* Posts by Mark 65

3432 publicly visible posts • joined 11 Jun 2009

Everyone loves programming in Python! You disagree? But it's the fastest growing, says Stack Overflow

Mark 65

Re: Very revealing

Why should coding be any different?

Because choice of language becomes a religious debate. You can see it in the comments that have come before yours. Anyone questioning aspects of Python or simply stating "not my cup of tea" for any reason are massively down-voted. That is cult like behaviour and displays all that is wrong with aspects of the IT community. Shit like that is simply counterproductive.

Python is great for some things and mediocre for others. It is likely popular because it is free and can lend its hand to pretty much anything given the frameworks available and ease of wrapping libraries written in other languages. It is a one stop shop and that will appeal to people. "I can do anything in Python". You certainly can, but it will be a Jack of all Trades though not necessarily master of none. Let us not forget that some time ago there was a cult of Java.

Mark 65

Re: The Right Tool for a Lot of Jobs

@bb: I'd say for doing data analysis you'd want to know 2 languages - Python and R. This has been noted it various "what are you using" polls in the sector. Python give you excellent data munging capabilities but I'd much rather use R with data.table and ggplot2 for slice and dice and charting than the abortion that is matplotlib. Aspiring to MatLab's plotting capabilities is a low bar indeed.

Smart meters: 'Dog's breakfast' that'll only save you 'a tenner' – report

Mark 65

Re: Really, that Much?

The result is - apart from cheaper meter reads - also more accurate meter reads.

I think smart meters, of any kind, have been shown to have pretty questionable accuracy. The following article will be local to you and relevant

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11816828

In it at least one company admits to using Hall sensors in <= 1.5% of installations - inaccurate but usually favour the customer - whereas others mention nothing. Take from that what you will. Typically the cheapest meter they can lay their hands upon will be the one they use. That may mean that there are Rogowski Coil samples out there. Pray you don't have one.

US government: We can jail you indefinitely for not decrypting your data

Mark 65

Re: Use hidden partitions

No, you chose to use a form of encryption that works cross-platform on a container or whole of disk basis. That it also has the ability to create hidden volumes is incidental. If a prosecutor makes an accusation that it was deliberately chosen for this (hidden partition) reason then they would actually have to back that assertion up. That is totally separate from encryption keys and the like and is a basic point of law. They need to convince a magistrate or jury of that, they cannot just talk shit without convincing the relevant party - not that it is always difficult with the declining levels of education in society.

As for "Basically, you have a touching faith in the law and those tasked with implementing it. Maybe you're right. I don't feel like taking that gamble.", whilst I admire your honesty that attitude is how tyranny takes hold and I, for one, do not wish to be ruled over by a "think they're high and mighty" arsehole class of contemptible pricks.

Mark 65

Re: Use hidden partitions

Point 2 is clearly incorrect.

They can't prove you're using a hidden partition but you cannot prove that you are not. You are fucked.

Thus no crime can be proven. The law states clearly the password to decrypt data. You have clearly complied. You cannot then take the leap of faith that a file system exists in the "free data" of a file system when you cannot prove this to be the case.

Mark 65

Re: The USA:

It's really sad to see American judges and legislators wiping their arses with the American Constitution

Watched a doco about the DPR / Ross Ulbricht case the other night. There was some shady shit going on in that courthouse that's for sure.

Uncle Sam outlines evidence against British security whiz Hutchins

Mark 65

Re: Something's up

I wouldn't be surprised if that was the work of the FBI too

Don't be silly, they'd pay in BitCoin.

CrashPlan crashes out of cloudy consumer backup caper

Mark 65

Re: Unlimited Storage

Likely because unlimited data on one machine does not typically end up like unlimited data on many machines, as is the case for the home plan.

Mark 65

Re: Alternative peer-to-peer backup?

The OP did comment about not having to concern themselves with tunnels or NAT traversal. QNAP remote sync definitely requires port forwarding. Unless Synology uses a centralised middle-man thus creating a "removal of service" issue then you'll need port forwarding there too. Not to mention that you also need fixed IP / dynamic dns provision.

Regarding UPS's I'd say you always need one anywhere you have data you value, especially on a RAID array.

Mark 65

Re: No mention of Family plan...

If the new cost to you is $100/mth then you should probably think about trying to aggregate data to a centralised server before uploading. If you feel you need to have 10 separate machines all syncing independently to the cloud then guess what, you need to pay for that privilege.

Mark 65

Surely you could use rsnapshot or some other variant if you are using a local drive only.

Mark 65

Re: Although it's a bit crap....

Alternatively just pay the $10/device/month. Yes it is around $50/yr more expensive than the home plan for a single source but you either value the data or you don't. I started using it as an extra level (3 copies, 2 formats, 2 locations) of backup just this year. I liked it because of the in-built encryption from the client side, a facility most others did not offer. The per device pricing aspect is easily side-stepped by aggregating your data client-side first, something I'd advise you to do anyhow. That just leaves you with $50/yr extra to find and if that's what I need to pay so that they can continue to offer me the service then I'm ok with that.

Paris nightclub red-faced after booze-for-boobs offer exposed

Mark 65

Re: Outrageous Sexism

@h4rm0ny: I've often felt it the case that many find it far too easy to just play the sexism card when it comes to women in computing than to stop and think a little and come to the conclusion that maybe, just maybe, they have gone into other careers that are more lucrative and more interesting to them. Let's not forget that programmers and other IT workers are often seen as almost a worthless commodity to be bought at the lowest price possible by many in management and on the user side of the fence. I mean what female wouldn't want to spend the next 40+ years of their life being treated like they're an inconvenience? Not to mention that, where I live at least, there is a booming section of women that have decided to create their own businesses post child birth in order to have greater freedom around the time they have to do things. My guess is that most of these have never looked back. Mumtrepreneurs I believe is the hipster tag for them.

WikiLeaks a 'hostile intelligence service', SS7 spying, Russian money laundering – all now on US Congress todo list

Mark 65

Re: Glad someone noticed

I think it has been shown before that, much like our own parliament, most members of the house don't read shit before voting on it but instead base their decision on the edited highlights.

Bizzby balls-up: Handyman app spams customer's details to world+dog

Mark 65

Re: Don't look behind the curtain!!

I think we just witnessed the end of their business.

Drone-maker DJI's Go app contains naughty Javascript hot-patching framework

Mark 65

To an extent this is all good. For the time being, having the flight engine most want to use, it is a bit of a shitty situation. However, in time I believe this nonchalant bullshit will result in a viable open source flight system coming to pass. Invention to a large extent is driven by someone somewhere acting like an arsehole, it tends to bring the right types out of the woodwork to help. Think retired aeronautics engineer who gets the shits because his grandson's expensive new drone stopped working as it should due to a sly update etc. I have faith in this case that DJI's time at the top has peaked.

Samsung's bantam SSD makes WD's 'passport' drive look passé

Mark 65

Re: Crikey - $800???

And expensive enough to replace your internal SSD with a much bigger, much faster one and run your VM even better off of that.

Just thinking the same. My 1TB NVMe SSD which runs at 2GB/s read speed cost less than that. Yes it's twice the storage but I think with SATA storage we are currently being gouged with unjustifiable prices for portable devices so they can make hay before the combine harvester falls off the cliff. I have a feeling prices for these devices will pootle along for a bit before taking a permanent nose dive.

Revealed: The naughty tricks used by web ads to bypass blockers

Mark 65

Re: Right here on the The Register

El Reg displaying irritating ads on a site that has tech savvy readers is more irritating than, but akin to, the http vs https debacle whereby people were requesting it all the time and El Reg took forever to respond. They got there but at a frankly embarrassing pace for a tech site. We can only hope they clean up their shit with regards shitbag adverts. Until they do it is unlikely they will make much revenue from them given the readership.

New iPhone details leak: Yes, Apple is still chasing Samsung

Mark 65

@wolfetone: Apple have never innovated

Remind me how well Android/Samsung pay is going right now? Apple may not be the "innovator" and may have been late to market with NFC and tap to pay but they sure as shit knew how to make it work, unlike some.

Linus Torvalds pens vintage 'f*cking' rant at kernel dev's 'utter BS'

Mark 65

Re: >that only he seems to find acceptable.<

@LeeE: Do you think there may be a denied pull request in there somewhere?

Mark 65

Re: As I've said before ...

I do take exception to Linus' approach to handling anything he deems to be critical of his work. That smacks of a God complex and that rarely works out well for anybody.

I look forward to a comparison between the Linux kernel overseen by a man with a God complex and a rival one that is "designed by committee". That never works out well.

Mark 65

Re: Counter argument

Given the behaviour, or rather lack thereof, currently observed in classrooms and the quality of the "educated" product that eventuates I'd say teachers are the last people to talk to about what works.

Those who can...do, those who can't...teach.

Mark 65

Re: Big egos make bad code.

@Sil: The world already has far too many delicate little flowers in it whose parents convinced them over the years that "mummy's little soldier is special" and that they can do no wrong. I suffer this crap daily having to deal with clueless tits that just will not accept that they don't have a fucking scooby what they are doing. They are productivity detractors.

The man is trying to get shit done and doesn't suffer fools gladly. I have no problem with this. I feel the world would be a better place if there was less tolerance of whiny little twats not more.

Go fork yourself: Bitcoin has split in two – and yes, it's all forked up

Mark 65

The tax man thanks you for your honesty.

Wallet-snatch hack: ApplePay 'vulnerable to attack', claim researchers

Mark 65

Re: Not really a weakness in ApplePay

The weakness in the system is this

The first step in the second attack is for hackers to steal the payment token from a [targeted] victim's phone. To do that, they will use public Wi‑Fi, or offer their own 'fake' Wi‑Fi hotspot, and request users create a profile.

Stupid squared essentially. Anyone who thinks to themselves "that's a handy free hotspot that wants me to do X" and partake gets everything they deserve. If people want to use technical devices without understanding the consequences then fine, but you will get fvcked in the long term. A little self education or even common sense on this front goes a long way.

Nest security camera captures landlord's romp on tenants' bed

Mark 65

Re: No respect

Isn't the correct term for that a "zuffle"? Wonder what the term would be for the use of a wedding dress?

Bezos' bonkers bank of bucks beats big Bill's brilliant billionaire bundle

Mark 65

Bill...?

Due to a shock stock plunge after revealing Amazon's second-quarter financial results today, Bezos may have just knocked himself off of the top spot. Doh!

Or Bill just sold some of his share portfolio for shits and giggles.

iRobot just banked a fat profit. And it knows how to make more: Sharing maps of your homes

Mark 65

Re: Knowledge is power

If you then embed an RFID under the skin of each resident the system can then know who is entering the room and act accordingly.

Mark 65

Re: Dodgy story

But it does a b***** good job with my floors. Especially the bedroom carpet, which (being deeper than others in the house) was visibly cleaner after the roomba than it ever had been after cleaning with a conventional upright vacuum cleaner.

All I can say is that you must have a really shit vacuum if one of these undergassed battery powered fluff flickers does a better job. I haven't encountered one yet that will even come close to my Miele.

No time for nap, update your QNAP: RAIDed NAS data corruption bug squashed

Mark 65

Re: This article should be a you should never buy a qnap array again.

I'll be honest, I love my QNAP NAS. I own one of the more expensive i5 powered variants that can, and does, run various servers on it. I like its compact size, hot swappable drives, web interface etc. However, this sort of thing does concern me - that whole aspect of not overly being in control of your own destiny. Also I have noted a change in QNAP with regards quality. My expensive NAS has plastic disk trays. My older 4 bay QNAP has nicer metal ones. Needless to say the plastic ones resonate at times - a touch irritating given the price tag and I suspect due to the quick release drive holding mechanism. I would prefer them to be metal with rubber grommets on the drive contact points. I also had an issue with them about firmware behaviour with a UPS system which mysteriously fixed itself with a firmware update that made no mention of fixes to the UPS software or configuration.

I originally came from a tower pc running Ubuntu as my "NAS" but downsized for the size and power savings along with the more appropriate interface for the task. If I were replacing the system today then I think I would do so by building my own box and running one of the NAS-targeted distributions or a linux server variant such as Ubuntu, Centos etc. At least that way fixes would be more readily available as would the ability to modify (or not) the settings and packages as I saw fit. The argument for a QNAP is, after all, that they have performed all the quality control and packaged up everything so it should just work - this is not what seems to be happening.

TechnologyOne says City of Brisbane ignored its own reviews

Mark 65

Useless twats meet inept parasites. Match made in heaven. Get the lawyers involved for the gravy train shitfest trifecta.

Fat-fingered G Suite admins spill internal biz beans onto public 'net

Mark 65

Chances are if so many are getting it wrong it is either not obvious or has the wrong default value.

The lady (or man) vanishes: The thorny issue of GDPR coding

Mark 65

Re: @AC

The proliferation of copies of data is one of the prime 'crimes' of IT today.

But your backups and archives are presumably going to be caught up by this legislation also. Be a nice job for someone cleaning out records from backup sets, do the geniuses in the EU specify how this is to happen?

Tapping the Bank of Mum and Dad: Why your Netflix subscription is poised to rise (again)

Mark 65

While Uber has a clear path to monopoly profits one day – by wiping out the local taxi competition and installing itself as a municipalities delivery infrastructure – Netflix's path to world domination is much more questionable and tenuous.

I sincerely doubt that this will happen either. Uber is a money pit. Somewhere where VC dollars go to die. They are gaining market share by VCs subsidising the cost of your fare. At some point the VC dollars will dry up and Uber will be gone.

Cops harpoon two dark net whales in megabust: AlphaBay and Hansa

Mark 65

I thought it was known as "evolution"

One-quarter of UK.gov IT projects at high risk of failure

Mark 65

Re: Point of order, madam chairperson

"seems to imply" is your inference and is incorrect. "In the NHS" in this instance was referring to "within the realm of" or "in the area of" and not "by the NHS". The point being that it is a project by whomever targeting a massive user of IT for which it sucks up christ knows how many dollars out of the theatre side of the operation. Anything more malware resilient and reliable lacking the standover capabilities of a vendor such as MS would be an improvement.

Mark 65

Users hate it because "it looks different". When you look at their reasons for hating it you can pretty much discount it as typical whiny user bullshit. Hell, move from 7 to 10 and "it looks different". Look at the work that is being done in the NHS (article recently on El Reg) to produce a distribution that can be used across the system that would cut license fees and standardise desktops not to mention reduce hospital shutting malware issues.

Let's harden Internet crypto so quantum computers can't crack it

Mark 65

Re: Possible deadly flaw - compromised software

One more reason to use open source software then?

I'm also pretty sure that researchers would be able to check whether the key generator / random number generator in IE/Edge is producing shite. It's not like there wouldn't be many eyes (more than just the 5 usuals) looking at this aspect.

Jodie Who-ttaker? The Doctor is in

Mark 65

Re: Sorry, but ...

I think the Doctor should have come back as K-9.

UK spookhaus GCHQ can crack end-to-end encryption, claims Australian A-G

Mark 65

Re: Let Pi = 3

You missed option 4 - attack the endpoint. If I have the ability to run code as root on your device then chances are I can get at the data before it gets encrypted thus, in "Brandisology" I have cracked the end-to-end encryption. This is how they plan on doing it and GB is just another legal fuckknuckle that cannot comprehend what he's being told. All the more reason to get some sort of Qubes for mobes.

Mark 65

Physics is just applied mathematics, so gravity will be easy-peasy

I always remember my physics teacher saying that mathematics was just a subset of physics, but then he would say that wouldn't he?

Slower US F-35A purchases piles $27bn onto total fighter jet bill

Mark 65

Re: How much for one?

With the price levels and delays being reached by this white elephant I would not be surprised to see them superseded by drones before ever going into mass service. Greater G-force can be encountered, less worries about an expensive to train meatsack.

Former GCHQ boss backs end-to-end encryption

Mark 65

Re: Pah.

The problem I have with his concept of 5eyes and tech companies working together to allow the circumvention i.e. bugging the device rather than backdooring the actual apps is that we will then end up with mass circumvention because these arseholes just cannot help themselves.

Everything you need to know about the Petya, er, NotPetya nasty trashing PCs worldwide

Mark 65

Re: The real blame goes to..

It still amazes me how people are using bog-standard OS variants for critical tasks. Maersk for their global shipping operations and whomever is in charge of monitoring radiation at Chernobyl. Sure, there's likely some forced aspect of software X only runs on Windows but for massive companies with real market power and scientists I cannot see why you wouldn't enforce the usage of a hardened OS suitable for the task. Some suitable Linux variant springs to mind.

How many times must an OS fail in critical applications before the right people have a fucking light bulb moment?

Mozilla dev and Curl inventor Daniel Stenberg denied travel to USA

Mark 65

Re: So ESTA can't manage reliable data transfer but its the passengers who get it in the neck.

More to the point

“ESTA” is the Electronic System for Travel Authorization and is a pre-screening program for citizens of nations that don't need a visa to visit the United States. Securing an ESTA authorization takes a few minutes on a dedicated web site and costs US$4 to apply and then a further $10 if approved, whereupon the US Department of Homeland Security lets your airline know it's okay for you to board.

That looks and smells like an electronic visa to me.

Photobucket says photo-f**k-it, starts off-site image shakedown

Mark 65

Re: Pulling The Rug From Under People's Feet

It works almost everywhere. It's called market inertia

More like "bait and switch"

Mark 65

Re: "That includes free/cheap being a temporary illusion,"

A national health service is just about the only viable and effective way to provide one. If it is private you effectively get held to ransom over your health. How much are you willing to pay to carry on living a worthwhile existence with full mobility and a functioning body? Politicians (and people like the OP of the "socialist" rant) don't seem to get how the main things a society (and economy) needs are healthy, educated workers and a minimal legal framework within which everyone can operate. Minimal because things will find a natural equilibrium provided abuse (or lobbying) is not tolerated.

Australian govt promises to push Five Eyes nations to break encryption

Mark 65

Re: Imminent danger.

Man, I have and will always believe that George Brandis is a fucking despot. One seriously nasty piece of work. He is an absolute stooge for the 3 letter agencies. No doubt they have photos on him.

Queensland Police want access to locked devices

Mark 65

Re: I used to really think Australia would be a cool place to live

Sorry, but that is a bullshit counter argument. The truck driver will not be waiting for an hour unless he's a fucking idiot and so's his employer. Dawn varies in time throughout the year by more than 1 hour so if cows are milked "when the sun rises" then his arrival time varies from around 4am to around 6am throughout the year. He's based on sunrise + X, so daylight savings makes no difference.

As for the North of 40C at 8pm argument - so what? If that 8pm stayed as 7pm then North of 40C at 7pm is not likely to drop by too much by 8pm. If you live in that kind of heat zone then you have air con or sit and sweat. 1hr does not make a difference to that.

The "no daylight savings" arguments in QLD are archaic and simply shit-kicking in my opinion. I believe they stem more from a desire to be different from the rest of the eastern seaboard than anything based in reality. More a case of "NSW want us to but they can get fucked cos we don't take orders from the likes of them blues" than fact-based.

Mark 65

Re: Folks are dumb where they come from

Hmmm, you could think that way but I prefer to think that if it gets over the line in QLD it'll soon be present in NSW and VIC especially given the fun-police legislation south of the border. There's nothing they like more in NSW than a bit of "rule your life/can-do can't-do" on the books.

Ever tried drinking spirits in Sydney because you may prefer a good Whiskey or G & T more than an over-fizzed beer? Best of luck with that - you may get your first but try for two or three and see what happens.