* Posts by Tromos

1188 publicly visible posts • joined 23 Sep 2013

Singapore's prime minister releases source code for his hand-coded Sudoku-solver

Tromos

Logic - Problem solving - Politics

Choose the odd one out.

OMFG – Emojis are killing off traditional 'net slang

Tromos

All very well for LOLs

Can't see anything for FOAD.

From Manchester to Microsoft – missing mum :-(

Tromos

Yeehah! We're expecting some tumbleweed next week.

With highlights like a car park and a Starbucks for the leisure hours, I think I'd rather stay at work.

'Just follow the damn Constitution!' FBI, DoJ skewered over demands for crypto backdoors

Tromos

At last!

The message is starting to begin to commence to get through.

Major London rail station reveals system passwords during TV documentary

Tromos

Red herrings.

Having the password on a note stuck to the monitor isn't a bad idea. It stops people bothering to watch what you're typing when you sit down and enter the real password.

Intel has ambitions to turn modems into virtual servers and reinvent broadband

Tromos

Yet more scope for malware.

At this rate we will shortly be needing to do AV scans on our CAT5 cables.

Samsung Electronics' sales go OVER A CLIFF

Tromos

Re: @Tromos

I did read it and expressly dismissed it. I'm sure that anyone with an extended warranty just waltzes into the shop and tells them their purchase is malfunctioning and instantly walks out with a full refund. Oh yes, no faffing around at all.

Tromos

In the EU all these types of product are guaranteed for 2 years and the point of sale is responsible. If the manufacturer offers one year the shop can pass it on to them during that period but has to take on the responsibility for the second year. Any local dealers who are not interested in problems can have their interest aroused by the small claims court.

E-voting and the UK election: Pick a lizard, any lizard

Tromos

If E-voting was workable, why use it to concentrate an entire constituency's votes down to 1 (the elected MP)? Even if your choice was elected would they vote the way you wished every time? It would be better to use a digital voting system to effectively have a national referendum on everything and lose the party politics with whip systems that are every bit as iniquitous as union block votes.

Free markets aren't rubbish – in fact, they solve our rubbish woes

Tromos

Many supermarkets in Greece have a machine for taking empty beer bottles and printing a credit slip for the 20 eurocent per bottle deposit refund. A few years back there were one armed bandits dotted about that took empty drinks cans. Pulling a lever to spin the reels also crushed the can and the payouts were in the form of money off vouchers to spend in a nearby establishment.

A few simple incentives work a whole lot better than fines and punishments.

UK's annual PCB waste = 81 HMS Belfasts, says National Physical Lab

Tromos

Doesn't add up

I'm finding the original million ton figure for PCB waste a little difficult to reconcile. That is somewhere in the region of 16 kilograms for every man, woman and child in the country. There must surely be an awful lot of recyclable metal (e.g. transformers and bits of chassis) included to get to this figure. Even a big old TV would only have a couple of kilograms of PCB with components and I can't see the average family scrapping the equivalent of about 30 TV's worth of electronics annually.

Brit boffins blow up Li-On batteries and film the melting copper

Tromos
Joke

Could be useful.

I'm filing a patent for a high-speed battery operated pizza oven.

TURKEY-SIZED 'platypus' T. REX found by kid BAFFLES boffins

Tromos

Turkey-sized platypus

What??? A 300,000 square mile platypus!!!

Acer introduces a REVOLUTION in tablet tech: The PENCIL

Tromos

Not a good idea for anyone with small kids

They see you use a pencil, they prefer crayons and felt-tips.

The Apple Watch: Throbbing strap-on with a knurled knob

Tromos

Health is touted as the Watch’s killer app

I knew too much exercise wouldn't be good for me!

Grooveshark faces $750 MEELLION piracy payout

Tromos

No pocket money for Len

I suspect that the legal bills will render Grooveshark's assets such that any fine is moot.

Who was downloading smut in the office while eating ice cream?

Tromos

Fifty shades of vanilla

I too vote for encores.

Apple Watch RIPPED APART, its GUTS EXPOSED to hungry Vultures

Tromos

Apple are obviously steering the fanbois towards the more expensive strap options. That sports strap makes the whole thing look like a kids watch picked up from Lidl for a fiver.

Disk drive shipment numbers set to spin down

Tromos
Holmes

disk motor shipments have a high correlation with overall disk drive shipments

See icon

Google: We're not mad, our mobes-in-sky Project Loon is FINE

Tromos
Joke

The aim to provide 100 per cent global internet coverage is laudable

How can you criticise their spelling of Vodafone when you go so far astray on the spelling of 'laughable'.

MEPs: Oi, Juncker! Hands off our science and research dosh

Tromos

Typical Brussels

Set up a strategic investment group funded by money taken from scientific research. Group decides that best strategic investment would be scientific research. Net result? Scientific research loses funding to the amount of a few bureaucrats salaries plus expenses, lots of paper pushed around, lots of lunches consumed and very little else.

Costa Coffee Club members wake up and smell the data breach

Tromos

Re: Password format

FTFY

"storing it hashed and salted and with a sprinkle of chocolate on top..."

Facebook invents Caller ID ... say Hello to today's staggering technology

Tromos

@Sebastian A

If there is a similar feature, I hope there is also a feature to automatically reject ID withheld calls that some phones have.

FBI alert: Get these motherf'king hackers off this motherf'king plane

Tromos

I've been on several flights that display flight data (ground speed, altitude, outside air temperature, etc.) on the entertainment screens. Anyone know if these are coming from the same sensors providing the pilot/auto-pilot with their info, or are they separate air-gapped sensors? I suspect they are from the actual flight sensors (probably the auxiliary set) and they are hopefully optically isolated to prevent anything coming back from the entertainment system. It isn't hacking that is the threat, it is more likely to be some idiot feeding large voltages back down the headphone sockets.

Seagate rides on Cray's tails as supercomputer sales spike

Tromos

Just how much storage...

...does the Met Office need to store the result of a coin toss?

Thank heavens for the silicon chip: A BRIEF history of data

Tromos
Facepalm

Whatever next?

Data processors process data.

Apple will cut down 36,000 acres of forest in 'conservation scheme'

Tromos

The wrong end of the stick

What's all this about forests? Apple are talking about conservation of profits.

Web advertising giant (Google) to spew ads over web – using HTTPS

Tromos

ads over HTTPS?

I'm fine with that. My hosts file will carry on preventing them getting through.

WikiLeaks reveals searchable trove of Sony Pictures documents

Tromos

I'd go further and say that it is beyond fair game and it shouldn't be down to the likes of Wikileaks to do the publishing. The government itself should be doing it. When two of the most untrusted entities in the world are corresponding in secret it can only reinforce the view that they are up to no good.

Stateside security screeners sacked for squeezing 'sexy' sacks

Tromos
Joke

The screeners were terminated as a result.

A bit harsh. I'd have thought summary dismissal would be adequate.

WHAT did GOOGLE do SO WRONG to get a slapping from the EU?

Tromos

@bilium

I suspect MS would have been wary of trying it on, but for the precedent set by the Google monopoly's Android desktop being full of Google.

Lib Dem manifesto: Spook slapdown, ban on teen-repelling Mosquitos

Tromos

"The party says it wants to continue to release government data sets"

I look forward to finding more USB sticks lying around on underground trains.

Verizon, NetFlix, KFC ad-men pay traffic cons $500k a month

Tromos
Happy

Advertisers getting screwed over?

I'm all for it.

Labour manifesto: Tech Bacc, not-spot zapping and hi-speed interwebs

Tromos

Technical baccalaureate

Sounds mighty impressive, but probably just gets handed out to anyone capable of connecting an X-Box to a TV.

MIT shows off machine-learning script to make CREEPY HEADS

Tromos

We all live in a yellow subroutine

So, basically, MIT have reduced thousands of lines of code to fifty that call thousands of lines of code.

Pre-order consumergasm will leave Apple Watches out of stock for months

Tromos

Re: Just goes to show...

Or even being mugged twice for the same watch. One million have already had their first mugging.

Urine for a treat this Monday, ISS 'nauts: SpaceX to launch pee-powered coffee pot

Tromos

At least it will...

...have that authentic Starbucks flavour.

Oh no, Moto! Cable modem has hardcoded 'technician' backdoor

Tromos
Joke

Sounds safe enough to me

Who would think to type 'technician' rather than 'admin'?

TTIP: Protect our privacy in EU-US trade deal or ELSE, snarl MEPs

Tromos

"Under EU law, personal data can only be transferred outside the EU if the receiving nation offers protections equal to EU data protection laws."

Is there any point to a law that is being broken thousands of times per second?

Steely wonder? It's blind to 4G and needs armour: Samsung Galaxy S6

Tromos

Re: Multi Fingerprints

My clunky old Alcatel accepts thousands of fingerprints - you can clearly see them all over the screen.

EU Commish mulls new bloc-wide rule on web content takedowns

Tromos

Get Europe involved and I'm sure getting your site unblocked will be speedily dealt with - as soon as the Greek economy has been sorted out.

Mobile 4G spectrum investors actually spent $12.4m on walkie-talkie frequencies – US SEC

Tromos

Unavailable?

A spokesperson for Janus Spectrum was unavailable at time of publication.

s/unavailable/boarding a flight for the Bahamas/

SanDisk's record-busting 512GB SD CARD will fit perfectly in your empty wallet

Tromos

Re: There are also 128GB and 256GB models available...

"It's a pity there's not yet a micro SD one available, though..."

Hence the big photo at the top of the article to remind one of what is not available.

Stress me, test me, vex me ... boffins seek Hall Effect in frustrated magnets

Tromos
Joke

You want entanglement?

Come and see my cable cupboard!

Apple Watch: When I think about you, I digital touch myself

Tromos

More rank profiteering from Apple

Why should there be such a massive difference in price for the maintenance/repair of the gold watch as opposed to the aluminium version? Is something likely to go wrong with the gold? Might it go rusty?

WIN a RockBLOCK Mk2 Iridium sat comms unit

Tromos

Advancing Space Science - High Altitude Test

PlayStation Vita owners – Sony owes you $25 cash or $50 credit

Tromos

Why isn't somebody facing a possible jail sentence?

Passing off paid actors as ordinary consumers to endorse a product goes way beyond misleading advertising. It is FRAUD.

Cisco wipes its memory from susceptible-to-Row Hammer list

Tromos

Manufacturer error

Any RAM chip that is operated within the manufacturer's guidelines should be able to handle any pattern of address and/or data thrown at it. If it fails, it is faulty and should be returned for replacement or refund. Describing the process as 'hammering' unfairly shifts the perceived blame in the same manner as 'overclocking' or 'over/undervolting'. It comes down to a design error in the chip and if the entire line has to be withdrawn and the mask redesigned from scratch, so be it.

Apple's Tim Cook and Salesforce's Marc Benioff DECLARE WAR on anti-gay Indiana

Tromos
Devil

What next in the name of religious freedoms?

Stoning of the blasphemous?

Human sacrifices?

Slaughtering the non-believers?

Satnav launches are like buses: none for ages then three arrive at once

Tromos
Facepalm

Unintended orbits?

Apparently, some sort of system that will direct them to where they need to go is required.