Not necessarily. I could see a scenario in which a cable box (or similar) would happily output an analog signal in 480i, but the HD signal would only be output in digital (with the appropriate copy protection). That way they can at least protect the high-resolution version of the content. I hear that cable companies are starting to ship HD cable boxes without functioning HD component outputs, but the HDMI outputs and analog SD outputs still work just fine.
I think content producers/distributors realize that blocking analog SD output is a losing battle because it would anger too many people. But HD is still new enough that they can still fiddle with it to try to protect high quality video streams. And they want to fiddle with HD content now before large numbers of people become accustomed to it working in a specific way.
I remember reading about this tech a long time ago and it was suggested that this sort of thing would be useful for pilots. In a modern fighter jet, there are several displays in front of the pilot, each one having lots of information behind menus. The pilot's eyes are already saturated with information, and the audio channel is used up by human-to-human communication and critical warnings. So if we want to get more information into the pilot, we could try to make use of other senses. A "tongue interface" might do the trick, but if the information is processed by the visual cortex, then this interface would just be competing with the existing visual information.
Do you really think retailers would put up with 1 out of 2 people returning the XBOX they bought there?
Retailers only see a very small percentage of the problem. Most issues happen over 6 months after the console is purchased. At that point, it is too late to return it to the store, and you have to ship it to Microsoft for repairs.
My 3rd XBox 360 went bad a couple of months ago, and this is the first one that died outside of warranty. I had the option of paying $100 to have Microsoft "repair" it (presumably making it work again, but leaving the flaws that caused it to slowly die in the first place), or I could spend $200 on a new XBox 360 Arcade (which replaces all the parts that are actually broken) and get a fresh 3 year warranty. I chose to buy a new unit, because when you buy a 360, that warranty is the most valuable part of the package. As I see it, I'm not buying the hardware, I'm paying for a 3 year lease on the hardware. I suppose another benefit of buying a brand new unit is that the newer 360 consoles should have less heat-related problems than the originals. So who knows, maybe this one will last a little longer.
Oddly, the only reason I bought a 360 in the first place was because the DVD drive on my original XBox went bad, and I wanted to get a new console and continue playing my original XBox games. Before that, I only bought a new console when I wanted to upgrade to the latest technology. These days, I only buy a new console to replace a broken one (like the PS2 I bought the first time I had to send my 360 in for service).
I would like to help all the lawmakers out there who would like to pass a law that limits expression (e.g. the ability to sell video games to whoever the all I want). If any of you are reading Slashdot, please read the following helpful instructions.
The rest of us have decided that free expression is important to us, so we explicitly included that right in our Constitution. That means you can't make a law that limits the expression of U.S. citizens. If you would like to make such a law, you need to get the Constitution changed so that the law would be allowed. The people who are able to change the Constitution are members of the U.S. Congress. These people all work in Washington, D.C. but some of them live near you. There are several ways to get in touch with these people, including visiting them at their office or sending them a letter. Some members of congress even have web sites and you can send them e-mail. When you communicate with a congressperson, remember to tell them who you are and how you want the constitution changed. If you decide to visit them in Washington, don't forget to bring a map of the area, so you don't get lost.
There, hopefully that should be all the help you need. Now don't bother us with any more attempted laws until after the Constitution has been changed, okay?
Because "Quick Charging" is, by far, the least significant part of the electric car problem so there is very little practical value in researching it. Even if you could make a car that charges quickly, you would need to spend a large amount of money on charging stations capable of delivering that much power to the vehicle. The more practical solution to this problem is to build a vehicle that allows a technician at a "gas station" to swap out the partially-depleted battery for a fully charged one.
If I was a silicon brain you could just back me up.
But how does it help you if there happens to be some copy of you somewhere? If you were killed and that copy was restored, would it be you? Or would it just be a copy that resembles you? The scary thing about this question is that to all the observers (including the copy), the copy is you, and no harm has been done, even though the original "you" is dead.
I often think about this issue in terms of "Star Trek"-style transportation. That is, a person is converted into energy and then energy is then sent somewhere and reconstructed. But that energy represents information, and you could just as easily scan a person and send that information elsewhere to make a copy while leaving the original person in place. So essentially what would happen with "transporting" is that a person is scanned, destroyed, and then re-constructed somewhere else. The re-constructed person has all the memories of the original person, so to him, he was simply "transported." All observers would also say that the person was transported. However, the original person no longer exists. This sort of transporting could happen over and over and nobody would have any evidence that people are being killed.
Ah, but isn't said reverse engineering a violation of the DMCA itself?
I doubt it. The DMCA doesn't make "reverse engineering" illegal. It more narrowly spells out what is illegal:
Circumventing a technical protection measure that controls access to content.
Distributing software that allows users to circumvent a technical protection measure that controls access to or distribution of content
Note I'm paraphrasing the above from memory -- so it's probably not 100% accurate, but hopefully it conveys the level of detail in the DMCA.
Clearly the law doesn't cut both ways -- it cuts in favor of content producers/distributors. All in all, I agree that the law (or this part of it at least) needs to go.
You can teach some of the basics of digital electronics using logic chips like adders, decoders, flip-flops, etc. For example, hook a 4-bit adder up to some switches (on the input side) and LEDs (on the output) to demonstrate how it works. I think this is a great experiment because it can help explain how math and numbers are related to electrical signals in a computer.
For more advanced projects:
Combine 2 4-bit adders to make an 8-bit adder
Add some flip-flops and a "clock" switch to save the results of an addition operation
Make a simple "ALU" by combining the adder with some and gates. Throw in a switch to control which operation is performed.
Build a 4-bit adder out of and/or/not gates.
Build a flip-flop out of and/or/not gates.
I highly recommend that you give each student (or team of students) a bread board and a reliable power supply and multimeter to work with. These things don't have to be too expensive (e.g. scrounge for unused wall-wart power supplies and tack on a 5V regulator), and they will help the experiments go smoothly.
While I agree that driving an old car is the way to go, I don't think avoiding car financing is always wise. A car loan is one of the cheapest types of loans you can get. Let's say you have $20,000 and you want to buy a car that costs $20,000. In a typical market, you could get a loan to pay for the car and invest the cash in a low-risk mutual fund and come out on top.
Wired used to be cool and had decent writers. Wired used to be something to/read/.
I agree. I canceled my subscription a couple of years ago after I noticed that every cover story was an advertisement for some movie that was coming to theaters that month. The rest of the issue was also generally uninteresting.
If they charge for on demand content, then people will just go back to downloading it for free.
Exactly. This is why nobody subscribes to cable, Directv, HBO, Netflix, XM, etc. It's because these services cost money and because we can get all the content for free. There are no other factors involved.
Bill Gates: Your Internet ad was brought to my attention, but I can't figure out what, if
anything, Compuglobalhypermeganet does, so rather than risk competing with
you, I've decided simply to buy you out.
[Homer and Marge quietly discuss this proposal]
Homer: I reluctantly accept your proposal!
Bill Gates: Well everyone always does. Buy 'em out, boys!
[Gates' lackeys trash the room.]
Homer: Hey, what the hell's going on!
Bill Gates: Oh, I didn't get rich by writing a lot of checks! [insane
laughter]
Automated refactoring (e.g. renaming a variable/function/class and having all references updated)
Configuration management integration (e.g. create a "task" associated with a Jira entry. When switching to that task all files for that task are opened. When completing that task, files are checked in to source control with the appropriate Jira tags, the Jira entry is updated, and a peer review package is generated).
Integration with other tools (modeling, automated test)
I agree with the assertion in previous posts that IDEs provide a lot of efficiency in some situations. Not all software development is hacking and debugging -- some of us work in a very rigorous environment where we have to contend with things like configuration management, peer review, automated testing, architecture modeling, etc. We don't enjoy doing these things as much as we enjoy writing code, so getting our IDE to help us with some of these "other things" saves us time and makes work less tedious.
It might be just powerful enough to run a mythtv backend. It would take some experimentation, but it might just work. Just combine the "wall wart" with:
There is something very pleasing and unix-like about this sort of setup. Instead of having a large, noisy computer that contains all sort of components do perform this task and many others, we have a few components that do one thing well, and we just connect those components together. I hope in the future we have more devices that allow this sort of "tinkering by combination."
Before anyone takes this recommendation seriously, I would like to point out that there are several ways that this particular activity (combining booze with skiing) can get you killed:
(The obvious) Skiing involves high speeds and several people have gotten seriously hurt or killed even when there is no alcohol involved. Skiing while drunk is probably about as safe (for you and others) as driving while drunk.
If you are a novice skiier on vacation somewhere at high altitude, you will experience altitude sickness and other issues related to the foreign climate. The biggest risk is that you can get seriously dehydrated without knowing it. Naturally, drinking alcohol will make you even more dehydrated and less able to tell that you are dehydrated. Drink lots of water/gatorade/etc and nothing else and your trip will be much more enjoyable.
Do we? I certainly don't. In fact, the idea that there is something in consciousness that is outside the chain of cause and effect is truly terrifying, because that would mean that the universe is not comprehensible on a fundamental level.
That's exactly right. And humans, in general, want to believe that their consciousness comes from their souls (or equivalent), which are derived from God (or equivalent), who is inherently incomprehensible. It is this belief that gives people that satisfying feeling of being special while at the same time having no (meaningful) responsibilities. Not all humans have this desire, but most do.
Personally, I think that we probably could produce a computer that has all the consciousness of a human being, but why would we want to? Computers are good at solving a well-defined class of problems in a completely predictable way. If I wanted to solve a complex problem containing nuances like ethics, I would just get a human to do it. Humans are readily available and cheap to produce if more are needed.
I used to subscribe to the Yahoo! games on demand service -- which is similar to what you describe. I paid a monthly fee, and I could download and play games (from their selection) as much as I want. It was convenient and I rather enjoyed it. I don't know if there are any services like that anymore, though.
You can earn a master's degree part time while you work. If you work for the right company, they will even pay your tuition. This is what I did when I graduated from undergrad. I got a job with a large defense contractor, then got a master's degree in 2 years of part time work (2 courses per semester, one course over the summer). The time commitment was tough (I had to give up most of my hobbies), but it was worth it. The master's degree cost me nothing (my company payed the school about 15k per year, though). On top of that, the top-tier school that I attended to get my master's had a "simplified" admission program for employees of my company -- I basically didn't have to apply at all. I'm not sure I would have even been accepted at this school if I had to apply and compete with other folks (my grades in undergrad were not stellar).
If I stayed at the same company after my degree, I wouldn't have gotten a raise due to my additional academic credentials. However, I started applying for a new job after I finished my degree and I got several offers at the next higher pay grade due to my degree. I ended up taking a job at a R&D center -- a place where I wouldn't even have gotten a job offer if I didn't have a graduate degree. So, yes, you can get higher pay or a better job due to having an advanced degree, but you may have to leave your current job to get it.
BTW, I am a programmer/software engineer and both of my degrees are in computer science. There are tons of companies/organizations out there that value programmers with advanced degrees.
Surely breaking two or more hashes simultaneously would be far harder
You can't be "sure" about much in cryptography. If m is a message, and f and g are hash functions, you are assuming that you get more security from f(g(m)) than from f(m). You have to define what kind of security you are hoping for. With hash algorithms, you usually want: given m', it is difficult to find some m where h(m) = m'.
So to answer your question, using f(g(m)) would only be more secure than f(m) if f contains some vulnerability and no cryptanalytic vulnerability is introduced by combining f and g. If I don't have any information about either type of vulnerability, I would have no reason to assume that f(g(m)) is more secure than f(m). In this situation, I would stick with f(m) because it has been studied more and people have probably spent time trying to break it.
To put it another way, breaking f(g(m)) does not necessarily require breaking both f and g. The resulting algorithm that you get by composing f with g is still only one algorithm (just like SHA-1), and that is the only algorithm that needs to be broken.
Slashdot Mirror
Not necessarily. I could see a scenario in which a cable box (or similar) would happily output an analog signal in 480i, but the HD signal would only be output in digital (with the appropriate copy protection). That way they can at least protect the high-resolution version of the content. I hear that cable companies are starting to ship HD cable boxes without functioning HD component outputs, but the HDMI outputs and analog SD outputs still work just fine. I think content producers/distributors realize that blocking analog SD output is a losing battle because it would anger too many people. But HD is still new enough that they can still fiddle with it to try to protect high quality video streams. And they want to fiddle with HD content now before large numbers of people become accustomed to it working in a specific way.
Riiiight... You can achieve security by having a poorly paid guard keep an eye on the valuable prescription drugs in the prison.
Really? Do you live in St Louis? If so, I know of a good job for you.
"Multitaskers do it simultaneously"
I remember reading about this tech a long time ago and it was suggested that this sort of thing would be useful for pilots. In a modern fighter jet, there are several displays in front of the pilot, each one having lots of information behind menus. The pilot's eyes are already saturated with information, and the audio channel is used up by human-to-human communication and critical warnings. So if we want to get more information into the pilot, we could try to make use of other senses. A "tongue interface" might do the trick, but if the information is processed by the visual cortex, then this interface would just be competing with the existing visual information.
Retailers only see a very small percentage of the problem. Most issues happen over 6 months after the console is purchased. At that point, it is too late to return it to the store, and you have to ship it to Microsoft for repairs.
My 3rd XBox 360 went bad a couple of months ago, and this is the first one that died outside of warranty. I had the option of paying $100 to have Microsoft "repair" it (presumably making it work again, but leaving the flaws that caused it to slowly die in the first place), or I could spend $200 on a new XBox 360 Arcade (which replaces all the parts that are actually broken) and get a fresh 3 year warranty. I chose to buy a new unit, because when you buy a 360, that warranty is the most valuable part of the package. As I see it, I'm not buying the hardware, I'm paying for a 3 year lease on the hardware. I suppose another benefit of buying a brand new unit is that the newer 360 consoles should have less heat-related problems than the originals. So who knows, maybe this one will last a little longer.
Oddly, the only reason I bought a 360 in the first place was because the DVD drive on my original XBox went bad, and I wanted to get a new console and continue playing my original XBox games. Before that, I only bought a new console when I wanted to upgrade to the latest technology. These days, I only buy a new console to replace a broken one (like the PS2 I bought the first time I had to send my 360 in for service).
I would like to help all the lawmakers out there who would like to pass a law that limits expression (e.g. the ability to sell video games to whoever the all I want). If any of you are reading Slashdot, please read the following helpful instructions.
The rest of us have decided that free expression is important to us, so we explicitly included that right in our Constitution. That means you can't make a law that limits the expression of U.S. citizens. If you would like to make such a law, you need to get the Constitution changed so that the law would be allowed. The people who are able to change the Constitution are members of the U.S. Congress. These people all work in Washington, D.C. but some of them live near you. There are several ways to get in touch with these people, including visiting them at their office or sending them a letter. Some members of congress even have web sites and you can send them e-mail. When you communicate with a congressperson, remember to tell them who you are and how you want the constitution changed. If you decide to visit them in Washington, don't forget to bring a map of the area, so you don't get lost.
There, hopefully that should be all the help you need. Now don't bother us with any more attempted laws until after the Constitution has been changed, okay?
Because "Quick Charging" is, by far, the least significant part of the electric car problem so there is very little practical value in researching it. Even if you could make a car that charges quickly, you would need to spend a large amount of money on charging stations capable of delivering that much power to the vehicle. The more practical solution to this problem is to build a vehicle that allows a technician at a "gas station" to swap out the partially-depleted battery for a fully charged one.
But how does it help you if there happens to be some copy of you somewhere? If you were killed and that copy was restored, would it be you? Or would it just be a copy that resembles you? The scary thing about this question is that to all the observers (including the copy), the copy is you, and no harm has been done, even though the original "you" is dead.
I often think about this issue in terms of "Star Trek"-style transportation. That is, a person is converted into energy and then energy is then sent somewhere and reconstructed. But that energy represents information, and you could just as easily scan a person and send that information elsewhere to make a copy while leaving the original person in place. So essentially what would happen with "transporting" is that a person is scanned, destroyed, and then re-constructed somewhere else. The re-constructed person has all the memories of the original person, so to him, he was simply "transported." All observers would also say that the person was transported. However, the original person no longer exists. This sort of transporting could happen over and over and nobody would have any evidence that people are being killed.
I doubt it. The DMCA doesn't make "reverse engineering" illegal. It more narrowly spells out what is illegal:
Note I'm paraphrasing the above from memory -- so it's probably not 100% accurate, but hopefully it conveys the level of detail in the DMCA.
Clearly the law doesn't cut both ways -- it cuts in favor of content producers/distributors. All in all, I agree that the law (or this part of it at least) needs to go.
For more advanced projects:
I highly recommend that you give each student (or team of students) a bread board and a reliable power supply and multimeter to work with. These things don't have to be too expensive (e.g. scrounge for unused wall-wart power supplies and tack on a 5V regulator), and they will help the experiments go smoothly.
While I agree that driving an old car is the way to go, I don't think avoiding car financing is always wise. A car loan is one of the cheapest types of loans you can get. Let's say you have $20,000 and you want to buy a car that costs $20,000. In a typical market, you could get a loan to pay for the car and invest the cash in a low-risk mutual fund and come out on top.
But perhaps the attackers used an iPhone?
I agree. I canceled my subscription a couple of years ago after I noticed that every cover story was an advertisement for some movie that was coming to theaters that month. The rest of the issue was also generally uninteresting.
Exactly. This is why nobody subscribes to cable, Directv, HBO, Netflix, XM, etc. It's because these services cost money and because we can get all the content for free. There are no other factors involved.
Bill Gates: Your Internet ad was brought to my attention, but I can't figure out what, if anything, Compuglobalhypermeganet does, so rather than risk competing with you, I've decided simply to buy you out.
[Homer and Marge quietly discuss this proposal]
Homer: I reluctantly accept your proposal!
Bill Gates: Well everyone always does. Buy 'em out, boys!
[Gates' lackeys trash the room.]
Homer: Hey, what the hell's going on!
Bill Gates: Oh, I didn't get rich by writing a lot of checks! [insane laughter]
No.
You will be receiving a bill from me shortly. Let me know if I can help you out with any more painfully obvious legal advice.
I agree with the assertion in previous posts that IDEs provide a lot of efficiency in some situations. Not all software development is hacking and debugging -- some of us work in a very rigorous environment where we have to contend with things like configuration management, peer review, automated testing, architecture modeling, etc. We don't enjoy doing these things as much as we enjoy writing code, so getting our IDE to help us with some of these "other things" saves us time and makes work less tedious.
There is something very pleasing and unix-like about this sort of setup. Instead of having a large, noisy computer that contains all sort of components do perform this task and many others, we have a few components that do one thing well, and we just connect those components together. I hope in the future we have more devices that allow this sort of "tinkering by combination."
That's exactly right. And humans, in general, want to believe that their consciousness comes from their souls (or equivalent), which are derived from God (or equivalent), who is inherently incomprehensible. It is this belief that gives people that satisfying feeling of being special while at the same time having no (meaningful) responsibilities. Not all humans have this desire, but most do.
Personally, I think that we probably could produce a computer that has all the consciousness of a human being, but why would we want to? Computers are good at solving a well-defined class of problems in a completely predictable way. If I wanted to solve a complex problem containing nuances like ethics, I would just get a human to do it. Humans are readily available and cheap to produce if more are needed.
I used to subscribe to the Yahoo! games on demand service -- which is similar to what you describe. I paid a monthly fee, and I could download and play games (from their selection) as much as I want. It was convenient and I rather enjoyed it. I don't know if there are any services like that anymore, though.
You can earn a master's degree part time while you work. If you work for the right company, they will even pay your tuition. This is what I did when I graduated from undergrad. I got a job with a large defense contractor, then got a master's degree in 2 years of part time work (2 courses per semester, one course over the summer). The time commitment was tough (I had to give up most of my hobbies), but it was worth it. The master's degree cost me nothing (my company payed the school about 15k per year, though). On top of that, the top-tier school that I attended to get my master's had a "simplified" admission program for employees of my company -- I basically didn't have to apply at all. I'm not sure I would have even been accepted at this school if I had to apply and compete with other folks (my grades in undergrad were not stellar).
If I stayed at the same company after my degree, I wouldn't have gotten a raise due to my additional academic credentials. However, I started applying for a new job after I finished my degree and I got several offers at the next higher pay grade due to my degree. I ended up taking a job at a R&D center -- a place where I wouldn't even have gotten a job offer if I didn't have a graduate degree. So, yes, you can get higher pay or a better job due to having an advanced degree, but you may have to leave your current job to get it.
BTW, I am a programmer/software engineer and both of my degrees are in computer science. There are tons of companies/organizations out there that value programmers with advanced degrees.
Surely breaking two or more hashes simultaneously would be far harder
You can't be "sure" about much in cryptography. If m is a message, and f and g are hash functions, you are assuming that you get more security from f(g(m)) than from f(m). You have to define what kind of security you are hoping for. With hash algorithms, you usually want: given m', it is difficult to find some m where h(m) = m'.
So to answer your question, using f(g(m)) would only be more secure than f(m) if f contains some vulnerability and no cryptanalytic vulnerability is introduced by combining f and g. If I don't have any information about either type of vulnerability, I would have no reason to assume that f(g(m)) is more secure than f(m). In this situation, I would stick with f(m) because it has been studied more and people have probably spent time trying to break it.
To put it another way, breaking f(g(m)) does not necessarily require breaking both f and g. The resulting algorithm that you get by composing f with g is still only one algorithm (just like SHA-1), and that is the only algorithm that needs to be broken.