* Posts by Fatman

2400 publicly visible posts • joined 6 Apr 2008

US nuke lab drops Chinese networking kit

Fatman

RE: ...you're not having it call home hourly...

NO, more likely, it has a listener in its firmware that just waits for a specifically crafted packet to arrive, and then BAM, the shit hits the fan.

That day could take many years to arrive.

Hey Lenovo, want to kill Apple? Look to Samsung hitman for tips

Fatman

Re: It's called the Law of Big Numbers

No, it's called the "Law of the Over Inflated Baloon".

Inflated beyond a safe maximum - it bursts.

Like Confucious said: "One Prick, All Gone", and in Apple's case, that prick may end being Samsung.

Fatman

RE: iTwats

The girl over in the grafix department owes me a couple of favors (and, no, she is not into NFC either - you need to check the story on the "real" uses for NFC if you don't "get" that meaning), and I have this idea for expressing your typical Apple user as an iTwat. Hopefully I can get her to turn it into reality.

'Leccy-starved Reg hack: 'How I survive on 1.5kW'

Fatman

Re: You say "boletín" I say "Part P Certificate"... I say (maybe) extortion

I am so glad, that in my home (US) state, a homeowner can legally do work on their home - subject to a municipal inspection.

In 1988, I needed to move the existing 125 amp service from a soon to be removed interior wall to an exterior garage wall, along with relocating the electric meter from the back of the garage to the side of the garage. (I wanted to free up the area behind the garage in the event I decided to expand the porch, and I knew that the local power company really hates to have their meters located inside a building, or an enclosed porch.)

Now, the fact that I was an electrician for 10 years didn't hurt either. Without telling the inspector who I had worked for, I ran past him what I was planning to do, and he didn't find any problems with the scope of the work planned.

Since I really hate to work things hot, I set things us so that I would remove the old meter and panel after the power company moved the drop to the new side of the house. Once the new panel was installed, and the circuits extended back to a 6" by 6" by 6" splice box in the attic, the only load the old service was supplying was a temporary 40 amp feed to the new service. The inspector came back out a second time to insure that the panel and service were properly installed, and that the grounding (earthing for you Brits) was done correctly. He then contacted the power company so they could move the drop. (In my area, the power company will not connect a service that has not been inspected.) I arranged to be home when the worker from the power company showed up, and cut loose the temporary feed, while he moved the drop. Done.

That weekend, with the old meter and service now dead, I ripped it from the wall. One last inspection, and job done.

Other than materials and a building permit fee, that job didn't cost too much. Just my time.

Bootnote: It was on the last inspection, did the inspector ask me: "Didn't you used to work for ........" "Yep, sure did."

Now, during my time as an electrician, I got to know many inspectors from the numerous municipalities in my area, and have heard some of the horror stories about stupid shit being done by homeowners. Today, I bet a youtube search will bring up hundreds, if not thousands of videos of absolutely shitty attempts at electrical work, most of them quite dangerous.

If you know what you are doing, and use the proper materials and perform the work in accordance with your local codes, then that is one thing. Taking shortcuts, is something completely different. Some people will do work without an inspection, and especially when it comes to electricity, doing uninspected work is quick grounds for you to find out about some deeply buried cancellation or claim refusal provisions in your home fire insurance policy that come with (financially) painful consequences.

Fatman

RE: 100 amp 3-phase supply installed

Why would you want three phase for a residential load????

WRT the US, the common residential 3 phase voltages are 120/208 Volt Wye, or 120/240 Volt Delta.

If you are provisioned with a Delta service, then that third phase is useless for a single phase load, as it sits at 208 volts above ground.

If you are provisioned with a 208 volt Wye service, then any "240" volt loads are only going to see 208 volts phase to phase, an approximate 13% voltage drop from their nameplate rating with a correspondingly HIGHER current draw.

In some high rise buildings, a residence may be supplied by two phases tapped from a three phase Wye service.

You would be far better off using a 200 or 225 Amp 120/240 volt single phase service - unless you has a specific three phase load that had to be fed.

Standards sultan sanctifies 60GHz wireless LAN tech

Fatman

Re: would only work line of sight and small distance connection

I seriously doubt your distance would exceed 5 meters at that frequency; unless you were allowed more transmitter power (like maybe a full watt).

What I would suspect that one may experience is intermittent signal loss if a lot of movement occurred in the "line of sight", or so very close to it (causing reflections).

It won't be until kit is actually in the field, will real world, as opposed to lab conditions, define the usefulness of this technology.

I am not holding my breath on this one.

At last! A REAL use for NFC: Bonking butler bots and oven-puters

Fatman
FAIL

"""Innovation""" sponsored by SONY

$DEITY-forbid!!!!!

If you don't know why, then Google is your friend.

Just ask it about 'BMG rootkit fiasco'.

Then you will understand my apprehension of anything SONY is involved with.

Texas schoolgirl loses case over RFID tag suspension

Fatman

Re: You lost the election, get over it.

My sentiments exactly.

Now, take your medicine for electing W for two terms.

To me, two terms of W, and his off the books wars amount to someone with a bad case of constipation, and Obama as the medicine needed to flush all of that blocked up shit out the back end. Until it is all out, the US is going to be miserable.

Unfortunately, it will may take until 2016 before we can declare the patient better. A lot depends on how much shit needs to be moved.

Fatman

Re: ...training them to be dependent upon little pieces of plastic

There is another side to this - bullies stealing lunch money. At many schools this has been an ongoing problem; and by eliminating the need to carry coin, you thwart the bully. And, as the article points out, you get a summary of purchases; which could be used by interested parents to make sure their kids eat healthy meals, as opposed to the sugar laden crap found in so many school lunchroom vending machines.

Minicam movie pirate gets record-breaking five years in prison

Fatman

RE: Let the downvotes begin..

You asked for it

downvotes+1000

Hey el Reg, please add this to his downvote total, as you only let me downvote him once.

Fatman

...length of the sentence depends on the strength of the lobby group ...

Oh yes, the old adage at work:

Money Talks, Bullshit Walks

'SHUT THE F**K UP!' The moment Linus Torvalds ruined a dev's year

Fatman
FAIL

Re: This and many other reasons...why I stay clear of Linux

Loverock, is that you?????

Open-source attack dog enters Ballmer's inner ring

Fatman

Re: what Linus did, yes, that was IMHO incredibly stupid as it broke rule 1 of decent man management

On this we agree.

One of the hallmarks of a good boss is know when, and where to criticize a subordinates fuck up.

Unless it is absolutely necessary to make an example of someone, save the ass chewing for a private session.

Being perceived as a loose cannon on a roll, is a morale killer.

I know, I used to work for one. And $DEITY, I hated the way he treated people, including myself. It was one uncalled-for public ass chewing that caused me to quit on the spot. Eventually his antics got the attention of higher ups, and he ended up being frog-marched out the door.

Fatman
Linux

Re: Isn't that the next Ubuntu release? Rabid Rottweiler?

NO, actually, its Raring Ringtail, due out in April.

Fatman

Re: ban 'shill' and and the words "Microsoft funded trolls"

OK, then, I will just substitute "Microsoft funded (delusional) evangelists" then.

Better?

Windows Media Center EPG has SWITCHED OFF, wail Euro users

Fatman
WTF?

RE:...the fault lies with Microsoft and some hapless admin bod has forgotten...

$DEITY, I don't want to be that clueless (l)user!!!!

S/He might end up with a chair ride out a window, courtesy of one Steve Ballmer.

Fatman
FAIL

RE: MS are none too subtly trying to kill Media Center

Smells like what they did with Plays For Sure a while back.

iPhone 'Do Not Disturb' bug to self-destruct on Monday

Fatman
Joke

Re: Distracted coder

If I am going to be distracted, then it should be by at least a 38DD!

Fatman

Re: iPad Calendar crashes ... event spanning the March/April boundary

I guess you have seen Apple's solution to the infamous April Fool's Day bug - just ignore it.

Fatman
FAIL

Re: Not again!

To me

cheap young developers

is code for hiring a H-1B

How an Amazon engineer's slip-up started a 20-hour Netflix cock-up

Fatman
Pint

Re: Church? Seriously?

At least that is what they say!!

Now, if you think I believe most of them, then, I have this swampland in Florida I could sell you.

For a few, I seriously doubt that they could assume a stand-up position on a Sunday morning.

Icon expresses why!!

Fatman

RE: According to the Peter Principle it is more likely to generate a promotion.

Only if he was in manglement!!

Fatman

RE: can't beat locally stored content :-)

Don't 2Tb drives make for some nice amounts of locally stored content!!!!

Fatman

Re: efficiency would improve immensely if I were allowed to fire some asses now and then

Simples, just hire this guy:

http://disqus.com/JIMTHEBOSS/

Check out some of his CW posts - perfect manglement material.

Fatman

RE: Wonder if Amazon have been hiring ex RBS employees?

Damn you!!!!

Another keyboard fucked up!!!!!!

Fatman
WTF?

Re: that if you strain it too hard it snaps and the pieces go flying across the room

WHY, did an image of Steve Ballmer sitting in an executive chair, being ricocheted by a over stretched bungee cord; and being hurled out the window of Microsoft's HQ suddenly pop up in my mind?????

Fatman
WTF?

Re: Sadly I work in a stupid company where all major things happen on a Sunday morning

Are you so sure that is all bad?

WROK PALCE had to """fix""" a telco related """fire hazard""" involving a shitload of phone lines that were not "plenum rated cable" (according to """fire marshal"""). On a Sunday morning, WROK PALCE is only manned by security, and no one else. So, I have to ask, do you want phone lines going down during the business day, with employees at WROK, or do you want the phone lines going down when most employees are at church???

Let me see, I will take Sunday morning, any time for this kind of downtime.

Fatman
FAIL

RE: Sounds like a RGE - Resume Generating Event...

Preceded by a ETE - Employment Terminating Event.

The only appropriate icon for this screw-up.

Thunderbolt interface strikes YOUR PC: What's the damage?

Fatman
Coat

Charts!

OK, this may seem extremely picky, but wouldn't the use of COLOR (or colour for the east side of the pond) make the charts a bit more helpful. Why, you may ask??

I noticed that for many of the measurements depicted, the only difference was the interface used with the same drive. Had these been of a different color, or even being separated from the others, the performance differences due to the varied interfaces would have been more obvious.

Alright, I'll get my coat, and leave!

HP itching to flog flaccid biz units: Are Autonomy, PSG in firing line?

Fatman

Increasing shareholder value???

I hate to keep on kicking this dead horse, but, the stupidity of the typical business school types is blatantly on display at HP.

The typical business school mentality deals with the short term, never the long term. Increased profits NOW!!!!!!!! WHY?, probably because, you (the Crummy Executive Officer) will not be around in 3 to 5 years when the shit hits the fan. But the long term employees, (that being those that you don't send packing because of misguided cost cutting) will have to clean up the shit you left behind.

IIRC, the correct term for this type of manglement is "sea-gull management". (The urban dictionary's #1 definition calls it like it is: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Seagull%20Management)

There comes a time, when you have cut the costs so far down to the bone, there ain't shit left. Kill R&D, and you don't have any new products left, kill morale by cutting people, and you end up with a people business that has "lost its soul". You end up with a company that is fucked up. IMHO, HP is fucked up.

It isn't just manglement that is to blame here, because you have a BoD that rubber stamps whatever shitty plan their current CEO has concocted to increase shareholder value. Didn't Leo """sell""" Autonomy as a way to increase shareholder value?

If HP's claims about Autonomy are to be believed, then Leo the A-hole pissed away a considerable amount of shareholder value, and the BoD was just as complicit in it in overpaying for a dubious acquisition. Isn't this the same (or nearly the same BoD) that allowed Hurd to """leave"""? Isn't this the same (or nearly the same BoD) that brought Carly on board??

I thank $DEITY that I don't own any HP stock, because I would sure as shit have ditched that stock a long time ago.

Simply put, the BoD is fucked up.

HP seniorsenile manglement is fucked up.

And they collectively are making sure that, in the end, HP gets fucked up.

$DEITY, I feel sorry for HP employees, and I can understand why some of them chose to jump ship. If you can avoid being chained to the HP Titanic as it goes down, you might actually survive its sinking. In another post, I mentioned about HP's crowing about its cutting 17,000+ jobs, and losing some key IT people.

(You can read about that item here: http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9235168/HP_cuts_workforce_by_5_looks_to_probe_GM_hires) {Sorry el Reg, but your story didn't cover HP's crowing about job cuts and probing the turncoat motivated to leave IT employees, otherwise, I would have linked to one of your pieces.}

Jesus Christ, what the fuck do you expect when you treat employees like ass-wipes, use once, and discard? Do you honestly expect any loyalty when people see their jobs disappearing, and the seniorsenile manglement getting all of the perks? No wonder why this company is heading for the bottom of the ocean! The only shit manglement gives to its people is the shit it (manglement) lets trickle down (or flies off the fan blades) to them.

It is clear that the good-ole-boy executive circle is infected with this kind of MBA (mainly brainless asshole), and executives who screw up, end up with a nice golden parachute; often finding themselves on boards of other companies. So, I ask this, if you own stock in a company, and find that, say Carly, or Mark or Leo, or similarly other brain dead damagement types are on its board; do you really trust their judgment? I know I wouldn't.

Chinese court orders Apple to cough £100k to writers for violating copyright

Fatman

Re: "copyright infringement complaints very seriously".

This:

A spokeswoman for Apple told the BBC that the company takes "copyright infringement complaints very seriously".

"We're always updating our service to better assist content owners in protecting their rights," she added.

sounds like bullshit speak to me.

Hey el Reg, how about a bullshit icon?? Please??

Fatman

RE: I wonder if that'll catch on in the West too...

Not if $GLOBAL_BIG_CORPS gets their way with buying politicians off.

Craptastic analysis turns 2.8 zettabytes of Big Data into 2.8 ZB of FAIL

Fatman
Linux

Re: I have this vision of monkeys, keyboards, ...

I could not let that one get past me.

Aren't you describing the crack Windows 8 development team???

</fanboy rant>

Fatman
Mushroom

Re: ...those pasty management clowns...

I really wish that the shuttle wasn't retired. One useful purpose for it would have been to send those those pasty management clowns into orbit, sans spacesuit.

My New Year Resolution is simple: assist incompetent manglers to achieve self destruction, any way possible.

I look forward to my next manglement tangle within the next two weeks.

Are your landlines buried in the stone age?

Fatman

Re: Separate networks are not strictly necessary ....

Someone else who learned that painful lesson in Networking 110 at the University of Hard Knocks.

Now, you know why we do it.

North Korea releases first computer game

Fatman
Big Brother

Re: Bow down

That made me laugh.

I suspect you forgot the <sarcasm> tags.

Icon appropriate for NKorea!

Fatman

Re: Cooperating ... with DPRK/North Korea is the best way ....

In a perfect world, that may be true, but the world has had to tolerate those arrogant assholes since 1953, and their shit is getting tiresome. (60 fucking years, mind you!)

So, a better solution would be a 'quick" end to the suffering of the N Korean people (and the rest of the world, BTW).

The easiest way to accomplish that is to remove the government. As to how, that is left as an exercise for the reader.

Fatman
Flame

Re: So, it's clear that a CEO has *more* responsibility ....

Quoting you:

So, it's clear that a CEO has *more* responsibility for the use of his company's products, but not *necessarily* a significant personal culpability. There are cases, however - Bhopal, say - where the actions or inactions of one or two individuals might have cost or saved hundreds of lives.

I can add another case to that list: the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. There are at least 3 CEO's who heads ought to be held responsible,

1) BP's

2) Halliburton, and

3) the CEO of the drilling company (their name escapes me).

In all fairness, the head of BP has been deservedly pilloried in the media, but not much said about the other two. And, that should not be the case.

Fatman

Re: Second thought: maybe Pyongyang really is that dull and repetitive

They probably took their cue from the Cold War era communist East Germany/Berlin.

Fatman
FAIL

Re: Shouldn't there be more tanks...

You noticed that too!

I would a realistic "experience" would be dodging the tanks and other military vehicles, the thousands of armed soldiers, the thousands of propaganda posters, etc.

If I had to describe this """game""" in one word, it would be "boring".

Major new science: Women more nude, more often online

Fatman

Re: ...choosing the bird with the biggest Bulgarian AirBags

I once dated a girl with some really large ones, and to say that they often got in the way is an understatement. I prefer a woman that isn't "top heavy" - if you know what I mean.

Hey el Reg, bring back the Bulgarian Air Bags icon.

Chill out, biz barons... your new IT system might not look like the old one

Fatman

Re: Trevor Pott is a Bad Person and should be eaten by vendors -- @jake:

He was having a go at windows 8 you pillock. Will you please *wake up*

He may have also been trying to take a quick shot at Canonical's clusterfuck called Unity. You either love ir (Unity), or you hate it.

Put me in the hate camp. I can't stand that thing on a desktop.

In every build of Ubuntu I have installed since it appeared, it gets ripped out. I like using Gnome panel with custom launchers for the often used apps; and a "clean" wallpaper for the desktop. After all, one must be able to appreciate the beauty of a certain Girl On Fire (my desktop "wall paper") with no icons getting in the way.

Fatman
Linux

Re: ...a need for .Net involvement in the first place..

I, for one, am glad that since I work in a *nix shop; that clusterfuck (.Net) is not found on our machines.

I was cleaning up the documents of an old WindblowZE machine before retiring it, and found: .Net 1.0, .Net 1.1, .Net 2.1, and .Net 3.1, all consuming hard disk space. How did that person manage to live with less than 5GB of free space on a 30GB hard drive, I will never know.

When I found out that the machine was being donated to a non-profit, and they (the non-profit) wanted Linux on it, it was such a pleasure to insert a Live CD, and nuke that sucker from orbit.

Fatman

Re: ...web based system took three to five times the work and time.....

I can believe that. Real world example:

I was working for this company in the mid 1980's using an application written in a 4GL called PRO-IV. (info on PRO-IV can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PROIV and here: http://www.proiv.com/ )

If you check out the first link, under "History", you will note a comment about MDIS, it was a port (for MSDOS) they had created that is one of the two platforms involved in this example.

The *nix variant was running on a Convergent Technologies S-80 (20 MHz 68020 CPU) supporting 16 terminal users. Data entry operations on this system "flew". Dumping over 140,000 inventory items into a report (for export to a spreadsheet for external manipulation) was quick. Trying the same task under MSDOS on a PC with a 66MHz CPU took forever. And we could not figure out why. The data and the application were on the same machine with only ONE user!

Finally, we made a call, and got the answer - the MSDOS port was going up and down the TCP/IP stack for disk i/o, even when it was on the same machine. No wonder performance sucked. So, I would not doubt that some of your performance issues are network related, in the sense that the workstation must pass the request to the server, wait for the server to chomp on the request, and spit out the result.

The *nix system's terminal screen's fixed text was drawn only once, on entry to the specific data entry screen; if you made multiple record entries, only the relevant data was moved down the wire. With the MSDOS system, the screen was redrawn each time it was changed, contributing to the sluggishness of the app. Needless to say, the shitty performance of a PC with this software convinced the owner to stick with the *nix box for quite a long time.

This points out one of the downsides of a interactive "web app" - everything (i.e. `the page`) has to be sent to the client each time something gets changed.

Fatman
WTF?

Re: Surprised you can hear that over the constant Kerching noises

I know!!!

Someone once told me that SAP stood for:

Shut up

And

Pay!!!!

Fatman
FAIL

Re: Too many business believe that IT is the silver bullet ....

probably because they do not completely understand IT, and try to accomplish the impossible on the cheap.

You get some ID10T who picks up some cheapo shelf-ware, and expects it to do shit it was never designed for, and because it is proprietary code, it can't be modified. I keep telling manglement assholes that before they can even try to replace software, or, $DEITY-forbid, replace manual methods; they need to completely understand what they want to accomplish. And that means doing your homework, something many lazy manglers refuse to do. The end result of taking shortcuts is commonly known as a clusterfuck.

Royal clusterfucks usually involve Oracle or SAP, and a large consulting firm.

Fatman

Re: To date? No complaints. My completed systems work.

Then I bet you don't do SAP; everything I hear about them usually has references to the word clusterfuck.

Steve Jobs' Apple yacht freed after family settles the bill

Fatman
Thumb Up

Re: Proper name- the iSore.

Bravo!!!!

You sir, just made my day!!!!!

Fatman
Alert

Re: That yacht looks terrible...and I bet the navigation systems are shit.

I hope that they don't use Apple Maps!!