* Posts by TeeCee

9433 publicly visible posts • joined 5 Oct 2007

Google chisels Chrome OS tablet, rumors say

TeeCee Gold badge
Grenade

It's deja vu all over again.

It doesn't seem that long ago that a certain large software company decided that their wonderful OS was so destined to be all things to all men that they shipped it running on just about everthing. Desktops, laptops (well if you had a big enough lap in those days), tablets, phones, you name it.

I even remember Bill talking about Windows on washing machines and toasters.

Thinking about it, I suppose at least Chrome makes sense on a Surface, even if it is a bit 1950s.

Mr Bean ousts PM from Spain's official website

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Coffee/keyboard

Further insanity.

I took great delight in noting that in the description of the contracted deliverable items was: "and security of the website".

12 million?

Sheer quality and you owe me a keyboard.

Bono accuses ISPs of 'reverse Robin Hooding' over piracy

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Stop

Theft?

Taking and Driving Away - no theft involved.

Small comfort in the nit-picking semantic niceties to the poor sod who's had his car nicked though.

As you might have guessed, I'm somewhat hacked off with that hoary old chestnut being parroted every time some arsehat^H^H^Hsunglasses uses the word "theft" in connection with the word "copyright".

2016 bug hits Windows phones

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Dead Vulture

Bollocks!

WinMo 6.1 vanilla here and every one I've received so far this year quite correctly says 2010.

If you actually *read* the linked article, it says specifically that it's not confined to WinMo devices and seems to affect all US carriers.

I wonder what's really at fault here?

Microsoft tosses Windows, Office discounts at XP holdouts

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Unhappy

As the man said earlier....

.....MS Office has a stranglehold on the corp market.

For me this means MS Office at home as well. God knows I've *tried* to get along with OO, but the problem here is that it's *just* different enough to be really bloody annoying.

If it were the same, but with fewer "features" (aka: less bloat), I'd be happy with it. If it were completely different in its way of working, I could live with it. This almost-but-not-quite-Office feel that it has now drives me up the wall.

NASA's Kepler telescope finds 5 new planets

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Joke

Easy one.

"Kepler 7b has about the same density as Styrofoam."

It's obviously new. I'm sure that whoever ordered it from Magrathea will get around to unpacking it soon and it'll become a perfectly normal, earth-type planet, briefly surrounded by huge chunks of styrofoam until the cleaners hoover up.

25kg of cocaine hits Spanish supermarket shelves

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Stop

Those smugglers.

A "sensational error" eh?

Presumably the sensation that they are referring to here is that of having ones bollocks nailed to the table by a stony-faced henchman as the boss asks yet again where his nose candy is.

TeeCee Gold badge
Coat

"enormous green tropical bananas"

Apparently they were perfectly ordinary bananas before the contents of the box were carelessly spilled during opening.

Snow in the festive season? Who could have seen that coming?

Today is not New Year's Eve - or the end of the decade

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Alert

Ok smartarse.

Since the Mayan Calendar ends in 2012 and, as any fule kno, the end of the Mayan Calendar means the end of the world*, only two questions now need to be answered.

In exactly which calendar is that 2012 in and is it a Monday?

I now have a headache and I'll be sending a bill for the aspirin.

*Personally I reckon that any civilisation that builds a 1000 odd years of contingency** into its calendar is doing quite well and anyone looking back at it and taking the end seriously needs their bumps felt.

**I once worked in a place that had a bespoke timesheet system that needed its calendar populated every couple of years. We'd always forget and the calendar would end unexpectedly*** until someone fixed it. Oddly enough, the world's still here though......

***Usually on a Monday.

US word czars unfriend shovel-ready toxic assets

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WTF?

Other news in the same vein.

Quote (Toadygraph motoring section):

Meanwhile, staff at the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) have been told not to use the word "unfortunately" along with the phrases "I'm afraid ...", "not possible" and "I can't".

Endquote.

Presumably they're just going to standardise on "fuck off" then.

Russia plans asteroid-defence space mission to Apophis

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Happy

Stargate?

I suppose it would solve the problem if you could find a Stargate big enough to stuff it through.

Bit of a pisser for whoever's on the other end though. You know, having an umpteen million tonne asteroid moving at something considerably faster than fuck delivered unexpectedly to your planet like that.

I suppose that as it would just have been stuffed forcibly through a small hole it would be all hot and runny too.

Spirit rover clocks up six years on Mars

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Coat

Plastic cutlery?

Pah!

Never in the field of human endeavour has a problem been found that cannot be fixed with duct tape and/or a coat hanger.

They said what? Quotes of the Year

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Headmaster

Latin?

Maybe. Note though that English has two "n"s in "pronounce".

First rule of linguistic pedantry: The slightest imperfection in any pedantic post that contains even the merest hint of smugness is asking for it. With knobs on.

NASA eyes asteroid, Moon and Venus

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Yeah, right.

Great idea, I can see it now.

"Good news. We have a Space Station in Mars orbit. All we need to do is go up to the station in Earth orbit to assemble the Interplanetary ship to go there and...........oh..........bugger....."

Adobe predicted as top 2010 hacker target

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Grenade

Third party firewalls.

It'd be nice if more of these actually bloody asked if you wanted to allow Adobe products access to the 'net rather than just seeing that they're on their vendor-supplied list of trusted things, dropping their kecks and bending over without so much as a by your leave.

Apart from that caveat, good idea.

Tobacco biofuel to solve energy/ environment crisis?

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Coat

Anonymous Coward?

You are Gordon Brown and I claim my five pounds.

UK Border Agency delights with festive e-card

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I wonder.

How much they paid to some bunch of whalesong merchants to come up with that thing?

FOI request anybody?

Swedish bankers punt webcam smut to kiddies

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Coat

Oh come on!

Not fair to criticise. How could you possibly write anything factual about the Internet and not include at least one pr0n link?

Just out of interest, how far up the list was sex.com?

Official: British telly really is almost all repeats

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Viewer generated?

We have one of those, it started recently.

I can't remember what it's called. I always refer to it as "The Tinfoil Hat Channel" as its output seems to consist entirely of grainy video of some complete twat espousing his theory that Jesus was an alien monster or somesuch and interviewing other Jesus-was-an-alien-monster believers to justify it.

Last time I ran across this while channel flicking, there was some arsehat on there who seemed to believe that every word written by Dan Brown was fact. Fortunately I found that "The Great Escape" was showing on another channel, so I watched that instead.....

Senior IT workers caught in bank bonus tax crossfire

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FAIL

Ah. Bear crap, Papal religion and surprise sunrise again?

Knee-jerk reaction by one of Gordon's Gonads* proves poorly thought out, lacks clarity and has unexpected side-effects?

Nobody could have seen that coming.

*The Cabinet. 'Cos they're a load of useless bollocks and like to spend their time close to the PM's arsehole, that's why.

Wireless e-car recharge tech within range?

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Also not kidding.

You forgot:

11) Assuming that 1-10 are surmountable problems, now design a "standard" pack that serves the needs of both a future small three-door hatchback and its two tonne SUV counterpart....

NZ gal's Bulgarian airbags halt traffic

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Stop

Headline misleading?

As far as I can make out, while the ensuing fracas was traffic-stopping, the actual funbags as displayed were conclusively proven not to be.

Nvidia boss: Intel suit to 'transform computer industry'

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FAIL

Intel? Graphics?

"....accused Intel of illegally attempting to smother the makers of rival graphic chips......"

Really? Doesn't seem to have achieved much as the market still seems to be ATI, Nvidia and also-rans. Even netbooks (where it ain't that important) get performance points for having an Nvidia ION rather than some Intel shite. Bit of a black mark here for the usually highly effective Intel Department of Bungs, Lies, Nobbling and Other Devious Practices.

US warships to get plane-snatching robot arms?

TeeCee Gold badge

Re: It's been done.

It's certainly possible to get the ship and aircraft stationary relative to each other, given a fast enough ship and a slow enough aircraft. The Akron and Macon were somewhat faster than surface ships and the aircraft they carried were slow biplanes. Even then the process of hooking on was incredibly difficulty and very dangerous.

Surface ships are significantly slower, but it can be done if there's a strong enough wind to turn into to increase the airspeed over the deck.

I'm only aware of one combination where this effect has been demonstrated. That was a Swordfish pilot landing on a US fleet carrier in WWII. He'd been sent over so the yank pilots could get a butcher's at the aircraft and add it to their "don't shoot these down" list. When he arrived, the carrier turned into the wind and steamed at full speed as per standard drill for receiving aircraft. The problem surfaced that there was quite a stiff breeze blowing and the combined speed of the carrier and the wind was some way above the stalling speed of the Swordfish, even with the flaps retracted. He found that while he could hover and even fly backwards over the deck he couldn't land and had to ask the carrier to slow down, much to the amusement of the assembled US pilots.

I can't see this one going anywhere in calm conditions though.

Boeing 787 Dreamliner set for first flight

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FAIL

Occam's razor.

What's more likely here:

A) They're going to try a series of high-risk maneuvers in a brand-spanking new aircraft that hasn't even had its list of gremlins written yet.

B) Some PR flack has taken the testing "to do" list and the maiden flight announcement, put two and two together and come up with five.

Soot warming 'maybe bigger than greenhouse gases' - NASA

TeeCee Gold badge
FAIL

DPF.

They don't work very well on most cars either. The Next Big Thing, courtesy of mandatory DPFs, in warranty claims* is blown engines due to "sumping" caused by unfulfilled DPF regeneration burn cycles**. If you ain't doing the motorway miles to make a DPF work as designed, buy a petrol car or petrol/electric hybrid.

Incidently, have you ever seen the clouds of crap thrown out by a sumping diesel.....?

*Many manufacturers are taking the attitude that catastrophic engine failure due to screwed DPFs is a user maintenance issue and not covered (Mazda? I'm looking at you). You're supposed to have it cleaned if the light comes on. Dealer cleaning of a DPF costs upwards of 300 quid as it requires removal, burnout in a sealed environment and mandates an oil flush/change to remove and replace oil contaminated by the failed burn cycles that got you into this situation......ouch!

**They don't need to do this at all if they get run at 2000RPM+ for >20minutes regularly as the heat from the exhaust burns the crap off anyway. The problem here is that the burn cycle *requires* 2000RPM+ for >20minutes to its stuff or it does nothing but pump diesel into the oil sump and eventually you end up sumping as the engine runs on its own oil. Since the fact that regeneration is required at all indicates that you're not doing this sort of running.....FAIL. Also, since regeneration works by injecting diesel into the exhaust stroke, writing off the fuel economy advantage that you bought a diesel for in the first place........EPIC FAIL.

Googlephone facing 10m more Jobsian challengers?

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Joke

OMFG!

If only. The things you^H^H^H I could do with Priss and a rootkit.

Who knew the future was going to be so much fun?

Ladies put off tech careers by sci-fi posters, Coke cans

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Unhappy

It's a slippery slope.

"..... computer geek surrounded by such things as computer games, science fiction memorabilia and junk food,"

Has it come to this? When I started in this business it was easy to spot a true geek in his lair. The desk was laden to the gunwales with half-empty coffee cups and overflowing ashtrays, you were able to cut chunks out of the air in the vicinity with a blunt knife to build a wall, and there'd be some arcane bit of COBOL, FORTRAN, RPG or such glowing in baleful green on the screen.

It'll be *diet* bloody coke next.....

Google Chrome bug outs users seeking anonymity

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Coat

@Obvious

Oh come on! Any fule kno that the readership of El Reg is overwhelmingly made up of Chinese dissidents and Jihadi terrorists.

Well, it's either that or the dirty mac brigade hold sway round here.

The slightly shabby raincoat with the loli manga in the pocket please..

Microsoft China accused of pilfering webcode

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MS response:

"When in Rome.............."

German shoppers slug it out with salami

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Sub-head.

"Pensioner's Pork Product Parries Parmesan Poignard" perchance?

UK e-car trials kick off with mass motor handover

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Happy

Early cars.

Whether you could or could not get 500 miles out of a tank was immaterial. Making 150 miles in one go would have been a miracle. Over that distance, you'd expect to go through a couple of tyres, suffer at least one serious mechanical failure and have to fill the oil tank on the total-loss lubrication system.

The only real advantage of the things was that you didn't need to keep a building full of fodder to put into them and to spend half your life up to your knees in horseshit. Oh, and when they dropped dead at the side of the road you could fix 'em.

Copenhagen talks stalled by green puppeteers

TeeCee Gold badge
WTF?

Well bugger me!

You mean to say that, with all the world's countries represented in one place, they can't come to an agreement that they'll all sign up to without either at least half of them walking out or it being a meaningless, toothless, watered down compromise? I don't think the carbon-cultists needed to bother sticking their oar in to achieve that one.

Next week: The tinfoil hat brigade show how Nostradamus* predicted the failure of the Copenhagen Climate talks and how this will lead to the end of the Mayan calendar, a plague of frogs and a documentary on the Discovery Channel.

Also, what's with the outpouring of crusty eviltude directed at DONG? I thought they were one of the ones who were full-on with the eco-wash and were last seen trying to stick wind turbines all over the Thames Estuary**?

*'Cos if he didn't he's complete crap as a seer. Even Mystic Meg could have seen that coming.

**No, I have no idea where they're planning to erect their enormous DONG farm this week.

Eggheads solve England penalty-shootout crapness riddle

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Thumb Down

No.

That's the reason they end up having to take the bloody things in the first place.

The first step to recovery is admitting that you have a problem or, in the England team's case, being shit isn't enough. They have to *know* they are.

3 billion have suffered Slade's 'Merry Xmas Everybody'

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Grenade

Tolerant planet this.

3 Billion people have been subjected to this globally?

It's a miracle that we haven't been invaded, stomped into the ground and had all our recording studios confiscated by a multinational coalition formed from Every Other Country In The Entire Bleedin' World.......

DVLA data powers likely to be abused by foreign officials

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FAIL

High risk?

Let's face it, giving this data away free to Bulgarian traffic wardens presents a far higher risk than flogging it en masse to the shady cowboys of the private clamping industry.

Who's more likely to want to misuse this data. Someone in Sofia or two dodgy blokes with a record for petty theft and their own tow truck in Essex?

Odd that. Pass a piece of legislation obliging the DVLA to share its data with authorised authorities and they're up in arms about the security risks, but offer them the chance to make a few quid on the side and it's a very different story.

If you ever needed a cast-iron proof that this mob are as bent as a nine-bob note, this is it.

TeeCee Gold badge
WTF?

Clones?

Yes, of course. If you're ringing a car in Bratislava, a British registration is exactly what you need to avert all suspicion......

Mozilla to open - gasp! - Firefox add-on store

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Troll

IE takes the shell with it?

You really ought to upgrade from Windows ME you know.

Stolen bank data mixed into list of French tax dodgers

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Double Ahem.

And with "up to 4,000 French clients.......named on the stolen list" too.

That's a hell of a lot of signatories on each account they have there.

Amazon EC2 urges customers to name their price

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Coat

Next week.

Greg Egan gives up mathematics, stops writing SF and takes up Prophecy as a full-time job.

"QIPS Exchange" anyone?

Mine's the one with the lizard entrails in the pockets.

IBM chums with Swiss to build 3D brain-density processors

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FAIL

Flaw in logic.

".....increasingly powerful computer processors are set to guzzle the entire world electricity supply by the year 2100....."

Always assuming that come 2100 we're still using basically the same sort of processor technology.

Assumption. The mother of all fuckups.

Axeman Chancellor toes the line on ID cards

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Happy

Cost savings?

Even better. We just make a policy decision not to go to the US. We can save the cost of biometrics in toto and the only thing that takes a hit is the US tourism industry.

I can't see a downside here.

Chumby internet-connected alarm clock

TeeCee Gold badge

Soft and an accelerometer?

Close, but no cigar. Now take out the crap, make it more robust and add reaction as follows:

Slap with hand: Radio.

Mash with fist: Short snooze.

Venomous wallop with shoe: Long snooze.

Hurled across room to impact heavily with opposite wall: It's a sick day, STFU.

Reduced to individual components with cricket bat: Automated warranty claim, free replacement and raise accelerometer reaction thresholds by 10%.

Zuckerberg pictures exposed by Facebook privacy roll-back

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Badgers

Indeed!

Faced with either being made to look like the world's most complete two-faced git or pretending that I'd done it deliberately, I'd have taken that option too.

Opera on Google Chrome OS: what me worry?

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Coat

Sexy?

Maybe there are nude pictures of the Google monopoly circulating to prove this, but we're just not allowed to mention that there are.

Or aren't.

Or whatever.

Dell tech flashes woman with (her own) jubblies

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Coat

Re: Elvis in support.

So, is he still working there or has he left the building?

Hackers root Motorola Droid

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Grenade

Not misleading at all.

"It does allow....allow wireless teather (sic)...."

I'd describe that as one of the basic fundamentals of "free, unrestricted" use myself. They can shove their expensive toy where the sun shineth not if they've got restrictions like that built into it.

That's Android off my shopping list.

Asus said to be making gadget inspired by gadget Apple is said to be making

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Coat

EeePad?

Are you sure it wasn't just some French bloke talking about the iPad?

Budget to make e-cars better for business?

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FAIL

Plug-in hybrids.

Am I the only one who sees a problem here?

As a company car, one of these presents a dilemma. Do you a) let the thing run off its engine all the time*, filling the tank with the company fuel card for free** or b) charge it up overnight at home at your own expense, saving the company's fuel costs?

Some may say that companies should provide charging points in the office car-park, but they're going to tax the fsck out of those so you won't be parking there anyway (c.f. government/joined-up thinking).

I reckon anyone going for "b" is in line for the Order of the Carbon Cult with Oak leaf and Cluster.

*Exactly like a non-plugin Hybrid.

**Since you're taxed on this you may as well get your money's worth.

Epson models wearable PlayStation 3

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Joke

Re: XBOX 360

Is that an Xbox 360 on on your back or have you been at the curry again?