I have seen the flash "applications" where you play with puzzles, write refrigerator poetry, and even clothe models. But these don't *do* anything. I think it could be interesting to develop web pages that allow their layouts to be overridden by user-configurable preferences. (Maybe XML will allow this? -- I'm ignorant.) For example, you could interactively move all your slashboxes to the bottom of the page instead of leaving them on the default right-hand side. then you change your mind and put them all aligned on the left. Hmmm...this pretty much amounts to turning each web page into a sort of desktop. However the numerous web sites that strategically place advertisements within the page wouldn't go for this.
(snip) Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving And revolving at 900 miles an hour. It's orbiting at 19 miles a second, so it's reckoned, The sun that is the source of all our power. Now the sun, and you and me, and all the stars that we can see, Are moving at a million miles a day, In the outer spiral arm, at 40,000 miles an hour, Of a galaxy we call the Milky Way.
Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars; It's a hundred thousand light-years side to side; It bulges in the middle sixteen thousand light-years thick, But out by us it's just three thousand light-years wide. We're thirty thousand light-years from Galactic Central Point, We go 'round every two hundred million years; And our galaxy itself is one of millions of billions In this amazing and expanding universe.
I was trying to follow your work and instead I get diameter of Jupiter's orbit * diameter of Sun = 8.45*14 mi^2. The probability according to your method is about 2.8*10^(-4) or about 1 in 3500. Did I miss something?
Your post inspired me to try a different calculation for the probability of seeing a distant sun's disk dimmed by a planet.
Let: Rs = sun radius Dsp = distance from sun to planet (orbit radius) Rp = planet radius
Draw the cone from the observer (apex) to the diameter of the distant sun. Neglecting curvature and using similar cones, the radius of the concial section intersecting the planet orbit is
x = Rs * (Dop / Dos)
where Dop (Dos) = distance from observer to planet (sun).
The diameter of the disk = 2*(x + Rp). The area of the disk = pi * (x + Rp)^2.
The areal fraction that the disk is of the orbital surface area = (x + Rp)^2 / (4*Dsp^2).
Now assume: (1) the observer is far away from the sun-planet system, and (2) the planet size is much less than the orbital distance: then putting everything together,
Probability = P ~ (Rs / Dsp)^2 / 4.
Assuming Radius of Sun 4.33*10^5 miles Radius of Jupiter's orbit 4.88*10^8 miles,
P ~ 1.97 * 10^(-7),
or about a 1 in 5.1 million chance of seeing a dimming event, given these parameters, etc. This assumes that the observer can look in any direction and find a candidate solar system.
If this calculation is right, I might have more hope of finding another planetary system than winning the state lottery;-P
Sorry, I probably misspoke thinking of another article. The 9 out of 41 probably has more to do with apathy, politics, etc., than ToC.
ToC traditionally has to do with the consumption of a resource, usually renewable, that can be shared by all. When one of several competing groups figures out how to exploit the structure of the system first, that group "wins" the entire resource for itself at the expense of the common good.
On the other hand, ToC does apply albeit in a reverse sense, where corporations are the "consumers" of citizens' renewable disposable income. (Maybe not so renewable in the current economy, unfortunately.) In this view a company might be able to figure out how to lock out other companies from competing to earn consumer dollars. Such a company would casually be called a "monopoly" by laymen, but it becomes an illegal monopoly when that company abuses its vendor lock. The US govt has deemed MS guilty of this.
Microsoft claims that the states have no contitutional authority to bring such action stating that "Permitting the nonsettling states to seek sweeping, nationwide relief under the federal antitrust laws and would raise serious constitutional questions,"...
MS is at the very least a national monopoly. There should be nothing less than a national remedy. We have a tragedy of the commons situation with only 9 states pursuing the matter doing the work of the other 41.
IIRC the US post office was once trying to overtake email services over the internet -- and looking to charge a small fee per email. Although people who pay an internet service provider pay indirectly for email services through their monthy fee, I am sure they would object to paying per email on top of that. However, a small fee could deter the casual spammer and thereby reduce email glut.
This could be the next distributed.net project;-) Everyone takes a snapshot (film, digital, videocam, etc.) of his surroundings, sends it in to a central location (a la distributed or Seti@home), paste together, and voila.
REDMOND, WA - Today in a press conference Microsoft Corp. unveiled the
latest version of its Windows operating system, Windows(R)
XPSecure(TM) "It is the easiest to use and most secure version of
Windows ever to be released," touted the former chairman Bill Gates.
At the press conference the company performed a live installation of
XPSecure(TM) to demonstrate the simplicity of installation. "Our
customers have let us know that security is a foremost concern," said
Gates. "We have listened to their concerns, and we have designed our
software to fully and securely reinstall their favorite operating
system." Windows(R) XPSecure(TM) also features a Secure Live
Update(TM) option that will automatically connect customers' computers
to the internet to download late-breaking security updates. "We
realize there is much confusion out there about which security
features are truly secure. We have taken care of that with our
customers in mind," Gates continued. Windows(R) XPSecure(TM) is
scheduled to retail at $249.99 and is expected to begin to ship to
vendors in North America as early as next week. "We highly recommend
that customers of any previous version of Microsoft(R) Windows(R)
install this version to obtain an unprecedented level of user
experience in performance and reliability."
We cannot tell companies or governments to mind their own business!
In principle, yes we can: don't do business with that company, don't vote that person into office. However, what do you do when there's collusion of business against the consumer (caller ID and call ID blocking), of gov't against the people ("domestic security" stuff), and of business and gov't against the people (insert Redmond reference here)? When any of these reach their boiling point, a revolution is born. I think GNU/Linux is one such example.
Yeah, I had that happen to me earlier, causing me to find the regular mosix FAQ. Try the openmosix FAQ again -- it works now, but it seems to be aimed at people in-the-know.
I never heard of mosix,
on
OpenMosix
·
· Score: 4, Informative
and since information is a bit lacking at the link provided, here's a link to the regular mosix FAQ.
There are also firms that air commercials advertising how they can help you patent your brilliant idea.
It seemed to me those firms could steal your ideas as their own -- maybe they make you sign over your rights as part of the paperwork. If so, then you have to find the time, money and interest to fight them based on your own prior art. Or at least hire a lawyer. I dunno, but it sounds kind of shady to me.
After playing with the alternative translation option, I would translate this for us Americans as one who is willing to stick his neck out (note: uit =/out/).
This finding would appear to be a new development since The Register's recent report suggesting Morpheus "is free of malicious code."
Caution of another possible security hole in this software was mentioned by
The Tech Report precisely 6 months ago today (give or take a time zone or two).
Looks like this will keep us on our toes for a while.
I was wondering whether someone would mention TiVO, etc. Do they have targeted advertisements on them?
My impression has been that targeted internet ads don't work (the ubiquitous pop-up ads, for example), partially because it is the wrong medium. Blanket TV ads sort of work because you have a bunch of demographics watching the tube. Companies would get the biggest bang for their buck if they could display targeted advertisements in the proper medium. The obvious solution is to roll advertising into pay-per-view/TiVO/digital cable because you can track user's habits and preferences (cable cookie, anyone?) Are companies doing this already, and if not, when will they realize they should?
I am pretty sure you meant that rhetorically, but, no, I would generally expect Windows bugs and linux bugs to be different in nature. I think the examples speak for themselves. The OSes are of different code base and were written with different goals in mind.
IMO, AMD deserves some credit for discussing the problem and not turning away now that it has come up.
how was AMD supposed to know that Linux was doing the same bad thing-
How did AMD know that Windows-* was doing the bad things? I guess it didn't occur to AMD to download and inspect the kernel source code or talk to the linux kernel mailing list(s) and developers? It seems to me that that is effectively what they would have had to do with Microsoft.
OFF-TOPIC: This sort of touches on the point another poster made 1-2 weeks ago or so. I probably will recall the specific accusations incorrectly (and hence flamed), but the gist of that post was the hypothesis that AMD has a loyal following of users, in particular linux users, and it would be nice if AMD reciprocated a little in recognition of that. I am largely ignorant of AMD's contributions to the community per se, so put the flame on a low setting, ok?, as I am an AMD newlywed myself:)
The scary thing here is if they start payrolling disgruntled computer geeks. This notion is not that far off from what has been happening in the linux community with respect to, for example, the RIAA. It is really another form of arms race, but with encryption (copy or access protection).
(1) Even if Lindows.com, Inc., slipped somewhere, I don't see it
as significantly hindering open software in general. To me it seems
Microsoft is partly demonstrating its sour grapes via legal muscle.
It would be interesting if that notion could be lobbied to the public, but
that doesn't make us any better (i.e., it leads
to the Dark Side I guess).
(2) [cut to courtroom scene. Whovian on stand.]
"Your Honor, it says LindowsOS(TM) will have the ability to run both
Windows(R) and Linux(R) software. On the other hand, Microsoft(R)
Windows(R) runs just "Windows" software. So, your Honor, there is no
confusion in my mind that these are two distinct products."
I wonder if this list of contact informations could be turned into
some kind of affidavit attesting to the users NOT being confused
between the two OSes.
The man page for shred says
CAUTION: Note that shred relies on a very important assumption: that the filesystem
overwrites data in place. This is the traditional way to do things, but many mod
ern filesystem designs do not satisfy this assumption. The following are examples
of filesystems on which shred is not effective:
* log-structured or journaled filesystems, such as those supplied with
AIX and Solaris (and JFS, ReiserFS, XFS, etc.)
Using shred on ext3 does not seem to be a good idea. I use srm instead. srm overwrites the data 30+ different times using bit patterns and random patterns. The high number of overwrites is supposed not only to allow for slight deviations in alignment betweeen the drive heads and track on the platter, but also meets some very high (you might say "federal") standards, short of (or in some cases, followed by) incinerating the disk.
Slashdot Mirror
Mmmmmmm....iFurby.
Since these oases usually have a food joint and a gas station, I suggest they advertise with the slogan:
Eat here and get gas.
I know it's old, but hey it's Mickey D's.
I have seen the flash "applications" where you play with puzzles, write refrigerator poetry, and even clothe models. But these don't *do* anything. I think it could be interesting to develop web pages that allow their layouts to be overridden by user-configurable preferences. (Maybe XML will allow this? -- I'm ignorant.) For example, you could interactively move all your slashboxes to the bottom of the page instead of leaving them on the default right-hand side. then you change your mind and put them all aligned on the left. Hmmm...this pretty much amounts to turning each web page into a sort of desktop. However the numerous web sites that strategically place advertisements within the page wouldn't go for this.
Yeah, I would imagine that the bear would take issue with being turned inside out.
/simpsons >
< simpsons >
Now if only I could get hold of that green gas that turns people inside out.
<
They've said it all:
(snip)
Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving
And revolving at 900 miles an hour.
It's orbiting at 19 miles a second, so it's reckoned,
The sun that is the source of all our power.
Now the sun, and you and me, and all the stars that we can see,
Are moving at a million miles a day,
In the outer spiral arm, at 40,000 miles an hour,
Of a galaxy we call the Milky Way.
Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars;
It's a hundred thousand light-years side to side;
It bulges in the middle sixteen thousand light-years thick,
But out by us it's just three thousand light-years wide.
We're thirty thousand light-years from Galactic Central Point,
We go 'round every two hundred million years;
And our galaxy itself is one of millions of billions
In this amazing and expanding universe.
I was trying to follow your work and instead I get diameter of Jupiter's orbit * diameter of Sun = 8.45*14 mi^2. The probability according to your method is about 2.8*10^(-4) or about 1 in 3500. Did I miss something?
;-P
Your post inspired me to try a different calculation for the probability of seeing a distant sun's disk dimmed by a planet.
Let:
Rs = sun radius
Dsp = distance from sun to planet (orbit radius)
Rp = planet radius
Draw the cone from the observer (apex) to the diameter of the distant sun. Neglecting curvature and using similar cones, the radius of the concial section intersecting the planet orbit is
x = Rs * (Dop / Dos)
where Dop (Dos) = distance from observer to planet (sun).
The diameter of the disk = 2*(x + Rp).
The area of the disk = pi * (x + Rp)^2.
The areal fraction that the disk is of the orbital surface area = (x + Rp)^2 / (4*Dsp^2).
Now assume: (1) the observer is far away from the sun-planet system, and (2) the planet size is much less than the orbital distance: then putting everything together,
Probability = P ~ (Rs / Dsp)^2 / 4.
Assuming
Radius of Sun 4.33*10^5 miles
Radius of Jupiter's orbit 4.88*10^8 miles,
P ~ 1.97 * 10^(-7),
or about a 1 in 5.1 million chance of seeing a dimming event, given these parameters, etc. This assumes that the observer can look in any direction and find a candidate solar system.
If this calculation is right, I might have more hope of finding another planetary system than winning the state lottery
Sorry, I probably misspoke thinking of another article. The 9 out of 41 probably has more to do with apathy, politics, etc., than ToC.
ToC traditionally has to do with the consumption of a resource, usually renewable, that can be shared by all. When one of several competing groups figures out how to exploit the structure of the system first, that group "wins" the entire resource for itself at the expense of the common good.
On the other hand, ToC does apply albeit in a reverse sense, where corporations are the "consumers" of citizens' renewable disposable income. (Maybe not so renewable in the current economy, unfortunately.) In this view a company might be able to figure out how to lock out other companies from competing to earn consumer dollars. Such a company would casually be called a "monopoly" by laymen, but it becomes an illegal monopoly when that company abuses its vendor lock. The US govt has deemed MS guilty of this.
Microsoft claims that the states have no contitutional authority to bring such action stating that "Permitting the nonsettling states to seek sweeping, nationwide relief under the federal antitrust laws and would raise serious constitutional questions,"...
MS is at the very least a national monopoly. There should be nothing less than a national remedy. We have a tragedy of the commons situation with only 9 states pursuing the matter doing the work of the other 41.
IIRC the US post office was once trying to overtake email services over the internet -- and looking to charge a small fee per email. Although people who pay an internet service provider pay indirectly for email services through their monthy fee, I am sure they would object to paying per email on top of that. However, a small fee could deter the casual spammer and thereby reduce email glut.
This could be the next distributed.net project ;-)
Everyone takes a snapshot (film, digital, videocam, etc.)
of his surroundings, sends it in to a central location
(a la distributed or Seti@home), paste together, and voila.
REDMOND, WA - Today in a press conference Microsoft Corp. unveiled the
latest version of its Windows operating system, Windows(R)
XPSecure(TM) "It is the easiest to use and most secure version of
Windows ever to be released," touted the former chairman Bill Gates.
At the press conference the company performed a live installation of
XPSecure(TM) to demonstrate the simplicity of installation. "Our
customers have let us know that security is a foremost concern," said
Gates. "We have listened to their concerns, and we have designed our
software to fully and securely reinstall their favorite operating
system." Windows(R) XPSecure(TM) also features a Secure Live
Update(TM) option that will automatically connect customers' computers
to the internet to download late-breaking security updates. "We
realize there is much confusion out there about which security
features are truly secure. We have taken care of that with our
customers in mind," Gates continued. Windows(R) XPSecure(TM) is
scheduled to retail at $249.99 and is expected to begin to ship to
vendors in North America as early as next week. "We highly recommend
that customers of any previous version of Microsoft(R) Windows(R)
install this version to obtain an unprecedented level of user
experience in performance and reliability."
We cannot tell companies or governments to mind their own business!
In principle, yes we can: don't do business with that company, don't vote that person into office. However, what do you do when there's collusion of business against the consumer (caller ID and call ID blocking), of gov't against the people ("domestic security" stuff), and of business and gov't against the people (insert Redmond reference here)? When any of these reach their boiling point, a revolution is born. I think GNU/Linux is one such example.
Yeah, I had that happen to me earlier, causing me to find the regular mosix FAQ. Try the openmosix FAQ again -- it works now, but it seems to be aimed at people in-the-know.
and since information is a bit lacking at the link provided, here's a link to the regular mosix FAQ.
There are also firms that air commercials advertising how they can help you patent your brilliant idea.
It seemed to me those firms could steal your ideas as their own -- maybe they make you sign over your rights as part of the paperwork. If so, then you have to find the time, money and interest to fight them based on your own prior art. Or at least hire a lawyer. I dunno, but it sounds kind of shady to me.
After playing with the alternative translation option, I would translate this for us Americans as one who is willing to stick his neck out (note: uit = /out/).
Just missed submitting the story myself.
This finding would appear to be a new development since The Register's recent report suggesting Morpheus "is free of malicious code."
Caution of another possible security hole in this software was mentioned by
The Tech Report precisely 6 months ago today (give or take a time zone or two).
Looks like this will keep us on our toes for a while.
Uncle Bill saw his shadow today. That means 6 more years of Microsoft.
Whew. Looks like I won't have to upgrade from Windows 3.1 afterall! Thanks Microsoft!
I was wondering whether someone would mention TiVO, etc. Do they have targeted advertisements on them?
My impression has been that targeted internet ads don't work (the ubiquitous pop-up ads, for example), partially because it is the wrong medium. Blanket TV ads sort of work because you have a bunch of demographics watching the tube. Companies would get the biggest bang for their buck if they could display targeted advertisements in the proper medium. The obvious solution is to roll advertising into pay-per-view/TiVO/digital cable because you can track user's habits and preferences (cable cookie, anyone?) Are companies doing this already, and if not, when will they realize they should?
I am pretty sure you meant that rhetorically, but, no, I would generally expect Windows bugs and linux bugs to be different in nature. I think the examples speak for themselves. The OSes are of different code base and were written with different goals in mind.
IMO, AMD deserves some credit for discussing the problem and not turning away now that it has come up.
how was AMD supposed to know that Linux was doing the same bad thing-
:)
How did AMD know that Windows-* was doing the bad things? I guess it didn't occur to AMD to download and inspect the kernel source code or talk to the linux kernel mailing list(s) and developers? It seems to me that that is effectively what they would have had to do with Microsoft.
OFF-TOPIC: This sort of touches on the point another poster made 1-2 weeks ago or so. I probably will recall the specific accusations incorrectly (and hence flamed), but the gist of that post was the hypothesis that AMD has a loyal following of users, in particular linux users, and it would be nice if AMD reciprocated a little in recognition of that. I am largely ignorant of AMD's contributions to the community per se, so put the flame on a low setting, ok?, as I am an AMD newlywed myself
The scary thing here is if they start payrolling disgruntled computer geeks. This notion is not that far off from what has been happening in the linux community with respect to, for example, the RIAA. It is really another form of arms race, but with encryption (copy or access protection).
Couple of thoughts here.
(1) Even if Lindows.com, Inc., slipped somewhere, I don't see it
as significantly hindering open software in general. To me it seems
Microsoft is partly demonstrating its sour grapes via legal muscle.
It would be interesting if that notion could be lobbied to the public, but
that doesn't make us any better (i.e., it leads
to the Dark Side I guess).
(2) [cut to courtroom scene. Whovian on stand.]
"Your Honor, it says LindowsOS(TM) will have the ability to run both
Windows(R) and Linux(R) software. On the other hand, Microsoft(R)
Windows(R) runs just "Windows" software. So, your Honor, there is no
confusion in my mind that these are two distinct products."
I wonder if this list of contact informations could be turned into
some kind of affidavit attesting to the users NOT being confused
between the two OSes.
The man page for shred says
CAUTION: Note that shred relies on a very important assumption: that the filesystem
overwrites data in place. This is the traditional way to do things, but many mod
ern filesystem designs do not satisfy this assumption. The following are examples
of filesystems on which shred is not effective:
* log-structured or journaled filesystems, such as those supplied with
AIX and Solaris (and JFS, ReiserFS, XFS, etc.)
Using shred on ext3 does not seem to be a good idea. I use srm instead. srm overwrites the data 30+ different times using bit patterns and random patterns. The high number of overwrites is supposed not only to allow for slight deviations in alignment betweeen the drive heads and track on the platter, but also meets some very high (you might say "federal") standards, short of (or in some cases, followed by) incinerating the disk.