Slashdot Mirror

Dude,
The Speed of light is not constant. The oft quoted speed of light is the speed of light in a vacuum. See Here.

No ground breaking crypto solving or Beowulfs yet but some solid calculations going on.

Also, in terms of just storing energy within a power station, are there any alteratnives that work at an industrial scale? (do batteries work? I guess dams could be considered energy storage devices...) What are the efficiencies of those?

currency converter - findsounds.com

how stuff works - infoplease

about.com - librarian's index

rebecca's reference - tom mayo's links
-words:

acronym/abbr -lookup -finder -bm

trans -babelfish -worldlingo -google bm

bartleby

phrontistery

pseudodictionary

jargon file
--music

epitonic - pitchfork

sonomu - electraum

gnod - audioquarium --books:

amazon - abebooks - bookfinder

gutenberg & onlinebooks

loc.gov - lambiek comiclopedia - rebecca's books

Wikipedia
How Stuff Works

I like browsing articles at howstuffworks.com. I go there looking for something specific and end up spending hours reading the articles. They're not overly technical, but not so simple as to be inaccurate either. It's something I can share with others and not confuse them right out. ;-)

I suggest you do your research, all of these things I mentioned are a possibility, right now NASA is using alot of this technology I mentioned to send robotic probes up into space.

I cant believe ignorant people come on slashdot thinking they know about technology, then find out they dont know shit about nano technology, or robotics and suddenly its all science fiction.

Since you dont believe me, Here you go dumb person, read How Hydrogren Fuel Cells Work

This will help people like you who think they know everything.

If you want to read about the doppler effect actually read the document you linked to!

"Police officers use the Doppler Effect to determine the speed of your car."

Doppler effect has nothing to do with this.

"The radar set measures the time it takes for the echo to arrive, as well as the Doppler shift of the echo."

"A police radar looks only for Doppler-shifted signals, and because the radar beam is tightly focused it hits only one car."

"Radar works by the Doppler effect except that it uses radio waves instead of sound waves."

"In radar where a moving target is involved, the signal undergoes the Doppler shift when impinging upon the target."

"The Doppler effect is also used in some forms of radar to measure the velocity of detected objects."

"Radar guns, for example, are based on the Doppler effect."

"Radar guns, for example use the Doppler effect to measure the speed of vehicles or other objects such as baseballs."

Want more?

If you want to read about the doppler effect actually read the document you linked to!

"Police officers use the Doppler Effect to determine the speed of your car."

Doppler effect has nothing to do with this.

"The radar set measures the time it takes for the echo to arrive, as well as the Doppler shift of the echo."

"A police radar looks only for Doppler-shifted signals, and because the radar beam is tightly focused it hits only one car."

"Radar works by the Doppler effect except that it uses radio waves instead of sound waves."

"In radar where a moving target is involved, the signal undergoes the Doppler shift when impinging upon the target."

"The Doppler effect is also used in some forms of radar to measure the velocity of detected objects."

"Radar guns, for example, are based on the Doppler effect."

"Radar guns, for example use the Doppler effect to measure the speed of vehicles or other objects such as baseballs."

Want more?

Here is a snippet about sleep and addiction

The most important long-term problem is the effect that caffeine has on sleep.The half-life of caffeine in your body is about 6 hours. That means that if you consume a big cup of coffee with 200 mg of caffeine in it at 3:00 PM, by 9:00 PM about 100 mg of that caffeine is still in your system. You may be able to fall asleep, but your body probably will miss out on the benefits of deep sleep. That deficit adds up fast. The next day you feel worse, so you need caffeine as soon as you get out of bed. The cycle continues day after day. This is why 90% of Americans consume caffeine every day. Once you get in the cycle, you have to keep taking the drug. Even worse, if you try to stop taking caffeine, you get very tired and depressed and you get a terrible, splitting headache as blood vessels in the brain dilate. These negative effects force you to run back to caffeine even if you want to stop.

The answer is right here:

Is the sound on vinyl records better than on CDs or DVDs?

A black rectangle? If it was the VChip, the entire signal would be blocked, not obscured by a black rectangle.

I think you're barking up the wrong tree; you should look at the captioning.

With all due respect, you are completely wrong.

Hertz (Hz) is a unit that in all practicalities measures "times per second".

The number 44.1kHz used to signify sample rate means that the sound is sampled 44,100 times per second. It has nothing to do with frequency of the sound - which is how many sound waves per second.

You should read the HowStuffWorks question, Is the sound on vinyl records better than on CDs or DVDs?.

With all due respect, you are completely wrong.

Hertz (Hz) is a unit that in all practicalities measures "times per second".

The number 44.1kHz used to signify sample rate means that the sound is sampled 44,100 times per second. It has nothing to do with frequency of the sound - which is how many sound waves per second.

You should read the HowStuffWorks question, Is the sound on vinyl records better than on CDs or DVDs?.

In both cases, Speedpass and the toll system, the heart of the device is a small radio transmitter that is actually powered by an RF field in the vicinity of either the gas pump or the toll booth. When bombarded with enough RF, a chip in the transponder sends back its serial number. The difference between the mini ones for Speedpass and the big ones at the toll booths are that the toll ones have to work much further away from the tx/rx antennas. I've never taken one apart, but I expect the antennas are much larger.

The problem with using a system like this for a credit card is that the transponder is dumb--it doesn't know what it's transmitting to, or whether it is appropriate to transmit your credit card number at that moment. If it gets hit with enough RF to energize the circuit, it transmits your account number. This would be very dangerous, for obvious reasons.

If I were building them, I would put a little 'fail-safe' on the top of the card: two metallic patches separated by a few millimeters, that you have to cover/connect with your thumb in order for the card to transmit. I'm not sure how complicated the circuit would be, but I have personally seen devices that have metal bars like that and use the capacitance to know whether a human hand is touching it or whether it's brushed up against an inanimate object.

There's more radiation inhaled by coal fumes than emitted by nuclear power for the same amount of power. And then theres the ecological damage...
Pollutants produced per year by a 500kW coal plant:

"Sulfur Dioxide - Main cause of acid rain 10,000 Tons
Nitrogen Oxides - Causes smog and acid rain 10,200 Tons
Carbon Dioxide - Greenhouse gas suspected of causing global warming 3,700,000 Tons

It also produces smaller amounts of just about every element on the periodic table, including the radioactive ones. In fact, a coal-burning power plant emits more radiation than a (properly functioning) nuclear power plant!"

Whether or not the parent post gave complete credence to their business plan doesn't matter. Your cut and paste from the fine article does not change the fact that movie theatre profit is generated principally from concessions, and should their model prove successful, others will copy it but won't mind paying the "high cost" of popcorn serving.

It is documented concessions are the principle motivator in the venture of showing feature releases. If there is sufficient demand for popcorn when the bodies arrive, it will be understandable when they will sell popcorn.

Only if you're still using a 32-bit C library. If you use a 64-bit time() function, you'll be okay for about 250 billion years or so.

The Amiga measures time in seconds. As it turns out, the number of seconds to accumulate until 19 January, 2046, 03:14:07 will form the largest value a signed 32 bit integer number can hold. This is not a problem for the time keeping module (timer.device). However, application software and other operating system components which treat the number of seconds as a signed quantity will get into trouble one second later: the number of seconds will rise to 2,147,483,648 which in two's complement format represents the negative number -2,147,483,648.
[...]
Amiga computers equipped with battery backed up real time clock hardware use one of two different hardware designs: either the Oki MSM6242RS (A500, A2000) or the Ricoh RP5C01 (A3000, A1200, A4000) chip. As is common with clock chips of that type, the year counter is implemented as a two digit BCD number. Once it reaches the year 99, the counter will roll over and start again at 00.[...] While the system clock will keep ticking beyond 31 December, 2077 [1 January 2078] a system reset will set the clock back to 1 January, 1978.
[...]
An unsigned 32 bit integer can hold a maximum value of 4,294,967,295. When the Amiga has accumulated that many seconds, it will be 7 February, 2114, 06:28:15. One second later the seconds counter will roll over and restart at 0. In other words, on 7 February, 2114, 06:28:16 the Amiga will believe that it is midnight on 1 January, 1978.

Actually, it doesn't. Both CDs and GameCube discs spin clockwise. This is easily shown with a GameCube and a top-loading CD player like most portables. I can't verify on DVDs since I don't even have a DVD player, much less a top-loading one, but Howstuffworks shows it spinning clockwise.

What seems a little more likely is that they're read outside-in rather than the standard inside-out.

IIRC, Lockheed was the primary contractor on the HST and all NRO (National Reconnaissance Office) satellites.

Some links (non-classified, publicly-available knowledge):

National Reconnaissance Office (NRO)

"What is a keyhole satellite and what can it really spy on?"

ScottKin

I suggest you really read up on GM crops and found out what they are. It seems like you have some evil vision in your head of something that is no different than evolution at an accelerated rate.

I think Monsanto is evil here, they can't control their crops and I firmly disagree with allowing patents on process/creations such as these but GM foods are not some evil boogy monster, any more so than modern farming techniques.

I know exactly what GM crops are thank you. I was just providing another example (albeit in a different sphere) of just how greedy biotech companies are, even in life or death situations.

GM crop development isn't about speeding up natural or artificial selection. It's about taking the qualities you want, perhaps from two different plant types, perhaps from more, to develop a more "desirable" product.

So, you could be talking about taking one type of plant and transplanting genetic code from a totally different type of plant into it to give the first plant some of the genetic properties of the second plant.

Want wheat that doesn't fall down so easily? Take the relevant genetic code (the bit that says "make this plant's stalk strong" from a totally different plant and replace the corresponding code in the wheat's DNA. Want longer lasting apples? Replace the relevant genetic code with some from a plant that bears fruit that doesn't go rotten as quickly.

Obviously, with natural or artificial selection, it's possible to do this to a degree, but it isn't possible to take the properties of two completely different species and combine them - you can't cross breed an apple and an orange through traditional methods but with genetic modification you can - that is what GM crops and products are about.

There is no way that modern farming techniques could ever produce the kind of seed that Monsanto has made, because it is modified at the genetic level using genetic code from several totally different plant species. Please don't suggest that it's "evolution at an accelerated rate". That's just plain ignorance.

Perhaps, as you seem so ignorant about the facts, you should do some research. Here's a Google link to help you out: GM foods.

The third link is particularly helpful, so I'll include it here for your benefit: HowStuffWorks - What are genetically modified (GM) foods?.

By the way, for someone who's criticising other people for what they do and don't know, your lack of basic knowledge on the subject is stunning.

You idiot, that's a special kind of ink in those markers.

http://www.howstuffworks.com/question212.htm

Too True! Every item you listed should be mandatory curriculum in High School. I look back, from the perspective of a technical trainer, on how and what was ostensibly "covered" in HS and wonder, "WTF were they actually trying to teach us...if anything?!"
Granted, I attended four different high schools (father was in the AF security service) which doesn't make for a very contiguous learning experience but, seriously, the instructors I encountered didn't seem to have a clue about the most basic tenets of effective training delivery.
Where was Slashdot and THIS website, HowStuffWorks - Learn how Everything Works!, when I was in highschool and needed them, dammit!
Oh...Right! Websites hadn't been invented yet. Oh well, I'd have settled for a BBS.

There is a "making-of" episode where they show what is actually involved in creating a single show.

If you have not see it then read this page:
How 'Junkyard Wars' Works: Behind The Scenes

I work film projection, and almost all 16x9 movies have viewable image out to 4:3 - the 16:9 area is cropped out from the rest of the frame in the projection process.

I used to work in film projection, and most of the movies were anamorphic or hard-matted. Only the cheapest ones were soft-matted (cropped out at the time of the projection process).

That said, one time a film was out of frame so you could see the bottom part, and it became aware that some of the "naked" female actors were actually just wearing low-cut strapless bras.

I work film projection, and almost all 16x9 movies have viewable image out to 4:3 - the 16:9 area is cropped out from the rest of the frame in the projection process.

I used to work in film projection, and most of the movies were anamorphic or hard-matted. Only the cheapest ones were soft-matted (cropped out at the time of the projection process).

That said, one time a film was out of frame so you could see the bottom part, and it became aware that some of the "naked" female actors were actually just wearing low-cut strapless bras.

I work film projection, and almost all 16x9 movies have viewable image out to 4:3 - the 16:9 area is cropped out from the rest of the frame in the projection process.

I used to work in film projection, and most of the movies were anamorphic or hard-matted. Only the cheapest ones were soft-matted (cropped out at the time of the projection process).

That said, one time a film was out of frame so you could see the bottom part, and it became aware that some of the "naked" female actors were actually just wearing low-cut strapless bras.

Here's one. Hardly technical (the site is a high level type site) but very interesting.

the polygraph is not a lie detector. A polygraph actually records a number of different signals. Respiration, persperation... A polygraph only detects your output, not your internal processes. That may eventually change with walk-through brain scanners at the airports...

The polygraph operator may be thoroughly trained to interpret this data, or they might simply have bought a polygraph and hired themselves out immediately. Training and certification varies greatly from state to state. It's claimed that they measure 'deceptive reactions' pretty well, (bear in mind that they also run on Windows..No, i'm not kidding.) If you really believe what you're saying, a polygraph won't pick that up. But on the other hand, it might. I would say that the jury's out on their effectiveness, but they don't let polygraph results anywhere near a jury. (we'll get to that.) Dweceptive behaviour is not the same as lying. If you give a patently false answer to every question, it messes with the baseline. If you give honest answers that mislead, it may or may not pick them up. If you tell the truth but think about something bad you've done lately, you might get a false positive. It's that messy.

Voice analysers promise similar results- the ability to pick up changes in a person's voice, microtremors, when deceptive intent creeps in... but have also been shown to be faulty. And then shown to be fine. And then faulty again. And so on.

The supreme court has ruled that polygraph tests can be administered- but that the data may not be used as evidence in court. Although it is illegal to make a polygraph test part of the private industry hiring practice, the feds can do this all they want, and are expanding their activities in this regard as more sophisticated, digital equipment becomes available.

It's more likely that brain imaging will evolve to replace the polygraph- and even then, it probably won't be 100%. There will always be those who can believe what they are saying to be true. It's all about confidence. So to answer the question- yes, they could try, but they might not be able to get anything useful from it, and if you know enough about how they work, you could give them enough false positives that they'd never work it out. Then they'd simply get a court order to bug your keyboard instead, out of sheer frustration. Unless you were deemed a REAL threat to national security- in which case they import you to egypt for 'questioning...'

sorry if i sound pessimistic. But the answer is that if it's that important, they'll use something more proven than a polygraph....

the polygraph is not a lie detector. A polygraph actually records a number of different signals. Respiration, persperation... A polygraph only detects your output, not your internal processes. That may eventually change with walk-through brain scanners at the airports...

The polygraph operator may be thoroughly trained to interpret this data, or they might simply have bought a polygraph and hired themselves out immediately. Training and certification varies greatly from state to state. It's claimed that they measure 'deceptive reactions' pretty well, (bear in mind that they also run on Windows..No, i'm not kidding.) If you really believe what you're saying, a polygraph won't pick that up. But on the other hand, it might. I would say that the jury's out on their effectiveness, but they don't let polygraph results anywhere near a jury. (we'll get to that.) Dweceptive behaviour is not the same as lying. If you give a patently false answer to every question, it messes with the baseline. If you give honest answers that mislead, it may or may not pick them up. If you tell the truth but think about something bad you've done lately, you might get a false positive. It's that messy.

Voice analysers promise similar results- the ability to pick up changes in a person's voice, microtremors, when deceptive intent creeps in... but have also been shown to be faulty. And then shown to be fine. And then faulty again. And so on.

The supreme court has ruled that polygraph tests can be administered- but that the data may not be used as evidence in court. Although it is illegal to make a polygraph test part of the private industry hiring practice, the feds can do this all they want, and are expanding their activities in this regard as more sophisticated, digital equipment becomes available.

It's more likely that brain imaging will evolve to replace the polygraph- and even then, it probably won't be 100%. There will always be those who can believe what they are saying to be true. It's all about confidence. So to answer the question- yes, they could try, but they might not be able to get anything useful from it, and if you know enough about how they work, you could give them enough false positives that they'd never work it out. Then they'd simply get a court order to bug your keyboard instead, out of sheer frustration. Unless you were deemed a REAL threat to national security- in which case they import you to egypt for 'questioning...'

sorry if i sound pessimistic. But the answer is that if it's that important, they'll use something more proven than a polygraph....

This site has an interesting article that fully explains how classic barcodes work, how you can decode the bars, etc. An interesting read.

How Microwaves Work

How Microwave Ovens Work

I don't get it. You can send your ashes to space for $5,300, but a letter is nearly 4 times more expensive?

No, there are several HDTV spec'ed resolutions:

The formats used in HDTV are:

720p - 1280x720 pixels progressive
1080i - 1920x1080 pixels interlaced
1080p - 1920x1080 pixels progressive

You can get the whose story here at HowStuffWorks.

No, there are several HDTV spec'ed resolutions:

The formats used in HDTV are:

720p - 1280x720 pixels progressive
1080i - 1920x1080 pixels interlaced
1080p - 1920x1080 pixels progressive

You can get the whose story here at HowStuffWorks.

Or did you read and article and just happen to miss this part:

"The probes are based on bunker-buster penetrators, but instead of explosives, would carry sophisticated scientific instruments hardened against the shock of striking the lunar surface."

You might want to refrain from commenting on anyone else's stupidity or engineering skills.

-B

Just how exactly do you expect a Massive Ordnance Air Blast to work without the air? For those that need to be reminded... read

It seems you're not quite clear on what interlacing does or why it exists.

Let me explain this in the simplest terms possible.

Interlacing NEVER applies to film, period.
It is strictly used in television, nothing else.

Interlacing only exists because of the way television sets were designed.
Go here for a simple explanation of how interlacing in tv works. They explain it better than I would.

In a theatre, there is no scanning of any kind. The image you see is FLASHED on the screen by opening the projector's gate for a specific period of time, 1/48th of a second for 24 frames per second (actually, it's 2x 1/96th of a second, to minimize flicker). The gate is opened and closed by a spinning disc, which is open for 180 out of the 360 circle. It's actually 2x90 cutouts, rather than one 180, as flashing the same image twice in the same period of time reduces flicker. In a camera however, it's one 180 cutout (it can be changed, for effects purposes).

IMAX should be able to at either 24fps or 48 fps, and I don't think the projectionist is forced to use one or the other. (someone please correct me if I'm wrong).
But IF you were stuck with a 48fps system, the easiest way to solve that is to optically print every frame twice on the IMAX film at the lab.
Your eyes will not notice it because you're already used to 24fps in a regular theatre, where every frame is flashed twice anyway.

Again... Interlacing NEVER works in projected images, because your eyes will see the lines. You will not see lines in television, unless the interlacing is horrendously crappy. Just try catching it on your local news. That's right... you can't. Project that same image without de-interlacing it, and you will.

All wires will eventually suffer from signal degradation. But the key difference between cable and DSL that limits its distance is the signal bandwidth. DSL allocates about 1.5MHz of the frequency spectrum for data transfer whereas cable uses a 6MHz channel band within the 42-850MHz range for data transmision. Since the frequency and bandwidth is higher for cable modems, it is less susceptible to noise and signal degradation. Coax cable also has more shielding compared to copper phone cables.

All wires will eventually suffer from signal degradation. But the key difference between cable and DSL that limits its distance is the signal bandwidth. DSL allocates about 1.5MHz of the frequency spectrum for data transfer whereas cable uses a 6MHz channel band within the 42-850MHz range for data transmision. Since the frequency and bandwidth is higher for cable modems, it is less susceptible to noise and signal degradation. Coax cable also has more shielding compared to copper phone cables.

Considering the business model of pornography, I can't imagine an amateur video shot on a 1-CCD MiniDV camcorder and edited in iMovie is going to scale well to IMAX size.

Besides, even if you did have the budget to shoot in IMAX, even the most, ahem (tug on collar), accommodating porn star will have some aversion to having a camera this big forced into his or her nether-regions.

You can find out a little more information about Social Security numbers on this page on HowStuffWorks.

You can find out a little more information about Social Security numbers on this page on HowStuffWorks.

Maybe I'm too picky, but my biggest complaint about upconverting 35mm movies to IMAX is the mismatched cinematography, not the technical gotchas. The whole idea behind an IMAX film is to give the audience a window into a different world. Think about the "native" IMAX films you've seen... rather than use a mixture of camera angles to project a story on a screen, an IMAX film treats the audience as a camera and the screen as window. Slow, wide pans... a large, detailed screen... conservative transitions. IMAX filmmakers want you to feel as though you're truly inside the new environment, actually being positioned to see the action in front of you... not just watching a story on a glorifed TV. A good, native IMAX movie does this -- it makes the audience feel as though they're truly hovering around the subject matter. A bad IMAX movie makes the audience tired, confused, or sick.

My other beef is with the public's misconception of the IMAX film format. Traditional (non-dome) IMAX uses 15/70 film. That is, 70mm film with 15 sprockets per frame. This is not plain "70mm film, which dedicates only 5 sprockets per frame. 15/70 IMAX has 3x as much film surface area as plain 70mm and nearly 10x as much as plain 35mm. (Plus other benefits, such as double the framerate and generally better audio. Though 35mm is catching up with some recent films being available in 48fps and new 7.1 channel audio from Sony SDDS and DTS).

For more information on the IMAX format, check these out:
http://www.superspeedway.com/eng/imax1.html

http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/imax1.htm

Establishment science is a byproduct of dominant political and economic interests. (Some people don't like to hear that.) So, what kind of energy systems will emerge under a political and economic order that has been controlled, at least for the last 100 years, by corrupt oil money? Wide adoption of viable alternative energy systems would completely subvert the dominant paradigm (the U.S. imposed global economic and political order) and depose long established elites.

The only way that any paradigm breaking technologies will emerge is if we (average people) build them ourselves. This work must be carried out by the non experts among us, the laymen and the backyard tinkerers because the alleged "scientists" are too busy maintaining the status quo on the road to oblivion.

To wit:

I recently came up with an idea that might allow for the creation of a vehicle that burns no non renewable hydrocarbons (gasoline) and in fact runs on solar power and water.

"Whuuuh?" you ask. Forget about what "CAN'T" happen for a few minutes and keep reading!

!WARNING! I have done NO research on actually building this prototype. In fact, I have no experience at all with high voltage electrical systems, generators, explosive gasses or internal combustion engines. Actually attempting to execute the following ideas may be very dangerous.

And if I had the money, I'd be out right now trying to do this. ;)

Let's get down to it:

Hybrid gasoline-electric cars use both conventional gas burning and electrical engines. If you want to know more about how hybrid cars work, see howstuffworks.com for an excellent summary. Hopefully, someone out there has a pioneering spirit, a full workshop and access to, and ability to modify, a Toyota Prius or Honda Insight.

In my opinion, the primary problem with hybrid gas-electric cars is that THEY STILL BURN GASOLINE. My idea is primarily concerned with eliminating the need to use any gasoline at all (or any other filthy, proprietary fuel) in a vehicle that is, for all intents and purposes, extremely well engineered and efficient.

The question then becomes: What type of fuel would the vehicle's internal combustion engine burn?

Behold, JL Naudin's Bingo Fuel Reactor.

Passing current through carbon electrodes immersed in ORDINARY TAP WATER produces gas that can power conventional internal combustion engines. See Naudin's incredible demonstration in which he powers a 5 kilowatt Honda generator directly with the gas from his BingoFuel Reactor. Ok, class, pay attention: Look at the specification for the type of fuel required to run that Honda generator. It's supposed to run on automotive unleaded gasoline (minimum 86 pump octane). Yep, that's the same automotive unleaded gasoline that you put in your car, or in those Honda and Toyota hybrids.

Obviously, to get that gas out of the water, current must be passed through the carbon electrical array.

To all of you people out there shaking your heads, mumbling, "This is 11th grade chemistry class electrolysis, this takes too much power," stick with me.

Look at what Naudin says about the BingoFuel system vs. electrolysis:

It is interesting to notice that in this test of a 1 cell BingoFuel Reactor, the current used is 81.6 Amperes (see Test#1). With a same value of current used in a 1 cell electrolyser the volume of the of H2 is 36 liters per hour (at 20C). There is 46% of H2 in the synthetic gas genera

Ah, darn. You're quite right!

It seems like this would be an ideal complement to a system that was built with mram - non-volatile (modernised 'core') memory since no battery backup would be required. But I'm sure you already had that in mind. :)