How do we make the public understand programming?

Thursday, December 1st, 2011

In response to a recent survey telling us that schools are getting the teaching of Information Technology all wrong by not including “computer programs” in the syllabus, the BBC has offered up seven questions about computer programs. I urge you to take the quick quiz and then come back here when you’re done.

I scored five out of seven. I don’t know the correct HTML for inserting an image, and I couldn’t work out which subset of acronyms the question with GNU in it was driving at, mainly because the preceding five questions were not about “computer programs” at all; they were about the history of the people who happened to be involved in the invention of programming, either as a general concept (Jaquard) or as an incredibly early implementation (Hopper and COBOL).

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Net neutrality: what the BBC says and what the BBC does

Friday, April 1st, 2011

The BBC has been one of the most vociferous defenders of net neutrality – the concept that all internet traffic is treated equally.  However, a couple of deals struck with BT suggest the BBC isn’t as wedded to net neutrality as it likes to claim.

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Android App of the Week: BBC iPlayer

Monday, February 14th, 2011

The sluggish attitude of the BBC to Android apps has meant that numerous pretenders have appeared: search for BBC in the Android Market and you’ll find dozens of tools that provide stories from the corporation’s news and sports sites, as well as a couple that provide iPlayer content unofficially.

That’s changed with the release of an official iPlayer app. It’s potentially one of the biggest apps to ever hit the market, and it’s been released simultaneously with the iPad edition.

Boot up the app and it’s immediately obvious this is something special. Featured programmes sit at the top of the screen, and scrolling down sees more fade into view smoothly. Switch your phone around and you’re able to scroll horizontally through Auntie’s top content.

Click on a show and the familiar iPlayer layout appears, with options to share the the show over any social-networking apps you’ve got installed or add it to your favourites for later viewing. Graphics illustrate the programme’s channel, duration and availability on iPlayer, and there are eight links to recommend shows at the bottom of the screen – just scroll through them horizontally and click. (more…)

Why Lord Sugar needs to fire his “technical expert”

Thursday, December 16th, 2010

“I’m not interested in  any Steady Eddies or Cautious Carols,” barks Lord Sugar at the start of this week’s Apprentice – indeed, it’s Blundering Bordans that Amstrad Alan’s keen on.

The Bordan in question is Bordan Tkachuk, the CEO of computer firm Viglen, and one of the “trusted associates” dragged in to grill Sugar’s Apprentice candidates. Being the boss of a computer firm, Sugar naturally wants him to test out the technical acumen of Stuart Baggs – a hideous genetic blend of David Brent, Christopher Biggins and a cheap Burton’s suit.

Stuart “The Brand” Baggs runs his own ISP on the Isle of Man, and eagle-eyed Bordan’s spotted something iffy on his CV. Baggs claims he’s running a “fully licensed telecoms company”, but Bordan’s been on the blower to the Isle of Man authorities and found out that he only has a licence for broadband.

“Stuart you’re blagging to me,” said Tkachuk, cornering his prey. “I know what an ISP is. It’s an Internet Service Protocol.”

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BBC lost laptops: a case of trial by PR

Monday, August 9th, 2010

You can tell it’s the summer silly season. Take, for example, the story doing the rounds today about the BBC losing 146 laptops, 65 mobile phones and 17 BlackBerrys to the tune of a headline-friendly £240,000 over the past two years.

It sounds terrible, especially given that the money comes from the public via the licence fee, but when, or if, you stop to think about it – that actually represents less one and a half laptops a week.

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Apple iPad TV ads start already…. on the BBC

Tuesday, June 1st, 2010

Few will be surprised that the Apple iPad has started getting heavy promotion on TV, but more than few eyebrows might be raised that the free advertising is coming courtesy of the BBC.

Since the Monaco Grand Prix a fortnight ago, F1 presenter Jake Humphrey has traded in his normal clipboard for the Apple tablet. Now whenever Jake’s on screen, he’s seen brandishing the iPad, with the Apple logo embossed on the back of the device being beamed to millions of viewers worldwide.

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Why are iPlayer viewers exempt from the TV licence?

Friday, October 2nd, 2009

There was a chap from TV Licensing on BBC Breakfast this morning, reminding Britain’s small business owners that they owed his employers £142.50 if they wanted to watch live TV on their computers at work.

“How you can possibly enforce that?” asked the BBC man, somewhere in between the 96 daily reminders of how you can watch BBC News online. “We can and we will,” was the gist of the not particularly convincing reply. Still, it’s nice to see that, just as small businesses are putting the worst of the recession flames out, TV Licensing wants to open another can of petrol.

But why pick on small businesses? During his convoluted explanation of what you can and can’t do, the enforcer explained that you don’t need to buy a licence to watch BBC programmes on iPlayer after they are broadcast.

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Why BT’s not the biggest broadband choker

Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009

The BBC is getting positively hot under the collar about BT’s “iPlayer throttling”. It’s nice to see the big broadcasters finally paying attention to the hidden chokes applied to our broadband connections, although readers of the Smash Your Broadband Limits feature on the cover of this month’s PC Pro would already have been well aware that BT Option 1 customers were restricted to only 896Kbits/sec for streaming video.

BT Option 1 isn’t the worst service when it comes to strangling connections, however. Not by a long chalk. Take BT-owned PlusNet example. Its “Unlimited” account offers a maximum bandwidth of only 256Kbits/sec from download sites during peak hours (6pm-11pm) while peer-to-peer traffic is granted a paltry maximum of 128Kbits/sec from 6pm-10pm. Try downloading a 1.5GB HD show from iPlayer during peak hours on that connection and it will probably arrive a couple of hours after you’ve gone to bed.

Other ISPs pull similar ruses (you can find out what your ISP is up to in this month’s mag). Perhaps now the BBC has taken an interest, we’ll get a frank and open debate about the murky practice of traffic shaping.

BBC iPlayer: bad, good, then bad again?

Thursday, December 11th, 2008

You may remember that we at PC Pro were none too impressed with the BBC iPlayer when it was first released. Our preview of the beta software lamented the way the iPlayer was raggedly ripped in two (a website for selecting shows, a separate desktop app for viewing them), the appalling user interface and the limited selection of shows. “It’s produced a bug-ridden, slow and ultimately disappointing product… and worst of all, the Beeb’s done it with your money,” the preview concluded.

Since the dark days of November 2007, I’m pleased to say the iPlayer has improved almost beyond recognition. The website interface is now much cleaner and finding the particular episode of a series that you want to watch is no longer a case of randomly clicking on identical boxes and hoping for the best. Shows can now be streamed in either standard or “high-quality” versions if you can’t be bothered to wait for the download (although downloads still offers much greater picture quality), and devices such as media players, games consoles and phones are now well supported with dedicated downloads.   

If the truth be told, the BBC has turned what was looking like a multi-million lame duck into one of the most popular internet services this country has ever seen – and deserves credit for doing so.

Which makes it all the more galling that the next evolution of the iPlayer looks set to undo much of the good work.

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How to watch the BBC iPlayer on the Xbox 360

Sunday, November 23rd, 2008

Ever since the BBC announced that its iPlayer works perfectly happily with a couple of Media Center Extenders (NetGear’s EVA8000 and the Linksys DMA2200), I’ve been determined to get the service working on my Xbox 360. After all, if the iPlayer works on third-party MCE devices, why the hell shouldn’t it work on Microsoft’s own?

The BBC’s Where To Get iPlayer page suggests getting the service to run on any MCE (or Home Media Hub as the Beeb calls them) should be a piece of cake. Simply download the programmes as normal on your PC, open Windows Media Center and add the iPlayer downloads folder to your Media Center library, then jump on to your MCE device and simply play back the relevant files from the comfort of your TV. Robert is your dad’s brother.

Except it doesn’t work on the Xbox 360. Well, at least not my Xbox 360, nor those of a couple of colleagues I’ve spoken to. Although judging by numerous internet forums, it seems to work flawlessly for some people. When I click on downloaded programmes using the Xbox 360’s MCE, however, I’m presented with a blue screen displaying the message:

“Video Error. Files needed to display video are not installed or not working correctly.”

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