Posts by Dr. Vagmeister

I worked with someone who showed me a US business card where the persons name was Richard Wank.

In addition, someone on the team was called Richard Hampton.

Re: USA decoupling From China

Whenever i order electronic components, sometimes it is difficult to determine the country of origin, but UK Farnell does seem to list it for most. Using Mouser (US based supplier) then no information for country of origin is provided.

The country listed on Farnell is just the last location the product was processed. So no guarantee of excluding China. A manufacturer could easily make in China and then label/encapsulate in another country and it would be listed other than China.

It would require all manufacturers to agree to a chain of manufacturing documentation, which is easy to ascertain too.

Another annoying thing, is that Amazon does not list the country of origin, so you can only determine this by delving into the site, or that the delivery time is long.

Re: One reason to stay with Windows - Outlook

I use Wine and Play on Linux to manage the versions and application to run on which Wine version.

i run PCB CAD software and simulation software no issues. It "may" require some tinkering, but in general no issue. Else, a VM is used for some home grown software.

I have not tried it, but people have said that Office runs under Wine no problems - so there are many approaches.

Re: RE: knew what they were getting into

In a way, if the elections were fair, then yes, the Russian people get what they voted for, yet reports are that the election was fraudulent. From the BBC 20th September 2021 :

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-58614227

States :

"With almost all of the votes counted, the United Russia party had won nearly 50% of the vote, marking a slight drop in support from the previous election.

Mr Putin's biggest critics were barred from running, and there were reports of ballot stuffing and forced voting."

Putin got 50% of the vote. The Tories got 43.6% of the vote.

People being barred from running, does seem to be a situation that means the results were less than representative.

Re: Trickle-down economics

I agree that no one should be forced to do anything, and that unions must not have too much power.

With the UK at the moment, anything that is seen as a threat to the Tory party ideology, the usual scare tactics are used such as the unions of the 1970's, or people are labelled lefty etc. as a derogatory meaning. I do not see this challenged in the media, to the point that the issue of nationalisation is never discussed for fear of being called a socialist or communist (mainly the forums).

I use KDE and Dolphin. Have multiple tabs open accessing information regularly, and could not go back to Windows use regularly.

I have a windows PC and three instances of file manager open which is an absolute pain when copying and remembering which windows has what location in it.

Thanks for the information, much appreciated.

Re: Quote "The news will come as a relief to the public"

I thought this was already part of the Investigatory Powers Act :

"required communication service providers (CSPs) to retain British internet users' "Internet connection records" – which websites were visited but not the particular pages and not the full browsing history – for one year"

From the wiki page : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investigatory_Powers_Act_2016

Does this proposed act go further, by recording web pages etc ?

Re: Rail "cargo" trains from China to Europe.

Energy storage already exists in the home (solar and battery), for the power networks as per the link, and others such as hydro etc. Old article :

https://www.r-e-a.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Energy-Storage-FINAL6.pdf

The issue is that the government fails to steer the correct direction.

Re: They want a passport ...

I can see this going wrong where Facebook have access to the government gateway or other, to verify the details you have submitted.

Then, i am sure that the there would be a data mining of the government system to "verify" others not using Facebook as some sort of test, or blatant data extraction.

Without a government portal, then how can Facebook "confirm" that the passport you have entered is valid ?

Re: "Modernising the way local authorities and operators work together"

Oh yes, they are absolutely crepe.

Woman across the road backed into my car on two occasions coming out of her drive. I suggested that the council use on the kerb parking as per my side. Their response was that it would require the tarmac path to be strengthened as the utilities were running underneath the pavement. We had work completed for new gas pipes and water pipes in the entire road - and all utilities are my side not the other, and you can see the TV cable company trenches my side too.

Re: 2G?

I have a 2G phone. The battery lasts 3 weeks with near zero phone usage. I don't need a smartphone. The only time it could come in handy is when i select a bottle of wine going cheap - does it taste like sawdust or vinegar ?

Yes, but that is British Red Tape designed by a French company, manufactured in Poland.... a la Blue Passports.

Re: EA have killed battlefield

I recall that EA stated that they were directly competing with CoD and aimed to take some of CoD sales - the DVD cover looked very much like the CoD cover.

That was when the rot started, and EA pushed the game towards CoD gameplay.

Squads made the game worse. Squads isolated the squad from everyone else, so teamwork with the side failed. In BF2:MC people talked to one another, then later with squads, especially in Europe, people just don't talk due to this ?

EA obviously who have shareholders, went for the money, and all roads lead to CoD.

The other funny things was for BF5 where they did the "woke" thing (complains online), and the reply from EA was, don't buy it then. And guess what, people didn't. That was hilarious.

Re: Fear the frightening foreigner!

When i design and build my electronics as a hobby, i always use British components.... and that then ends up just being the transformer and PCB's.

For the PCB's the cost using a UK manufacturer is generally cost 8x more than using Chinese PCB's delivered.

Our government and the EU have been woefully incompetent here. (i know it is a simplistic statement)

Re: "a world-leading data policy"

Yes, this is just another "UK for Sale" process, where the UK citizens are being sold.

Re: Absolute cunt's trick

You are paid for your contracted hours, and that is usually based on attending your place of work.

Unless that contract states that 10% of your pay is for commuting costs, then Google as per the OP, are being c*nts.

They are simply denying those savings the worker benefits from, by working from home.

Google could easily deny home working, which would solve the issue, but people may not like that since people now realise that working from home is just as beneficial to the company as to the person.

Re: They will have to support Windows 10 for longer than five years

A vast number of people are not aware of what an OS is. Some think it is Internet Explorer. They know about ChromeOS or Android, purely because it is the name assigned to the product they have. Same for Apple, as they know about the product, but not really bothered about the OS.

Microsoft have a monopoly, and their actions will be forcing people to upgrade their perfectly adequate PC's to a newer model, when they don't need to.

Is this in effect, forced landfill ?

If every business specifies MS Office product compatibility, and many businesses and government departments are now Office365, Cloud etc., then Linux does not stand a chance.

The culmination of Microsoft strategy and government inaction on their monopoly status will just cause the OS/Hardware merry go round to continue.

Re: It's not just high end parts

Agreed. I was looking at Dell laptops, and their 17" Inspiron's are not available in the UK.

I was also having trouble obtaining the IRFI4020 for my class D amplifier, and Nov 2021 is the delivery date, but luckily i obtained them from RS, as they were out of stock for months, so some have just come in.

Strangely, same for some capacitors too, next year delivery on 1% tolerances in some areas.

It's cos of the temerity....

The fucking temerity that they think they own your PC.

Re: Is it a real opt-out?

Thanks for the reminder. I recall i sent in the form to the GP 8 years, or so, ago. I have resent the form as they have e-mail now.

This is atrocious that the Government is not telling people about GP records opt out. The NHS Digital online system should cater for both.

Re: If it's not on the side of a bus...

Can we all agree that Boris Johnson, aka The Johnson, is the patron saint of liars ?

Re: What's the point?

I thought that they would have moved to a subscription model by now.

If they do for Windows 11, i am wondering what those non-technical people will do.

I would be quite miffed if suddenly i had to upgrade, and then was asked for money for the upgrade, and the previous is not supported.

Maybe the strategy is full telemetry for those who do not wish to pay for Windows 11.

Re: A data leak in China? You couldn't make it up...

Didn't the Chinese get their own version of Windows from Microsoft, as the telemetry was an issue for the Chinese, reporting to the wrong servers outside China ?

So, i expect this to be a legitimate version, but the Chinese one.

Re: Yes, of course

"Yes it has, but if KDE suited people's needs then they wouldn't be running Windows."

Of the limited people i talk to about computing (non work), many people don't know about Linux, so they would never even experience KDE.

They know about Android, but that is just because of the proliferatrion of the mobile devices, and probably don't know what an OS is about.

I use KDE, and it is great, similar to Windows 7 or XP interface in operation.

A conversation i had a while back, i explained that i ran Linux, and was asked, does it have Word or Excel, and i replied no (obviously), so the other person pretty much said what's the point. Perhaps until an ODF is the de facto standard, then Linux with LibreOffice won't make an in road that is required to accelerate Linux popularity ?

Re: Is Win10 stable yet?

It has been 5+ years since Windows 10, and i am surprised that they have not started to request a subscription. Then again, with so many issues appearing, they perhaps realised that they couldn't really charge for it.

They have a captive audience, so they don't really need to try too hard.

Re: Call the RAC?

That was really, really, funny. You should have got more upvotes.

You can imagine the companion TomTom to go with it, speaking the location to the Brexiteer, maybe with a "Hurrah" every now and then, or "Definitely no foreigners" randomly.

Re: AMD <3 ARM too

I had an XBOX360 and good on Moistness-soft, they repaired the unit free of charge.

It was due to the in-house design of the ASIC (https://www.designnews.com/engineering-disaster-xbox-360-red-ring-death)

They have probably learnt by this serious error in judgement, and it will be out-sourced for their ARM design implementation.

Then again, sometimes despite having vast sums of money, they may try and cut corners.