It's probably safer to take a chance on land mines than to be swallowed up by Kudzu while you're asleep.... Look out on the sides of the roads in parts of Alabama and Georgia and you'll see the humps/bumps where cows and cars have paused too long and succumbed to the onslaught of fast growing Kudzu...... On the other hand, if you could genetically engineer Kudzu to die unless it encountered a land mine, it could turn red and within a few hours, assuming normal growth rate, protect the mine from intrusion by kids, adults and animals. Within a few days, it might even protect against tractors and tanks getting to the mine. Within a few weeks, the local population would be devoured and there would be no one left to get to the mines anyway, so there would be no need for exploding the mines. Very cost effective.
As they say in Dilbert,"You're new around here aren't you?
You should install AOL and then try to use Mozilla for your browser and email to get that "freedom of choice" feel. I suggest you install Goback or an alternate first.
Seems to me, the president only gets to sign things that were inacted by the House and Senate. As best as I can remember, when the DMCA was enacted, we had a Republican dominated Congress, and a Democrat president. That made for a pretty good system of checks and balances, which is probably the best thing about our government. My guess is that at the time, we who could forsee the ill effects of such a bill, did not write our congressional representatives, since it is easier to whine on/.
Democrat or Republican? It makes not difference! As long as we are so engrossed in pointing fingers at the "other" party and don't take responsibility for being a part of the governing system, we will continue to have poor laws.
If every/. reader were to contact their representatives during the month of February,2004, by letter or Fax, asking them to do something about the DMCA we would see some action.
I worked on the Voyager spacecraft and on projects for the ISS. I've worked with the best and some of the worst. I pretty much agree with you that people in all areas are not infallable, including both you and me and any investigation board. I also am aware, just as you, that management gives priority to economics and schedule over safe design. Its a shame, but when management does not bother to listen to the reserved engineer who knows exactly what he is talking about but is too shy to jump up on the desk and shout it in his face, the result will be exactly as you say; loss of Challenger, Columbia and lives.
A good example is the Air Transportation Board and the case where the side door blew off a 747 some years ago, aired on Natl Geographic Channel earlier tonight. The ATB report was that the maintenance technicians were not following procedures and causing damage to the door locks.
And engineer and father of a son who was sucked out the door when it came off did his own investigation and discovered the door lock system was failing. He proved it and still could not get the ATB to modify its report. A few months later when another door failed, luckily on the ground, the ATB was forced to acknowledge an error. Just because a test report is written, does not make it the gospel truth.
Well, I won't argue. You may be right. You have to believe what you want to. One group had 20 years working with the foam, including active data. A PhD had a year to do tests and came up with a partially conflicting conclusion and wrote a convincing report. If you were riding the Shuttle, which would you stake your life on?
A PhD makes one educated, but not necessarily an expert. Now you can say case closed.
You can learn a lot from the CAIB report. You can learn a lot from the design engineers who have been working on the project for over 20 years. You are at liberty to shout BS for anything you don't agree with. Just keep in mind that it was the design engineers who raised the questions about there being a potential problem with the foam breaking off. And if you don't believe it will absorb water, you should test a piece yourself, or find an engineer who has done so. I got my information from an engineer.
It's the artist that makes the picture, not the medium. I have had a camera for 45 years and have never achieved close to the fame that Ansel Adams had. Just having a shiney new paint bucket does not make you a "Monet" quality artist.
Ansel spent countless hours in the darkroom to "manipulate" his pictures. THat included choosing print paper type, exposure time, dodging (making an area lighter or darker) and the list goes on and on. If he had had a digital camera to match the resolution of his film camera, he would probably have been overjoyed. However, it seems that neither Canon or Kodak with their 13 and 15 megapixel cameras have come close to the resolution of the large negative cameras, so Ansel would probably still be using film!
Did'nt QuarterDeck come up with the name windows in their literature long before Microsoft started calling anything with the Windows name? Also, although I do not remember the dates, but in the mid '80s or earlier, NCR Corporation started selling a windowing package to customers to interface to their Unix machines, long before MS brought out Windows 3.0. Did MS have an earlier release they called "Windows"?
I recently talked to an engineer from the booster rockets. He said his group was aware of the foam problem on the boosters and changed to a hard surface foam type that would not come apart during flight. The company working on the main tank foam would not consider changing foam type since it is very expensive to change at this stage of the game.
The foam on the main tank can absorb moisture, so with a fresh load of liquid hydrogen (and an overnight rain)it condenses and freezes, making not a chunk of foam, but a chunk of ice break loose and hit the shuttle wing. There's more details of course, but you get the picture. He did mention that at the temperatures and pressures of re-entry, a hairline crack would be disastrous, and such a crack would not be detected by an astronaut doing a space walk.
Re:Stuck with Windows? You're just a NERD.
on
PC Annoyances
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· Score: 1
My upgrades are based on the premise that "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!"
Obviously, many people think there is a great benefit in upgrading from W-98 to W-XP. My most reliable computer is still running W-95, (5 years, no crash or downtime) and when my W-98 box is tied up with a circuit analysis program, the W95 box allows me to keep working. My W-98 finally crashed because I got in too much of a hurry with REGEDIT for a program that would not correctly allow a re-install for something that got messed up. (Mozilla, no less) I use W-2000 at work (and sometimes XP), W-98 at home mostly, and since both work for me flawlessly, I can't come up with a reason to change either to the other, regardless of which might be better for some tasks I don't do. I agree with the author about using W-98.
If you search the university website for Bushlan, you find no reference to 45MHz anywhere. The project has been done at 7 MHz RADIO spectrum for doing the research. 7 MHz is near the 40 meter amateur band and indeed is good for long distance communication most of the time. When the TV bands become available in a few years, they will have to adjust frequency, but even 45 MHz which is just under the 6 meter amateur band, and enjoys fairly good communication reliability. You might also consider that in the USA, the TV bands 2-6 have been able to transmit uninterrupted analog signals for over 50 years at distances of over 100 miles (about 160km). Can somebody point me to the 45MHz reference?
At $100 per year, it will be more expensive than Windows after one year. Does my machine quit working at the end of the one year lease? Try selling that to a company as customer savvy as Walmart!
The general population cannot even copy and paste! (Yes, I teach community classes.) Having them try to interface with SUN to reset a lease is out of the question, and Walmart cannot handle that kind of customer support. You don't think SUN is going to support Walmart computers do you?
They're called SOUND LEVEL METERS. However, it is much easier (and cheaper) to setup a microphone and circuit to record data to a flash memory that can be collected and carried back to the lab than to have a rather expensive sound level meter that needs direct connection to a computer for data acquisition and retaining it for later comparison usage.
Professionalism means that I don't have to use three letter "cuss-word" abbreviations to make myself understood.
Sound intensity is measured in db just like electrical power. The zero db level (Io) is defined as the threshold of human hearing for a 1000Hz tone, 10 ^(-16) watts per square centimeter.
Measured intensity is 10log(Inew/Io). However, the article said the calculated levels were accurate to within 1 db(average). That means the difference between calculated and measured was 1 db regardless of the actual level. Now, since the average was accurate within 1 db, that could mean 4 at 1/2 db difference and 1 at 3db difference for engineers. (.5+.5+.5+.5+3)/5=1
For politicians, it could mean that one was +42 and one was -38 for an average of (+48 -32)/2=1. Beware of statistics.
Not a programming language?
on
Effective XML
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· Score: 1
Glad you cleared that up for us non-programmers. Now if I could just figure out what it really is!
Pump the water to the front and it glides downhill in that direction, just like an air glider, while you use the rudder to set the direction. When you are deep enough, pump out the water and the front rises, letting you glide uphill in the direction you wish to go. It's just simple physics and simple aerodynamics. You are trying to make it too hard.
You use the force of gravity to sink. (Does that mean you use the force of anti-gravity to rise?)
I think they got a PATENT on some EULA protected by the DMCA which was later set to music. In order to avoid lawsuits from the RIAA, any mention of aircraft technology must be accompanied by a reference to the Wright borthers.
The baking soda technology is certainly not new. I ordered mine from a cereal box coupon some 50 years ago. Gray plastic, and worked like a charm. Unlike the ones in the article, it would have lasted more than 50 years except for that old dog that liked to chew on toys.
For us non-programmers (and being somewhat ignorant now and then), I wondered what my local pharmacy would think if I carried my files there. A search on Google, gave me a few choices for CVS. However, Concurrent Versions System is foreign to me. Is this a ?nix only program or also for MSwindows or what? A little explanation of mnemonics is always appreciated.
Let's see now, you said...., - No wait, that's not what you meant! - Let's try it again! Either way, its kinda funny. 'Course, I still don't know if what you did't say was what you meant to not say.
I expect the FCC will come up with a tax on VoIP to help pay for access to the phone lines. However, I already pay for access charges for my land based phone and data charges for for my DSL connection. I'll bet that these charges do not decrease as the FCC requires additional taxes for VoIP. (I fully expect to see regulationa and taxes for VoIP.)
It's probably safer to take a chance on land mines than to be swallowed up by Kudzu while you're asleep. ... Look out on the sides of the roads in parts of Alabama and Georgia and you'll see the humps/bumps where cows and cars have paused too long and succumbed to the onslaught of fast growing Kudzu. ..... On the other hand, if you could genetically engineer Kudzu to die unless it encountered a land mine, it could turn red and within a few hours, assuming normal growth rate, protect the mine from intrusion by kids, adults and animals. Within a few days, it might even protect against tractors and tanks getting to the mine. Within a few weeks, the local population would be devoured and there would be no one left to get to the mines anyway, so there would be no need for exploding the mines. Very cost effective.
You didn't get the joke did you?
You should install AOL and then try to use Mozilla for your browser and email to get that "freedom of choice" feel.
I suggest you install Goback or an alternate first.
The subject line says it all! With 120 pounds of gadgets and 27 cables, my hiking trip is only 30 feet!
Democrat or Republican? It makes not difference! As long as we are so engrossed in pointing fingers at the "other" party and don't take responsibility for being a part of the governing system, we will continue to have poor laws.
If every
I worked on the Voyager spacecraft and on projects for the ISS. I've worked with the best and some of the worst. I pretty much agree with you that people in all areas are not infallable, including both you and me and any investigation board. I also am aware, just as you, that management gives priority to economics and schedule over safe design. Its a shame, but when management does not bother to listen to the reserved engineer who knows exactly what he is talking about but is too shy to jump up on the desk and shout it in his face, the result will be exactly as you say; loss of Challenger, Columbia and lives. A good example is the Air Transportation Board and the case where the side door blew off a 747 some years ago, aired on Natl Geographic Channel earlier tonight. The ATB report was that the maintenance technicians were not following procedures and causing damage to the door locks. And engineer and father of a son who was sucked out the door when it came off did his own investigation and discovered the door lock system was failing. He proved it and still could not get the ATB to modify its report. A few months later when another door failed, luckily on the ground, the ATB was forced to acknowledge an error. Just because a test report is written, does not make it the gospel truth.
You mean for those who did not read the three sentences of the /. article?
Well, I won't argue. You may be right. You have to believe what you want to. One group had 20 years working with the foam, including active data. A PhD had a year to do tests and came up with a partially conflicting conclusion and wrote a convincing report. If you were riding the Shuttle, which would you stake your life on? A PhD makes one educated, but not necessarily an expert. Now you can say case closed.
You can learn a lot from the CAIB report. You can learn a lot from the design engineers who have been working on the project for over 20 years. You are at liberty to shout BS for anything you don't agree with. Just keep in mind that it was the design engineers who raised the questions about there being a potential problem with the foam breaking off. And if you don't believe it will absorb water, you should test a piece yourself, or find an engineer who has done so. I got my information from an engineer.
Ansel spent countless hours in the darkroom to "manipulate" his pictures. THat included choosing print paper type, exposure time, dodging (making an area lighter or darker) and the list goes on and on. If he had had a digital camera to match the resolution of his film camera, he would probably have been overjoyed. However, it seems that neither Canon or Kodak with their 13 and 15 megapixel cameras have come close to the resolution of the large negative cameras, so Ansel would probably still be using film!
Did'nt QuarterDeck come up with the name windows in their literature long before Microsoft started calling anything with the Windows name?
Also, although I do not remember the dates, but in the mid '80s or earlier, NCR Corporation started selling a windowing package to customers to interface to their Unix machines, long before MS brought out Windows 3.0. Did MS have an earlier release they called "Windows"?
Some of the engineers believe that a crack too small to be seen during a spacewalk could still be destructive to the shuttle.
The foam on the main tank can absorb moisture, so with a fresh load of liquid hydrogen (and an overnight rain)it condenses and freezes, making not a chunk of foam, but a chunk of ice break loose and hit the shuttle wing.
There's more details of course, but you get the picture. He did mention that at the temperatures and pressures of re-entry, a hairline crack would be disastrous, and such a crack would not be detected by an astronaut doing a space walk.
Obviously, many people think there is a great benefit in upgrading from W-98 to W-XP. My most reliable computer is still running W-95, (5 years, no crash or downtime) and when my W-98 box is tied up with a circuit analysis program, the W95 box allows me to keep working. My W-98 finally crashed because I got in too much of a hurry with REGEDIT for a program that would not correctly allow a re-install for something that got messed up. (Mozilla, no less) I use W-2000 at work (and sometimes XP), W-98 at home mostly, and since both work for me flawlessly, I can't come up with a reason to change either to the other, regardless of which might be better for some tasks I don't do. I agree with the author about using W-98.
If you search the university website for Bushlan, you find no reference to 45MHz anywhere. The project has been done at 7 MHz RADIO spectrum for doing the research. 7 MHz is near the 40 meter amateur band and indeed is good for long distance communication most of the time. When the TV bands become available in a few years, they will have to adjust frequency, but even 45 MHz which is just under the 6 meter amateur band, and enjoys fairly good communication reliability. You might also consider that in the USA, the TV bands 2-6 have been able to transmit uninterrupted analog signals for over 50 years at distances of over 100 miles (about 160km). Can somebody point me to the 45MHz reference?
The general population cannot even copy and paste! (Yes, I teach community classes.) Having them try to interface with SUN to reset a lease is out of the question, and Walmart cannot handle that kind of customer support. You don't think SUN is going to support Walmart computers do you?
Professionalism means that I don't have to use three letter "cuss-word" abbreviations to make myself understood.
Measured intensity is 10log(Inew/Io). However, the article said the calculated levels were accurate to within 1 db(average). That means the difference between calculated and measured was 1 db regardless of the actual level. Now, since the average was accurate within 1 db, that could mean 4 at 1/2 db difference and 1 at 3db difference for engineers. (.5+.5+.5+.5+3)/5=1
For politicians, it could mean that one was +42 and one was -38 for an average of (+48 -32)/2=1.
Beware of statistics.
Glad you cleared that up for us non-programmers. Now if I could just figure out what it really is!
Pump the water to the front and it glides downhill in that direction, just like an air glider, while you use the rudder to set the direction. When you are deep enough, pump out the water and the front rises, letting you glide uphill in the direction you wish to go. It's just simple physics and simple aerodynamics. You are trying to make it too hard. You use the force of gravity to sink. (Does that mean you use the force of anti-gravity to rise?)
If you want to know more just ask.
The baking soda technology is certainly not new. I ordered mine from a cereal box coupon some 50 years ago. Gray plastic, and worked like a charm. Unlike the ones in the article, it would have lasted more than 50 years except for that old dog that liked to chew on toys.
For us non-programmers (and being somewhat ignorant now and then), I wondered what my local pharmacy would think if I carried my files there. A search on Google, gave me a few choices for CVS. However, Concurrent Versions System is foreign to me. Is this a ?nix only program or also for MSwindows or what? A little explanation of mnemonics is always appreciated.
Let's see now, you said...., - No wait, that's not what you meant! - Let's try it again! Either way, its kinda funny. 'Course, I still don't know if what you did't say was what you meant to not say.
I expect the FCC will come up with a tax on VoIP to help pay for access to the phone lines. However, I already pay for access charges for my land based phone and data charges for for my DSL connection. I'll bet that these charges do not decrease as the FCC requires additional taxes for VoIP. (I fully expect to see regulationa and taxes for VoIP.)