gtsc's comments | WingNews

gtsc | 13 years ago | on: Ask HN: Is this bad security? "Enter the second and fifth password characters"

HSBC asks for a primary password as well as 3 random characters of a secondary password. They could hash your original password + each of the characters in your secondary password, which would mean an attacker would have to crack your primary password first if the database was compromised.

From a UI perspective though it's pretty annoying having to enter 3 random characters of a (complex) password, although it's something you get used to.

gtsc | 13 years ago | on: Ubuntu's Plans To Implement UEFI SecureBoot: No GRUB2

Uh, how exactly? The whole point of the private key is that it's only known to MS...

gtsc | 13 years ago | on: The Sandia Cooler: A totally new CPU heatsink design that's 30% more efficient

Random fan on Newegg has ~2W power draw, so not much. But many processors are limited by heat dissipation, so better heat transfer could mean faster clock speeds (think water cooling, but much more convenient). Also means the fans could run much quieter (see the video), which makes sense since most of the fan's energy is going into noise/vibrations.

gtsc | 13 years ago | on: The Sandia Cooler: A totally new CPU heatsink design that's 30% more efficient

Heading of link is wrong: original source article says its 30 TIMES more efficient, not 30%. This would be a seriously big deal if it's actually commercialized: based on the Sandia video I have no doubt they have a working prototype.

gtsc | 14 years ago | on: How Not To Sort By Average Rating

Here's an even simpler way to think about it: it's the left point of the standard 95% confidence interval from the Central Limit Theorem plus a hack for small sample sizes. The Wikipedia page says the hack is almost equivalent to estimating p = (X+2)/(n+4) i.e. assuming each item starts with two upvotes and two downvotes.