dog will bark to be let in, when it cannot see the person to let them in, do they have abstract thought? Does a dog have a soul? They are remembered by their human companions, after they die.

As you work your way down the intellectual levels...

Do you remember your first car? Its little quirks, its failings as it got old. It indicates when it's hungry or it's unwell. Does it make a happy noise, a serious one or an angry one? Does a car have a soul?

Robert Forsyth

Re: Created in the image of the creator

As said by someone, "Man makes god in his own image."

Robert Forsyth

Re: AI-parsing and n-gram parsing

I'm an old goat.

Alice comes = Alice is come or Alice has come

compare: Alices have come

There is no plural in Alice comes, jests, sings.

The Alices have come, they are jesting and singing.

The walking stick belonging to the man with the shiny knob. Fruit flies like bananas.

Even in the 1980s, AI was more than one thing/discipline. I remember reading about a search algorithm based on the behaviour of ants. Fuzzy logic was used to guess when a tube platform was too full. Markov chains/models use for speech recognition.

Earlier there was a realization that natural processes could be emulated with a simple processor and complex data; rather than a complex processor and simple data.

Drone goal! Quadcopter menace alert freezes flights from London Heathrow Airport

Robert Forsyth

Last time was coincident with shortage of fuel and a French majority share takeover.

Robert Forsyth

Re: Yet another...

African or European?

Oregon can't stop people from calling themselves engineers, judge rules in Traffic-Light-Math-Gate

Robert Forsyth

Re: Great for this Engineer

Software Engineering exists, but it isn't what companies typically want when they ask for a Software Engineer.

Software Engineering is (devising ways to) efficiently producing software of sufficient quality. This may be by means of a compiler or interpreter for a domain specific language; or some trade off in choice of algorithm between implementation complexity and speed; or using some off-the-shelf part instead of bespoke.

Software, at one level, is giving detailed instructions on how to do a task on a slightly abstract machine or simplified model of a machine.

I think an engine is the work of an engineer, not the other way round; engine is named after engineer; a design is the work of a designer, clean is the work of a cleaner; compared to, paint is not the work of a painter.

With running a railway steam engine, some body plans water (and coal) refilling which will depend on the load on the engine. The engine driver may be a safety engineer, in that they imagine/predict the consequences of a coarse of action, so letting the fireman drive the train when it is safe to do so.

Robert Forsyth

Many a true word is said in jest.

Could you speak up a bit? I didn't catch your password

Robert Forsyth

Re: If this is how things are going to be

If not LEMONS?

IBM: Co-Op Insurance talking direct to coding subcontractor helped collapse of £55m IT revamp project

Robert Forsyth

Just Goes to Show

I was under the impression (I swallowed their PR) IBM were much improved over days of past, but seem I have wrongly spouting rubbish - I am truly sorry to all those in earshot.

My more direct experience is, they seem to deliberately choose a less common interpretation of the requirement* - for no financial advantage - just to show stupid the customer is.

* we can all easily do this, invent an unlikely 'round hole' scenario and let it suffer the 'square peg' requirement.

My IBM experience was the PC hell/help-desk was moved (outsourced) to a Canadian first-line call centre, I think the requirement was for a polite and English speaking call centre (like in Leeds or Ireland, perhaps). The Canadian call centre was quite good with late evening problems.

GCSE computer science should be exam only, says Ofqual

Robert Forsyth

Re: Doesn't matter

John Majors' Labour Government !?

Robert Forsyth

Ofsted Have Caused It

Ofsted inspections cause some schools to game the exam system:

Not allowing borderline students to take exams;

Teaching how to pass exams, but not learning much about the subject.

I assume the school's reward is based on exam results, and not how they improve the pupils.

Looking at my daughter's recent exams (and mocks), they are almost exactly the same as mine of almost 40 years earlier.

Computer Science is not really Software Engineering, Software Engineering is not really Programming. There is some overlap.

Computer Science, the science of computers - how they work

Software Engineering - how to build software more correctly, cheaply and quickly

Programming - devising a solution to the requirements and instructing the computer to execute this solution

Need a modest Arm Cortex-A CPU in your custom chip? Just apply online. Plus $125,000

Robert Forsyth

Re: Age

PIC 22p

AVR 21p

555 25p Capacitor 3p to 20p

4060 25p Watch crystal 10p

Robert Forsyth

Re: Age

A PIC is often cheaper than a 555 + capacitor

Cabinet Office: Forget about Verify – look at our 3,000 designers (and 56 meetups)

Robert Forsyth

Cargo Culting Apple?

Disclaimer, I didn't read the cited document.

Robert Forsyth

Re: Doug Adams was right

Cheap shot

MIMEsweeper maker loses UK High Court patent fight over 15-year-old bulletin board post

Robert Forsyth

Re: The Patent Claim at issue

The article said the judge thought "using the whitelist indexed by part/file type (and sender) to bypass the AV rejection" was non obvious.

The plaintive, if not idiots, badly presented the evidence i.e. a shedload of documents with no narrative.

According to Wikipedia, Dr. John Harrison described whitelisting applications to prevent the execution of malware in 2005.

Access Control Lists have been around since 1984, and could be considered a whitelist, also the passwd file on Unix.

Take the wheel, Arm tells its notebook-grade Cortex-A76 CPU: Now you're a robo-ride brain

Robert Forsyth

Japanese?

Apple hands €14.3bn in back taxes to reluctant Ireland

Robert Forsyth

(I was under the impression) Ireland wants hi-tech jobs in Ireland, by attracting hi-tech companies with low taxes. I'm not sure the strategy works, I guess it works for Ireland as they seem to be trying not the frighten other 'hi-tech' companies.

Having rich companies (and poor ones) stifle technology diversity and innovation.

Check out this link! It's not like it'll crash your iPhone or anything (Hint: Of course it will)

Robert Forsyth

Tried on KDE Konqueror

KHTML engine -> Thomas and Triggered

WebEngine -> Thomas and Triggered

WebKit -> 0

KHTML taken by Apple for base of WebKit

WebKit taken by Google for Chrome

The Register's 2018 homepage redesign: What's going on now?

Robert Forsyth

Desktop Version OK, but...

(I thought) The original design was to mimic a red top tabloid, I assume that is why in landscape there are useless grey bands left and right. Could these unused areas of screen fulfil the mechanics of a web-page (navigation to the left) and (slow moving or static) advertising (to the right).

I am not sure you have to limit yourself to this metaphor, it is a web-page.

Don't have an ad at the top, then repeat it down the page, that just annoys. Although I want you to make the most money from your adverts. Perhaps you could have a classified ads section.

Basically there are landscape and portrait modes, with a roughly portrait content area.

In landscape the banner, navigation menu, and footer can slide to the left. And the equivalent to the leaflets that fall out of a newspaper to the right.

In portrait mode the banner and navigation menu reveal when you scroll up or stop scrolling for a few seconds.

The main content area, seems reasonable:

Big picture news story somewhere near the centre.

Top News big size, medium, small, small; top left

Most read just a list to the right

Latest news big size, medium, small... below

I don't think the categories (Data Centre, Software, Security, etc.) work, although the headline could be tagged with its category in small perhaps DC, SW, Sec, DO, Bus, PT, Sci, ET, BN, and Lec. Clicking on the section navigation would filter.

EU wants one phone plug to rule them all. But we've got a better idea.

Robert Forsyth

I too, just switched to magnetic connectors.

The micro-USB phones Xperia X and P8 Lite 2017 seem happy.

The Lightning iPad will only charge from the Apple charger.

The USB-C Xperia XA2 would not fast charge from the NetDot 5th gen. cable, but does from 7th gen.

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