pwaring

pwaring, 4 months ago to business

If you run a small business without dedicated sales staff, do you put a limit on the free time spent on initial enquiries from prospective clients?

Context: I was turned down for work recently because I only offer 30 minutes, and that wasn't enough. I'm not going to change my policy based on 1 rejection, but I am curious as to how long other businesses allow.

#freelancing #business

pwaring, 8 months ago to Trains

I'm all in favour of more cross-channel (and cross-Europe and cross-UK) rail links, but I can't see how a new Paris-London link can possibly work when St Pancras is already at capacity for border control and there isn't really any room to expand. The demand may or may not be there but the capacity definitely isn't at the moment.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/12/spanish-rail-firm-evolyn-planning-london-paris-service-rival-eurostar

#railway #train

pwaring, 1 month ago to random

Question that came up at film club last week: I subscribe to 3 weekly magazines (one of which resulted in a suggestion for the club, hence the topic). Can you guess which 3?

Hints: they’re all published in the UK and not ‘top shelf’.

pwaring, 8 months ago to random

Developers seem to fall into one of two camps when it comes to upgrading to the latest version of X (e.g. PHP):

1. Upgrading is essential and not doing so is irresponsible.

2. Upgrading is costly and risky and often can't be commercially justified. Sometimes it's not even possible.

I am very strongly in the second camp, even though I advise upgrading and outline the risks of not doing so (I will generally support old versions for as long as possible).

pwaring, 2 months ago to random

If you're in the UK, the deadline for registering to vote in the upcoming elections (local, mayoral and others, depending on your location) is 23:59 today.

You can also register for a postal vote if you want to avoid the new ID requirements for voting in person.

Online options are only available in some parts of the UK, so you might need to hand-deliver a paper form instead.

https://www.gov.uk/register-to-vote

pwaring, 9 months ago to random

UK followers: It's that time of year again when I remind you all to book your flu vaccination (available in September but you can book now). Most pharmacy chains offer it and might be quicker than your GP. Free if you have a qualifying condition (or are over 65), the rules aren't the same as COVID boosters (you might be eligible for flu but not CV19). £10-15 if you have to pay, or your employer might give you a voucher.

pwaring, 1 year ago to random

Sad to say this, but with the FLOSS UK website also down (TLS certificate expired in April), I think it's finally the end of the Organisation Formerly Known as UKUUG.

I spent 6 years on Council (4 as chair, plus a brief stint as interim treasurer), went to most (all?) of the conferences in that time and met a lot of people who I'm still in touch with.

#ukuug #flossuk

pwaring, 1 year ago to random

Them: To download this PDF document, you need to give us all of your contact details so we can email it to you (and hassle you forever after)

Me: sticks name of PDF into search engine, downloads from direct link

pwaring, 9 months ago to random

I have a collection of book series on my to-read list, some of which I've been keen to finish (or re-read) for a long time, including Discworld, Dune, Foundation and The Wheel of Time:

https://www.roguetory.org.uk/archives/2023/08/25/book-series-to-read/

Is anyone else reading a good book series at the moment, or has one that means a lot to them?

#bookstodon

pwaring, 9 months ago to random

Really enjoying The Algebraist so far. Iain M. Banks is one of a handful of authors where I like everything I've read (even Pratchett has some duds IMO).

#mcrsf #bookstodon

pwaring, 1 month ago to random

Tried to find some vegetable stock for soup at the supermarket. 1g salt per portion. Well, tinned soup is >2g so I guess that’s an improvement. Oh wait, a single stock cube is 4 portions and therefore 4g of salt?! It’s worse than the tinned version! (I checked every single option on the shelves, the lowest was 0.6g per portion).

pwaring, 1 year ago to random

If any of my followers are on Duolingo and would like to connect, I'm pwaring666 (pwaring was already taken).

#duolingo

pwaring, 11 months ago to random

Which UK comparison site do people use for insurance nowadays? I've used a local broker until now, but they got bought a few months ago and I don't want to deal with the new owners (they closed the branch and made everyone redundant a week before Christmas).

pwaring, 9 months ago to random

Self-service checkouts:

1. How is a bag an unexpected item in the BAGGING area?

2. Why do some allow a bag allowance and others don't (even at the same supermarket - card only checkouts are less sensitive than cash + card)?

3. Why isn't 'using own bag' the default, given that nearly everyone does this (in the UK at least)?

pwaring, 1 year ago to random

So it looks like Firefox are once again pushing to make DNS over HTTPS the default unless you opt-out. I won't rehash previous arguments but I blogged about them the first time this came up (tl;dr - it breaks local network settings, creates a single point of failure, and has privacy implicationsy):

https://www.phpdeveloper.org.uk/why-mozillas-dns-over-https-proposal-is-a-bad-idea/

#firefox #doh

pwaring, 3 months ago (edited 3 months ago) to manchester

I really wish we had orbital transport routes in Greater Manchester, it's easy to get from one of the towns into the city centre but not from one town to the next. Sometimes it's quicker to go into the city centre and out again than go around. Worst case is going two towns across, when both orbital and radial routes are slow.

#manchester

pwaring, 9 months ago to random

Bought a new phone (forced purchase due to old one no longer receiving security updates), but my provider forget to tell me it needs a different size SIM and they also don't support eSIM. Presumably this is how non-tech people feel all the time?

pwaring, 10 months ago to ipv6

AWS charging for IPv4 addresses reminds me of the post I wrote 5 years ago, asking if governments should mandate IPv6 (in short: yes, because it's a competition concern and scarcity of v4 distorts the market):

https://www.phpdeveloper.org.uk/should-government-mandate-ipv6-rollout/

#ipv6

pwaring, 4 months ago to random

Am I right in saying that, on every processor in commercial use (i.e. not something an academic has dreamed up to discuss a hypothetical that no one else cares about), ADD is a faster (fewer cycles) operation than DIV?

(I know that a compiler might change a division to MUL, ADD, and some form of shift.)

#Assembly

pwaring, 8 months ago to random

Wow, Steve Furber has just retired from the University of Manchester Department of Computer Science. Feels like the end of an era - he taught me hardware design (sadly I was a lousy student as I had no interest in that part of CS) and was Head of Department. I did help him fix his Mac though when I was a member of staff.

If you have a smart phone, you're very likely using a later version of an architecture he helped develop.

pwaring, 5 months ago to AncientHistory

Nice start to this morning: email alert from Google Scholar telling me my MA dissertation has been cited again. It's described as a 'historical study'! Despite it being a topic I chose for a laugh (and somehow got away with it), it's been cited at least 6 times, whereas my 'serious' MPhil thesis has never been cited.

https://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?cites=16108384199762249642&as_sdt=2005&sciodt=0,5&hl=en

#AncientHistory #RomeTotalWar #academia

pwaring, 11 months ago to random

Amazon: To buy this product, you must verify your age to demonstrate you are over 18.

Me: I've been a customer for over 18 years...

pwaring, 7 months ago to random

Had a weird dream last night where I was appointed Vice Chancellor of the University of Manchester. Some staff were unsure whether I had the skills and experience for the role but most of them were won over when I drew up a list of unnecessary meetings to be cancelled with immediate effect.

pwaring, 1 year ago to random

Dilemma at the supermarket today: do I buy the items that are about to go past their use by date, thus reducing food waste, or do I leave them to be marked down so that someone with less income can buy them cheaply?

pwaring, 8 months ago to random

I knew that electric cars had fewer moving parts but I didn't realise until recently how big the gap is.

VW golf (petrol engine): 113
Chevy Bolt (electric motor): 3

Potentially a big issue for repair shops as there's less to go wrong, and for manufacturers as the reduced complexity means fewer workers needed (with lower skill sets?)

Source: Investors Chronicle, 29th September 2023