WHAT ATTRACTED YOUR ATTENTION TODAY?

[Big Kev]

A Typhoon doing aerobatics over Whitby this afternoon...

[Stanley]

That was the one Tiz.
David, I could be wrong and it was the last edition not this week's? It was definitely in there.

[Tizer]

The Lanelli wellness village project seems to have had some strange things going on: `Carmarthenshire County Council’s private-sector partner in the £250 million Wellness and Life Science Village development project...is a new incarnation of the dissolved Kent Neurosciences Ltd, the company with which the county council signed an exclusivity agreement in 2016,' and: `So the county council’s private-sector partner for a £250 million contract – incidentally the only company to tender for the opportunity – had no money and no employees, but six-figure debts and an ongoing reliance on loans from its directors.' Referring to one of the directors: `Rupert Harrison is listed at Companies House as a banker and attorney, and is a current director of some 19 companies, half of which are new and as at the end of July 2018 had not yet submitted accounts.' As Tripps would say, whatever could go wrong? `Reincarnation Shock at Llanelli’s £250m Wellness Village' LINK

[Tripps]

Well - if that's not the one that was in the Eye, then it should be.

The directors are Franz Hermann Dickmann (77), Dr Phyllis Holt-Dickmann (66), Rupert Knight Harrison (58), Kevin Stephen Smith (54), James Edward Dickmann (49), and former leader of Carmarthenshire County Council, Meryl Gravell (73).

The Wellness Centre is not just about money, of course, but it will need to be profitable if taxpayers are not to be saddled with liabilities, and there must be doubts over the current financial capacity of the West Wales population to buy heavily enough into the wellness vision to ensure its success. West Wales is, after all, one of the poorest parts of North West Europe.

[Stanley]

Private Eye is full of cunning wheezes like these, when it was first mooted I thought the Cardiff Lagoons was a good idea but as the truth emerged in PE I realised it was actually another cunning wheeze, part of which was the re-opening and development of a quarry across the water. Incidentally this idea hasn't quite died yet, planning applications are being made for the quarry and the locals are fighting against it tooth and nail.
What grabbed me was how unseasonably cold it was. The Met office tell us that there is no sign of any respite until the end of the month. Deep Joy!
I note also that the French nuclear power station that is the design basis for Hinkley Point has still not been signed off (and has a massive cost overrun) and this is part of the conditions attached to the Hinkley Point contract. We are getting near the deadline date in that contract so expect a reverse ferret very soon.
I have just noticed that tonight could be a good night for watching the Perseid Meteor shower which is forecast to be a notable one this year. It depends on the sky of course but there is a good chance it could be clear.

[plaques]

PE I realised it was actually another cunning wheeze, part of which was the re-opening and development of a quarry across the water.

I have always thought that the proposed bypass from a point near Brierfield to just past Foulridge was just a decoy to release more land for housing development. The land between the bypass and existing roads would be considered 'spoilt' making it available for premium priced housing.

[Tizer]

That's a standard ploy where we live, Plaques. The edge of the suburbs creeps outwards until a developer says `There's only those fields between the houses and the motorway; that gap needs filling in' and the planners let it through.

[Stanley]

I was listening to James Naughty examining classified advertisements on R4 and at one point he got into corsets. His informant, (A lady professor of Aeronautical Engineering no less!) told him something I have never heard before. Evidently some husbands, when lacing their wives in a morning would use complicated unique knots. The idea was that when they unlaced the ladies later they could tell if the lacing had been undone in the interim! A cunning ploy!

[PanBiker]

Urban myth I reckon. Unless my understanding of ladies corsets is flawed, unlacing would not be a requirement as a measure of unfaithfulness. Or don't these claimed complicated knot gentlemen understand the basics of access.

[Stanley]

They has their own agendas Ian and perhaps had different concerns.
The fact that my grand daughter has left Dubai this morning on her way over here..... She arrives in Manchester around 11:30.
Cloudy so no sight of the meteor shower.

[plaques]

Mussolini is back. "Say what you like about Mussolini, he made the trains run on time'
First Trenitalia has won the contract to run rail services on the West Coast Main Line.
Aberdeen-based firm First Group and Trenitalia UK, a subsidiary that is ultimately owned by the Italian government, will run the service as a 70-30 joint venture.
Trenitalia
We have just flogged off another bit of our strategic rail services to an EU based company and I thought we were about to leave the EU so that we could be in complete control of things?

[Stanley]

Quite P. And note that it has been done in a hurry before the long awaited report of the ongoing enquiry which leaks say is going to rubbish the present franchise system. I have great sympathy for those who have to use the system and put up with paying increased sums for overcrowded and unreliable service.
The rain.......
Overnight news that global stock markets are opening quite low and there is a sense of unease.
Later. News that a teenage girl(?) called Dorothy has tweeted about her mother confiscating all her electronic devices and it has immediately gone viral. Why? She sent the tweet from the families LG smart fridge.
Still hankering after a smart home?

[Wendyf]

Later reports suggest the fridge's Twitter account is faked. 'Dorothy' has been having everyone on.

[Stanley]

Ah, I haven't seen that. Good story though!

[Tizer]

Anyone with a smartphone should read this, which is why I've put it here rather than in the computers topic...
`What3words: The app that can save your life' LINK
`Police have urged everyone to download a smartphone app they say has already saved several lives. What is it and how does it work?'

[Tripps]

Clever family the Sheldricks. Those who have been keeping up will understand.

Sounds useful - and I've swiftly downloaded it. It needs some 'due diligence' though.

It wants to know my location - and since most on the web think I'm in Bolton le Sands, except the ones who think I'm in Bude Cornwall, which suits me, I'm reluctant to tell it. Do I want to let an unknown, untried and untested 3rd party know my exact whereabouts all the time? I don't think so.

We'll see what develops. . . . .

[Tizer]

Isn't the solution to not keep your GPS working all the the time on the phone but to have the app loaded and then switch the GPS on if you get lost in a forest or down the back streets of Cambridge? As you know, I'm no expert on smartphones so I could be wrong.

[PanBiker]

Similar to what radio Amateurs have been using for decades. The Maidenhead Locator system can resolve a location to an accuracy of 1m anywhere on the globe. Based on Latutude and Longitude and the sub division of the same into grid squares. Conventionally most amateur users will use it to reference a location down to 100 or 10m. My location here on the Croft is referenced as IO83VW to 100m resolution add another two digits to get 10m resolution and a further two to get down to 1m. You can find your locator via Google Earth or Street Map or a number of downloadable apps that will work it out from the phones built in GPS. Where this new system differs is that they have substituted a database of words rather than just using a shorter alphanumeric string. Re-inventing the wheel to some degree because if you have a mobile phone you can easily be traced to within 1m with various existing apps.

Good initiative though and is providing employment for a few folk.

[plaques]

app loaded and then switch the GPS on if you get lost in a forest or down the back streets of Cambridge?

Only a few years ago we set off with a rambling group not more than a mile from Burnley centre. Moved off the main road up a wooded valley towards Briercliffe. At no time were we more than ½ mile from houses. Then a lady fell but fortunately with only minor bruising. Suddenly we realised that we couldn't tell anybody exactly where we were. GPS and any other app would have been most welcome.

[PanBiker]

My Motorola phone uses both the U.S. GPS satellites and the Russian GLONASS network. Each maintain 24 satellites in orbit so that's 48 to go at. My Geocaching app sometimes can see 18 + satellites and has better than 1m accuracy. Both Russia and the US ceased degrading the accuracy or at least relaxed the degradation for civilian use quite a few years ago now. The "find my phone" apps use the same system for folk who loose or have them stolen and the car trackers that you can have fitted and subscribe to the mapping utilities that go with them. A lot of folk who complain about having an ID card have no idea that they are being tracked to less than 1m accuracy unless they have the nous to turn of the GPS on their phones, better not use an ATM, credit or debit card or a hole in the wall though.

[Stanley]

Fascinating. I'm tempted to ask what an app is but on reflection I have quite enough difficulty dealing with my world how it is!
I am in touch with my grand daughter, she isn't in Bulgaria now but Clitheroe and is looking up bus times for Barlick!

[PanBiker]

Shortened form of Application mainly used when referring to programs for mobile phones. Why use 11 letters when you can get away with 3.

[Tizer]

Can all smartphone app[lication]s be installed on PCs? Or do they only work with the types of OS used on the phones?

[Tripps]

Can all smartphone app[lication]s be installed on PCs?

I'm not expert, but there are so many 'apps' and I don't think all can go on the phone. Most of the ones I want can though.

I have just looked, and found that I have 95 (!) on my phone- - which was a surprise to me. Many are from the google stable, and can't be removed. I largely ignore them. , The beauty of the others is that it is so quick and easy to install, try them, then uninstall if you don't use them.

All free of course. Get one (SCG) - you'll love it.

[Tripps]

she isn't in Bulgaria now but Clitheroe

I watched a flight from Dubai to Newcastle about 18 months ago as I knew some one aboard it. I watched the same flight the other day on my phone. It still runs every day, and arrives within minutes of its scheduled time. I think that's (literally) amazing.

I saw the rioting in Hong Kong airport, and it seemed there were no flights - a quick look at Flight Tracker showed that aircraft were still taking off. We are our own news gatherers now.