Posts by jake

Re: Child-proof reset operation

Whatever, Martin. I've lived with both systems. The US one is easier, cheaper, and just as safe (if not safer) than what I experienced in the UK. Note that the first of the two "wiring practices" photos that you provided are not to code in any US jurisdiction that I am aware of ... and the second was clearly installed by an amateur. The "higher currents" argument is a red herring ... I have multiple 50A, 240V sockets (NEMA 14–50) here at the ranch, whereas that daisy-chained example's entire circuit is probably rated at no more than 10A @ 230V.

Also, note the fuse panel in Martin's first example ... That thing runs THE ENTIRE HOUSE! And sadly, it is actually quite typical of British household wiring, at least in my experience. Kind of made me yearn for that archaic 60 Amp breaker panel from my first apartment when I first ran across it. Good thing most of their houses are made of stone, no?

Re: Child-proof reset operation

"any socket tended to have its power supplied via two separate circuits"

No, just one circuit. It's a loop (or "ring", imagine that!) connected to a single breaker/fuse. It's only in use in the UK (and a few former outposts). Daft concept, unless you're almost out of wire making materials.

Re: Child-proof reset operation

"BS1363 - probably still the safest domestic sockets in the world :-)"

Unfortunately, it's your ridiculously over-sized plugs that are the problem. It's easier to put the safety factor upstream from the plug. Safer, too. (You really think a 13A fuse is going to protect little B1FF or Buffy?) That's why this whole place has GFCI (RCB to you Brits) protected circuitry everywhere that it makes sense.

But if you actually enjoy living with a wiring standard that was de rigueur when George VI was on the throne, who am I to argue. Just note that most of the rest of the world has moved on, and for very good reasons.

Re: And I thought Smart TVs were bad

You think your friends are shocked? The only TV in this house is a 32" 1988 Sony Trinitron. Purchased new, by me, in 1988. HDMI? What's that? I still use RCA plugs between the TV and whatever I'm using as input. Works just fine, for my needs. What kind of fucking idiot would I have to be to pay money to make a change just for the sake of change because marketing told me I had to?

I know people who have purchased a new telly every year or two for the last couple decades! What the fuck? WHY? What an ostentatious waste of money!

Re: Designed by SW engineers

"Although I do have to give them credit for not embedding a full Linux stack"

That'll be the "fix" after the marketing department gets wind of the negative feedback over the current reset procedure.

Well, yes.

Have you not noticed that people who purchase so-called "smart" thingies are rarely actually smart?

Re: Child-proof reset operation

"It's quite unusual to find toddlers that tall."

You've either never had a toddler about the house, or you have never owned a desk lamp, floor lamp, or other low mounted lighting device.

Re: Child-proof reset operation

My daughter sent me a video. My granddaughter had pulled the bottom drawer out almost fully, the next drawer out 3/4 of the way, the next half way and the top one about a quarter, forming a staircase to get onto the kitchen counter. Then she moved the coffee pot over to form the final step, so she could reach the cookies on top of the fridge. She was three, nearly four.

In the email, daughter confessed to doing the exact same thing, except she used the conveniently placed microwave oven as the final step. I told her that I knew about it, why did she think there were only cookies up there on very rare occasion? And why was it only three or four cookies?

She asked how I knew ... I told her that I had observed her through the kitchen window. The way I figured it, it was better to allow the minor transgression & victory than let her figure out something more dangerous ...

I also told her that I had used a breadbox as the final step.

Forwarding the email and video on to my Dad, he allowed as to how the cookies were on top of an icebox in his day, and he had used the flour canister as the final step. Makes me wonder how my grandfather managed it back in the 1800s :-)

Re: If anybody cares ...

According to the OED, "dumpster fire" seems to have first showed up in print in the newspaper Arizona Republic in 2003. It was in a review of the movie Texas Chainsaw Massacre, written by one Bill Muller. Sadly, Bill passed away in 2007, so we can't ask him where he got the phrase ... but as is almost always the case, it was probably around in the spoken language for a number of years prior to that.

Despite it apparently being common in the sports-talk world since about 2009, I don't remember hearing it until it entered Politics with the Trump nomination ...

As a side note, the word "dumpster" was coined for the first modern refuse collection system, where a truck picks up the box of trash and deposits the contents into an opening at the top, for transportation to the dump (tip, to you Brits), leaving the box behind for another fill. The inventor of this system was a dude named George Roby Dempster, who coined the trademark names "Dempster Dumpster" and "Dumpster" in 1935. These days, like kleenex, hoover and xerox, it is usually used as a generic noun and not capitalized. It's a good thing a guy named Dempster invented it ... Somehow "wheelie bin fire" or "skip fire" doesn't have quite the same ring to it.

Re: "beginner Linux"

Peter, when was the last time you tried Slackware? I installed the 32-bit version of Slack 14.2 -stable on the Wife's machine (kitchen sink install) a couple years ago, and have kept it updated as necessary. The only non-stock software I had to add was LibreOffice[0]. To date, using it as a home user and SOHO, she has been perfectly happy with the result. Absolutely zero headaches, and you know what they say ... Happy Wife, happy life.

You can check out Slack's very grueling update schedule here ... and actually, the last several dozen updates, she's handled it for herself. (Running slackpkg update then slackpkg upgrade-all and answering one or two questions[1] isn't exactly rocket surgery.)

I run both the 32 bit and 64 bit versions, depending on hardware. I also see zero headaches, and there is no need to mess with anything. The days of hair shirts are behind us in the Slackware world ... IF you don't want to mess with it. On the other hand, if you DO want to mess with it, you can.

Honestly, its just install it and run it. It gets out of the way and lets us get on with our work. I actually don't think about which OS I'm running anymore, unless I'm making a post like this one. Can't ask for much more than that out of an OS.

[0] If you don't want to compile code for yourself, between Alien BOB's site (Eric Hameleers) and Slackbuilds, most of your software needs should be covered:

http://www.slackware.com/~alien/

https://www.slackbuilds.org/repository/14.2/

[1] One prompting to run LILO if needed (or Grub, if you prefer) and one about updating config files, or not, and should the old version be saved (she just hits "O", allowing me to back her out gracefully if necessary, which hasn't happened yet).

Re: For AIState Side Prime Orderly Orders .... into Exercising AIMaster Cog Keys*

"Be Careful out there in Space. There be Daemons and Fiends"

Post proof or retract.

Methinks ...

... someone has inhaled a trifle too much cosmik debris.

Or perhaps they are calling attention to the misunderstood, un-studied and generally ignored Mars Trojans and the like? I mean, the obvious pro-Oortness of this mission is clearly to the detriment of the other bits & bobs floating around out there. INNER SYSTEM ROCKS MATTER!

Re: Can you actually tell if a comet is pristine or not?

Besides, once you've got out there and found your little piece of contaminated ice, how do you know it hasn't made a couple dozen trips inwards before finally having its orbit perturbed into long-term parking?

Re: Artist's concept of a comet travelling towards the inner Solar System.

Scale Solar System Model in your browser here.

Bookmark this one for next time a grade-school kid asks you how big space is ... it doesn't exactly depict all of space, of course, but it's a start.

Re: Soooo, to sum up...

You'll only get one of them. That's a throwing axe, the handle is too short for felling, and too long for carving (the 490-2 is still a throwing axe, badly balanced by the long handle). Instead, I'd recommend this, for both visual effect and close-in functionality. Or this, just because it's the best store-bought felling axe I've ever used.

Re: FaceBucks is the obvious name

FakeBucks.

I wouldn't even call it that.

It's more along the lines of pinball tokens.

Re: Stonehenge?

No clouds on Salisbury Plain? Shit, the weather really IS changing!

Re: "No panic, no forced reboot."

1) I have seen Windows, including Windows 10, reboot WITHOUT authorization far too many times to count. Even when told specifically not to. Even the so-called "enterprise" versions. But I wasn't talking about Windows. I was talking about the OP's comment, and didn't even mention an OS.

2) I was responding to the OP's seemingly misguided opinion that any change to the Kernel means a reboot is necessary. I was not specifically commenting on the issue at hand.

Hotpatching is as hotpatching does. I use it occasionally. It's not like a reboot is going to kill me or anything ... I gave up on the uptime DSWs a LONG time ago.

I am perfectly secure, thank you very much :-) Oh, wait, you mean this computer attached via TCP/IP to the world-wide network called "The Internet"? No, that's not secure at all. No such computer is, for the simple reason that TCP/IP is inherently insecure. So I take precautions when using it, like not using my real name/address, not giving out my SSN, not doing any banking and not using my credit cards over it. Yourself?

Re: "No panic, no forced reboot."

1) He said "forced reboot". He can choose when to reboot, if needed.

2) Look up loadable kernel modules.

Re: So, not great, not terrible

Sabroni, we're somewhat blasé about it because it's just another minor bug which was ALREADY PATCHED when ElReg ran the article. In fact, my users (corporate, academic and home) were already patched before I posted my comments late last night. It was no big deal, discovered & fixed in a matter of hours.

Bugs are inevitable in large coding projects. It's not the existence of bugs that are the difference in perception. It's the mechanism for acknowledging and dealing with them.

Reminds me ...

... of the even older days of the Ping of Death.

Doesn't make me misty eyed at all. Just another bug to patch.

::shrugs::

Mike probably wouldn't have had much to say about it.

It's a bug in the Kernel, not in ping.

Re: From what I remember ...

Where did I say I was abroad with the Brits?

Well, to be perfectly honest, I was abroad with the Brits, but only because I am a Californian who has spent close to 20% of my life in the UK. But visit Spain with you lot on VACA? No fuckin' way. I have much better things to do with my down time than drinking Harp, Carlsberg or Kronenberg on a beach in Andalusia or Valencia.

From what I remember ...

... you lot import far more crabs from Spain every summer than you export.

Clam up before we have to use some mussel on you.

Re: minge pump

"Is minge universal slang or is it relatively UK specific"

UK specific, with some bleed-over into the former Empire. My Big Dic says it first appeared in print in 1903, but was used in the spoken form in various lower-class dialects in the British Isles starting sometime in the late 1800s. It's probably from the Romani language ("mitch", 1874), and possibly originated in Armenian. Derivatives (minger, minging, etc.) seem to be inventions of the 1990s. I certainly don't remember them from my Schoolboy Daze in Yorkshire a couple decades prior ...

Not to be confused with "ming", with a hard g, which is Scottish, meaning excrement, first seen in print in 1924 ... and from the 1970s, minging (mingin') meaning stinking, unpleasant, or drunk. Or perhaps unpleasantly stinking drunk.

Re: Re Car

There were also automatic chokes that were operated by heat from the exhaust.