Posts by werdsmith

Re: Big brother is creeping up behind you.

There is no legal obligation to indicate before turning.

This is true and it's also unwise to trust the indication of other drivers.

Re: The older the better

Problem is, when you exaggerate an anecdote like this, there are many of us reading who have experience with these cars and we know it is bullshit.

Re: The older the better

One of the biggest challenges is the bit where the camera see you getting to close to a white line without having used an indicator so takes over the steering to move you away from it - straight into the pothole/vehicle you were trying to avoid

I've driven several makes of cars with this feature and more. It doesn't work like that at all. You feel the steering in your hands kind of reminding you and urging you to move away from the line, but it doesn't take over and is overridden with minimal resistance. If you ignored it because you weren't paying attention to your driving (like falling asleep or looking at a phone) then it would guide keep the car in lane. It's also easy to switch off.

Newer cars have more engineered in safety, energy absorption is improving all the time. If somebody driving carefully in a revered old classic meets an idiot in a new car who causes a collision then the likelihood is that the idiot walks away with ears ringing from airbag infation. The classic car driver will have an extended stay in hospital, if they are lucky.

Rule 1 of good business. Give the customers what they want.

Honda suffered bad publicity when Toyota maintained their Burnaston factory, Nissan stayed in the NorthEast but Honda closed their Swindon plant.

Re: A happy life?

I also have a TomTom SatNav, a cheap entry level one with free updates for life. I stopped using it some time ago when I started getting cars with builtin nav.

Last week I hired a Transit with no sat nav. I dug out the old TomTom and plugged it in, pulled up the TomTom websites and a message "your map data is over 42 months old, please update".

Clicked update, and it loaded maps from October 2023.

Also, if you connect to website it downloads the latest satellite data for quicker fix.

I understand some TOMTOM sat navs with western europe maps sstopped updating because all western europe data outgrew the available storage on the device, but it is still possible to down load a single country.

A few years back there were a load of lies in tabloids about stopping updates for eol devices. TomTom tried to clarify, but the dirty media ignored it, and loads of thickos sucked it up.

A Honda Connect subscription used to be 1 year free with a new car and then paid after that.

Very few people took up the subscription, so it is now 3 years free.

Re: "I hate that I don't own Microsoft Office or Photoshop. "

Gimp.

That’s really not a decent option, for mine and many requirements it’s a pile of crap. But Affinity is a good perpetual license alternative.

Affinity also provide alternatives to other applications in the Adobe stable.

Re: EV rentals

The EVs internal sat nav automatically finds public chargers, that's not the problem.

Switching over to actually driving something unfamiliar in a place that is unfamiliar is more of a problem, when convenience is required.

Re: Building software is hard...

The web was better with NCSA Mosaic than with any browser since

NCSA Mosaic and the web were an order of magnitude simpler then. You cannot predict how it would have evolved.

Re: Corporations

Yes, I don’t believe that going without rest is good for the people or the project. If they haven’t got shift teams available then that’s not heroic, it’s another failure.

Re: pre-1995 vehicles

And if the fuel is still available.

I see the task of obtaining ordinary petrol and diesel in 10 years time will be similar to finding LPG fuel today.

Re: 7kW

20 years old. Like the faultless 2003 Yaris that sits on my drive waiting for a purpose.

As for "if not". The trial example has the cables running below ground to a charge point next to the road and is happily charging cars.

Re: Another of Baldrick's "Cunning Plans"

Makes you wonder if EV articles instrantly trigger Register commenters into auto-whinge-before-think mode.

Re: 7kW

Probably 20-30 years or more before we are all forced to change to EV.

As for parking, current capacity and cable obstruction, I'm sure this has been considered. If not, then they are very stupid people for not coming to ask on Register forums first.

Re: Think of the Grid!

Driving around south Cambridge, I've got used to the 20mph limit, for example in Addenbrookes and between the hospital and Cherry Hinton. I'm quite happy to stay at 20 with the auto limiter set on the car though I didn't like it at first.

I think without a limiter then a person would spend too much time looking down at their speed.

There are those that don't want to do 20 and will harass those that do, but they are thankfully few.

Re: Think of the Grid!

"Oh the humanity"

It's unfortunate that the big old dirigible was filled with hydrogen. It would have been much better if it had been filled with something less flammable, like petrol for example.

Had the doped fabric caught fire with petrol inside the envelope then the liquid would have washed over everybody on the the ground instead of venting upwards like the H gas did. And there would have been no disastrous event.

Re: Think of the Grid!

You could use one of those big old MayTag ovens to park an electric car in.

My double oven can do about 3KW with both ovens. My hob is induction tech from the 1990s so much lower power than those old spiral ring elements from the 1950s, or those bizarre halogen things from the 1970s. (and cleaner and tidier than a gas one from the 19th century).

I've decided I'm going to self power my oven in future. A Peltier effect device in the oven will supply all the power it needs forever.

Re: Think of the Grid!

We sometimes import, and sometimes export electricity. The interconnects can often be seen running in either direction. It's for balancing demand and seems to work nicely.

Re: It can be done.

Many lies here.

Re: Schematics?

The information is probably on YouTube.

There might not be schematics but there is the internet and smart people.

Re: Simples

Fly tipping on your own property?

Fuck off

Re: How many

Apple would soon introduce replaceable batteries and get rid of glue if their phones doubled in price

iPhone batteries are one of the easiest to replace and the “glue” is just double sided tape that sticks the battery to the inside of the case and just requires a firm pull to remove.

The requirement for a heat gun is another phone maker.

Re: If you aren't full of shrapnel you will probably suffocate

Daleks have been going up and down stairs since 1988.

Re: One-off risk?

Internet rule of thumb #1: when somebody drops an academic achievement or professional experience into an online discussion, odds on they are bullshitting.

I have a PhD in calling out internet bullshitters…..

Re: "Actually, this is precisely the service you paid for"

It's a bit of a strange scenario for me. A change of this nature is going to require a ticket to be raised, then a change request in response. to the ticket. The CR will require a couple of approvers.

If in doubt, raise a ticket.

Read all these comments and no mention of a change control process of any kind, but I don't know of any serious organisation not using ITIL or something resembling ITIL.

I think there is no small amount of embellishment / fiction involved in most On-Call pieces.

Re: is 10x $$$ normal?

VM In England should be £45 for 1.13Gb/s but with slow up speed.

All Chromebooks are moving way faster than that on their year long orbital path.