Posts by JeffyPooh

iPhone battery will outlast your daily data plan

Spencer: "...The iphone battery lasts less than a day with the internet on..."

I've never found a way to switch off the entire Internet. If you mean the iPhone's 3G data connection then it depends on how you use it (not just on versus off). My 3GS battery lasts all day, with 3G data turned on all the time (never off). My usage pattern has been as high as 5 or 6 GB per month. In short, I've never been able to drain the battery in one day using the Internet. My generous daily bandwidth allowance would be gone before the battery.

But you could drain the battery if you played locally-stored videos all day, or fiddled with the iPod function keeping the screen on. But it takes some effort.

I charge it every night while I sleep.

YMMV.

Space Elevator - use a damn pulley

JM: "...my only hope now is the space elevator. Get Otis on the phone..."

Supposedly one of the primary impediments to 'The Space Elevator' is providing power to the climbing craft. They're proposing all sorts of crazy system to beam power to the climbing craft. So to review: - 50,000km long carbon nanotube belt, easy. - huge dead mass at the top end, easy. - safety systems, easy. - zero-G bathrooms, easy.

But a stupid pulley at the far end with a looped belt driven from the ground, that's impossible. [?]

Malicious software

My dad has some sort of horrible malware infesting his PC. It slows down the whole thing, generally gets in the way, and basically makes a complete annoyance of itself. Recently, it even started popping up messages demanding payment of $60.

Yeah, it's called McAfee.

The supposed cure is worse than the desease, folks. Much worse.

Probably uses the Volvo dashboard 2-in-1 display

An episode of Top Gear demonstrated the Volvo dash display that could show navigation to the driver and videos to the passenger, at the same time, from one 7-inch LCD display. At the time, I told anyone that would listen that this was the future of no-glasses 3D. Wanna bet that this Nintendo device is the same tech?

Safari browser on iPhone is a crash-prone PoS

Here - I'll say it using 'my outer voice':

The Safari browser on the iPhone (3GS) is a crash-prone piece of sh_t. If you have several windows open and you dare to try to manage them (moving from one window to another, maybe closing one on the way past) while another is still loading - crash-and-burn city. It just hangs, you sigh and do the five, four, three, two, one count down until it closes itself. No, I've not jail-broken nor hacked anything. Yes, the OS is up-to-date. Yes, I've reset, reloaded, and restored it several times. Yes, it's been consistent for the past year. No, everything else is good.

Also, has anyone else in The Entire Fricken Universe ever tried to use Google Blogger on an iPhone? It's difficult. Forget about rich text Compose mode. Can't paste a simple URL into the LINK dialog. Sometimes you can't put the cursor at the start of column 1 for all the tea in China. Many similar glitches. Perhaps some of these are Google's fault (?).

There's a lot to like. But it ain't perfect.

If God hadn't intended us to eat beef...

If God hadn't intended us to eat beef, He wouldn't have made it so damn yummy.

A few days ago I had a 8.4-oz steak (yes, they measure to the tenth of an oz, probably Troy...) that cost $50. Just for the meat, but it included a free potato side. Nice.

Anyway...

Whispered: "Concrete." This is the ultimate low hanging fruit. Capture the CO2 from the concrete plants. Point sources. Right beside rail tracks. Multiplied ratio, since lime gives off yet more CO2. It's the ultimate "duh!" Take "Concrete Steps for Climate Change".

Don't ignore Paul 4 !!!!

Follow his link to the Telegraph typo:

"Large Hardon Collider"

Even with 68% of the pixels...

I've got the previous model, a Canon G10, and I think it's fabulous. It feels good in the hands and (under suitable conditions) it takes amazing pictures. In order to not even bother trying to compete with DSLRs (it's not in the same league), I've removed the neck strap and installed a nice wrist strap. The neck strap goes on the carry case.

I think it's amazing that almost anyone can afford a very good camera these days. There are lots to choose from.

By the way, I feel sorry for UK residents and the prices they have to pay. I got my G10 (brand new) for Cdn$430 from a reputable dealer (walk-up sale).

Cheers.

Data point - Sony S-350 - time to view movie

My local Sony Store had the S-350 BluRay player on sale. I asked the salesman how long it took, starting from power-on, to see the 'Play Movie' icon. He told it was reasonably quick. I said, "Show me." We timed it. About four minutes. Let me repeat that, FOUR MINUTES! Just on the off chance that any senior executives are reading this, they should know that I chose to NOT purchase the product.

Because of her...

I *still* have a personal ban on purchasing anything from HP.

Call me when they're capturing CO2 from concrete factories

Concrete factories spew enormous amounts of CO2. They're point sources. Their product then recaptures some CO2 over its life. It's the ultimate low-hanging fruit. The fact that they're not capturing CO2 at concrete factories is clear-cut evidence that the whole thing if pure fraud.

I'll take the issue seriously once the concrete factories are capturing CO2.

Total medals vs. Gold medals vs. weighted average

Assume: Gold 5 pts, Silver 2 pts, Bronze 1pt.

Do the math.

Opera widgets, silent, uninstall flagged as virus

I installed Opera on my PC. I downloaded a few widgets, but sound was absent on all of them. Couldn't make the sound work. So I tried to uninstall the widgets, and then AVG refused to allow the uninstall code to run.

Unimpressed.

The big mistake...

Scientists are *supposed* to be skeptical; 24 hours a day. That's their job! When terms such as "climate change skeptic" are used as an insult, and their "beliefs" (!) are questioned, then it's become a religion. Science is *never* a closed case; NEVER! Those caught-up in this scandal are some of the same folks that have moved the issue from science to what amounts to a religion. They should be deeply ashamed.

Of course, we should still move forward with real action to reduce CO2 (as a risk reduction measure). I'd recommend starting with the 'low hanging fruit' of cement (concrete) plants. They emit huge amounts of CO2 that should be captured. There are known processes to accomplish this, now. One stop shopping for a significant portion of the solution. The inaction on this obvious and relatively cheap first step is criminal. If this isn't being addressed, then why bother with actions that will costs orders of magnitude more per unit change? Look up "Concrete Steps for Climate Change".

Concrete steps

Concrete plants emit CO2 from the energy the use to burn lime into concrete. And then the conversion process itself emits even more CO2. Such plants are almost always next to rail lines. Capture this CO2 at any expense and transport it away by rail to be sequestered. Subsidize the costs. Outlaw small concrete producers, turn them into distributors. Just get it done.

And here's the bonus. The concrete will reabsorb CO2 from the atmosphere over its lifetime.

Now think! If this was implemented fully, then by increasing concrete production, we actually increase the removal of CO2 from the atmosphere. Dubai would become the world's largest CO2 sink.

The idiots shouldn't be arguing about WHO does WHAT, they should be working to agreements on WHAT needs to be done. Such as capturing CO2 from all concrete producing plants, and getting the double bonus.

This one idea could achieve about a quarter of the overall reduction being sought. 25% from one simple step. Duh.

It's not that complicated...

If one 'owns' (in both senses of the word) the entire ATM, then one doesn't need to fit a card skimmer and pin code capture camera . The victim provides both the card margnetic stripe, and the pin code. One only needs to intercept these signals internally - the magnetic stripe data in its raw form, and the associated pin code read from the keypad. This data can be stored on removeable media, or transmitted to a safe location.

When you interact with an ATM, you're providing both your magnetic stripe data and pin code. You have to trust the machine. ATMs that are embedded into the wall of a large and impressive bank building are probably safe. Those that are in the back of a pub could be 'owned' by anyone.

"Calibration"?

"...To calibrate you press a series of buttons on the unit as instructed in the manual, turn around 180° and turn the unit from its front onto its back and then back again."

That sort of flip it over and over "calibration" cycle usually implies a built-in compass (like the iPhone 3GS). Pure GPS units normally do not need to be flip-flop "calibrated".

Duh...

This whole nonsense of space tethers and beamed power is stupid.

What they plan to do is (get this...) have a heavy satellite linked to the ground by a tether many thousands of kilometers in length and of almost unimaginable strength. It's incredible. It's ambitious. And it's rubbish.

Why not simply make the tether twice as long, in a loop, and have a pulley at the top and a simple motor at the bottom? No requirement for foolish and inefficient power beaming schemes. Just a simple motor on the ground.

"A loop with a pulley at the top? Well that would be IMPOSSIBLE! Harumph!"

Idiots.

Why not *ALL* channels as Favorites?

My idea is that all TVs and set-top boxes should come preprogrammed with *all* channels preprogrammed as "Favorites". These favorite registers would be preprogrammed in accordance with, ah, the actual channel number they contain.

So if, for example, you wanted to watch your favorite channel which is channel number 873, you would press "Fav." and then type in the digits 8, 7, and 3 and press enter to select Favorite register number 873 which contains channel number 873. See?

Oh... Sorry. Never mind.

Yeah! And electric cars too!

We might as well run with it.

Let's make sure that plug-in electric cars are also recharged using a standardized connector. Might as well be the same one as the mobile phones - micro USB.

LOL.

Who made off with my cut/copy/paste?

I'm learning that with the Ip-Hone-y one should be very careful about updating anything. I'm running about 50% of the updates (including apps) making things worse or removing key features.

3.1 made cut/copy/paste disappear from certain dialog boxes. Very annoying and stupid.

"Media" .NE. BluRay disks

"...stream media..." - well, except for BluRay disks which are not available via 'Remote Play_anything_but_a_BluRay_disk...'

Sequestering "carbon" versus CO2

At some point in the far future:

"Where... <gasp> did... <gasp> all... <gasp> the... <gasp> oxygen... go? <gasp>."

If they just shorten the test loop distance...

If they would just shorten the test loop distance so that the petrol engine isn't actually required during the so-called test, then it would achieve INFINITY miles per US gallon.

And that's about 1.20095042 times INFINITY in miles per Imperial gallon. Amazing!

Now, where's my SW-defined antenna?

SW-defined radios are a world of over-hyped promises. The promises included almost DC-to-daylight frequency coverage from one box. But that one box is connected to one antenna, which covers one (or maybe three) bands - poorly.

I'll second Brett's comment...

Almost a week ago, I saw an iPhone advertisement on TV that clearly showed the obviously-magnetic compass dial holding steady on a twisting iPhone. The voice said, "Need a compass? There's an app for that."

So it's not exactly a big secret.

Mobile broadband - got that T-shirt

I live in the forest mere minutes from civilization. DSL is not available. Cable TV is not available. So for years we suffered with only dial-up. We knew about mobile (cellular) broadband, but it was always about a trillion dollars a month for any amount of usage.

Then one of our local wireless telcos (Telus) started offering "Unlimited" EVDO access for under $100 a month. So we grabbed it. After about ten months, the slime balls at Telus decided that 'unlimited' meant "5GB a month is cool", and they cut us off. Lying liars.

Now another wireless telco (Rogers) is offering an explicit (ie. honest, ie. not lying, ie. not Deceptive Marketing Practices) 5GB per month over HSPA for about the same price. So we're using that one now. So far they've been perfectly honest about what's what. But we've had to scale back to limited usage to stay around 3-5 GB a month. It's really tight!!

WiMax is coming soon... coming soon... coming soon... coming soon...

Until then, we'll continue to back-fill with some sort of mobile broadband at twice the price and one-third the service.

Rogers HSPA isn't bad, except it isn't really unfettered access to the web. There seems to be plenty of blocked ports and a few websites were (for a time) simply not available. My Sanyo R227 Internet radio just sings perfectly when I take it into town and connect it to a real Cable modem at my Dad's house. But at my home using HSPA - some stations and all On Demand simply don't work.

In summary - mobile broadband sucks. It's expensive and they make it seem like there is some huge International bit shortage. In spite of other wireless options (WiMax) being presented without such insane limits.

So it'll be "Commerce Dept. Sucks" next?

Geesh - Symantec has not exactly been exploring the heights of customer satisfaction recently. Google the search terms "Symantec Sucks" if you don't have any first-hand experience with any of their 'stellar' (not) consumer products as Norton Internet Security 2007 (created under his highly-compensated watch).

Anyway - I wish him the very best of luck, and I highly recommend a novel management approach called "attention to detail" - he should try it some time.

relative airflow + the surfaces

Forget silly little helicopters with a spinning disk.

My 'invention' is an airplane wing that would consist of two sections, upper and lower flight surfaces, each like a conveyor belt in the cross section of the lifting shape of a wing. The two belts would emerge from the trailing edge, move against the air as if the airplane was moving, and then disappear together into the leading edge. Turn on the belt motors, and the airplane should go straight up even with zero forward velocity. The wing upper and lower surfaces move instead of the air. It's all relative; right?

Since it is such a ludicrous idea, I hereby place it into the public domain.

Uh... excuse me... <raises hand>

What about the ole' strategically-placed special-gas ultra-fast reacting spark-gap that will-cause-a-dead-short to all incoming enegy trick? Before you poo-poo the concept, don't forget that many run-of-the-mill comm system are designed to survive a direct fricken hit from a rather large lightning bolt. And the protection devices that do they job are small and rather cute. I'm very surprised that it's considered to be an unsolved problem.