Re: Harmony by disharmony
Slightly O/T but do you remember the Frankie Goes To Hollywood game that came out on the C64 and (IIRC) other 8-bit platforms?
Very strange. Played it at a friend's house circa 1987 (Hi Rowan P-J!) and was utterly bemused.
Posts by David 132
3847 publicly visible posts • joined 1 Mar 2010
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Three seconds of audio could end up costing Fox $500,000
Friday 27th January 2023 21:23 GMT 
Re: ...Seismic Rock and Roll App
Around the same mag as the 1925 earthquake which did so much urban renewal in Santa Barbara.
LOL at your turn of phrase there!
Although it does remind me of the exchange in the book Wyrd Sisters:
'Exactly how,' she said, eventually, 'does one go about knocking over the houses of people one does not like?'
'Urban clearance,' said the Fool.
'I was thinking of burning them down.'
'Hygienic urban clearance,' the Fool added promptly.
'And sowing the ground with salt.'
'I suspect that is hygienic urban clearance and a programme of environmental improvements. It might be a good idea to plant a few trees as well.'
Friday 27th January 2023 20:29 GMT
Re: Harmony by disharmony
Oh, you and me both. Being woken twice in succession at ~2AM in Northern Oregon for an Amber Alert about a missing child in southern California did not put me in a good mood.
OTOH, you've just given me an idea.
The EAS tone would make the most annoying ring-tone ever. <Evil cackle>
Lockheed Martin demos 50kW anti-aircraft frickin' laser beam
Tesla eyes Nevada for Semi electric truck plant, battery factory
If your Start menu or apps are freezing up on Windows, Microsoft has a suggestion
Thursday 26th January 2023 01:24 GMT 
Wait, what?
FTFA: According to Barco, ClickShare's maker, when the app begins to read the Outlook Calendar, the Start menu may ignore mouse clicks, the Windows key may not work, and the desktop Search feature may ignore mouse clicks on the Search button as well as the Windows+S key.
What the heck does the Start menu have to do with Outlook?
That is classic Microsoft right there. Tight integration between things that really, really don't need to be integrated, to the point of ridiculous failure modes like this.
What next - if you have a floral-themed wallpaper, Notepad will refuse to open?
Well that escalated quickly: India demos homebrew mobile OS
Wednesday 25th January 2023 20:52 GMT
Re: They're screwed ...
It varies. I had occasion recently to work with a team of Indian devs (redbaron.in, for those who want specifics) and I found them to be really helpful and quick to respond with new builds that met my requirements. Although the 11-hour timezone difference between us made for a lot of very late-night debug sessions!
(I'd have done the dev work myself, but the scenario was: "we need 6 separate apps written, in time for a hard deadline. Which is 2½ weeks from now." Something-something failure to plan on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part, but hey ho.)
Global network outage hits Microsoft: Azure, Teams, Outlook all down
Go to security school, GoTo – theft of encryption keys shows you need it
Microsoft is checking everyone's bags for unsupported Office installs
Saturday 21st January 2023 20:23 GMT
Or helpfully installs 365 and sets it to be the default for .doc/.xls/.ppt files, in the same way that they keep inveigling Edge back onto systems of people who've had the temerity to install an alternative browser.
"We'll be delighted to allow you to edit your document! But first, let's take you through the product purchase and activation wizard..."
Saturday 21st January 2023 20:12 GMT
Re: "Malicious software removal tool"
I'm running Windows 10 and *will* escape this.
That's because several months ago, after my PC "helpfully" rebooted overnight to install updates - despite me repeatedly telling it not to, and losing me a ton of open documents and hours of work - a red mist descended in front of my eyes and I f*cking nuked the Windows Update subsystem with extreme prejudice (hence ---> icon). Can't even remember what I did now (like I said - red mist), but it involved removing all file ownership/read/execute permissions to the WU stack, obliterating chunks of the Registry, and probably threatening the PC with a baseball bat too. Probably an over-reaction but I was not in a mood to ask nicely.
Now I'm sure some of the holier-than-thou types reading this will tut-tut "but your PC is now vulnerable and out-of-date!" and probably downvote me, as if I care. But I will say that my Windows 10 install has been trouble-free ever since, rock-solid, and still gets Defender definition updates anyway. It stays out of my way and doesn't pester me at all. Almost like Windows 7 of fond recollection.
Massive outage grounded US flights because someone accidentally deleted a file
Bringing cakes into the office is killing your colleagues, says UK food watchdog boss
Mailchimp 'fesses up to second digital burglary in five months
IBM top brass accused again of using mainframes to prop up Watson, cloud sales
Microsoft locks door to default guest authentication in Windows Pro
Wednesday 18th January 2023 08:03 GMT
Re: Observation
Technically what it's telling you is how much more wonderful things would be if you were online and could have a super, shiny, modern, lovely Microsoft account. Tied to Microsoft, of course, and increasing their tentacles' grip around you, but only a jaded cynic would suggest that's their primary motivation. They just love you and want the best for you, honestly.
NASA overspent $15m on Oracle software because it was afraid an audit could cost more
Saturday 14th January 2023 05:24 GMT
Re: Learn guys...
You missed off the next bit, which is just as applicable, as it's Oracle we're talking about:
"...Crowley had been extremely impressed with the warranties offered by the computer industry, and had in fact sent a bundle Below to the
department that drew up the Immortal Soul agreements, with a yellow memo form attached just saying: 'Learn, guys...'
Of course, the comparison is a little unfair. One is the blood-red-hued font of all evil and suffering in our lives, and the other is, um... Hell.
OneDrive back on its feet, but ongoing Skype credit problem hasn't gone away
Mixing an invisible laser and a fire alarm made for a disastrous demo
Tuesday 10th January 2023 06:11 GMT
Re: Alert Audio
I'm sure I've told this story before, but many years ago - late 90s - when I was a mere whippersnapper fresh out of university and in my first job, I downloaded a Father Ted screensaver to my work PC. It blanked the screen and then played a random audio sample from Father Jack - "drink!", "arse!", "girls!", "feck!" and so on, to the accompaniment of the same word on the screen in blackletter font.
Hilarious. For about 5 minutes.
So I moved the mouse to exit the screensaver, and got on with my day. Logging customer issues, playing back voicemails and having to turn the PC's speakers up to hear & transcribe them... yeah, you can probably see where this is going.
I was called away from my desk, or maybe I wandered off to get a coffee, can't remember.
What I do remember is that when I ambled back onto my floor of the cubefarm a while later, that bloody screensaver had kicked back in, and the PC was loudly yelling DRINK! FECK! ARSE! to the entire floor.
Whoops. One more to add to my large collection of "sink into the ground" moments...
CES Worst in Show slams gummi gouging, money-wasting mugs, and other dubious kit
After roasting Nvidia for overheating issues AMD now has its own
FTX boss Sam Bankman-Fried pleads not guilty on eight charges
Thursday 5th January 2023 08:35 GMT
Re: Seems a bit late?
He spent the last few weeks blabbing his mouth off to any and all news/blog sites that would listen. I imagined at the time that his lawyer(s) were probably biting through their desks in frustration and desperately trying to get him to STFU and stop digging himself deeper.
Ah well. Time to get the popcorn and watch the fun.
Cops chase Tesla driver 'dozing' with Autopilot on
NASA may tap SpaceX to rescue ISS 'nauts in Soyuz leak
TikTok confirms it tracked journalists' locations as part of leak investigation
SEC: Startup had 'no functional streaming service', raised $1.3m anyway
FCC calls for mega $300 million fine for massive US robocall campaign
Thursday 22nd December 2022 23:26 GMT
Not trying to out-hang-'em-and-flog-'em on you, but this is one instance where I'd be all in favor of the death penalty. And I'm serious. These cretins have caused so much stress and upset and cost millions of people time, money and peace. As repeat offenders they've had their one chance, but shown that they don't care.
A quick drop from Albert Pierrepoint's modern counterpart would definitely preclude any more villainy from this pair.
As it is, I'm sure they'll just declare bankruptcy, having carefully transferred their assets into others' names or tax-haven jurisdictions, and they'll pop up doing exactly the same thing a couple of years from now.
Why would a keyboard pack a GPU and run Unreal Engine? To show animations beneath the clear keys, natch
Wednesday 21st December 2022 02:54 GMT
Re: wow, bling value $millions
I just watched the video. As you said, utterly impractical, and yet I want one. TBH $350 is not that much by modern high-end keyboard standards.
However, I have to ask. Why, given that this is the cutting-edge of keyboard technology, does it have a case design that looks like a Victorian pianola or a William Morris wallpaper? Or possibly, being charitable, a steampunk cosplay item? Those artfully carved finials and flourishes would look wonderful on an antique Davenport desk, but a keyboard...?
Patch Tuesday update is causing some Windows 10 systems to blue screen
OneCoin co-founder pleads guilty to $4 billion fraud
Microsoft patent eyes ads in streaming online games
Tuesday 20th December 2022 16:23 GMT
Re: I wonder whatever happened to...
No no, he's got a point. Look at what happened to streaming services and movies. They have adverts before/after/in them now, and so the content companies did the decent thing and no longer charge the end-consumer. Which is jolly nice of them. After all, to charge people a subscription or ticket cost, and then show adverts, would be double-dipping, and that would be greedy, and I'm not sure I'd want to live in the kind of world where that was a thing.
Also, there are unicorns at the bottom of my garden.
Amazon, Games Workshop announce Warhammer 40k film deal
Plaice in spaaace: NASA boosts astronauts' cognition with piscine diet
Microsoft Teams: A vector for child sexual abuse material with a two-day processing time for complaints
Friday 16th December 2022 15:49 GMT
Re: Apple's recently announced end to end encryption for iCloud
In the old days, one of the shining characteristics of British (and Western in general?) justice was neatly and proudly summed up by the saying “better that a dozen guilty men go free, than that one innocent man be wrongly convicted”
Well now thanks to mob hysteria, showboating politicians and single-issue pressure groups, that’s morphed into “better that a dozen innocent men be wrongly accused, have their lives and reputations ruined, and suffer oppressive surveillance measures, than that one guilty man go free”.
Progress.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
