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User: jonbryce

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Comments · 4,419

  1. Re:Prior Art so Prior It Hurts on IBM Wants Patent For Regex SSN Validation · · Score: 1

    We have National Insurance numbers here which do pretty much the same thing. I guess you have to check that it is two letters which are not "TN" followed by 6 numbers, followed by the letter A, B, C or D.

  2. Re:Good elements and bad elements. on Public Notices Going Online, Not In Newspapers · · Score: 1

    In England, public notices generally have to be published at http://www.london-gazette.gov.uk/ . In Scotland, they appear on http://www.edinburgh-gazette.gov.uk/ and in Northern Ireland, on http://www.belfast-gazette.co.uk/ .

  3. Re:I can bring food on Survey Finds Airport Wi-Fi More Important Than Food · · Score: 1

    But water is apparently a highly explosive substance that can be used to bring a plane down.

    It isn't known exactly how this might be carried out, but apparently it was discussed on some Islamic internet site.

  4. Re:Not surprising on Survey Finds Airport Wi-Fi More Important Than Food · · Score: 2, Funny

    sudo apt-get install tcpdump

    Do this before you leave for the airport.

  5. Re:Moving target [Re:Frequency of change is irrel. on Calculating Password Policy Strength Vs. Cracking · · Score: 1

    If the cars are moving, the probability of each individual shot hitting is the same as before eg 1:10, but the probability of one of the series of 10 shots is less than 1:1. However the probability of more than one of the 10 shots hitting has increased from 0:1.

    If what matters is whether or not you are shot rather than how many times you are shot if you are unlucky, then you should move around.

  6. Re:Slashdot MOTD Says It Well IMHO... on Wine Project Frustration and Forking · · Score: 1

    But surely you can have it both ways?

    You could set up a "wine-experimental" fork, maybe call it "grape juice", where you try out things that are not considered good enough for the main wine. Once they have sufficiently matured, they could be backported.

  7. Re:red and white wine? on Wine Project Frustration and Forking · · Score: 1

    A rosé surely?

  8. Re:soy milk on BPA Leaches From Polycarbonate Bottles Into Humans · · Score: 2, Funny

    If she's only got soyabeans, rather than coconuts or melons, you probably aren't going to compliment them.

  9. Re:Frequency of change is irrelevant! on Calculating Password Policy Strength Vs. Cracking · · Score: 1

    No it doesn't imply that at all.

    For each password you try, you have for example 1:1x10^111 probability that it is correct.

    Without a password change as you go through your 1x10^111 possible combinations, you will find the correct one eventually.

    This is the same as a situation where the password is a single bit. A brute force attack would take two attempts, and where changing the password includes the possibility of keeping it the same as before.

    If the password is changed once while you go though them all, you might find two correct passwords - one before the change and one after, one correct password - before or after the change, or no correct passwords; so your chances of finding a correct password have been reduced from 100% to 75%.

    Of course, if people don't chose their passwords randomly, this significantly reduces the effectiveness of them.

  10. Re:Frequency of change is irrelevant! on Calculating Password Policy Strength Vs. Cracking · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It's not an irrelevant factor. Without any password changes, you are guaranteed to get the password eventually. If you do change passwords, you are trying to hit a moving target. You might get it, you might not, and even if you do, you don't have long before you have to run the attack again.

  11. Re:bar set pretty high on Windows 7 Sets Direction of Low-Power CPU Market · · Score: 1

    That's an urban myth.

    There were at least three different gauge sizes in use in Britain before we standardised on "standard gauge". The Great Western Railway used a much wider gauge. The Glasgow Subway used, and still uses a much narrower gauge.

    Ireland (which was a single country as part of Britain at that point) standardised on a slightly narrower gauge. A lot of Americans came from Ireland, but nevertheless used the mainland standard rather than the Irish standard.

  12. Re:The words "mostly", "web", and "etc." on Windows 7 Sets Direction of Low-Power CPU Market · · Score: 1

    www.itv.com - Britains second most popular TV channel after BBC uses Silverlight for its live and on-demand streams.

  13. Re:No VGA out? on Windows 7 Sets Direction of Low-Power CPU Market · · Score: 1

    I'm sure there are a lot of people who carry them around to do Powerpoint presentations. An external monitor port is essential for that, and a netbook is more than capable of running Powerpoint.

  14. Re:No VGA out? on Windows 7 Sets Direction of Low-Power CPU Market · · Score: 1

    HDMI is just DVI on a smaller plug. You can get an adaptor if needed.

  15. Re:Might wait to see if this turns out to be true on Windows 7 Sets Direction of Low-Power CPU Market · · Score: 1

    I think one of the confusions is that Vista Home Basic = Windows 7 Starter and Vista Starter = Windows 7 Home Basic.

    You will be getting Starter on low end machines just like you get Home Basic on them at the moment.

    But Starter is no longer the one with the 3 app limit. That's Home Basic, which you won't be getting.

    Of course it is perfectly possible that I'm also confused and talking complete rubbish here.

  16. Re:It's Called S.E.X on How To Help a Friend With an MMO Addiction? · · Score: 1

    That's what you want, because it will motivate him to get away from his computer.

  17. Re:Hey Microsoft on HTML 5 As a Viable Alternative To Flash? · · Score: 1

    Except that Microsoft are trying to take on Adobe with Silverlight and Expressions Studio, with fairly limited success at the moment.

  18. Re:My Kingdom for a Datagrid Element! on HTML 5 As a Viable Alternative To Flash? · · Score: 4, Funny

    He doesn't have to support IE, but he does have to hand code his pages using emacs.

  19. Re:I know you slashdotters hate to hear it on MS Suggests Using Shims For XP-To-Win7 Transition · · Score: 1

    c:\users\jonathan\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Program Files (x86)\ in my case.

  20. Re:I know you slashdotters hate to hear it on MS Suggests Using Shims For XP-To-Win7 Transition · · Score: 1

    You can load Office 2007/8 documents in Office 2003 with a free downloadable addon.

  21. Re:RDP on Using 1 Gaming Computer For 2 People? · · Score: 1

    Lets try é - é. Yes, that works.

  22. Re:RDP on Using 1 Gaming Computer For 2 People? · · Score: 0

    Windows 2003 isn't really suitable for gaming. The graphics performance is pretty lousy.

  23. Re:It comes as no suprise. on No Museum Status For UK Home of Enigma Machine · · Score: 1

    I guess we have the Daily Telegraph for that.

  24. Re:Somewhere... on FSF Settles Suit Against Cisco · · Score: 1

    Yes, but there is likely to be a power struggle to determine who replaces him at the helm; and that's what could destroy the FSF as an organisation.

    Possibly Creative Commons or the Open Source Initiative could end up taking over as the main standard bearer for Free Software.

  25. Re:RTFA on FSF Settles Suit Against Cisco · · Score: 1

    Is state sales tax tax deductible?