I don't like it, and not for the reasons you'd think.
Living alone: - Biosphere 2 was huge, and *on earth.* It failed. The guy would need a *lot* of support from earth. If it doesn't come during the launch window, fatal results. Come to think of it, almost every adverse scenario results in certain death.
- We have not even done this on the moon yet. Shouldn't this be tried first? Almost all of the mars mission proposals I've seen require a moon base.
Waste: Lots of it. This guy is not going to live in a self-sufficient environment (Biosphere argument) and thus will leave a lot of mars-debris all around. I guess this is minor and some would argue inevitable, but he is going to colonize the whole planet with his own waste products of all sorts.
A thought question: Will a mars mission not irreversibly contaminate Mars? I have often thought about the moon - it used to be sterile, but now there is human / earth bacteria everywhere around the landing sites. NASA does not sterilize probes it sends. What's that? Bacteria can't survive? Actually, they probably can - many species are capable of withstanding cosmic rays and zero atmosphere, etc.
"Adding something cold to thermite doesn't cancel it out, it just makes it angry."
Wow, just wow. We've talked about this kind of thing before in the context of CSI and Mythbusters.
I really wish that popular science shows would at least attempt to bring some education into the mix. I am not against blurring of education and entertainment, but the videos presented are simply bad entertainment. Why not give an elementary discussion of 'heat capacity' or energy that is associated with phase transitions, etc? It would still give the explosion of thermite and provide a small education.
Does anybody remember the old PBS series "3-2-1 contact" or "Square One?" It had education plus entertainment in a nice combination IMHO. What I would like to see is a Mythbusters-type show where they try to predict things *first* with introduction to physics / chemistry concepts, and then test their findings (with explosions and the hilarious consequences.) They do this a bit with their *Warning Science Content* segments, but it could be made a bit more rigorous.
Yes, I know the arguments that this is making kids "interested in science," but true research / science is very little about explosions, and these shows are, in my experience, not making kids interested in the rigor or reality of scientific reasoning. The question regarding thermite was proposed by a 30+ year old man!
That is the often-repeated mantra. However, it is, at best, simplistic and at worst very misleading. There is a very nice summary of some findings in this week's New England Journal of Medicine, very accessible reading for the non-M.D. too. Take a look if you are interested, it is free access for all:
Before the idiot flamers start -- I am NOT saying that the above poster is absolutely WRONG, just that it is more complex as some of the followup posts suggest (screening ADDS to upfront costs, and the cost of monitoring diseases that have very little outcome change due to treatment, etc.)
To be honest, my hospital is pretty agnostic as a whole. I mean, they use established technologies that will work and be cheap whatever the methodology -- on the whole we use Exchange server for mail, Microsoft IIS or Apache for the web (weird combo, split down the center), and Citrix for Windows apps on desktops (good idea for keeping the desktop OS independent, and easily allowing VPN access regardless of platform.)
The majority of clinical apps were developed for Windows without any open source. There are two prominent projects here, though, both in patient records, that are being developed for Linux platform, and right now run using Cygwin/X, which I am involved in. Despite this as of now, I really don't see our hospital being a leader in open source adoption simply because it is often easier and quicker to buy things that can get you up and running in a hurry (Linux STILL does not have an integrated corporate mail/scheduling system that rivals Exchange server, as much as I hate its proprietary MAPI crap.)
IMHO corporations that have IT as a support to their operations that are far from IT itself will have very limited interest in developing technology per se. They just want something that works adequately and works fast, without too much cost to themselves. Until open source can provide a framework that gets them up and running with a cost that is less than M$ or whatever corporate supplier, or until there are *clear* understandable benefits to open source, it won't be used widely.
>...Until they have to write their master's thesis with tons of tables, a dynamic table of contents, and more formatting >sections than you can shake 116 pages of stick at...
Agreed -- anybody that has used any semi-advanced feature such as Excel's pivot-tables (OO's data-pilot) will tell you that the frustration factor is high with both, but MUCH higher with openoffice. My hospital sends me schedules that are in.doc format, but for some reason damned impossible to open with openoffice due to weird placement of a column that obscures the name. Very annoying. However, she is using this to write the text portion of her dissertation, nothing fancy. When it comes time to format she can use the school lab computers if needed, keeping the file on a backed-up pendrive.
>Has she just started using computers in the past 2 weeks? Because I'm pretty frightened if she had trouble with the >absolute most basic functions. >Does she have trouble driving blue cars as well? Because she is used to red and yellow ones.
Uh, dude, this is why you don't have a girlfriend. Most girls I know want to fiddle with computers as much as you would want to spend 2 hours talking about nuances of interior design. Seriously though, she just didn't scroll down in the Save As drop-down far enough... I told her that it is in there somewhere and she then found it on her own. In her mind she was thinking "different program = different filetype" which I find many non-computer people do, and was ready to give up at the drop of a hat, as many people also do. There is a good post about default file formats above, but I agree with this defaulting to an open standard. Heh, remember when it was hard to transfer files between a PC and a Mac?
The funny thing is, after you push the software on somebody and allow them to reap the rewards, they are incredulous. It undermines the concept of "fairness" that they have learned as you state above.
My girlfriend was about to shell out several hundred dollars for Word on her new Mac. I introduced her to openoffice, but she couldn't figure out how to save files, and said "it uses incompatible format, I have to buy the Word."
I showed her how to save in.doc format, and she was astounded. She is converted, and introduced 4 of her friends, all students, to openoffice.
Viral marketing can work, and old learned prejudices can be overcome...
Very interesting thesis of this post. In my line of work (health care) there is a lot of in-house development of patient care record systems, as there is not a dominant standard at this time.
I've found the following:
- You get smarter, more resourceful people when they are not MSCE drones, but actually programmers that are able to solve a problem, not just relay it up the chain or find the checkbox in the configuration GUI.
- There is much less waste in a way, and more in another way. Specifically, implementing a solution often involves talking to a single person about a problem with the database, not finding the "Oracle consultant guy" who then can talk to the "Microsoft guy." With a department that has its own development, these things seem to go faster and there is less separation of functions.
- However, many hospitals / organizations duplicate functionality, which is the "more waste" that I talk about. I mean, many, many businesses are the same and need email / web server setups plus a few business-specific apps. This is all duplicated by each organization. Training a consultant is even more globally efficient in this regard, who can take his expertise and start multiple implementations without (expensive) retraining.
Overall, I think this is great news for smart people going into IT. You will be sought after to lead a company department, and all of those license fees can now contribute to your salary + additional savings for the company. Would you rather earn $x from being a MSCE admin, or $5x managing a vertical open-source system with much more intellectual stimulation? I'd take the latter.
>Your arguments are also not exactly indicative of a healthy scientific mindset; you even admitted spending almost >no time on it, and yet from that you boldly asserted that it is absolutely impossible that there might be any >differences between this and a pacemaker. There are many differences that could lead to increased potential for >cancer.
Please calm down. Being rational is often a very good thing:
>You are implying that nobody is ever allowed to get angry about anything because it denotes instability.
Getting angry about a quite mild post on an internet forum is excessive IMHO. I'm not angry, and I do not think he should be either. This has nothing to do with "nobody is ever allowed to get angry about anything." If I hurt his sister, yes, he could and should get angry.
I didn't do anything very emotionally charged -- the thing I find most disturbing is that he clearly confused saying "I don't see any way this should cause cancer" == "advocacy for a product" and came out with a bunch of personal attacks. For the record, I don't think RFID implantation is a good idea at all. I also don't see any way they could cause cancer. Saying "Obama does not beat his wife" does not mean "I am going to vote for him," even though many people get hot and bothered by any defense of something unpopular in the local group.
>you even admitted spending almost no time on it
This is what I do for a living. I spend a LOT of time on related questions. If I ask a engineer if there is any way that using changing amounts of carbon in steel formation could lead to premature failure, he could spend almost no time on it, and his thoughts would be much, much more valid than any of mine.
>boldly asserted that it is absolutely impossible that there might be any differences between this and a pacemaker.
"boldly asserted that it is absolutely impossible." Where did I do this? I'm again surprised at the lack of rationality of this statement, SmallFurry/dustmite. Please read up on rhetoric and straw man arguments. I even clearly stated that I spent almost no time on it, as above. If implantation of a general subcutaneous device led to appreciable rises in cancer, I should know about it from multiple studies looking at outcomes of generally implanted devices, which I am intimately familiar with. You make the same incorrect arguments as the person above.
I am confused by your vitriol and scattered arguments. I posted AC while finished tasks and during downtime on call at the hospital, and really can't figure out why you post this crazy response.
>First there is the ethical difference, a pacemaker makes a sick person better. A RFID capsule is NOT medicine.
I never claimed that they were ethically the same. Maybe you should re-read my post. I'm not signing anybody up, or recommending that they get RFID implants. I am also not personally or professionally in favor of a number of things like this (tattoos, extraneous piercings), but I do feel obliged to provide factual information (or at least information best supported by the scientific process) if I can.
>First do no harm, ever heard that? Unrelated ad hominem arguments, ever heard that?
>Second, the pacemaker is not injected into tissue but rather implanted in the body. The cancer is claimed to be >caused be the tissue surrounding it becoming inflamed.
You obviously do not understand how a pacemaker is implanted from your statements. Most of the time they rest in the subcutaneous space, exactly where a RFID device can be implanted.
>There is a huge difference between implanting a device in a person via surgery who would otherwise die and >injecting a device into healthy tissue into a person who has got nothing wrong with them. If you can't see that, >you suck as a doctor and for that matter as a human being.
WTH? This is just sad. I feel sorry that you have clearly been experiencing a hard life, but insulting other people will not make it better. You are simply a disgrace. It is a shame that users such as this pollute the internet -- well reasoned responses are drowned by a series of silly posts and drive intelligent people from the forum. Back in the 1980s, USENET was a heaven for university professors, intellectuals, and engineers. Now it is eternal september.
As I said, the coating of the RFID implant would primarily determine how it is received by the body -- usually foreign objects are "walled off" by fibroblasts and become ensheathed in a fibrous capusle. While any increased cell replication poses risks of cancerous transformation, this, to me, would not be excessive, and less than a standard pacemaker.
I know what you are saying, and agree with you to a large extent, but as a former 6502 hacker I am not sure you understand what you are talking about.
The majority of the copy protection routines on the Apple//e depended on nuances of a combination of hardware and software not just software. Disk reading routines were able to be controlled in software -- copy protected games would not include standard apple "DOS" but essentially invent their own disk reading routines. In order to copy a disk, you would have to get extra memory, try to load the program into it using its own disk reading routine, find the starting location of the program, remap this into a format that could fit on a normal disk, and then save it back to a disk (using a standard DOS loaded into your extra memory.) Some methods of protection altered the write timing cycles on the disk, varying sector timing / size, etc. In general you would need, to unprotect disks, a hardware-modified//e with extra memory.
Something that changes the read/write timing of a disk would be very, very difficult to emulate correctly, 100% of the time. A good fraction of copy-protected files could not even be made into a standard.dsk image, and thus would be most likely lost as the original magnetic media fades -- an emulator built to emulate the nuances of the hardware would probably never be built, as even getting a method to accurately read some standardized format of the original magnetic media would be difficult / impossible. Thus the original article writer's statement is correct, whether he knew the details or not...
Was going to mod you up, but I'll reply instead (sorry!).
I completely agree.
The GNOME filechooser is an abomination. It is one of the reasons that Linus Torvalds uses KDE, and the reason that no sane person will touch GNOME.
1. COMPLETELY unintuitive (and difficult to get used to) initial layout. Instead of having an area with the file name that you can type in, there is simply a three-panel directory. What happens if you start typing? Some weird mystery box appears that is right on top of your filter dialog, which is unlabeled!
Want to type part of the filename? Go ahead, but as soon as you make a selection to change to a different directory, it is gone! What's more, if you were in a Save dialog, the default value is now gone forever.
2. The CANCEL and OK buttons are reversed from almost all other GUIs. Cancel to the left? Cancel above OK? What???
3. Windows-like distrust of any other directories other than your home. Want to save something in/usr/local? Well, go to "File System" first so you can then access your root.
Numerous other issues (resize behavior -- the whole dialog moves if you change file type), etc. prevent me from using this, EVER.
For those linux readers using firefox, a simple fix is to go to about:config and change ui.allow.platform.filepicker to FALSE. Do it now, for your own sanity.
This technology has been around at least since I've been in medical school, so probably > 8 years. Capsule endoscopy is quite well developed, and I really wish that the Science Daily people would do a bit more research to put "new" events in perspective.
The one in the article sounds as though there is a tether and can be manipulated back and forth. I don't have any experience with this one. The systems I saw were like this or this and were passively mobilized by small intestine movement, just as your body would move food. The person undergoing the study would wear a vest with an embedded antenna, which would receive the images and store it on a hard drive attached.
After images were obtained, we could review the film either on still frames or "animation". It looked like driving through the intestine -- kind of like a very bizarre EPCOT center ride.
A couple notes that are very important:
- As with all medical technology, it must be validated before being trusted too much. Direct visualization endoscopy is the "gold standard," and this is being tested against that. Even still, don't get too excited, as most diagnosis is followed by a treatment, so if anything suspicious is found you'll probably need the real endoscopy for a better look / resection of polyps, etc.
- With the system at my hospital, the patient would get a $100 rebate if they... um... returned the device. Believe it or not, a lot of people did not. (maybe I'm just too desensitized, or not wealthy enough, but that seems like easy money.)
We had a very interesting case where one guy's images *all of a sudden* switched to a different part of the colon, and then went back again. It was really weird -- until we found another patient that had the *same thing*, with similar images.
It turned out that the two patients were talking about their common procedure in the parking lot after they left our office. They stood close enough together that the pill wireless cameras started recording each other's images. They now have a unique identifier in most systems.
Agreed -- definite deal breaker for me as well. The battery is ALWAYS the first thing that dies in my laptop -- I would like it to be a $40 replacement part, not something that I need a screwdriver for, or (even worse) mail my machine back to Apple.
I have never gotten more than a hundred charges or so from my battery without noticing definite decrease in capacity -- these are not deep charges, and if you use the battery every day, that is quite a few replacements over the life of the machine...
I had a girlfriend once whose physical shape was AWESOME, but her acoustic shape was terrible. Believe me, you don't ever want to be in that situation. Now, the ones that are nearly spherical are easily identified from a distance, and I tend to stay away from them.
It depends on what type of job you want, and how good you want to be. Really, it does, and the answer is not simple.
I really feel it is best to concentrate in core subjects during college. It is trite, but nobody cares if you know high level language X, be it Java, Python, Ruby, etc. This will change. Knowing how to program, that is a skill that will never go out of date.
I do most of my programming in a very scientific environment, which requires MATLAB for "quick and dirty" computations, but I have also written elaborate C programs when needed for speed (up to 15 times as fast as interpreted MATLAB code despite the claims of optimizations.)
If I were you, I would learn C in and out, through and through. It will guarantee you skills that you will use for the rest of your life, and you will never be an idiot. The way to best do this is to write moderate sized programs in C. I would take as many high level courses in the college environment as possible, preferably one on Operating Systems, which are some of the most complex programming environments and concepts that you will be exposed to. If you are truly into CS theory, then high level mathematics courses are favorable.
What to program, you ask? Why, the standard lot. Here are some of the coding projects we were given in college.
Hello, World (just kidding.)
The game of life.
The game of animals (teaching navigation of link lists, etc.)
Make a program that plays Connect 4 against you. (basic algorithmic concepts, basic "AI")
Make the above program graphical, for fun (GUI / display concepts).
Write a program that implements the Zip algorithm (Huffman encoding -- not as hard as you'd think.)
If these are too basic for you in C, then I'd try to understand a bit of the linux kernel, or get involved in an open source project. Good luck!
Yes, I have heard stuff like this repeated a lot too. This may be true, but I do not think that it is all the politician's fault. I think it is partly the fact that the population of the USA was probably a fraction (~120 million) of what it is today. It is simply not reasonable to have any contact with any meaningful fraction of your electorate. I think the candidates DO, given their security and time limitations, make an effort to go out there and shake people's hands.
Think about your state -- this is probably analogous to the USA quite a while ago. I have shaken my state governor's hand (I went to Boys' state) and got to talk to him a bit. I dated a girl from a small country in Europe, and she had met their president numerous times (and he knew her father by first name). It is partly just a function of the US becoming very large that this is not possible.
P.S. Back when Slashdot was starting, me and 'Taco were really tight, PM'ing every night, but now he doesn't even answer the emails I send to him...:p
Yes, very true regarding the isolation. Additionally, planes' rigorous inspection and freedom from interference allows planes to be fly-by-wire, but we do not have this luxury with cars yet...
No production car has a total steer-by-wire system yet; every car still has an absolute mechanical linkage between the steering column and the wheels. A LOT of manufacturers have been looking into alternatives -- BMW in particular (I know this car manufacturer the best) has some completely "steer-by-wire" systems are in concept cars. They have a hybrid system currently called "active steer" since '04, which I think all BMWs have, which basically increases the angle to the wheels at lower speeds.
Numerous cars now have complete "throttle-by-wire", present in BMWs though since about 2004, so there is no mechanical gas pedal linkage, and this is now relatively common, but not universal among cars. Apparently there were some complaints about it early, but now the programming is very similar to the mechanical linkage. If you lose your throttle control due to a computer malfunction, it is simply not as bad as completely losing your steering.
For some really good articles on the issues involved, check out:
It was never that really hot information... There were commercially available wristwatches that would dial the phone for you by holding it up to the phone, etc.
As a prank, when I was in grade school, circa 1990, a friend and I made a BASIC program on our school IBM's that would give a fake login screen that would "allow" you via simple commands to "dial FBI" completely with realistic "modem" dialtone and carrier tones. It would be hilarious to watch some of the other students get so excited to type "help", then a few silly commands, and finally "DIAL FBI" and get carried away to see an ASCII art warning screen we drew up. The best thing was, after they "logged in" they would get dropped, and never tell the teachers what was going on because of their "illegal" activity. Those sneaky kids!
I forgot where we got the tone listing, but I think it was in a book in the school library. It was amazingly realistic when played on the speaker.
As for whistling to dial, it is a myth as far as I know. A person can whistle 2600; it is not that hard. I hate how mythical powers get embodied to people that exploited lame design and in band signaling by the phone companies. To whistle to dial is impossible, because multiple tones are required.
I have always wondered about this. I am sure that I am *not* in the minority, but I am planning on getting a Macbook pro when my current laptop (Thinkpad) dies or becomes horribly obsolete. It seems to me that the switch from Vista debacles or attraction to Macs will take 3-5 years as the PC upgrade cycle lengthens, and the fact that Macs seem very prominent "on the net" may translate to more presence as new users / young people buy their first computer, or as others upgrade.
Simply put, your "feeling" may mean very well for the future of Apple. I might join, *despite* the cult atmosphere.
On the related note, the decline in the legendary Thinkpad was instrumental in my plan to switch. I run Linux exclusively now, but look at the build quality difference between the T43 and T60 as Lenovo took over IBM thinkpad development. Sad.
Meanwhile, the Macbooks look sleek and well designed...
It's a shame that the x86 is such a complex instruction set; this means that the age of the handheld computer as an easy programming platform for hacking is over.
When I was programming for Apple//e, I had a good majority of the opcodes for the 6502 chip memorized, laying out assembly by hand. I later learned 68k assembly, and again, it is very "understandable" to a person just sitting down in front of the computer looking at an assembly printout. In the early 90's, pretty much x86 dominated and I stopped doing pretty much all assembly programming.
In 1996 I was delighted when the palm pilot came out, using a 68328 (68k instruction set). It was like a renaissance, again programming in assembly and hacking other things for fun. Now, once again, it appears this will be dead!
As a question to the slashdot community, is it possible to program "naked" x86 assembler? I have never really put in the time to learn it, but it just seems exceedingly complex and tedious to program for this chip without use of a higher level crutch (C compiler...) I am sad that once again everything I know is becoming outdated...:)
>Part of the problem is that brake lights themselves only have "on" and "off" modes. They could be designed to convey so >much more information than that...
Very good idea. BMW (and Mercedes IIRC) have exactly this technology if you own one or have driven behind one. They call it "Adaptive brake lights" (Mercedes has its own trade name.) Google it for more info.
Basically with light braking one red bar lights up, and with hard braking there is two red bars with a white bar too. It is easily noticeable if you ever see it in action.
FWIW, car companies have been pretty response to stuff like this, but driving habits are difficult to change. I wish the US would go on a public education campaign against idiot driving habits, which are for some reason generally accepted. To me, it is as bad as drunk driving.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't like it, and not for the reasons you'd think.
Living alone:
- Biosphere 2 was huge, and *on earth.* It failed. The guy would need a *lot* of support from earth. If it doesn't come during the launch window, fatal results. Come to think of it, almost every adverse scenario results in certain death.
- We have not even done this on the moon yet. Shouldn't this be tried first? Almost all of the mars mission proposals I've seen require a moon base.
Waste: Lots of it. This guy is not going to live in a self-sufficient environment (Biosphere argument) and thus will leave a lot of mars-debris all around. I guess this is minor and some would argue inevitable, but he is going to colonize the whole planet with his own waste products of all sorts.
A thought question: Will a mars mission not irreversibly contaminate Mars? I have often thought about the moon - it used to be sterile, but now there is human / earth bacteria everywhere around the landing sites. NASA does not sterilize probes it sends. What's that? Bacteria can't survive? Actually, they probably can - many species are capable of withstanding cosmic rays and zero atmosphere, etc.
Cue the "I nominate Mitch Bainwol" comments...
From TFV:
"Adding something cold to thermite doesn't cancel it out, it just makes it angry."
Wow, just wow. We've talked about this kind of thing before in the context of CSI and Mythbusters.
I really wish that popular science shows would at least attempt to bring some education into the mix. I am not against blurring of education and entertainment, but the videos presented are simply bad entertainment. Why not give an elementary discussion of 'heat capacity' or energy that is associated with phase transitions, etc? It would still give the explosion of thermite and provide a small education.
Does anybody remember the old PBS series "3-2-1 contact" or "Square One?" It had education plus entertainment in a nice combination IMHO. What I would like to see is a Mythbusters-type show where they try to predict things *first* with introduction to physics / chemistry concepts, and then test their findings (with explosions and the hilarious consequences.) They do this a bit with their *Warning Science Content* segments, but it could be made a bit more rigorous.
Yes, I know the arguments that this is making kids "interested in science," but true research / science is very little about explosions, and these shows are, in my experience, not making kids interested in the rigor or reality of scientific reasoning. The question regarding thermite was proposed by a 30+ year old man!
I patent the "One-click" patent approval process.
I'll license it back to them for a fee.
That is the often-repeated mantra. However, it is, at best, simplistic and at worst very misleading. There is a very nice summary of some findings in this week's New England Journal of Medicine, very accessible reading for the non-M.D. too. Take a look if you are interested, it is free access for all:
http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/358/7/661
Before the idiot flamers start -- I am NOT saying that the above poster is absolutely WRONG, just that it is more complex as some of the followup posts suggest (screening ADDS to upfront costs, and the cost of monitoring diseases that have very little outcome change due to treatment, etc.)
To be honest, my hospital is pretty agnostic as a whole. I mean, they use established technologies that will work and be cheap whatever the methodology -- on the whole we use Exchange server for mail, Microsoft IIS or Apache for the web (weird combo, split down the center), and Citrix for Windows apps on desktops (good idea for keeping the desktop OS independent, and easily allowing VPN access regardless of platform.)
The majority of clinical apps were developed for Windows without any open source. There are two prominent projects here, though, both in patient records, that are being developed for Linux platform, and right now run using Cygwin/X, which I am involved in. Despite this as of now, I really don't see our hospital being a leader in open source adoption simply because it is often easier and quicker to buy things that can get you up and running in a hurry (Linux STILL does not have an integrated corporate mail/scheduling system that rivals Exchange server, as much as I hate its proprietary MAPI crap.)
IMHO corporations that have IT as a support to their operations that are far from IT itself will have very limited interest in developing technology per se. They just want something that works adequately and works fast, without too much cost to themselves. Until open source can provide a framework that gets them up and running with a cost that is less than M$ or whatever corporate supplier, or until there are *clear* understandable benefits to open source, it won't be used widely.
>...Until they have to write their master's thesis with tons of tables, a dynamic table of contents, and more formatting
.doc format, but for some reason damned impossible to open with openoffice due to weird placement of a column that obscures the name. Very annoying. However, she is using this to write the text portion of her dissertation, nothing fancy. When it comes time to format she can use the school lab computers if needed, keeping the file on a backed-up pendrive.
>sections than you can shake 116 pages of stick at...
Agreed -- anybody that has used any semi-advanced feature such as Excel's pivot-tables (OO's data-pilot) will tell you that the frustration factor is high with both, but MUCH higher with openoffice. My hospital sends me schedules that are in
>Has she just started using computers in the past 2 weeks? Because I'm pretty frightened if she had trouble with the
>absolute most basic functions.
>Does she have trouble driving blue cars as well? Because she is used to red and yellow ones.
Uh, dude, this is why you don't have a girlfriend. Most girls I know want to fiddle with computers as much as you would want to spend 2 hours talking about nuances of interior design. Seriously though, she just didn't scroll down in the Save As drop-down far enough... I told her that it is in there somewhere and she then found it on her own. In her mind she was thinking "different program = different filetype" which I find many non-computer people do, and was ready to give up at the drop of a hat, as many people also do. There is a good post about default file formats above, but I agree with this defaulting to an open standard. Heh, remember when it was hard to transfer files between a PC and a Mac?
The funny thing is, after you push the software on somebody and allow them to reap the rewards, they are incredulous. It undermines the concept of "fairness" that they have learned as you state above.
.doc format, and she was astounded. She is converted, and introduced 4 of her friends, all students, to openoffice.
My girlfriend was about to shell out several hundred dollars for Word on her new Mac. I introduced her to openoffice, but she couldn't figure out how to save files, and said "it uses incompatible format, I have to buy the Word."
I showed her how to save in
Viral marketing can work, and old learned prejudices can be overcome...
Nothing new, and basic psychology. This has been proposed before, even on Slashdot many times in many posts.
It is also the explanation behind fraternity rites / hazing and various initiation procedures to clubs. No pain == no value in many people's eyes.
You could almost look at defense of Microsoft as a form of the Stockholm syndrome.
Very interesting thesis of this post. In my line of work (health care) there is a lot of in-house development of patient care record systems, as there is not a dominant standard at this time.
I've found the following:
- You get smarter, more resourceful people when they are not MSCE drones, but actually programmers that are able to solve a problem, not just relay it up the chain or find the checkbox in the configuration GUI.
- There is much less waste in a way, and more in another way. Specifically, implementing a solution often involves talking to a single person about a problem with the database, not finding the "Oracle consultant guy" who then can talk to the "Microsoft guy." With a department that has its own development, these things seem to go faster and there is less separation of functions.
- However, many hospitals / organizations duplicate functionality, which is the "more waste" that I talk about. I mean, many, many businesses are the same and need email / web server setups plus a few business-specific apps. This is all duplicated by each organization. Training a consultant is even more globally efficient in this regard, who can take his expertise and start multiple implementations without (expensive) retraining.
Overall, I think this is great news for smart people going into IT. You will be sought after to lead a company department, and all of those license fees can now contribute to your salary + additional savings for the company. Would you rather earn $x from being a MSCE admin, or $5x managing a vertical open-source system with much more intellectual stimulation? I'd take the latter.
No, no, no.
>Your arguments are also not exactly indicative of a healthy scientific mindset; you even admitted spending almost
>no time on it, and yet from that you boldly asserted that it is absolutely impossible that there might be any
>differences between this and a pacemaker. There are many differences that could lead to increased potential for
>cancer.
Please calm down. Being rational is often a very good thing:
>You are implying that nobody is ever allowed to get angry about anything because it denotes instability.
Getting angry about a quite mild post on an internet forum is excessive IMHO. I'm not angry, and I do not think he should be either. This has nothing to do with "nobody is ever allowed to get angry about anything." If I hurt his sister, yes, he could and should get angry.
I didn't do anything very emotionally charged -- the thing I find most disturbing is that he clearly confused saying "I don't see any way this should cause cancer" == "advocacy for a product" and came out with a bunch of personal attacks. For the record, I don't think RFID implantation is a good idea at all. I also don't see any way they could cause cancer. Saying "Obama does not beat his wife" does not mean "I am going to vote for him," even though many people get hot and bothered by any defense of something unpopular in the local group.
>you even admitted spending almost no time on it
This is what I do for a living. I spend a LOT of time on related questions. If I ask a engineer if there is any way that using changing amounts of carbon in steel formation could lead to premature failure, he could spend almost no time on it, and his thoughts would be much, much more valid than any of mine.
>boldly asserted that it is absolutely impossible that there might be any differences between this and a pacemaker.
"boldly asserted that it is absolutely impossible." Where did I do this? I'm again surprised at the lack of rationality of this statement, SmallFurry/dustmite. Please read up on rhetoric and straw man arguments. I even clearly stated that I spent almost no time on it, as above. If implantation of a general subcutaneous device led to appreciable rises in cancer, I should know about it from multiple studies looking at outcomes of generally implanted devices, which I am intimately familiar with. You make the same incorrect arguments as the person above.
I am confused by your vitriol and scattered arguments. I posted AC while finished tasks and during downtime on call at the hospital, and really can't figure out why you post this crazy response.
>First there is the ethical difference, a pacemaker makes a sick person better. A RFID capsule is NOT medicine.
I never claimed that they were ethically the same. Maybe you should re-read my post. I'm not signing anybody up, or recommending that they get RFID implants. I am also not personally or professionally in favor of a number of things like this (tattoos, extraneous piercings), but I do feel obliged to provide factual information (or at least information best supported by the scientific process) if I can.
>First do no harm, ever heard that?
Unrelated ad hominem arguments, ever heard that?
>Second, the pacemaker is not injected into tissue but rather implanted in the body. The cancer is claimed to be
>caused be the tissue surrounding it becoming inflamed.
You obviously do not understand how a pacemaker is implanted from your statements. Most of the time they rest in the subcutaneous space, exactly where a RFID device can be implanted.
>There is a huge difference between implanting a device in a person via surgery who would otherwise die and
>injecting a device into healthy tissue into a person who has got nothing wrong with them. If you can't see that,
>you suck as a doctor and for that matter as a human being.
WTH? This is just sad. I feel sorry that you have clearly been experiencing a hard life, but insulting other people will not make it better. You are simply a disgrace. It is a shame that users such as this pollute the internet -- well reasoned responses are drowned by a series of silly posts and drive intelligent people from the forum. Back in the 1980s, USENET was a heaven for university professors, intellectuals, and engineers. Now it is eternal september.
As I said, the coating of the RFID implant would primarily determine how it is received by the body -- usually foreign objects are "walled off" by fibroblasts and become ensheathed in a fibrous capusle. While any increased cell replication poses risks of cancerous transformation, this, to me, would not be excessive, and less than a standard pacemaker.
I know what you are saying, and agree with you to a large extent, but as a former 6502 hacker I am not sure you understand what you are talking about.
//e depended on nuances of a combination of hardware and software not just software. Disk reading routines were able to be controlled in software -- copy protected games would not include standard apple "DOS" but essentially invent their own disk reading routines. In order to copy a disk, you would have to get extra memory, try to load the program into it using its own disk reading routine, find the starting location of the program, remap this into a format that could fit on a normal disk, and then save it back to a disk (using a standard DOS loaded into your extra memory.) Some methods of protection altered the write timing cycles on the disk, varying sector timing / size, etc. In general you would need, to unprotect disks, a hardware-modified //e with extra memory.
.dsk image, and thus would be most likely lost as the original magnetic media fades -- an emulator built to emulate the nuances of the hardware would probably never be built, as even getting a method to accurately read some standardized format of the original magnetic media would be difficult / impossible. Thus the original article writer's statement is correct, whether he knew the details or not...
The majority of the copy protection routines on the Apple
Something that changes the read/write timing of a disk would be very, very difficult to emulate correctly, 100% of the time. A good fraction of copy-protected files could not even be made into a standard
Was going to mod you up, but I'll reply instead (sorry!).
/usr/local? Well, go to "File System" first so you can then access your root.
I completely agree.
The GNOME filechooser is an abomination. It is one of the reasons that Linus Torvalds uses KDE, and the reason that no sane person will touch GNOME.
1. COMPLETELY unintuitive (and difficult to get used to) initial layout. Instead of having an area with the file name that you can type in, there is simply a three-panel directory. What happens if you start typing? Some weird mystery box appears that is right on top of your filter dialog, which is unlabeled!
Want to type part of the filename? Go ahead, but as soon as you make a selection to change to a different directory, it is gone! What's more, if you were in a Save dialog, the default value is now gone forever.
2. The CANCEL and OK buttons are reversed from almost all other GUIs. Cancel to the left? Cancel above OK? What???
3. Windows-like distrust of any other directories other than your home. Want to save something in
Numerous other issues (resize behavior -- the whole dialog moves if you change file type), etc. prevent me from using this, EVER.
For those linux readers using firefox, a simple fix is to go to about:config and change ui.allow.platform.filepicker to FALSE. Do it now, for your own sanity.
No worries, you can use alien to listen to the songs. They will just be scattered across your system in really weird directories.
This technology has been around at least since I've been in medical school, so probably > 8 years. Capsule endoscopy is quite well developed, and I really wish that the Science Daily people would do a bit more research to put "new" events in perspective.
The one in the article sounds as though there is a tether and can be manipulated back and forth. I don't have any experience with this one. The systems I saw were like this or this and were passively mobilized by small intestine movement, just as your body would move food. The person undergoing the study would wear a vest with an embedded antenna, which would receive the images and store it on a hard drive attached.
After images were obtained, we could review the film either on still frames or "animation". It looked like driving through the intestine -- kind of like a very bizarre EPCOT center ride.
A couple notes that are very important:
- As with all medical technology, it must be validated before being trusted too much. Direct visualization endoscopy is the "gold standard," and this is being tested against that. Even still, don't get too excited, as most diagnosis is followed by a treatment, so if anything suspicious is found you'll probably need the real endoscopy for a better look / resection of polyps, etc.
- With the system at my hospital, the patient would get a $100 rebate if they... um... returned the device. Believe it or not, a lot of people did not. (maybe I'm just too desensitized, or not wealthy enough, but that seems like easy money.)
We had a very interesting case where one guy's images *all of a sudden* switched to a different part of the colon, and then went back again. It was really weird -- until we found another patient that had the *same thing*, with similar images.
It turned out that the two patients were talking about their common procedure in the parking lot after they left our office. They stood close enough together that the pill wireless cameras started recording each other's images. They now have a unique identifier in most systems.
to offer 'integrated' batteries into devices.
Imagine what a recall of the iPod or Macbook Air battery would do to Apple's share price.
(Now smile to yourself, quietly.)
Agreed -- definite deal breaker for me as well. The battery is ALWAYS the first thing that dies in my laptop -- I would like it to be a $40 replacement part, not something that I need a screwdriver for, or (even worse) mail my machine back to Apple.
I have never gotten more than a hundred charges or so from my battery without noticing definite decrease in capacity -- these are not deep charges, and if you use the battery every day, that is quite a few replacements over the life of the machine...
I had a girlfriend once whose physical shape was AWESOME, but her acoustic shape was terrible. Believe me, you don't ever want to be in that situation. Now, the ones that are nearly spherical are easily identified from a distance, and I tend to stay away from them.
It depends on what type of job you want, and how good you want to be. Really, it does, and the answer is not simple.
I really feel it is best to concentrate in core subjects during college. It is trite, but nobody cares if you know high level language X, be it Java, Python, Ruby, etc. This will change. Knowing how to program, that is a skill that will never go out of date.
I do most of my programming in a very scientific environment, which requires MATLAB for "quick and dirty" computations, but I have also written elaborate C programs when needed for speed (up to 15 times as fast as interpreted MATLAB code despite the claims of optimizations.)
If I were you, I would learn C in and out, through and through. It will guarantee you skills that you will use for the rest of your life, and you will never be an idiot. The way to best do this is to write moderate sized programs in C. I would take as many high level courses in the college environment as possible, preferably one on Operating Systems, which are some of the most complex programming environments and concepts that you will be exposed to. If you are truly into CS theory, then high level mathematics courses are favorable.
What to program, you ask? Why, the standard lot. Here are some of the coding projects we were given in college.
Hello, World (just kidding.)
The game of life.
The game of animals (teaching navigation of link lists, etc.)
Make a program that plays Connect 4 against you. (basic algorithmic concepts, basic "AI")
Make the above program graphical, for fun (GUI / display concepts).
Write a program that implements the Zip algorithm (Huffman encoding -- not as hard as you'd think.)
If these are too basic for you in C, then I'd try to understand a bit of the linux kernel, or get involved in an open source project. Good luck!
Yes, I have heard stuff like this repeated a lot too. This may be true, but I do not think that it is all the politician's fault. I think it is partly the fact that the population of the USA was probably a fraction (~120 million) of what it is today. It is simply not reasonable to have any contact with any meaningful fraction of your electorate. I think the candidates DO, given their security and time limitations, make an effort to go out there and shake people's hands.
:p
Think about your state -- this is probably analogous to the USA quite a while ago. I have shaken my state governor's hand (I went to Boys' state) and got to talk to him a bit. I dated a girl from a small country in Europe, and she had met their president numerous times (and he knew her father by first name). It is partly just a function of the US becoming very large that this is not possible.
P.S. Back when Slashdot was starting, me and 'Taco were really tight, PM'ing every night, but now he doesn't even answer the emails I send to him...
Yes, very true regarding the isolation. Additionally, planes' rigorous inspection and freedom from interference allows planes to be fly-by-wire, but we do not have this luxury with cars yet...
No production car has a total steer-by-wire system yet; every car still has an absolute mechanical linkage between the steering column and the wheels. A LOT of manufacturers have been looking into alternatives -- BMW in particular (I know this car manufacturer the best) has some completely "steer-by-wire" systems are in concept cars. They have a hybrid system currently called "active steer" since '04, which I think all BMWs have, which basically increases the angle to the wheels at lower speeds.
Numerous cars now have complete "throttle-by-wire", present in BMWs though since about 2004, so there is no mechanical gas pedal linkage, and this is now relatively common, but not universal among cars. Apparently there were some complaints about it early, but now the programming is very similar to the mechanical linkage. If you lose your throttle control due to a computer malfunction, it is simply not as bad as completely losing your steering.
For some really good articles on the issues involved, check out:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb078/is_200311/ai_hibm1G1110736640
http://www.autofieldguide.com/columns/1103pb.html
And some guy's Stanford Ph.D. thesis -- actually a pretty good read, summarizing issues nicely.
http://www-cdr.stanford.edu/dynamic/bywire/dissertation.pdf
http://auto.howstuffworks.com/steering5.htm
I think your tones are off. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DTMF
It was never that really hot information... There were commercially available wristwatches that would dial the phone for you by holding it up to the phone, etc.
As a prank, when I was in grade school, circa 1990, a friend and I made a BASIC program on our school IBM's that would give a fake login screen that would "allow" you via simple commands to "dial FBI" completely with realistic "modem" dialtone and carrier tones. It would be hilarious to watch some of the other students get so excited to type "help", then a few silly commands, and finally "DIAL FBI" and get carried away to see an ASCII art warning screen we drew up. The best thing was, after they "logged in" they would get dropped, and never tell the teachers what was going on because of their "illegal" activity. Those sneaky kids!
I forgot where we got the tone listing, but I think it was in a book in the school library. It was amazingly realistic when played on the speaker.
As for whistling to dial, it is a myth as far as I know. A person can whistle 2600; it is not that hard. I hate how mythical powers get embodied to people that exploited lame design and in band signaling by the phone companies. To whistle to dial is impossible, because multiple tones are required.
I have always wondered about this. I am sure that I am *not* in the minority, but I am planning on getting a Macbook pro when my current laptop (Thinkpad) dies or becomes horribly obsolete. It seems to me that the switch from Vista debacles or attraction to Macs will take 3-5 years as the PC upgrade cycle lengthens, and the fact that Macs seem very prominent "on the net" may translate to more presence as new users / young people buy their first computer, or as others upgrade.
Simply put, your "feeling" may mean very well for the future of Apple. I might join, *despite* the cult atmosphere.
On the related note, the decline in the legendary Thinkpad was instrumental in my plan to switch. I run Linux exclusively now, but look at the build quality difference between the T43 and T60 as Lenovo took over IBM thinkpad development. Sad.
Meanwhile, the Macbooks look sleek and well designed...
It's a shame that the x86 is such a complex instruction set; this means that the age of the handheld computer as an easy programming platform for hacking is over.
//e, I had a good majority of the opcodes for the 6502 chip memorized, laying out assembly by hand. I later learned 68k assembly, and again, it is very "understandable" to a person just sitting down in front of the computer looking at an assembly printout. In the early 90's, pretty much x86 dominated and I stopped doing pretty much all assembly programming.
:)
When I was programming for Apple
In 1996 I was delighted when the palm pilot came out, using a 68328 (68k instruction set). It was like a renaissance, again programming in assembly and hacking other things for fun. Now, once again, it appears this will be dead!
As a question to the slashdot community, is it possible to program "naked" x86 assembler? I have never really put in the time to learn it, but it just seems exceedingly complex and tedious to program for this chip without use of a higher level crutch (C compiler...) I am sad that once again everything I know is becoming outdated...
>Part of the problem is that brake lights themselves only have "on" and "off" modes. They could be designed to convey so
>much more information than that...
Very good idea. BMW (and Mercedes IIRC) have exactly this technology if you own one or have driven behind one. They call it "Adaptive brake lights" (Mercedes has its own trade name.) Google it for more info.
Basically with light braking one red bar lights up, and with hard braking there is two red bars with a white bar too. It is easily noticeable if you ever see it in action.
FWIW, car companies have been pretty response to stuff like this, but driving habits are difficult to change. I wish the US would go on a public education campaign against idiot driving habits, which are for some reason generally accepted. To me, it is as bad as drunk driving.