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3151

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: WizNote (a PIM from China) - Mini-Review + Provisional User Forum

« Last post by IainB on February 21, 2014, 03:35 PM »

thanks for those screenshots ianb!  that helps convince me even more how great this program is.  i had my doubts for a while.

-superboyac (February 21, 2014, 12:23 PM)

I am very pleased if they were of help/use. I would suggest that one of the best ways of establishing whether the program itself is of real use would be to find out first-hand, taking the engineer's systematic "suck-it-and-see" approach.
I learned the value of this approach years ago when testing out combinations of different jets (comprising jets/valves/aerators) in a Weber 40DCOE that had been bolted onto the inlet manifold of a 3.5L V8 Oldsmobile/Buick engine in a sports car. The object of the exercise was to establish what combination of jets would lead to optimum fuel consumption across the range of driving conditions in city, motorway and urban driving circuits without sacrificing power (response and acceleration). I read two books written by the engineer who had designed this particular carburettor, one book was mostly theory, and one was mostly guidelines on practical application. This was where I first met the phrase used by the designer who recommended that the reader take a systematic "'suck-it-and-see" approach. It is a concept that seems to transfer very well for application in the domain of software testing/evaluation.

Whilst I will usually always have some basic standard criteria for the evaluation of software, I am well aware that one cannot think of everything and that taking a systematic "suck-it-and-see" approach opens up the opportunity for inadvertent discovery of some potentially new/useful feature of the thing being evaluated.
This particularly seems to be the case with WizNote, where one of the greatest constraints appears to be the lack of comprehensive English documentation.

Thus, if you were to (say) start trialling the software yourself in a similar manner and documenting your knowledge in this discussion thread, then maybe we could create some more synergy. I am unable to commit to more than intermittent bits of time to test the thing, so your input could be really helpful.
You can take get synergy in a forum like DCF. @urlwolf's appraisal and lists of features, for example, was what started the ball rolling and gave me the impetus to kick off this mini-review.

3152

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: WizNote (a PIM from China) - Mini-Review + Provisional User Forum

« Last post by IainB on February 21, 2014, 05:50 AM »

Deliberately left blank.

3153

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: WizNote (a PIM from China) - Mini-Review + Provisional User Forum

« Last post by IainB on February 21, 2014, 05:41 AM »

Ah, I have just figured out how to switch off text speech in mid-sentence. Go to the Systray and there is a WizTTS (Text-To-Speech) icon. Right click it and select exit.
If you click on the Speech | Options in WN, it says the TTS is Microsoft Anna - English (United States)

Microsoft Anna is the standard TTS  - it is an Accessibility Feature in MS Office 2013 called "Speak" - it does not appear on the ribbon. It reads text rather well - it's quite smart - though it is a bit jerky.
For example it reads the text 2014-02-10 2218hrs as "February 10th twenty-fourteen two thousand two hundred eighteen hours" (i.e., it understood that "hrs" was an abbreviation for "hours"). If it had been smarter, it would have read it in the correct military format of "twenty-two eighteen hours".

3154

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: WizNote (a PIM from China) - Mini-Review + Provisional User Forum

« Last post by IainB on February 21, 2014, 05:00 AM »

...I still don't get how to use markdown with wiznote though...

-urlwolf (February 21, 2014, 02:37 AM)

Well, I'm not sure I understand what "markdown" is, other than an alternative non-html method of changing font styles and font weighting, but have you  - for example - saved a web page into WN and then gone into it and edited it? I have, and it's amazingly easy. Is that "markdown"?

For example:

3155

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: WizNote (a PIM from China) - Mini-Review + Provisional User Forum

« Last post by IainB on February 20, 2014, 07:14 PM »

Does anyone know how to operate with markdown?
I see a plugin in the list, but how does it work?

-urlwolf (February 15, 2014, 01:11 PM)

This might help - some more info:

More Features
2014-02-18 Features
1, support markdown rendering

Support for the knowledge notes Windows, iPhone, iPad, Android, Mac Edition
Not only can create notes, you can also create a beautiful note with a simple syntax
2, @ save to note is known, the permanent collection of micro-blog content

Support for the knowledge notes Windows, iPhone, iPad, Android, Web, Mac Edition
See the valuable content you want to save microblogging down, or comment directly forwarded microblogging and @ save notes to know the content will be automatically saved to the knowledge that the note "microblogging Favorites" folder.
3, the micro-channel public accounts, the contents of the permanent collection of micro-channel

Support for the knowledge notes Windows, iPhone, iPad, Android, Web, Mac Edition
Prefer typing notes directly and is known to dialogue; trying to micro-letter valuable content preserved; directly send text, audio, links, address, location is known to the notes of the micro-channel public accounts, the content will be automatically saved to the notes to know is known to "micro letter Favorites" directory notes.
4, page save page content

Support for the knowledge notes Windows, Web, Mac Edition
How Web content pages, but want to preserve the entire page content, to the right to know just save notes, select the page to save the contents of several pages of notes will be saved to know.
Page contains links to web content will be saved to the knowledge of notes.
5, squared diary

Support for the Windows version known notes
Without having to think too much about the format, content to simply lose
6, support for external editors

Support for the Windows version known notes
Notes can be used directly for the known word, vim and other external editor, think what kind of format, to know the notes can be found.
7, a variety of notes template

Support for the Windows version known notes
Daily Review, meeting notes, Cornell notes template, etc., do not take the time to consider the format, directly brought on by.
8, photo editing

  Support for the knowledge notes Windows, Android version
 Want to note in the picture little circle at the end and Android client pc can be achieved
9, support the notes posted to various blog

Support for the Windows version known notes
Can be sent to Netease blog, Sina blog, etc., you can also publish directly to wordpress, quickly share notes to more people
10, desktop notes, task lists and calendar events

Support for the Windows version known notes
You can easily add desktop notes, task lists and calendar events, also supports synchronization with Google Calendar.
11, the lock is known notes

Support for the knowledge notes Windows, iPhone, iPad, Android version
 Short-term leave, locked to know notes, to prevent others peeping.
12, a network management

Support for the Windows version known notes
Can create a new contact, you can also import contacts installed plug directly into contact.
Constantly updated. . .

From WizNote

3156

Living Room / Re: 20th Annual International Deming Research Seminar - March 3-4, 2014 (NY, USA).

« Last post by IainB on February 20, 2014, 05:15 PM »

...Oh, That guy. From what I recall of the story told when the factory I was working at years ago was being switched over to Just In Time (JIT) manufacturing. These techniques were indeed so new and revolutionary at the time that the current prevailing wisdom infested business establishment in the US had flat out laughed at him, and then basically foisted him on the Japanese after the war. Which then backfired rather handily for the Japanese and is much of the why the current top selling car in the US a currently the Toyota Corolla ... And has been for something like the past 12 years (which annoys me to no end).

-Stoic Joker (February 20, 2014, 01:02 PM)

That's seems sort of right, but a bit jumbled up. Refer to the Timeline given in The Deming Institute page.

3157

Living Room / Re: 20th Annual International Deming Research Seminar - March 3-4, 2014 (NY, USA).

« Last post by IainB on February 20, 2014, 04:39 PM »

If one wanted to learn more about Deming and his approach to process improvement, a good place to start could well be The Deming Institute, because they seem to be focussed on Deming and are "just the facts m'am" and no BS.
A lot of the Deming material was formerly available via MIT (where he taught) and on the Internet in the public domain from there and from some other educational institutions. It seems to have all been expunged (though I have some copies) and put under the umbrella of The Deming Institute.
Their website currently has these sections:

• About The Institute
• Deming Today
• The Man
• Overview
• Theories & Teachings
• Photo Gallery
• Selected Articles
• Timeline
• Events
• News & Media
• Ways to Give
• Store

__________________________

There are a lot of useful books and teaching materials for sale in the Store. Looks expensive. I'd suggest you could do worse than check on Amazon for used copies first, before buying from the store.
In section The Man, they say:

...The impact of his revolutionary ideas has been compared to those of Copernicus, Darwin and Freud. ...
__________________

Now that might be true, but some people (not me, you understand) might say that there is a very big difference between those great seekers after truth and Deming, in that the knowledge contained in the writings and speech of Copernicus, Darwin and Freud is freely accessible, is available for free, and is not locked up in commercial copyright by some parasitic self-appointed authority and moneygrubbing organisation acting as keeper of the keys and that extorts a small ransom from any student as the price for such important knowledge/education - but I couldn't possibly comment.

As a mathematician/statistician, Deming was indeed a seeker after truth, and over his lifetime he contributed a great deal to knowledge in the domain of operations research.
He was scientific and pragmatic, advocating the use of simple statistical control charts (as per Shewhart) as the way to understand a business process. (This was where an understanding of simple variance analysis proved so useful.) It was basically "Find out for yourself. Study the process using statistical control charts and you will find the observations are the process talking to you, telling you about itself, and you can use the data to understand and prove everything that happens in the process. Then use the PDSA to improve the process."

Some relevant quotes:

"In god we trust, all others bring data."
"Action that is not based on sound theory/good practice is irrational by definition."

If you wanted to know what the Japanese thought (and still think) of Deming's contribution to their country and its huge economic development and success, look up the history of JUSE and The Deming Prize, and do some research on what that flower-shaped thingy is that Deming has on a sash he wears over his dinner jacket in one of the photos in that small collage in The Man.

3158

Living Room / Re: 20th Annual International Deming Research Seminar - March 3-4, 2014 (NY, USA).

« Last post by IainB on February 20, 2014, 01:54 PM »

Deming was way too conceptual, compared to other quality philosophers of that time, especially Juran and populist Crosby. ...

-Attronarch (February 20, 2014, 11:31 AM)

Yes, well, like Deming said, "...what he was telling us about was actually very simple, but that it seemed hard to understand as a lot of it seemed to go against conventional wisdom - what we had been taught or indoctrinated with - and so was difficult to accept/internalise."
Misconceptions abound.

3159

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: WizNote (a PIM from China) - Mini-Review + Provisional User Forum

« Last post by IainB on February 20, 2014, 01:43 PM »

Just for information, below is a sample clip of the translated-to-English text from the blog.wiz.cn (auto-translated via Google Chrome). There have been quite a few posts to that blog, and they are quite well-written and well-illustrated with helpful screen shots and diagrams. Worth a look if you would like to learn more.
Auto-translation via Google Chrome is a real boon, blast their eyes...
(Copied below sans embedded hyperlinks/images.)

Offline reading capabilities
2014-02-18 Features

Anytime you want to see good travel plans, travel Raiders do? Before starting to put these data into knowledge under the notes and offline download, so smooth travel all the way!
Want to travel on the road quickly see teams share information? There are notes of data synchronization network environment, people are not together, they can work together!
Want in the other car, queuing, car and other piecemeal time to read their own tidied learning item? Before work in a network environment, save offline download notes for known learning materials, to improve their grasp of fragmented time!
Offline reading feature is completely free, all users can enjoy using.
No network, can still work, study. Data roaming can not afford injuries, no google, Baidu, e-mail, then use the knowledge that your notes offline reading capabilities, view, search correct. I remember in the case of networks, the need to download offline viewing notes oh.
Offline environment as usual create, edit notes, there will be automatically synchronized to the server under the network environment .

Do not know how to use offline reading capabilities? Just following a few simple steps

Open the phone side is known notebook (iPhone, iPad, Android) client
Find the setting options for the known notes
Find the "personal data offline download" or "group data offline download"
Select the data you want to download offline viewing
Click the Sync button
After the end of the synchronization, notes data download is successful, you can under no circumstances offline viewing notes the network .

Do not know how to use offline reading capabilities? Just following a few simple steps

Open the phone side is known notebook (iPhone, iPad, Android) client
Find the setting options for the known notes
Find the "personal data offline download" or "group data offline download"
Select the data you want to download offline viewing
Click the Sync button
After the end of the synchronization, notes data download is successful, you can under no circumstances offline viewing notes the network.
With the knowledge that your notes offline reading capabilities, allowing you to live, work experience in all aspects of unexpected harvest!
From WizNote

3160

Living Room / Re: 20th Annual International Deming Research Seminar - March 3-4, 2014 (NY, USA).

« Last post by IainB on February 20, 2014, 08:19 AM »

I don't know of any summaries about Deming's work that might help one to learn much about it. His book "Out of the Crisis" is probably recommended reading, and also the experiment with the red and white beads is very important.
Maybe it was just me, but I found him quite hard going. Even though I attended one of his 4-day seminars, it was really only on the morning of the last day that the penny began to drop. I nearly missed it. Up until that point I had almost completely misunderstood what he had been on about - though, in my arrogance, I had thought I understood.  After the epiphany hit me, I felt somewhat ashamed of my previously ignorant state.
He had pre-warned us that it was simple, but seemed hard to understand. He said he'd spent a great deal of his working life trying to simplify the complexity of what Shewhart had taught.

3161

The Getting Organized Experiment of 2009 / Re: Warning: Time is the single biggest cause of stress in our western culture

« Last post by IainB on February 20, 2014, 07:51 AM »

"Time is an illusion - lunchtime doubly so." from HHGTTG, by Douglas Adams.

3162

Developer's Corner / PWCT- Programming Without Coding Technology: Free Science & Engineering software

« Last post by IainB on February 20, 2014, 07:19 AM »

Just stumbled upon this - it was referred to in the latest SourceForge.net Update [email protected]

Looks rather interesting:

Programming Without Coding Technology
PWCT is a general-purpose visual programming tool  designed for novice and expert programmers.    A novice programmer can use PWCT to learn programming  concepts like Data Structure, Control Structure, Programming Paradigm,..etc.  An expert programmer can use PWCT to develop large and/or complex software.

See also their website: http://doublesvsoop.sourceforge.net/

3163

Living Room / Re: 20th Annual International Deming Research Seminar - March 3-4, 2014 (NY, USA).

« Last post by IainB on February 20, 2014, 07:11 AM »

Just got a summary on Wkikpedia -
(Deming circle / PDCA)

-tomos (February 20, 2014, 03:49 AM)

I think you might find that that is not "a summary of Deming" or of anything much, but rather just a description of "the PDCA/PDSA cycle" (aka "the  Shewhart cycle").
Take care. The Wikipedia article you linked to seems to rapidly wander off into BS territory with the OPDCA and "Lean [insert word here]", where you'd probably need thigh-length gumboots to wade through all the management consulting BS.
I'd be very surprised if you found any of that at the seminar.

3164

Living Room / 20th Annual International Deming Research Seminar - March 3-4, 2014 (NY, USA).

« Last post by IainB on February 19, 2014, 08:05 PM »

Thought I'd post this in case anyone on the forum might be interested and able to take advantage of the opportunity to learn more about what people may have done using Deming's suggestions for "transformation" of business. A pity they only hold these seminars in the US. I've never attended one yet, but I'd still love to go. I see they are going to touch on operations research too.
One of the most useful and life-changing experiences for me was attending one of Deming's 4-day seminars. He said that what he was telling us about was actually very simple, but that it seemed hard to understand as a lot of it seemed to go against conventional wisdom - what we had been taught or indoctrinated with - and so was difficult to accept/internalise. He was right.
When I finally got to understanding what he was on about, I started to employ his approach and methods in my business as an IT and management consultant, and it led to assignments that were successfully completed, made me a lot of money, got repeat business (assignments), and got me a reputation for being something of a business process wizard - when in fact, all I had been doing was correctly applying tested theory and good/"best" practice, and Deming's approach and methods.

Read more about it at the link.
(Copied below sans embedded hyperlinks/images.)

20th Annual International Deming Research Seminar
March 3-4, 2014 : New York, NY USA

The Deming Institute is a proud Co-Sponsor of this exchange of knowledge

Experts in healthcare and education, as well as practitioners in government, manufacturing, and service industries will reveal their findings for the first time in two days of presentations, exchanges, and roundtables with other academics and practitioners who gather from around the world to share their ideas and explore Dr. W. Edwards Deming’s theory of management in a wide-ranging context. The forum is The 20th Annual International Deming Research Seminar, March 3-4 in New York City.

Be among the first to learn of a new direction in management and operations research.

Hear the latest ideas on use of incentives, sustaining company success, performance management systems, enhancing commerce, teams, appraisals, measurement systems, fear, trust, ethics, and leadership.

Student Discount (Student ID Required) is available through The Deming Cooperative.

No refunds within 10 days of the event, 50% refund 11 - 30 days prior to event. Substitutions always welcome.
Event Pricing:    Regular: $395

3165

Living Room / Re: DOTCOM saga - updates

« Last post by IainB on February 19, 2014, 04:59 PM »

Now the NZ judiciary have apparently reversed the decision that the Dotcom raid was illegal, though the FBI's taking of evidence is apparently still deemed as being illegal. One has no idea what the heck is going on or how long it may be before the decision(s) are changed again. PM John Keys seems to be wanting to make little comment and is keeping the thing at arm's length (as he should). No mention yet of how the apparent perjury by the police is to be addressed.
Here's a a very good summary from Stuff.co.nz
(Copied below sans embedded hyperlinks/images.)

Dotcom raid legal, FBI taking evidence not
AIMEE GULLIVER AND KIRSTY JOHNSTON
Last updated 14:24 19/02/2014
Fairfax NZ

The Court of Appeal has ruled that the raids on Kim DotCom's mansion were legal - however the removal of electronic goods was an unauthorised breach.
Kim Dotcom
RAIDS WERE LEGAL: Though the warrants to raid Kim Dotcom's Auckland mansion in 2012 were flawed, the Court of Appeal says they were still valid.
Related Links
Court of Appeal judgment: Her Majesty's Attorney-General v Kim Dotcom
Crime
Man dies in river fall Lundy retrial delayed Dotcom raid legal, FBI taking evidence not Police not called over possible $15m fraud Top court throws out killer's claim for damages Sorry mum, your car's been confiscated Sikh leader escapes jail Sex worker heard about Mob 'tax' Stabbing was self defence, jury finds Home detention for fatal race

Police raids on Kim Dotcom's mansion in 2012 have been declared legal, but FBI removal of electronic information seized in the search was an unauthorised breach, the Court of Appeal has found.

    Court of Appeal judgment: Her Majesty's Attorney-General v Kim Dotcom (.pdf)

Dotcom's legal team was reviewing the rulings, and would likely seek leave to appeal to the Supreme Court over the validity of the warrants, the internet tycoon's lawyer Ira Rothken said.

Police executed search warrants on the properties of Dotcom and computer programmer Bram van der Kolk on January 20, 2012, seizing 135 electronic items including laptops, computers, portable hard drives, flash storage devices and servers.

In a judgment released today, the Court of Appeal said the warrants were executed at the request of the United States Department of Justice which is seeking the extradition of Dotcom, van der Kolk and others to face trial on a number of charges including breach of copyright and money laundering involving "substantial sums of money".

The High Court ruled last June the search warrants executed on Dotcom's mansion at Coatesville in Auckland's rural north, were invalid because they were not sufficiently specific.

Justice Winkelmann ruled the search warrants "did not adequately describe the offences to which they related" and "authorised the seizure of such very broad categories of items that unauthorised irrelevant material would inevitably be captured".

No offence was identified in the warrants which merely referred to "breach of copyright" - an offence in the United States, but there is no criminal offence of breach of copyright in New Zealand.

The warrants also did not stipulate which country's laws the alleged offence was committed under, Justice Winkelmann found.

The other defects went "to the heart of the warrants and could not be properly categorised as minor", she ruled.

The attorney-general appealed this decision, acknowledging the search warrants were "far from perfect", but that leading authorities required the court to adopt a "common-sense approach taking into account the particular circumstances of the case".

In its judgment today, the Court of Appeal said that while the warrants were defective in some respects, the deficiencies were not sufficient to mean they should be nullified.

Dotcom and the other respondents would have understood the nature and scope of the warrants, especially in light of their arrest warrants – which were not defective - and the explanations given to them by the police when the properties were searched, the Court of Appeal found.

In these circumstance, no miscarriage of justice occurred.

"[We] are satisfied that the defects in the search warrants have not caused any significant prejudice to the respondents beyond the prejudice caused inevitably by the execution of a search warrant," the Appeal Court judgment said.

In relation to the electronic information, the court said the police wrongly permitted the FBI to take to the United States copies of some of the electronic items seized in the raid.

In June the High Court ruled the removal of the copies of the electronic items was in breach of the solicitor-general's direction to the commissioner of police that the items were to remain in the commissioner's "custody and control" until further direction.

The Appeal Court dismissed the Attorney-General's appeal on that matter, and held the removal was unlawful and contrary to the solicitor-general's direction.

None of the other issues relating to Dotcom currently before the courts were dealt with by the Court of Appeal's judgment today.

POLITICAL REACTION

Prime Minister John Key said the case would drag on well past the election.

"What the Court of Appeal has found is that the police search warrants were valid. The only point I would make is there are going to be a lot of twists and turns in terms of litigation with Mr Dotcom. These matters are highly likely to be appealed so we'll just leave it at that."

He said the ruling proved the police were correct when they said the mistakes they made in relation to the raids were "form over substance".

"One of the major arguments were that the police acted in an invalid way that's just not the finding of the Court of Appeal.

The case would likely not be done before the election, he said.

"If somebody wants to appeal an extradition and take legal action at every nook and cranny then it can take a very long time."

Key would not say whether the finding increased the likelihood of Dotcom being extradited.

Green Party co-leader Russel Norman, who last week called the case against Dotcom flawed and said he would move to block any extradition, refused to say whether the verdict had changed his view.

The case had a long way to go "and I'm not going to get into every twist and turn of it".

"It's not really a matter for me, obviously it's between the Crown and Kim Dotcom."

His comments last week were based on the information available to him at the time and he would not reconsider those until the court process was complete.

"There will no doubt be new facts arise over the course of the year ... Let's see what happens over the course of the year and then we'll see what's going on."

DOTCOM EXPLAINED

Kim Dotcom's legal case is made up of four separate strands in four different courts and it's got a long way to go yet, so here's a bluffer's guide.

1. Disclosure: Kim Dotcom's lawyers want to know what evidence the US Government has against him. The US says "disclosure" of evidence isn't required for an extradition hearing. Although the High Court ordered the evidence to be handed over, the Court of Appeal overturned that decision. This argument is now awaiting a ruling by the Supreme Court.

2. Search and Seizure: Last year, the High Court ruled the search warrants used in the January raid on Dotcom's house were too broad, and therefore illegal. Today, that was overturned and the Court of Appeal ruled that while the warrants were defective, they were legal. However, the Appeal Court judges agreed data taken from Dotcom, "cloned", and given to the FBI was unauthorised. Dotcom is likely to take the search warrant decision to the Supreme Court as overturning it could help with his extradition case.

3. Compensation from police and the GCSB: This is related to the search and seizure. Dotcom's team are effectively suing police and the spy agency for $6m for illegally monitoring his communications, then searching his home and taking his property. While today's judgement undermines part of this case - the use of unlawful warrants - Dotcom could still sue for the spying, the unlawful removal of data, and what he believes were "over-the-top" tactics and human rights breaches by the police during the raid.

4. The Extradition: Originally set down for March 2013, due to the myriad of complications in the case, the extradition has now been moved to later this year, with further delays likely. Usually extradition hearings are relatively straightforward, but don't cross your fingers in this case.

TIMELINE

2010

Kim Dotcom, an internet businessman with old convictions for hacking and insider trading (wiped under Germany's clean-slate law), applies for New Zealand residency. Rents mansion of Chrisco founder Richard Bradley in Coatesville.

November: Granted residency.

2011

Early 2011: FBI asks NZ to help investigation of Dotcom's file-sharing business Megaupload.

December 2011: GCSB spies on Dotcom at request of police.

2012

January 20: Armed raid on Dotcom's home. He, Finn Batato, Mathias Ortmann and Bram van der Kolk arrested. FBI accuse him of half-billion-dollar copyright theft. He denies it.

February 16: Ofcanz and GCSB debrief; police raise concerns surveillance may have been illegal because of permanent residency status.

February 22: Dotcom is granted bail.

February 27: GCSB's lawyer concludes surveillance was lawful.

June 28: In the New Zealand High Court, Justice Helen Winkelmann rules the raid on the Dotcom mansion was illegal.

August 10: Ofcanz's Detective Inspector Grant Wormald tells High Court about a "mystery group" of officials at

December 14 meeting.

August 16: Deputy PM Bill English signs certificate suppressing GCSB involvement in Dotcom raid. The fact gets out anyway.

September 13: GCSB says it became aware the spying was illegal.

September 17: Key launches an inquiry, headed by Inspector-General of Intelligence Paul Neazor.

September 24: Crown files memorandum confirming GCSB involvement. Key goes public.

September 27: Key apologises to Dotcom after Neazor says GCSB surveillance was illegal as Dotcom is NZ resident.

September 28: Greens' Russel Norman lodges complaint with police over GCSB.

October 1: Cabinet Secretary Rebecca Kitteridge begins review of GCSB.

All year: Numerous legal hearings in NZ and US over bail conditions, the legality of the raid and attempts to extradite Dotcom.

2013

January 20: Dotcom launches his new "Mega" file-storage business, with a celebrity-studded party.

March 7: The Court of Appeal rules Dotcom can sue the GCSB and NZ police, upholding a previous High Court decision.

April 3: Scrutiny of GCSB head Ian Fletcher reveals he got the job after an approach by Key. The pair were childhood friends.

April 8: Fairfax's Andrea Vance reveals details from leaked copy of Kitteridge's report into GCSB, which says more than 80 people may have been illegally spied on.

April 9: Kitteridge Report officially released.

June 9: CIA whistleblower Edward Snowden reveals Prism surveillance programme by American NSA. Dotcom talks up links between GCSB and NSA.

July 3: Dotcom appears at select committee hearings on proposed law to let GCSB spy on NZers. Dotcom and Key trade insults.

July 30: Dispute over evidence disclosure reaches the New Zealand Supreme Court.

August 21: New Zealand Government rushes through law change giving GSCB powers to spy on NZers.

2014

January 15: Dotcom unveils a logo revealing his political venture, the Internet Party.

February 19: The Court of Appeal deems the raids on the Dotcom mansion to be legal.

- © Fairfax NZ News

3166

Living Room / The peer review game

« Last post by IainB on February 19, 2014, 03:23 AM »

It rather looks like someone at the U. of Bristol (UK) is prepared to address the real issue - the elephant in the room - i.e., "increasing concern surrounding the reproducibility of much published research". Some people may find it surprising that this is discussed in the journal Nature. Unfortunately, it is of course behind a paywall.
Bishop Hill mentions it:
_________________________________
The peer review game
Feb 19, 2014 Journals

There is an interesting letter in Nature this week. In-Uck Park of the University of Bristol and his colleagues have adopted something of a game-theoretic approach to try to understand aspects of the peer review process.

The objective of science is to advance knowledge, primarily in two interlinked ways: circulating ideas, and defending or criticizing the ideas of others. Peer review acts as the gatekeeper to these mechanisms. Given the increasing concern surrounding the reproducibility of much published research, it is critical to understand whether peer review is intrinsically susceptible to failure, or whether other extrinsic factors are responsible that distort scientists’ decisions. Here we show that even when scientists are motivated to promote the truth, their behaviour may be influenced, and even dominated, by information gleaned from their peers’ behaviour, rather than by their personal dispositions. This phenomenon, known as herding, subjects the scientific community to an inherent risk of converging on an incorrect answer and raises the possibility that, under certain conditions, science may not be self-correcting. We further demonstrate that exercising some subjectivity in reviewer decisions, which serves to curb the herding process, can be beneficial for the scientific community in processing available information to estimate truth more accurately. By examining the impact of different models of reviewer decisions on the dynamic process of publication, and thereby on eventual aggregation of knowledge, we provide a new perspective on the ongoing discussion of how the peer-review process may be improved.

Which is a pretty interesting result, and one which I think will ring true with many readers at BH at least. Here's an excerpt from the conclusions:

Science may ...not be as self-correcting as is commonly assumed, and peer-review models which encourage objectivity over subjectivity may reduce the ability of science to selfcorrect. Although herding among  agents is well understood in cases where the incentives directly reward acting in accord with the crowd (for example, financial markets), it is instructive to see that it can occur when agents (that is, scientists) are motivated by the pursuit of truth, and when gatekeepers (that is, reviewers and editors) exist with the same motivation. In such cases, it is important that individuals put weight on their private signals, in order to be able to escape from herding. Behavioural economic experiments indicate that prediction markets, which aggregate private signals acrossmarket participants, might provide information advantages.Knowledge in scientific research is often highly diffuse, across individuals and groups, and publishing and peer-review models should attempt to capture this.We have discussed the importance of allowing reviewers to express subjective opinions in their recommendations, but other approaches, such as the use of post-publication peer review, may achieve the same end.

3167

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by IainB on February 19, 2014, 02:16 AM »

Oops!
Little boy: Mommy, can we drive over to Google Las Vegas Bird Fries again and get another box of those yummy crispy fried birds and BBQ sauce? They're finger-lickin' good!    
(Ivanpah - Google's new ‘$2.2 Billion Bird-Scorching Solar Project’.)




Well, if it wasn't a desert before, it certainly will be now!    
That's the way to do it! I guess that's a real "Do no evil" environmental footprint of several hundred acres, eh?
Priceless. Absolute ROFLMAO moment. Tears in eyes.

3168

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: AHK script to insert date and time to file name

« Last post by IainB on February 18, 2014, 08:44 PM »

@4wd: Thanks for the AutoIT code.
I just did pretty much the same thing in AHK out of interest (a training exercise) and for @metaDCoder (if needed):

Notes:

• This works for files and folders alike.
  
  
• I did this for xplorer² only, as that is the file explorer I use and I am unsure what the Active Window name for Windows Explorer is (or should be). You need a check like this so as to ensure that the code only runs when your file explorer is the active window, so that way it does not try to run when no file has been selected in a window for some other non-file explorer application.
  I did this generically for Windows File Explorer otherwise. If I was doing this for myself, I might have some slightly different code as xplorer² has a command to pass the file name/path directly to the clipboard
  
  
• If you want to test it at each stage, you can un-comment (remove the semi-colon) at the start of each of the three MsgBox lines.
  
  
• I have assumed that the file CREATION date time is what is wanted. There are options in the FileGetTime instruction:
  M = Modification time (this is the default if the parameter is omitted)
  C = Creation time
  A = Last access time
  

Code: Autohotkey [Select]

1. ;=============================================================
2. ^+G::  ; Ctrl+Shift+G grabs folder/file path to clipboard and puts CREATION date/time into Clipboard
3.         FileDateTime := ""      ; define and clear variable
4.         FileNamePath := ""      ; define and clear variable
5.         SetTitleMatchMode, 2    ; match must be for specified string anywhere in the window Title name
6.         IfWinActive,  xplorer² ; do this if xplorer² is the string in the active window Title
7.         {
8.         clipboard := "" ; clear clipboard
9.         SendInput, ^c   ; copies file path and name to clipboard
10.         ClipWait, 2 ; wait for up to 2 seconds for state change before proceeding, so as to ensure capture to clipboard
11. ;       MsgBox, 0, Pause 1 - Clipboard content, %Clipboard%     ; display clipboard text contents (for testing)
12.         }
13.         else    ; return (do nothing)
14.         {
15.         return
16.         }
17.         FileNamePath = %Clipboard%      ; puts just plain text of file name and path from clipboard into variable
18. ;       MsgBox, 0, Pause 2 - FileNamePath, %FileNamePath%       ; display variable text contents (for testing)
19.         FileGetTime, FileDateTime, %FileNamePath%, C    ; get file CREATION date/time for named path/file
20.         FormatTime, FileDateTime, %FileDateTime%, yyyy-MM-dd HHmm  ; It will look like 2010-12-21 0353
21. ;       MsgBox, 0, Pause 3 - formatted FileDateTime, %FileDateTime%     ; display variable text contents
22.         clipboard = %FileDateTime%      ; put the formatted date/time into clipboard
23.         return
24. ;-------------------------------------------------------------------
25. ;============================================================

3169

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: AHK script to insert date and time to file name

« Last post by IainB on February 18, 2014, 04:18 PM »

@metaDCoder: Ah, thanks for that link to http://www.autohotkey.com...ath-for-files-on-desktop/
I shall write/try out a script for this idea and post it here when I get it to work.

3170

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Perfect Effects 8 Premium Edition *FREE* (again) for a limited time

« Last post by IainB on February 18, 2014, 01:08 AM »

Well, I downloaded it, installed it, and ran it and at startup it failed with an obscure and apparently random error number - different every time.
So I repeated after a second download. Same result.
About to give up on it unless anyone can suggest a workaround.

Ah wait, I just found this in the support page:

I am receiving an “Unknown Error – xxx” – the number is different each time.
This error appears immediately after launch and is a different number each time.   Please follow these instructions to resolve this issue 1. Go to: StartControl PanelAdministrative ToolsServices 2. In this window, look for these three services: Windows Event Log, Task Scheduler, and Nalpeiron Licensing Service 3. Make sure all three services Status is listed as “Running” and…

EDIT: Fixed it:

...Instead of double clicking on the .exe installer file please RIGHT CLICK and choose RUN AS THE ADMINISTRATOR...

Worked a treat. Nice GUI. Will find out if it is of any use to me now...

3171

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Perfect Effects 8 Premium Edition *FREE* (again) for a limited time

« Last post by IainB on February 17, 2014, 03:43 AM »

Looks interesting. Thanks!

3172

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: AHK script to insert date and time to file name

« Last post by IainB on February 17, 2014, 02:08 AM »

You'd be able to use AHK FileGetTime for that:
From the Help file:
Parameters

• OutputVar: The name of the variable in which to store the retrieved date-time in format YYYYMMDDHH24MISS. The time is your own local time, not UTC/GMT.
• Filename: The name of the target file or folder, which is assumed to be in %A_WorkingDir% if an absolute path isn't specified. If omitted, the current file of the innermost enclosing File-Loop will be used instead.
• WhichTime: Which timestamp to retrieve:
  M = Modification time (this is the default if the parameter is omitted)
  C = Creation time
  A = Last access time
  

I haven't used it in an AHK script, but it should presumably work fine.
First, you'd need to decide which of the three file date/times you wanted to retrieve by default - M, C, or A.
The new bit for me would be pinpointing the input file from which to take the date/time.

3173

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by IainB on February 17, 2014, 12:45 AM »

deja vu
[/quote]

Doh! I forgot that's where I got it from. Was in a huge rush and tidying up my image files and didn't think to check first.

3174

General Software Discussion / Re: Beware the Samsung rootkit

« Last post by IainB on February 16, 2014, 05:31 PM »

I could be wrong, of course, but I can't see that this discussion has in fact so far identified any real risk/threat - it seems to be all supposition.
I would recommend great care. The link to the allegations of spyware in the Kies install is to a discussion here that levels alarmist criticism without actually proving/substantiating what is said. Even some of the comments in that thread seem to throw doubt on the validity of the alarmism.

If you wanted to contain/inhibit the "suspect" software or DLLs - just-in-case (nothing wrong with paranoia) - without disrupting anything or disabling the Kies installation, then it might be worth considering trying to do that via Windows Software Restrictions Policies.

By the way, TotalVirus and Malwarebytes do not seem to object to the software involved, but that's my copy of the installed software. Check your own software as it may be different.

3175

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by IainB on February 16, 2014, 12:45 AM »

This probably wouldn't be permitted speech in current PC-controlled education: