... the juicy novelization of what _really_ happened, by Cory Doctorow of course:-)
Plenty of puns to choose from for the title ("Damn, Green", the "Green and the Damned", "The new Dambusters").
>>As hard as it is to get a law onto the books, it's almost impossible to get a law off the books
Robert Heinlein's suggestion from "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" kind of resonates here:
“I note one proposal to make this Congress a two-house body. Excellent -- the more impediments to legislation the better. But, instead of following tradition, I suggest one house of legislators, another whose single duty is to repeal laws. Let the legislators pass laws only with a two-thirds majority... while the repealers are able to cancel any law through a mere one-third minority. Preposterous? Think about it. If a bill is so poor that it cannot command two-thirds of your consents, is it not likely that it would make a poor law? And if a law is disliked by as many as one-third is it not likely that you would be better off without it?”
This technology exists e.g. http://doom.wikia.com/wiki/Text_Mode_Doom - would have been way cooler to actually implement the option permanently than just upload this Video
Umm hello? The 2nd biggest selling point of Windows probably back to 3.0 after a GUI was so-called "multi-tasking" - i.e. multiple applications, is MS trying to jump back a full 2 decades in one go?
Looking at my desktop
- Browser (never less than 2-3 tabs)
- File explorer
- Instant messenger (being generous and counting as one, since you can use Pidgin, Digsby, Trillian etc)
- Email client
- Text editor
- One application actually doing the work (office, an IDE or whatever)
3 times over the limit already, although I guess that as long as you allow yourself to be voluntarily locked into their propriatary applications (IE, Microsoft Live, Outlook) you may be given just that little more...
In the same vein making the mistake to "eat apple" received from a bum 5 minutes into the game, needed to get it on with the last babe "Eve", in the first Leisure Suit Larry.
You couldn't go back and get it, had to replay the entire sodding game.
20 years ago and I still remember the frustration - in the end I snuck a peek at a solutions book in the store to crack that one.
>>Now how many 2 year olds, 6 year olds, or 10 year olds, do you know that can do the same in twelve weeks or less?
I did (French at 3 years), my brother did (English at 6 years).
In both cases, thrown into school/pre-school environment at the start of the school year in September - fluent *and accent-free* by Xmas.
The "accent free" part is probably the biggest difference, even a with a lot of training, learning a language past age of about 13-16, you will keep an accent no matter how much you practice / how long you are immersed. Your brain cannot distinguish cleanly between the different sounds, e.g. english vees and doubleyous for Germans, German consecutive consonants and sibilants for English people (try saying "StreichholzschÃchtelchen" = small matchbox. Now wipe your monitor), those funky nasal sounds in French... then you move to tonal languages like Chinese *shudder*....
Go witness the awesomeness of the "Hot Dog Stand" scheme of Windows 3.1 in all it's glory.
http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000341.html
On windows, I tend set the default background color to a light gray instead of white, gives everything a Unixy feel and is less strain on the eyes, although the effect may be psychological rather than physical since the advent of TFT.
Obviously, this only applies to apps, most websites override this (this/. edit window is grey, but the posts are on white Background)
As with anything you'd like your kids to do: - Lead by example: If they watch you repairing/building/fiddling with things, they will want to do it as well. - Enable: place to make a mess!!! Tools. Raw materials. Things to take to bits and to combine
Let them find what they'd like to fiddle with.
Don't jump on them with instructions and help, Even if you mean well. Wait for the moment when they are ready to invite you, then share the project.
My father worked on a number of major contracts for the Navy and Air Force back in the sixties, and anything they decided they liked and wanted to have built cheaper elsewhere they would just stamp "CLASSIFIED".[...] After that happened to Dad a couple of times, he made damn sure that the patent apps and design specs left out crucial elements such that they'd eventually have to come back and buy it from his company. Damn! Your dad was Harry Stamper from "Armageddon"?
7. The RIANZ and MPANZ will demand the mandatory inclusion of the broadcast flag on all woks world wide.... thus subtly destroying the entire Chinese DVD cloning industry
for years I have been dreaming of something like this for tea (I mean the real stuff: 1 big chipped mug, 1 english teabag, milk, 2 sugars, ta luv). Instead of waiting 60-180 seconds for an electric kettle to boil (where you always make too much water), have something microwave-driven which will produce exactly 1 mug of boiling hot water in 2 seconds through microwave heating... heaven!
Additionally, I'm sure you could hack something like that into a wicked steam-driven repeater potato gun...
Cogent went through exactly the same exercise with France Telecom in April this year - I was on the receiving end (hosting a service behind for lots of french customers) and it was a right royal PITA.
Interestingly enough, it was the same story, France Telecom had given Cogent 60 days notice to sign a new agreement. The deadline went by, Cogent wouldn't budge, never the faintest warning to the customers that there was a potential problem. In fact it was 12 hours after the peering went down before we got ANY information from Cogent, which was the following mail, basically a royal "passing of the buck".
From: NOC-EU To: Thu, 14 Apr 2005 10:06:13 -0400 Subjact: Peer Problem with France Telecom HD271257
Dear Cogent Customer,
We are very sorry to hear you are experiencing problems with your connection. We're aware of this issue and we are working to improve things as quickly as possible.
The specific issue is with France Telecom. Since Cogent's inception, we have maintained a robust peering relationship with them. Recently, however, they made a unilateral decision to de-peer. The direct result of this action is the isolation of our two networks.
Cogent is very concerned by this action. Peering relationships such as these are the foundation of a successful Internet community. We are working to better understand France Telecom's motivation. We speculate that this action is in direct response to Cogent's competitive pricing in the market. Cogent's goal is to have France Telecom re-instate the connection.
We appreciate your patience as we work on this issue. We are closely monitoring this situation in our support center. If you call back for an update, please reference master ticket: HD271257 We encourage you to also contact France Telecom so that they fully understand the impact of their action. You may reach them at noc@opentransit.net
As always, we sincerely appreciate your business. We will keep you up to date on the situation.
Sincerely
regards / Mit freundlichen Gruessen
C.C.D. C o g e n t Communications Deutschland GmbH Stephanstr. 3 60313 Frankfurt
It seems to be Cogent's business philosophy to play a game "chicken" in these situations, to not warn the customers, and to take it's customers as hostages.
We migrated our entire uplink to another provider in 3 days, and of course the link came back up on day 5 - but we're NOT going back.
Slashdot Mirror
if it's possible to add some digital/analogue inputs/outputs it could become electronics bloggers new favourite toy
See here http://elinux.org/RaspberryPiBoard#Provisional_specification
... obviously provisional...
"General-purpose I/O (About 16 3v3) and various other interfaces, brought out to 1.27mm pin-strip"
EA fails on Humility, Honor and Compassion at least.... off to the dungeons!
Actually, if you define 0.999... as having an infinite number of decimal points
Mathematics grammar nazi says: :-)
"It has an infinite number of decimal places, but only one decimal point"
... the juicy novelization of what _really_ happened, by Cory Doctorow of course :-)
Plenty of puns to choose from for the title ("Damn, Green", the "Green and the Damned", "The new Dambusters").
>>As hard as it is to get a law onto the books, it's almost impossible to get a law off the books
Robert Heinlein's suggestion from "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" kind of resonates here:
“I note one proposal to make this Congress a two-house body. Excellent -- the more impediments to legislation the better. But, instead of following tradition, I suggest one house of legislators, another whose single duty is to repeal laws. Let the legislators pass laws only with a two-thirds majority... while the repealers are able to cancel any law through a mere one-third minority. Preposterous? Think about it. If a bill is so poor that it cannot command two-thirds of your consents, is it not likely that it would make a poor law? And if a law is disliked by as many as one-third is it not likely that you would be better off without it?”
( http://www.halexandria.org/dward272.htm )
This technology exists e.g. http://doom.wikia.com/wiki/Text_Mode_Doom - would have been way cooler to actually implement the option permanently than just upload this Video
in standard media units
- Two female mosquitos colliding at 1.652 km/h? http://lhc-machine-outreach.web.cern.ch/lhc-machine-outreach/lhc_glossary.htm
- An unladen African swallow falling off a grain of sand?
- The calorific value of 1 cornflake unleashed over the space of a fortnight?
The problems you describe under "capital-M Methodologies" sound similar to "Cargo Cult Software Engineering" http://stevemcconnell.com/ieeesoftware/eic10.htm
>>How many shitloads are in a fucktonne?
It depends:
- British or American shitload?
- Land or nautical fucktonne?
Umm hello? The 2nd biggest selling point of Windows probably back to 3.0 after a GUI was so-called "multi-tasking" - i.e. multiple applications, is MS trying to jump back a full 2 decades in one go?
Looking at my desktop
- Browser (never less than 2-3 tabs)
- File explorer
- Instant messenger (being generous and counting as one, since you can use Pidgin, Digsby, Trillian etc)
- Email client
- Text editor
- One application actually doing the work (office, an IDE or whatever)
3 times over the limit already, although I guess that as long as you allow yourself to be voluntarily locked into their propriatary applications (IE, Microsoft Live, Outlook) you may be given just that little more...
Internet fame awaits the first fat guy with a webcam who posts a "Haumea-Haumea" video to YouTube.
In the same vein making the mistake to "eat apple" received from a bum 5 minutes into the game, needed to get it on with the last babe "Eve", in the first Leisure Suit Larry. You couldn't go back and get it, had to replay the entire sodding game. 20 years ago and I still remember the frustration - in the end I snuck a peek at a solutions book in the store to crack that one.
>>Now how many 2 year olds, 6 year olds, or 10 year olds, do you know that can do the same in twelve weeks or less?
I did (French at 3 years), my brother did (English at 6 years).
In both cases, thrown into school/pre-school environment at the start of the school year in September - fluent *and accent-free* by Xmas.
The "accent free" part is probably the biggest difference, even a with a lot of training, learning a language past age of about 13-16, you will keep an accent no matter how much you practice / how long you are immersed. Your brain cannot distinguish cleanly between the different sounds, e.g. english vees and doubleyous for Germans, German consecutive consonants and sibilants for English people (try saying "StreichholzschÃchtelchen" = small matchbox. Now wipe your monitor), those funky nasal sounds in French... then you move to tonal languages like Chinese *shudder*....
Go witness the awesomeness of the "Hot Dog Stand" scheme of Windows 3.1 in all it's glory. http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000341.html On windows, I tend set the default background color to a light gray instead of white, gives everything a Unixy feel and is less strain on the eyes, although the effect may be psychological rather than physical since the advent of TFT. Obviously, this only applies to apps, most websites override this (this /. edit window is grey, but the posts are on white Background)
As with anything you'd like your kids to do:
- Lead by example: If they watch you repairing/building/fiddling with things, they will want to do it as well.
- Enable: place to make a mess!!! Tools. Raw materials. Things to take to bits and to combine
Let them find what they'd like to fiddle with.
Don't jump on them with instructions and help, Even if you mean well. Wait for the moment when they are ready to invite you, then share the project.
"All Hail Xenu!"
oops, sorry, got my alien-worshipping loonies mixed up...
After that happened to Dad a couple of times, he made damn sure that the patent apps and design specs left out crucial elements such that they'd eventually have to come back and buy it from his company. Damn! Your dad was Harry Stamper from "Armageddon"?
You must be f***ing Ben Affleck...
you forgot...
... thus subtly destroying the entire Chinese DVD cloning industry
7. The RIANZ and MPANZ will demand the mandatory inclusion of the broadcast flag on all woks world wide.
I have a 100 MHz 486 DX Laptop in the room next to me, which boots Windows 95 with 4 Megs RAM, without too much pain.
It is actually useable, can browse files, connect to the Net (Netscape).
Of course once you try to run any MS-Office app - you're screwed...
Tried to run mulinux on it, it worked, but didnt like the 4 MB RAM at all, no way to get a GUI up
For all those what didn't get the joke (*), why not look on Wikipedia...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blinkenlights
(*) My uncle used to say "Whoosh above their heads and Splat against the wall"
Sunday afternoon, not totally focused, and the headline arrived in my brain as
"Easy Watercooling RC Pig"
which would have been a marginally more interesting story.
Allow me be the first to say:
"Curse you, Red Baron!"
B*gger this for showers and kitchens, BUT...
for years I have been dreaming of something like this for tea (I mean the real stuff: 1 big chipped mug, 1 english teabag, milk, 2 sugars, ta luv).
Instead of waiting 60-180 seconds for an electric kettle to boil (where you always make too much water), have something microwave-driven which will produce exactly 1 mug of boiling hot water in 2 seconds through microwave heating... heaven!
Additionally, I'm sure you could hack something like that into a wicked steam-driven repeater potato gun...
Cogent went through exactly the same exercise with France Telecom in April this year - I was on the receiving end (hosting a service behind for lots of french customers) and it was a right royal PITA.
Interestingly enough, it was the same story, France Telecom had given Cogent 60 days notice to sign a new agreement. The deadline went by, Cogent wouldn't budge, never the faintest warning to the customers that there was a potential problem. In fact it was 12 hours after the peering went down before we got ANY information from Cogent, which was the following mail, basically a royal "passing of the buck".
From: NOC-EU
To: Thu, 14 Apr 2005 10:06:13 -0400
Subjact: Peer Problem with France Telecom HD271257
Dear Cogent Customer,
We are very sorry to hear you are experiencing problems with your
connection. We're aware of this issue and we are working to improve
things as quickly as possible.
The specific issue is with France Telecom. Since Cogent's inception,
we have maintained a robust peering relationship with them. Recently,
however, they made a unilateral decision to de-peer. The direct
result
of this action is the isolation of our two networks.
Cogent is very concerned by this action. Peering relationships such
as these are the foundation of a successful Internet community. We
are
working to better understand France Telecom's motivation. We
speculate
that this action is in direct response to Cogent's competitive
pricing
in the market. Cogent's goal is to have France Telecom re-instate the
connection.
We appreciate your patience as we work on this issue. We are closely
monitoring this situation in our support center. If you call back for
an update, please reference master ticket: HD271257 We encourage you
to also contact France Telecom so that they fully understand the
impact of their action. You may reach them at noc@opentransit.net
As always, we sincerely appreciate your business. We will keep you
up
to date on the situation.
Sincerely
regards / Mit freundlichen Gruessen
C.C.D. C o g e n t Communications Deutschland GmbH
Stephanstr. 3
60313 Frankfurt
Tel.: +49 69 299896 96
fax.: +49 69 299896 54
mail: noc-eu@cogentco.com
It seems to be Cogent's business philosophy to play a game "chicken" in these situations, to not warn the customers, and to take it's customers as hostages.
We migrated our entire uplink to another provider in 3 days, and of course the link came back up on day 5 - but we're NOT going back.
Let me be the first to say.... ...Balls!