Duckduckgo...

I've pretty much given up on using Google for general searches, in favour of Duckduckgo. Silly name but it does the job, and at least makes an attempt to show the user some respect.

Just for the record...

...I'm quite enjoying Gnome 3. Have used Gnome (for years), LXDE, xfce, but have never really got on with KDE for some reason. Granted Gnome 3 is still pretty raw and lacking quite badly in some respects, but hopefully will improve, but even so after using it for the last two months, interspersed with a comparison with xfce, I just like it, simple as that!

Bugs R Us @ 1935,

are you for real? Please re-read what you posted and apply yourself to the category question: 'nutjobs' and 'people who have religious faith'; do either of these categories exist totally, or even substantially, within the other?

I'll save you some time: answer = 'No'. In fact a wonderfully small part of the 'people who have religious faith' group shares space with 'nutjobs' group, and an even smaller subset of that fall within the 'actively violent religious-nutjob' category.

I think you may well find that it isn't 'religion' per se that is the source of your angst, but 'people', particularly a relatively tiny group who use 'religion' as a justification for their bad behaviour. If you took that justification away they would almost certainly find another in short order.

As for the matter in hand: unless compelled to visit the USA I strongly recommend travel via Singapore/Hong Kong, etc. where transit passengers are treated as normal human beings rather than inconveniences/criminals-who-just-haven't-been-caught-yet.

I've already done the deed...

...and jumped ship---to Arch Linux. The initial setup is a bit of a faff, and definitely not friendly to anyone who wants everything to 'just work', but the sense of relief that I'm back in charge of the system makes it all worthwhile.

Ubuntu was great while it lasted, but I think we've reached a fork in the road.

Not so much missed the boat...

...as dead in the water.

It's a crazy, fucked up world...

Fact: Firearms, hand guns in particular, are generally designed for the purpose of wounding and killing human beings.

So, lets glorify something that has as it's primary purpose the destruction of life.

What 'weapon' someone chooses to use against someone else is utterly irrelevant as to whether a handgun is something a morally sane human being should hold up as an object worthy of state recognition, or any other kind of glorification.

'You have heard it said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth', but I say to you: love your enemies and do good to those who hate you'. Glorifying any object designed for the purpose of killing our brothers and sisters doesn't seem to sit well with the man's words, now does it?

aGreed

[that is all]

I think you will find...

...Loyal Commenter's analysis is, in this case, pretty much spot on. Doesn't excuse doc's foolishness, but there are others who probably need to actually take responsibility for the whole snafu; he gets a ticking off, and allowed to get on with the job he's actually there to do.

I can't really remember...

...but it was probably sniffing the methylated-spirit vapour off the freshly minted Banda copies that rotted my brain; or maybe that was somebody else, I can't really remember...

Capacity is not the issue...

...for most consumers, that bottleneck was breached long ago. Speed, reliability, energy efficiency, and price are the hot spots, especially outside the desktop/server market.

I think we all know by now...

...that the US Patent system is utterly broken, and merely a Wild West for robbers, charlatans, and carpet baggers to come up with ever more outrageous claims and scams with which to screw each other over and skew the 'market' (I use the term advisedly), in their favour.

Thankfully the US Patent system and corporate brigands, with their associated flocks of vulpine lawyers and tame judiciary, is not that of the whole world; although to see how they carry on they clearly want it to be.

When is the rest of the world going to grow a pair and tell them where they can stick their useless and predatory system, and more importantly come up with something a whole lot better for all of us?

TrackMeNot?...

...maybe not, but it sends out bogus search requests at preset intervals so that genuine queries are hidden in the mass of junk searches, i.e. in theory making it difficult/impossible for advertiser's algorithms to work out what my 'profile' is.

re MSL Skycrane, and other ramblings...

Has it occurred to anyone else that the 'MSL Skycrane' takes the KISS principle, kicks it down the stairs, and then drops a Mars rover on it from a very great height? It may work, but what are the odds of something going wrong all along that long complicated chain of events. Whatever happened to the giant inflatable beach ball approach---'zorbing' on Mars, what a fun way to start the holiday of a lifetime!

And, speaking of the actual thread topic, I vote 'To Boldly Go' a 'romantic non-starter'. If we're going to do 'space' at all we should be concentrating on better motive power, safer (radiation proof) rides, and learning how to get around the solar system economically and in some style, before we start setting up shop anywhere else. We've still got plenty of work to do here before we start exporting the human condition anywhere else.

EEE!!!

As far as I am concerned the 'netbook concept' was more or less strangled at birth by MS rapidly implementing it's 'eee' policy. Instead of cheap, light, long lived the platform evolved overnight into expensive, heavy (in software terms), and miserable battery life. Since then the type has consolidated into 'small laptop' and nothing like what many of the early (and wannabe early) adopters were hoping for.

Ah, well, there's always next time.

The phrase...

...'horrible cludge' springs to mind.

or, as the old folks used to say, 'If it's worth doing, it's worth doing properly' [the FIRST time!], but then it's only tax payers' money, so who really cares?

More 'united we stand'...

In thirty years time if the boys with the moustaches are flying anything at all it'll be logistics (fuel and freight), everything else will be UAVs and choppers. High time, as mentioned above, the forces were merged and stopped faffing about hanging on to outmoded ways.

United we stand...

It's about time 'the world' told these trolls and chancers (however 'respectable' they may be), to FOAD, unless they can make a genuine case for loss of income or some other tangible loss.

No whining please...

...if you come round to my place (invited or not), and I say, 'Take your disgusting habit outside if you simply must indulge in it', there's no point moaning, those are the house rules. You can take yourself, and your disgusting habit, off in high dudgeon, 0or you can meekly step outside for five minutes (or how ever long it takes), but when we are in someone else's space, whether it's called 'My Space' or whatever, we play by their rules.

This is the internet after all. there's nothiing stopping anyone who doesn't like they someone has their place setup going off and setting up their own space with the kind of rules they like to have.

On the other hand instead of/alongside rules there is always the possibility of 'responsibility', now there's a subversive idea...

Pardon my cynicism...

1. He may be right, but he would say that wouldn't he;

2. All your datas are belonging to us.

and 3. We are the cloud and you will be assimilated.

They can prise my hard drive from my cold dead hand, but no one is owning my 'stuff' before then.

EEE~III

So, it's happened at last---Microsoft has been knocked off its perch.

Apple is the new M$, and instead of, 'Embrace, extend, extinguish', we are now blessed with, 'Initiate, inhibit, infantilise'.

Big business, as usual.

The answer to extortion rackets...

...is always the same: the 'little guys' have to get together to form a mob that's bigger than 'the Mob', then preferably take them down by law (so much more civilised, though maybe not so much fun).

It's worse than you think

@ 'VBS is more than that'

In fact the VBS is a layer on top of the CRB system. Anyone applying for VBS registration will have their application run through the CRB system.

Unfortunately, the VBS has set out very woolly guidelines as to how it will make decisions. In principle applications will go through 'on the nod' unless there is any 'cause for concern' about an individual's behaviour.

That 'cause for concern' may include hearsay, formal complaints that have been dismissed by a professional body, informal complaints that have been dismissed, etc. In all cases the VB board are free to make their own decision based on their assessment of 'the balance of probabilities'(!).

It hopefully doesn't take too much imagination, or experience of bureaucratic processes, to see that the 'precautionary principle' is likely to make itself felt, i.e. 'Can we afford to take the risk of being wrong on this case?'.

Yes, people will be able to appeal a negative response, but in the meantime they will be hung out to dry and forbidden from taking up a new post, maybe suspended from their current job, and will somehow have to argue that 'on the balance of probabilities' they are in fact trustworthy and suitable for the job.

This outfit are going to have they say so over the careers and livelihood's of near on half the working population---the imperial possibilities are simply stupendous.

Meanwhile the vast majority of abuse of vulnerable people takes place not in the workplace but in the home, by family members and 'friends' of the person being abused.

Hide a lie with a bit of truth

@Biometric Passports by Richard Wharram

It's a lie wrapped up in a half truth. As I understand it EU passports, and presumably all passports, are supposed to meet a new international standard which involves storing biometric details in the passport chip, i.e. your photograph and, in due course, your fingerprints, plus all the data that is already printed in the passport. That's it. Anything 'extra' has been slipped in under the pretext of fulfilling those basic requirements.

The Govt. plan to get us onto the Identity Register by compelling us to supply lots of extra information when we apply for a passport, though there is no requirement for this information for the passport itself.

Student wisdom

Along time ago my student flatmates and I came to the unanimous conclusion that at least 90% of everything is crap. The web has done nothing to disillusion me of our profound rightness.

Dreams are free, or £20 billion, but who's counting?

HM Civil Service have wanted 'ID Cards' for years. They were trying to persude the last Tory govt. to bring them in, and have probably been trying to have them reinstated pretty much ever since they were abolished in that famous case (memory outage), back in the late forties.

Modern tech. just makes the whole concept (wet dream), of sexy streamlined all embracing efficiency intolerably attractive to the civil service mind, not to mention the political front of house and the commercial parasites and scavengers that feed off the whole pile.

Forget conspiracy theories (though I'm sure there are a few that could be fished out), go for the 'cock up' theory of government first time every time, then and only then look for darker motivations.

[we really do need a steaming pile of poo icon]

Something to hold onto in your pocket

Owning rifles and shotguns, especially beyond the city limits, I can handle that. But handguns? 'I've got it for defense'--- they whine their self serving, blind bullshit. Handguns have one purpose out on the street or in the home and that's to provide a convenient way to kill people. You might just as well all walk round with a sword on your hip---gentlemen once did---or a club in your hand (don't go getting the wrong idea now). Does it reduce crime? Does it, hell! Just makes the killing easier; any brain dead fool can pull a trigger (probably kill the wrong person though---nerves).

The 'right to bear arms' does nothing for your safety, except maybe in your dreams. Does it make things worse, well that's harder to say; as others have said it's people who kill people, guns just make the job easier and less up close and personal. I've been out in the hills with a .22 and a .303 for rabbits and deer, it's no big deal. But try concealing one of those down your trousers, or in your sock. You'll look like a dick head for sure, and they're a bugger to draw quickly.

Incompetence, perfidy, and farce...

...what more could we ask for!