Occam, "clunky"? You mean it doesn't use braces? Or that is uses semantic whitespace, like Python? It's very terse, and has little syntactic sugar. I'd love to see what you'd do to make it less "clunky".
Personally, as a compiler writer, I've found my higher degrees in CS much more useful than the BCS membership which I had, but gave up as a useless expense about 15 years ago. I've certainly never, in 25 years, employed, recommended, or preferred, someone on the grounds that they are MBCS, or CITP. Both are about as useful indicators of ability and knowledge as CCNE or MSCE.
Ironically, MBCS would probably be more "useful" to me now that I've given up CS, and am retraining as a lawyer!
But there is no useful, unique, or reliable, mapping between NI number and a identity. NI numbers are given out like confetti, and there are far more of them issued than there are UK residents. It's quite possible for one person to have have several NI numbers.
They're getting rid of the ID *CARDS*, not the database.
Yes, they are; the database will be deleted.
The coalition programme says "We will scrap the ID card scheme, the National Identity register and the ContactPoint database, and halt the next generation of biometric passports." (http://www.conservatives.com/News/News_stories/2010/05/~/media/Files/Downloadable%20Files/coalition-programme.ashx?dl=true)
The BBC reports: "Once the cards are illegal, the National Identity Register will be "physically destroyed", say ministers." (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8707355.stm)
1) They weren't tax dodgers, just ordinary savers choosing to save with an Icelandic-owned bank. The British government are pissed that they compensated the savers (expecting Iceland to repay them later), and now the Icelandic government won't cough up what they owe the British government.
2) England is not the same thing as Britain, Britain is not the same thing as England. Exactly like California is not the same thing as the USA, and the USA is not the same thing as California. Not to hard to grasp, is it?
Pedantically true; however, in normal UK usage, a prosecution is a criminal suit, prosecuted by the state, concerning offences against the criminal law. Yes, a civil case may be prosecuted, but it is not a prosecution.
Just to be clear, Dr Singh is not being "prosecuted for libel" - that's only for criminal offences, and libel is not a criminal offence, but a civil wrong. He is being sued for libel, in the civil courts, by the BCA.
Because they are expressions of ideas, more like mathematical proofs than real, mechanical, inventions - and neither ideas nor mathematical theories are patentable. The "expressions of ideas" bit is why programmes are copyrightable -- as literary works. And if they're literary works, protected by copyright, how can the be patentable too?
And remember, in Europe you can't patent business methods or processes, either.
And he appealed the ticket, and the case was then dropped. The same cop who ticketed the nose blower had given a man a fixed penalty fine for littering the week before - when he dropped a ten pound note!
Unfortunately the Police are under no obligation to remove the DNA from the database until your 100th birthday I've read through the regulations they work under. In the appendix there are form letters for the chief constable to tell you that your dna can not be removed, there is no example of a letter saying it can.
Only in England & Wales; this is NOT he case in Scotland, where sampled DNA is removed from the database at the end of the relevant enquiry.
Scotland and England have different legal systems, criminal law, and police powers, and rules of evidence.
The headline is incorrect: it's not UK police, it's English Police who hold onto DNA. DNA samples, and profiles, are routinely destroyed at the end of the relevant enquiry in Scotland, which is a quite distinct legal jurisdiction from England.
Absolutely; this is the biggest problem I see with the phasing our of cheques - my daughter has so far taken upwards of £800 in cheques to her school in this school year (mainly for out of school trips, but also for music tuition, lunches, materials, and so on). The school hates cash, as its just not set up to handle it, and the amounts generated by 1500 pupils would be a real headache for them. And cards aren't an option, as I'm not going travel to the school just to pay for £5-10 in person, and my daughter clearly isn't going to take my card. And the admin to track electronic payments would also be a burden they can do without. Cheques, however, are pretty much ideal.
what with the distinction being less clear between private and public money in Europe
Not really; the Commission is very hard on all, and any, state aid to industry. There's really nothing like the US pork-barrel allocation of public there.
Well, of course. The "Unix Philosophy" is good for for Unix, and the Unix research system was unashamedly designed to be a system for programming, and programmers. It was never intended to be for "everyone else".
The Parliamentarian mandate for RFIDs is similar to the stupidity that gave us a bunch of computer-controlled voting booths
We don't have computer-controlled voting booths in the UK, and the parliamentary manadate for ID cards is still, sadly, fairly sound.
politicians don't understand technology. To them it's just "magic" that will cure everything
Now, that is 100% on the mark.
I can easily imagine the BBC "reporting" is similar.
You might be able to imagine it (hell, I can imgine a liberal version of Fox), but it's just not the case; government, of both colours, have been complaining about anti-Government bias for as long as I can remember - and that's back to the 70s.
Not in the UK: I don't have to show any ID to get a prescription filled (or to see my doctor); I don't have to carry a driving licence to drive (although I do have to hold one, and be able to produce it in inside a week or so); and I don't have to show ID for any train journey.
I think you've got things confused: it's the BBC that restricts access to iPlayer content, not the ISPs. And it's the ISPs who want the revenue, from the BBC. And the BBC don't actually sell anything, anyway; it's all given away, funded from the licence fee.
Because BBC television programs aren't "for-profit". They carry no sponsorship, or advertising. They are funded from the mandatory license fees. Which those outside the UK do not pay, which is why those on non-UK IP addresses can't access BBC iPlayer content.
And the SNP - which is why this database is England only (so far), as the SNP Government in Scotland wants nothing to do with the database state, or the state ID card. They have clearly stated that, even if it is succesfully introduced, they will not make access to the state functions they control (NHS, education, DSS, etc) depend upon, or even involve, production of the state ID card, as long as they are in power, or hold the balance of power.
It's called "tiling". And it's already been done, by Wirth's Oberon system, and the WM from Bell Lab's Plan 9. Mind you, they also had some prety idiosyncratic things about them, too. For something more X11 conventional (albeit written in Haskell) try Monad - http://xmonad.org/.
No, because we're not required to. We can be asked by a police officer, with due cause, to produce it within 7 days at a police station of our chosing.
How do you ID at pubs?
Unless you look too young to drink, and so have to prove your age to the barman, there's no requirement for ID there. Ever.
Can I point out, again, for the benefit of non-Brits, that the police in this instance were the City of London Police - which is a very small constabulary which only covers the City of London - essentially the "Square Mile" financial area - and not the Metropolitan Police, who cover the other 600 square miles of London. The Met are rather more measured that the CoLP, who are the ones with dodgy links to the Cult of ElRon.
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Occam, "clunky"? You mean it doesn't use braces? Or that is uses semantic whitespace, like Python? It's very terse, and has little syntactic sugar. I'd love to see what you'd do to make it less "clunky".
Personally, as a compiler writer, I've found my higher degrees in CS much more useful than the BCS membership which I had, but gave up as a useless expense about 15 years ago. I've certainly never, in 25 years, employed, recommended, or preferred, someone on the grounds that they are MBCS, or CITP. Both are about as useful indicators of ability and knowledge as CCNE or MSCE.
Ironically, MBCS would probably be more "useful" to me now that I've given up CS, and am retraining as a lawyer!
we all have a National insurance number in the UK
But there is no useful, unique, or reliable, mapping between NI number and a identity. NI numbers are given out like confetti, and there are far more of them issued than there are UK residents. It's quite possible for one person to have have several NI numbers.
They're getting rid of the ID *CARDS*, not the database.
Yes, they are; the database will be deleted.
The coalition programme says "We will scrap the ID card scheme,
the National Identity register and the ContactPoint database, and halt the next generation of biometric passports." (http://www.conservatives.com/News/News_stories/2010/05/~/media/Files/Downloadable%20Files/coalition-programme.ashx?dl=true)
The BBC reports: "Once the cards are illegal, the National Identity Register will be "physically destroyed", say ministers." (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8707355.stm)
1) They weren't tax dodgers, just ordinary savers choosing to save with an Icelandic-owned bank. The British government are pissed that they compensated the savers (expecting Iceland to repay them later), and now the Icelandic government won't cough up what they owe the British government.
2) England is not the same thing as Britain, Britain is not the same thing as England. Exactly like California is not the same thing as the USA, and the USA is not the same thing as California. Not to hard to grasp, is it?
Pedantically true; however, in normal UK usage, a prosecution is a criminal suit, prosecuted by the state, concerning offences against the criminal law. Yes, a civil case may be prosecuted, but it is not a prosecution.
Just to be clear, Dr Singh is not being "prosecuted for libel" - that's only for criminal offences, and libel is not a criminal offence, but a civil wrong. He is being sued for libel, in the civil courts, by the BCA.
Because they are expressions of ideas, more like mathematical proofs than real, mechanical, inventions - and neither ideas nor mathematical theories are patentable. The "expressions of ideas" bit is why programmes are copyrightable -- as literary works. And if they're literary works, protected by copyright, how can the be patentable too?
And remember, in Europe you can't patent business methods or processes, either.
Have a closer look; it's not the queen who makes that promise, it's the governor of the Bank of England - that's why his signature is on the note.
Why bother with them at all, then?
(And my passport says "British Citizen" not "subject of the crown".)
And he appealed the ticket, and the case was then dropped. The same cop who ticketed the nose blower had given a man a fixed penalty fine for littering the week before - when he dropped a ten pound note!
Unfortunately the Police are under no obligation to remove the DNA from the database until your 100th birthday I've read through the regulations they work under. In the appendix there are form letters for the chief constable to tell you that your dna can not be removed, there is no example of a letter saying it can.
Only in England & Wales; this is NOT he case in Scotland, where sampled DNA is removed from the database at the end of the relevant enquiry.
Scotland and England have different legal systems, criminal law, and police powers, and rules of evidence.
The headline is incorrect: it's not UK police, it's English Police who hold onto DNA. DNA samples, and profiles, are routinely destroyed at the end of the relevant enquiry in Scotland, which is a quite distinct legal jurisdiction from England.
Absolutely; this is the biggest problem I see with the phasing our of cheques - my daughter has so far taken upwards of £800 in cheques to her school in this school year (mainly for out of school trips, but also for music tuition, lunches, materials, and so on). The school hates cash, as its just not set up to handle it, and the amounts generated by 1500 pupils would be a real headache for them. And cards aren't an option, as I'm not going travel to the school just to pay for £5-10 in person, and my daughter clearly isn't going to take my card. And the admin to track electronic payments would also be a burden they can do without. Cheques, however, are pretty much ideal.
what with the distinction being less clear between private and public money in Europe
Not really; the Commission is very hard on all, and any, state aid to industry. There's really nothing like the US pork-barrel allocation of public there.
I think the niche it's aiming at is the, "Look! We made a programming language, too!" niche.
Since one of the three designers of Go is Ken Thompson (designer of C), I would doubt that.
Well, of course. The "Unix Philosophy" is good for for Unix, and the Unix research system was unashamedly designed to be a system for programming, and programmers. It was never intended to be for "everyone else".
The Parliamentarian mandate for RFIDs is similar to the stupidity that gave us a bunch of computer-controlled voting booths
We don't have computer-controlled voting booths in the UK, and the parliamentary manadate for ID cards is still, sadly, fairly sound.
politicians don't understand technology. To them it's just "magic" that will cure everything
Now, that is 100% on the mark.
I can easily imagine the BBC "reporting" is similar.
You might be able to imagine it (hell, I can imgine a liberal version of Fox), but it's just not the case; government, of both colours, have been complaining about anti-Government bias for as long as I can remember - and that's back to the 70s.
Not in the UK: I don't have to show any ID to get a prescription filled (or to see my doctor); I don't have to carry a driving licence to drive (although I do have to hold one, and be able to produce it in inside a week or so); and I don't have to show ID for any train journey.
I think you've got things confused: it's the BBC that restricts access to iPlayer content, not the ISPs. And it's the ISPs who want the revenue, from the BBC. And the BBC don't actually sell anything, anyway; it's all given away, funded from the licence fee.
Because BBC television programs aren't "for-profit". They carry no sponsorship, or advertising.
They are funded from the mandatory license fees. Which those outside the UK do not pay, which is why those on non-UK IP addresses can't access BBC iPlayer content.
And the SNP - which is why this database is England only (so far), as the SNP Government in Scotland wants nothing to do with the database state, or the state ID card. They have clearly stated that, even if it is succesfully introduced, they will not make access to the state functions they control (NHS, education, DSS, etc) depend upon, or even involve, production of the state ID card, as long as they are in power, or hold the balance of power.
It's called "tiling". And it's already been done, by Wirth's Oberon system, and the WM from Bell Lab's Plan 9. Mind you, they also had some prety idiosyncratic things about them, too. For something more X11 conventional (albeit written in Haskell) try Monad - http://xmonad.org/.
Don't the british carry their drivers license?
No, because we're not required to. We can be asked by a police officer, with due cause, to produce it within 7 days at a police station of our chosing.
How do you ID at pubs?
Unless you look too young to drink, and so have to prove your age to the barman, there's no requirement for ID there. Ever.
Hell, we don't even have to produce ID to vote!
City of London Police - 900 officers.
Metropoliltan Police - 32,000 officers.