Slashdot Mirror


User: AaronLS

AaronLS's activity in the archive.

Stories
0
Comments
465
First seen
Last seen
Profile
(view on slashdot.org)

Comments · 465

  1. Re:Cold/Flu makes us zombies? on Zombie Plants Help To Spread Bacterial Pathogen · · Score: 1

    "to other viruses" should have read "to other generations"

  2. Re:Cold/Flu makes us zombies? on Zombie Plants Help To Spread Bacterial Pathogen · · Score: 1

    It's an immune system response that viruses leverage to spread. If you could create a similar virus that didn't cause an immune system response, its transmition rates would probably be lower. I would argue that just as the pathogen in the article has evolved to evoke a certain response in the article, cold/flu have probably evolved to maximize the immune system response(short of killing the host) as such variations of the virus would transmit more readily and pass that evolutionary trait to other viruses.

    Regardless, how is any of that a counter argument to the application of zombie terminology? Is it dead? No, then not a zombie. It's a vogue term and it's silly for a study to use the term. Modified behavior != zombie.

  3. Cold/Flu makes us zombies? on Zombie Plants Help To Spread Bacterial Pathogen · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The cold/flu causes us to produce additional muccus/sneeze/cough, altering our behavior which increases transmission rates. This doesn't mean we are zombies. I think it's a very interesting find, but a little ridiculous to involve the term zombie.

  4. Re:Thanks, but.... on .NET Native Compilation Preview Released · · Score: 1

    I agree with the essence of the statement, but it's written in terms of childish absolutes such as "nobody" that obviously isn't true. Maybe if he had said "The majority of .NET developers aren't doing metro. When you expand support for this feature, then it'll be interesting to the rest of us." But some people live in a world that revolves around them and cry when they get left out. I hope this feature comes to the rest of the .NET platform, but I'm not going to cry about it.

  5. Not what cloud excels at on Ask Slashdot: Do Any Development Shops Build-Test-Deploy On A Cloud Service? · · Score: 1

    Cloud is good for reliability, scalability, and if your particular scenario meets certain criteria, sometimes cost. Overall the cloud would be usually be more expensive, but can be cheaper to use cloud and only pay for what you need if you have short periods of high load combined with long periods of little load. Thus cloud might be cheaper because rather than paying for, cooling, powering, and maintaining alot of high end servers waiting to handle a large load only occasionally, you pay for what you need with the cloud. I would speculate you wouldn't see such savings on a single server.

    If you could find a development/CI hosting platform that meets your needs, that would probably be a better bet. Such a service might be using cloud behind the scenes, but they benefit from the efficiencies of scale.

    Another option is a semi-dedicate VPS. There are some VPS services that give you root access and terms would allow you to use the box as you do now.

    I think someone went into this with the assumption that costs would go down using cloud, but your management time is going to be the same or more. You don't have a physical box, but now you will spend more time figuring out the nuances of your cloud host.

    The key is to seperate the goal from the premature jump to cloud:
    -If the goal is to get rid of the physical box, then VPS is an option.
    -If the goal is to get rid of the physical box and lower management time/costs, then a hosted development/build/integration service is a good option. That way you don't even have to manage the OS, updates to the software/services, or perform backups.

  6. Re:Canadian company goes bankrupt on Owner of Nortel Patents Sues Cisco For 'Immense' Patent Infringement · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Right-ism that "attracts low-information voters with buzzwords and sounds bites like" socialism and "destroying America".

    Still have my same insurance BTW.

  7. Re:The Mod still works on Minecraft Creator Halts Plans For Oculus Version Following Facebook Acquisition · · Score: 2

    What version of Minecraft does it support? The answer to that question does change something.

  8. Re:Unsurprising ... on Minecraft Creator Halts Plans For Oculus Version Following Facebook Acquisition · · Score: 1

    Man, and I was so excited they the developer iteration was 1080 resolution and only $350. If that reflects potential commercial pricing, and you look at other existing HMDs at that resolution, then that's actually pretty awesome.

  9. Re:Duff's Device on Ask Slashdot: What Do You Consider Elegant Code? · · Score: 1

    He did ask if it was a joke, which is a valid question because plenty of people on the internet make rediculously stupid statements. I don't blame him for wondering if you were serious or a joke. He clearly reallized that there was a remote possibility that you were joking, so I don't see that a "woosh" was appropriate. You could have just said you were indeed joking :)

  10. Re:What does "stealing" bitcoins mean anyway? on MtGox Finds 200,000 Bitcoins In Old Wallet · · Score: 1

    Thanks for the excellent explanation.

  11. Re:What does "stealing" bitcoins mean anyway? on MtGox Finds 200,000 Bitcoins In Old Wallet · · Score: 1

    My understanding of bitcoin is limited, but I thought that there were distributed public ledgers that track transactions on the bitcoin network. How would they transfer these without anyone knowing?

  12. Re:Sensors are much better at "capturing light" on Kodak Ends Production of Acetate Base For Photographic Film · · Score: 1

    That's nice. I'll have to pay more attention on my next camera. Think my Nikon D60 only goes up to 1200. How is the graininess on that camera? Mine gets really grainy on long exposures if I have ISO above 800. I know that's kind of the holy grail pipe dream of getting high ISO without graininess.

  13. Re:Sad, but inevitable. on Kodak Ends Production of Acetate Base For Photographic Film · · Score: 1

    Not to mention having to keep a notebook on settings you used for each photo so that you could learn what is working.

  14. Re:Sad, but inevitable. on Kodak Ends Production of Acetate Base For Photographic Film · · Score: 2

    One thing is for certain, there's alot of things that are alot easier and cheaper to do in digital. I did alot of long exposures and night photography. Trying to get a balance between grainyness and being too dark is challenging when the feedback you get on your settings is a couple weeks later. You can go through a whole roll trying different settings. One time I went to pick up prints and the lab gave me the negatives and said they didn't turn out. I had to point out to them a couple shots on the negatives that were of a little bio-luminescent grub. They were skeptical but went and printed them for me and they turned out fine. That was an entire roll of film just for two pictures.

    I also got alot better because I was getting immediate feedback when using manual settings.

    It also makes doing timelapse photography feasible on an amateur budget.

    What's really odd to me is the digital cameras are not any better at capturing light. I saw a documentary on a large telescope that talked about how much light is not captured by film, and what a huge amount more is captured by a CCD, which is important for imaging faint objects. Maybe they have a better CCD than what you get in cameras.

  15. Re:BUT CAN IT HEAR THE GRAPEVINE ?? on Computer Memory Can Be Read With a Flash of Light · · Score: 1

    LOL You don't hear the grapevine! You hear IT THROUGH the grapevine. I.e. if there were a grapevine wall and people talking on the otherside that didn't know you were there. The grapevine itself doesn't talk, it's a freaking plant!

  16. Re:10 micrometres wide on Computer Memory Can Be Read With a Flash of Light · · Score: 1

    That would be funny. A lab technician standing next to you instead of a microscope(scanning electron... whatever they use) and asking you what you see and you trying to describe it to them in words, or drawing a little picture, lol. Not trying to be mean, just a funny image to me.

  17. Re:Define "In Use" on Mobile Devices Will Outnumber People By 2017 · · Score: 1

    He said "I" and "Everyone I Know". Those are some pretty specific constraints. He was making a speculation, and I see nowhere that he extrapolate that to everyone. Nor did he indicate he was an American, nor in Southern state if you're the same AC commenting below. Seems you're just as bad as far as making hostile presumptions about other people based on little to no evidence. You're entitled to your opinion, but should be embarrassed at your hypocrisy because it just demonstrates your own stupidity.

  18. Re:Constitution on The NSA: Never Not Watching · · Score: 1

    Don't sue the bus driver because you stepped in from of the bus.

  19. Re:Constitution on The NSA: Never Not Watching · · Score: 1

    You don't need to sue them, you can simply not do business with them and they will have no data to collect. No one forced you to do business with these corporations. The ability for them to sell your data is made clear in the user agreements. Whether or not you read them, it's pretty much common knowledge.

  20. Re:just now? on Keyless Remote Entry For Cars May Have Been Cracked · · Score: 1

    " 7 dog years = 1 human year. How many years would it be for a digital dog @ 4.4GHZ?"

    The same amount of time as it would be for a digital human. Changing the units of measurement does not turn years into seconds, it's still the same length of time. You are so blatantly stupid, yet think you are qualified to tell people they are wrong regarding things you obviously possess only a pseudoscience knowledge of... is the only thing that is mind blowing.

  21. Re:jailbreak != breaking encryption on Keyless Remote Entry For Cars May Have Been Cracked · · Score: 2

    Exactly, jailbreaking a phone is a completely different animal, because within the device somewhere is the private key, and it is only hidden through obfuscation. Just like a desktop, you have access to the complete system, and it's just a matter of time, skill, and effort to pulling it a part and either finding the private key or bypassing.

    On the other hand, a proper keyless system has the private key in the FOB, and assuming all the components of the system are properly implemented using well established security standards, then there should be no FEASIBLE way to defeat the cryptography in a short amount of time without physically stealing/breaking open a FOB or physically modifying the vehicle.

    In the phone case, the manufacturer wants to prevent you from breaking into the phone, but they handed you the private key inside the phone. In the case of the vehicle, only you the owner carry the private key in your FOB, and the criminals do not have that. Unfortunately there's probably alot of vehicles with vulnerabilities or not even an architecture that could laughably be called security.

  22. Re:just now? on Keyless Remote Entry For Cars May Have Been Cracked · · Score: 3, Informative

    I would be surprised if the majority of keyless entry was RFID. It may be that the vulnerable ones use this, but RFID is not in anyway a form of authorization. It is a form of identification. The difference is your username and your password. Anyone should be able to get the RFID and be no closer to accessing the system, just as your username is not private information and is fairly useless without the password. Their are lots of easy and inconspicuous ways to steal an RFID because it's just their saying "HEY, I'm 157951234654..." and anything can read that ID and then easily masquerade as that RFID.

    A proper keyless system uses cryptography(and does so properly). This is why many FOBS are quite expensive to replace and have a battery inside. When you attempt to unlock the vehicle, the vehicle sends a challenge to the FOB, and the FOB uses a private key to sign it, the vehicle then gets that signed response and verifies it using the public key. I know that my FOB uses a 40bit key, which isn't very strong. Hopefully the vehicle has delays in place to prevent someone from trying thousands of keys a second, otherwise it could be broken with brute force given the small key size. This would still take a good while though.

    It's possible that some of these vehicles are vulnerable if someone got their hands on a database of public keys(or worse private keys), from which you could spend time searching for the private keys through brute force and build up a database of the private keys, and then load that list onto a portable device the masquerades as a FOB.

    There's lots of possibilities.

  23. Re:Cool! All we have to do is create code to math. on Canada Courts, Patent Office Warns Against Trying To Patent Mathematics · · Score: 1

    It could be viewed as a set of values with a mapping to another set with a binary representation.

  24. Re:Viral Marketing by NASA on Astronaut Chris Hadfield Performs Space Oddity On the ISS · · Score: 1

    I'm certain the theft of your syrup reserve was a conspiracy to send the Canadian nation into turmoil. (j/k in case anyone thinks I'm serious)

  25. Re:Really? on Astronaut Chris Hadfield Performs Space Oddity On the ISS · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm sure someone has been just as narrow sighted before... "How is the America the future? The future of what? It's an empty savage infested hell. It's good place to send those who disagree with our religious beliefs. That's it. America is the past, the Columbus Age is as dead as polytheism."