* Posts by Stoneshop

5951 publicly visible posts • joined 8 Oct 2009

'Bitcoin heist' shock: Cops seek 4 for aggravated burglary in Midsomer Murders town

Stoneshop
Mushroom

How about 'explosive'?

Same initial letters, expresses the rate of growth quite well IMO, and could very well be applicable to the foreseeable aftermath of a billowing cloud of smoke and debris all around.

User stepped on mouse, complained pedal wasn’t making PC go faster

Stoneshop
Facepalm

Re: underneath the keyboard

Swap the password Post-It with your neighbour's.

Supermicro is, like, totally harnessing green energy sources to churn out servers, dude

Stoneshop
Boffin

Re: Without combustion?

And pumping out more CO2 than simple burning as the Oxygen that would have gone to easily filtered out Sulphurous and Nitrogenous oxides is instead added to the Carbon.

Nope. In every CH4 molecule (methane) there's only one carbon atom, which can only bind two oxygen atoms. There's no way that excess O2 (which is present in the air used for combustion anyway) can suddenly cause more CO2 to be produced because that would require more C, thus more CH4. And with the fuel cell tech keeping SOx and NOx out of the reaction you don't have to scrub them from the exhaust, ergo, better in that respect.

Biker nerfed by robo Chevy in San Francisco now lobs sueball at GM

Stoneshop
Alien

Car markings

An article elsewhere had a pic of that robo-car, and they're easily identified as such, or at the very least something out of the ordinary, by a roof rack fitted with cameras and other sensors.

They appear to not have further markings such as "BEWARE - ROTM - KEEP YOUR DISTANCE"

Aut-doh!-pilot: Driver jams 65mph Tesla Model S under fire truck, walks away from crash

Stoneshop
FAIL

Re: Don't call it Autopilot, for a start

How many humans drive into the back of a (stationary) big bright red vehicle

Definitely not none.

with flashing lights and sirens wailing?

When they're stopped at the accident they keep the flashing lights on but cut the sirens.

Stoneshop
Pint

Re: 2018: "But it was on Autopilot!"

had some hilarious moments of people just riding straight into bushes or just getting on one side of the bike and falling off the other...

During a festive evening celebrating something-or-other, one of the local security guards came in and alerted us that someone outside had been trying to get on his bike for roughly the past half hour, and would we want to help him?

Hawaii governor: I wanted to tell everyone nuke alert was fake – I just forgot my password

Stoneshop

Re: Eh?

Brain Salad Surgery

Death notice: Moore's Law. 19 April 1965 – 2 January 2018

Stoneshop
Pint

i'd have about £150

And doubling every 18 months

'WHAT THE F*CK IS GOING ON?' Linus Torvalds explodes at Intel spinning Spectre fix as a security feature

Stoneshop
Flame

Re: I Remember When...

But it's illegal to say nice things about Itanium here at El'Reg.

It's a very nice space heater that surprisingly offers a few compute capabilities.

Stoneshop
Headmaster

Re: I'm just waiting for this to be re-branded

Sadly, I don't recall ever seeing any with a fully featured left digit.

IOt fits, and should rightfully be considered a three-letter word.

Stoneshop
Headmaster

Re: "Let 'em have it Linus"

the man is a c**k

Cork? Could well be.

I expect that if you throw him into a pool or river, he'll float.

Nominations open for comp restoration gong, the Tony Sale Award

Stoneshop
Pint

I'm just not sure what award they should qualify for...

There are several categories:

- The Tardis Award for ostensibly storing at least double the overall volume of a shed inside that same shed.

- The Librarian's Ribbon for knowing by heart all the items stored, and their exact location. An additional medal can be gained for knowing what the function of at least 50% of said items is (this to allow a certain number of widgets "I have no frigging idea what it's for exactly, but it looked worth saving" like we all have).

- Lifetime membership of the Society for Putting Things on top of Other Things, for, well, having put impressive numbers of Things on top of Other Things.

Stoneshop
FAIL

Bah

How about nominating someone, or a group, involved in restoring or keeping running machines not less than 30 years old?

'The capacitors exploded, showering the lab in flaming confetti'

Stoneshop
Mushroom

There was the student on the lab bench opposite mine, who wasn't aware of what the ridge and the '+' markings on an electrolytic cap were meant to convey. With the working voltage for the circuit being 150VDC, for reasons I can't remember any more (no, it didn't involve vacuum tubes). So, a couple of seconds after powering on, there was an almighty bang, a rather pungent, acrid smell and a very pale student.

Stoneshop
FAIL

Re: Improbable

How about you explain me how short circuit inside 5V powered chip caused "power surge".

Simple.

Switching PSUs take their reference feedback from their most relevant output voltage, in most cases the +5V rail. Load that rail heavily and you'll see the other output voltages go up. Do something silly with the +5V rail, like that chip blowing, and you could well have the PSU go nuts. And given the crap which even today is sold as computer power supplies, never mind 30 years back, I wouldn't bet on some random PSU shutting down in a decent manner without any malodorous and/or acoustic side effects in case of a sudden overload.

And saying "that's not supposed to happen" will just show that you know shit about designing and building electronics, especially where shaving the last microrenminbi off the BoM is concerned

User had no webcam or mic, complained vid conference didn’t work

Stoneshop
FAIL

Re: Equipment and training?

This could not have been missed by the user !!!

Oh, really?

Why did I buy a gadget I know I'll never use?

Stoneshop

The request for bolt cutters to free someone's bicycle was a thing too far though.

And you were right in denying that; it's the domain of cordless angle grinders, to set you off from the low-life bicycle-pinching yobbo's.

Stoneshop

We've all got stories of needing that one weird cable and just so happening to still have it.

Them: "We've got these GPS trackers to fit in the support vehicles for $event, but they only come with mains chargers. Now, the vans have mains converters; can you fit those on your motorcycles too?"

Me: "You're kidding? Something that big just to power a tracker the size of a ciggie packet?"

Them: "Well, the battery doesn't last even half the event, so ..."

Me: "Don't they have 12V adapters?"

Them: "Maybe, but they weren't supplied"

Me: :The charger outputs, mmm, 5 Volts, and this socket may be non-standard but it looks just like the socket on my digicam, for which I <rummage> have an USB cable. <inserts> <inserts in powerbank> Aaaaand it works. So, ten of these cables from fastandcheapcables.com, ten USB charger adapters for car ciggie lighters, and we're set."

Stoneshop
Boffin

Re: Bags full of the stuff

Wrong, its been a few weeks now and not once have I had any remorse... I don't miss any of it....

Just weeks, and you're in between moves? So not really having projects underway? Projects that you wouldn't manage to get working without that one particular part or cable that's in one of those boxes that you've now chucked out?

I bet your new home doesn't have a shed either.

Stoneshop

Re: Guilty as charged...

Ditto Torx screwdriver bits that are needed when removing hard disk platters for physical destruction.

Nah. In my life as a FS tech I had to disassemble RA81 HDAs (70-18491-01) onsite in cases where the platters had to be left at the customer (sensitive data) while the shell and positioner still had to go back to Logistics anyway as part of the replacement parts process. For the (5? 6? mm) bolts holding the shell together you needed Torx sockets, then for the platters a Torx bit, with neither being present in the standard toolkit. So it was the best-fitting hex-nut socket for the shell bolts and an Allen key for the platters, and as the tools provided were of decent quality they managed without stripping or being damaged themselves

Hawaiian fake nukes alert caused by fat-fingered fumble of garbage GUI

Stoneshop
Facepalm

And here is the, ahem, UI in question

Beware of projectile vomiting

Stoneshop
Mushroom

To send this message,

click on all the photos containing nuclear tests

Stoneshop

Re: UI design 101

and I guess no "are you sure" and "are you REALLY sure" to confirm

Such a two-step confirmation needs to be one positive ("Are you sure?") and one negative ("Cancel alert?"), and should require full verbal responses ("Yes", "No"). Would take maybe 10 seconds extra while almost eliminating accidental activation.

Even better: two hard-wired buttons with those flip-top covers, a good distance apart, and you need to hold them for at least five seconds while a LOUD buzzer sounds.

Drone crashes after operator failed to spot extra building site crane

Stoneshop
Thumb Up

about to strike the crane because of a lack of perspective

Well, a slice of fairy cake would have helped there

China's first space station to – ahem – de-orbit in late March

Stoneshop
Boffin

Well, yes, but very small

As the area of the earth's surface covered by Tiangong's orbit is about 341.3E6 km^2, with Nork covering a mere 120540 km^2 , or just 0.035% of that, you can see it's not very likely it'll hit there.

Microsoft wants to patent mind control

Stoneshop
Boffin

Judging from that diagram they've patented thinking about boxes.

So they shouldn't mind if I keep thinking outside the box.

Stoneshop
Holmes

Re: Blindingly Obvious Patent

it proves the US patent office isn't fit for purpose

Which has been proven already time and again.

PC lab in remote leper colony had wrong cables, no licences, and not much hope

Stoneshop

Re: Incompentent or Deliberate - you choose

“Unfortunately, the desktops only had HDMI and the screens were VGA..."

So was it incompentence on the Chinese Embassy parts for sending desktops and screens which couldnt go together (and which obviously was never checked) or was it a deliberate attempt to force a little bit more business their way (or to a friends business) for repairs/upgrades/etc...

"Have them click on AliExpress and they can be knee-deep in HDMI-VGA adapters"

Intel AMT security locks bypassed on corp laptops – fresh research

Stoneshop
Facepalm

Re: Why blame Intel?

Some people don't bother to change default passwords,

If the manufacturer puts in a feature requiring a strong password, then a request to set a strong password should be issued on setting up the system. If not set or left default the option should be disabled.

Self-driving cars still do not exist even if we think they do

Stoneshop
Coat

there aren't any enjoyable Nissans

None of them are able to, err, satisfy you?

Boffins closer to solving what causes weird radio bursts from space

Stoneshop
Alien

Re: OTT

A teenager from an advanced civilisation on bonfire night?

Aye, something close. The more adventurous go buzzing other planets, wearing silly antennae and making 'beep beep' noises, others just stay in their cellar with their computers, and there's now one botnetting a cloud of dark matter around a powerful star and making it go 'blip' to annoy the neighbour alien teenager who's just returned home with a gorgeous bombshell who was sufficiently impressed with his antennae and the beeping, and who are now trying to sleep in after some utterly extended interspecies sex.

In other words, juvenile jealousy.

Stoneshop
Alien

Re: Alien? Unlikely

So, warning lights for roadworks on an interstellar bypass?

Good lord, Kodak's stock is up 120 per cent. How? New film? Oh. It launched a crypto-coin

Stoneshop

It just needs further developing.

Astroboffins say our Solar System is a dark, violent, cosmic weirdo

Stoneshop
Windows

a dark, violent, cosmic weirdo

I saw someone like that Monday afternoon.

Who's that at Ring's door? Why, it's Skybell with a begging cup, er, patent rip-off lawsuit

Stoneshop
Facepalm

We all know the way the USPTO operates

But the proper reaction to these patent applications should have been: "Innovative? Pull the other one, it's got bells on."

Here come the lawyers! Intel slapped with three Meltdown bug lawsuits

Stoneshop

Re: Quote of the year

Nothing is simple any more.

Sums it up nicely. Sums everything up nicely.

And outside of the domains where things aren't simple because of the subject matter, people are hard at work (and often failing, luckily, but still) to make simple things not simple any more. E.g. Juicero, the Otto lock and many other such ventures.

Whizzes' lithium-iron-oxide battery 'octuples' capacity on the cheap

Stoneshop
Facepalm

Re: Great News

This is great - it means that in the future my phone could last a week without a charge.

So? Mine do that already.

Nebula spotted with more super-sized bodies than a gym on Jan 2nd

Stoneshop

Re: LIGO/VIRGO

Given that it concerns black holes, how are they going to pinpoint the location of the event since, by definition, they didn't see that a collision was going to take place ?

Do you mean to imply that you can't see a black hole collision coming because you can't see those black holes themselves?

The presence of black holes can be inferred by effects on their local environment, stuff swirling inwards around them, as well as gravitational lensing. So they can be located, their trajectories determined and a possible collision predicted.

Cool disk drive actuator pillar, Seagate – how about two of them?

Stoneshop

Re: So...

Yes, providing you don't mind both of them failing at the same time.

With RAID-0, they might as well do.

Stoneshop
FAIL

Re: One read write head per track ?!

Why do you think the number of tracks matters ?

Because the actual head is about 1000 times as wide as a single track, meaning there's NO FSCKING WAY you can get separate heads over each track.

Plus there's the cost.

With your first comment I thought you were trolling, but it appears you really think it's feasible. It is not.

Stoneshop

Two sets of heads

DEC's RA8x series drives used two heads per side on a single arm, effectively halving the seek stroke while still being able to access the entire platter.

I've also encountered a drive with two independent positioner assemblies, but details appear to be in some offline part of my memory.

Stoneshop

Re: So...

Theoretically yes, the way I read it. At least, as long as you're not (close to) saturating the host interface and the drive buffers.

Stoneshop

When you have one set of heads, it doesn't matter *precisely* where the heads go when they're looking for track 13,

That would be a sticking point if the positioner controller was using an external reference, like servo tracks or even a feedback system coupled to the positioner itself, but that has long passed. Nowadays the positioning data comes from the active head itself, in a way that you might want to describe as 'maximum correct signal' (not unlike manually tuning a radio). Although the drive logic has to have some rough idea of where track 13 is, and how much to seek inwards or outwards to get there, the final positioning over the track is done using the signal from the head itself.

I remember that, years ago, this was the reason given for the much lower densities on removable media than were available with hard drives

That's part of it. Another reason is that the environment in a drive using removable packs can't be as clean as in a HDA, so head flight height can't be as low. And track width is related to head flight height again: lower height means narrower tracks means greater data density.

Linux Mint 18.3: A breath of fresh air? Well, it's a step into the unGNOME

Stoneshop

Re: Timeshift

Does the Linux implementation of OpenZFS not have snapshots?

$ uname -a

Linux machine 3.16.0-4-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 3.16.43-2+deb8u5 (2017-09-19) x86_64 GNU/Linux

root@machine:~

$ zfs

missing command

usage: zfs command args ...

where 'command' is one of the following:

create [-p] [-o property=value] ... <filesystem>

create [-ps] [-b blocksize] [-o property=value] ... -V <size> <volume>

destroy [-fnpRrv] <filesystem|volume>

destroy [-dnpRrv] <filesystem|volume>@<snap>[%<snap>][,...]

destroy <filesystem|volume>#<bookmark>

snapshot|snap [-r] [-o property=value] ... <filesystem|volume>@<snap> ...

rollback [-rRf] <snapshot>

clone [-p] [-o property=value] ... <snapshot> <filesystem|volume>

promote <clone-filesystem>

[ ... ]

Big shock: $700 Internet-of-Things door lock not a success

Stoneshop
FAIL

Re: Bah!

a vicious guard dog costs less than the locks.

Really? Locks don't need to eat. They don't need to be taken for a walk twice every day either.

Stoneshop

Re: Bah!

and no matter how well you try to control and log that they can always just get a copy cut before giving it back.

There are locks however, and they start at about one-tenth of the price of this Otto lock, that you can't get duplicated at your average locksmith. You want a spare? You present the dealer with a token you received with the original purchase (NOT the actual key), plus some ID. If you want to have an illegal copy made you would need to pilfer a blank and get (access to) cutting tools. Which means that, if one of your house guests is capable of that, you need to be slightly more discerning in your choice of guests.

You can make locks more difficult to pick, but you can't avoid having that hole available for poking.

I know a world-class security engineer whose hobby is lock-picking. In which he's also world-class. There are fully mechanical locks he grades as 'couple of minutes with an angle grinder is less bothersome'.

Stoneshop
Holmes

Re: The perfect IoT device!

absolutely no [...] backdoors

It was supposed to go on your front AND back door, so that's $1400; $2100 if you have a garage with a door into your house. Or do you leave them with tumbler locks? Now there's a backdoor.

Stoneshop
Devil

Prior art

NSFW

Stoneshop
Pint

Re: $700 versus $25

the windows get burglar bars installed.

So you count on the burglar to get sloshed, forgetting his original intention?

Kernel-memory-leaking Intel processor design flaw forces Linux, Windows redesign

Stoneshop

Re: 68000 versus 8086

ULAs weren't available in the early 1980s hence the IBM's use of lots of TTL to get it to work at all.

So the ZX81 and BBC B were built with technology that didn't exist? Interesting.

Now if IBM decided to just use standard components, that's another matter. But ULAs and other MSI-level custom chips were definitely available at the time the PC was designed.