SCMODS would be the equivalent of one of the systems that CLETS talks to. Probably a Wants and Warrants database given the information that was brought up on the screen.
I'm fairly certain that any halfway decent Chicagoan would have recognized the address of Wrigley Field, tho..;)
That's one thing that surprised me after I first started working with law enforcement and public safety agencies.. I noticed little references to actual workings of those jobs that I had completely missed in earlier viewings of movies and tv shows.
One of the major problems with US elections is that there's a large portion of the population who don't care who's running or what they're saying, just which party they're running for. When I lived in Leon County, Florida, people didn't even run as Republican for a lot of local tickets because the population was so heavily Democrat. To make it even more depressing, several people (even random people I'd meet at some random event) explained to me that it was "because Lincoln was Republican."... WTF?!
CLETS is just another state law enforcement messaging system - not a single database. I'm pretty sure every state has one and they talk to each other via NLETS (National Law Enforcement Telecommunications System). Nothing new. NLETS itself has been around in various forms since the 60s and several of the state systems originated before that.
I've worked on these in several states. They let authorized agencies run queries to *specific* databases (DMV, Sex Offender lists, Wants/Warrants, Stolen Vehicles, Criminal History Records, etc.). Usually each one of these is run by a different agency which is connected to the state system. Most of the traffic I've seen over the years is Drivers License and Vehicle Registration inquiries (two completely separate inquiries) resulting from someone getting pulled over.
A cop being able to "write anything about you" means that whatever state/local agency is running the system that data gets put in isn't properly auditing their system. Something that actually pisses off the Feds.
In the states I've worked in, a person's access is limited based on their role and what they've been certified for. Your average cop wouldn't be able to enter or modify data, just query it, and even there they normally wouldn't be able to query all systems. A highway patrol officer, for example, would most likely only be able to query DMV, Wants/Warrants, and Stolen Vehicles - and that's assuming they have the ability to access it themselves instead of having to call it in to a dispatcher.
The West Virginia number is most likely at the FBI's NCIC.
When I lived in the Florida panhandle, the speed limit on the main highway (I-10 - 2 lanes of traffic each way, very large median between*) was 70, with a posted minimum speed of 40. That's barely more than half the speed limit, and there's still a fairly significant number of people who go below it. Even with on-ramps sometimes being a mile long, with plenty of chance to accelerate up to the speed of traffic, people would STOP at the end of the on-ramp. Seeing behavior like this finally helped me understand how I was hearing about multiple car accidents blocking the highway on the radio every other week.
After moving to the DC area, I was shocked the first time I went on the Beltway (4+ lanes of traffic each way) where the speed limit is 55, yet the flow of traffic (outside of rush hour, when there is no flow) is closer to 70.
*I mention the median because sometimes I would hear about a single incident closing down the highway in both directions.
Not only did this ship with XP, as others have noted, but you couldn't remove it.
When I found it on a work computer I had inherited, I tried to remove it. Uninstall? Not listed. Windows Setup? Not listed. Ok, Delete the directory. Success! Five minutes later when I was looking for other things to clear off, I found the directory had been recreated in C:\Program Files\, complete with files! I have no idea where they came from, either, as the computer was not on the network and did not have the Windows CD in (or the install files on the hard drive).
IIRC, when Movie Maker 2 was available on the Windows Update site, there was a note that you wouldn't be able to uninstall it.
Look... Me and the McDonald's people got this little misunderstanding. See, they're McDonald's... I'm McDowell's. They got the Golden Arches, mine is the Golden Arcs. They got the Big Mac, I got the Big Mick. We both got two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles and onions, but their buns have sesame seeds. My buns have no seeds.
That's pretty much what a Delta Customer Service rep told me when I was stuck in Atlanta after my connecting flight was cancelled. I was automatically rebooked on a flight more than 24 hours after my original flight with no access to my bags, and they refused to do anything except give me a voucher that indicated when my rebooked flight was. Some people who were in line with me (they cancelled approx 75 flights out of Atlanta that night) were rebooked 3 to 4 DAYS later and got the same answer from Delta.
This reminds me of a trip I had to New Hampshire once. My friend and I were exploring and we came across a (very poorly maintained) trail that was marked on his map as a road. As he proceeded to drive on it in his brand new Audi, I commented that it probably wasn't the best idea and we should find a way around. He said "No problem. I've got all-wheel drive." To which, I replied, "And a sport suspension. You wouldn't drive a Lambo on this trail, would you?"
(Note for the non-petrolheads: Lamborghini is owned by Volkswagen AG just like Audi and puts all-wheel drive in all it's cars.)
I admit I made my ISP decision based on performance. I started out with Verizon DSL, but switched to Comcast due to a lack of performance on Verizon's part. But I'm not talking about speed (directly). Verizon's service was pathetic. Lots of dropped packets (50%+) and complete service outages. And when I called their customer service, I got none - just a run around about DSL not being offered in my area.
After a couple months of that, I switched to Comcast. Paid the same amount of money, got double the stated bandwidth, and could actually use the service. Customer service isn't much better than what I got with Verizon - nothing getting solved on the first call, always trying to set up in-home visits to replace the set-top box (yes, even for internet issues) - but at least they admit they offer service. It was no surprise to me when I heard about Mona"The Hammer" Shaw in the local news.
I've changed phones many times in the last year, my company keeps swapping them out on me. All three of the phones they've given me in the past year, an older Motorola Q, a Blackberry Curve, and now the older model iPhone all use USB to charge. For the iPhone I actually bought an alarm clock to handle charging that.
They may all use USB to charge, but for the Motorola, at least, you have to have a Motorola charger. Try plugging it into any other devices USB charger, and it complains about it being an invalid charger and doesn't charge. Even if they use the exact same current for charging. This, IMHO, is the biggest failure of USB as a power source currently. Everyone trying to nickle and dime you by forcing you to use their chargers.
It's all fine and dandy to say that they all charge the same way and have the same power connectors, but when you still need a separate charger for each device, the 'standard' is broken.
Actually, if it's the first three Genesis albums, there's not a lot of Collins. He didn't join them til the third album. It is, however, a lot of Gabriel, Banks, and Rutherford.
The only way for people to completely avoid DPI would be to cut themselves off from the internet. Even if their ISP doesn't use it, some other ISP will and any data that went that way will be subjected to it. Most traffic that I create goes through several networks on the way to its destination. For example, between my hotel's ISP and Google, my packets go through alter.net (a/k/a Verizon Business), Quest, and a few other routers that don't have reverse lookups. Third-party DPI, anyone?
Wow you mean I can get 80 channels for free? Silly me for paying the cable company for channels like Food, USA, Bravo, CNN, MSNBC, and the like when I could get them for free. You have only 24 analog channels. Man sucks to be you. In my area, most of the HD channels are just HD broadcasts of SD channels.
That's pretty much true of the HD here, as well, but those channels you listed are all digital here. I suppose they did it to make room for the 3 seperate channels for HBO-HD, Showtime-HD, etc. Yes, that's right. They don't just provide one HBO-HD, but 3! And they're all the same, not HBO-HD, HBO2-HD, HBOW-HD, or whatever combo.
The initial reason I went with digital cable instead of analog was because I needed the internet service they offered and you couldn't get it without upgrading to digital cable. Complete BS on their part, but it was them or dial-up, which doesn't play nice with the multiple RDC/VNC linkups I sometimes need for work. At the time, there were over 100 analog cable channels. A little over a year ago, most of those went digital.
In the digital cable, MythTV isn't very useful; however for those of us who use analog cable (which will be the majority of Americans for a while), MythTV does have some life left.
So basically you pay the cable company to get the channels you can get over the air? In my area, there's just over two dozen channels left on analog cable - the local networks, a few pbs channels, and a handful channels that nobody cares about (QVC, HSN, a couple of Spanish channels - not the big two of Univision and Telemundo, the local gov't channels, etc.). If I went OTA, I could actually get a few channels I couldn't get from cable (granted, most of those are networks from a different city, but still).
Just like VHS isn't dead as it is being slowly phased out over the next decade.
Have you been living in a cave for the last couple of years? New releases are not put out on VHS anymore. Most studios stopped completely in 2006 after a phase-out and almost all the rest have stopped since. The only thing left for VHS is home recording and films that are now completely out of print (no new VHS being produced and not released on DVD).
Personally, I'm not getting into the HD craze for the foreseeable future, either, but I'm also not stuck in the 90s.
Don't worry. BPI (RIAA in the UK) will probably claim that anyone who downloads a song is profiting by not paying for the album therefore they are subject to the new fines.
Depends on the way the system was written, I suppose.
I know a former COBOL programmer who worked for a telco in the early 90s who dealt with their billing program. Every month, he had to make program changes as part of their invoicing process for customers like Coca-Cola and the Mormon Church.
For me Firefox is now bookmarking every site I visit and allowing me to search for these sites by keywords in the url or title of the webpage.
Um... No it isn't.
The "Awesome Bar" (terrible name, IMHO) uses both the bookmarks you create and the browser history. If you wipe out the history and haven't bookmarked anything yourself, the Awesome Bar has nothing to reference.
I'm not sure how it is with VG retailers, but when I worked at Suncoast (video store) there was a company policy against carding people to prevent selling adult videos (think Playboy) to underage people. Forget about carding for the rated-R movies. The only time we could ask for ID was if they were paying by check.
I've done mobile development in the past and we were forced to use 'Jet DB' (MS Access) files on the devices. Never again. If you want SQL access to your data, go with something like SQLite. If you're simply looking for keyed data storage/access, go with Berkeley DB. Jet DB is heavier than BDB and less capable than SQLite.
That's the problem. The instant you try to get any identifying information, they hang up on you. Between forged Caller ID and that, there's no way to get enough information for a useful complaint.
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SCMODS would be the equivalent of one of the systems that CLETS talks to. Probably a Wants and Warrants database given the information that was brought up on the screen.
I'm fairly certain that any halfway decent Chicagoan would have recognized the address of Wrigley Field, tho.. ;)
That's one thing that surprised me after I first started working with law enforcement and public safety agencies.. I noticed little references to actual workings of those jobs that I had completely missed in earlier viewings of movies and tv shows.
One of the major problems with US elections is that there's a large portion of the population who don't care who's running or what they're saying, just which party they're running for. When I lived in Leon County, Florida, people didn't even run as Republican for a lot of local tickets because the population was so heavily Democrat. To make it even more depressing, several people (even random people I'd meet at some random event) explained to me that it was "because Lincoln was Republican." ... WTF?!
Paranoid much?
CLETS is just another state law enforcement messaging system - not a single database. I'm pretty sure every state has one and they talk to each other via NLETS (National Law Enforcement Telecommunications System). Nothing new. NLETS itself has been around in various forms since the 60s and several of the state systems originated before that.
I've worked on these in several states. They let authorized agencies run queries to *specific* databases (DMV, Sex Offender lists, Wants/Warrants, Stolen Vehicles, Criminal History Records, etc.). Usually each one of these is run by a different agency which is connected to the state system. Most of the traffic I've seen over the years is Drivers License and Vehicle Registration inquiries (two completely separate inquiries) resulting from someone getting pulled over.
A cop being able to "write anything about you" means that whatever state/local agency is running the system that data gets put in isn't properly auditing their system. Something that actually pisses off the Feds.
In the states I've worked in, a person's access is limited based on their role and what they've been certified for. Your average cop wouldn't be able to enter or modify data, just query it, and even there they normally wouldn't be able to query all systems. A highway patrol officer, for example, would most likely only be able to query DMV, Wants/Warrants, and Stolen Vehicles - and that's assuming they have the ability to access it themselves instead of having to call it in to a dispatcher.
The West Virginia number is most likely at the FBI's NCIC.
CSIRO is also the reason that 802.11n is in perma-draft status.
When I lived in the Florida panhandle, the speed limit on the main highway (I-10 - 2 lanes of traffic each way, very large median between*) was 70, with a posted minimum speed of 40. That's barely more than half the speed limit, and there's still a fairly significant number of people who go below it. Even with on-ramps sometimes being a mile long, with plenty of chance to accelerate up to the speed of traffic, people would STOP at the end of the on-ramp. Seeing behavior like this finally helped me understand how I was hearing about multiple car accidents blocking the highway on the radio every other week.
After moving to the DC area, I was shocked the first time I went on the Beltway (4+ lanes of traffic each way) where the speed limit is 55, yet the flow of traffic (outside of rush hour, when there is no flow) is closer to 70.
*I mention the median because sometimes I would hear about a single incident closing down the highway in both directions.
Not only did this ship with XP, as others have noted, but you couldn't remove it.
When I found it on a work computer I had inherited, I tried to remove it. Uninstall? Not listed. Windows Setup? Not listed. Ok, Delete the directory. Success! Five minutes later when I was looking for other things to clear off, I found the directory had been recreated in C:\Program Files\, complete with files! I have no idea where they came from, either, as the computer was not on the network and did not have the Windows CD in (or the install files on the hard drive).
IIRC, when Movie Maker 2 was available on the Windows Update site, there was a note that you wouldn't be able to uninstall it.
Look... Me and the McDonald's people got this little misunderstanding. See, they're McDonald's... I'm McDowell's. They got the Golden Arches, mine is the Golden Arcs. They got the Big Mac, I got the Big Mick. We both got two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles and onions, but their buns have sesame seeds. My buns have no seeds.
That's pretty much what a Delta Customer Service rep told me when I was stuck in Atlanta after my connecting flight was cancelled. I was automatically rebooked on a flight more than 24 hours after my original flight with no access to my bags, and they refused to do anything except give me a voucher that indicated when my rebooked flight was. Some people who were in line with me (they cancelled approx 75 flights out of Atlanta that night) were rebooked 3 to 4 DAYS later and got the same answer from Delta.
This reminds me of a trip I had to New Hampshire once. My friend and I were exploring and we came across a (very poorly maintained) trail that was marked on his map as a road. As he proceeded to drive on it in his brand new Audi, I commented that it probably wasn't the best idea and we should find a way around. He said "No problem. I've got all-wheel drive." To which, I replied, "And a sport suspension. You wouldn't drive a Lambo on this trail, would you?"
(Note for the non-petrolheads: Lamborghini is owned by Volkswagen AG just like Audi and puts all-wheel drive in all it's cars.)
I admit I made my ISP decision based on performance. I started out with Verizon DSL, but switched to Comcast due to a lack of performance on Verizon's part. But I'm not talking about speed (directly). Verizon's service was pathetic. Lots of dropped packets (50%+) and complete service outages. And when I called their customer service, I got none - just a run around about DSL not being offered in my area.
After a couple months of that, I switched to Comcast. Paid the same amount of money, got double the stated bandwidth, and could actually use the service. Customer service isn't much better than what I got with Verizon - nothing getting solved on the first call, always trying to set up in-home visits to replace the set-top box (yes, even for internet issues) - but at least they admit they offer service. It was no surprise to me when I heard about Mona"The Hammer" Shaw in the local news.
I've changed phones many times in the last year, my company keeps swapping them out on me. All three of the phones they've given me in the past year, an older Motorola Q, a Blackberry Curve, and now the older model iPhone all use USB to charge. For the iPhone I actually bought an alarm clock to handle charging that.
They may all use USB to charge, but for the Motorola, at least, you have to have a Motorola charger. Try plugging it into any other devices USB charger, and it complains about it being an invalid charger and doesn't charge. Even if they use the exact same current for charging. This, IMHO, is the biggest failure of USB as a power source currently. Everyone trying to nickle and dime you by forcing you to use their chargers.
It's all fine and dandy to say that they all charge the same way and have the same power connectors, but when you still need a separate charger for each device, the 'standard' is broken.
Actually, if it's the first three Genesis albums, there's not a lot of Collins. He didn't join them til the third album. It is, however, a lot of Gabriel, Banks, and Rutherford.
Plaid
The only way for people to completely avoid DPI would be to cut themselves off from the internet. Even if their ISP doesn't use it, some other ISP will and any data that went that way will be subjected to it. Most traffic that I create goes through several networks on the way to its destination. For example, between my hotel's ISP and Google, my packets go through alter.net (a/k/a Verizon Business), Quest, and a few other routers that don't have reverse lookups. Third-party DPI, anyone?
Wow you mean I can get 80 channels for free? Silly me for paying the cable company for channels like Food, USA, Bravo, CNN, MSNBC, and the like when I could get them for free. You have only 24 analog channels. Man sucks to be you. In my area, most of the HD channels are just HD broadcasts of SD channels.
That's pretty much true of the HD here, as well, but those channels you listed are all digital here. I suppose they did it to make room for the 3 seperate channels for HBO-HD, Showtime-HD, etc. Yes, that's right. They don't just provide one HBO-HD, but 3! And they're all the same, not HBO-HD, HBO2-HD, HBOW-HD, or whatever combo.
The initial reason I went with digital cable instead of analog was because I needed the internet service they offered and you couldn't get it without upgrading to digital cable. Complete BS on their part, but it was them or dial-up, which doesn't play nice with the multiple RDC/VNC linkups I sometimes need for work. At the time, there were over 100 analog cable channels. A little over a year ago, most of those went digital.
In the digital cable, MythTV isn't very useful; however for those of us who use analog cable (which will be the majority of Americans for a while), MythTV does have some life left.
So basically you pay the cable company to get the channels you can get over the air? In my area, there's just over two dozen channels left on analog cable - the local networks, a few pbs channels, and a handful channels that nobody cares about (QVC, HSN, a couple of Spanish channels - not the big two of Univision and Telemundo, the local gov't channels, etc.). If I went OTA, I could actually get a few channels I couldn't get from cable (granted, most of those are networks from a different city, but still).
Just like VHS isn't dead as it is being slowly phased out over the next decade.
Have you been living in a cave for the last couple of years? New releases are not put out on VHS anymore. Most studios stopped completely in 2006 after a phase-out and almost all the rest have stopped since. The only thing left for VHS is home recording and films that are now completely out of print (no new VHS being produced and not released on DVD).
Personally, I'm not getting into the HD craze for the foreseeable future, either, but I'm also not stuck in the 90s.
Don't worry. BPI (RIAA in the UK) will probably claim that anyone who downloads a song is profiting by not paying for the album therefore they are subject to the new fines.
No. In the Young Indy series, it was Sean Patrick Flanery. River Phoenix was only in Last Crusade.
Breaking into the Pentagon computer..
Double click on 'Yes.'
Oh. Password protected. Twenty billion possible chances..
Er..
Jeff.
Hey!
Depends on the way the system was written, I suppose.
I know a former COBOL programmer who worked for a telco in the early 90s who dealt with their billing program. Every month, he had to make program changes as part of their invoicing process for customers like Coca-Cola and the Mormon Church.
Forget about nuking them. Project Crossbow is real!
For me Firefox is now bookmarking every site I visit and allowing me to search for these sites by keywords in the url or title of the webpage.
Um... No it isn't.
The "Awesome Bar" (terrible name, IMHO) uses both the bookmarks you create and the browser history. If you wipe out the history and haven't bookmarked anything yourself, the Awesome Bar has nothing to reference.
I'm not sure how it is with VG retailers, but when I worked at Suncoast (video store) there was a company policy against carding people to prevent selling adult videos (think Playboy) to underage people. Forget about carding for the rated-R movies. The only time we could ask for ID was if they were paying by check.
Oh.
Dear.
God.
I've done mobile development in the past and we were forced to use 'Jet DB' (MS Access) files on the devices. Never again. If you want SQL access to your data, go with something like SQLite. If you're simply looking for keyed data storage/access, go with Berkeley DB. Jet DB is heavier than BDB and less capable than SQLite.
That's the problem. The instant you try to get any identifying information, they hang up on you. Between forged Caller ID and that, there's no way to get enough information for a useful complaint.