* Posts by Robert E A Harvey

3010 publicly visible posts • joined 8 Oct 2006

Experts agree: Your next car will be smarter than you

Robert E A Harvey

Umm.

I got accused elseforum of being a luddite for suggesting that "not wearing google glass while driving" was a sensible precaution.

I don't fancy your chances much with this idea! But yet, mysteriously, no such charge has been raised...

Want faster fibre? Get rid of the glass

Robert E A Harvey
Headmaster

Re: Umm, minor point

Yes, true. But propagation factor is defined as the ratio to c, the speed of light in vacuo.

PS: someone will now out-pedant both of us!

BT scores £146 meellion more UK.gov cash to fibre up Balamory

Robert E A Harvey

Memory

I distibctly remember the gubblement explaining that BT had to be privatised because only the private sector could fund all the future investment. the gupplemunt did not have that sort of cash, they said.

West Virginia seeks Google Glass driving ban

Robert E A Harvey

Well...

...I think it's a sensible precaution. We have no idea how badly it will affect driving, which is bad enough already. No-ome has neede one to drive a car for the last 115 years, so let's try and do without it, eh?

Review: Renault Zoe electric car

Robert E A Harvey
Unhappy

Hmm.

You will need to do a lot of miles per month for the fuel saving to swamp the £70 battery lease.

Hmm. Need to do a lot of miles per month in a vehicle with 70 mile range....

Hmmmm.

Dragons' Den badboy's Expansys burns sales, profits up in smoke

Robert E A Harvey
Unhappy

Re: There's nothing right about Expensive

I got burned on trying to return a defective HP phone, and will never buy again.

Review: Sony Xperia Z

Robert E A Harvey
Happy

Re: Err...

Ah. My humor gland has recently been damaged. Thank you.

Robert E A Harvey
Headmaster

Err...

"go like a privy door when the plague’s in town"

Mixed metaphor of the month?

SanDisk cops to malfunctioning Micro SDs in Galaxy S3s

Robert E A Harvey

Re: RMA policy

So go to trading standards. They are supposed to be the policemen.

Google Drive goes titsup for MILLIONS of users

Robert E A Harvey
Coat

I wonder

If they've tried switching it off and back on?

Britain's passport and ID service seeks facial recog tech suppliers

Robert E A Harvey

Re: Often no discouragement from staff is required

I've used them at UK and Netherlands airports without much difficulty or much delay. The ones at Stanstead seemed never to find my face unless I crouched down by 5 inches, and the ones at Birmingham I have to stand closer than they suggest, but that apart it all seems to work.

Microsoft Surface Pro sales CANNIBALIZING Surface RT

Robert E A Harvey

going cheep

I thought that. There will be a shedload going cheap.

I'll offer £50

for a dozen.

Samsung's new co-CEO: 'Windows isn't selling very well'

Robert E A Harvey

>they produced a Windows Phone but their heart wasn't in it.

Perhaps it was a little finger-wag to Google, too? Just to keep Android coming?

Robert E A Harvey

what's that noise?

It's chickens coming home to roost!

Groupon deal spam slapped by Australian regulator

Robert E A Harvey

I had a quick look when all the hoopla started. Dear glod, what a collection of vacuous, hedonistic, WAGgish, TOWIE--inspired overpriced tat. I'd not pay 10% of the groupon price to have some witless girl cut me toenails or some hooray chinless drive me round snetterton. The idea that people pay the alleged full price for any of these foolish pursuits leaves me with my jaw on the ground.

Anyone attracted to that sort of selfish twodge deserves all the spam they get, I reckon.

I did give them an email address. It was someone I don't like.

Applications to run more white-space Local TV stations invited

Robert E A Harvey

Dear God

Is there not enough dire rubbish creating pointless electronic smog?

Keep calm and carry on flogging: Dell soothes troops as buyout looms

Robert E A Harvey

It's a stick-up. Plain and simple. and opportunist raid by unscrupulous capitalists.

Robert E A Harvey

Well, they aren't going to Flog anything to me, as long as they inisist it MUST have W8 on it. If ever there was an opportunity to make money from thier flirtations with Ubuntu, this was it, but all they are offering is one miserable 'developers' workstation.

Blinkered, narrow minded, idiots. Or completely enthralled to the evil empire.

Buggerm, in either case.

Microsoft exec selling his Surface tablet

Robert E A Harvey

The real story

Surely the real story is a Microsoft Exec so impoversished that he has to flog off his old gear to afford new stuff?

ITV catches up with TVCatchup

Robert E A Harvey

Re: They just don't do it on a unified site..

As I recall it, the BBC had just such a proposal which was stamped on by either competition or regulatory authorities. Project Kangaroo, I think.

Ah yes, http://www.competition-commission.org.uk/assets/competitioncommission/docs/pdf/non-inquiry/press_rel/2009/feb/pdf/05-09

Here's the $4.99 utility that might just have saved Windows 8

Robert E A Harvey

This continues to amuse

Given that $MEGACORP have yet to migrate me to W7, and that at home I am entirely Apple/Linux, this remains a source of amusement rather than personal pain. But I am running low on popcorn!

At least it should provide Mickysoft with a defence next time the EU competition commissioner comes to call. "People have to go to 3rd parties to make our stuff work. How can that be abuse of a monopoly?"

Boffins implant almost-cellphone in the BRAIN

Robert E A Harvey
Boffin

Good.

I reckon direct neural interfaces will stop all the KDE/Gnome version wars, the spats over Tiles, and the tedium over whether keyboards are a good thing or a waste of carrying weight.

Wire me up, wire me up NOW!

Torvalds asks 'Why do PC manufacturers even bother any more?'

Robert E A Harvey
Thumb Up

This

>they were cheaper and not better

Yes. Yes, yes and Yes. And Yes.

Review: Livin' in the cloud with Google's new Chromebook Pixel

Robert E A Harvey

Questions

1. How difficult is a linux install? Can you access the bootloader/bios-thing?

2. Is there any internal access? Can we even think about an SSD upgrade?

3. Is the displayport bidirectional? can it be used as a display on other products?

4. Is the SD socket full depth, or does the card stick out?

Flexy 'iWatch' glass said to be three years away

Robert E A Harvey

Re: LEO

Yes, but that was before the mobile data bubble. Motodrama were only offering phones[1], at the same cost per call as Inmarsat. I had a long row with them saying that they needed to be cheaper than mobile, and the cellular networks would never get into rural 3rd world, leaving them a massive market place. The network foundered in the same way that the HP slatey thing did. By trying to muscle into an established business, not breaking that business to smithereens.

In the end I took my 30-ship-1200-passenger deal to Inmarsat. The earth terminals were cheaper.

[1] and 9600 baud modem ports

Robert E A Harvey

LEO

With the cash Apple have they could build their own Low Earth Orbit satellite network and cut out the cellphone and wifi suppliers with a unique, apple-only always-on netwwork.

I suspect the RF budget would bugger the battery life on the fondle slabs, but hey. it would be cool to have a spacephone!

Microsoft Surface Pro will land in UK in WEEKS*

Robert E A Harvey
Thumb Up

@AC 12:19

>all the directors, managers and other senior staff

ah yes. All the people who don't need a proper computer. I see your point.

Truck-maker CAT flogs smartphone spawn to butter-fingered fondlers

Robert E A Harvey

Re: Cat's not friendly.

>so what are CAT supposed to do, refuse to sell to the US gov?

The US expects loads of people not to sell to other governments, so why not?

Robert E A Harvey

Re: Whatever.

I do hope it went in the soup before it went in the toilet, or I'm not coming to supper at your house!

Official: Sky to buy O2 and BE's home broadband product in £200m deal

Robert E A Harvey
Big Brother

hang on

I thought we all knew Murdoch was the evil incarnate. How did this get approved?

Mobile tech bods beg devs: C'mon, where's that KILLER app?

Robert E A Harvey

App suggestions

Family tracker

Elderly person walkie-talkie mode (private chat, private VOIP, always on)

Children's internet monitoring - a list of pages visited from some other computer updating on your phone in the background. An alert if they visit somewhere non-whitelisted they have never been before

Family recepies - collaborative recipie book built up by members of a small family network.

I've just realised I've invented 'facebook for families'. How about a private FB/twitter/IRC/chat network?

Nominet tosses plan for shorter .uk domains in the bin (for now)

Robert E A Harvey

Re: The Best That Can Be Said

Well, quite. If you own frednurk.com and frednurk.co.uk and frednurk.plc.uk and frednurk.ltd.uk and frednurk.net you are bound to pay for frednurk.uk aren't you?

Jimmy Wales: 'I'm Wikipedia's monarch'

Robert E A Harvey

Re: A simple direct question answered truthfully proves that it be so and not a fantasy?

Oh, that would be Mike Corley, of that ilk.

search the gurgle gropes usenet archive for "mindcontrol" or search wikiLies for his name and you will find out more than you ever wanted to know. They even wrote an opera about him.

Fondling again: HP slates new tablet for April

Robert E A Harvey
Thumb Down

Re: Welcome back...

Don't get yer hopes up. I reckon they'll bollox it up yet.

In fact, they already did. 1024x600. I reckon vTech could do better than that.

Microsoft secure Azure Storage goes down WORLDWIDE

Robert E A Harvey

Altered mind

I entered the story thinking 'shit happens' and being quite sympathetic to the microsofters.

Then I saw the first paragraph. " let the HTTPS certificate expire."

Tossers.

Hands-on with Ubuntu's rudimentary phone and tablet OS

Robert E A Harvey

Re: High Hopes

I was right with you till

> going to let Apple makes it 30% on something that should be free.

If you'd said 'could be free', I'd have agreed 100%, but I have no objection to apple profiting from proprietary code they have written.

Robert E A Harvey

but puzzling nonetheless

Puzzling me, at any rate.

I thought the whole point of using Linux was to re-purpose existing code, but this reads as though that is not happening. A Browser with only rendering & navigation sounds like it is being written from the ground up. Why? There are dozens of browsers for Linux. The TV image was announced last year. Has nothing liftable emerged from that.

I can sort of see the idea of using dead icons as placeholders, but there are all those desktop widgets that could be under them for now.

This sounds like something announced off the fag packet, not off a running prototype. I really, really, want it to be fantastic, but in 6 months? Scared now.

Google takes Chromebook upmarket with touchy-feely Pixel

Robert E A Harvey

But... Re: Paint me nonplussed

Do the whores in west Africa have knickers?

AMD: Star Trek holodecks within reach

Robert E A Harvey

Oi! Science!

Now look, lads. You promised me Flying Cars before you promised me Holodecks. One thing at a time, eh?

Higgs data shows alternate reality will SWALLOW UNIVERSE

Robert E A Harvey

There's a bloke here

...in a box with a flashing light on the top.

Says he can stop it with a blue led

Dell's Ubuntu dev laptop gets much-needed display boost

Robert E A Harvey

Re: 1080p _is_ low resolution

Yes.

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Why do we put up with this?

Dev preview of Ubuntu for phones touching down February 21

Robert E A Harvey

Want!

I've read all the naysayers, and the caveats, and the warnings.

But I still WANT ONE.

Reg readers scuffle over the ultimate cuppa

Robert E A Harvey

The Night Watch

In one of Pterry's novels Commander Vimes is offered a cup of tea '3 sugars, boiled orange in a builders boot' and he confesses that is how he likes it.

These recepies are all pale imitations of that Ur-tea

Nokia's Elopocalypse two years on: Has Microsoft kept its side of the bargain?

Robert E A Harvey

@Microsoft 5636771

"1 post • joined Thursday 14th February 2013 12:28 GMT"

I think someone with a sense of humour is having a complicated joke here...

Fashionably slate

Robert E A Harvey

@Stuart Logland

Where is the +100 upvote button?

Perky smartphone figures can't stop droop of worldwide mobe sales

Robert E A Harvey

Why do we expect any growth?

... but it's Shiney!

Robert E A Harvey
Paris Hilton

Upvoted for Paris

But I am fairly sure she ain't smart enough not to need her features.

Robert E A Harvey

Re: Buyers are getting full?

>I don't understand how 'intense market competition' could weaken sales

You and me both. My Tosh-o-meter certainly twitched at that one.

Robert E A Harvey

Re: As with desktops

That's right. I've had the same non-smart phone for 6 years now. I don't need a smartphone, I've got a laptop. I don't want a smart phone, I don't want to be answering emails in my own time.

It's like electric cookers. Once every bugger has got one, you only have a replacement market.

Register reader Ray revs radio-controlled Raspberry Pi race rover

Robert E A Harvey

Re: URL?

It's damned cool, though all the same.