Posts by Charles Manning 3509 publicly visible posts • joined 26 Jun 2007
Precisely.
I live in NZ and have never been to Blighty. If I go, then going to Bletchley is an absolute must on my itinery.
However, like most, the only motivation to go to Bletchley would be to see the computers. I can see stables, swans and gift shops with marmalade anywhere - even in NZ.
It would be sad though if the NMC was to move since the setting is part of the story. Still, if it was a choice between seeing the NMC or seeing the estate, the computers would win.
Well I had an interesting experience yesterday...
Four developers (real developers: Linux kernel, electronics designers etc - not just web content "developers") in the office when someone needed to test our website by accessing it from outside our local network,
Although we all had phones, they were all candy-bar feature phones. None were smart phones.
Had to go find a marketing mupet....
I asked people my and they backed up my impressions. When I'm in the office, I have a PC. When I am at home and walking about, I want to be left alone. The phone is there just to make contact etc.
The real techies have gone full circle long ago. Since real techies are often early adopters, we might see a trend back to a smartphone-less society when facebook updates can wait until you're at home.
How pathetic do people think humans are that they think a Smart Phone is borderline being a human right?
I'm no luddite or anything. My family of 4, including myself, have "feature phones", pretty much only used for voice and very seldom used for texting.
I do have 2 smart phones which Google sent me for testing some software I wrote for them, but they are not used on a day to day basis.
It is surely only the dumbest people that think a smartphone is a ncessity. To repurpose the comment made about Steven Fry:
"A smart phone is a stupid person's idea of what smart technology should be".
If what you say is true, then it won't be a Yahoo-only problem. The same issue would be faced by hotmail, Google etc.
It is rather unclear, but there do not seem to be reports of that happening.
If it is only Yahoo that are having the issue, then there is some smoke being blown up donkeys.
Unions gang together to drive wages up, way past they should be.
Some corporations gang together to drive wages down.
Both use the same principles and are equally morally bankrupt.
The reserve army theory works well for unskilled and low-skill work where you can fire Joe on Monday afternoon and have Pete doing his old job as well by lunchtime Tuesday. Tech (the real stuff) really isn't like that.
Me too. For 30 years.
I agree that the RPi is not enough to make a proper product. You will typically have to do a lot of board design and shagging about with the kernel and software to make something that looks like a real product.
But the same holds for the Intel thing. It is no closer to being a real product than the RPi.
If I was to use these boards in some sort of products (eg. test jigs) I would go with the Pi over this thing because they are available from multiple vendors and I know I can still buy RPis in a year or two, and there are thousands of people that have dabbled with the RPi and ironed out its issues. This thing you're on your own.
If I was up against the task of designing a board + software to bake into a product I would pick an ARM over the Intel any day. Heres why:
* The ARMs are a known quantity. They have the same debug tools etc. One debugger toolchain works on all of them. There are near infinite sources of information. Almost everything you learn with one ARM device is immediately transferable to other devices from other manufacturers.Intel: none of those.
* Intel has a very long track record of killing off their devices, a major reason why embedded people avoid them like the pox. If I design a board with an Intel on it, it becomes very unlikely I will be able to source those parts two or three years from now. That screws me over and I need to then re-design the board. I'd do better to just go with a vendor that has shown a willingness to commit to the embedded market.
There is absolutely nothing compelling in this part or this board.
is not a technical one, it is a business one and a shareholder one.
Intel is getting their lunch eaten by ARM in every space except servers, and ARMs are threatening there too.
Intel is trying to find some new markets. If they don't then they will slowly atrophy.
These threats must be making stockholder meetings uncomfortable. Intel was once a Blue Chip stock with guaranteed healthy returns. Now they look like they are heading for a rock. They need some comforting stories to quell the riots.
Unfortunately for Intel, they very much understand high margin business that pretty much goes like this:
1. Spend lots on development.
2. Take a tablespoon of sand. Bake a chip and sell it for $100 or more. Repeat.
3. Big profit.
The business model they need to develop is low-margin. We're talking sub-$10 gross margin per chip, and far less for the real bottom end.
Playing with a few development boards is the easy bit. Getting there is going to require a complete corporate re-jigging: development, marketing, sales,.... It is unclear that is possible with a company with 100,000 employees and development sites scattered around the globe.
This particular spec is for servers, not phones etc. Undoubtedly they will make phone etc specs too at some stage. Canonical would want that if their Ubuntu-phone goes anywhere.
This is not the first such spec though. ARM have already done something similar for the Coretex M0 and M3. It really helps portability as you don't have to fiddle so much with linker scripts, debug scripts and the like to move from one device to another.
The current Linux kernel uses a device tree to allow a single kernel to boot on multiple different platforms. That is handy for making packages which will run on a wide variety of hardware. Like a PC, it does blow out the code footprint as you end up with drivers for stuff that is not even present on the SoC you are using. This is very handy for the distro-oriented folks who want to generate a single OS that can be booted on, say, both a RPi and a beagleboard.
Very few of the real embedded systems running Linux will run a full-fat kernel though. Most will trim the kernel down to just what is needed for the task at hand. While this takes a bit more time to do, it reduces footprint dramatically and speeds up booting.
Hardware flexibility is really important too.
Intel don't allow you to design chips. You have to take what Intel decides to bake.
With ARM **you** can customise the chips **you** want.
For networking/servers this might be muli-core parts with networking fabric, automatic switchover,... buitlt in. For crypto crunching it might be chips with huge crypto engines built in. For movie makers it might be chips with lots of video heavy-lifting done in hardware.
All these things do lead to power saving, but they also lead to reduced systems costs. All very important in doing more.
But to copy a swipe key, you need to get the thing in your hands.
The mag swipe thing is surely a huge step up from the previous mechanical technology which could be copied with a $2 file. With mechanical keys a lost key is a huge issue because changing the lock takes a long time and $$$. Swipe keys can be changed in minutes for cents.
Assuming the challenge/response isn't Lock:"1234", phone:"5678", RF keys should be a step up in security from that.
"Surely if it's an "unlicensed money transmitting business" then he's not covered by the Bank Secrecy Act ?"
Nope. It is the same principle that requires you to pay taxes on ill-gotten gains. If you don't declare your drug dealings, you can get hammered by IRS (as well as on drug charges).
What makes it hard for these blokes is that due toe the BC anonymity they don't have the info they have to provide even if they want to. Forcing people to identify themselves to cash in, or buy, BC is going to take away a lot of reason to use it.
Wells Fargo would be up against the same charges if they executed wire transfers without asking for Id.
According to TFA, it seems these people were potentially operating an illegal money transmitting facility.
In USA the following applies:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/31/5330
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/31/5313
One of the requirements is that "When a domestic financial institution is involved in a transaction for the payment, receipt, or transfer of United States coins or currency (or other monetary instruments the Secretary of the Treasury prescribes), in an amount, denomination, or amount and denomination, or under circumstances the Secretary prescribes by regulation, the institution and any other participant in the transaction the Secretary may prescribe shall file a report on the transaction at the time and in the way the Secretary prescribes. A participant acting for another person shall make the report as the agent or bailee of the person and identify the person for whom the transaction is being made. "
These laws were put in place to control money laundering.
That pretty much forbids any anonymous transactions, whether for drugs or legal products. While they cannot nail the anonymous people, they can nail the people providing the service.
It might not be morally right to cuff them, but the law is the law and at this stage it looks like they might have broken it.
If this is run through the courts as a test case, it could potentially break Bitcoin in USA.
I am not at all adverse to "hand ups" and ensuring that people get good opportunities (part of the reason I don't actually have any problem paying taxes and living in a place like NZ).
Free education (that results in useful output), or at least very well subsidised education, is a really good thing.
Guaranteed income is like life-long dole. It is destructive. Why even get out of bed if there is no incentive?
Some of us are more productive than others and to get the most out of the economy, and thus the most wealth into society, we need to make sure we're all doing what we can. When someone doesn't feel like being a truck driver (all he's capable of) because he can get the same money doing nothing, then society loses a truck driver. Someone else has to drive that truck and is therefore not doing something else.
Trying to achieve fairness is ill founded. How do you even measure fairness anyway?
For example,John screws around partying his whole adolescence then at age 16 takes a job pushing supermarket trolleys from 9am to 5pm sharp. Fred studies his arse off, goes to university and burns midnight oil. He enters the workplace at 22. Is it fair that Fed gets paid the same as John? Of course not.
Ultimately what makes it fair is getting the same access to education etc (as is the case in NZ). If you don't get off yer bum and make the most of the resources put in front of you, then should everyone else be penalised?
I don't know if you can blame the unemployed, the homeless etc, but smashing the buses won't get them employment or homes etc.
There is only one way I'll ever run as fast as Usain Bolt and that is if he walks. Slowly. When that happens we don't have two high performing runners. We have two miserable losers. Everyone loses because we've lost that sprinter's capability.
There is only one road to equality:reduce everyone's productivity and earning until we're all equally homeless, unemployed etc. Then nobody can afford anything. In particular, nobody will be able to afford to hire anyone else, eat out etc. The service jobs and tips that low-end earners depend on will then go away....
It is the high performers that create the surpluses in society that allow the low performers to tag along for the ride. If everyone is just eeking by then nobody is paying that lovely tax that pays for food stamps, unemployment allowances, etc.
Sounds like an own goal to me.
No. Windows Phone HAD its space. Past tense. Its, not it's. Fixed both of those for you.
"market share growth" etc... Tosh! Microsoft has been playing this phone game for a very long time. Since 2001. Longer than Google or Apple. The "give them a chance to get warmed up" excuse does not work!
MS pretty much had the corporate market sewn up if they wanted it and could have shoulder-charged Blackberry out of existence in 2004 or so.
Those older MS phones were the preferred "corporate" phone in many countries and the MS corporate end-to-end storyline was quite compelling.
Then they bought the Danger Kin phone with its consumer-oriented and no longer corporate-oriented UI. The sensible thing would have been to run two phone brands: Kin for kids, Windows Phone for the existing corporate customers.
But no, not MS. They kill their corporate phone platform and replace it with the kiddie phone.
This is a fundamental violation of market management: Always look after your bread and butter customers first. If you want to try new markets, then do so with parallel products.
It all comes down to MS arrogance. They have had so long telling corporate customers which hoops to jump through they thought they could just command the corporate customers to take on the new phone even though it lacks many corporate features.
Shock!! Horror!! Customers have choices now and found alternatives.
There are basically 2 approaches to space exploration:
* Send humans. Nobody wants the bad PR when people get killed, so reliability has to be really high. They have to come back. Humans are heavy and need air, food, etc which makes for huge payload. All very challenging, slows down progress and extremely expensive.
* Send robots. It's a bloody machine. If it dies, so what, send another. They don't have to come back. They can have unlimited missions if they don't break. Allows far more rapid experimentation. Way cheaper; five robot missions is cheaper than one manned mission so you can afford to make a few craters.
The Russians figured this out in the 1960s. Only 50% or so of their moon missions actually worked, but that was ok. The win some, loose some attitude allowed far more rapid progress.
People seem to have picked up my comments the wrong way.
I don't think the NSA are doing a good job finding needles. It does not even appear they are finding needles, just burning bits of the haystack.
I don't think they are making USA safer.
I don't think they should even be looking.
However there is no middle ground either. The NSA cannot fill their function (ie. to snoop and find potential terrorists and other threats) without data mining everyone.
To perform their role, and not impinge on the average citizen or others is a very delicate line to tread and is probably impossible. The NSA have proven themselves unable to act with the level of responsibility and restraint required when given such wide powers. IMHO, they cannot be trusted and there is absolutely no indication they can be brought back on track with fresh management or oversight. If it was up to me, I'd shut them down since regular policing seems to be doing a better job.
Basically, USA have to decide whether they want to keep the NSA and everyone snooped, or shut down the NSA altogether. They cannot have it both ways.
Targeted surveillance is pretty much the old-school way of doing things. The plods get some tip-off from the public, get a warrant and do some wire tapping etc. The critical factor is that you need someone being vigilant enough to give the tip-off. No tip-off and the whole chain does not happen.
The whole point of mass surveillance is that it does the data mining for you and generates the tip-offs.
Without that, 99% of what the NSA does is meaningless and you might as well shut them down.
Asking the US to ban mass surveillance is like asking them to give up the atom bomb. The fox will not hand over the keys to the hen house.
I am not at all suggesting the NSA are a nice bunch of people on an ethically sound mission, merely that they cannot provide a useful surveillance function to help detect criminals unless they profile all the data they can get their mits on.
There really is no middle ground. You can't find the needles unless you sift through the haystack.
It had nothing to do with 9/11.
They started because the tech had got to the stage where all this logging was feasible. It would have happened regardless of 9/11.
Just like the whole WMD thing, 9/11 is just a convenient excuse to retrofit to justify what was going on.
When Ballmer announced his retirement, the share price went UP, yet they still want him around? Dumb bastards deserve whatever they get.
As for any potential CEO, being worried. I don't blame them. The new guy is just going to be a new scapegoat unless he can be allowed to turn some serious stuff around.
Perhaps this is all a big plan. Hire in a new guy, but hamstring him so badly he can't do anything. In 5 years time Ballmer comes back and does a Jobsian return.
Hey, I said that's a possible plan, not that it would work. Ballmer and Gates are so badly deluded about Ballmer's capability that they probably think this would work.
Intel have a long history of building up, or buying, a business then dumping it.
It has happened with numerous microcontrollers: 8051, 960 and others.
It has happened with their memory products.
It has happened with their StrongARM/Xscale line.
It has happened with thei USB chipsets.
It has happened with various companies they bought then sold (eg. Dialogic).
It is no wonder that nobody wants to build their chipsets into embedded products any more.
They normally dump non-core businesses when they're getting beaten up and expect to face angry shareholders, so selling off the TV biz suggests they expect to be mauled by the shareholders for all the screwing around in mobile and the hammering they continue to get from ARM.
Of course eating 2x these bags at a go would be bad for you. I only ate one. I kept the other one for tomorrow.
Seriously, packing them in catering size bags was silly. Anyone buying these is going to be of the mindset that 1 bag == one serving. 5lb of laxatives is not a good idea.
They should have given up at 3.
MS really need to adapt to the reality that this is not the 1990s any more. They can't just tell the world what to do.
Forcing people to make a choice between W8 and OSX or some such is stupid when they would willingly take W7 instead.
Basically: "You know those great wholesome sandwiches you like so much? Well we won't sell them to you. You can buy this turd sandwich or sod off to McD."
Exactly the sort of customer interaction they teach you to avoid in marketing 101.
Considering how much *BSD is important to Apple, I am surprised they can't find 20k hidden in their pocket lint.
Yes, I know Apple don't use OpenBSD directly, but the "ecosystem" of *BSD developers out there does help to provide them with a pool of talent to draw on.
The death of OpenBSD would hurt Apple far more than 20k.
"At last, POTUS recognizes that there is a big enough stink in the air to warrant some "action"."
Nope POTUS realises that if he does not say something he will go down in history as the NSA-friendly spying president.
So all he has done is to say enough to kick the can down the road a bit, hoping he can continue to do so until the next sucker takes over,
A task force is a great burying tool. Look at the last VP task force into gun control. It lasted long enough for the media to get bored and go home.
If the NSA stuff doesn't just go quiet by itself, you can guarantee there will be a task force created to "handle" the issue for a few months.
"his political goals are left-wing".
The buttons he pushes and stuff that comes out of mouth are left wing (using an American calibration) , but his actions - what he should actually be judged on - are not.
Indeed if they didn't come in conveniently coloured read and blue wrappers, most people could tell the actions of Obama or Bush apart.
Increased government size is generally a left-wing style action. Federal govt size continues to grow under all presidents - even those who campaigned against it.
About the only outstanding feature of Obama's run has been Obamacare. Many people will think of that as being something like the universal healthcare much of the rest of the world gets. It is not. It is instead a draconian policy that forces people to get healthcare insurance whether they like it or not.
Liars is a strong word, but probably accurate.
It seems that presidents are largely powerless and have little real control whether that is "read mah lips: no more taxes" or shutting Guantanamo down within a year, ok two, maybe four...screw it just keep it open!
Even having the best intentions does not mean stuff gets done.
It is hardly amazing that the US govt is so dysfunctional. There are municipalities fighting with states fighting with the feds ove3r the same powers. At a federal level, we have oversight from senators, representatives and the president all fighting along both party lines and power play between the offices.
Just at a federal level there are a bunch of 3&4-letter agencies which are largely independent and have their own fiefdoms. NASA and NOOA fighting over research turf (& budget), FBI, CIA and NSA fighting over security turf.
Even the military have this sort of infighting between Army, Navy and Air Force.
Then to make it more exciting add in state-level police, agencies and military bodies.
No wonder anything that actually gets done ends up being a half-arsed compromise and costs so much.
Obama needs his plausable deniability. NSA needs their smoke screen and need this all put to bed.
Everyone with half a brain knows NSA will keep spying on whomever they see fit including Merkel and US citizens. They see that as required to perform what they deem to be their role.
One thing this sort of issue raises is what the point of having a president anyway?
If the management have confidence that they are doing the right thing then they will report reduced profits and look the shareholders square in the eye and promise that this is a short dip, with a rosy future just around the corner.
If they don't have confidence in what they are doing then they know the shareholders must be placated otherwise they will ask embarrassing questions and start demanding management changes.
Intel's recent attempts at mobile have been embarrassing and half baked. They just cannot stop the slide when they come up against ARM. Now ARM is threatening servers too.
Intel management have not worked out their future well enough to face a hostile bunch of shareholders. Thus there is only one thing they can do: cut costs drastically to keep the numbers looking reasonable.
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