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PalmOS 5 had/has full support for WiFi. They even have released a WiFi card that can plug into the SD slot of many Palm OS 5 devices. I have personally used a Tungsten T3 with the WiFi card for a number of years and it works quite well, especially for doing stuff over SSH or quickly checking email.

There were also a couple of PalmOS 5 devices that had built-in WiFi notably the Tungsten TX and the LifeDrive.

"at any given time, 50,000 predators are on the Internet prowling for children."

In this case, cited by Alberto Gonzalez, who references Dateline as his source. This statistic is incredibly spurious, and everyone here on Slashdot should understand why.

Sex offenders are real, but the debate is particularly muddied by misinformation.

.. but if you prefer something more aggressive than passive, you can't beat tennis racket bug zappers. Keeps the kids off the xbox for hours.

Will the corrupters of the U.S. get control of Canada, too?

By some measures, the U.S. government is the most corrupt in the world. For example, this Rolling Stone article: The Great American Bubble Machine. (The full article is in the paper edition, available at any library.)

The U.S. government spends more money on surveillance and war than any country in the history of the world. That taxpayer money partly helps those who want corruption to profit, and hurts U.S. taxpayers, and the entire world. For just one example, see the book: House of Bush, House of Saud

The U.S. government has invaded or bombed 25 countries since the 2nd world war. Most or all of the interference was for profit. Quote: '... although nearly all the post-World War II interventions were carried out in the name of "freedom" and "democracy," nearly all of them in fact defended dictatorships controlled by pro-U.S. elites' The dictators pay the corrupters. In Iraq, the U.S. government wanted control over the oil, and didn't care how many people it killed. In Afghanistan, the corrupters want to build an oil pipeline from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to a port where the oil can be delivered.

The U.S. government has a higher percentage of its people in prison than any country ever in the history of the world, over 6 times higher than in Europe, for example. Wikipedia quote: Approximately one in every 18 men in the United States is behind bars or being monitored.

U.S. citizens don't want to believe that their government is as corrupt as it is, even though the recent financial corruption has made many of them poor.

If the corrupters have success in Canada, they will only want more. The problem is MUCH bigger than most people think.

Plenty of cool applications to think off; the race is on to build the first Netscape of Augmented Reality, and then we can all quickly build a whole new World Wide Web.

When visiting a new town just Google for a suitable set of layers.

Tube stations, Tourist information (with guided tours), traffic, dating (heh! I'm available).... i'm sure that is just the beginning.

Coincidently I Just finished reading Halting State (Charles Cross) -- set in Edinburgh 2017 AR was already standard -- in fact the protagonist had difficulty imagining not being able to know where she was all the time.

There is a place. It is a place where broken rocks ring a red sun.
Several centuries ago, we discovered a race of arthropod-like creatures called Whilles, with whom we could not deal.
They rejected friendly overtures on the parts of every known intelligent race. Also, they slew our emissaries and sent their remains back to us, missing a few pieces here and there.
When first we contacted them, they possessed vehicles for travel within their own solar system. Shortly thereafter, they developed interstellar travel.
Wherever they went, they killed and they stole and then beat it back home.
Perhaps they didn't realize the size of the interstellar community at that time, or perhaps they didn't care.
They guessed right if they thought it would take an awfully long time to reach an accord when it came to declaring war on them.
There is actually very little precedent for interstellar war. The Pei'ans are about the only ones who remember any..
So the attacks failed, what remained of our forces were withdrawn, and we began to bombard the planet.
The Whilles were, however, further along technologically than we'd initially thought. They had a near-perfect defense system against missiles.
So we withdrew and tried to contain them. They didn't stop their raids, though.
Then the Names were contacted, and three worldscapers, Sang-ring of Greldei, Karth'ting of Mordei and I, were chosen by lot to use our abilities in reverse.
Later, within the system of the Whilles, beyond the orbit of their home world, a belt of asteroids began to collapse upon itself, forming a planetoid.
Rock by rock, it grew, and slowly it altered its course. We sat, with our machinery, beyond the orbit of the farthest planet, directing the new world's growth and its slow spiral inward.
When the Whilles realized what was happening, they tried to destroy it.
But it was too late. They never asked for mercy, and none of them tried to flee. They waited, and the day came.
The orbits of the two worlds intersected, and now it is a place where broken rocks ring a red sun. I stayed drunk for a week after that.

http://www.amazon.com/Isle-Dead-Eye-Roger-Zelazny/dp/0743434684/

No, the clerks were doing their jobs well, but then Enron wasn't bad decisions - it was fraud. My point is that a lot of people were arguing the labor theory of value: the UAW workers made all the money for the company, which was then driven into the ground by bad management. Bad management can kill companies, but so can bad workers, and it's pretty hard to argue that the UAW's unionized workers were responsible for the company's profits when times were good, but that they bore none of the responsibility when things went south.

There's a really interesting book called Sabotage in the American Workplace that has a story from a line worker that dedicated his life - and he was a long way from the only one doing it - to sabotaging the cars they manufactured so that nobody would ever buy one from the company they hated so much. When workers are that short-sighted, they deserve what they get.

"Paradoxically, metal or ceramic implants meant to prevent bone breaks can sometimes cause them. Current implants are significantly harder than the bone that surrounds them. Natural bone can flex slightly. In fact, stress helps build stronger bones. However, the harder implants can apply so much stress to a particular area that the bone snaps. Softer wooden implants might cause fewer bone breaks."

Hm, this is like what I learned in Structures: or Why Things Don't Fall Down.

The author noted that insurance companies, finding a weak wall, would often over-retrofit it. Then the building collapses, becase the weight that would have been born by the wall is displaced onto the other walls.

He also wrote about the cult of metal. The only reason engines are made of metal, he explained, is because they have to contain very high temperatures. If it were not for that, they could be made far more efficiently with hoses and bladders. He challenged the readers to come up with ways to make things that are presently made out of metal out of other materials -- such as wood and bird feathers.

Um... this has been done:

The Movies

http://www.research.att.com/~njas/sequences/ This is huge.

http://www.amazon.com/Dictionary-Real-Numbers-J-Borwein/dp/0534128408 A Dictionary of Real Numbers (Hardcover)

The keyboard looks like it might be this Adesso model: http://www.amazon.com/Adesso-Wireless-Keyboard-Optical-Trackball/dp/B000JJM7S0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1249910929&sr=8-1 If so, my experience with it is that it is crap. Every time I woke the PC up from a sleep state, I had to re-sync the keyboard with the USB dongle. Typing sporadically dropped keystrokes, and the trackball was jittery. Overall it felt very cheaply made. Just my two cents.

Hmm, strange. I'd have thought someone would have done it already. Even if it's just by some researcher.

After all, some people claim they can teach dogs to read:

http://www.amazon.com/Teach-Your-Bonnie-Bergin-Ed-D/dp/076792245X

If they can really read, "speaking" is not such a big problem nowadays.

http://art-bin.com/art/omodest.html

A Modest Proposal

For Preventing The Children of Poor People in Ireland From Being A burden to Their Parents or Country, and For Making Them Beneficial to The Public

By Jonathan Swift (1729)

an excerpt:

"I have reckoned upon a medium that a child just born will weigh 12 pounds, and in a solar year, if tolerably nursed, increaseth to 28 pounds.

"I grant this food will be somewhat dear, and therefore very proper for landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of the parents, seem to have the best title to the children."

And don't forget to read the companion cookbook, "To Serve Man" ... here ya go: http://www.amazon.com/Serve-Man-Cookbook-People/dp/1880448823

Not really sure if your making a joke or what exactly. (I have not had coffee YET) But a 200 grain round of 10mm Buffalo Bore travels at close to 1700 fps and carry's enough energy to penetrate a brown bear just about anywhere (according to acquaintance, occasional shooting partner and author of Alaska Bear Tails Larry Kaniut)

So there the go, information. Enjoy.

I recently had to return 3 Sony LCDs of 2 different varieties because of various manufacturing defects and decided to try Samsung. I had recently got a bonus at work so decided to splurge on an backlight with LEDs to avoid the problems that plagued the Sony models I had. It might be a bit more expensive now to get an LED backed display like the one I ended up getting the UN40B6000 model and I've had 0 problems with it so far. I should mention I'm picky as hell about colors and uneven lighting and I think it was worth the extra few bucks. Another bonus is that it runs far cooler than the other LCDs I have seen and given equal components (read capacitors) should last a lot longer.

I also bought one of those Proscan 40" LCDs they had at Costco for 450 bucks and I use that to watch movies in the computer lounge area. Great deal but I would not waste a Blu-Ray player on it. It does have a transformer buzz thing going on all the time but for 450 bucks you can't complain. The only thing I hate about is that it draws 240 watts continuously because of the poor power system design but I just bought one of those wireless xmas-lights plugs and I turn off the whole power strip, warts and all when I'm not using it.

It's not open source, but for $0.01, you can buy Robert X. Cringely's wonderful though dated Accidental Empires: How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make Their Millions, Battle Foreign Competition, and Still Can't Get a Date. Not only does Bob give you first-hand accounts of the people who pioneered computer hardware, software, and operating systems, he's also pretty damn funny. You could also point your students to his free sites: the current site or the old site.

He's not always right, but he's usually knows what he's talking about and he's frequently entertaining.

to stop the wanting a Cig when i have coffee. i got theses.

http://www.amazon.com/Tea-Tree-Therapy-TOOTHPICKS-CINNAMON/dp/B000GUHAES

they Sell them at the Whole foods around here.. they are damn strong.. and more than enough to satisfy that change of flavor in your mouth..

the Cinnamon are good.. the plain ones are anything but - and taste like cheap menthol..

not saying this is the answer.. but if you really want to quit.. it can help.. if you let it help.

Ah, the classic Mouseman 96. I loved that thing so much back in my Quake days. I used to collect them so I'd always have a spare, I still have one or two of them tucked away amidst my old PC stuff (although it's quite likely they've already been picked over and scavenged for replacement parts over the years). You could practically forget it was under your hand, it was perfectly shaped and effortless to move.

They did make a USB version called the Wingman but I never tried it; you can still find PS/2 ports on a surprising number of PCs.

One of my personal interests in this era of gaming, which doesn't have a direct analog today, is the arcade->console adaptation route, and the technical, artistic, and gameplay challenges involved. I guess I've always known that such adaptations were common, but until recently I didn't really understand just how deeply such adaptations/ports were affected by the differences between special-purpose arcade hardware and generic and generally underpowered console hardware, and what sorts of heroic efforts porters went to to try to get something even vaguely like the cabinet to run on a home machine (sometimes in vain). That's probably the single thing I found most interesting about a recent book on the Atari VCS that opened my eyes on that. I'd read all sorts of stuff previously about the VCS (aka 2600) hardware, and different stuff about its cultural, business, and social role, but pulling the two together by looking at how the tech affects the culture and vice versa is really fascinating to me. I think ports are a particularly good lens to look at that through, because they focus sharply on how the tech affected what the designer could or couldn't do; the aforementioned book's examples of the disastrous Pac-Man port, on the one hand, and the unfaithful but interesting/successful adaptation of Star Castle into Yars' Revenge , on the other, are particularly thought-provoking.

So I really like that aspect of this article, tracing how Robotron was and wasn't successfully adapted to home machines, and which parts specifically of the arcade version survived the translation and were still compelling in the home version. Although we don't have nearly the same hardware limitations on home machines these days, I think we're in a way still struggling with similar issues about "what worked in the arcade, and how can we adapt it?"--- e.g. the discussion in this article of custom controllers to make the home version more authentic reminds me of our current era's custom controllers (Rock Band's peripherals being the best-selling). And, more broadly, we're trying to figure out whether platforms matter, and if so, how. The Wii has a compelling "what's different" angle for its platform, but is that a one-time, peripheral-only thing? Do the Xbox 360, PC, and PS3 have interesting differences going for them? Do physical arcade cabinets still matter?

More generally, I think it's one way of getting at a sort of design science that's still lacking for games, and I like how this article tries to break that down. Obviously much of game design is not really "science", but other design fields still do carefully analyze existing works, try to identify which elements specifically mattered, etc.; you might be doing something that's artistic/subjective in a lot of respects, but that doesn't mean you have to do it blind. I mean, if I want to learn architecture, there are a lot of books I can buy. I can buy a book specifically on the Bauhaus style, or some sub-style of it, or one particular architect's style. But, despite their huge role in popular culture, I can't buy a book about the design style of, say, Microprose 4X games, analyzing what elements they had in common or didn't, their relationship to other games of the era, how technical aspects influenced the design and vice versa, etc., etc. As a player, I can probably tell you some stuff off the top of my head, and I think there really is a book to be written there--- or an in-depth article on the internet if you can't interest a publisher--- but nobody's written it.

So I guess that's a long-winded way of saying: yes, more of this!

"I am a neuroscientist and I can tell you for sure that the basic form of the information in a brain is not a linear bit. But it does obey the laws of physics, and everything we know points to it following pretty mundane physics."

Are you quite sure about that?

It's not widely discussed in psychology or neuroscience, but there does exist 150 years of evidence for anomalous cognition states which really blow a hole in the mind-brain relationship. Some authors are now starting to publish on this. Kelly et al's 'Irreducible Mind' came out a couple years ago and is full of footnotes:

http://www.rowmanlittlefield.com/Catalog/SingleBook.shtml?command=Search&db=^DB/CATALOG.db&eqSKUdata=0742547922

http://books.google.co.nz/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC&dq=irreducible+mind&printsec=frontcover&source=bn&hl=en&ei=mp97So2GEo3-tQOVoszvCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6#v=onepage&q=&f=false

For a more approachable street-level introduction: the late Elizabeth Meyer's 'Extraordinary Knowing'.
http://www.amazon.com/Extraordinary-Knowing-Science-Skepticism-Inexplicable/dp/0553803352
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AClVSWvNsWw

I've had a few anomalous experiences of my own. Taken seriously, this body of material makes the 'mind == brain == machine' hypothesis very hard to stretch to explain the facts. There's certainly a loose correlation between some body/brain states and some conscious states; but there is by no means a one-to-one correlation, nor does conventional physics even begin to address the correlations seen in autogansfeld and Zener type experiments - or in remote viewing or precognitive dreams.

Light cones simply don't seem to apply - the mind is sometimes a very naughty boy and just flat-out cheats, accessing information it has no physical reason to know. Try simulating *that*.

That sounds exactly like the Kindle DX (http://amazon.com/kindledx). While the ebooks Amazon sells have DRM, it reads all sorts of formats, and DX reads pdfs (I don't believe the kindle 2 has one). I have a kindle one and the majority of my reading material is things I have put on it, be it from feedbooks.com, mobileread.com, or other sources.

Phone mice did.

And so did many a car mouse.

At the very least, we know the brain obeys the laws of physics. A computer can simulate the laws of physics. Therefore, a computer can simulate the brain.

Douglas Hofstadter has a thing or two to say about it.
And Roger Penrose outrightly disagrees with you. And, in case you hadn't noticed, Roger Penrose is a rather renowned physicist.

I realise those works are old. That doesn't mean they're obsolete though, though I'd be glad to read a more recent view (i.e. one using more recent analogies than computers with autoexec.bat).

At the very least, we know the brain obeys the laws of physics. A computer can simulate the laws of physics. Therefore, a computer can simulate the brain.

Douglas Hofstadter has a thing or two to say about it.
And Roger Penrose outrightly disagrees with you. And, in case you hadn't noticed, Roger Penrose is a rather renowned physicist.

I realise those works are old. That doesn't mean they're obsolete though, though I'd be glad to read a more recent view (i.e. one using more recent analogies than computers with autoexec.bat).

Anyone read this book? The idea is that someone figures out how to capture the state of a human brain on some special tapes. Comedy, of course, ensues.

This LED-backlit LCD supposed has a five-million-to-one contrast ratio.

That's a completely fake stat. From the reviews: "The autodimming feature is also poorly implemented. Again, in credits or scenes where there is more dark than light, it will turn the backlight down for "better contrast". However, when the TV changes its mind about the scene, the previously dim white areas will pop bright white. It looks very strange." That's how they get that number, and why it's bull.

Like the GP said, contrast is really lacking, and vendors know it, making it doubly impossible to get accurate numbers on their actual contrast abilities.

I would also suggest knowing each others Meyers Briggs personality types and understanding what that means in a relationship. This helped us understand our differences better and use them to our advantage as a couple rather than focusing on the negatives. Here's a proper link to the 5 Love Languages:

The 5 Love Languages

Finally, set ground rules for conflict resolution so things don't escalate. We use the HALT acronym:
Hungry - Discussions go better when not distracted.
Angry - Always try to calm down to prevent a disagreement from escalating and then saying something you really don't mean but can't take back.
Lonely - Sometimes you just need some time together to feel close enough to discuss tough issues.
Tired - It's hard to think logically when you are too tired.

If either of us invokes HALT, then we have to set a time to continue the discussion within the next few days (or sooner if it is really urgent).

Marriage can make you both better than you ever would have been apart, it just takes a little work to do so. Good luck!

The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work doesn't make too many assumptions about you (it looks like there is another edition out which is probably identical except for the cover). And as a nice bonus, it's based on actual research, not useless psychobabble dreamed up by somebody based on theories that were based on theories by Freud. Freud's a bad foundation, almost anything built upon his work comes down in under three decades. Anyway, this book doesn't assume that you are stupid, willfully ignorant, a neanderthal, or any of that. Most of the stuff by John Gottman is good, it's all based from his love lab, an actual scientific setup where they study couples. Just as an example of how amazing they are, they have figured out how to predict the permanence of a marriage after watching one argument and interviewing the couple for about 15 minutes (!).

• Define your target audience. Even kids ages 8-12 vary quite a bit. Are you targeting girls? boys? What do you percieve to be their interests? Get some kids in your target age range to tell you about games they like and see if you can borrow some concepts. Keep them involved in testing too. The reason shows like "Dora the explorer" are so popular is because the kid feels as though they are joining in the adventure.
• Define your story. Every good game as some sort of objective, even puzzle games. Educational games are no different. Is there some Antagonist involved? "Beating level 7" is not as interesting as "taking down the evil emperor". With a younger audience, keep it simple and reasonable. Maybe becoming the star player of some game (soccer, baseball, etc..) or the best race car driver would work.
• Define your approach. Using your story, how are some ways you can progress through it? If the objective is to conquer territory, then you'd have some way to win the game neighborhood-by-neighborhood. Almost Zelda-like in that you take down dungeon by dungeon before facing Ganon. Also consider the attention span of your audience. If you have one level that takes them 20 minutes of repetitive playing, you may lose a lot of players. If you're doing some sort of platform game, you may consider having some way to save progress. If you're doing simple web app games, then you'll want to keep them short and sweet.

We used this book in a game design class I took. While certainly not an end-all-be-all book on game design, it certainly got the class thinking about some of the subtleties in games. How to approach accomplishment in the game, how to encourage the player to keep going (important for younger ones so they don't get frustrated), etc...

Contrast is perhaps in worst shape. The most impressive videos are those that have contrast ranges over a million, preferably over a billion. Super dark shadows and bright light source appear real then. The best monitors at Best Buy have contrast ranges in hundred thousands, but many are under a thousand. Different contrasts are very noticeable viewing screens side-by side. Sony has an experimental Organic-LED screen with a million contrast that starts to look realistic.

This LED-backlit LCD supposed has a five-million-to-one contrast ratio.

They have these at Best Buy, and the 40-inch one is only $1600, and I think I may be getting one. I'm not about to assume that manufacturer-reported contrast ratio is accurate, but visually comparing them to the normal florescent-backlit LCDs next to them, the difference is incredibly apparent and I think worth the extra price.

This book is about the life cycle of failed relationships. The path to divorce may start earlier than the wedding. Learn if some patterns apply to you. Some concepts revolve around distribution of information about the relationship among the couple. The book is not written by a psychologist who may be tempted to offer explanations, but by a sociologist who - in a curious unity of neutral, objective, indifferent yet compassionate discussion - analyzes a high number of uncouplings and highlight patterns of events and information flow. The book is thus compatible with analytical thinking, while its narration style might be interesting for the literary. Spirituality, commonplaces, broilerplate folksy advice or upbeat can-do encouragement are not found here. Considering the wealth of information, conclusions and advice are kept to precious short phrases, which is a merit of the book considering its stance and how little we know about ourselves.

http://www.amazon.com/Uncoupling-Turning-Points-Intimate-Relationships/dp/0679730028

"Getting the Love You Want" by Harville Hendrix http://www.amazon.com/Getting-Love-You-Want-Couples/dp/0805068953 29 years and counting

Against Love

Saved my marriage for sure. After reading we stopped "working" on the relationship.

Also a lot of geeks are opting for non-traditional relationships (non-monogamy and the like), at least be open to talking about it all. Geeks -- even literary ones -- are after all highly evolved creatures.

One of the rabbis my geeky wife and I discussed our then-pending marriage with handed me a sheet entitled The Rules. I remember exactly two of them:

• Rule 1: The male is always wrong.
  . . .
• Rule ?: If at any time the female suspects the male knows the rules, she may change them.

In the ensuing 18 years, I have found these two rules to be the most accurate advice anyone has ever given me.

But seriously, the main thing to do with your wife is to talk to her and share your feelings, and listen to her when she talks. A very good book on communications between the genders is You Just Don't Understand: Women and Men in Conversation, by Deborah Tannen. The executive summary: When your female partner tells you about a problem, most of the time she wants you to shut up and listen, and not to try and tell her how to fix it. Besides helping me get along with women, the book has also helped me get along better with other men.

In any case, felicitations to you and your geeky honey. Live long and prosper, and be fruitful and multiply.

Intelligent people do not need the kind of rubberstamp advice you find in self-help books. As long you remain honest, open and calm, you are very well off. Not doing stupid thing like playing WoW (ATTN! compare to watching football with you buddies and sipping beer) through your anniversary helps, too.

It's not quite that simple. Not sure that most self-help books are any good, but my wife and I got married in a church that had an extensive pre-marital program and we've really, really appreciated it. Having a few tools in your toolbox and knowing that various things that happen are not unexpected or unique to you is pretty powerful. Especially up front, where you can be ambushed by an issue and say/do things that set a bad tone early on.

Personally, I highly recommend the book Love & Respect

And I definitely disagree with the "it's common sense" philosophy I've seen in a couple of postings. It's often the fact that "common sense" for you and "common sense" for her (basically family/cultural norms) will differ but you won't be able to see it since "common sense" is so "obvious" so how could anyone sincerely and sanely disagree. If I had to give soundbites, I'd say "don't act in fear", "know your limitations", "negotiate", "what she's doing makes sense to her", "why are you doing what you're doing?", and "seek to understand before being understood", or something like that.

* this can be either the best or the worst thing you'll do in your lifetime. THINK ABOUT IT CAREFULLY. If there are troubling bits then don't.
* don't assume that because you're married you can stop being nice 'because you've caught her'. She can divorce you, or worse.
* common law marriage. community property. alimony. Look up the laws in your state.
* learn what she likes and do it. don't try to make her like what you do.
* goto amazon.com and get a copy of this book. It explains the expectational differences between the sexes. http://www.amazon.com/Why-Dont-Enough-Women-Love/dp/0671689789/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1249474597&sr=8-1
* figure out how you're going to raise the kids. If you're strict and she's permissive and neither of you will give in then you're headed toward disaster.
* treat her as well as you'd like to be treated. Most people will respond with love if you love them, even if you do it badly.

Good luck!

I couldn't disagree with this more. My wife and I are both intelligent, sensitive, caring, dedicated people. But after being married for 5 years, we were seriously ready to throw in the towel if something didn't change. I'd share with people occasionally that we were having some trouble, and people would ask what it was about; my response was, "Honestly, we don't really know. If we understood what the problem was, it wouldn't be happening."

By a random chance (aka God's intervention), we were put onto the work of a guy named John Gottman. John Gottman actually did research on all kinds of couples. He'd wire them up with electrodes to measure their sweat and heart rates, and record their conversations. They even had an apartment rigged up where people would live for 2 days, and record their interactions. He then correlated what he saw with with people's marital satisfaction rating, and with the success of their marriage down the road. He got good enough that after listening to a 15-minute conversation about a hot-spot in their marriage, he could predict with 95% accuracy whether a couple would be divorced in 5 years' time.

We picked up his books, and a lot of what he described I saw in our marriage. Suddenly things aren't so mysterious anymore. We're definitely not out of the woods yet; 5 years of pain and bad habits don't just disappear. But now at least I feel like I have an idea what's going wrong, and even better, I have an idea of what "going right" looks like; and the "going right" is backed by real research, not just "This is my theory". I'd definitely recommend his books to anyone who ever wants to have a long-term relationship, even if it's pretty good right now.

Recommended books:

• The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work: Overview of his work
• Ten Lessons to Transform Your Marriage: Ten "case studies". The central theme is really the same, but seeing how it works out in each individual couple is helpful.
• The Relationship Cure: Probably a must-read for any geek who has trouble connecting with people.

I couldn't disagree with this more. My wife and I are both intelligent, sensitive, caring, dedicated people. But after being married for 5 years, we were seriously ready to throw in the towel if something didn't change. I'd share with people occasionally that we were having some trouble, and people would ask what it was about; my response was, "Honestly, we don't really know. If we understood what the problem was, it wouldn't be happening."

By a random chance (aka God's intervention), we were put onto the work of a guy named John Gottman. John Gottman actually did research on all kinds of couples. He'd wire them up with electrodes to measure their sweat and heart rates, and record their conversations. They even had an apartment rigged up where people would live for 2 days, and record their interactions. He then correlated what he saw with with people's marital satisfaction rating, and with the success of their marriage down the road. He got good enough that after listening to a 15-minute conversation about a hot-spot in their marriage, he could predict with 95% accuracy whether a couple would be divorced in 5 years' time.

We picked up his books, and a lot of what he described I saw in our marriage. Suddenly things aren't so mysterious anymore. We're definitely not out of the woods yet; 5 years of pain and bad habits don't just disappear. But now at least I feel like I have an idea what's going wrong, and even better, I have an idea of what "going right" looks like; and the "going right" is backed by real research, not just "This is my theory". I'd definitely recommend his books to anyone who ever wants to have a long-term relationship, even if it's pretty good right now.

Recommended books:

• The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work: Overview of his work
• Ten Lessons to Transform Your Marriage: Ten "case studies". The central theme is really the same, but seeing how it works out in each individual couple is helpful.
• The Relationship Cure: Probably a must-read for any geek who has trouble connecting with people.

I couldn't disagree with this more. My wife and I are both intelligent, sensitive, caring, dedicated people. But after being married for 5 years, we were seriously ready to throw in the towel if something didn't change. I'd share with people occasionally that we were having some trouble, and people would ask what it was about; my response was, "Honestly, we don't really know. If we understood what the problem was, it wouldn't be happening."

By a random chance (aka God's intervention), we were put onto the work of a guy named John Gottman. John Gottman actually did research on all kinds of couples. He'd wire them up with electrodes to measure their sweat and heart rates, and record their conversations. They even had an apartment rigged up where people would live for 2 days, and record their interactions. He then correlated what he saw with with people's marital satisfaction rating, and with the success of their marriage down the road. He got good enough that after listening to a 15-minute conversation about a hot-spot in their marriage, he could predict with 95% accuracy whether a couple would be divorced in 5 years' time.

We picked up his books, and a lot of what he described I saw in our marriage. Suddenly things aren't so mysterious anymore. We're definitely not out of the woods yet; 5 years of pain and bad habits don't just disappear. But now at least I feel like I have an idea what's going wrong, and even better, I have an idea of what "going right" looks like; and the "going right" is backed by real research, not just "This is my theory". I'd definitely recommend his books to anyone who ever wants to have a long-term relationship, even if it's pretty good right now.

Recommended books:

• The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work: Overview of his work
• Ten Lessons to Transform Your Marriage: Ten "case studies". The central theme is really the same, but seeing how it works out in each individual couple is helpful.
• The Relationship Cure: Probably a must-read for any geek who has trouble connecting with people.

I suspect that 90% of what you want to figure out has nothing to do with your geek aspects. Having a good marriage take a lot of effort either way.

I've gotten a lot out of these two books:

What Wives Wish their Husbands Knew about Woman

The Five Love Languages (best if both of you read this one).

Also, a few random tips:

• If you hit a rough patch, think back to when you were dating and head-over-heals in love with each other. That can remind you of the whole picture when things look bleak.
• Really lover her. That means sacrifice on your part. Understand what really makes her happy, and try to make it happen. This may mean buying a couch rather than a 30" display, etc. I don't mean never do things for yourself, but try hard to not be selfish or self-centered.
• When you fight, be good: Be mature. If you're upset, don't lash out. When arguing, don't go for the rhetorical kill, but instead stick to the issue at hand, and remember who she is. If you find yourself feeling cranky or irrational, ask to resume the conversation after you've had a chance to sort out why you feel so upset. If you're tired, see if you can have a truce until you've had some sleep.
• Sometimes you might think you're smarter than she is, because society generally calls computer geeks smart, and we hear it a lot at work and from friends/family. So you may be tempted, especially if she ends up being a stay-at-home mom, to feel superior to her. Be on guard against this. Not only is the sentiment very likely to be inaccurate, but it will take your marriage down a very scary path.
• Work really hard to avoid cheating on her. We're all subject to temptation. Only high-school/college friends, coworkers, etc. Use your head to avoid situations that may be too much for you to stay faithful. Give yourself a lot of safety margin on this one. This probably means avoiding developing close friendships with women you find even remotely attractive. It's a high cost, but if that's what it takes, then your wife deserves you paying it.
• Try to stay healthy and attractive to her. You'll live longer, and it's nice for her. Remember that contrary to the ideals of feminism, for almost all women, a certain measure of macho and toughness is extremely attractive. (You'll need to carefully research when and how much of this is beneficial, or else you'll come off as a jerk.)
• Try to be really good to her in bed. Learn what works for her in particular. Don't push too much to try stuff she really doesn't want to try. Don't confuse porn with reality. Use any of the million tricks available to increase your stamina in bed, since men almost always finish way before women have had all the climaxes they'd want in a given session. If you can convince her to communicate with you about what she likes and what she doesn't in bed, you're 80% of the way to keeping her really satisfied.
• Develop virtues, such as patience, wisdom, courage, empathy, fairness, generosity, and honesty. There are lots of reasons to do this, and one of them is that your wife will benefit from being married to a good man.

I suspect that 90% of what you want to figure out has nothing to do with your geek aspects. Having a good marriage take a lot of effort either way.

I've gotten a lot out of these two books:

What Wives Wish their Husbands Knew about Woman

The Five Love Languages (best if both of you read this one).

Also, a few random tips:

• If you hit a rough patch, think back to when you were dating and head-over-heals in love with each other. That can remind you of the whole picture when things look bleak.
• Really lover her. That means sacrifice on your part. Understand what really makes her happy, and try to make it happen. This may mean buying a couch rather than a 30" display, etc. I don't mean never do things for yourself, but try hard to not be selfish or self-centered.
• When you fight, be good: Be mature. If you're upset, don't lash out. When arguing, don't go for the rhetorical kill, but instead stick to the issue at hand, and remember who she is. If you find yourself feeling cranky or irrational, ask to resume the conversation after you've had a chance to sort out why you feel so upset. If you're tired, see if you can have a truce until you've had some sleep.
• Sometimes you might think you're smarter than she is, because society generally calls computer geeks smart, and we hear it a lot at work and from friends/family. So you may be tempted, especially if she ends up being a stay-at-home mom, to feel superior to her. Be on guard against this. Not only is the sentiment very likely to be inaccurate, but it will take your marriage down a very scary path.
• Work really hard to avoid cheating on her. We're all subject to temptation. Only high-school/college friends, coworkers, etc. Use your head to avoid situations that may be too much for you to stay faithful. Give yourself a lot of safety margin on this one. This probably means avoiding developing close friendships with women you find even remotely attractive. It's a high cost, but if that's what it takes, then your wife deserves you paying it.
• Try to stay healthy and attractive to her. You'll live longer, and it's nice for her. Remember that contrary to the ideals of feminism, for almost all women, a certain measure of macho and toughness is extremely attractive. (You'll need to carefully research when and how much of this is beneficial, or else you'll come off as a jerk.)
• Try to be really good to her in bed. Learn what works for her in particular. Don't push too much to try stuff she really doesn't want to try. Don't confuse porn with reality. Use any of the million tricks available to increase your stamina in bed, since men almost always finish way before women have had all the climaxes they'd want in a given session. If you can convince her to communicate with you about what she likes and what she doesn't in bed, you're 80% of the way to keeping her really satisfied.
• Develop virtues, such as patience, wisdom, courage, empathy, fairness, generosity, and honesty. There are lots of reasons to do this, and one of them is that your wife will benefit from being married to a good man.

My fiance and I -- epidemiology and engineering PhD students, respectively -- found this classic text helpful:

Kiersy and Bates
Please Understand Me: Character and Temperament Types
http://www.amazon.com/Please-Understand-Me-Character-Temperament/dp/0960695400

Our Windows licenses are cheaper than our Redhat licenses

You probably get volume licenses for Windows. If I wanted to pay Redhat, even though I'm not legally required to do so to use Redhat Linux, a 1 year Basic desktop subscription is $80. The cheapest stand alone version, ie not an upgrade, of Windows Vista Amazon lists is Home Basic, which isn't good for much more than browsing the Internet, using e-mail, or viewing photos and costs $110 whereas for a more capable OS you'll pay more.

The longer support you'll get from MS makes it worthwhile but all the activation, spyware, and other things MS requires is what made me switch from a Windows to a Linux and Mac user. And with my Mac I actually get more support from Apple, if needed, than I did from MS. However I've used less support for my Mac in 2 years than I needed in one year for each and every one of the Windows PCs I owned. And I didn't pay any more for it than I would have for a similarly specified Windows PC.

Falcon

i'm looking into buying the book, is it risk by dan gardner?

page here

Try here: http://www.amazon.com/best-Dinosaur-Comics-2003-2005-D/dp/0756005183

the premise that the copyright owner should be able to charge on a per-word basis (especially in text made up largely of quotations from other sources, as most AP articles are) is truly preposterous.

Some copyright writers, owners, are paid by the number of words. That's how news and periodicals pay. Check out some guides for magazine writers.

Falcon

I've used both Word and InDesign, and most of the time I still use Word for most simple and mid-range documents. I tried OpenOffice once before (an older version, not sure how much has changed since), but it couldn't even do some relatively simple stuff at the time (didn't recognize transparent layers in graphics, no option for setting a transparent color in a graphic, etc.). OpenOffice is indeed fine for most "mom & pop" users. But it lacks a lot of even the relatively simple features of Word. Word may not be useful for the high end stuff (that's what InDesign is for), but it's much more powerful for the lower level and mid-range stuff than OpenOffice. As for the expense, you can buy Office with the full versions of Word and Powerpoint for $80. So the price is a pretty nominal consideration now.

Very unlikely. Humans have one fewer pair of chromosomes than any of the other primates (because two of their chromosomes fused to form one of ours) and a bunch of chromosomes have long sequences that are inverted compared to other primates' sequences. That's not to say it couldn't happen: horses and mules have a 1pair difference, and manage to produce (mostly sterile) offspring regularly, but that's rare. And, as someone else said and is discussed in more detail in the wholly wonderful book Elephants On Acid , scientists in the old Soviet Union tried repeatedly to make human/chimp hybrids using artificial insemination in volunteers, and never had any success. There have been documented cases of primates raping humans, as well, but again, no documented offspring. (There's a very creepy scene in -- I believe -- Farley Mowat's Woman In The Mists where he describes a woman researcher working for Diane Fossey being raped by a chimp while other researchers stood and watched. I know it was her group, but I don't remember if it was his book that discussed it.)

If one were to make a video grame out of "Pride and Prejudice" for example, it would take some serious ingenuity to figure out a way of designing it such that the game stays true to the book and gives the player something to do besides just running around and talking to everyone (which essentially makes it an interactive movie, and very minimally so at that), has the player participating in the story whereby they have some sort of effect on the outcome, yet can stay true to the book. If it stays too true to the book then everything is predetermined and it doesn't make for much of a game, and if it doesn't then there is little point in tying it to a piece of classic literature.

I believe you're looking for this:

http://www.amazon.com/Pride-Prejudice-Zombies-Classic-Ultraviolent/dp/1594743347/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1249308176&sr=8-1

Adapting stories from other media for videogames isn't a new idea. It's just that films have been the usual source, perhaps because they're culturally/commercially closer, especially if you compare the AAA game title to the blockbuster Hollywood film. Films also come with a built-in visual style to adapt, which helps with the recognition. The practice has become prominent enough that the only major general study of adaptation between mediums that I know of actually spends a decent amount of time discussing videogame adaptations of films, film adaptations of videogames, and so on (usually videogames get ignored in these sorts of media-study analyses).

But... they're mostly not that good. I think this could be said even if we try to look at things sympathetically. The aforementioned book argues that adaptations often get a bad critical rap, because there's a certain mystique around "the original", and assumption that a mere adaptation is always a bastardization of the original that can't possibly capture it. But let's accept that argument, and treat adaptations as interesting and legitimate in their own right, trying not to start out with an assumption that all adaptations are bad. Even then, can you really say that adapting films has been a successful way to make videogames? The only ones that come out even reasonably okay imo are sort of "adaptation light"--- where you borrow some visual elements and general setting/characters from the film, but otherwise mostly ignore it. This works best in big-universe films, like Star Wars, where you're not really adapting an actual film so much as a set of ideas.

Will this all fare better for literature? I can see adapting the general setting of a book as plausible. In fact, that's been done successfully in a few interactive fictions, which share with books the text medium (perhaps like graphical videogames share the visual medium with film). I've played some good Lovecraft-mythos IFs, for example, like Anchorhead (this book on IF discusses the issue of IFs being adapted from literature a bit further). But adapting the book itself? Perhaps as the storyline for a linear RPG-style game? Or something more fundamental than that?

I guess what I'm saying with all this in a roundabout way might be something like: yes, interesting idea, but how? Not asking that as a purely skeptical question; I think there may be ways it'd work. There might even be multiple different kind of adaptations that would work. But I think there are a lot of pitfalls. In particular, a sure pitfall is making "this game is an adaptation of 'real literature'" be the selling point for the game.

Proposing to adapt literature to videogames is the starting point, and you need a vision beyond that for why or how. Why is it interesting to adapt literature to a videogame? Why aren't you just writing a novel on the one hand, or making a non-adaptation videogame on the other? I think there might be good answers for why, but I don't see them here, at least not yet--- I don't think the mere idea of making games tackle "serious" subject matter is enough of an answer.