Slashdot Mirror

Here is one, that's close, not exactly 1920 x 1080, but 1900 x 1200.

Or if you really have money to burn, you can get one from IBM at a blistering 3840 x 2400 for a measly $8k plus a grand or so for a card to drive it.

Here's a tip.

Write a paper for a trade or online magazine. It doesn't have to be a doctoral thesis. Just a simple "Hello World" article will suffice. Be sure it's a topic that hasn't been beaten to death and be sure it's a topic you know cold. "How to" articles are always in demand at places like IBM's DeveloperWorks or JavaWorld.

You will be surprised how impressive even the simplest article will make your resume look. Being an author makes you an expert in the eyes of your typical HR resume reader, especially when compared to your typical "C/C++/Java/Perl/VB/PHP/......" resume.

Good luck!

JoAnn

For those (like myself) who have little idea about spintronics, Wikipedia has a general article that seemed to explain it to me quite well. Of course, I'm not a physicist so I have no idea whether or not it's accurate although I'm tempted to find out more from the referenced article. PhysicsWeb has more of the same. Apparently this will have far-reaching implications on RAM and cable bandwidth.

IBM Public License, Version 1.0

This is a free software license but it is incompatible with the GPL. The IBM Public License is incompatible with the GPL because it has various specific requirements that are not in the GPL. For example, it requires certain patent licenses be given that the GPL does not require. (We don't think those patent license requirements are inherently a bad idea, but nonetheless they are incompatible with the GNU GPL.)

By the way, that same FSF page says the same about IBM's other open source license, the Common Public License, used in Eclipse.

I hope that a future version of the GPL will allow LGPL-style linking with code covered by GPL-incompatible "free software" licenses in cases where no proprietary software is linked in or perhaps that a future version of the GPL will address software patent problems in a way that is compatible with the IBM Public License and the Apache 2 License.

In the meantime, to me, the advantages of Postfix are less than the disadvantages of the obstacles to future code recycling. If the incompatabilities could be fixed by a change to either the GPL or the IPL, and if enough of the hype about postfix proved to be real, I would probably switch to postfix.

I know I am a statistically insignificant sample, but there are others, mostly developers, who care about being able to copy code between free software projects in general and GPL compatability in particular. So, Postfix gain that much more usage and support if and when this incompatability is resolved, such as, for the short term, by adding some exceptions for the GPL, as the CUPS project did.

IBM Public License, Version 1.0

This is a free software license but it is incompatible with the GPL. The IBM Public License is incompatible with the GPL because it has various specific requirements that are not in the GPL. For example, it requires certain patent licenses be given that the GPL does not require. (We don't think those patent license requirements are inherently a bad idea, but nonetheless they are incompatible with the GNU GPL.)

By the way, that same FSF page says the same about IBM's other open source license, the Common Public License, used in Eclipse.

I hope that a future version of the GPL will allow LGPL-style linking with code covered by GPL-incompatible "free software" licenses in cases where no proprietary software is linked in or perhaps that a future version of the GPL will address software patent problems in a way that is compatible with the IBM Public License and the Apache 2 License.

In the meantime, to me, the advantages of Postfix are less than the disadvantages of the obstacles to future code recycling. If the incompatabilities could be fixed by a change to either the GPL or the IPL, and if enough of the hype about postfix proved to be real, I would probably switch to postfix.

I know I am a statistically insignificant sample, but there are others, mostly developers, who care about being able to copy code between free software projects in general and GPL compatability in particular. So, Postfix gain that much more usage and support if and when this incompatability is resolved, such as, for the short term, by adding some exceptions for the GPL, as the CUPS project did.

Would you consider using a memory doubler (or tripler, or quadrupler) if it was done totally transparently in hardware?

Nope. No company does research any more.

Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the Universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the Universe is winning. -- Rich Cook.

All I really know, is that the people who show up with a degree in English, and want to code, rarely work out.

If you don't mind the advice, I think the problem may lie in how you interview. It's hard to do a good interview for a programing job, especially for those of us who still consider ourselves coders, but the preperations will pay off.

I ask the usual character questions -- do you like Star Trek? Could Superman beat up Darth Vader? Do you think it's ok to put mustard on a Roast Beef sandwich? And so on. (kidding of course).

I also do a whiteboard test of language neutral tasks. Using an OO language the interviewee and I make up on the spot (syntax only of course) we build a program that can, given a list of all the flights in the US, tell you the fastest way to get from point A to point B, at any given time. If they actualy understand the math, that's even better, but I'll settle for us making progress towards a solution, and seeing their designs. I also do a Meta-language example, where we, on the whiteboard , build a Turing machine (though I don't call it that during the interview, we just talk about rules for our machine) that will be able to recognize certain things. I also will frequently run Robocode and then looking at the API with the interviewee, ask about the robot they would make.

I agree that this sort of stuff does give the CS grad an advantage -- they've probably had discrete math, and ougta understand nodes, edges and the pumping lemma. But I think that these concepts are generic enough that a person with no "formal" training can still arrive at good answers. I also think though that this reveals the CS students who can parrot what they heard but didn't "understand." I find these sort of thngs very valuable in revealing CS majors who can talk the talk, but can't code their way out of a wet paper bag. I'm not saying I've never hired a dud, but I can say (knok on wood) so far I've avoided the "negative work" employee, who is so bad it takes another developer to fix everything this 1st guy broke. As for the entry level positions, and salary, I wrote some thoughts about essential skills. If you have the skills I describe, you should take the job, and start working -- you'll get promoted quickly. And none of that has to do with a degree -- it's attitude.

in fact, like backov, I'm wary of too much education --if you have a BS and an MS in CS I'm wary of you. I'll want to know why you didn't go work right away with a BS. If you have a BS in CS, I'm gonna want to know what programs you made for yourself, for pleasure, and not for school. You should have a simple website somewhere too. PLEASE have a web site somewhere. If you don't have your resume available from your home page, along with a few other docs, you won't do well in this field. And if you're just out of college, you should have a student web page right? Finally, you probably know if you're a star or not. If you are indeed a star, take the job if it's cool, and don't worry about the money. Learn from the greybeards around, and realize that you're gonna fly the coop soon enough anyway. Most developers get their best raises by constantly switching jobs. If you're not a star, friggin RECOGNIZE that, and embrace your roll as a "behind th

Wikipedia says it was Thomas J. Watson who said that in 1943. This was shortly before Thomas J. Watson Jr. came home from WWII and began promoting computers heavily within IBM. Other web source seem to agree. IBM doesn't seem to endorse it in official material though there is a presentation sitting on one of their sites that mentions it.

Whether or not it's true, the lesson of the quote is that even (especially?) people on the brink of a tipping point may not recognize the huge impact of the disruptive technology they are working with. Works the other way, too. Often those promoting some cool, geeky technology assume everyone will want one, when in fact they don't; at least not yet. Look at the many early attempts at "portable" computers or the many attempts at handheld devices and runs at tablet-style PCs. Ultimately, some of those technologies caught on (and tablets still look like they might) but at a much slower rate than anticipated.

First, you have to obtain a copy of GAY NIGGERS FROM OUTER SPACE THE MOVIE and watch it.

Second, you need to succeed in posting a GNAA "first post" on slashdot.org, a popular "news for trolls" website

Third, you need to join the official GNAA irc channel #GNAA on Evolnet, and apply for membership.
Talk to one of the ops or any of the other members in the channel to sign up today!

If you are having trouble locating #GNAA, the official GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA irc channel, you might be on a wrong irc network. The correct network is Evolnet, and you can connect to irc.catheadlabs.com or irc.gnaa.us as one of the EFNet servers.
If you do not have an IRC client handy, you are free to use the GNAA Java IRC client by clicking here.

About Lunix
Lunix is an operating system. An operating sy

The 'tip top' computer programmers in the world who are not working for the likes of IBM or Microsoft are likely working at/for the NSA.

As you can see, all three firms would undoubtedly treat such talent as a valuable proprietery resource to be held in the strictest of confidence.

Text based gui's are still being created but it depends on your backend. Some DBMS's still rely on terminal type input and output natively. Examples of these are: d3 jBase ibm's u2 family. There are various options for gui'zing them but they excel at POS and terminal type input and output. Check them out. You can read about these types of databases on usenet @ comp.databases.pick.

Unless you're in the right, and want to prevent other bottom feeders from trying the same sort of tactics. In that case, you don't throw money at the problem, you throw lots and lots of lawyers.

Most of your points have been addressed, but I think this one has not:

Although Java is a little bit nicer than C++, one error Java programmers often do is that they forget to assign null to pointers. This has a big consequence: the virtual machine does not free unused objects as soon as possible.

You don't need to set variables to null to have them garbage collected. In fact, sometimes it's a bad idea.

> I can't think of any technology that has successfully spanned this many decades from proof-of-concept to practical reality.

How about The Marquand Logic Machine?

That's a pretty impressive scaling up over the last 12+ decades.

Otherwise known as autonomic computing

I always read that as:

# Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive comments might be moderated +5

Dumbest warnings I ever saw were on a laptop's power supply:

FOR USERS IN CALIFORNIA:

WARNING: The power cord on this product contains lead, a chemical known to the State of California to cause cancer, and birth defects or other reproductive harm. Wash hands after handling.

Of course, there's no word on whether the lead in the power cord is transmuted to gold when I cross the border into Nevada, or whether or not residents of other states need to wash their hands after plugging things in or not.

(The background is that a bunch of twits fell for the junk science on PVC softened with lead phthalates. Consider that if studies on intravenous bags with the stuff are questionable, it's Not Bloody Likely that failing to wash your hands after you plug in your laptop is going to kill you. But since when did science matter to the granola-crunchin' hypesters of the People's Republic of California? It's to protect the chilllllldren and the enviiiiiiirunmennnnnt!

I've been curious if there has been a hyperelegant neural network solution that can do everything from recognize handwriting to faces. [...] Are there any real (not patent or such) related reasons this doesn't exist?

Aside from the fact that about a third of the brain (if I remember correctly) is dedicated to visual processing and that the brain has a hundred billion neurons, each neuron firing at up to 1KHz and with thousands of connections to other neurons? :)

It's an enourmously complex task to be able to do this reliably. Recognizing a straight-on photograph and matching it up with a corresponding mugshot is a whole lot different than seeing the side of a person's half-shadowed face from slightly behind them and recognizing that as the same Alice who held up the convenience store on Tuesday.

Handwriting recognition is orders of magnitude easier to do, since it's a lot easier to recognize similarities between a sample of writing and previously analyzed samples. In fact, there's a lot of research into this already. Facial recognition is slowly getting there, but people are still stumbling over the same mistakes that were made decades ago -- attempting to formalize facial recognition by defining a set of rules and matching to those rules. Much like spam filtering, this works to a degree until the differences between the one you want and the one you don't no longer fits within the rules.

Neural net + genetic algorithms/programming to refine the net's connections and behavior is probably a good approach. Finding a means of populating, storing, and computing hundreds of billions of nodes in the network is the real challenge I think. Of course, take everything I've said with a huge grain of salt as this is a subject I'm fascinated by but have little practical experience with.

it will strike back with its patent portfolio

Then they'll be as despised as IBM.

But what happens when I set it next to two or three computers?

Put a NAS frontend on it and let clients mount it. A little too "enterprisey" for the hobby crowd I know, but a solution nonetheless. Instead of saving up to buy one of these, I could just put a hard disk somewhere in my computer room and have clients map the drive space. Also comes in handy during those pesky FBI raids when your data drives are actually installed in the attic or inside the walls themselves.

Regarding #3, that is not generally true. Check out Brian Goetz's article, where he points out:

Object pooling is a straightforward concept -- maintain a pool of frequently used objects and grab one from the pool instead of creating a new one whenever needed. The theory is that pooling spreads out the allocation costs over many more uses. When the object creation cost is high, such as with database connections or threads, or the pooled object represents a limited and costly resource, such as with database connections, this makes sense. However, the number of situations where these conditions apply is fairly small.

In addition, object pooling has some serious downsides. Because the object pool is generally shared across all threads, allocation from the object pool can be a synchronization bottleneck. Pooling also forces you to manage deallocation explicitly, which reintroduces the risks of dangling pointers. Also, the pool size must be properly tuned to get the desired performance result. If it is too small, it will not prevent allocation; and if it is too large, resources that could get reclaimed will instead sit idle in the pool. By tying up memory that could be reclaimed, the use of object pools places additional pressure on the garbage collector. Writing an effective pool implementation is not simple.

In his "Performance Myths Exposed" talk at JavaOne 2003 (see Resources), Dr. Cliff Click offered concrete benchmarking data showing that object pooling is a performance loss for all but the most heavyweight objects on modern JVMs. Add in the serialization of allocation and the dangling-pointer risks, and it's clear that pooling should be avoided in all but the most extreme cases.

• How can I buy their product? Who sells it?

• What does it cost?

What Cray's rightfully pointing out is that for most business applications, however, distributed computing is not a viable option. When processing on a transaction basis, the transactions often need to posted in the exact order they were recieved, which means they must be taken serially.

The veracity of that depends on a few things, including whether or not the database behind the app is single- or multi-threaded. For a database like Universe, performance running on a cluster wouldn't differ all that much from performance on an IBM or Sun or HP risc box of the same processing power. The downside of multi-threaded databases is that, aside from dealing with a sharp increase in the number of users, you cannot make aggregate processing any faster by adding CPU's, you have to add memory, or move to faster buses or faster CPU's.

The cluster isn't the solution to everything. Nor is the supercomputer. You've gotta think about the job, then figure out which tool is right for the task.

It's all a trade-off of one sort or another, and yes, you have to have the right tool for the situation at hand. But let's not forget that there are a variety of non-traditional solutions for traditional situations that often result in a much lower Total Cost of Ownership. We don't read more about these, in part, because it's not in Vendors' best interests for us to do so.

nitpick: These are also not generally considered HPC.

But anyways, where do you draw the cutoff? Would you consider something like this an HPC or an HPCCC? Technically, that's an HPCCC, but I don't see how you could really call it anything but HPC. Clusters (with a good interconnect) are every bit as HPC as Cray.
Now, that doesn't meant that they're always better. There are still jobs that a Cray is more appropriate for, but for a large number of HPC jobs, clusters are very appropriate (and cost-beneficial).

TZ

I'm no expert, but I became curious about the difference between IBM AFS and OpenAFS and it seems that they are the same.

This means I will probably check it out for my next fileserver project... ;)

IBM Linux Ad

I agree. The article (not the slashdot post) seems quite 'arrogant'. Pervasive computing has been around for about 25 years now (also overlapping with ubiquitous computing). There is an IEEE magazine (IEEE Pervasive Computing) about it, conferences about it (PerCom) - these people never mention anything about what's already happened; being "The MIT", that is not unexpected but is still unfortunate.

Argh...the garbage collector does handle circular references automatically and has done so for at least two years. Weak references are something totally different and are used e.g. for caches.

I did not mean that Apple's was independent of Sun, just that Apple is the one who makes it for their platform. Same with IBM's main JVM. They both have a lot invested in keeping Java stable.

But IBM also has the Jikes RVM, which is an open source Java virtual machine. It is separate from the Sun-based JVM that IBM makes.

You missed a few:

http://www.hp.com/products1/unix/java/

http://h18012.www1.hp.com/java/alpha/

http://www.sgi.com/software/java/

http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/java/jdk/ind ex.html

http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/java/

So it looks like we have JVMs for, at least, Linux, Solaris, Windows, OS X, Irix, AIX, HP-UX, Tru64, OpenVMS, OS/2, and z/OS.

What was the list of platforms for C# and .NET again?

It is clear you do not know anything about Python. You are not a long-time Python developer but rather a troll. The first hint is that you misspell Guido Van Rossum's name.

The second hint is that you cite a page from 1999. A Python developer would know that that was before Python had cyclic garbage collection. Here is an article from 2001 that describes how the issue was fixed.

The third hint is that you point to a page that describes how to avoid creating a memory leak by appending an infinite number of items to a list. Guess what: appending an infinite number of items to a list causes a memory leak in Java, C++, C, assembly, Scheme, sh, Perl and every other programming language in the world. If you ask the computer to store a continually growing list of items, it will do so...in any language.

If you think that Python can leak memory in circumstances where other languages would not, post an example program and we'll all test it out.

While I do applaud these two institutions for their initiative, and wish them the best of luck, I feel that the poster has put a little bit of an unfair spin on the news, as if this is something that they just dreamed up entirelyon their own.

IBM, for example, has had a Pervasive Computing Lab in Austin, TX for several years that has produced several applications in a multitude of markets.

In fact, those of you that are fans of Opera may want to check out Multimodal Browsing on the Sharp Zaurus. Those of you with Windows may want to check out IBM's Multimodal Toolkit for creating these new X+V pages that we might be hearing more about in the future.

Enjoy the links!
~ Mike

While I do applaud these two institutions for their initiative, and wish them the best of luck, I feel that the poster has put a little bit of an unfair spin on the news, as if this is something that they just dreamed up entirelyon their own.

IBM, for example, has had a Pervasive Computing Lab in Austin, TX for several years that has produced several applications in a multitude of markets.

In fact, those of you that are fans of Opera may want to check out Multimodal Browsing on the Sharp Zaurus. Those of you with Windows may want to check out IBM's Multimodal Toolkit for creating these new X+V pages that we might be hearing more about in the future.

Enjoy the links!
~ Mike

While I do applaud these two institutions for their initiative, and wish them the best of luck, I feel that the poster has put a little bit of an unfair spin on the news, as if this is something that they just dreamed up entirelyon their own.

IBM, for example, has had a Pervasive Computing Lab in Austin, TX for several years that has produced several applications in a multitude of markets.

In fact, those of you that are fans of Opera may want to check out Multimodal Browsing on the Sharp Zaurus. Those of you with Windows may want to check out IBM's Multimodal Toolkit for creating these new X+V pages that we might be hearing more about in the future.

Enjoy the links!
~ Mike

While I do applaud these two institutions for their initiative, and wish them the best of luck, I feel that the poster has put a little bit of an unfair spin on the news, as if this is something that they just dreamed up entirelyon their own.

IBM, for example, has had a Pervasive Computing Lab in Austin, TX for several years that has produced several applications in a multitude of markets.

In fact, those of you that are fans of Opera may want to check out Multimodal Browsing on the Sharp Zaurus. Those of you with Windows may want to check out IBM's Multimodal Toolkit for creating these new X+V pages that we might be hearing more about in the future.

Enjoy the links!
~ Mike

While I do applaud these two institutions for their initiative, and wish them the best of luck, I feel that the poster has put a little bit of an unfair spin on the news, as if this is something that they just dreamed up entirelyon their own.

IBM, for example, has had a Pervasive Computing Lab in Austin, TX for several years that has produced several applications in a multitude of markets.

In fact, those of you that are fans of Opera may want to check out Multimodal Browsing on the Sharp Zaurus. Those of you with Windows may want to check out IBM's Multimodal Toolkit for creating these new X+V pages that we might be hearing more about in the future.

Enjoy the links!
~ Mike

There is pretty much nothing you cannot do with Notes. It is definately not open, and if you don't have it as your mail server, or on your system, this solution will not work for you. If, however, your mail system is on Notes, use a custom Lotus Notes DB.

Lotus Notes HomePage

Domino Redbook Online Summary Here.

Good Luck!

There is pretty much nothing you cannot do with Notes. It is definately not open, and if you don't have it as your mail server, or on your system, this solution will not work for you. If, however, your mail system is on Notes, use a custom Lotus Notes DB.

Lotus Notes HomePage

Domino Redbook Online Summary Here.

Good Luck!

Interestingly IBM already has a JDK. I have a feeling the only reason they aren't putting more effort into it (though it is Java 2) is that they're still waiting to see how .NET and Mono come out. Can't steal Sun's thunder now can we?

However, this still doesn't mean we can go out and buy that motherboard with that sweet bus, but does give an indication of the blurred lines that currently exist when people call Apple hardware proprietary. The most important thing to remember about why proprietary has such negative connotations is that it generally translates into more expensive hardware. [pipe_dream]And with the spate of new customers lined up for POWER-derived processors, Apple may finally be able to offer a powerful and cheap low-end computer[/pipe_dream]

It's here: IBM SDK for 64-bit iSeries/pSeries.

It's called DCOP and it's used a lot. Here's one of several tutorial on the subject: IBM tutorial. Note that Ian is planning a tutorial showing how you can use DCOP from KJSEmbed in this series too.

You are thinking of the IBM product recycling plan, which includes a UPS pre-paid shipping label.

BladeCenter JS20

Specs, as stated on IBM's page:

Modular blade server optimized for the BladeCenter enclosure

Two PowerPC® 970 processors at up to 1.6GHz standard

512MB standard/4GB max PC2700 ECC DDR memory

Up to two IDE hard disk drives for 80GB maximum internal storage

Two Gigabit Ethernet controllers standard with load balancing and failover features
$2,699

How disappointing. For the sake of perspective, here's the Xserve G5 Cluster Node:

Dual 2GHz PowerPC G5

512MB DDR400 ECC SDRAM

80GB Serial ATA drive

Mac OS X Server (10 Client)

Dual Gigabit Ethernet
$2,999

OK, so the IBM server is slightly cheaper. But look what you get:

slower processors: 1.6 GHz vs. 2.0 GHz

slower memory: 333MHz vs. 400MHz

slower storage: ATA-100 vs. SATA

no storage in the standard model: 0 GB vs. 80 GB

less expandable storage: 80 GB vs. 750 GB

less expandable memory: 4 GB vs. 8 GB

That being the case, I'd say this is a disappointing product. Why would anyone choose it over the Xserve?

Is the POWER/PowerPC platform not open? There are other companies that make (slow!) Apple processors as well. So just what the hell does it mean when /.ers say something is propietary? Maybe this age old jibe is just geek for- "I can't build it from scratch." Just how bad of a thing is that?

It's rather depressing to see Slashdot care so much about the 35th anniversary of an obscure technical document, and apparently not at all about the 10-year anniversary of the beginning of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.

This may not be news for nerds, but it is stuff that matters.

I can't blame /. too much, because I didn't submit an article. But I can feel depressed now by the utter lack of mention of it.

But no matter. Let's forget those dark troubling thoughts, and celebrate the 40th birthday of the IBM/360!

Small sample:

1. Air New Zealand replaces 150 Compaq servers with a single mainframe running zLinux.
2. Telia Net replaces 70 UNIX servers with a single mainframe running zLinux.
3. Banco Mercantile Venezuela replaces Windows and UNIX servers with zLinux mainframe.
4. SAIC moves application to Linux on the mainframe, for the stock exchanges.

Gartner says IBM had over 100 new mainframe customers in 2002 (according to one report I saw). Haven't seen 2003 data yet.

It's free. IBM has a program for Linux developers who wish to test their application(s) on a genuine mainframe. You get a free z/VM-hosted Linux image for 30 days.

Which gives an idea of how many concurrent VMs mainframes can handle (and at what cost if IBM is giving them away to developers). Note that you have the whole image, root login and all.

There's a pretty good zArchitecture summary here describing the RAS (Reliability, Availability, Serviceability) aspects of the z900. Be sure to back up and visit the G5/G6 RAS features (linked in the article), because those still apply. Note that the z990 added a couple new RAS features.

This journal article mentions something called Parallel Sysplex, and it's worth highlighting. Very interesting stuff, that.

TIP is probably closest to TPF.

IBM went toe-to-toe with Sperry and Burroughs (now Unisys) and beat them in most markets. The companies fought to a draw with the airlines, with Sperry and IBM roughly splitting the market. (I think Burroughs was stronger in banking and finance.) Unisys still has some customers, still running TIP, still on ClearPath mainframes.