Slashdot Mirror


User: tezza

tezza's activity in the archive.

Stories
0
Comments
270
First seen
Last seen
Profile
(view on slashdot.org)

Comments · 270

  1. Think About the Moral Issues! on Man Sells Baby to Pay for Gadgets · · Score: 1

    What if these funds were used buying M$ Products, or an SCO license. We couldn't have that!

  2. There goes the neigbourhood on Caltech Researchers Weigh Individual Molecules · · Score: 2, Funny
    Your Honour,

    The defendant stands charged for posession of with intent to supply, 300 zeptograms of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine, a Class A prohibited substance under ...

  3. Re:Eclipse has a long way to go. on On Plug-ins and Extensible Architectures · · Score: 2, Interesting
    I use Eclipse as a complement to my development process. The other main parts are:

    Emacs NT
    Cygwin
    c:\cygwin\bin\rxvt.exe -fn "Lucida Console-11" -bg DarkSlateGray -fg Wheat -cr Orchid -sl 10240 -tn xterm -g 170x70 -e /usr/bin/bash --login -i
    perl
    and
    ant 1.6.1

    Each is for a special purpose.

    To bring it back to the article, the Eclipse plugins I use are the visual Ant Task validator, the Debug mode with process attach, code completion, debug groups [coming in 3.1] and a whole host of others.

    The single best features are auto-compile and a usable dropdown class explorer. Emacs speedbar cannot come close to comlete overview of the whole project with 3000+ classes.

    Horses for courses. Eclipse is no panacea, but it is darn good at what it does, and there are a great range of plugins.

  4. They managed all of this on Keylogging Used To Catch Bank Crackers · · Score: 5, Funny

    without Bruce Willis? Amazing.

  5. Re:THE ARTICLE IS CORRECT... on Keylogging Used To Catch Bank Crackers · · Score: 1
    Correct, but not very clear.
    It took two reads to make sure of who the subject was.

    The editor should read The Economist Style Guide. It details how to write clear and consise articles.

  6. Re:The Human Factor... on VoIP to Fuel Plague of 'Dialing for Dollars'/Spam · · Score: 1
    Hi there telemonster.

    You make a good point. Unfortunately, it is one that the telemarketers have overcome.

    I'm ill off work today, and got raised out of bed at 8:30 am. to a call on my landline. There was no-one on the other side. Here in Britain, MPs are looking into it, because the Direct Marketing association is failing to ensure that they do not Silent Call old people.

    The basis is that they get a whole pool of automated diallers to dial, and connect the live ones through to a human. The Silent Calls, result when you pick up the ringing call and all the human marketers are busy, so the computer cannot put anyone through. Silence, but you still went to the trouble of picking the fucker up.

    So most of the hassle of the Call is The Call, not The Conversation. It takes a hardened person 1 ms to put the phone down on a telemarketer, but 5 seconds to hear, move and answer the damn thing.

  7. An outraged Australian on Aus. Gov't Considers Fines for Online Suicide Info · · Score: 1
    I'm an Australian citizen

    Last year a friend of mine committed suicide by overdosing on painkillers in a hotel room in Sydney. He was a brilliant guy.
    On his request his father emailed all his friends to inform them. I'm in London now, and so may not have heard if not for the email.
    The immense stupidity of this current course of action may lead to the law makers trying harder to 'crack down' at election time to cover failing. Also perhaps to please the religious Right, who seem to be the only voters able to form a lobby these days.
    I dread the day when mentioning a suicide is criminalised in an attempt to Double Speak the concept away.

    Here in Britain it is legal to commit suicide. On the Tube and the overland, one of the portfoli of computer Automated voice messages for why a train is late is a 'Person under a Train'. Everyone sighs, rolls there eyes and accepts it is a better reason than 'Leaves on the Track'. Unfortunately people do commit criminal suicide attempts as well.

    G-d rest your soul Tristan, you are missed.

  8. Not darned testable on Too Darned Big to Test? · · Score: 4, Interesting
    At least by a computer.

    I do a lot of programming with visual output. It is impossible to have a computer check that the font got outlined correctly in the PDF, say.

    When you combine this with user input and then rare-case branching logic, you can end up with a nightmare of unfollowed paths. Unfollowed, to some extent, means untested.

    Just one extra branch can be disasterous because of factorials involved depending where it is placed in the branch pipeline. One minute, everything working, next minute some new code and

    (n+1)!
    things that need to be eyeballed.
  9. Saw this yesterday on British Government Considers Tax on Computers · · Score: 2, Informative
    also see The Register

    Not mooted until 2017 currently. The playing field will be a lot different by then, so it may be moved forward.

    I would expect the fees would be a lot lower than the £120 TV licence currently in place. PC users would not be accessing BBC content 24/7.

  10. The Librarian should not be worried on ALA President Not Fond of Bloggers · · Score: 2, Insightful
    Joel Spolsky, frequent Blogger decided to release a Dead Tree compendium of his articles.

    To quote his rationale:

    the biggest advantage of the book is that when you throw it at your colleague's head after a very frustrating argument about whether to throw away all your code and start over from scratch, it makes more of an impact than a URL

    Blogging can spread the word, but references to printed material carry a lot more weight [no pun] than an html page full of supportive links.

    Anyone interested in how this free speach thing corrupts society on a wider scale through disinformation, should go to Speakers' Corner in Hyde Park in London.

    There you will see the Evangelicals preaching to their convverted congregation who turn up to support and cry Hallelulejah at the orchestrated time. You will also see a drunkard with a small footladder arguing that "G-d is a Lesbian". There are people listening. Ruin of society does not result.

    Note, actual Speakers' Corner content may vary.

  11. Book for replacement names on Arcade Kit Seller Applies for MAME Trademark [updated] · · Score: 1

    1. Firebox 0.33
    2. ArcadeSpire 0.25
    3. The program formerly known as Mame 0.33

  12. Re:Why not? on Fingerprints Replace Credit Cards in Seattle · · Score: 1
    Agreed with parent. Stores such as this one factor theft into their pricing.

    They may make more by having a higher turnover of customers and less staff hours than any loss on stolen goods.

    They have honour systems at the moment where you barcode scan the products yourself with a hand scanner. They take it as given that you bought 3 carrots and not 4.

    Not applicable for all industries as 24 carats is quite different to 9.

  13. At least it is text mode only on Could Your Blackberry Be Damaging Your Thumbs? · · Score: 1

    If you could view pr0n... say with libPr0nLite, then you'd have wr3ck3d wr1sts and thuck3dthumbz.

  14. Re:Word and Deed on Firefox Developer on Recruitment Policy · · Score: 1
    Hi there skajake .

    I'm sorry it came across as pouting.

    I'm not bitter, but this guy Blake's ego seems to be out of control.

    Firefox 1.0 is not the best browser in history, as Firefox v3 or v4 will be. So where are these improvements going to come from?? It seems the Glory Boys like Blake want to use the barrier to entry of how difficult it is to fork to keep the glory for themselves.

    [As an aside my last sentence is pure hypothesis, as Blake didn't come across that badly. I'm not try to character assassinate the guy]

    There are a few conflicting interests here:

    1. The Firefox people are busy
    2. They want good,safe code
    3. They want it to go in as easily as possible
    4. They do not have time to vet people
    5. People who may have good ideas

    So far so uncontroversial

    But the point is, with number 4. is that instead of not having time to vet, they may instead be too arrogant. They may not be making time to vet potential developers from outside.

    In that case the firefox developers would be wrong. Arrogance is indicated by Blake's text, and this does not bode well for the guy taking time to let other's into his old boys' browser club.

    Call that pouting, I dare you.

  15. Word and Deed on Firefox Developer on Recruitment Policy · · Score: 1, Interesting
    Wow. Only 'Hubris' even comes close to describing how arrogant this guy comes across.

    People sometimes ask why we work on Firefox for free. It gets hard to keep a straight face at work. Give me another project that touches the lives of millions of people worldwide and still has public codenames like The Ocho which get published in the media.

    --------

    I find it hard to keep my lunch down when I read such self-aggrandising bullshit.

    Then they lock out other developers so they can't fucking choose a fucking codename just in case it dilutes their moment in the media spotlight.

    So they seem arrogant both in word and deed.

  16. In further news: Bruce Wayne Industries files suit on Nanotech Brings Battery Life Extender for Mobiles · · Score: 1

    They claim they developed this BatMax technology over several years in the BatCave.

  17. Pushlets on What is JSON, JSON-RPC and JSON-RPC-Java? · · Score: 3, Informative
    http://www.pushlets.com

    This is a server side push framework based on the same idea. It preceded GMail et alia.

  18. What utter rubbish on What You'll Wish You'd Known · · Score: 1
    In retrospect this was stupid. It was like someone getting fouled in a soccer game and saying, hey, you fouled me, that's against the rules, and walking off the field in indignation

    Everyone know's its Football.

  19. Wanted: Whitehat hacker on AI Bots Pick The Hits of Tomorrow · · Score: 1
    *[hack hack hack]*

    s/Britney Spears/Beta Band/gi;
  20. Re:Magnifying on Planning For Mozilla 2.0 · · Score: 1
    What's the point in magnifying raster images?

    For people with poor vision. More technically savvy people can download a separate app, but this would be a lot more convenient.

    On a similar note should the ALT text be displayed larger when zoomed??

  21. Blame your sub-conscious for the censorship on Getting the Girl · · Score: 1
    as I pondered the Playboy bunnies, the return of Leisure Suit Larry, and the slew of buxom virtual ladies headlining each booth

    Your subconscious mind filters images before your conscious mind gets a chance. So in a crowd, you tend to notice the stunning girls, and look straight past the mingers. So whilst there may only be slightly more good looking girls in a crowd, say, you'll notice the increase. Later, to a friend you'll say, 'everywhere I looked, there were Babes!'. What you often mean is: 'Everywhere I looked there was some woman my sub-conscious did not pre-erradictate [sic].'

    You notice v. ugly women [here used as partner, subsititute Man if you are a woman, or stay if you are a lesbian etc.] because you desire to avoid them especially, and the subconscious highlights them to ensure you conciously do so.

    Also people sub-consiously find evidence that backs up assumptions they already had. Does it sound like this poster had an axe somewhere needing to be ground??

    So even to her sub-consious, where breasts are still attractive to females [kown], as well as being a natural competitive eye-drawer for women, is it surprising all she sees is large breasted images??

    Her subconsious is working overtime to highlight them.

  22. At last a sciency based explanation on The Tin-Whisker Menace · · Score: 1
    Perhaps this explains why my Sony Minidisc started playing up
    ($WARRANTY_PERIOD + 1)
    .

    Gadget makers rejoice, you've got a new excuse to keep refresh cycles short...

  23. Re:Real adversity on Business Under Fire · · Score: 1
    Yes because the Palestinians don't just have the valid concern of the Israelis to worry about, they have their own governing warlords/bodies.

    Hamas, a leading Palestinian terror network, also has responsibility for the provision of Hospitals and food distribution. If you disagree with them, then you may suffer retribution in many ways.

    Also the palestinian judicial system is wrought with corruption, although this is just what I can gleen from Haaretz and the Word on the Stetl. Israeli business have the benefit of a working Judicial system, which is impartial. Take for instance the Supreme Court finding that Israel must take down some parts of the highly controversial Wall at some cost.

  24. Re:Bullshit propaganda on Business Under Fire · · Score: 2, Interesting
    Thank you! I'm glad there's at least one other person that sees what the real problem is.

    Okay. I have been to Israel. I am Jewish. I think that the Palestinians should be given their land back.

    But clearly you do not understand the whole picture.

    There are issues of The Right of Return for Palestinian exiles, say.
    There is the issue of whether the region is a Two State solution or a One State, although Two State is almost definitely the case that will happen.
    There is the issue of how to deal with some amazingly fanatical Right Wing Jewish Settlers who illegally occupy that land. This is but to touch on some of the issues.

    But the BIGGEST issue that is ALWAYS discussed is that, with ALL these suicide bombings and murders, if the land is given back under these current conditions, it will APPEAR to validate terrorism and the demonisation of the Jewish state Israel, as a successful negotiating tactic. Because that, is what Israel and the World cannot afford to let happen. Then whenever someone had a Beef, this could be a resort, and not even the last one.

    So your solution is quite simplistic and completely flawed. Never mind that I disagree about yor view of their ethnic cleansing of Palestinians

  25. Re:Humorous? on India's Cops Meet Technology · · Score: 1
    I couldn't agree more.

    My anecdote on India and IT was some of my friends having to use SafeWeb (remember that??) to prevent the government snooping their web pages.

    They received constant death threats from police and unnamed callers. My friend who worked there was female and was threatened with rape over the telephone as well. She said that a local indian employee was raped and murdered during her term there.

    She was an Australian lawyer working for an Amnesty International type NGO, investigating human rights' abuse and corruption in India.