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Christmas is Coming
Couple of Christmas bits to get ya in the spirit: We have a link to
Planet Christmas as well as the tech details and even
some danger. This thing
features 96,790 miniature Christmas lights, 7.2 miles of wire to connect everything, 110 strobe lights, the 8' inflatable snowmen, handled by 425 computer controlled circuits. A slightly
less ambitious project was submitted by apago. This project lets winamp
control christmas lights, complete with schematics for the serial interface
and source code for the plugin.
Actually, it really helps me when people put these things up. I use them as navpoints.
Dancin Santa
Does that mean all the lights turn blue during crashes?
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
All this talk of finding new ways of being flashy and new during the holidays and so little talk of the important birthday celebrated on December 25. Really, would it kill you to pay some respect to the very important individual whose birth is celebrated yearly on that one day of the year?
I mean honestly, you all give each other gifts but I, the birthday boy, don't get so much as a card from you!
STOP MISUSING APOSTROPHES, YOU MORONS!!!
Imagine a Rudolph cluster of those!
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
Don't forget:
/etc/passwd > list
:-)
better !pout !cry
better watchout
lpr why
santa claus town
cat
ncheck list
ncheck list
cat list | grep naughty > nogiftlist
cat list | grep nice > giftlist
santa claus town
who | grep sleeping
who | grep awake
who | grep bad || good
for (goodness sake) {
be good
}
Merry Xmas, everyone!
$6.21 is the number of the beast before sales tax. Meh.
Because DEC 25 = OCT 31.
(ducks)
"The problem with the French is that they don't have a word for 'entrepeneur'." -George W. Bush
/. doesn't like > signs.. ;)
/etc/passwd >list
better !pout !cry
better watchout
lpr why
santa claus <north pole >town
cat
ncheck list
ncheck list
cat list | grep naughty >nogiftlist
cat list | grep nice >giftlist
santa claus <north pole >town
who | grep sleeping
who | grep awake
who | egrep 'bad|good'
for (goodness sake) {
be good
}
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
My floor in the dorm, Thomas Jefferson 4 North at the University of Missouri-Rolla, has done this for years. 16 control boxes controlling a total of 96 strands of lights individually. They are also controlled by the serial port of an old 486 running slackware. This year we even played pong. We'll have pictures and a video up soon hopefully at this page. Okay, so the video won't be that high quality, but the lights kick ass.
Even though this is the US, likely the most overtly Christian nation in the world, December 25th (Christmas) is no longer about celebrating the birth of Christ (which didn't even happen on December 25th). Christmas is now about buying kids (people in general) things that they want, spending money because you feel obligated, and generally being a good little consumer. Even though it is a very hard (nearly impossible) thing to do, everyone should think about not buying gifts for people next year. Instead, make something or do something nice for them. (I'm rebuilding my mom's PC for her for Christmas, parts excluded.) It'll save everyone money, stop the agony over what to buy, give you more free time, and allow you to generally make each other happier.
Stop spending, start sharing. Christmas shouldn't be about gifts and money, it should be about family and helping each other and being nice to each other.
-Steve
But you can turn my Xmas lights on/off via the internet. Check out the interactive webcams at http://206.54.177.105
:)
The Xmas lights are in the living room. Now I've got motivation to do something more impressive for next year.
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
D00d, j00 r0ck!
I built an (analog) gadget like this in college, but this kicks vastly more ass.
When I saw the story I originally thought of stringing a room full of ultrabright LEDs or doing some case mods (hmm, all the holes in my case glow and pulsate in time to the beat, changing colors as lights mix), but as soon as I saw "triac", I immediately thought "xenon flash lamp", a.k.a. strobe light.
You've just given the hardware-geek contingent of Slashdot something to build over the holidays, and that's the kind of Christmas present that we've always wanted, and that our relatives never get for us ;-)
From the "danger" article:
At that instant 16,600 volts shot through his body.
There is no way for 16,600 volts of electricity to shooth through anything, even copper wire. We are talking about amps at this point, i.e. the flow of electricity (coulombs/second) depending on the guy's resistance when he touched the other wire. Volts are a measure of "potential energy" not of current, which is what shot through this guy's body.
I wonder if PCP made him more conductive than the average person. After all, you can really say this guy was pretty wired...
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all!
E
http://eugeneciurana.com | http://ciurana.eu
Top 10 things I wanted for Christmas ... but didn't get :(
;)
/dev/null that gives - and not takes
1. triple caffeinated penguin mints
2. semis@slashdot.org
3. A Hemos action figurine
4. "Fear the Penguin" T-Shirt signed by bill.
5. one of them things from fufme.com
6. a new hotmail exploit on Bugtraq
7. my shell to say "Merry Christmas - jackass" when I logged in
8. "slashdot me, baby" boxers.
9. a
10. A Picachu voodoo doll
$6.21 is the number of the beast before sales tax. Meh.
Actually, please forget about Hannukah. It is a nothing holday, that is only mentioned 'cause it falls out near X-Mas. If you want to show how truely open minded and all embracing you are, tell someone Chag Sameach on Simchas Torah.
While the story of Hannukah itself is interesting, its long reaching affects are more so. After the revloution which pushed the Syrian-Greeks out of Israel, the Macabees assumed the leadership of the country, They were so bad at it, they invited, yes, invited, the Romans in. Once the Romans had a foothold, they assumed control of the country...which lead to the Diaspora (and Christmas...and Easter).
Open Source Identity Management: FreeIPA.org
Go here to see what a real light display can look like. I visited this one year a while back. Rumor had it that his neighbors put complained enough about him putting up 1 million lights on his property that he bought the houses on each side of him and put 1 million lights on each of those properties. After the supreme court wouldn't hear his case, he was forced to shut down his display. Disney ended up getting in contact with him and now he does the Specticle of Lights down at MGM Studios (I think).
Now we know whose been clicking on all those X10 pop-ups....
there are no stupid questions, but there are a lot of inquisitive idiots
I seem to recall seeing other pictures from this event at some point in the past, but they're turning up really hard to find.
Turns out the guy that did this ended up surviving.. crazy stuff. Wish there was more info on it cuz these sorts of things always facinate me. ;)
Today is one of the most astronomically, planetary, and mythologically important days of the year, and yet I have heard no one mention the fact that today is the Winter Solstace... the Shortest day of the year in the Norther Hemisphere and the Longest in the Southern.
The Winter Solstace was one of the most important days of the year for the Celts, Germans, Normans, and other European pagans. As a matter of fact, there is significant evidence that Christmas Day was placed where it is now in the calendar in order to supplant the pagan solstace festivals.
So, in honor of the Solstace, I'd like to propose a few changes!
Let's hang sausages from the trees this year instead of garland or glass balls, in remembrance of the ancient warriors who strung the entrails of animals and their enemies (if they were good in battle) all around the ice-covered forest.
Let's build some ripping big bonfires in order to warm the body and get the blood to boiling.
Let's see some virgins 'sacrificed' (nudge nudge, wink wink, if you know what I mean) live on the internet!
Let's also bring out all the old Solstace carols that time has forgot, like these old favorites:
-"Oh, Come all ye Pagans!"
-"Deck the halls with well-tanned Goatskins!"
-"It's beginning to look a lot like Samhain" (A little out of season, but still in the spirit)
And
"Let's all Dance Naked 'Round the Old Bonfire"
Any excuse for a party, right?
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
2) I like getting presents.
So fuck off.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
Nice to see PlanetChristmas gets the wonderful gift of a /.ing this year.
Everytime you look at porn a devil gets their horns.
Mozilla's a nice operating system, but it needs a better browser.
Only kick I get out of xmass is making the kids behave by saying "Now Behave Otherwise Santa Will Eat One Of His Reindeer." Well it works till the 25th