* Posts by M Gale

3500 publicly visible posts • joined 22 Apr 2007

Sony KD-84X9005 84in ultra-HD TV review

M Gale

Re: No need for the average consumer

Same idiots that insist on valves sounding "better", I warrant.

Now a good valve amp can sound okay, but really, for hi fi just give me some nice fat MOSFETs. Keep the valves in the guitar amps where the fuzz and distortion makes it more awesome, and a 30 second warm-up before the gig starts is acceptable.

And give me 60fps cinema.

Brain boffins: 'Yes, math CAN make your head hurt – LITERALLY'

M Gale

..and whoever voted that post down had better have a PHd in the subject and be prepared to explain themselves.

Red buttons mean nothing. You know, zero. That's a number, that tends to be used when you want to express "nothing". Zilch, nada, nowt. Not a sausage.

See?

M Gale

"The problem about maths is the numbers get in the way."

Seriously, words spoken by a pretty fearsome mathematician I know. I know what they mean too.. maths is about patterns. The numbers are simply how it's expressed.

Free Android apps often secretly make calls, use the camera

M Gale

Re: Fix the real issue

Like the checkbox in Android under "Security" that states "allow installation of apps from unknown sources". Smae one that puts up a big scary warning about damage to your tablet if you check it. Or perhaps the one under "Developer Options" that states "Debug mode when USB is connected". Same one that puts up an equally scary warning about installing apps without notification and reading log data.. after you've gone through the "are you sure you want to fuck around with developer options" warning.

...which apparently isn't enough for some people who would rather pay $99 for the "privilege".

M Gale

Re: Tumbleweed...

Of course they do, but not in money.

What can I say? Sergey's a bit of alright. Got an A0 poster of him topless pinned to the ceiling above my bed.

Purr.

See you soon, love.

M Gale

Re: LBE Privacy Guard.

Unfortunately that requires a rooted device. Useless for anybody outside of Reg readers and other techies, and to be honest I'm not too fond of the idea myself. I like having a warranty.

Selective permission denial needs to be baked into the official build. Preferably with a popup for when a newly installed app first tries to use whatever part of the system that requires permission.

M Gale

Re: How to Fix It

"or some souped-up 6502-descendant"

You know how ARM was invented?

"Acorn's aim at that time was to produce personal computers which met the needs of the business community by providing office automation facilities. Clearly, more power was needed than was offered by the 6502. In the fine tradition of the computer hobbyist, the design team decided to develop their own processor, which would provide an environment with some similarities to the familiar 6502 instruction set but lead Acorn and its products directly into the world of 32-bit computing."

(http://www.ot1.com/arm/armchap1.html)

M Gale

Re: Tumbleweed...

Hi.

Microsoft are fucking shit, and you're wrong. Try reading the posts.

M Gale

So how do you differentiate...

...between "making a phone call" and "making a phone call"?

Personally I think the only thing that needs to change is Google to finally see sense and allow post-install denial of permissions. Including on the bundled bloatware.

Facebook trial: Tell everyone where you are, have a Wi-Fi peanut

M Gale

Any way you could check in with a completely spoofed location?

Just wondering.

Lab mice drown in their THOUSANDS as Hurricane Sandy fills NYU basement

M Gale

Re: Backups? Aren't they baseball players or something?

Forget the mice. What about the rats?

I still remember us looking after someone's dog, and at the same time a rat found its way in through the back door. The dog had spent its entire life being trained as a rodenticidal maniac. Holy shit, I've never seen something so small jump so high. In human terms, it was like doing a Fosberry Flop over your house and clearing the roof by ten feet.

I don't think six inches would really do much.

Microsoft opens Windows Phone 8 dev kit to world+dog

M Gale

Re: $8 (eight) for the introductory offer.

It is about protecting the device from the users.

Unless they pony up $99, in which case it's entirely unprotected. That doesn't protect anything from anybody, but it is a tax on ownership.

I understand your post. You're just highly wrong, and you're assuming by "developers" I mean "big software house that pays developers" and not "a guy who wants to make an app". To the former, $99 probably is toilet paper. To the latter, $99 is a month's travel budget.

M Gale

Re: $8 (eight) for the introductory offer.

So.. you have a tickbox, like Android. USB debugging disabled until the user specifically asks for it. No sideloading or alternative sources until the user specifically asks for it. Don't forget this is $99 plus the fee to get onto Microsoft's app store, which seems to have its own rather ironic restrictions on shoddy code.

As to $99 being incidental, we're not all EA.

M Gale

Re: Not so difficult to port games to Windows Phone 8

Yeah.

Anybody ever bothered looking at the cost involved in buying the full Unity3D, the full Autodesk creative suite, MS visual studio, a proper version of Windows 8 and all the other various things that people think you have to have to develop software?

Might as well just buy a house, sit on it for 6 months and re-sell it. You'll make more money and it'll probably be a lower outlay, and definitely less risk.

M Gale

Re: $8 (eight) for the introductory offer.

"MS are not going to buy your development hardware for you."

Since when is having to pay $99 to use your own device translate to Microsoft buying my hardware for me?

"Really, it's pretty much necessary that there be some barrier such as a fee, to stop anything being installed on a device by anyone otherwise the whole security model collapses."

Really? I would think just a simple username/password attached to an admin account would work. That or just not lending your device to all and sundry. Don't make excuses for Microsoft trying to monetize the shit out of everything. A fee is entirely unnecessary to allow someone to do what they want with what they own.

M Gale

You can develop for a laptop on the laptop you're developing for, and no need to pay a tax to a price-gouging vendor with a history of lock-in.

Oh, wait.

Come on Microsoft, Apple. Catch up, won't you?

M Gale

Re: $8 (eight) for the introductory offer.

They would be stupid not to put a phone emulator in their IDE.

However, how is a 32" not-touch monitor going to emulate multi-touch? Or non-mocked GPS? Accelerometers? Gyroes? Cameras? Any of the myriad extra bits of hardware on a real phone or tablet?

That and emulators have a tendency to run like frozen pigshit uphill in Winter compared with the real hardware. If you want to see how your app will really run, you really need a really real device. Really Microsoft, are you so stingy as to charge $99 to give someone the ability to do what they want with what they own? How much does it cost to give out an unlock key? About 0.000000001p for the cost of the electricity to run the server? Why do you even need to dev-lock the device in the first place?

Oh yes. Copying Apple.

M Gale

Re: $8 (eight) for the introductory offer.

$99, apparently.

There's a very limited, crippled unlock for $9.

M Gale

Re: developer tools for android suck

Or buy AIDE Premium and develop your app on the same device you're deploying it to. £7.99 in the old empire money, which is not bad for a full IDE with Dropbox and Git integration that can take your eclipse project files and import them directly. There's a free version for you to play about with to see if you like it, too.

Inside the iPad mini: Pray you never have to open one

M Gale

Re: Where is the GPS chip again?

You've got to have turned directions on at least once for the giggle factor, surely?

"In 500 yards, tuIn 1 mile, tuYou have reached your destination!"

Wonder if bitching betty could keep up with flying speeds?

M Gale

Re: Nope...

Downvoted? Really?

Has Mr Red Button Fetish actually owned the old Tab 7, or any iteration of the DS?

Stereo. Small distance between speakers. Works. Has separation. Fuxache.

M Gale

Re: Nope...

Yes. For example, the original Galaxy Tab, and the Nintendo *DS consoles.

M Gale

What...

...just to check the sparkplugs?

U crazy bro?

M Gale

Re: Nice try with the Chinese but ...

Yeah, ends up coming back as "Ino longer tolerate, I do not intend to put it." The joys of translation!

UK iPad Mini FRENZY: Queues stretch SEVERAL FEET from till

M Gale

It's not as if Apple have been shouting about the coming of the new Messiah like they have with their other launches.

Besides, the Nexus 7 is just better, in every way. People who want a seven incher have probably already got that or a Tab.

Asus: we ship a million Google's Nexus 7s monthly

M Gale

Re: I want a really high resolution display for reading

I'll give you an experiment:

Render an image at 10Kx10K.

Render the same image at 100x100.

Now scale the 10Kx10K image down to 100x100.

In most cases, the scaled image will look nicer.

You know how FSAA works right? A simple version of 8x FSAA basically goes "render the image 8x larger than it should be, then use intelligent sampling/scaling algorithms to fit it to the screen".

It's why FSAA eats the shit out of your GPU, but it's worth turning on if you can render at a good frame rate. As to whether you'll be buying 2K or 4K movies, well it depends on whether there is anything else. Especially if it's the same price and doesn't come with extra-odious DRM, you'd be a fool not to.

M Gale

Re: Isn't it ironic?

Don't you mean the comments section of a Nexus 7 article got hijacked by a few sour Apples, and the rest of us are too busy laughing to pour on any real amount of hate?

Really, if you don't care for Android, just ignore it and the gazillions of manufacturers that produce devices running it, please. Care for what you like and use and buy.. or come on here and and say how your Ferrari is so much better than my Fiesta, or something. I really can stand lots more.

M Gale

Re: I want a really high resolution display for reading

Sub-pixel accuracy. Well, sub-cone-and-rod accuracy anyway.

That's why.

Really, if the tech is going that way anyway, then whyever not use it? Games, especially polygon-based, will use whatever resolution you throw at them and are not limited by the resolution the video was recorded at. Plus give it a couple of years and you'll be downloading 2K and 4K movies, you mark my words.

M Gale

Re: @AC 12:42

you're right... you'd have to pay me a lot more to be seen in a BMW than a Fiesta.

Upvoted. Not because I hate BMWs. I think their addiction to rear wheel drive is lots of fun.

However that was an awesome one-liner.

M Gale

Re: @AC 12:42

And then you show them a decent Droidslab, one of the Nexus devices or something by Asus, and suddenly it swings the argument again.

There was a company in the 80s and 90s. Amstrad. They sold on the principle of "stack it high, sell it cheap", and did more to put a computer into people's homes than any amount of price gouging by Microsoft or Apple. This is the same thing, but 30 years later. Trying to say "well I have a Ferrari and you have an icky little 1.1L A-reg Ford Fezzbomb" is just elitism, and sounds maybe a little bit like sour grapes. I know people who have more fun in their Fiesta than you'll ever have in your delicate little Precious. That's probably what hurts the most, isn't it?

Also https://wiki.goonfleet.com/images/Dinc-noammo-ruinyourlife.jpg - just because.

Fans' loyalty questioned as iPhone popularity plummets

M Gale

Re: Plus, Apple are very busy alienating developers...

It was just a quick 30 second back-of-a-<textarea> sketch. I know it's a little more complex than that, but for particularly games that run full-screen and don't use the built-in UI widgets, it's not much more complex. The idea is that you never use px values. Use an arbitrary unit of your own definition (let's say millimetres, em-spaces, linguines or dragonlengths) and then define how many pixels that means later, when you can get the current device's screen height and width.

As for stuff that uses the UI widgets, well I think someone already mentioned Apple having a smart re-flow tool. As for Android, the page at http://developer.android.com/guide/practices/screens_support.html shows this is a done deal and something that's quite comprehensively explained. Basically the answer to how you support many screen sizes is "you don't have to, it scales itself, but here's some methods to make it look even nicer."

Also hm, this thing has stopped understanding hypertext. <i>Well foo.</i>

M Gale

Re: Plus, Apple are very busy alienating developers...

screenWidth = whateverHandler.screenWidth

screenHeight = whateverHandler.screenHeight

unitWidth = arbitrary_number

unitHeight = arbitrary_number

scaleWidth = screenWidth / unitWidth

scaleHeight = screenHeight / unitHeight

function coordScale(xPos, yPos){

return [xPos * scaleWidth, yPos * scaleHeight]

}

No I'm not a phone developer, but is the above pseudocode really that hard?

Mozilla: Windows 7 browser bungle cost us nine MILLION downloads

M Gale

Re: So without free advertising, FireFox can't get downloads?

Fortunately you can completely avoid Apple products and continue to use your computer, the Internet and smartphones in general quite nicely. Android has somewhat seen to that.

Now try doing anything on a PC without Windows. Ever noticed how so many computer-related learning courses are not so much "how to use computers" as "how to use Microsoft software"?

As I have already said here, does nobody remember what happened when Microsoft had a near-100% monopoly on web browsers? That's why they have been legally forced to provide the choice. Apple didn't try to own the entire Internet, even if they do sorely want to be Microsoft.

If the iThings ever got as widespread as IE did, and if Apple ever used that to try and dictate how the Internet works, then you watch the court orders come thick and fast. A little like the slap they just got for that non-apology.

M Gale

Re: Maybe I'm cynical, but...

You do remember when IE had 90-odd percent share of browsers due to the tactic, and Microsoft started trying to use that to pwn Web standards?

Yeah. Browser ballot screen is not bullshit, even if you don't understand the need for it.

Android games console jumps to Jelly Bean for penultimate test phase

M Gale

I definitely hope not. It looks like a nice piece of kit, and it'd be a shame to cripple it like that.

Mind you, I don't buy most PC games due to them being crippled with DRM either. You want my money? Make sure I own what I buy. I don't do rental-disguised-as-purchase, thanks.

M Gale

Was reading about this before on its Kickstarter page. It looked interesting up until the "games must be free to play" bit.

No ta. I'd rather pay for a game and own it than have a "free to play, pay to win and be bombarded with spyware throughout" version.

SMARTPHONES make TEENS have SEX with STRANGERS

M Gale

HIV covered by insurance

I'm sure that as you lay in the hospital bed, the retroviral drugs failing to make the common cold stop killing you slowly and painfully, you'll be glad that at least the insurance is paying for it.

M Gale

Correlation does not imply causation...

...however it does waggle its eyebrows and wiggle its hips while cooing suggestively "lookie, over here!"

M Gale

Re: Aha!

" I confiscated the pupils that had better phones than me!"

Now then now then.

One million Facebook users' names and email addresses: $5

M Gale

Re: This Facebook thing is getting way too much attention.

"Back in the 80s, almost every rich geek or geeky kid with rich parents subscribed to some sort of BBS."

Fixed it for you. Anyway, "ISPs" weren't really around in the 80s. Neither was the Internet as we know it today.

M Gale

Re: ...third-party developer....

Really, don't go there. The "west" might not be perfect, but compared to a fuckload of other places it's a goddamned paradise.

M Gale

How much more useful is Facebook compared to, say, a CC/BCC email list?

Then you own your own damned contact list. Hardly an inconvenience. "Ohai, I want to send this mail to..." *click each user name or select groups/all*

I'm pretty sure people used to use these things called "email clients" that did something surprisingly similar to this at one point, before Facebonk decided to get a whole load of suckers (Zuck's words, not mine) signed up.

New York tech firms form 'bucket brigade' to fuel flagging servers

M Gale

Re: Harder to ignite...

Diesel can be burned like wax. Dip something porous and somewhat flammable in it (like a rag, paper, whatever), and burn that. In fact I've seen candles that use diesel instead of wax, with the wick on a floating thing atop a pool of the stuff. Cheaper than lamp oil, I guess.

Nobody knows what to call Microsoft's ex-Metro UI

M Gale

Re: Only one accurate name

Bidsum.

UK's Intellectual Property Obliteration office attacked by Parliament

M Gale

Re: Rights don't exist in isolation

"Namely that if you copy, you have a duty to publish everything."

Uhm, no you don't. I have copies of GPL software here that I'm not distributing. You should try reading the GPL some time.

As for "publish all work using it".. depends on what you mean. I don't see many of the commercial developers (yes they do exist) being forced to give their stuff away for free just because they made a Linux version.

Now if you're on about making your own Linux, taking the hard work of thousands of others who have given their work to the community, locking it up behind a pretty veneer and a layer of proprietary binaries.. no, no you can't do that. And quite right too.

California begins crackdown on mobile app developers

M Gale

"You could stick a paragraph in there about users having to sacrifice their first-born to a graven image of Baal and virtually no-one would notice."

Pretty sure something similar to this has already been done to highlight how stupid EULAs are.

In fact, here it is.

Ballmer claims Win 8 sales strong, WinPhone to follow

M Gale
M Gale

Re: I call FAIL

"Win 8 OS looks too much like a damn Android screen."

You sure?

Positive about that?

Or as Jim Carey might say...

REE HEEE HEE HEEEEEEEEALLY?

Sorry, I call shenanigans.