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...the rift that grew between Jeff Hawkins and 3Com CEO Eric Benhamou, resulting in Hawkins', Dubinsky's and Colligan's leaving to found Handspring.

Hawkins' longtime wish was for Palm to be run by Palm. His frustration mounted under the wing of US Robotics and later 3Com, when his requests for a spin-off fell on deaf ears.

Read Piloting Palm by Butter & Pogue for that account.

To triangulate the source of spoofed IP packets, to (theoretically) sniff a keyboard by recording TCP sequence numbers, and even how to build a distributed computer out of covert channels, see Michal Zalewski's Silence On The Wire. It's less practical than nslookup and whois but it's a glorious romp through the fun parts of information security. Read it for inspiration and to jar you into thinking outside the box.

(Disclosure: I got a free review copy.)

Pity I can't go back an edit my message, since what I wrote might be considered to some to be a spoiler. But then, I didn't say who booby trapped them, when they did so, or how. So consider it a teaser!

If you (dear reader) haven't read the Mars trilogy yet (Red Mars, Blue Mars, Green Mars), it's about a bunch of people (scientists, engineers, etc) being sent off to Mars to start a new colony for Earth. Once there they revolt and declare themselves an independent state/planet. They start terraforming Mars and dealing with the political, economic and military consequences of their actions.

A great science fiction series, with the usual author-intervention at appropriate points to make sure the story gets told the way he wanted it.

Get it at Barnes And Noble (because they don't patent obvious ideas): http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnIn quiry.asp?isbn=0553560735

There are several different options for relational databases, and despite what the slashdot community thinks, MySQL isn't necessarily the right one.

Let's first assume that you're devoted to the Oracle platform. Oracle has some nice advantages compared to some of the other RBDMS. It handles triggers very well, it supports a java based client for end user applications (programmed via PL/SQL), and it's damned fast (when it's setup up very well). Notably, you will need a dedicated Oracle server with pretty robust specs fi you want it to run well.

Now, a brief comparison of other products in case you are not devoted to Oracle.

Access is relatively cheap and easy to use if you're not going to be doing a lot concurrent operations on the DB.

MySQL is one of the most efficient databases I've worked with in terms of speed, assuming you've got a well normalized database. You can also run MySQL from a nondedicated machine for quite some time before you need a dedicated box (your results may vary). MySQL does have some limitations, though.

As best as I can tell, MS SQL Server runs pretty well, but seems like an oversized version of Access. This can be a good or a bad thing, depending on how you look at it. It does offer decent performance, an easy user interface, and it's a Microsoft product, which of course comes with positives and negatives.

There's also IBM's DB2 platform which (last I used it) had a fast db engine, and a horribly slow front end.

Wikipedia has a nice article that distinguishes between the different RDBMS out there. If you haven't yet picked a platform, I would suggest that you start there.

There are several things you can do, once you've picked a RDBMS, however, your best approach is to learn SQL. SQL is pretty standard amongst the DB engines, and if you can use it well, you'll be golden. This has been my favorite reference manual, although I must it admit if you're first learning SQL, the reading is quite dry. I would also recommend that you find a good resource for whichever database engine you end up using, because each of them has specific functions and keywords that you might need to look up from time to time.

Finally, one last question, if you don't mind me asking... If you've got a computer science background, why don't you have a good basic understanding of RDBMS? I mean, when it comes down to it they're all basically the same. Maybe I'm wrong, but it makes me wonder...

Consequentially, if you're boss is willing to hire me, I might just be looking for a job. :)

I've started reading this book and it seems to cover quite a few topics that I think would help you out.
  http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnIn quiry.asp?userid=QR3ELP4CM8&isbn=1931836396&itm=1

Migrate in stages. Put in a firewall! Do the things you think you should do. It's going to take time but maybe you can get some help from students.

but don't like the Slashdot whore-link: clickey

You might also read the Dune series by Frank Herbert or, more specifically, the prequels starting with The Butlerian Jihad

Sure, it would be a Utopia until someone decides to use the A.I. or robots/machines in general to take over. If the computer running the waste recycler was 0wn3d what would you do? What about the one tracking food distribution? How long could we go without them before wide-spread panic and chaos?

I'll stick with less intelligent, specialized systems, thank you. I'm not even happy with many of today's systems. How can we lose power to a huge portion of the U.S. and Canada and not really be sure how it happened. (I am refering to the blackout that hit New York and other major cities in the eastern U.S. and Canada in 2003. It was later tracked to a software bug that meant information was not updated properly.) So what happens if the power grid doesn't reboot? Reinstall from scratch over the next 10 - 20 days?!?

but don't like the Slashdot whore link: Clickey

If you want to read a great book based on exactly that premise, read Fallen Angles. It's an easy read and funny. SF Fandom saves the world!

Let's take this a step further.

Scientists in Australia's tropical north are collecting blood from crocodiles in the hope of developing a powerful antibiotic for humans, after tests showed that the reptile's immune system kills the HIV virus.

Since antibiotics are agents that kill bacteria rather than viruses, this paragraph is a non sequitur.

The definition of 'antibiotic' (taken from Stedman's Concise Medical Dictionary for the Health Professions, Illustrated 4th ed. ) is as follows:

1. relating to antibiosis.
2. prejudicial to life.
3. a soluble substance derived from a mold or bacterium that inhibits the growth of other microorganisms.
4. relating to such an action

Antibiosis is further defined (also from Stedman's) as

1. an association of two organisms which is detrimental to one of them, in contrast to probiosis.
2. production of an antibiotic by bacteria or other organisms inhibitory to other living things, especially among soil microbes

The problem with the statement from the above post is twofold:

1. Antibiotics, strictly speaking, kill living organisms, not just bacteria. Antibacterials are what specifically kill bacteria.
2. A non sequitur is "1. an inference that does not follow from the premises; specifically : a fallacy resulting from a simple conversion of a universal affirmative proposition or from the transposition of a condition and its consequent; and 2. a statement (as a response) that does not follow logically from anything previously said." The post above is not correct in the use of that term, since the quotation is the first sentence of the article. The statement may be inaccurate, strictly speaking, but it is not a non sequitur.

Let's keep going...

Similarly, the phrase

However, the crocodile's immune system may be too powerful for humans makes no sense scientifically. What part of the immune system are we talking about? "too powerful" in what sense?

I must admit that I could not find much of a problem with that individual line from the Reuters article. Think about graft-versus-host (GVH) disease. One might imagine a similar event taking place. I must admit that I am speculating here, but on the surface it seems plausible. It depends on which components the researchers intend to use. If it were simply crocodilian antibodies, then maybe the scenario I mentioned is less likely (GVH requires more components of the immune system than just antibodies), and the greater problem would be serum sickness but I don't know. If anyone has specific knowledge of crocodilian (or reptilian, in general) immune function, sharing such knowledge would be appreciated.

I am a little surprised that, with all the fault found with the article, no comment was made on what (in my opinion) is the most inaccurate and misleading statement of the entire article:

Britton said the crocodile immune system worked differently from the human system by directly attacking bacteria immediately an infection occurred in the body.

Maybe the crocodile's immune system works differently from the human's immune system, but it cannot be simply by virtue of having a mechanism for raising immediate countermeasures after a successful infection. In humans, among others, that job is carried out by th

Here's a plug for my favorite introductory book on the subject, Fundamentals of Astrodynamics by Roger R. Bate, Donald D. Mueller and Jerry E. White.

Amazon link

Barnes & Noble link

I didn't even have to special-order my copy. I walked into my nearest B&N and it was on the shelf. Your mileage may vary.

The book is Copyright © 1971, during the heyday of the Apollo moon missions, but its content was developed during the 1960s as part of US Air Force Academy classes for astronautics or aerospace engineering students. It covers computing orbital elements from various combinations of knowns/unknowns, refining initial estimates with additional observations, prediction problems, intercept problems, targeting problems, orbital perterbances, orbit changes, mission planning and more. Many of its chapter-ending problems are intended to be solved with a slide rule.

No one book can cover all of orbital mechanics. This is, after all, rocket science. But this is the best introductory book I know.

• Railways were early drivers of major parts of business culture; JoAnne Yates developed this idea in her landmark book "Control through Communication: The Rise of System in American Management". According to Yates, railroad industry was the first geographically disperse industry, and this developed the accoutrements of modern business culture, starting with hierarchical organization and its assets (top-down communication: the memorandom; bottom-up communication: the report, the filing cabinet, and alphabetic filing, which superseded the pigeonhole and various numerical systems). Here is a free critique of some of Yates's work, if you don't want to buy the book.
  
  
• Finally, the business needs of the railroads drove the development of the telegraph, to satisfy their need to communicate. Telegraphers were among the first business employees to develop repetitive stress injuries, from their morse code keys. The Vibroplex Bug was invented by Horace Martin in 1890 to compensate for the RSI injury of telegraphers, which as called "glass arm."

Is it some sort of interrupt thing related to using the network a lot ? Or the disk ? How do you fiugre out WHY the computer is so slow, and where the load is coming from ?

Also, any comments on this other book -- is it worth getting in addition to the one reveiwed here ? Optimizing Linux Performance: A Hands-on Guide to Linux Performance Tools

Thanks in advance.

Off-topic, but about your sig. In the book(s) I have, Arthur says, "Ford, you're turning into an infinite number of penguins. Stop it." I know each version from different publishers are different, but I find that one more amusing. Meh. :)

So we have a planet full of organisms that are related by their physical structure and genetic code. It's also full of fossilized organisms that are also related to modern organisms by their physical structure. Do you suggest that we not investigate these coincidences? Do you also suggest that, after all of the investigation that we have done, we shouldn't be pretty confident that mammals have a common ancestor? Do you have a better explanation for why we have all the same bones and muscles, only mutated into different forms? Do you have a better explanation for why there are primitive, fossilized organisms that are quite obviously our ancestors but that have physical features that are more similar to apes?

I'm not going to go into too detailed of an argument with you, because I'm guessing by your post that you probably won't give much thought to what I'm saying. Here's a suggestion - gather some information. Read up on what we know about biology, and I think you'll be surprised. It's not as mysterious as you probably think it is. Here's a dare - I challenge you to read a Richard Dawkins book and really pay attention to what he's talking about. If it doesn't convince you that the scientific study of life's origins is real theory and not "philosophy" then I'll eat the book.

Correlation does not imply causation. Here are a few factors that can also be correlated to the decrease in crime that began in the early '90s.

I could say that legalized abortion caused a decrease in crime, since those most likely to give birth to future teenage criminals began aborting them. While almost everyone disagrees with this for their own pet ideological reasons (anti-abortion people, liberals who think that the trend unfairly implies that poor minorities with underage single parents are more likely to become criminals, &c.). This is actually the subject of a serious, scholarly paper referenced in the aforelinked wikipedia article, and mentioned in the book Freakonomics, which should be required reading for everyone.

I could say that having a Republican-controlled Congress is responsible for a decrease in crime, since Republicans are tough on crime and Democrats are pussies. Note I provide as much evidence for this assertion as you have for yours.

I could say that the fall of the Soviet Union is responsible for a decrease in crime, since KGB agents caused all street crime in the US.

I could say that NAFTA is responsible for a decrease in crime, since most violent criminals just wanted free trade with Canada and Mexico, and their puropse for causing violence was eliminated when NAFTA was passed.

nice try, though

In Stephen Baxter's Voyage, he had NASA do something similar... they strapped 4 SRBs onto a Saturn V to create the V-B.

Reusing existing hardware is a wonderful idea, while new technology is developed. And it gets us away from the horrendous side-mount.

My only question is: Is the Shuttle ET strong enough to hold 100 tons on top?

Sorry, that was supposed to be the funny part... ripped off from Rats of NIMH. Don't worry, I won't quit my day job :)

Thanks for the link though, I'll go check it out.

I would gladly pay the $100 they were asking for Johnny Cash Unearthed because of the book it comes with

Thanks, glad you said that as I didn't know about it. I love and sorely miss Johnny Cash, especially as part of the HighwayMen, Cash, Kris Kristofferson, Walyon Jennings, and Willie Nelsen. Ah, Amazon has it, Unearthed [BOX SET] for $72. Barne and Noble has if for the same price but as a member I can get it %10 off.

A couple of thoughts on that. Depending on what I am doing, I can usually get through a day...The legs are a little shorter than my T|E, but not much. The battery life appears to be about the same as the first-gen Tungsten series, as long as you aren't using the wireless card.

I have a USB sync cable from which I can draw power from my laptop. In addition, the PSP uses the same battery as the Zaurus. Pelican makes a Power Brick which works perfectly with the Zaurus, and at $20, gives you nearly two full charges, and can charge the Zaurus while you are using it.

Probably. But an excellent book about such topics is Song of the Dodo, by David Quammen. In it he writes about island biogeography and examines what happens evolutionarily when species are cut off from the main group. It's a fascinating and fun read and includes details both about Darwin and Alfred Wallace, who may have beaten Darwin to the punch in actuality.

By using such despicable harassment techniques against these scientists, all Joe Barton has managed to accomplish here is to certify their findings.

And so is Gamestop. Consider the movie Team America: World Police sold by Barnes and Noble (owner of GameStop) on DVD. The theatrical version of the film contained a tame sex scene featuring puppets. In the DVD version, without any warning, this sex scene is expanded with clips of one puppet defecating on the face of another. If a parent had viewed this film at the theater and thought it was appropriate for a 16 year old, then bought the DVD from GameStop's parent company, isn't that parent being 'deceived'?

With the internet's penetration into most homes across the United States, it's become ridiculous for the FCC or 'Family Values' promoters to get upset over Howard Stern or Janet Jackson. Kids are readily able to access much more controversial content over the internet. You can pretty much bet that the kids who unlock the Hot Coffee feature in GTA have seen non-animated versions of the same behavior elsewhere.

Seth

Along the same lines another great book Unix Network Programming Volume 2

Stevens' books are always great, and this one is no exception. I use this book regularly and I highly recommend it. But that aside, there is another shorter and somewhat overlapping book: Advanced Unix Programming: 2nd Edition by Marc J. Rockhind, that I highly recommend anyone who might like the reviewed Stevens book should check out as well. Link was the only bn.com reference to it that I saw, but my copy is softcover, whereas the link appears to be hardcover.

• us vs. them (developing a subculture)
• control (doctors sell the idea of control through their discourse)
• power (sounding like an "expert")
• dominance (intimidating through fine use of the jargon)

Scott

10 seconds... http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnin quiry.asp?ISBN=0805057552&pdf=y And before you argue that BN doesn't have it in stock... either does Amazon, they will search for it though.

I believe Barnes & Noble ships worldwide.

Slashdot comments have made me aware of how little Americans know about the activities of their own government. Yet surprisingly those with little awareness often have extremely strong and angry opinions.

Michael Moore's information about the involvement of Saudis with the Bush family came from this book:

The Iron Triangle: Inside the secret world of The Carlyle Group by Dan Briody, Wiley, 2003, Hoboken, New Jersey, USA. Reviews: Powell's Barnes & Noble Amazon

With what don't you agree concerning this book? Do you doubt that both the rich Saudis and the Bush family have investments in oil and weapons companies? Michael Moore's movie showed network footage of George W. Bush and a Saudi holding hands. Do you doubt that Bush holds hands with Saudis? Then read these articles from The Christian Science Monitor and CBS News. The Bush family calls one of the Saudis "Bandar Bush", and believes that he is their friend; that's completely untrue of course. Fifteen of the 18 attackers of the 9/11 bombings were Saudis, and some rich Saudis have supported al Qaeda.

Unocal, and many other oil companies, want to build a pipeline across Afghanistan, because that is the shortest route from rich oil fields to Pakistan and the ocean, with the exception of through unsafe Iran. Do you doubt this?

Notice: The links to the book are tied to my accounts with the booksellers. If you buy the book and don't want me to have a commission, do a search for the book to get a link that is not connected with me. After a year, I have made exactly $0.00 from these arrangements. I spent months reading the books and writing short reviews of them for my article Unprecedented Corruption: A guide to conflict of interest in the U.S. government.

Free over $25. Where've I seen that before? Oh, right, on the order I just placed at the end of last week. ;)

Are you incorrectly implying the word is not a legitimate one?

No, I am correctly implying that.

but seriously, it'd be much more worth it if they were designed to look like old leather books. you know, like rich old people have in their study. in movies.

barnes and noble has some classic books reprinted in some faux-leather hardcover format (example) which would be much more impressive to have filling up a room.

You don't need that (or any other) book to realize an Amazon.com link on Slashdot doesn't necessarily favorably influence people.

Here is the B&N link:

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnIn quiry.asp?isbn=0671723650&itm=1

Basically, if time travel is actually possible, the instant that you travel back in time, you would create a fork in the past; you go back to 1978, and every single event prior to the time that you land in may be the same, but as soon as you land in 1978 you create a version of 1978 where you existed. Getting back to your own future would be really difficult, if not impossible.

Exactly, and this is not even close to a new idea.

I read about it in David Deutsch's The Fabric of Reality, which is seven years old now. I'm sure that he didn't invent the concept either, even in terms of grounding it in quantum physics.

Of course, it's all a little silly until someone can actually gather some empirical data.

This is the first I've ever heard of tours being given at Y-12, since it is still operational. However, there are (or at least were) tours of various parts of X-10 (aka the Oak Ridge National Laboratory or ORNL) and K-25 (gasseous diffusion plant). However, having worked at Y-12 for a couple summers as an undergrad, I did have a chance to see some of the sights at Y-12, and can say that it's an interesting place in many ways.

Incedentally, the museum is the American Museum of Science and Energy. Also, X-10, Y-12, and K-25 (the three plants) are all inside the city limits of Oak Ridge, but since it's a fairly rural area, they are sometimes mistaken as being outside the city. If you want to know more about Oak Ridge and the Manhattan Project, there is a really good book City Behind a Fence.

You've read 'Distress' by Greg Egan, haven't you?

Don't forget to have the sexual identity portions of your brain surgically removed.

Great book: Cuckoo's Egg, ISBN: 0743411463. New version coming out Sept 2005. First detailed account of gov't hacker back in good ol late 80's/UNIX days.

Before reading that new edition, may I suggest an alternative reading?

Don't believe me? Arthur Jensen, an intelligence researcher who started talking about a genetic component for intelligence back in the 60s, received death threats for his work. Pinker outlines in his most recent book, The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature, how much grief and ostracism other researchers have suffered for any implication that intelligence is not 100% environmental.

I just got a Master's in gifted education, and when I interviewed for a PhD program in Learning Sciences I had at least two different professors tell me (very enthusiastically) "Giftedness! That's so politically incorrect! I love it, we need someone who's brave enough to study that here! You know everyone's going to hate you, don't you?" And that's just for implying that smart people have different educational needs than other people, not even saying that it's innate. My professor in gifted ed here spends a lot of her time defending herself in the media, a lot more time than someone researching, say, reading would have to spend.

If you think this isn't a horrifically politically charged issue, you obviously haven't been anywhere near the field.

Don't believe me? Arthur Jensen, an intelligence researcher who started talking about a genetic component for intelligence back in the 60s, received death threats for his work. Pinker outlines in his most recent book, The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature, how much grief and ostracism other researchers have suffered for any implication that intelligence is not 100% environmental.

I just got a Master's in gifted education, and when I interviewed for a PhD program in Learning Sciences I had at least two different professors tell me (very enthusiastically) "Giftedness! That's so politically incorrect! I love it, we need someone who's brave enough to study that here! You know everyone's going to hate you, don't you?" And that's just for implying that smart people have different educational needs than other people, not even saying that it's innate. My professor in gifted ed here spends a lot of her time defending herself in the media, a lot more time than someone researching, say, reading would have to spend.

If you think this isn't a horrifically politically charged issue, you obviously haven't been anywhere near the field.

No kidding. Arthur Jensen, a major intelligence researcher, received many death threats for his work.

Steven Pinker is the LAST person to imply that because something is politically incorrect, it's flat-out wrong. You're right, that quote might sound like it, but I think it's just a bad quote.

Steven Pinker is the LAST person to imply that because something is politically incorrect, it's flat-out wrong. You're right, that quote might sound like it, but I think it's just a bad quote.

What the hell can happen next? My money's on Bill Gates being found dead with a grapefruit up his arse up a crack whore alley..

Is this the sour grapefruit you refer to? Or perhaps this one? ^.^

What the hell can happen next? My money's on Bill Gates being found dead with a grapefruit up his arse up a crack whore alley..

Is this the sour grapefruit you refer to? Or perhaps this one? ^.^

Incomplete, and thus inaccurate. Nanotechnology is likely to make petrochemical synthesis from alternative raw materials possible, and alternate materials may partially replace plastics. (Pla However, the key difficulty in replacing oil is that it is a pre-existing compact form chemical energy storage. Nanotechnology might concievably produce a replacement energy storage technology-- although the high energy profit ratio and reasonable energy density of gasoline make this somewhat questionable. However, if you are using nanotechnology to synthesize a form of energy storage, you still need the energy as an input in one form or another. Nanotechnology is primarily materials science; it does not provide new energy sources.

A space elevator is highly unlikely to be developed before it is rendered unnecessary by other nanotech-based technology.

Um? A space elevator allows for access to space via a Conservative system. Unless losses to entropy are far higher than projections for fullerene conductors indicate, there is NO more long-term economical way for bulk materials space transport; the costs are prinicpally capital set-up costs, of which the bulk are projected for the initial semi-orbital space deployment... of just the sort that a beanstalk can ameliorate.

Furthermore, large scale space solar is the ONLY kind of energy source capable of sustaining humanity to a Singularity scenario, barring a suprise in a GUT breakthough well beyond what is expected at this point from string theory models. Nanotech is primarily an improvement in materials science, not physics. It has the potential to improve energy storage and transportation, but very limited possibilites for improving energy production.

Besides which, I said Transhumans will go off-planet - not every monkey-ass primate who can wipe his nose. If the latter die by the billions, it's NOT a disaster.

Unfortunately, until said Transhumans are living in a self-contained biosphere, they are probably reliant for production of their food supply on said monkey-ass primates. Even then, the transhumans will need a self-sustaining technological infrastructure. Haven't you read Marooned in Realtime? Merely because something is stupid does not mean it is safe to remove from your local economy nor ecology. Additionally, diminished biodiversity within a species-- even (trans)humans-- is generally a bad thing; too much risk of single point of failure from epidemics and the like.

Or even worse, the Boogie Man could eclipse the sun with a giant disco ball, letting all the evil minions stay out forever!

http://video.barnesandnoble.com/search/product.asp ?ean=14764172538

The Bush administration is, as the texas expression goes, all hat and no cattle. They're beefing up security where it doesn't matter so that they can look like they're doing something. In the mean time, the real issues are going unaddressed because it's either "too expensive" or "too difficult" to do anything meaningfull.

Replace "too difficult" with a phrase like "realistically impossible" and drop your pointless anti-Bush mewling, and you'd be on to something. For example, read "The Outlaw Sea", a book in which the author addresses this specific issue directly. Or have you become secretly aware of some sort of magical universal detector that would have been implemented by a gloriously enlightened Kerry administration? (See how political trolling utterly ruins the opportunity for serious discussion?)

I wondered why Larry Cuban was writing about file sharing.

Sounds like something out of Michael Crichton's Prey

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