> and seems to contain a mixed bag of predetermined threats made to goad interrogation subjects into spilling their secrets
"Now, Mr. Jones, if you do not tell me what we want to know, you may well have the pleasure of finding out why the first four letters of my code name is 'Anal'."
Or maybe each of the ten weather balloons may or may not have a live six-year-old boy riding in it, and DARPA full well remembers what happened last time with just *one*.
Actually I think damages were 40000d6, for which a final roll of $125000 is slightly below statistical expectation. In order to count the sheer number of dice, a roller rink had to temporarily be rented out as bean counters dumped the entire truckload of all 40K dice.
That's so many six sided dice, WotC has announced plans to buy out Chessex.
In other litigation news, GW is suing WotC for the usage of the term, "40K dice".
> far stronger than I need to be for day to day life as an IT professional!
Your work environment will adapt.
Trac ticket 14849 Reported by: Operations Manager Owned by: Somersault Priority: Major Description: Hey, we just got eight full racks of blade servers downstairs. Please bring them up to the fifth floor before lunch. There's also a three-ton rack cooler that needs to be installed.
Trac ticket 14936 Reported by: Operations Manager Owned by: Somersault Priority: Major Description: Our next truckload of routers is here. I need them in the NOC. This time, DO NOT bring the truck. Just the routers.
Trac ticket 15186 Reported by: Office Manager Owned by: Somersault Priority: Major Description: Somersault, would you be a dear and open the jar of peanut butter in the kitchen fridge? No one else in the office can even budge it, but you with your exo-suit and all... Thanks.
Don't get just one cat. Get more than one. Get several.
You're right - Cat 1 and Cat 2 will probably do nothing. Most people won't even think they exist. Cat 3 will do most of the work, but won't harrass rats beyond 100 meters. Cat 4 needs motivation - give it a small token, like a ring.
Cat 5 can be faster than Cat 3, but like Cat 3, speed and response begin to attenuate after 100 meters. They start dropping packets, which should promptly be buried in the litter box. In the event that rodents bite back, you should consider shielding Cat 5.
Cat 6 is extremely fast with very little latency, but inflexible and difficult to work with. I use them in my fruit pantry, where rats ate "twisted pears"
We like to think if as birth-barfing. The really nasty part is when it gets near the end... Ever drag your own anus down the length of your tongue? It's not pleasant.
I got mine from Best Buy, and paid the extra $30 for the extended warranty. Every time the pedal breaks, I bring it in, and they bust open a new box of Rock Band to give me the pedal inside. The remainder of the box goes back to Harmonix.
It was happening a few times at first, then when I was having my cousins come over for Rock Band every night, the pedal was breaking on a nightly basis. Best record so far is a broken pedal 5 nights in a row. 11 broken pedals so far.
I hope is enough people have done what I've done, this is going to cost Harmonix dearly. My Best Buy warranty lasts until September. I can keep doing this until then.
> Automated Computational Aesthetics You don't have to graph things out by hand.
> Fully Automated Graph Layout You don't have to graph things out by hand.
> Real-Time 3D Graphics If you change your equation, the graph changes too.
> Automated Table Layout Shows you the points they graphed.
> Dynamic Interactivity It's got a GUI.
> Integrated Geometric Computing Runs on a computer following Moore's law, hence "geometric" advancement.
> Combinatorial Optimization Solve the Travelling Salesman problem by something other than brute force.
> Equational Theorem Proving Okay, that could be cool... if the previous versions didn't have it already.
> New Generation Numerical Integration It can use numbers now?
> Computable Data > Financial Data > Astronomical Data > Country Data > Particle Data > Graph Data > Mathematical Data Since this is a list of "New Features", previous versions of Mathematica could not be used for these purposes. All you could do was show a fellow math geek how that humanities major had a really nice set of 80085.
> Unification of Graphics, Text & Controls In previous versions, you were lucky if what you wrote or clicked resembled anything like the output! Now, when when you type in "y=x", you actually get a straight diagonal line, instead of one of the spirally partial differential functions we like to put on the cover of the manual!
> Language for Data Integration There's now its own scripting language. Whoa, Mathematica never had *that* before!
> Dynamic Graphical Input Use symbols you never thought possible! Like that squiggly "integrate" symbol, or that lambda derive-like thingy. Even use that upside-down "U" for set theory!
> Instant Multimedia Programming Uses both Video and Audio! Include a Youtube video in your equations of Stephen himself telling you how wrong your equation is!
> Real-Time Code Annotation Add "comments" whenever and wherever you want! No other language has the ability to "comment" on your code!
> Instant High-Level Debugging Be able to step through your code and set break points! Stephen is the first person to think of it! No other programming IDE has ever done anything so revolutionary!
> Integrated Graphics Editing & Drawing Did your equations predict that the Mars Lander was going to crash and burn? Use the Graph Editor to change the equation output, and show your fellow engineers a perfect atmospheric re-entry! Then re-sell those high-risk equations to an over-leveraged engineer who does care! You'll be long gone by the time they realize what you've done! This feature brought to you by the Lenders Association of US Banks.
> HID Support You may now use a mouse and keyboard in this version, instead of simply shouting at the screen, hoping it'll do something!
> Streamlined Presentation Framework Use an overhead projector instead of a video monitor to show your results!
> New Documentation Framework Dynamic Interactivity We'd like to call it "Google"...
I didn't say they stopped selling... they just changed their focus, and by focus, I mean what the sales staff are knowledgeable about.
Have you tried to ask sales staff about low level hardware lately? They tend to look it up in a catalog before they tell you whether you have it, without even knowing what it is.
Radio Shack isn't exactly attracting Electrical Engineering graduates these days.
People who say bad things about a company's products are quickly discredited.
"Are you trying to say that the Monster Cable is a piece of $#@^? I'm sorry, you're not one of the RIAA-approved article writers in one of the mainstream audiophile rags that gets massive funding from us. What? You are? Oh, I'll be talking with your editor over our next golf game... if I were you, I'd look for a new job about now."
Pretty soon, every main-rag reviewer is giving an overpriced product 5 stars. Those who tell the truth are deemed unknowledgeable and irrelevant.
Radio Shack has unrecognizably revamped themselves throughout their lifetime. The original name came from back when they were selling equipment catering to ham radio enthusiasts. Then, at some point, they were only selling record players and stereos in the 40's, and suddenly the staff dumbed down - my grandfather had difficulty requesting things like 3200-ohm resistors anymore, or having them made behind the counter by staff.
In the 1960's they declared bankruptcy (just like CC this morning), but a certain Charles Tandy bought them out. Tandy was a leather mogul, and the chain was temporarily renamed... wait for it... Tandy Radio Shack & Leather! Radio Shack was the place for all your leather needs! BTW, I have a genuine Radio Shack bullwhip in my attic. Too bad I never got around to asking for a ball gag and blindfold.
Then they went back to concentrating on low level electronic components. Then they switched the emphasis on to trying to sell home computers. Then they switched to almost strictly consumer electronics.
So I don't think of Radio Shack as a cockroach, whose form hasn't changed for millions of years... It's more like the Phantom, when each one dies, it passes the name and costume to someone in the next generation, who most likely has different tactics and fighting styles.
I already tend to believe humans don't have free will to begin with. We are governed by a set of rules, that while we might think we are free to take a drastically different action, there are further rules upon those rules which determine why we took that action.
Okay, so as an example... it's close to lunch time, and I haven't eaten all day. I have money, and I'm right outside a burger joint. Is it Free Will that I decide to go inside and buy some food? What if I watched a video on arterial plaque buildup the previous day and decide to try to find a salad instead? Is it Free Will, or was my logic governed by another set of rules that determined I would seek a healthier alternative? We might think our actions are determined by a thought process, but I've been philosophizing heavily as to how those thought processes got into place to begin with.
The story would have to be about cloned Vikings plagued by un-killable cannibal white apes who are really guarding a huge diamond repository, which holds the key to curing a mysterious blood-hardening disease from outer space that's actually a swarm of silicon-hungry nanobots trying to rescue a professor trapped 600 years in the past.
Hmm, come to think of it, that doesn't sound like a bad screenplay...
Or she could have run the ransom demand through Babelfish:
"Tony however is I prisoner. We want hundred million US dollar and a naked piece of Aunt Bea, needing helicopter to backseat hide all the base belonging to us. If this step is loudly satisfactory, then we will starting continue to transmit Tony Stark goatse to the Youtube."
So, believers of the Flying Spaghetti Monster are all a scam? Who's been scammed by the FSM? I don't think Bobby Henderson has driven a single person to bankruptcy with his religion!
Slashdot Mirror
> and seems to contain a mixed bag of predetermined threats made to goad interrogation subjects into spilling their secrets
"Now, Mr. Jones, if you do not tell me what we want to know, you may well have the pleasure of finding out why the first four letters of my code name is 'Anal'."
"Employees not wearing protective gear worked with bacteria that were supposed to have been killed but may not have been."
The Employees were supposed to have been killed? Now which Three-Letter-Angency is responsible for that?
I have trouble believing they are really Satanists, rather than people claiming to be Satanists.
Oh wait, that's true of most Christians too.
What makes some insect farmers more edible than others?
I thought this meant your Minecraft session occurred in a boat trapped with a tiger.
Or maybe each of the ten weather balloons may or may not have a live six-year-old boy riding in it, and DARPA full well remembers what happened last time with just *one*.
Solomon
I don't know about you others, but I shave, despite getting my slashdot account almost 12 years ago.
Actually I think damages were 40000d6, for which a final roll of $125000 is slightly below statistical expectation. In order to count the sheer number of dice, a roller rink had to temporarily be rented out as bean counters dumped the entire truckload of all 40K dice.
That's so many six sided dice, WotC has announced plans to buy out Chessex.
In other litigation news, GW is suing WotC for the usage of the term, "40K dice".
Maybe it's the caliber of the government IT workers...
Military Official: Davis, I need you to wipe every hard drive in this container.
Minimum Wage IT Contractor: Okay. [Opens a pack of lemon-scented WetNaps and starts wiping the outside of the hard drives.] Hard drives wiped, sir.
Officer: Then I need you to write "10101010" repeatedly on them, until there's no more space!
MWITC: Okay. [Pulls out Sharpie and draws alternating dashes and circles on the enclosure until there's no more place to put any.] Done, sir.
Officer: Good. Sign off on this ticket, and we're ready to liquidate them on Ebay!
> far stronger than I need to be for day to day life as an IT professional!
Your work environment will adapt.
Trac ticket 14849
Reported by: Operations Manager
Owned by: Somersault
Priority: Major
Description: Hey, we just got eight full racks of blade servers downstairs. Please bring them up to the fifth floor before lunch. There's also a three-ton rack cooler that needs to be installed.
Trac ticket 14936
Reported by: Operations Manager
Owned by: Somersault
Priority: Major
Description: Our next truckload of routers is here. I need them in the NOC. This time, DO NOT bring the truck. Just the routers.
Trac ticket 15186
Reported by: Office Manager
Owned by: Somersault
Priority: Major
Description: Somersault, would you be a dear and open the jar of peanut butter in the kitchen fridge? No one else in the office can even budge it, but you with your exo-suit and all... Thanks.
Don't get just one cat. Get more than one. Get several.
You're right - Cat 1 and Cat 2 will probably do nothing. Most people won't even think they exist. Cat 3 will do most of the work, but won't harrass rats beyond 100 meters. Cat 4 needs motivation - give it a small token, like a ring.
Cat 5 can be faster than Cat 3, but like Cat 3, speed and response begin to attenuate after 100 meters. They start dropping packets, which should promptly be buried in the litter box. In the event that rodents bite back, you should consider shielding Cat 5.
Cat 6 is extremely fast with very little latency, but inflexible and difficult to work with. I use them in my fruit pantry, where rats ate "twisted pears"
We like to think if as birth-barfing. The really nasty part is when it gets near the end... Ever drag your own anus down the length of your tongue? It's not pleasant.
Yours truly,
Self-Birthing Snake
I got mine from Best Buy, and paid the extra $30 for the extended warranty. Every time the pedal breaks, I bring it in, and they bust open a new box of Rock Band to give me the pedal inside. The remainder of the box goes back to Harmonix.
It was happening a few times at first, then when I was having my cousins come over for Rock Band every night, the pedal was breaking on a nightly basis. Best record so far is a broken pedal 5 nights in a row. 11 broken pedals so far.
I hope is enough people have done what I've done, this is going to cost Harmonix dearly. My Best Buy warranty lasts until September. I can keep doing this until then.
S.
Uhh...
> High-Impact Adaptive Visualization
It's got graphics now.
> Automated Computational Aesthetics
You don't have to graph things out by hand.
> Fully Automated Graph Layout
You don't have to graph things out by hand.
> Real-Time 3D Graphics
If you change your equation, the graph changes too.
> Automated Table Layout
Shows you the points they graphed.
> Dynamic Interactivity
It's got a GUI.
> Integrated Geometric Computing
Runs on a computer following Moore's law, hence "geometric" advancement.
> Combinatorial Optimization
Solve the Travelling Salesman problem by something other than brute force.
> Equational Theorem Proving
Okay, that could be cool... if the previous versions didn't have it already.
> New Generation Numerical Integration
It can use numbers now?
> Computable Data
> Financial Data
> Astronomical Data
> Country Data
> Particle Data
> Graph Data
> Mathematical Data
Since this is a list of "New Features", previous versions of Mathematica could not be used for these purposes. All you could do was show a fellow math geek how that humanities major had a really nice set of 80085.
> Unification of Graphics, Text & Controls
In previous versions, you were lucky if what you wrote or clicked resembled anything like the output! Now, when when you type in "y=x", you actually get a straight diagonal line, instead of one of the spirally partial differential functions we like to put on the cover of the manual!
> Language for Data Integration
There's now its own scripting language. Whoa, Mathematica never had *that* before!
> Dynamic Graphical Input
Use symbols you never thought possible! Like that squiggly "integrate" symbol, or that lambda derive-like thingy. Even use that upside-down "U" for set theory!
> Instant Multimedia Programming
Uses both Video and Audio! Include a Youtube video in your equations of Stephen himself telling you how wrong your equation is!
> Real-Time Code Annotation
Add "comments" whenever and wherever you want! No other language has the ability to "comment" on your code!
> Instant High-Level Debugging
Be able to step through your code and set break points! Stephen is the first person to think of it! No other programming IDE has ever done anything so revolutionary!
> Integrated Graphics Editing & Drawing
Did your equations predict that the Mars Lander was going to crash and burn? Use the Graph Editor to change the equation output, and show your fellow engineers a perfect atmospheric re-entry! Then re-sell those high-risk equations to an over-leveraged engineer who does care! You'll be long gone by the time they realize what you've done! This feature brought to you by the Lenders Association of US Banks.
> HID Support
You may now use a mouse and keyboard in this version, instead of simply shouting at the screen, hoping it'll do something!
> Streamlined Presentation Framework
Use an overhead projector instead of a video monitor to show your results!
> New Documentation Framework Dynamic Interactivity
We'd like to call it "Google"...
Solomon Chang
I didn't say they stopped selling... they just changed their focus, and by focus, I mean what the sales staff are knowledgeable about.
Have you tried to ask sales staff about low level hardware lately? They tend to look it up in a catalog before they tell you whether you have it, without even knowing what it is.
Radio Shack isn't exactly attracting Electrical Engineering graduates these days.
S.
People who say bad things about a company's products are quickly discredited.
"Are you trying to say that the Monster Cable is a piece of $#@^? I'm sorry, you're not one of the RIAA-approved article writers in one of the mainstream audiophile rags that gets massive funding from us. What? You are? Oh, I'll be talking with your editor over our next golf game... if I were you, I'd look for a new job about now."
Pretty soon, every main-rag reviewer is giving an overpriced product 5 stars. Those who tell the truth are deemed unknowledgeable and irrelevant.
Radio Shack has unrecognizably revamped themselves throughout their lifetime. The original name came from back when they were selling equipment catering to ham radio enthusiasts. Then, at some point, they were only selling record players and stereos in the 40's, and suddenly the staff dumbed down - my grandfather had difficulty requesting things like 3200-ohm resistors anymore, or having them made behind the counter by staff.
In the 1960's they declared bankruptcy (just like CC this morning), but a certain Charles Tandy bought them out. Tandy was a leather mogul, and the chain was temporarily renamed... wait for it... Tandy Radio Shack & Leather! Radio Shack was the place for all your leather needs! BTW, I have a genuine Radio Shack bullwhip in my attic. Too bad I never got around to asking for a ball gag and blindfold.
Then they went back to concentrating on low level electronic components. Then they switched the emphasis on to trying to sell home computers. Then they switched to almost strictly consumer electronics.
So I don't think of Radio Shack as a cockroach, whose form hasn't changed for millions of years... It's more like the Phantom, when each one dies, it passes the name and costume to someone in the next generation, who most likely has different tactics and fighting styles.
But it's the plostitute giving ferratio to my "dirty election", yes?
S.
I already tend to believe humans don't have free will to begin with. We are governed by a set of rules, that while we might think we are free to take a drastically different action, there are further rules upon those rules which determine why we took that action.
Okay, so as an example... it's close to lunch time, and I haven't eaten all day. I have money, and I'm right outside a burger joint. Is it Free Will that I decide to go inside and buy some food? What if I watched a video on arterial plaque buildup the previous day and decide to try to find a salad instead? Is it Free Will, or was my logic governed by another set of rules that determined I would seek a healthier alternative? We might think our actions are determined by a thought process, but I've been philosophizing heavily as to how those thought processes got into place to begin with.
Solomon Chang
Actually, after I first saw the headline, I thought "Career Pirate" was an off-shored worker. Or, as they say in South Park: "Dey Dook Our Dobs!"
Solomon
Get your Michael Crichton Mashups in line!
The story would have to be about cloned Vikings plagued by un-killable cannibal white apes who are really guarding a huge diamond repository, which holds the key to curing a mysterious blood-hardening disease from outer space that's actually a swarm of silicon-hungry nanobots trying to rescue a professor trapped 600 years in the past.
Hmm, come to think of it, that doesn't sound like a bad screenplay...
Solomon Chang
Or she could have run the ransom demand through Babelfish:
"Tony however is I prisoner. We want hundred million US dollar and a naked piece of Aunt Bea, needing helicopter to backseat hide all the base belonging to us. If this step is loudly satisfactory, then we will starting continue to transmit Tony Stark goatse to the Youtube."
And Voila! Same gist, for less money!
Solomon
> What's an Atari 2600?
It's a whole new treasure trove of source material for Uwe Bolle.
Solomon
> From more than 600 blocks, they have identified nearly 360 fossil animals: wasps,
> flies, ants, spiders
Why so far away? They might get better resolution if they held the sample right up next to the machine.
Solomon Chang
So, believers of the Flying Spaghetti Monster are all a scam? Who's been scammed by the FSM? I don't think Bobby Henderson has driven a single person to bankruptcy with his religion!
Solomon