If I recall correctly, Car & Driver did an article on the runaway Audi fiasco. They determined that in ALL production cars, the brakes (not breaks) are ALWAYS more powerful than the engine. Therefore you can ALWAYS use the brakes to stop a "runaway" car. Period. End of story. I believe Pat Bedard authored the article. Pat, are you there?
These stories are more about someone wanting to get rid of a car than any technical problem. I'll bet the owner is behind on his payments.
there is a danger that sign detection could become annoying
No kidding! Just the thought of such a system is annoying. This system totally ignores the fact that most people drive on the same roads day after day. I never look at road signs during my daily commute. What's the point; they never change. I certainly don't need or want an idiot system reading me the same damn signs everyday. I know I speed and all the drivers around me know they are speeding too.
He predicts that working systems will have overrides or variable sensitivity
The parent is a troll right? I have to respond anyway...
DB2/400 performance absolutely sucks
Yeah I started believing the propaganda too but then I did some testing of my own. Simple SQL select statements took twice as long using MYSQL as DB2/400. Throw in some scalar functions with a "group by" and MYSQL just rolled over and died. DB2/400 didn't even slow down.
WebSphere performance and management blows
I don't have experience with WebSphere but I do use Apache and Tomcat. The intranet I maintain runs both. Management is just what you would expect for any Apache/Tomcat install. The performance of Tomcat and java servlets hasn't been an issue either.
after the latest rounds of PTFs, services packs and OS upgrades have wrecked havoc on working installations
Are you sure this isn't a personal problem. I've been through three model upgrades, twice as many OS upgrades and countless PTF installs. All came off without a hitch. Total unplanned downtime in 6 years: 45 minutes.
Their RAID controllers, massive RISCs and reliable hardware are fantastic for stable servers with 24/7 uptime. But OS/400 just can't take advantage of it.
I'm not sure what a massive RISC is but that doesn't matter. The reliability of iSeries/AS400s is directly due to OS/400 so I'm not sure how OS/400 isn't taking advantage of all that great hardware. The error handling capabilities of OS/400 are a true work of art. Virtually all cards and devices can be hot swapped. Adding drives and new features (PCI cards) can be done without a reboot. Newer models include standby processors for capacity on demand and fail over capability. And OS/400 can run multiple partitions. Those partitions can be OS/400 or Linux. I just don't understand what you mean by OS/400 just can't take advantage of it
The iSeries really does Rock! To know it is to love it.
The public - Who keep insisting that the goverment provide ever more services
I don't think it is the public insisting on ever more services; it is politicians promising ever more services (whether the public needs/wants them or not) in order to get elected. Of course the politicians promise to lower taxes at the same time. The general public, but not/. readers of course, is just dumb enough to think this is actually possible.
I just got back from northern Germany which is covered up with windmills (the modern, electric generating kind, not the farming, grain grinding kind). I wonder how long it will be before France or Denmark sue to get their breeze back.
wean us off oil gradually rather than the cataclysmic reorganization we'll have when oil runs out
Running out of oil won't be a here-today-gone-tomorrow type event. There won't be anything cataclysmic about it. The supply will diminish gradually, prices will rise, and alternative energy sources will be gradually adopted as they become cheaper than oil. The transition will be driven by simple economics.
There are two issues here - exploration and discovery. The precept of the article falls solidly on the latter. The future of mankind depends on the former.
Although I don't necessarily agree that the future of mankind depends on exploration, I do believe that it is human nature (except for journalists) for man to explore. There are always more reasons to stay home than venture out, but that is not what we are made of. Columbus only thought he knew where he was going and look what he discovered along the way.
Look at how much the U.S. thought it would cost originally to get to the Moon, $10-20 billion. And you know they spent way more than that actually doing it.
Actually that estimate is pretty accurate: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/history/apollo/index.h tml
And keep in mind that number includes 6 moon landings (Apollos 11 through 17 minus 13) and 2 orbital flights (Apollo 9 was planned, Apollo 13 somewhat unplanned).
to go up against DARPA's robot army. I can't help but think of all those John Wayne westerns where a Hollywood back lot is made to look like a thousand acre ranch. I'm pretty sure similar techniques could be used to steer the robots and all their stereo vision technology right into a hydraulic crusher.
Sounds like you're stuck in a bad company, not stuck on a bad platform. I work on an AS/400 using SQL, stored procedures, JavaServer Pages, Java Beans, VB, Apache and Tomcat. It's all very cool and very reliable. (What's a blue screen? Actually we have NT/2000 servers too so I do know what blue screens are.)
If I needed to, I could partition my machine and run multiple virtual AS/400s or Linux. I could also run AIX binaries.
As for administration, anyone not running a "lights-out" AS/400 operation isn't trying hard enough. My network admin changes backup tapes everyday (I don't think he has to turn the light's on to do this) and that's pretty much it.
Slashdot Mirror
If I recall correctly, Car & Driver did an article on the runaway Audi fiasco. They determined that in ALL production cars, the brakes (not breaks) are ALWAYS more powerful than the engine. Therefore you can ALWAYS use the brakes to stop a "runaway" car. Period. End of story. I believe Pat Bedard authored the article. Pat, are you there?
These stories are more about someone wanting to get rid of a car than any technical problem. I'll bet the owner is behind on his payments.
there is a danger that sign detection could become annoying
No kidding! Just the thought of such a system is annoying. This system totally ignores the fact that most people drive on the same roads day after day. I never look at road signs during my daily commute. What's the point; they never change. I certainly don't need or want an idiot system reading me the same damn signs everyday. I know I speed and all the drivers around me know they are speeding too.
He predicts that working systems will have overrides or variable sensitivity
Like an OFF switch?
We'll run out of oil before global warming freezes us to death. Or so say the Swedes.
Off to shop for my new SUV.
The parent is a troll right? I have to respond anyway...
DB2/400 performance absolutely sucks
Yeah I started believing the propaganda too but then I did some testing of my own. Simple SQL select statements took twice as long using MYSQL as DB2/400. Throw in some scalar functions with a "group by" and MYSQL just rolled over and died. DB2/400 didn't even slow down.
WebSphere performance and management blows
I don't have experience with WebSphere but I do use Apache and Tomcat. The intranet I maintain runs both. Management is just what you would expect for any Apache/Tomcat install. The performance of Tomcat and java servlets hasn't been an issue either.
after the latest rounds of PTFs, services packs and OS upgrades have wrecked havoc on working installations
Are you sure this isn't a personal problem. I've been through three model upgrades, twice as many OS upgrades and countless PTF installs. All came off without a hitch. Total unplanned downtime in 6 years: 45 minutes.
Their RAID controllers, massive RISCs and reliable hardware are fantastic for stable servers with 24/7 uptime. But OS/400 just can't take advantage of it.
I'm not sure what a massive RISC is but that doesn't matter. The reliability of iSeries/AS400s is directly due to OS/400 so I'm not sure how OS/400 isn't taking advantage of all that great hardware. The error handling capabilities of OS/400 are a true work of art. Virtually all cards and devices can be hot swapped. Adding drives and new features (PCI cards) can be done without a reboot. Newer models include standby processors for capacity on demand and fail over capability. And OS/400 can run multiple partitions. Those partitions can be OS/400 or Linux. I just don't understand what you mean by OS/400 just can't take advantage of it
The iSeries really does Rock! To know it is to love it.
The public - Who keep insisting that the goverment provide ever more services
/. readers of course, is just dumb enough to think this is actually possible.
I don't think it is the public insisting on ever more services; it is politicians promising ever more services (whether the public needs/wants them or not) in order to get elected. Of course the politicians promise to lower taxes at the same time. The general public, but not
I just got back from northern Germany which is covered up with windmills (the modern, electric generating kind, not the farming, grain grinding kind). I wonder how long it will be before France or Denmark sue to get their breeze back.
wean us off oil gradually rather than the cataclysmic reorganization we'll have when oil runs out
Running out of oil won't be a here-today-gone-tomorrow type event. There won't be anything cataclysmic about it. The supply will diminish gradually, prices will rise, and alternative energy sources will be gradually adopted as they become cheaper than oil. The transition will be driven by simple economics.
There are two issues here - exploration and discovery. The precept of the article falls solidly on the latter. The future of mankind depends on the former.
Although I don't necessarily agree that the future of mankind depends on exploration, I do believe that it is human nature (except for journalists) for man to explore. There are always more reasons to stay home than venture out, but that is not what we are made of. Columbus only thought he knew where he was going and look what he discovered along the way.
Look at how much the U.S. thought it would cost originally to get to the Moon, $10-20 billion. And you know they spent way more than that actually doing it.
h tml
Actually that estimate is pretty accurate: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/history/apollo/index.
And keep in mind that number includes 6 moon landings (Apollos 11 through 17 minus 13) and 2 orbital flights (Apollo 9 was planned, Apollo 13 somewhat unplanned).
to go up against DARPA's robot army. I can't help but think of all those John Wayne westerns where a Hollywood back lot is made to look like a thousand acre ranch. I'm pretty sure similar techniques could be used to steer the robots and all their stereo vision technology right into a hydraulic crusher.
Because Boeing and the airlines can make a buck or two on the service.
Sounds like you're stuck in a bad company, not stuck on a bad platform. I work on an AS/400 using SQL, stored procedures, JavaServer Pages, Java Beans, VB, Apache and Tomcat. It's all very cool and very reliable. (What's a blue screen? Actually we have NT/2000 servers too so I do know what blue screens are.)
If I needed to, I could partition my machine and run multiple virtual AS/400s or Linux. I could also run AIX binaries.
As for administration, anyone not running a "lights-out" AS/400 operation isn't trying hard enough. My network admin changes backup tapes everyday (I don't think he has to turn the light's on to do this) and that's pretty much it.
What's a pop-up? pop-under?