Posts by big_D

Re: Starlink hasn't been up long

The enemy's gate is down.

Re: Less of the rather dismissive "Trade union club", please

Only job I had where I had to be a union member, I lost the job through unfair dismissal and the union wasn't interested - they were too worried about rocking the boat.

(I stood up to management about the server room (2nd floor, south facing, floor-to-ceiling windows) needing A/C and a couple of other matters, where their IT policy contradicted best practices and auditor recommendations and the CEO didn't like my "attitude", so made me redundant, then advertised for a replacement* for my job.)

* At least the replacement contacted me 3 months later and thanked me for the good work I'd done in documenting all the systems, while I was there.

Re: One question.

That things like Gmail, Maps and YouTube aren't pre-installed is a good thing, for me. I don't have to disable them when I get a new phone.

No Play Store, not so hot.

Re: The Register has asked Google to comment...

PR droid? Only if you know the secret code to type into their automated telephone system, otherwise it just bounces you around menus for 10 minutes, before cutting you off.

I don't know, I've met some Brexit supporters who want out with no deal, trade under WTO conditions.

Point out that it isn't that simple, or that WTO conditions are there to protect those too incompetent to make their own deal doesn't seem to resonate with them.

I was lucky, with the first vote, I was 3 months away from being ineligible to vote, not that it made much difference. If their is a second vote, I won't be allowed to vote.

Re: home office buffoons

I also pointed out that I had spent the last 6 years interpreting German legal documents! But that isn't a certificate either! The test was a doddle, I had 3 hours, I only needed around 74 minutes and 30 minutes of that was listening to recorded conversations, which you can't speed up anyway.

I did meet a Scot at the Citizenship Test who has worked at a local department store for 20 years, he managed to get away with a signed letter from the directors, saying that he was fluent in German. At the test, around a third of the participants, around 20 people, were British.

Yep. I've met a few Brits, here in Germany, who are putting it off getting German citizenship or checking to see if they need a work permit until the last minute. Their faces go rather pale, when I explain that a) the process will take a minimum of 3 months and b) if it isn't through by the time Brexit goes through, they might need to apply for a work permit, which will also take time and c) if they get it in before Brexit, they get dual citizenship, but afterwards they have to give up their British citizenship.

I didn't need to get German citizenship, I have a German wife, but the question of work permits and being able to carry on working after Brexit made me go on the safe side. I applied in October and I got my citizenship through 2 days before the original Brexit deadline. Mainly because I had to wait over a month until I could find a place in a German Language exam for migrants - I was lucky, I managed to get one in December last year, but that was the only appointment I could find that was not after May this year. There are a lot of immigrants here needing the language certificates.

It is interesting, can I fly to the UK on my British passport and then return on my German one?

Re: home office buffoons

On the other side, I applied for German citizenship. Friendly, efficient and knew exactly what they were doing. Provided useful information and pointed me in the right direction for things like the language certificate to prove I could speak German (actually sitting there and talking to them for half an hour didn't count, bureaucracy for you).

Re: So to gain entry into America you MUST......

Makes me glad I don't "do" social media.

Re: s/ware updates 2 or 3 years

Unfortunately the 2 years upgrade, 3 years security updates is standard for pretty much all Android devices, starting with Google themselves.

I agree, security updates should be mandatory for 5 - 6 years.

Same here, Mate 10 Pro (coming up for 2 years old), P-Smart (18 months) and P20 (1 year) all on current Android 9.1, with either June or July patches.

Re: I'd happily buy a Huawei .... if:

Mine have no network cruft, they are unlocked, they receive monthly updates and they are dual SIM.

It is a password field, just fill it in with asterisk.

This is more about Amazon/Audible finding an acceptable way of doing this.

Re: Why AI transcription?

But, again, Amazon/Audible have both the original text and the audiobook, they don't need to transcribe, they just need to enhance Whispersync.

And why not approach the publishers and try and work out a good way of doing this, instead of trying to circumvent agreements and the law?

If big tech put as much effort into doing things properly in the first place, as opposed to spending the effort in trying to find new ways to circumvent the law, they'd have to pay lawyers much less and they wouldn't have to keep re-doing everything because they got caught.

Re: Have I got this right?

Here the Harry Potter books are read by Rufus Beck, also a great voice actor and really good. I'm currently re-reading as audio books - just finished Harry Portter und der Orden des Phönix and with my next credit I'll be getting der Halbblutprinz.

I currently have 280 titles in my Audible library - a mixture of German and English versions. I am a big Audible fan, but in this case, I don't see this as good move on their part.

With the subscription model of Audible (9,99 a month for a credit and all subsequent audiobooks 9,99 or cheaper, I feel that the listeners are already getting a very good deal, compared to the traditional prices for audiobooks. Amazon/Audible already have a good solution to this problem (Whispersync), I don't see how disadvantaging authors and publishers further is a good thing.

I agree with you for the most part. With Whispersync, you can already buy both the audio and ebook versions at a discount and carry on on the other medium from where you left off - E.g. I sometimes listen to an audiobook in the car, then switch to the ebook when I go to bed, so I don't disturb my wife; although I generally listen to a different book to the one I'm reading in bed.

Re: Reinventing the wheel

They already do that, to a degree, with Whispersync. If you buy the ebook you can get the audiobook at a discount or vice-versa. When listening to the book, it automatically updates the position in the ebook - although I believe not dynamically, I've never tried that, I generally listen to the book in the car, then switch to my Kindle when I'm home. If they made that update dynamic, there wouldn't be any problems.

Re: Have I got this right?

The text version already exists, so there is no need to transcribe the audio and, if the user wants to see the text, they just need to buy the book at the discounted rate (with my Amazon/Audible account, I can usually get the book/audiobook pair at a big discount).

Subtitles? But that is for film for the hard of hearing. If you are hard of hearing, you are unlikely to have bought the audiobook in the first place.

I agree with you about the foreign language part, but, again, I generally look it up in the written version of the book, if I really can't understand it after repeatedly listening to the sentence - or ask a friend.

Re: Just ask first :)

I think it is an arrogance thing.

Re: Old-skool publishers vs Amazon

I would say that they have woken up, they've been cheated and dumped upon by Amazon all to often. I'm not saying the publishing industry are saints, but Amazon is no saviour, it is the devourer.

Re: back shift operations..

An op at one place I worked wrote a game of Space Invaders in DCL on a VAX. Each sprite had its own process and automatically moved itself, when hit the process was killed.

Very cool, but took a lot of power at higher levels, when the sprites moved faster.

Maybe that is where BOFH got his idea for Unreal Tournament with enemies being users' PCs...