Humans are not herbivores
We are Omnivores like pigs and chimps.
A healthy diet includes meat *and* veg, not meat *or* veg.
Posts by GrahamT
437 posts • joined Thursday 15th March 2007 11:16 GMT
Posted in Raspberry Pi
Re: Why does this article's feature show a picture of something else?
The first image is an alpha board, as the caption says; the second picture is the pre-production sample, also as captioned. The second picture looks as near as dammit to the production board pictures I've seen. I get mine next week, so then I will know just how close, but who cares anyway?
Re: See, this is what I like about Google
The Microsoft car only works if at least one window is open, but slows down if you open too many.
To stop it, you press on the start button. Every so often on a journey the car will become unstable, so you have to stop the car and restart it, if closing and re-opening the windows doesn't work.
If it goes crazy and can't be controlled, you have to press three widely spaced buttons simultaneously to be presented with a dialogue box asking if you want to stop, restart, monitor the performance or lock the doors.
Posted in Basic instinct: how we used to code
Re: Errrr....
and before that it was on "I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again." on the radio, circa 1964-68.
John Cleese, Tim Brook Taylor, Bill Oddie and Graham Garden, and others whose names I can't remember.
Posted in LOHAN gasps at stiff and slippery tube
Re: Ice buildup vs. ice joining things together
A thin layer of lube on the rod won't necessarily stop icing, but should ensure any ice droplets are dislodged easily, like a shower of pearls, by the tube thrusting its way along the erect rod.
Re: Meet the Fuckers?
..or twin with Condom in France.
Posted in The BBC Micro turns 30
Re: even many schools didn't buy them
A friend of mine was a teacher at a school that decided Spectrums were better value than Beebs. They lasted one or two terms at most before falling to bits. They replaced them with Beebs that worked for years before becoming obsolete as PCs took over.
Steel case, proper keyboard, or plastic case with rubber chiclets, against 11-16 year olds: no contest.
By coincidence, I took my Beeb B to recycling only two weeks ago.
Posted in Ubuntu penguins build Linux TV challenge
"duel licensing agreement"
So that's pistols at dawn; survivor gets the rights.
Or did you mean 'dual licensing agreement'?
Posted in Ken Russell dies aged 84
At least his films weren't boring.
I have enjoyed every Ken Russell Film I have watched. Lots of visual jokes, even if the continuity was sometimes a bit lacking. I'm not sure if the mediaeval nun in The Devils wearing a wristwatch was one or the other.
I hope there is a retrospective on one or more of the TV channels.
What comes over though, in all the obits, is what a nice guy he was.
R.I.P.
I disagree
That would be the monokini
Posted in Why GNOME refugees love Xfce
Thank you, people
I'm sure no one is reading this thread anymore, but just in case;
Having read all the comments, I switched my laptop from Unity/Gnome 3 to Xubuntu/Xfce. (sudo apt-get xubuntu-desktop) I am really happy I did. I can't say i *hated* Unity/Gnome 3, just that they "got in the way" and left me scratching my ancient head about ways to do simple tasks.
Xfce hasn't been completely trouble free, but at least most things look and work the way I want them to, and Google has sorted out the rest. (and I still have all the Ubuntu/Gnome apps I installed)
Last time I tried Xfce it had less flesh on it than a catwalk model, but I was pleasntly shocked at how much it has come on. This is what Canonical should be offering as the default rather than Unity.
Thank you again all the splendid people that know what they are talking about.
Posted in Happy 40th birthday, Intel 4004!
Pedantry
Re: "The 8080 wasn't alone, though – there was plenty of competition in the earlier days, such as the Zilog Z80, Motorola 6800, and MOS Technology 6501, which Pawlowski told us were all essentially equal competitors at the time."
The Z80 took the 8080 architecture and expanded it with more 16 bit registers like the IX and IY index registers; it came after those other processors, so wasn't really a competitor "at the time", and soon took Intels market for general purpose microprocessors. For us Brits, its most obvious manifestation was in the Sinclair ZX80 and 81, but it was also used in many embedded systems. I loved programming those things.
The first microprocessor I worked with was the 6800, which I thought had a better architecture than the 8080, but CP/M ran on 8080 (and Z80) and was too dominant by the time the 6800 came along.
I never wrote software in assembler for the 6502, as I didn't like the architecture at all - but that didn't stop me loving my BBC micro.
Why Petrol/diesel?
Because hydrocarbons have a better energy density and are easier to handle than hydrogen. More importantly, there are millions of cars/trucks/buses on the planet that can use it.
If energy was so cheap, CO2 could be extracted from the atmosphere and converted back to hydrocarbons so reducing global warming; the carbon particles from diesel could be collected at source and recycled into fuel too. (though there is no shortage of carbon above and below ground)
However, I don't expect any of this to happen in my rapidly diminishing lifetime. I remember cheap energy being promised when I was at school 50 years ago.
I still have the (vinyl) double albums of both films. Shame the fourth side of the latter is all David Essex.
A few missing
Gimme Shelter - Stones
Live at Pompei - Pink Floyd
Help! - Beatles
Don't Look Back - Bob Dylan
No Direction Home - Bob Dylan
Monterey Pop
Woodstock (How could you miss Woodstock?)
Still, I can't argue with Spinal Tap at 11, they are still one better than anyone else.
A Musical...
Doesn't that also apply to "The Wall"?
At least in Tommy you see musicians performing most of the way through. (Elton, Tina Turner, etc.)
Re: Brian Cox
On his TV programme, didn't he (or maybe it was someone else) characterise Entropy and the end of the Universe as "Things can only get Worse"
Literary Kindles
I feel a Shakespearean theme coming on:
7" Kindle Much Ado About Nothing
8.9" (or iPad size) Kindle Measure for Measure
10.1" Kindle As You Like It.
Odd layout
I'm not sure what their business model is, but the City has been ignored except for a lone node at Liverpool Street. Shopping ares seem to have been targetted with clusters around Oxford Street, and Kensington and Knightsbridge, rather than business areas.
Perhaps the nodes are going to serve adds for the nearby shops to bring Nokia some return.
Posted in Beeb measures Blighty in doormats
thin end of the wedge
After sulfur we would get aluminum, which is but a short step to chromum, strontum and germanum
Non Sequitur
"..also prove useful in making sense of languages that are not currently spoken by humans, including ancient languages and communication between animals"
Unlikely; the statistical method only works if you know the language that is encoded/enciphered - in this case German. As no one alive speaks animal or many of the dead languages, how would they know the relevance of symbol or sequence frequency? That is why a Rosetta Stone is so important - it provides a basic glossary in the unknown and a known language.
RIP dmr
main( )
{
printf("goodbye, world");
}
Posted in Dell opens new data centre in Slough
The Office
The Office was such a good ad for Slough that they have ripped down the bus station and roundabout that featured in the opening titles. They need to get rid of the Thames Valley University (AKA Slough Tech) building next.
However some enterprising resident has opened a bar/restaurant on the high street called "Wernham Hogg" so the office wasn't all bad news for Slough.
By the way, the smell is from the sewage works at the side of the M4. It was moved nearer Slough when they needed land for Heathrow expansion a few years back. Slough's bad luck, but not its fault.
Really the first?
Warning - this is based on old memories and hearsay, so may not be 100% accurate.
My father, a keen cyclist when he was young, told me about indoor racing bikes made of bamboo in the 1930s. He said that even the wheel rims were made of bamboo strips. Of course there were no carbon fibre or resin-glass composites in those days, and even aluminium was scarce, so it made sense to use a strong lightweight natural material to produce something lighter than an all steel bike.
I believe the fragility of the bamboo, and the lethal splinters when it broke on impact (not unusual in indoor racing) put paid to it as a realistic material, certainly for outdoor use. After the war there were new materials, so it faded into the mists of time, waiting for someone to reinvent it.
Have you thought of the weather onboard a ship?
If temperature was an issue, the laptops could be put in a reefer container. These can be used to warm as well as cool cargo. They would have to plug into the train's power supply as the diesel for their GenSets would probably freeze at -40C.
I see this as a stopgap, rather than a regular service, as the capacity of a train is far below that of a ship, and it costs a lot more.
Where does 40 days come from? All our services take 28 days from Kaohsiung to Hamburg. O.K. still twice the train time, but less likely to be delayed by ice/leaves/buffalo, etc. on the line. Also, they still have to be shipped from Taiwan to the mainland to be put on a train, so there is still the time/cost of loading/unloading a ship involved. Add in the fact that ocean rates are rock bottom at present and you wonder how long the rail service will continue.
There are good reasons why most of the world's goods travel by ship.
Re: Burning Oil
Burning waste oil in steam ships might have been normal in the 50's when nuclear vessels were first proposed, but current container vessels are diesel, so use similar oil to that used in diesel trains and lorries, but much less per kilometre-tonne. True, the oil companies insist on selling the lines high sulphur diesel, but modern ships have all sorts of exhaust treatment built in. It would be to the bottom line's advantage to use cleaner fuel. Currently many ships are "slow steaming" (though few use steam) to save fuel. There is a big push to make container shipping even greener than it already is.
Posted in Verity's secret shame revealed
I want to play this game
A for Air
E for ere
H for heir
B for Christ
C for cue
Q for queue
D for W
F for vescent
G for Gnostic
I for ire (or "an eye")
J for Jugoslavia
K for knave (or kyu)
N for nave
M for Mnemonic
O for Oedipus
P for Ptolomey
R for right (or " for Miller")
W for write
S for 's-Gravenhage
T for Thought (faw' if you are a cockney)
U for me
V for engine
X for horizontal (or unknown quantity)
Y for vertical
Z for depth
"Gluts" are temporary
World trade is down at the moment, so there is a glut of containers and ships. During the good times, the Chinese and Taiwanese manufacturers of containers have difficulty keeping up.
There is constant "wastage" of containers through damage, loss at sea and theft. There are whole villages in Africa made of containers, and we know we haven't sold any of ours there. (I work for a shipping line)
A container costs from $3000 dollars up, depending on size type and material, so a 3000 TEU vessel is carrying containers worth more than $10 million before you count the cost of the goods inside them.
Empty repositioning is the bugbear of the shipping industry. A few years ago there was a drastic shortage of containers on the West Coast US and they were running out of storage in the container yards on the East, because the flow of goods was eastward and no one wanted to pay to ship empty containers back by train.
Nowadays, if you want to ship something from Europe to the Far East, you only need to pay the port handling charges and the fuel costs, the line will basically carry it for free, just to get its empties back were they are needed, with someone else paying for the fuel. That is how recycling companies can afford to ship waste to China for sorting, rather than getting us to sort it at source.
Don't forget the batteries
I hope the batteries are included in that heated payload. Li-ion batteries start to lose power below -10C. Consumer batteries aren't much good below -20C. NASA uses batteries that work between -60C to -80C, but I don't think your budget allows for that level of performance.
Similarly...
The only eBooks available on the French Amazon website are old classics. No modern books at all. The French are big book readers, so if they were available they would probably buy them.
Posted in End of an era: Atlantis hits the tarmac
One era ends, another begins
It's all down to LOHAN now.
Depends on the product
If firewood is the product rather than fine hardwoods, then coppicing will give a harvest every 10-15 years per tree with no replanting costs. He could even set up a charcoaling scheme for the barbecue market using his coppiced timber to raise the value of the harvest.
I've got a feeling he knows what he is doing.
So that's where he went
When I saw the name, I thought of a Scouse network engineer I used to work with. I googled him, and the images confirm it - it's him. He worked hard and rose fast through the company we worked for and went on to greater things at SITA.
The boy done good.
Posted in Booze for wrinklies: Good or bad?
Age related smartness
Quote: "The traditional view is that alcohol misuse is uncommon in older people,"
No, you just get better at hiding it.
Only 4 years before I have to stretch my daily consumption to a week; better get busy.
Yes
and had concrete poured down the shafts, so they could never be opened again.
Posted in A sysadmin's top ten tales of woe
True
That happened at one of our clients, but they were 8" discs then.
Posted in Verity Stob and the super subjunction
Churlish, I know,
but "to better differentiate" is a split infinitive. The original reads better. (Or should that be ... "better reads"?/2)
Posted in Verity Stob and the super subjunction
Propositions
Winston Churchill was belittling the rule that sentences should not end with a preposition, such as "That is a load of rubbish, which I will not put up with."
Of course, he could have said "I will not put up with that load of rubbish" but that wouldn't have got him into the dictonaries of quotations.
Posted in Verity Stob and the super subjunction
My personal bugbear...
..is a customer in a restaurant ordering their food by prefixing the item with "Can I get ...?", to which the response from the waiter/waitress should be "No, I get it, you just tell me what you want."
Both my (grown up) children use this, and it makes me cringe each time I hear it.
Posted in Reg hack applauds asinine augmentation
For an El Reg theme...
How about Beesara (with an optional terminal "h") Starts with B and has a feminine ending. Can be shortened to Bee or Trix.
Re: Never heard Peter used...
As in Point Peter (or Percy) at the Porcelain.
Posted in Lock up your lungs, here comes Grimsvotn
Eyjafjallajokullageddon
I do hope that makes the next edition of the OED.
We have Great Tits in Berkshire...
..but Blue Tits aren't so common, even when it's cold. You should see the breasts on our Robins, though.
Posted in Ohio cops taze naked marathoneer
Nude-nited Kingdom
All laws making nudity illegal per se were repealed in 2008 (I think) but the police can use various Public Order laws to stop people appearing nude in public, which usually result in a "not-guilty" from a jury, so the police tend to turn a blind eye, or issue a caution.
Some protestors have got themselves convicted and gaoled for Contempt-of-court for appearing nude in court, but that is what you would expect..
Obviously flashing (indecent exposure) and public sex (Outraging Public Decency) are a different matter and will result in prosecution and getting put on the sex offenders register.
All in all, the British legal attitude seems quite sensible given our puritanical history.
Posted in Ohio cops taze naked marathoneer
Bared In The USA
The San Francisco Bay-To-Breakers run (not strictly a marathon, but nevertheless a long public race) certainly has many naked runners of both sexes; some with a bit of body paint, some completely skyclad, some women topless, and several women wearing nothing but a bra - presumably for comfort when running - but still looking very weird compared to the other categories of nudity.
Anyway, the point is, you can't generalise about the USA from one state.
On a related note, I saw a woman walking stark naked through Prague on Friday evening, apparently modelling for a photographer. The world didn't end, no one was tazed, and life went on as usual.
NIMBY?
There is probably a need for Lewis Pages, but Not In My Back Yard.
No problem
As IE9 doesn't work with Windows XP, it's not going to make a great deal of difference to a lot of us.
Firefox 4 does - and with Linux, and with that Maccie thing that some people are keen on.
Posted in All hail our cloud computing overlords
Re: IBM were right after all. (about cloud computing)
So that's why they bought Stratus.
Posted in Chemists create current-bearing plastic
Electrochemical series
If the plastics can have different conductivity, that will make resistors cheaper as the resistance will be in the bulk rather than a surface coat of thin film carbon.
Secondly, will different plastics be in different postions in the electrochemical series? If so you could make lightweight flexible batteries using an external electrolyte (any acidic or alkaline liquid or gel) without having heavy metals leaching out. I'm thinking the self powered vibrating dildo here.
Posted in Inventor of the Workmate dies
Wood and steel
OK, mine's not 35 years old, nearer 32, but it is definitely steel and quite rusty in parts. I guess they changed from aluminium quite early in the lifecycle. Still used regularly though.
Opinion
David McLeman
My 25 years of comical IT buzzwords
Tim Worstall
Time to take a sniff at the coffee, perhaps
Chris Mellor
Will they have to drag him back like last time?
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