...getting a Mac OS-X port out for OpenOffice is critical to keeping a Microsoft dominance of yet another operating system's office suite to a minimum. The project is need of someone to step up to the plate as a project lead.
Let's not forget that MS made a ton of its initial cash selling office software for the Apple and Macintosh Operating Systems. In fact, MS Office first appeared on those OSes and NOT on Windows. Though many Mac users have chosen to use Corel's Office, MS has always been #1 or #2 on that platform.
-Kryptonik
When the project started a few years ago, the world was excited by the possibility of knowing what every single gene in humanity did. After all, if we understood what is is that makes a human a human, perhaps we could cure genetic disease and maybe someday improve ourselves...live for hundreds of years, whatever.
What most people fail to grasp, however, is that the Genome project is only the first and earliest step in this process. Sure, we have mapped the human genome, but we still don't know what most of them do. There could be 40 different genes that affect height, for instance, and the only way we have used in the past to figure out which genes do what is to screw around with genes in an egg and see what kind of baby comes out of it, like in fruit flies or mice where thousands of genetic experiements have been done in the past. I hope it goes without saying that this research technique is not possible in humans.
However, we still want to learn the functionality of our genes eventually because, both medically and sensationally speaking, that is the supposed eventual goal of the fruits Genome project.
Now, I pose a question to slashdot readers. I'm primarily a web application developer and don't really know how far the field of computer modelling has gone in terms of biological systems, so now that we've mapped all the genes, how much longer until we can create a system to mimic the human body closely enough to try our genetic experiements out digitally? Because until that point, I really don't see what good the Genome has done for us.
Many have suggested that the government place some kind of regulation on companies that would force them to clean up whatever junk they put up there, fixing the capatilist trend to externalize problems (ie - the companies have no incentive to clean up after themselves). However, this law could already be in place.
Companies nowadays are responsible for cleaning up messes made years ago, whether or not they originally new the mess would be hazardous to the environment. For instance, in one case in upstate Mass. involving GE, the company was forced to dig up dozens of plots of land they had created for employees using dirt that was used to soak up chemicals from industrial plants. At the time, the chemicals were thought to actually make the soil more fertile, but 30 years later they found out it was carcinogous. This law makes GE pay for the damage even though it didn't know it was inflicting any originally.
If space can be seen as part of the natural environment and public domain, then I don't see why companies can't be held to the same law up there. In this case, however, they have no excuse as we have known for decades that space debris would be a problem eventually.
It seems that there are a lot of people that are in a real hurry to get to Mars as soon as possible. "Forget the plasma rockets, just set up an excersize bike in the ship that astronauts could use to power the tried-and-true space propellers!!" However, there are serious problems that NASA has to tackle before any attempt to reach the Red Planet can be made.
For starters, the trip, as it is planned now, would take 3 years: 6 months there, 6 months back, 2 years (or so) waiting for the planets to be in good enough alignment for the trip back. The travel time isn't really the issue with this duration of the trip. Sure, you could cut the trip by 6 months, but if you're already gone for 2+ years another couple months isn't that critical. The issue is keeping them sustained during that time. NASA is developing a life support system dubbed "The Can" that is supposed to be 99.9% efficient by the time it's completed. Now it stands somewhere in the mid 80's (a significant amount of resources still need to be added to the can during it's operation), so even if it took 1 month to get to mars, the duration of stay requires a much more sophisticated living system.
Secondly, the time that the astronauts spend in space is extremely bad for their health. Solar radiation, especially when it comes in waves eminating from flares, are extremely cancer-causing. It's for the astronauts' benefit that we postpone the mission for the rockets, even if life support and other missions weren't already doing so (optimistically, we hope to send humans there by the end of the decade).
If you would like to read more information regarding the current Mars plan, at least what many of it's initiators feel should be the plan, check out Robert Zubrin's excellent book The Case for Mars : The Plan to Settle the Red Planet.
As far as email allowing subs to be detected, I really don't think that subs in hostile waters would get dropped a bouy from a plane so that soldiers can answer they're personal email.
"Hey, captain, do you mind if we break radio silence for a minute? The Backstreet boys concert is beings streamed live from Z100!!!
During the Cold War one of the greatest military advancements in the United States was in submarine technology. We outclassed our Soviet Competitors for years and have an incredible preemptive strike system in place around the world targeted at our enemies from the seas. (if you're interesting in learning more about the US-Soviet sub game during the cold war, read Blind Man's Bluff)
The real military security holes nowadays are not with expanding communications abilities (I mean, hey, if a soldier is underwater for months at a time, he has every right to naked pictures of Pamela, Carmen Electra, gerbils, or whatever he's into), but with antiquated security systems on the mainland (Los Alamos, chinese spies, my cousin Harry who has posters of bomb desings taken from work, the widespread government use of Windows 98).
Slashdot Mirror
...getting a Mac OS-X port out for OpenOffice is critical to keeping a Microsoft dominance of yet another operating system's office suite to a minimum. The project is need of someone to step up to the plate as a project lead. Let's not forget that MS made a ton of its initial cash selling office software for the Apple and Macintosh Operating Systems. In fact, MS Office first appeared on those OSes and NOT on Windows. Though many Mac users have chosen to use Corel's Office, MS has always been #1 or #2 on that platform. -Kryptonik
When the project started a few years ago, the world was excited by the possibility of knowing what every single gene in humanity did. After all, if we understood what is is that makes a human a human, perhaps we could cure genetic disease and maybe someday improve ourselves...live for hundreds of years, whatever.
What most people fail to grasp, however, is that the Genome project is only the first and earliest step in this process. Sure, we have mapped the human genome, but we still don't know what most of them do. There could be 40 different genes that affect height, for instance, and the only way we have used in the past to figure out which genes do what is to screw around with genes in an egg and see what kind of baby comes out of it, like in fruit flies or mice where thousands of genetic experiements have been done in the past. I hope it goes without saying that this research technique is not possible in humans.
However, we still want to learn the functionality of our genes eventually because, both medically and sensationally speaking, that is the supposed eventual goal of the fruits Genome project.
Now, I pose a question to slashdot readers. I'm primarily a web application developer and don't really know how far the field of computer modelling has gone in terms of biological systems, so now that we've mapped all the genes, how much longer until we can create a system to mimic the human body closely enough to try our genetic experiements out digitally? Because until that point, I really don't see what good the Genome has done for us.
Companies nowadays are responsible for cleaning up messes made years ago, whether or not they originally new the mess would be hazardous to the environment. For instance, in one case in upstate Mass. involving GE, the company was forced to dig up dozens of plots of land they had created for employees using dirt that was used to soak up chemicals from industrial plants. At the time, the chemicals were thought to actually make the soil more fertile, but 30 years later they found out it was carcinogous. This law makes GE pay for the damage even though it didn't know it was inflicting any originally.
If space can be seen as part of the natural environment and public domain, then I don't see why companies can't be held to the same law up there. In this case, however, they have no excuse as we have known for decades that space debris would be a problem eventually.
For starters, the trip, as it is planned now, would take 3 years: 6 months there, 6 months back, 2 years (or so) waiting for the planets to be in good enough alignment for the trip back. The travel time isn't really the issue with this duration of the trip. Sure, you could cut the trip by 6 months, but if you're already gone for 2+ years another couple months isn't that critical. The issue is keeping them sustained during that time. NASA is developing a life support system dubbed "The Can" that is supposed to be 99.9% efficient by the time it's completed. Now it stands somewhere in the mid 80's (a significant amount of resources still need to be added to the can during it's operation), so even if it took 1 month to get to mars, the duration of stay requires a much more sophisticated living system.
Secondly, the time that the astronauts spend in space is extremely bad for their health. Solar radiation, especially when it comes in waves eminating from flares, are extremely cancer-causing. It's for the astronauts' benefit that we postpone the mission for the rockets, even if life support and other missions weren't already doing so (optimistically, we hope to send humans there by the end of the decade).
If you would like to read more information regarding the current Mars plan, at least what many of it's initiators feel should be the plan, check out Robert Zubrin's excellent book The Case for Mars : The Plan to Settle the Red Planet.
As far as email allowing subs to be detected, I really don't think that subs in hostile waters would get dropped a bouy from a plane so that soldiers can answer they're personal email.
During the Cold War one of the greatest military advancements in the United States was in submarine technology. We outclassed our Soviet Competitors for years and have an incredible preemptive strike system in place around the world targeted at our enemies from the seas. (if you're interesting in learning more about the US-Soviet sub game during the cold war, read Blind Man's Bluff)
The real military security holes nowadays are not with expanding communications abilities (I mean, hey, if a soldier is underwater for months at a time, he has every right to naked pictures of Pamela, Carmen Electra, gerbils, or whatever he's into), but with antiquated security systems on the mainland (Los Alamos, chinese spies, my cousin Harry who has posters of bomb desings taken from work, the widespread government use of Windows 98).
Kryptonik