Posts by 45RPM 1707 publicly visible posts • joined 26 Oct 2010
Really, I have a PowerBook 100 (you know, the 16MHz 68000 powered laptop). I can assure you that batteries are not available for it. But, if they were, and if they used modern chemistry, I reckon that (considering how big they could be, and how little power the 100 uses) it might set records for longevity.
It looks like a very nice laptop. It should sell like hotcakes. With regard to repairability, it’s great news that it’s more repairable - this is something that should be encouraged. That said…
My 2011 MacBook Air was easy to replace the battery on. That’s the only repair it’s needed.
My 2020 M1 MacBook Air has needed no repairs at all. It only has 8GB RAM too - and it still feels as snappy as it did when new. The Neo should be even quicker. For most users (not gamers, not video editors) this is all the laptop that they’ll need - and, if I was a gambling man, will probably remain all that most people need for eight years or more.
Is it an embarrassment and it betrays a severe and worrying lack of moral fibre in Whitehall that Palantir were even allowed to bid - let alone win - to provide services to the NHS.
That our current government doesn’t shut the door on them right now shows that they are little better than the government that they replaced.
Years ago (the Spindler or Amelio years) there was a joke printed in MacUser. It feels like its time might have come again.
Q. What’s the difference between Apple and the Boy Scouts?
A. The Boy Scouts have adult supervision.
This is exactly the wrong time to be hamstringing macOS by removing AppleScript.
I’m not sure that it’s just about the command line. The value of tools like AppleScript in an AI world shouldn’t be underestimated. AppleScript enables just about everything on a Mac to be automated - although Apple does seem to have been deprecating in recent years in favour of friendlier (but less powerful) alternatives like Automator.
Hopefully Apple will wake up and realise that, inadvertently, 35 years ago they gave the Mac one of the most powerful AI enablers, a secret weapon in the macOS arsenal. If they show AppleScript some love then a future AI macOS will be able to achieve just about anything (within the limitations of the computer itself)
On the Windows side, and to a lesser extent (because it doesn’t work everywhere), there’s VBA. Perhaps Microsoft could extend VBA to be as comprehensive as AppleScript? And application automation is one of the few areas where Linux has some catching up to do - although doubtless someone here will tell me that I’m wrong and, if so, I look forward to seeing their suggestions for Linux tools that can provide full scripting of any GUI application.
A lot of cock has been spouted by certain commentards regarding the reliability of renewable sources like solar and wind power, and how they aren’t worth the investment. From where I’m sitting, they’re looking like a valuable part of the energy mix right now. They aren’t the whole answer, but they should probably be the majority of it.
Everyone should read your post. It’s a masterclass in whataboutery and not understanding what words mean. You said a lot without actually saying anything at all. It’s an impressive argument, maybe even a winning argument, when pontificating with like minded individuals in the pub. But as points to sway a crowd of critical thinkers? I think you lost your argument and the audience.
No, I disagree. Political Correctness is about ensuring your language doesn’t cause offence without first checking to see if it does cause a problem. It’s about fixing a problem that might not exist. Wokeness is about being aware of and responsive to what is actually causing a problem.
I suspect that there’s a global awareness, universal across the political divide, about what is moral and what isn’t. It may be subconscious, but the language is there and it is real. The liberal left gets accused of being…
Woke (being awake is good. Try achieving anything when asleep)
Do-Gooders (is being bad preferable)
Snowflakes (which is good if we’re talking about appreciation of their beauty and uniqueness and bad if we’re talking about their fragility and tendency to melt (hmm. Odd how the far right is always the most upset about a perceived slight!))
The point is, when the far right accuses the liberal left of these things they are implicitly recognising that they’re on the wrong side of history.
"Karl Popper said it best with his Paradox of Tolerance. "Woke" people haven't read or understood that, so then call anyone who disagrees with their world view 'ignorant f'ng twats', 'fascists', 'Nazis' etc etc. 'Woke' people and pseudo-liberals can be remarkably intolerant."
I think I'm going to have to give you a thumbs up here. The liberal left really haven't understood Poppers Paradox. This was painfully apparent during Biden's administration when the government was bending over backwards to be (or, at least, appear to be) 'fair'. Twitter, a major platform, was sold to one oligarch, the Washington Post to another oligarch, Trumps prosecution was deferred time and again, and the far right rabble rousing grew ever louder and more emboldened. To the extent that it was able to come out wearing its heart on its sleeve - and everyone laughed. The warnings of Karl Popper should have been heeded. The Biden Administration should have redressed the balance in the Supreme Court so that there was equal representation on both sides - and then shut down any discussions or platforms that fomented intolerance and intolerant views. It didn't, and we're now in this horrible mess.
Of course, in an ideal world, everyone would have the capacity to think critically, and understand the mess that intolerance and hatred gets us into (as Master Yoda warned us). In such a world, Poppers Paradox would be an amusing little hypothetical. But we aren't in that world. And yes, it isn't very nice when words like 'ignorant f'ng twats', 'fascists', 'Nazis' get bandied about. But compared to the actions of ICE and the Trump regime, these are just words - and perhaps the best way to avoid being called 'ignorant f'ng twat', 'fascist', 'Nazi' etc is not to act like one.
And yes, I know this isn't what you meant. But it is what you said, and you were right. So you get a thumbs up.
I like being woke. I like being considerate of other people. I like being able to recognise when I’m just being nasty and mean spirited (and therefore able to apologise for it). I like having the intellectual wherewithal to recognise that the place that other peoples prejudices come from might not be evil - it might just be misguided and manipulated by people who genuinely are beyond redemption. I like wanting to make the world a better place for everyone, and not just for myself. And I hope that Anthropic doesn’t lose its moral fibre*, as so many others (like Apple for example) have done.
*insofar as any big businesses have moral fibre, which ain’t usually a whole lot, but in this case and so far Anthropic seems to be doing better than most.
This is the sort of thing that would have left me incensed once upon a time. But I’ve seen too many changes and learned that this is just the nature of progress. Software engineers are becoming prompt engineers.
When I started, I started on teletypes and I learned about assembly language before progressing to C. We had to understand the architecture and be sympathetic to it. Java came along and suddenly developers didn’t have to know or care about the underlying hardware. Nor be careful in their use of memory. The world was brave and new and I didn’t like it. Isn’t this just more of the same? And I’m sure that my skills would have been considered soft by the greybeards who came before me with their punch cards and their toggle switches.
The world turns. We move with it - or we get a job doing something so menial that it isn’t worth giving to a robot.
I just wish that the AIs could be more power efficient and less memory hungry. And I’m just glad that the bulk of my career is behind me. I don’t think I’d want to be a prompt engineer.
I had rubber band powered model aeroplanes that I flew until they could take it no more (eventually they wouldn't fly straight anymore), whereupon I hung them from my bedroom ceiling. But the fun didn't stop there - because I also had a BB gun (which made an excellent anti-aircraft cannon). Sitting on the floor, back against the radiator, taking pot-shots. Honestly, I'm quite glad that my son isn't me!
And surely playability is what Lego is all about? It isn’t a slur to call Lego a toy - toys are wonderful. I’m close to retirement and I still love to play with toys - especially tactile, physical ones. For me, and I appreciate that there are different opinions out there equally valuable to mine, a completed Lego model that sits on the shelf and never gets played with it just something else that needs to be dusted.
That is the risk associated with accountability. But if you’re doing the right thing, if you abide by the law, if you really only go after people who are committing criminal acts or in the country illegally, provided you don’t act in a morally bankrupt manner, then you won’t have anything to worry about, will you?
No - I wouldn’t bring a gun either. But if it’s allowed to carry a gun, and if the rights of Trump supporters to carry weapons to a protest are upheld (as they are) then the rights of anyone to be armed at any protest should also be upheld.
And whilst you are right that you should follow the instructions of a cop (whose face will be visible, who will have identification (and hence be accountable)), it would be foolish in the extreme to follow the instructions of someone who isn’t a cop and who doesn’t have ID, and who hides their face. They could be a thief. They could be a murderer. And, as we have seen, if they’re ICE then they may very well be.
Aww. Sweet. You either believe that or you’re a bot.
If ICE were accountable then they’d show identification. If ICE were accountable then they wouldn’t cover their faces. In this respect they’re actually less accountable than the Gestapo.
As for being accountable to the elected leaders, I don’t think that it’s by any means certain that there will be another election. We’ll see if the mid terms happen, and we’ll see whether or not the elections (if they do happen) will be free and fair and honoured.
It’s not rocket science. It’s evidently wrong. Apple and Google should remove these apps and disable them immediately. The would be the right thing to do. But, and I hate to say this, given their support for the current regime in America, I think that Tim Cook and Sundar Pichai are seriously lacking in moral fibre. Let’s hope that they’re soon replaced by leaders who know right from wrong.
Whether or not an AI is genuinely intelligent (I think not), whether or not an AI is sentient (again, no), I think we need to be laying ground rules for AI development now. Asimovs rules seem like a good starting point to me - which would, of course, rule out AI use by the military (no bad thing - if I’m going to be killed I’d prefer to be killed by and entity with a conscience* who’s conscience will torture them for the rest of their lives for their action)
I also think it’s a good idea for us to remember our manners. So I always say please, and I say thank you, and I don’t insult the AI. My prompts are clear, and I check to ensure whether or not there’s anything that I can do to help the AI. I also ask for citations, and I check the sources and the output. I treat the AI as if it’s intelligent and sentient, even if it isn’t, because a) one day it might be and b) I believe that good manners and decency are a defining characteristic of a civilised human.
* of course, this is why extremist groups ‘other’ people - why they think of races, sexualities, religions, genders etc other than their own as subhuman - so they don’t have to bother their consciences. Ever had a moment of realisation that your argument has bus sized holes in it?
Whenever you use AI, get it to cite its sources. Then check that those sources exist and are relevant. When I played with Copilot I discovered that it often couldn’t accurately remember the prompt let alone provide evidence for its suppositions. Copilot is the AI equivalent of Donald Trump. Not very clever, not evidenced, useless - and inexplicably popular.
Well I could stand to pay a fair bit more for a start. But there are ways of enforcing taxation - if you have property or investments then you must pay. For forfeit the property. If you want to vote or hold a position of power, if you want to own a newspaper or any media company then you have to be resident. It can even be made to work for social media companies - whilst the whole shebang needn’t be owned by a resident - Zuckerberg and Musk don’t need to move here - they need to have a UK branch, with a UK board and a UK CEO who will be be legally held to account (up to and including prison time) for any transgressions. That alone will warrant a large salary - which will need to be taxed. The thing is, a lot of cock is talked about how the super rich will take their business elsewhere. I doubt it. They like suckling on the wealth of this country too much, even if they won’t get to keep so much of it. And if they do decide to pack up and go elsewhere, businesses and all, then good riddance. They weren’t contributing anyway.
Once again, the tories dive in with an overly simplistic solution that will do nothing to help anyone.
If you want to reduce mental health issues you need to remove the stressors in society. You need to provide or ensure that the conditions exists for…
* good quality jobs
* good quality education (including schools, adult education, libraries, youth clubs etc)
* a good safety net in terms of income support, unemployment benefit and social housing
* good quality health care
* sports facilities (both for schools and municipal)
You need to stop, or outlaw, the othering of people for reasons of race, nationality, religion, sexual orientation etc
If these things can be done then, as a society, we will be happier and healthier (and more civilized) - and, as a bonus, crime rates will fall. There’s a problem though. It won’t come for free. We will need to…
* Tax corporations and clamp down on their tax dodging
* Tax the rich and clamp down on their tax dodging
* Hold organisations which promulgate division and antisocial behaviours to account
All these things are possible. It won’t be easy though. So sod it. Back to giving the rich a free pass, hating people who have nothing, and ensuring that the poorest people in society get beaten with the shitty end of the stick whilst offering up simple solutions which have little to no effect.
It isn’t difficult to sort out the facts from the lies - there are entire organisations devoted to that effort. Snopes for one. And then there are news sources which have built a reputation for solid, reliable, reporting (the FT and the Guardian spring to mind), and those whose trustworthiness is laughable (The Sun, Express, Mail, GBNews etc). I think a case can be made to shut down regular transgressors, although I think perhaps that the level of evidence required should be akin to a criminal trial rather than by fiat. At the very least, when a lie is told then the apology for the lie should be front page, bold face, and fulsome - rather than buried in the back with the classified ads.
Thank you for the clarification. I don’t use social media, so I’m not aware of the depth of the rot - except in the broadest of strokes and from what I have read elsewhere.
If nothing else this should be a big flashing sign telling people to get off Facebook. It’ll do no good staying there!
If we are to retain the freedoms that we currently enjoy then a serious effort needs to be made to silence or shut down organisations that promulgate lies, anti social behaviours, criminal activity or which support fascistic organisations.
Businesses like X (which overtly supports fascist and criminal positions) and FaceBook which, whilst not overly fascist, does nothing to censor misinformation or those who themselves support fascist organisations.
If we can do this then we don’t need to worry about Reform or EDL or any of these other wing nut “parties”. They appeal to the congenitally hard of thinking who lack the faculties to research the bullshit that they’re fed. So if we can turn off the shitpumps then they’ll stop receiving misinformation. They might stop voting altogether - but whatever happens, they’ll be happier and less angry for it.
Exactly this. Although I read it a little before the eponymous year. I remember thinking at the time that it would be impossible because there just wasn’t enough bandwidth to support such surveillance. But I have a famously stinky track record for predicting which technologies will succeed and which will fail. Other ‘hits’ include…
* what’s the point of the Mac - why would anyone buy a computer that isn’t IBM compatible (since then (in 1992), I stopped using a PC compatible as my main computer)
* why would anyone buy an iPod - it’s not as good as MiniDisc
* USB isn’t as useful as… you get the idea.
I do stand behind my argument that social media is a total waste of anyone’s time though.
Democracy prevents misbehaviour by states! Bwa ha ha ha ha!
I used to believe that too. Until Brexit. Until Trump. Seriously - have you seen what’s happening in the US right now!?
But yes. If you’re buying a TV make sure that it can work without a network connection. And then don’t connect it to the network. Similarly, don’t buy a smart speaker, or anything else that listens in to your private conversations.
Or, sod it, do those things and accept the risk. Seriously - have you read 1984?
Oranges and lemons say the bells of st Clements…
I don’t like subscription model software. I like a nice, simple, perpetual license. But, just as I think that musicians, film makers and authors deserve to be paid for their efforts (I am one after all), I’m more than happy to pay for a license for the software that I use.
Unfortunately, a lot of FOSS is functional but not actually pleasant to use - and I’m not actually into wearing a hair shirt or eating my own peeling skin or fingernails.
Trump will always renege on any deal that he strikes. The other party is going to come out of any deal very badly (because the paedorange hasn’t learned that the only truly successful deals are those where both parties get to walk away with something that they want). So the only winning move is not to play. Put another way, the wisest thing to do is to tell him to F-Off up front.
Don’t say things like “we all owe Apple”. I mean, I know it’s true and you know it’s true - but it’ll only end up starting a flame war with the peeps who hate Apple with a burning passion.
Mind you, I hope Apple can turn the ship around with macOS / iOS UI design - or I might be joining their number!
I think I’m probably as close to being a Pi flanboy (see what I did there?) as anyone. I love a Raspberry Pi and, yes, there are cheaper devices - but they lack the support and the ecosystem so, for me, Raspberry Pi reigns supreme. But…
What’s the point?
Maybe I’m missing something but I think that a computer as powerful as the Pi 5 (or even the Pi 4) needs more than 1GB RAM. If you can get by on 1GB RAM then you’ll probably find that the Pi 3 or even the Pi 2 is adequate for your needs. This just seems to be a marketing thing - Pi 5 now available for super cheap (except not really).
If you want a 5, save up. Get one with at least 4GB. If you think 1GB is fine just save and get a 3.
Okay. Fair point. I have use BRAnch (which is the equivalent of GOTO in 68000 assembly). But remember that assembler is a mnemonic map to the machine language of the architecture that it’s written for. And so all the niceties that make Rust, Kotlin, <insert language of choice here> so great are missing - and, in fact, any hypothetical processor which implemented all of them would be hideously inefficient.
It’s the job of a capable software developer to be sympathetic both to the architecture that they’re developing for and the needs of future maintainers of the software, and use the most appropriate tools for the job (and follow coding standards etc). In my view, GOTO just leads to spaghettification. Except then, when its use is unavoidable.
I can’t remember if I started out consciously avoiding using it in C - it was thirty years ago, and I’ve truncated my memory several times since then. But now I genuinely can’t think of a situation where it might be necessary. For and While have me covered.
I would be interested to see an example of code that it more clearly expressed with goto than refactored to exclude it.
My dogmatic view was that if you don’t understand the requirement well enough to write the code for yourself, how do you expect to be able to write a prompt which is well enough expressed for an AI to do it for you? And it’s worse for writing tests (TDD), which can be thought of as the format requirements. I feel very nervous about AI writing those.
But it’s a case of do as I say, not as I do, and I’ve found a use case where vibe coding can be very useful (subject, of course, to careful code review).
Legacy code was often written without the good practices of TDD, and the result is a tonne of code without good regression tests, which makes it the very devil to bring up to date with the latest security patches. The thing is, it’s already in Production. It’s already performing correctly. So… we can get AI to…
1. Review the code and document the tests required. A human will review this, add additional tests as necessary (and, in this case, more likely remove the crufty testing that the AI has suggested for no good purpose)
2. Get the AI to implement these tests. (Naturally, the tests will need to be renewed by a human to ensure correct implementation.)
In my view this is a useful task for AI, and greatly accelerates the building of test coverage.
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