Re: BBC clickbait
In general, you don't sack people on medical leave and the enquiry is still ongoing, so that's not really a surprise.
25355 publicly visible posts • joined 21 May 2010
"Those that know SCSI busses - or anything much about computer systems, really - will recall that ID's tend to start at '0': What the RAID cabinet called slot '1' was, in fact, SCSI ID 0 and so on. One can only imagine the chaos that he was met with when the system was rebooted: one dead drive still in the array, one good one pulled out and replaced with a virgin unit - but with an ID conflicting with the only remaining good one...oops.
Been there, seen that. We were hired as a "pair of hands" to go replace a faulty HDD in a RAID on a customer site. Out of hours. Got there, security guard, surprisingly, was expecting me and showed me to the server (yes, singular. It was a while ago), only for me to note and point out to the security guard that a drive had already been pulled out. The wrong drive. So I phone the customers contact number and (also surprisingly) got straight through to their Sysadmin at HQ, told him what I'd found. After the muttered "oh shit" comment, he kindly accepted that it was their own stupid fault, no one should have touched it, would I please re-install the incorrectly removed drive, replace the actually faulty one and then leave site since even that was more than we had been contracted for and he'd deal with the fall out and try to rebuild remotely. I made the security guard wacht what I was doing, explaining in simple terms exactly what I was doing, wrote it up in the same way and got him to sign it. Extreme arse covering was most definitely the order of the day :-)
"Meanwhile, the 3/Y is beginning to look dated and is missing a refresh, just when all of the competition are beginning to release second and even third-gen alternatives."
Seeing a Model Y in my rear view mirror, it looks like a reboot version of the VM Beetle. I wonder if that was intentional or accidental?
"Pontiac Aztec"
Never heard of it, probably because I'm in the UK. It wouldn't look all that out of place with the many similar models of that type on the road today. Mind you, I don't care that much about "style" either, so long as the vehicle can get me from A to B in reasonable comfort :-) Having a "free" company car for the last 20+ years with little input other than occasionally being asked what colour I'd like probably has something to do with me not caring all that much about which car I drive too :-)
"Edit: Can you actually mount a gooseneck/5th wheel in the bed? Not seen any details about where the batteries are hidden. And can you fit towing mirrors?"
I've seen caravans pulled by a pickup using a smaller version of the HGV standard fifth wheel. Caravan is obviously designed for that purpose too with a different shape, forward overhang over the pin.
"Yeah, the so ugly it's cute response won't work on some people, but the reality is, these thinks are iconic of an age, and will be sitting next to a Tucker and a car show 50 or 100 years from now with an explanatory placard of Musks folley."
Early 21st Century version of the DeLorean? Can it reach precisely 88mph and leave flaming tyre tracks?
Icon, for Doc Brown --------------->
"Not sure how the author missed that the Surface Pro != Surface Book, it's been a decade. The author wants a Book... not a Pro."
True. But to be fair to the author, he does make the point that the entire series of articles is about trying out different kit in different situations. In this case, using a Pro as a replacement for a laptop is likely not a great experience, even if it is useful is other situations.
"Audiobook or paperback?"
Entirely up to you. I prefer books, but I drive a lot so have both read the books (NOT while driving!!) and listened to the audiobooks on the road. And there's no real "reading order" either except where some stories may be related or direct sequels, and even then , it usually doesn't matter that much. Personally, I prefer publication order
As for the Luggage, Try here for a more in depth description.
Oh, and there's been a few Discworld live action TV miniseries as well as a couple of hard to find animations.
Yes, thanks, you raise a good point with your example of using youtube-dl (or the improved fork yt-dlp). Laws tend to be badly written until there's some case law and judges decisions to help define it, and we all know how poorly written many laws are. After all, if they were well written and clear, we'd not not need so many lawyers :-)
On the other hand, he does have a point regarding website data scraping. According to the article, under current US law, if you publish something on the web, it's legal for anyone to then scrape it. What they use it for afterwards might be a legal grey area, possibly even directly illegal. But the general thrust is that your data can be legally taken, even if it impacts on the performance of your servers to the detriment of the intended users. This applies even if the data isn't your, but user generated too. This seems to go against the spirit of the internet and the web in a big way. It's already bitten service providers offering "unlimited use"[*] contracts that then get abused by some users downloading at full speed 24/7 such that they had to add "fair use" clauses when the numbers of people taking the "unlimited" term literally grew too high.. Same could be said of an "All You Can Eat" buffet. Some people will go over the the top, abuse the system, and fill up multiple plates and waste much of the food.
When we have grey areas in the law, there will always be some fuckwit who pushes the boundaries because they need a hard line with a sign saying "Do Not Cross" before they stop, they just can't seem to cope with the "reasonable doubt" of a fuzzy area, almost always to the detriment of the normal, reasonable people who can see that grey area "boundary" and treat it as a sensible warning, keeping clear and only pushing it gently now and then.
Musk may be a twat, but even a stopped clock is correct twice per day.
[*] lets not get into the argument about "unlimited data" and lack of provision for obvious and expected increases in usage by service providers.
Free? Really?
Not even an anonymous free trial of a couple goes? nah, not interested enough to sacrifice another free email addy ;-)
Handing over an email address that will be spammed is not "free" in my book, even if I can create new ones at will and then block or dispose of them. Even that takes time and so is a "cost" to me of my free time over and above the time I'm prepared to spend to see if it's of any interest.
"pretty minimal training for some non-IT savvy users."
They are generally the best to support because they are far more likely to ask for help if they don't understand something. It's the ones with a little knowledge who are dangerous, the ones who plough on regardless because they "know" what they are doing and have managed like that for years :-)
"it isn't really deleted items (if it was anything going there would immediately disappear forever)"
Maybe it should. After all, in most mail systems, even if the user empties the bin/trash whatever, it's only gone from their mailbox. Corporate policy for arse covering and/or local jurisdiction regulations will probably require archiving of all emails for some mandated length of time, usually at least a couple of years, often 7 or more, maybe even "in perpetuity" in some cases.
"you have a good point. We even waste time and money on step ladder training! I mean how have I lived to 52 without knowing how to use a step ladder!"
Indemnity. If you fall off after having done the "training", the company is either off the hook or at least less on the hook than otherwise.
Also, maybe there's too wide a spread in disciplines and sub disciplines? Would there need to be certifications for "programmer" covering various languages? Which ones? What about someone specialising in financial systems? Are they competent to go work on machine learning/AI? Or developing Physics/Biology simulators? I suspect any form of certification would leave many people needing to acquire paperwork they don't need and isn't relevant to their job but which at some employers would very quickly demand as a condition of employment.
But, getting back to the article and comments re users not knowing or not being trained because they are expected to already know, that's a huge problem. Being "experienced" in using Office, for example, is far, far from being competent in using Office. Using a tool poorly, incorrectly or being ignorant of what it is capable of for years, makes you legitimately "experienced, but definitely not competent and that applies all the way from the lowliest users to the highest level admins and/or devs. The real difference comes in the persons attitude and level of curiosity, assuming their job allows them time to explore, chat with colleagues, ask for help etc.
"but most are unused, maybe because they're no more convenient and most of us don't have another person onto whom we can pawn off the work."
Most people can muddle up a half decent manual/physical filing system that works, at least for them. Setting up rules in a mail client is "technical" and a job for the IT experts :-)
"but just got "well that's how I work" answer."
Well, to be fair, assuming it was Windows, that's part of how MS advertise themselves. Windows, working the way you work. Of cousre, those of us in IT know that what it REALLY means is Windows, work the way we allow you to, YOU must change to suit OUR ever-changing workflows :-)
"Exchange server needed restoring to get it back."
You missed a trick there! You should have told him that restoring the server would lose everything sent or received since that backup was taken and you'd need a new server to resore to so as to copy off just his "lost" email :-) That's be at least the minimum response from any true BOFH.
You'd also expect the Postie who delivers the same route everyday to know when bin collections days are too. Possibly with the odd exceptions when the regular Postie is on holiday, or a new starter begins a route, or maybe the Xmas rush when the "holiday staff" are employed.
"We've always been jealous of those Cadburys-purple wheelie bins and often wonder what goes in them."
They are for waste chocolate, hence the reduction in collection schedules to "never per year" since they never seem to have anything in them.
FWIW, the mantra is "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle". This is reuse. Recycle generally means strip down and build new stuff from the metals, glass, wood, plastic etc. I think there really ought to be a fourth term, Refurbish/Renovate, between Reuse and Recycle since that terms can be implied by both Reuse and Recycle, sort of :-)
"Metro services usually run every few minutes, so it's not really necessary to use a timetable. Just turn up at the platform and wait."
If you mean the Tyneside Metro, it depends where you are Trains are every 12 minutes, which can mean on some of the network, every 6 minutes where the routes share the line. There used to 4 "routes" at one time with trains as frequent as every 3-4 minutes in places as there would be a extra "route" that overlapped 100% but only ran back and forth over the busiest stretches, but now there are only two "routes" with an overlap. Mind you, with a 40 year old fleet of trains with an expected lifetime of 20 years, it's not that unusual for a train to not turn up and have to wait 24 minutes, worst case, for a train :-(
"Some route changes are not obvious except to the initiated."
Not being a local, I got my directions from Google Maps, which had me get the train into London, jump on the adjoining Underground for two or three stops, change, go a coiupl more stops an arrive at destination. Checked with hotel staff on arrival and they said, no, stay on the original Underground train to $station, it's closer to $destination and quicker than changing if marginally a longer journey. Looking at the Underground map, there was no way to tell that Google was less useful than local knowledge and neither let you in on the secret of just how long those pedestrian tunnels can be in some places such you emerge back into daylight a half mile or more from the actual station! :-)
On the other hand, this was back in the 90's. Anyone in the UK who didn't watch much, if any, TV or went to the cinema for exposure to US TV and films, might not know what "trash" means. The sort of people who are that self-important are more likely to be the "driven" type, workaholics, and spend what spare time they have on the golf course. Few US software programmes were ever properly and fully localised into UK English, and that's still the case today. For that matter, even "recycle bin" wasn't an especially common term outside of Windows95 back then although most people with an ounce of intelligence should probably be able to work out what it means.
"It seems the more self-important a person is the more bizarre their thought processes become"
I'd not say "bizarre", just "uninformed". When they are that self-important, you can't teach them anything, so they just make assumptions and "middle through" anything they don't understand based on that same self-importance that if "the underlings" can do it, then so can they. They only have themselves to blame when it bites them in the bum though, it's their own fault for being "too important" to be shown one-to-one how to do something or attend the company training courses.
"complaining they've run out of disk space...It's not fun to have to wait for Windows to have delete that many files."
Doesn't Windows now have a setting whereby the OS can start deleting "oldest first" when running low on disc space these days? I don't use Windows much if I can avoid it but I'm sure I saw that option somewhere at some stage.
Fortunately, most of us, well, most of reading and posting here, don't think like that :-)
Apparently "aid" was supposed to stop in 2015 but didn't and a further £2B has been sent since then. Let's agree it's at least partial reparations and not "aid" :-)
Anyway, whatever the politics, I'm still rooting for ISRO to succeed, it can only benefit both India and the world :-)
"Of course, local/in person doesn't exactly scale well to make money from..."
Depends on the expectations of the people involved. Theatre has been around for a very long time. It didn't fold because they weren't making enough money. Of course, touring theatre actors are probably not all going to be driving around in flash cars and living the high life.
But the extras casting agencies will often advertise locally for those people, who may have little to no experience, when the location shoot is somewhere "out of the way". We don't really get a lot of filming in our area, but when it does happen, it's "big news" locally and there's always interviews with people who signed up as extras for a few days. Some, but not all, will be students from one or more of the local universities on media studies courses, others will be just "random" people who thought it might be a fun few days work. For example, the Dunkirk beach scene for Atonement was filmed in Redcar not far from me and quite a number of extras where locals who'd never done that before. I think there was mention of some locals being involved in the latest Indiana Jones outing when they filmed up at Bamburgh Castle too.
So, it certainly does happen, but it probably heavily depends on the where the location shoot is happening. Most of the extras are just there as "set dressing" and don't need prior experience and probably come a lot cheaper than agency "pros" or, at worst, are "hired" by the agency on a one off basis.
"I propose an AI to replace Hollywood moguls. Scan them once, give them $200 and see how they like the idea."
Probably the easiest job in Hollywood to replace with AI
Check list of previous blockbusters
If release date < today - 10 years then order remake or reboot
done
I bought my LG when dumb TVs were starting to get hard to find. It is a dumb one, thankfully, but I have no idea what the TV guide, if any might be like. Having cable, I've never actually connected a TV aerial to it. Thinking about it, I have no idea if it's even got a DTV tuner or if it's only got an analogue tuner. I'd have to check the manual to find out :-).
But it does have a very good picture. LG do seem to be pretty good at that bit.
Meanwhile, in real life, Amazon cancelled somones Alexa account over some possibly fictitious dispute and he was having difficulties opening his front door.
Amazon confirms it locked Microsoft engineer out of his Echo gear over false claim
Just search on
amazon alexa account closed by mistake
for many other wonderful stories of how people rely on technology.
"First, it's now 3 years since I bought it and it's still getting updates, including new features like a change of the home screen.
it's clear that at some point not very far in the future, there will be no incentive to buy a new one as long as the current one works."
For most people, the second statement is now and will remain true anyway. As for the first statement, maybe you bought a newly released model or maybe they really are extending their level of s/w and app support. But come back in another 7 years when it's reached 10 years old, the absolute bare minimum expected lifespan of a TV and let us know if it's still getting maintenance updates and which apps no longer work :-)
"Unfortunately I see more manufacturers insisting on the device phoning home every day. It's for your safety obviously as there may be someone nefarious trying to grab your data, ie the manufacturer."
If I ever end up with a TV like that it will because there is no information on the outside of the packaging or in the marketing materiels specifying that and it will be going straight back the retailer as "not fit for purpose"