That was for February only. It came and it passed, and there have been few updates released. Conclusion: MS Developers got bored fixing bugs on Febrary 1st, and so they decided to play pin the tail on Bill for the rest of the month.
What happens if fission powered rockets crash? Instant nuclear disaster, unless the containment vessel holds (and it might, but the public will not be convinced it would).
That's why they'd probably shuttle the rocket parts separately, particularly the nuclear core. Just as a nuclear missle is a dud without it's warhread, a nuclear rocket would not very dangerous without it's fuel.
Ah, wasn't sure if WA had state tax - my mistake. I guess that begs the question of whether or not they should just add a state income tax rather than singling out software companies.
Software creation requires mainly man-hours, and since employees already pay state income taxes I'd think the state already recieves their share and doesn't have the right to double-tax for intellectual work.
Nothing I've seen in any of the existing trailers has convinced me otherwise yet. It has the same icky psuedo-realistic CGI look to it, the same bland acting. The only redeming qualities I can foresee is Boba Fett's father which could make for some interesting fight scenes, and of course Portman who looks stunning as always. Other than that it's gonna be a rehash of the eye-candy-plotless filmmaking that Lucas seems to enjoy making now.
This time around I'm certainly not going to go to any lengths to see it on opening day. Maybe 3 weeks after opening day when everyone's had their turn at blasting the movie I'll catch a Monday matinee to see it.
Companies send junk mail to us because it's a proven way to get people to buy stuff. It obviously generates enough response for it to be profitable business. And I have to wonder about that small portion of the population that actually buys into all the crap - I see them as the problem, not the businesses. If nobody responded to it, and the companies made no money from it then we would eventually see this type of marketing go away.
We should educate the population and make them realize that they are responsible for making junk mail so popular.
Re:complexity of supercomputers approaching brain
on
Arguing A.I.
·
· Score: 2, Informative
"the brain is not digital, it's analog"
IANAE (i am not an expert) but I do not think it is entirely proper to say the brain is analog. Not all things in nature are analog or random at all (DNA for example). The network of synapses behave in a digital matter. The signals that travel on it, and the particular path they take could be considered analog. So it's a fuzzy middle ground that no one can really explain yet.
... where your character is an Islamic fundamentalist and your goal is to hijack 747's and blow up buildings. The game would be very realistic: you have to break through the cockpit door and slit the throats of the pilots with lightning fast game controller speed, shoot down opposing F18's while you fly the airplane into your choice of skyscrapers, and trigger well placed bombs to kill as many innocent people as possible.
I'm sure GTA3 is fun (GTA1 certainly was). And an airplane hijacking game might have sounded like a lot fun game before September 11th as well.
I agree that banning a game is not a correct solution - even if such a game as this existed. I believe video games should be classified as any other form of art (film, paintings, photography), and laws should be made to ensure that any video game cannot be declared illegal no matter it's content. I have no problems with certain games being only sold to those over 21, but prohibition on video games in the name of "saving the children" is a weak argument.
I agree. Comcast is the cable provider in the Baltimore area, and the Comcast@Home service I've had from them has been nothing short of fantastic. It's very reliable and the speed is satisfactory (can never have enough). Seriously, the connection has only gone down once during prime time for 2 hours in the past year (no kidding), and once in a blue moon it'll go offline at 4am presumably for maintainance which I can accept unless I'm in the middle of a late night game of Quake.
My IP address recently switched for the first time which caused some confusion for a while until I realized it. But I am concerned that that my network address is still on.home.com - so I pray that we Comcast subscribers won't go dark tomorrow.
>"screens" that we could flip through and even >drag down to peek at the one behind.
Enlightenment can be configured to use virtual desktops in this manner (You would still have to manually maximize the windows though). I was never fond of it because I prefer to use the window pager to flip between windows.
I read on Anandtech.com (September Cooler roundup) there is a Zalman (sp?) fan that has the option of running in noiseless (passive) mode. It wouldn't be enough to cool an Athlon, but perhaps the Pentium 4 1.4Ghz would be stable with it.
The problem is it's really difficult to purposely play poorly in Quake3. If your opponent is a newbie it's nearly impossible to play against them without making it appear as though you are mocking them. And all this will do is make the girl not want to play you at anything because you're "too good".
Better to find a non-FPS game, like that Worms game - it would be perfect.
In recent years, I owned 2 Fujitsu drives, a 2gb and a 6gb both of which were toast in about 2 years. I switched to Western Digital, own a 20gb that's been running smooth for 3 years now, a 30 gb for 1 year. I just got the WD 7200rpm 80gb a few weeks ago so I can't vouch for that one.
So until I have some major catastrophy with all these WD drives I'm gonna be loyal to them - with the except that I'm gonna try the Seagate Barricuda 4 soon for it's low-noise characterstic.
I know, I've been through it. Creativity and the desire to work on open source software is what comes from having a boring and/or restrictive full time job. All day long you do work for someone else, and meanwhile can't wait to go home and do work on something you really want to do.
But when you loss the foundation of stable but boring work you also loose that energy and drive that was put into an open source project.
When you don't have a regular routine, and a stable lifestyle, coding stuff for free just isn't a priority anymore.
$449 is a ridiculous amount of money to spend on tiny plastic speakers with 2inch woofers. IMO surround sound on a computer is kind of a waste of money - they're only good for games, and where would you mount the rear speakers? on stands? by your desk?
These are the only computer speakers I would recommend:
Swans M200 multimedia speakers for $300:
http://www.av123.com/divaproducts.html
These are real bookshelf speakers with 5" woofers and soft dome tweeter (easier on your ears). The frequency response is 55Hz-18kHz which means they have enough bass as to not require a bass module.
Another option that you should consider is getting a small stereo - non amplified speakers, and a small integrated amplifier or stereo reciever. This opens up a lot more possibilities.
It's a piece of ****. I moved in with a roommate who was using one of these for the home network (cable). He thought it worked fine, but he isn't a gamer. When I started doing some tests I realized a major problem with it. It's nearly impossible to play online games with this router - not kidding. My guess is that it does not support network packets over a certain size OR it just doesn't have the throughput to support gaming.
I got a linux box up front now with the 2.4 kernel (a bit of a pain to get that patched up for a proper masqed firewall) - but the result is 100% improvement over the Linksys.
I can confirm other reports that the Linksys router is a bit unstable. It goes offline quite often, without a reason. At one point the router refused to connect to the cable modem service for over half an hour, I got fed up, put my linux box up front, and the connection was fine.
Don't wast your money on these toys - they are not for serious networking, it is a solution for simple connection sharing for computer novices. If you know how to use Linux you'll have considerably better results with a 486 or low end pentium, with 2 network cards and a hub.
Afaik base jumping chutes are essentially already open, they throw a mini-chute as they leave the edge of a cliff and this pulls out the rest of the chute. It's approximately equal to how Airborn Infantry men parachute out of an airplane - the chute is opened as soon as they leave the plane. The trigger in a parachute used for free fall skydiving is not the same.
Of course it doesn't mean that I wouldn't check my parachute once in a while.
Base Jumping
on
More WTC News
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I swear, if I ever work in a tall building like the towers I am going to learn to base jump. I'm going to keep a parachute under my desk in the event this (or even just a bad fire) ever happens to me.
It's very likley that none of the people on these planes had any clue that the hijackers were going to deliberatly crash the plane (especially not into a large building with lots of people). Think about it - do you really believe that the hijackers would take control of the plane, and then over the PA announce to everyone "We're going to crash the plane now, so buckle up please". That would have encouraged the people to attack them.
It's much more likely that they assumed control of the plane and yelled "don't try to be a hero and you'll get out of this alive". If I were a kamakazi hijacker, that's exactly what I'd say.
I bet everyone in the planes were more concerned with not getting themselves shot/stabbed and that they'd get through it alive.
As far as I understand they wrote a custom GUI lib to replace X Windows (which is old, slow, etc), not to replace GUI toolkits ala GTK/QT. From the site, it says Qt does in fact run under the AtheOS GUI. That doesn't mean KDE (and KDE software) will work, but it's probably not out of the scope of possibility for the OS.
After reading the article I can only fathom an image in my mind of Bill Gates, sitting alone in a dark office laughing maniacally as he types page after page...
"All competition, innovation, assimilation, and no play make Bill a dull boy. All competition, innovation, assimilation, and no play make Bill a dull boy...."
Slashdot Mirror
That was for February only. It came and it passed, and there have been few updates released. Conclusion: MS Developers got bored fixing bugs on Febrary 1st, and so they decided to play pin the tail on Bill for the rest of the month.
That's why they'd probably shuttle the rocket parts separately, particularly the nuclear core. Just as a nuclear missle is a dud without it's warhread, a nuclear rocket would not very dangerous without it's fuel.
Ah, wasn't sure if WA had state tax - my mistake. I guess that begs the question of whether or not they should just add a state income tax rather than singling out software companies.
Software creation requires mainly man-hours, and since employees already pay state income taxes I'd think the state already recieves their share and doesn't have the right to double-tax for intellectual work.
Nothing I've seen in any of the existing trailers has convinced me otherwise yet. It has the same icky psuedo-realistic CGI look to it, the same bland acting. The only redeming qualities I can foresee is Boba Fett's father which could make for some interesting fight scenes, and of course Portman who looks stunning as always. Other than that it's gonna be a rehash of the eye-candy-plotless filmmaking that Lucas seems to enjoy making now.
This time around I'm certainly not going to go to any lengths to see it on opening day. Maybe 3 weeks after opening day when everyone's had their turn at blasting the movie I'll catch a Monday matinee to see it.
Whatever a big mac combo costs now, it will cost between 2 and 5 cents more next year. It has been rising by this range every year I can remember.
They just realized that they were looking at the photographs upside down :)
Companies send junk mail to us because it's a proven way to get people to buy stuff. It obviously generates enough response for it to be profitable business. And I have to wonder about that small portion of the population that actually buys into all the crap - I see them as the problem, not the businesses. If nobody responded to it, and the companies made no money from it then we would eventually see this type of marketing go away.
We should educate the population and make them realize that they are responsible for making junk mail so popular.
"the brain is not digital, it's analog"
IANAE (i am not an expert) but I do not think it is entirely proper to say the brain is analog. Not all things in nature are analog or random at all (DNA for example). The network of synapses behave in a digital matter. The signals that travel on it, and the particular path they take could be considered analog. So it's a fuzzy middle ground that no one can really explain yet.
... where your character is an Islamic fundamentalist and your goal is to hijack 747's and blow up buildings. The game would be very realistic: you have to break through the cockpit door and slit the throats of the pilots with lightning fast game controller speed, shoot down opposing F18's while you fly the airplane into your choice of skyscrapers, and trigger well placed bombs to kill as many innocent people as possible.
I'm sure GTA3 is fun (GTA1 certainly was). And an airplane hijacking game might have sounded like a lot fun game before September 11th as well.
I agree that banning a game is not a correct solution - even if such a game as this existed. I believe video games should be classified as any other form of art (film, paintings, photography), and laws should be made to ensure that any video game cannot be declared illegal no matter it's content. I have no problems with certain games being only sold to those over 21, but prohibition on video games in the name of "saving the children" is a weak argument.
I agree. Comcast is the cable provider in the Baltimore area, and the Comcast@Home service I've had from them has been nothing short of fantastic. It's very reliable and the speed is satisfactory (can never have enough). Seriously, the connection has only gone down once during prime time for 2 hours in the past year (no kidding), and once in a blue moon it'll go offline at 4am presumably for maintainance which I can accept unless I'm in the middle of a late night game of Quake.
.home.com - so I pray that we Comcast subscribers won't go dark tomorrow.
My IP address recently switched for the first time which caused some confusion for a while until I realized it. But I am concerned that that my network address is still on
>"screens" that we could flip through and even >drag down to peek at the one behind.
Enlightenment can be configured to use virtual desktops in this manner (You would still have to manually maximize the windows though). I was never fond of it because I prefer to use the window pager to flip between windows.
Refer to the slashdot article about it:4 6&mode=thread
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/14/13182
I'd rather just purchase that, and be able to install it in my choice of distribution.
Sorry I meant passive heatsink, the fan is an option. Gotta stop drinking beer when posting...
2 2
Here is the article:
http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.html?i=1532&p=
I read on Anandtech.com (September Cooler roundup) there is a Zalman (sp?) fan that has the option of running in noiseless (passive) mode. It wouldn't be enough to cool an Athlon, but perhaps the Pentium 4 1.4Ghz would be stable with it.
The problem is it's really difficult to purposely play poorly in Quake3. If your opponent is a newbie it's nearly impossible to play against them without making it appear as though you are mocking them. And all this will do is make the girl not want to play you at anything because you're "too good".
Better to find a non-FPS game, like that Worms game - it would be perfect.
In recent years, I owned 2 Fujitsu drives, a 2gb and a 6gb both of which were toast in about 2 years. I switched to Western Digital, own a 20gb that's been running smooth for 3 years now, a 30 gb for 1 year. I just got the WD 7200rpm 80gb a few weeks ago so I can't vouch for that one.
So until I have some major catastrophy with all these WD drives I'm gonna be loyal to them - with the except that I'm gonna try the Seagate Barricuda 4 soon for it's low-noise characterstic.
I know, I've been through it. Creativity and the desire to work on open source software is what comes from having a boring and/or restrictive full time job. All day long you do work for someone else, and meanwhile can't wait to go home and do work on something you really want to do.
But when you loss the foundation of stable but boring work you also loose that energy and drive that was put into an open source project.
When you don't have a regular routine, and a stable lifestyle, coding stuff for free just isn't a priority anymore.
$449 is a ridiculous amount of money to spend on tiny plastic speakers with 2inch woofers. IMO surround sound on a computer is kind of a waste of money - they're only good for games, and where would you mount the rear speakers? on stands? by your desk?
These are the only computer speakers I would recommend:
Swans M200 multimedia speakers for $300:
http://www.av123.com/divaproducts.html
These are real bookshelf speakers with 5" woofers and soft dome tweeter (easier on your ears). The frequency response is 55Hz-18kHz which means they have enough bass as to not require a bass module.
Another option that you should consider is getting a small stereo - non amplified speakers, and a small integrated amplifier or stereo reciever. This opens up a lot more possibilities.
It's a piece of ****. I moved in with a roommate who was using one of these for the home network (cable). He thought it worked fine, but he isn't a gamer. When I started doing some tests I realized a major problem with it. It's nearly impossible to play online games with this router - not kidding. My guess is that it does not support network packets over a certain size OR it just doesn't have the throughput to support gaming.
I got a linux box up front now with the 2.4 kernel (a bit of a pain to get that patched up for a proper masqed firewall) - but the result is 100% improvement over the Linksys.
I can confirm other reports that the Linksys router is a bit unstable. It goes offline quite often, without a reason. At one point the router refused to connect to the cable modem service for over half an hour, I got fed up, put my linux box up front, and the connection was fine.
Don't wast your money on these toys - they are not for serious networking, it is a solution for simple connection sharing for computer novices. If you know how to use Linux you'll have considerably better results with a 486 or low end pentium, with 2 network cards and a hub.
Afaik base jumping chutes are essentially already open, they throw a mini-chute as they leave the edge of a cliff and this pulls out the rest of the chute. It's approximately equal to how Airborn Infantry men parachute out of an airplane - the chute is opened as soon as they leave the plane. The trigger in a parachute used for free fall skydiving is not the same.
Of course it doesn't mean that I wouldn't check my parachute once in a while.
I swear, if I ever work in a tall building like the towers I am going to learn to base jump. I'm going to keep a parachute under my desk in the event this (or even just a bad fire) ever happens to me.
It's very likley that none of the people on these planes had any clue that the hijackers were going to deliberatly crash the plane (especially not into a large building with lots of people). Think about it - do you really believe that the hijackers would take control of the plane, and then over the PA announce to everyone "We're going to crash the plane now, so buckle up please". That would have encouraged the people to attack them.
It's much more likely that they assumed control of the plane and yelled "don't try to be a hero and you'll get out of this alive". If I were a kamakazi hijacker, that's exactly what I'd say.
I bet everyone in the planes were more concerned with not getting themselves shot/stabbed and that they'd get through it alive.
As far as I understand they wrote a custom GUI lib to replace X Windows (which is old, slow, etc), not to replace GUI toolkits ala GTK/QT. From the site, it says Qt does in fact run under the AtheOS GUI. That doesn't mean KDE (and KDE software) will work, but it's probably not out of the scope of possibility for the OS.
After reading the article I can only fathom an image in my mind of Bill Gates, sitting alone in a dark office laughing maniacally as he types page after page...
"All competition, innovation, assimilation, and no play make Bill a dull boy. All competition, innovation, assimilation, and no play make Bill a dull boy...."