We need to be careful. I once read a documentary about robots taking control of an oil drilling platform. It didn't work out well for any of the humans who worked there; the platform designer even suffered a mental breakdown due to injuries suffered at the hands of the robots.
G. B. Blackrock owned that oil platform and I'm sure he would advise against robot control of other oil platforms.
"You could make an argument that, for the good of the user and even the good of the ecosystem, Automatic Updates should be turned on by default. People should have patched machines. But that would be contrary to our belief about user control; users need to have a choice."
"In other words," continued Peter Cullen, "freedom is the right of all sentient beings."
I used to work for a music store, and we had a machine for sheet music that was similar to this one. You put in your money, select your song and key, and it prints out.
I don't recall ever seeing anyone using it
Actually, in the days when I bought sheet music, I used that sort of machine in the store a number of times. From what I recall, the selection was not ideal (or I would have used it more), plus of course, there was still plenty of pre-printed music for sale as well.
If the selection were much better, and pre-printed selections were weak, it might have taken off.
Never mind *technical* buzzwords. I think the biggest buzzword of the last decade has been the word "extreme". You'd think with the web right there at people's fingers and mice, they could make use of an online thesaurus to search for a word that's not quite so tired and overused.
When your processor press release sounds like a Mountain Dew commercial, it's hard to take that information seriously.
When you read the old 1920's/1930's pulp novels about "The Shadow", there isn't the "cloud men's minds" business like from the old radio show that was based on the novels (and the modern movie based on the radio show). Instead, the crimefighter was able to be nearly invisible by blending into the darkness, appearing only as a shadow under the
occasional street lamp, but freely able to disappear on most of the street, and even in hotel stairways and the dimly-lit corners of mobsters' hotel rooms.
Anyway, in reading these pulp novels, I always wondered if things really were that dimly lit in the 1920's and 1930's, that someone dressed in black being able to hide in the corner of a room you were in seemed realistic back then, or if even then it was a preposterous notion (as it would be if the same novels were being written today). If such a thing would have been possible, then we really do light our communities and buildings WAY more than used to be done in the early days after the invention of the electric light.
The United States government has announced in a press conference that this action is considered a terrorist act toward Microsoft. "Our allies would use Microsoft software for this task", said George W. Bush. "They are not with us, so they must be against us." Bombing of Japan begins tomorrow.
I'm assuming, of course, that they saw no one
else entering the arena in the near future, as
opposed to making their alliance but knowing
someone else was going to make a smaller alliance by the time of their press conference.
I'm just being way to pedantic here, aren't I?
Hello? Hello? (crickets chirping, as even the moderators have left to go play Frogger at this point)
Back in the days when the Onion still had the
older six pictures for their "What Do You Think?" feature, they asked about Michael Jordan
leaving the NBA to play baseball. One of the six folks replied,
"Going from large orange balls to small white ones will be pretty strange. But enough about my problems. What was the question?"
Turn the answering machine on, but set it so that
you can hear the messages people are leaving. Then, screen every call. Period. If people start to leave a message, and it's a message you want, pick up the phone.
Let people who you want to talk to, know that you screen your calls for this reason, so that they will leave a message.
You are under no obligation to pick up the phone. Ever. Don't do it unless the call actually matters to you. And even if it does, but you're busy at the moment, let the machine take the call and you can call back later.
The phone is there to serve you, not the other way around. I have let someone leave a message, just because I was in the coding zone at that moment, or enjoying an ice cream cone, or even awake-but-trying-to-nap, and didn't feel like picking up the phone. So I didn't.
On a side note, I saw a story on the news last night that several people arrived on the scene of an attempted child kidnapping. They managed to get the two children free from the kidnapper, and kicked and beat him until the police arrived. While I don't condone vigilante actions, this is probably the roughest punishment the kidnapper will face. I'm sure he'll get minimal jail time.
I'm sure he'll also sue those who kicked and beat him.
Normally, I would have assumed it was a scam. My friends aren't the type to do cutesy things like that. But on the other hand, the spam arrived on my birthday! So I figured, "No, it has to be legit, a message from one of my friends. I don't get much spam; what are the chances a spam of this particular kind would arrive exactly on my birthday?"
When I went to the site, they wanted a name, so I put in a fake name, and then they wanted more info, and I figured, "The hell with this, whoever sent me a birthday message, too bad for them. I'm not giving this place more info." But by that point I had already confirmed my email by entering my name, since I was so certain it was legit due to the birthday timing.
It's nice to know my initial instincts were correct, and that I didn't miss some nice birthday message from a friend. But their scam did manage to harvest my address due to perfectly coincidental timing on their part.
What makes you innately entitled to higher quality?
I'm serious. This is a point of annoyance for me because of those credit card or loan commercials or whatever they are, with all those people saying, "I was $8 million in debt from reckless spending[1], but now I can get the credit I deserve!" And then you have the average couch potato sitting at home, saying, "Yeah, I *do* deserve to spend more money I don't have! I'll sign up with them!"
My point is that we overuse the word "deserve". It implies entitlement. And we already think we are entitled to too much (such as credit!). We don't need to start acting like we're entitled to improved media compression technology as well.
Just a thought...
ChicagoFan
[1] Yes, I do know for some there's some legit reason things went bad for them...medical expenses or whatever. I think they are the exception, though.
It's about time, since we left someone there!
on
Back to the Moon?
·
· Score: 1
This poor guy has been waiting for 30 years for us to go back and get him.
Re:"Sleazy Attorney"
on
ICANN Updates
·
· Score: 3, Funny
oh sure, if you want to overload operator = for every class...
1) Without operator=, I couldn't swap two elements of a class even if I wrote a swap function specifically for that class instead of using a template. (unless you had a member swap(), I guess, but then you have to write a member swap() instead of a member operator=).
2) Operator= exists automatically for all classes. You only need to overload it if you are specifically allocating dynamic memory or using other such resources, and often you can just make your member variables objects (instead of pointers to objects) and let their functions do the dirty work.
Slashdot Mirror
G. B. Blackrock owned that oil platform and I'm sure he would advise against robot control of other oil platforms.
"You could make an argument that, for the good of the user and even the good of the ecosystem, Automatic Updates should be turned on by default. People should have patched machines. But that would be contrary to our belief about user control; users need to have a choice."
"In other words," continued Peter Cullen, "freedom is the right of all sentient beings."
[insert your joke here]
No problem; in grad school I didn't even have the cardboard box.
"Yeah, three of them."
"How were they?"
"They're great."
I don't recall ever seeing anyone using it
Actually, in the days when I bought sheet music, I used that sort of machine in the store a number of times. From what I recall, the selection was not ideal (or I would have used it more), plus of course, there was still plenty of pre-printed music for sale as well.
If the selection were much better, and pre-printed selections were weak, it might have taken off.
ChicagoFan
http://www.technohol.com/new-u/spitfire/index.asp
Spider case, spider case
Way more geeky than "All Your Base".
Tell the web? Not too wise!
Posted here, server dies.
Look out! Mirror the spider case.
When your processor press release sounds like a Mountain Dew commercial, it's hard to take that information seriously.
ChicagoFan
Anyway, in reading these pulp novels, I always wondered if things really were that dimly lit in the 1920's and 1930's, that someone dressed in black being able to hide in the corner of a room you were in seemed realistic back then, or if even then it was a preposterous notion (as it would be if the same novels were being written today). If such a thing would have been possible, then we really do light our communities and buildings WAY more than used to be done in the early days after the invention of the electric light.
ChicagoFan
"Ya see tos men? Tos men use mentos as mementos!"
ChicagoFan
The United States government has announced in a press conference that this action is considered a terrorist act toward Microsoft. "Our allies would use Microsoft software for this task", said George W. Bush. "They are not with us, so they must be against us." Bombing of Japan begins tomorrow.
I'm just being way to pedantic here, aren't I?
Hello? Hello? (crickets chirping, as even the moderators have left to go play Frogger at this point)
ChicagoFan
If they don't know enough discrete math to realize that they are being redundant, can we really trust their technical background?
ChicagoFan
"Going from large orange balls to small white ones will be pretty strange. But enough about my problems. What was the question?"
ChicagoFan
Requirements: 1 answering machine
Turn the answering machine on, but set it so that you can hear the messages people are leaving. Then, screen every call. Period. If people start to leave a message, and it's a message you want, pick up the phone.
Let people who you want to talk to, know that you screen your calls for this reason, so that they will leave a message.
You are under no obligation to pick up the phone. Ever. Don't do it unless the call actually matters to you. And even if it does, but you're busy at the moment, let the machine take the call and you can call back later.
The phone is there to serve you, not the other way around. I have let someone leave a message, just because I was in the coding zone at that moment, or enjoying an ice cream cone, or even awake-but-trying-to-nap, and didn't feel like picking up the phone. So I didn't.
ChicagoFan
I'm sure he'll also sue those who kicked and beat him.
And he'll probably win, too.
Cynically,
ChicagoFan
Normally, I would have assumed it was a scam. My friends aren't the type to do cutesy things like that. But on the other hand, the spam arrived on my birthday! So I figured, "No, it has to be legit, a message from one of my friends. I don't get much spam; what are the chances a spam of this particular kind would arrive exactly on my birthday?"
When I went to the site, they wanted a name, so I put in a fake name, and then they wanted more info, and I figured, "The hell with this, whoever sent me a birthday message, too bad for them. I'm not giving this place more info." But by that point I had already confirmed my email by entering my name, since I was so certain it was legit due to the birthday timing.
It's nice to know my initial instincts were correct, and that I didn't miss some nice birthday message from a friend. But their scam did manage to harvest my address due to perfectly coincidental timing on their part.
ChicagoFan
Deserve?
What makes you innately entitled to higher quality?
I'm serious. This is a point of annoyance for me because of those credit card or loan commercials or whatever they are, with all those people saying, "I was $8 million in debt from reckless spending[1], but now I can get the credit I deserve!" And then you have the average couch potato sitting at home, saying, "Yeah, I *do* deserve to spend more money I don't have! I'll sign up with them!"
My point is that we overuse the word "deserve". It implies entitlement. And we already think we are entitled to too much (such as credit!). We don't need to start acting like we're entitled to improved media compression technology as well.
Just a thought...
ChicagoFan
[1] Yes, I do know for some there's some legit reason things went bad for them...medical expenses or whatever. I think they are the exception, though.
This poor guy has been waiting for 30 years for us to go back and get him.
You can't prove to a judge that he's sleazy.
Sure I can.
"Your honor, he's an attorney. I rest my case."
ChicagoFan
Sixty percent of Slashdotters argue that spelling and grammar are not important.
"It's just science; who cares?"
"It's just English; who cares? People know what I mean."
All meaningful knowledge should be important.
ChicagoFan, who almost certainly made a spelling or grammar mistake somewhere in this post
oh sure, if you want to overload operator = for every class...
1) Without operator=, I couldn't swap two elements of a class even if I wrote a swap function specifically for that class instead of using a template. (unless you had a member swap(), I guess, but then you have to write a member swap() instead of a member operator=).
2) Operator= exists automatically for all classes. You only need to overload it if you are specifically allocating dynamic memory or using other such resources, and often you can just make your member variables objects (instead of pointers to objects) and let their functions do the dirty work.
So it's not as much work as you think.
ChicagoFan, probably IHBT
swap (int* a, int* b)
{
int tmp;
tmp = *a;
*a = *b;
*b = tmp;
}
Bah. Long live C++!
template < class Visa>
swap(Visa& a, Visa& b)
{
Visa tmp;
tmp = a;
a = b;
b = tmp;
}
"Visa. It's every type you want (it) to be."
ChicagoFan
(this crap here only to get past the "too few characters per line" filter)