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User: patch0

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  1. Depending on the nature of your data... on How Do You Organize Your Experimental Data? · · Score: 1

    Depending on the nature of your data, I used to use netcdf files quite a lot (https://www.unidata.ucar.edu/software/netcdf/). I also work on data sharing and standardisation, this is a full time job, so really you can spend as much time as you want on this and still not get it done. There are a variety of international data standards which exist to facilitate the management and sharing of data. I know you aren't necessarily talking about sharing your data, but many of the same issues apply. In short, unless you wish to spend a great deal of time on this or your employer has some data management solution for you then there are probably only a variety of unsatisfactory solutions which no doubt the slashdotters here will suggest :)

  2. Re:An ever shorter leash for the end users on iOS 4 Releases Today · · Score: 1

    Just bought an iPad, it goes with my iPhone 3GS and my Airport Extreme and my AppleTV. I'm fully aware of the Apple media walled garden, I don't care about that in the slightest. Why? Because their DRM is so piss-poor I know I can break it if I want to without enourmous effort. In the end I've bought these Apple products because I like the convenience of having a single media collection that coordinates simply accross all my various devices (~30GB music ~30GB photos, several hundred GB of film and TV shows).

    I know I can have all those things with various FOSS solutions such as Myth TV etc, or even Windows devices. But to be honest I work in IT all day long, often doing unpaid overtime, I don't want to come home and wrestle with my computers at home too, be they Linux based or Windows based. Apple's devices are more expensive than they could be, but for me at least, they are well designed, very easy to use (for the non-technical members of my household this is very important) and very very convenient. In the end, I bought those Apple products because I'm lazy and I can afford them. I also don't understand the frankly bizarre levels of spleen directed at Apple for daring to produce products that people clearly want.

  3. Re:Oh yea. Teach them non mainstream stuff on Exam Board Deletes C and PHP From CompSci A-Levels · · Score: 1

    In my A-Level in electronics we had to learn to program in machine code. Rather than teach us a real instruction set they made one up so as not to 'give unfair advantage to a student who might know an existing instruction set'... what crap. How many 17 year olds you know are gonna be overly familiar with a particular instruction set?

  4. Re:Silly Brits on UK Election Arcana, Explained By Software · · Score: 1

    FPTP Error 404: Government Not Found. Reset your voting system to proportional representation and try again.

  5. Re:Hopefully Not on Next iPhone — Front-Facing Camera, A4 Processor · · Score: 1

    I can view the iPlayer just fine on my iphone over wifi.

  6. They only just figured this out? on Later School Start For Teenagers Brings Drop In Absenteeism · · Score: 1

    I rarely bothered to turn up to school before 10am anyway....

  7. Re:Why? on Correcting Poor Typing Technique? · · Score: 1

    I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss the original poster's claim of 100wpm. My mother was trained at school as a touch typist, she worked as a professional secretary in the 60s and 70s and can manage (IIRC) about 100wpm on an average day, this would probably go up if she started typing regularly again.

    On the other hand, I've never learned to touch type, but when I'm working at my fastest I can usually keep up with my mother (though with more typos than her).

  8. Re:What's that? A "war against youth"? on Using Classical Music As a Form of Social Control · · Score: 1

    Nah, that's not typical of the UK, that's just Liverpool....

  9. Re:yes on Does a Lame E-Mail Address Really Matter? · · Score: 1

    Exactly the reason my CV has my personal email address of my own website domain name on it. Of course it just forwards to my gmail account and could also forward to my hotmail or aol account.....

  10. Re:Context? on Google CEO Says Privacy Worries Are For Wrongdoers · · Score: 1

    While the context is obviously important and I don't think the one quote he gave is a fair representation of what he was getting at, I can't help thinking about the old argument 'if you've nothing to hide you've nothing to fear', which put another way is 'those who fear persecution should be persecuted' and it seems to me that companies like google need to be extremely delicate in handling these issues to avoid that particular slippery slope....

  11. Re:Good grief! - Bend Over! on Hacker McKinnon To Be Extradited To US · · Score: 1

    When the old lady in question is the US military it's reasonable (IMO) to describe their lack of self defence as a dereliction of duty. I don't beleive your argument can sensibly be applied to a nationally organised military service whose whole purpose for existing *is* self defence... well that and invading other countries who have lots of oil, depending on who you listen to.

  12. Re:Good grief! on Hacker McKinnon To Be Extradited To US · · Score: 1

    That's just about the most retarded thing I've ever seen written anywhere. The amount the UK spends on healthcare is more than the GDP of some small countries. If we wanted to reduce healthcare costs why would we waste effort offloading healthcare costs one person at a time?

  13. Re:kinda like... on Windows 7 Touch, Dead On Arrival · · Score: 1

    I have to agree, I can see it kinda making more sense to have a touch interface like a keyboard and a screen. Of course this would be a really odd thing to work out as it'd probably mean totally redefining how we interact with computers. Would the point and click aspect be on the screen or the touch pad? What would you display on the screen vs the touch pad etc etc....

  14. Re:An Easy Apology on Alan Turing Gets an Apology From Prime Minister Brown · · Score: 1

    From 1801 to 1921 Ireland was a part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain. Oscar Wilde lived between the 1850s and around 1900 and was undeniably British (though not English obviously)...

  15. So what we really want to see... on Attractive Women Make Men Temporarily Stupid · · Score: 1

    ...are pictures of the women they were chatting to that made their brains stop working properly.

  16. Re:What's the point? on TomTom Releases iPhone Navigation App · · Score: 1

    I'm assuming the tom tom app downloads the maps and stores them locally on the iphone. Issues with the googlemap app that comes as standard are that it needs an internet connection to display the map so sometimes if you're in an area of patchy 3G signal you get a blank grid instead of a map. Otherwise it would be pretty pointless buying this in my opinion.

  17. Re:Right... on US Tests System To Evade Foreign Web Censorship · · Score: 1

    That explains why I feel like some of the trolls around here would fail a Turing test....

  18. So what? on UK National ID Card Cloned In 12 Minutes · · Score: 1

    Am I the only person here thinking that cloning a card containing biometric data means very little? I mean, unless you're gonna have plastic surgery too it makes little difference who has measurements of your cheekbones and ears. Not that I like ID cards mind you and I'm also nervous of biometric data being collected on me, but I'm not sure it's as much of a big deal as it might be.

  19. Re:The issue is the license: Copyright and contrac on Temperature Data Wants To Be Free · · Score: 1

    I can attest to this seeing as I have (freely) had access to and worked with this data while doing my PhD at a British University. In fact I think I still have a copy of it on a DVD somewhere.....

  20. Re:Stealing hi-res versions on New Developments In NPG/Wikipedia Lawsuit Threat · · Score: 1

    TFA says he hacked in, try reading it.

  21. Stealing hi-res versions on New Developments In NPG/Wikipedia Lawsuit Threat · · Score: 4, Interesting

    It kind of worries me that he hacked in and took the hi-res images. We run a gallery of biological images and it costs us a lot of money and effort to digitise our 80-100 year old collections in order to make them useful to the public and scientific community. We do want our images in the public domain and we do want them used, but we need to have the cash to keep doing this work as a small charity so clearly there needs to be some balance. If someone hacked in and took our hi-res images it might jeopardize our ability to add other images on our already shoe-string budget. If he gets away with that I'd be quite upset to be honest...

  22. Re:Well, now we'll know. on Sunspots Return · · Score: 1

    Almost right, the theory is in fact the reverse of your statement: linkage

  23. Re:Android G1 also heats when using GPS on Some Overheating 3GS iPhones Glow Pink · · Score: 1

    My iPhone 3GS definitely heats up when using GPS, noticed it this weekend while lost on the way to a wedding...

  24. Get a hobby on Where Does a Geek Find a Social Life? · · Score: 1

    I met my wife and all of my previous girlfriends from the last 10 years at aikido classes. My sister-in-law has met her last 3 boyfriends playing hockey, seems like a shared interest is a useful thing when trying to meet people.

  25. Re:Filtering is the Hijab of the Internet on Google Suggest Disabled In China Due To Porn · · Score: 1

    how does one 'lump' pornography? - no wait, on second thought....