Soli

AirTag hacked and reprogrammed by security researcher

Soli

May 2021

bestkeptsecret said:

OT: @Soli, nice to see you back. Where have you been?

It's good to be back.

dewme said:

This is an interesting argument that reminds me of the difference between "communication" and "connection," both at a technical level and a human level. Commenter ppietra's points are valid for many networking protocols that support both connected and unconnected messaging, where connected messaging generally infers that there is a notion of session/connection state information that is maintained by the endpoints and intermediaries that exists even when packets are not being actively sent of the wire. This contents, context, lifetime, semantics, and roles related to this state information is protocol specific. That's all fine and good.

The human side of this argument falls along the lines of the distinctions drawn between communication and connection that are the primary focus of writers, speakers, and presenters like John C. Maxwell, most notably in his book "Everyone Communicates, Few Connect." I'm not going to rehash the book here, but it is very evident that there's a whole lot of communication taking place around the topic of connections, but not very much connection is actually happening.

Your mention of sessions makes me think I know where those chuckle heads were misunderstanding basic networking lingo. Take TCP v UDP for example, which many here probably learned about at one point. One is considered connection-less, but that's simply because it doesn't do the three-way handshake before sending data, which is first reaching out, then being informed that you were heard by the recipient, and then having the initiator reach back out to the recipient to say they got their message before sending the encapsulated data. There are also additional messages (read: overhead) for verifying the data that was received yada yada yada that makes TCP a heavier protocol over UDP, but in both cases a connection has to be made, it's just that with UDP and many others don't first establish a connection prior to transmitting data. You let other protocols and often higher layers figure out what was and wasn't received and then make additional requests as needed. (less)

But that's all higher up in the OSI model. Even if you could use all connection-less protocols (read: protocols that don't establish a prior connection before transmitting) they still need would need to be run on on a connected network at the lower layers before they can operate and then would need other layers to verify that data was received. Even something as basic as plugging in an Ethernet cable connects something. In this case it's physical connection, and that can sometimes be the problem if there is a fault in the hardware.

Each connection opens up the possibly for more complex connections but the model still works the same regards of how technologies evolve. I've spent decades designing, building, optimizing, and troubleshooting networks. I can't tell you have many times I've had to come in to resolve was I was told were unsolvable problems that turned out that they were simply digging at the wrong layer, so to speak. I can't fault those who don't work in IT for not knowing, but I'll be forever perplexed by someone in IT that can't figure out why someone's [insert app] isn't connecting without them ever trying to ping an IP, go to another website, or even check the bloody physical connection to narrow down the scope of the problem. A systematic approach has never failed me.

I preciously used the example of establishing links to satellites because there is no handshake. Usually you see the word link in this context, but a link is just a connection. First the physical layer, which will mean the radios and antennas with the correct modulation for that medium and without obstructions/interference. If these aren't congruent then there is no connection. Period. Then the data link layer, and so on. These are still connections even if we don't see a physical cable running to the satellite, without a three-way handshake between nodes, and without the satellite verifying that we're receiving data.

PS: I'm still laughing about someone saying that Bluetooth and NFC aren't a part of networking. I guess this place hasn't changed much.

Blood oxygen sensor, Touch ID rumored for 'watchOS 7,' Apple Watch 'Series 6'

Soli

March 2020

bruce ketchum said:

GeorgeBMac said:

danvdr said:

Seems to me that

… (more)

blood oxygen will largely be a cool party trick. A) Unless you are quite sick, your O2 is normal. If you are quite sick and aren't getting enough O2 your body detects it and you feel short of breath and start breathing faster/harder. The O2 sensor gives you a number; whether you head to the doctor or not will depend on how you feel.

Now, if they could get an accurate blood glucose (i.e. blood sugar) monitor, I think that will be a game changer. (But that one is likely a ways off.)

An SpO2 sensor could, I suspect, be useful for endurance athletes. It is a well accepted fact that high end endurance athletes (runners, cyclists, etc.) are rated on their VO2Max (the body's ability to take in and use Oxygen). So, providing real time blood levels of oxygen during an event could provide additional useful data to those athletes over and above heart rate.

For myself, when I race, I look at heart rate most of all in order to pace myself by allowing it to climb from 80% of max up to 95-100% in a controlled manner. I suspect that blood oxygen levels might be very useful to know in order to better pace myself during an event -- telling me how well my heart and lungs are supplying oxygen to my muscles.

In healthy people, arterial blood oxygen levels don't increase or decrease during physical activity. You might see a slight, momentary drop during a so-called supramaximal effort, but largely no change. Increased O2 delivery to active muscles is accomplished by increasing respiratory rate and increasing cardiac output (stroke volume x heart rate). Unless you have a disease or disorder, a single hemoglobin protein molecule picks up and drops off four oxygen molecules at the same rate always, no matter what state of activity you're in.

This study indicate that oxygen saturation does indeed decrease as you reach maximum heart rate. This study was done with athletes and nothing indicates that it was a momentary drop.

https://www.stahq.org/files/1813/5845/7616/18_Lain2_Abstract.pdf

(less)

Second 2020 iPad teardown shows how LiDAR differs from Face ID

Soli

March 2020

Beats said:

Soli said:

Beats said:

… (more)
So he's correct. If Truedepth is indeed better than we can be sure it will be added to later models as it compliments AR.

Maybe not. TrueDepth might be better for details when looking at a predisposed object that it's expecting to verify with a map and at a close, predetermined range expectation (well within an arm's length), compared to another use of lidar* that is designed for mapping countless objects in significantly larger area (a room). Kind of like having a macro lens for taking a picture of a mountain range and then arguing that that macro lens is better because it can get higher detail of a specific object.

* I keep seeing LiDAR spelled this way. Just stick with lidar like we have for radar, laser and the uncommon maser (even though it predates laser and follows its pattern).

Probably because the lower case "i" has been all the rage since the early 2000s. I still cringe when I see knockoffs use it though.

It's not an Apple thing. It's because the 'i' isn't it's own word, but part of the word light, just as you could've once found RaDAR as it uses the 'a' from the word Radio along with d(etection) a(nd) r(anging), for both acronyms.

I'm still unsure what's stopping Apple from making their lidar system more accurate or Truedepth have wider range.

Why are you assuming Apple is "stopping"? Clearly their years of work with lidar is being applied to devics to make them better, faster, and more accurate with every iteration. Because they didn't call it TrueDepth and it doesn't have the exact same feature set as lidar being used with other sensors for a very specific use case on the front of the camera? You don't want the system on the back to work for Face ID and you don't want Face ID to map a room. That should be clear.

Blood oxygen sensor, Touch ID rumored for 'watchOS 7,' Apple Watch 'Series 6'

Soli

March 2020

Mgwl said:

seanismorris said:

I read in a review on the
… (more)

Do you have Hey Siri or raise to wake enabled? I have those off which greatly increases my battery life.

Blood oxygen sensor, Touch ID rumored for 'watchOS 7,' Apple Watch 'Series 6'

Soli

March 2020

seanismorris said:

I read in a review on the Samsung watch the battery life is up to 48 hours. But, using LTE it lasted 3 hours...

This might not be comparable

… (more)

About

Reactions

AirTag hacked and reprogrammed by security researcher

Blood oxygen sensor, Touch ID rumored for 'watchOS 7,' Apple Watch 'Series 6'

Second 2020 iPad teardown shows how LiDAR differs from Face ID

Blood oxygen sensor, Touch ID rumored for 'watchOS 7,' Apple Watch 'Series 6'

Blood oxygen sensor, Touch ID rumored for 'watchOS 7,' Apple Watch 'Series 6'