(a) No person may operate a civil aircraft in the United States at a true flight Mach number greater than 1 except in compliance with conditions and limitations in an authorization to exceed Mach 1 issued to the operator under appendix B of this part.
(b) In addition, no person may operate a civil aircraft for which the maximum operating limit speed MM0 exceeds a Mach number of 1, to or from an airport in the United States, unless --
(1) Information available to the flight crew includes flight limitations that ensure that flights entering or leaving the United States will not cause a sonic boom to reach the surface within the United States; and
(2) The operator complies with the flight limitations prescribed in paragraph (b)(1) of this section or complies with conditions and limitations in an authorization to exceed Mach 1 issued under appendix B of this part. (Approved by the Office of Management and Budget under control number 2120-0005)
Re:Another SIMNET/DoD Simulation alumnus
on
P2P Goes To War
·
· Score: 1
The two founders of MaK were also "old dogs of war" from SIMNET. John Morrison and Warren Katz (the M and K in MaK) did excellent work on SIMNET for BBN, and it doesn't surprise me that their RTI works well.
Another SIMNET/DoD Simulation alumnus
on
P2P Goes To War
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I was one of the original SIMNET developers at BBN in the 80s. One of the problems we had at that time was scalibility -- we used broadcast ethernet to relay vehicle state to all other vehicles. As you might imagine, this doesn't work very well once you get up to 500 or so vehicles.
HLA uses a single or multi-server architecture, which allows entities to "sign up" for objects and event they find interesting. Each entity can also be a server, which might be the way to make the P2P part work.
Freedom of speech includes the freedom to be as anal and vitrolic as you want. So what's the problem?
Freedom of speech does _not_ include the freedom to rename someone else's (Linus, et. al.) hard work.
While it would be nice if Linus would give high-profile credit to FSF, only a self-aggrandizing, arrogant blowhard like RMS would unilaterally decree that he can rename another product.
A monopoly is natural only if you narrow your view
on
Rhythms Flatlines
·
· Score: 1
While w3woody makes some good points, I believe that he/she looks at the problem of natural monopoly only from a current technology perspective.
To take the telephone (Baby Bell) case; yes, only the RBOC (in my case, Qwest) has copper to my house. And if you restrict your view to "who owns the copper to my house", then Qwest does have a natural monopoly in telephony. If, however, you consider other modes of delivery (cellphone, voice over ip, etc.) then Qwest does not have a monopoly. In my case, I use my cellphone almost exclusively for personal comms, relegating the normal phone to 911 calls and telemarketers.
Similarly, there's only one cable wire coming to my house, which gives the cable company a monopoly on cable TV. But, I can erect a satellite dish, and go around the cable company.
I heartily agree that regulatory agencies seem to exist to protect and benefit the regulated. But for those limited cases (e.g., the one road on the optimal path from point A to B) where a natural monopoly exists (until we all have personal aircraft), then maybe a regulatory agency is the best of the available bad solutions.
Absent government interference in the market, a monopoly (natural or otherwise) can only exist in the short term. As w3woody pointed out, a monopoly is by definition inefficient, which makes it vulnerable to disruptive technology, which can destroy the chokehold held by the monopoly.
First, thanks to bkeeler for actually looking up the appropriate FAR, rather than mindlessly speculating.
I'd point out that the PIC (Pilot In Command) can further restrict electronic devices. FAR 91.3 says:
"The Pilot In Command is responsible for, and the final authority as to, the operation of the aircraft"
If I'm PIC, and I am conducting any approach in the clouds, the network is going to be turned off. I'll throw the breaker if I have to. And I'll ask anyone using an 802.11b network to step outside.
While MagicMike is completely correct in his analysis, there's one other part to consider -- if your costless collar is "too tight", the IRS may consider a costless collar to be a constructive sale, and you owe taxes on the day you construct the collar. So, take his advice -- see a financial professional.
Airbus takes the position that the flight computer cannot be overridden, ever, while Boeing's FBW (Fly By Wire) system may complain when it thinks you're about to do something wrong, but will let you do it.
As a pilot and software engineer, I find that the Airbus philosophy -- that the computer can never, ever, screw up -- fundamentally flawed. There's no frigging way that a bunch of French (or any other nationality) coders correctly coded the system to handle every flight regime. You bet your life that they correctly coded the FBW system every time you board an Airbus.
Software patents are abhorrent to me insofar as all patentable software is pure math
Really? So, if I understand your argument correctly, it would be OK for me as the inventor to patent PGP implemented in an ASIC, but I couldn't receive a patent if I implemented PGP in software?
This seems like an artificial dichotomy.
Note: no, I am not claiming that I invented PGP. This is an example!
I personally think cellphone driving should be dealt with in a similar manner as drunk driving - who's with me?
While most drivers have had to maneuver in extremis to avoid some bozo who isn't paying attention to his or her driving, I heartly oppose any simple-minded "no cellphone use while driving" law.
The problem isn't the use of the cellphone (or shaving, eating, applying makeup, talking to a passenger, etc.) -- the real problem is Driver Judgement (or lack thereof). The government gives minimal training to new drivers, tests them to absurdly simple standards, then gives them a license to drive a two-ton death machine. Any biped with a pulse can get a license. So why would anyone expect said biped to have a clue?
Refuting the claim that "cellphone use is as dangerous as drunk driving" is easy -- just ask any pilot. Pilots navigate in three space, keep the greasy side down, listen and respond to the radio, listen to other people's conversations (and determine if they are affected -- "where is that Learjet who just called in?", for example), and visualize other traffic and topology. They manage to do all these tasks safely and quickly.
The way pilots can handle this kind of workload is simple -- they prioritize their tasks. Aviate, navigate, then communicate. We're trained to say "stand by" to a controller if we're busy with an aircraft control task.
While in a car, I do the same thing. If I'm in heavy traffic, I won't pick up the phone if it rings. However, on a lightly travelled freeway, I will pick up, and increase my following distance. If conditions change (traffic incrases, or it starts raining), I might say "I'll have to call you back". Judgement is the key here.
So, I say we should determine driver judgement by results. Specifically:
1. no mindless "you can't do X while driving" laws.
2. a $10000 fine for any at fault accident, and a 90 day license suspension. You screw up, you pay.
3. Mandatory driver retests every two years. Retests cover freeway driving (how to merge, how to use turn signals, no camping in the passing lane) and emergency procedures (lane change, spin recovery, etc.)
As the old saying goes, "having a no smoking section in a restaurant is like having a no peeing section in a pool".
Re:All is not what it seems.
on
DSL Woes
·
· Score: 2
So (if I read the press release correctly), the decision makers at Internet Express took Covad's propaganda as gospel, failed to do their due dilligence, and mindlessly signed up. Then the company found out that the world wasn't as rosy as the propaganda claimed.
Sorry, but the fault lies with Internet Express. If they pulled their heads out of their arse and acted liked true business people, they wouldn't be in this situation.
Those are two seperate test clauses you've managed to run together. The important bits are: (...)
While I agree that what technos quoted is the law as written, reality seems to be a bit more constrained. I'm drawing on my experience as a named inventor and primary technical contact for a patent issued a few years ago (and flamed on slashdot.)
Both of the relevant sections (102 and 103) turn on what prior art the Examiner has in front of him/her (him, in my case.) The interesting thing was that, since the Examiner didn't really understand what we were doing, he turned into search machine on the prior art. He'd look at our independant claims, then try to find something similiar in the prior art. It was almost as though he was running grep on the prior art, looking for matching key phrases.
In my case, he found a patent that mentioned a crucial part of our application, and promptly said "rejected". We had to point out to him that the referenced patent did indeed mention a part of our app, but it also said that "this part cannot be currently accomplished". That is, the referenced patent taught away from our invention.
After a few more rounds of similar things (Examiner say "patent xxx mentions the foo technology, therefore you can't patent it"; we point out that our tech is more advanced or is sufficiently different), our patent was allowed, and issued a few months later.
This is one man's tale. I sure there are others out there.
And no, our Examiner wasn't clueless, just not on the cutting edge of our field. If he was on the cutting edge, we would have hired him.:-)
I TOLD YOU WHAT THE PATENT DID BASED ONLY ON ITS GOAL. IT IS THEREFORE OBVIOUS.
Um, no. The legal definition of "obvious to a person skilled in the art" is "the invention has been described in a publication more than one year before the filing date." It's that simple.
A patent is a business tool, not a refereed paper. Get over it. Or, if you want to change that, write your congresscritter.
Re:Accidents, far more than firearms
on
Clever Girl Bess
·
· Score: 1
You are absolutely right, blaming the gun does nothing, it is the shooter who is to blame... so, how do you keep firearms away from psychos? Two words: Gun Control!
And for your next trick, you'll join Mothers Against Cars Driven By Drunks.
It seems to me the only way out of this legal sinkhole would be to convince the Patent Office to actually apply the two most important tenants of patent law - 1: prior art invalidates a patent application and 2: the idea must not be obvious to the layperson. Tenant #2 is just as important as #1.
In any event, I hope I'm wrong:)
You are.:-)
First, prior art does not invalidate an application. The discovery of prior art might require the application to narrow his or her claims. Or, if the patent has already issued, prior art is ammunition in a lawsuit. Prior Art, in and of itself, does not automagically invalidate a patent.
Second, a patent must be useful, novel (that's where prior art becomes a factor), and not obvious to someone "skilled in the art". The legal definition of nonobvious seems to be "was the exact idea published more than one year ago?", or if the pieces of the invention were published in several places, and some other publication suggests that these ideas be brought together.
IANAL, but I have been through the patenting process. Your Mileage May Vary. What seems to upset many slashdot readers is that the legal and business rules for patents do not line up with the "common sense" rules of developers.
Overpriced, you say. Put your money where your mouth is, and short 100000 shares. See what happens. You'll either be right, and heading for the beach, or your broker will hand you your head on a platter.
It's easy to flame and/or whine here on slashdot. The reason AMD has a market cap of $7B while Transmeta is $3B is the market's belief (or lack thereof) in the two companies.
If you think the market is on drugs (and it wouldn't be the first time), _do_ something about it.
Using this technology onboard aircraft will only amount to cancer-in-a-can, and should be protested.
Beg pardon, but bullshit. 802.11b devices only use 100mW of power. If that's "cancer-in-a-can", we should already be dead from cellphones, cop's radar, and a host of other devices.
Somebody should just get it over with and force Nevada to let them build the proposed storage facility.
Here we have Yet Another Whining Bozo who wants the benefit of something, without paying the cost. Perhaps we should force you to accept high-level nuclear waste in your backyard.
Slashdot Mirror
The government takes a dim view of sonic booms over the US land mass.
i tl e_14/14cfr91_00.html
http://www.access.gpo.gov/nara/cfr/cfrhtml_00/T
91.817 Civil aircraft sonic boom.
(a) No person may operate a civil aircraft in the United States at a true flight Mach number greater than 1 except in compliance with conditions and limitations in an authorization to exceed Mach 1 issued to the operator under appendix B of this part.
(b) In addition, no person may operate a civil aircraft for which the maximum operating limit speed MM0 exceeds a Mach number of 1, to or from an airport in the United States, unless --
(1) Information available to the flight crew includes flight limitations that ensure that flights entering or leaving the United States will not cause a sonic boom to reach the surface within the United States; and
(2) The operator complies with the flight limitations prescribed in paragraph (b)(1) of this section or complies with conditions and limitations in an authorization to exceed Mach 1 issued under appendix B of this part. (Approved by the Office of Management and Budget under control number 2120-0005)
The two founders of MaK were also "old dogs of war" from SIMNET. John Morrison and Warren Katz (the M and K in MaK) did excellent work on SIMNET for BBN, and it doesn't surprise me that their RTI works well.
I was one of the original SIMNET developers at BBN in the 80s. One of the problems we had at that time was scalibility -- we used broadcast ethernet to relay vehicle state to all other vehicles. As you might imagine, this doesn't work very well once you get up to 500 or so vehicles.
HLA uses a single or multi-server architecture, which allows entities to "sign up" for objects and event they find interesting. Each entity can also be a server, which might be the way to make the P2P part work.
Freedom of speech includes the freedom to be as anal and vitrolic as you want. So what's the problem?
Freedom of speech does _not_ include the freedom to rename someone else's (Linus, et. al.) hard work.
While it would be nice if Linus would give high-profile credit to FSF, only a self-aggrandizing, arrogant blowhard like RMS would unilaterally decree that he can rename another product.
To take the telephone (Baby Bell) case; yes, only the RBOC (in my case, Qwest) has copper to my house. And if you restrict your view to "who owns the copper to my house", then Qwest does have a natural monopoly in telephony. If, however, you consider other modes of delivery (cellphone, voice over ip, etc.) then Qwest does not have a monopoly. In my case, I use my cellphone almost exclusively for personal comms, relegating the normal phone to 911 calls and telemarketers.
Similarly, there's only one cable wire coming to my house, which gives the cable company a monopoly on cable TV. But, I can erect a satellite dish, and go around the cable company.
I heartily agree that regulatory agencies seem to exist to protect and benefit the regulated. But for those limited cases (e.g., the one road on the optimal path from point A to B) where a natural monopoly exists (until we all have personal aircraft), then maybe a regulatory agency is the best of the available bad solutions.
Absent government interference in the market, a monopoly (natural or otherwise) can only exist in the short term. As w3woody pointed out, a monopoly is by definition inefficient, which makes it vulnerable to disruptive technology, which can destroy the chokehold held by the monopoly.
It's a joke, son! A joke, I tell ya ...
... fix your cranio-rectal inversion.
I'd point out that the PIC (Pilot In Command) can further restrict electronic devices. FAR 91.3 says: "The Pilot In Command is responsible for, and the final authority as to, the operation of the aircraft"
If I'm PIC, and I am conducting any approach in the clouds, the network is going to be turned off. I'll throw the breaker if I have to. And I'll ask anyone using an 802.11b network to step outside.
While MagicMike is completely correct in his analysis, there's one other part to consider -- if your costless collar is "too tight", the IRS may consider a costless collar to be a constructive sale, and you owe taxes on the day you construct the collar. So, take his advice -- see a financial professional.
You can beat the caching by placing a Pragma: no-cache in the http response and/or set the last modified date to now.
As a pilot and software engineer, I find that the Airbus philosophy -- that the computer can never, ever, screw up -- fundamentally flawed. There's no frigging way that a bunch of French (or any other nationality) coders correctly coded the system to handle every flight regime. You bet your life that they correctly coded the FBW system every time you board an Airbus.
Do you feel lucky? Well, do you, punk?
Interoperability, in Microsoft-speak, usually means "Embrace, Extend, Exterminate". Is Microsoft repudiating this ugly practice?
... "what the hell were you thinking?" Going from unix to windows must be like going from a Ferrari to a tricycle.
Really? So, if I understand your argument correctly, it would be OK for me as the inventor to patent PGP implemented in an ASIC, but I couldn't receive a patent if I implemented PGP in software?
This seems like an artificial dichotomy.
Note: no, I am not claiming that I invented PGP. This is an example!
While most drivers have had to maneuver in extremis to avoid some bozo who isn't paying attention to his or her driving, I heartly oppose any simple-minded "no cellphone use while driving" law.
The problem isn't the use of the cellphone (or shaving, eating, applying makeup, talking to a passenger, etc.) -- the real problem is Driver Judgement (or lack thereof). The government gives minimal training to new drivers, tests them to absurdly simple standards, then gives them a license to drive a two-ton death machine. Any biped with a pulse can get a license. So why would anyone expect said biped to have a clue?
Refuting the claim that "cellphone use is as dangerous as drunk driving" is easy -- just ask any pilot. Pilots navigate in three space, keep the greasy side down, listen and respond to the radio, listen to other people's conversations (and determine if they are affected -- "where is that Learjet who just called in?", for example), and visualize other traffic and topology. They manage to do all these tasks safely and quickly.
The way pilots can handle this kind of workload is simple -- they prioritize their tasks. Aviate, navigate, then communicate. We're trained to say "stand by" to a controller if we're busy with an aircraft control task.
While in a car, I do the same thing. If I'm in heavy traffic, I won't pick up the phone if it rings. However, on a lightly travelled freeway, I will pick up, and increase my following distance. If conditions change (traffic incrases, or it starts raining), I might say "I'll have to call you back". Judgement is the key here.
So, I say we should determine driver judgement by results. Specifically:
1. no mindless "you can't do X while driving" laws.
2. a $10000 fine for any at fault accident, and a 90 day license suspension. You screw up, you pay.
3. Mandatory driver retests every two years. Retests cover freeway driving (how to merge, how to use turn signals, no camping in the passing lane) and emergency procedures (lane change, spin recovery, etc.)
OK, who's with me?
As the old saying goes, "having a no smoking section in a restaurant is like having a no peeing section in a pool".
Sorry, but the fault lies with Internet Express. If they pulled their heads out of their arse and acted liked true business people, they wouldn't be in this situation.
Those are two seperate test clauses you've managed to run together. The important bits are: (...)
While I agree that what technos quoted is the law as written, reality seems to be a bit more constrained. I'm drawing on my experience as a named inventor and primary technical contact for a patent issued a few years ago (and flamed on slashdot.)
Both of the relevant sections (102 and 103) turn on what prior art the Examiner has in front of him/her (him, in my case.) The interesting thing was that, since the Examiner didn't really understand what we were doing, he turned into search machine on the prior art. He'd look at our independant claims, then try to find something similiar in the prior art. It was almost as though he was running grep on the prior art, looking for matching key phrases.
In my case, he found a patent that mentioned a crucial part of our application, and promptly said "rejected". We had to point out to him that the referenced patent did indeed mention a part of our app, but it also said that "this part cannot be currently accomplished". That is, the referenced patent taught away from our invention.
After a few more rounds of similar things (Examiner say "patent xxx mentions the foo technology, therefore you can't patent it"; we point out that our tech is more advanced or is sufficiently different), our patent was allowed, and issued a few months later.
This is one man's tale. I sure there are others out there.
And no, our Examiner wasn't clueless, just not on the cutting edge of our field. If he was on the cutting edge, we would have hired him. :-)
I TOLD YOU WHAT THE PATENT DID BASED ONLY ON ITS GOAL. IT IS THEREFORE OBVIOUS.
Um, no. The legal definition of "obvious to a person skilled in the art" is "the invention has been described in a publication more than one year before the filing date." It's that simple.
A patent is a business tool, not a refereed paper. Get over it. Or, if you want to change that, write your congresscritter.
And for your next trick, you'll join Mothers Against Cars Driven By Drunks.
Hoplophobes are so clueless ...
In any event, I hope I'm wrong :)
You are. :-)
First, prior art does not invalidate an application. The discovery of prior art might require the application to narrow his or her claims. Or, if the patent has already issued, prior art is ammunition in a lawsuit. Prior Art, in and of itself, does not automagically invalidate a patent.
Second, a patent must be useful, novel (that's where prior art becomes a factor), and not obvious to someone "skilled in the art". The legal definition of nonobvious seems to be "was the exact idea published more than one year ago?", or if the pieces of the invention were published in several places, and some other publication suggests that these ideas be brought together.
IANAL, but I have been through the patenting process. Your Mileage May Vary. What seems to upset many slashdot readers is that the legal and business rules for patents do not line up with the "common sense" rules of developers.
It's easy to flame and/or whine here on slashdot. The reason AMD has a market cap of $7B while Transmeta is $3B is the market's belief (or lack thereof) in the two companies.
If you think the market is on drugs (and it wouldn't be the first time), _do_ something about it.
Beg pardon, but bullshit. 802.11b devices only use 100mW of power. If that's "cancer-in-a-can", we should already be dead from cellphones, cop's radar, and a host of other devices.
Here we have Yet Another Whining Bozo who wants the benefit of something, without paying the cost. Perhaps we should force you to accept high-level nuclear waste in your backyard.
.. and watch your payload get destroyed by a software error. Thanks, No.