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User: altstadt

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Comments · 92

  1. Re:apocalypse , now? on Giant Iceberg to Collide with Glacier · · Score: 2, Informative

    Nope. It can't possibly be hotter than 444.6 C. See this for proof.

  2. Re:I can't decide on IBM Grid Near 50,000 machines - Slashdot Users #13 · · Score: 1

    The People's Front of Judea.

  3. Re:What do I think? on Post-Googleism At IBM With Piquant · · Score: 1

    Everybody knows the Canadian Prime Minister is Jean Poutine.

  4. Re:I can't get Thunderbird to read Moz mail! on Mozilla 1.7.5 Released · · Score: 1

    Set up an IMAP server.

    Get a cheap PC, Courier IMAP, fetchmail, and postfix. Follow the directions on either the main Gentoo install pages or the email howto in the Gentoo forums. (The forums are down right now, so the only link I have is to the end of the current discussion: http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?p=1884811#1 884811)

    I was able to do this, so it can't be that complicated.

  5. Re:Octave? on Open Source Math Software For Education? · · Score: 1

    Given that Euler was originally written in 1988 for an Atari ST, I don't think the age of Octave has much to do with it. Years ago, when I actually needed a Matlab clone, I found Euler to be more compatible than Octave. Octave needed gnuplot to get any graphical output. I guess things have changed since then.

    Upon further investigation, it looks like the Unix/Linux version of the program is no longer being maintained. It appears stuck at 1.60.6 while the original is up to 2.03 for Win*.

  6. Re:Octave? on Open Source Math Software For Education? · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Every time a discussion of math packages comes up, Octave is always mentioned right away, but Euler gets ignored. I'm curious why people seem to prefer Octave over Euler so much that Euler is virtually unknown.

  7. Re:Inaccurate summary on Mambo Users Threatened · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    mod -1 didn't RTFA

  8. Re:link handling in Linux / KDE? on Batch-o-Moz: Firefox, Thunderbird, Suite Released · · Score: 2, Informative

    There is no need for shell scripts, but it is annoying that it doesn't work out of the box on Linux the same way it does on Windows.

    Shut down Firefox and Thunderbird. Replace foo below with the appropriate random characters for the directory names on your system. Make sure each command is all on one line. Fix up any extra spaces added by /.

    Firefox: echo 'user_pref("network.protocol-handler.app.mailto", "/usr/bin/thunderbird");' >> ~/.mozilla/firefox/default.foo/user.js Thunderbird: echo 'user_pref("network.protocol-handler.app.http", "/usr/bin/firefox");' >> ~/.thunderbird/default.foo/user.js

    Note that this has only been tested for Firefox 0.9.3 and Thunderbird 0.7.3. YMMV.

  9. Re:A concerted effort... on Broadband Envy: Fixing American Broadband · · Score: 1

    Hey, we know its an unfair criticism, compared to small densly populated countries like Japan and Korea...

    and Canada...

  10. Re:Focuses on 1 script, 1 language on The Science of Word Recognition · · Score: 1

    Did you notice the footnote about 1/3 of the way through the article?

    In the text: Most saccades are forward movements from 7 to 9 letters,* but 10-15% of all saccades are regressive or backwards movements.

    Bottom of the page: * Average saccade length and fixation times vary by language. The data presented here are for American English readers. While the values vary by language, it is remarkable that reading cognitive processes change so little from language to language.

  11. Re:only one thing will really work on Surviving College With Gear And Sanity Intact? · · Score: 1

    This is good advice even if you don't have anything valuable in your room.

    I recall relocating the entire contents of a unlocked double room to the floor washrooms once. The beds were reassembled over the stall partitions.

  12. Solaris? on Blade Runner Is The Best Sci-Fi Film · · Score: 1

    How did Solaris ever get on the list, let alone at number 5?

    Every foot of film shot for this movie made it into the final cut. If an editor was ever allowed a chance at the movie, it could be tightened into a pretty good 45 minute TV episode. Instead we get to spend 20 minutes watching a passenger in a car on a freeway who could have been asleep.

    I can live with everything else on the list, even though some of them haven't held up well over time (the best example of this is CEot3K, which I still agree belongs in the list). Considered in context with the times they were made, I can't think of anything to replace them though.

    But Solaris? Benford must have been on crack.

  13. Angelo My Love on What's the Worst Movie You've Ever Seen? · · Score: 1

    Angelo My Love is my personal benchmark for bad movies. Imagine a documentary with no narrator, a documentary where nobody speaks any language you understand, a documentary with no subtitles, a documentary about people you don't care about in any way by the end. I don't know what Robert Duvall could have been thinking about when he made it. Did he spend a year in a drug induced coma around 1982-1983?

    My wife took me to see this based on the opinion of a particular reviewer. The only good thing that came out of it was that by the end I knew that I had found the perfect movie reviewer, one who's opinion was so completely opposite to mine that I knew from then on to avoid movies he liked and to go to movies he hated. Unfortunately, for both of us, he died a few years later or else I'm sure I would still be using him to check out which movies to watch or avoid.

    This movie has become a continuing family joke. Any time I take my wife to see something she hates, it subtracts from the bad movie balance sheet between us, and we laugh about how it still doesn't make up for Angelo My Love. I still have a lot of bad movies to go through before we are even.

  14. Re:Auto Scroll on Best PDA To Read e-Texts On? · · Score: 1

    Whatever you get, make sure the reader program you use has some way to disable the autoscroll feature. Getting some minor thumb exercise is way better than waking up in the morning to a PDA with dead batteries and blank memory.

  15. Re:Sound Effects on Rescuers Prep for Hybrid Car Accidents · · Score: 1

    How about Woo Woo?

  16. Re:Ploy? on Microsoft WiX Code Released to SourceForge.Net · · Score: 1

    I believe that the old saying goes: when a tiger is feeding you lunch, it isn't looking after your interests.

    Not that I think that this is what is happening here...

  17. Re:Anyone stupid enough to use their "traffic jam" on Adding Background Noise To Your Phone Call · · Score: 1

    Last weekend I drove the I5 from the Canadian border to Portland and back. Everybody on the road was driving in the lane next to the HOV lane, or in the left lane when there wasn't an HOV. Now that I know that passing on the right is expected behavior, I will stay in the right hand lane and cut 10-20% off my travel time.

    Thanks for the tip.

  18. Re:Can anyone verify this quote on Lawsuit Filed Against Unregulated GloFish · · Score: 1

    Here, have a nice slab of cow. It had a pre-disposition to falling down when it tried to walk, but I'm sure it's okay to eat.

    Genes express themselves as proteins. Currently we (as a species) are dealing with the effects of some proteins (found in another species) that are mis-folding and then appear to be replicating themselves without the benefit of genetic material.

    I agree that this fish issue is currently being blown out of proportion, but I can understand the reaction.

  19. Re:Read their AUP on How Much Broadband Usage is Too Much? · · Score: 1

    Oh my, the Stats 101 class must have let out early today. Unfortunately in their rush to show off their collective mental muscle, they have all managed to ignore the most important part of my original comment.

    Unless all the customers have somehow conspired to use exactly the same bandwidth, someone will be above average and thus due for a letter.

    Yes, yes. All you Biology 101 students joining us can now point out the mistake in my first paragraph.

  20. Re:Read their AUP on How Much Broadband Usage is Too Much? · · Score: 3, Interesting

    By definition, half of all their customers are using "above average" bandwidth. Is their goal to drive all their customers to pay for zero bandwith usage?

  21. blue LED Christmas lights on On NTSC Video, Blue Blurring, Chroma Subsampling · · Score: 1

    This is all the more obvious these days with all the blue LED Christmas lights around. I find these really hard to see when it is very dark. They are almost invisible until I am within 100 m or so. At any greater distance they only show up as sort of a dark subliminal smudge.

    Oddly enough, they seem brighter when used in dimly lit building interiors.

  22. Re:Secrets? on First Review Of Return Of The King · · Score: 1

    I can count the books (newspapers, magazines, etc.) I see on one hand. However I run out of appendages long before I have counted the people on the train.

    The original poster was correct.

  23. new interview request on So, HP, What Exactly Are You Trying To Sell Us? · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I'd like to see Charles Cooper interview whoever came up with .Net, too.

    Forget about .net. Get this guy to interview Darl.

  24. Re:Jeeves on Microsoft Looks At Other Search Engines · · Score: 3, Funny

    Is it just me or does anybody else think that Jeeves is just a repackaged Eliza?

    I have never had a useful search result from Jeeves. The results it gives are always part of some party game: guess how this result relates to your question.

  25. I'm not in the US! on Disney to Make Movies Available Online · · Score: 1

    You insensitive clod!

    Consider yourself lucky. I get the message:

    Thank you for your interest in Movielink. We want you to take part in the powerful Internet movie rental experience that Movielink delivers, but it is presently unavailable to users outside of the United States.