My wife thinks this is more likely to have been secretly created by a few women as a way of getting cash from *really* stupid men
She's probably right.
683 publicly visible posts • joined 2 Jun 2008
"actually, when was the last Apple product that couldn't be described as a concept you can already get elsewhere, but with an Apple logo on it?"
I thought that's Apple's explicit product development approach? See a segment, wait for others to make mistakes, pick so good ideas and make them work better, develop a better product, charge *a lot* more for it.
Was told this story by a work colleague...
He was working in Germany for a telco and they were upgrading the redundant systems for a couple of data centres (electrics, hardware, software etc). The demo was set for the CIO to come and see it all working and properly test it by killing grid power supply to the data centre by throwing the breakers, simulating a power outage.
The day came, with great ceremony the breakers were pulled by him, grid power ceased and lo and behold everything worked as it needed to. Generators generated, UPSs hummed, servers shut down in a controlled and graceful manner. Seeing the success the CIO then said (in German of course), "Excellent, well done. Well, better get the power back then...." and threw the breakers back before anyone could stop him, missing several hours of carefully prepared procedure to move back to normal operation in a single swoop. The surge of current took out enough power hardware (generators, switches, UPS etc) that it was days and days before the data centre was back up and running.
Ooops.
I was asked by someone if I was bothered about the Facebook data leak. I thought for a minute then answered truthfully 'No'. When I really considered it, I had always assumed that any data that I give Facebook (intentionally or unintentionally) is for sale to the highest bidder. This just confirmed it.
I'd be annoyed if my bank did this, but Facebook? Scorpion's gonna sting, its in their nature.
Did think this was unlikely when I read the story in the Telegraph (yes yes, I read the Torygraph - I go there for the Matt and Alex cartoons, honestly). From the article there would seem to be no evidence of a hack, just his suspicions that you can get 'co-ordinates' from a skype chat.
Probably a mix of triangulated cell phone, satellite imagery and maybe a snitch on the ground to help them properly target the operating theatre :(
"And the result is 100% guaranteed correct."
If by correct you mean 'tallied correctly' then yes. If by 'correct' you mean 'without any kind of fraud' then no, it can't do that. There are plenty of election exploits that blockchain isn't an answer for (see Tower Hamlets mayoral election as an example).
Blockchain is a cunning technology, but lets not pretend it can fix all election ills.
"Google docs is more modern, it was designed bfrom the outset to be web based, office is a hybrid abomination, not very good at either."
From my direct experience, I would assume "more modern" on their spreadsheet app means "doesn't do the stuff I need it to"
Office can be a pain (particularly when Excel in its latest incarnation decides that I have been using it for too long and starts munching extra CPU cycles for no reason, necessitating all Excel windows being closed and opened again), but at least it has the functionality I need. Where was COUNTIFS for so long (a quick google tells me finally been added very recently)? Why is sorting such a pain in the arse?
Id hate to be forced to use the g suite only. My wife is forced to at her work and regularly brings in her own laptop with O365 on it to get stuff done.
A client I worked for used the g-suite so I gave it a go (brave, given how much my wife moans about it). My experience:
Email - fine. I preferred outlook but that was only because I know it well, both had their plus and minus points.stuck with Google without issue really.
Spreadsheets - the Google version is severely limited. Quickly moved back to excel in my own laptop.
Word and PowerPoint equivalent - as spreadsheets. Terrible. Quickly moved back.
Files. It was fine so stuck with it. One drive generally sucks, so hard for Google to be worse!
Complex financial shenanigans like this are rarely in the interest of the shareholders long term. Generally these types of moves are more about satisfying the career ambitions of the CEO, or a cunning plan to affect the short term stock price for options maturing.
I don't know the details of this one, and it could be a great idea, but I'd be shocked if it works out well in the long term
I wouldn't start with Unseen Academicals or Raising Steam, two of the last Discworld series as I'm not sure they are as good as the others. Felt like he was losing his bite, particularly in Raising Steam *ducks and runs for cover*
Hard to pick a favourite, but I would probably start with Guards Guards and then follow the Commader Vimes focused ones for a bit.
Once they sorted out the drivers I've found it to be a great laptop. It's expensive, but IT dept pays so that isn't my problem!
I like the look of the Surface Pro (5) as well, but the Surface Book is more stable and I like the feel of a proper keyboard.
I had the choice of the Dell XPS instead, but the screen ratio wasn't right - the 3:2 of the Surface Book works much better for me.
If you went back to even 2014 I can't see that I would have believed that I would be happy with a Microsoft own brand laptop, but here we are!
My wife's work use the G Suite , but have so many exceptions (particularly in marketing where she works for Excel and Powerpoint - files going back and forward to agencies etc) that I do wonder if they are saving any money and would just be better off going for a 365 licence per user.
I was forced to use the G Suite working at a previous client - it was okay but not great. Couldn't go over to it permanently - you'd have to prise Excel from my cold dead fingers!
My guess is that with 128GB in as standard, there are going to be few people who will miss the lack of an SD card slot.
I'm surprised at the lack of a headphone jack (probably a deal breaker for me) and no version with a second SIM card slot though (targeted at bits of the Asian market).
Unless you're tech diving and tracking run time against your deco schedule, most people generally use some kind of dive computer rather than a watch. You'd have to take it off anyway to get your arm through the wetsuit / drysuit sleeve. And given large mound of kit needed for diving you're not saving much in the way of weight or hassle.
Even when tech diving, I used to use a Suunto (plus a spare, depending on what I was doing) in guage mode as having depth and time in the same place was useful.
Not sure that criticising a smartwatch for not being able to survive a scuba dive is that fair a criticism !
I'm seriously annoyed that nothing to beat the smartwatch 3 has come out yet. I want new shiny shiny!
Its an ugly thing, but it does have some plus points that a lot have but few bring together in a single watch:
- Uses the same cable to charge as my phone (micro USB) - no proprietary cable to lose or forget
- Lasts 2 days or more
- All the usual notification goodness
- Inbuilt GPS so not relying on my phone for Strava tracking
- Always on screen for looking at the time that doesn't kill the battery (why aren't there more using the transreflective approach - seems to work well on this)
- Costs less than a mid range phone
To be honest, I want a smartwatch 4 - everything this one does but better looking (and for Sony to start making the steel straps again so I can find one that costs less than the watch itself)
Ah. For those guys you need to give the address 4 Poets Way, Harrow, HA1 1SG.
Poets way is a very short connecting road between two others just behind the Harrow council offices. There are no houses in it, but the road and postcode is correct and they won't know that till they get there :)
The wife is a contractor and the national retailer for whom she works regularly screws the payment and she finally gets the cash weeks after it was due as the accounts department mainly employs zombies from Shaun of the Dead.
As a result she keeps a good reserve as I thought was the case for all contractors? It's a bad situation to be in and they have my sympathy but I thought all contractors keep some cash in reserve for situations like this?
PS in case you're wondering, she stays working there as they agreed to part time hours that work for her and it's 5 mins from the kids school. Some months they do pay on time. Even if it's not the right amount!