No, you eliminate some redundancy, thus *increasing* the randomness. The whole point is, with compression, if your output is less than perfectly random, then you must be able to compress more, as there are additional patterns that can be eliminated. Or, at least that was my understanding.:)
In support of this is fact that you can't compress a perfectly random data stream. Why? Because there is no redundancy to eliminate. And a perfect compression algorithm should output data which isn't further compressible... meaning it's indistinguishable from perfectly random noise.
... or other online photo-posting websites. Create/select a known tag, and post what appear to be appropriate images there, which also happen to contain a steganographically hidden payload...
Just to be clear, steganography is not security through obscurity, at least not as it's traditionally thought about. The latter is the practice of having security policies, but not divulging them, with the hope that lack of knowledge will make those policies harder to crack. The former is the practice of hiding communications in apparently-innocuous data, so people don't know you're communicating in the first place.
Perfect compression should eliminate all randomness.
Okay, you lost me here, or maybe I've forgotten the little bit of information theory I once knew. Shouldn't perfect compression generate something which appears perfectly random?
Interesting point... hopefully they use standard video codecs. And has it been confirmed that playing from memory stick would be an option? The cynical part of me wonders, considering that might encourage "piracy", and Sony has a studio arm...
Too bad you were clouded by his political venting and missed the point that the Webb *isn't a better system*! It's a *different* system.
1) The Webb is IR only, thus it fills a different niche than the Hubble, which is visible + near UV.
2) The Webb is neither expandable nor repairable. While the Hubble is in LEO, the Webb will be at the L1 Lagrange point. Meaning it'll require far more expensive launches and fancy robotics to perform any kind of upgrades.
Frankly, shutting down the Hubble is just bad thinking. There is no instrument that can replace it (and, no, earth based observatories with AO do *not* replace the Hubble, both in resolution and in spectrum coverage), and there are none planned.
Sure the DS has the touchpad, but what good is it being put to use right now?
Actually, I thought the Metroid Prime demo was an excellent example of the potential for the touchscreen as a control device... in fact, I can't play that game in any other mode (doubly brilliant, the buttons on the right happen to also be in the right configuration to use as a joypad, so Prime can be used by lefties, too). I can also imagine using the touchscreen to emulate the PSP's analogue control. Not to mention all the specialized games which use it (the minigames in Mario 64, etc).
Yet, the DS plays for something like 10-12 hours, and there are people who've put their DS to sleep for 2 *days* and picked it up and continued where the left off. Heck, I started playing my DS on the bus to work, put it to sleep when I arrived, and started back up for my trip home. Sorry, but the battery life plus cost of the PSP is a *serious* drawback.
Worse, 3-4 hours, the PSP battery life is *seriously* limiting. I go on road trips every couple months, not to mention air travel occasionally, and I'm *rarely* traveling for less that 3-4 hours. OTOH, the battery life of a DS means it will operate for, basically, a whole day.
My girlfriends mom saw my PSP playing a demo movie and said that she would buy one when they came out here just to watch movies on
I hope you told her it uses custom media, not DVD, and thus, like the dearth of mini-disc albums, it's very likely that only a small subset of movies will be released for it (and most from Sony's collection, I would wager).
Differences of race do not clash with this definition
Unfortunately, there was a time when differences in race *did* clash with the definition of marriage *at the time*, which is why I used the analogy. Yet, today, we have a different definition, and we look back at those times and wonder how we could have been so racist. This will, I suspect, one day be the case for the issue of sexual orientation, as well.
Consequently it becomes ludicrous to try and justify bans on inter-racial couples because you first have to define race.
That's a silly argument. We define limitations on abortion, even though it's very difficult to define the stage at which a fetus is "alive". Similarly, we define the age of consent, even though the definition of "adult" is similarly difficult to pin down. The fact is, we as a society draw arbitrary lines all over the place.
No, the reality is we choose not to have a ban on inter-racial marriage because we, as a society, realize that's wrong.
The other difference is that race is a state of being, whereas sexuality is defined by your actions.
In your opinion. I believe ones sexuality is as innate a property of a person as their gender or race. Of course, on this we'll never agree, so...:)
Now I am aware that some people dvelop sexual desires for people of the same gender while others do not. But this doesn't change how we define gay or straight.
Huh?!? That's *exactly* how we define gay or straight. If you're a man attracted to men, you're gay. If you're a man attracted to men, but "choose a heterosexual lifestyle", you're a gay man in the closet. It doesn't change the fact that you're gay.
But you didn't answer his question about how you'd react if the Prime Minister decided that banning all abortions was a matter of fundamental rights
Well, given that banning abortions eliminates the woman's right to control her body, I'd say the PM would be woefully mistaken, and the courts would likely agree. The point is, such an action would not be in keeping with the CHRA.
(the right to life of an unborn child)
Of course, there are the rights of the child to consider. Unfortunately, you have to decide how you define "life" first. Moreover, you must balance the rights of the mother against the rights of the child. Thus, the issue isn't so black and white. The current situation attempts to strike some semblance of a balance.
Interestingly, there's an important point here. On the issue of abortion, there's the problem of balancing the rights of individuals, due to potential harm. In the case of gay marriage, there is no harm. None! And, at least in my opinion, the rights of individuals should *never* be impinged upon unless it is to protect the rights of others. Thus, this issue is *significantly* different from the issue of abortion.
Letting the government force people who don't agree with you into line is a very dangerous habit to get into.
And having a government which only acts in the interests of the majority is also a very dangerous thing. Again, haven't you heard of "Tyranny of the Majority"? I mean, what's the point of a rights act if the government can tromp all over it based on the whims of the electorate?
but our government's attempt to evade the democratic process on this one is an embarassment.
And if the government did nothing, the judicial system would do it instead. It's already pretty clear that the court system has interpretted the CHRA and determined that the current definition is discriminatory. Thus, any attempt by the government to define marriage as between a man and a woman would be shot down pretty quickly, and rightly so. After all, if the government tried to define marriage as between a man and a woman of the same race, or between a man and a woman of the Christian faith, I'd be equally outraged. Wouldn't you?
Well, clearly I'm not going to convince you... but, might I suggest you review you arguments, and replace "homosexual couples" with "mixed-race couples", and tell me again how this isn't discrimination.
Much like your PM forcing your government to vote for same-sex marriage, even though a substantial amount of the government and population are against the initiative.
I will address this one particular issue. Much like women's sufferage, and much like slavery, the fact is, the right (and only legal) thing to do is currently not the popular thing to do. Fortunately, unlike certain other democracies in the world, our government and judicial system realize that popular opinion can *never* be allowed to trump the rights afforded to citizens under our human rights act. And that, much to the chagrin of many a bigotted Canadian, includes discrimination based on sexuality. Your own President Lincoln understood this concept, which is why he freed the slaves, despite massive opposition. Unfortunately the very beliefs that ended slavery were forgotten by subsequent generations in the US.
The fact is, our government is doing the *ethical* thing here. So, citing it as an example is, really, just a demonstration of your clear lack of understanding regarding how a civilized country should operate, and also demonstrates how you've forsaken the lessons taught by your own forebearers.
Willful ignorance is still ignorance, and there's little excuse for intellectual laziness. Why live in this world if you don't intend to learn about it?
The difference is that many people can drive while talking on a cellphone without being impaired (despite what you might think). The same is not true of drunk driving.
Are you sure about that? There are some who claim they can drive while somewhat or even moderately impaired. In fact, I would claim that there are many more drunk drivers on the road than we realize, because most of them get home safely. It's only a percentage that actually get into accidents. Thus the following statement:
This is just another stupid attempt to blame EVERYONE because a few people are incapable of doing something safely in this country.
Should equally apply to drunk driving. Period. End of story.
The fact is, there are plenty of activities we outlaw because "a minor few are incompetant":
Speeding Jaywalking Various bicycle safety laws (requiring helmets, bells, etc)
I don't give a damn who this person is... if they have something valuable to say, they have a right to say it, and ad hominem attacks, regardless of their veracity, do NOT qualify as informative!
Just a suggestion for the future, just drop an SSH server on the machine. Then lock down the database ports on the server so you can only connect from localhost, and use SSH port forwarding to access them from a remote machine. Much safer, and it's a secured connection so you don't have to worry about traffic being sniffed.
Good lord, are you kidding? I would assume any reasonable organization that was accessing their database over a network would keep the webserver on a DMZ and the database server behind a firewall that's tightened up and only allows access to the database from the DMZ. Isn't this, uh, kinda obvious? And, of course, if the database and the webserver are on the same box, *why* is remote access enabled at all?
Slashdot Mirror
has it's prices artificially propped up by the black market?
Nope, by the government, who increases the cost of doing business for producers, and also creates scarcity by stemming the flow of the substance.
Yeah, I noticed that after I hit the submit button... I really meant "patterned", or something to that effect...
also eliminate (some) randomness.
:)
No, you eliminate some redundancy, thus *increasing* the randomness. The whole point is, with compression, if your output is less than perfectly random, then you must be able to compress more, as there are additional patterns that can be eliminated. Or, at least that was my understanding.
In support of this is fact that you can't compress a perfectly random data stream. Why? Because there is no redundancy to eliminate. And a perfect compression algorithm should output data which isn't further compressible... meaning it's indistinguishable from perfectly random noise.
... or other online photo-posting websites. Create/select a known tag, and post what appear to be appropriate images there, which also happen to contain a steganographically hidden payload...
Just to be clear, steganography is not security through obscurity, at least not as it's traditionally thought about. The latter is the practice of having security policies, but not divulging them, with the hope that lack of knowledge will make those policies harder to crack. The former is the practice of hiding communications in apparently-innocuous data, so people don't know you're communicating in the first place.
Perfect compression should eliminate all randomness.
Okay, you lost me here, or maybe I've forgotten the little bit of information theory I once knew. Shouldn't perfect compression generate something which appears perfectly random?
Interesting point... hopefully they use standard video codecs. And has it been confirmed that playing from memory stick would be an option? The cynical part of me wonders, considering that might encourage "piracy", and Sony has a studio arm...
lets get a better system
Too bad you were clouded by his political venting and missed the point that the Webb *isn't a better system*! It's a *different* system.
1) The Webb is IR only, thus it fills a different niche than the Hubble, which is visible + near UV.
2) The Webb is neither expandable nor repairable. While the Hubble is in LEO, the Webb will be at the L1 Lagrange point. Meaning it'll require far more expensive launches and fancy robotics to perform any kind of upgrades.
Frankly, shutting down the Hubble is just bad thinking. There is no instrument that can replace it (and, no, earth based observatories with AO do *not* replace the Hubble, both in resolution and in spectrum coverage), and there are none planned.
Sure the DS has the touchpad, but what good is it being put to use right now?
Actually, I thought the Metroid Prime demo was an excellent example of the potential for the touchscreen as a control device... in fact, I can't play that game in any other mode (doubly brilliant, the buttons on the right happen to also be in the right configuration to use as a joypad, so Prime can be used by lefties, too). I can also imagine using the touchscreen to emulate the PSP's analogue control. Not to mention all the specialized games which use it (the minigames in Mario 64, etc).
Yet, the DS plays for something like 10-12 hours, and there are people who've put their DS to sleep for 2 *days* and picked it up and continued where the left off. Heck, I started playing my DS on the bus to work, put it to sleep when I arrived, and started back up for my trip home. Sorry, but the battery life plus cost of the PSP is a *serious* drawback.
Worse, 3-4 hours, the PSP battery life is *seriously* limiting. I go on road trips every couple months, not to mention air travel occasionally, and I'm *rarely* traveling for less that 3-4 hours. OTOH, the battery life of a DS means it will operate for, basically, a whole day.
My girlfriends mom saw my PSP playing a demo movie and said that she would buy one when they came out here just to watch movies on
I hope you told her it uses custom media, not DVD, and thus, like the dearth of mini-disc albums, it's very likely that only a small subset of movies will be released for it (and most from Sony's collection, I would wager).
Differences of race do not clash with this definition
Unfortunately, there was a time when differences in race *did* clash with the definition of marriage *at the time*, which is why I used the analogy. Yet, today, we have a different definition, and we look back at those times and wonder how we could have been so racist. This will, I suspect, one day be the case for the issue of sexual orientation, as well.
Consequently it becomes ludicrous to try and justify bans on inter-racial couples because you first have to define race.
:)
That's a silly argument. We define limitations on abortion, even though it's very difficult to define the stage at which a fetus is "alive". Similarly, we define the age of consent, even though the definition of "adult" is similarly difficult to pin down. The fact is, we as a society draw arbitrary lines all over the place.
No, the reality is we choose not to have a ban on inter-racial marriage because we, as a society, realize that's wrong.
The other difference is that race is a state of being, whereas sexuality is defined by your actions.
In your opinion. I believe ones sexuality is as innate a property of a person as their gender or race. Of course, on this we'll never agree, so...
Now I am aware that some people dvelop sexual desires for people of the same gender while others do not. But this doesn't change how we define gay or straight.
Huh?!? That's *exactly* how we define gay or straight. If you're a man attracted to men, you're gay. If you're a man attracted to men, but "choose a heterosexual lifestyle", you're a gay man in the closet. It doesn't change the fact that you're gay.
But you didn't answer his question about how you'd react if the Prime Minister decided that banning all abortions was a matter of fundamental rights
Well, given that banning abortions eliminates the woman's right to control her body, I'd say the PM would be woefully mistaken, and the courts would likely agree. The point is, such an action would not be in keeping with the CHRA.
(the right to life of an unborn child)
Of course, there are the rights of the child to consider. Unfortunately, you have to decide how you define "life" first. Moreover, you must balance the rights of the mother against the rights of the child. Thus, the issue isn't so black and white. The current situation attempts to strike some semblance of a balance.
Interestingly, there's an important point here. On the issue of abortion, there's the problem of balancing the rights of individuals, due to potential harm. In the case of gay marriage, there is no harm. None! And, at least in my opinion, the rights of individuals should *never* be impinged upon unless it is to protect the rights of others. Thus, this issue is *significantly* different from the issue of abortion.
Letting the government force people who don't agree with you into line is a very dangerous habit to get into.
And having a government which only acts in the interests of the majority is also a very dangerous thing. Again, haven't you heard of "Tyranny of the Majority"? I mean, what's the point of a rights act if the government can tromp all over it based on the whims of the electorate?
but our government's attempt to evade the democratic process on this one is an embarassment.
And if the government did nothing, the judicial system would do it instead. It's already pretty clear that the court system has interpretted the CHRA and determined that the current definition is discriminatory. Thus, any attempt by the government to define marriage as between a man and a woman would be shot down pretty quickly, and rightly so. After all, if the government tried to define marriage as between a man and a woman of the same race, or between a man and a woman of the Christian faith, I'd be equally outraged. Wouldn't you?
Homosexual couples aren't the same as interracial couples.
Why? Other than gender, what's the difference?
Well, clearly I'm not going to convince you... but, might I suggest you review you arguments, and replace "homosexual couples" with "mixed-race couples", and tell me again how this isn't discrimination.
Much like your PM forcing your government to vote for same-sex marriage, even though a substantial amount of the government and population are against the initiative.
I will address this one particular issue. Much like women's sufferage, and much like slavery, the fact is, the right (and only legal) thing to do is currently not the popular thing to do. Fortunately, unlike certain other democracies in the world, our government and judicial system realize that popular opinion can *never* be allowed to trump the rights afforded to citizens under our human rights act. And that, much to the chagrin of many a bigotted Canadian, includes discrimination based on sexuality. Your own President Lincoln understood this concept, which is why he freed the slaves, despite massive opposition. Unfortunately the very beliefs that ended slavery were forgotten by subsequent generations in the US.
The fact is, our government is doing the *ethical* thing here. So, citing it as an example is, really, just a demonstration of your clear lack of understanding regarding how a civilized country should operate, and also demonstrates how you've forsaken the lessons taught by your own forebearers.
Willful ignorance is still ignorance, and there's little excuse for intellectual laziness. Why live in this world if you don't intend to learn about it?
Are you sure about that? There are some who claim they can drive while somewhat or even moderately impaired. In fact, I would claim that there are many more drunk drivers on the road than we realize, because most of them get home safely. It's only a percentage that actually get into accidents. Thus the following statement:
This is just another stupid attempt to blame EVERYONE because a few people are incapable of doing something safely in this country.
Should equally apply to drunk driving. Period. End of story.
The fact is, there are plenty of activities we outlaw because "a minor few are incompetant":
Speeding
Jaywalking
Various bicycle safety laws (requiring helmets, bells, etc)
Funny... you could say the same thing about people driving while drunk...
I don't give a damn who this person is... if they have something valuable to say, they have a right to say it, and ad hominem attacks, regardless of their veracity, do NOT qualify as informative!
And "Stand By Me" was also a novella, interestingly enough...
LOL! That's friggin' hilarious... :)
Just a suggestion for the future, just drop an SSH server on the machine. Then lock down the database ports on the server so you can only connect from localhost, and use SSH port forwarding to access them from a remote machine. Much safer, and it's a secured connection so you don't have to worry about traffic being sniffed.
Good lord, are you kidding? I would assume any reasonable organization that was accessing their database over a network would keep the webserver on a DMZ and the database server behind a firewall that's tightened up and only allows access to the database from the DMZ. Isn't this, uh, kinda obvious? And, of course, if the database and the webserver are on the same box, *why* is remote access enabled at all?