True dat. Unless you actually plan to blow everyone up in which case overt or covert, it's not like your concerned about who's around to care anyway.
Anyway, Dr Strangelove is surely the reference for this kind of debate:
[after learning of the Doomsday Machine] President Merkin Muffley: But this is absolute madness, Ambassador! Why should you *build* such a thing? Ambassador de Sadesky: There were those of us who fought against it, but in the end we could not keep up with the expense involved in the arms race, the space race, and the peace race. At the same time our people grumbled for more nylons and washing machines. Our doomsday scheme cost us just a small fraction of what we had been spending on defense in a single year. The deciding factor was when we learned that your country was working along similar lines, and we were afraid of a doomsday gap. President Merkin Muffley: This is preposterous. I've never approved of anything like that. Ambassador de Sadesky: Our source was the New York Times. [Strangelove admits that he investigated making such a machine] Dr. Strangelove: Based on the findings of the report, my conclusion was that this idea was not a practical deterrent for reasons which at this moment must be all too obvious. General "Buck" Turgidson: Gee, I wish we had one of them doomsday machines.
[discussing the Doomsday machine] President Merkin Muffley: How is it possible for this thing to be triggered automatically and at the same time impossible to untrigger? Dr. Strangelove: Mr. President, it is not only possible, it is essential. That is the whole idea of this machine, you know. Deterrence is the art of producing in the mind of the enemy... the FEAR to attack. And so, because of the automated and irrevocable decision-making process which rules out human meddling, the Doomsday machine is terrifying and simple to understand... and completely credible and convincing.
Dr. Strangelove: Of course, the whole point of a Doomsday Machine is lost, if you *keep* it a *secret*! Why didn't you tell the world, EH? Ambassador de Sadesky: It was to be announced at the Party Congress on Monday. As you know, the Premier loves surprises.
According to http://www.schneier.com/book-applied.html this version was published in 1996. Clifford Cocks' research wasn't made public until 1997. Since we know that Bruce Schneier feeds SchrÃdinger's cat on his back porch, without opening the box, we assume that he was just being polite by not publishing it before it was made publicly known.
They were working for GCHQ and were bound not to share it with the plebs. It was protected under the official secrets act and not made available until 1997. That's the nature of security services, I don't think it was meant to be selfish, as you make it sound.
<conspiracy>There is of course the theory that they didn't use it because they knew something everyone else didn't and hence were happy for it to become widespread.</conspiracy>
From the EPRI: Computer modeling on aircraft impacts conducted by EPRI in 2002 confirmed the strength of used fuel storage facilities, and the worst-case scenario approach taken by the NAS on events with very low probability does not lend itself to informed decision-making by policymakers. State-of-the-art computer modeling techniques applied in the EPRI aircraft study determined that typical nuclear plant containment structures, used fuel storage pools, fuel storage containers, and used fuel transportation containers at U.S. nuclear power plants would withstand these impact forces despite some concrete crushing and bent steel.
Doesn't it also send a big blast down the line to make damn sure that everyone knows the packet has been mangled? Not particularly important, but I always thought it was kind of like screaming profanities when something goes wrong.
Power is getting more expensive for the end user. I'm not sure about the large TVs, but the next time I build a computer (which will likely be a media PC) I will aim for power efficient components as I intend to leave it on for a fair amount of time.
In Europe we have the power efficiency stickers on a lot of things, and whilst it's not likely to be the primary factor in my purchasing decisions, it will certainly be what makes me choose between two comparable products. I'd likely pay a sensible amount more (determined by the reduced running cost and my expected usage etc. of the product) for a more efficient one.
I think the increasing awareness, and increasing cost of energy will prompt people to choose products for efficiency, and hence it becomes a good idea for manufacturers to cater to that.
One of the more amusing locations for these stickers btw. is on aeroplanes. It was right by the door, and I don't recall them telling you the efficiency at any other point, so it's a bit late really. I would like to have seen someone turn round in disgust and refuse to board the plane because it wasn't efficient enough though...
The BBC had an article on a guy who was running a fake ID setup for illegal immigrants, it's not like anyone determined can't get one.
Secondly, my passport doesn't have my address on it anyway, so conceivably neither do any of the fake ones. If it is linked to any address, that address, like my driving license, will be my parents' address. They could have moved in the meantime (or passed away or something) so the database still wouldn't know where I live. If you were fairly careful I'm pretty sure that even with perfectly legitimate ID you could still at least keep your address unknown.
At the end of the day I can't see how it's going to prevent terrorism. Some of them are muppets I'll grant you, but they are more likely to blow themselves up in a toilet, or set themselves on fire and get beaten up by Scotsmen than to cause any major loss of life. Look back a few years to when we had the IRA. The amount of effort that went in to tracking and surveillance of the IRA did not stop them from blowing up a fair amount of stuff. This approach of surveying everyone will not work no matter how hard people try. It may prevent a few attacks but it will not prevent all of them and it will not preserve the freedoms that we want protected.
I am trying to work out whether she is actually a fascist or if she is simply an idiot who has never looked at how the sort of things she is suggesting have worked out in history.
Isn't some of it down to storage and transmission. Hydrocarbon fuels are relatively easy to store and have a high energy density, hence are very useful for transport. Batteries don't go as far, there are transmission losses in cables etc. I don't know the numbers for it but I wouldn't be surprised to find that it was more efficient to make hydrocarbon type fuels in very sunny areas and transport it (even when you take into account the inefficiency in its use) than to make electricity and transport that.
Re:Current Limiting?
on
Linux 2.6.27 Out
·
· Score: 3, Informative
Surely a lot of that is up to the compiler. In fact everything you mention there is likely to be a compiler decision unless you code stuff in assembly (which means you are already being fairly processor specific).
Math Coproc: Replace it with a (much slower and longer) integer based floating point algorithm.
MMX/SSE: You just have to do lots of operations, rather than in one fell swoop.
The big one is having a MMU, which has been there on x86 architectures since the 386, and on pretty much any other processor outside of the embedded arena. For those systems you have uClinux, which has a 2.6 kernel release.
I've used some of the processors available on opencores (some of which are written from scratch and are quite different from existing processors) but many of those have had linux kernels ported to them.
Having the source available makes a huge amount of stuff possible. You could probably compile for a Turing machine if you were sadistic enough.
I believe for many reasons that there isn't such a thing as an unbreakable cypher
One time pad
It is the only 'unbreakable' encryption since if done correctly the encrypted data shares no information with the plaintext.
Unfortunately it's not the easiest encryption to use. My best guess in this case would be to take a copy of the pad with you. If the laptop is searched then you never use that pad because it is compromised. Once you have encrypted your data you destroy the copy of the pad. When you return home you decrypt the data using the original pad. Obviously you would need to secure the original pad at home (e.g. not actually in your house) so that it can't be found in a search. Not convenient of course, but technically unbreakable.
Personally I agree with whoever suggested transferring your data back via secure shell. In fact, encrypt it with a nice big RSA key, email it to an anonymous gmail account, and carry the key back on a USB stick. What are they gonna do, find all the encrypted data in the world and test your key to see if it decrypts it?
(The really paranoid part of me thinks that this makes it only a matter of time before possession of any data that could potentially be an encryption key will be a criminal offense)
Finally if you wanted to be cocky, I'd suggest hiding your pictures as a watermark or whatever in some other, completely innocent pictures. You really think they'll look twice at pictures of a geek in swimshorts.
Seen that fail. You think the guy who didn't notice you come up behind him is going to know who's honking their horn?
Bear in mind this is a very specific situation, as are all situations when driving. If I'm already going faster than him, in that part of a second it takes me to react, I'm going to be further past him, so actually dumping the clutch and getting forward quickly worked. If I was the car behind me I would have already have to have slammed my brakes on (seriously, the guy pulling out was about 90 and completely unaware of what he was doing, and the guy behind was pretty bloody close to me) I don't think he would have been able to stop quickly enough if I had also dropped back behind the car.
I can't put exact numbers on it, but if I was doing 70, the guy in the next lane in 55-60 and I had about one car space behind me before the next person and slow down enough to get behind the person pulling out in in the second or two that I have before he hits me I'm going to be doing what 40? That's quite a sudden jump for the guy behind. I didn't think that would happen. Also getting a couple of feet further forward takes me out of his blind spot, so he's less likely to carry on pulling out.
Oh, and I did use my horn. A lot. The guy made it about six inches over the line, probably a foot from the back of my car before realising and swerved back in.
Really, this is offtopic with regards to the speed-limiting device since I only made that decision knowing that I had enough speed and acceleration in order to successfully get past the guy.
I met a guy who did valeting. They did a lot of work on brand new BMWs. They'd get them off the boats at the docks, belt them 10 miles up the motorway and clean them and bring them back. They started getting in trouble when customers were having their warranties voided for over-revving the engines. Apparently getting an M3 up to 130MPh was the record. When the last M5 came out the trackers were apparently set up to alert the company if the cars were taken over 75 MPH before delivery to customers.
Britain just changed it's rules so you can now be imprisoned for causing death by careless driving (previously you could only be fined). Death by dangerous driving was and still is a greater offence. Careless driving means being distracted by mobile phones, the radio, pretty girls etc.
A/Some car manufacturer(s) did once remove the clicking noise (originally made by the relays in the flasher unit) since it was simple and much more reliable as a piece of solid state electronics. This however led to complaints from people who didn't realise they'd left their blinkers on.
Really. You're in the outside lane (I'm in the UK, so the far right). There is someone close behind you. You are approximately 1/3 to 1/2 past the car to your left, dead in his blind spot, going about 5 mph faster than him. He puts on his right hand indicator (or flasher or whatever you call them) and starts moving towards the edge of his lane. Do you:
A: Drop down a gear and floor it. The guy behind will have seen his indicator and be able to slow down to accomodate.
B: Slam on your brakes. Leave the guy behind you with nowhere to go except into the back of you.
Now I know this depends on the guy behind you being a bit too close or slow to react, but anyone who drives on a motorway knows that this is a pretty common scenario. I see lots of people who assume that just stamping on the brakes is the best option rather than quickly getting past or moving out a lane where safe.
I believe it to be best explained by the late, great Douglas Adams:
There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.
There is another theory which states that this has already happened.
There is a third theory which suggests that both of the first two theories were concocted by a wily editor of The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy in order to increase the universal level of uncertainty and paranoia and so boost the sales of the Guide. This last theory is of course the most convincing as The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy is the only book in the whole of the known universe to have the words DON'T PANIC inscribed in large friendly letters on the cover.
It takes the governments of fairly large countries years to develop Nuclear Weapons. Barring that one incident with the planes the only core competencies most current day terrorist organisations seem to have involve blowing themselves up. I just can't see them getting it right, and not without someone noticing. And I know, blah blah dirty bombs, which are a ludicrously overrated threat. They'd have more success tainting baby formula or something...
Slashdot Mirror
I think it looks like the rich are earning too much.
Arrgh!! Muphry's Law in action... I'll be in the corner sobbing if anyone needs me.
I suggest you correct:
joke -----> %
0 /|\ You
/ \
My ASCII art is terrible, and I don't take it seriously.
It's a terrible shame when one with such a low uid falls from such a great height...
True dat. Unless you actually plan to blow everyone up in which case overt or covert, it's not like your concerned about who's around to care anyway.
Anyway, Dr Strangelove is surely the reference for this kind of debate:
[after learning of the Doomsday Machine]
President Merkin Muffley: But this is absolute madness, Ambassador! Why should you *build* such a thing?
Ambassador de Sadesky: There were those of us who fought against it, but in the end we could not keep up with the expense involved in the arms race, the space race, and the peace race. At the same time our people grumbled for more nylons and washing machines. Our doomsday scheme cost us just a small fraction of what we had been spending on defense in a single year. The deciding factor was when we learned that your country was working along similar lines, and we were afraid of a doomsday gap.
President Merkin Muffley: This is preposterous. I've never approved of anything like that.
Ambassador de Sadesky: Our source was the New York Times.
[Strangelove admits that he investigated making such a machine]
Dr. Strangelove: Based on the findings of the report, my conclusion was that this idea was not a practical deterrent for reasons which at this moment must be all too obvious.
General "Buck" Turgidson: Gee, I wish we had one of them doomsday machines.
[discussing the Doomsday machine]
President Merkin Muffley: How is it possible for this thing to be triggered automatically and at the same time impossible to untrigger?
Dr. Strangelove: Mr. President, it is not only possible, it is essential. That is the whole idea of this machine, you know. Deterrence is the art of producing in the mind of the enemy... the FEAR to attack. And so, because of the automated and irrevocable decision-making process which rules out human meddling, the Doomsday machine is terrifying and simple to understand... and completely credible and convincing.
Dr. Strangelove: Of course, the whole point of a Doomsday Machine is lost, if you *keep* it a *secret*! Why didn't you tell the world, EH?
Ambassador de Sadesky: It was to be announced at the Party Congress on Monday. As you know, the Premier loves surprises.
According to http://www.schneier.com/book-applied.html this version was published in 1996. Clifford Cocks' research wasn't made public until 1997. Since we know that Bruce Schneier feeds SchrÃdinger's cat on his back porch, without opening the box, we assume that he was just being polite by not publishing it before it was made publicly known.
They were working for GCHQ and were bound not to share it with the plebs. It was protected under the official secrets act and not made available until 1997. That's the nature of security services, I don't think it was meant to be selfish, as you make it sound.
<conspiracy>There is of course the theory that they didn't use it because they knew something everyone else didn't and hence were happy for it to become widespread.</conspiracy>
http://www.nei.org/newsandevents/usednuclearfuel/
From the EPRI:
Computer modeling on aircraft impacts conducted by EPRI in 2002 confirmed the strength of used fuel storage facilities, and the worst-case scenario approach taken by the NAS on events with very low probability does not lend itself to informed decision-making by policymakers. State-of-the-art computer modeling techniques applied in the EPRI aircraft study determined that typical nuclear plant containment structures, used fuel storage pools, fuel storage containers, and used fuel transportation containers at U.S. nuclear power plants would withstand these impact forces despite some concrete crushing and bent steel.
Doesn't it also send a big blast down the line to make damn sure that everyone knows the packet has been mangled? Not particularly important, but I always thought it was kind of like screaming profanities when something goes wrong.
Sounds like some kind of funky beard styling.
Shave a mohawk on your chin: The Mohave. I might actually grow one.
Power is getting more expensive for the end user. I'm not sure about the large TVs, but the next time I build a computer (which will likely be a media PC) I will aim for power efficient components as I intend to leave it on for a fair amount of time.
In Europe we have the power efficiency stickers on a lot of things, and whilst it's not likely to be the primary factor in my purchasing decisions, it will certainly be what makes me choose between two comparable products. I'd likely pay a sensible amount more (determined by the reduced running cost and my expected usage etc. of the product) for a more efficient one.
I think the increasing awareness, and increasing cost of energy will prompt people to choose products for efficiency, and hence it becomes a good idea for manufacturers to cater to that.
One of the more amusing locations for these stickers btw. is on aeroplanes. It was right by the door, and I don't recall them telling you the efficiency at any other point, so it's a bit late really. I would like to have seen someone turn round in disgust and refuse to board the plane because it wasn't efficient enough though...
The BBC had an article on a guy who was running a fake ID setup for illegal immigrants, it's not like anyone determined can't get one.
Secondly, my passport doesn't have my address on it anyway, so conceivably neither do any of the fake ones. If it is linked to any address, that address, like my driving license, will be my parents' address. They could have moved in the meantime (or passed away or something) so the database still wouldn't know where I live. If you were fairly careful I'm pretty sure that even with perfectly legitimate ID you could still at least keep your address unknown.
At the end of the day I can't see how it's going to prevent terrorism. Some of them are muppets I'll grant you, but they are more likely to blow themselves up in a toilet, or set themselves on fire and get beaten up by Scotsmen than to cause any major loss of life. Look back a few years to when we had the IRA. The amount of effort that went in to tracking and surveillance of the IRA did not stop them from blowing up a fair amount of stuff. This approach of surveying everyone will not work no matter how hard people try. It may prevent a few attacks but it will not prevent all of them and it will not preserve the freedoms that we want protected.
Replying to myself is lame, but I've just seen this:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/10/17/hoon_comms_data_bill/
These people are surely unfit to be in charge.
True, but they have been countered by the ramblings of Jacqui Smith:
http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2008/10/17/jacqui-smith-wants-facebook
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7671046.stm
I am trying to work out whether she is actually a fascist or if she is simply an idiot who has never looked at how the sort of things she is suggesting have worked out in history.
There has to be an option along the lines of:
[ ] It uses Nuclear power, and that scares a large number of people who don't get the science behind it.
I can possibly see a place for something like:
[ ] It uses science, and that scares a large number of people who don't get the science behind it.
Reminds me of a Looney Tunes where the coyote has straps an outboard and a sink to his back.
Isn't some of it down to storage and transmission. Hydrocarbon fuels are relatively easy to store and have a high energy density, hence are very useful for transport. Batteries don't go as far, there are transmission losses in cables etc. I don't know the numbers for it but I wouldn't be surprised to find that it was more efficient to make hydrocarbon type fuels in very sunny areas and transport it (even when you take into account the inefficiency in its use) than to make electricity and transport that.
Surely a lot of that is up to the compiler. In fact everything you mention there is likely to be a compiler decision unless you code stuff in assembly (which means you are already being fairly processor specific).
Math Coproc: Replace it with a (much slower and longer) integer based floating point algorithm.
MMX/SSE: You just have to do lots of operations, rather than in one fell swoop.
The big one is having a MMU, which has been there on x86 architectures since the 386, and on pretty much any other processor outside of the embedded arena. For those systems you have uClinux, which has a 2.6 kernel release.
I've used some of the processors available on opencores (some of which are written from scratch and are quite different from existing processors) but many of those have had linux kernels ported to them.
Having the source available makes a huge amount of stuff possible. You could probably compile for a Turing machine if you were sadistic enough.
I believe for many reasons that there isn't such a thing as an unbreakable cypher
One time pad
It is the only 'unbreakable' encryption since if done correctly the encrypted data shares no information with the plaintext.
Unfortunately it's not the easiest encryption to use. My best guess in this case would be to take a copy of the pad with you. If the laptop is searched then you never use that pad because it is compromised. Once you have encrypted your data you destroy the copy of the pad. When you return home you decrypt the data using the original pad. Obviously you would need to secure the original pad at home (e.g. not actually in your house) so that it can't be found in a search. Not convenient of course, but technically unbreakable.
Personally I agree with whoever suggested transferring your data back via secure shell. In fact, encrypt it with a nice big RSA key, email it to an anonymous gmail account, and carry the key back on a USB stick. What are they gonna do, find all the encrypted data in the world and test your key to see if it decrypts it?
(The really paranoid part of me thinks that this makes it only a matter of time before possession of any data that could potentially be an encryption key will be a criminal offense)
Finally if you wanted to be cocky, I'd suggest hiding your pictures as a watermark or whatever in some other, completely innocent pictures. You really think they'll look twice at pictures of a geek in swimshorts.
As a pilot friend of mine once said:
'If it's not Boeing, I'm not going'
Bear in mind this is a very specific situation, as are all situations when driving. If I'm already going faster than him, in that part of a second it takes me to react, I'm going to be further past him, so actually dumping the clutch and getting forward quickly worked. If I was the car behind me I would have already have to have slammed my brakes on (seriously, the guy pulling out was about 90 and completely unaware of what he was doing, and the guy behind was pretty bloody close to me) I don't think he would have been able to stop quickly enough if I had also dropped back behind the car.
I can't put exact numbers on it, but if I was doing 70, the guy in the next lane in 55-60 and I had about one car space behind me before the next person and slow down enough to get behind the person pulling out in in the second or two that I have before he hits me I'm going to be doing what 40? That's quite a sudden jump for the guy behind. I didn't think that would happen. Also getting a couple of feet further forward takes me out of his blind spot, so he's less likely to carry on pulling out.
Oh, and I did use my horn. A lot. The guy made it about six inches over the line, probably a foot from the back of my car before realising and swerved back in.
Really, this is offtopic with regards to the speed-limiting device since I only made that decision knowing that I had enough speed and acceleration in order to successfully get past the guy.
I met a guy who did valeting. They did a lot of work on brand new BMWs. They'd get them off the boats at the docks, belt them 10 miles up the motorway and clean them and bring them back. They started getting in trouble when customers were having their warranties voided for over-revving the engines. Apparently getting an M3 up to 130MPh was the record. When the last M5 came out the trackers were apparently set up to alert the company if the cars were taken over 75 MPH before delivery to customers.
Britain just changed it's rules so you can now be imprisoned for causing death by careless driving (previously you could only be fined). Death by dangerous driving was and still is a greater offence. Careless driving means being distracted by mobile phones, the radio, pretty girls etc.
A/Some car manufacturer(s) did once remove the clicking noise (originally made by the relays in the flasher unit) since it was simple and much more reliable as a piece of solid state electronics. This however led to complaints from people who didn't realise they'd left their blinkers on.
Really. You're in the outside lane (I'm in the UK, so the far right). There is someone close behind you. You are approximately 1/3 to 1/2 past the car to your left, dead in his blind spot, going about 5 mph faster than him. He puts on his right hand indicator (or flasher or whatever you call them) and starts moving towards the edge of his lane. Do you: A: Drop down a gear and floor it. The guy behind will have seen his indicator and be able to slow down to accomodate. B: Slam on your brakes. Leave the guy behind you with nowhere to go except into the back of you. Now I know this depends on the guy behind you being a bit too close or slow to react, but anyone who drives on a motorway knows that this is a pretty common scenario. I see lots of people who assume that just stamping on the brakes is the best option rather than quickly getting past or moving out a lane where safe.
I believe it to be best explained by the late, great Douglas Adams:
There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.
There is another theory which states that this has already happened.
There is a third theory which suggests that both of the first two theories were concocted by a wily editor of The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy in order to increase the universal level of uncertainty and paranoia and so boost the sales of the Guide. This last theory is of course the most convincing as The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy is the only book in the whole of the known universe to have the words DON'T PANIC inscribed in large friendly letters on the cover.
It takes the governments of fairly large countries years to develop Nuclear Weapons. Barring that one incident with the planes the only core competencies most current day terrorist organisations seem to have involve blowing themselves up. I just can't see them getting it right, and not without someone noticing. And I know, blah blah dirty bombs, which are a ludicrously overrated threat. They'd have more success tainting baby formula or something...