Posts by John Brown (no body)

Re: I miss IBM keyboards

"the feel of the Spectrum only with actual keys perched on top."

ISTR there was an actual "keyboard convertor" for the Spectrum that was an open box that sat on top of the Speccy and had purely mechanical keys which in turn pressed the actual keys below

Re: Disaster recover?

"Should people not use datacenters?"

I didn't say that. Datacentres were around before "cloud". I was having a go at the marketing and media types.

Re: Astro Boy

"Harvard University’s Department of Astrology"

One the worlds premier universities has a Department of Astrology???? I bet the boys and girls of Yale have great fun with that.

"Fat lot of good it'll do you after a year of lockdown drinking."

Well marinated? Should be tasty when fried up with some red onions. And a nice Chianti :-)

Re: It occurs to me

"You can't see her until the last second."

When that story was first reported on El Reg, many people pointed out the poor lighting conditions. Then some commenters who were locals pointed out that the visibility to a human eye is far better than what it appears to be in that video.

Re: It occurs to me

"E.g. If a supply line automation actually fails 1/10,000 operations, change it to simulate failure once every 1,000 operations, to keep humans on their toes."

I counter that suggestion with The Boy Who Cried Wolf.

Re: But... but... we are driving because we like it, right?

"If I want to walk down the middle of the carriageway, what is to stop me?"

Possibly the policeman who comes knocking on your door when one of the 100's of cameras pointing at you from all the self-driving vehicles uploads the offending image and video for facial/gait/whatever recognition and passes your address to the police, courtesy of Facebook :-)

It'll be such easy pickings for the Police that they'll go after all of them to get a nice clear up rate.

Re: But... but... we are driving because we like it, right?

"This has been predicted for a while"

I remember a short story by Larry Niven where someone was sentenced to be dismantled for the organ banks for manually driving their car.

Not sure of the date, but I think I read it in The Long Arm Of Gil Hamilton back in the early 80s. It was a collection so the story will likely be at least a few years older.

Re: Hopefully

It's an interesting argument. But does Starlink or similar even require rural subsidies? They can supply internet just as easily to a city centre as the middle of nowhere.

Re: 1 million users?

"So Starlink, 4000 satellites messing up the sky, can only provide connectivity to 1 million users?"

Apart from other have said, it's also worth noting that the base stations are not necessarily intended for a single users. Put one in a small village in the middle of nowhere and all the villagers can connect to it over WiFi or a mesh or something.

Re: Home Office working

"It will be interesting to see how many companies revert back to type when all this is over."

Looks like ours will be reverting to type. The CEO does a video pronouncement every month or so. There are distinct undertones of "why aren't we all back in the office yet?" and actual out-loud comments about how it will be great when we're all back in the office soon. Luckily, my job is out on the road. I've not been in the office in over a year now. I usually only go in once or twice a year as it is. Being 250 miles from the office helps too!

Re: Hats off

"You're right that I'm young enough not to have experienced that myself, but I think at least some of these statements aren't missing the point too much."

I was around then, you hit nail on the head. Yes, little of peoples work was in front of a PC back then. Those who did use PCs were not necessarily networked. Many didn't use a PC at all. Working from home would be all but impossible for many. Those who could take a PC home or had one at home AND had an internet connection would have difficulties because a lot of what they did involved data from paper and filing cabinets, from colleagues, faxes etc. Switching all that to remote working from home for those people who didn't even use computers at work but would have to to be able to work from home would have been a nightmare.

Re: Hats off

"Even if you could get extra lines out there, it would be hideously expensive and require a bunch of extra provisioning."

Remember when BT used to "split" a line to two houses? Using a modem on one of those line meant you were lucky to get anything close to the rated speed of the modem. I imagine you'd be lucky to get a connection if both customers were trying to use a modem at the same time. So, the logistics of BT going out there to add millions of extra landlines all over the country would be utterly horrific! Assuming the exchanges could even handle them. And so far, we've only talked about two working adults wanting to be on line at the same time. What about the kids? Online education in the 90's would have been almost impossible, let alone with two working parents.

I remember having multiple PCs networked and sharing dial-up at home back then. "Is anyone using the internet? I need to download a file, your access might slow down or stop."

Re: Reply To All

*e.g. "Has anyone left a pair of gloves in the staff room?" followed by not only the originator, but everyone else receiving the all the stupid but inevitable 15 "not me" replies.

My boss sometimes sends out emails which are worded in such a way that they ate more or less demanding that everyone reply ether Yes or No. There's always some who hit reply-all. <sigh>

FWIW, we are an IT business and our department are all technicians who should ALL know better.

Re: I haven't seen a good game of Reply-to-All Tennis in years

"stop being awkward and just do it".

Clearly it was a box ticking exercise and not an actual, honest to goodness DR plan they wanted. I suspect the entire budget for it was spent on your jolly training course and time spent away from your normal job (probably budgeted for 1 afternoon to write a few bullet points)

Re: I haven't seen a good game of Reply-to-All Tennis in years

"It's still a regular occurrence - sometimes accidental mail to all, "Please let me know if this particular set of circumstances applies to you currently" followed by 270ty-billion replies of "I'm not", "Not me", "Why have I received this?", "I don't need that"..."

We get those as "surveys" or "online training" courses. Usually about how to stay safe in the office (if you are one of the few still going in) or how to make sure sure computer setup is safe and comfortable to use. But, as with all these things, they get sent company wide. Even the cleaners get them! Those of us out on the road take great delight in answering "no" to the many questions relating to adjustable chairs, wrist rests and properly positioned screen to minimise reflections. NO!!! I'M IN A FUCKING CAR PARK WITH THE LAPTOP BALANCED ON MY KNEE AND THE GEAR STICK. IT IS NOT ERGONOMIC!!!!

Oddly enough, despite all the exhortations to make sure everything is done correctly and the stated offers to help with equipment, there never seems to be any follow-up to the fact that NO!!! everything I do is NOT in line with the H&S "guidance".

Bit at least it's not an email only survey and reply-all can;t work because only very special people can send to the company-wide list.

Re: A rather large piece of paper for a fair test

"Even a young child when asked what is in the example image in this story would likely say something like "an apple with a piece of paper/label stuck to it", adding that there is writing on the paper/label if they are older. This is a description of a multi-object scene and includes adequate description to relate the subject for most situations and also shows context. Expecting singular object returns is self-defeating and shows a blinkered approach that is never going to work for anything other than clean, sanitised images of single, non-composite objects."

I wonder if the problem is that it takes the first likely answer and that text recognition has a higher priority than image recognition. I wonder how the "AI" would respond to an apple with the word pizza written directly on it with a marker pen?

Re: To web designers

"Lawsuits are very motivational for companies."

It's such a shame that it has to come to that. Maybe there needs to be a catchphrase and a campaign to highlight the spending power of disabled people as a whole. I suspect the businesses who currently don't give a damn unless forced by law might start to give a damn when the realise the sales or clicks they are losing. They probably assume that all disabled people can't hold down a job and have no spare cash to spend. I assume other countries have had a a similar experience to the UK headlines and campaigns highlighting, eg the "grey pound" and the "pink pound".

"that would surely scare the shit out of all these other none compliant website to sort themselves out to."

You're assuming they are the sort of people who read the tech news on the subject. I suspect most of them live in their own little bubbles. and I don't mean COVID bubbles :-)

Re: One thing people tend to forget about FOSS.

It's a bit like those skeletons wielding swords in Jason and the Argonauts! You can't kill them, they just keep coming back!