Yeah, they exist, and they apparently lack the ability to be up for long periods of time. They make the likes of SWBell look good. A good chunk of their network was down for 36hrs last week. Mmmm...
I'm not aware of any prosecutions, but the law is on the books - the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986 (EPCA) makes it criminal to
listen to cellular phone calls.
No. The ECPA makes it illegal to tell anyone of what you heard while listening to communications on certain frequencies, including the 46-49MHz band (I think that's it), which was used by old portable phones, and the 800somethingMHz frequencies used by cellular phones. However, the 1900MHz "PCS" band isn't included in that, nor is the band used by Nextel.
On the other hand, it _IS_ illegal to sell a scanner which will recieve the bands which the ECPA pertains to. It isn't, however, illegal to modify one for your own use.
Some states may have different laws, but that's how it is in most that I'm aware of...
I dunno... it's not THAT big a deal... I don't think I've ever even looked for software at wal-mart... if I'm gonna go get software I'll go to a software
store or get it online... and how well is it really going to sell? not that well in my opinion. No offense to wal-mart shoppers ( hey I shop there too) but
Wal-mart would be about the last place I would expect somebody to shop for linux... most people hear of linux online or from a friend I would assume
Actually, Wal-Mart often has software cheaper than other places. The ones here have been selling Linux for about a year now, and they actually go through the boxes from time to time.
Sam's Club has been carrying Mandrake since 6.0 and I seem to recall seeing a RedHat 5.2 there before that. Now they have Mandrake, Redhat, and Corel. They actually do a good volume in them, unless they're sending them back to the publisher or something.
As far as being a place to shop to Linux, it's more about the impulse buy. If I were "shopping" for Linux, I'd probably buy it online. But if I had been told about Linux by a friend or something, and then saw it at Wal-Mart, since it's fairly cheap, I'd be inclined to pick it up.
Well, we still have speed limits. They aren't "selectively enforced", they are "randomly enforced." If everyone is speeding, then
the cop can pull over any car he can catch:-)
Not selectively enforced? Tell that to the officers that stop me and don't give me tickets. BTW, if you guys are out there: Thanks for not making my insurance any higher than the $550/6 months I already pay.
The insurance industry is a bigger racket than the movie industry ever thought about being.
You could say the same thing about sales tax: you're getting taxed for spending money that's already been taxed.
And this is why I think a national sales tax would be better. It would no longer matter how much money you make, only how much you spend. Groceries, which in many states are already not taxed, should not have sales tax, but everything else should. Clothes, houses, cars, whatever. Then those that could only afford cheap cars would pay little tax, and those that buy $50,000 SUV's would be taxed much more. Seems more fair than the current system, and it eliminates the need for me as an individual to file a bunch of bullshit with the government telling them how much I made last year, which, incidentally, I feel is none of their business. People should not be taxed, only commercial entities.
Even if I were in a vacuum right now, I would still be comfortable in terms of temperature because I would be radiating heat away approximately fast
as I was absorbing it. Besides, if space is so warm, why do the astronauts have heating devices in the suits they wear for EVMs?
Yes, space is as warm as I think, at least when the sun is shining upon you. When you are in sunlight, the radiant heat which you absorb is quite enormous, quite a good deal more than you radiate away, even if you have good thermal transfer between your "light" side and your "dark" side. The amount of heat which you radiate away is fairly constant, no matter how much radiant heat you are absorbing at a given time.
If you were in a vacuum, and you weren't in space, you could be correct, however, in space, in the presence of a heat radiating body, such as the sun, will increase your temperature enormously, in the absence of such a thing, you eventually radiate all your heat away, save what little heat is transferred to you by collisions with the few molecules that are present in interplanetary space.
IIRC, they're not heaters, but more "temperature regulators." Basically they either absorb heat or generate heat as necessary to keep the intrepid spacewalker from burning up at 400 degrees if he's in sunlight, or pretty much freezing to death in the event that he's in shade. However, most particles that one finds in space tend to be highly energetic, since they tend to move at a good fraction of the speed of light. However, there are very few of them per unit volume, and so one's trusty thermometer becomes decidedly un-trusty, and registers a temperature reading somewhere below -200F, unless, of course, the probe is in direct sunlight, in which case, depending on the design, the matter which makes up the probe gets nice and hot and registers quite a warm temperature.
In the end, the "temperature" in space doesn't really apply anyway, since temperature is a measure of the energy level of a molecule, and space has no molecules. The only reason Earth has a temperature is of course because all of the molecules have a temperature, and the density of those molecules is such that they tend to bang into the temperature sensing device quite a lot.
Hope that clears it up,
-Nathan Care about freedom?
Well, like I said earlier, unless the heat sinks are properly configured, you could very easily burn out the processor by overcloaking it. Part of the problem with heat
dissipation in space (and part of the problem with breathing...) is the lack of gravity. With no natural breeze, you get the same air trapped around the processor.
The configuration of the heat sink has nothing to do with it. Assuming that the computer in question at least has a fan, the lack of gravity shouldn't affect its cooling in any way. In an actual vacuum, however, there will be very little heat dissipation, since radiating heat off takes quite a while, as opposed to heat transfer through another substance.
Now, yes, you can use fans to move air about. But how do the fans work in 0 G? (Well, microgravity, but pretty much the same thing...) I imagine that the fans have to be
reconfigured as well.
Fans work just as well in microgravity, assuming that they're attached to something to keep them from moving. All a fan does is push air away from it. (relatively speaking, of course) Since your standard heatsink is attached to the processor or motherboard in some way, that's not a problem. The only problem would be the exhaust of the air from the case, which would produce a force enough to move the laptop around, probably. But that's why they velcro the things down.
I also imagine that the boards have to be reinforced to withstand the forces during takeoff, as well as the screen... the mouse is simple; use the same little pad you normally
do with laptops.
I wouldn't see why. The forces aren't more than 20 g's I'm sure, and most hard drives, when off, are rated for anywhere from 30 to 60G's. The LCD screen, however, I don't know enough about to know whether the G forces would affect it, but I wouldn't have any reason to believe that it wouldn't work. The actual circuit boards also tend to be fairly well attached to the case, and therefore wouldn't have much capacity for shifting, so wouldn't be damaged by the G's either. In short, one's standard computer would probably work fairly well in microgravity. Even most CD-ROM drives would probably work, given that they usually have those little tabs to keep the disc from doing weird things when you mount the drive sideways.
How much would you be able to overclock a 366 Celeron system if you put it outside the ship, and of course, in the shade?
None. Hell, it would probly burn itself out pretty quickly. Remember, there's no air outside the ship, and most computers this side of a Cray are air cooled, and therefore would have no cooling in the near vacuum of space. Besides, space is not cold at all, even in the shade, what few molecules you find flying around tend to be very hot, not very cold, as they're moving around at quite a good clip. It's just that there's very few molecules around, so there's not a lot of heat transfer, except for radiant heat.
If you have variable pricing, and can identify the customers' pricing limits ahead of time, you can make the
optimal amount of money. You charge the $400 people $400 and the $100 people $100. You make
$4000 from the $400 people and $2000 from the $100 people. So you get $8000 from your flight rather
than only $2000 with the fixed prices.
Your argument does not hold, for this is not how airline ticket pricing works. It is a scam, yes, but in other ways. They simply have various fares which state when you must buy the ticket and when it can be used. Each fare has a different price. Generally, the way it works is that the price for the farthest in advance fare is the lowest, and the closer you get to departure time the more expensive it gets until the flight departs. Normally these time points are at 21, 14, 7, and 3 days.
The reason that this penalizes (gouges) business travelers more is that business travelers on the whole have less notice of their travel needs, and often purchase tickets less than one day prior to departure. Therefore they get charged the highest price. The rest of us just don't go with less than 7 days notice.
The only departure from this is that airlines will from time to time run special fares or whatnot if the flight is what their computer thinks is "undersold." American, for example often has cheap fares for the coming weekend which they publish on Wednesday or Thursday, and you must buy on Thursday or Friday for travel on Friday or Saturday.
The screw in all this is that the business is a complete racket. Anytime one company wants to raise fares, they will generally publish it in the reservations computer in the dead middle of the night, and wait for a few minutes to see if the other airlines follow, if not, they switch back. So it's very rare to see much price competition on routes with the major airlines.
The point of all this is just that Amazon isn't doing what the airlines are doing. I personally don't think it's bad. If you're too stupid to make sure that you're not being gouged, it's your own fault.
but I wouldn't dream of doing it on my only home computer if I was living in Bucktooth, Arkansas or something.
Hey, there's no problem getting support for Linux in Bucktooth, Arkansas, you just have to pay me to drive out there and fix it for you. *grin* Seriously, though, almost anywhere you go these days there's someone who knows enough about Linux to get it fixed no matter how badly you've hosed it, or it has hosed itself.
If nothing else, most anyone who works at a local computer store can take the CD which you left with the people in the office, put a new disk in the machine, and install it well enough to get it on the Internet, and then you can fix it well yourself. (I had to do this with a machine in a town of 8,000 once) Mmmm...
If there's not a computer store, many, if not most offices have at least one person who is capable enough with a computer to listen to your instructions while you walk them through the initial setup of the machine. Basic Linux installation is very easy. Hell, anyone who can operate a screwdriver can even replace IDE hard disks if they can find one to purchase. Of course, now that Wal-Mart carries them, one can buy them in all but the smallest of towns.
Xunker is right, if you have a RISC-based AS/400, i.e. a modern one, it is using PowerPC under the hood.
I was under the impression that the AS/400 used a Power processor, not a PowerPC. The PowerPC, of course, being the "scaled-down" version made for desktop type usage rather than balls to the wall 100% processor usage all the time with more disk I/O than god going on. Oh well, I could be wrong, if I am, that's life...
Well, they're not arguing that, they're arguing that a CA court has jurisdiction over another US resident. Things like RICO set a fairly strong legal standard in support of their argument, so I won't be surprised in the slightest if the court upholds this.
Uh, the legal standard has always been, even since RICO, that if someone who is not a resident of your state and is not in your state when they commit the act, and none of the parties to the action of which the defendant knows are in the state, the court has no jurisdiction. Of course, I sure as hell am *NOT* a lawyer, but I work for about 50 of them..
However, RICO is a suck-ass law anyway, what with basically eliminating due process. It really blows how they can accuse you of "racketeering," or with being a mobster and just take your property and to get it back, *YOU* must petition the court and prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you in fact used "clean" money to get it. What a screw.
Hell, if *I* ran Napster, and *I* had that $15 mil they got, www.napster.kg would be running now...
Hmm, good idea, if all the Napster officers, employees, and VCs funding them lived there, and if Napster wasn't a California corporation. Since they are, the California court would consider itself to be of competent jurisdiction, so, assuming the worst case, Napster would be found guilty, or the VCs would be convicted of contributory infringement. Then next time they came in the country (if ever) or to another country which wanted to arrest them for ignoring the California court.
Mmm, I can see it now, N'Sync would of course play RMS, ESR, Alan Cox, and who knows who else. Britney Sporks will, of course, have no role in the movie whatsoever, except to sing "Crazy," about how Open Source pisses off both RIAA and MPAA.
Large OEM's, on the other hand, have the OPTION of including media-less liscenses, for the SOLE
reason that it's cheaper for the OEM.
That is patently not true. MS is forbidding the OEMs from including the media with the computer. The OEM from whom we purchase our PCs would much rather have given us the twenty cent CD-ROM, since now they have had to license GoBack in case of difficulty, because us resellers were quite irate at the lack of Windows media, since we have to support the pile of dogshit.
The reason that the Mom-n-Pop places give you a real CD is that they MUST, since they cannot purchase bulk Windows OEM licenses. They basically have to buy lots of copies of boxed Windows at $150 apiece. They have always been screwed. Now the OEMs are more screwed than before. Won't let them sell PCs without Windows, and they won't let them include the media for the crap that MS forces them to give the consumer. The OEM (despite moving $500M/quarter in computers) will not say no to Microsoft, because Microsoft will increase their license charges. You think I exaggerate? No, I do not, it happened a few years back; they learned quickly. Now they take it up the ass like all the other OEMs. Oh well.
That means either BIOS locking your disks, shipping
recovery CD's that cannot be used with other systems, or going medialess. Some OEM's are chosing
medialess because it saves them the cost of creating a recovery CD and managing it. Smaller OEM's that
pay higher prices do not have these limitations
Do you have any clue of what you speak? Medialess means they give you a recovery CD, instead of a real Windows OEM CD-ROM. Under the old system, they paid the same, had to provide the tech support, and pretty much got fucked just as much, but they could ship a real Windows CD if they wanted. Now they can't. So now they MUST give the consumer a recovery CD which it is their responsibility to build. It gets worse all the time, not better, for both the OEMs and the end user.
its IBM who should be worried about Sun virtually locking up the midrange
Hah, the AS/400 is an infinitely better machine. First, aside from the 'e' series, which has that nasty looking red panel on the front, the AS/400 looks much nicer. Secondly, OS/400 is far superior to Solaris. Third, the AS/400 is much more expandable than any Sun box. Fourth, IBM can do pretty much whatever they please to the underlying processor architecture, and user programs still run just fine. (They did it back in the early or mid 90s, so I expect they'll do it again). And, on top of all that, they're not all that expensive, either. One more thing. They just _DO NOT_ crash. Well, unless the IBM-supplied UPS goes on the fritz and starts giving it bad power, but then IBM comes out and fixes it for you (you did buy the service contract, right?) and replaces the UPS under warranty, and it's back to just not crashing, EVER. Mmmm, can you tell that I want an AS/400 in my living room? Maybe I should go dig up the '92 model and bring it home. Now if they'd ever finish the Linux port...
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think that there are any patches to get q3 for linux running in windows.
And THAT is another reason I use Windows at all on my comp...
Ok, I will correct you. Yes, it can be done, I've played Q3 for Linux on Linux twice, in Windows countless times. You might try *gasp* reading Loki's support page! Yes, that's right, they have instructions for using your Linux CD to get q3 in Windows right there in the support page! If you can't find it, here's a link: Can I use the Linux CD to run Quake III under Windows
and/or the Mac OS?
Mmmm, that was hard, it took 4 clicks. Why don't you actually try to figure things out before spouting off bullshit that others will read and take as fact, eh?
Even though i LOVE linux I still use windows for gaming for the main reason that, right now at least, it's the
better platform for games.
Stop being part of the problem. I purchased Q3 for Linux, from my local Software, etc. even. I rarely play it under Linux, however. All you have to do is download a point release and copy the data file to the directory with it, and voila, a working copy of Q3 on Windows. The point being, that if there were less people like you, who are so fucking lazy that they can't even download some software so they can support Loki and Linux games in general, but still use the software on Windows, then you suck, and you're part of the problem. Stop it. All that's gonna do is make Loki go out of business. If they go out before SC3K is done, I'll be pissed.
1214 Knights Krossing Cir. Apt 105b
Orlando, FL 32817
US
Wow, next time I'm on the east side of Orlando, around UCF, I'll be sure to drop by and kick in the asshole's door. Wait, no, I won't do that, I'll just put a bug in his ear. (Do you know how painful that is?) That's it! That's what the punishment for spamming should be. Having a bug put in your ear and your hands tied behind your back for a night. Mmmmm...
Does this mean that the Crusoe-based products that we were made to
think are currently in the latter stages of production are in fact
not, since only now are the details of production being arranged?
No, it means that that Transmeta is testing out the possibility of including other chip makers in on
the deal, rather than leaving it exclusively to IBM, due to IBM being more expensive than the others. Think of it like them starting up
a new fab plant, only virtually, rather than what it means when Intel or AMD does it, physically.
-Nathan
Re:I really don't see how they could get sued.
on
Hacker Crackdown?
·
· Score: 1
The California State Court of Appeal says yes.
California doesn't count, it's a rogue state that doesn't consider itself part of the U.S.
It will be reigned in soon, when China finally does the same to Taiwan.
I propose that the government simply remove it's protection from copyrights dealing with computer programs. They should have fallen under the patent law to begin with. In fact it is my understanding the the computer companies originally had attempted to file for patents for software, AND WERE DENIED. So they obtained copyrights instead... which I would view as unconstituional.
You sir, must be a nut. Software should *NOT* be patentable. Patents are evil. Patents are about keeping others from using a particular method of doing something, whether or not the others came up with the idea independently. Would you like it if Microsoft had patented spreadsheets? Or the GUI? Then just because it was another GUI, KDE and GNOME would be violating the patent.
Copyright, however, definitely applies, at least for the source. Source code is a form of expression, just as surely as a book of recipies is.
In the last paragraph of the article, Sega's spokesman is quoted as saying something like, "We realize there will always be a hard-core group who will pirate our games, we just want to keep it from becoming mainstream consumer activity."
This strikes me as a much more realistic and even agreeable view than what the RIAA is saying. RIAA is trying to get existing rights under law taken away from us, but as the guy states in the article, there are no such space shifting laws that apply to console games. However, they're not trying to keep it from happening altogether, and trying to make it a felony or anything, just to keep it from happening wholesale.
While this is not an ideal situation, I find it difficult to condemn such a stance, given that they are being so much more reasonable than RIAA.
But I, for one, just lost a lot of interest in reading/.
Here's a novel idea. If it bothers you that much. Stop reading Slashdot. Or even start a "Slashcott" or something. That'll probably make you feel a lot better than whining about it. Half of Slashdot's fun are the opinions, which, quite often, end up being political. Oh well, you have a solution, use it.
It's strange that people who usually pride themselves of being logical individuals don't see any fault with this
"eye for an eye and tooth for tooth" capital punishment bullshit. The same people who scorn religious people
by calling them illogical, hysterical and "stupid people driven by emotion instead of logic", show all these
characteristics themselves when discussing death penalty. Killing the criminal doesn't bring your loved one
back and if revenge is all you care about, you're completely driven by your emotions and should learn how
to control them better.
I don't consider myself to be particularly logical. I don't consider any human to be particularly logical. There probably are no humans that could be very logical in the case of their loved ones being murdered by some scum-sucking asshole. Emotional control in such a case is not possible.
I would want the bastard to get a life sentence with no possiblity of parole (so that he/she won't be doing it again), but no, I would not want the guy dead. Yet another loss of life would only make things even worse.
So we as a society should pay on the order of $60,000 per year to keep the fuckwit locked up? Gee, no wonder the US is in so much debt. Until we force the inmates to do some sort of money-making activity, and making it just like out in the real world, where if you don't work, you don't eat, we shouldn't be locking up people who admit to killing. Hell, there are people who not only admit to it, but ask for the death penalty, get it, and still can't be executed for 10 years, because of the US's fucked up court system.
And I am sure you are aware of how many people in death rows have been recently released by new DNA
evidence. If I remember right, in some state 50% of death row inmates were found not guilty...
So would it be OK to impose the death penalty in cases where the DNA evidence does not prove the person's innocence, and make the DNA testing be a pre-requisite for imposing the death penalty? If we do that, that's as close to 100% as we will ever get without actually having recorded the murder on videotape.
Arguments for and against the death penalty are each just as illogical and based upon feeling as the other. There's no point in calling supporters of the death penalty emotion-driven. My argument is simply that if there is no doubt, than the person in question does not deserve to continue to live, especially when it's on my dime.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, they exist, and they apparently lack the ability to be up for long periods of time. They make the likes of SWBell look good. A good chunk of their network was down for 36hrs last week. Mmmm...
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
I'm not aware of any prosecutions, but the law is on the books - the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986 (EPCA) makes it criminal to listen to cellular phone calls.
No. The ECPA makes it illegal to tell anyone of what you heard while listening to communications on certain frequencies, including the 46-49MHz band (I think that's it), which was used by old portable phones, and the 800somethingMHz frequencies used by cellular phones. However, the 1900MHz "PCS" band isn't included in that, nor is the band used by Nextel.
On the other hand, it _IS_ illegal to sell a scanner which will recieve the bands which the ECPA pertains to. It isn't, however, illegal to modify one for your own use.
Some states may have different laws, but that's how it is in most that I'm aware of...
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
Actually, Wal-Mart often has software cheaper than other places. The ones here have been selling Linux for about a year now, and they actually go through the boxes from time to time.
Sam's Club has been carrying Mandrake since 6.0 and I seem to recall seeing a RedHat 5.2 there before that. Now they have Mandrake, Redhat, and Corel. They actually do a good volume in them, unless they're sending them back to the publisher or something.
As far as being a place to shop to Linux, it's more about the impulse buy. If I were "shopping" for Linux, I'd probably buy it online. But if I had been told about Linux by a friend or something, and then saw it at Wal-Mart, since it's fairly cheap, I'd be inclined to pick it up.
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
Note: Al Gore's dad was a US Senator, George W. Bush's dad was President).
So who was Clinton's dad? Oh wait...
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
Not selectively enforced? Tell that to the officers that stop me and don't give me tickets. BTW, if you guys are out there: Thanks for not making my insurance any higher than the $550/6 months I already pay.
The insurance industry is a bigger racket than the movie industry ever thought about being.
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
You could say the same thing about sales tax: you're getting taxed for spending money that's already been taxed.
And this is why I think a national sales tax would be better. It would no longer matter how much money you make, only how much you spend. Groceries, which in many states are already not taxed, should not have sales tax, but everything else should. Clothes, houses, cars, whatever. Then those that could only afford cheap cars would pay little tax, and those that buy $50,000 SUV's would be taxed much more. Seems more fair than the current system, and it eliminates the need for me as an individual to file a bunch of bullshit with the government telling them how much I made last year, which, incidentally, I feel is none of their business. People should not be taxed, only commercial entities.
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
Even if I were in a vacuum right now, I would still be comfortable in terms of temperature because I would be radiating heat away approximately fast as I was absorbing it. Besides, if space is so warm, why do the astronauts have heating devices in the suits they wear for EVMs?
Yes, space is as warm as I think, at least when the sun is shining upon you. When you are in sunlight, the radiant heat which you absorb is quite enormous, quite a good deal more than you radiate away, even if you have good thermal transfer between your "light" side and your "dark" side. The amount of heat which you radiate away is fairly constant, no matter how much radiant heat you are absorbing at a given time.
If you were in a vacuum, and you weren't in space, you could be correct, however, in space, in the presence of a heat radiating body, such as the sun, will increase your temperature enormously, in the absence of such a thing, you eventually radiate all your heat away, save what little heat is transferred to you by collisions with the few molecules that are present in interplanetary space.
IIRC, they're not heaters, but more "temperature regulators." Basically they either absorb heat or generate heat as necessary to keep the intrepid spacewalker from burning up at 400 degrees if he's in sunlight, or pretty much freezing to death in the event that he's in shade. However, most particles that one finds in space tend to be highly energetic, since they tend to move at a good fraction of the speed of light. However, there are very few of them per unit volume, and so one's trusty thermometer becomes decidedly un-trusty, and registers a temperature reading somewhere below -200F, unless, of course, the probe is in direct sunlight, in which case, depending on the design, the matter which makes up the probe gets nice and hot and registers quite a warm temperature.
In the end, the "temperature" in space doesn't really apply anyway, since temperature is a measure of the energy level of a molecule, and space has no molecules. The only reason Earth has a temperature is of course because all of the molecules have a temperature, and the density of those molecules is such that they tend to bang into the temperature sensing device quite a lot.
Hope that clears it up, -Nathan
Care about freedom?
Well, like I said earlier, unless the heat sinks are properly configured, you could very easily burn out the processor by overcloaking it. Part of the problem with heat dissipation in space (and part of the problem with breathing...) is the lack of gravity. With no natural breeze, you get the same air trapped around the processor.
The configuration of the heat sink has nothing to do with it. Assuming that the computer in question at least has a fan, the lack of gravity shouldn't affect its cooling in any way. In an actual vacuum, however, there will be very little heat dissipation, since radiating heat off takes quite a while, as opposed to heat transfer through another substance.
Now, yes, you can use fans to move air about. But how do the fans work in 0 G? (Well, microgravity, but pretty much the same thing...) I imagine that the fans have to be reconfigured as well.
Fans work just as well in microgravity, assuming that they're attached to something to keep them from moving. All a fan does is push air away from it. (relatively speaking, of course) Since your standard heatsink is attached to the processor or motherboard in some way, that's not a problem. The only problem would be the exhaust of the air from the case, which would produce a force enough to move the laptop around, probably. But that's why they velcro the things down.
I also imagine that the boards have to be reinforced to withstand the forces during takeoff, as well as the screen... the mouse is simple; use the same little pad you normally do with laptops.
I wouldn't see why. The forces aren't more than 20 g's I'm sure, and most hard drives, when off, are rated for anywhere from 30 to 60G's. The LCD screen, however, I don't know enough about to know whether the G forces would affect it, but I wouldn't have any reason to believe that it wouldn't work. The actual circuit boards also tend to be fairly well attached to the case, and therefore wouldn't have much capacity for shifting, so wouldn't be damaged by the G's either. In short, one's standard computer would probably work fairly well in microgravity. Even most CD-ROM drives would probably work, given that they usually have those little tabs to keep the disc from doing weird things when you mount the drive sideways.
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
How much would you be able to overclock a 366 Celeron system if you put it outside the ship, and of course, in the shade?
None. Hell, it would probly burn itself out pretty quickly. Remember, there's no air outside the ship, and most computers this side of a Cray are air cooled, and therefore would have no cooling in the near vacuum of space. Besides, space is not cold at all, even in the shade, what few molecules you find flying around tend to be very hot, not very cold, as they're moving around at quite a good clip. It's just that there's very few molecules around, so there's not a lot of heat transfer, except for radiant heat.
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
If you have variable pricing, and can identify the customers' pricing limits ahead of time, you can make the optimal amount of money. You charge the $400 people $400 and the $100 people $100. You make $4000 from the $400 people and $2000 from the $100 people. So you get $8000 from your flight rather than only $2000 with the fixed prices.
Your argument does not hold, for this is not how airline ticket pricing works. It is a scam, yes, but in other ways. They simply have various fares which state when you must buy the ticket and when it can be used. Each fare has a different price. Generally, the way it works is that the price for the farthest in advance fare is the lowest, and the closer you get to departure time the more expensive it gets until the flight departs. Normally these time points are at 21, 14, 7, and 3 days.
The reason that this penalizes (gouges) business travelers more is that business travelers on the whole have less notice of their travel needs, and often purchase tickets less than one day prior to departure. Therefore they get charged the highest price. The rest of us just don't go with less than 7 days notice.
The only departure from this is that airlines will from time to time run special fares or whatnot if the flight is what their computer thinks is "undersold." American, for example often has cheap fares for the coming weekend which they publish on Wednesday or Thursday, and you must buy on Thursday or Friday for travel on Friday or Saturday.
The screw in all this is that the business is a complete racket. Anytime one company wants to raise fares, they will generally publish it in the reservations computer in the dead middle of the night, and wait for a few minutes to see if the other airlines follow, if not, they switch back. So it's very rare to see much price competition on routes with the major airlines.
The point of all this is just that Amazon isn't doing what the airlines are doing. I personally don't think it's bad. If you're too stupid to make sure that you're not being gouged, it's your own fault.
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
but I wouldn't dream of doing it on my only home computer if I was living in Bucktooth, Arkansas or something.
Hey, there's no problem getting support for Linux in Bucktooth, Arkansas, you just have to pay me to drive out there and fix it for you. *grin* Seriously, though, almost anywhere you go these days there's someone who knows enough about Linux to get it fixed no matter how badly you've hosed it, or it has hosed itself.
If nothing else, most anyone who works at a local computer store can take the CD which you left with the people in the office, put a new disk in the machine, and install it well enough to get it on the Internet, and then you can fix it well yourself. (I had to do this with a machine in a town of 8,000 once) Mmmm...
If there's not a computer store, many, if not most offices have at least one person who is capable enough with a computer to listen to your instructions while you walk them through the initial setup of the machine. Basic Linux installation is very easy. Hell, anyone who can operate a screwdriver can even replace IDE hard disks if they can find one to purchase. Of course, now that Wal-Mart carries them, one can buy them in all but the smallest of towns.
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
Xunker is right, if you have a RISC-based AS/400, i.e. a modern one, it is using PowerPC under the hood.
I was under the impression that the AS/400 used a Power processor, not a PowerPC. The PowerPC, of course, being the "scaled-down" version made for desktop type usage rather than balls to the wall 100% processor usage all the time with more disk I/O than god going on. Oh well, I could be wrong, if I am, that's life...
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
Well, they're not arguing that, they're arguing that a CA court has jurisdiction over another US resident. Things like RICO set a fairly strong legal standard in support of their argument, so I won't be surprised in the slightest if the court upholds this.
Uh, the legal standard has always been, even since RICO, that if someone who is not a resident of your state and is not in your state when they commit the act, and none of the parties to the action of which the defendant knows are in the state, the court has no jurisdiction. Of course, I sure as hell am *NOT* a lawyer, but I work for about 50 of them..
However, RICO is a suck-ass law anyway, what with basically eliminating due process. It really blows how they can accuse you of "racketeering," or with being a mobster and just take your property and to get it back, *YOU* must petition the court and prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you in fact used "clean" money to get it. What a screw.
Hell, if *I* ran Napster, and *I* had that $15 mil they got, www.napster.kg would be running now...
Hmm, good idea, if all the Napster officers, employees, and VCs funding them lived there, and if Napster wasn't a California corporation. Since they are, the California court would consider itself to be of competent jurisdiction, so, assuming the worst case, Napster would be found guilty, or the VCs would be convicted of contributory infringement. Then next time they came in the country (if ever) or to another country which wanted to arrest them for ignoring the California court.
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
Mmm, I can see it now, N'Sync would of course play RMS, ESR, Alan Cox, and who knows who else. Britney Sporks will, of course, have no role in the movie whatsoever, except to sing "Crazy," about how Open Source pisses off both RIAA and MPAA.
Just so you know, I was joking, maybe.
-NathanCare about freedom?
Large OEM's, on the other hand, have the OPTION of including media-less liscenses, for the SOLE reason that it's cheaper for the OEM.
That is patently not true. MS is forbidding the OEMs from including the media with the computer. The OEM from whom we purchase our PCs would much rather have given us the twenty cent CD-ROM, since now they have had to license GoBack in case of difficulty, because us resellers were quite irate at the lack of Windows media, since we have to support the pile of dogshit.
The reason that the Mom-n-Pop places give you a real CD is that they MUST, since they cannot purchase bulk Windows OEM licenses. They basically have to buy lots of copies of boxed Windows at $150 apiece. They have always been screwed. Now the OEMs are more screwed than before. Won't let them sell PCs without Windows, and they won't let them include the media for the crap that MS forces them to give the consumer. The OEM (despite moving $500M/quarter in computers) will not say no to Microsoft, because Microsoft will increase their license charges. You think I exaggerate? No, I do not, it happened a few years back; they learned quickly. Now they take it up the ass like all the other OEMs. Oh well.
That means either BIOS locking your disks, shipping recovery CD's that cannot be used with other systems, or going medialess. Some OEM's are chosing medialess because it saves them the cost of creating a recovery CD and managing it. Smaller OEM's that pay higher prices do not have these limitations
Do you have any clue of what you speak? Medialess means they give you a recovery CD, instead of a real Windows OEM CD-ROM. Under the old system, they paid the same, had to provide the tech support, and pretty much got fucked just as much, but they could ship a real Windows CD if they wanted. Now they can't. So now they MUST give the consumer a recovery CD which it is their responsibility to build. It gets worse all the time, not better, for both the OEMs and the end user.
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
its IBM who should be worried about Sun virtually locking up the midrange
Hah, the AS/400 is an infinitely better machine. First, aside from the 'e' series, which has that nasty looking red panel on the front, the AS/400 looks much nicer. Secondly, OS/400 is far superior to Solaris. Third, the AS/400 is much more expandable than any Sun box. Fourth, IBM can do pretty much whatever they please to the underlying processor architecture, and user programs still run just fine. (They did it back in the early or mid 90s, so I expect they'll do it again). And, on top of all that, they're not all that expensive, either. One more thing. They just _DO NOT_ crash. Well, unless the IBM-supplied UPS goes on the fritz and starts giving it bad power, but then IBM comes out and fixes it for you (you did buy the service contract, right?) and replaces the UPS under warranty, and it's back to just not crashing, EVER. Mmmm, can you tell that I want an AS/400 in my living room? Maybe I should go dig up the '92 model and bring it home. Now if they'd ever finish the Linux port...
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think that there are any patches to get q3 for linux running in windows. And THAT is another reason I use Windows at all on my comp...
Ok, I will correct you. Yes, it can be done, I've played Q3 for Linux on Linux twice, in Windows countless times. You might try *gasp* reading Loki's support page! Yes, that's right, they have instructions for using your Linux CD to get q3 in Windows right there in the support page! If you can't find it, here's a link:
Can I use the Linux CD to run Quake III under Windows and/or the Mac OS?
Mmmm, that was hard, it took 4 clicks. Why don't you actually try to figure things out before spouting off bullshit that others will read and take as fact, eh?
-Nathan
Even though i LOVE linux I still use windows for gaming for the main reason that, right now at least, it's the better platform for games.
Stop being part of the problem. I purchased Q3 for Linux, from my local Software, etc. even. I rarely play it under Linux, however. All you have to do is download a point release and copy the data file to the directory with it, and voila, a working copy of Q3 on Windows. The point being, that if there were less people like you, who are so fucking lazy that they can't even download some software so they can support Loki and Linux games in general, but still use the software on Windows, then you suck, and you're part of the problem. Stop it. All that's gonna do is make Loki go out of business. If they go out before SC3K is done, I'll be pissed.
-Nathan
1214 Knights Krossing Cir. Apt 105b Orlando, FL 32817 US
Wow, next time I'm on the east side of Orlando, around UCF, I'll be sure to drop by and kick in the asshole's door. Wait, no, I won't do that, I'll just put a bug in his ear. (Do you know how painful that is?) That's it! That's what the punishment for spamming should be. Having a bug put in your ear and your hands tied behind your back for a night. Mmmmm...
-Nathan
Does this mean that the Crusoe-based products that we were made to think are currently in the latter stages of production are in fact not, since only now are the details of production being arranged?
No, it means that that Transmeta is testing out the possibility of including other chip makers in on the deal, rather than leaving it exclusively to IBM, due to IBM being more expensive than the others. Think of it like them starting up a new fab plant, only virtually, rather than what it means when Intel or AMD does it, physically.
-Nathan
The California State Court of Appeal says yes.
California doesn't count, it's a rogue state that doesn't consider itself part of the U.S. It will be reigned in soon, when China finally does the same to Taiwan.
-Nathan
I propose that the government simply remove it's protection from copyrights dealing with computer programs. They should have fallen under the patent law to begin with. In fact it is my understanding the the computer companies originally had attempted to file for patents for software, AND WERE DENIED. So they obtained copyrights instead... which I would view as unconstituional.
You sir, must be a nut. Software should *NOT* be patentable. Patents are evil. Patents are about keeping others from using a particular method of doing something, whether or not the others came up with the idea independently. Would you like it if Microsoft had patented spreadsheets? Or the GUI? Then just because it was another GUI, KDE and GNOME would be violating the patent.
Copyright, however, definitely applies, at least for the source. Source code is a form of expression, just as surely as a book of recipies is.
-Nathan
In the last paragraph of the article, Sega's spokesman is quoted as saying something like, "We realize there will always be a hard-core group who will pirate our games, we just want to keep it from becoming mainstream consumer activity."
This strikes me as a much more realistic and even agreeable view than what the RIAA is saying. RIAA is trying to get existing rights under law taken away from us, but as the guy states in the article, there are no such space shifting laws that apply to console games. However, they're not trying to keep it from happening altogether, and trying to make it a felony or anything, just to keep it from happening wholesale.
While this is not an ideal situation, I find it difficult to condemn such a stance, given that they are being so much more reasonable than RIAA.
-Nathan
But I, for one, just lost a lot of interest in reading /.
Here's a novel idea. If it bothers you that much. Stop reading Slashdot. Or even start a "Slashcott" or something. That'll probably make you feel a lot better than whining about it. Half of Slashdot's fun are the opinions, which, quite often, end up being political. Oh well, you have a solution, use it.
-Nathan
It's strange that people who usually pride themselves of being logical individuals don't see any fault with this "eye for an eye and tooth for tooth" capital punishment bullshit. The same people who scorn religious people by calling them illogical, hysterical and "stupid people driven by emotion instead of logic", show all these characteristics themselves when discussing death penalty. Killing the criminal doesn't bring your loved one back and if revenge is all you care about, you're completely driven by your emotions and should learn how to control them better.
I don't consider myself to be particularly logical. I don't consider any human to be particularly logical. There probably are no humans that could be very logical in the case of their loved ones being murdered by some scum-sucking asshole. Emotional control in such a case is not possible.
I would want the bastard to get a life sentence with no possiblity of parole (so that he/she won't be doing it again), but no, I would not want the guy dead. Yet another loss of life would only make things even worse.
So we as a society should pay on the order of $60,000 per year to keep the fuckwit locked up? Gee, no wonder the US is in so much debt. Until we force the inmates to do some sort of money-making activity, and making it just like out in the real world, where if you don't work, you don't eat, we shouldn't be locking up people who admit to killing. Hell, there are people who not only admit to it, but ask for the death penalty, get it, and still can't be executed for 10 years, because of the US's fucked up court system.
And I am sure you are aware of how many people in death rows have been recently released by new DNA evidence. If I remember right, in some state 50% of death row inmates were found not guilty...
So would it be OK to impose the death penalty in cases where the DNA evidence does not prove the person's innocence, and make the DNA testing be a pre-requisite for imposing the death penalty? If we do that, that's as close to 100% as we will ever get without actually having recorded the murder on videotape.
Arguments for and against the death penalty are each just as illogical and based upon feeling as the other. There's no point in calling supporters of the death penalty emotion-driven. My argument is simply that if there is no doubt, than the person in question does not deserve to continue to live, especially when it's on my dime.
-Nathan