According to This article on BBC News Michael Foale is no stranger to this: "He was onboard the Mir space station in 1987 when a Progress supply tanker crashed into it - one of the most dangerous incidents to have ever taken place in space."
I've just finished reading Dragonfly, a book all about the incident you mention. Summarising: A manual docking system wasn't nearly up to the task of docking a Progress, and because of frequent system failures, the Russians bring them in fast and break hard. They'd had to turn off radar telemetry because it was interfering with a video signal from the Progress. The Progress hit the station, punching a postage-stamp sized hole in one section and damaging a solar array. The crew were able to seal off affected section, but only after effectively crippling the station because they had to unplug all the cables going through a doorway.
This was shortly after a near miss of another Progress, a fire in one of the oxygen generators and a bunch of other system failures. The Russians more or less took it in their stride. The Americans, less so.
If anyone is interested in these events, dig out the book. I don't have time to find an Amazon link at the moment -- will post one if no one beats me to it.
It's not that your house/apartment is getting you down, it's that subconsiously you realise that you're not participating sufficiently in office politics. It makes you nervous about the strength of your position.
Get a laptop/tablet and start making appearances at the office. Hob nob, suck up, scheme. You'll feel a lot better.
Pool messages, read when available, then let them queue up again.
This is better than email how?
Come off it, email is an open standard, easy to manage and available for every device with an Internet connection. I can send email from my mobile phone. If all you're going to do with an IM is treat it like email, what's the point of moving away from a low-bandwidth open standard?
Everyone knows that Battle Picross is a rip-off of Mario no Picross right? I'm assuming that the games didn't need to be original, but Mario's Picross was released for the original Gameboy way back when, so I doubt the 256k limit was too much of a problem.
the 'don't disturb' setting usually prevents annoying IM activity while you're working and sends a nice 'currently working' message back to the sender.
I'm supposed to play with statuses all day? When the computer can work this out automatically the promblem is solved; "User has two databases and an editor open and keeps hitting F5 -- User is coding, try again later". (If you can call PHP "coding";)
You're not weird. I see IM as a step backwards. The phone is an interruption. Email lets me deal with messages in a priority I decide. IM is an interruption.
IM is one of those things you want other people to have so you can get hold of them at a moment's notice, but you don't like when it interrupts what you're doing. I'd say the next big thing in on-line communication will have more in common with phpBB than ICQ.
I disagree with the rating of a single [insert product category here], I therefore believe that the ratings systems for said product category are broken. Do you A: Agree with me or 2: Want to lose some Karma?
The way it's worded, it might define "Radio Rentals" (they rent out computers as well as fridges and TVs) as an ISP because they provide a service that lets people connect to electronic content. Heck, it might even include power companies as without power most desktops aren't much use.
It may also include anyone who's enabled Internet Connection sharing under Windows and almost definately includes any closed Wi-Fi networks like Perth's free hobbyist wireless network (despite the fact that there's no bridge to the Internet).
I'd be smug about being an Australian if our tech laws weren't pretty much the same level of crap.
Well, as an example I bought my mother a model Humvee for a Mother's day some years back. She has since created a collection of hundreds of H1 models. I've pitched in on video cards for friends, DVDs are an easy way out but if you pick the right ones they can received well. A sewing machine for a birthday just before Christmas, which in turn was used to make Christmas gifts for other people. A few Monopoly sets for someone who collects them. One year I gave out heaps of Swatches, including some very limited edition sets. Fairly interesting stuff on the whole.
Enron had about as many politicians and their pocket as anyone ever has. They also dealt in ficticious product. In the end it didn't help. Sure, a whole state got screwed over so bad it now has an ficticious person running it, but these houses of cards do eventually come falling down. Meanwhile, a monopoly on music is not going to plunge my house into darkness.
Back in the days of DOS, every game needed its own video and sound drivers. When Windows came around you could get a niche video or audio card so long as it had Windows drivers. Then came DirectX. It was like winding back the clock. If your card with its Windows drivers didn't have DirectX support, kiss the games goodbye. I'd just bought an (expensive) everything-on-the-motherboard name-brand multimedia PC and brand new it was less than the minimum specs to run new games, if they didn't require DirectX 3 or better support.
That's when I noticed that you could buy a A$2,500 PC or a A$350 console to play pretty much the same games. I bought a PSX and didn't return to PC gaming for roughly five years. And if Neverwinter Nights had been released on network-enabled consoles rather than PC I might still not have returned to PC gaming.
If after a year, the recipient doesn't feel like keeping up the site, they have still had a year out of it. If they do keep it up, they've recieved a year for free. How are either of these stupid?
So long as you're paying up front for a whole year, there aren't any extra costs that could suddenly appear and you won't get upset if it doesn't get used after the first month, then I guess it's your money to risk.
Buying someone a service (or a pet) as a gift is, well, stupid is the most positive thing I can think of. Don't buy people things that need money fed into them forever.
But isn't the story about a bundle of five? It looks like two are total crap, one is a bit sus and two might be good if you like that sort of thing. Not a good signal to noise ratio.
The only difference between a "pro" reviewer and a gamefaq reviewer is payment. Reviews from both sources should be taken with equal grains of salt -- that's why I quoted two.
Slashdot Mirror
This was shortly after a near miss of another Progress, a fire in one of the oxygen generators and a bunch of other system failures. The Russians more or less took it in their stride. The Americans, less so.
If anyone is interested in these events, dig out the book. I don't have time to find an Amazon link at the moment -- will post one if no one beats me to it.
Get a laptop/tablet and start making appearances at the office. Hob nob, suck up, scheme. You'll feel a lot better.
Hey, we'd be video conferencing our hearts out if I didn't have to open 2^16 ports on the firewall to get MSN Messenger's video link up.
Uptake amongst the "clients" has been too low for me to effectively use IM in your context, but if it works for you, cool.
Come off it, email is an open standard, easy to manage and available for every device with an Internet connection. I can send email from my mobile phone. If all you're going to do with an IM is treat it like email, what's the point of moving away from a low-bandwidth open standard?
Everyone knows that Battle Picross is a rip-off of Mario no Picross right? I'm assuming that the games didn't need to be original, but Mario's Picross was released for the original Gameboy way back when, so I doubt the 256k limit was too much of a problem.
IM is one of those things you want other people to have so you can get hold of them at a moment's notice, but you don't like when it interrupts what you're doing. I'd say the next big thing in on-line communication will have more in common with phpBB than ICQ.
Gotta love the PA Strip...
I disagree with the rating of a single [insert product category here], I therefore believe that the ratings systems for said product category are broken. Do you A: Agree with me or 2: Want to lose some Karma?
It may also include anyone who's enabled Internet Connection sharing under Windows and almost definately includes any closed Wi-Fi networks like Perth's free hobbyist wireless network (despite the fact that there's no bridge to the Internet).
I'd be smug about being an Australian if our tech laws weren't pretty much the same level of crap.
Hey, it's "Ask Slashdot" -- you're not only going to get opinions you agree with. :)
Well, as an example I bought my mother a model Humvee for a Mother's day some years back. She has since created a collection of hundreds of H1 models. I've pitched in on video cards for friends, DVDs are an easy way out but if you pick the right ones they can received well. A sewing machine for a birthday just before Christmas, which in turn was used to make Christmas gifts for other people. A few Monopoly sets for someone who collects them. One year I gave out heaps of Swatches, including some very limited edition sets. Fairly interesting stuff on the whole.
Enron had about as many politicians and their pocket as anyone ever has. They also dealt in ficticious product. In the end it didn't help. Sure, a whole state got screwed over so bad it now has an ficticious person running it, but these houses of cards do eventually come falling down. Meanwhile, a monopoly on music is not going to plunge my house into darkness.
http://games.slashdot.org/~Kris_J/journal/53272. I hope they like retro games (and have a GameCube ;)
Hey, if you bang rocks together enough, do you think you'd ever end up with Naquadah?
That's when I noticed that you could buy a A$2,500 PC or a A$350 console to play pretty much the same games. I bought a PSX and didn't return to PC gaming for roughly five years. And if Neverwinter Nights had been released on network-enabled consoles rather than PC I might still not have returned to PC gaming.
Can't post my ideas fast enough, you beat me to it. Simple solutions are often the best.
Buying someone a service (or a pet) as a gift is, well, stupid is the most positive thing I can think of. Don't buy people things that need money fed into them forever.
But isn't the story about a bundle of five? It looks like two are total crap, one is a bit sus and two might be good if you like that sort of thing. Not a good signal to noise ratio.
Yeah, but Kensington already make cute little USB fans. :)
The only difference between a "pro" reviewer and a gamefaq reviewer is payment. Reviews from both sources should be taken with equal grains of salt -- that's why I quoted two.