Posts by John Smith 19

Re: Cuber Purl Hurbor

"> a transactional risk engine based on feedback from 50 billion data points

WTF does that shite even mean?"

Hire a con-sultant and I'm sure they will tell you for a modest fee.

Re: Why not just build a solar panel that covers half the world....

"To me the most obvious problem with this solution, besides the outrageous cost, is what would happen if this multi-megawatt death ray misses it's intended target? "

The power level for that "death ray" as you call it was set to be about the leakage power level of a microwave oven. The system needs a unit on the receiving end to focus the beam and de-focuses if it drifts off. The focussed beam is still about 2km square and was designed to allow people to stand underneath it.

Microwave converters run around 95%+ efficient but sunlight -> AC conversion is around 70%. BTW above c800Km altitude the system generates 24/7.

Voted down because you were ignorant enough to make the comment without a few minutes (or even check the ElReg) to find out the real story.

Re: Quite frankly.....

"@kb - so what you are saying is that in spite of the millions and millions of legitimate licenses that M$ sells in a year, those of us in IT would have to suffer thru SecureBoot because M$ is worried about a few percent being pirated? "

He is.

"The whole PC industry shouldn't be borked just because M$ is losing a few percent of sales. "

It's not like they have not done this before.

"We've already had to bend over and kiss our own asses for years to keep M$ happy."

And MS see no reason why you the mark customer should not continue to do so.

"Not all of us are total M$ whores, some of us have real work to do on these toy computers."

But you're not using a copy of their OS to do it.

The bald turkey dancer hates that.

"My greeting home was a privilege previously only permitted for my wife, a complementary scrotum squeeze by a TSA agent."

Does anything make you feel quite like a suspect in your own country than that little greeting?

And remember, it's complementary, it's not free (whose paying for the TSA?)

TBF The question I've always wondered about DHS is as it was built (AFAIK) from 24 separate agencies, how do they even decide where to hold the office Christmas party?

"Taking bets on how long that will take to bite him in the ass. I reckon less than 6 months."

I bid 6 weeks, but I think that's generous, but when it's discovered is another matter

For the successful cracker (who keeps it secret) this is the perfect target.

The sense of smug complacency that will set in could allow them to establish the biggest botnet the internet has ever seen. OK that's a bit of hype but certainly quite large.

I've heard this "It's uncrackable" spiel a few times. A classic was the SKy digital TV encryption system.

The channel coding remains (AFAIK) unbroken with a 2048bit PKA key.

The cards were not. Giving free TV channels to those in the know.

"At least, when installed on a Galaxy Nexus, it can make phone calls and send SMS (and receive them) "

Some say this is the iPhone's less developed ability.

"enough different hardware so getting it ported to as much hardware as possible is a sensible way to find issues early and fix them."

Agreed provided they get on the case and fix it.

"I for one am very interested to see how quickly they will get to something usable as I need a new phone :-)"

Not tempted to dev/port an app or two to the UI yourself?

That is the point. This is a dev version. I don't think they seriously think anyone is going to dump their current phone OS and flash a copy of this on there.

Re: Stumbling around in the dark

"The 8 worst predictive modeling techniques"

Now how many of these are GCHQ going to deploy in their new find-a-terrorist system?

Re: Can you actually make calls on it?

"Is it, in fact, actually a phone?"

It's claimed to be an OS for "smartphones" but as people have said of the iPhone it's not very good for making calls.

I don't want a lifestyle. I just want to be able to punch a number and get connected to the person I'm calling.

Anywhere above ground (and preferably some way below) in my service providers alleged coverage area.

A v 0.1 UI is not necessarily a problem for an apps developer. But a 0.1 API is hence my comment about the frequent updates needed to get this into shape.

Re: If I was going to be hunted down by a celebrity assassin

"Oooooh! Now you've done it...

ginger women and trifle...

ginger women WITH trifle....

ginger women COVERED with trifle....

all that jelly, and cream, and goodness knows where the sponge fingers go......"

Oh behave

Re: none of this is new

"Traveling to distant planetary systems is impossible."

No, just highly prohibitive in terms of money, energy and time. There is no law of nature that prevents it happening. The Voyagers are already doing it, but at a very slow pace given the size of the universe.

Would that be one of those "facts" like the assertion by the UK Astronomer Royal that space travel is "Utter bilge"?

Perhaps, because the context of the quote was the proceeding line that "It would cost as much as a major war just to put a man on the moon."

Currently its impossible for someone to start a journey to another star and be alive at arrival.

But more technological progress has been made since (roughly) the mid 19th century than the previous 18 centuries combined.

Things change.

Re: logs don't lie

"The data on the Tesla blog clearly proves Broder is a lying scumbag."

I'd qualify that and say they appear to show that.

But there is no independent chain of evidence one way or the other.

There might be an argument for an independent body to fit some kind of black box to all cars sent on road tests by companies. If anyone complains they take the test out of archive and publish it for everyone to see. All road tests are subjective after all and you're reading the reviewers impression of the vehicle as much as it's detailed handling and driving qualities.

Finding (or forming) a body everybody would trust is likely to be tricky.

Re: Impressive.

"he density seems to be 4 bits in a cubic micron (assuming a 2D layer of cells, that would be a feature size of 250 nm -- not too impressive)"

I'll make 2 points.

How many layers of those memory elements can you lay down on a semiconductor chip, not material layers. Actually unified working components?

Because that's pretty much 1 layer (3d chips with multiple layers of logic and/or memory have not worked out well), versus as many as you like with a protein/DNA system. Those DNA layers are likely to be 10-100x thinner than any viable semiconductor layer (which on conventional wafers sits on about a 300-500 micrometre thick silicon layer).

Secondly this is v0.1 technology. It's not got data input and to make proper use of existing data mechanisms (the ribosome) you'd want to store in codons and a double helix with 1 twist giving six bits of storage.

DNA give you volumetric density in way conventional semiconductor processing simply does not.

Changing the mindset to play to its strengths and adapt to its weaknesses will be challenging.