And for all we know, it could be so blindingly inefficient that it's cost the school system hundreds of thousands or millions in wasted energy over that quarter century. See how uninformed assertions work?
I must have missed the part in my post where I commented on how efficient the system was. I was replying the the GP who stated that the HVAC systems were complex and the issue was with keeping proper temperatures in the different zones of the buildings.
If they are only having problems with the hardware, why not just put an Amiga emulator on a new computer?
It doesn't sound like they are really have any real difficulty with the computer.
FTFA:"Parts for the computer are difficult to find, Hopkins said. It is on its second mouse and third monitor."
Also FTFA:"Because they share the same frequency as our maintenance communications radios and operations maintenance radios - yes, they do interfere"
I'm guessing that they could find radios that are on a different frequency for less than 1.5 to 2 million dollars.
Apparently the student who originally programed it is still in the area and they call him when they have any issues. I hope they at least offer him the Amiga for sentimental reasons when it goes offline. I don't think there are many high-school projects, particularly on this scope, that have worked for so long. And will require over a million dollars to replace. The tax payers of Grand Rapids should thank him.
You're also going to need some way to keep the kids from screwing with them.
When I was in school the sure fire way to get us to mess with something like a thermostat was to put a lock of some kind on it. It was usually the threat of meeting with the "The Board of Education" that kept us in line. "The Board of Education" was very similar to a cricket bat with holes drilled in it that our principal kept on the wall behind his desk, which was labeled, "The Board of Education" in bright red outlined in black.
I'm guessing that between Ritalin and the constant distraction of cell phones, things like thermostats really wouldn't be noticed by students today.
Environmental control and monitoring becomes complicated when you're considering large buildings.
And yet a high-school student from the 1980's was able to engineer a system with off the shelf computers and a little ingenuity. And managed to build a system that has lasted for 25 years.
You'd think there would be some kind of checks in place that wouldn't allow the plane to operate when critical files are missing. Or that the files couldn't be deleted.
Stories like these are the reason I can't believe auto manufacturers are even considering being able to push updates to cars. The checks in place for aircraft hardware is extremely rigorous. Pretty much every nut and bolt has a complete history log. If this kind of thing can happen on an aircraft, what happens when some weird conditions occur that cause brakes to fail in an automotive update? That's a a rhetorical question. The answer is the manufacturer will deny everything and make counter accusations, and hope they can fix the problem before anyone finds out.
I'm all for moving forward with technology, but sometimes it seems we're creating more dangerous problems with our solutions.
So if someone who is keen on guns has never seen a Sterling sub machine gun
I didn't say I never saw one. Just that I've never saw in the US. I suppose that's not true though. I've seen nonfunctional ones in the US. I only ever saw ones that could be fired outside of the US. They are not very common in the US. Even at a glance they have only a similar appearance. The Sterling has a 30 round banana clip sticking out of the side. If there's no clip then the wielder may have one round chambered (at most). But that would be pretty stupid.
There are plenty of movie sci fi guns based on real weapons, and plenty of accessorised real weapons which are indistinguishable from movie sci fi guns unless you get to examine them properly. Which you don't if someone is pointing one at you.
Agreed. But how may of these mass shootings occur with collector type of guns? I'm not going to say that they never happen, as I'm sure some kid had a gun collector father that went nuts. But even then, most handguns and rifles used in these tragedies are standard hunting/"assault weapons" or standard handguns.
If you're planning to attack a school or whatever, you're not going to go buy $2K and $3K weapons to do so. And you aren't going to get a bunch of bulky heavy rifles to do so. You're sure not going to need to attach a scope or bi-pod mount to walk around shooting people with. It adds weight and is going to have a better chance of getting caught on things.
Not that any of this matters. The guy was dressed as a stormtrooper. It's pretty damn obvious he wasn't carrying a Sterling.
I can sympathize, Granted, I live in a house, so I've always just unplugged the smoke detector with the low battery. But for some reason, they always seem to do this in the middle of the night. It's annoying as hell trying to get back to sleep after you find the one that's chirping and then unplug it, remove the battery and put it someplace you won't hear it until it finally stops chirping.
Get some 10 year "smoke detector batteries" My smoke detectors are hard wired, and the batteries are only there in case of a power failure. Since smoke detectors should also be replaced every ten years, I use a permanent marker to date the battery cover and replace all detectors and batteries at the same time.
If the blaster was black plastic, would you be able to distinguish it from a real gun from 100 feet away?
I was raised around guns, and also enjoyed the original Star Wars movies when they were popular. So I'm going to say, I could distinguish between a toy and a real gun from farther away than that, even with failing eyesight. Here's a stormtrooper gun vs. a 9 mm. Which is probably going to be fairly common. How blind would you have to be to not be able to see the difference? Even if you are not very familiar with guns, you'd have to be pretty obtuse to mistake these two. If you can't tell the difference between them, then you probably wouldn't be able to distinguish a gun from a stick.
Probably the most similar weapon you'd see in the US would be a TEC-9 But even that would be pretty hard to confuse with a toy blaster. Quite honestly, someone would probably have a better chance of hitting you by throwing the toy at you than hitting you with a TEC-9, unless you are less then a few inches from the barrel, and it doesn't jam.
Apparently the Stormtrooper blaster is based off of the Sterling L2A3 But the toy has a lot of extra crap attached to it, so you'd have to be pretty far to mistake the two. Plus, I can't say I've ever seen a Sterling L2A3 in the US. I doubt many people in the US, other than serious gun collectors, have ever seen one.
guess I'll just have to wait another 30 odd years for another one
That will be an exciting movie. Jeff Bridges and Bruce Boxleitner will be in their mid nineties. They can do battle with the MCP pushing around their "light-walkers" and tell the younger cast how their identity disks were the size of a Frisbee instead of these new dime sized ones.
The entire plot will end up being them trying to get their stolen identity disk back from the evil megabit or something. But then they discover that they accidentally used it in a soda machine by mistake. Everyone will get a good laugh out of it. Then when they return to the real world, it'll be completely destroyed because of a decompression error that will cause their oxygen tanks to explode upon materialization.
I think everyone understands that. How else could it possibly work?
I think you give nontechnical people more credit than you should. I guarantee there are two people out there right now discussing what happens to their pictures if it rains. One of them probably has an MBA.
Basically, China is focused on annexing as much as they can and claiming they've always had it.
Because China apparently thrives on that sort of thing.
So, fall behind China on the space race at your own peril, or you'll find they've annexed the entire moon.
China believes it can make up any rules it wants. Because China's leaders are batshit crazy, and China's citizens have been kept in the dark so long they don't know what happened at Tiananmen Square.
Love the Chinese people. Hate the Chinese government.
Basically, the US is focused on controlling as much as they can and claiming they've always had it.
Because US apparently thrives on that sort of thing.
So, fall behind the US on the arms race at your own peril, or you'll find they've policed the entire earth.
The US believes it can make up any rules it wants. Because the USA's leaders are batshit crazy, and US citizens have been kept in the dark so long they don't know what happened at Tiananmen Square, or any number of other issues.
Love the US people. Hate the US government.
See how much fun generalizations can be?
Don't get me wrong, I'm from the US and love my country. But our government is so far off the rails at this point, train wreck doesn't even begin to describe it. I also have friends from and in China. The bullshit propaganda their government tells them lines up with the truth about as much as what ours tells us about China.
Cool. I can't wait until this fall when it's time to update my company laptop. My current Dell Precision M6600 was about twice that when I got it two and a half years ago. I think the upgrade to the Nvidia Quadro 3000M w 2GB of RAM was about $800 of it.
The CPU is only a tenth of a GHz faster on this model than the one I currently have, and I have 20 GB of faster RAM along with a 256GB Samsung 840 Pro and a 750 GB spinning disk. 1080X1920 was the highest resolution I could get at the time, but I think the built in screen is 17". The higher resolution would be a really nice improvement.
The newer one weighs less than half of the one I have now. But I'd be curious what the weight of the power transformer is. On my current system it is about the size of a clay brick and probably weighs close to 2 lbs. I can get about 2 hours out of the battery with no real power reduction crippling the system. Probably 3.5 to 4 under the most favorable conditions. So 9 hours would be a big improvement too.
I'll have to wait to see if Windows 10 is worth bothering with though. I suppose I could always install Windows 7 from the recovery disks that came with my current system.
Just because she said one thing and did another doesn't make that a lie. It could be that the facts changed.
That's a good one. It didn't work out so well for George W. Bush when the facts changed.
Of course you Republicans are so full of hate that you stop thinking logically.
Democrats, Republicans, you're all so full of hatred for each other you're not only illogical, you're blind and stupid too.
I'm old enough to remember when universal healthcare was a Republican goal. The Democrats claimed it would be the end of America. Funny how the roles have reversed.
Of course that's the beauty of the internet. It's been around long enough that you can find videos of just about any politician whose been in office long enough vehemently claiming the exact opposite of what they so strongly state they believe now. But you just keep blindly believing whatever your "team" in the blue or red uniforms keeps telling you to think. It's easier that way I suppose.
The Continental Army fought in uniform, under the command of officers,
Indeed, for the most part the Continental Army did. That's why I stated "particularly the militia". Many refused to wear uniforms, and not lining up in formation was considered pretty unconventional back then.
Perception may be a different animal
Which was my entire point. Can you imagine how the history books would have been written if the British won that war? I don't think it would have been very kind to the Continental army, and in particular to the militia.
terrorist scum that ignore every rule of civilized warfare.
I wonder if that's what the British thought about the guerrilla tactics of the Continental army, particularly the militia. Don't get me wrong, I'm no supporter of terrorists, but I do find it interesting how one mans valiant freedom fighter is another mans dishonorable terrorist.
You stagger the ones with the smoke ahead of the warhead by a half mile or so and create a column of smoke for it to pass through. I can't say I gave it much thought, but it seems a little easier than adding cooling systems to a perfectly mirrored hypersonic reentry vehicle.
Slashdot Mirror
And for all we know, it could be so blindingly inefficient that it's cost the school system hundreds of thousands or millions in wasted energy over that quarter century. See how uninformed assertions work?
I must have missed the part in my post where I commented on how efficient the system was. I was replying the the GP who stated that the HVAC systems were complex and the issue was with keeping proper temperatures in the different zones of the buildings.
If they are only having problems with the hardware, why not just put an Amiga emulator on a new computer?
It doesn't sound like they are really have any real difficulty with the computer.
FTFA:"Parts for the computer are difficult to find, Hopkins said. It is on its second mouse and third monitor."
Also FTFA:"Because they share the same frequency as our maintenance communications radios and operations maintenance radios - yes, they do interfere"
I'm guessing that they could find radios that are on a different frequency for less than 1.5 to 2 million dollars.
Apparently the student who originally programed it is still in the area and they call him when they have any issues. I hope they at least offer him the Amiga for sentimental reasons when it goes offline. I don't think there are many high-school projects, particularly on this scope, that have worked for so long. And will require over a million dollars to replace. The tax payers of Grand Rapids should thank him.
You're also going to need some way to keep the kids from screwing with them.
When I was in school the sure fire way to get us to mess with something like a thermostat was to put a lock of some kind on it. It was usually the threat of meeting with the "The Board of Education" that kept us in line. "The Board of Education" was very similar to a cricket bat with holes drilled in it that our principal kept on the wall behind his desk, which was labeled, "The Board of Education" in bright red outlined in black.
I'm guessing that between Ritalin and the constant distraction of cell phones, things like thermostats really wouldn't be noticed by students today.
Environmental control and monitoring becomes complicated when you're considering large buildings.
And yet a high-school student from the 1980's was able to engineer a system with off the shelf computers and a little ingenuity. And managed to build a system that has lasted for 25 years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
You'd think there would be some kind of checks in place that wouldn't allow the plane to operate when critical files are missing. Or that the files couldn't be deleted.
Stories like these are the reason I can't believe auto manufacturers are even considering being able to push updates to cars. The checks in place for aircraft hardware is extremely rigorous. Pretty much every nut and bolt has a complete history log. If this kind of thing can happen on an aircraft, what happens when some weird conditions occur that cause brakes to fail in an automotive update? That's a a rhetorical question. The answer is the manufacturer will deny everything and make counter accusations, and hope they can fix the problem before anyone finds out.
I'm all for moving forward with technology, but sometimes it seems we're creating more dangerous problems with our solutions.
So if someone who is keen on guns has never seen a Sterling sub machine gun
I didn't say I never saw one. Just that I've never saw in the US. I suppose that's not true though. I've seen nonfunctional ones in the US. I only ever saw ones that could be fired outside of the US. They are not very common in the US. Even at a glance they have only a similar appearance. The Sterling has a 30 round banana clip sticking out of the side. If there's no clip then the wielder may have one round chambered (at most). But that would be pretty stupid.
There are plenty of movie sci fi guns based on real weapons, and plenty of accessorised real weapons which are indistinguishable from movie sci fi guns unless you get to examine them properly. Which you don't if someone is pointing one at you.
Agreed. But how may of these mass shootings occur with collector type of guns? I'm not going to say that they never happen, as I'm sure some kid had a gun collector father that went nuts. But even then, most handguns and rifles used in these tragedies are standard hunting/"assault weapons" or standard handguns.
If you're planning to attack a school or whatever, you're not going to go buy $2K and $3K weapons to do so. And you aren't going to get a bunch of bulky heavy rifles to do so. You're sure not going to need to attach a scope or bi-pod mount to walk around shooting people with. It adds weight and is going to have a better chance of getting caught on things.
Not that any of this matters. The guy was dressed as a stormtrooper. It's pretty damn obvious he wasn't carrying a Sterling.
I can sympathize, Granted, I live in a house, so I've always just unplugged the smoke detector with the low battery. But for some reason, they always seem to do this in the middle of the night. It's annoying as hell trying to get back to sleep after you find the one that's chirping and then unplug it, remove the battery and put it someplace you won't hear it until it finally stops chirping.
Get some 10 year "smoke detector batteries" My smoke detectors are hard wired, and the batteries are only there in case of a power failure. Since smoke detectors should also be replaced every ten years, I use a permanent marker to date the battery cover and replace all detectors and batteries at the same time.
Nichelle Nichols, who played the lovely Lt. Uhura
Lovely? That's a bit of an understatement. She was down right sexy as hell in her day.
I wish her a speedy and full recovery.
If the blaster was black plastic, would you be able to distinguish it from a real gun from 100 feet away?
I was raised around guns, and also enjoyed the original Star Wars movies when they were popular. So I'm going to say, I could distinguish between a toy and a real gun from farther away than that, even with failing eyesight. Here's a stormtrooper gun vs. a 9 mm. Which is probably going to be fairly common. How blind would you have to be to not be able to see the difference? Even if you are not very familiar with guns, you'd have to be pretty obtuse to mistake these two. If you can't tell the difference between them, then you probably wouldn't be able to distinguish a gun from a stick.
Probably the most similar weapon you'd see in the US would be a TEC-9 But even that would be pretty hard to confuse with a toy blaster. Quite honestly, someone would probably have a better chance of hitting you by throwing the toy at you than hitting you with a TEC-9, unless you are less then a few inches from the barrel, and it doesn't jam.
Apparently the Stormtrooper blaster is based off of the Sterling L2A3 But the toy has a lot of extra crap attached to it, so you'd have to be pretty far to mistake the two. Plus, I can't say I've ever seen a Sterling L2A3 in the US. I doubt many people in the US, other than serious gun collectors, have ever seen one.
Can someone confirm this? Every time I've changed computers, the conversation log starts over for me. I always assumed it was kept on my local system.
It's right there in the middle of the name.
guess I'll just have to wait another 30 odd years for another one
That will be an exciting movie. Jeff Bridges and Bruce Boxleitner will be in their mid nineties. They can do battle with the MCP pushing around their "light-walkers" and tell the younger cast how their identity disks were the size of a Frisbee instead of these new dime sized ones.
The entire plot will end up being them trying to get their stolen identity disk back from the evil megabit or something. But then they discover that they accidentally used it in a soda machine by mistake. Everyone will get a good laugh out of it. Then when they return to the real world, it'll be completely destroyed because of a decompression error that will cause their oxygen tanks to explode upon materialization.
Does the satellite have unlimited storage space available?
Well it is surrounded by vacuum.
It came across a tachyon eddy and is at warp speed on it's way to the Cardassian homeworld.
This should help.
USPS would have misdelivered it.
KPA North Korean base, air force base in South Korea.
Meh, what's the difference. Potato, tomato,
I think everyone understands that. How else could it possibly work?
I think you give nontechnical people more credit than you should. I guarantee there are two people out there right now discussing what happens to their pictures if it rains. One of them probably has an MBA.
Basically, China is focused on annexing as much as they can and claiming they've always had it.
Because China apparently thrives on that sort of thing.
So, fall behind China on the space race at your own peril, or you'll find they've annexed the entire moon.
China believes it can make up any rules it wants. Because China's leaders are batshit crazy, and China's citizens have been kept in the dark so long they don't know what happened at Tiananmen Square.
Love the Chinese people. Hate the Chinese government.
Basically, the US is focused on controlling as much as they can and claiming they've always had it.
Because US apparently thrives on that sort of thing.
So, fall behind the US on the arms race at your own peril, or you'll find they've policed the entire earth.
The US believes it can make up any rules it wants. Because the USA's leaders are batshit crazy, and US citizens have been kept in the dark so long they don't know what happened at Tiananmen Square, or any number of other issues.
Love the US people. Hate the US government.
See how much fun generalizations can be?
Don't get me wrong, I'm from the US and love my country. But our government is so far off the rails at this point, train wreck doesn't even begin to describe it. I also have friends from and in China. The bullshit propaganda their government tells them lines up with the truth about as much as what ours tells us about China.
Cool. I can't wait until this fall when it's time to update my company laptop. My current Dell Precision M6600 was about twice that when I got it two and a half years ago. I think the upgrade to the Nvidia Quadro 3000M w 2GB of RAM was about $800 of it.
The CPU is only a tenth of a GHz faster on this model than the one I currently have, and I have 20 GB of faster RAM along with a 256GB Samsung 840 Pro and a 750 GB spinning disk. 1080X1920 was the highest resolution I could get at the time, but I think the built in screen is 17". The higher resolution would be a really nice improvement.
The newer one weighs less than half of the one I have now. But I'd be curious what the weight of the power transformer is. On my current system it is about the size of a clay brick and probably weighs close to 2 lbs. I can get about 2 hours out of the battery with no real power reduction crippling the system. Probably 3.5 to 4 under the most favorable conditions. So 9 hours would be a big improvement too.
I'll have to wait to see if Windows 10 is worth bothering with though. I suppose I could always install Windows 7 from the recovery disks that came with my current system.
Just because she said one thing and did another doesn't make that a lie. It could be that the facts changed.
That's a good one. It didn't work out so well for George W. Bush when the facts changed.
Of course you Republicans are so full of hate that you stop thinking logically.
Democrats, Republicans, you're all so full of hatred for each other you're not only illogical, you're blind and stupid too.
I'm old enough to remember when universal healthcare was a Republican goal. The Democrats claimed it would be the end of America. Funny how the roles have reversed.
Of course that's the beauty of the internet. It's been around long enough that you can find videos of just about any politician whose been in office long enough vehemently claiming the exact opposite of what they so strongly state they believe now. But you just keep blindly believing whatever your "team" in the blue or red uniforms keeps telling you to think. It's easier that way I suppose.
That poor little boy Kathy, I'll bet he got beat up a lot
I guess you never heard the Johnny Cash song, "A Boy Named Sue"
The Continental Army fought in uniform, under the command of officers,
Indeed, for the most part the Continental Army did. That's why I stated "particularly the militia". Many refused to wear uniforms, and not lining up in formation was considered pretty unconventional back then.
Perception may be a different animal
Which was my entire point. Can you imagine how the history books would have been written if the British won that war? I don't think it would have been very kind to the Continental army, and in particular to the militia.
terrorist scum that ignore every rule of civilized warfare.
I wonder if that's what the British thought about the guerrilla tactics of the Continental army, particularly the militia. Don't get me wrong, I'm no supporter of terrorists, but I do find it interesting how one mans valiant freedom fighter is another mans dishonorable terrorist.
You stagger the ones with the smoke ahead of the warhead by a half mile or so and create a column of smoke for it to pass through. I can't say I gave it much thought, but it seems a little easier than adding cooling systems to a perfectly mirrored hypersonic reentry vehicle.