Posts by John Brown (no body)

So you can't think of a single example of people being labelled terrorists by one group and freedom fighters by another group? Nelson Mandela comes to mind as an example you may have heard of. I'll leave you to go do your own research for others because you clearly have a red rage going on with this topic and any further comments will only be seen through that haze.

Re: I'm learning

Calling out a nation state for it's action (or lack of in this case) is far, far different than calling out an entire religion. But of course, anyone calling out Israel always seem to be accused of being anti-semitic,

Re: Targets

"If I lived across the pond, I'd be asking why the UK is on the list."

Probably because, like many "free" countries, it's one of the places dissidents etc flee to. Some of them will have set up organisations opposing the home government etc.

Re: Not all good

Enough to cover the fuel costs and vehicle hire fees? And the uprated insurance you'd need? :-)

Re: Sounds vaguely familiar.. LOL

"Bit of thinking then out came the multi-meter and onto the PSU. The +12V and -12V outputs were somewhat low (less than +8V and -8V respectively). Turns out that those voltages, only used by the serial interface, (standard RS-232 signalling levels) were just too low for it signal reliably to the host system. So it just wasn't "hearing" the XON/XOFFs."

Back in the old days of field engineering (MSDOS, so not all that long ago), I came across a similar incident involving a serial printer. I didn't have any of the right test gear you had, other than loop-back pluigs and a copy of CheckIt!. Anyway, there was clearly nothing wrong with the serial port as such and the printer worked on another PC. Out of curiosity as much as anything else, I tested the +/-12v and like you, got about 9v on each. Future visits to errant serial printers involving strange symptoms like missing characters etc, one of the first things was to just plug a new PSU in first since that was actually one of the quickest tests, ie they had leads long enough to not have to remove the old one for testing and I did once come across one where testing the 12v lines didn't show a problem (it was only a voltage drop under certain load conditions)

I was going to suggest Accessories Anonymous, but I suspect that may full of teenage girls with 3000 different coloured scrunchies and other cheap "fashion" tat :-)

Re: I'm sure

If it was moving fast enough to pass through, the kinetic energy dissipation would likely have been a bit explosive and have left a slightly larger hole, especially at the exit side of the event.

Re: Congratulations

Pah! They were always re-routing the power in Star Trek, on a weekly basis! Even The Doctor knew all you had to do was reverse the polarity of the neutron flow to avoid disaster.

Re: 250 mile range/19 passengers

Mine too, and if it's a holiday, then for me the journey is part of the holiday, nice scenic detours etc. On the other hand, I frequently drive 300-400 mile round trips for work. That's not holiday and the journey is less fun. Not that my my departure or arrival points could possibly be helped by flying in this instance, but a lot of people need those short hops and a few hundred miles where the airports at each end are convenient will be a lot faster than driving for many. On the other hand "enhanced" security at airports may negate that. I've not flown for many years. I'd imagine that for internal flights, there are systems in place now to speed things up.

Re: Unintended consequences...

Have a play with this

They claim a 250 mile range, so allowing for "reserve", say 200 miles. That covers, from Leeds, most of the main population centres of the UK.

If we assume that 250 miles is the practical range, ie that includes the "reserve", then it doesn't quite get to Inverness and the western Highlands, Cornwall or the SW of NI, but takes in all of the rest of the UK from Leeds. It's enough to cover many of the UK internal flights in what is currently the aircraft equivalent of a Nissan Leaf.

London - Edinburgh is out of range without "refuelling", but London to Paris, Antwerp, Brussels, Channel Islands are all in range.

Re: 250 mile range/19 passengers

"Yes for most journeys 250 miles is driving range, although it depends on the geography of the specific journey. As it it could be much further and slower to drive if there were mountain ranges, bodies of water etc you have to drive around, that a plane can fly over."

The first commercial airline in the US flew across the bay between Tampa and St Petersberg in ~20 minutes. The equivalent car journey was 20 hours, or 2 hours, weather permitting, by boat.

Re: 250 mile range/19 passengers

"Whoop-de-do. 250 miles is basically my "might as well drive" range."

The early models of current electric cars had ranges of 30-40 miles in real life. Whoop-de-do. But things have moved on a little since then.

The first airliner flew in 1913, but never went into commercial service due to WWI. It had a range of about 600Km and carried 16 passengers in Russia. Post-war, the French Goliath flew commercially, carrying 14 passengers.

Re: I wonder

Yeah, but land based runways tend to be a little longer than floating sea based ones so you don't need the massive acceleration to achieve take off speed before reaching the end.

Re: I wonder

"Or do they have a quick swap with already charged battery pack?"

That might be the best idea. Conventional aircraft only fuel up with enough for the trip plus some spare to save weight. The same could apply to replaceable battery pack. If max range is 250nM, there's real reason they shouldn't use a half size pack for a 100nM trip.

Re: Supply pipe

Similar but opposite here. The row of house I live in, each house used to be two smaller ones. there two stopcocks for each house, but only one actually leads into the house. One year, I saw some water seeping up and though "oh shit this could be expensive". Then stopped and though about where the "live" stop cock was and where the water comes into the house. Turned out the unused stopcock was still open and the it was probably the capped off end 10 feet towards the other end of the house that was leaking, likely the cap itself. So I turned off the disused stopcock and the leak stopped.

Some years later, the water company sent a letter saying they'd be coming out to replace the stopcocks in the next two weeks. Came home from work one day to find a nice square of concrete had been sawn out and replaced, a nice new round stopcock plate in the middle that looks like it needs a tool to open. They didn't touch the other stopcock, still having the ancient square flip-top cover. Such a shame they replaced the disused one and not the actual active one.

Some years after that, the water company dug up the whole road to replace the water main. I was leaning over the fence watching them work when they got to my house. I pointed out that each house used to be two houses and the second pipe to each house was not in use. One of the guys said something along the lines of "fuck! why did no one tell us?". They had been putting in all the joints and offshoots to match what had been there for the last 120 years. I live at the end of the street they were finishing at.

Re: Jeez

"Seems a bit paranoid to me (and I'm a bit paranoid myself)."

The system probably cost less than a security guards annual salary. After 12 months or less, it's "free". Trebles all 'round boys!

Re: "If" - Context

I doubt the system is in place to match every visitor and flash up possible matches for a human to check. It's far more likely that it's looking at every visitor and only alerting staff when it thinks there's a match. At which point sirens and red flashing lights start up and the suspect is ejected.

Re: "If" - Context

I wonder how well Chinese developed FR works outside China? Likewise any other countries with FR programmes. I'm sure this must be happening all over the world, possibly with similar levels of issues with their minorities or non-locals. After all, white people are the minority in much of the world.

Re: exhibit ingrained racist assumptions in the design

With modern electronics, is it beyond the wit of engineers to come up with a solution? Non-linear gain for example? Or is down to FR software matched with cheap, nasty CCTV cameras instead of the expensive ones used when setting up and/or calibrating it? Are these placing buying a "system" or just installing some software onto an existing CCTV system?

After all, there are some damned good home security systems out there with some very good hi res night vision cameras. And yet, whenever the Police want to trace a suspect, the only CCTV "footage" they show on TV always seems to be grainy, blurry B&W images, often at 10FPS or less.

I'd be prepared to bet that the source image at this roller rink came from a "bubble cam" where the housing has never been cleaned, up on a wall or ceiling in less than ideal lighting conditions and a very wide angle lens.

Re: Most common fault was Magnets

"We’re talking CRT era here - the first official multi screen support was in Win98 I think,"

MS-DOS. AutoCad. Used the text-only MDA screen for the text entry and menus while the gfx CAD display, CGA, or possibly even EGA got the full screen resolution of 640x200 or 640x350, not space lost to menus etc.

Re: Adjust the monitor settings?

"Used to work for a monitor I had that would make a loud whistling noise from time-to-time. A good whack 1/3 of the way down on the right hand side soon fixed it."

My dads TV was doing that, some years ago when CRTs were still the only option. He mentioned it when I was there so I took a look around the back. The tiny "welding arc light" showing through the vents was a clue something might be up. So I turned it off, went out to the car and brought my tools in and re-soldered the bit that was arcing. Problem solved and I was dads golden boy for a while :-)

(Yes, I did discharge the tube first. Even I knew that the arc light was probably a high voltage that I didn't want to touch!)

Re: I am intrigued

Already done. WPS Office is quite usable according to a friend who went that route. His light computer use meant he dumped the laptop and reverted to doing everything on his phone. It'd not work for me, but there's already a product and market out there.

Re: Valve hardware and a bad track record

Nothing wrong with abandonware."

Absolutely! I'm still using a NookHD tablet, flashed with Cyanogen. It makes a great Kodi remote, or for looking up stuff on IMDB, or just general browsing. Or games. or, or, or...

I think it cost me under a £100, possibly much less, I've forgotten now, in The Great Nook Fire-sale.

Re: Valve hardware and a bad track record

"The battery life sounds a big hurdle here, "

Really? I wonder how many gamers would spend more than a "several hours" playing games on the go with no option to plug in and re-charge? I suspect that might more of an edge case than normal run-of-the-mill users. Not to mention that the "several hours" is playing high spec games constantly, with 7-8 hours quoted for lighter games or other uses, all on a 7" screen.

Re: Nintendo Clone?

Yeah, it's just GameBoy clone :-)))

Splitters!

Re: collusion

It's a bit of a tough one in some respects, especially for the normal everyday folk. France had officially surrendered at that point. I'd not be surprised to find that most of the "on the ground" Police were told either stay in your job or the Germans bring in their own people. A choice between the Devil and the deep blue sea.

Re: 'In the Public Interest'

"and as it is the person(s) still appear to have been raided, which is the kind of retaliation whistleblowers are supposed to be protected from."

From the little we know so far, it seems whoever got hold of the data then passed it to the press, possibly anonymously or as a "protected" source. I don't think that reaches the level of "whistle blower" in law. If the law doesn't know who the whistle blower is, it can't protect them. So, it seems at this stage, they are treating is as criminal act of breaking into a system and stealing data.

On the other hand, as was mentioned further up, the ICO seem to be taking a single instance of a very tiny amount of data affecting only two people way more seriously than the 99.99% of other open cases they have on the books, let alone the many more they simply refuse to investigate.

Re: "We have always been at War with ...

"Or having lunch at a restaurant where a person who tested positive had dinner several hours later (you are registered at having been in the restaurant until 23:59 even if you left at 18:00)"

Venue check-in notifications only advise that you visited a place where someone who since tested positive was also there the same day. That's all. That means a slightly higher risk of cross infection, so be careful, maybe book a test if feel you might need one. Use some common sense. If it was a large open plan area with decent ventilation, odds or low you got it. If it was a relatively small, eclosed space, go get a test.

If you were there at the same time as someone who tested positive and were within 2 m for more than 15 minutes, then you will get the alert to self-isolate due to the bluetooth proximity algo. At which point you also order home test kits and potentially cut short self-isolation. Or, if you know the likely location from the data, and you know it was open and well ventilated, ignore it and get on with your life.

Re: "We have always been at War with ...

I saw a figure of 47% of current cases are people who have been vaccinated. I was busy at the time, so I didn't dig in to find if that was doubly vaccinated at least two weeks prior or just had at least one vaccination or what numbers had symptoms or were hospitalised.

But, it needs to be borne in mind that being vaccinated doesn't stop you getting infected. It reduces the chances of being infected, reduces any possible symptoms, possibly to none, and severly reduces the chances of being hospitalised and reduces the chances of passing it on. But it doesn't mean you can't get it and can't pass it on to the large percentage still not vaccinated.