Yep up until a few years ago channel hovercraft were regulated by the civil aviation people, but they eventually saw sense & now they are regulated by the maritime authority.
During WWII the Russians trained dogs to find their food under armoured vehicles.
Eventually these dogs were released in the vicinity of German Panzer columns with bombs strapped to their backs & 1 foot long levers sticking up from the backpacks. When they ran under the tank the lever got pushed down & the bomb went off.
But before the program went into gear the Germans came apon some intelligence with details of the bomb dogs, so the 1st time they were used the Germans shot all the dogs straight away. Consequently the program was never used again.
The Israelis have also used suicide bomb rotweilers in Lebanon.
I've seen computer keyboards that are designed for use in call centres where workers can dial out via the modem in the cvomputer & the computer's in effect also gets used as a phone.
When used with the dialer software the number pad changes to the phone layout, while otherwise it uses the standard PC keyboard layout.
To add to the confusion the keys have both numbers on it.
So for example the '7' key has a little grey '1' printed on it next to where the '7' is printed, & 'home' is printed underneath. While the '8' key has a little grey '2' printed next to where the '8' is printed, & also has the up arrow printed on it to. Etc, etc.
Its just a matter of throwing the household garbage in the right bin.
The rectangular black bin for bottles 'n cans.
The yellow wheelie bin for paper 'n cardboard.
The green wheelie bin (or compose heap) for garden refuse & foor scraps.
The grey bin for everything else.
The grey bin goes out once a week, the green bin with it every fortnight, the yellow 'n black bins every other fortnight. The black bin is designed so it can sit inside the yellow bin for transportation. So it just means wheeling out 2 bins one night a week instead of 1 bin.
"....Same thing here. I'd gladly pay a few extra dollars of tax money for the option of putting the old computer beside the blue box, or even pay a few dollars to get it taken away knowing its going to be reused.
But if you _force_ me to pay directly, without any direct benefit to me (and not seeing my computer in a landfill is not a tangible benefit to most anybody), you've made me your enemy. I don't take being forced to do anything very well when it doesn't harm anyone else, and neither should you!..."
1st you say here its better to finance recycling through hidden taxes.
"...I believe this is the reason the EU is having a hard time applying this idea to cars? Because people are tired of paying hidden taxes to support a bunch of soft-hearted-and-headed green thumbs?..."
Now you are saying its bad to pay for recycling with hidden taxes.
I'd saythere's only about 4 christians in the whole of Oz & Europe who don't accept evolotion.
Gez most people in Oz just happen to be born Anglican or Catholic & that's as far as it goes. It's the same again in Europe. Except depending on the part of Europe you can substitute Lutherian, reformed, etc for Anglican or Orthadox for Catholic.
Now with the small minority in Oz 'n Europe, who actually happen to bother thinking about theological concepts, evolution was just the way god did it. The Melbourne Cardinal even banished a American Catholic preach back to the US because he publically denounced evolution.
Here in Oz there's only about 4 creationists, all probably in Queensland. From my experiance in Europe virtually the only creationists there are the American Baptist missionairies in Russia trying to convert the godless communist heathens (haven't they heard of the Russian Orthadox Church?).
Really Canadians are just a slower, less pushy, better mannered sub-species of Americans. Even though the occasional Quebecois throwback pops up (for novelty value these throwbacks arn't culled)
I'm talking about having 2 arms, so each platter has 4 lasers reading & writing to it.
Because the pickups that are under & ontop of each platter & always lined up together, which limits what both can read at the same time to data on exactly the same spot under & ontop of the platter.
Having 2 completely seperate arms mounted 180d apart from each other arround the platter means that they could track independently in & out from each other. Of course in such a drive, each arm would still read to both the bottom & top of all the platters. So in effect there would be 4 heads per platter rather than 2.
PC + NES + X-Box + PS2 + NGC + old Atari thing = a lot of boxes cluttering things up & a mess of double adaptors, powercables, powersupply briquettes & video cables.
Sticking it all in one box & working out some sort of switching setup so all devices can share the same power imput & video output queues clutter effect.
If a laser head spins centrivical force would have to be taken into account in regards to the laser tracking action.
Having 2 laser pickups would be the go.
It makes me wonder why HDDs don't have 2 magnetic heads. That way you wouldn't need the complicated hardware/software raid setups to be able to read 'n write to the HDD at the same time.
Think a turntable with 2 stylus arms, opposite the axis from each other, & both having to track across the grooves independently from each other (of course not possible one a record but you know what I mean).
& Have dual input 110v/240v powersupplies, where you just need one of those travel-mate adaptors that just change the physical plug layout.
Its simple economies of scale.
Doing it that way is cheaper than doing different runs for different countries.
I assume that on the back there'd be a tiny hole that you can fit a screwdriver through that lines up with a tiny sloted mini-switch for switching PAL to NTSC, etc. Or some other switching method.
My brother's DVD player has a little hole that lines up with a sloted mini-switch on the circut board - you just stick a swrewdriver in & turn it different notches for different DVD regions, or all the way arround for the region free setting. His DVD player auto switches between PAL & NTSC (it has 3 settings - 'PAL', 'NTSC' & 'Auto')
Of course I'm just assuming this, but from my experiance here in Oz, it seems all the contempory electrical gear seems to be world compatible.
If the XBox was going to be custom made for different countries, you'd be looking at 5 or 6 different regions of DVDs, 2 different powersupplies (110v for Nth America, 240v for everywhere else, & about 8 different powerplug types) & PAL, SECAM & NTSC video outputs.
Now just about every telly, VCR, DVD & TV card in Oz outputs all 3 types at the flick of the switch ('PAL', 'NTSC', 'Auto', I assume SECAM can work under either the 'PAL' or 'Auto' setting). I don't see why the XBox would be any different.
While just about every DVD player in Oz can be set to change regions & 'region-free' (earlier ones), or change regions & 'multi-region' (later ones). Either via an internal microswitch that's oftern externally accesable (as ealier mentioned), or via a coded button sequence on the remote, or by the salesman working some magic on the guts at purchase time. I don't see why the XBox will be any different.
Now with powersupplies, it gets more complicated. There's no reason the XBox can't have 110v/240v dual imputs, however there's the problem of about at least 8 different mainstream wall-plug formats across the world.
The XBox could deal with this problem in 2 ways -
- It could have a dual input 110v/240v built-in powersupply with a standard cassette-radio type 2 pin plug on it, or a 3 slot PC powersupply plug on it, & MS just supplying it with different powercables for the different countries.
- The other option is for MS just to sell the XBoxes with external briquette type powersupplies that match whatever country its sold in.
Which means using a Oz XBox in the US would hopefully be as simple as either changing the powercable or the briquette powersupply (whichever is applicable).
Slashdot Mirror
Check out all those Hollywood hyperlinks
H'mm
I bet they have their own Washington polies in their pocket, including one in 'W's cabinet.
Actually that's a unfair bet because I already no that.
Or they must have pretty full on flashes
Mind you I'm in Oz
Actually I remember reading somewhere that Oz phone lines can Potentially do up to 64K, that maybe why I've even manage to do 56K sometimes
80% the length of a 747 but fater. Only the 1st 4 were built. Volga shipyard's still got or the jig 'n stuff & will build more to order.
Here's a good article on them.
Here's a close up pic, notice the twin 23mm cannon dorsal turret
Here's a pic of 2 flying along side by side
Here's a rear 3.4 view
Top view
Front on, on its beaching bogies
Unloading a armoured fighting vehicle
On the tarmac
3 way drawing
I've used it before for slashdotted sites
Yep up until a few years ago channel hovercraft were regulated by the civil aviation people, but they eventually saw sense & now they are regulated by the maritime authority.
That seems to solve the problem
Just compare the size of a US pint (about 500mls) with a Brit/Commonwealth pint (about 600mls)
If everyone just used RTF there would be no problems.
Afterall 90% of users don't use 90% of the crap that they pad these officesuites with to justify the price.
During WWII the Russians trained dogs to find their food under armoured vehicles.
Eventually these dogs were released in the vicinity of German Panzer columns with bombs strapped to their backs & 1 foot long levers sticking up from the backpacks. When they ran under the tank the lever got pushed down & the bomb went off.
But before the program went into gear the Germans came apon some intelligence with details of the bomb dogs, so the 1st time they were used the Germans shot all the dogs straight away. Consequently the program was never used again.
The Israelis have also used suicide bomb rotweilers in Lebanon.
You see Apple has large Education Dept & university/tech/college contracts.
This is for them.
But once supplies get into gear, & the price for that spec starts to decrease, they'll open sales for them to the general public, you watch.
The way it will work is that large contracts with Education Dept & universities/techs/colleges will get 1st go.
Then Education staff will be able to by them from the collage Apple shop or through college book & supply shops.
Then it will be anyone with a student card buying from the collage Apple shop or through college book & supply shops.
Then they'l be sold in public stores but only to Education institions, education staff & people with student cards.
Finally when they have gone through all this routine over about 6 months & if supplies stock up a bit, then they'll be released for general sale.
That's the way its occured here where I am, in the past when Apple has released 'education only' products.
Nice, easy, simple 'n neat.
99% of the crap in MS Office is not used by 99% of users.
Lets face it for the vast majority of people wordpad & RTF files are all they need.
I've seen computer keyboards that are designed for use in call centres where workers can dial out via the modem in the cvomputer & the computer's in effect also gets used as a phone.
When used with the dialer software the number pad changes to the phone layout, while otherwise it uses the standard PC keyboard layout.
To add to the confusion the keys have both numbers on it.
So for example the '7' key has a little grey '1' printed on it next to where the '7' is printed, & 'home' is printed underneath. While the '8' key has a little grey '2' printed next to where the '8' is printed, & also has the up arrow printed on it to. Etc, etc.
Have you ever tried steering a bicycle that has its front wheel centre locked?
Well guess what? You can ACTUALLY steer it by leaning.
Its just a matter of throwing the household garbage in the right bin.
The rectangular black bin for bottles 'n cans.
The yellow wheelie bin for paper 'n cardboard.
The green wheelie bin (or compose heap) for garden refuse & foor scraps.
The grey bin for everything else.
The grey bin goes out once a week, the green bin with it every fortnight, the yellow 'n black bins every other fortnight. The black bin is designed so it can sit inside the yellow bin for transportation. So it just means wheeling out 2 bins one night a week instead of 1 bin.
"....Same thing here. I'd gladly pay a few extra dollars of tax money for the option of putting the old computer beside the blue box, or even pay a few dollars to get it taken away knowing its going to be reused.
But if you _force_ me to pay directly, without any direct benefit to me (and not seeing my computer in a landfill is not a tangible benefit to most anybody), you've made me your enemy. I don't take being forced to do anything very well when it doesn't harm anyone else, and neither should you!..."
1st you say here its better to finance recycling through hidden taxes.
"...I believe this is the reason the EU is having a hard time applying this idea to cars? Because people are tired of paying hidden taxes to support a bunch of soft-hearted-and-headed green thumbs?..."
Now you are saying its bad to pay for recycling with hidden taxes.
Make up your mind.
I'd saythere's only about 4 christians in the whole of Oz & Europe who don't accept evolotion.
Gez most people in Oz just happen to be born Anglican or Catholic & that's as far as it goes. It's the same again in Europe. Except depending on the part of Europe you can substitute Lutherian, reformed, etc for Anglican or Orthadox for Catholic.
Now with the small minority in Oz 'n Europe, who actually happen to bother thinking about theological concepts, evolution was just the way god did it. The Melbourne Cardinal even banished a American Catholic preach back to the US because he publically denounced evolution.
Here in Oz there's only about 4 creationists, all probably in Queensland. From my experiance in Europe virtually the only creationists there are the American Baptist missionairies in Russia trying to convert the godless communist heathens (haven't they heard of the Russian Orthadox Church?).
Afterall Canada's just another US state.
Really Canadians are just a slower, less pushy, better mannered sub-species of Americans. Even though the occasional Quebecois throwback pops up (for novelty value these throwbacks arn't culled)
Ie, it never rains but it pours.
You have no idea what the back shifts are about do you?
they are only there for when something fuckups.
90% of 90% of nights they only need 1 person, nut when things fuck up they'll all of a sudden get 50 cals a minute, that's why they have 15 people on.
Under & ontop of each platter.
I'm talking about having 2 arms, so each platter has 4 lasers reading & writing to it.
Because the pickups that are under & ontop of each platter & always lined up together, which limits what both can read at the same time to data on exactly the same spot under & ontop of the platter.
Having 2 completely seperate arms mounted 180d apart from each other arround the platter means that they could track independently in & out from each other. Of course in such a drive, each arm would still read to both the bottom & top of all the platters. So in effect there would be 4 heads per platter rather than 2.
PC + NES + X-Box + PS2 + NGC + old Atari thing = a lot of boxes cluttering things up & a mess of double adaptors, powercables, powersupply briquettes & video cables.
Sticking it all in one box & working out some sort of switching setup so all devices can share the same power imput & video output queues clutter effect.
One on each side.
If a laser head spins centrivical force would have to be taken into account in regards to the laser tracking action.
Having 2 laser pickups would be the go.
It makes me wonder why HDDs don't have 2 magnetic heads. That way you wouldn't need the complicated hardware/software raid setups to be able to read 'n write to the HDD at the same time.
Think a turntable with 2 stylus arms, opposite the axis from each other, & both having to track across the grooves independently from each other (of course not possible one a record but you know what I mean).
& Have dual input 110v/240v powersupplies, where you just need one of those travel-mate adaptors that just change the physical plug layout.
Its simple economies of scale.
Doing it that way is cheaper than doing different runs for different countries.
I assume that on the back there'd be a tiny hole that you can fit a screwdriver through that lines up with a tiny sloted mini-switch for switching PAL to NTSC, etc. Or some other switching method.
My brother's DVD player has a little hole that lines up with a sloted mini-switch on the circut board - you just stick a swrewdriver in & turn it different notches for different DVD regions, or all the way arround for the region free setting. His DVD player auto switches between PAL & NTSC (it has 3 settings - 'PAL', 'NTSC' & 'Auto')
Of course I'm just assuming this, but from my experiance here in Oz, it seems all the contempory electrical gear seems to be world compatible.
If the XBox was going to be custom made for different countries, you'd be looking at 5 or 6 different regions of DVDs, 2 different powersupplies (110v for Nth America, 240v for everywhere else, & about 8 different powerplug types) & PAL, SECAM & NTSC video outputs.
Now just about every telly, VCR, DVD & TV card in Oz outputs all 3 types at the flick of the switch ('PAL', 'NTSC', 'Auto', I assume SECAM can work under either the 'PAL' or 'Auto' setting). I don't see why the XBox would be any different.
While just about every DVD player in Oz can be set to change regions & 'region-free' (earlier ones), or change regions & 'multi-region' (later ones). Either via an internal microswitch that's oftern externally accesable (as ealier mentioned), or via a coded button sequence on the remote, or by the salesman working some magic on the guts at purchase time. I don't see why the XBox will be any different.
Now with powersupplies, it gets more complicated. There's no reason the XBox can't have 110v/240v dual imputs, however there's the problem of about at least 8 different mainstream wall-plug formats across the world.
The XBox could deal with this problem in 2 ways -
- It could have a dual input 110v/240v built-in powersupply with a standard cassette-radio type 2 pin plug on it, or a 3 slot PC powersupply plug on it, & MS just supplying it with different powercables for the different countries.
- The other option is for MS just to sell the XBoxes with external briquette type powersupplies that match whatever country its sold in.
Which means using a Oz XBox in the US would hopefully be as simple as either changing the powercable or the briquette powersupply (whichever is applicable).