And to add to this comment, there are some good reasons for thinking of the moon:
1) Low gravity as opposed to no gravity
Any degassing from equipment or other debris would settle to the ground, instead of hanging around the mirror... Of course, you would alos need periodic "cleaning" of the mirror.
2) Raw materials
You could imagine that since the moon is made up of silicates and other minerals like titanium, you'd have a chance of constructing the mirrors in place. Like solar powered robots mining and the extruding glass and mirror in the vacuum to be then formed into mirror and placed. (I still need to work out the minor details...)
3) Stability
Vibrations could quickly be damped, and astronauts would have less problems as they bumped it around.
There are problems, like the issue of the sun blinding it for a decent part of the month, but I'm sure these effects could be minimized by placing it in a crater or other such terrain.
From the SVA site: There are also some standards in other countries that are recognised as being sufficiently similar to those that apply in Europe, such as the safety standards that apply in the United States, Canada and Australia.
So I am not convinced of your claim yet. Also, appearances, although deceiving, are important, and that Smart car will never look 'safer' as compared to an SUV tank. And exactly why isn't the Smart car in the US yet?
I was looking for the standards that US cars don't necessarily meet, and the only ones I found were the theft deterrence (optional in US), and the side impact protection (I'm guessing side impact airbags, also optional in US).
As a friend mentioned, the other reason for small, and thus more efficient, cars in Europe is the smaller and narrow streets of so many towns. I don't think one SUV would fit through some of those lanes, let alone 2.
Just to mention a minor thing. There is a larger emphasis placed on safety and comfort (and honsetly, safety is very far up there) in vehicles in America. And it's not that Americans are worst drivers than anybody else in the world, it's just more of a obsession.
My first proof would be looking at the approxiamtely once/week story on either national or local news about the latest crash tests of some vehicle, and the fact that many adds actually state a safety rating.
Now, if gas were a lot more expensive, maybe this would begin to take a backseat to fuel efficiency. However, as safety standards are now, many of the "ultra-efficient" european cars are not even road-safe for the US.
When I was in Italy (which is how I know that US drivers are not the worst), I really thought some of the micro and mini and Smart cars were great. I even looked into buying one and getting it shipped. However, the amount of modifications needed to make it pass the lowest safety standards pretty much doubled the cost of the vehicle. Also, I got to thinking that driving it next to LandCruisers would soon be a source of nightmares.
So, no, American cars don't get good gas milage, but it isn't necessarily because Americans want to spend money to use gas.
Sure, maybe new systems would provide this security. However, not everyone is going to drop their old, perfectly working system, and go throw $1000 or whatever at Dell so that they can buy a book online.
So all vendors have to face the fact that people with older hardware (>5 years old, sometimes), want to buy things. Hey, they have to deal with old software at this point, which is much easier to upgrade.
So servers have to run compatibility with old systems at the same time as supporting the new. I have a feeling that most people are fine with the compatibility as is. And furthermore, wouldn't a new motherboard design cost more? So why would Dell, Compaq, etc move to it at all?
The bigger threat here is to embedded systems, where this security is of little concern to end users, but big issue to the DRM people. So what you'd have is unhackable Tivos, dvd players, etc.
I can't see this really taking off in the PC world, especially if these new chips affect performance.
"Buy our system! You can't do as much and it tuns slower, for more money!"
So if by a single act you violated 2 laws, you committed 2 crimes, and you can be tried for each.
But they must be pursued at the same time. As an example, the prosecutors did not have 400 or so attempts to try McVeigh for blowing up the building, even though he committed 400 or so murders in that event.
I think it's time people stopped pushing *ix as some sort of holy grail, in terms of power and usability And in this, and the majority of your other comment, I would agree.
I just thought you were looking at VB vs. Unix. Sorry about that.
Most people would define Unix systems exactly this way. Look through the man pages, filled with small, tight little programs, each one doesn't do a whole lot, but they allow a whole lot of freedom to do massive things quickly,
Try writing quick filters for data in windows, without downloading "Bob's little filter helper" or some other idiot program.
You could always start at the lowest priority process and work your way up. You would just have to have a policy for giving critical services higher priorities.
Just a minor off-topic note to add to this. I do all my work on Linux, apart from using PowerPoint on XP. Now, I know it was only a limited sample, and I know there are plenty of counter point examples, but from my limited experience, it seems that most people who develop apps/addons for windows (freelance developers, hobbiest, etc), want to get paid for it. Just try to find powerpoint backgrounds, for example. Also, the source for these little applications that people write is hard to come by.
Now, on the otherhand, it's generally hard to find open source or Linux land material that people charge for. There are a few examples, but for the most part, there are husge collections of applications taht come with all source, and are completely free.
I'm wondering if the community in each case has such a differnet mindset. It's quite odd that people who write free applications for *nix systems are quite content to give away the code, but people who write apps for windows seem... reluctant.
(For those not able to follow this conversation, surf at 0, it's fun.)
2. A fork bomb is something like a process which loops creating processes that loop creating processes.... (ie. no _one_ process to penalize).
I agree. There is a way to stop this, but it's not important for the given argument. Same with the memory argument.
And my point is, no, it's not the same. The memory manager could charge the cost of swapping memory to the process that is requiring that memory. The actual policy for making it work correctly might be an issue, but it would be impossible to say "the lower priority process always gets charged for the swap". That way, higher priority processes continue to run. Now, some proceses would suffer. In fact, many user level processes that all run at the same prority would probably suffer, but the system would not crash.
If you don't think this is a problem, then there is no X bug, since the "user" might want a 16000 point font displayed. Therefore the system is doing exactly what it should do. (You can always fix a bug by calling it a feature).
Well there is only so much the kernel can do. Lots of people also think forkbombs that effectively crash the system are also bugs. Read about UNIX - it isn't the kernel's task to impose this sort of policy... all it can do is try to distribute CPU time fairly between thousands of CPU hogging threads. (From an AC above) Yes, it should be the job of the OS to handle resource contention, and your right, fork bombs are problems, since the number of processes is large.
However, this is one process. OS research has proven the capability of resource containers. That one process should be the one that slows and dies, not the entire system. Otherwise, all of those benefits that *nixes have over MS systems are trivial if one user level process, non-privelaged, can DOS the system without a second thought.
But this certainly isn't a default, and you might be able to fix a process or two, but what would you set the limit to for ordinary processes for ordinary users? The size of physical memory? Physical+Swap? I thought that was the sort of thing the Memory manager was supposed to handle.
Isn't this X bug a symptom of a more serious linux bug? Why should any process get to take all of the memory. I've done this with strictly user level programs, and I was able to make the system crash (a severe memory leak in a small program I had written). How should any user level process stop a machine?
In a couple of cases, Linux was able to kill my memory hog, but there's some sort of serious resource contention. I hope the 2.6 kernel addresses this issue.
Fine, the DMCA makes it illegal, but they still have to have some security. Are you expected to be in some sort of contact on some kind of basis, or do they actually broadcast, "Turn off Joe's receiver now."
Or is it the exact same technology as DirectTV and the like, that work without phone connectivity?
How does it work? Specifically, how do they confirm you have a subscription, and how do they stop you from using the system? Is it the same technology as cell-phones, and is it hackable?
But if they were to fail that could affect how the stock market sees them... Most of Microsoft's assets are simply numbers in stock exchange computer systems.
That's not true. The previous article about their billions was specifically referring to cash reserves, which are not stock. Why do you think they have never paid a single dividend?
Actually, from the press release, Boeing isn't backing it-- yet. They just said thqt they were in testing, and notice the lack of results or data.
Without data from even a not-so-independent reviewer like Boeing (not so independent since they seem to have some financial interests in the company), I'm far from thinking this is close to reality.
...I'm guessing the initial price won't be that cheap. Interesting how after years of improvement in visualization, we're back to green monocrome.
Re:What is alive seriously
on
Rare Earth
·
· Score: 1
About the rock: How do you know there is no metabolic activity? We might only observe it for a year, maybe two. But if the rock "lives" for billions of years, would you even know what to look for?
Now, it could easily be argued, "It certainly is inanimate enough for our purposes." And I would agree.
But what if there is an alien race that lives for millions of years, and looks like a coral outgrowth (as in the book "Radix".)? How would you know if it were alive?
Re:The problem with all these equations...
on
Rare Earth
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
I'm so glad I clicked reload before making this exact comment.
One additional thing, however, if what we even consider to be alive. Andromeda Strain really piqued by interest when one of the scientists showed a watch, a lit candle, and a rock, and claimed that each could be considered alive (the rock is just moving very slowly, the flame certainly has all the proper characteristics).
I'm betting we'll end up calling anything "alive" if we can't predict it's future behavior exactly. This would also mean that once we understand simple cells, we might not consider them "alive" anymore.
Slashdot Mirror
But couldn't you be doing more, since you have time to read and post to slashdot?
Think of the children!
(Goodbye high karma...)
And to add to this comment, there are some good reasons for thinking of the moon:
1) Low gravity as opposed to no gravity
Any degassing from equipment or other debris would settle to the ground, instead of hanging around the mirror... Of course, you would alos need periodic "cleaning" of the mirror.
2) Raw materials
You could imagine that since the moon is made up of silicates and other minerals like titanium, you'd have a chance of constructing the mirrors in place. Like solar powered robots mining and the extruding glass and mirror in the vacuum to be then formed into mirror and placed. (I still need to work out the minor details...)
3) Stability
Vibrations could quickly be damped, and astronauts would have less problems as they bumped it around.
There are problems, like the issue of the sun blinding it for a decent part of the month, but I'm sure these effects could be minimized by placing it in a crater or other such terrain.
From the SVA site:
There are also some standards in other countries that are recognised as being sufficiently similar to those that apply in Europe, such as the safety standards that apply in the United States, Canada and Australia.
So I am not convinced of your claim yet. Also, appearances, although deceiving, are important, and that Smart car will never look 'safer' as compared to an SUV tank. And exactly why isn't the Smart car in the US yet?
I was looking for the standards that US cars don't necessarily meet, and the only ones I found were the theft deterrence (optional in US), and the side impact protection (I'm guessing side impact airbags, also optional in US).
As a friend mentioned, the other reason for small, and thus more efficient, cars in Europe is the smaller and narrow streets of so many towns. I don't think one SUV would fit through some of those lanes, let alone 2.
Just to mention a minor thing. There is a larger emphasis placed on safety and comfort (and honsetly, safety is very far up there) in vehicles in America. And it's not that Americans are worst drivers than anybody else in the world, it's just more of a obsession.
My first proof would be looking at the approxiamtely once/week story on either national or local news about the latest crash tests of some vehicle, and the fact that many adds actually state a safety rating.
Now, if gas were a lot more expensive, maybe this would begin to take a backseat to fuel efficiency. However, as safety standards are now, many of the "ultra-efficient" european cars are not even road-safe for the US.
When I was in Italy (which is how I know that US drivers are not the worst), I really thought some of the micro and mini and Smart cars were great. I even looked into buying one and getting it shipped. However, the amount of modifications needed to make it pass the lowest safety standards pretty much doubled the cost of the vehicle. Also, I got to thinking that driving it next to LandCruisers would soon be a source of nightmares.
So, no, American cars don't get good gas milage, but it isn't necessarily because Americans want to spend money to use gas.
Replace one master of my system with another! Nothing better than having Gates control my system than having many people do it.
Sure, maybe new systems would provide this security. However, not everyone is going to drop their old, perfectly working system, and go throw $1000 or whatever at Dell so that they can buy a book online.
So all vendors have to face the fact that people with older hardware (>5 years old, sometimes), want to buy things. Hey, they have to deal with old software at this point, which is much easier to upgrade.
So servers have to run compatibility with old systems at the same time as supporting the new. I have a feeling that most people are fine with the compatibility as is. And furthermore, wouldn't a new motherboard design cost more? So why would Dell, Compaq, etc move to it at all?
The bigger threat here is to embedded systems, where this security is of little concern to end users, but big issue to the DRM people. So what you'd have is unhackable Tivos, dvd players, etc.
I can't see this really taking off in the PC world, especially if these new chips affect performance.
"Buy our system! You can't do as much and it tuns slower, for more money!"
So if by a single act you violated 2 laws, you committed 2 crimes, and you can be tried for each.
But they must be pursued at the same time. As an example, the prosecutors did not have 400 or so attempts to try McVeigh for blowing up the building, even though he committed 400 or so murders in that event.
Windows 98 doesn't use multiple processors.
I think it's time people stopped pushing *ix as some sort of holy grail, in terms of power and usability
And in this, and the majority of your other comment, I would agree.
I just thought you were looking at VB vs. Unix. Sorry about that.
power = simple tools + wide selection of tools
Most people would define Unix systems exactly this way. Look through the man pages, filled with small, tight little programs, each one doesn't do a whole lot, but they allow a whole lot of freedom to do massive things quickly,
Try writing quick filters for data in windows, without downloading "Bob's little filter helper" or some other idiot program.
This is the google link.
Here's one that might be a little more informative. I leave the google link to someone else.
You could always start at the lowest priority process and work your way up. You would just have to have a policy for giving critical services higher priorities.
Just a minor off-topic note to add to this. I do all my work on Linux, apart from using PowerPoint on XP. Now, I know it was only a limited sample, and I know there are plenty of counter point examples, but from my limited experience, it seems that most people who develop apps/addons for windows (freelance developers, hobbiest, etc), want to get paid for it. Just try to find powerpoint backgrounds, for example. Also, the source for these little applications that people write is hard to come by.
Now, on the otherhand, it's generally hard to find open source or Linux land material that people charge for. There are a few examples, but for the most part, there are husge collections of applications taht come with all source, and are completely free.
I'm wondering if the community in each case has such a differnet mindset. It's quite odd that people who write free applications for *nix systems are quite content to give away the code, but people who write apps for windows seem... reluctant.
(For those not able to follow this conversation, surf at 0, it's fun.)
2. A fork bomb is something like a process which loops creating processes that loop creating processes.... (ie. no _one_ process to penalize).
I agree. There is a way to stop this, but it's not important for the given argument.
Same with the memory argument.
And my point is, no, it's not the same. The memory manager could charge the cost of swapping memory to the process that is requiring that memory. The actual policy for making it work correctly might be an issue, but it would be impossible to say "the lower priority process always gets charged for the swap". That way, higher priority processes continue to run. Now, some proceses would suffer. In fact, many user level processes that all run at the same prority would probably suffer, but the system would not crash.
If you don't think this is a problem, then there is no X bug, since the "user" might want a 16000 point font displayed. Therefore the system is doing exactly what it should do. (You can always fix a bug by calling it a feature).
Well there is only so much the kernel can do. Lots of people also think forkbombs that effectively crash the system are also bugs. Read about UNIX - it isn't the kernel's task to impose this sort of policy ... all it can do is try to distribute CPU time fairly between thousands of CPU hogging threads.
(From an AC above)
Yes, it should be the job of the OS to handle resource contention, and your right, fork bombs are problems, since the number of processes is large.
However, this is one process. OS research has proven the capability of resource containers. That one process should be the one that slows and dies, not the entire system. Otherwise, all of those benefits that *nixes have over MS systems are trivial if one user level process, non-privelaged, can DOS the system without a second thought.
But this certainly isn't a default, and you might be able to fix a process or two, but what would you set the limit to for ordinary processes for ordinary users? The size of physical memory? Physical+Swap? I thought that was the sort of thing the Memory manager was supposed to handle.
Isn't this X bug a symptom of a more serious linux bug? Why should any process get to take all of the memory. I've done this with strictly user level programs, and I was able to make the system crash (a severe memory leak in a small program I had written). How should any user level process stop a machine?
In a couple of cases, Linux was able to kill my memory hog, but there's some sort of serious resource contention. I hope the 2.6 kernel addresses this issue.
Fine, the DMCA makes it illegal, but they still have to have some security. Are you expected to be in some sort of contact on some kind of basis, or do they actually broadcast, "Turn off Joe's receiver now."
Or is it the exact same technology as DirectTV and the like, that work without phone connectivity?
How does it work? Specifically, how do they confirm you have a subscription, and how do they stop you from using the system? Is it the same technology as cell-phones, and is it hackable?
Just Curious.
But if they were to fail that could affect how the stock market sees them... Most of Microsoft's assets are simply numbers in stock exchange computer systems.
That's not true. The previous article about their billions was specifically referring to cash reserves, which are not stock. Why do you think they have never paid a single dividend?
Actually, from the press release, Boeing isn't backing it-- yet. They just said thqt they were in testing, and notice the lack of results or data.
Without data from even a not-so-independent reviewer like Boeing (not so independent since they seem to have some financial interests in the company), I'm far from thinking this is close to reality.
...I'm guessing the initial price won't be that cheap. Interesting how after years of improvement in visualization, we're back to green monocrome.
About the rock: How do you know there is no metabolic activity? We might only observe it for a year, maybe two. But if the rock "lives" for billions of years, would you even know what to look for?
Now, it could easily be argued, "It certainly is inanimate enough for our purposes." And I would agree.
But what if there is an alien race that lives for millions of years, and looks like a coral outgrowth (as in the book "Radix".)? How would you know if it were alive?
I'm so glad I clicked reload before making this exact comment.
One additional thing, however, if what we even consider to be alive. Andromeda Strain really piqued by interest when one of the scientists showed a watch, a lit candle, and a rock, and claimed that each could be considered alive (the rock is just moving very slowly, the flame certainly has all the proper characteristics).
I'm betting we'll end up calling anything "alive" if we can't predict it's future behavior exactly. This would also mean that once we understand simple cells, we might not consider them "alive" anymore.