I think this is why society now sees most cars becoming lighter, with less metal, having airbags, and more and more airbags for side, rear and ??? crash protection.
There is simply no way to have a really big heavy vehicle,using all that metal to keep occupants feeling safe, that gets fantastic fuel mileage.
Acceleration always uses more fuel/energy if the item has more mass.
I think a very light car of the future that gets great mileage will crush like an egg, but have lots of airbags for occupant safety.
One comes to mind that has been in the news lately: Scion IQ. But historically: Mini and such.
Society will always need some big heavy stuff, like to haul commerce, but I think most commuters really do not need an SUV-class sized vehicle.
The hard part, for most Americans I think, is that a lot of self-image of having status, being independent, started in the 1950's with Eisenhower, interstate act, and big cars of the age.
To this day we see people declaring their pride and self-status with Big Luxury Cars and Big Luxury SUVs. It is the value system imprinted on generations of car buyers: bigger is better
It is only as traffic, crowding, and smaller and smaller available parking become limiting factors (perhaps in more European cities now?) that people will shift.
Not because they want to, but because they are forced to.
I am sure the militaries are _always_ looking for new bugs to use as weapons....and movies as old as the Omega Man (1971) have entertained us with the idea.
...so it could be argued that it is exactly true: If something is engineered as a web application, it is precisely because resources and staff were allocated by management for it to be built?
If you do not think you want to code all day (which is why I went to school to get a comp. sci. degree), then perhaps a 'supporting' field, like project management?
Then you could work in I.T. of almost any company, and work with programmers, software, and such.
There was an excellent previous post for permanently installing back up power for your home.
Of course, could just buy a portable generator and use extension cords to the 2 vital items: fridge and furnace blower.
BUT! If you are somewhere cold, what are you doing running a fridge? Just put the food in a critter safe box outside and let the cold weather keep the stuff frozen, hm?
For doing things like solar or wind, I would like to recommend a web site, and a magazine. Please try "homepower dot com" and Homepower magazine, I read them, and recommend them.
If they have such big power problems, and big(er?) places like google can use solar power, why can't the NSA simply start to install solar at all their facilities?
If you really want to help yourself and equipment stay comfortable, perhaps put about 1kw of solar power into the house. Get about seven 160w solar panels, and a grid tie inverter. Mount the solar panels on the garage or a patio, or the roof, and then you could run a window air conditioner all day, etc etc.
Since the solar power stuff would be on the roof and walls, even if the house got a 'little' flooded, that equipment wouldn't be damaged.
Right now there are forests that do not have to worry about termites, as it still gets cold enough in the winter to kill those insects.
What happens to those forests once the coldest winter temperatures are _not_ enough to kill them? The lumber industry of the American northwest would be jeopardized. Currently we need renewable lumber for housing, paper, and such.
I had to purchase a graphical calculator for Calculus I back about 10 years ago.
I got a TI-85 for about $100 back in the day.
Never used it after that class except as a normal digital answer calculator.
For me, in retrospect, it was a bit of a waste of money.
Being a programmer, I think I would _better_ like to see graphing calculators that have flash memory, or accept a USB flash drive, so you could keep programs, and that can be programmed like the old "hand held basic-language computers" Radio Shack used to sell.
Lastly I'd rather see such a "calculator" be able to do C, or Fortran in addition to Basic.
Slashdot Mirror
I think this is why society now sees most cars becoming lighter, with less metal, having airbags, and more and more airbags for side, rear and ??? crash protection.
There is simply no way to have a really big heavy vehicle,using all that metal to keep occupants feeling safe, that gets fantastic fuel mileage.
Acceleration always uses more fuel/energy if the item has more mass.
I think a very light car of the future that gets great mileage will crush like an egg, but have lots of airbags for occupant safety.
One comes to mind that has been in the news lately: Scion IQ. But historically: Mini and such.
Society will always need some big heavy stuff, like to haul commerce, but I think most commuters really do not need an SUV-class sized vehicle.
The hard part, for most Americans I think, is that a lot of self-image of having status, being independent, started in the 1950's with Eisenhower, interstate act, and big cars of the age.
To this day we see people declaring their pride and self-status with Big Luxury Cars and Big Luxury SUVs. It is the value system imprinted on generations of car buyers: bigger is better
It is only as traffic, crowding, and smaller and smaller available parking become limiting factors (perhaps in more European cities now?) that people will shift.
Not because they want to, but because they are forced to.
When I was studying Comp Sci, I recall that most assignments were to 'understand the concept' and program a solution.
Usually the programs were single-threaded. Maybe a section of a course was on concurrency (mutexes, threading), but not an entire course or courses.
As multi-core becomes more the norm, then perhaps there can be an entire course on concurrency and how to design/program with this thinking in mind.
Speaking of defenses...
I am sure the militaries are _always_ looking for new bugs to use as weapons. ...and movies as old as the Omega Man (1971) have entertained us with the idea.
...so it could be argued that it is exactly true: If something is engineered as a web application, it is precisely because resources and staff were allocated by management for it to be built?
Once RedHat stopped selling desktop packages, I switched to Debian stable.
Now I think that I will not likely switch back. RH had their chance, but now I have evolved (devolved?).
I still have my RedHat v7.1 boxed set, too.
Nuclear power is an excellent idea.
I prefer fusion myself. Big 'ol billions of years of reliable fusion power plant... and our planet orbits it constantly.
Now we just need enough collectors, via solar panels and concentrating solar power plants, to use all that freely available power.
Started with RedHat while in college to do programming assignments in Unix because the computer labs at school were always full.
Switched to Debian after a few years, as I got more into the GNU open source religion/philosophy. Been using Debian ever since.
If you do not think you want to code all day (which is why I went to school to get a comp. sci. degree), then perhaps a 'supporting' field, like project management?
Then you could work in I.T. of almost any company, and work with programmers, software, and such.
'news.google dot com' listed slashdot as the top provider for this story.
Kinda cool.
There was an excellent previous post for permanently installing back up power for your home.
Of course, could just buy a portable generator and use extension cords to the 2 vital items: fridge and furnace blower.
BUT! If you are somewhere cold, what are you doing running a fridge? Just put the food in a critter safe box outside and let the cold weather keep the stuff frozen, hm?
For doing things like solar or wind, I would like to recommend a web site, and a magazine. Please try "homepower dot com" and Homepower magazine, I read them, and recommend them.
I posted before reading previous comments. I see others have already had similar thoughts that the USB jump drives are a good candidate.
After all, they are basically EEPROMS.
I would imagine if someone wrote infrequently to one, then only used it to read data 10yrs later, there would be no corruption?
Oh no! ...Isn't this how the invaders would sneak into a system and take it over (a la Reddick)?
Wife liked AVG enough to purchase a paid for copy. Also have ClamWin loaded 'just in case.'
I have had good success recommending both AVG and ClamWin as a combination, to others running M$.
For my Debian workstation, I don't run as privileged user, so doing a scan once in a while with ClamAV has done just fine.
As then my work PC could keep my toes warm :)
too true!
Way cool!
So, will we have replicants soon, a la 'Blade Runner' ?
It seems much more science than science fiction now....
LUGs are a good way to be social with fellow Linux geeks.
I go for the social interaction, as there is always an after-party at our monthly LUG meetings (sgvlug.org)
If they have such big power problems, and big(er?) places like google can use solar power, why can't the NSA simply start to install solar at all their facilities?
If you really want to help yourself and equipment stay comfortable, perhaps put about 1kw of solar power into the house. Get about seven 160w solar panels, and a grid tie inverter. Mount the solar panels on the garage or a patio, or the roof, and then you could run a window air conditioner all day, etc etc.
Since the solar power stuff would be on the roof and walls, even if the house got a 'little' flooded, that equipment wouldn't be damaged.
same here - shashdot (of course!)
Oh, and news.google.com
One place I've worked at (an avionics company), had a drug-free policy, and giving blood was even part of the interview process.
It was a great place to work.
So, based on that experience, I would prefer a place that has such checks in place.
Right now there are forests that do not have to worry about termites, as it still gets cold enough in the winter to kill those insects.
What happens to those forests once the coldest winter temperatures are _not_ enough to kill them? The lumber industry of the American northwest would be jeopardized. Currently we need renewable lumber for housing, paper, and such.
I had to purchase a graphical calculator for Calculus I back about 10 years ago.
I got a TI-85 for about $100 back in the day.
Never used it after that class except as a normal digital answer calculator.
For me, in retrospect, it was a bit of a waste of money.
Being a programmer, I think I would _better_ like to see graphing calculators that have flash memory, or accept a USB flash drive, so you could keep programs, and that can be programmed like the old "hand held basic-language computers" Radio Shack used to sell.
Lastly I'd rather see such a "calculator" be able to do C, or Fortran in addition to Basic.