Catch them young...
Anyone who thinks Cruz would have been any better as a candidate than Trump, take a look at this. At least the comments (for the most part) will restore your faith in humanity.
Posts by Chris King
1153 publicly visible posts • joined 13 Feb 2009
Ex-HP boss Carly Fiorina sacked one week into new job
Facebook bungs 10-year-old kid $10k to not 'eliminate' Justin Bieber
Wednesday 4th May 2016 06:12 GMT
Re: 10 year old
13 years old, and that's down to COPPA.
Not that anyone seems to be enforcing it, if YouTube comments are anything to go by. (Obligatory XKCD)
F-35s failed 'scramble test' because of buggy software
Switch survives three hours of beer spray, fails after twelve
Friday 29th April 2016 22:19 GMT
Re: "Land that thing now, while I'm still in the mood to let you !"
"What happened next? Did he move them to the same room as equipment used by someone over your head, meaning you couldn't turn off those ports without having to answer to him/her why they couldn't make the weekend deadline because you cut him/her off just as the deadline was closing?"
He just whinged to his boss, who then tried to whinge at my division head.
Not that that did them any good - he just told them to stop being so bloody stupid and to call back on Monday morning.
Friday 29th April 2016 11:36 GMT
"Land that thing now, while I'm still in the mood to let you !"
"Turn it off, or in ten minutes I'll make it go off with my axe, or in half an hour the water will make it explode, I'll put the fire out, and it will still be off"
Some people just can't take a hint...
Network Technician: This machine is causing problems for your part of the campus, please disconnect it.
Network Manager: This machine is causing problems for your part of the campus, please disconnect it.
Me: You're messing up the network and you've ignored my colleagues. I'm pulling your plug.
Chummy decides he knows better than me, and moves the machine.
At this point, I had all the network ports in the room turned off.
He moved it next door, so I had all those ports turned off too.
Did I mention this was pub o'clock on a Friday ?
Linux greybeards release beta of systemd-free Debian fork
Friday 29th April 2016 13:03 GMT
From http://alien.slackbook.org/blog/pulseaudio-comes-to-slackware-current-beta/
Yes, some people will be opiniated. We invited the Devil into our house and stuff. Well, PulseAudio is not maintained by Lennart anymore, and saner people took the helm. We expect no big mess as a result, just a learning curve to understand the new sound configuration. And truthfully, we were left no choice. The alternative would have been to say bye-bye to bluetooth in Slackware because already, major pieces of software are dropping or preparing to drop support the old and incompatible BlueZ 4.x API.
Note: Slackware is NOT going to add systemd. It’s too controversial and there is no need. Your sleep will be sound now.
Quad-core coffee table trumped by dual-Mac garden furniture
Your mother has a smooth forehead, Klingon language lovers roar at Paramount
Friday 29th April 2016 11:52 GMT
Re: Axanar looked awesome
"Several other fan produced not-for-profit productions have been made and paramount seems to be OK with them so long as nobody profits from it".
The "Star Wreck" series was a good example. Paramount were pretty cool about the whole thing, even the commercially-distributed "Imperial Edition" (the P-Fleet ships were redesigned in that one to give them a more "Soviet" look).
Friday 29th April 2016 11:45 GMT
"Normally I'd agree, but CBS have generally been pretty good with regard to fan-stuff, and the Axanar crew were really taking the piss"
After I pledged to Adam Nimoy's "For the Love of Spock", the Axanar mob spammed me asking for a pledge too. They got nothing from me, other than an e-mail along the lines of "sharing mailing lists like this is NOT cool".
F-35's dodgy software in the spotlight again
Tuesday 26th April 2016 10:23 GMT
Re: Just trust US. We've been flying by the seat of our pants for a long time
"There is a reason the F-22 is not being exported to anyone (not even close allies like Australia). It is the pinnacle of combat jets (and with a price tag to match)."
That, and the fact they stopped manufacturing them almost four years ago.
Pro who killed Apple's Power Mac found... masquerading as a coffee table
Friday 22nd April 2016 16:08 GMT
Re: I have
My boss in a previous job kept a Hollerith punch around as a conversation piece, and yes, I used punch cards as bookmarks too. I think they even kept the little knives (for cleaning out chads and pulling out damaged cards) as letter-openers.
I even threatened one bad user with the Hollerith, yelling "If I had my way, THIS would be the nearest you'd get to a computer for the rest of your course !"
Come get your free Opera VPN (and bring along something to read)
Thursday 21st April 2016 20:04 GMT
King's Law of Free Stuff on the Internet
Build a free service, and some bastard will come along and abuse it in ways you've never thought of.
"I know ! Let's build a VPN so people can surf the web in privacy !" is almost invariably followed by "Where the hell did all this Netflix traffic come from ?", "Why is our VPN server taking such an interest in all of those military sites ?" and "Why are our proxy caches turning into a mirror of XHamster ?"
Admin fishes dirty office chat from mistyped-email bin and then ...?
Friday 15th April 2016 16:14 GMT
Re: How stunningly boring
Where's the option to "Blackmail both parties for money and sex, then frame each for the other's murder and watch from the public gallery as they get sent down" ? Now that's an option.
If they've murdered each other, how can they be sent down ? It's like asking where you bury survivors.
Friday 15th April 2016 13:53 GMT
I've been called FAR worse things over the years by users.
I would have taken chummy aside and "had words", maybe go as far as a scare-the-bugger-half-to-death, but dobbing him in like that ? That's just cold.
Anyway, I have room to talk about bad behaviour on placements - I was blind drunk by 10am on the day I was supposed to meet my placement supervisor for the first time. Okay, it was my 21st birthday, and yes, THAT was my "present" !
Friday 15th April 2016 08:52 GMT
Catch-alls are a bad idea...
Catch-all addresses attract spam, and you're either going to get fried for snooping, or fried for passing mail on to the wrong address. Even if you survive a potential frying, you've made an open-ended commitment to sorting out typos for users who won't bother to check where they're sending stuff.
They are useful as diagnostic tools though, especially when rogue users start setting up shadow IT systems and misconfigure them... Yeah yeah, this is an ancient example, so shoot me...
Me: Please shut down your Netscape Collabra server, your "intranet" is not officially sanctioned and is insecure.
Him: This matter does not concern you.
Me: Security of the campus network IS my concern. It's actually part of MY job.
Him: I still don't see why it's any of your business.
Me: Do you admit that you are running an unauthorised server on personal equipment ?
Him: I refuse to incriminate myself.
At this point, I hold up a print-out of a bounced e-mail from the offending machine, because he cocked up the configuration.
Me: Are... You... Run-ning... A... Net-scape... Coll-ab-ra... Ser-ver ?
It's a bit like that scene from Red Dwarf where Captain Hollister asks Lister about Frankenstein, but I was determined that this guy and the intranet weren't going to have a baby intranet.
Embattled 123-reg flings six months' free hosting at angry customers
Thursday 21st April 2016 14:34 GMT 
Dear 123-reg, that loud BANG! you just heard...
...was another bunch of customers passing the sound barrier to get away from you as fast as possible.
If I had been a customer affected by this cock-up, I wouldn't be wringing my hands and whining about compensation, I'd be looking for someone more competent and moving everything away at the first opportunity.
Six months of FREE!!! crap is still six months of crap, and probably comes with strings attached. No thank you.
Academic network Janet clobbered with DDoS attacks – again
Wednesday 20th April 2016 17:20 GMT
Re: Valid excuse?
"They didn't accept excuses like it in your day and many do not do so today.
If your dog ate your homework, show us the dog vomit as proof.
And that's just the departmental administrators - the profs want something more conclusive !
Every year, the ikkle firsties think they're so original with their excuses, failing to realise the people they're trying to hoodwink probably tried them thirty years ago, on staff who tried to use them thirty years before and so on back to the dawn of humanity...
"Wolf ate Ug's stone tablet !"
"Ug better go look for constipated wolf and get it back then !"
(The departmental admins were probably allowed to carry clubs and spears back then too)
Monday 18th April 2016 23:50 GMT
Re: Valid excuse?
Even in the 90's, some JANET sites still only had 2Mbit/sec or 8Mbit/sec MegaStream lines for the entire site. Hell, I worked on one site that had a 64Kbit/sec link to the Uni across the road, and that was one of the last X25 sites on JANET - beer icon, for being reminded about Camtec PADs and other X25 kit.
Ad slinger Phorm ceases trading
Thursday 14th April 2016 13:31 GMT
Don't crack open the champagne too soon...
The company may be gone, but that doesn't necessarily mean the tech is gone.
The brains that helped create it still exist, and they could re-create it in a new way elsewhere.
And you can also bet that somebody has copies of the source code safetly stashed away.
Phorm is not dead - the stupidity merely sleeps.
Bundling ZFS and Linux is impossible says Richard Stallman
Tuesday 12th April 2016 16:27 GMT
Re: Ubuntu's legal advice process
If you're squishing lawyers to get a "favourable opinion", you're doing it wrong. (Squish 'em for fun !)
It's more likely to be...
Canonical: Can we bundle ZFS without breaching any licences?
Lawyer 1: No sir, that would be impossible.
*rustling of large amounts of used banknotes*
Lawyer 1: It would appear at first glance to be impossible, but further research is required.
That naked picture on my PC? Not mine. The IT guy put it there
Saturday 9th April 2016 17:55 GMT
Oh, did the cleaner block your toilet as well ?
The guy with the thing about older ladies and doggies who loved each other very much (mentioned earlier in this thread) wasn't the only Friend of Humanity I had to deal with in that job...
Another bad-tempered specimen did the queue-jump thing and was sent packing, just as the head of the Estates Division walked in.
"He's been annoying you as well, Chris ?"
"Nothing I can't handle. What did he do to you then ?"
"Seems he's blocked his toilet, and threw his toys out of the pram because we wouldn't send someone out that instant".
"So you're going to make him live with it for a while then ?"
"Oh yes, the lawns need tending to, that's a higher priority right now".
"But it's the middle of winter and there's several inches of snow on the ground !"
"True, but you can never start too early with lawns - toodle-pip !"
Moral of the story: Pissing off the IT folks is one thing, but never EVER piss off the people who fix your plumbing. Not being able to flush sucks a whole lot more than not being able to print.
Friday 8th April 2016 13:30 GMT
Re: When I was in a similar position...
Back when I had to man the front desk, students knew that jumping the queue was a Very Bad Idea.
One guy didn't, and he barged past ten other students queueing up patiently in front of him. Strike One.
He then started talking down at me like I was stupid. Strike Two.
That didn't get him what he wanted, so he started screaming insults at me. Strike Three, you're out !
"Right then, let's see why your account is suspended..."
<clicky clicky clicky> DING DING DING WE HAVE A WINNER !
He was still screaming abuse at this point, so I decided it was time to shut this loon up. I raised my voice from "Normal" to "Everyone In The Building Will Hear Me"...
"YOU ARE MASSIVELY OVER QUOTA AND YOUR ACCOUNT IS FULL OF JPG FILES WITH PORN-RELATED NAMES LIKE DOG-SCREWS-MILF-001.JPG. QUITE A CATALOGUE OF IT YOU'VE GOT THERE, SON !"
Did I mention that all of the other students in the queue were female ? If looks could kill, he wouldn't just be dead, he would have been a rapidly expanding cloud of greasy particles.
Chummy suddenly lost his composure, and I suspected that bladder/bowel control were about to go too, so I let him beat a hasty retreat - hey, I didn't want him soiling the carpets !
"Next please !"
Field technicians want to grab my tool and probe my things
GCHQ is having problems meeting Osborne's 2020 recruitment target
Saturday 9th April 2016 09:34 GMT
Re: Obvious Motivational
"They sound like a great idea in theory, but in practice, totally annoying and tiring to constantly look at".
Then you discover the art of demotivational posters and start making your own.
BOFH: Sure, I could make your cheapo printer perform miracles
Friday 8th April 2016 22:25 GMT
Re: If anyone knows of any recommended method
Ever had users substitute their own paper without considering if it's even suitable ?
Someone once managed to take a DEClaser "tank" (LPS17) out of commission with some "recycled" paper. I suspect it was recycled hemp, rather than actual paper. Poor bloody printer was completely jammed up with what looked like little flakes of paper towel, and it almost caught fire.
She told me she was trying to save the Earth by not using the nasty bleached stuff we normally used.
I told her she was getting the bill for the engineer call-out and parts.
Friday 8th April 2016 22:17 GMT
Re: PAs - heh
In a previous job, one user decided to print off some early-morning porn in the labs, and discovered to his horror that the printer was empty.
My boss turned up early, noticed the lack of paper and helpfully re-loaded the trays.
Fifty pages of Playboy pix were duly confiscated, and the user came in to demand a refund on his charged printing. The boss-man sent him away without his refund or his print-outs, just some sage advice:
"Why not just go and buy a magazine from the newsagents ? I hear they're in colour these days !"
Friday 8th April 2016 22:00 GMT
Re: 30 printers
That's assuming that
(a) Stuff gets PAT tested before going out to users (who invariably order stuff just after the PAT tester has done his annual rounds), and
(b) You don't have been counters that issue asset tags months after kit actually goes into service.
The record for (b) is "the tags finally arrived the day after I pulled the servers out of the rack to scrap them".
Nest bricks Revolv home automation hubs, because evolution
Thursday 7th April 2016 16:47 GMT
Re: Hard lesson
Oh, and when an online company offers you a "lifetime guarantee", they mean the lifetime of the company - not your lifetime.
Not even that - they mean the lifetime of the product manager's interest in the project, or that of the beancounters.
Even if you can touch something, that means nothing if it relies on software hosted elsewhere.
Google reveals own security regime policy trusts no network, anywhere, ever
Wednesday 6th April 2016 17:06 GMT
"We have a firewall, we are secure."
Ever had a PHB actually declare something like that to the local press ? I have.
We got ripped to shreds by a worm that someone downloaded with some random screensaver, and I was on holiday when I saw that news article.
They could probably hear me face-palming from 200 miles away, let alone see the flash and the mushroom cloud from the resulting F-bomb.
Wanna be a DevOps expert? You’ll have to be a Red Hat expert first…
French mobe repair shop chaps trash customer's phone
Monday 4th April 2016 18:10 GMT
Re: Doh
They could qualify for a "Special Mention" - they didn't remove themselves from the gene pool, but they've probably committed career suicide.
Being dicks toward the customer and busting their phone is bad enough, but being so monumentally fuckwitted as to post it on the internet is, what can I say... "Special" ?
If I had a pound for every loon who over-exposed themselves on social media and said "I only thought my mates could see it", I wouldn't need to bother with the Lottery.
Monday 4th April 2016 15:46 GMT
Re: Customer Service
Back when they were part of Hutchison, Orange were very good. Think about Line 2, HSCSD (and the Demon Orange ROMP), Wildfire and all the other technical innovations they made available for customers.
Then France Telecom bought them out, and what did we get ? "Simplification" (read: Less Choice, More Money Please), overseas call centres and all the cool stuff got scrapped - but hey, we got free pizzas and cinema tickets. Yay for mediocrity !
Monday 4th April 2016 13:00 GMT
Re: Customer Service
Orange (UK) were no better in that respect. After being hit with a £200+ data bill due to their incompetence on a tariff change, they repeatedly promised that a manager would call me back (never happened), they repeatedly promised to re-calculate my bill (never happened) and assured me that my complaints were being noted on my account (can you see a pattern forming here ?). They even refused to sign for a recorded delivery letter of complaint I sent to the Executive Office ! I eventually got my money back, but I had to fight for it.
How do you build a cheap iPhone? Use a lot of old parts
Mud sticks: Microsoft, Windows 10 and reputational damage
Friday 25th March 2016 09:46 GMT
"Microsoft gets the opportunity to reboot its reputation with Redstone in the summer – that's the codename for its next overhaul of Windows 10"
The sad thing is that there's quite a reasonable system under there, it's all the other crap they've foisted on it that gives it such a bad rep:
Forced downloads - not everybody has a fast line or unlimited bandwidth ;
Forced installs - changing the way the machine works under the users and breaking old apps is a support nightmare ;
Telemetry - I don't want my systems "phoning home" unless I permit them to do so, say to report a crash or checking for updates ;
Adverts - those little ads in Solitaire and on the Start Menu ? Thin end of the wedge. MY computer is NOT your billboard. I paid for it, you didn't ;
"Mystery Meat" updates - I want to know what those updates do and what they're likely to change, so if something breaks I don't have to risk killing my machine by pulling random updates until things work again ;
No control over update scheduling - if you foist updates on me during the working day, my bandwidth is eye-wateringly expensive. I'll take updates to stay secure and fix things, but I'll take them at MY convenience, thank you very much ;
Random settings changes - if you want to change a setting, at least let me know what you're wanting to change and why, and give me the option to veto it. I may have that setting set for a specific reason, so please stop trying to tell me what you think is best for me ;
Dumbed-down error reporting - sure, make it simple for the folks who need to know something is broken, but I need to know what is broken and where.
Don't even get me started on the UI, the nurse says it's time for my medication and it never goes down easily when I've been foaming at the mouth...
True believers mind-meld FreeBSD with Ubuntu to burn systemd
Tuesday 22nd March 2016 22:48 GMT
Re: Haters gonna hate
"The Slackers seem a pragmatic bunch and I am not aware that they have ruled out systemd in a possible future release as a result of dependencies on the systemd suite"
I haven't seen anything concrete on this, but the general consensus seems to be "we'll see how it goes, but we don't feel the need to implement it right now".
It's definitely not in -current, and 14.2 went to first release candidate last week. They recently implemented PulseAudio, so Pat V isn't exactly sitting in a darkened room with a wax doll of Lennart and a big box of pins.
Computers shouldn't smoke. Cigarettes aren't healthy for anyone
Thursday 24th March 2016 09:09 GMT
Not just nicotine-tar dust bunnies...
I was once called out to deal with a machine that had gone kaput. The prof in question was a chain-smoker, and his office had yellowed walls.
I knew the machine was a goner before I even opened it. Beige tinge to the case and keyboard, and it was sitting on a layer of cigarette ash. Opening it up, I found that all the fans were totally gunked up and wouldn't move, so it looked like the CPU had cooked itself.
"This is beyond economic repair. All I can do is transfer the data from the hard drive once your department replaces the machine".
Biting the hand that feeds IT
