I realize that locomotives are hybrid design (which is totally irrelevant), but their capacity to reclaim the energy of their motion is limited to such a degree that it should be considered absolutely negligible. A system which could reclaim ALL of the energy and provide it back into the grid of a local city is what I was thinking.
So, unless the trains you're talking about have several dozen train cars loaded with large capacity batteries, I don't think we're exactly talking about the same thing...
Exactly. Why would we want to rely on an unpredictable, complicated solution to generate a small amount of electricity when we could be harnessing lots of other sources which are much more reliable, scalable, simple, and cheap!
What about using EM induction to slow down trains? How much electricity could a freight train generate if it stopped using a "third rail" and some magnets beginning a few miles out of town (when it'll already begin slowing down). The savings in mech braking wear and tear, the usefulness of the quantity of electricity generated, the predictability, reliability, simplicity, and cost of such a system make this idea seem so much better than trying to harness the power of "walking."
But we're not into "useful tech", we want something "clever" sounding and "outside of the box" - even if it's really useless and a waste of resources that could equivocally produce a superior, albeit "boring" and "obvious" solution.
This green revolution made so much more sense when it didn't have the all the hype. Bring back the old timers!
One thing I noticed that I found interesting was that the windows have a new position variable - theta if you will - that allows the edges of a window to be non-parallel to the boundaries of the screen (rotated). This I have not seen before, but it makes me wonder how badly it would break backwards compatibility?
I don't see how this is any different (legally) than - for example - a factory or research facility requiring you to check in your phones and cameras when you take a tour of their facility. It's THEIR property, THEIR terms. Like it or leave!
I worked in a computer store for a year where we sold 95% Asus boards (low end stuff, usually). A few hundred a year, probably. The DOA/failure rates for those boards had to be less than 1 in 100.
Then I switched to a company using desktop MSI boards (when they should have been using more industrial grade stuff, but they were too cheap to cut into their 99% profit margin), and I built a hundred or so of those machines a year for over 2 years. The DOA/failure rates for those boards was probably about 1 in 25.
Not the most thorough analysis, but my anecdotal experience suggests that MSI boards are not worth it - even the cheap boards (like Soltek) offer better quality at a lower price point with no feature compromise.
On a side note: the one factor I noticed between both jobs was that Maxtor hard drives are completely worthless.
Having said that, I think it's great that Asus has added this functionality to motherboards. I didn't RTFA but I am wondering if it's possible for this platform to run some type of AV and/or disk utilities (file system repair, disk cloning,...) to aide users in recovering from catastrophes, upgrade hardware, etc...
I realize it's not targeting the OS, but it just so happens that (until very recently) all computers running Mac OS have a fixed hardware base, unlike PCs. I thought I made this fundamental concept pretty clear.
My point here is that even if Macs don't own the market, there is frequently at at least one in every major corporate/government network. Since they can be positively identified, and their hardware possibilities narrowed down to a tiny fraction of those for the PC market, it would be a logical entry point from which to leverage a large scale attack if you knew you could get a high level backdoor installed.
TFS says the code must be specifically targeted to a particular machine which, on a PC, means a very big challenge.
On a Mac, however, you could easily target a very large number of people using only a very small number of hardware variations. Could this exploit be better suited to Macs than PCs? On the other hand, it also seems like it would be equally easier to detect the problem, since your algorithm can be fairly specific (both in terms of Macs and PCs), since the code needed to exploit would be rather specific.
I see this era of ultra-mini-super-small-mini whatever laptops cultivating a market for which web apps - such as Microsoft Live or Google Docs and Adobe Photoshop Express - finally make sense. It's like they're finally finding their home.
What I mean is that it's obvious that a $300 laptop is going to cut corners. Since they will likely lose on the disk space front, having the ability to run a full blown office suite and image editing software without installing anything will be truly appealing - not to mention that you can store so much of your stuff online, making it easier to switch to your desktop when you get back to the office and finish your work.
Will this new market finally bring these services to the foreground?
Mod parent up - it really is a stupid metric if you ask me. There's no "gallons" of anything involved. It's an electric car.
We should be using a better metric such as kW per mile or something. Anything based on currency or the price of a consumable is going to vary with time (like $/mile here), so this value will mean nothing in a few months when prices change.
Alternatively (for those who don't want to download an extra program):
- Go to about:config in Firefox
- Right click/command click in the list and chose New > String
- For the preference name use "general.useragent.override"
- Use any value you wish, such as "Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/1A543a Safari/419.3"
- You can verify your change by going to "about:" in Firefox and reading the information from the page!
Can't help you with the 'finding a working iPhone number' part though!
finding your firearm and picking its trigger lock, then loading it with their own magazine and ammo and then using it for evil
What part of 'unprotected gun' suggests a trigger lock and a properly stored ammo and magazine? When I said unprotected gun, I mean, for example, a gun sitting in an unlocked drawer, loaded and without a lock.
If I'm not mistaken, the limitations of this bill are easily mitigated by insurance companies by simply saying: "Hey, sign this release so we can see a copy of your genetic tests and we'll knock 50% off the list price for your premiums!" While charging exorbitantly high fees for non-signers... Or are there protections in place for this kind of game playing?
I didn't read the text of the law (not that I would get much out of it anyway) so perhaps someone with more complete knowledge can correct me if I'm wrong...
It's not just about carbon! There are other problems with these reactions that produce pollutants besides CO2, which might not otherwise exist - like NOx (which are very harmful free radicals). The carbon may be the same, but you're still changing the composition of the elements in the atmosphere. I'd rather have 1billion tons of N2 than a billion tons of NOx.
I agree battery chemistry is not perfected, but the potential to develop better batteries and even battery-free technology exists. Burning hydrocarbons is inherently wasteful, inefficient and harmful. How? It's all about secondary pollution.
Secondary pollution is a major problem. Have you thought about what it takes to produce bio fuels? Food! Food has to be grown in crops, which usually involve diversion of water, pollution from fertilizers, and consumption of fuels to plant, maintain, harvest, and distribute crops. All of this causes secondary pollution, as well as additional fuel consumption. That adds up to inefficient and harmful. While the primary burning of hydrocarbons may appear acceptable for the time being, few people take the time to think past the obvious.
It wouldn't matter if gas was $.01 or $10.00 @ gallon, I still have to drive to work, shop and do several other chores.
...and zero emissions vehicles are unsuitable for these purposes becauseeeeee........? How come people in Europe can manage with gas that's two to three times more expensive than ours? You're just moaning. Accept that change is on the horizon - dinosaurs who think that they need gasoline to preserve their pristine suburban lifestyle are on their way out just like the RIAA!
It's all about FORCING people to change. Make sure you read my entire post. People wont switch from gasoline as long as its economically viable. +4 insightful? Should be +4 doesn't read between the lines.
Should I not be held (somewhat) responsible if my unprotected gun is used in a crime? A computer with an internet connection has inherent risks, it's the users responsibility to secure and protect their own goods against damage, as well as malicious uses.
If your computer is damaged in an effort to mitigate a large-scale botnet causing massive infrastructure problems and costing people money, then perhaps you could at least learn something from the process.
I don't feel sympathy for their (speculated, potential) loss/damage, I feel pity for their ignorance. My dad always told me not to use tools without understanding how to use them properly and safely, there's no reason this logic can't apply to computers.
Burning hydrocarbons is not the future! It's the past, present, and the whole reason we're in this mess!
What would happen to fuel consumption if gas dropped to $1/gallon? Everyone would consume more, and all the years worth of effort to get people to buy economical cars, avoid wasting fuel, and to think more green would be wasted.
We DO NOT NEED CHEAPER GASOLINE! We need to get rid of it entirely. Zero emissions is the ONLY way forward, and as long as gasoline is economically viable people will continue to burn it and destroy the environment.
Take a page from malware writers - add a script that connects to an IRC channel and lets you issue remote commands.
Of particular interest would be returning the results of various network utilities (ie traceroute), as well as displaying messages (ie: THIS LAPTOP IS BEING TRACKED. TO AVOID PROSECUTION RETURN WITHIN 24 HOURS) or just shutting it down, etc.
No kidding. About 75% of professors seem to think that it's acceptable to waste the students' time by conveying exactly the same information (and NOTHING more) that they could have digested with 10 minutes of reading via a 50 minute lecture.That's not education--that's a complete waste of 40 minutes.
This statement is a bunch of shit. How many schools did you attend? How many different professors at each school did you have? My guess is that you went to no more than two college level schools, probably in a geographically confined area. If you hate your fucking school, GO FIND ANOTHER ONE! Quit paying your tuition and supporting a bogus school.
Saying that 75% of all Professors are crap is a preposterous and reckless misrepresentation of what boils down to be localized, anecdotal whining.
Having said that, I attend a community college and I find that there are lots of students who care about their education and want to learn the materials so they can succeed. These students pay attention, absorb the material and read the books. They are NOT the majority by any means, however.
The rest typically fall quite short, and the worst ones (the ones you'll typically find sitting in the back watching YouTube videos all class) are piggybacking on their parent's bank account, often fresh out of high school, and not very interested in doing well (why do they need an education? mom and dad make plenty of money!) In these cases, I don't mind letting them fail a class over and over by providing YouTube videos of kittens, because it keeps them occupied. Usually, when they're not absorbed in some distraction they're just making things difficult for everyone else (talking to other idiots, asking stupid questions to annoy the teacher, text messaging...)
Granted, some lectures are pointless (I've had several) but it's not fair by any means to blame it entirely on the Professor. I've had many cases where several students - myself included - were simply taking a class that was too easy. The students who belonged in the class found it tremendously helpful and educational even though I did not.
Instead of having to force PayPal users to use only specific browsers, they educate the consumers on safe browsing habits and not blindly clicking on "OMG SEND ME UR CC NUMBER AND BANK DETAILS LOLOL". Hmm, just did a quick search of my Gmail inbox:
June 2007, from PayPal:
Subject: "Shop with PayPal for sizzling summer deals"
Prominently featured: "Take the Fight Phishing Challenge, Test your ability to spot fake
PayPal emails."
May 2007, from PayPal:
Subject: "Now send money and make free calls"
#2 article: "Fight back against phishing"
February 2007, from PayPal:
Subject: Get a $15 cash rebate from PayPal
#2 article: "No Phishing Allowed. Fight back with our new Anti-Phishing Guide."
June 2005, from PayPal:
Subject: "Ten Ways to Spot Fake Emails"
The entire email is about spotting/avoiding phishing attacks
Honestly, I don't see how PayPal can be blamed for people's lack of willingness to self educate and be vigilant. It's your money, you need to protect it, don't rely on other people. They offer all the tools, it's up to people to take advantage of them and learn a thing or two.
Personally, I don't exactly condone people piggybacking on someone else's connection - open or not.
However, I have on occasion utilized open access points. The typical scenario is that I'm lost or need to look up a place to eat, so I pull up in a residential area, hop on to grab some directions or something, and then I'm done.
Another situation would be when I'm troubleshooting someones computer or network on location, and for one reason or another I have no other option when I need to look up a syntax, get advice, or download a patch.
In all of these cases I steer clear of illegal activities, minimize the bandwidth used (only surfing and downloading small files like patches or spybot updates).
For these situations I am really grateful for these open APs, whether because of ignorance or kindness I will never know, but grateful none the less. Does the/. community frown upon this kind of use? Is it REALLY considered immoral or illegal?
Isn't it possible just to claim your wireless access point was left open and that someone else was using your wireless without your consent or knowledge? They can only prove it was your modem that transmitted the information, not the actual PC without doing a forensic hard disk analysis, right?
My router spoofs all my MACs and I've only got one IPA, so anyone using my router looks the same to the entire web.
Slashdot Mirror
I realize that locomotives are hybrid design (which is totally irrelevant), but their capacity to reclaim the energy of their motion is limited to such a degree that it should be considered absolutely negligible. A system which could reclaim ALL of the energy and provide it back into the grid of a local city is what I was thinking.
So, unless the trains you're talking about have several dozen train cars loaded with large capacity batteries, I don't think we're exactly talking about the same thing...
Exactly. Why would we want to rely on an unpredictable, complicated solution to generate a small amount of electricity when we could be harnessing lots of other sources which are much more reliable, scalable, simple, and cheap!
What about using EM induction to slow down trains? How much electricity could a freight train generate if it stopped using a "third rail" and some magnets beginning a few miles out of town (when it'll already begin slowing down). The savings in mech braking wear and tear, the usefulness of the quantity of electricity generated, the predictability, reliability, simplicity, and cost of such a system make this idea seem so much better than trying to harness the power of "walking."
But we're not into "useful tech", we want something "clever" sounding and "outside of the box" - even if it's really useless and a waste of resources that could equivocally produce a superior, albeit "boring" and "obvious" solution.
This green revolution made so much more sense when it didn't have the all the hype. Bring back the old timers!
Do you mean like this?
=)
One thing I noticed that I found interesting was that the windows have a new position variable - theta if you will - that allows the edges of a window to be non-parallel to the boundaries of the screen (rotated). This I have not seen before, but it makes me wonder how badly it would break backwards compatibility?
Mod parent up because s/he is exactly right.
I don't see how this is any different (legally) than - for example - a factory or research facility requiring you to check in your phones and cameras when you take a tour of their facility. It's THEIR property, THEIR terms. Like it or leave!
I worked in a computer store for a year where we sold 95% Asus boards (low end stuff, usually). A few hundred a year, probably. The DOA/failure rates for those boards had to be less than 1 in 100.
Then I switched to a company using desktop MSI boards (when they should have been using more industrial grade stuff, but they were too cheap to cut into their 99% profit margin), and I built a hundred or so of those machines a year for over 2 years. The DOA/failure rates for those boards was probably about 1 in 25.
Not the most thorough analysis, but my anecdotal experience suggests that MSI boards are not worth it - even the cheap boards (like Soltek) offer better quality at a lower price point with no feature compromise.
On a side note: the one factor I noticed between both jobs was that Maxtor hard drives are completely worthless.
Having said that, I think it's great that Asus has added this functionality to motherboards. I didn't RTFA but I am wondering if it's possible for this platform to run some type of AV and/or disk utilities (file system repair, disk cloning, ...) to aide users in recovering from catastrophes, upgrade hardware, etc...
Ugh, space lawyers? This just puts us one step closer to space IP lawyers, and we all know what that's going to be like.
I realize it's not targeting the OS, but it just so happens that (until very recently) all computers running Mac OS have a fixed hardware base, unlike PCs. I thought I made this fundamental concept pretty clear.
My point here is that even if Macs don't own the market, there is frequently at at least one in every major corporate/government network. Since they can be positively identified, and their hardware possibilities narrowed down to a tiny fraction of those for the PC market, it would be a logical entry point from which to leverage a large scale attack if you knew you could get a high level backdoor installed.
Does this clear it up for you?
TFS says the code must be specifically targeted to a particular machine which, on a PC, means a very big challenge.
On a Mac, however, you could easily target a very large number of people using only a very small number of hardware variations. Could this exploit be better suited to Macs than PCs? On the other hand, it also seems like it would be equally easier to detect the problem, since your algorithm can be fairly specific (both in terms of Macs and PCs), since the code needed to exploit would be rather specific.
I bow to no hero except Theremin Hero!
I see this era of ultra-mini-super-small-mini whatever laptops cultivating a market for which web apps - such as Microsoft Live or Google Docs and Adobe Photoshop Express - finally make sense. It's like they're finally finding their home.
What I mean is that it's obvious that a $300 laptop is going to cut corners. Since they will likely lose on the disk space front, having the ability to run a full blown office suite and image editing software without installing anything will be truly appealing - not to mention that you can store so much of your stuff online, making it easier to switch to your desktop when you get back to the office and finish your work.
Will this new market finally bring these services to the foreground?
Mod parent up - it really is a stupid metric if you ask me. There's no "gallons" of anything involved. It's an electric car.
We should be using a better metric such as kW per mile or something. Anything based on currency or the price of a consumable is going to vary with time (like $/mile here), so this value will mean nothing in a few months when prices change.
Some say he can't get too near a strong magnetic field, or else his head would explode...
Can't help you with the 'finding a working iPhone number' part though!
What part of 'unprotected gun' suggests a trigger lock and a properly stored ammo and magazine? When I said unprotected gun, I mean, for example, a gun sitting in an unlocked drawer, loaded and without a lock.
If I'm not mistaken, the limitations of this bill are easily mitigated by insurance companies by simply saying: "Hey, sign this release so we can see a copy of your genetic tests and we'll knock 50% off the list price for your premiums!" While charging exorbitantly high fees for non-signers... Or are there protections in place for this kind of game playing?
I didn't read the text of the law (not that I would get much out of it anyway) so perhaps someone with more complete knowledge can correct me if I'm wrong...
It's not just about carbon! There are other problems with these reactions that produce pollutants besides CO2, which might not otherwise exist - like NOx (which are very harmful free radicals). The carbon may be the same, but you're still changing the composition of the elements in the atmosphere. I'd rather have 1billion tons of N2 than a billion tons of NOx.
I agree battery chemistry is not perfected, but the potential to develop better batteries and even battery-free technology exists. Burning hydrocarbons is inherently wasteful, inefficient and harmful. How? It's all about secondary pollution.
Secondary pollution is a major problem. Have you thought about what it takes to produce bio fuels? Food! Food has to be grown in crops, which usually involve diversion of water, pollution from fertilizers, and consumption of fuels to plant, maintain, harvest, and distribute crops. All of this causes secondary pollution, as well as additional fuel consumption. That adds up to inefficient and harmful. While the primary burning of hydrocarbons may appear acceptable for the time being, few people take the time to think past the obvious.
...and zero emissions vehicles are unsuitable for these purposes becauseeeeee........? How come people in Europe can manage with gas that's two to three times more expensive than ours? You're just moaning. Accept that change is on the horizon - dinosaurs who think that they need gasoline to preserve their pristine suburban lifestyle are on their way out just like the RIAA!
It's all about FORCING people to change. Make sure you read my entire post. People wont switch from gasoline as long as its economically viable. +4 insightful? Should be +4 doesn't read between the lines.
Should I not be held (somewhat) responsible if my unprotected gun is used in a crime? A computer with an internet connection has inherent risks, it's the users responsibility to secure and protect their own goods against damage, as well as malicious uses.
If your computer is damaged in an effort to mitigate a large-scale botnet causing massive infrastructure problems and costing people money, then perhaps you could at least learn something from the process.
I don't feel sympathy for their (speculated, potential) loss/damage, I feel pity for their ignorance. My dad always told me not to use tools without understanding how to use them properly and safely, there's no reason this logic can't apply to computers.
Burning hydrocarbons is not the future! It's the past, present, and the whole reason we're in this mess!
What would happen to fuel consumption if gas dropped to $1/gallon? Everyone would consume more, and all the years worth of effort to get people to buy economical cars, avoid wasting fuel, and to think more green would be wasted.
We DO NOT NEED CHEAPER GASOLINE! We need to get rid of it entirely. Zero emissions is the ONLY way forward, and as long as gasoline is economically viable people will continue to burn it and destroy the environment.
Take a page from malware writers - add a script that connects to an IRC channel and lets you issue remote commands.
Of particular interest would be returning the results of various network utilities (ie traceroute), as well as displaying messages (ie: THIS LAPTOP IS BEING TRACKED. TO AVOID PROSECUTION RETURN WITHIN 24 HOURS) or just shutting it down, etc.
Just an idea :)
This statement is a bunch of shit. How many schools did you attend? How many different professors at each school did you have? My guess is that you went to no more than two college level schools, probably in a geographically confined area. If you hate your fucking school, GO FIND ANOTHER ONE! Quit paying your tuition and supporting a bogus school.
Saying that 75% of all Professors are crap is a preposterous and reckless misrepresentation of what boils down to be localized, anecdotal whining.
Having said that, I attend a community college and I find that there are lots of students who care about their education and want to learn the materials so they can succeed. These students pay attention, absorb the material and read the books. They are NOT the majority by any means, however.
The rest typically fall quite short, and the worst ones (the ones you'll typically find sitting in the back watching YouTube videos all class) are piggybacking on their parent's bank account, often fresh out of high school, and not very interested in doing well (why do they need an education? mom and dad make plenty of money!) In these cases, I don't mind letting them fail a class over and over by providing YouTube videos of kittens, because it keeps them occupied. Usually, when they're not absorbed in some distraction they're just making things difficult for everyone else (talking to other idiots, asking stupid questions to annoy the teacher, text messaging...)
Granted, some lectures are pointless (I've had several) but it's not fair by any means to blame it entirely on the Professor. I've had many cases where several students - myself included - were simply taking a class that was too easy. The students who belonged in the class found it tremendously helpful and educational even though I did not.
June 2007, from PayPal:
Subject: "Shop with PayPal for sizzling summer deals"
Prominently featured: "Take the Fight Phishing Challenge, Test your ability to spot fake PayPal emails."
May 2007, from PayPal:
Subject: "Now send money and make free calls"
#2 article: "Fight back against phishing"
February 2007, from PayPal:
Subject: Get a $15 cash rebate from PayPal
#2 article: "No Phishing Allowed. Fight back with our new Anti-Phishing Guide."
June 2005, from PayPal:
Subject: "Ten Ways to Spot Fake Emails" The entire email is about spotting/avoiding phishing attacks
Admittedly, they've been slacking off lately, but it's not like they've never tried it before. Also, a quick look at the PayPal Security Center reveals to me: ...and a plethora of other tips and bits of useful information that any half-wit can find and understand
- Report fake (phishing) email
- Report fake (spoof) websites
-
Honestly, I don't see how PayPal can be blamed for people's lack of willingness to self educate and be vigilant. It's your money, you need to protect it, don't rely on other people. They offer all the tools, it's up to people to take advantage of them and learn a thing or two.
Personally, I don't exactly condone people piggybacking on someone else's connection - open or not.
However, I have on occasion utilized open access points. The typical scenario is that I'm lost or need to look up a place to eat, so I pull up in a residential area, hop on to grab some directions or something, and then I'm done.
Another situation would be when I'm troubleshooting someones computer or network on location, and for one reason or another I have no other option when I need to look up a syntax, get advice, or download a patch.
In all of these cases I steer clear of illegal activities, minimize the bandwidth used (only surfing and downloading small files like patches or spybot updates).
For these situations I am really grateful for these open APs, whether because of ignorance or kindness I will never know, but grateful none the less. Does the /. community frown upon this kind of use? Is it REALLY considered immoral or illegal?
Isn't it possible just to claim your wireless access point was left open and that someone else was using your wireless without your consent or knowledge? They can only prove it was your modem that transmitted the information, not the actual PC without doing a forensic hard disk analysis, right?
My router spoofs all my MACs and I've only got one IPA, so anyone using my router looks the same to the entire web.
Is this a plausible defense?