Posts by Mage

Re: Next time, include a refueling port.

3. It's probably similar cost to launch a new better telescope than refuel an old one so far away.

4. It's got broken reaction wheels. More failures are possible.

I hope the James Webb will be a success.

Re: Telephonists

Also allegedly a reason for female radio operators in WWII, though it might have been anxious staff procurement wanting to avoid having female appointments blocked.

However I don't think it's a frequency response issue, but the idea that fainter female voice with more background noise is easier to understand. So I suspect that the software is poor rather than anything inherent about female voices, which can be clearer (certain parts of Brooklyn, Dublin, Yorkshire and West Country may be exceptions).

I expect they have poor choice of samples, despite claims that it's some other problem.

The only difference I see from 25 years ago is that it seems to skip the personalised user training and give about the same performance, poor. The phone menus with voice recognition are ghastly compared to numbered menus, which are ghastly. None of it is to make a better customer experience but to save money.

Same with evil automated checkouts, which encourage some people to cheat. No doubt the thefts are less than cost of a checkout operator. I don't expect transparent & honest figures for how accurate Amazon's invisible checkout is. Next step is to ban customers from aisles and have Argos style terminal (identical to online website / phone app) and you queue to wait for shopping basket to appear. Pay by paypal, IBAN, plastic or RFID phone.

Re: How Strange

Occasionally in the last few years I did get the odd bargain for stuff that wasn't junk.

Also true in PC World.

Once even in Hardly Normal's, a nice Toshiba HDTV because it was older stock (no ethernet, loads of video in options and fatter with CCFL backlight giving a more even and better white than cheaper LED TVS, some of which have edge based LEDs.

Re: Hmmm, who's broadcasting this shite?

Except it's STREAMING. Broadcast is quite a different thing, only using identical data for everyone and rather rare outside a LAN. WiFi has to do it by duplicating the UDP stream for each client unless some newer version has added a true broadcast mode. Also with Broadcast there is only linear scheduling and everyone has same data at the same time (+/- distribution latency).

LTE's broadcast mode is really a customised DTT so as to sell Scheduled Broadcast PayTV if Ofcom manages to sell off all terrestrial TV spectrum. Qualcomm did a Broadcast trial for Mobile in UK. Nokia long ago had a handset with DVB-h and there were some handsets in Germany with DVB-t, but neither mobile operators, regulators or phone makers can get revenue from DVB-T in a phone.

US doesn't care about out of control Borgs

This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mergers_and_acquisitions_by_Amazon

See also

List of mergers and acquisitions by Apple

List of mergers and acquisitions by Facebook

List of mergers and acquisitions by Google

List of mergers and acquisitions by Twitter

List of mergers and acquisitions by Microsoft

Also Disney!

Consumers exist to be exploited

Foreign companies exist to be offshored to, and be sued if they try to enter US Retail

Re: 240/230/220V

It didn't. They changed the % limits for Mainland Europe, GB, NI and Ireland. It's mostly 240V in UK, 220V in Germany and 230V in Ireland, like it always was. Equipment marked CE has to work in any EU electrical supply, though it MUST have the local standard of plug, if it plugs in.

The most criminal is Amazon supplying 5V chargers with a CE mark. Yet they only have the USA two blades, illegal in all of Europe to retail. The actual electronics like most SMPSU do seem to work 90V to 245V.

Older 220V gear with a transformer and no taps (Such as German Market radios) may need a dropper resistor in the UK.

Re: Skype account

I was annoyed when MS killed older Skype, they did it MUCH later on Linux. The replacement is inferior. So I and many others now use Viber (we tried QQ for a while on Windows & Android, but only Chinese on Linux).

~

Only Viber issue is that SOME laptops are assumed to be retina/HiDPI by Viber/QT/Flatback. It's not simply being 1920 x 1080, something knows physical screen size and making a stupid decision. Solution is install, if OK do nothing, if not put QT_SCALE_FACTOR=0.5 in the startup environment: sudo nano /etc/environment works on my Linux Mint 18.3. Another laptop with same 1920 x 1080 also made by Lenovo but larger screen was fine. Both same identical desktop & Linux Mint. This seems to occur with some other Flatpack apps on Ubuntu, but Mint only got Flatpack with 18.3.

It sounds like a classic "Oh Linux is too hard" but really this was simpler than any of the half dozen major issues I've had with Win 10 or with Skype since MS decided it was a Phone App with adverts.

Re: Go for it BlackBerry

No, much as I despise certain companies we need the rule of law and an end to patent trolls.

Absolutely none of these should ever have been awarded.

Re: disclose my email address

Didn't you do that ANYWAY, to be a commentard?

Re: A man let down by others

I'd use a coil in series with electronics to develop a magnetic field, that operated plunger to change setting of clock type balance wheel escapement. The spring loaded centre off/on switch would lock the escapement via balance wheel or give the coil driven plunger a kick to start wheel.

I've made custom series current coils to do this. A prototype would use the coil in a quartz clock that takes as low as 0.9V pulse to kick the cogs once a second. That coil has a metal plunger that interacts with a circular permanent magnet on a cog.

Why did competitors use a rechargeable cell? Because it's much cheaper than a spring drive, doesn't rust and NiCd or NiMH can last five years (cycles only). LiPoly not so long life, esp at extreme temperatures (cycles and time since manufacture).

I've worked with creating patents (I have one) and finding legal, moral solutions to circumvent. It's difficult & expensive and since 19th C the patent is useless unless owned by a big company. A UK Chemist in New York (1890s) copied Swedish (?) Wilhelm Hellesen's battery and sold the US patent to The American Novelty Co. that was later National Carbon/Union Carbide/US Eveready and is now Energiser.

US government eventually invalidated Edison's Movie patents (which were invalid when fiiled!).

It's glamorous to be an inventor, but really since 19th C it's a mechanism for big rich companies. The USPTO works on the principle that if the Patent is "really" invalid, it's up to a rich competitor to prove it in US Courts. They make little money from rejecting them and don't make much effort to spot if prior art, obvious to someone schooled in the art or too broad. Many patent applications that seem novel or have no prior art do fail or should fail on the "obvious" aspect.

Design Patents (=UK Registered Design), Trademarks and Copyright are all different things. You need money. "Winter is Coming".

More likely to get rich being a Patent Lawyer than "inventing", in sense of patenting. Indeed I've never made a cent from my brilliant patent.

Re: company is not profitable, then they shareholders don't get

Curiously not true. Shareholders and Management may be asset stripping / running it into the ground. Plenty of examples recently and over last 30 years, USA, UK & Ireland.

Enron, UK Ever Ready, Eircom, Anglo Irish Bank, Carillion.

Re: isn't something the typical person has the financial resources

Like 2G/3G it will get cheaper.

Also possibly hack a femto cell (bought, borrowed or stolen).

being American and there is no place with that name in the states

Amazon Inc.

Re: Still only 1080 Vertical

1080 might be fine for TV, Absolutely stupid for editing documents. The 1200 I had on my 2002 laptop is a minimum.

The so called "retina" screen laptops are madly expensive and most are a far too small screen for 16:9. The 16:9 or 16:10 (if you are lucky with 1920 x 1200) is not great either for a laptop / documents. Makes a tall enough screen too wide.

11" high paper shown at 120 dpi needs 1320 pixels high. At old 1.66:1 Cinema Widescreen that is 2192 pixel wide approx. That would be about a 17" screen but less wide than 16:9 laptop. 120dpi is a minimum resolution. Above 150 dpi you need more pixels or the screen & text gets too small.

I have big screens for video. I want to watch video without reading glasses.

Re: firewalls will be obsolete

No, just only deployed by the clued. An IP4 LAN with one public IP needs a NAT router. Technically a firewall is a separate thing and still needed between your LAN and ISP on IP6 only. Admittedly people might not have one as modem + switch will "work".