> despite it being readily available (Shale oil, gulf oil, tundra oil, the list goes on.)
First off, what you listed is NOT readily available: it is available at extreme cost and risk. Did we already forget the gulf spill? And the news around fracking? And don't make me laugh about tundra oil: estimates put the available tundra oil - given our current daily demands - at about two years tops, and that's 10~15 years from when the paperwork is signed.
Second, America exports and enormous amount of domestic oil. I still don't understand how we can be importing AND exporting the same resource, but it seems like that could go a long way to helping our oil woes.
...At least for another 20 years until there really is none left. But hey, why plan for the future?
"Nibble" Magazine's Two-Liners & Beagle Bros
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Tetris In 140 Bytes
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· Score: 1
Anyone remember the last page of every issue of Nibble, that featured "two liner" contests? The goal was to write something in two lines of Applesoft basic, and the winners always managed to blow my mind. Beagle Bros released a disk of of these in the early 80's.
Nearly everyone on/. with the exception of true IT nerds completely don't understand why Itanium has been alive and kicking for 15+ years.
Itanium isn't about performance, it is about INSANE reliability. There is no server product that has ever existed with as many reliability features as Itanium.
That is why it is still alive, the cost to put those features into desktop/mobile processors is too steep. If you recall, the intel Xeon server line is just beefed up desktop cores but the same architecture. THrowing in all the server features of Itanium (lockstep, edc on every cache, wide address busses, etc) would eat up way too much real-estate. Xeon meets the vast majority of server needs, but Itanium is for the true mission-critical systems.
Why have we grown so accustomed to the style changing radically every new release? Not just apple, but any phone, or gadget, or car... Why do we feel this need to see a new fancy box?
Seems like once we arrive at the thinnest tablets, it will be the ultimate "form follows function": a flat panel. Will we then no longer expect a radical new shape? (circular tablets?)
Or it will train them not to think when wikipedia goes down...
Some of the best instructors I had taught the concepts and not the "units", and all the notes and cribsheets in the world were useless if you didn't understand the concept. Not every instructor can be one of the top-10, so maybe we do need to handicap those profs with internet access./s
Probably should be modded as off topic for this, but why did the article feel the need to point out Paget's gender change? did it make her a better programmer, or design better hardware? or were there lots of people reading the article were like "Hey, I knew I guy with the last name Paget that worked there, I wonder if they are related?... Oh!"/scratches head
"I think that without being able to examine the vehicles, we cannot tell what or where the failure points will be."
I agree, some of the other comments explain that this is a "point and shoot" mission, without a chance to inspect the design for further engineering feedback. Someone else posted about a think called "Deacon's Masterpiece" in response to my over/under design statement, which is where I was headed. But like you said, without examining it, other engineering methods need to be employed.
In hindsight, I was playing devil's advocate, and probably should have started with that to avoid all of the flames!
That's exactly what was cooking in my head, but never heard of it before: Deacon's Masterpiece. Yes! I was actually thinking in my head, the perfect engineering solution would be one that last exactly the allotted time then disintegrates, at optimal cost. I didn't know there was a term for it.
I like the next step in the discussion, the statement: "the strut that lasts a few months' time, but would snap on impact." Does this mean that the most perfectly "Deaconized" subgroups/subcomponents cannot be assembled into one device that meets the "global Deaconized requirement". Seems like a paradox at first: if every part is built to meet its minimum requirements, shouldn't the entire design meet its minimum requirements???
It feels like this is an ancient question... but I never actually studied the history of engineering while at engineering school.
"In the mining industry, where safety is paramount. They typically have entire redundant control systems to ensure no downtime. The systems are designed to last 20-30 years but get replaced every 5 years to make sure that nothing goes wrong ever."
Why not build systems to last 100, 1,000 or even 100,000 years if you care so much about safety? Because 100,000 reliability, even to the non-engineer, sounds like overkill. But you yourself, as an engineer, claim that your system should NEVER fail. But you said 30 years was enough. That is NOT NEVER! It is 30 years.
Why didn't you design for "NEVER"? Because it would be an astronomical cost.
The engineer has to figure out how to build for 30 years, and not for 1,000, and not for 5.
I think it is great that the device was design to last max a year or two, and lasted 8, but on the flipside, this means they aren't really good engineers.
How can I say this?
The estimates were off by 400%~800%!!! Or more!!!
Just because they erred on the side of a good result doesn't mean the estimates are better. It means their methodology is HEAVILY padded, or if we assume +/-400~800%, they were just lucky that it didn't swing the other way. Given Phobos-Grunt, perhaps space engineering margin of error really is +/-400~800%. Although I suspect huge margins of error were thrown about in NASA>
If that's the case, huge design buffers, that means they don't understand the underlying physics/materials engineer, and had to heavily overdesign, which means there is a far more efficient design out there.
I'm not knocking NASA engineers, I'm just exploring how to shave down this margin so that they can make more efficient designs at lower cost that behave as expected.
Building something that behaves as expected is far, far, FAR more important than building something that blows away expectations by orders of magnitude. The former is good engineering, the latter is waste, or worse, dumb luck!
Is there a new movie coming out about this or something? I say this because anytime an outlet like The History Channel suddenly starts hyping some weird paranormal event, it is because they were seeded with $$$ by the studio to drum up hype. This story sounds familiar, but I don't see the trailers.
As much as I want to see a vigilante internet group of elite white-hat hackers send a potent message, a DDoS is hardly effective. It grabs a headline or two, but in the end, does nothing.
Who pays...??? People who don't have 20-40 hours of free time to learn what AV software is, understand all of the bits and pieces that different companies offer (email scanning? web scanning? disk scanning? registry scanning?), and understand what is best for them. I think for a computer noob like a grandma or non-techie (yes, they really do exist despite the trends), 40 hours is a CONSERVATIVE estimate of how long it would take for them to understand AV well enough to make those kinds of decisions. Hence, companies like Symantec (I miss when it was just norton utilities for DOS that came with a disk AND a book, with his nerdy smiling face on the cover).
This is why I hate PCs (and I was a teen building 286s in the 1980s).
Not understanding how 90+% of the world uses computers is a barrier many slashdotters encounter when trying to ascertain why the PC industry produces such poor products.
(here comes my bias...)
Which is why Macs are so popular. We can argue about virus threats on macs, but that isn't the issue: when some nerd like yourself makes people feel stupid for buying AV software they don't understand, that isn't even a discussed/advertised issue with Macs, they do an about face from the PC aisle. And I say good for them.
Slashdot Mirror
> despite it being readily available (Shale oil, gulf oil, tundra oil, the list goes on.)
First off, what you listed is NOT readily available: it is available at extreme cost and risk. Did we already forget the gulf spill? And the news around fracking? And don't make me laugh about tundra oil: estimates put the available tundra oil - given our current daily demands - at about two years tops, and that's 10~15 years from when the paperwork is signed.
Second, America exports and enormous amount of domestic oil. I still don't understand how we can be importing AND exporting the same resource, but it seems like that could go a long way to helping our oil woes.
Anyone remember the last page of every issue of Nibble, that featured "two liner" contests? The goal was to write something in two lines of Applesoft basic, and the winners always managed to blow my mind. Beagle Bros released a disk of of these in the early 80's.
Glad to see this kind of challenge returning!
You really wonder why? Probably because you haven't a clue what a monopoly is.
"Yeah, I could have gone with the $30 board, but then I'd be in the same boat you're in."
Spending more money for quality???!?!?
What are you, an Apple Fanboi??!
See my above post about this:
http://labs.hoffmanlabs.com/node/95
Nearly everyone on /. with the exception of true IT nerds completely don't understand why Itanium has been alive and kicking for 15+ years.
Itanium isn't about performance, it is about INSANE reliability. There is no server product that has ever existed with as many reliability features as Itanium.
Read and learn:
http://labs.hoffmanlabs.com/node/95
That is why it is still alive, the cost to put those features into desktop/mobile processors is too steep. If you recall, the intel Xeon server line is just beefed up desktop cores but the same architecture. THrowing in all the server features of Itanium (lockstep, edc on every cache, wide address busses, etc) would eat up way too much real-estate. Xeon meets the vast majority of server needs, but Itanium is for the true mission-critical systems.
I'll wait for some investigation into this. Note the source, TheBlaze, is an inquirer-like conservative rag.
+1 /snort/ ;-)
Why have we grown so accustomed to the style changing radically every new release? Not just apple, but any phone, or gadget, or car... Why do we feel this need to see a new fancy box?
Seems like once we arrive at the thinnest tablets, it will be the ultimate "form follows function": a flat panel. Will we then no longer expect a radical new shape? (circular tablets?)
Or it will train them not to think when wikipedia goes down...
Some of the best instructors I had taught the concepts and not the "units", and all the notes and cribsheets in the world were useless if you didn't understand the concept. Not every instructor can be one of the top-10, so maybe we do need to handicap those profs with internet access. /s
in the technological arms race, this is pretty damn cool idea.
Probably should be modded as off topic for this, but why did the article feel the need to point out Paget's gender change? did it make her a better programmer, or design better hardware? or were there lots of people reading the article were like "Hey, I knew I guy with the last name Paget that worked there, I wonder if they are related? ... Oh!" /scratches head
"I think that without being able to examine the vehicles, we cannot tell what or where the failure points will be."
I agree, some of the other comments explain that this is a "point and shoot" mission, without a chance to inspect the design for further engineering feedback. Someone else posted about a think called "Deacon's Masterpiece" in response to my over/under design statement, which is where I was headed. But like you said, without examining it, other engineering methods need to be employed.
In hindsight, I was playing devil's advocate, and probably should have started with that to avoid all of the flames!
That's exactly what was cooking in my head, but never heard of it before: Deacon's Masterpiece. Yes! I was actually thinking in my head, the perfect engineering solution would be one that last exactly the allotted time then disintegrates, at optimal cost. I didn't know there was a term for it.
I like the next step in the discussion, the statement: "the strut that lasts a few months' time, but would snap on impact." Does this mean that the most perfectly "Deaconized" subgroups/subcomponents cannot be assembled into one device that meets the "global Deaconized requirement". Seems like a paradox at first: if every part is built to meet its minimum requirements, shouldn't the entire design meet its minimum requirements???
It feels like this is an ancient question... but I never actually studied the history of engineering while at engineering school.
You are completely making my point:
You said:
"In the mining industry, where safety is paramount. They typically have entire redundant control systems to ensure no downtime. The systems are designed to last 20-30 years but get replaced every 5 years to make sure that nothing goes wrong ever."
Why not build systems to last 100, 1,000 or even 100,000 years if you care so much about safety? Because 100,000 reliability, even to the non-engineer, sounds like overkill. But you yourself, as an engineer, claim that your system should NEVER fail. But you said 30 years was enough. That is NOT NEVER! It is 30 years.
Why didn't you design for "NEVER"? Because it would be an astronomical cost.
The engineer has to figure out how to build for 30 years, and not for 1,000, and not for 5.
Just as I said: enough cake.
Clearly you aren't and never will be an engineer, we all have different strengths.
The point of engineering is to have "just enough cake." Not too much (overdesign), not too little (underdesign).
I think it is great that the device was design to last max a year or two, and lasted 8, but on the flipside, this means they aren't really good engineers.
How can I say this?
The estimates were off by 400%~800%!!! Or more!!!
Just because they erred on the side of a good result doesn't mean the estimates are better. It means their methodology is HEAVILY padded, or if we assume +/-400~800%, they were just lucky that it didn't swing the other way. Given Phobos-Grunt, perhaps space engineering margin of error really is +/-400~800%. Although I suspect huge margins of error were thrown about in NASA>
If that's the case, huge design buffers, that means they don't understand the underlying physics/materials engineer, and had to heavily overdesign, which means there is a far more efficient design out there.
I'm not knocking NASA engineers, I'm just exploring how to shave down this margin so that they can make more efficient designs at lower cost that behave as expected.
Building something that behaves as expected is far, far, FAR more important than building something that blows away expectations by orders of magnitude. The former is good engineering, the latter is waste, or worse, dumb luck!
Discuss.
Is there a new movie coming out about this or something? I say this because anytime an outlet like The History Channel suddenly starts hyping some weird paranormal event, it is because they were seeded with $$$ by the studio to drum up hype. This story sounds familiar, but I don't see the trailers.
Bingo.
I dunno... maybe take over WOPR and launch a Global Thermonuclear War against Seattle?
As much as I want to see a vigilante internet group of elite white-hat hackers send a potent message, a DDoS is hardly effective. It grabs a headline or two, but in the end, does nothing.
Too bad l0pht/CDC went legit.
*sigh*
You can totally do Lambdas with Boost. /s :-)
My IT friend in 1993.
Time to find him on facebook.
Well put!
Who pays...??? People who don't have 20-40 hours of free time to learn what AV software is, understand all of the bits and pieces that different companies offer (email scanning? web scanning? disk scanning? registry scanning?), and understand what is best for them. I think for a computer noob like a grandma or non-techie (yes, they really do exist despite the trends), 40 hours is a CONSERVATIVE estimate of how long it would take for them to understand AV well enough to make those kinds of decisions. Hence, companies like Symantec (I miss when it was just norton utilities for DOS that came with a disk AND a book, with his nerdy smiling face on the cover).
This is why I hate PCs (and I was a teen building 286s in the 1980s).
Not understanding how 90+% of the world uses computers is a barrier many slashdotters encounter when trying to ascertain why the PC industry produces such poor products.
(here comes my bias...)
Which is why Macs are so popular. We can argue about virus threats on macs, but that isn't the issue: when some nerd like yourself makes people feel stupid for buying AV software they don't understand, that isn't even a discussed/advertised issue with Macs, they do an about face from the PC aisle. And I say good for them.