Maybe one day we can have international power lines where all the countries with lots of sunshine provide power to the rest of the world?
Great idea, but power simply can't be distributed over that great a distance.
To make up for losses due to resistance in wires, they up the voltage to absurd levels -- decreasing the current level, and, in the process, the voltage drop over a long distance. However, this can only be taken so far, and towers supplying electricity to the rest of the planet is way too far.
In fact, I'm pretty sure that the continental US is too wide for coast-to-coast power sharing (that is, power generated in, say, New York, can only be "shipped" as far west as Indiana, or so).
On the other hand, replace today's wires with some kind of high-current, high-temperature superconductor, and you're golden.
I do something very much like this with VNC. I've got VNC server running (as a service, so I can lock / unlock the Windows box) on a Win2K desktop. Then, on my linux box, I start up x2vnc, pointing it at the aforementioned desktop, and giving it an edge where the desktops connect. Then, when I drag the mouse from the linux machine over towards the Windows monitor, the mouse and all keyboard input change focus accordingly.
It's all very cool.
I think there's a vnc2vnc (or something like that) that allows this to be used amongst multiple windows desktops.
One of the initial selling points for NeXT computers, way back when (has it really been 15 years? sheesh...) was the Optical drive. It was a 256 MB, 5"x1/4" hunk of plastic, and the intention was that you could carry your entire NeXTSTEP OS, home files, etc., around with you. Bring it to the public terminal in your dorm's basement, slap it in, and reboot.
Now, obviously, that didn't work (they were big, slow, and buggy). But today it should be even easier, almost trivial, to do something. Just bring a Knoppix CD with you whenever you go to a public access sytem (assuming they don't lock down the CD-ROM drive). If you can fit it on a business card CD, you can even keep it in your wallet.
They could even do this at the system-provider level -- have branded, mass-produced, customized versions of Knoppix in each machine, and encourage people to check the CD and reboot before they use it. Of course, this wouldn't work as well with the systems intended for graphic editing, etc. (with AI, Photoshop, etc.), but for simple internet access systems, it'd be pretty good...
Last I checked, as annoying as the feature is, the ability to have IE play MIDI files autonomyously is still there
Yeah, and it's in Mozilla / Firebird, too. Every time I run across a page playing lousy MIDI music (or even good music) I go searching through the prefs panel, hoping some new setting came in with the last release.
Does anyone know of a hidden preferences setting to disable auto-play of music?
(I don't know if Moz would use the DirectX midiplayer, anyway, but I want to turn off this damned music regardless).
Fool! DVI is an all-digital video connection standard, that supports optional encryption! (well mostly all-digital, if you ignore the optional analog compatibility connection)
(though I will agree that most likely any DVD player supporting DVI will be using encryption).
I think it's called HDCP, or High Defintion Copy Protection, or somesuch.
More interesting is a DVD player that up-converts to 1080i -- I've read conflicting reports on whether those are "allowed" by the DVD manufacturer's agreement. But get that, and support for the MS (ugh) HDTV-lite codec (like on the new T2 disc) and you're in busines. Sort of.
The Iranians, after the US had fled their embassy years ago and forgot to burn the shredded papers, pieced together those documents *by hand*.
From what I understand, these documents came from a low-grade, mid-70's shredder that wasn't any better than the $30 POS you can buy from a drugstore: producing strips 1/8" wide by 11" long. Relatively easy to re-assemble these (especially if you're talking about a small bank statement with lots of spot color).
Today's "standard" crosscut government shredders cut paper into little tiny strips like 3/16" by 1/32" wide (much better than the consumer "Crosscut! Better security!!" shredder we saw at Staples the other day, 1/8" x 2" strips). I'd actually be surprised if this technology could be used on those sorts of shredder chits -- since there are really only so many ways you can put toner on a piece of paper that small, sooner or later you're using a pile of randomly-selected bricks to "reconstruct" a building -- you'll be able to glean anything you want from it.
The only game of Risk I've ever won (I'm lousy at these sorts of games) was a Nuclear variety. Rolling three sixes would slag a country such that nobody could go in, ever again. Rolling three threes killed everyone, and you had to wait six turns before you could go back in. Rolling three ones was a neutron bomb -- kills *all* of your opponent's armies in the war zone, but none of yours, and you can move right in.
We'd slagged right down through Eurasia, as well as Alaska, so we had a full-out east-vs-west battle in the one remaining non-slagged country: The middle east. We threw some "normal" nukes, built up and moved armies on both sides for six turns, threw another normal nuke, built up some more, etc., etc., until someone (me, luckily) threw a neutron bomb, and marched through the rest of the countries with little effort (since, naturally, all my opponent's armies were clustered conveniently nearby).
The craziest game of Risk I ever watched was a three-board, multi-day marathon session. I'm not sure any of the players went to class for at least three days.
They might want to watch out, because from what I understand AOL has the world's largest internet cache system (all running Linux, actually). And I'd bet that it's been in place since before 1996.
In MacOS X, next to the time there is a little sound icon, same as Windoze.This one is new, I think
The way that you sort columns in a file list has changed to the Windoze way -- instead of the ascending/descending triangle being in the right-top corner like MacOS 9, now in MacOS X it is actually on the column itself, like Windoze.I think the NeXT finder had this
Apple copied the idea of showing a little arrow on aliases/shortcuts.Nope, that came from NeXT, though I think it was italicized names instead (it's been years since I used NeXTStep extensively).
And the idea of arrow cursors with an extra symbol added, such as arrow and a plus sign (copy).NeXT again -- it used modifier keys during a drag to force link, copy, or move (shown visibly with little green icons that would float over whatever you're dragging)
For a long time, MS Windows could update your clock for Daylight Savings Time automatically, whereas Mac users had to do it manually. Apple eventually realized that automatic updating was a good idea, and copied the idea.
I'm pretty sure NeXTStep did this. They also had a world-map timezone chooser, a better dock clock (that actually shows the date), and NTP support (which is still bloody difficult in windows)
The fact is, the look and feel of Windows 95 was VERY much influenced by NeXTSTEP, perhaps even more so than the Mac influence (desktop icons, etc).
As others have said, Halo is a pretty good cooporative game.
Also:
Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance (PS2, but I think it's now on Xbox)
Simpsons Road Rage - has a head-to-head mode
Toejam and Earl - has a cool co-op mode that merges both halfs of the screen into one when both players are near each other
Unreal (tournament? championship?) - another FPS, but unlike Halo, it's got lots of bots that allow us to at least play a little capture the flag or deathmatch w/out (that's my biggest beef with Halo - no bots, so arena play is a little limited with only 2 or 3 people)
One thing that we've noticed that's a little annoying -- all the 2-player games we've tried split the screen into two wide sections, one above the other. This is great on a normal TV, but on a 16:9 set, it's really over-narrow. I'd love to see games start offering the option to split side-by-side. Each half would be a little narrower than a regular 4:3 screen, but it'd be a little easier when you have to worry about looking all around you (like in a FPS), rather than just side-to-side.
This is really cool. Some years back, someone made a big splash (and pissed off a bunch of people, if I recall correctly) when he took a bunch of Supreme Court tapes, edited them down, added some basic commentary, and published 6 cassettes along with a book (called May It Please The Court). It covered 20-some cases, from Roe v Wade to flag burning to creationism. (I see there's a second book, focusing on First Amendment cases, as well.)
I highly recommend this, as the commentary and text really help the reader/listener to understand what's going on. It's truly fascinating, even just from the standpoint of how these procedings operate (it's almost closer to a debate than a courtroom), and gives incredible insight into why the Court rules one way or another, at a more "human" level (it's not all dry legalese).
I haven't checked out oyez.org yet (hopefully it's recovering), so I don't know how much it has as far as commentary or background, but hopefully it'll be as interesting as this book was.
How do I synchronize a Wrist PDA with a PC? Included with the Wrist PDA is the HotSync Pod, which enables you to synchronize information between your Wrist PDA and your PC.
Okay, this looks like a new development, and is obviously pretty welcome. Thanks for noticing that.:)
So now we're back to size being the big issue -- both in terms of bulkiness and in terms of screen real estate.
Incidentally, it looks like the battery is expected to last only 4 days! (based on 30 minutes of use a day). I'd want it running 24x7, with a clock face or somesuch on it. After all, it's probably meant to replace your wristwatch.
Cool idea, lousy implementation
on
Palm OS Wristwatch
·
· Score: 5, Informative
While I'm usually an all-out advocate of PalmOS and am generally happy to see new and different offerings, I can't help but think that this is a bad idea.
First, the reviews I've seen (based on earlier versions) showed this to be really big and clunky. I know it can be hip to be square, but this might be pushing the limits a bit.
It's pretty expensive, especially considering what you can get in a full-out PDA for the price.
It will take a little getting used to for regular Palm users, as it deviates a little bit from some of the standard interface widgets (no icons for "home," for example -- you just "back out" of whatever program you're in). Plus, it'll be tough to do many things on such a small screen (but, again, this is a new approach).
Finally, from what I've read (including on the Fossil site), it won't synchronize directly with a computer. You have to load up special software on an existing Palm, and then use that software to sync selected data from your handheld to the watch (via IR). I suppose that someone might be able to hack together a CPU-based IR sync system, but that should be standard equipment.
I'll be interested to see where this goes, but I'm frankly a little disappointed, especially with regards to synchronization -- I think that'll be the biggest complaint (right before how big the thing is).
Since when did IBM have anything to do with SMP in the kernel?
I think they're complaining that SMP was a restricted technology, so by helping to add SMP to the Linux kernel, and making it freely available, IBM violated US export laws. By violating those laws, IBM is therefore in violation of the SCO / IBM license agreement (not sure how that connection was made), and therefore, all rights assigned to IBM are void, blah, blah, blah, blah.
They're asking a judge for an injunction now? Good. The sooner the judicial system gets a chance to take a formal look at this, the better.
Actually, if you follow that link you'll see that they may in fact be the same person
Yeah, I was focused more on the fact that Tolkien himself wasn't sure about this and had been working on a way to correct it.
The fact that Frodo sees Glorfindel so clearly in the shadow world (into which he is being drawn by the Morgul blade) also argues for this. It tends to indicate that he has been in Aman, in the presence of the Valar.
Interesting thought. I'll have to dig into that (it's about time I started my annual re-reading, in preparation for the next film, though this time it'll have to wait until after I'm done with Potter.:) )
Not to mention the fact it kills off Glorfindel a few hundred years before he saves Frodo in Lord of the Rings
Yeah, that confused me, too. Different elf, same name. Check this out: Glorfindel
[er...sorry...reposted 'cause I wrongly thought slash would automagically linkify a bare URL. And then I had to wait 2 minutes to correct it. Almost not worth the trouble. So I hope you appreciate it.:) (yes, I'm killing time waiting for the timer to time out).]
Yes, the Silmarillion is an excellent book, but definitely hard to read. I've only read it a couple times, and the last time I tried to take it one story at a time, which made it a little easier to digest.
The other books published by his son, Christopher, have also been very interesting, though much harder to digest, and probably should be taken in publication order. In decreasing order of "accessibilty," there's probably "Unfinished Tales" (sort of an addendum to the Silmarillion), "The Book of Lost Tales" (parts 1 and 2), which covers some of the same material as Silmarillion (as well as some additional tales) but from a slightly different viewpoint, and with a bit more of a narrative frame around it, then "The Lays of Beleriand," which is basically two unfinished versions of stories in the Silmarallion presented in alliterative verse (think Beowulf).
After that, they get much more specific to individual stories and detailed as to drafts, notes, unfinished bits, etc.
However, I did find one very interesting tidbit recently while looking up information on Saruman. Tolkien toyed with the idea (I believe expressed in a letter but never expanded upon) that "Saruman might actually *be* the Balrog of Moria." Basically, Balrogs and the Istari (wizards), as well as Sauron, are all Maiar (sort of a demi-god, or higher-level angel), and can take any form they choose. So it's entirely possible that Saruman could have manifested himself as a Balrog. However, Tolkien never actually followed up on this idea.
Anyway, what's best about the Silmarillion is that it ties everything together. Ever wonder what Elrond's story is? Who Galadriel is? (she's pretty much the oldest Elf there, actually). Where Shelob came from? A while back, I started trying to outline the entire history of Middle Earth, from the Two Trees to RoTK, and it was amazing to see how many threads all came back together.
A great way to "browse" through the entire Middle Earth history is The Encyclopedia of Arda. Lots of details there, in a very well-produced hyperlinked setting.
The speed of the foam relative to the shuttle can easily be determined by measuring frame-to-frame motion in the video given some point of reference, like, the shuttle wing.
Argh, of course. Yeah. So if the "white blur" moves 10 feet in a single 1/60 second frame, then it's moving, what, 600 feet per second (or something around 400 MPH). Factor in uncertainty for the size of the blur (because, after all, it's blurred), and you get a nice clean velocity range.
I've been wondering this from the beginning of the foam investigations and tests...
They've talked about firing foam samples at wing mockups at hundreds/thousands of miles an hour, 'cause (I think) the Shuttle was flying at that speed when it was hit. But wasn't the foam also flying at that speed? Shouldn't the actual velocity of the foam hitting the wing edge be fairly minimal?
Or are they assuming that the wind drag on the foam chunk would reduce its absoute speed significantly, thus increasing the relative speed with which it hit the wing?
In other words, did the foam fall off and drop, low speed, into the wing, or did the foam flake off and stop dead in the air, then the shuttle ran into it at a huge velocity?
They're positioning the TabletPC as a laptop you can write on. I think that's the big mistake -- trying to make this a laptop, when they can't possibly compete with laptops for the price. You end up with something that's too big, too heavy, runs too hot, eats batteries too fast, and is too damned slow to be as useful as it could be.
What I want is, essentially, a letter-sized PDA. Something I can take notes on, browse the web via 802.11 or whatever, read email, and that's about it. If I want to do CAD/CAM, or gaming, or write a 200-page document, then I'll use a desktop. No Windows, no Linux even -- Palm OS would be ideal.
With such a tablet, I could leave it sitting on my coffee table. We're watching a movie, and someone asks "what else was he in?" I hit pause, pick up the tablet, tap "on", and it instantly comes on, just like a Palm. I hit the web browser, go to IMDB, write in my query, and answer the question. Then I set it down and resume the movie. Total time, from question to answer and back to movie: 60 seconds.
Do that with a tablet PC, running *any* OS.
Keep a little cradle on the side that it can charge from, hook that via Cat-5 to the network, have some kind of synchronization software running on some server, and you've now got the ability to hot-sync, with no computer in your family room. Pick the thing up when you go to work and read all the news, while on the subway, that got synch'd to it overnight. Go to starbucks on your lunch hour and catch up on personal email. Whatever.
Anything you can do with a PDA, you should be able to do just as easily with a tablet. It's a logical extension of the PDA to a larger form-factor for reading full-sized documents, web surfing, collaboration around a coffee table, etc. But it doesn't need to be a full-out laptop.
Really, this seems to me a no-brainer, and it should be trivially easy for a hardware maker to implement. Just take the guts from one of the newer Palm models (with the 400 MHz XScale processor), add 64 MB of flash RAM, a CF slot (bundled with a 64 MB card, obviously the end user can expand that) for long-term storage, stick in bluetooth and 802.11, and build it all into a lightweight 1024x768 portable display. Add recharchable batteries, stir, and put out a press release. Sell it for $700, and I'll buy one tomorrow.
Slashdot Mirror
but remember, under the current Disney regime, it's death plus ninety years.
Is this the term of the copyright, or a new proposed penalty for violations?
Maybe one day we can have international power lines where all the countries with lots of sunshine provide power to the rest of the world?
Great idea, but power simply can't be distributed over that great a distance.
To make up for losses due to resistance in wires, they up the voltage to absurd levels -- decreasing the current level, and, in the process, the voltage drop over a long distance. However, this can only be taken so far, and towers supplying electricity to the rest of the planet is way too far.
In fact, I'm pretty sure that the continental US is too wide for coast-to-coast power sharing (that is, power generated in, say, New York, can only be "shipped" as far west as Indiana, or so).
On the other hand, replace today's wires with some kind of high-current, high-temperature superconductor, and you're golden.
I do something very much like this with VNC. I've got VNC server running (as a service, so I can lock / unlock the Windows box) on a Win2K desktop. Then, on my linux box, I start up x2vnc, pointing it at the aforementioned desktop, and giving it an edge where the desktops connect. Then, when I drag the mouse from the linux machine over towards the Windows monitor, the mouse and all keyboard input change focus accordingly.
It's all very cool.
I think there's a vnc2vnc (or something like that) that allows this to be used amongst multiple windows desktops.
One of the initial selling points for NeXT computers, way back when (has it really been 15 years? sheesh...) was the Optical drive. It was a 256 MB, 5"x1/4" hunk of plastic, and the intention was that you could carry your entire NeXTSTEP OS, home files, etc., around with you. Bring it to the public terminal in your dorm's basement, slap it in, and reboot.
Now, obviously, that didn't work (they were big, slow, and buggy). But today it should be even easier, almost trivial, to do something. Just bring a Knoppix CD with you whenever you go to a public access sytem (assuming they don't lock down the CD-ROM drive). If you can fit it on a business card CD, you can even keep it in your wallet.
They could even do this at the system-provider level -- have branded, mass-produced, customized versions of Knoppix in each machine, and encourage people to check the CD and reboot before they use it. Of course, this wouldn't work as well with the systems intended for graphic editing, etc. (with AI, Photoshop, etc.), but for simple internet access systems, it'd be pretty good...
Last I checked, as annoying as the feature is, the ability to have IE play MIDI files autonomyously is still there
Yeah, and it's in Mozilla / Firebird, too. Every time I run across a page playing lousy MIDI music (or even good music) I go searching through the prefs panel, hoping some new setting came in with the last release.
Does anyone know of a hidden preferences setting to disable auto-play of music?
(I don't know if Moz would use the DirectX midiplayer, anyway, but I want to turn off this damned music regardless).
Fool! DVI is an encrypted data stream!
Fool! DVI is an all-digital video connection standard, that supports optional encryption! (well mostly all-digital, if you ignore the optional analog compatibility connection)
(though I will agree that most likely any DVD player supporting DVI will be using encryption).
I think it's called HDCP, or High Defintion Copy Protection, or somesuch.
More interesting is a DVD player that up-converts to 1080i -- I've read conflicting reports on whether those are "allowed" by the DVD manufacturer's agreement. But get that, and support for the MS (ugh) HDTV-lite codec (like on the new T2 disc) and you're in busines. Sort of.
The Iranians, after the US had fled their embassy years ago and forgot to burn the shredded papers, pieced together those documents *by hand*.
From what I understand, these documents came from a low-grade, mid-70's shredder that wasn't any better than the $30 POS you can buy from a drugstore: producing strips 1/8" wide by 11" long. Relatively easy to re-assemble these (especially if you're talking about a small bank statement with lots of spot color).
Today's "standard" crosscut government shredders cut paper into little tiny strips like 3/16" by 1/32" wide (much better than the consumer "Crosscut! Better security!!" shredder we saw at Staples the other day, 1/8" x 2" strips). I'd actually be surprised if this technology could be used on those sorts of shredder chits -- since there are really only so many ways you can put toner on a piece of paper that small, sooner or later you're using a pile of randomly-selected bricks to "reconstruct" a building -- you'll be able to glean anything you want from it.
We always player nuclear RISK
The only game of Risk I've ever won (I'm lousy at these sorts of games) was a Nuclear variety. Rolling three sixes would slag a country such that nobody could go in, ever again. Rolling three threes killed everyone, and you had to wait six turns before you could go back in. Rolling three ones was a neutron bomb -- kills *all* of your opponent's armies in the war zone, but none of yours, and you can move right in.
We'd slagged right down through Eurasia, as well as Alaska, so we had a full-out east-vs-west battle in the one remaining non-slagged country: The middle east. We threw some "normal" nukes, built up and moved armies on both sides for six turns, threw another normal nuke, built up some more, etc., etc., until someone (me, luckily) threw a neutron bomb, and marched through the rest of the countries with little effort (since, naturally, all my opponent's armies were clustered conveniently nearby).
The craziest game of Risk I ever watched was a three-board, multi-day marathon session. I'm not sure any of the players went to class for at least three days.
>>> "%x"%(0xAD9+0x5EF)
'10c8'
Python. Ptuii!
% dc
16o16iAD9 5EF+p
10C8
^D
As long as we're mirroring it, anyone feel like transposing it from a 10-by-5 into a 5-by-10 table? Would make reading it MUCH easier.
They might want to watch out, because from what I understand AOL has the world's largest internet cache system (all running Linux, actually). And I'd bet that it's been in place since before 1996.
- In MacOS X, next to the time there is a little sound icon, same as Windoze. This one is new, I think
- The way that you sort columns in a file list has changed to the Windoze way -- instead of the ascending/descending triangle being in the right-top corner like MacOS 9, now in MacOS X it is actually on the column itself, like Windoze. I think the NeXT finder had this
- Apple copied the idea of showing a little arrow on aliases/shortcuts. Nope, that came from NeXT, though I think it was italicized names instead (it's been years since I used NeXTStep extensively).
- And the idea of arrow cursors with an extra symbol added, such as arrow and a plus sign (copy). NeXT again -- it used modifier keys during a drag to force link, copy, or move (shown visibly with little green icons that would float over whatever you're dragging)
- For a long time, MS Windows could update your clock for Daylight Savings Time automatically, whereas Mac users had to do it manually. Apple eventually realized that automatic updating was a good idea, and copied the idea.
I'm pretty sure NeXTStep did this. They also had a world-map timezone chooser, a better dock clock (that actually shows the date), and NTP support (which is still bloody difficult in windows)
The fact is, the look and feel of Windows 95 was VERY much influenced by NeXTSTEP, perhaps even more so than the Mac influence (desktop icons, etc).- Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance (PS2, but I think it's now on Xbox)
- Simpsons Road Rage - has a head-to-head mode
- Toejam and Earl - has a cool co-op mode that merges both halfs of the screen into one when both players are near each other
- Unreal (tournament? championship?) - another FPS, but unlike Halo, it's got lots of bots that allow us to at least play a little capture the flag or deathmatch w/out (that's my biggest beef with Halo - no bots, so arena play is a little limited with only 2 or 3 people)
One thing that we've noticed that's a little annoying -- all the 2-player games we've tried split the screen into two wide sections, one above the other. This is great on a normal TV, but on a 16:9 set, it's really over-narrow. I'd love to see games start offering the option to split side-by-side. Each half would be a little narrower than a regular 4:3 screen, but it'd be a little easier when you have to worry about looking all around you (like in a FPS), rather than just side-to-side.This is really cool. Some years back, someone made a big splash (and pissed off a bunch of people, if I recall correctly) when he took a bunch of Supreme Court tapes, edited them down, added some basic commentary, and published 6 cassettes along with a book (called May It Please The Court). It covered 20-some cases, from Roe v Wade to flag burning to creationism. (I see there's a second book, focusing on First Amendment cases, as well.)
I highly recommend this, as the commentary and text really help the reader/listener to understand what's going on. It's truly fascinating, even just from the standpoint of how these procedings operate (it's almost closer to a debate than a courtroom), and gives incredible insight into why the Court rules one way or another, at a more "human" level (it's not all dry legalese).
I haven't checked out oyez.org yet (hopefully it's recovering), so I don't know how much it has as far as commentary or background, but hopefully it'll be as interesting as this book was.
(re: not being able to sync with a PC)
:)
How do I synchronize a Wrist PDA with a PC?
Included with the Wrist PDA is the HotSync Pod, which enables you to synchronize information between your Wrist PDA and your PC.
Okay, this looks like a new development, and is obviously pretty welcome. Thanks for noticing that.
So now we're back to size being the big issue -- both in terms of bulkiness and in terms of screen real estate.
Incidentally, it looks like the battery is expected to last only 4 days! (based on 30 minutes of use a day). I'd want it running 24x7, with a clock face or somesuch on it. After all, it's probably meant to replace your wristwatch.
While I'm usually an all-out advocate of PalmOS and am generally happy to see new and different offerings, I can't help but think that this is a bad idea.
First, the reviews I've seen (based on earlier versions) showed this to be really big and clunky. I know it can be hip to be square, but this might be pushing the limits a bit.
It's pretty expensive, especially considering what you can get in a full-out PDA for the price.
It will take a little getting used to for regular Palm users, as it deviates a little bit from some of the standard interface widgets (no icons for "home," for example -- you just "back out" of whatever program you're in). Plus, it'll be tough to do many things on such a small screen (but, again, this is a new approach).
Finally, from what I've read (including on the Fossil site), it won't synchronize directly with a computer. You have to load up special software on an existing Palm, and then use that software to sync selected data from your handheld to the watch (via IR). I suppose that someone might be able to hack together a CPU-based IR sync system, but that should be standard equipment.
I'll be interested to see where this goes, but I'm frankly a little disappointed, especially with regards to synchronization -- I think that'll be the biggest complaint (right before how big the thing is).
the Monty Python foot suitably amended with at least one smoking bullet hole through it
This one gets my vote! And it can apply to any story about someone (or some company) doing something so stupid it's comical.
Since when did IBM have anything to do with SMP in the kernel?
I think they're complaining that SMP was a restricted technology, so by helping to add SMP to the Linux kernel, and making it freely available, IBM violated US export laws. By violating those laws, IBM is therefore in violation of the SCO / IBM license agreement (not sure how that connection was made), and therefore, all rights assigned to IBM are void, blah, blah, blah, blah.
They're asking a judge for an injunction now? Good. The sooner the judicial system gets a chance to take a formal look at this, the better.
Actually, if you follow that link you'll see that they may in fact be the same person
:) )
Yeah, I was focused more on the fact that Tolkien himself wasn't sure about this and had been working on a way to correct it.
The fact that Frodo sees Glorfindel so clearly in the shadow world (into which he is being drawn by the Morgul blade) also argues for this. It tends to indicate that he has been in Aman, in the presence of the Valar.
Interesting thought. I'll have to dig into that (it's about time I started my annual re-reading, in preparation for the next film, though this time it'll have to wait until after I'm done with Potter.
Not to mention the fact it kills off Glorfindel a few hundred years before he saves Frodo in Lord of the Rings
:) (yes, I'm killing time waiting for the timer to time out).]
Yeah, that confused me, too. Different elf, same name. Check this out: Glorfindel
[er...sorry...reposted 'cause I wrongly thought slash would automagically linkify a bare URL. And then I had to wait 2 minutes to correct it. Almost not worth the trouble. So I hope you appreciate it.
Not to mention the fact it kills off Glorfindel a few hundred years before he saves Frodo in Lord of the Rings
Yeah, that confused me, too. Different elf, same name. Check this out: http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/g/glorfindel.html
Yes, the Silmarillion is an excellent book, but definitely hard to read. I've only read it a couple times, and the last time I tried to take it one story at a time, which made it a little easier to digest.
The other books published by his son, Christopher, have also been very interesting, though much harder to digest, and probably should be taken in publication order. In decreasing order of "accessibilty," there's probably "Unfinished Tales" (sort of an addendum to the Silmarillion), "The Book of Lost Tales" (parts 1 and 2), which covers some of the same material as Silmarillion (as well as some additional tales) but from a slightly different viewpoint, and with a bit more of a narrative frame around it, then "The Lays of Beleriand," which is basically two unfinished versions of stories in the Silmarallion presented in alliterative verse (think Beowulf).
After that, they get much more specific to individual stories and detailed as to drafts, notes, unfinished bits, etc.
However, I did find one very interesting tidbit recently while looking up information on Saruman. Tolkien toyed with the idea (I believe expressed in a letter but never expanded upon) that "Saruman might actually *be* the Balrog of Moria." Basically, Balrogs and the Istari (wizards), as well as Sauron, are all Maiar (sort of a demi-god, or higher-level angel), and can take any form they choose. So it's entirely possible that Saruman could have manifested himself as a Balrog. However, Tolkien never actually followed up on this idea.
Anyway, what's best about the Silmarillion is that it ties everything together. Ever wonder what Elrond's story is? Who Galadriel is? (she's pretty much the oldest Elf there, actually). Where Shelob came from? A while back, I started trying to outline the entire history of Middle Earth, from the Two Trees to RoTK, and it was amazing to see how many threads all came back together.
A great way to "browse" through the entire Middle Earth history is The Encyclopedia of Arda. Lots of details there, in a very well-produced hyperlinked setting.
The speed of the foam relative to the shuttle can easily be determined by measuring frame-to-frame motion in the video given some point of reference, like, the shuttle wing.
:)
Argh, of course. Yeah. So if the "white blur" moves 10 feet in a single 1/60 second frame, then it's moving, what, 600 feet per second (or something around 400 MPH). Factor in uncertainty for the size of the blur (because, after all, it's blurred), and you get a nice clean velocity range.
I shoulda thought of this, too.
I've been wondering this from the beginning of the foam investigations and tests...
They've talked about firing foam samples at wing mockups at hundreds/thousands of miles an hour, 'cause (I think) the Shuttle was flying at that speed when it was hit. But wasn't the foam also flying at that speed? Shouldn't the actual velocity of the foam hitting the wing edge be fairly minimal?
Or are they assuming that the wind drag on the foam chunk would reduce its absoute speed significantly, thus increasing the relative speed with which it hit the wing?
In other words, did the foam fall off and drop, low speed, into the wing, or did the foam flake off and stop dead in the air, then the shuttle ran into it at a huge velocity?
They're positioning the TabletPC as a laptop you can write on. I think that's the big mistake -- trying to make this a laptop, when they can't possibly compete with laptops for the price. You end up with something that's too big, too heavy, runs too hot, eats batteries too fast, and is too damned slow to be as useful as it could be.
What I want is, essentially, a letter-sized PDA. Something I can take notes on, browse the web via 802.11 or whatever, read email, and that's about it. If I want to do CAD/CAM, or gaming, or write a 200-page document, then I'll use a desktop. No Windows, no Linux even -- Palm OS would be ideal.
With such a tablet, I could leave it sitting on my coffee table. We're watching a movie, and someone asks "what else was he in?" I hit pause, pick up the tablet, tap "on", and it instantly comes on, just like a Palm. I hit the web browser, go to IMDB, write in my query, and answer the question. Then I set it down and resume the movie. Total time, from question to answer and back to movie: 60 seconds.
Do that with a tablet PC, running *any* OS.
Keep a little cradle on the side that it can charge from, hook that via Cat-5 to the network, have some kind of synchronization software running on some server, and you've now got the ability to hot-sync, with no computer in your family room. Pick the thing up when you go to work and read all the news, while on the subway, that got synch'd to it overnight. Go to starbucks on your lunch hour and catch up on personal email. Whatever.
Anything you can do with a PDA, you should be able to do just as easily with a tablet. It's a logical extension of the PDA to a larger form-factor for reading full-sized documents, web surfing, collaboration around a coffee table, etc. But it doesn't need to be a full-out laptop.
Really, this seems to me a no-brainer, and it should be trivially easy for a hardware maker to implement. Just take the guts from one of the newer Palm models (with the 400 MHz XScale processor), add 64 MB of flash RAM, a CF slot (bundled with a 64 MB card, obviously the end user can expand that) for long-term storage, stick in bluetooth and 802.11, and build it all into a lightweight 1024x768 portable display. Add recharchable batteries, stir, and put out a press release. Sell it for $700, and I'll buy one tomorrow.