Posts by Alan Brown 16473 publicly visible posts • joined 8 Feb 2008
Linus rants. Other people simply jump off the ship.
Either way, building a "open source" distribution on top of proprietary SoCs is something that _will_ result in the developers for said distributions getting disillusioned and finding somehting else to do.
I doubt Jean-Baptiste Quéru will be the last one to do this.
It's about fragmentation.
Despite claims to the contrary, fragmentation is a bad thing on disk arrays (ok, not nearly so bad on SSD ones), especially if they're serving multiple heavy clients (headseek is a bitch)
If you have seriously large storage your %age can be vastly reduced. We usually only see performance degradation on Terabyte-class FSes once they hit something higher than 99% (YMMV) - a much greater source of slowdowns is users putting 32,000+ files in one directory (150,000+ in one case) and wondering why their operating system doesn't like it.
If you insist on using NTFS all bets are off, but I'm pretty sure that even that doesn't take disks offline at 100% full.
If any vendor told me that the shiny new 400TB (usable) SAN system i was about to pay for for can only filled to 80%, I'd be seeking another vendor (a couple have and that's why they aren't under consideration anymore).
Then again if XYZ vendor sold me a 400TiB usable array which had 600TB in it, I would take the 400TB usable staement happily.
* Rules should NOT exempt political, religious or other kinds of advertising. (fat chance of that!)
* Rules should include a right of private action (small claims court) with mandatory statutory damages (this means that offenders can't argue that £500 is unjustified).
* Rules should make the advertiser and the company they're advertising for, joint and severally liable (this makes it a lot harder to hide - follow the money, etc)
* Rules should include criminal penalties for failure to consult the Do Not Call lists (plus mandatory triple damages, in the case of private action)
* Rules MUST NOT stop enforcement action if the principals are determined to be outside the UK.
The FCC has quite happily gone after TCPA violaters based in the UK and German authorities have been kicking down doors all over the EU when it comes to illegal marketing. UK regulators are seen as a soft touch.
Seriously, the ICO and Ofcom are for too timid, slow and bloated.
Allowing a right of private action is the item which will slow this kind of provacy breach right down. Businesses which have been hoodwinked by marketing companies will have to swallow a very bitter pill and then recover it via private legal action, etc.
Once you get it to the point where anyone reputable won't touch things with a bargepole then you're left with the terminally niave (who will get educated quickly when money becomes involved) and the criminals. They can only shut down and restart a few entities before it becomes apparent what they're doing and criminal activity allows "piercing the corporate veil" - going after the people behind the company, not the company itself.
"It's fine, as long as the fine is per offence, i.e. for everyone contacted, and for each occasion."
I've pointed this out to the ICO on several occasions. They regard an offence as one investigation, no matter how many breaches have occured, over how long a period.
It's this lax attitude which has led rogues to treat the fines as a cost of doing business.
" just wish they made more home appliances. The last time my Bosch dishwasher broke, it cost me a £120 call out fee, and the guy couldn't fix it. We'd have been better off just buying a new one."
No you don't. Look at the Wikipedia article about their washing machines. They weren't particularly reliable.
"think sucking up large amounts of plaster, brick dust, wood shavings etc, and still keep going. Not only that but they have a service policy that makes financial sense. "
One of my friends has had 3 warranty claims denied by Dyson because they'd been "sucking the wrong kind of dust."
Needless to say she doesn't buy 'em any more.
There's nothing stopping a cyclonic cleaner having a bag, if designed correctly. By the time you add enough filtration to stop fine dust being sprayed around the room the level of suck is equally poor on both types.
Most blockages I've encountered are in the hose and that will happen anyway.
Interestingly, you can more than double the effectiveness of a vac by venting the exhaust downwards just ahead of the suction nozzle. The patent is held by a nice UK gentleman in his 80s (I've chatted to him a few times) who seems determined to hold out for a UK maker to implement it (I told him not to bother, he'd live comfortably in his retirement on royalties if he licensed it worldwide)
If you really don't want a room full of fine dust, fit a house vac system, or get a large shop-vac-style system and park it outside, with a long hose.
"HR "managers" in too many firms have power and authority (to hire and fire) well beyond their ability to understand the roles they hiring and firing for."
And once they've truely clusterfucked the organisations they get a nice golden handshake.
I know of one outfit where one HR manager nearly caused a general strike and another (female, with a political agenda) decided women werent being paid well enough, so launched a company-wide review process which left large numbers of staff traumatised and half the female staff in a worse position than they'd been previously.
"The ultimate loser in this is the end user, which in this context, is the company trying to develop a product for their customers. Rather than being able to select a SoC and other hardware based on specifications and cost, they have to factor in device-family-specific kernel trees that may be lagging behind mainline by years, may be incompatible with other kernel trees, and each carry with it its own unique set of bugs."
"Users" can vote with their wallets. Instead of going for $CHEAPEST device which then requiers a shedload of manhours every time there's a variation, go for the one which is fully documented, etc.
Requirements for NDAs seem to fall away rapdily in the face of "Oh well, we'll just switch to XYZ competing manufacturer".
When the mkIII and the mkIIIa and the mk111a2 all vary by substantial amounts, it's a problem.
Linux has a point and being shouty about it means his point gets circulated.
My sympathies to the BSD guys btw. There's a lot of things which can (and should) be done better in the linux kernel - and with sufficient feedback might well be. Then again there are the odd bits I can't stand in the BSD kernel too. :)
UK ringmain designs effectively mandate the use of fused plugs or individually fused outlets, but there's NO compelling reason to use rainmains in new builds or rewires (extra labour costs far outweigh a few pence saving in copper)
It might be possible to standardise on C12/C13 and C19/C20 but that would take a lot of politicking I certainly wouldn't want to get into when pretty much all the EU is using or moving to variants of Schukos and the UK is the odd man out.
FWIW the contact pressure and surface area in the UK plug is lower than in most countries, resulting in a higher possibility of socket thermal damage when the pins are subjected to overcurrent conditions - which is partly why the thing got scaled up to ensure "overcurrent" would blow the fuse first.
(Round pins are also a bitch to deal with in terms of contact pressure as it's difficult to get 100% mating in mass produced brass components which in turn means the contacts can have hotspots and end up desprung. Blade type pins (USA/AU/NZ/China, etc) are easier to fabricate, make reliable sockets for and have more consistent contact pressure, but it hurts like hell if you stand on one in the middle of the night. They can also have pin shrouds - AU/NZ plugs have had these for about a decade)
It's not just RasPis which suffer from MicroSD failings, but at least you can solve the issue on those by pulling out the other end.
I'm fairly careful, but my phone's MicroSd power socket is unreliable after 2 years. Time to fit a new one.
I suspect the the EU made a mistake in specifying them as a standard power connector, but it's strongly motivated me to ensure the next phone has contactless charging onboard.
"Huawei's origins were somewhat grubbier than that - they started out making counterfeit Cisco kit."
Not quite.
They were Cisco's contract manufacturer for many years, then started selling the same kit under their own brand (naughty). It's no different to a number of other "knockoffs" which are off the same production line but not branded.
This was the reason Cisco moved from open updates of their software to a subscription licensing model (Sun did the same thing for the same reasons)
In any case, Huawei no longer manufacture for Cisco and their current kit shares no common hardware internals with Cisco (Not suprising given that as a rule Cisco gear is grossly underpowered for the price).
(I've just spent 3 months evaluating switch/router kit and just about everyone out there is selling kit that's twice as powerful as Cisco for half the price, even before discounts are taken into account, and the differences stay much the same after discounts are factored in (noone EVER pays list price unless they're terminally stupid). Brocade in particular is a very attracitve proposition for enterprise kit if you don't want to buy Huawei because of politics)
> Back up your entire MP3, photo, docs collection on Verbatim dvd-r, then repeat with Hu-Flung_dung brand DVD-r. See which one has your data intact after 20 years.
Based on my experience with such tests - neither will. CDR is not an archival medium, no matter which of the dyes is used (but Phtalocyanin will last about 5 times longer than older types)
On the other hand, CDRW is - because it uses heat-induced phase changes in an amorphous media vs bleaching a dye which will fade out regardless of uv exposure.
DVDs of any type aren't (the sandwich construction makes them disintregrate after 2-10 years) and BDRs might be but the jury's still out (I haven't had long enough for verify aging tests), but they're still uneconomic at present.
None of that matters overly because in 20 years time you probably won't have a device capable of reading your Archival backups.
For the price difference between the inks it's cheaper to reprint the image.
None of them are as fade-resistant as the old tektronic phaser (waxjet) systems but those are finicky to maintain at best and don't perform at all well unless you keep 'em in a low-dust enviornment and use them every day (they gunge up surprisingly easily)
My nexus was updated OTA a few weeks back - and immediately started having wifi problems (intermittent connectivity, can't stay connected, can't get connected in the first place, etc)
Lots of Nexus 7 owners are reporting the same thing
Just to confirm it's a 4.3 and not a Nexus problem, the same thing started happening when I updated a Samsung SGS2 to Cyanogenmod 10.2 (JB 4.3) - up to 4.2 it was fine. As 10.2 is beta (and bug reports are mostly discouraged) there aren't many CyanogenMod users who've reported this issue (yet)
Yes, I switched off all the battery-saving tweaks, etc etc. It made no difference whatsoever and the problem is significatly worse for 5GHz channels than it is for 2.4GHz.
There are some hints that it's specific to 802.11n protocols but only one of my APs has N (which can't be disabled) whilst the others are A, G and B units - they all have the same problems.
On that basis it's just as well that 4.3 hasn't been widely rolled out until the Wifi is fixed Whatever the chocolate factory did to the kernel, it's been highly detrminental.
The prime thrust of this legislation is to prevent patenting of '"XYZ well known processs" on a computer'
Which should never have been allowed in any jurisdiction. Taking something already invented and computerising it isn't novel or a new invention, merely a refinement.
I have an 070 too (at £1.50/min), but I don't get a cut and I don't promote it.
It _is_ handy though - and at that high rate, cold callers are getting utterly scalped. Anyone else is asked to call back on a different number.
PPP is a trade association. While they may claim to be a regulator, they also claim to be exempt from FOI
"North Korea do however have an enormous army (even if it is mostly crap) and an unfeasibly large number of artillery pieces and rockets aimed at Seoul."
It's fairly well known that in the event of hostilities the first shot most Nork grunts would fire would be into the head of their commanding officers. Artillery can be pointed the other way too, so it's doubtful they have more than a couple of rounds apiece.
I'd be extremely surprised to find that any of the weaponry the grunts are waving around actually contain bullets - and also surprised if their immediate superiors had enough to do more than shoot themselves in the head. It's a bit like Iraq in that respect - almost all the footsoldiers were conscripted Kurds who immediately dropped weapons and surrendered en masse(*) to the americans because they figured it couldn't be any worse than fighting them.
(*) A lot more tried to than were able to. USAF planes strafed a lot of places full of soldiers attempting to surrender
"Of course, that might trigger a nasty reaction from others,"
The DPRK was a creation of the USSR. The Russians have lilttle interest in supporting therm anymore and the Chinese see them as an inherited embarassment (it'd be a loss of face to back off supporting them though, unless the Norks piss in their wheaties)
Bombing 'em without having the chinese on board might well be ugly, but I suspect they'd be just as likely to heave a sigh of releif and turn off the oil pipline over the border.
> The Amstrad Gate Array contract went to Ferranti had had the lowest bid but their design was "riddled with errors".
It wasn't just their domestic commercial stuff which had that problem.
> Sugar phoned them up and explained to them using 1 syllable anglo saxon words what he thought of them
If I'd had their phone number I would have done the same thing - frequently and loudly - from the top of show covered mountains where i was having to replace duff devices.
"It doesn't sound as if this will stop (presumably bottle-fed as babies) adolescents from staring at the cleavage of women they are skyping with. "
There's a simple solution for that one - the woman in question should tilt the camera up a bit. If I wore a shirt as low in the front as most women seem to they'd be going ew at the hairy man boobs, so why not put on something a little higher cut for work in the interests of equality?
Then again those same adolescents won't have the camera pointing at their face anyway.
"I'm more concerned about the legalities of what happen when a RoboCar *does* have an accident? "
All the onboard cameras and blackboxes will leave no doubt whatsoever who's at fault and if it's the robot, (which is doubtful based on experience so far - the google cars have been subjected to most fo the situations discussed and so far their only bump was when one got rear ended by a meatbag at traffic lights) programming will be updated quickly.
Liabilities are something for insurance companies to work out, as they are now. And int he absence of a driver, the vehicle owner or the nominal "person in charge" will bear responsibility, as per usual. Actual software errors will be covered by standard business liability insurance (which is surprisngly cheap).
Bambi is a little different when it's a moose/14 point red stag or even just a friesian cow.
All the above will come through the windscreen feet first and kill you if you hit 'em square on, seatbelts, airbags and any other safety features notwithstanding.
With the extra reaction time afforded by computers that hit might even become a near-miss - which little johny's mother will be very glad about when he darts across the road from between 2 parked cars (my standard driving pattern in cities includes "WATCH THE BLOODY FOOTPATH AND LOOK UNDER PARKED CARS FOR FEET ON THE OTHER SIDE" - which has led to passengers wondering why I'm braking well BEFORE Little Johnny appears. Computers will doubtless be programmed to do the same thing and not have to shush passengers)
For starters you reduce reaction times by 1 second (notice red light, lift foot off accelerator, put foot on brake). That's the reason for the "2 second rule" and would shorten braking distances by that much.
Secondly even given ABS and ESP, most drivers will still plough into an obstacle in front of them rather than trying to go around it. Electronics is likely to better handle collision avoidance.
Plus it can "see" in the dark and it doesn't get distracted by the kids fighting in the back seat or the passenger blurting out that he's pregnant/wants a dvorce/both, or the legs of the cute female/buns on the cute male it just drove past.
Plus it doesn't indulge in dickwaving activity for the benfit or other drivers/observers/personal jollies
Plus it doesn't get impatient and start barrelling down safety lanes, or blocking main carriageways by rubbernecking at something that's happened on the lanes in the other direction.
It might be boring but it'll get you there, safely. That's more than I can say for the average taxi driver I've encountered.
"Of course people should be trained to the right level before getting into a car, and should adhere to that level when driving."
But they don't.
Most drivers would FAIL a driving test if retested with no warning (theory and practical). That there are so few crashes with meatbags at the wheel says a lot more about luck than management.
I suspect that when driverless cars become practical, mandatory periodic retesting will become the norm to be allowed to obtain and keep a driving license.
WRT the comment about truckers: A stevedore could sleep in the cabin while the robot does the easy part (driving) but (s)he isn't going to get much rest compared with having stevedores onsite or nearby who can be called out to handle loading/unloading (the first applications will be longhaul warehouse to warehouse in any case). Robot trucks are most likely to be run at low speeds to obtain maximum fuel efficiency. No 12 hour limits or drivers getting bored shitless to worry about, etc.
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Careful
There are 2 parts at work:
1: Mechanical royalties - these are the artist fees
2: Copyright royalties - these go to the composer
There are a lot of composers who make a pretty good living turning out pop songs (tin pan alley never died, it just updated), but artists to tend to get the shitty end of the stick.
"I think what we need to do is redesign software and get back to the days of 1000 lines of hand crafted assembler to replace 10,000 lines of C++ :-)"
and/or better assemblers. there are amazing variations in what's produced for the same input.
Those of us with long memories may recall the wee experiment with recompiling Atari ST/STe roms using a more modern compiler instead of Lattice C - and finding that the new code was 1/3-1/2 the original size.
Good luck with the handcrafted assembler. You'd get better results from exposing the native RISC internals of Intel/AMD x86 chips and programming for that, rather than having to pass through the x86 microkernel inside the bloody things.
"it used to be the case that transistors physically close on the die would be very closely matched in characteristics. "
It used to be the case that batches of transistors were cooked up and then assigned part numbers based on their characteristics - and those characteristics would vary widely across the batch.
This was back in the days of 97% reject rates on TTL/CMOS chip manufacture - and most failed for the same reason (widely varying characteristics)
If you can get hold of a copy of Baum's "A little less witchery, a little more craft" it goes into great length about the bucket chemistry approach to semiconducter manufacture in the 1970s/early 1980s.
The holy grail for masks is xray lithography but even that has had issues with finding a stable monochromatic source dating back to the 1980s. You have to start wondering if we're going to see "pick'n'place" atom shifters used instead at some future date (that's the logical end of IBM's atom placintg experiments).
"But Capitalism falls down if you don't assume infinite exponential growth."
Even Adam Smith said that growth cannot continue forever. The current crop of economists suffer from a bad case of short-termism.
Single digit economic growth is unsustainable for more than about a century. which is why there are horrific crashes at regular intervals. NO economists plan for a level market (even in Japan, where it's been flat for 20 years) because there's a herd mentality that growth always happens.
"Manhattan" chip building has been the holy grail for a long time (it was being talked about in the late 1970s) but it's always encountered fundamental problems which make it unsuitable for computation devices - such as "how do you get rid of the heat?"
The resulting answer always tends to be low power equipment which is more easily replicated in 2D.
Layers are great for flash but I'm not so sure how applicable they are to anything involving non-significant amounts of energy dissipation.
The reason people thought Columbus was nuts wasn't because they throught the world was flat, it was because he was using flawed ideas which caculated the circumference of the earth at about 2/3 of reality and they thought he couldn't carry enough supplies to get to India the long way round.
As it was his flotilla was well past the point where they could turn back and not starve along the way when they finally did hit land. He'd been faking log readings and keeping the real ones under wraps in order to avoid mutiny by an increasingly worried set of crew. The real distance covered was well in excess of what he'd calculated it should be.
So as it turned out, he was wrong and they were right, but the americas got discovered along the way.
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