The dictionary may agree with you, but I have my doubts.:)
Anyway, I don't remember there being a story about the guy making his own CPU, but I do remember everyone in one of my introductory ECE courses doing that. Does that count?
Why would you want some overly-complicated "each application has its own mixer device" instead of just a checkbox that says "turn automatic volume compensation on" or some other word for "normalization". My car stereo can do that, and it cost less than this new Windows OS will...
And just how would one go about "creating" a computer? Does that mean assmebling parts that someone else invented, er, created? Those are crappy analogies, even though the point being suported is a decent one.
How about "creating a child" v/s "inventing a child"...
Funny, I chose systems administration because I prefer to set my own schedule and because I hate arbitrarily structured roles. My schedule consists mostly of watching some monitors to make sure stuff's running, followed by playing around. Granted, it's playing that's mostly work-related, but it's still playing to me...
CD Text was new in about 1994-1995 or so. That was when I bought my last head unit (the first one with the retractable face and fold-down door) and changer - the text thing came out shortly afterwards. I was irritated.:)
I thought that the excelon head units would run the old changers, too, but I could easily be mistaken. Either way, if you happen to run across those Kenwood control specs, drop me a line. I haven't been able to find anything useful yet...
If you clicked on any of my links, you'd see dates in the 1999 range... I haven't looked around much since then. It makes me happy to know that someone's managed to document some of them, though. The new changers are all compatible with the old head units, so I'm guessing that they've just extended the protocol some. They added disk naming, which shouldn't make things much more difficult. It'd make it easier, I'd think, since it'd sure be nice to display track names on the headunit.:)
I've looked around some, though, and have only found some info on Sony stuff (and this project: http://sourceforge.net/projects/gnunilink/). Too bad I hate Sony, or this'd be great stuff...
Note that my post about emulating the Kenwood occured about a month before the people at PhatNoise (now makers of the audio Keg) started working on their device. They actually finished theirs, which is more than I did. They're not real keen on sharing their specs, though. At least, they haven't been helpful when I've contacted them. Kenwood's been useless, too. Not that I'm bitter or anything.:)
As far as how the things actually work, no, they use different control signals. Most do put the line-level audio on 3 wires back to the head unit, but they vary on how they detect the presence of a changer and control said changer. It's a good idea, though, and I'd really like to know if anyone ever documents how any of them work. It just *can't* be much more than can be done with a serial port...
Furthermore, Sony is not well known for top of the line electronics... they're well known for consumer electronics.
This is the most important part of the preceeding comment, and the one that I soooo wish that more people were aware of. The part about amps not needing giant displays takes a close second, though.:)
I'll go back to wishing that my Yamaha preamp was a MacIntosh now...
If this particualr driver was paying enough attention to avoid the child, he probably also would have nocited that the road ahead could not suport his vehicle at 114MPH. That hypothetical child would've been hit either way.:)
If your 2-year old gets hit by a car doing the 30MPH residential speed limit, your 2-year old is very likely just as dead. Even at the 15MPH "alley" speed limit (that's the legal limit in alleys in IL, anyway), your kid's probably pretty badly hurt.
Kids appear pretty durable when they fall down, but dropping 30 lbs a distance of 2 feet or so isn't quite the same as smacking a kid into a moving car...
That said, this guy admitted to speeding by more than 30 over the limit, so the big-brother device *should* be irrelevent.
You apperently haven't met the sysadmin at my employer's place (AKA, me). He has a couple of OS X boxes that still run Quark 5.whatever in Classic mode, and a bunch of other System 9.x users that will not let him upgrade their machines because Quark under Classic is a big pain in the butt.
In other words, we're still running Quark, despite there being no native OS X version. I hate it, and wish that Adobe InDesign would just take over, but those old Mac users aren't real keen on that whole "change" thing...
So, how much time was put into instructional design in the fully on-line version? You can't just take written course materials, HTML-ify them, and expect the results to be as good without a facilitator as tehy were in a classroom with a facilitator. The course has to be altered - some more than others - to work in a different environment. This is the critical step that soooo many people miss.
I've taken courses online through several universities, and my BS in CS degree is coming from Franklin University (online - alliance.franklin.edu). I presently work for a company that specializes in creating online educational material. Several of the courses that I took sucked, several didn't. Most of the ones that didn't were the ones that clearly took a different approach from just putting the syllabus up online with a message board. We've found that online learning can actually be as effective if not more so for some learners, and that some just can't work that way. So, part of it's just the learner, but a *huge* part's the presentation of the material. I hope you guys took that into account.:)
That, or they should just take all of the addressess that are listed in all the RBLs and reassign them. Korea alone has several ranges that are being wasted...:)
My roommate and I used dryer duct and a large PVC "tee" fitting cut in half to duct some of the air from our single large A/C unit (in a rented apt) to the other rooms in the house (ducting was run along the ceiling). We then had fans in the rooms blowing back into the A/C'd room to promote circulation. It worked suprisingly well. I'd use insulated ducting next time, as the temperature conduction through the duct walls hurt efficiency some. The more asthetically concerened would likely dislike that choice.
One thing to note - make sure that you don't point the A/C unit at the heating thermostat across the room, or try to make sure that you turn off the heater control if you do. It's annoying to find out that your A/C unit is turning on the heater...:) Luckily, the heater in our POS rented house mostly just heated the basement through the extra uncovered ducts (until we noticed that a year later).
No, because it's a lot easier to hold a round thing up against a round socket than it is to line up a flat key in the right direction, push it in, and turn it when my hands are full of groceries. The tumblers on an electronic lock don't need lubricated, either, so it should still work just as easily a few years from now (I'm too lazy to re-graphite my locks every few months).
Add to those benefits that the locks are programmable - so I can carry *one* key that unlocks my front door, back door, 3 garage doors, and logs me in to one of the many computers that sit on my desk at home and at work. My wife gets one key that she needs to carry around in her limited-space purse instead of 5. A spare "key" goes in the pile of change in my car, and since most criminals don't know what the heck it is, they probably won't get into my house after they steal my car. Speaking of the car, I can use the same iButton to activate the shaved door handles on my car instead of using a remote control. With a little more wiring, I can use the same button to enable starting of the car. That's *one* key replacing 7 keys and one remote control.
If you don't have a lefthand drill bit (most people don't), go to your local sears and buy a screw-out set. They go in your drill or 1/4" hex screwdriver - you put your drill (or hand) in reverse, push on the stripped screw, and the screw comes out. There is *nothing* in a computer case that's stronger than one of those screw extractors, so you should be fine.:)
Actually, I'd advise getting the 10-piece set, but since the 3-piece set is only $20, you should be set. The drill-out things are easier to use, but either one will be easier than drilling a hole in the center of a little machine screw and then getting a screw extractor in that hole.
I have several personal computers that run specific tasks, and they never break. Not "often" - never. It's not impossible. The "impossible" part is putting more time into planning and development to avoid the little problems that crop up, and then putting more time into testing to find whatever problems happen to occur. That's not nearly as glamorous as devloping some big "new" system that'll find faults after they happen, though, so it probably won't happen.
I'm certainly not saying that error detection is a bad thing or a waste of time. I will say, however, that not nearly enough time is devoted to planning or quality control, and that it'd make more sense to make the systems more stable to begin with. As an analogy, a car with a convertible top probably is easier to extract dead bodies from after a brake failure - but it would be a better use of time to make the brakes work properly the first time instead of making the convertible top easier to cut open...:)
It might be a better use of time to write code that works correctly and is properly tested before release, rather than doing all of that on some other piece of meta-code that's likely to have a bunch o' problems too.
Slashdot Mirror
The dictionary may agree with you, but I have my doubts. :)
Anyway, I don't remember there being a story about the guy making his own CPU, but I do remember everyone in one of my introductory ECE courses doing that. Does that count?
Why would you want some overly-complicated "each application has its own mixer device" instead of just a checkbox that says "turn automatic volume compensation on" or some other word for "normalization". My car stereo can do that, and it cost less than this new Windows OS will...
To counter every story that the SS agent frind tells you, I'll bet I know of one person who has never had any identity theft problem.
And just how would one go about "creating" a computer? Does that mean assmebling parts that someone else invented, er, created? Those are crappy analogies, even though the point being suported is a decent one.
How about "creating a child" v/s "inventing a child"...
Funny, I chose systems administration because I prefer to set my own schedule and because I hate arbitrarily structured roles. My schedule consists mostly of watching some monitors to make sure stuff's running, followed by playing around. Granted, it's playing that's mostly work-related, but it's still playing to me...
CD Text was new in about 1994-1995 or so. That was when I bought my last head unit (the first one with the retractable face and fold-down door) and changer - the text thing came out shortly afterwards. I was irritated. :)
I thought that the excelon head units would run the old changers, too, but I could easily be mistaken. Either way, if you happen to run across those Kenwood control specs, drop me a line. I haven't been able to find anything useful yet...
The Sony protocol is really well documented, apperently. http://www.cus.org.uk/~cleggy/
If you clicked on any of my links, you'd see dates in the 1999 range... I haven't looked around much since then. It makes me happy to know that someone's managed to document some of them, though. The new changers are all compatible with the old head units, so I'm guessing that they've just extended the protocol some. They added disk naming, which shouldn't make things much more difficult. It'd make it easier, I'd think, since it'd sure be nice to display track names on the headunit. :)
I've looked around some, though, and have only found some info on Sony stuff (and this project: http://sourceforge.net/projects/gnunilink/). Too bad I hate Sony, or this'd be great stuff...
Have you been reading my old car mp3 player page or my old usenet posts again? :)
:)
Note that my post about emulating the Kenwood occured about a month before the people at PhatNoise (now makers of the audio Keg) started working on their device. They actually finished theirs, which is more than I did. They're not real keen on sharing their specs, though. At least, they haven't been helpful when I've contacted them. Kenwood's been useless, too. Not that I'm bitter or anything.
As far as how the things actually work, no, they use different control signals. Most do put the line-level audio on 3 wires back to the head unit, but they vary on how they detect the presence of a changer and control said changer. It's a good idea, though, and I'd really like to know if anyone ever documents how any of them work. It just *can't* be much more than can be done with a serial port...
Furthermore, Sony is not well known for top of the line electronics... they're well known for consumer electronics.
This is the most important part of the preceeding comment, and the one that I soooo wish that more people were aware of. The part about amps not needing giant displays takes a close second, though. :)
I'll go back to wishing that my Yamaha preamp was a MacIntosh now...
I'm not sure what the problem with just turning off image display and using google is, anyway...
Except getting used to having one and then moving to Sprint where you've gotta actually dial a number to contact your wife... :)
In IL, it's >30 MPH over the limit (which is 65 on the interstates) that gets you a reckless driving - ticket with suspension as one possible penalty.
If this particualr driver was paying enough attention to avoid the child, he probably also would have nocited that the road ahead could not suport his vehicle at 114MPH. That hypothetical child would've been hit either way. :)
Just link nano to pico and never look back!
Or, link vim to pico and let the users' confused looks entertain you. :)
If your 2-year old gets hit by a car doing the 30MPH residential speed limit, your 2-year old is very likely just as dead. Even at the 15MPH "alley" speed limit (that's the legal limit in alleys in IL, anyway), your kid's probably pretty badly hurt.
Kids appear pretty durable when they fall down, but dropping 30 lbs a distance of 2 feet or so isn't quite the same as smacking a kid into a moving car...
That said, this guy admitted to speeding by more than 30 over the limit, so the big-brother device *should* be irrelevent.
You apperently haven't met the sysadmin at my employer's place (AKA, me). He has a couple of OS X boxes that still run Quark 5.whatever in Classic mode, and a bunch of other System 9.x users that will not let him upgrade their machines because Quark under Classic is a big pain in the butt.
In other words, we're still running Quark, despite there being no native OS X version. I hate it, and wish that Adobe InDesign would just take over, but those old Mac users aren't real keen on that whole "change" thing...
So, how much time was put into instructional design in the fully on-line version? You can't just take written course materials, HTML-ify them, and expect the results to be as good without a facilitator as tehy were in a classroom with a facilitator. The course has to be altered - some more than others - to work in a different environment. This is the critical step that soooo many people miss.
:)
I've taken courses online through several universities, and my BS in CS degree is coming from Franklin University (online - alliance.franklin.edu). I presently work for a company that specializes in creating online educational material. Several of the courses that I took sucked, several didn't. Most of the ones that didn't were the ones that clearly took a different approach from just putting the syllabus up online with a message board. We've found that online learning can actually be as effective if not more so for some learners, and that some just can't work that way. So, part of it's just the learner, but a *huge* part's the presentation of the material. I hope you guys took that into account.
That, or they should just take all of the addressess that are listed in all the RBLs and reassign them. Korea alone has several ranges that are being wasted... :)
My roommate and I used dryer duct and a large PVC "tee" fitting cut in half to duct some of the air from our single large A/C unit (in a rented apt) to the other rooms in the house (ducting was run along the ceiling). We then had fans in the rooms blowing back into the A/C'd room to promote circulation. It worked suprisingly well. I'd use insulated ducting next time, as the temperature conduction through the duct walls hurt efficiency some. The more asthetically concerened would likely dislike that choice.
:) Luckily, the heater in our POS rented house mostly just heated the basement through the extra uncovered ducts (until we noticed that a year later).
One thing to note - make sure that you don't point the A/C unit at the heating thermostat across the room, or try to make sure that you turn off the heater control if you do. It's annoying to find out that your A/C unit is turning on the heater...
No, because it's a lot easier to hold a round thing up against a round socket than it is to line up a flat key in the right direction, push it in, and turn it when my hands are full of groceries. The tumblers on an electronic lock don't need lubricated, either, so it should still work just as easily a few years from now (I'm too lazy to re-graphite my locks every few months).
Add to those benefits that the locks are programmable - so I can carry *one* key that unlocks my front door, back door, 3 garage doors, and logs me in to one of the many computers that sit on my desk at home and at work. My wife gets one key that she needs to carry around in her limited-space purse instead of 5. A spare "key" goes in the pile of change in my car, and since most criminals don't know what the heck it is, they probably won't get into my house after they steal my car. Speaking of the car, I can use the same iButton to activate the shaved door handles on my car instead of using a remote control. With a little more wiring, I can use the same button to enable starting of the car. That's *one* key replacing 7 keys and one remote control.
That, and the lock's pretty cool, too.
Everyone should use iButtons. Everywhere. They'll soon be opening the doors to *my* house, anyway...
If you don't have a lefthand drill bit (most people don't), go to your local sears and buy a screw-out set. They go in your drill or 1/4" hex screwdriver - you put your drill (or hand) in reverse, push on the stripped screw, and the screw comes out. There is *nothing* in a computer case that's stronger than one of those screw extractors, so you should be fine. :)
Actually, I'd advise getting the 10-piece set, but since the 3-piece set is only $20, you should be set. The drill-out things are easier to use, but either one will be easier than drilling a hole in the center of a little machine screw and then getting a screw extractor in that hole.
I have several personal computers that run specific tasks, and they never break. Not "often" - never. It's not impossible. The "impossible" part is putting more time into planning and development to avoid the little problems that crop up, and then putting more time into testing to find whatever problems happen to occur. That's not nearly as glamorous as devloping some big "new" system that'll find faults after they happen, though, so it probably won't happen.
:)
I'm certainly not saying that error detection is a bad thing or a waste of time. I will say, however, that not nearly enough time is devoted to planning or quality control, and that it'd make more sense to make the systems more stable to begin with. As an analogy, a car with a convertible top probably is easier to extract dead bodies from after a brake failure - but it would be a better use of time to make the brakes work properly the first time instead of making the convertible top easier to cut open...
It might be a better use of time to write code that works correctly and is properly tested before release, rather than doing all of that on some other piece of meta-code that's likely to have a bunch o' problems too.