Posts by Doctor Syntax

There's been a lot of talk about wouldn't it be a good idea to have challenge tests for vaccines. I'm sure they'd like volunteers, especially for the control group. After all, if, as you think, there's nothing in it you wouldn't be at risk so nothing to stop you. And if you're wrong it would be a valuable learning opportunity. Why not volunteer?

"they have changed what they are buying"

And where, which is probably what's really pissing off DB.

Re: Data Entry

I've never come across a typewriter that didn't get into a tangle when I was typing. I suspect the thing about touch typists is that they work at a constant pace whilst the amateur will stutter and end up with two or three type bars in flight at the same time

Re: Am I missing something here?

You might not stop Google or whoever slurping. But consider this scenario:

You want to open a bank account*

Your bak wants identification and things like how long have you lived at your house.

The bank is apt to go to credit reference agancies like Equifax which are great slurpers of data (leaf back through a few days of el Reg to see the report about the ICO). At present you have no option but to allow thee agencies to have records on you and to let them sell them to anyone who wants to buy.

If you've just moved to the address you might not have been there long enough to meet the bank's requirements.

Something like this could allow you to satisfy the bank's checks. You could exert your rights as a data subject (assuming you live in a jurisdiction that allows those rights) to tell the credit agencies to delete their records on you.

*Even worse, some people are now finding their bank accounts frozen because of misidentification leading to suspicions of money laundering.

Man in the middle attack on server?

Re: And if there is

I'd wondered about that, especially as the last two routers I've had came with a USB connector for storage. It would require the ISP to provide a fixed address or at least to maintain a DNS service for the router and that, in turn would tie the ID to the ISP.

Nothing unique about Australia

Expect every govt. to demand access.

Re: So there is now a pod server for privacy

Google and al the other usual suspects.

Re: FPTP must die

And how does that deal with voting for one single post such as a president or other office holder?

Re: FPTP must die

There are some practical difficulties with PR when you're voting for a single post. Do you slice the candidates up and glue the bits together in proportion to the votes or do you operate some sort of time-sharing scheme? OK, I acknowledge the lure of the first option.

Re: And now for this...

Such sophistication in the political parties in NI in the '70s doesn't resemble anything I remember from those days.

"a vote should not be counted unless the voter can demonstrate a basic understanding of the issues."

Perhaps that rule should also apply to candidates for office and do so without the candidates being assisted by special advisors.

Re: One down ...

"Nobody had really heard of Tony Blair"

You couldn't have been watching. He'd been doing his smirk-on-a stick act for yonks.

Re: Pugh, Pugh, Barney McGrew, Cuthbert, Dibble, & Grubb

He's also having to cope with Twitter fact-checking him.

Re: Yay! Party time!

"Brazil ... have the results before the end of the day."

Some countries already have the results before the polls open.

Re: Yay! Party time!

Did you actually read the article you referenced? The name "Trump" is mentioned 15 times. Now go look for yourself to see how many times "Biden" is mentioned.

Re: Yay! Party time!

"The poor fools in the Secret Service who get assigned to protect ex-President Trump."

Isn't it one of those quirks of the US that the Secret Service is actually part of the IRS?

Re: Not if Republicans run the senate

"I have to admit that's a conspiracy theory I've not heard before."

There's a new one every day.

Re: One down ...

"after all, he's got all the time in the world now"

Maybe even time to sort out his taxes?

"Also, in my experience, every company thinks they are unique and that they have special requirements, but they're not."

That's your experience. Others have other experiences.

I had a client in logistics, mostly print logistics and, true enough, that cold be run on an ordinary ERP system. But they also had a few outstations doing reprographics and it turned out that actual print management had a quite different approach. They had a different package just for those. Moved to another client, also in print, and they had a separate print-industry package, basically similar in scope to the previous client but from a different vendor.

OK, so the print job management task is fairly standardised, just different to ordinary order processing/warehousing etc. but still able to be served by standard packages, just don't expect your ERP approach to work without a lot of changes.

Moral 1: there may be scope for ERP packages but their nature can vary between

But client 1 had a contract which required custom printing for which client 2 was sub-contracted. To get the required data in from the customer and then from 1 to 2 required a certain amount of customisation of the ERP system, some from the vendor, some from me. And when the data got to client 2 it was handled by entirely custom software. In fact at client 2 apart from what was, essentially front office functions handled b the bought in package all the production S/W was custom. And none of the custom production print S/W would have been in the least applicable to the ice cream factory gig...

Moral 2: production control is likely to be custom.

Re: Never under estimate the ability of a user to out stupid you

"they run the company"

BOFHs let them think that.

Re: Similar one.

"how much cheaper it would be to just sack them if it kept happening."

The really effective cure.

"To be fair going over which drawers you've opened today its not the first thing on anybody's diagnostics list."

Noticing proximity of switch to drawer when opened might be somewhere on anybody's joined-up thinking list.

Re: Shell Energy

https://www.ceoemail.com/ is your friend for occasions like this.

Re: Back in the Telepone Days...

Northern Powergrid has an interesting variant. Option 2, fault reporting, asks for our post code then repeats what the recorded greeting told you, i.e. the area they serve, then tells you you don't appear to be in it and aks if you want to speak to an advisor. It understands "yes" with no trouble and puts you through to a human who then asks for your post code and has no trouble in determining that you are indeed in their area.

Some of us are retired and devote our spare time to public service.