Umm, you don't know what triple-buffering is. It reduces latency by eliminating a bottleneck that exists in double-buffering.
Quick review of multiple-buffering for graphics display:
Without double-buffering, drawing is done in the same buffer that is used to refresh the display. This has all sorts of nasty effects when you're changing the display contents rapidly.
With double-buffering, drawing is done on a background buffer. When the frame is done, it's swapped with the display buffer and drawing can resume. The problem is that there is often a period of time when the drawing buffer is completed, but the display buffer is still being used to update the screen, so you can't swap. This leaves the GPU idle, and can cause update latency.
Triple-buffering adds a second background buffer. Drawing is done on one of the two background buffers, and when it's done it's queued up to be swapped with the display buffer as soon as possible. Meanwhile, the GPU can continue drawing onto the other background buffer. In the event that it is completed before the first background buffer is swapped to the display, the first buffer can simply be discarded. More commonly, of course, the first back buffer is swapped in while the GPU is working on the second back buffer.
The effect of triple-buffering is to reduce latency, increase framerate and improve smoothness. More importantly, it allows display, GPU and CPU to all run full speed without any bottlenecks, reducing the chance that a delay in any one of them causes everything to back up.
The cost of triple-buffering is the RAM required for the other buffer.
Unfortunately, no one seems interested in fixing legal immigration, which really would solve the problem. From my armchair, here's what I think we should do:
Get tough on employers of illegals: Make it a federal felony, with a mandatory minimum one-year sentence, per count, for whoever was responsible for the hire, plus serious financial penalties for corporations found to be employing illegals. Make non-compliance with INS policies a lesser crime for employers of legal immigrants.
To make it easy to catch employers of illegals, offer permanent residency to any illegal who turns in their boss.
Revamp immigration policy, eliminating the quotas and lotteries, but adding deeper background checks for work visas (funded by applicant fees, with some provision for hardship cases).
Require that immigrants on any visa be able to show how they are supporting themselves (or being supported), at any time. Also require them to keep INS apprised of their home address and phone number at all times. Failure to do so results in deportation and future denial of visas.
Adjust welfare program policies to deny services to legal and illegal immigrants, until permanent residency or naturalization, status is achieved.
Provide a mandatory citizenship course for all immigrants, whether they're working towards earning citizenship or not. It should include a little about culture and history but be focused primarily on the rights and responsibilities of good citizens -- and on the rights side it should be particularly thorough around work-related law, including minimum wages, maximum hours, safe working conditions, etc. It should be taught in the immigrants' native languages, and should include a brief course in basic English phrases, and should strongly encourage immigrants to enroll in regular English courses (perhaps subsidized).
Provide free access to legal consultation related to workplace abuses. Also provide ongoing free non-financial support services around finding jobs, buying/renting housing, acquiring medical coverage, etc.
Add a small additional income tax for immigrants on work visas, withheld from their paychecks, to fund the above initiatives. Self-employed immigrants who are found to cheat on their taxes should be prosecuted for tax fraud, then deported and denied future visas.
I'm sure more needs to be added to cover all the bases, but you get the idea: Throw open the doors, but keep track of who comes in, where they are and what they're doing, provide them with the support they need to integrate well and to mitigate abuse but require them to be self-sufficient or go home, and make the whole program self-funding. Oh, and come down like a load of bricks on anyone subverting the process, and hit employers trying to skirt the rules especially hard, to shut off the money to illegals.
Yes, open the borders -- though with a procedure to screen out the ill, criminals, etc.. No, don't sign them up for food stamps, or provide them any other welfare benefits. The Ellis Island model, basically. It worked well for your ancestors and mine.
So let them go through the legal immigration process. Problem solved!
The problem isn't that they're unwilling to do that, you know. The problem is that they're not allowed to. For most people in the world, the only way to immigrate legally to the US is -- literally -- to win a lottery. Each country in the world is allotted so many slots per year and you have to submit your application and get lucky enough to have your name drawn in the lottery. Well, that is if the process isn't corrupt.
I think it's a great idea, but the fact that these people are willing to do something illegal disturbs me.
Find the law they have broken. AFAICT, there are federal statutes that make it a crime to enter or stay improperly after you've been ejected once, but those who overstay their visas or sneak in the first time haven't actually committed any crime. They just didn't comply with policy.
Sure, they don't want to be paid or treated like illegal immigrants
There's a very simple solution to this: Make it easy to immigrate and work here legally. Then all of those immigrants will be able to demand reasonable pay and treatment, and will. As a result, Americans who want to do that work will get the jobs, because they're easier to communicate with.
As long as the number of gun owners is more than 50 times the number of soldiers, high tech weapons dont matter. Remember almost half the households have guns, and the guns are spread out all across the country.
You also have to keep in mind that soldiers are not automata. If citizens have sufficient ability to resist and if there are enough resisting that it's necessary to deploy military forces to stop them, then many of the soldiers will be at least somewhat on the side of the resisters, and many more will be unwilling to fire on their countrymen.
As for what guerrilla forces who can hide among the populace and engage in hit-and-run tactics can achieve, even with vastly inferior weapons, see history.
When you combine all of these factors, yes, America's arms are a significant deterrent to tyranny.
Look up US v Hiibel. Verbally providing your name and address satisfies the stop and identify requirements. Not producing an ID card is not probable cause for an arrest.
And yet, it's still in state law in how many states? Wikipedia holds the answer...
Indeed it is in state law, but the SCOTUS opinion renders any requirements to provide identification irrelevant. Most of the state statutes now actually say you are required to identify yourself, not that you are required to present identification. Also note that this doesn't apply if you're operating a motor vehicle. In that case, you can be required to provide your driver's license to prove that you have the state's permission to do so.
In other words US citizens could end up arrested and detained while their status is clarified.
Look up Stop and Identify laws, that's already true.
Look up US v Hiibel. Verbally providing your name and address satisfies the stop and identify requirements. Not producing an ID card is not probable cause for an arrest.
Apple is going with a standard for a change (unlike Google's original implementation).
Google Wallet is an implementation of MasterCard's Paypass, which is a standardized variant of EMV. There's nothing non-standard about Google's implementation. They had to choose MasterCard Paypass, Visa Paywave or Discover Zip so that it would work on the already-deployed acceptance devices, but all three are basically interoperable and all are based on EMV standards. I'm sure Paypass was selected based on who was interested in partnering, though I don't actually know how that choice was made.
(Note: I work for Google, on technology related to Wallet. I also worked in the smart card and NFC industry for nearly 15 years before joining Google.)
Not really. They make up a heck of a lot less than 10% of the population, especially here along the Wasatch Front.
The people who camp and cause fires that way also make up a fairly small portion of the population. Larger than shooters, but not much larger.
It takes some unusual conditions for copper and lead bullets to start fires (not the case for steel-jacketed rounds, or for reactive targets, obviously), but normal procedure for wildfires is to blame firearms if anyone was known or suspected to have been shooting in the vicinity and no other specific cause presents itself. What percentage of the 20 allegedly shooting-caused fires were actually caused by something else is unknowable, but it's likely greater than zero.
Right. All the fires when people were shooting in red-flag warning "tinderbox" conditions were caused by fire fairies or gnomes.
I don't respond to sarcasm. If you'd like to make an argument make it like a grownup.
Utah state law specifically authorizes municipalities to restrict firearms discharge within their city limits
[citation needed]. I've seen the sections of state code which say "Unless specifically authorized by the Legislature by statute, a local authority or state entity may not enact or enforce any ordinance, regulation, or rule pertaining to firearms" and I've seen the legislature's tendency to try to trump/seize control from cities (esp. SLC) on all kinds of issues; I haven't seen the provision you cite.
UCA 10-8-47: "the municipal legislative body may regulate and prevent the discharge of firearms".
Note that they may not regulate possession or carry, only discharge.
Federal law, whether statutory or regulatory, trumps state law and even state constitutions, per Article VI.
If you could teach our state legislators this fact it would be a great accomplishment. They've passed scores of bills that their own legal counsel has said are unconstitutional attempts to trump federal law, and many of them are nullificationists.
I didn't say they couldn't try, only that they couldn't do it.
As I've said elsewhere, there aren't that many target shooters, and they start a vastly disproportionate number of fires
I disagree. There are a lot of target shooters.
these fires have caused considerably more damage than the vast majority of the fires on that silly list (many of those were zero-acre fires).
As were many of the allegedly shooting-caused fires. The origin of the fire doesn't have much to do with the damage that results. And, yes, that "allegedly" is there for a reason. It takes some unusual conditions for copper and lead bullets to start fires (not the case for steel-jacketed rounds, or for reactive targets, obviously), but normal procedure for wildfires is to blame firearms if anyone was known or suspected to have been shooting in the vicinity and no other specific cause presents itself. What percentage of the 20 allegedly shooting-caused fires were actually caused by something else is unknowable, but it's likely greater than zero.
But more to the point: counties, municipalities, and the BLM, Forest Service, and NPS all have the power to restrict campfires, and they often do put restrictions in place during fire season. But the state legislature has not only failed to put reasonable shooting regulations in place but has barred anyone else from doing so.
Well, they've barred counties. Utah state law specifically authorizes municipalities to restrict firearms discharge within their city limits, and of course the state can't restrict federal agencies. Federal law, whether statutory or regulatory, trumps state law and even state constitutions, per Article VI.
I see two people debating a topic on which I'm not very knowledgeable. One of them consistently focuses his comments on factual statements, the other occasionally veers into histrionics (shouting) and attacking his opponent's intelligence.
To which should I give more weight, assuming I'm not willing right now to go investigate the merits of their respective factual claims?
Eh? Smartphone activation numbers show that there are just over a million smartphones activated per day, combining Android and iOS (I don't know about the minor players, but they're minor). So one vendor selling a few million per day seems very unlikely.
won't face punishment for something they couldn't have possibly predicted
From TFS:
The fire was the 20th this year in Utah sparked by target shooting
As compared with the 188 human-cause wildfires in Utah so far this year which were sparked by causes other than target shooting. Not that this lets shooters off the hook, but if you're going to impose regulations to prevent wildfires you should probably start with the low-hanging fruit: campfires.
Correction: I took the 218 total human-caused wildfire figure from another slashdot post. I'm not sure where he got it, but the official source reports a total of 229 human-caused fires this year, at least if you add up the agency totals yourself. The "Grand Total" on the page is inexplicably wrong.
won't face punishment for something they couldn't have possibly predicted
From TFS:
The fire was the 20th this year in Utah sparked by target shooting
As compared with the 188 human-cause wildfires in Utah so far this year which were sparked by causes other than target shooting. Not that this lets shooters off the hook, but if you're going to impose regulations to prevent wildfires you should probably start with the low-hanging fruit: campfires.
It pains me to see such judgement passed on what I thought was a website full of forward thinking technologists.
I didn't pass any judgments on the employees. If I judged Apple, it was positively, both in that they're willing to employ people many companies would not, and that they're smart enough to exploit an underutilized part of the workforce. If I made any negative judgements, it was towards all of the other potential employers who refuse to hire people that don't fit a certain range of images for public-facing positions, or else towards the general public who are uncomfortable with people that don't fit those images.
In fact, I don't judge those companies negatively, either. Public reactions are what they are, and companies have to deal with reality as it is not as they wish it were. And I don't really judge Apple positively, either, because I don't think their hiring policy is any kind of a moral stance. I think it's just a recognition that the bulk of their target market is young enough not to be too put off by alternative images.
In many cases, Tiffany wouldn't hire them. I've never seen anyone with two-inch gauges and tattoos from wrist to shoulder working at Tiffany.
I've never seen anyone like that at an Apple store either. For all of the "think different" stuff, Apple seems to prefer their employees... even retail clerks... to be stylish and "clean cut", so to speak. Remember, Apple is all about image.
Different stores, maybe?
I've been to the stores in Utah (SLC) and Colorado (Boulder, Broomfield and Denver), and seen many employees with body mods. Not a majority, mind you, but a significant minority.
Slashdot Mirror
Umm, you don't know what triple-buffering is. It reduces latency by eliminating a bottleneck that exists in double-buffering.
Quick review of multiple-buffering for graphics display:
Without double-buffering, drawing is done in the same buffer that is used to refresh the display. This has all sorts of nasty effects when you're changing the display contents rapidly.
With double-buffering, drawing is done on a background buffer. When the frame is done, it's swapped with the display buffer and drawing can resume. The problem is that there is often a period of time when the drawing buffer is completed, but the display buffer is still being used to update the screen, so you can't swap. This leaves the GPU idle, and can cause update latency.
Triple-buffering adds a second background buffer. Drawing is done on one of the two background buffers, and when it's done it's queued up to be swapped with the display buffer as soon as possible. Meanwhile, the GPU can continue drawing onto the other background buffer. In the event that it is completed before the first background buffer is swapped to the display, the first buffer can simply be discarded. More commonly, of course, the first back buffer is swapped in while the GPU is working on the second back buffer.
The effect of triple-buffering is to reduce latency, increase framerate and improve smoothness. More importantly, it allows display, GPU and CPU to all run full speed without any bottlenecks, reducing the chance that a delay in any one of them causes everything to back up.
The cost of triple-buffering is the RAM required for the other buffer.
Unfortunately, no one seems interested in fixing legal immigration, which really would solve the problem. From my armchair, here's what I think we should do:
I'm sure more needs to be added to cover all the bases, but you get the idea: Throw open the doors, but keep track of who comes in, where they are and what they're doing, provide them with the support they need to integrate well and to mitigate abuse but require them to be self-sufficient or go home, and make the whole program self-funding. Oh, and come down like a load of bricks on anyone subverting the process, and hit employers trying to skirt the rules especially hard, to shut off the money to illegals.
Yes, open the borders -- though with a procedure to screen out the ill, criminals, etc.. No, don't sign them up for food stamps, or provide them any other welfare benefits. The Ellis Island model, basically. It worked well for your ancestors and mine.
So let them go through the legal immigration process. Problem solved!
The problem isn't that they're unwilling to do that, you know. The problem is that they're not allowed to. For most people in the world, the only way to immigrate legally to the US is -- literally -- to win a lottery. Each country in the world is allotted so many slots per year and you have to submit your application and get lucky enough to have your name drawn in the lottery. Well, that is if the process isn't corrupt.
I think it's a great idea, but the fact that these people are willing to do something illegal disturbs me.
Find the law they have broken. AFAICT, there are federal statutes that make it a crime to enter or stay improperly after you've been ejected once, but those who overstay their visas or sneak in the first time haven't actually committed any crime. They just didn't comply with policy.
Sure, they don't want to be paid or treated like illegal immigrants
There's a very simple solution to this: Make it easy to immigrate and work here legally. Then all of those immigrants will be able to demand reasonable pay and treatment, and will. As a result, Americans who want to do that work will get the jobs, because they're easier to communicate with.
Lost in the demagogic hyper-bloviating is the fact that no one is really against legal immigration.
No? Then why do we make it so difficult to immigrate legally?
I suggest you try going back to KDE4 now that it's matured a bit.
As long as the number of gun owners is more than 50 times the number of soldiers, high tech weapons dont matter. Remember almost half the households have guns, and the guns are spread out all across the country.
You also have to keep in mind that soldiers are not automata. If citizens have sufficient ability to resist and if there are enough resisting that it's necessary to deploy military forces to stop them, then many of the soldiers will be at least somewhat on the side of the resisters, and many more will be unwilling to fire on their countrymen.
As for what guerrilla forces who can hide among the populace and engage in hit-and-run tactics can achieve, even with vastly inferior weapons, see history.
When you combine all of these factors, yes, America's arms are a significant deterrent to tyranny.
Indeed it is in state law, but the SCOTUS opinion renders any requirements to provide identification irrelevant.
Uh no. It's not at all irrelevant while you're on the side of the road being harassed. That word does not mean what you think it means.
If you can keep your head, being harassed in that way can be quite lucrative.
Look up US v Hiibel. Verbally providing your name and address satisfies the stop and identify requirements. Not producing an ID card is not probable cause for an arrest.
And yet, it's still in state law in how many states? Wikipedia holds the answer...
Indeed it is in state law, but the SCOTUS opinion renders any requirements to provide identification irrelevant. Most of the state statutes now actually say you are required to identify yourself, not that you are required to present identification. Also note that this doesn't apply if you're operating a motor vehicle. In that case, you can be required to provide your driver's license to prove that you have the state's permission to do so.
In other words US citizens could end up arrested and detained while their status is clarified.
Look up Stop and Identify laws, that's already true.
Look up US v Hiibel. Verbally providing your name and address satisfies the stop and identify requirements. Not producing an ID card is not probable cause for an arrest.
Apple is going with a standard for a change (unlike Google's original implementation).
Google Wallet is an implementation of MasterCard's Paypass, which is a standardized variant of EMV. There's nothing non-standard about Google's implementation. They had to choose MasterCard Paypass, Visa Paywave or Discover Zip so that it would work on the already-deployed acceptance devices, but all three are basically interoperable and all are based on EMV standards. I'm sure Paypass was selected based on who was interested in partnering, though I don't actually know how that choice was made.
(Note: I work for Google, on technology related to Wallet. I also worked in the smart card and NFC industry for nearly 15 years before joining Google.)
Still hating your job, I see.
Not really. They make up a heck of a lot less than 10% of the population, especially here along the Wasatch Front.
The people who camp and cause fires that way also make up a fairly small portion of the population. Larger than shooters, but not much larger.
Right. All the fires when people were shooting in red-flag warning "tinderbox" conditions were caused by fire fairies or gnomes.
I don't respond to sarcasm. If you'd like to make an argument make it like a grownup.
[citation needed]. I've seen the sections of state code which say "Unless specifically authorized by the Legislature by statute, a local authority or state entity may not enact or enforce any ordinance, regulation, or rule pertaining to firearms" and I've seen the legislature's tendency to try to trump/seize control from cities (esp. SLC) on all kinds of issues; I haven't seen the provision you cite.
UCA 10-8-47: "the municipal legislative body may regulate and prevent the discharge of firearms".
Note that they may not regulate possession or carry, only discharge.
If you could teach our state legislators this fact it would be a great accomplishment. They've passed scores of bills that their own legal counsel has said are unconstitutional attempts to trump federal law, and many of them are nullificationists.
I didn't say they couldn't try, only that they couldn't do it.
Very well, you are certainly free to ignore my perception of how your style damages your arguments.
What if at some time, he joined something like a game engine, a kernel, or a useful application in development? Still not a problem?
At the point when he decides to start doing those things, he should start being careful about ownership.
As I've said elsewhere, there aren't that many target shooters, and they start a vastly disproportionate number of fires
I disagree. There are a lot of target shooters.
these fires have caused considerably more damage than the vast majority of the fires on that silly list (many of those were zero-acre fires).
As were many of the allegedly shooting-caused fires. The origin of the fire doesn't have much to do with the damage that results. And, yes, that "allegedly" is there for a reason. It takes some unusual conditions for copper and lead bullets to start fires (not the case for steel-jacketed rounds, or for reactive targets, obviously), but normal procedure for wildfires is to blame firearms if anyone was known or suspected to have been shooting in the vicinity and no other specific cause presents itself. What percentage of the 20 allegedly shooting-caused fires were actually caused by something else is unknowable, but it's likely greater than zero.
But more to the point: counties, municipalities, and the BLM, Forest Service, and NPS all have the power to restrict campfires, and they often do put restrictions in place during fire season. But the state legislature has not only failed to put reasonable shooting regulations in place but has barred anyone else from doing so.
Well, they've barred counties. Utah state law specifically authorizes municipalities to restrict firearms discharge within their city limits, and of course the state can't restrict federal agencies. Federal law, whether statutory or regulatory, trumps state law and even state constitutions, per Article VI.
I see two people debating a topic on which I'm not very knowledgeable. One of them consistently focuses his comments on factual statements, the other occasionally veers into histrionics (shouting) and attacking his opponent's intelligence.
To which should I give more weight, assuming I'm not willing right now to go investigate the merits of their respective factual claims?
Eh? Smartphone activation numbers show that there are just over a million smartphones activated per day, combining Android and iOS (I don't know about the minor players, but they're minor). So one vendor selling a few million per day seems very unlikely.
From TFS: The fire was the 20th this year in Utah sparked by target shooting
As compared with the 188 human-cause wildfires in Utah so far this year which were sparked by causes other than target shooting. Not that this lets shooters off the hook, but if you're going to impose regulations to prevent wildfires you should probably start with the low-hanging fruit: campfires.
Correction: I took the 218 total human-caused wildfire figure from another slashdot post. I'm not sure where he got it, but the official source reports a total of 229 human-caused fires this year, at least if you add up the agency totals yourself. The "Grand Total" on the page is inexplicably wrong.
From TFS: The fire was the 20th this year in Utah sparked by target shooting
As compared with the 188 human-cause wildfires in Utah so far this year which were sparked by causes other than target shooting. Not that this lets shooters off the hook, but if you're going to impose regulations to prevent wildfires you should probably start with the low-hanging fruit: campfires.
Removes unsightly craters! Restores youthful appearance! Look billions of years younger!
Asteroids hate to be anthropomorphized.
It pains me to see such judgement passed on what I thought was a website full of forward thinking technologists.
I didn't pass any judgments on the employees. If I judged Apple, it was positively, both in that they're willing to employ people many companies would not, and that they're smart enough to exploit an underutilized part of the workforce. If I made any negative judgements, it was towards all of the other potential employers who refuse to hire people that don't fit a certain range of images for public-facing positions, or else towards the general public who are uncomfortable with people that don't fit those images.
In fact, I don't judge those companies negatively, either. Public reactions are what they are, and companies have to deal with reality as it is not as they wish it were. And I don't really judge Apple positively, either, because I don't think their hiring policy is any kind of a moral stance. I think it's just a recognition that the bulk of their target market is young enough not to be too put off by alternative images.
In many cases, Tiffany wouldn't hire them. I've never seen anyone with two-inch gauges and tattoos from wrist to shoulder working at Tiffany.
I've never seen anyone like that at an Apple store either. For all of the "think different" stuff, Apple seems to prefer their employees... even retail clerks... to be stylish and "clean cut", so to speak. Remember, Apple is all about image.
Different stores, maybe?
I've been to the stores in Utah (SLC) and Colorado (Boulder, Broomfield and Denver), and seen many employees with body mods. Not a majority, mind you, but a significant minority.