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The project page is here

720x480 15.7MB divx AVI
320x240 2.4MB divx AVI

The project page is here

• A central repository of packages, and a GUI with more than 10000 packages, all installable with 2 clicks.
  
• Automatic upgrading of all these packages.
  
• Uniform interface to install, remove or upgrade all of these packages.
  
• Automatic installation of packages according to file access attempts (auto-apt).
  

• Desktop/network integration (i.e: ftp exploration works just like local file exploration) (and no, this does not work, not even in Windows XP, try copying files from one ftp to another, for example).
  
• Panel applets bringing usefulness to the panel, as well as quick browsers/bookmark lists in the panel (Microsoft copied some of this)
  
• Tabbed command-line consoles
  
• Password-keeping wallets for all applications, allowing the user to remember just one password
  
• Customization of desktop behavior, shortcut keys to basic operations such as minimizing/maximizing, and any other feature in the desktop.
  
• Division of responsibility, window management keeps working even when applications hang.
  
• Search feature in Configuration Manager.
  
• Countless other innovations
  

• The diff/patch tools.
  
• gcc: A single compiler handling the compilation of a huge collection of languages, in a large set of platforms.
  
• xemacs: An environment platform that allows extensions via a dynamic language with seamless on-the-fly compilation of the extension code you write. Also, the most featureful platform out there for this purpose, with powerful macro recorders/editors, customizable key binding, etc.
  
• Languages: Python, Perl, Ruby. Microsoft is still behind in this area, despite its .NET technology, which is less innovation, and more an extension of the Java platform (I would even say, Java done right). Many more languages are Open Source, but I simply don't recall the exact history of other language to tell for sure.
  
• Vast libraries in each of these languages, many of which are filled with technical innovation (i.e: Twisted Matrix, SDL, pygame)
  
• Transparent RPC's for: Python, Ruby, Smalltalk. Microsoft, to the best of my knowledge, does not implement a single transparent RPC. (Transparent means that the server needs not be aware of what objects the client will use, nor does it require any code to explicitly export the object's features to the client, as Microsoft's COM/.NET technologies require).
  

• CoLinux [colinux.org]: Modifying the Linux Kernel to run in kernel-mode side-by-side a host operating system.
  
• bochs: Unprivileged, 100% user-space emulation of an entire PC.
  
• qemu: Like bochs, but with dynamic code translation.
  

I think GT already knows:

You can write a purely functional program using C++ quite easily. There are even libraries to help you out.

It's not the language that is dictating a procedural or object oriented programming paradigm. Most people simply do not think in functional programming terms.

I agree that most programmers would benefit from trying out different languages, but saying that functional languages are "more expressive, cleaner, and more elegant" is just silly. Have you seen Lisp code?!?

Actually, some easily readable stuff by Alan Kay:
http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/learn/12
http://www.educause.edu/pub/er/review/reviewArticl es/31422.html

Heh, so am I. I'm a civil engineering major, and just yesterday I was offered a job by one of my professors solely because I am also interested in CS. He said he hadn't found anyone like me in years, and that both regular civil engineering students and regular computer science students were useless for his work (which is this, by the way).

The problem is that clouds are not static, and many of the clouds are smaller than the resolution of the models. It' s a well known issue. The numbers you have seen are only fuge factors.

"Climate models rely heavily on satellite data, but because clouds change rapidly, their structure is difficult to simulate in computer models. Yet, understanding global climate change depends heavily on the ability to accurately model cloud structure and behavior. "The only vehicles we currently have to predict future climatic change are general circulation models, which run on computers," said Cess. "As far as we know, no model has predicted the change in cloud vertical structure we observed in 1998 -- that tells us there's a problem with the models. If we're going to have robust climate models, they must predict what we observe."

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Study/CloudsInBal ance/

"Current computer climate models can't accurately predict cloud formation, which, in turn, hinders their ability to forecast climate change from human activities. " http://gtresearchnews.gatech.edu/newsrelease/cloud cover.htm

As a math geek, I only know about free math textbooks.

It isn't *great* science, but it is not completely without foundation, and more importantly does reinforce the message that sci+tech is cool.

Of course, it does feature dorky guys in white coats on occasion, but on the whole scientists are shown in a positive light: Carter would be a lab rat given half a chance, Jackson is an out-and-out geek.

I found this paper with an interview with the creator that bears out what you're saying. It's pretty cool, actually, that they gave the ghosts different personalities; I stand corrected.

Here you go:

Delta Clipper Experiment
Wikipedia

If you want to see what happened here's the video

IMHO, I don't think the strut failure was due to malice. I think it was simply a mistake/stupidity.

I got to watch several DC-X flights. I got to see it hover, move laterally, land, and the infamous 'dip & swoop' manuever.

I'm still dumbfounded that DC-X lost NASA's Reusable Launch Vehicle competition to the VentureStar design. Lockheed had an obviously bogus blue-sky design. McD had a working 1/3 scale proof-of-principle prototype.

A lot more design and testing would have been required to get to the full Delta Clipper orbital vehicle, but it still remains one of the better SSTO design ideas out there.

At least I got to see a rocket dance once. It was simply Incredible.

-I.V.

ages ago,

http://www.cc.gatech.edu/~ranma1/mac_install.html

shoot, was even mentioned here on /. last fall...

http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/10/ 06/1321243&tid=222&tid=203&tid=179&tid=211

This seems a good place to put this as any...

My Ethics class here at Georgia Tech recently completed a Topic Paper about all the sections of the Patriot Act scheduled to sunset Dec 31, 2005.

Feel free to peruse the posted papers (multiple formats).

Feel extremely free to Slashdot the site, making it impossible for them to be graded in the next few week, giving us all A's in the class!

-shep

People interested in this sort of stuff might also take a look at some research that I have been doing over the past few years looking more specifically at window management for multiple monitor users. You can find the studies I have conducted and techniques I have proposed (and built) on my research website

I'm also currently looking for Windows XP multiple-monitor users to run some new window management interfaces for some studies that I am conducting. Details are linked off of my main site.

Just to counter some of the "this doesn't solve a real problem" comments... this is research and sometimes the value of these things is the way it gets other people to think about the right interaction that windows can have, whether cross-application or within-application (such as in a programming environment). No matter how much screen space you have you will always be constrained... figuring out ways to get the most of the space are likely to be worthwhile. Anyway, I do understand the "is this a problem?" comments... I conducted some studies to try to figure out the real problems and then attack them directly. Again, see the webpage for details and email me if you have questions or are interested in being a study participant.

People interested in this sort of stuff might also take a look at some research that I have been doing over the past few years looking more specifically at window management for multiple monitor users. You can find the studies I have conducted and techniques I have proposed (and built) on my research website

I'm also currently looking for Windows XP multiple-monitor users to run some new window management interfaces for some studies that I am conducting. Details are linked off of my main site.

Just to counter some of the "this doesn't solve a real problem" comments... this is research and sometimes the value of these things is the way it gets other people to think about the right interaction that windows can have, whether cross-application or within-application (such as in a programming environment). No matter how much screen space you have you will always be constrained... figuring out ways to get the most of the space are likely to be worthwhile. Anyway, I do understand the "is this a problem?" comments... I conducted some studies to try to figure out the real problems and then attack them directly. Again, see the webpage for details and email me if you have questions or are interested in being a study participant.

People interested in this sort of stuff might also take a look at some research that I have been doing over the past few years looking more specifically at window management for multiple monitor users. You can find the studies I have conducted and techniques I have proposed (and built) on my research website

I'm also currently looking for Windows XP multiple-monitor users to run some new window management interfaces for some studies that I am conducting. Details are linked off of my main site.

Just to counter some of the "this doesn't solve a real problem" comments... this is research and sometimes the value of these things is the way it gets other people to think about the right interaction that windows can have, whether cross-application or within-application (such as in a programming environment). No matter how much screen space you have you will always be constrained... figuring out ways to get the most of the space are likely to be worthwhile. Anyway, I do understand the "is this a problem?" comments... I conducted some studies to try to figure out the real problems and then attack them directly. Again, see the webpage for details and email me if you have questions or are interested in being a study participant.

First off let me say that the desktop situation is abysmal on _every_ OS. Their are fundamental decisions stemming from the earliest GUI's that slow the speed of the interfaces and allow for entirely unneeded errors.

All this is _provable_. Speed of an interface can be modeled using the GOMS framework. If you are new to GOMS do not argue its accuracy here, there are several newbie mistakes that have been explained and would only serve to cloud the debate. Ever get annoyed at how fast the terminal is to use, and GUI's only seem to get in the way? GOMS explains it, typing is much much faster than the _multiple steps_ involved in using a mouse. Not to say that GUIs or mice are bad, but poorly implimented. GOMs can show when to use mice, when to use typing, and how to structure the size and conceptual model of an interface to be as speedy as possible.

But GOMs in and of itself is only a tool. Not a guide on how to create an interface. Liken this to racetracks. Once can sure build a fast car when their motive and only measure is speed, but can be more expensive, unsafe, unreliable, etc, etc, etc.

So where can one reliably make an interface that works well with humans? Most use "intuition." But this "intuition" is genrally nothing more than familiarity. And familiarty does not fix the current, demostratable problems.

So where does one turn? To the science of how humans think, their limitations, and the subset focusing on human computer interaction. Cognitives cience

Using this one can construct an interface based on what humans can do. It has exposed our limits and abilities. What mental models we handle better. Folders and Files? A model based on our desks, not a model based on how our brains handle information and computer interactions.

Using these tools we can end up with an interface faster than the terminal, easier to use, and less error prone than either GUI or terminal based programs. Don't believe me? Try Archy. It is a nearly total departure from standard interfaces. Thus for anyone familiar with comptuers have to retrain their muscle memory. One will constantly reach for the mouse in a vein effort to select text. It will piss you off. If you habituate it's use you will find how much harder and more complex the other text editing interfaces are.

Interfaces are a thing we can fix that Windows and OS X can't without major losses. We have upserped Windows in security and stability. Things Windows _cannot_ fix without breaking everything. OS X has poor performance. In fact horrific proformance thanks to the MACH core. The interface is one of the last major thing in OSS software that MS and Apple are beating us at.

BUT ITS FREE!! Which is a lie. Yes, it is not their higher costs of administration, vendor support, and retraining. It is also the worst selling point. Ask any professional sales person. The only people that hooks are people you don't want to deal with. Just reimagine that mangager that was a cheapskate manager who pinched every penny and lost dollars in lost productivity. The old pinch pennies, trip over dollars.

We have to beat them where they are sore, and believe me, their interface sucks. I use OS X. It is only less annoying than windows or UNIX.

Okay, I really have to go, this thing needs to be edited in half, correct the spelling, etc. but I have dinner calling me. Agree, disagree but interested? Email me, we can bitch over the finer points : ) aal357 REPLACETHIS sent dot com

Check out the Embroided Musical Ball built by MIT. Very much hands-on, and very cool :)

The last item is the kicker (when combined with 16bit color). http://www.tekgear.com/index.cfm?pageID=2&section= 83&function=viewproducts&nodelist=1,83 has some cool stuff, though. My AI professor at GaTech, Thad Starner, who is one of the leading pioneers in wearable computing (or so he says), uses the MicroOptical CV-3, iirc. He even wears it while teaching.

I second that. The GT College of Computing has an excellent Graphics and Visualization Unit, which also gets involved with research through the Georgia Tech Research Institute (their research arm).

http://www.cc.gatech.edu/gvu/

Try the Georgia Institue of Technology. The College of Computing has an awesome graphics graduate program. People you should contact are Jarek Rossignac and Greg Turk. Those are the two professors who I am most familar with, but there are more.

Those are the links to each's homepages. From there you can browse out to their works, papers, projects, etc. Feel free to drop them a line.

Hope the best

Try the Georgia Institue of Technology. The College of Computing has an awesome graphics graduate program. People you should contact are Jarek Rossignac and Greg Turk. Those are the two professors who I am most familar with, but there are more.

Those are the links to each's homepages. From there you can browse out to their works, papers, projects, etc. Feel free to drop them a line.

Hope the best

Try the Georgia Institue of Technology. The College of Computing has an awesome graphics graduate program. People you should contact are Jarek Rossignac and Greg Turk. Those are the two professors who I am most familar with, but there are more.

Those are the links to each's homepages. From there you can browse out to their works, papers, projects, etc. Feel free to drop them a line.

Hope the best

• A central repository of packages, and a GUI with more than 10000 packages, all installable with 2 clicks.
  
• Automatic upgrading of all these packages.
  
• Uniform interface to install, remove or upgrade all of these packages.
  
• Automatic installation of packages according to file access attempts (auto-apt).
  

• Desktop/network integration (i.e: ftp exploration works just like local file exploration) (and no, this does not work, not even in Windows XP, try copying files from one ftp to another, for example).
  
• Panel applets bringing usefulness to the panel, as well as quick browsers/bookmark lists in the panel (Microsoft copied some of this)
  
• Tabbed command-line consoles
  
• Password-keeping wallets for all applications, allowing the user to remember just one password
  
• Customization of desktop behavior, shortcut keys to basic operations such as minimizing/maximizing, and any other feature in the desktop.
  
• Division of responsibility, window management keeps working even when applications hang.
  
• Search feature in Configuration Manager.
  
• Countless other innovations
  

• The diff/patch tools.
  
• gcc: A single compiler handling the compilation of a huge collection of languages, in a large set of platforms.
  
• xemacs: An environment platform that allows extensions via a dynamic language with seamless on-the-fly compilation of the extension code you write. Also, the most featureful platform out there for this purpose, with powerful macro recorders/editors, customizable key binding, etc.
  
• Languages: Python, Perl, Ruby. Microsoft is still behind in this area, despite its .NET technology, which is less innovation, and more an extension of the Java platform (I would even say, Java done right). Many more languages are Open Source, but I simply don't recall the exact history of other language to tell for sure.
  
• Vast libraries in each of these languages, many of which are filled with technical innovation (i.e: Twisted Matrix, SDL, pygame)
  
• Transparent RPC's for: Python, Ruby, Smalltalk. Microsoft, to the best of my knowledge, does not implement a single transparent RPC. (Transparent means that the server needs not be aware of what objects the client will use, nor does it require any code to explicitly export the object's features to the client, as Microsoft's COM/.NET technologies require).
  

• CoLinux: Modifying the Linux Kernel to run in kernel-mode side-by-side a host operating system.
  
• bochs: Unprivileged, 100% user-space emulation of an entire PC.
  
• qemu: Like bochs, but with dynamic code translation.
  

Hello,

I am the development TA for this mechatronics class.

The Crazy J guitar was made by three students, Jason, Susan, and Turner over the course of one quarter (not semester) five years ago.

Their prior knowledge about Mechatronics was limited before they took the class. They learned basic microcontrollers, assembly for the HC11, and basic electronics in class lectures and laboratory lectures at the same time they were constructing their project.

Everything was hand made by they alone. The mechanics were designed, machined,and sandblasted by them. They designed the circuits and actually made them using a circuit board router and soldering Iron. Of course the program for the HC11 was written by them.

After the end of the course, they are able to apply in control theory in a real physical system instead of playing around with simulations.

This project's scope was limited due to the time constraint of one quarter. Of course they are off to a great start so who knows what they will come up with in the future.

If you want to see a movie of the guitar playing, more projects, or lab exercises for the course. Go to http://www.me.gatech.edu/mechatronics_lab

Thanks,
Akio

http://www.me.gatech.edu/mechatronics_lab/

There are over five years of projects with pictures, video and more.

By the way, the develoment TA, Akio (not me), is looking for a job ;)

Of course the robot will never replace a guitarist, we all know it. But that's not the point. The point is that a bunch of teens got together and built this thing that goes from MIDI to Real instrument instead of the usual other way around. Check out the Control Code page on the project's site.

And to make it a bit more interesting, here's an idea for the Crazy J team: Use this self-tuning guitar for next year's project, integrate its controls with the Crazy J's and voila, you'll be able to actually bend strings...

The first pic looks like something out of Gulliver's Travels.

It even has a fan! Just like a real guitarist! Those have those, right?

http://www.me.gatech.edu/mechatronics_lab/Projects /Movies/GUIT1.AVI

lets look at the file path... http://www.me.gatech.edu/mechatronics_lab/Projects /Fall00/group3/sound.htm

fall of 2000, this doen't seem to be BREAKING NEWS

The URL of the concordia website is: http://encs.concordia.ca/Quarterly/winter2005/Text /robokeith.htm
Winter2005

The GaTech website URL is: http://www.me.gatech.edu/mechatronics_lab/Projects /Fall00/group3/contents.htm
Fall00

Now, I don't know for sure when the Concordia project was made, but I do know the GaTech one was made in 2000.

It appeals to me, actually -- Michael Mateas from the experimental game lab came and spoke to our natural-language AI class at Gerogia Tech, and he's developing really wild techniques for storytelling here. It's interesting just from a technical perspective -- any time you can get a better interface or more realistic characters in a game, that's appealing, yes?

http://www.cc.gatech.edu/fac/Thad.Starner/

Research "wearable computing"

No, I'm pretty sure he meant multi path:. Not only will it cause fading, but it will screw up the phase (and group delay) which will muck with the GPS algorithm--giving inaccurate results.

Brett

That both designs display using a Miller column browser (with different content!) and can show an image won't be sufficient.

So that's what it's called. This user interface predates the Macintosh, in fact it predates the Xerox Star office system that inspired the Macintosh. It comes from the Smalltalk class browser.

i have my doubts about some (but not all!) of the research that people undertake in the academic world of computer engineering/systems. from what i have seen, some academics will rush to publish for the sake of having a paper, even if it means cutting corners on an otherwise interesting idea or application. while i won't say that this is the norm at the very best institutions in the world, things on the whole can seem less than perfect.

i imply nothing about the individuals in the paper that Bram attacks, since i haven't interacted with them firsthand. however, it might be interesting to note that the primary author is a grad student at Georgia Tech. according to his web page, his stint at MS research was just a ~6 month period, 2/04-6/04 & 7/04-8/04:

http://www.cc.gatech.edu/~gantsich/biography.htm

the call for papers for this 2005 conference set a deadline of 7/7/2004:

http://www.ieee-infocom.org/2005/call_for_papers.h tm

this does not leave a huge block of time for one student to brush up on the research background, flesh up the practical aspects of the idea, implement (and validate?) a simulator, complete a preliminary set of data runs, and write a paper draft worthy of acceptance. let's not forget any downtime that might arise at the start of an internship (moving over the pond, getting acclimated, etc.).

here, i assume the not unrealistic situation where the official research scientist principally serves as a primary investigator. he brews the idea, perhaps working out some more theoretical aspects of the problem, and handles all the headaches related to funding/approval/propaganda. this entrusts a good deal of the grunt work to the student. i tend to see this sort of behavior in the ivory tower, but it is entirely likely that research in industry is much more balanced!

time should not be an excuse in any case, but it does raise an eyebrow toward the paper-happy nature of some research these days. you make the call on what you believe is reasonable concerning those flaws in methodology that Bram has so derided in his blog.

does anyone have a clue about the timing of the media's spin on things? The Register's article from the first slashdot posting is one of the first according to Google News...

What has linux on the xbox turned into?

This.

I thought the Oracle had foretold the destiny of Google in EPIC!!! What's going on?! Is the world going crazy?!

/joke

I agree with the comments about the blog being here to stay. However, where the blog is going is anybody's guess -- and what the mainstream media will do to keep on top of things is another can of worms.

I think the fictional story about the future of Google is pretty timely at this point.

http://oak.psych.gatech.edu/~epic/

The truth is, the major online news outlets may in fact head in that direction -- news aggregators bringing a particular slice of the blogosphere to your desktop.

Sry, it's been a while

http://www.me.gatech.edu/energy/andy_phd/three.htm

Hey, look what miracles (for example, here, here or here) can be done with C++ templates!

There probably WILL be an open source system such as Second Life at some point. But that point might be ten years in the future for all we know.

My favorite candidate on the Open Source camp is Croquet. It is designed by some of the early pioneers of the user interface such as Alan Key. It's goals are broader than Second Life, I hope it succeeds!

On the other hand, I think that eventually Linden Labs will open source it's own system, and simply keep control of the economy like they do right now.

There are some studies related to that sort of thing from Georgia Tech's contextual computing group. You're probably most interested in "An Empirical Study of Typing Rates on mini-QWERTY Keyboards," although the Twiddler studies are also interesting since they present a 3x4 button interface much like a normal phone.

The answer to how fast on a mini-qwerty looks to average about 60 wpm, and on a Twiddler the speeds average 47 wpm.

The studies are available at: http://www.cc.gatech.edu/ccg/publications.html

Interesting. Here is his homepage.

I hope you learned more than you otherwise would have.

Hm, well a Sweden tour seems to be the largest currently optimised tour at 24,978 cities.

The parent post reminds me of this:
http://oak.psych.gatech.edu/~epic/

-Anonymous Coward from the Future

If you're happy using wxWidgets, there are now bindings for Squeak (http://homepage.mac.com/rgayvert/wxsqueak.html).

And of course Squeak has an incredible web development framework - Seaside (http://seaside.st/). Try the tutorial -- you will be blown away!

There is a lot of interesting development happening in Squeak at the moment; if you've not played with it in the last couple of years, it's well worth giving it some attention. If you're having trouble getting into Squeak, have a look at some of the tutorial material on http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/377 .