``Many have heard by now of the SK disaster. Here is what I have learned:
Apparently an ID tube, most likely on the bottom of the detector,
imploded and set off a chain reaction destroying much of the detector to
about a depth of 2 meters or so below the current water level.
Apparently the top 7 supermodules and the top are intact.
The destruction is reported to be extensive with about 7000 ID and 1000
OD tubes destroyed. The various layers between the ID and OD are
shredded. There appears to be huge piles of glass and other debris on
the tank bottom. Waveshifter plates are shattered, cables perhaps
shredded, etc. The water is full of antimony and other hazardous
chemicals.
ICRR is shortly holding a press conference along with Monbushio (Sp?).
Reporters are milling about outside the mine entrance.
''
I worked over the summer at a federally funded research and development corporation (think ``military industrial complex'') in a department that develops various remote sensors such as are flown on General Atomics' ``Predator'' unmanned aerial vehicle. Nearly all of the engineers in my department preferred Linux to Windows, but due to Navy requirements they were required to deliver a Windows NT-based product. Their response was essentially to bring unix to NT. By using Cygwin they were able to program in what looked and smelled liked a Linux development environment, yet it was really Windows NT. Furthermore the code could easily be adapted for customers who were more open minded about Linux. I found Cygwin to be very impressive indeed.
I also have worked at LBL where Linux is nothing short of pervasive. We even have experiments at the south pole run by Linux machines, such as the AMANDA project, a giant neutrino telescope embedded kilometers down in the ice at the pole.
I have to say, it really is nice to see the NSA contributing to an open source project in such a positive manner. Being "open" isn't exactly one of their usual activities. From the changelog it looks like they are really digging into the depths of the kernel too -- not just superficial changes. Is anyone running this in a production environment?
What about the list of books I've checked out from the library? The list of movies I've rented?
To the best of my knowledge both are protected; in the case of video rentals by the video rental privacy act which allegedly came about as a direct result of some reporters checking into their congressmen's video rental habits. Shouldn't web sites visited fall into the same general category? Maybe posting a list of websites visited by selected congressmen would have the same effect as it did with movie rentals. (-:
A good source for concise, challenging programming problems is the archives of past ACM programming contests. Take a look at The Annual Berkeley Programming Contest. While during the contests, the only metric that matters is whether your program generates the correct output for the given (unknown) input, many of the problems raise issues that can be debated in more depth: what is the easiest solution to code? what is the most elegant approach? what is the most efficient? What are the strengths and weaknesses of using C, C++, or Java as the implementation language? etc.
When I was learning to program, my favorite source sof programming inspiration were popular math books, eg The Mathematical Tourist by Ivars Peterson, and the Amateur Scientist and Mathematical Recreations columns of Scientific American. I'd implement simulations of percolation; Conway's game of life in one, two, three dimensions; plot the Mandelbrot and Julia sets; iterated function systems fractals; simulating preditor-prey models; simulating the spread of a disease or forest-fire. Of course, all of that was on DOS using Turbo Pascal. Now that access to networked unix machines is so widely available, there are many new opportunities (eg, for network-related stuff) available.
Good reading material is a very important source of challenges, problems, and insight into computer science as a science. I'm thinking particularly of the famous Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, the textbook used in freshman computer science cources at MIT and University of California, Berkeley. The book demonstrates clearly that there are multiple approaches to problem solving, each with its advantages and disadvantages; SICP also convinces the student of the beauty and power of high-level abstraction.
Slashdot Mirror
The Z80 is also used in the venerable TI-85 calculator, and related models.
Press releases, FAQ, pictures, and an explanation of the findings may be found here.
-- Tobin
This arrived in my mailbox:
``Many have heard by now of the SK disaster. Here is what I have learned:
Apparently an ID tube, most likely on the bottom of the detector,
imploded and set off a chain reaction destroying much of the detector to
about a depth of 2 meters or so below the current water level.
Apparently the top 7 supermodules and the top are intact.
The destruction is reported to be extensive with about 7000 ID and 1000
OD tubes destroyed. The various layers between the ID and OD are
shredded. There appears to be huge piles of glass and other debris on
the tank bottom. Waveshifter plates are shattered, cables perhaps
shredded, etc. The water is full of antimony and other hazardous
chemicals.
ICRR is shortly holding a press conference along with Monbushio (Sp?).
Reporters are milling about outside the mine entrance.
''
Also, Reuters has the story.
I worked over the summer at a federally funded research and development corporation (think ``military industrial complex'') in a department that develops various remote sensors such as are flown on General Atomics' ``Predator'' unmanned aerial vehicle. Nearly all of the engineers in my department preferred Linux to Windows, but due to Navy requirements they were required to deliver a Windows NT-based product. Their response was essentially to bring unix to NT. By using Cygwin they were able to program in what looked and smelled liked a Linux development environment, yet it was really Windows NT. Furthermore the code could easily be adapted for customers who were more open minded about Linux. I found Cygwin to be very impressive indeed.
I also have worked at LBL where Linux is nothing short of pervasive. We even have experiments at the south pole run by Linux machines, such as the AMANDA project, a giant neutrino telescope embedded kilometers down in the ice at the pole.
I have to say, it really is nice to see the NSA contributing to an open source project in such a positive manner. Being "open" isn't exactly one of their usual activities. From the changelog it looks like they are really digging into the depths of the kernel too -- not just superficial changes. Is anyone running this in a production environment?
``Liberty may be blind, but she has some sophisticated listening devices.''
What about the list of books I've checked out from the library? The list of movies I've rented? To the best of my knowledge both are protected; in the case of video rentals by the video rental privacy act which allegedly came about as a direct result of some reporters checking into their congressmen's video rental habits. Shouldn't web sites visited fall into the same general category? Maybe posting a list of websites visited by selected congressmen would have the same effect as it did with movie rentals. (-:
A good source for concise, challenging programming problems is the archives of past ACM programming contests. Take a look at The Annual Berkeley Programming Contest. While during the contests, the only metric that matters is whether your program generates the correct output for the given (unknown) input, many of the problems raise issues that can be debated in more depth: what is the easiest solution to code? what is the most elegant approach? what is the most efficient? What are the strengths and weaknesses of using C, C++, or Java as the implementation language? etc.
When I was learning to program, my favorite source sof programming inspiration were popular math books, eg The Mathematical Tourist by Ivars Peterson, and the Amateur Scientist and Mathematical Recreations columns of Scientific American. I'd implement simulations of percolation; Conway's game of life in one, two, three dimensions; plot the Mandelbrot and Julia sets; iterated function systems fractals; simulating preditor-prey models; simulating the spread of a disease or forest-fire. Of course, all of that was on DOS using Turbo Pascal. Now that access to networked unix machines is so widely available, there are many new opportunities (eg, for network-related stuff) available.
Good reading material is a very important source of challenges, problems, and insight into computer science as a science. I'm thinking particularly of the famous Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, the textbook used in freshman computer science cources at MIT and University of California, Berkeley. The book demonstrates clearly that there are multiple approaches to problem solving, each with its advantages and disadvantages; SICP also convinces the student of the beauty and power of high-level abstraction.
-- Tobin