I've been with Demon for years (since 1996 ?) but I've had enough and will be moving to Pipex next month. The reason ? Since Demon were taken over by Thus their tech support is absolutely pathetic (and the retention on their news servers is bloody awful too)
Now in the "good old days" when they were run by management who understood what they were doing and CARED about the customer you could ask them a technical question and you'd receive a very good detailed answer from an obviously knowledgable technician.
However this year I've emailed them three sets of questions which they've "answered" by copying and pasting stuff from either their online FAQ or from some obvious marketing bumf. And this is despite me starting my last two emails with "I have already read your FAQ and these questions are not covered by them...". In fact my last email specifically stated that if they didn't answer my question I was going to Pipex. Guess what ? They didn't answer my question and replied with a press release about their upcoming "free upgrade to 2mb".
So Demon used to be excellent but I've simply had enough of their awful, ignorant tech support. Worst thing is if I stuck with them I'd shortly be getting a free upgrade from 512Kbs to 2mbs. But who cares ? Their news servers are useless and they don't care enough to answer my questions so what's the point ?
In contrast my mates at work who use Pipex rave about the quality of their service. 10Gb a month access to GigaNews news servers (with excellent retention), no service interruptions, consistent high speed, 50Mb web space. In preparation for my switch I've also emailed Pipexs tech support to ask about running my own servers, service limitations etc. and all my questions have been answered promptly, intelligently and to my liking ("yes to servers, no blocked ports" etc. etc.
Poor old Demon... They used to be ace when Cliff Stanford was in charge:(
Every time a cracker manages to compromise or wreck a system then hopefully subsequent investigation reveals the flaw that was exploited and it's fixed. If this exposes a fundamental problem in the basic design then it's back to the drawing board (unless you're Microsoft who don't care because the money's still flowing in:)
Hopefully systems will always remain mostly ahead of all but the most adept crackers. And maybe one day a system with AI can even be 99.9999% cracker proof.
Those sort of glib, uninformative error messages are the bane of computing. If you're a programmer and this is how you handle errors you're a waste of time.
The only place I'd say this approach was acceptable would be software for a kiosk type app but for a desktop app it's inexcusably poor.
At the very least there should be a way to retrieve additional details from the error prompt (perhaps a button if it's a GUI app) Activating this "additional details" option should then give a full descriptive audit trail of all the errors that led to the failure. And all error messages should be meaning ful and supply full details (i.e . if a file failed to open give the reason and the name of the file)
Otherwise we're into the land of pure nonsense as typified by the Atari 1040 range which used to pop up a dialogue box that simply said "Warning something strange has happened, please try to avoid" acoompanied by a button that simply said "I will". Priceless humour but utterly crap design !
In direct contrast to Apple (who had the sense to realise a good thing when they saw it by using *BSD as the basis of OSX) Microsofts new mission statement seems to be to prove the adage:
"Those who don't understand UNIX are doomed to reinvent it, poorly." --Henry Spencer
(apologies if the quote is attributed to the wrong person but I'm drunk and simply Googled for the first result...)
And I'm not saying humanity can't do better than *nix but, currently, it's still a hell of a good start (mind you I've worked on ICLs, now Fujitsus, VME which is simply a pure pleasure... a pure pleasure... File generations... Mmmm... recover that file from 10 edits ago before you made a complete balls up of everything...)
And then Google get to read, index, and (at a later date) profit from your emails...
Personally I've set up SquirrelMail on my little home server and am busy working out how to get it to work in https mode only.
That's got the advantage that it too is web based but it's (hopefully) private to boot (my sysadmin incompetence not withstanding:)
Having said that I do have a gmail account but I have every expectation that a future Google will become a.n.other corporation and all their current concerns about privacy will be slowly eroded "to enhance our customer experience whilst maximising shareholder value" etc. etc.
And whilst you're at it don't forget Easter which, in Europe, was originally the time for worship of the goddess Oestre.
Which also explains why there's an "easter bunny" as Oestres sacred symbols were the moon and the hare. The moon was revered for its influence on females (also explaining why Oestrogen is so named) and the hare was revered as a symbol of fertility (because it's one of the few animals that can get pregnant again before giving birth to the currently gestating foetus(es))
And thence also comes the idea of Easter being the time of the Earths rebirth which is why, when the Christians subsumed the Easter festival, it became the time of the year when Jesus died and was resurrected.
So the moral of the story ? Reocurring symbols one and all Kids. Same ideas different deitys. Dig a little deeper under almost every "Christian" feast day/celebration and you'll find some earlier foundations of an entirely different nature.
But having said all this Oestre was undoubtedly overlaid on an ever earlier God/Goddess etc. etc.
But next easter whilst you enjoy your "easter eggs" and "bunnies" do spare a thought for an old European goddess.
That could all be well and good as long as their was one slight change to copyright laws.
e.g. The only people who can receive ANY paymenmts in relation to copyrighted works are the original authors and/or the original performers of a work (in the case of people doing the writing and other people doing the performing both would get a share etc.)
The same for inventors. Only the original inventor gets any share of the copyright.
Furthermore these rights cannot be sold, leased or given away
And once all the original copyright holders have died the works become public domain.
That way only the people who are directly resonsible for the work get the credit. And a fucking pox on all middle men whose only purpose is to parasite and fuck up the creative process.
Sorry but I haven't read the article as I've just come in pissed from the pub.
But WTF do you think will happen when a PUBLICALLY LISTED COMPANY has access to this sort of data ? It's a marketroids ultimate wet dream.
So I for one don't care what Googles stated privacy policy is. This can be overturned in one board meeting by one "entity" with enough shares (remember: as far as "the Law" (tm) is concerned Corporations are people too)
In the wrong hands Google will become the ultimate Stasi machine. The state apparatus outlined in 1984 will look like a holiday camp in comparison. And one day it WILL fall into the wrong hands. The hands which never hug anyone because they're too busy clutching wads of (insert name of curreny de jour here) to their chest.
Admittedly they do provide some "splendid things" (tm) but, as with all other corporate resources, use them with open eyes and at your own peril...
Finally I must say that I do love Google. It's been my search engine of choice for years and I even use Gmail. I'm just not naive enough to think that it will always be the magic fairy land of fine principoles and warm fluffy goodness that it currently seems to be.
God how I loathe Flash. And now there's a GPL alternative ? Great... Yet more crappy plugins that I'll not be installing but will make Firefox nause me with that bastard yellow bar every time I visit an infected site.
But as usual it's not that I hate the technology per se - just the use made of it by the clueless imbeclies who operate as "web designers" when they're really only fit to work on TV advertising.
If I had my way I'd pass a law that anyone making a flash only website will be tracked down planetwide and have their eyes removed with a red hot spoon followed by the wounds being packed with salts extracted from dog piss.
To us Europeans it seems that America is utterly determined to become both more fascist than 1940s Germany and more repressive and intrusive that either communist era Russia or East Germany etc.
And you still get Americans calling people "Commie" intended as an insult !
Your leaders truly are insane. The only bad thing is the idiots in the UK government have their heads firmly stuck up the American right wings arse so I guess we can expect the same crap over here too.
And what will be the result of all these clampdowns ? "Every time we try to impose order we create chaos"...
But then again I think the Google logo is overdoing it.
I just hope when they roll it out they keep the "classic" page available for those of us who don't want personalisation.
And rest assured one day all the personal information that Google are collecting (search histories, emails) WILL be put to nefarious ends. The only question is how long will it take for the "bad guys" (tm) to take control.
So we have a flawed operating system that doesn't give the user (when in Administrator mode) the required tools to remove software from their o/s. It also makes it trivially easy for malicious third parties to install software on the o/s.
And the answer is to pass legislation to try to prevent said operating system being exploited ?
This is completely Mindless. It's like letting a colony of wasps build a nest in your bedroom then treating each individual sting without ever looking at the nest.
Mindless I say... What they should have done is pass a law telling MS to fix their fucking rotten o/s. That MIGHT have done some good.
Sadly BBC TV has started to show lots and lots of advertising. Admittedly this is for its own programs but it's being done in the manner of all advertising and it's still really irritating (not on the scale of Sky irritating I'll grant you but still irritating.)
And yes it is me who complains weekly to the regulator about it:)
Sorry but if I'm paying for a TV service I expect it to be shown without advertising. If you're advertising at me I'm not going to pay for it.
That's why Sky subscribers are total morons. They pay fantastic sums of money to watch TV programs which are continually interrupted by mindless advertising. Imbeciles the lot of 'em.
But hats off to the BBC for once again doing a good thing !
Slashdot Mirror
Well I know I tend not to bother looking at much mainstream media but I didn't even know this existed.
So now I take a look, it looks interesting, and they're shutting it down. Bloody typical.
Oh well I'd best get emailing the BBC to compain then eh ?
I couldn't agree more.
:(
I've been with Demon for years (since 1996 ?) but I've had enough and will be moving to Pipex next month. The reason ? Since Demon were taken over by Thus their tech support is absolutely pathetic (and the retention on their news servers is bloody awful too)
Now in the "good old days" when they were run by management who understood what they were doing and CARED about the customer you could ask them a technical question and you'd receive a very good detailed answer from an obviously knowledgable technician.
However this year I've emailed them three sets of questions which they've "answered" by copying and pasting stuff from either their online FAQ or from some obvious marketing bumf. And this is despite me starting my last two emails with "I have already read your FAQ and these questions are not covered by them...". In fact my last email specifically stated that if they didn't answer my question I was going to Pipex. Guess what ? They didn't answer my question and replied with a press release about their upcoming "free upgrade to 2mb".
So Demon used to be excellent but I've simply had enough of their awful, ignorant tech support. Worst thing is if I stuck with them I'd shortly be getting a free upgrade from 512Kbs to 2mbs. But who cares ? Their news servers are useless and they don't care enough to answer my questions so what's the point ?
In contrast my mates at work who use Pipex rave about the quality of their service. 10Gb a month access to GigaNews news servers (with excellent retention), no service interruptions, consistent high speed, 50Mb web space. In preparation for my switch I've also emailed Pipexs tech support to ask about running my own servers, service limitations etc. and all my questions have been answered promptly, intelligently and to my liking ("yes to servers, no blocked ports" etc. etc.
Poor old Demon... They used to be ace when Cliff Stanford was in charge
Mmmm... pie in the sky...
Mildred, fire up my hot air balloon, we're off hunting sky pie !
Absolutely. It's simply evolution in action.
:)
Every time a cracker manages to compromise or wreck a system then hopefully subsequent investigation reveals the flaw that was exploited and it's fixed. If this exposes a fundamental problem in the basic design then it's back to the drawing board (unless you're Microsoft who don't care because the money's still flowing in
Hopefully systems will always remain mostly ahead of all but the most adept crackers. And maybe one day a system with AI can even be 99.9999% cracker proof.
Well said that man !
Those sort of glib, uninformative error messages are the bane of computing. If you're a programmer and this is how you handle errors you're a waste of time.
The only place I'd say this approach was acceptable would be software for a kiosk type app but for a desktop app it's inexcusably poor.
At the very least there should be a way to retrieve additional details from the error prompt (perhaps a button if it's a GUI app) Activating this "additional details" option should then give a full descriptive audit trail of all the errors that led to the failure. And all error messages should be meaning ful and supply full details (i.e . if a file failed to open give the reason and the name of the file)
Otherwise we're into the land of pure nonsense as typified by the Atari 1040 range which used to pop up a dialogue box that simply said "Warning something strange has happened, please try to avoid" acoompanied by a button that simply said "I will". Priceless humour but utterly crap design !
Unless of course our fantastic new DRM scheme is allowed to protect your computer for us^H^H you !
Expect much more of this sort of talk in the years to come.
And don't foget that once everything is digital the *AA wankers can really start pushing the DRM crap and "pay per view" on everyone.
Amen to that.
That's why any DVD I buy is first put through DVD Shrink to remove all the crap from the start.
I've bought the fucking thing and I'll watch it how I want to watch it thankyou very much.
Thankyou sir !
:) and will get my editor out a.s.a.p.
And following this with a quick look at their website I notice there's also a plugin to force the use of an https link.
I am ashamed at how inattentative I usually am
Bugger... I meant to add the URL where I found the quote as it's a good read...
Unix Utilities Part 4
Ho hum...
In direct contrast to Apple (who had the sense to realise a good thing when they saw it by using *BSD as the basis of OSX) Microsofts new mission statement seems to be to prove the adage:
"Those who don't understand UNIX are doomed to reinvent it, poorly."
--Henry Spencer
(apologies if the quote is attributed to the wrong person but I'm drunk and simply Googled for the first result...)
And I'm not saying humanity can't do better than *nix but, currently, it's still a hell of a good start (mind you I've worked on ICLs, now Fujitsus, VME which is simply a pure pleasure... a pure pleasure... File generations... Mmmm... recover that file from 10 edits ago before you made a complete balls up of everything...)
So that's where all the old STASI people went after the fall of communism.
:)
They're alive and well and running America
And then Google get to read, index, and (at a later date) profit from your emails...
:)
Personally I've set up SquirrelMail on my little home server and am busy working out how to get it to work in https mode only.
That's got the advantage that it too is web based but it's (hopefully) private to boot (my sysadmin incompetence not withstanding
Having said that I do have a gmail account but I have every expectation that a future Google will become a.n.other corporation and all their current concerns about privacy will be slowly eroded "to enhance our customer experience whilst maximising shareholder value" etc. etc.
Why on earth would anyone use a Microsoft OS as a container for a proper OS ?
Surely it should be the other way round ?
And whilst you're at it don't forget Easter which, in Europe, was originally the time for worship of the goddess Oestre.
Which also explains why there's an "easter bunny" as Oestres sacred symbols were the moon and the hare. The moon was revered for its influence on females (also explaining why Oestrogen is so named) and the hare was revered as a symbol of fertility (because it's one of the few animals that can get pregnant again before giving birth to the currently gestating foetus(es))
And thence also comes the idea of Easter being the time of the Earths rebirth which is why, when the Christians subsumed the Easter festival, it became the time of the year when Jesus died and was resurrected.
So the moral of the story ? Reocurring symbols one and all Kids. Same ideas different deitys. Dig a little deeper under almost every "Christian" feast day/celebration and you'll find some earlier foundations of an entirely different nature.
But having said all this Oestre was undoubtedly overlaid on an ever earlier God/Goddess etc. etc.
But next easter whilst you enjoy your "easter eggs" and "bunnies" do spare a thought for an old European goddess.
Praise "Bob" (and leave Chthulu out of it) !
That could all be well and good as long as their was one slight change to copyright laws.
e.g. The only people who can receive ANY paymenmts in relation to copyrighted works are the original authors and/or the original performers of a work (in the case of people doing the writing and other people doing the performing both would get a share etc.)
The same for inventors. Only the original inventor gets any share of the copyright.
Furthermore these rights cannot be sold, leased or given away
And once all the original copyright holders have died the works become public domain.
That way only the people who are directly resonsible for the work get the credit. And a fucking pox on all middle men whose only purpose is to parasite and fuck up the creative process.
Sorry but I haven't read the article as I've just come in pissed from the pub.
But WTF do you think will happen when a PUBLICALLY LISTED COMPANY has access to this sort of data ? It's a marketroids ultimate wet dream.
So I for one don't care what Googles stated privacy policy is. This can be overturned in one board meeting by one "entity" with enough shares (remember: as far as "the Law" (tm) is concerned Corporations are people too)
In the wrong hands Google will become the ultimate Stasi machine. The state apparatus outlined in 1984 will look like a holiday camp in comparison. And one day it WILL fall into the wrong hands. The hands which never hug anyone because they're too busy clutching wads of (insert name of curreny de jour here) to their chest.
Admittedly they do provide some "splendid things" (tm) but, as with all other corporate resources, use them with open eyes and at your own peril...
Finally I must say that I do love Google. It's been my search engine of choice for years and I even use Gmail. I'm just not naive enough to think that it will always be the magic fairy land of fine principoles and warm fluffy goodness that it currently seems to be.
God how I loathe Flash. And now there's a GPL alternative ? Great... Yet more crappy plugins that I'll not be installing but will make Firefox nause me with that bastard yellow bar every time I visit an infected site.
But as usual it's not that I hate the technology per se - just the use made of it by the clueless imbeclies who operate as "web designers" when they're really only fit to work on TV advertising.
If I had my way I'd pass a law that anyone making a flash only website will be tracked down planetwide and have their eyes removed with a red hot spoon followed by the wounds being packed with salts extracted from dog piss.
Bastards.
Ho ho ho.
To us Europeans it seems that America is utterly determined to become both more fascist than 1940s Germany and more repressive and intrusive that either communist era Russia or East Germany etc.
And you still get Americans calling people "Commie" intended as an insult !
Your leaders truly are insane. The only bad thing is the idiots in the UK government have their heads firmly stuck up the American right wings arse so I guess we can expect the same crap over here too.
And what will be the result of all these clampdowns ? "Every time we try to impose order we create chaos"...
Next stop mandatory RFID implants for all humans.
Sorry that stinks...
But then again I think the Google logo is overdoing it.
I just hope when they roll it out they keep the "classic" page available for those of us who don't want personalisation.
And rest assured one day all the personal information that Google are collecting (search histories, emails) WILL be put to nefarious ends. The only question is how long will it take for the "bad guys" (tm) to take control.
This is moronic !
So we have a flawed operating system that doesn't give the user (when in Administrator mode) the required tools to remove software from their o/s. It also makes it trivially easy for malicious third parties to install software on the o/s.
And the answer is to pass legislation to try to prevent said operating system being exploited ?
This is completely Mindless. It's like letting a colony of wasps build a nest in your bedroom then treating each individual sting without ever looking at the nest.
Mindless I say... What they should have done is pass a law telling MS to fix their fucking rotten o/s. That MIGHT have done some good.
Ah... not quite true I'm afraid...
:)
Sadly BBC TV has started to show lots and lots of advertising. Admittedly this is for its own programs but it's being done in the manner of all advertising and it's still really irritating (not on the scale of Sky irritating I'll grant you but still irritating.)
And yes it is me who complains weekly to the regulator about it
Sorry but if I'm paying for a TV service I expect it to be shown without advertising. If you're advertising at me I'm not going to pay for it.
That's why Sky subscribers are total morons. They pay fantastic sums of money to watch TV programs which are continually interrupted by mindless advertising. Imbeciles the lot of 'em.
But hats off to the BBC for once again doing a good thing !
The BBC also have the absolutely massive advantage in that they're not Microsoft or Real.
:)
I for one won't touch streaming content produced by that pair of bastards
"Wah.. wah.. wah.. it's not fair. People are getting locked into THEIR technology when they should be getting locked into OUR technology".
Me ? I'm not buying into ANYONES lock in technology. You can shove your DRMd Apples iTunes right up Hilary Rosens arse.
Multiplication tables ? Damned sissy and new fangled if you ask me.
:)
When I was a lad we had to use "Napiers Bones" (Logarithms)
And I stil l got all the answers wrong