* Posts by Patrician

481 publicly visible posts • joined 20 Sep 2013

Page:

15 'could it be aliens?' fast radio bursts observed in one night

Patrician

Re: Spinal Taps Amps.

Bugger Spinal Tap, it was a concert by the plutonium rock band "Disaster Area"!

Couple fires sueball at Amazon over faulty solar eclipse-viewing goggles

Patrician

Re: Get out the popcorn

If the glasses were brought from a third party vendor are Amazon responsible for any refunds requested? I'm not sure that they are, any more that a towns market operator would be responsible for refunding a faulty product brought from one of the market stalls.

Terry Pratchett's unfinished works flattened by steamroller

Patrician

Re: I'm touched by the weirdness of this request...

I second Mort as a good starting point; that or maybe Wyrd Sisters.

Can North Korean nukes hit US mainland? Maybe. But EMP blast threat is 'highly credible'

Patrician

Re: Never understood the obsession with ICBMs

It was also a computer game....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fourth_Protocol_(video_game)

Virgin Media customers complain of outages across UK

Patrician

Been with VM since Telewest days; not been a perfect relationship admittedly as they do seem to run their network pretty sweaty and are very slow to fix over subscription issues (twelve months to fix in my area when a 200Mbps connection would drop to 30Mbps between 17:00 and 00:00). But would so much rather deal with VM support than BT or Talk, Talk for instance; I have to do both as a part of my job and they're both far, far worse.

US prosecutors demand data to unmask every visitor to anti-Trump protest website

Patrician

Re: The morons in the US voted for Trump. What did you expect.

"Thank fuck for boundary changes if it keeps that bearded twat out of power and his cabal of evil Stalinists."

So you're not a believer in democracy then?

Can the last person watching desktop video please turn out the light?

Patrician

I don't really regard a channels "look what is coming up" type announcements as adverts and don't mind those, and have previously discovered a new TV programme that I would otherwise have missed. As for the standard, 3rd party, ads I TVR everything on commercial TV and FF past any ad breaks, run a Adblocker and make a mental note of any product whose ads have annoyed me and make sure I never purchase said products as much as I can.

Regarding the ad companies I think it is so sweet that they really believe that they are providing a valuable service to us!

Foot-long £1 sausage roll arrives

Patrician

Re: but does it taste any good

Greggs are still worth eating, just the right ratios of grease to pastry/meat stuff, so long as they are at the right temperature;too cool and yuk!

Patrician

Father Ted?

Look out Silicon Valley, here comes Brit bruiser Amber Rudd to lay down the (cyber) law

Patrician

Re: Not Very Bright...

@boltar

"Terrorists like everyone else will go down the path of least resistance"

No, sorry, but the people like the ones that carried out the recent UK attacks *may* use WhatsApp for personal communications, but I'll bet you a pound to a penny that the "organisation" uses private systems for the official terrorist communications and organising attacks. These will be well hidden and secured and only accessible via VPN/Tor and their ilk. It's even possible that dead drops and face to face meetings are more usual that WhatsApp messaging for the "orders" stage of an attack.

Couple that with the fact that the perpetrators of the recent UK attacks were already "known to the security services" and were not being monitored due to "resources", what is the point of having thousands of more "targets" to watch?

Virgin Media's profanity warning triggered by chief exec's name

Patrician

"But since then, some staff have been unhappy about the direction of the company. In a conference call last year, of which The Register saw a transcript, staff complained that Liberty Global were "faceless change drivers with no concern for the Virgin values"."

"Virgin values"? So over subscribing their broadband services and taking months or even years to fix it, while still selling new connections in those areas! Do they mean those "Virgin values" do you think?

Concorde without the cacophony: NASA thinks it's cracked quiet supersonic flight

Patrician

...."But once they've done that, the real goal has to be to get public support for supersonic travel. To do that they'll want to demonstrate the "sonic thump" to people, by flying over them, so people know what it sounds like and don't have the fear of the unknown that was a problem for Concorde."...

The only reason Concorde wasn't certified to fly over the mainland United States is because it wasn't built by an American company; had it been built by Boeing or MacDonald Douglas it would have had no trouble getting cerification.

Microsoft admits to disabling third-party antivirus code if Win 10 doesn't like it

Patrician

Re: '34 years of development - Windows 10 is the result'

...."Your FUD definitely looks like it was created in 1990:

Linux Mint 18.1 "Cinnamon" overview

KDE Plasma 5.X Review 2015

Ubuntu Gnome 17.04 Review

Unity 5 running on Ubuntu Natively"

I was referring the software not the OS with this comment as I stated in the comment it's self.

How often does an end user need to disable SMB shares manually on their PC? Again I was referring primarily to software/driver installation example as below:-

Install Plex Home Theater in Mint run the following commands (Once you've managed to work out which version will work in Mint that is):-

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:plexapp/plexht

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install plexhometheater

Install Plex Home Theater in Windows:-

Download, left click "setup", left click "next", left click "next", left click "finish" - all done and no need to go any where near a command line.

While it's still necessary to drop to command line to carry simple tasks like installing some software Linux, Mint or otherwise, will never be ready for main stream use.*

* I'm not talking about people like us that post here, by "mainstream" I'm referring to "users" in the very broad sense.

Patrician

Re: Linux "pushers" again

Agreed, Word and Excel compatibles would be okay for a lot of our customers too (they would have to be *very* compatible mind), however, there is no Outlook or Power Point and the Outlook compatibles (admittedly I've not looked at all Outlook compatibles) are lacking in some way or other whether it be a calendar or whatever.

Patrician

Re: Linux "pushers" again

None of the software you've listed has all the functionality of MS Office in one package.

Patrician

Re: '34 years of development - Windows 10 is the result'

Sorry but Linux, in any form is not a viable replacement for Windows as an OS;many companies still have legacy software that will only run in Windows, and quite often Linux versions of software are lacking in functionality and/or the interface looks like it was created in 1995.

Not to mention the number of times it's necessary to drop to command line in Linux to carry out operations that in Windows can be done by a few mouse clicks; also the fact that there is still a lack of hardware support for Linux, from even major manufacturers, means Linux is still not really ready for general usage by the great unwashed.

You can't take the pervs off Facebook, says US Supreme Court

Patrician
Happy

Re: Sex offenders covers a lot of ground

..."Why the hell did England have to send us the Puritans? Couldn't you have sent them to Australia and given us the convicts?" ...

We didn't "send" you any puritans, they went of their own free will; we did send, generously, quite a few convicts though just to be fair and spread them around a bit.*

* an estimated 52,000 convicts were sent to America between 1718 and 1775.

Elon Musk reveals Mars colony rocket capable of bringing pizza joints to the red planet

Patrician

Re: So many flaws

And if a bloody great space rock hits your "fairer" Earth? If the human race didn't expand to other planets in the Solar System it would stand a chance of becoming extinct at that point.

Patrician

Re: Hmmmn.. pizza!

....."Although, as I'm reading the Mote in God's Eye at the moment, I'd much rather live on the battlecruiser MacArthur. Well, perhaps maybe Lenin. "....

Great book, one of Niven & Purcell's best. I think...

Look who's joined the anti-encryption posse: Germany, come on down

Patrician

Re: Short memories

If the authorities have suspicions about particular person let them present their and present before a judge; if that evidence is considered compelling enough the judge can issue a court order allowing that suspect to be monitored.

This is how it should work .....

Labour says it will vote against DUP's proposed TV Licence reforms

Patrician

....I like the BBC but at the current moment in time with regards to their news I don't care if they stop getting the licence fee and move to a commercial model because I won't be paying for it....."

But you *do* pay for it, every advert on commercial TV has to be paid for by somebody, normally the end users of the product being advertised.

Patrician

Re: Assumptions

....""love your brother as yourself", lovely ideas, but not ones espoused much by many Christians....."

Which of course means that they're not really Christians .......

Europe-wide BitTorrent indexer blockade looms after Pirate Bay blow

Patrician

Actually you are incorrect; I've come across the Amazon "Payment method in accessing country" issue myself. There was a link on a bands YouTube site to purchase their CD which I clicked and didn't notice that the link was for Amazon.com and not amazon.co.uk. It wouldn't let me purchase from the .com site using my UK CC's.

Virtual reality headsets even less popular than wearable devices

Patrician

There are several issues, for me, with VR; the cost is the first, for something that would only be in periodic use, because VR doesn't suit all game formats, (rather like the HOTAS I bought a couple of years ago, it only gets dusted off for the occasional spot of ED and is used for nothing else) it's way too expensive.

Secondly as a user of spectacles VR goggles/helmets are a no starter; I could put contacts in when wanting to use VR I guess, but that's just more hassle, and the more hassle something is to use the less likely it is that it will be used I'm afraid.

German court says 'Nein' on Facebook profile access request

Patrician

I find myself in two minds on this issue; on the one had we on these forums are constantly bemoaning the erosion of our privacy online and with that "hat on" I say good for FB. Just because this was an account owned by a minor does not, I believe, negate their right to privacy.

With the other "hat on" I sympathise with the parents who're just trying to find answers to the question "why has this happened"? So I can see both sides of this and I'm not sure if there is an easy answer; from a privacy point of view I come down on the side of FB and the German courts I think, however, that would change if it was a child of mine involved of course.

Bye bye MP3: You sucked the life out of music. But vinyl is just as warped

Patrician

Re: Fidelity portable

..."Concerto for Group and Orchestra"...

I know; in my collection too ...

Patrician

Not sure what the quality of your turntable was Mr Dabbs but I never had that bad a time of it in the vinyl era; occasional albums would have to be returned but the vast majority I bought played with no issues on my Grundig, or the later Sony, Deck. Never had to resort to pennies on the tone arm and always got a complete play through, even on albums that ran longer than the usual thirty-five minutes (Todd Rundgrens "Utopia" is one that springs to mind)

Bloke charged under UK terror law for refusing to cough up passwords

Patrician

Re: "used only in extreme terrorism cases"

"Terr'sm is just EVUHL" ..

It is, no matter how it came about; or do you think otherwise?

All that free music on YouTube is good for you, Google tells music biz

Patrician

Found Vandroya, a band I'd never heard of through YouTube, listened to several tracks that were on there and then bought both their CD's from their website. So, in this instance, the article is correct.

Microsoft touts next Windows 10 Creators Update: It's set for a Fall

Patrician

Re: Slow SSD Blues

Did you know you could inspect the specifications of any notebook you wish to purchase *before* you hand over any cash?

Did you know that if you think that the installed SSD is too small you can choose *not to buy* that make/model?

Amazon announces new Echo just as Microsoft's first Cortana-powered clone breaks cover

Patrician

"you are buying something that then sells you stuff. A win-win situation. For someone !!"

Not really; it's only selling you something if you actually buy whats advertised. Otherwise it's *trying* to sell you stuff.

Nerd Klaxon: Barbican to host Science Fiction exhibition this summer

Patrician

Initially thought that The Bible was the first work of Science Fiction, but then it's more a work of Fantasy I suppose.

Put down your coffee and admire the sheer amount of data Windows 10 Creators Update will slurp from your PC

Patrician

Re: I thought

The point is that if "playing some childish game" is what the PC user want's to do on their machine (and it's not your place to decide what a user should and shouldn't do on their PC, not everyone wants to use their PC just for "office work". Many want to use it for entertainment too) then they have no choice but to use Windows.

Linux at this point in time is not a viable alternative.

Patrician

Re: BongoJoe

@ Badger31

It's not a "requirement" to have DX12 admittedly, but paying £30 to £50 per game and not getting the full features because my OS doesn't support them is a bit of a deal breaker for me.

I've said this before on these forums many time now, I'd love Linux to be a true alternative to Windows, I really would, but although some distro's have made great strides in usability and Valve has made valiant attempts to increase Linux support from game developers, it still isn't there yet I'm afraid.

Unfortunately Windows is still just "easier"....

Patrician

Re: I thought

Please show me how to play Mass Effect:Andromeda on anything other than Windows without jumping through stupidly complicated hoops that may result in a running game but with much reduced performance? Same for Fallout 4, Witcher 3 and the list goes on and on. No other OS is a viable option as a gaming OS unfortunately.

Patrician

Re: BongoJoe

..."I can't see why anyone would actually want this snooping POS running on their Hardware?" ..

Because they do stuff other than web, email and office on their PC and have no choice; want to game, on your PC it's got to be Windows, there is no other option.

Riddle of cannibal black hole pairs solved ... nearly: Astroboffins explain all to El Reg

Patrician

Re: They solved nothing. Just fairy tales.

So you have no understanding of how science works?

Forget robot overlords, humankind will get finished off by IoT

Patrician

Isn't WhatsApp the terrorist place to be now?

Patrician

..."Why would you want ice cold beer?"..

If an American one, so you couldn't taste it?

SpaceX wows world with a ho-hum launch of a reused rocket, landing it on a tiny boring barge

Patrician

Re: Amazing

..."fly-back airbreathers"

Cannot, yet, get to the altitudes nor speeds required for anything that requires orbital speeds.

Manufacturers reject ‘no deal’ Brexit approach

Patrician

Re: Welcome to Trump.UK

...."They already have banks that issue their own bank notes (ignoring for the moment that the UK tax payer owns a substantial slice of that)."....

They have that but they don't have their own currency; they use the pound, the pictures on their notes being different does not make it their own currency.

Patrician

Re: Welcome to Trump.UK

Do you really think that the economic chaos that will be caused by your Brexit vote is a good thing for your 11 year olds future, wasn't "ill-considered"? Especially as it was, by your own admission, brought about by a perceived federalism that doesn't actually exist.

Patrician

Re: not stop them having to leave the EU I'm afraid

..."If they achieve independence before and the UK breaks up, while still in the EU, they can't be chucked out of it, unless the whole UK were"..

No,

As was discussed many times during the Scottish independence referendum, one of the "tenets" of EU membership is that each country has their own currency; Scotland fails at the first hurdle in this regard as they have no currency of their own and creating a currency from scratch is no quick task. There are many more requirements for membership that Scotland also fails at the moment.

If Scotland becomes independent of the UK, either before or after the two years from article 50 trigger, it will still have to leave the EU.

Patrician

Re: It'll be fine

Your getting those figures from where? Wishful thinking? Hope? Faith?

Patrician

Re: Welcome to Trump.UK

..."and will almost certainly vote to leave the UK...."

Well they can vote to leave the UK but that'll not stop them having to leave the EU I'm afraid, they're are in the EU as a part of the UK.

No matter what they do, Scotland will leave the EU, either as a part of the UK or, if independent, on it's own, and will have to apply to join and suffer the time and requirements that takes, including, creating their own currency.

Disney plotting 15 more years of Star Wars

Patrician

Re: Getting old ...

That wasn't the plot line for Rogue One .....

TRAPPIST-1's planets are quiet. Quiet as the grave, in fact

Patrician

Your question shows that you have very little knowledge of evolutionary science and I'd advise you start taking a basic course as soon as possible.

Patrician

Re: More Magic than Goldilocks orbit distance...

"Earth has a one in a million combination of life supporting conditions."

In just our galaxy one in a million leaves an awful lot of planets; and none of the conditions/elements that led to the formation of the Earth are unique to the solar system.

Patrician

Re: We won't be living on alien planets.

I really can't understand the down votes; your post is, logically, the best way for us to colonise the solar system.

Norfolk County Council sent filing cabinet filled with kids' info to a second-hand shop

Patrician

While I fully support fining for this type of security breach, it must be said that it is the people of Norfolk that will actually be paying the fine, not the idiots that were responsible for this.

When government bodies do this type of thing fining doesn't really achieve anything as it's not the organisations money and they don't care; there needs to be some kind of punishment to make sure more care is taken in future, something along the lines that the person responsible looses their job for instance. Or am I just being silly?

Page: