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If you want to listen to the other side of the discussion, here's a good book on the topic. It will open your eyes..

Anyone interested in how a former giant could collapse so bad would probably enjoy David Cord's The Decline and Fall of Nokia . I flipped through it at our large bookstore in Helsinki and found it gripping enough to purchase there and then. Besides press coverage, Cord bases his account on interviews with former Nokia staffers -- there are a lot of bitter Nokia veterans in the Helsinki veteran who want to get the inside story out. Also, as much as I love my N900, it is sad to see that the writing was on the wall even before that particular device came out.

It's tempting to stoop to a LMGTFY link. Google is not hard to use. Blaming other people for both your laziness and ignorance is extremely sad.

It's tempting to stoop to a LMGTFY link. Google is not hard to use. Blaming other people for both your laziness and ignorance is extremely sad.

It was never designed to connect any and all peripherals. You are completely missing this point.

I'm not missing that point at all. The use cases for Firewire and USB overlapped heavily and USB was both cheaper (it's backers charged more to license and the tech was more costly too) and could be used with more devices that people actually had. Firewire was arguably better for a lot of purposes but USB was good enough for most of those purposes. Thunderbolt probably has a better shot than Firewire did to stand apart but so far where Thunderbolt and USB overlap, USB is winning easily. Kind of a pity since Thunderbolt is the design I actually prefer for a lot of uses. I like the connector better too.

According to Intel and others it is aimed to almost expose PCIe bridge to connections rather than replacing USB.

Users don't care. In fact most of them have never even heard of PCIe. Only engineers give a shit about that. Nobody is asking the question "how can I bridge PCIe"? They are asking how they can connect their hard drive or their monitor or their printer. Users only care that it works, not how efficiently. You are 100% correct that Thunderbolt is a better technical solution but it is not a better economic solution. Better economic solutions will beat better technical solutions in 10 out of 10 cases.

No one I know has a USB driven monitor so it cannot be everyone. Yes they have monitors that have USB ports but these are to use as a USB hub.

No, not USB pass through. USB driven monitors. Does not even require a separate power cable and works fine with USB 2.0. There are other versions besides. They aren't widely used but with USB 3.1 I fully expect to see more devices like it.

Again you are completely missing the point. If you need sustained transfers like digital video back in the day, you wanted a FireWire not a USB.

I'm not missing the point at all. They won't know and won't care that USB is a sub-optimal choice. Yes, USB is inferior for that purpose but if it gets their work done with a minimum of fuss no one will care. The pros will use specialty gear because they know and have a reason to care. Most others won't. Bear in mind that I run a company that makes specialty wire cables/harnesses so I deal with pros and engineers on this stuff daily.

How the hell is TB going to cost you a lot more money?

You can't figure that out? I do have one computer with Thunderbolt but the port sits unused because I have nothing that needs it. My monitor is driven by HDMI and I'd have to get an adapter to use the Thunderbolt port. None of my storage, printers, mice, keyboards, or ethernet needs Thunderbolt. I would have to spend money to integrate Thunderbolt to get right back to exactly where I am right now without it. Furthermore the chipsets and other gear necessary to run Thunderbolt are more expensive than those for USB. (Have you priced Thunderbolt adapters and cables recently?) Putting Thunderbolt onto a board increases the cost of that board more than putting USB on the board does. Intel is pushing it but ARM and other chip makers are not so it isn't (yet) available for anything that doesn't have an Intel chip.

Other than the fact that Intel is the one pushing it and is part of their ultrabook specification?

You are hugely underestimating how difficult it is to displace an installed base. People already have a ton of USB gear, it's backwards compatible, USB 3.1 is pretty darn fast, etc. Furthermore Thunderbolt is only compatible with Intel chipsets and a huge percentage of devices out there are based on ARM and other processor manufacturers. The old saying is trite but true that people buy solutions, not products. In order for people to buy Thunderbolt gear it needs to solve a problem for them. I'm not rooting against Thunderbolt, I'm just dubious of its long term prospects in any use where it overlaps with USB.

I suggest Richard Feynman's Lectures on Computation. People in the physics world will know the name, but the topics covered are great for CS/CE topics, and probably not things that were considered and/or covered in regular classes.

http://www.amazon.com/Feynman-...

The book that had the greatest influence om me was Domain Driven Design, by Eric Evans.
It really made the difference from thinking like a developer, to thinking like an architect (I still write code every day)

http://www.amazon.com/Domain-D...

by Don Norman

And to go with that: "concrete mathematics" which gives lots of basics many grad students lack.
http://www.amazon.com/Concrete...

Graduate-level CS encompasses a lot of ground!

Knuth is of course a valuable addition to the book-shelf — as others have pointed out, it's a superb source for chasing up information, details and citations for algorithms and data structures one needs to justify or investigate, if nothing else.

Okasaki's Purely Functional Data Structures has also already been mentioned, and I'd add my endorsement!

I would recommend two other texts to add to a collection:

• Computational Geometry by de Berg et al.: computational geometry techniques have a habit of turning up all over the place in CS and computing more generally, and this is probably the best overview text, providing motivating examples, a good high level theoretical discussion, and pseudo-code.
• Category Theory for Computing Science by Barr and Wells is an excellent introduction to both type theory and category theory, each informing the other.

I would recommend a book on convex optimisation and probabilistic graphical models, but frankly I don't know of a single text on either topic that I could whole-heartedly recommend. Any suggestions?

Graduate-level CS encompasses a lot of ground!

Knuth is of course a valuable addition to the book-shelf — as others have pointed out, it's a superb source for chasing up information, details and citations for algorithms and data structures one needs to justify or investigate, if nothing else.

Okasaki's Purely Functional Data Structures has also already been mentioned, and I'd add my endorsement!

I would recommend two other texts to add to a collection:

• Computational Geometry by de Berg et al.: computational geometry techniques have a habit of turning up all over the place in CS and computing more generally, and this is probably the best overview text, providing motivating examples, a good high level theoretical discussion, and pseudo-code.
• Category Theory for Computing Science by Barr and Wells is an excellent introduction to both type theory and category theory, each informing the other.

I would recommend a book on convex optimisation and probabilistic graphical models, but frankly I don't know of a single text on either topic that I could whole-heartedly recommend. Any suggestions?

First off, what's "pure CS?" Is there a grad school of adulterated CS? Then, get this book: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb...

Computer Science: An Overview by Brookshear. See the forest for the trees.
http://www.amazon.com/Computer...

Mythical Man Month by Brooks. Don't get lost in the woods.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Myth...

And find a favorite programmer and follow their writings\blogs\tweets. eg: Carmack, Linus, etc.

Computer Science: An Overview by Brookshear. See the forest for the trees.
http://www.amazon.com/Computer...

Mythical Man Month by Brooks. Don't get lost in the woods.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Myth...

And find a favorite programmer and follow their writings\blogs\tweets. eg: Carmack, Linus, etc.

http://www.amazon.com/Deadly-S... Good food for thought dished out in byte-sized chunks. Intellectually tasty and very digestable.

But the original version is 70 bucks! From 1990 no less:

http://www.amazon.com/UNIX-Net...

While the 3rd Edition is cheaper:

http://www.amazon.com/UNIX-Net...

But the original version is 70 bucks! From 1990 no less:

http://www.amazon.com/UNIX-Net...

While the 3rd Edition is cheaper:

http://www.amazon.com/UNIX-Net...

Since most of the "Computer Science" we call today is actually "industrial science" with variations on things we already know, you shouuld go back and learn all of the fundamentals fo the science, which in my opinion was established by Knuth.

Which, I can assure you, you haven't learned them if you went to a typical University in the United States. For one thing, you spent way too much time reading about other things to cover the basics of the science of computing in 4 years at a University.

http://www.amazon.com/Computer...

This should be a graduation present for all University Students, and a cornerstone for those who want to avoid college because of cost/indoctrinized education and begin studying the topic yourself.

What I like about this set of books is, you can even as a beginner, skim the text and if you like, avoid the theory, and immediately start trying to write code and in many cases, the algorithms in the code point to an understanding to the process of many mathematical functions.

With this understanding, you can start trying to tackle some of the fairly formidable abstract ideas in the text which forms the foundations of computer science.

For example, I learned what integration was about from a computer algorithm this way when I was 14, and once I understood what was happening with the code the math was much simpler. I always thought Calculas at the time was big and scary. Not so scary when you do it in C code.

Calculas = Fancy Adding and Subtracting. :-)

But you won't touch any subject matter right now, or in the foreseeable future that Donald didn't already cover in these volumes.

You realize that you have already lost this battle a long time ago, right?

http://www.amazon.com/s/?ie=UT...

"how can I build a profitable luxury hotel here?"

Or how about a "for profit" prison? We send up low level criminals like students, pot users, computer hackers, political dissidents, etc up there... While they are in prison they can be taught a trade, like computer programming. Then when they get out tell them they have a debt to society for the trip up, housing, food, water, air, waste disposal, etc, not to mention if they want to return to earth... I'm sure only a few will pull together the required funds. Might not be legal in most countries on earth, but the moon doesn't have any laws, right?

Damn, I'm feeling evil today >:D

Just make sure they don't start building a mass driver.

http://www.amazon.com/Dragonfl...

That would be Caesar Baronius, a Cardinal. It appears that the exact quote is:

"The Bible teaches us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go."

I'm glad that you brought this up - religion and science by definition exist to provide answers to very, very different questions. The Dalai Lama approaches the differences between Science and Religion, their similarities, and how they can learn from each other in his book, The Universe in a Single Atom. It's a great read for scientists and religious people alike.

One of his very important points is that when people were first trying to figure out the world, they didn't have all of the mathematical knowledge or fancy tools or computers or even a good way to describe how things worked. Some of this was included into religious texts and that's okay, but if we can prove that something is true or false, and a religion teaches the opposite, then the religion should be updated. People make mistakes, we're only human, right?

Your post proves my point. You care more about moral posturing and displaying your conformity with a bankrupt ideology than you do about the truth.

I wonder what is going to happen when cats like you read Nicholas Wade's new book! .

You'll probably have a heart attack. And you still won't live in a majority black neighborhood. And you won't wonder why Slashdot doesn't run a story about the major New York Times Science writer admitting that yes, it's true. Intelligence is genetic. In fact, any behavioral attribute that can be reliably measured has a genetic component.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/produ...

This scenario was played out in a novel called "Lights Out" by David Crawford. It's fiction, but I can see it going down in a manner very similar to that story.

Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/Lights-O...

If you are whining about the "collateral murder" incident, they were killed because they were sneaking around with terrorists and weren't wearing the special journalist hat. So no, "we" really don't like killing journalists.

I believe I've read similar arguments some time ago in a book titled Rare Earth: Why Complex Life is Uncommon in the Universe. It was published a decade ago. So it's a slow news day again, I guess. ;-)

Lets burn the lawyers offices down.

The lawyers are powerless without the courts. It's the Court orders, backed by ... wait for it ... men with guns that make this environment possible.

Do you know why everybody is so jumpy and the cops are doing summary executions now? Because everybody is a criminal, everybody is a suspect, and the cops and the courts enforce these absurd laws rather than than defend the Constitution as a co-equal branch.

Hell, the Constitution didn't even make it past 1803 intact in design, and FDR accepted the Supreme Court's final surrender in 1937 from Chief Justice Hughes as a settlement to his plan to expand the Court with its cronies. Overnight, SCOTUS began finding all of Roosevelt's programs suddenly Constitutional even concluding that growing wheat for your family farm is part of "Interstate Commerce" and suddenly of Federal providence.

The problem now is that it's impossible for the People to know what the Constitution says because (supposedly) it doesn't mean anything until SCOTUS tells us what it means, which might well be the opposite of what we "think" it means (that is, the plain English meaning). The catch is that the Constitution is what authorizes the government in the first place. If the People aren't competent to understand their agreement with that government, then they weren't competent to create it in the first place and the grant of power is void.

Actually, at the time I worked this out, and at the time I wrote that comment, I was completely unaware this was a "thing" for relativistic travel--I'd seen it used once or twice for short distances, but nothing going any considerable fraction of c. I guess there's really nothing new under the sun (or any other suns for that matter).

Actually, at the time I worked this out, and at the time I wrote that comment, I was completely unaware this was a "thing" for relativistic travel--I'd seen it used once or twice for short distances, but nothing going any considerable fraction of c. I guess there's really nothing new under the sun (or any other suns for that matter).

Spiral bound is nice as it lays open and flat, but the spiral part doesn't weather well. For the last couple years I've been using a Whitelines squared hardcover notebook and a Lamy fountain pen/a. If you're gonna be using it for the next year or so, you might as well get decent stuff.

Spiral bound is nice as it lays open and flat, but the spiral part doesn't weather well. For the last couple years I've been using a Whitelines squared hardcover notebook and a Lamy fountain pen/a. If you're gonna be using it for the next year or so, you might as well get decent stuff.

"49% or so of us know and the other 51% are too arrogant to admit that they aren't going to improve things much without the help of the government."

Well you guys need to come out of your illusions first.

http://www.amazon.com/Empire-I...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

http://www.democracynow.org/bl...

NC on: Free markets

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

The Hasbro MY 3D Viewer has been out for about 3 years. No it doesn't connect to a PC bu it's wireless and 3D and works w/ your head motion, no LED required. Just add a bungie cord to strap it to your head for hands free motion. http://www.amazon.com/Hasbro-V...

Detroit was the economic powerhouse of the United States for decades until its business leaders caught the 'MBA Disease' and managed their companies into the ground.

I'm not sure exactly what the "MBA disease" is but the rise of professional managers in the '50s and '60s, as exemplified by the rise of Robert McNamara and the "Whiz Kids" at Ford, was actually a very good time for the US auto industry. What killed the US auto industry was a combination of 1.) building crap cars with terrible quality; 2.) not foreseeing the Oil Crisis of the '70s and that customers might actually want small, non-gas guzzler cars; and most importantly 3.) a dysfunctional relationship between management and unions that resulted in an outrageous, unsustainable cost structure. Management didn't have the courage to make necessary big cost structure changes, and they kept kicking the can down the road by promising huge pension and benefit increases that wouldn't have to be paid for until they had the retired and the next sucker got stuck with it. Wash, rinse, repeat. There was ample evidence that cars could be built well and profitably in the US, as the NUMMI joint venture between Toyota and GM proved, but doing so required big changes from both management and unions and neither were willing to budge from the system that had kept them fat and happy for decades.

It all nearly fell apart in the '90s (the rise of SUVs was all that saved Detroit back then) and then finally in '08. But the system had been rotting for decades and all it took was the right push to send it collapsing into a heap. If you're interested in what went wrong with the US auto industry and why, I highly recommend Crash Course by Paul Ingrassia. The This American Life episode on NUMMI is also brilliant and well worth a listen.

haha. See if this link works:

http://www.amazon.com/Mikrotik-Routerboard-RB2011UAS-2HND-IN-port-Ethernet/dp/B00BGIXOHQ

At worst, you can just google for the model (RB2011UAS-2HND-IN). Pretty close to the top link

I've had really good luck with my RB2011UAS-2HND-IN from Mikrotik. It's pretty easy to configure queues by interface, all the way down to tagging the packets and throttling down to individual TCP/UDP ports.

Costs slightly more than a cheap home router, but you have something pretty sturdy and extremely flexible to work with.

Because the future of humanity depends on getting off of this rock eventually.

Using a phrase like "the future of humanity" suggests that humanity as it currently exists has a future. As technology progresses and the merging of man and machine becomes a possibility, who knows that future inhabitants of this planet will want or need. In his novel Marooned in Realtime , which deals with a technological singularity, Vernor Vinge speculated that an advanced race might decide to just burrow deep underground and live in a virtual reality there instead of expanding out into the cosmos. Sure, you could argue that billions of years from now civilization would be threatened by the sun expanding into a red giant, but that's hardly a case for the need for human beings to get off Earth now or anytime soon.

Looks like it's already available http://www.amazon.com/gp/produ...

$559 is actually on the low side for ergonomic office chairs. Ever priced an Aeron? A low end model is $899 on Amazon right now. I've been in many companies where these are standard equipment.

http://www.amazon.com/Aeron-Ch...

However, I have to say that when discussing code, it is really nice to be standing as it is easier to gather around the screen with others and look at things. I'm a prof, so this is great for teaching a couple of people at once.

Also, I had some extra money at the end of a semester and bought a muvman stool. It is really great . The center post sits in a stiff ball-and-socket joint at the bottom and allows you to move around while you kind of sit/lean. Only thing is the price.

That's what I thought until my son started using those "specialized" pieces to make all kinds of wacky inventions. Most of those "specific" pieces fall into two categories:
- A regular piece with different coloring or embossed printing to match the character.
- A standard mechanical engineering piece that you've just never seen before.

I am a software guy with little mechanical knowledge, but as I read the Lego Technic Builders Guide I now see many of those "specialized" pieces actually look like nicely-finished versions of standard Technic bricks.

This is *before* those limits were lifted. As a citizen, I'm looking forward to seeing the power of the wealthy further cemented in this country, and so exquisitely draped in the pretense of democracy that my fellow citizens believe themselves empowered. It's gonna get better! (For the wealthy). How exciting for those of us who imagine ourselves upwardly mobile within the American caste system.

George Lakoff explained how it works in his book Don't think of an elephant. People don't vote for what's best for them (using logic). They vote their identity, and the conservitives have made excellent use of language to frame the debate in such a way that poor people actually feel good about removing social services, by voting Republican. Tax cuts are framed as "tax relieve", only relieving the state of so much money it can't afford social programs anymore.

In their view social programs are bad for poor people, as poor people deserve to be poor, and this punishes them for not working hard enough. Rich people deserve to be rich. They are clever, otherwise they wouldn't be rich. If poor people want to be rich, let them work for it. Poor people are needed to serve the rich. (This is not my view to be clear).

Another important frame: Pro Life! Abortion is bad, because it undermines the power of the father in the family. When a teenager becomes pregnant, it's her own fault, and she should live with the consequences. She didn't listen to her father, who is the moral authority and who decides what's good and what't wrong. When an adult woman decides to have an abortion because she wants to work on her career, she undermines this strict-father-morale as well. A career is not for women - they should stay at home and raise the children. Pro Life is not about life, it's about male dominance. Pro Life is not about the life of that baby - they don't care about that baby that probably would have little value to them. Pro Life is not about life, because it's OK to physically attack and occasionally kill people who work at abortion clinics. Casualties of war!

How can you be against life? Are you for real that you want more taxes? Vote Conservative!

Ouch, that poor straw man didn't stand a chance against you...

George Lakoff explained how it works in his book Don't think of an elephant.

I once picked up this book in a bookstore. I read a few pages into the first chapter, where he claims that Republicans believe in beating newborn babies with "sticks, belts and wooden paddles". I stopped reading at that point, figuring that such a partisan shill can't possibly have anything useful to say.

Keep belittling the power of people, forget about Rosa Parks and many others who through civil disobedience have change this country for better.

Rosa Parks was not a "spontaneous uprising". While in American schools her story tends to be misportrayed as a case of a solitary dissident (an issue fascinatingly explored in educator Herbert Kohl's Should We Burn Babar? ), in reality she was active in the local NAACP and her and her fellow civil rights aspirants had been waiting for the perfect moment to further their cause.

Rosa Parks is an example of dramatic social change coming from committed, organized groups and not spontaneous outbursts of individual discontent.

This is *before* those limits were lifted. As a citizen, I'm looking forward to seeing the power of the wealthy further cemented in this country, and so exquisitely draped in the pretense of democracy that my fellow citizens believe themselves empowered. It's gonna get better! (For the wealthy). How exciting for those of us who imagine ourselves upwardly mobile within the American caste system.

George Lakoff explained how it works in his book Don't think of an elephant. People don't vote for what's best for them (using logic). They vote their identity, and the conservitives have made excellent use of language to frame the debate in such a way that poor people actually feel good about removing social services, by voting Republican. Tax cuts are framed as "tax relieve", only relieving the state of so much money it can't afford social programs anymore.

In their view social programs are bad for poor people, as poor people deserve to be poor, and this punishes them for not working hard enough. Rich people deserve to be rich. They are clever, otherwise they wouldn't be rich. If poor people want to be rich, let them work for it. Poor people are needed to serve the rich. (This is not my view to be clear).

Another important frame: Pro Life! Abortion is bad, because it undermines the power of the father in the family. When a teenager becomes pregnant, it's her own fault, and she should live with the consequences. She didn't listen to her father, who is the moral authority and who decides what's good and what't wrong. When an adult woman decides to have an abortion because she wants to work on her career, she undermines this strict-father-morale as well. A career is not for women - they should stay at home and raise the children. Pro Life is not about life, it's about male dominance. Pro Life is not about the life of that baby - they don't care about that baby that probably would have little value to them. Pro Life is not about life, because it's OK to physically attack and occasionally kill people who work at abortion clinics. Casualties of war!

How can you be against life? Are you for real that you want more taxes? Vote Conservative!

All I really need mounted in the dash is an AMP and speakers.

That's pretty much what ALL cheap car stereos have been doing for the past decade. Except they throw in a clock, USB & SD card slots for MP3s, and usually a radio.

How does $25 grab you:

https://www.amazon.com/XO-Visi...

We don't but that goes with any product out there. The difference is software has things like License Agreements and Terms of Service most of which give the software vendor no liability whatsoever for their product if it fails to perform. Imagine if you bought a car with a License Agreement that said "you have a license to use this vehicle however we assume no liability for it's use or damages caused by or within the vehicle." In the case of software vendors when problems are found they shrug their shoulders and introduce a patch or fix. If the software is no longer supported, they'll just direct you to their professional services folks and sign you up for custom support or the sales department to get you to buy their latest offerings.

Another aspect of vulnerabilities like this isn't from a security but also a safety perspective. Bad software has killed people. Read "Fatal Defect." It's an older book but it's a fascinating study of bad software design that's actually killed people.

The Amazon business is focused around it's core principles:
http://www.amazon.com/Values-C...

Notice that "Frugality" is listed as one of them.

Too late. We already did it voluntary.