Posts by Callum

boom for offshore consultancies

The big winner from the reduction in flexible contractors from the market place in FinTech has been the larger offshore (majority Indian) consultancies. Surely that's quite a loss in tax revenues.

2 api's

The big problem is that whilst API Gateway/lambda is a great protective wrapper round services with downloadable Android and Ios libraries for your API; the back end services that fulfil this API still have to be internet facing and cannot be inside a non-internet facing Virtual Private Cloud, which is pretty frustrating.

debit card key compromise

Having designed a few online banking solutions for uk retail banks; I reckon that this looks like a debit card key compromise. The fraudulent transactions seemed to originate abroad having been used for various online purchases which to me sounds like the actual ebanking system was not compromised. AFAIK Tesco didn't shut down their branch or online systems after the breach.

If a key has been compromised and someone is minting new cards; then that's bloody interesting. I've not heard of a type 4 issuer having a key compromise before.

ip config?

my 3G dongle on linux looks like it is successfully authenticating and then immediately dropping on ip config.

Jun 4 10:14:12 x pppd[3749]: CHAP authentication succeeded

Jun 4 10:14:12 x NetworkManager[873]: CHAP authentication succeeded

Jun 4 10:14:32 x NetworkManager[873]: <warn> pppd timed out or didn't initialize our dbus module

Jun 4 10:14:32 x NetworkManager[873]: <info> Activation (ttyUSB0) Stage 4 of 5 (IPv4 Configure Timeout) scheduled...

Jun 4 10:14:32 x NetworkManager[873]: <info> Activation (ttyUSB0) Stage 4 of 5 (IPv4 Configure Timeout) started...

Jun 4 10:14:32 x NetworkManager[873]: <info> (ttyUSB0): device state change: ip-config -> failed (reason 'ip-config-unavailable') [70 120 5]

Jun 4 10:14:32 x NetworkManager[873]: <info> Marking connection '3 - Internet' invalid.

...

Jun 4 10:14:32 x pppd[3749]: Connection terminated.

anyone know

How did Curiosity took the picture of itself? I'm imagining it stitched some pics together - but you can see the camera in the picture?

mountain bike lamps

CREE XPG etc LEDs have revolutionised night mountain biking, with 1500+ lumen output and long burn times. One of the big problems though is that using them in a snow storm is headache inducing - possibly why they are not used for car main headlights.

these are beautifully made machines and well worth the price this was sold for. The Kommander version that I was lucky enough to play with had 3 types of wood inset in the carrying box to make a nice pattern and had small details like slightly frosted bulbs so that wet hands could unscrew and replace. It even had a custom made oil bottle that set into the carrying case and all the parts worked smoothly. Perhaps they should have concentrated more on the code rather than aesthetics!!

the last thing you'll do

... and the last configuration change to made to the C&C server is to instruct it's army of bots to attack itself

it's not that old

me and 5 others wrote the original abbey national online banking code in 2000 - 2001, abbey was pretty late to online banking at the time. I've noticed it's been refreshed a few times since then but up until last year I still recognised the same underlying structure that had must have been in place for 10 years! It was a pretty cool system because, at launch, you could use it on Sky, web or cHTML website that only worked on those old LCD screen Nokias; i.e. a bit too far ahead of its time.

Is it legal?

I was wondering whether it was legal to make a role redundant and replace it with an offshore/recently onshore individual?

* I'm sure we've all seen it happen; but anyone know the legality of this and is this why RBS are being very careful in their wording of the events that took place?

erm. entrepreneurial tax relief

or indeed, the HMRC closing the loophole where small IT service companies used to be able to close through a voluntary windup of their company and only pay tax at entrepreneurial relief on the assets of the company (usually a bank account chocked full of cash) - which was far cheaper than paying tax on the income/dividends.

The new rules state that companies can still do this; but have to become insolvement and therefore involve a solvency practioner.

April is significant because a lot of small IT service companies were getting it done and dusted before the new rules came into place.

I bet you'll find that a lot of new IT companies started up around the same time.

I was a nildram customer; which became Opal and then talktalkbusiness. The service with talktalk business is utterly awful. e.g. they have failed three times in a row to log an openreach call to replace a master socket. It's so bad that I have a draytek vigor router with a "3" 3G usb key plugged in permanently to switch when the contention rates rise in the evening (which bugs me because I'm meant to be a business customer and shielded from evening consumer usage)

Anyone got any recommendations for a ADSL broadband provider that works for techies. i.e. not the watered down crap service that seems to be the norm. I don't care about price.

adobe have been a bit vicious by actually removing the adobeair package from their yum repository. Frankly, I don't see what harm there was by just leaving it there ad infinitum. The binary install provided on their archive page is a bit of a nightmare to install on modern Linux OS's.

PayPal is a bank in the EU and is called PayPal Europe SÃ rl & Cie, SCA (PayPal Luxembourg). Critically, though, it does not fall under FSA jurisdiction but are regulated under the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier (CSSF), the Luxembourg equivalent of the FSA.

I don't think it has bank status in the USA though. Only European accounts were transferred to the above entity.

I have one of the LG smart Tv's. The apps within it's LG-only-app-market are largely crap; the DLNA simply won't work with my NAS (freenas 7.2), it's impossible to "type" a URL with the finicky controller, the Skype application needs an LG mic and camera ()that aren't for sale yet). I should have just bought a normal LED TV and bought a firebox'd apple tv or something.

Mr Brewer is a well known unionist in Scotland and unashamedly pushes the union agenda quite hard in newsnight scotland (the programme after the main Newsnight, in scotland) to the point that at the last election he was beginning to sound like the Iraqi Information minister, "So, it's a bad night for the SNP then?" (whilst the SNP were winning seats hand over fist).

just as...

just as Dell decided to drop the Dell Streak, a 5" too-small-tablet/too-big-phone!

mpg

anyone worked out the miles per gallon of endeavour yet? 122 million miles is not a lot more than some of the old VW's on ebay.

IT contracts

with solvency regulation, retail distribution review and now gender based pricing legislation all due for implementation it is going to be happy days for anyone working at retail life & pensions providers.

>> that's me getting my wallet to add in an extra 50 quid a month into my pension because my life annuity will be worth less.

"Mobile Broadband plus" plan

I have the GBP25 / month tmobile "Mobile Broadband plus" plan that was originally designed for the little Huawei USB sticks (u220 and u170). It includes "downloading internet files and skype" and when used in a phone you can do VOIP. it comes with a FUP of 3Gb standard or 10Gb with some sort of booster package.

I checked with tmob yesterday and they are not changing the terms of this plan. Might be "upgrading" to get the little USB stick thing instead of a new phone.

there's a way to get around this

switch your plan to a "Mobile Broadband plus" and it will retain either 3Gb or 10Gb per month fair usage. I switched to this for my Huawei USB sticks used as backups in our Draytek Vigor routers and for one of the laptops.

This FUP is only for the phone plans but the Mobile Broadband plus plan still allows unlimited texting and voice calls. For me, it costs GBP25 per month but that's on month 21 of a 24 month deal so it may be cheaper for you.

truecrypt

hate to be a killjoy, but my Fedora linux install had a single check box "encrypt this partition" during installation - it has been through 3 major OS updates and a squidzillion minor updates without ever needing any maintenance.

boohoo. I feel like I'm missing out on something.

licensed for android market?

many of the cheapo android tablets don't have "android market" and so will be unable to get hold of all the apps. Does this one have access to android market?

Paris is used to seeing men with a 9 inch bulge in their pocket

hang on lads, I've got an idea

if only we could charity fund a boat, lets call it the "Ark Royal". It would be a shame to have it without some deck ornaments - so we'll throw in Sea Harriers and to make sure it doesn't get torpedo'd by an errant submarine then we'll need 9 or so Nimrods.

paypal only. can you imagine the fees on £40bn in donations?

android market?

not mentioned in the review is android market... has this tablet been officially sanctioned by google to run android market? many of the cheapo android tablets don't have it and are a bit useless.

same for audio CD sales

I seem to remember that the defence of "licenced, not owned" has been used in the UK by record companies attempting to prevent DVD and CD's from being sold second hand. However, I can't remember what the outcome was. anyone have a link?

Dell will drop it after the PR has died down

I'm typing this on my trusty Dell XPS M1330n (that came with Ubuntu). Now that the machine is 2 years old; I cannot find any replacement Dell laptops that don't come with "Dell recommends Windows..." Check out http://www.dell.co.uk/ubuntu and then click through to their "Linux laptops and Pc's" - all of them only have Windows 7 or XP for operating system choice including the Mini 10.

facebook makes intel a bit easy

you can't make this up, look at some of her facebook wall: if that's not a code then I've not being reading enough LeCarre thrillers.

"Anna Chapman The moon is amazing tonight in new york

29 April at 01:46 via Mobile Web"

I'm alright

because my cat's name is "y£^%$d3D*m)"

oh bugger.

done it before

I worked at the FT and WSJ (Dow Jones) newspapers when they tried online pricing models in the 90's. Both saw immense drops in readership. Both changed back to majority-free content.

Even though both papers were more niche than The Times, and both offered market data (which financial pro's are used to paying for) - there just wasn't enough volume of readership to make it work out.

I heard a scare story from another paper (not named) that spent millions for a paid content section only to have 30-odd people sign up.

WebOs is clever - but lots of faults outstanding for uk users

I've been using a Palm Pre for the last few months and whilst I love the smooth multi-tasking it fails in one extremely important area. It keeps dropping off the network into a well known "Phone Offline" mode because of some bug sync'ing email to the phone. quite how that affects voice calls I do not know.

The multiple OS updates have improved the system considerably but are so US-focussed that EU 3G/GSM users often find strange bugs. UK users don't have access to the paid-for apps so all you get are the often useless free "fart-apps". the folks who has WebOS-doctored their phones are finding massive problems when updates are sent out by o2.

However, on the other hand, it syncs with my kontact (linux) calendar which few other phones have!

k2 Bike did that in the 90's

@rainforestguppy: K2 Bike smartshock, a cpu controlled damping device using a piezo actuator to control damping rebound was on bikes in 1998!!! cannondale are only 12 years behind!

N series, remember them?

I bought some Dell XPS M1330N for my business - remember them? they were the Linux laptops? brilliant, even a a few years on, it works brilliantly with the latest Fedora 12.

ahhh, now I understand.

1. sell Dell systems with windows

2. let clueless users clog them up with rubbish

3. clueless (l)users equate computers with Austin Allegro's - "it's old, it is getting slower"

4. Dell sells cluless lusers new systems

5. profit!

not new

Heriot-Watt University did a project to photo every business premise like this in Scotland in 1993/1994. they used a modified transit van and encoded all the photos on huge dinner plate sized laser disks because they were the obvious future of storage.

ooops.