Re:Skyshadow's Summer Reading Recommendations:
on
The Cassini Division
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· Score: 1
A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge.
Entertaining story along with two extremely interesting concepts: the intragalactic usenet and well-executed small group-minded aliens. If you like it, A Deepness in the Sky by the same author is a definate next stop. Vinge reminds me a lot of Larry Niven, again in a good way.
Yeah, it's fairly nice. Compares favorably to Niven's stuff, imo. No bolt-on-sex-scene-per-book to start with.. The concept of everything getting more stupid the closer you get into galactic center is fairly amusing. Along with sentient IP packets, apparently they did not filter for evil bit..
Damn straight. I've been ripping every single CD into a hi-bitrate MP3 as soon as I buy it. Talk about convenience of having your entire CD collection on your PC hooked to home theatre and even workplace.
Some of those so-called copy protected CDs have such lame small warning label it's efficiently hid by the store CD-holder.. They rip still just fine. And I take them back just because they tried to deceive me by hiding the label.
Industrial automation is shielded to the harshest IEC spec (10V/m) which is generated by a GSM900 2W output at 60cm distance. Consumer electronics has to withstand 3V/m which would be about 1 meter (inverse square law).. Shielded environment devices are tested against 1V/m, which you would hit at around 1.6 meters. EMI apparently does not exist in US, it's just European and Asian phenomenom.
That's free air distance, not taking into account the great many wires in the plane picking up the interference. Cell phone is not an insignificant EMI generator, it's bloody noisy especially with bad reception.
Oh, and I've heard a couple of times the captain announce we're not going anywhere until you gentlemen turn off your phones. Couldn't finish pre-takeoff check-up due to picking up emissions..
It's easier to beg for forgivness afterwards, than ask for permission first.
Yup, I'm sure all the people laid off for running distributed processing on company hardware agree with you. Not that I think firing someone for running genuinely useful software (cancer research) on their workstation's idle cycles is justifiable.
Sort of like the templar heresy, then. Not a problem with that line of thought. However, I got a plenty of problem with anyone who says to reject modern (or any kind) of medical treatment for ideological reasons. Pope included.
Now correct me if I'm wrong, but this is the group that believes all illnesses are a punishment from God and the only effective treatment is to pray and repent..? The dogma says reject antibiotics, vaccines and so forth?
Either it or that's different christian scientists.
The juicy stuff is towards the end of the article. The basic thesis of the article turns out to be that the marriage is likely to be successful if the partners have similar functions.
That's not quite what it said. Key is not having similar functions, but compatible functions. Either strong response to whatever you spouse does tends to work, as long as it's on both sides.. Or being (somewhat) nice even when the partner's being difficult works. And, ahem, ignoring or not being able to respond never works. As does only reacting negatively. More negatively to negative input but ignoring positive.
You can say it's difficult to enumerate emotions, which is true, but you can enumerate interpersonal interaction, which is what they're doing. It's not about psychohistory (great editorial, guys), it's about studying in a scientific way how couples interact with each other. Nothing new there of course, just a new kind of analysis. Maybe slashdot editors are more familiar with SF-"science" than marriage..?
Magic words: "Shelf life". UV from fluorescents adds up.
They already destroy the flavour by preservation process. Make yourself a favour, try Real Ale sometime. But watch out, drinking too much unfiltered ale..
There's plenty of 1st class stuff from independent companies. Steel Beasts and Combat mission come to mind. Also Space Empires IV. Latter is under Shrapnel games which imo is not a very good distributor at all. They want all of the pie, period. That means if a local chain wants to buy a few dozen copies.. No way, José!
What these things have in common is a good core game that lacks some polish. Eye candy plus retail availability tends to kick in with the sequel when the guys have some . Unfortunately most of the game magazines are very crappy.. About as good journalism as Ziff-Davis is known for. They'll give half a page max for superb game such as Arx Fatalis but run 8-page hype/preview about unreal II. Which turned out to be rather ho-hum experience.
Fortunately for us Finns, the local "Pelit" magazine is rather classy. Almost no hype articles, no exclusive reviews with pre-written script, not afraid to call a spade a spade. I understand the US edition of PC Gamer was their original role model way back when. Anyone heard of a semi-decent games mag in UK?
Radial context, gestures, you'll miss none of those when you got 5-button mouse with wheel! I got forward/backward/open new tab in my fingertips. Gesture that:)
Just think for a second, why do you want to pay for the Dolby digital or even Pro Logic decoding? Are you going to watch movies on your 19 inch tube or something? Don't you have a TV for that?
For serious gaming performance, you can grab any half-decent amplifier with 5.1 input plus 4 satellites. That gives you nice surround sound for EAX games. Plus the sound quality wipes the floor with these "multimedia THX" systems. Add woofer if necessary.
At least you can do it in Finland. Sometimes lowest court level cases have unfair / semi-illegal resolutions. Mid-level court decisions are very rarely so. If you're suing the county, the county court might be a little bit biased. Ditto if the county sues you!
Problem with the system is that just about everyone appeals to a higher court. Prosecution is unhappy with too easy sentences, defense with too harsh ones. Defendants are unhappy if they don't get not guilty with legal fees covered. And so on.
If nothing else, maybe this will make a few people realize nuclear's the best energy source mankind has at the moment. For spaceships, you save tons of weight since uranium contains so much energy plus you can use emerging technologies such as ion engines. Juice's not something you're short of.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, it's fairly nice. Compares favorably to Niven's stuff, imo. No bolt-on-sex-scene-per-book to start with.. The concept of everything getting more stupid the closer you get into galactic center is fairly amusing. Along with sentient IP packets, apparently they did not filter for evil bit..
Damn straight. I've been ripping every single CD into a hi-bitrate MP3 as soon as I buy it. Talk about convenience of having your entire CD collection on your PC hooked to home theatre and even workplace.
Some of those so-called copy protected CDs have such lame small warning label it's efficiently hid by the store CD-holder.. They rip still just fine. And I take them back just because they tried to deceive me by hiding the label.
Whoa there. I think that's what ICQ lite is for. It's surprisingly good.. Like they took messenger part out of ICQ and got rid of excess crap.
Industrial automation is shielded to the harshest IEC spec (10V/m) which is generated by a GSM900 2W output at 60cm distance. Consumer electronics has to withstand 3V/m which would be about 1 meter (inverse square law) .. Shielded environment devices are tested against 1V/m, which you would hit at around 1.6 meters. EMI apparently does not exist in US, it's just European and Asian phenomenom.
That's free air distance, not taking into account the great many wires in the plane picking up the interference. Cell phone is not an insignificant EMI generator, it's bloody noisy especially with bad reception.
Oh, and I've heard a couple of times the captain announce we're not going anywhere until you gentlemen turn off your phones. Couldn't finish pre-takeoff check-up due to picking up emissions..
Sort of like the templar heresy, then. Not a problem with that line of thought. However, I got a plenty of problem with anyone who says to reject modern (or any kind) of medical treatment for ideological reasons. Pope included.
Now correct me if I'm wrong, but this is the group that believes all illnesses are a punishment from God and the only effective treatment is to pray and repent..? The dogma says reject antibiotics, vaccines and so forth?
Either it or that's different christian scientists.
That still won't bother anyone who's due for viral treatment. There's this neat thing called "quarantine", too.
If you're already dying out of the brain tumor, are you going to give a damn?
Hey, thanks. I was just wondering if it was fast or not.
That's not quite what it said. Key is not having similar functions, but compatible functions. Either strong response to whatever you spouse does tends to work, as long as it's on both sides.. Or being (somewhat) nice even when the partner's being difficult works. And, ahem, ignoring or not being able to respond never works. As does only reacting negatively. More negatively to negative input but ignoring positive.
You can say it's difficult to enumerate emotions, which is true, but you can enumerate interpersonal interaction, which is what they're doing. It's not about psychohistory (great editorial, guys), it's about studying in a scientific way how couples interact with each other. Nothing new there of course, just a new kind of analysis. Maybe slashdot editors are more familiar with SF-"science" than marriage..?
Magic words: "Shelf life". UV from fluorescents adds up.
They already destroy the flavour by preservation process. Make yourself a favour, try Real Ale sometime. But watch out, drinking too much unfiltered ale..
There's plenty of 1st class stuff from independent companies. Steel Beasts and Combat mission come to mind. Also Space Empires IV. Latter is under Shrapnel games which imo is not a very good distributor at all. They want all of the pie, period. That means if a local chain wants to buy a few dozen copies.. No way, José!
What these things have in common is a good core game that lacks some polish. Eye candy plus retail availability tends to kick in with the sequel when the guys have some . Unfortunately most of the game magazines are very crappy.. About as good journalism as Ziff-Davis is known for. They'll give half a page max for superb game such as Arx Fatalis but run 8-page hype/preview about unreal II. Which turned out to be rather ho-hum experience.
Fortunately for us Finns, the local "Pelit" magazine is rather classy. Almost no hype articles, no exclusive reviews with pre-written script, not afraid to call a spade a spade. I understand the US edition of PC Gamer was their original role model way back when. Anyone heard of a semi-decent games mag in UK?
Radial context, gestures, you'll miss none of those when you got 5-button mouse with wheel! I got forward/backward/open new tab in my fingertips. Gesture that :)
You can easily take a big chunk out of the ram use by getting rid of unnecessary services. Check out "disable XP services" in google.
Linux will take a lot of ram if you let Redhat install every app it wants to, as well..
True enough. Not sure it's worth the extra expense thought. Ok, I'm sure it's not worthwhile with MY hearing.. 40dB hearing treshold :)
Just think for a second, why do you want to pay for the Dolby digital or even Pro Logic decoding? Are you going to watch movies on your 19 inch tube or something? Don't you have a TV for that?
For serious gaming performance, you can grab any half-decent amplifier with 5.1 input plus 4 satellites. That gives you nice surround sound for EAX games. Plus the sound quality wipes the floor with these "multimedia THX" systems. Add woofer if necessary.
There's something that can deliver payload that far, that fast. The shuttle.
Doesn't have to be a very large bomb.
Yeah, metric system is just so tricky. All those mobile decimal points..
I wonder if all those UD packets I crunched had anything to contribute. Probably not.
Ok, I never thought I'd see the day when a /. reader is hailing Evil Goverment legislation. What next? Start paying royalties on downloaded MP3s?
At least you can do it in Finland. Sometimes lowest court level cases have unfair / semi-illegal resolutions. Mid-level court decisions are very rarely so. If you're suing the county, the county court might be a little bit biased. Ditto if the county sues you!
Problem with the system is that just about everyone appeals to a higher court. Prosecution is unhappy with too easy sentences, defense with too harsh ones. Defendants are unhappy if they don't get not guilty with legal fees covered. And so on.
Remember where you're posting. This is
If nothing else, maybe this will make a few people realize nuclear's the best energy source mankind has at the moment. For spaceships, you save tons of weight since uranium contains so much energy plus you can use emerging technologies such as ion engines. Juice's not something you're short of.