* Posts by MachDiamond

8717 publicly visible posts • joined 10 Aug 2012

England's village green hydrogen dream in tatters

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Hydrogen is absolute SHIT for energy storage or transfer

I'd love to see some commentary to go with the downvotes. In the US, there have been plenty of stories of people going off-grid and having their homes condemned for occupation due to regulations that require connection to utilities if they are available. There's been a couple where kids are involved that are even more painful to hear about. It's nothing about the livability of the home, just that it isn't connected with an active billing account.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Well, duh

"A lot of new houses today seem to be being built with heat pumps installed. It'll be interesting to see how those work out before spending well over £10k to retrofit our older houses."

It will also be useful to get data based on microclimates. There could be swaths that do really well with a ASHP and some that do rather poorly.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Correction

"Hot air is a valuable form of heating."

While what politicians spew is often called "hot" air, it's only slightly above ambient and completely useless. Not enough delta-T.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Hydrogen is absolute SHIT for energy storage or transfer

"And if you don't like it you can just freeze to death without heating as they'll just cut you off."

Depends on where you are. In some places you won't be able to occupy a house that isn't connected to utilities and they'll move mountains to make sure you are out of there even though for 1/4 of the price of doing that, they could pay your bill for you. Chances are a law will be passed that you must be connected and if you fail to pay your bill, they'll put a lien on the property.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: I have to wonder

"And somewhere around about 1,054 ministerial appointments up until April of this year. That includes junior minister appointments, and is based on parliamentary data. What a shower of dishonest, incompetent shit."

Do any of them have qualifications in engineering or science? In the US they are mainly failed attorneys so complete shite when it comes to anything very useful.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Well, duh

"Say an all in price of £15k for the heat pump and full system retrofit and make-good."

That's sounds a bit too cheap. Are you including permits and inspections?

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Heat pump crump.

"California building code requires heating units, whether you need them or not, but essentially says zip about requiring AC."

The building codes require heating, but that doesn't mean you have to use it or decide to take it out if you like. My heater hasn't been on for 8 years and it's on the chopping block when I get around to redoing the utility room where it lives. I'm eying the space for more storage for my canning habit. I'm in the process of building two more solar collectors for heating the house. I don't mind wearing a jumper most of the time, but not always when indoors. I'm aiming to have most of the south wall of the house covered in collectors in the next year or so. The eves shade the sun from the wall in the warmer months so I won't have to buy blocks of ice come July to compensate. The vent on the roof for the gas heater will also be able to go which will make installing solar PV easier.

MachDiamond Silver badge

"It's currently 12C in my bedroom and about 7C in the kitchen. That's good enough for winter."

I think I sleep better in winter when it's a bit cold in my room. I'm slid under a stack of blankets with the second away from me being electric. It makes more sense to just heat me rather than the whole house. I have electric heat in the bathroom I turn on when I shower.

MachDiamond Silver badge

"To meet the 2050 deadline they would need to be converting 20,000 properties a *week* to heatpumps"

That would also mean the immediate cessation of boiler installation and the scrapping of boilers with plenty of life left in them which also tosses out all of the energy used to create them.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Which Led Zep Album?

"Because it is the smallest sized atom making perfect seals that work year in, year out is next to impossible."

Actually, He is smaller. H likes to live as a pair while Helium is happy as a single atom.

Hundreds of thousands of dollars in crypto stolen after Ledger code poisoned

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Only $610,000?

"The old adage about a fool and his money comes to mind every time I hear about someone getting scammed, hacked, rug pulled etc. etc."

I think many people are looking for easy money and haven't yet learned that 'easy' and 'low-risk' are on opposite sides of the graph. Any investment worth getting into is not going to be simple. It will take some knowledge and skill to make a proper evaluation of the risks and rewards.

Plain old currency speculation at least has the benefit of historical records that are based on something real. If you use Euros to buy US Dollars thinking the Dollar will go up, even if you jump wrong, the Dollar will still have value. It's not going to evaporate leaving behind a news story about somebody missing and believed to currently be in a country with no extradition treaties with any other country.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Next steps

"Good stuff but it will also nullify all that guff we hear about crypto transactions being anonymous and free from state or indeed any central control."

The sorts of transactions you would want to hide that would make crypto the medium of choice will be automatically flagged as suspicious. If you make a large transaction using crypto for something like a car or land, the tax authority is going to want a chat about where the money came from and that they've carved out and been paid what they think would be due on that money. If you can't provide a good paper trail on that money, there will be a reckoning. That's the problem with big transactions, they're usually for something that is registered or licensed if they're legit. You could buy tonnes of wheat for delivery somewhere, but what would be the reason for using crypto?

A number of people that were duped by SBF (strange family name since his parents never married) have been screaming for more regulation. I have yet to see the media interview somebody that is just shrugging and saying it was the chance they took and nothing should change.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: I'm sorry, what was that?

"Digital pound or dollar anyone? (I hope not....)"

I'd not want to participate in those either. It's those cash purchases that I mentioned above where a Three Letter Agency can really get to know you. If all of your day to day purchases are computerized, it just makes it easier to build a detailed file about you since computers can spot the patterns and spit out matches rather than trained humans pouring over endless minutia.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: I'm sorry, what was that?

"if cryptocurrencies were widely used and you were fleeing a despotic government you could walk across the border with your keys memorised or steganographically hidden"

That is way off to one side of the graph. Not impossible, but it might be improbable that somebody with enough money to diddle with crypto would have enough of anything to hide when crossing a border. That would also be crossing a border at a formal crossing.

Sewing a pattern in your clothes would be really extreme. A microSD card is very easy to hide and a simple RFID is even easier.

MachDiamond Silver badge

I'm sorry, what was that?

How exactly (in excruciating detail) is crypto better than cash? I am, of course, talking about transactions not involving any sort of contra-ban or bribery. I have money in a bank account insured by a government agency. I have precious metals and some gems. I have some art and I have banknotes. I don't have a penchant for drugs, firearms or have enough money for a down payment on a honest politician (one that stays bought). I suppose that the fees could be less painful when trying to take money across borders in large amounts, but I've done that before in creative ways aside from a suitcase full of cash.

Many people seem to be rushing into crypto under the impression that it will be an easy way to make a pile of easy money. Easy is the operative word. The truth is that the bottom levels of the pyramid where money can be made have already been filled up and those above that point are taking a huge risk somebody can be found willing to give them more per coin before the music stops and it's discovered that there are far fewer chairs than one was lead to believe.

It's at the point where the aren't many common expenses that aren't already exposed to government prying. Rents, mortgages, utilities, insurance, loan payments are all either keep track of through registration, licensing and taxes or easily subpoenaed. What's left are actually the important things that can be paid with cash that will say more about you than you own a car and live in a home.

Privacy crusaders accuse X of ad-targeting that flouts EU rules

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: My guess

"I also hope, though don't really expect, that they find reason to make Xitler personally liable for any fines Xitter isn't able to cover after liquidating its remaining assets."

He IS the owner and in a very obvious way exercises absolute control over the company. He could have just continued to buy stock in Twitter and been able to demand many of the changes he's been doing without the same level of exposure. There may have even been some adult supervision left to keep him out of trouble. His new top of the line Gulfstream jet is going to be kept busy taking him all over the place for court dates and government enquiry appearances.

NASA engineers scratch heads as Voyager 1 starts spouting cosmic gibberish

MachDiamond Silver badge
Coat

Re: Extended warranty?

"Just a thought."

After spamming Eric Idle, I suppose I could send a letter to JPL letting them know that the warranty on their spacecraft will expire soon and they should call to renew. (All popular gift cards accepted)

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Where are the Pythons?

"Are you asking us to 'spam' Eric? (or maybe his pet fish)"

Well, yes.

Now I'll need to see if I can add a viking helmet logo to my envelope program.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Where are the Pythons?

With all of the great Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett references, we need the remaining Pythons to get together and write a space opera to extend the reference universe we can draw from. I've got Eric's address around here somewhere, I should send a letter.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Have they tried

"I use "give it a kick in the guts"."

We'll let nobby kick it in the fork.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Excelent design - aliens must be proud

"Would need billions of gigabytes of storage for any onboard software, would need to upgrade online very few days with a billion times more bandwidth that V1 and V2 have, would need constant rebooting and troubleshooting with at least half the time not working. Would be filled with useless shit and nagging adverts."

I'll give you one guess why NASA doesn't use Windows as a basis for spacecraft software.

Tesla says California's Autopilot action violates its free speech rights

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: According to Musk, fraud is protected under the 1st Amendment

"If he can get the gross weight over 8,500 pounds, then it's officially a Heavy Duty Vehicle"

Gubbmint is already carving out additional weight allowances in the US for electric semi trucks due to the added weight of the batteries. Totally bonkers since the weight limits are in place to keep the motorways from crumbling even faster and to keep bridges doing bridge stuff rather than creating new fish habitats.

Big heavy vehicles do take some getting used to since they aren't as nimble or as good at stopping as a passenger vehicle. Building one for public consumption that accelerates like stink is a bit of a problem.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: According to Musk, fraud is protected under the 1st Amendment

"custard-based microelectronics"

So all of the processing is done in YouSpace?

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: According to Musk, fraud is protected under the 1st Amendment

"So, we started advising them to keep the batteries warm, perhaps wrapping them up in something warm when in the field."

I put camera batteries in my pocket where they will be warmed by my body. A coat pocket doesn't work as well since it can be insulated from me as well as the outside so the battery won't be warmed up.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: According to Musk, fraud is protected under the 1st Amendment

"Seriously though, why does "the land of the free" not have a law against unfair dismissal,"

The US does and doesn't. Each state formulates their own employment laws with some Federal laws that supersede them (discrimination and such). In most places, you work "at will" so you can be dismissed or quit. Even with this, it's not too hard to open a case if you've been sacked and either get your job back (why would you?) or be compensated.

I had a manufacturing company for many years and was taught by my mentors to be very careful about hiring and firing. I was told that if I wanted to let an employee go, I should document everything and also give them warnings or I could be on the hook for a lawsuit or back wages. Sadly, dismissing People of Color tends to lead to the most lawsuits so one is advised to tread most carefully there.

MachDiamond Silver badge

"Dead people cant sue."

Hmm, nobody has told that to the US court system.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: They do it over there but they don’t do it here …. (Ooh fashion)

"The ASA have fewer teeth than the front row of a Rolling Stones concert."

One could also say fewer remaining brain cells than those ON the stage.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: They do it over there but they don’t do it here …. (Ooh fashion)

"so the vitamin bottle itseld doesnt have to claim anything."

The vitamin bottle can't claim anything or they'd have to go through proper clinical trials and publish the results. I expect that wouldn't be a good idea as the invented stories from "disinterested" parties are so much better.

I should have said that Tesla doesn't do 'traditional advertising' as in running ads in various places. They might on Twitter since it would be a handy way for Elon to shovel money from Tesla into the barren cupboards of X.

MachDiamond Silver badge
Thumb Up

Re: Quote from Terry Pratchett - Going Postal

"Or I watch the live action video version."

I'll add a thumbs up for watching Hogfather. I could be a bit biased as Michelle Dockery playing Susan Sto Helit doesn't get old for me. She's very pretty.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: The Earth is flat

"the Earth is flat in every sufficiently small area."

Looked at fractally, it also has an infinite coastline. Ok, effectively infinite.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: According to Musk, fraud is protected under the 1st Amendment

"To be fair, the reason there is little research on weed as medication is that research on it was banned for decades."

Absolutely and why somebody saying that research done years ago proves XYZ. It won't have been done in the US and many other countries for the reason that there would have been no way to get permission to research therapeutic applications. If you wanted to "prove" that MJ causes dementia, you may have had a chance at being granted a license, but a very slim chance.

I see some truth in a few of the anecdotal claims, but I know some are false, at least in my case. It's useless on me for back spasms, I only got stupid with a painful back and no benefit I could tell. If those remedies are valid claims, it shouldn't be hard to prove them out with proper trials.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: They do it over there but they don’t do it here …. (Ooh fashion)

"If Musk comes over here with his ads, he won’t stand a chance."

The laughs are on you. Tesla doesn't advertise.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Volkswagen should have had these brilliant lawyers in 2015

"The judge probably will dismiss this case, they have better things to do."

Elon could also try the Sovereign Citizen gambit too. I can't believe how many times those people get off with just a caution on the court TV shows when they should be locked up in padded cells for an eon or three.

Enterprising techie took the bumpy road to replacing vintage hardware

MachDiamond Silver badge

In our own house

I've seen in more than one place where nobody was thinking about upgrading the office tech and creating a budget for that. Accountants will also do things such as have a budget for a department that doesn't include repairs, but if they want to replace something, it comes out of the departments budget which is likely already straining at the seams. This can be one of the curses of accountants. They only see the prices but pay no attention to the costs. Not only would a drive upgrade add more storage, it could shrink the space required, use less power (and less AC to keep cool and be easy to migrate over files.

My HP 4100TN works like a champ and I pick up OEM toner cartridges off of eBay when I spot a good price. I have a stack of multi-function machines that I've acquired for free over the years as a back up. I don't do much printing at home (WFH) as a good portion are large prints and I can just send those off to the office supply store where they have several large machines and pick them up later. If I spot another 4000 series HP in good nick, it's coming home with me.

Tesla to remote patch 2M vehicles after damning Autopilot safety probe

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: There's a movie in there.

"Elon and other auto makers may not like the idea of being tighly regulated. But speaking as potential collateral damage, I think regulating these folks tightly is a just dandy idea."

Surprisingly, lots of industries welcome regulation. If Elon creates a bad name for autonomous driving systems, that spills over on all of the others who may have done a much better job. Not saying that have, mind, just using it as an example.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: "recall"

"Obviously, USA isn't the UK, so perhaps to get American's attention they might want to bring back televised crucifixion."

Stonings!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffwFXGPRDu4

Obligatory Python link.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: "recall"

"Though owners might get a bit narked at realising functionality could be removed at whim of manufacturer."

If they don't know that already, they've been living under a rock.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: "recall"

"One of the major causes of Tesla accidents isn't just that Tesla doesn't use Lidar, it's that it doesn't use cameras to monitor for driver attention, "

Do you really want a car that's watching and recording you while you drive? It's already come to light that Tesla cars send video back to the mothership. If there is any sort of incident, you are also ratting yourself out if the video shows something you'd have rather wasn't brought up.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Autopilot may undermine the effectiveness of the driver's supervision

"“The currently enabled Autopilot, Enhanced Autopilot and Full Self-Driving features require active driver supervision and do not make the vehicle autonomous.”"

Yet, in interviews, Elon will show just that by removing his hands from the steering wheel while he drives reporters around and how he claims that FSD often does all of the driving for him with no interruptions. Those videos and quotes aren't very hard to find. While the written word is what they'll point to when in court, people are getting their information from the media releases since reading a EULA/Contract is tedious and those documents are created for maximum unreadability and just there to trot out in court.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: "recall"

"Hasn't Musk already objected that it interferes withhis free speech rights to call it Autopilot irrespective of whether it does what it says on the tin?"

The bigger issue is that Tesla has filed affidavits with the State of California and possibly elsewhere that characterizes Autopilot as no more than Level 2 drivers assistance. Yet, they (mainly Elon) will talk about how wonderful it is during interviews and earnings calls and how it drives Elon all over Austin, TX with zero interactions (FSD, I assume).

They could rename Autopilot to "MondoDrive" or even "GigaDrive" and it wouldn't lead people on about what is can actually do.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: "recall"

The word "recall" is used to denote an issue that the automaker must address as soon as reasonably possible as opposed to an update they push out themselves to correct something. If the industry wants to come up with a new word, it would make no difference. In aerospace there are degrees of mandates all with their own name. The lowest might require an update or inspection the next time the aircraft goes through annual maintenance or repair. Another can specify a repair within XX days and the most severe could ground the aircraft type until repairs are made/checks done. Mentor Pilot may have done a segment on this or just explained it over a combination of videos. When I was working on rockets, it was the last all the time if the FAA was concerned about something, but a bit different as our craft were 'experimental' and didn't carry a Type Certificate.

'Return to Office' declared dead

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Stick

"I've known people give up £100K+ jobs in London for £70-80K similar jobs elsewhere in the UK and have more disposable income thanks to lower housing costs and vastly lower commuting costs :-)"

This is why it's very important to do the research on where the job is located. The company may be offering a high salary bracket, but that might not be sufficient once taxes and costs are considered. The more you are paid, the higher your tax rates which is big trimming right from the top. If it also means living in a high cost area, that's post-tax money going there since housing isn't usually tax deductible. There's also all of the non-tangible considerations such as congestion, noise, crime, access to open space, etc.

I built a rough spreadsheet of figures when I was job hunting some years back to help me evaluate whether a salary being offered was as good as it seemed. I found that everything in the Silicon Valley, San Francisco area paid poorly even though the salary being offered looked pretty generous. Other 'tech centers' were much the same. The last job I had working for somebody else seemed to pay very little, but the cost of living was so cheap I was able to buy and pay off a home in just 5 years (not the Taj Mahal, I can tell you). This has meant I can work doing what I like away from the rat race and still keep the pantry full and take holidays and not stress about making next month's rent or what I would do if the company folded up or I was sacked.

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Loud minority

"You made person you, how could you suggest such a thing!"

It was the Guinness talking. Flagons and flagons of Guinness. ... and a shot of Old Janx Spirit on the side.

GM's Cruise sheds nine execs in the name of safety and integrity

MachDiamond Silver badge

Fascinating, thought Mr Spock

I wonder if any of the programmers of autonomous driving software ever considered the situation of having somebody lying in the road. A human would slam on the brakes and have a bit of a freak-out if they came across an accident victim lying injured in the road. A robotaxi, not so much. Perhaps it thought, umm, classified the person only a speed bump.

I'd like to stake my claim that a day or so ago I predicted the chance that Cruise would be wound up. This may be a good indicator that GM is finding the risks to be more than the rewards.

If I'm out of town and need to take a taxi, I like to ask the driver about places to go and those areas to avoid. A robot could be programmed for that, but it would be like adwords. The businesses would have to purchase recommendations for the robo taxis to mention them where a human driver might get some commission, but it might be as completely crass since they'd a bad review if they pointed people at places that were a complete rip-off. It's easy enough to go online and find a good steak house, but it's another to find who is making the best take away curry close by.

Surprise! Email from personal.
information.reveal@gmail.com is not going to contain good news

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: but it's not always as easy as that to implement.

"One even insisted on enrolling my (personal!) phone in their device management / remote wipe capability as part of the deal."

I'm with you on not allowing that. I had somebody I was working with want me to have Text. I fought like mad to have the telco take it off my service since I found it a massive time waster and buggy. I told this other person that if he wanted me to have text, he could bloody well provide me with a phone and service. Didn't happen since he didn't want to pay for it.

My personal business if none of an employer's business. I am not going to allow them access to my personal phone. It could happen that I'm looking into employment elsewhere and would not like them to know about that until I'm ready to tell them. I might have data on my phone that I don't want to be remotely wiped if I'm dismissed and it's done before I have a chance to make sure it's backed up. When I was working for a company with a very abrasive person nominally over me, I was looking for a job elsewhere. He managed to get himself invited to leave and the company then hired a very good engineering manager so I decided to stay. Had the company known I was shopping my resume, they might have hired a replacement for me to train and then let me go.

Adobe warns it may face massive fines for subscription cancellation practices

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Finally

"Very happy with Affinity Photo, purchased, not rented."

The Photoshop/Lightroom combo for US$125/yr was a good deal over what I had paid for boxed software, but it's since doubled in price and the new features are mainly not that useful for me. I also keep my main production machine offline and Adobe forces me to expose that computer to the internet once a month or so when I'd rather not.

NASA pushes back timing of ISS deorbit vehicle contract

MachDiamond Silver badge

"This picture shows some rebar surviving at one of the Trinity test foundations, 100 feet from The Bomb, but perhaps the ground shielded it."

I've visited there and have photos of the rebar. I thought the site had been excavated in the blast, but they explain how the boundary effect works to prevent that to some extent. A big enough bomb will make a crater.

California commission says Cruise withheld data about parking atop of a pedestrian

MachDiamond Silver badge

Cruise scaled back

GM is pulling way back on Cruise and could pull the plug completely. Even the MBA's might be seeing that there's more to it than CGI presentations and scheduling deployment dates while waving at the engineers to "just get it done. There's a good chap."

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: CPUC is culpable

A governor of California signed a law permitting the testing of autonomous vehicles on public roads before there was any framework on restrictions and liability. All of that was to be determined at a later date. In the mean time, ... Ready, Steady...... GO!

MachDiamond Silver badge

Re: Worrying statement

"Anyone reading that sentence might get the impression that the software was a bit dodgy to start off with!"

With Over-The-Air updating, it's not JUST an impression. Everybody knows it's dodgy and was released long before it was ready.

When I worked on rockets, our joke was, "We'll fix it in software" even when it was a hardware issue. We weren't all that caviler since even the small landers we worked on were very expensive and took a fair bit of time to build.