Minor nitpick: ethanol used as fuel in Brazil is dehydrated ethanol (ethanol with no mixture of water, unlike what is used for pharmaceutical/recreational purposes)
Actually the pollution from burnt ethanol is nowhere near the nastiness of that of gasoline. The percentage of carbon monoxide in the exhaust of an ethanol engine is negligible and we all know carbon monoxide is a far more harful pollutant than the traces acetic acid.
In fact, pollution is Sao Paulo has been steadily deteriorating since ethanol engines went out of fashion. I should know...
Although it's been a long while since I don't delve into such matters, I can tell you thiis: nobody in their right minds would propose using ethanol with current engines. Ethanol cars in Brazil have different carburators and use different materials for the combustion chamber than their similar gasoline powered models. Of course, you would have to revamp your car's engine, but that could be achieved in a very cost effetive manner, so that people wouldn't have to pay almost the price of a new car just for the sake of fuel change.
I keep seeing people talking about methanol or alcohol as a fuel. It won't work!
Then you'd better tell all those people in Brazil filling up their tanks with it. Remember: in the mid-eighties this was almost 90% of all personal automobiles in the country...
Let's review:
Yup, let's go...
The concept is that you have a renewable energy source. You effectively are harvesting sunlight.
This only works if the amount of energy you get out of the fuel is greater than the amount of energy it takes to produce the fuel.
Great job, so far...
In order to distill alcohol to the point where it will burn as a fuel takes more energy than burning the alcohol produces.
Close, but no cigar. Where have you got that dumb idea? You just have to boil and then cool it back to room temperature (roughly speaking).
Conclusion: alcohol is not a renewable fuel source. Now, if you are locating a nuclear plant next to the distillary to make up the difference, then you can use alcohol as an energy storage medium, just as you can use hydrogen or really big springs. But it isn't an energy source, it is an energy storage system. The neat thing about gasoline is that you get more energy out of burning it than it takes to produce it. It's just not a renewable source...
Ah, now I see what you were driving at. To use your own words, gasoline (oil, really) is also just an energy storage system, the neat thing about it being that it you don't have to harvest, just mine it, which can be cheaper, but doesn't necessarily have to be so. I'm curious now, what makes you think that the solar energy absortion process in the origin of petroleum is any more efficient than that of alcohol (a.k.a, fermented plant carbohydrates)? Is there some mysterious biological process I'm missing? Or perhaps you think oil was formed by some magical non-biological process?
What the previous poster meant was that the ethanol used in the gasoline/alcohol mixture is dehydrated ethanol, not methanol. Methanol does not come from sugar cane, but rather from wood. I am not sure that it is mixed in any fuel commercially used in Brazil.
You may be right that is is cheaper now, but this situation will change pretty quickly long before we run out of it, as I'm sure you'd be aware if you were following the latest trends in crude oil pricing...
At some point in the early 80s something like 80% of all cars manufactured in Brazil used pure Ethanol, but since then government subsisidies having been cut down and oil prices decreasing the use of ethanol is down to less than 10% of personal vehicles. Even so, the gasoline used in all other cars is actually a mixture of gasoline and ethanol, which, of course, forces importers to adapt the carburators accordingly.
I've read once (don't ask me for references) that officials in California and Canada are looking into the Brazilian experience so as to implement a similar program at home.
Notice that the author is conspicuous in comparing apples to oranges (GNU libc to BSD libc) and some other clues in his article hint that he is a disgruntled BSD advocate.
IMHO, the term 'bloat' when used in technical discussions has become a meaningless way of lashing derisive remarks towards your opponent. Nothing is 'bloated' on its own, but only in comparison to a similar piece of software. Then again, you have to ask yourself if both pieces of software perform the same tasks, have similar features etc. Saying X is bloated, is all fine and dady, if you can point to details of its design that make for superfluous code. Can it be done in a more efficient way? With more compact code? That is meaningful discussion about the "bloatedness" of software, all the rest is just mindlesss ranting. If you equal more features with bloat, then my friend, your place is not in a creative business like programming.
Once IE is no longer "part of the OS", but an app on many OS, it will be the new "Desktop" like KDE or GNOME, but better!!! KDE and GNOME sit over their own small space... IE sits over the NET.
Sheesh, you don't know much about either GNOME or KDE, do you? Still, it must feel 'k3w1' to spout your "knowledge" and chant hurrah for M$, it's oh so posh a thing to do on/. nowadays. BTW, IE sits over the Microsoft.NET (there's a difference, you know...).
Why, I challenge you to find a single post of mine in which I diss Katz, or come out with really puerile remark like "KATZ YOU SUCK". What I was disagreeing with was your assumption that filtering or moderation have anything to do with censorship. They do not, and only obstinate trolls think so.
For the record: 1) I do filter Katz stories, because they generally don't interest me and a flood of meaningless discussion ensue them; 2) I was not particularly pissed off by this book review, because the subject at hand interests me, but still I see how people who have a strong beef with Katz find this very annoying.
And what do Katz filtering and moderation have to do with censorship, oh wise one?
If I'm on a plane and my seat neighbour is a very talkative bore, am I censoring him if I use earplugs or an earphne stereo or just fall asleep so as not to be drawn into his morose chat? Am I censoring him if I advise other passengers not to pay attention to this moron?
afc@tonga:~$ bc bc 1.05 Copyright 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1997, 1998 Free Software Foundation, Inc. This is free software with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. For details type `warranty'. 26*26*26 17576
Nope, I'm afraid you cannot have 2000000000 TLD names with only 26 letters in the alphabet...
For another take of a musician's point of view in relation to RIAA's stance on the electronic trading of digital music, read this article on Salon by Courtney Love. Very enlightening and revealing for all those who insist on defendind the industry fron piracy...
I submitted this article to the/. crew, but it seems the team of trained mammals haven't found it as interesting...Oh, well
I'm sure that my karma will plummit for pointing this out, but come on HeUnique, where is your sense of grammar?
I am not sure about your karma (or mine, after this) but your credentials as a grammar nazi are irrevocably lost for spelling 'plummet' as you just did.
Perhaps, but a moment of careful meditation will make you realize that parallel and distributed applications are horses of a different colour, even though they may race on the same track sometimes...
I'll concede that your translation may be more accurate than mine (Spanish not being my first language), even though I thought 'pendejo' was used as a deriding term for an annoying person, i.e., an asshole. I also think the literal translation of 'pendejo' is 'pube'. Now let's petition Rob for the name change;-)
I may be particularly dense today, but how does the "secret cult" thing affects the challenge? And given that, from a user interface point of view Linux and FreeBSD (and for all I know, the Hurd once is finished) are virtually equivalent, why is the challenge greater in one versus the other?
And lest we forget, would you be so kind as to explain what is this pollution that you keep talking about? Final question: are you a programmer?
In the improbable case you're not just feeding us a line with this Hong Kong newspaper story I have to ask you: your sole motivation for using Linux (or FreeBSD) is because of its secrecy, this "being on the fringe" feeling? You might as well quit using computers (or posting to Slashdot!) because it is too "popular" nowadays. Consider joining a secret cult, or collecting stamps. Anything that might suit your little heart's desire for weirdness will spare our patience here.
What happened to the previous two, BTW? Are they standard AC crap and have been modded into oblivion?
Anyways, my guess as to what happened to your post moderation is that, even though you intended it to be a humorous, commonplace inanity, it found echo in the cluelessness of some moderators. Slashdot is such an amazing place!
What kind of services could a Third-World country have to offer (to another country... first world countries just take what they want from the third world... it's wrong, but we get everything we want/need out of them already)?
There are you go again making the wrong assumptions. Who says the services have to be provided to another country? Clearly, the point of a service-based economy is making more money circulate internally, thus helping the economy grow as a whole.
Granted, a good netting some dollars from exports is good, but most Third World countries already do thatv (some with industrialized goods, some with agricultural produce). Doesn't go very far towards improving the living conditions for the majority, though.
I realize that agriculture is not the sole source of income in the poorer countries of the world. I simply contend that there is a natural progression for an economy. Trying to skip the development of a solid industrial sector is silly.
Once again, your contention is wrong. What is natural progress in history? Which country shows them the correct path to follow? The US? Switzerland? Japan? Anyways, you're also wrong in assuming that the industrial infrastructure is not in place. Most countries in Latin America, and most in Southern Asia have a fairly industrialized economy. What they don't have, in opposition to Western Europe, North America and Japan is a sizeable middle class, which is able to provide three fundamental things: tax money to fund a rational social infrastructure; savings to fuel investment; and third the demand for services that will grow the economy. Anything that brings about more of the latter is a worthy goal, IMHO.
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Minor nitpick: ethanol used as fuel in Brazil is dehydrated ethanol (ethanol with no mixture of water, unlike what is used for pharmaceutical/recreational purposes)
In fact, pollution is Sao Paulo has been steadily deteriorating since ethanol engines went out of fashion. I should know...
Although it's been a long while since I don't delve into such matters, I can tell you thiis: nobody in their right minds would propose using ethanol with current engines. Ethanol cars in Brazil have different carburators and use different materials for the combustion chamber than their similar gasoline powered models. Of course, you would have to revamp your car's engine, but that could be achieved in a very cost effetive manner, so that people wouldn't have to pay almost the price of a new car just for the sake of fuel change.
Then you'd better tell all those people in Brazil filling up their tanks with it. Remember: in the mid-eighties this was almost 90% of all personal automobiles in the country...
Let's review:Yup, let's go...
The concept is that you have a renewable energy source. You effectively are harvesting sunlight.This only works if the amount of energy you get out of the fuel is greater than the amount of energy it takes to produce the fuel.
Great job, so far...
In order to distill alcohol to the point where it will burn as a fuel takes more energy than burning the alcohol produces.Close, but no cigar. Where have you got that dumb idea? You just have to boil and then cool it back to room temperature (roughly speaking).
Conclusion: alcohol is not a renewable fuel source. Now, if you are locating a nuclear plant next to the distillary to make up the difference, then you can use alcohol as an energy storage medium, just as you can use hydrogen or really big springs. But it isn't an energy source, it is an energy storage system. The neat thing about gasoline is that you get more energy out of burning it than it takes to produce it. It's just not a renewable source...Ah, now I see what you were driving at. To use your own words, gasoline (oil, really) is also just an energy storage system, the neat thing about it being that it you don't have to harvest, just mine it, which can be cheaper, but doesn't necessarily have to be so. I'm curious now, what makes you think that the solar energy absortion process in the origin of petroleum is any more efficient than that of alcohol (a.k.a, fermented plant carbohydrates)? Is there some mysterious biological process I'm missing? Or perhaps you think oil was formed by some magical non-biological process?
What the previous poster meant was that the ethanol used in the gasoline/alcohol mixture is dehydrated ethanol, not methanol. Methanol does not come from sugar cane, but rather from wood. I am not sure that it is mixed in any fuel commercially used in Brazil.
Para mais informações, dê uma olhada aqui.
You may be right that is is cheaper now, but this situation will change pretty quickly long before we run out of it, as I'm sure you'd be aware if you were following the latest trends in crude oil pricing...
I've read once (don't ask me for references) that officials in California and Canada are looking into the Brazilian experience so as to implement a similar program at home.
Are you this guy's old uncle? Gee, I miss OOG the caveman...
BTW, and very OT, happy Bastille Day to all French slashdotters.
IMHO, the term 'bloat' when used in technical discussions has become a meaningless way of lashing derisive remarks towards your opponent. Nothing is 'bloated' on its own, but only in comparison to a similar piece of software. Then again, you have to ask yourself if both pieces of software perform the same tasks, have similar features etc. Saying X is bloated, is all fine and dady, if you can point to details of its design that make for superfluous code. Can it be done in a more efficient way? With more compact code? That is meaningful discussion about the "bloatedness" of software, all the rest is just mindlesss ranting. If you equal more features with bloat, then my friend, your place is not in a creative business like programming.
Once IE is no longer "part of the OS", but an app on many OS, it will be the new "Desktop" like KDE or GNOME, but better!!! KDE and GNOME sit over their own small space... IE sits over the NET.
Sheesh, you don't know much about either GNOME or KDE, do you? Still, it must feel 'k3w1' to spout your "knowledge" and chant hurrah for M$, it's oh so posh a thing to do onFor the record: 1) I do filter Katz stories, because they generally don't interest me and a flood of meaningless discussion ensue them; 2) I was not particularly pissed off by this book review, because the subject at hand interests me, but still I see how people who have a strong beef with Katz find this very annoying.
Gee, how clever of you to rehash somebody else's quotes. Much easier than having any wit, I guess...
If I'm on a plane and my seat neighbour is a very talkative bore, am I censoring him if I use earplugs or an earphne stereo or just fall asleep so as not to be drawn into his morose chat? Am I censoring him if I advise other passengers not to pay attention to this moron?
Are you BTW a friend of TheAngryGuy?
afc@tonga:~$ bc
Nope, I'm afraid you cannot have 2000000000 TLD names with only 26 letters in the alphabet...bc 1.05
Copyright 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1997, 1998 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This is free software with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. For details type `warranty'.
26*26*26
17576
I submitted this article to the /. crew, but it seems the team of trained mammals haven't found it as interesting...Oh, well
I'm sure that my karma will plummit for pointing this out, but come on HeUnique, where is your sense of grammar?
I am not sure about your karma (or mine, after this) but your credentials as a grammar nazi are irrevocably lost for spelling 'plummet' as you just did.
Perhaps, but a moment of careful meditation will make you realize that parallel and distributed applications are horses of a different colour, even though they may race on the same track sometimes...
I'll concede that your translation may be more accurate than mine (Spanish not being my first language), even though I thought 'pendejo' was used as a deriding term for an annoying person, i.e., an asshole. I also think the literal translation of 'pendejo' is 'pube'. ;-)
Now let's petition Rob for the name change
And lest we forget, would you be so kind as to explain what is this pollution that you keep talking about? Final question: are you a programmer?
Or, to put it in other words, you may be unhappy about the way NASA goes about space exploration. but just imagine if Microsoft was doing it...
In the improbable case you're not just feeding us a line with this Hong Kong newspaper story I have to ask you: your sole motivation for using Linux (or FreeBSD) is because of its secrecy, this "being on the fringe" feeling? You might as well quit using computers (or posting to Slashdot!) because it is too "popular" nowadays. Consider joining a secret cult, or collecting stamps. Anything that might suit your little heart's desire for weirdness will spare our patience here.
Tasmanian devil?
Anyways, my guess as to what happened to your post moderation is that, even though you intended it to be a humorous, commonplace inanity, it found echo in the cluelessness of some moderators. Slashdot is such an amazing place!
What kind of services could a Third-World country have to offer (to another country ... first world countries just take what they want from the third world ... it's wrong, but we get everything we want/need out of them already)?
There are you go again making the wrong assumptions. Who says the services have to be provided to another country? Clearly, the point of a service-based economy is making more money circulate internally, thus helping the economy grow as a whole.
Granted, a good netting some dollars from exports is good, but most Third World countries already do thatv (some with industrialized goods, some with agricultural produce). Doesn't go very far towards improving the living conditions for the majority, though.
I realize that agriculture is not the sole source of income in the poorer countries of the world. I simply contend that there is a natural progression for an economy. Trying to skip the development of a solid industrial sector is silly.
Once again, your contention is wrong. What is natural progress in history? Which country shows them the correct path to follow? The US? Switzerland? Japan?
Anyways, you're also wrong in assuming that the industrial infrastructure is not in place. Most countries in Latin America, and most in Southern Asia have a fairly industrialized economy. What they don't have, in opposition to Western Europe, North America and Japan is a sizeable middle class, which is able to provide three fundamental things: tax money to fund a rational social infrastructure; savings to fuel investment; and third the demand for services that will grow the economy. Anything that brings about more of the latter is a worthy goal, IMHO.