* Posts by Archivist

265 publicly visible posts • joined 20 Dec 2010

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What a surprise! Apple found a way to deliver browser engine and app store choice

Archivist

Re: My phone, my life.

True, but not my choice. Try to do anything now, and and internet communication is necessary, whether by phone or computer.

Banking

Healthcare

Bills

Bookings

Entertainment

Transport

Income

Savings

I think it's more than just my problem.

Archivist

My phone, my life.

Before my life was controlled by my phone - banking, billing, health etc, I craved for 3rd party apps. Now my phone is more than just a plaything that happens to make calls, security is #1 for me.

I know malware has and will slip through the official store, but less than somewhere unsupervised. I doubt I will use any 3rd party stores.

Volkswagen stuck in neutral after 'IT disruption'

Archivist

Toyota

They're following the Toyota manufacturing model aren't they?

Freecycle gives users the gift of a security breach notice

Archivist

Oh no!

The miscreants can find out what I give away!

IBM describes analog AI chip that might displace power-hungry GPUs

Archivist

Bah, you had it easy

I had to work with 709s and JFETS for high impedances.

Deployed publicly accessible MOVEit Transfer? Oh no. Mass exploitation underway

Archivist

Stock photo

Looks like a TV station.

Cheapest, oldest, slowest part fixed very modern Mac

Archivist

It gets worse

Some USB hardware - specifically Apple keyboards suddenly fail to work with the Mac they've been married to for several years.

The solution: add a USB extension cable.

I had been at the end of my tether until that worked out!

Hey Apple, what good is a status page if you only update it after the outage?

Archivist

The answer is obvious

Look at Down-detector first.

Of course Russia's ex-space boss doubts US set foot on the Moon

Archivist
Boffin

Obligatory Clangers mention

Of course the Clangers and Soup Dragon could verify it, but he probably never got to watch it back in the good old USSR.

NHS Highland 'reprimanded' by data watchdog for BCC blunder with HIV patients

Archivist

Re: Letting the get away with it

Would you prefer that the NHS was stripped of the funds that might improve things?

Europol warns ChatGPT already helping folks commit crimes

Archivist

Interception

Now wouldn't it be good to intercept such queries and output bogus information...

Boeing Starliner's 1st crewed trip to the ISS delayed again over battery overheating risk

Archivist

Sunni and Butch

Sounds like a 60's duo.

Alarming: Tesla lawsuit claims collision monitoring system is faulty

Archivist

Re: VW too

Mercedes too. It was a relief when snow buildup caused the radar to fail. Then I only had a cancellable warning every 10 minutes, instead of a squark.

Microsoft to snatch Visio app away from iOS users this summer

Archivist

Re: Use Omnigraffle.

Unfortunately you can't buy it. It's subscription.

Boffins concoct interference-busting radios

Archivist

Selectivity

Looks like we're going back to basics, albeit with a modern approach.

LibreOffice 7.5 update: A great time to jump on this FOSS productivity suite

Archivist

LO lost me

I moved back to Open Office because of the Mac clipboard bug that causes LO to hang. Now OO does everything I want so I'll stay here until there's a reason to change.

Japan's NTT Docomo uses invisibility cloak tech to fix 5G reception

Archivist

Depends on the glass

Losses through plain glass are not so great. It's when you start adding reflective materials that it becomes a serious attenuator.

NASA Geotail spacecraft's 30-year mission ends after last data recorder fails

Archivist

A testament to great engineering

As an engineer myself I have the greatest respect for the engineers who developed and built these systems.

Home Depot sent my email, details of stuff I bought to Meta, customer complains

Archivist

Re: Annnnnnnd...

Maybe you should give them an email address comprised of the maximum 320 characters. That'll piss 'em off.

Google slays thousands of fake news vids posted by pro-China group Dragonbridge

Archivist

Censorship

I don't think censorship is a good thing. In a world where people long for free speech, this sounds counter-productive.

Sure their narrative may seem or be false but how much should one believe random Youtube channels anyway?

BOFH and the case of the Zoom call that never was

Archivist

Re: Far too close to home

Being a "fancy Mac user" myself, I became the go-to every time a visitor needs an adaptor.

The only problem was getting the adaptor back. At one time I was ordering replacements every couple of months.

PayPal says crooks poked around 35,000 accounts in credential stuffing attack

Archivist

Re: 2FA

Paypal 2FA is used on occasions. It trusts my main browser but if I try a transaction from one of the many other browsers I use, it sends a text.

Next-gen Qi2 wireless charging spec seeded by Apple

Archivist

I would buy one

A phone without ports could be much more water resistant. For me, ports are just holes to get clogged by pocket lint.

London cops break into gallery to rescue lifelike art installation

Archivist

Re: Life is a minestrone

Was humming that only this morning.

Square Kilometre Array Observatory construction commences

Archivist

What, no technical data?

All I've learned is the antennae are like Xmas trees.

Just 22% of techies in UK aged 50 or older, says Chartered Institute for IT

Archivist

Re: hmmmm

72 here and still getting excitement working at the coal face. A background in RF and broadcast fills some of the gaps in knowledge my colleagues have. I didn't apply for this job, I just slid into a vacuum that was created by new technologies.

Working keeps me physically and mentally healthy. My peers who retired earlier have aged must faster than me.

Will I retire? Maybe in 3 years or as long as I'm useful.

CT scanning tech could put an end to 100ml liquid limit on flights by 2024

Archivist

Japan

4-years ago in Japan there were "bottle analysers" of some sort in the airports. I was able to take my own water on both internal and international flights.

Time Lords decree an end to leap seconds before risky attempt to reverse time

Archivist

Re: Didn't someone previously propose

面白い です

France says non to Office 365 and Google Workspace in school

Archivist

Gateway drugs

That they are.

Evernote's fall from grace is complete, with sale to Italian app maker

Archivist

Re: Joplin

Seconded, and I can use whatever cloud service I want for sync.

It's so good that I worry that it can't stay free for ever - I did give a small donation.

Go ahead, be rude. You don't know it now, but it will cost you $350,000

Archivist

Re: In the last century

Yes, those are the ones.

Archivist

In the last century

We bought a lot of identical spec workstations from a medium size manufacturer (yes they existed in those days). As soon as they went into service the HDDs started failing. The drives were all the same IBM model.

Upon contacting the manufacturer they would only advance replacements as and when they failed - we were losing 2 a week at that stage. Almost all did fail eventually but by then we'd bitten the bullet and bought some drives ourselves.

I can't remember the manufacturers name but I do remember smiling to myself when they went bust.

Doctor gave patients the wrong test results due to 'printer problems'

Archivist

Undeserved downvotes

You must have been downvoted by people with absolutely no knowledge of the UK health system - can't comment on elsewhere.

Parallels increases prices with Desktop version 18

Archivist

Other options

Crossover Office works well on my Mac M1. I use it daily for a Windows (x86) only PCB app that I have been using for 25 years, so not ready to change.

Taiwanese military reports DDoS in wake of Pelosi visit

Archivist

Well I for one am glad of this cyber attack. It will allow Taiwan to harden their systems before the main Chinese onslaught.

Whatever hit the Moon in March, it left this weird double crater

Archivist

Re: My Theory FWIW...

+1 for a Clangers mention.

Apple may have to cough up $1bn to Brits in latest iPhone Batterygate claim

Archivist

Furthermore

While it may have aided some people by extending the battery life albeit with a slower phone, Apple probably had to replace fewer batteries under warranty. Thus the accountants win again.

US to help Japan make leading-edge 2nm chips, possibly by 2025

Archivist

Re: So, we're now at 2nm

Well you only have to point it out once to me, and I'm grateful for the knowledge.

I look forward to a future of picometre skyscrapers!

World’s smallest remote-controlled robots are smaller than a flea

Archivist

Boffin?

I stopped reading when this word appeared as presumably the story was borrowed from a tabloid newspaper.

Voyager 1 space probe producing ‘anomalous telemetry data’

Archivist

Re: "expected life span"

I think he meant record.

BOFH: On Wednesdays, we wear gloves

Archivist

Re: Truly excellent

I have a notch at 10.125KHz and a tinnitus tone each side of it, from 405 line TV days when the workshop would have dozen of them on soak test. At my age I'm surprised I can hear above 10K.

Nothing's working, and I've checked everything, so it must be YOUR fault

Archivist

Humble

Over the years I've usually been the one doing the fixing, but on those occasions I've asked for assistance, I've learned that it pays to be humble and admit up front that it might be something I've done wrong. That way I feel less of an idiot!

The rocky road to better Linux software installation: Containers, containers, containers

Archivist

Experiences

My experience with Linux snaps has been similar. Because of my job, I have 23 versions of the same app sitting in my Mac Applications folder, all of which were easily installed - with some renaming, any of which I can spring to life with a click.

If only Linux could do that.

Amazon tells folks it will stop accepting UK Visa credit cards via weird empty email

Archivist

Limited choice

So my credit card is Mastercard and my bank debit card is just about to switch from Visa to Mastercard.

Previously if the Mastercard didn't work for a transaction I would use my Visa card. What would I do now:

Walk away from the petrol station?

Wash up in the restaurant?

Leave my wife as collateral?

Maybe it's time to start carrying a wad of cash again - if anyone will accept it now;)

Magnanimous Apple will allow people to fix their iPhones using parts bought from its Self Service Repair program

Archivist

I used non-apple parts to repair my family's iPhones* but the quality was often sub-standard.

Now we just take them to the Apples Store and get them to do it. It's a bit more expensive but far less hassle.

Would I bother again, even with genuine parts? No.

* With 12 iPhones in the family there was nearly always one needing attention!

Another brick in the (kitchen) wall: Users report frozen 1st generation Google Home Hubs

Archivist

It's funny

I have bought propriety solutions because they seemingly required less effort to commission and (hopefully) keep working.

Now I think that that a little effort with IFTT and generic hardware would have been a better solution for the long term.

Reg reader returns Samsung TV after finding giant ads splattered everywhere

Archivist

Fun about nothing, or a regional problem?

I have two Samsung smart TVs, one 2018, one 2021. I have plenty of gripes but see no ads! (UK)

Arm teases its GPU that will follow next year's graphics processor tech

Archivist

Competition stifling

So tell me again why it's a good idea for Nvidia to buy ARM?

Don't touch that dial – the new guy just closed the application that no one is meant to close

Archivist

Re: Timely tale in the UK

Two words:

Red Bee

The day has a 'y' in it, so Virgin Galactic has announced another delay

Archivist

Re: Supplier identified fault

The Register has an "entertaining tabloid" style that is slightly more informative than the Sun or Mirror newspapers.

In any case, good news never sold any newspapers.

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