Posts by Jerome 0 551 publicly visible posts • joined 10 Jun 2009
I'm not talking about the extra scripting that's needed for each level or for different multi-player game modes, I'm talking about the engine itself. That's not paged - it just wouldn't be practical. Besides, even if it was, that hardly invalidates my point that the judge was using bizarre excuses to justify his reasoning when far more sensible excuses exist.
Only a portion of the work is copied into RAM at any time, so the judge had to dream up some bizarre argument about "drawings" and "pausing the game"?
Did no-one point out that the binary code of the game itself (i.e. the "computer program" that the console is running) is loaded in its entirety when the game is started? Are we to believe that computer programs may not be copyrighted, but only any images and sounds that happen to come with them?
I know our judiciary is hardly renowned for its knowledge of technical matters, but you'd think this might have occurred to the prosecution or their technical advisers at some point.
@ James 5 - your friend left the house, and that was the moment the installer chose to turn up. That's known as Sod's Law, and it's hardly under the control of Sky. Rupert Murdoch may be a sod (probably the nicest thing he's been called in a good few years), but it's not his own personal law.
Also, @ andy gibson - wow, someone else actually remembers Wild Palms! Every time I mention it to a friend, they always look at me as if I dreamt it. You're not any relation to William Gibson, are you? I figured maybe you were only watching it to catch your brother's cameo.
"We will jolly well get there, and we will jolly well knock them for six finally."
It's encouraging to know that a realistic approach to the problem is being taken by those in charge. I look forward to the day when the scourge of terrorism has been eradicated once and for all from the face of the internet, and we can all sleep easy in our beds.
Isn't that kinda like having a rusty old banger that you really want to get rid of, but since no-one will buy it you just sell your house, your other decent car, and everything else that you own? At the end of the day, won't Motorola just be left with the very thing they wanted to be shot of, and very little else?
"a quintillion bytes of storage"
Or, to put it in terms that might mean something to somebody, that's a million terabytes, or 100,000 Libraries of Congress (is that an official Reg measurement? I couldn't find the guide to check...)
Also, @ Dave 160 - I don't think Google care much that you get your search results one hundredth of a second quicker, but I think they'll be pretty pleased if they can serve both your search results and the huge amount of streaming data from sites like YouTube in a more efficient manner.
This looks like a rather cool product, but a touch on the pricey side. If it's only traditional remote-control functionality that you need, you can get a universal infra-red receiver very cheaply. This has the advantage that you can use an IR remote of your choice to control the PC.
The unit I own is called an Irman, though they don't seem to be around any more - one equivalent product is a PCIR. It's apparently easy to build your own too, though this is beyond my (non-existent) skills with a soldering iron.
Obviously this is sod-all use for web browsing from the sofa, but I'd want a full wireless keyboard and trackpad for that anyway. For control of audio and video a traditional remote is my preferred option.
If your XP box is taking five minutes to start up, you don't need an SSD, you need a Windows re-install. You must have some serious cruft installed. Even with a 3 year old installation of XP on a bog-standard SATA hard drive, I get a start-up time in the region of 1:30. I wonder if that means it'll boot in 20 seconds when I get around to buying an SSD?
Much though I love the Murdoch-slapdown aspect of the article, I'm still eagerly awaiting details of how these anti-Facebook stories "could lead to yet more government intervention directing how individuals are allowed to interact with the internet", as mentioned in the first paragraph.
Unless the quote from Andrea Hall alone is sufficient evidence of impending changes to legislation (which wouldn't surprise me a great deal these days, it has to be said) a few more details would be much appreciated.
'CIA spokesman George Little insisted the music was employed for "security" and "not for punitive purposes"'
Ah well, that explains it. Security music. Why didn't they just say so in the first place? I expect it was used to keep the guard rabbits happy while the candy-cane fence was repaired.
"IFixit’s teardown discovered that there isn’t actually any magic to the Magic Mouse."
Were they expecting to find a miniature wand powering the device? A ring of power or two perhaps? I'm deeply disappointed in Apple for such a misleading naming convention. Next you'll be telling me that the iPod doesn't contain any peas.
Whilst there's no excuse for not including an accelerometer on a phone these days, it's worth noting that we used to manage to change orientation on our devices using a clever invention known as a "button". If HTC were determined to leave out the accelerometer, there's no reason they couldn't have still included the (utterly essential) landscape view for keyboard and web browsing.
Providing you forgive the guy for his somewhat brash method of delivering his point - which is surely somewhat of a liability in his profession - he's talking a lot of sense. If you don't believe in the great sky fairy, why on earth would you invite one of his minions to watch your loved one being incinerated?
"an obvious decision to make: this or the iPhone. No other touchscreen smartphone is even in the running"
Why's that then? It seems to be a commonly expressed opinion. It's almost like there was a secret meeting to decide that the Pre was the iPhone killer, and no other phone would be invested with this title, lest the phone-buying public was too confused.
What about the HTC Touch HD, or the Hero? The Samsung Omnia HD? The Nokia N97? None of these are perfect by any means, but they all have some advantages over the iPhone, and plenty of advantages over the Pre. What makes the Pre so special?
$60 for an individual / developer license? The only way to generate excitement about these things is to let people play with them for free, even if you have to operate an invite system to start out with.
Once ten thousand excited developers have had a root around in the system, fixed up all of your bugs, and put together a handful of potentially useful / fun apps, that's when people start to notice your API and wonder if they should be paying you shedloads for it.
"unless Nokia suddenly embedded Qi technology into hundreds of handset models wireless charging will remain cool-but-pointless and expensive, unless Apple decides to get involved of course"
...at which point the technology would become vastly cooler, equally pointless, and more expensive than ever.
The important difference, which the Facefook spokesdroid so blithely glossed over, is that I happily allow an application running on my desktop to access Gmail via POP3. They are talking about allowing an application running on the servers of an unknown (to me) third party to access the entirety of my inbox.
These are two such very different things that to compare them is entirely disingenuous.
The untrustworthy domains are determined exactly the same way the advertising domains are determined by an ad blocker. If the list proves to be unreliable or inaccurate, subscribe to a different list.
This is not a perfect system by any means. Neither is the system employed currently by ad blockers. I don't know about you, but I'm not looking at any adverts right now, and the page content looks fine. This stuff isn't rocket science.
Wouldn't it have been more sensible to get a cage and stick the damn bird in it? As opposed to attempting to drive while a bloody great parrot flaps around in front of your face? Isn't that the idiocy which this woman was pulled over for in the first place... and then the police decide to copy her?
It's about time someone came up with a decent micro-payments system. I remember a few years back the idea was touted as the next big thing, but it never quite appeared. If anyone has the clout to make it work, it's Google.
I'd be glad to pay a penny or two to view each of my favourite web comics, for instance, such that the authors can support themselves via their hard work. It's always a bummer when your only choices are donating a big wad of cash via Paypal, or just freeloading.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
