Only from 11am to 1pm when it's shining down directly overhead. Any other time it's not really noticed at all. I mean, yeah, it's light out, but most of the streets are in shadow and the sun tends to be...forgotten.
Triv
High energy Solar Panels
Wearable computing
PDA
Finger mouse
Wrist key board
Head mounted display
Flat panel display
Customized technology west's
Shoulder mounted web camera
Lithium-Ion batteries
Satellite phone
Power converters
I was wondering how they powered all that stuff, and now I feel like an idiot. I was thinking fuel cells, batteries (which, granted, they did have) wind power and the rest, but completely missed THE SUN.
Funny what you don't think about when you live in a metropolis. I miss the country.:)
Triv
Re:Manual length and Macs vs. PC
on
Macintosh Clustering
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
yes, but according to the article they got a sixth-grader in Hawaii to set one up. Doesn't that say something about ease of use?
--Triv
...is that way too often they don't wake up when you want them to. I've seen this happen on macs as well as compaq boxes. It's an annoyance when a reboot is required - it's even more annoying when you're in the midst of a huge calculation/rendering job and there's a power problem. Hypothetically, You freeze/sleep/whatever your system. Once the crisis has been averted you wipe the sweat from your brow and breathe a sigh of relief, hit the little pulsating moon button and watch as your computer does...nothing.
"The answer to life, the universe and everything is...is...[zzzzzzt]"
no offense mate, but I think you're reading into this a little too deeply.
A parable for you - how many car theifs take their newly acquired goods around town for a spin? Not many - if they do, they're idiots. No, the first thing they do is get it to a chop shop as soon as humanly possible to be sold for parts. The parts themselves are worth much more than the car as a whole.
Some guy who steals your computer doesn't care what you're running or what your password is - he cares how large (and popular) your HD is and if the cd-rom's a dvd too. It's not about the machine, it's about the total income derived from selling all the parts. You could be running Basic for all he cares; if it spins or hums or whatever he can sell it.
Triv
I just hope this doesn't turn into one of those "Old hero comes out of retirement to tackle one last adventure and complains about how he's too old for this crap" movies.
Triv
"The opposite of a truth is a falsehood. But in this universe there exist such things as great truths, and the opposite of a great truth is another great truth"
Don't know if y'all noticed, but they dropped the educational price of the ipod by ten bucks to 350ish as well.
It's getting more affordable at least. At this rate it'll be under a hundred in...four years, at which point it'll be replaced with a much better unit that can be implanted subcutaneously and run off of your nervous system.
true, up to a point. The problem comes when something goes wrong.
My house got struck by lightning, fried my iMac's internal modem. It was integrated onto the motherboard (along with the 3d accelerator, vidram, and practically everything else.) To fix it meant to replace the motherboard. Not a cheap proposition.
I wouldn't want internal expandability for expandability's sake. As you said, firewire and USB solve that problem quite handily. I'd like it so I could swap out a faulty modem without the hassle of returning the thing to the shop.
Yes, I know I could get a USB modem. I did. But I don't like the idea that a minor burnout requires a $400+ investment.
I'm a sucker for director's commentary. I love hearing the behind-the-scenes stuff, and Peter Jackson is a greatspeaker (well, he WAS awhile ago - hope the experience hasn't changed him that much. Arrgh! Hollywood-speak!)
That's what I'm waiting for. Watch the film, then sit back and watch it again, and confirm everything I noticed that I learned in film school.:)
why would a rumor site cash in credibility in the future for 15 minutes of fame?
I guarantee you that no one's going to remember this little ploy - no one really remembered the last time they tried to pull this off, and no one really thinks any less of them.
Apple rumor sites are common, and everybody takes them with a grain of salt. It's just interesting, and fun. Ok, so they claim it's fact. Big deal. The bottom line is that no one's really going to know what's going on till the keynote address. Till then, it's no holds barred.
I think we all need to lighten up a bit.:)
Triv
Re:logo there for a reason
on
Apple PDA?
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Watch the bootup movie to see how he changes the orientation by spinning the wheel and pressing the button on the bottom.
Look at it really closely. See how easy the finger moves the wheel to change the orientation? It's way too...loose. It looks like there's no resistance at all, and without that resistance there's very little you can do keep it's orientation from slipping the moment your hand bumps a little. Besides, would YOU want a huge, single function button on the front of your pda?
Nice try, but not at all real. Good try tho. Just my view.
<brag>
I'm takin' a road trip, going to Philly (from NYC) with my four closest friend of 7 years, staying at a french hotel, eating at Bookbinders (the country's oldest seafodd restaurant) and getting <i>blitzed</i>. Bottle of champagne, bottle of 18-year-old scotch, bottle of grey goose and a bottle of Knob Creek.
</brag>
It sounds like a lot of money but it's really not when you factor in christmas presents (the scotch)and splitting the rest 4 ways. I'm probably going to throw down a hundred and have a night I won't easily forget.:)
So...does this 'chip' (or etched wire, or whatever) draw power, or is it a completely passive system? If there is one it couldn't be much, but what kind of battery might we be talking about here? What's the life-span?
The things keeping this technology out of paper currency currently are:
1. Cost
2. Chip size (large chip = more info stored = higher cost
3. manufacturing process (current chips are too large and too thick and therefore can't stand the kind of abuse money goes through)
It's got two primary uses as well - yes, to track counterfeiters, but more so to prevent counterfeiters for even trying.It's preventative.
I think it'd be kinda interesting to take a bill and track exactly where it's been and how far it's travelled, personal freedom issues aside.
Besides, they say this tech won't be even close to available till 2005. So quit worrying.:)
Triv
Re:I've got an even better idea
on
Lunar Lasers
·
· Score: 1
earth-based solar power is inherently unreliable. Remember, there's no atmosphere on the moon. That means no weather and nothing to diffuse the power of the sun's rays. Oh, and that whole night thing. There is no night on the light side of the moon.
What good is an entire array of solar-power stations somewhere if it's an overcast day and NONE of them recieve power? It's great as a backup, but if it's the only source of electricity for a region...well, then they're kinda screwed.
Well, what if you're musical taste isn't limited to what you already know and love? MP3's are great and all, but the random element of radio in appealing. I think music now (mainstream music, that is) is a wasteland. I'd love to tune in to satellite radio station with the kind of music I like in the hopes of finding something new that, for whatever reason, wouldn't survive on traditional radio.
If you need a pretty box, or demand optical connections to your reciever, go with the audiotron. If you want something tiny, or just want to hack at your MP3 player stereo component, this is a great way to go.
OR...if you want to run a MP3 box off of OSX, Audiotron doesn't cut it. It's kinda nice to see a desktop player with out-of-the-box OSX support.
Interestingly enough, this fits in well with an earlier article we did
I think I must've seen that at least tacked onto 5 stories this week. Isn't it funny how nothing on/. is new anymore? "I was going to reinvent the wheel, but damnit, they had it on slashdot years ago."
:)
Triv
Re:Sorry, but FAX is still hulking along...
on
Email Turns Thirty
·
· Score: 1
I agree with this one. I work in the payroll office of a large national toy store headquartered in New York (Boy, that narrows it down, don't it?;) ) and I recieve between 35 and 50 faxes a day. I get an email or two, mostly supply requests and stuff like that. Email's fine, but no matter how digital you make an office someone's still gonna want to keep hardcopy around. So it's either: Fax it and file it, or fax it, print it and file it.
Ideally we'd keep the entire filesystem on disk, but then all the fileclerks (ahem. Me?) would be out of work. Be 100 times easier to find stuff tho.
Take STarcraft. You fight like hell to accomplish the mission. You do, eventually, but then you're DYING to see what the setup for the NEXT mission is. You think, 'just a few minutes. Let's see what they're throwin' at me.' and it's all over.
Gather round, and let me tell you a tale. I take you way back to the fall of 1999. I was a music major at UMass. I loved the school, hated the department. I scrounged up some cash and picked up a copy of starcraft.
Whoops. I became so enthralled I would ditch my friends, play till 4am, say, 'well, I might as well stay up all night and then go to class', stay up till dawn, and finally crash just as I should have head out of the dorm. I had no social life (I used to leave parties to play) and was flunking out, but because, I reasoned, no one liked me (probably because I hardly ever left my room, if then only to meet the delivery guy)so I might as well sit and play. It's a catch-22 if ever I heard one.
This story doesn't have a fairy-tale ending. I lasted 2 semesters and got kicked out, eventually coming enough out of the hole to apply at the New School in New York City and get a job. It's like being an alcoholic. Yes, I still play games, but spend a good portion of the time trying to avoid sitting in front of my computer. Every once in awhile I regress, stay up all night with Deus Ex or what have you, and seriously regret it in the morning.
I don't have an 'addictive personality,' simply because, as someone said, I don't find everything addictive. Cigarettes and computer games. That's it.
All I'm saying is, this is real. Take my word for it.
Think about this: a desktop computer with a larger-than-laptop flatscreen (15", let's say) that stands on its own and can also be used as a laptop. I like the iMacs, personally, but they weigh 40 pounds - the idea of sticking an airport card in the is ridiculous if you can't lift the damn thing. I want something small, something classy, that I can take to the park and unfold on my desk at home without squinting at the screen or getting a neck cramp because of the positioning.
Slashdot Mirror
Only from 11am to 1pm when it's shining down directly overhead. Any other time it's not really noticed at all. I mean, yeah, it's light out, but most of the streets are in shadow and the sun tends to be...forgotten. Triv
From the site:
:)
The technology
High energy Solar Panels
Wearable computing
PDA
Finger mouse
Wrist key board
Head mounted display
Flat panel display
Customized technology west's
Shoulder mounted web camera
Lithium-Ion batteries
Satellite phone
Power converters
I was wondering how they powered all that stuff, and now I feel like an idiot. I was thinking fuel cells, batteries (which, granted, they did have) wind power and the rest, but completely missed THE SUN.
Funny what you don't think about when you live in a metropolis. I miss the country.
Triv
yes, but according to the article they got a sixth-grader in Hawaii to set one up. Doesn't that say something about ease of use? --Triv
...is that way too often they don't wake up when you want them to. I've seen this happen on macs as well as compaq boxes. It's an annoyance when a reboot is required - it's even more annoying when you're in the midst of a huge calculation/rendering job and there's a power problem. Hypothetically, You freeze/sleep/whatever your system. Once the crisis has been averted you wipe the sweat from your brow and breathe a sigh of relief, hit the little pulsating moon button and watch as your computer does...nothing.
"The answer to life, the universe and everything is...is...[zzzzzzt]"
"We're going to get lynched, do you know that?"
--Triv
no offense mate, but I think you're reading into this a little too deeply. A parable for you - how many car theifs take their newly acquired goods around town for a spin? Not many - if they do, they're idiots. No, the first thing they do is get it to a chop shop as soon as humanly possible to be sold for parts. The parts themselves are worth much more than the car as a whole. Some guy who steals your computer doesn't care what you're running or what your password is - he cares how large (and popular) your HD is and if the cd-rom's a dvd too. It's not about the machine, it's about the total income derived from selling all the parts. You could be running Basic for all he cares; if it spins or hums or whatever he can sell it. Triv
I just hope this doesn't turn into one of those "Old hero comes out of retirement to tackle one last adventure and complains about how he's too old for this crap" movies. Triv
This one's good too:
"The opposite of a truth is a falsehood. But in this universe there exist such things as great truths, and the opposite of a great truth is another great truth"
--Triv
Bah. I'm sure you'll say, "but I'm not a gamer, games suck anyway." but here goes.
:)
Max Payne
Civ III
Return to Wolfenstein
All three of which are on their way, so stop worrying. No, you don't get them immediately, but they WILL come. Just be patient.
Triv
Don't know if y'all noticed, but they dropped the educational price of the ipod by ten bucks to 350ish as well.
It's getting more affordable at least. At this rate it'll be under a hundred in...four years, at which point it'll be replaced with a much better unit that can be implanted subcutaneously and run off of your nervous system.
"I've got you...under my skin."
Triv
true, up to a point. The problem comes when something goes wrong.
My house got struck by lightning, fried my iMac's internal modem. It was integrated onto the motherboard (along with the 3d accelerator, vidram, and practically everything else.) To fix it meant to replace the motherboard. Not a cheap proposition.
I wouldn't want internal expandability for expandability's sake. As you said, firewire and USB solve that problem quite handily. I'd like it so I could swap out a faulty modem without the hassle of returning the thing to the shop.
Yes, I know I could get a USB modem. I did. But I don't like the idea that a minor burnout requires a $400+ investment.
Triv
I'm a sucker for director's commentary. I love hearing the behind-the-scenes stuff, and Peter Jackson is a greatspeaker (well, he WAS awhile ago - hope the experience hasn't changed him that much. Arrgh! Hollywood-speak!)
:)
That's what I'm waiting for. Watch the film, then sit back and watch it again, and confirm everything I noticed that I learned in film school.
Triv
It's about time that the decision as to what is considered violent is (legally, anyway) put back into the hands of kid's parents.
Triv
why would a rumor site cash in credibility in the future for 15 minutes of fame?
:)
I guarantee you that no one's going to remember this little ploy - no one really remembered the last time they tried to pull this off, and no one really thinks any less of them.
Apple rumor sites are common, and everybody takes them with a grain of salt. It's just interesting, and fun. Ok, so they claim it's fact. Big deal. The bottom line is that no one's really going to know what's going on till the keynote address. Till then, it's no holds barred.
I think we all need to lighten up a bit.
Triv
Watch the bootup movie to see how he changes the orientation by spinning the wheel and pressing the button on the bottom.
Look at it really closely. See how easy the finger moves the wheel to change the orientation? It's way too...loose. It looks like there's no resistance at all, and without that resistance there's very little you can do keep it's orientation from slipping the moment your hand bumps a little. Besides, would YOU want a huge, single function button on the front of your pda?
Nice try, but not at all real. Good try tho. Just my view.
Triv
Or even better:
:)
<brag>
I'm takin' a road trip, going to Philly (from NYC) with my four closest friend of 7 years, staying at a french hotel, eating at Bookbinders (the country's oldest seafodd restaurant) and getting <i>blitzed</i>. Bottle of champagne, bottle of 18-year-old scotch, bottle of grey goose and a bottle of Knob Creek.
</brag>
It sounds like a lot of money but it's really not when you factor in christmas presents (the scotch)and splitting the rest 4 ways. I'm probably going to throw down a hundred and have a night I won't easily forget.
Triv
So...does this 'chip' (or etched wire, or whatever) draw power, or is it a completely passive system? If there is one it couldn't be much, but what kind of battery might we be talking about here? What's the life-span?
Triv
perhaps you could have read the article?
:)
The things keeping this technology out of paper currency currently are:
1. Cost
2. Chip size (large chip = more info stored = higher cost
3. manufacturing process (current chips are too large and too thick and therefore can't stand the kind of abuse money goes through)
It's got two primary uses as well - yes, to track counterfeiters, but more so to prevent counterfeiters for even trying.It's preventative.
I think it'd be kinda interesting to take a bill and track exactly where it's been and how far it's travelled, personal freedom issues aside.
Besides, they say this tech won't be even close to available till 2005. So quit worrying.
Triv
earth-based solar power is inherently unreliable. Remember, there's no atmosphere on the moon. That means no weather and nothing to diffuse the power of the sun's rays. Oh, and that whole night thing. There is no night on the light side of the moon.
What good is an entire array of solar-power stations somewhere if it's an overcast day and NONE of them recieve power? It's great as a backup, but if it's the only source of electricity for a region...well, then they're kinda screwed.
Well, what if you're musical taste isn't limited to what you already know and love? MP3's are great and all, but the random element of radio in appealing. I think music now (mainstream music, that is) is a wasteland. I'd love to tune in to satellite radio station with the kind of music I like in the hopes of finding something new that, for whatever reason, wouldn't survive on traditional radio.
Triv
If you need a pretty box, or demand optical connections to your reciever, go with the audiotron. If you want something tiny, or just want to hack at your MP3 player stereo component, this is a great way to go.
OR...if you want to run a MP3 box off of OSX, Audiotron doesn't cut it. It's kinda nice to see a desktop player with out-of-the-box OSX support.
Triv
Interestingly enough, this fits in well with an earlier article we did
/. is new anymore? "I was going to reinvent the wheel, but damnit, they had it on slashdot years ago."
I think I must've seen that at least tacked onto 5 stories this week. Isn't it funny how nothing on
:)
Triv
I agree with this one. I work in the payroll office of a large national toy store headquartered in New York (Boy, that narrows it down, don't it? ;) ) and I recieve between 35 and 50 faxes a day. I get an email or two, mostly supply requests and stuff like that. Email's fine, but no matter how digital you make an office someone's still gonna want to keep hardcopy around. So it's either: Fax it and file it, or fax it, print it and file it.
:)
Ideally we'd keep the entire filesystem on disk, but then all the fileclerks (ahem. Me?) would be out of work. Be 100 times easier to find stuff tho.
Friggin' paper.
Triv
There's also the mission phenominon.
Take STarcraft. You fight like hell to accomplish the mission. You do, eventually, but then you're DYING to see what the setup for the NEXT mission is. You think, 'just a few minutes. Let's see what they're throwin' at me.' and it's all over.
--Triv
Gather round, and let me tell you a tale. I take you way back to the fall of 1999. I was a music major at UMass. I loved the school, hated the department. I scrounged up some cash and picked up a copy of starcraft.
Whoops. I became so enthralled I would ditch my friends, play till 4am, say, 'well, I might as well stay up all night and then go to class', stay up till dawn, and finally crash just as I should have head out of the dorm. I had no social life (I used to leave parties to play) and was flunking out, but because, I reasoned, no one liked me (probably because I hardly ever left my room, if then only to meet the delivery guy)so I might as well sit and play. It's a catch-22 if ever I heard one.
This story doesn't have a fairy-tale ending. I lasted 2 semesters and got kicked out, eventually coming enough out of the hole to apply at the New School in New York City and get a job. It's like being an alcoholic. Yes, I still play games, but spend a good portion of the time trying to avoid sitting in front of my computer. Every once in awhile I regress, stay up all night with Deus Ex or what have you, and seriously regret it in the morning.
I don't have an 'addictive personality,' simply because, as someone said, I don't find everything addictive. Cigarettes and computer games. That's it.
All I'm saying is, this is real. Take my word for it.
Triv
...is a portable/desktop hybrid.
Think about this: a desktop computer with a larger-than-laptop flatscreen (15", let's say) that stands on its own and can also be used as a laptop. I like the iMacs, personally, but they weigh 40 pounds - the idea of sticking an airport card in the is ridiculous if you can't lift the damn thing. I want something small, something classy, that I can take to the park and unfold on my desk at home without squinting at the screen or getting a neck cramp because of the positioning.
mmm. Just a thought.
Triv