The other day I tried to have a debate with someone.

We had an interesting subject and I found just the perfect YouTube video (All 6 minutes of it, rather than 2.5 hours is as traditional when trying to drown someone in YouTube videos..) which would open out the debate on all sides.

But they refuse to watch it, saying it says X and Y, when in fact it says Y and Z..

I had hoped we would talk about Z.

Reminds me of a climate group I joined, again a YouTube link, but instead of a debate, we had a refusal to watch said video because it was obviously wrong..

Next I imagine is "I'm not going to read that book, because its obviously wrong because it has the word "The" in the title.."

Or, I'm not going to listen to person X, because they are always wrong, someone else said so !

Must protect those ivory towers..

FX [ Checks outdoor CCTV..]

"Oh my god, its a nuclear winter !"

Picture is frozen..

FX [ Checks wiring, camera, server, switch, etc.. ]

FX [ Checks CCTV server.. notices picture not frozen.. ]

FX [ Checks CCTV client, notices 'status' Icon not displaying, clicks on Icon, it says "Paused".. ]

So, not a nuclear winter after all !

Having spent days wrestling to get an old phone working just enough so my mum can use it, before I waste any more time on getting another one to spend time trying to update the OS on it.. has anyone suggestions for a replacement, or coming soon replacement that fits the following requirements:

Costs less than $100 (Either new or second hand.)

Clamshell design, so screen is protected inside.

Physical QWERTY keyboard, with separate number row and backlit with large keys.

2G or 3G network capable.

Ideally bug free..

I just spent ages getting a simple thing like the ringtone to work correctly as it wouldn't let you choose the one you wanted, and the USB to PC link wasn't working, so in the end had to connect it to the internet via the wifi router, and download the working ringtone file off my own website..

I tried updating the OS, but just got errors, which I suspect is because I was using W10, and the updating only works in XP..

And I haven't got around to installing XP again on my backup PC..

A bit of an ethical dilemma here.

If I write the software I want to, which is super efficient, it helps rich people, but not poor people..

So, what do I do ?

Not write it ?

Or create a crippled version so it helps poor people and not rich people..

http://sage2.sagecommons.org/2015/...

Something like this as I have a spare wall in my bedroom and I thought, instead of covering it with a pretty picture like this:

Why not cover it with monitors and then I can change the picture when I want to. :-)

But a couple of questions, beyond, how do I get it to work..

What monitors would give the best fit, eg. so you see the joints the least, cost the least, and use the least power..

Otherwise, I'm guessing it will use up more juice than I can afford, cost more than I can afford, and you'd see the joins pretty easily..

Still, its worth asking. :-)

You just plug it in and it works, right..

No, not really, not until you have done this:

https://stackoverflow.com/questions...

And then this to update the phone:

https://web.archive.org/web/...

Hopefully after all that, the screen brightness setting doesn't keep resetting itself to lowest..

I wonder how much product X weighs ?

I'll just go to the manufacturers website and check..

"Sign in to see product specifications."

Why, it used to be on your bloody product page without needing to sign in !

No problem, I was once a customer, I have my login details here someplace..

"Invalid email address"

Damn it !

FX [ Checks old text files for information... ]

Ah, found it you bastards !

> 5mm 900gsm

More than 10% lighter than the competition, not that you'd ever know it, because they now hide that fact on their website..

Not that I'd buy from them again since their idea of protective packing is a plastic bin liner around an item that has to travel half the world and arrives as if its already been to Mars and back..

Does anyone have a really old HP hardware catalogue ?

The last page I think it was, what is the part number for a, I think it was Cheese & Pickle sandwich ?

I fancy trying to order one. :-)

My PC is downloading an update for something.

So, I guess that means if I go online and surf the web, that I'll use 50% of the bandwidth for the update and 50% for web surfing..

It feels more like 90% for the update, and 10% for me surfing the web.. :-(

Groups..

Let me just check the groups I'm in for any that take my fancy to look at..

Now, who designs the front end so about what, 5% of the screen space is actually the space devoted to your group list !!!

It's the little red edged square..

Google street view..

I was wandering around streets and noticed random houses, well, that you couldn't see..

How do you get your building pixelated ?

I see I'm back in Facebook jail after posting too many URL's. :-(

Was commenting on a post of mine to find out it had automatically been deleted. (I guess because it had a URL in it..)

In case anyone was wondering what the URL was, it was:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Bloody useless social media system not fit for purpose !

Chat, but don't chat too much, or you get censored !

Old stuff:

https://ibms360.co.uk/?page_id=22
> IBM 360 Model 20 Rescue and Restoration

> For the uninitiated, the processor of an
> IBM 360 Model 20 weighs up to 620KG.

Is it too much to ask for a dating app to at least, you know, reliable and not buggy !

Related link:

https://reddit.com/r/Tinder/...

Was chatting to someone earlier, they vanished, don't appear on my match list anymore.

Ok, assume unmatched.

An hour later, a message from them pops up!

But wait, if we are unmatched, they shouldn't be able to send messages right ?

So whats up with that !

I tried relogging, tried rebooting, now no one is showing in my match list..

I did upload a new picture, so maybe it was so awful, everyone who did like me, changed their minds suddenly !

Anyhow, it doesn't at the moment appear to be behaving as it should, I can see messages from someone that appears unmatched..

I tried testing by unmatching someone my end, and the messages between us vanished. (Of course, no way to get back from that without resetting the account !)

So that behaved as documented..

Anyhow, important message apps need to be reliable !

Especially paid for ones !

Otherwise folk aren't going to pay for them, again !

"Can you do X today?"

Listen, there are 62 items on the development list, if you want me to do X today, all of those will have to wait !

Do you still want me to do X today ?

"Yes"

FX [ Times passes . . . ]

"Why haven't you done all of those 62 items on your development list yet ?"

Grrrrr !

Even at one a week, it is going to take me like over a year to get them all done !

X isn't needed for at least a year, so it can be slotted into place after Y and Z have been done, because it will make it easier to do X then.

Doing X now, just makes it harder to do Y and Z afterwards !

I'll just do X..

Oh no I won't !

------------------
Windows 10 Home and Windows 10 Professional still contain the xxxxx client by default after a clean installation. If the xxxxx client is not used for 15 days in total (excluding the computer being turned off), it automatically uninstalls itself.
------------------

Well, that's bloody helpful isn't it !

NOT.

How many other pitfalls await the unwary who haven't used certain things for X days I wonder..

Question:

I once read that 95% of people on diets, never succeed and just put the weight back on.

So, what is special about the 5% ?

How do you know in advance if you are a 5% or a 95% person ?

There seems little information on this issue..

I did once study alcoholics, but I couldn't spot any statistical pattern on why some recovered and others didn't.

Not did anyone really offer any clues.

But, now we are in the internet age, so I can ask the world !

If its genetics, then does that mean they will always succeed at a diet, and not fail repeatedly ?

I've failed several times to diet..

Yet, as a kid, I was underweight for decades !

But maybe that was because food was expensive, or my mums cooking. :-)

So, what might help determine success or failure ?

More hard work ?

Or something else ?

Question, is one way to build a team, is to make sure they do tasks that they always complete, so they feel like winners ?

I guess the same could be said for relationships..

Just I was pondering, that playing computer games against AI that you can beat, gives you some kind of mental boost doesn't it ?

It reminds me of forums, that at times, people debate, not for the content, but because they feel good if they have the last word. (They win..)

This can make having technical discussions difficult if people aren't really trying to be helpful, but instead are trying to score points over the next person !

Ideally by being more helpful. :-)

But sometimes, or often, depending upon the system, this degrades into an all out mud slinging match where the original starting point was lost and someone resorts to mentioning Hitler..

So, it made me wonder, other than getting a bunch of folk to play against AI and feeling good about it, what other team building exercises could you do that could help you to build a team in the first place ?

I'm thinking, maybe all those silly hippy games of find the teddybear in the woods, aren't so stupid after all..

Though, once you have a bunch of teddybear loving hippies, how do you then get them to build a geothermal power plant and give free electricity to the poor..

That always seems a sticking point !

"Right team, lets go and plant some veg!"

FX [ Watches as entire team goes to the pub instead.. ]

I'm going to be passive aggressive.

No I'm not..

Alright Windows 10, what have you done with my D:..

FX [ Tries turning it off and on again.. ]

No matter how traffic free yesterday, always jams today..

Mount Everest:

Related link:

https://standard.co.uk/news/world/...

VideoLan..

Latest version, monitor goes into sleep mode..

Some previous version, it didn't !

https://trac.videolan.org/vlc/...
> The "disable screensaver" option isn't working

I can confirm that version 2.2.8 works as intended, as does indeed not let the monitor go to sleep, hurray !

To save me trying out every single version after that, does anyone know for sure a more up to date version that also works fine ?

Related link:

https://get.videolan.org/vlc/2.2.8/

Always with the difficult questions me. :-)

https://pcpartpicker.com/forums/...

I get the same error, which I think is linked to the monitor its connected to.

------------
shadow could not find any compatible direct3d devices

Error: Plane GPU benchmark Failed, aborting further tests on this GPU.
------------

Anyone thoughts ?

Related link:

https://www.userbenchmark.com

I also stumbled across this I didn't know about:

https://tenforums.com/tutorials/...

Though its called something else now, which makes it a bit confusing at first !

So will see if that makes any difference..

There is no search..

Well, not a real search, it only appears to search for tags.

Now how am I going to find that thing I vaguely remember someone talking about a year ago !

Can't we have a full 100% text search function ?

Or is there one hidden away someplace I don't now about..

https://theguardian.com/business/...

This bit caught my attention:

--------------------
The power shift comes at a tough time for a high street rocked by sweeping changes in shopping habits. The growth of online shopping has seen a swathe of retailers use an insolvency process known as a company voluntary arrangement to shut stores and seek lower rents.

Richer Sounds has been shielded from the storm by the founder’s decision to buy the freeholds on most of its 52 stores. “Any idiot can sign a lease,” he says. “I always wanted to be in control of my own destiny by owning the freeholds.” Today its rent and rates bill is just 1.5% of turnover, a figure many retail bosses can only dream of. “We’ve got small stores that are in very busy, secondary positions … so when business migrated to the web we weren’t decimated,” he says.
-----------------

Don't rent !

Some quite nice things he did there, though..

My own experience of giving a company to its workers didn't end so well, because when I wasn't there being in charge, the place drifted back to just like any other business.

Profits went down, efficiency dropped, and people took home 10 times less..

So, if you are going to do that, make sure your replacement boss is as good as you !

Which is kinda hard to find these days..

Related link:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

http://zero-k.info

Oh look, a shiny new game, well, I think its based on code from an old game..

Many of these kind of games suffer from one specific issue, they crash during a long drawn out game.

And guess what, this one isn't any different !

> Spring: Fatal Error
> Failed to allocate memory

Game only appeared to be using some 6Gb, and I've 24Gb, so nice ECC memory too, just so my game doesn't get ruined by any cosmic particles..

So, does anyone code a game like this, which doesn't crash after you've spent hours building up your forces/etc..

Or do I have to write my own !

I think it only happens in Firefox..

Scroll using the scrollwheel up to the top of the page, and it sometimes bounces downwards..

Most annoying.

Is this a 'feature' in Firefox/Windows 10/etc. you can turn off ?

Doesn't happen in Chrome..

The anti-brigade are at it again !

https://dailystar.co.uk/news/...

---------
Experts want more than 85% of the solar system to be marked as off-limits for those looking to cash in on the galactic gold rush.
---------

I'm sure every country in the world is going to sign up to that treaty..

-------
MOST of the solar system must be protected from damaging space mining and industrial exploitation, top scientists have warned.
-------

No chance this is 97% of scientists is it..

Come on guys, this is ridiculous now to the extreme.

We don't need to protect a bunch of dumb rocks !

What we need is more useful stuff, like car batteries, made from asteroids.

---------
“Once you’ve exploited the solar system, there’s nowhere left to go.”
---------

Except maybe, "another solar system"..

----------
They have estimated an eighth of the solar system’s mineable resources would be used up in just 400 years.
----------

You mean, turned into trash, that we could recycle..

--------
And what about the rings of Saturn? They are beautiful, almost pure water ice. Is it OK to mine those so that in 100 years they are gone?
--------

Oh yes, those are so beautiful aren't they, as I often go out on dark night and watch them from afar...

Sarcasm !

Related link:

https://dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech...

My PC is too slow..

I'm looking at the screen and it says "1 second till power off".

So I waggle the mouse.

It turns off..

Obviously a terrorflop of processing is not enough for it to not turn off the screen in time..

I had a whole second damn it !

Facebook groups.

If you belong to thousands, you'd think there would be an alphabetical sorting function wouldn't you..

But no, they are about as easy to access as if no one had even considered that people might belong to more than half a dozen groups !
(Yes I know, the average number of groups folk belong to is 12..)

They recently changed the group listing from a grid, to a list..

So now, instead of expanding the grid with say 20 clicks, I have to scroll a list with 2 or 3 times as many clicks !

In other systems, the entire list just scrolls without needing any clicking !!!

RSI folks !

Who designs this shit.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

I want to check one specific group, takes me 5 minutes to just find it !

Not productive software design at all !!!