Slashdot Mirror


User: nigeljw

nigeljw's activity in the archive.

Stories
0
Comments
9
First seen
Last seen
Profile
(view on slashdot.org)

Comments · 9

  1. following the suit of Google on Ballmer Turns To Geeks For Salvation · · Score: 1

    They seem to be following in suit of the changes made by Google. http://search.slashdot.org/story/11/01/20/2244202/Eric-Schmidt-Out-Larry-Page-In-As-Google-CEO

  2. the comments on Slashdot sadden me on Wikipedia Works To Close Gender Gap · · Score: 1

    wow... the crowd here could not be any more like the elitist Wikipedia community. try being a little less esoteric. also, a little less indifference would be nice. the comments are about ten to one negative for this article. slashdot is a container for a huge amount of negativity, and it never fails to sadden me about mankind. I wish more of this intelligence was use to produce positive "constructive" change.

  3. Piracy only negatively affects BAD expensive media on Piracy Boosts Anime Sales, Says Japanese Government Study · · Score: 1

    There would be zero proliferation of Japanese animation in the western world, without the mass fansubbing era. The groups seem to be becoming satisfied with current pricing schemes by sites such as Crunchy Roll, so they have been showing due respect (call out to Dattebayo!). I myself am an avid watcher, though the chrunchy roll player is a bit dodgy. On linux, the player stops swapping in new frames if I interact with the browser functions (fullscreen, etc), which is why I would MUCH rather be able to download a high quality version and watch it from my own hd using a solid video player. Or at least provide feeds that we can watch with remote players like VLC (though I always prefer mplayer). The commercial world is still slagging behind technology.

    Note: Fansubbing does not affect the sales of cheap bad anime. People will always buy bad cheap stuff, its in our nature. It only affects overpriced poorly adapted animations of respected manga. Even then, the affect is marginal as this article would make it seem.

  4. DIY WAN + Satellite Comms during a revolution on Egypt Shuts Off All Internet Access · · Score: 1, Interesting

    This is a practical guide for the Egyptians to set up a new independent network. For the instructions, skip to below the story.

    I live on a Island, Newfoundland, on which the first transatlantic wireless telegraph was communicated to Cornwall, England.

    I grew up driving all around the Island on the weekends with my Dad installing and servicing satellite up-links. It is his own business so he worked six or seven days a week when Newfoundland's economy was in the pits. His company has since become successful, even though wired communication companies always criticize the strength of satellite signals (which is bullshit, I always get very clean signals in a city with a huge amount of snow). He also does work in other electrical systems (power meters, wireless wide area networks, etc.). He has also always kept the same raggedy tag crew for his employees, who are a great group of people. Instead of reducing the salaries of his employees during the recession, he instead made up for the loss out of his paycheck. I am proud of my dad. I am sure my mother is proud of him as well in heaven. When I was younger, I liked to look at my Dad as a futuristic Marconi. I have since become a seasoned software developer myself.

    Instructions:

    The first thing I would do to establish a truly independent internet in Egypt is to set up a wide area network all around Cairo. Wireless towers throughout the city. Redundancy here is key, since if the government destroys some towers, others will still be online. The antennae only have to be separated by about 30 meters. The towers can easily be crafted since the antennae are lightweight.

    The hardware that is needed are a two WiLan radios for a point to point network. Omni directional antennae are needed for short range hub regions for the end user connections, and more powerful directional antennae are needed for long range point to point connections, plus any relay stations require two directional antennae (incoming and outgoing) and a repeater. Two RF connectors (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RF_connector) for each high grade coaxial cable. The towers are easily constructed out of steel. Cable cutters and proper crimping tools are a must (substitutes could be found). Wrenches: 9/16, and 3/4. A power meter is required to read the signal while peaking (positioning) and polarizing (rotating) the dish. You hook up the leads to the core of the cable and the outer shield.

    Satellite up-links are required to connect this localized network to the outside world. Earth station hardware should not be that difficult to find. Here in Newfoundland, almost all gas stations use earth stations for their Interac communications. I set most of them up myself when I was working before I went to university. Any large and small commercial cable satellite dishes can be used as down-link stations to transmit incoming information.

    The hardware needed are a RF Head (Telesat here in Canada make high quality transmission, I'd say Qualcomm make them as well) and a Hughes PES 5000 (I highly recommend this model, PES stands for personal earth station.). Two RF connectors are required to connect the coaxial cable between the RF Head and the PES. To peak the dish, a power meter is required. It is a similar process as for directional wireless antennae. An inclinometer is required to set the elevation, though this could be done by site. Down-links can be set up with only an LNB, which is a specialized/simplified type of RF Head that only allows for incoming signals (low noise block used with any commercial tv satellite). Down-links generally do not need to be polarized since they do not transmit and only receive. Always peak the dish with the transmit function off, then turn on the transmit function and polarize the RF Head, by rotating its body. Never stand in front of the dish when the transmit function is on. Its not necessarily that harmful, but it can disrupt the communications for other satellites if a transmit radio wave is bouncin

  5. The instantaneous position of your big head on 3D Cinema Doesn't Work and Never Will · · Score: 3

    Depth perception is not viewing in three dimensions. If you want three dimensions go develop a light field display (http://gl.ict.usc.edu/Research/3DDisplay/). Stereopsis is achieved perfectly using two displaced cameras to view the image. Parallax is not perfect unless head tracking is used to transform the view frustum dynamically. Its like static depth perception without it. Everyone knows that dynamic is always better unless it is typing (this is a funny truth/joke, I hope someone gets it).

    There is a huge difference between the 2D to 3D conversion process to produce films and using a stereoscopic camera with dual cameras. Cameron used stereoscopic cameras to film Avatar, though I am sure he used some tricks to accentuate some scenes. Chronicles of Narnia used the conversion process, so all the characters are flat (I mean in regards to video, and not plot development), but the computer generated backgrounds have depth perception.

    Somebody else mentioned that depth perception is past its prime. I agree with him/her. This is the same technology of the 60s. Until head tracking is combined with depth perception, all of the binocular cues are not active. Convergence can be achieved with future technology. The only problem with the current technology is that sometimes bad editors overlay foreground scenes (from a green screen) and backgrounds with different depths of field. This produces a wonky image that our brain has trouble processing. The Gestalt principles should be law when editing 3D video.

    Nintendo DS does not use stereopsis (two images). It uses big object detection with a computer vision library to detect the position of your large head. It does not produce two separate images for each eye to view. It then transforms the viewing frame to account for the position of your head. So if you are looking out a window, you can poke your head around and see around the interior of the edges of the screen.

    I can't believe I had to read this article so I could comment on it.

    3D films remind the audience that they are in a certain "perspective" relationship to the image. It is almost a Brechtian trick.

    What nonsense, this is only because its feels weird wearing those glasses. And the glasses tend to be less translucent around the edges which causes a dream like effect similar to the blurred borders in scenes used in 90s TV to evoke a dream state, and in some bad movies.

    The shifting of convergence he is talking about due to the strobing from horizontal motion would be greatly reduced using head tracking (with depth perception) to perfect the parallax, but it is kindof difficult unless everybody has their own display with a camera on it. A side angle camera is required to perfect this technology, as using the size of your head does not really determine you head z position. The dynamic/instantaneous position of your head is important.

  6. a quality of service above best efforts? on British ISPs Embracing Two-Tier Internet · · Score: 1

    Clearly their best effort should be the service we currently pay for with hard earned cash, not some multitiered bastardization of the internet...

  7. Keyboard no.. Mouse maybe on Will Touch Screens Kill the Keyboard? · · Score: 1

    There is no way I would ever develop on a virtual keyboard. (take note of the period at the end of the sentence)

    Typing speeds on a virtual keyboard will never match that of a physical keyboard. (Note: Virtual keyboards will eventually merge with their physical counterparts, at that point they are no longer virtual keyboards)

    There is NO satisfaction from smashing a virtual keyboard with your fists in anger.

    I hardly ever use my mouse as it is, so I imagine that touch screen desktop systems will kill the mouse. My laptop has a touch screen, and the only time I touch the screen is to recapture the context to the window, which is a very fluid action. (Note: Clearly "kill the mouse" is not as catchy as "kill the keyboard")

  8. Re:In Newfoundland... on Our Lazy Solar Dynamo — Hello Dalton Minimum? · · Score: 1

    In addendum, I meant to relate this to TFA by inferring that the solar maximum also influences our climates, and quite possibly the cause of the changes in our magnetic field.

  9. In Newfoundland... on Our Lazy Solar Dynamo — Hello Dalton Minimum? · · Score: 2

    We are experiencing a very warm winter without snow, when usually we have a cold winter with a significant amount of snow due to the Labrador current. Our current climate opposite of Britain and the rest of North America, where normally we have their current climates and they have ours. 6 years ago we had a very cold winter and the most snow since 1850, and each year followed suit until last year. Before that we had a short period of winters without snow, which was exactly as it is now. And before that (my childhood) we had a significant amount snow all throughout. I don't remember anything before that. My point being, to any Wikipedia scientists, there simply is a cycle of climates which is directly affected by the temperature of the earth, which cycles itself. The jet stream would be the most significant factor influencing our climates. It is of my belief that the current variances in weather are due to the reversal of polarization of our magnetic poles. In the recent years, the magnetic north pole has been moving around in much greater distances, which anyone reading /. should know. But at least I know this is all pure speculation, unlike most other people who constantly talk in absolutes and yet have no definitive proof.