Slashdot Mirror

Sad to say, Windows Mobile 6.x is the only game in town if you are interested in anything remotely related to software freedom.

What a weird thing to say, given Microsoft's history.

You can get the full source code for Android here http://source.android.com/.

There's a repository of FOSS Android apps here http://f-droid.org/, it has a market-style installer to make it easy.

The full SDK is here http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html, and there's an O'Reilly Cookbook available http://androidcookbook.com/home.seam.

If Java/Davlik coding is beyound you, try MIT's very clever App Inventor RAD http://appinventoredu.mit.edu/what-is-app-inventor. It's quite cool.

Note that all of these resources are gratis, and most are free as well.

When I saw the headline, I thought that the article described how you could create a linux kernel using http://scratch.mit.edu/

Which would have been a hell of a neat trick.

myke

OK, so why are the Chinese salaries growing year after year? Due to their almost non-existent internal demand?

http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/smokey.html

Also, your gripes infer that people just aren't going as fast as you want to go. Are you sure they are the problem?

Dude! The Uniform Vehicle Code, which forms the basis for all state vehicle codes says:

"Upon all roadways any vehicle proceeding at less than the normal speed of traffic at the time and place and under the conditions then existing shall be driven in the right-hand lane then available for traffic..."

Only a handful of states of specifically removed that requirement in their implementations, everywhere else it is the law of the land. Sometimes it is even stricter like in Mass and Kansas where the left lane is specificlly passing only.

So get off your high horse and move over to the right lane, OK?

Well, yes, the idea certainly didn't originate with Russel, and is in fact as old as we have a written record. Before Yeats, we had for example Michel de Montaigne in the 15'th century which argued and justified that, "it turns out that nothing is so firmly believed as whatever we know least about, and that no persons are more sure of themselves than those who tell us tall stories" That's someone pretty much explicitly statind Dunning-Kruger effect, centuries before Dunning and Kruger. And he in turn was quoting from Plato's Critias, who says, "the inexperience and utter ignorance of his hearers about any subject is a great assistance to him who has to speak of it", which isn't exactly Dunning-Kruger, but is actually even more on topic for explaining why politicians get away with economically-impossible promises and other complete BS. And that's, you know, Plato, 5'th century BC.

Humans are unique amongst organisms in that we've gone through this fantastically elaborate arms race with ourselves—much moreso than any other genus on the planet. Yes, we've needed to kill off the occasional lion or mammoth, but for the most part we've been competing against other tribes of pink-skinned bipeds, at least for the past while. The difference between 'artificial' and 'natural' is, then, the result of that hyper-evolved arms race. There aren't too many other species that we know about with substantial levels of intelligence (predominantly, birds, cetaceans, and primates) and of them, only the chimpanzee has been caught teaching its children how to carve spears. Perhaps the rest know something we don't—like how to have a good time. (That being said, it seems that whenever someone decides to publish something on the topic, the bias seems to be toward breaking down the barrier. But it's not a bad one.)

In biology the definition of what is artificial versus what is natural is particularly obvious, but not where I placed it in the previous post; agriculture is natural (essentially random) processes responding to human pressures. Only when we start mucking around in a plant's genes and begin inserting chunks of DNA with the wrong GC content and sharp corners does the process become truly synthetic.

The people who scream the loudest about how multiple inheritance or gotos are bad are the ones who also scream the loudest about "best practices", but in reality write some of the shittiest code there is.

I have a suspicion that Sussman and Abelson are spot on in Chapter 2 of Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, when they describe the problem of MI as one that may be intractable. Or, it may be AI-complete, since I can't see how method resolution in MI can work in a way described by an algorithm short of implementing a reasoning system with human-like capabilities. The sentence

The main difference between the confusion that existed ten years ago and the confusion that exists now is that now a variety of inadequate ontological theories have been embodied in a plethora of correspondingly inadequate programming languages.

is one of my favourite insights, at least from all those that I gained from that book.

I see. In your view the magic mystery inflation is hiding and it only shows up in select highly volatile commodities like oil. We can't see inflation in "government statistics" like CPI. We can't see large inflation in independent metrics like the BPP. We can't see inflation in agricultural commodities or base metals, both of which are cheaper than they were a year ago. But in the minds of some those facts don't "reflect reality" anymore than those "fake 'uprisings' in the middle east".

Might I suggest that perhaps your limited understanding of the global economy and the Federal Reserve fractional lending system could have a few blindspots? Seems a bit more likely that your "invisible inflation" theory.

I said it was a manifestation of it, not that the two were equivalent terms.

I highly recommend the MIT video series by Asher Shapiro on the subject:

http://web.mit.edu/hml/ncfmf.html

"Surface Tension in Fluid Mechanics"

the videos are excellent (and that's a big understatement), but if you are in a hurry just have a look at the section talking about contact angles in the film notes: http://web.mit.edu/hml/ncfmf/04STFM.pdf

I said it was a manifestation of it, not that the two were equivalent terms.

I highly recommend the MIT video series by Asher Shapiro on the subject:

http://web.mit.edu/hml/ncfmf.html

"Surface Tension in Fluid Mechanics"

the videos are excellent (and that's a big understatement), but if you are in a hurry just have a look at the section talking about contact angles in the film notes: http://web.mit.edu/hml/ncfmf/04STFM.pdf

I agree: diagnosis is only one (arguably less important) area where mobile technologies are going to benefit us. I think the real opportunity lies in transforming the way patients live with their illnesses after diagnosis. More generally, mobile technologies have the potential to dramatically improve the quality of our health by empowering patients to be more engaged in their care. I think the current focus on just collecting data for the purpose of diagnosis is misguided. What we really need to be focusing on is how to engage patients. Patients need to own and control their data, they need to have their data presented in timely, convenient, and actionable formats, and they need to be empowered to work with their doctors (and other care providers) through ongoing collaboration (not patriarchal episodic care). This is the primary focus of the group I work with at the MIT Media Lab. We are working to build an open-source platform for patient-centered care research, and recently completed an event where we invited students, health professionals, and innovators from industry to build prototypes of patient-empowering solutions. You can see a brief video summarizing the event and projects here: http://newmed.media.mit.edu/blog/jom/2012/02/23/health-and-wellness-innovation-2012-intro-video. Smartphones are indeed going to help start a boom in DIY medicine, but not just by becoming pocket-diagnosis machines. Rather, our phones are going to help us take control of our health.

I agree: diagnosis is only one (arguably less important) area where mobile technologies are going to benefit us. I think the real opportunity lies in transforming the way patients live with their illnesses after diagnosis. More generally, mobile technologies have the potential to dramatically improve the quality of our health by empowering patients to be more engaged in their care. I think the current focus on just collecting data for the purpose of diagnosis is misguided. What we really need to be focusing on is how to engage patients. Patients need to own and control their data, they need to have their data presented in timely, convenient, and actionable formats, and they need to be empowered to work with their doctors (and other care providers) through ongoing collaboration (not patriarchal episodic care). This is the primary focus of the group I work with at the MIT Media Lab. We are working to build an open-source platform for patient-centered care research, and recently completed an event where we invited students, health professionals, and innovators from industry to build prototypes of patient-empowering solutions. You can see a brief video summarizing the event and projects here: http://newmed.media.mit.edu/blog/jom/2012/02/23/health-and-wellness-innovation-2012-intro-video. Smartphones are indeed going to help start a boom in DIY medicine, but not just by becoming pocket-diagnosis machines. Rather, our phones are going to help us take control of our health.

Just need to modify the SCIgen Automatic CS Paper Generator a bit and voila! Instant publishing ;)

http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/

Except that alternative is worse for the workers, who already have the option of not working at those factories and, funnily enough, they don't actually prefer it.

Your solution helps your moral guilty at their expense. For shame.

http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/smokey.html

If what that quote says is true and you could derive the secret key from the public key then one could say that the key is worse than no security at all. Public keys are, by definition, public. They are generally available to the public at large on keyservers like http://pgp.mit.edu./ You wouldn't need to intercept any messages because you could use the public key to encrypt any number of examples. The false sense of security presented by encrypting something with one of these flawed keys would make them very dangerous indeed.

Despite your ignominious ad hominem, I don't have to rationalize anything, since I don't have a choice: I can't afford iPhones even if I wanted one.

There's no amount of talking or pragmatic compromise that will solve a basic problem of disrespecting human dignity in the workplace.

Sure. Stop buying the stuff and the disrespect for human dignity in the workplace goes away, because the workplace part ceases to exist. Of course, there'll be a new problem called famine and worse poverty, but since that's not caused directly by you, it's fine, right?

Unlike the starving subsistence farmer, the women and children in the sneaker factory are working at slave wages for our benefit--and this makes us feel unclean. And so there are self-righteous demands for international labor standards: We should not, the opponents of globalization insist, be willing to buy those sneakers and shirts unless the people who make them receive decent wages and work under decent conditions.
              This sounds only fair--but is it? Let's think through the consequences.

        First of all, even if we could assure the workers in Third World export industries of higher wages and better working conditions, this would do nothing for the peasants, day laborers, scavengers, and so on who make up the bulk of these countries' populations. At best, forcing developing countries to adhere to our labor standards would create a privileged labor aristocracy, leaving the poor majority no better off.
              And it might not even do that. The advantages of established First World industries are still formidable. The only reason developing countries have been able to compete with those industries is their ability to offer employers cheap labor. Deny them that ability, and you might well deny them the prospect of continuing industrial growth, even reverse the growth that has been achieved. And since export-oriented growth, for all its injustice, has been a huge boon for the workers in those nations, anything that curtails that growth is very much against their interests. A policy of good jobs in principle, but no jobs in practice, might assuage our consciences, but it is no favor to its alleged beneficiaries.

http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/smokey.html

http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/6-002x-related-curriculum/#Prerequisites

Just the other day I got stuck on a particularly woolly Project Euler problem and cruised on by http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/ to finally learn 6.042/18.062. I was actually prepared to learn a whole course worth of material, was psyched I'd found the motivation, only to have cold water poured on me when I discovered that the problem set solutions aren't posted. Looked around at other courses and found that this is not uncommon.

What's the point of this MITx with only one course? Why don't they get serious with what they started with OpenCourseWare first? I'd like to see them go all-in for most of course 6, 8, and 18.

For a FREE education from MIT, go to prep.ai.mit.edu.

Generalizations and assumptions, Slashoogle at it's best. See http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/smokey.html.

Jon How's group did this (see here). I've seen some of the videos; a quick Youtube search isn't turning them up, but if you dig a bit more you'll probably find them.

People should read this which is written nobody but Paul Krugman himself, the intellectual leader of left-wing. Some of these economic fallacies are repeated here like fifteen times. It is like going to mainstream news and saying downloading is stealing. Sure, there're efficiency issues here but 5 second hunch isn't an educated opinion.

Moralizing about these factories is maybe signalling caring to others but it isn't helping. Increasing labor regulation is probably worst thing you could do. They have actually done some of that in Bangladesh, and people ended up in their next best alternative: dead due to lack of food or prostitution. Good intentions don't mean good results.

People who say we shouldn't buy these chinese products could do the worst damage. Living standards don't rise because of regulation, more than Moon orbits Earth because of law makers. The only reason is that all these commentators can get away with this cheap talk, is that they nothing on the line. If you actually had money on the line how to rise people's living standards, you would maybe pick up an economics textbook, or *gasp* remain silent.

Mod up. My sentiments exactly.

Even in medicine (though I do not say the same about the pharmaceutical industry)... like the recent announcement by MIT of a treatment that could cure nearly ALL viruses, including HIV and the common cold.

And the recent research into restoring telomerase in the human body.

And... and... and...

I don't see any "failure" here.

http://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1721.1/7431/CS021.pdf

Bonus points for running Bluetooth USB adapters without actually having a computer connected (at least after startup). I experimented some with this sort of scheme and my one warning is this: it takes 10.24 seconds to check all possible hopping patterns for all possible Bluetooth devices, so if it needs to respond quickly, you're hosed. But it's good enough for showing off, or updating a "Boss Proximity Detector", or that sort of thing.

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/explainer-pnp.html

That's going to be tricky, though, because he's going to be up against MITx, an open-source platform designed inside a university to allow exactly that to happen. With the option to set up your own internal servers and to trade your classes and class components with other universities, I think MITx has the upper hand in this one....

Hackers have been involved in railroads since the very beginning!

The introductory signal processing textbook that I have is Lathi's "Signal Processing and Linear Systems". If you don't want to see it from the signal processing side, then any book covering introductory PDEs should have some Fourier Series. Alternatively, have a look at this.

We could not get approval to launch or sell it because of fear of the cannibalisation of film,' he told BBC News.

See Innovator's Dilemma

Included with the OLPC computers for children was Scratch, referenced in the article. Even Google App Inventor for android was based on it. For me looked lgreat, something that even a primary school children could use to do from very small to somewhat complex things. Also included are turtle art, a logo interpreter (simpler, but is so close scratch to it that not sure if worth teaching it) and a python interpreter (but it should be for more advanced/grown up childrens). Something like this should be adopted in schools, not particulary to teach about computing and programming, but on thinking, solving problems in ordered ways.

You seem to be thinking that the method they're talking about involves replacing live lectures with canned videos of lectures. I can see how you might get that impression from the slashdot summary, but the actual article does a significantly better job of explaining what it's about. It's about replacing traditional lectures, where students sit passively and take notes, with classes where the students interact with each other and/or with the professor.

YOU WILL FEEL THEIR FAILURE

The teaching method described in the article isn't new (it dates back to 1996), and the empirical evidence is that it succeeds, whereas traditional lecturing fails.

The slashot summary isn't terribly accurate, and even if you violate the social norms of /. and click through to read the article, the article is pretty sketchy as well. We're already getting comments from people who think this is about substituting video lectures for live lectures, and that's totally inaccurate.

This method is not new. I teach physics at a community college (not at Hahvahd like Mazur, alas), and I've been using methods similar to his for about 15 years. I learned about them from Mazur's book, which was published in 1996.

It's also not just some guy's opinion about how to teach. It's solidly backed up by research.

Let's start from the evidence. There is very strong evidence that lecturing is a terrible way to teach physics. The classic studies work like this. You give students a multiple-choice test at the beginning of the semester on very simple, basic concepts of physics. What hits the ground first, a larger rock or a smaller rock? What forces act on a book that's lying on a table? They do badly, but you expect that, because most of them haven't had high school physics. Then you teach a semester's worth of physics to them and give them the test again to measure how much they've improved. The usual statistic used to measure their improvement is the gain, G, defined as G=(final score-initial score)/(100%-initial score). In other words, if they haven't improved at all, G=0, and if they've improved as much as it was possible for them to improve, G=1. With classes that use traditional lecturing -- even by experienced, award-winning teachers who get glowing reviews from their students, are enthusiastic, and put a great deal of effort into their lectures -- you get about G=0.25. In other words, the students have developed very little conceptual understanding beyond what they came in with. On the other hand, if you use interactive teaching techniques that force students to participate actively and talk about concepts, you can usually get much higher G's.

The evidence is that it doesn't really matter very much what specific interactive technique you use, as long as it's interactive and deals with concepts. Mazur pioneered a technique called peer instruction. Just to be concrete, I'll describe his specific technique. You require the students to read the book *before* they come to class. You enforce this with reading quizzes given when they walk into lecture. The class consists basically of a bunch of multiple-choice conceptual questions. You pop up one of the questions on the screen and ask students to show you their initial opinion about which answer is right. This can be done with expensive electornic "clickers" or with cheap pieces of cardboard marked A, B, C, and D. If you see that almost everyone got it right, you briefly confirm that, and then move on. If they didn't, you have them break up into small groups and discuss the question. You walk around and listen a lot without saying much. Then you have them vote again again. The theory is that the right answer is supposed to win out over the wrong answers in the discussion. When it's time to give a test, you make sure that the test includes some purely conceptual questions, because otherwise students will tend to resist dropping the "plug and chug" approach they're used to and switching to focusing on concepts.

Mazur's book shows data where he got G~0.5 with this method. Nobody has ever gotten a G that high with traditional lecturing. Over the years since 1996, many of us who use interactive techniques have refined what we do, and it's not uncommon to significantly higher G's. The average for three of us who teach freshman calc-based physics at my school last semester was 0.7.

A common concern is that if the teacher d

I, for one, am an Aural learning type.

This review of the literature finds no support for the notion of matching instruction to learning styles. The whole thing was hogwash and wishful thinking.

Another issue here is that although the article is specifically about learning physics, you seem to be talking about learning in general. There is very strong evidence that lecturing is simply an ineffective way to teach physics in particular.

I'm sort of curious if you've ever actually tried to use app inventor to do anything interesting. Because as an educational platform, or a place for young adults to learn about software, or a way to give youth a voice using digital storytelling, it seems to do pretty well.

It's not the most flexible platform, but it is surprising (a) how much you can do with it and (b) how much creativity you can harness when you have a platform that's approachable by neophyte programmers with good ideas.

I'm sort of curious if you've ever actually tried to use app inventor to do anything interesting. Because as an educational platform, or a place for young adults to learn about software, or a way to give youth a voice using digital storytelling, it seems to do pretty well.

It's not the most flexible platform, but it is surprising (a) how much you can do with it and (b) how much creativity you can harness when you have a platform that's approachable by neophyte programmers with good ideas.

Relevant: http://appinventoredu.mit.edu/faq-app-inventor-transition-mit

I've been involved with the App Inventor community for a while; anyone who has been using AAI has known this time was coming. The hard deadline was set by Google a while back, the target from MIT was to get an analogue to the appinventorbeta.com service up and running by 12/31. They're a little short of that goal for a few important reasons.

Most importantly, the original App Inventor engine (at google) ran on top of google-proprietary internals. That is to say, it was not possible to spin out the App Inventor backend (which handles building and packaging an APK file from the blocks program) onto MIT servers without doing what amounted to a complete rewrite to enable it to run on App Engine. Google supported this effort and handed it off to MIT, who have been working hard to get an up-and-running system ASAP. As for right now:

If you absolutely rely on App Inventor, you can now run your own parallel instance of the backend by deploying the system as linked in the OP. This works nicely, because now the system is completely under your control (and you can hack it if you choose). This is useful for people teaching classes that use AAI as a platform (as I will be doing later this semester), but isn't so great for hobby programmers.

If you want something that runs like the old appinventorbeta.com site, allowing you to write apps but not have to worry about putting up your own backend server, wait a few weeks. There will be something up on appinventoredu.mit.edu fairly soon.

The reason why this transition is taking so long is nothing so nefarious as Google or MIT being evil or bad citizens. It's simple, really: there's not that many people actually doing coding for the project, and there's been a lot of coding to do. It'll be out soon. Patience, young apprentices.

App Inventor isn't going away, and as a matter of fact, the list of new features and useful extensions that are targeted for the coming few years is exciting and compelling.

Speaking as a current indie & AAA gamedev who has built game-related curriculum for 3 schools (middle school through college)...

Because of the diversity of student types (artist vs game designer vs programmer, etc...) I recommend teaching EPIC's Unreal Development Kit (UDK).
The tools are mature and will immediately offer something to every role on a game project.
As for yourself, the UDK uses Unrealscript which is based on a C++/C# syntax.
There is a wealth of knowledge via books and internet tutorials. (e.g., Just typed in "UDK tutorial" in YouTube and received over 4500+ results!)
A nice bonus is that learning UDK is something the kids can actually put on a resume and/or help them get an internship.

Milage will vary with other pre-built gamedev environments.
Below are a few all-in-one-solutions that have editing features, based in a Windows environment:

App Game Kit (AGK) - http://www.appgamekit.com/
Construct2 - http://www.scirra.com/construct2
Game-Editor - http://game-editor.com/
Game Maker - http://www.yoyogames.com/make
Game Salad - http://gamesalad.com/
Scratch - http://scratch.mit.edu/

Good luck!

Check out http://scratch.mit.edu/. It sure looks like kiddy stuff at first glance, but its awesomeness cannot be described, you have to try it yourself.

Since scratch takes care about all the nitty-gritty details, you can focus on actually *designing* good games, which is awfully hard.

I started on BASIC too, and I don't have much good to say about it. It stunted my progress as a programmer for almost a decade. Although I actually only used it for a couple of years, it dominated how I thought about programming, even when I wrote C. Thankfully, I eventually stumbled upon SICP and realized how wrong I'd been.

Dijkstra was right. Learning BASIC is a horrible thing to do to your mind. Javascript, with all its mistakes and atrocious syntax, at least got most of the important bits right.

http://www.senderek.com/SDLH/

http://senderek.com/SDLH/discrete-logarithm-hash-for-RSA-signatures.ps

http://www.senderek.com/pcp/pcp-security.html

http://www.mit.edu:8008/bloom-picayune/crypto/13190 {link appears dead/down :(}

[Relevant text from above link copied from the Pure Crypto Project Site link above]

Shamir's discrete logarithm hash function (SDLH)
The SDLH is base on a simple idea that once the message is converted into a long integer a hash of the message can be computed as follows:
hash(x) = g ^ x (mod p*q)
given, that both p and q are large primes which are being kept secret so that factoring n = p*q is computationally infeasible.
This hash function is provably collision-resistant, I quote the prove Ronald L. Rivest presented in his posting:

Adi Shamir once proposed the following hash function:

          Let n = p*q be the product of two large primes, such that
          factoring n is believed to be infeasible.

          Let g be an element of maximum order in Z_n^* (i.e. an
          element of order lambda(n) = lcm(p-1,q-1)).

          Assume that n and g are fixed and public; p and q are secret.

          Let x be an input to be hashed, interpreted as a
          non-negative integer. (Of arbitrary length; this may be
          considerably larger than n.)

          Define hash(x) = g^x (mod n).

Then this hash function is provably collision-resistant, since
the ability to find a collision means that you have an x and
an x' such that

          hash(x) = hash(x')

which implies that

          x - x' = k * lambda(n)

for some k. That is a collision implies that you can find a
multiple of lambda(n). Being able to find a multiple of lambda(n)
means that you can factor n.

I would suggest this meets the specs of your query above.

                  Cheers,
                  Ron Rivest

Ronald L. Rivest
Room 324, 200 Technology Square, Cambridge MA 02139
Tel 617-253-5880, Fax 617-258-9738, Email

There are a number of issues to be addressed, especially when the SDLH is being used together with the RSA signature scheme and a full analysis of the SDLH's security can be found in the paper "A Discrete Logarithm Hash Function for RSA Signatures". The analysis shows, that SDLH can safely be used together with RSA once certain conditions are met with regard to the selection of the user's key material. For details I like to refer to the paper about SDLH.

CAPTCHA: revolter {Well, cryptography can be used to secure communications between individuals during a revolt....}

e-learning needs the proper method and programming. The method that uses short modules to teach a concept and then quizzes the student to measure comprehension is best. Is the comprehension shows a lack, the student is re-looped into a variant with another explanatory approach, and again, if needed. 3 failures can trigger human intervention to assist the student. Success can be rewarded with a choice of games for a short interval.

There are a number of these out there, such as the MIT site http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2011/mitx-education-initiative-1219.html and the Khan Academy http://www.khanacademy.org/, these are among the best

Apple and the schools need to re-think the lockdown on the educational ipads so that only teaching apps and reward games are allowed. Surfing to a school site with solution sources will work. Unrestricted surfing on safe sites for an interval can be one of the rewards.

Being a retired teacher, I was conscious of the fact that the unions feared computers would reduce the need for teaching staff in the same manner as in the office and industry, so they opposed it. In addition, the incremental pay scale here in Canada means that new teachers start at $35,000 or so, and ramp up to $80,000 after 10 or more years. This means you can not get engineers, chemists, pharmacists, doctors, and many other college grads going into teaching because they can start at $60,000 or more on day 1 and never look back. The ranks of teacher input is filled with arts people and immigrants of various types who can not get their higher degree recognized here. A great levelling is needed, more to start and less at the end!!!

There are a few and they all deal with plug-in hybrids, and it turns out it's not so simple for EVs. Non-plug-in hybrids are cleaner on 100% dirty coal but PHEVs and pure EVs aren't because it turns out 100% dirty coal is actually worse than gasoline:

http://web.mit.edu/mitei/docs/.../electrification-transportation-system.pdf

This article calculates the efficiency of a pure EV running on 100% dirty coal and confirms that it's worse than gasoline, using a real-world worst-case scenario (Wyoming) an EV's emissions are roughly on par with a 25MPG gasoline car:

http://www.carbonlighthouse.com/2011/08/the-coal-powered-electric-car-part-iii/

So an EV running on 100% dirty coal or close to it is worse than a gasoline car, but there are few places where you could find such filthy sources of energy so in practice it should still be much cleaner.

In such circumstances, encrypting my email would simply alert anyone watching that something sensitive is being transmitted.

Chaffing, anyone?

http://people.csail.mit.edu/rivest/Chaffing.txt

[From Ron "RC4 RSA" Rivest] :)

Or will chaffing 'tip off' the Feds as well? ...

If they [the Feds/gov't] want to know what I'm sending, all they have to do is wait for me to go to work, enter my house, and install a keylogger on my box. It's not like they even need warrants nowadays for that crap.

In that case, you'll have to get a laptop or smaller computer and treat it like a 'football' ....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_football

But of course they could use TEMPEST or just 'tranq' you at home while you were sleeping to gain access to said laptop.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TEMPEST

Got two [or more] other trustworthy friends who can stay awake with you to 'babysit' the laptop properly at ALL times on 3, 8-hour shifts [or more shifts with less time involved per shift]?

CAPTCHA: unwraps [LOL! :D apropros for an encryption Slashdot thread! :)]

MIT has a long history (decade) of offering their entire courseware online for free:

http://ocw.mit.edu/about/next-decade/

Somewhat misquoted

MIT ... will enable students to ... earn certificates.

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2011/mitx-faq-1219

Rather, MIT plans to create a not-for-profit body within the Institute that will offer certification for online learners of MIT coursework. That body will carry a distinct name to avoid confusion.

So you'll get a cert from "Internet-U" stating you watched a video.

BTW the OCW calculus video series rocks as a refresher course. HIGHLY recommended. I wish they had video for more than just their 100 level intro courses.

It seems that a lot of people from hackish communities use PGP. These people are usually very sensitive when it comes to privacy. It strikes me that they have no trouble with the common practice to list name and e-mail address on one of the PGP key servers (e.g., http://pgp.mit.edu/). This seems to me very odd considering what a registry like this offers in terms of abuse. I would also really like to use PGP but I don't want my details listed on one of these servers. So one approach would be to not put the complete name info in the key to start with. Of course this kind of sabotages the "web-of-trust" idea, but for me, this doesn't work anyway because I would give my key to possible correspondents in person or on business card rather than have them look it up on a key server. I would be very interested to hear what more advanced PGP users have to say on this.

... and why it was designed the way it was. What was their intentions (flight every two weeks) but what resulted (astronomical operating costs). Cannot really blame those that made the decisions as Shuttle was the ***first*** attempt for a lowcost reusable spaceship. It was a huge effort requiring lots of work and tough decisions, the kind that mentally cripples most folks*. Consider the first "reusable" airplanes for transport of multiple passengers and cargo had their host of problems (i.e. Tri-motors).

Here it from the guys that made the decisions in these MIT lectures (there are many, below just a few). What moved me the most is much of talent, infrastructure and companies that designed, built, and tested items of the Shuttle no longer exists. I say give it up on trying to revive Shuttle. First rebuilt the industrial base, otherwise we will struggling like Korolev trying to get resources.

MIT 16.885J Aircraft Systems Engineering, Fall 2005
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/

Lecture 1: The Origins of the Space Shuttle by Dale Myers
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-1/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiYhQtGpRhc

Lecture 2: Space Shuttle History by Aaron Cohen
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-2/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJ2H06sseLM

Lecture 3: Orbiter Sub-System Design by Aaron Cohen
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-3/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDMbBjH8ZSs

Lecture 4: The Decision to Build the Shuttle by John Logsdon
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-4/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOAyzURugaw

*I talked to someone that worked on wind tunnel tests of various Shuttle configurations in the early 70s (his work was dynamic pressure measurements from shockwaves). There was a period when people were working double shifts in the wind tunnel facility (16 hours on, 8 hours off instead of usual day, swing, grave shift crews) while people at NASA HQ were arguing with the OMB. Idea of SRBs meant they drilled holes and mounted SRB segments on the ET portion of wind tunnel model (didn't bother to remove it from test section for work in machine shop). This double-shift work went on and on. Finally after (I think it was months) and on a Friday, they said "alright, we can go back to regular single shifts and will see you Monday." This person I spoke with said him and another guy he worked with went to have some pizza and beer. The other guy died the next day, he was only 49 years old.

... and why it was designed the way it was. What was their intentions (flight every two weeks) but what resulted (astronomical operating costs). Cannot really blame those that made the decisions as Shuttle was the ***first*** attempt for a lowcost reusable spaceship. It was a huge effort requiring lots of work and tough decisions, the kind that mentally cripples most folks*. Consider the first "reusable" airplanes for transport of multiple passengers and cargo had their host of problems (i.e. Tri-motors).

Here it from the guys that made the decisions in these MIT lectures (there are many, below just a few). What moved me the most is much of talent, infrastructure and companies that designed, built, and tested items of the Shuttle no longer exists. I say give it up on trying to revive Shuttle. First rebuilt the industrial base, otherwise we will struggling like Korolev trying to get resources.

MIT 16.885J Aircraft Systems Engineering, Fall 2005
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/

Lecture 1: The Origins of the Space Shuttle by Dale Myers
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-1/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiYhQtGpRhc

Lecture 2: Space Shuttle History by Aaron Cohen
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-2/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJ2H06sseLM

Lecture 3: Orbiter Sub-System Design by Aaron Cohen
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-3/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDMbBjH8ZSs

Lecture 4: The Decision to Build the Shuttle by John Logsdon
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-4/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOAyzURugaw

*I talked to someone that worked on wind tunnel tests of various Shuttle configurations in the early 70s (his work was dynamic pressure measurements from shockwaves). There was a period when people were working double shifts in the wind tunnel facility (16 hours on, 8 hours off instead of usual day, swing, grave shift crews) while people at NASA HQ were arguing with the OMB. Idea of SRBs meant they drilled holes and mounted SRB segments on the ET portion of wind tunnel model (didn't bother to remove it from test section for work in machine shop). This double-shift work went on and on. Finally after (I think it was months) and on a Friday, they said "alright, we can go back to regular single shifts and will see you Monday." This person I spoke with said him and another guy he worked with went to have some pizza and beer. The other guy died the next day, he was only 49 years old.

... and why it was designed the way it was. What was their intentions (flight every two weeks) but what resulted (astronomical operating costs). Cannot really blame those that made the decisions as Shuttle was the ***first*** attempt for a lowcost reusable spaceship. It was a huge effort requiring lots of work and tough decisions, the kind that mentally cripples most folks*. Consider the first "reusable" airplanes for transport of multiple passengers and cargo had their host of problems (i.e. Tri-motors).

Here it from the guys that made the decisions in these MIT lectures (there are many, below just a few). What moved me the most is much of talent, infrastructure and companies that designed, built, and tested items of the Shuttle no longer exists. I say give it up on trying to revive Shuttle. First rebuilt the industrial base, otherwise we will struggling like Korolev trying to get resources.

MIT 16.885J Aircraft Systems Engineering, Fall 2005
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/

Lecture 1: The Origins of the Space Shuttle by Dale Myers
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-1/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiYhQtGpRhc

Lecture 2: Space Shuttle History by Aaron Cohen
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-2/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJ2H06sseLM

Lecture 3: Orbiter Sub-System Design by Aaron Cohen
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-3/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDMbBjH8ZSs

Lecture 4: The Decision to Build the Shuttle by John Logsdon
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-4/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOAyzURugaw

*I talked to someone that worked on wind tunnel tests of various Shuttle configurations in the early 70s (his work was dynamic pressure measurements from shockwaves). There was a period when people were working double shifts in the wind tunnel facility (16 hours on, 8 hours off instead of usual day, swing, grave shift crews) while people at NASA HQ were arguing with the OMB. Idea of SRBs meant they drilled holes and mounted SRB segments on the ET portion of wind tunnel model (didn't bother to remove it from test section for work in machine shop). This double-shift work went on and on. Finally after (I think it was months) and on a Friday, they said "alright, we can go back to regular single shifts and will see you Monday." This person I spoke with said him and another guy he worked with went to have some pizza and beer. The other guy died the next day, he was only 49 years old.

... and why it was designed the way it was. What was their intentions (flight every two weeks) but what resulted (astronomical operating costs). Cannot really blame those that made the decisions as Shuttle was the ***first*** attempt for a lowcost reusable spaceship. It was a huge effort requiring lots of work and tough decisions, the kind that mentally cripples most folks*. Consider the first "reusable" airplanes for transport of multiple passengers and cargo had their host of problems (i.e. Tri-motors).

Here it from the guys that made the decisions in these MIT lectures (there are many, below just a few). What moved me the most is much of talent, infrastructure and companies that designed, built, and tested items of the Shuttle no longer exists. I say give it up on trying to revive Shuttle. First rebuilt the industrial base, otherwise we will struggling like Korolev trying to get resources.

MIT 16.885J Aircraft Systems Engineering, Fall 2005
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/

Lecture 1: The Origins of the Space Shuttle by Dale Myers
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-1/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiYhQtGpRhc

Lecture 2: Space Shuttle History by Aaron Cohen
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-2/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJ2H06sseLM

Lecture 3: Orbiter Sub-System Design by Aaron Cohen
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-3/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDMbBjH8ZSs

Lecture 4: The Decision to Build the Shuttle by John Logsdon
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/aeronautics-and-astronautics/16-885j-aircraft-systems-engineering-fall-2005/lecture-notes/lecture-4/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOAyzURugaw

*I talked to someone that worked on wind tunnel tests of various Shuttle configurations in the early 70s (his work was dynamic pressure measurements from shockwaves). There was a period when people were working double shifts in the wind tunnel facility (16 hours on, 8 hours off instead of usual day, swing, grave shift crews) while people at NASA HQ were arguing with the OMB. Idea of SRBs meant they drilled holes and mounted SRB segments on the ET portion of wind tunnel model (didn't bother to remove it from test section for work in machine shop). This double-shift work went on and on. Finally after (I think it was months) and on a Friday, they said "alright, we can go back to regular single shifts and will see you Monday." This person I spoke with said him and another guy he worked with went to have some pizza and beer. The other guy died the next day, he was only 49 years old.