* Posts by Steve Knox

1972 publicly visible posts • joined 16 Jul 2011

8086 and All That. Revisited

Steve Knox
Meh

Re: German?

Depends on whether you mean by genetics*, birth nationality, or chosen nationality.

*In which case he was Germanic; genetics know no political boundaries.

Opposable thumbs for FISTS, not finesse, say bioboffins

Steve Knox
Facepalm

Re: A title should not contradict it's article

@AC. The body of Richard IV's post uses it's correctly. The title does not. That's why I referred to the title.

Steve Knox
Boffin

Shurely...

Bioffins?

Steve Knox
Headmaster

Re: A title should not contradict it's article

A title should not contain it's where its is required.

Kickstarted mobe charger 'kicked to death by Apple'

Steve Knox
Coat

Re: Erratum: "4x18690" should read "4x18650"

A little better, but who's going to carry around 74,600 batteries?

US: We'll drag cyber-spies into COURT from their hideouts

Steve Knox

Title...?

Even though there's no expectation that the case will be heard...

So the US is saying here that they pretty much won't "drag cyber-spies into court" then?

US patent office: Nice try Apple, but pinch-to-zoom is NOT a new invention

Steve Knox
Mushroom

"The US Patent and Trademark Office has rejected..."

ZOMG! The Mayans Were Right!

Microsoft 'surprised' by Google Gmail 'winter cleaning'

Steve Knox
Devil

Wow

Microsoft this year re-branded its existing Hotmail service as Outlook.com.

It says something about the perceived quality of your mail system when applying the Outlook brand is considered an improvement.

Samsung grabs 'World's biggest handset-maker' title off Nokia

Steve Knox
Holmes

Why all the love for soul-less money grubbing, Apple copying Samsung?

Well, once you get past your own brand of fanboi[i?]sm, Samsung makes good kit at good prices.

they don't give a toss about you. They just want your money.

And that's different from Apple, Motorola, Nokia, etc. how?

I don't care about them, either. I just want a good product.

Secrets of an ad broker: NoSQL, millisecond auctions and FLASH ARRAYS

Steve Knox
Thumb Down

Non Sequitur

Disk drive arrays and RDBMS' are massive obstacles to the provision of such applications.

The second does not follow. Nothing in this article even talks about the pros/cons of relational databases.

Judge: There'll be no US Samsung ban, BUT no new trial with Apple either

Steve Knox

Re: Rational decision

So many down votes for Philip Lewis for no apparent reason.

There's a whole lotta fanboyism in this thread, and not of the Apple kind.

Apparently. That's a reason. Not a logical one, mind, but since when has logic shown face on these forums?

Seagate slips out super-silent 2.5in video hard drive

Steve Knox
Headmaster

Math and/or Grammar -- take your pick.

Rather, 100MB/sec / 12 streams = 8.33... MB/s per stream.

(The use of "simultaneously" to modify "handle" effectively rings in the noun phrase "12 separate video streams", meaning that "with..." can only modify "handle", which agrees with the subject drive, meaning that 100MB/s is the sustained data transfer rate for the drive, not for each stream.)

Windows 8: At least it's better than ‘not very good’

Steve Knox
FAIL

Re: Internet Explorer – the worst web browser in the world

So it was the worst out of 2?

In the summer of 1994, I was involved with selecting the web browser to install on my University's PCs. We tested at least five: Mosaic, Netscape, Opera, Lynx, and a DOS-based graphical browser whose name escapes me. When I did first try Internet Explorer a year later, it was worse than those five had been.

FCC: Kids, here's 100MHz of radio spectrum - but you have to share

Steve Knox

Re: Good article, but not entirely accurate

I'm not intimately involved with the investigation, so I'm not sure that this hasn't been tried. I do know from reports, however, that the perpetrator doesn't seem to interfere with test or other non-emergency traffic, and a few times, as investigation intensified, the perpetrator went silent, only to come back once things died down again.

Steve Knox
Boffin

Good article, but not entirely accurate

...plus illegal radio transmissions are, by their nature, easily tracked down.

This is only true in the case of consistent transmissions. We have a case in my neck of the woods (southern Maine, USA) where a certain individual has been transmitting at high power on emergency channels -- but only sporadically, and only when there's actually emergency traffic on those channels.

This is definitely illegal, and certainly immoral, as the net result has been the endangering of several lives. However, to date, tracking the individual responsible has failed due to the short-term sporadic nature of the transmissions.

Win7 hotspot hackers kick-funded - now they're network bondage pros

Steve Knox
Meh

Re: "with HTTP using multiple connections these days"????

Not to mention SPDY, which aims to get rid of most of those multiple connections, anyway.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/12/03/google_spdy_included_in_http_2_draft/

Apple and Samsung mobile monsters: 'We only eat RAW CASH'

Steve Knox
Coat

Re: Owning chipsets not key...

They are not precious...

They don't use a Ring bus architecture then?

(Sorry about that.. My punning's getting out of hand again. It's a bad hobbit, and I'm trying to break it, but I keep going there...and back again.)

MPs: 'Chilling' new libel law will CENSOR THE TRUTH online

Steve Knox
Unhappy

Re: One tiny little country

I thought the law applied if the material was published in the UK? i.e. the website could be viewed here.

Isn't that why libel tourism is so lucrative?

Exactly. And yet when the US government attempts to enforce its laws on the internet, everyone in the UK calls foul. And people in the US call foul when China's government censors things. Repeat ad nauseam.

Most people forget that the truth underlying the "pot calling the kettle black" metaphor is that both the pot and the kettle are in fact black.

That square QR barcode on the poster? Check it's not a sticker

Steve Knox
Thumb Up

Re: Same old, same old...

we use a QR code to allow quick access to our company wifi - scan the code on your device and voila - connected.

So all a hacker needs is some stickers and a wifi bridge or two, and voila - man-in-the-middle!

Apple: 27-inch iMac won't ship until next year

Steve Knox
Trollface

"...it's like saying everyone should buy Ford rather than BMW."

So... you're saying it's a valid argument, then?

Fred Flintstone may not have been real but his pet Dino WAS - boffins

Steve Knox
Pint

Re: what a stupid article title

Have one or two. Relax.

Steve Knox
Black Helicopters

Re: Bad dinoboffins!

He omitted the purple and the collar to avoid licensing fees from Warner Studios...

Apple share dive scuppers trader's alleged get-rich-quick fraud scam

Steve Knox
Facepalm

Not just illegal but stupid

Apparently he didn't realize that 500,000 is less than 1,623,375.

Forget fluorescents, plastic lighting strips coming out next year

Steve Knox
Facepalm

Re: Why one data point is not evidence.

Neither is the so-called "Centennial Light".

Yes.

That.

Was.

My.

Point.

Steve Knox
FAIL

Why one data point is not evidence.

While recycling them could be an issue the design should last much longer than conventional lighting systems. The team says one of their units has been in operation for over a decade with no sign of dying as yet.

http://www.centennialbulb.org/

John McAfee remains on the run, but outside Belize

Steve Knox

Re: In other words

I have been conducting an extensive ongoing campaign of misinformation. It's pretty much what I do.

Since 1992, or earlier, even. See, e.g, http://www.thehackademy.net/madchat/vxdevl/papers/avers/michtime.txt.

A valid use for Windows 8?

Steve Knox

@tony72

It's mostly a media pc, but I get my media from different sources: NetFlix, YouTube, other websites, local files. I also do have a game or two installed on it.

Most media player software I've tried either doesn't support web browsing (necessary for the video from some sites I visit), is difficult to set up, or (XMBC, I'm looking at you, here) actually forces the wrong labels on many of my files, making me rename them back.

I don't use Linux because NetFlix uses Silverlight DRM, and as mentioned above, that's not available, even with Moonlight.

I do use a keyboard/mouse, because the PC doesn't have infrared, but it's a wireless keyboard with integrated touchpad.

Steve Knox

Re: License violation

"If he had Vista Business from work, it was licensed to his employer, not to him personally. Therefore, he's not allowed to buy just an upgrade."

Unless it was a licence-tied-to-the-machine-and-sticker-stuck-on-the-side-of-the-box scenario.

Exactly.

Steve Knox
Alert

A valid use for Windows 8?

[This is more of a play-type topic, but since the only OS section is under work, I've put it here. Feel free to point me to a better section for this post.]

My media center PC at home was a discarded work PC with Windows Vista Business on it. It was slow and flaky, as Vista can be, but since an upgrade to Win7 was $100, I decided to live with the bugs.

I had tested Windows 8 this summer for work purposes and found the live tiles a distraction and the context switches cumbersome. But I realized the interface might work fairly well for a media PC. So, I decided to pay the $40 to upgrade my media center PC from Vista to Windows 8 when Microsoft announced that deal.

On Vista, I was using SRWare Iron for NetFlix, YouTube, and other web video sites, and VLC for local media. So we had two icons on the desktop and a number of bookmarks in the browser -- not overly complicated, but not exactly intuitive.

Windows 8 has a NetFlix app, and I've pinned the other websites we use to the start screen, along with VLC. We're also using the weather app on the start screen. So now from the start screen, there's one click to whatever we want to watch.

I did the upgrade last night while the wife was working a night shift, and she came home and starting using it with no help from me. I interrupted her with a 5-minute overview, but she had already figured out the major interface points herself.

So far, it's faster and more stable than Vista (which doesn't really surprise me) and cheaper than Windows 7.

Now, Windows 8 has received a lot of criticism for its interface, some of which is certainly justified. But it can work quite well for specific consumer purposes like a media PC. Tablet uses are a no-brainer, but anyone else have a good experience setting up Windows 8 on a PC for a particular use?

Scientists build largest ever computerized brain

Steve Knox

Because...

Here are a few of the many reasons for modeling a human brain before attempting to create a computer brain:

  • First off, we have human brains to compare to, so we can measure our progress
  • Second, there are still aspects of biological brains which we still don't understand, any of which could result in the creation of a computer brain so dysfunctional as to be useless.
  • Third, as these results show, our systems simply aren't capable of modeling a neural network of significant size.

Finally, I question your assertion that the sensory functions are irrelevant. Even a computer brain will have to interact with the world. Even if you only connect a terminal up as I/O, that has to be mapped as sensory input somehow.

Steve Knox
Thumb Up

Re: Java or not...

Thanks for the info, psyq. While I enjoy making trolling remarks about languages, I also do appreciate relevant, informative posts.

Steve Knox
Trollface

So far the model code is reaching the limits of what can be done...

...since the team is approaching the limits to how far you can scale the Java software

Java? Well, there's your problem...

At least it's not JavaScript, though.

Big Bang bashing boffins ‘Big Bounce’ back to BIRTH OF TIME

Steve Knox
Boffin

Speaking of perspective,

on the scale of the earth's revolution* around the sun, we're on the same order of magnitude as ants, size-wise at least. Yet we can comprehend it.

[N]o theory can ever be proved.

Yes, that's the point of science. No theory about anything can ever be proved. But the most likely theory can be selected by comparing degree of assumptions and correlation with observed evidence.

* The earth revolves around the sun. It rotates around its axis.

Google tools gaffe let ZOMBIE web admins feast on websites

Steve Knox
Mushroom

Re: what does deleted mean?

Decades of being wheedled by incompetent users have convinced most developers to ensure that the "delete" button doesn't actually delete anything.

We've been conditioned to retain but flag because when the inevitable request to restore the data comes, it doesn't matter to the user that they clicked OK on the giant flashing "WARNING THIS WILL DELETE THIS INFORMATION WITH NO HOPE OF RECOVERY. CLICK OK ONLY IF YOU REALLY REALLY MEAN IT" message. As far as they're concerned, if the data can't be restored, it's our fault.

Assange needs to get some sunlight and fresh air, say Ecuadoreans

Steve Knox

He has been looking a little pasty recently.

Read: since his first ever public appearance.

New Tosh drive can wipe out 4TB 'near instantaneously'

Steve Knox
Boffin

Re: 5 better then 3 ?

Here's how the platters/density debate stacks up, from first principles:

Picture a drive with one platter and two cylinders. With heads on each side, this gives you the potential to read/write two tracks at once out of the four total.

Now quadruple your data by adding three more platters and you can read eight tracks at once out of the sixteen total. Consequently, your sequential read speed quadruples.

However, it take the same amount of time to seek between the two cylinders as it did before, so random performance doesn't increase much.

If instead you quadrupled the density of the drive, you'd now have one platter with four cylinders each with twice as much data per track.

So your sequential read speed doubles, but your seek time also decreases (because the cylinders are closer together, reducing head travel time), improving random performance.

In short, if you want raw sequential performance, increase the number of platters. If you want random performance, increase density. If you want to store gobs of data, increase both.

Samsung printers have secret admin account

Steve Knox
Boffin

Re: I'm not posting this just to get a silver badge either.

<Smug> wasn't one of the new HTML tags, sorry TeeCee.

Ten weird Chinese mobile phones

Steve Knox
Devil

Begin GT Ferrari Phone

"You’ll be buying this one for its looks..."

Well, I won't, but I'm not a masochist with a gold fetish...

'Microsoft to make its own Surface phones' - mutterings

Steve Knox
Thumb Down

Yes They Can

But Digitimes ... can't be dismissed out of hand.

Yes they can. You know what statisticians call a predictor with a 40% correlation? "Worse than chance".

Badges for Commentards

Steve Knox
Trollface

How about a Devil's Advocate badge

For those posts which may have received a lot of downvotes, but generated some serious conversations?

Trolling isn't all bad, you know ; )

Steve Knox
Trollface

Re: Didn't I make 100 posts in a year?

...somewhere, some old 486 is running a BASIC script that's repeatedly doing SELECT and UPDATE statements...

That's T-SQL. BASIC would be doing rs.ReadNext and rs.Update.

Shurley, as this is EL Reg, the script should be running on a BBC Micro, and be using PEEK and POKE?

Elon Musk envisions small town of vegetarians on Mars

Steve Knox

Re: I would laugh if

Actually, taxing a Mars colony wouldn't make much sense -- you're almost certain to waste more resources trying to collect, even if the colonists were willing to pay, than you would gain in taxation anyway.

And if they weren't willing to pay, the cost of enforcement would be astronomical.

Pong creator turns nose up at Nintendo Wii U

Steve Knox
Happy

Re: If anything

I doubt it - for most people, the cost and complexity of setting up a gaming PC don't outweigh the benfits of better graphics. Add to the the ability of a console to sit in your living room and make use of your high-quality surrpoing sound systems and large display screen.

Sure, you can connect a PC up to these bits of kit, but them you have to factor in keeping a PC in the living room.

Co. was tossing a 2-yr old PC with Vista Business on it.

Bought a prev-gen ATI card (5250) for $50, a Blu-ray drive for $50, and a wireless KB/mouse for $20.

Now I have a media center PC with the ability to play games better than the XBOX does for peanuts. The video card has HDMI out with support for digital sound so it' works with my surround system perfectly.

The PC replaced:

1 old and slow cable box from a cable company who was charging way to much anyway,

1 Blu-ray player,

1 Argosy media player.

So it takes up less space, is less complex to manage, provides a higher quality experience, and if you count the savings on the cable bill, paid for itself in two months.

What's the problem with a PC in the living room again?

Apple versus Samsung: everything infringes everything

Steve Knox
Facepalm

Why I'm Not A Judge

My response would be along the lines of:

"Okay, Apple, you've done a good job of showing that Samsung does not respect your patents. Samsung, you've done a good job showing that Apple does not respect your patents.

Therefore, to protect the markets from your respective unrespectfulnesses, I am issuing an injunction prohibiting either company from importing or selling any product in this country that has not been tested against every patent* and proven non-infringing.

This injunction takes effect Monday, December 3rd -- unless you two companies find, somehow, that you can respect each others' patents by then.

*That's every patent."

Sandy Island does exist - on a 1908 chart

Steve Knox
Joke

Chart Title Explains It

"Pacific Ocean in Four Sheets"

[to the wind, presumably]

Microsoft dragging its feet on Linux Secure Boot fix

Steve Knox
Facepalm

Re: Never ascribe to malice that which can adequately be explained by incompetence

@Nigel 11.

No, what you've described is a very short view. In classical terms, it's what ethicists call selfish.

Steve Knox
Boffin

Never ascribe to malice that which can adequately be explained by incompetence

In the long view, malice is simply a subcategory of incompetence anyway.

HP: Autonomy had us believing in a false IDOL

Steve Knox
Facepalm

Re: @Steve Knox, 17:15

I always reply anonymously to anonymous posts...because anonymous posters irritate me and I think they should get a name.

Think about the logicl of that for 5 seconds, please. And if you don't see the problem, think again. If you still don't see the problem, kindly FO.

(Here's a hint: it only reinforces my allegation of hypocrisy.)

'Brit Bill Gates' Lynch: Only Mad Leo Apotheker understood Autonomy

Steve Knox
FAIL

Re: Anyone ever heard of due diligence

Now, do I take the word of a CEO with years of management experience, that understands how company law works, and who knows that if she incorrectly accuses someone of fault she will be sued, or some ill-informed poster?

False choice. Read up on the fundamentals of logic, Matt, before trying to use your brain.

Steve Knox
Boffin

Re: Anyone ever heard of due diligence

KPMG were hired by hp to do the due diligence. Deloitte were the accounting party on Autonomy's side. If anyone was negligent it was Deloitte and KPMG for not spotting the double-booking.

This presumes that the double-booking went on, and that it is the entire cause of HP's writedown. As of now we only have HP's word for that, and they're hardly a disinterested party.