Broadband is definitely cheaper in Canada (average $40 USD per month in the U.S., average $40 CDN in Canada), but Canadians are still not as connected as Americans.
It's not like we have a huge amount of choice in Canada though. I had this choice: Cogeco for a cable modem, or Bell for DSL. I wanted a DSL, but when I signed up with Bell, they did a line test and said my phone line wasn't good enough quality. That left me with a cable modem, or satellite I suppose, but to me that's no option.
The fact is, even though I can choose from dozens of long distance providers, I still can't choose from different cable internet, or DSL providers unless they run a new wire to my house. The last mile is very monopolistic. Perhaps wireless will change that, but I'm still waiting.
just like straight from neuromancer or other gibsons books
Yes, and if you could bring women into them, then you'd have to find yourself a bionically enhanced superwoman to bring in there with you... occular implants and all.
A friend of mine did a work term in Japan, and he told lots of interesting stories. Some of those vending machines dispense "School Girls' panties". You get the used panties, and a little story about the girl they belonged to.
There were also places to stay in Tokyo called "capsule hotels", for men only, like little stacked coffins you could sleep in, and it cost nearly $100 a night. He said each one had a little television in it, and the only stations you could get were porn!
1000 meters is a kilometer 1 000 000 meters is a megameter 1 000 000 000 meters is a gigameter... anything bigger than that, and you switch to AU's.;-)
Why not bring back a species that was extinct due to the actions of mankind like the Dodo bird, rather than something that nature or God extincted, probably for some "valid" reason?
I believe the current thinking is that mammoths were hunted to extinction by men. Mammoths and sabretooth tigers became extinct about 12,000 years ago in North America, which coincides nicely with the arrival of humans on the continent. Hence, by your argument, we should bring them back.
There cannot possibly be away to "guard" the entire length of the elevator on Earth, and if it were to break and come crashing down...
I would think that it could be controlled militarily. The obvious way would be for any nations that use it to either provide some kind of military forces (several countries have aircraft carriers, for instance, many others have submarines), or they could pay a 'security fee' to help support the operations of the other nations. I definitely think it's feasible.
You are right, though, the catastrophe if it snapped would be enormous. Perhaps you could make the bottom detachable in an emergency, so if you saw an attempt to break it in the middle, you could break the connection at the base and let it float off into space.
Only we were going to make one of those uber special graphics demos that ran in 386 Protected Mode! oooooh, aaaah!
My friend who did the music was the only one with talent, so he eventually realized the rest of us weren't going to be mastering vector based 3D graphics engines in the middle of grade 11. However, I did end up learning how to write an assembly library and link it into a QuickBASIC program... that's something!
Write in the margin of your lab book, "I have discovered an ingenious proof of *insert Earth shattering idea here*, but alas it will not fit in this small space."
Each country or jurisdiction certainly has the rights to govern traffic that travel through its own data networks. The problem (if it's really a problem) is that information has no borders. If I, in Canada, request a file from Germany, half of the packets may travel over one satellite connection, and the other half may bounce across a transatlantic cable. Who knows how many countries it crosses during the journey.
Here are some resolutions:
1) Include routing info with the packet, such as "Not legal in the US", and the routing algorithms have to deal with that. This is, of course, completely impractical.
2) Provide a direct network path between each pair of countries, and route packets from source to destination country directly. This is also impractical.
3) All countries connected to the internet need to agree that data in transit is in "neutral" territory. Only the hosting site and the requesting computer are subject to the laws of their respective jurisdictions.
#3 is more practical. Note that it does NOT preclude eavesdropping by countries in the middle, but it does preclude the use of content filters unless the source or destination of the information is in your own jurisdiction.
Of course, I can't see any government wilfully giving up the ability to filter the data travelling on networks in their country, so I can't see #3 working. The rest of the world will have to come up with a way to route information around certain oppressive governments, particularly if those counties are a bottleneck for information on the internet (as in the U.S. right now).
Just being around salt water will cause excessive corrosion of exposed metal parts. I can remember a situation where the metal contacts between the daughterboards and backplane of a system were getting corroded and causing problems, and that was inside an enclosure.
Putting a PC inside of a completely sealed enclosure is not always a good thing because you need to cool it down, and this is usually done with fans, so unless you also want to install an air conditioner in the side of the enclosure, you might want to find a ruggedized PC.
There are some very sturdy ruggedized laptops out there which can apparently be dunked in the ocean, pulled out and keep going, but I think they might be cost prohibitive for you.
Recently at a trade show I saw some industrial PCs that you could literally hose down with a garden hose and they would keep running. However, you're probably looking at $5000 even for a base model of one of those. Just look up "industrial PC" on the internet if you're interested.
Perhaps your best bet is to search the internet for oceanographic research groups. These guys go out to sea with tonnes of electronic equipment for months/years at a time, and they seem to make out alright, probably on restrictive budgets. If you write a nice email to one of these people, they might be kind enough to offer you some real advice.
We can only thank god that the Arabs are poorly trained and they feed their soldiers grool while our pilots are better than even you Americans.
I'm not American, I'm a Canadian.
You (Israelis) are not innocent in the eyes of the world, so don't pretend you are simple innocent victims. You kill 8 children (by accident - yeah right) when you try to assassinate one man. You don't care because they aren't Jewish.
You support the U.S. because they feed you your grool. You are the international puppets of the United States, while the rest of us have to defend against their growing expansionism. You can continue being the U.S.'s hired soldiers as long as you want, but you're on the wrong side. Some day you will have to stand up for yourselves, and then we'll see how tough you are.
While the rest of the civilized world is trying to ban land mines because of their devastating effects on civilian populations that lasts decades after the intended conflict, the U.S. is busy designing a weapon that has the (un?)intended effect of permanently blinding people. Great.
Given a choice, I'd rather lose a leg than go blind, wouldn't you?
I do realize that weapons that injure are far more effective against an enemy that cares for its wounded. However, there's a difference between a bullet wound, which can heal, and being blinded for life!
On top of this, the U.S. has a reputation for hitting civilians and friendly troops recently. Is this really going to be an effective weapon for U.S. troops to have on the battlefield? I hope we're also trying to perfect occular implants at the same time.
True interoperability means having servers for rival systems directly communicate with one another.
It's funny how in the telephone network, the only way to survive is to be completely interoperable, but with instant messaging they're all afraid because it "means having servers for rival systems directly communicate". OMG!
If you really want interoperability, then support Jabber.
And on top of that, he was advertising this in the local paper?
I have MANY times seen people selling mod chips in the local papers (in Canada). There is usually something in there like: "... to play backups and imports..." I have a feeling they only went after him because he was selling pirated video games. There is no such thing as a DMCA in Canada, so you're allowed to hack apart a PS/2 all you want, and modify it to play backup games, but you still can't make illegal copies of games.
Which works well, unless you subscribe to the extreme programming paradigm. In that case, you're never supposed to have a single programmer working on the code - always two there are...
There is something rotten at the core of software engineering.
Careful. If anything is rotten, it's the practice of trying to apply pure computer SCIENCE to practical machine control problems. Real engineers (who have a degree in engineering) tend to be much more pessimistic, self critical, and more driven to design the system before sitting down to write software. Reliable machine control software does get written on a regular basis, and much of it gets written in an algorithmic paradigm.
Engineers who write good machine control software do several things to better their odds: 1) KISS 2) Stay away from dynamic memory structures when you can, otherwise use a language or environment that helps check for memory leaks, etc. 3) Use a proven platform (i.e. a PLC, VLC, or a good RTOS like QNX). 4) Design, write spike solutions, design, discuss, redesign, discuss, design again, write, test.
Real software engineering may not be an edge of your seat, nailbiting, all night hacking experience, but it does tend to produce reliable, working results.
The first thing Communism says is that people don't have the right to engage in business dealings amongst themselves.
Where does it say that you have to have business dealings to have a democracy? Democracy is about governance by the people. If the people decided, democratically, that all property is communal, then you could very well have a democratically created communist country. After all, you are probably living in a democratically created socialist country right now (see my original post).
Right of property is one of the cornerstones of democracy.
I don't think you know what you're talking about. "Right of property" is a cornerstone of capitalism, but it has nothing to do with democracy. Democracy is the idea that the people choose the laws of the state by majority. A democracy can make a law that makes it illegal for private citizens to own certain property (consider nuclear weapons, illicit drugs, etc.). In a purely capitalist economy/state, there would be no such laws. A democracy can also pass laws to prohibit what you can do with your property (for instance, you can't sell stocks based on insider information). In a pure capitalist economy, there would be no such law.
PEOPLE!!! I don't know why everyone thinks I'm arguing for the virtues of communism. I am quite aware that democracy is the best system of government we have. I am also an advocate of personal privacy and freedom. All I'm trying to point out is that communism is NOT a system of government. Stalin created a dictatorship, and he created laws that tried to create a communist economy. Communism is an economic model, NOT a government. That's all I'm saying!
Slashdot Mirror
Please explain. They say that Canada is the most connected country.
"They" actually were saying the government wanted to *make* Canada the most connected country. How about this quote:
"Canada ranks second in overall connectivity only to the United States (Conference Board, January 2001)."
Here's the article.
Broadband is definitely cheaper in Canada (average $40 USD per month in the U.S., average $40 CDN in Canada), but Canadians are still not as connected as Americans.
It's not like we have a huge amount of choice in Canada though. I had this choice: Cogeco for a cable modem, or Bell for DSL. I wanted a DSL, but when I signed up with Bell, they did a line test and said my phone line wasn't good enough quality. That left me with a cable modem, or satellite I suppose, but to me that's no option.
The fact is, even though I can choose from dozens of long distance providers, I still can't choose from different cable internet, or DSL providers unless they run a new wire to my house. The last mile is very monopolistic. Perhaps wireless will change that, but I'm still waiting.
just like straight from neuromancer or other gibsons books
Yes, and if you could bring women into them, then you'd have to find yourself a bionically enhanced superwoman to bring in there with you... occular implants and all.
A friend of mine did a work term in Japan, and he told lots of interesting stories. Some of those vending machines dispense "School Girls' panties". You get the used panties, and a little story about the girl they belonged to.
There were also places to stay in Tokyo called "capsule hotels", for men only, like little stacked coffins you could sleep in, and it cost nearly $100 a night. He said each one had a little television in it, and the only stations you could get were porn!
Anyone have any first hand evidence?
Would you really say "Five MegaFaxes" for 5x10**6 faxes?
No, we'd say, "it's aboot time you stopped sendin' all those faxes, eh!"
What do the Canadians use ??
... anything bigger than that, and you switch to AU's. ;-)
We use the metric system:
1000 meters is a kilometer
1 000 000 meters is a megameter
1 000 000 000 meters is a gigameter
Why not bring back a species that was extinct due to the actions of mankind like the Dodo bird, rather than something that nature or God extincted, probably for some "valid" reason?
I believe the current thinking is that mammoths were hunted to extinction by men. Mammoths and sabretooth tigers became extinct about 12,000 years ago in North America, which coincides nicely with the arrival of humans on the continent. Hence, by your argument, we should bring them back.
one frame per second
That was just the starting framerate. I believe it mentioned up to 24 frames per second, once they cranked it up.
There cannot possibly be away to "guard" the entire length of the elevator on Earth, and if it were to break and come crashing down...
I would think that it could be controlled militarily. The obvious way would be for any nations that use it to either provide some kind of military forces (several countries have aircraft carriers, for instance, many others have submarines), or they could pay a 'security fee' to help support the operations of the other nations. I definitely think it's feasible.
You are right, though, the catastrophe if it snapped would be enormous. Perhaps you could make the bottom detachable in an emergency, so if you saw an attempt to break it in the middle, you could break the connection at the base and let it float off into space.
Just my $0.02
Only we were going to make one of those uber special graphics demos that ran in 386 Protected Mode! oooooh, aaaah!
My friend who did the music was the only one with talent, so he eventually realized the rest of us weren't going to be mastering vector based 3D graphics engines in the middle of grade 11. However, I did end up learning how to write an assembly library and link it into a QuickBASIC program... that's something!
Yes, we really need to "re-declare" the sovereignty of the internet, don't we?
Write in the margin of your lab book, "I have discovered an ingenious proof of *insert Earth shattering idea here*, but alas it will not fit in this small space."
Each country or jurisdiction certainly has the rights to govern traffic that travel through its own data networks. The problem (if it's really a problem) is that information has no borders. If I, in Canada, request a file from Germany, half of the packets may travel over one satellite connection, and the other half may bounce across a transatlantic cable. Who knows how many countries it crosses during the journey.
Here are some resolutions:
1) Include routing info with the packet, such as "Not legal in the US", and the routing algorithms have to deal with that. This is, of course, completely impractical.
2) Provide a direct network path between each pair of countries, and route packets from source to destination country directly. This is also impractical.
3) All countries connected to the internet need to agree that data in transit is in "neutral" territory. Only the hosting site and the requesting computer are subject to the laws of their respective jurisdictions.
#3 is more practical. Note that it does NOT preclude eavesdropping by countries in the middle, but it does preclude the use of content filters unless the source or destination of the information is in your own jurisdiction.
Of course, I can't see any government wilfully giving up the ability to filter the data travelling on networks in their country, so I can't see #3 working. The rest of the world will have to come up with a way to route information around certain oppressive governments, particularly if those counties are a bottleneck for information on the internet (as in the U.S. right now).
Meaning half an hour later, right?
Meaning 1.5 hours later than Eastern time, or a half hour later than Atlantic time.
Just being around salt water will cause excessive corrosion of exposed metal parts. I can remember a situation where the metal contacts between the daughterboards and backplane of a system were getting corroded and causing problems, and that was inside an enclosure.
Putting a PC inside of a completely sealed enclosure is not always a good thing because you need to cool it down, and this is usually done with fans, so unless you also want to install an air conditioner in the side of the enclosure, you might want to find a ruggedized PC.
There are some very sturdy ruggedized laptops out there which can apparently be dunked in the ocean, pulled out and keep going, but I think they might be cost prohibitive for you.
Recently at a trade show I saw some industrial PCs that you could literally hose down with a garden hose and they would keep running. However, you're probably looking at $5000 even for a base model of one of those. Just look up "industrial PC" on the internet if you're interested.
Perhaps your best bet is to search the internet for oceanographic research groups. These guys go out to sea with tonnes of electronic equipment for months/years at a time, and they seem to make out alright, probably on restrictive budgets. If you write a nice email to one of these people, they might be kind enough to offer you some real advice.
Try this site.
It also has instructions on how to teach Go, if you're interested.
by Anonymous Coward ... you are a moron
Ok, Coward.
We can only thank god that the Arabs are poorly trained and they feed their soldiers grool while our pilots are better than even you Americans.
I'm not American, I'm a Canadian.
You (Israelis) are not innocent in the eyes of the world, so don't pretend you are simple innocent victims. You kill 8 children (by accident - yeah right) when you try to assassinate one man. You don't care because they aren't Jewish.
You support the U.S. because they feed you your grool. You are the international puppets of the United States, while the rest of us have to defend against their growing expansionism. You can continue being the U.S.'s hired soldiers as long as you want, but you're on the wrong side. Some day you will have to stand up for yourselves, and then we'll see how tough you are.
SHEESH
While the rest of the civilized world is trying to ban land mines because of their devastating effects on civilian populations that lasts decades after the intended conflict, the U.S. is busy designing a weapon that has the (un?)intended effect of permanently blinding people. Great.
Given a choice, I'd rather lose a leg than go blind, wouldn't you?
I do realize that weapons that injure are far more effective against an enemy that cares for its wounded. However, there's a difference between a bullet wound, which can heal, and being blinded for life!
On top of this, the U.S. has a reputation for hitting civilians and friendly troops recently. Is this really going to be an effective weapon for U.S. troops to have on the battlefield? I hope we're also trying to perfect occular implants at the same time.
True interoperability means having servers for rival systems directly communicate with one another.
It's funny how in the telephone network, the only way to survive is to be completely interoperable, but with instant messaging they're all afraid because it "means having servers for rival systems directly communicate". OMG!
If you really want interoperability, then support Jabber.
And on top of that, he was advertising this in the local paper?
I have MANY times seen people selling mod chips in the local papers (in Canada). There is usually something in there like: "... to play backups and imports..." I have a feeling they only went after him because he was selling pirated video games. There is no such thing as a DMCA in Canada, so you're allowed to hack apart a PS/2 all you want, and modify it to play backup games, but you still can't make illegal copies of games.
only one person should be writing it
Which works well, unless you subscribe to the extreme programming paradigm. In that case, you're never supposed to have a single programmer working on the code - always two there are...
There is something rotten at the core of software engineering.
Careful. If anything is rotten, it's the practice of trying to apply pure computer SCIENCE to practical machine control problems. Real engineers (who have a degree in engineering) tend to be much more pessimistic, self critical, and more driven to design the system before sitting down to write software. Reliable machine control software does get written on a regular basis, and much of it gets written in an algorithmic paradigm.
Engineers who write good machine control software do several things to better their odds:
1) KISS
2) Stay away from dynamic memory structures when you can, otherwise use a language or environment that helps check for memory leaks, etc.
3) Use a proven platform (i.e. a PLC, VLC, or a good RTOS like QNX).
4) Design, write spike solutions, design, discuss, redesign, discuss, design again, write, test.
Real software engineering may not be an edge of your seat, nailbiting, all night hacking experience, but it does tend to produce reliable, working results.
The first thing Communism says is that people don't have the right to engage in business dealings amongst themselves.
Where does it say that you have to have business dealings to have a democracy? Democracy is about governance by the people. If the people decided, democratically, that all property is communal, then you could very well have a democratically created communist country. After all, you are probably living in a democratically created socialist country right now (see my original post).
Right of property is one of the cornerstones of democracy.
I don't think you know what you're talking about. "Right of property" is a cornerstone of capitalism, but it has nothing to do with democracy. Democracy is the idea that the people choose the laws of the state by majority. A democracy can make a law that makes it illegal for private citizens to own certain property (consider nuclear weapons, illicit drugs, etc.). In a purely capitalist economy/state, there would be no such laws. A democracy can also pass laws to prohibit what you can do with your property (for instance, you can't sell stocks based on insider information). In a pure capitalist economy, there would be no such law.
PEOPLE!!! I don't know why everyone thinks I'm arguing for the virtues of communism. I am quite aware that democracy is the best system of government we have. I am also an advocate of personal privacy and freedom. All I'm trying to point out is that communism is NOT a system of government. Stalin created a dictatorship, and he created laws that tried to create a communist economy. Communism is an economic model, NOT a government. That's all I'm saying!