Oh dear , some toys being chucked out of prams over at TfL HQ. Seems
poor old Peter Hendy was in a rage about the recent failures (read:
loss of revenue). Oh dear Peter , well now you know what its like for
Oyster to screw you out of your money through no fault of your own.
Suck it up mate.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7549603.stm

B2003

Boltar wrote:
> Oh dear , some toys being chucked out of prams over at TfL HQ. Seems
> poor old Peter Hendy was in a rage about the recent failures (read:
> loss of revenue). Oh dear Peter , well now you know what its like for
> Oyster to screw you out of your money through no fault of your own.
> Suck it up mate.
> 
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7549603.stm
> 
> B2003

Have you got anything intelligent to say about it, or are you just 
airing your well-known anti-Oyster views?

Personally, if Hendy is incandescent about the Oyster failures, good. 
He's every right to be, indeed if he wasn't he'd not be doing his job 
properly.

As for the early end of the contract (in two years, actually) various 
questions arise, not least of which is that Transys now have no 
particular incentive to improve their performance beyond whatever 
penalty payments are in the contract, a common drawback of outsourcing 
key functions.  The second question is how they structure the 
replacement.  The third is how this affects next years major roll out of 
PAYG on National Rail, which will presumably require Transys and TfL to 
co-operate in order to do the job properly, just at the point when EDS 
and Cubic will be looking to do things like move the best staff to more 
profitable areas.

Tom

On Sat, 09 Aug 2008 11:27:07 +0100, Tom Barry 
wrote:

>Boltar wrote:
>> Oh dear , some toys being chucked out of prams over at TfL HQ. Seems
>> poor old Peter Hendy was in a rage about the recent failures (read:
>> loss of revenue). Oh dear Peter , well now you know what its like for
>> Oyster to screw you out of your money through no fault of your own.
>> Suck it up mate.
>> 
>> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7549603.stm
>> 
>> B2003
>
>Have you got anything intelligent to say about it, or are you just 
>airing your well-known anti-Oyster views?
>
>Personally, if Hendy is incandescent about the Oyster failures, good. 
>He's every right to be, indeed if he wasn't he'd not be doing his job 
>properly.
>
>As for the early end of the contract (in two years, actually) various 
>questions arise, not least of which is that Transys now have no 
>particular incentive to improve their performance beyond whatever 
>penalty payments are in the contract, a common drawback of outsourcing 
>key functions.  The second question is how they structure the 
>replacement.  The third is how this affects next years major roll out of 
>PAYG on National Rail, which will presumably require Transys and TfL to 
>co-operate in order to do the job properly, just at the point when EDS 
>and Cubic will be looking to do things like move the best staff to more 
>profitable areas.

And not forgetting the resources needed to undertake the retendering
process [1]. I also don't see Cubic walking away from London given the
scale of equipment they have in place. They will also be spending time
and money to try to win the replacement contract (or at least a
significant role in any consortia that might put itself forward to bid).

[1] it was a very significant task the first time round and the
situation now is more complex in terms of stakeholders / participants
and also the divergent options around the way the technology will
develop. London Buses' view of on bus systems would suggest they'd want
to walk away from ticket machines being supplied by a future "Prestige"
consortia.

-- 
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!

Paul Corfield wrote:
> 
> And not forgetting the resources needed to undertake the retendering
> process [1]. I also don't see Cubic walking away from London given the
> scale of equipment they have in place. They will also be spending time
> and money to try to win the replacement contract (or at least a
> significant role in any consortia that might put itself forward to bid).
> 
> [1] it was a very significant task the first time round and the
> situation now is more complex in terms of stakeholders / participants
> and also the divergent options around the way the technology will
> develop. London Buses' view of on bus systems would suggest they'd want
> to walk away from ticket machines being supplied by a future "Prestige"
> consortia.
> 

Just as a matter of interest, I believe Boris Johnson's Director of 
Transport Policy, Kulveer Ranger, was involved in negotiating the PFI 
contract first time round (because he told the London Assembly Transport 
Committee, actually).  Whose side was he on?  In fact, what did he 
actually do, he'd have been very young to take a major responsibility at 
the time (he's younger than me, at 32 or 33)?

Tom

On Sat, 09 Aug 2008 11:53:12 +0100, Tom Barry 
wrote:

>Paul Corfield wrote:
>> 
>> And not forgetting the resources needed to undertake the retendering
>> process [1]. I also don't see Cubic walking away from London given the
>> scale of equipment they have in place. They will also be spending time
>> and money to try to win the replacement contract (or at least a
>> significant role in any consortia that might put itself forward to bid).
>> 
>> [1] it was a very significant task the first time round and the
>> situation now is more complex in terms of stakeholders / participants
>> and also the divergent options around the way the technology will
>> develop. London Buses' view of on bus systems would suggest they'd want
>> to walk away from ticket machines being supplied by a future "Prestige"
>> consortia.
>> 
>
>Just as a matter of interest, I believe Boris Johnson's Director of 
>Transport Policy, Kulveer Ranger, was involved in negotiating the PFI 
>contract first time round (because he told the London Assembly Transport 
>Committee, actually).  Whose side was he on?  In fact, what did he 
>actually do, he'd have been very young to take a major responsibility at 
>the time (he's younger than me, at 32 or 33)?

I have to be careful here or I'll seem bitter and twisted! 

Mr Ranger was nowhere near the project team when the contract was
negotiated. This was back in 1998 or so and I left Prestige in 1999.  At
that point in time a new project manager was appointed and she ran the
project for a number of years. She left and subsequently two further
project managers have followed in her shoes. Mr Barrie (the second one)
is still heading up the project team while the first one works alongside
me in JNP PPP land.

I have not met Mr Ranger but my understanding was that he was a Nichols
employee and supported the project team during part of the
implementation phase - I don't know precisely when.  Nichols provided
some support in the development / negotiation stage of the project but
Mr Ranger never set foot in the project office during my time - a Mr
Calthorpe and one other whose name escapes me were the Nichols people.

I'm sure Mr Ranger was involved with Prestige at some point and he was
also involved in the Tunnel Cooling project but I don't know what his
exact role was. However from my experience of Prestige he did not single
handedly deliver the contract / project on a plate [1] - as is suggested
by certain press releases.

I shall now await a brown envelope landing on my desk ;-)

[1] it was this suggestion that rather stuck in my throat given how much
work so many good people put in to that project to make it happen.
-- 
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!

On Sat, 09 Aug 2008 11:27:07 +0100, Tom Barry 
wrote:

>Have you got anything intelligent to say about it, or are you just 
>airing your well-known anti-Oyster views?

You have to ask?

Paul Corfield wrote:

>...
> 
> I'm sure Mr Ranger was involved with Prestige at some point and he was
> also involved in the Tunnel Cooling project but I don't know what his
> exact role was. However from my experience of Prestige he did not single
> handedly deliver the contract / project on a plate [1] - as is suggested
> by certain press releases.
> 
> I shall now await a brown envelope landing on my desk ;-)
> 
> [1] it was this suggestion that rather stuck in my throat given how much
> work so many good people put in to that project to make it happen.

Sort of confirms my suspicions - the impression he gave at the Transport 
Committee (which was that he'd helped renegotiate some part of the PFI 
rather than delivering the whole project) plus the factor of his youth 
was rather at odds with the PR, which seemed to me to be bigging up what 
appears to be a conventional bright young guy career in consultancy 
which occasionally touched on transport matters as something rather larger.

I suspect he did indeed help out during the Oyster PFI negotiations but 
not a lot else, but at least his minute amount of relevant transport 
experience won't be entirely wasted now they're going to need a new 
contract.  Although, in his current role he's not really involved 
day-to-day at TfL, is he?

In recent years his efforts seem mainly to be geared towards a political 
career, including standing for Parliament in Wigan and briefly being the 
Conservatives' vice-chairman.  I was at a party with him back in 2006, 
actually, although we didn't meet.

Tom

On 9 Aug, 11:27, Tom Barry  wrote:
> Have you got anything intelligent to say about it, or are you just
> airing your well-known anti-Oyster views?

I didn't notice anyone else posting the link. What would you like, a
discourse on its technical merits? We've already done that. For the
record I'm not anti Oyster per se, I'm anti the way TfL have set up
the PAYG which IMO is close to being fraudulent.

> Personally, if Hendy is incandescent about the Oyster failures, good.
> He's every right to be, indeed if he wasn't he'd not be doing his job
> properly.

If he'd been doing his job properly he'd have choisen the DES
encrypted MiFARE system, not the bargain basement hackable one thats
been around for ages.

> As for the early end of the contract (in two years, actually) various
> questions arise, not least of which is that Transys now have no
> particular incentive to improve their performance beyond whatever
> penalty payments are in the contract, a common drawback of outsourcing

Oh well, perhaps he (or his predecessor) shouldn't have outsourced.
But then its much easier for management to outsource because then if
things go wrong they can just bluster a lot and wave contracts rather
than having to actually take any blame for their poor decisions.

B2003

In message 
, 
Boltar  writes
>Oh dear , some toys being chucked out of prams over at TfL HQ. Seems
>poor old Peter Hendy was in a rage about the recent failures (read:
>loss of revenue). Oh dear Peter , well now you know what its like for
>Oyster to screw you out of your money through no fault of your own.
>Suck it up mate.
>
>http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7549603.stm
>

Paper travel cards & photocards here we come.... again :-)


-- 
Edward Cowling   Stop Thatcher's State Funeral
                  http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/thatchfuneral/

"Tom Barry"  wrote in message 
news:Rhenk.10106$Z24.1314@newsfe19.ams2...
> Boltar wrote:
>> Oh dear , some toys being chucked out of prams over at TfL HQ. Seems
>> poor old Peter Hendy was in a rage about the recent failures (read:
>> loss of revenue). Oh dear Peter , well now you know what its like for
>> Oyster to screw you out of your money through no fault of your own.
>> Suck it up mate.
>>
>> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7549603.stm
>>
>> B2003
>
> Have you got anything intelligent to say about it, or are you just airing 
> your well-known anti-Oyster views?
>
> Personally, if Hendy is incandescent about the Oyster failures, good. He's 
> every right to be, indeed if he wasn't he'd not be doing his job properly.
>
> As for the early end of the contract (in two years, actually) various 
> questions arise, not least of which is that Transys now have no particular 
> incentive to improve their performance beyond whatever penalty payments 
> are in the contract, a common drawback of outsourcing key functions.  The 
> second question is how they structure the replacement.  The third is how 
> this affects next years major roll out of PAYG on National Rail, which 
> will presumably require Transys and TfL to co-operate in order to do the 
> job properly, just at the point when EDS and Cubic will be looking to do 
> things like move the best staff to more profitable areas.

Which for me begs the question, what is it they are doing that couldn't 
(shouldn't) be done by TFL anyway, and why should they be incentivised to 
perform "better" (except in the sense that this is the, IMHO bogus, reason 
for outsourcing in the first place).

Fare collecting would seem to be a core activity of a transport operator 
that should be in house if the expertise is available, not some add on "nice 
to have" that can be outsourced for a theoritical saving at the expense of 
quality.

tim

On Sat, 9 Aug 2008 09:36:23 -0700 (PDT), Boltar wrote:

> If he'd been doing his job properly he'd have choisen the DES
> encrypted MiFARE system, not the bargain basement hackable one thats
> been around for ages.

DES is a deprecated cryptographic block cipher that falls to brute force
attacks due to its short 56-bit key. It has been superseded by AES.

-- 
jhk

On 9 Aug, 19:41, Jarle H Knudsen  wrote:
> On Sat, 9 Aug 2008 09:36:23 -0700 (PDT), Boltar wrote:
> > If he'd been doing his job properly he'd have choisen the DES
> > encrypted MiFARE system, not the bargain basement hackable one thats
> > been around for ages.
>
> DES is a deprecated cryptographic block cipher that falls to brute force
> attacks due to its short 56-bit key. It has been superseded by AES.

Its better than bugger all encryption. AFAIK mifare doesn't support
AES.

B2003

On Sat, 09 Aug 2008 13:13:55 +0100, Tom Barry 
wrote:

>In recent years his efforts seem mainly to be geared towards a political 
>career, including standing for Parliament in Wigan and briefly being the 
>Conservatives' vice-chairman.  I was at a party with him back in 2006, 
>actually, although we didn't meet.

You wouldn't happen to have links to the Boriswatch.co.uk blog would
you?
-- 
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!

Paul Corfield wrote:
> 
> You wouldn't happen to have links to the Boriswatch.co.uk blog would
> you?

Er, yes.  I guess using my real name didn't fool anyone, then.  Back to 
the drawing board.

:)

Tom

On Sun, 10 Aug 2008 09:54:16 +0100, Tom Barry 
wrote:

>Paul Corfield wrote:
>> 
>> You wouldn't happen to have links to the Boriswatch.co.uk blog would
>> you?
>
>Er, yes.  I guess using my real name didn't fool anyone, then.  Back to 
>the drawing board.

Well having had the last bendy bus thread transferred almost word for
word to the blog one has to be attentive to such things.
-- 
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!

On Sat, 9 Aug 2008 09:36:23 -0700 (PDT), Boltar
 wrote:

>On 9 Aug, 11:27, Tom Barry  wrote:
>> Have you got anything intelligent to say about it, or are you just
>> airing your well-known anti-Oyster views?
>
>I didn't notice anyone else posting the link. What would you like, a
>discourse on its technical merits? 

You can post the link and comment on it without a trademark  tedious
anti-Oyster rant.

On 10 Aug, 14:50, James Farrar  wrote:
> You can post the link and comment on it without a trademark  tedious
> anti-Oyster rant.

No ones forcing you to read it.

B2003

On Sat, 9 Aug 2008 12:16:14 -0700 (PDT), Boltar wrote:

> AFAIK mifare doesn't support AES.

According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIFARE , they do. The article
also mentions a replacement card for the current Oyster/MIFARE Classic card
that will support AES.

Does anyone know if these cards will be as fast as the current Oyster
cards, or if they will require travellers to hold the card still on the
reader longer?

-- 
jhk

On Aug 10, 8:18 pm, Jarle H Knudsen  wrote:
> On Sat, 9 Aug 2008 12:16:14 -0700 (PDT), Boltar wrote:
> > AFAIK mifare doesn't support AES.
>
> According tohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIFARE, they do. The article
> also mentions a replacement card for the current Oyster/MIFARE Classic card
> that will support AES.

Interesting, didn't spot a mention of AES on their site, just DES, but
then I didn't look that hard. In that case theres even less excuse for
TfL to pick the bottom of the range one.

>
> Does anyone know if these cards will be as fast as the current Oyster
> cards, or if they will require travellers to hold the card still on the
> reader longer?

More importantly , if they do force an upgrade are we expected to
cough up another 3 quid for a new card?

B2003

On 11 Aug, 09:54, Boltar  wrote:
> > > AFAIK mifare doesn't support AES.
>
> > According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIFARE, they do. The article
> > also mentions a replacement card for the current Oyster/MIFARE Classic card
> > that will support AES.
>
> Interesting, didn't spot a mention of AES on their site, just DES, but
> then I didn't look that hard. In that case theres even less excuse for
> TfL to pick the bottom of the range one.

Presumably because when they set the spec *ten years ago*, the card
systems didn't support AES.

--
John Band
john at johnband dot org
www.johnband.org

On Aug 11, 10:28 am, John B  wrote:
> > Interesting, didn't spot a mention of AES on their site, just DES, but
> > then I didn't look that hard. In that case theres even less excuse for
> > TfL to pick the bottom of the range one.
>
> Presumably because when they set the spec *ten years ago*, the card
> systems didn't support AES.

FTA:

1997 — MIFARE PRO with Triple DES coprocessor introduced.

No excuse.

B2003

On Sun, 10 Aug 2008 12:05:47 -0700 (PDT), Boltar
 wrote:

>On 10 Aug, 14:50, James Farrar  wrote:
>> You can post the link and comment on it without a trademark  tedious
>> anti-Oyster rant.
>
>No ones forcing you to read it.

No-one's forcing you to post it.

(Did you all spot what I did there?)

On Mon, 11 Aug 2008 03:25:43 -0700 (PDT), Boltar wrote:

> FTA:
> 
> 1997 ¡X MIFARE PRO with Triple DES coprocessor introduced.
> 
> No excuse.

But what did those cards cost back then? They were probably not cheap.

-- 
jhk

In message , James Farrar 
 writes

>>> You can post the link and comment on it without a trademark  tedious
>>> anti-Oyster rant.
>>
>>No ones forcing you to read it.
>
>No-one's forcing you to post it.
>
>(Did you all spot what I did there?)

Not quite. You seem to be talking to someone who's been blocked from my 
radar.
-- 
Steve Fitzgerald has now left the building.
You will find him in London's Docklands, E16, UK
(please use the reply to address for email)

On Aug 11, 4:14 pm, James Farrar  wrote:
> On Sun, 10 Aug 2008 12:05:47 -0700 (PDT), Boltar
>
>  wrote:
> >On 10 Aug, 14:50, James Farrar  wrote:
> >> You can post the link and comment on it without a trademark  tedious
> >> anti-Oyster rant.
>
> >No ones forcing you to read it.
>
> No-one's forcing you to post it.
>
> (Did you all spot what I did there?)

Talk bollox?

B2003

On Aug 11, 6:39 pm, Jarle H Knudsen  wrote:
> On Mon, 11 Aug 2008 03:25:43 -0700 (PDT), Boltar wrote:
> > FTA:
>
> > 1997 — MIFARE PRO with Triple DES coprocessor introduced.
>
> > No excuse.
>
> But what did those cards cost back then? They were probably not cheap.

Possibly not, but they should have built in an easy upgrade path so
now the old card has been hacked any newly issued cards can be DES or
AES encrypted and people with the old cards can upgrade if they want.

B2003

On 11 Aug, 16:14, James Farrar  wrote:
> On Sun, 10 Aug 2008 12:05:47 -0700 (PDT), Boltar
>
>  wrote:
> >On 10 Aug, 14:50, James Farrar  wrote:
> >> You can post the link and comment on it without a trademark  tedious
> >> anti-Oyster rant.
>
> >No ones forcing you to read it.
>
> No-one's forcing you to post it.
>
> (Did you all spot what I did there?)

Yes.  You resorted to a silly, childish "I know I am, but what are
you"-style argument because deep down you know the pro-Oyster idiots
don't have a real argument to back up your case.

On 14 Aug, 08:43, "paul.ingerson"  wrote:
> > >> You can post the link and comment on it without a trademark  tedious
> > >> anti-Oyster rant.
>
> > >No ones forcing you to read it.
>
> > No-one's forcing you to post it.
>
> > (Did you all spot what I did there?)
>
> Yes.  You resorted to a silly, childish "I know I am, but what are
> you"-style argument because deep down you know the pro-Oyster idiots
> don't have a real argument to back up your case.

Boltar's real name revealed...?

--
John Band
john at johnband dot org
www.johnband.org

On Aug 14, 10:21 am, John B  wrote:
> On 14 Aug, 08:43, "paul.ingerson"  wrote:
>
> > > >> You can post the link and comment on it without a trademark  tedious
> > > >> anti-Oyster rant.
>
> > > >No ones forcing you to read it.
>
> > > No-one's forcing you to post it.
>
> > > (Did you all spot what I did there?)
>
> > Yes.  You resorted to a silly, childish "I know I am, but what are
> > you"-style argument because deep down you know the pro-Oyster idiots
> > don't have a real argument to back up your case.
>
> Boltar's real name revealed...?

I need to drink stronger coffee because the subtext here has just
whooshed past me.

B2003