... such as the Little Ice Age. Take a gander at this article from The Economist 12/20/2003; find it here. Not conclusive, by any means, but food for thought.
Quote: "Three times in the past 2,000 years, there have been periods of cooling (most recently, the "little ice age" of the 17th and 18th centuries). These, he notes, followed the three largest known periods of plague, when the human population shrank in various parts of the world. The first period was a series of plagues that racked the Roman empire from the third to the sixth centuries. The second was the Black Death and its aftermath. The third was the epidemic of smallpox and other diseases that reduced the population of the Americas from some 50m to about 5m in the centuries after Europeans arrived, and which coincided with the little ice age. In each case, a lot of previously farmed land turned back into forest, sucking carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and cooling the climate. As environmentalists are wont to observe, mankind is part of nature. These observations show just how intimate the relationship is."
Even when a thunderstorm is raging in the next county and heading in your direction there is no model that will predict if and when it will arrive.
Actually, that's not true. The sub-regional scale models tend to be pretty good with thunderstorms and their movements, especially organized thunderstorm complexes. Larger scale models do suffer because they're not actually resolving the storms; they're trying to capture the effects of such storms on the resolved scale atmosphere. Increasingly, however, higher resolution models are being used over relatively short terms (less than 48 hours) where they are revealing some skill.
What is much more difficult is convective initiation -- predicting when and where a storm will occur. Even in this there are frequent successes. A few weeks ago, the Los Angeles area saw a freak hailstorm that just sat over south-central LA and dumped over 5" of rain in a raingage located in Lynwood. My own forecast for this day, made using a 6 km resolution model and available hours in advance, captured this storm beautifully. The problem is... believing it when it happens:-)
The really arrogant folks are those who use models to predict global weather 50 years from now, even when they limit their 'predictions' to general high temperature 'averages' for regions like North America or Africa.
You need to learn the distinction between weather and climate models. Think of the Lorenz equations, in which the solution hops around capriciously from one 'arm' of the Lorenz attractor 'butterfly' to another. Actually, what's happening is the modeled circulation is reversing between clockwise and counterclockwise in these hops. However, you can think of the two arms as 'rainy' vs. 'sunny' if you wish.
Any point on the trajectory at any instant of time is the 'weather', and after a while you're bound to be wrong. But the whole 'butterfly' itself is the climate. The climate model is asking: is the 'butterfly' as a whole changing. I'm not saying that climate models are perfect -- they surely aren't -- but it's possible to get the climate right and the weather wrong.
I wonder what relationship (if any) exists between current weather models and the ones created by Lorenz back in the '60s. Those simple equations can produce some very chaotic behavior, and were the influence for the infamous "butterfly effect."
Lorenz' equations were extremely simplified versions of equations employed in weather models. Indeed, unlike weather models, Lorenz' model doesn't attempt to simulate a system with a stupendously large number of degrees of freedom (points or grid cells in space, field variables like three velocity components, temperature, pressure, various forms of water substance, unresolvable mixing, etc.). Instead, it was a simplified representation of "convection rolls", as might be produced in a vessel heated from below. These can be more faithfully simulated with more sophisticated numerical models, tho at far greater expense.
It isn't really the number of degrees of freedom that makes prediction of both global weather and the Lorenz system so difficult, though, it's the nonlinear terms. Though extremely streamlined, the Lorenz system has nonlinear terms.
What we call the Lorenz model started with a two-dimensional fluid (bounded by free surfaces above and below, as I recall) and, by making assumptions about the structure the convection rolls would take, boiled (no pun) the problem down to three simple equations in three unknowns. The variables were called X (proportional to the intensity of the fluid motion), Y (proportional to the horizontal temperature difference) and Z (reflecting the vertical temperature difference that drives the convection).
The deceptively simple equations are dX/dt = -sX+sY dY/dt = -XZ+rX=-Y dZ/dt = XY-bZ The equations are coupled (changing X affects Y, etc.) but the interesting terms are XZ and XY, the nonlinear terms. Without them, the equations are very dull:-)
Many weather models take a 3D domain and divide it into grid cells and then solve equations numerically for the airflows in and out of the cells and cell-average properties like temperature, pressure, humidity, etc.. The equations yield, for each grid cell, a time rate of change for each variable. The forecast is then made by starting with a present value for each field and extrapolating the estimated time rate of change over a specified time step. That becomes the present state used to recalculate the time rate of change, producing the next forecast in the sequence. The final forecast is the end product of a very long time stepping sequence.
So, essentially, the procedure is a sequence of extrapolation and recalculation based on the extrapolation. That doesn't sound very encouraging, but really that's only because of the nonlinear terms.
Wow, I'm surprised that a resolution of 10 cubic kilometers is enough to actually make any predictions besides the most general of weather trends.
Think of the variation between the state of air at sea level and then at the ceiling of a 10km cell... that's some severe approximation.
It would be a horrifically bad approximation, yes, but you cannot compare horizontal resolutions and scales with vertical ones. The temperature variation over the lowest 10 km is about 70C (130F). At that height, pressure and density are both about 20% of their sea level values. You'll never find that kind of variation in the horizontal over any distance, never mind adjacent 10 km grid squares.
There is much that cannot be resolved at 10 km, but at this point in time 10 km horizontal resolution on a global scale is fantastic.
It's also the name of a 1990-ish Ford automobile, sold mainly in Australasia. However, I suspect that a Ford going down wouldn't be front page news, even on Slashdot.:-)
They [Apple] sold a total of 148,000 Cubes during the entire lifetime of Cube.
It sold 12,000 units in the quarter ended in March, 2001.
The Cube was introduced at a price of $1,799 in July 2000; the price was cut to $1,499 in January 2001.
I got my Cube (original version) for $899 when the CD-RW equipped appeared to displace it. If Apple could have hit that price point profitably, they would have sold a whole lot more. Despite its limitations, it is a very nice machine (and still my main home computer).
...20 minutes later the tech called back and said they would take a look at it "just to see" if it was an Apple problem, and I would see a pre-labelled post-paid return shipping box in the mail tomorrow. I sent it in and FOUR DAYS LATER had my Pismo back in hand with a brand new screen at no charge...
I've had nothing but good experiences with Apple Support. Of course, the best thing has been that I haven't needed much support:-)
Remember when the Wallstreet PowerBook G3 AC adapters were being recalled and replaced? I had to replace one on my own a few months prior to the recall. I bought the exact same adapter that Apple had just started shipping in the recall program. It made for a tight fit in the AC adapter plug, but it didn't seem too bad.
After a few months, tho, the wear and tear owing to that snug fit broke whatever board the adapter plug is attached to. This was just as the recall program had gotten into full swing. My PB was long out of warranty, so when I called Apple to explain the problem, I wasn't looking for any service. I called to warn them they were looking at a looming issue. The guy who fielded the call passed it to a supervisor who (to my astonishment) offered to fix my PB for free.
That's not all. The supervisor called back several hours later, asking me if I would mind shipping my PB to Apple HQ rather than the repair center. I would not be getting the PB back, tho. On receipt, they would ship me a brand new TiBook. I did, and had the TiBook the next day.
Soon thereafter, Apple started shipping a replacement for their replacement adapters. These didn't fit as snugly.
Part of my story is luck and timing. The rest is explained by killer support.
And, ironically enough, you can add tornadoes. California has a much higher incidence of tornadoes than even its own residents appreciate. They tend to be weak, but incidents per square mile are comparable to places on the fringes of Tornado Alley. [rah-rah]We got it all![/rah-rah]
Source: An issue of "Weather and Forecasting" appearing in 1994 had back-to-back articles on California tornadoes, by Blier and Batten and Monteverdi and Quadros.
How long did it take them to get a decent OS X version of their software out?
With respect to Illustrator, I'm still waiting. Illustrator 10.0.3 in OS X can be annoyingly slow, while Illustrator 7 in the Classic environment (or when booted into OS 9) on the same hardware flies. I don't know where the blame lies, but it's irritating.
I had the Application Enhancer running as well as Fruit Menu.
From my reading of Unsanity's website, FruitMenu contains AE anyway, so deep-sixing AE probably isn't enough. I also use FruitMenu - and another app, ASM (which enables an app switching menu), as well. They make OS X into... what it should be, IMHO. It's going to be harder for me to give them up.
The first Mac OS X Server, nee Rhapsody, contained a fully functional Apple menu - one that was actually more easily customizable than in any Classic Mac OS. I, for one, lament how this very useful yet unobtrusive tool has been enervated. If anyone hasn't seen MOSXS/Rhapsody, here are two screenshots highlighting the Apple menu:
Unfortunately, the latest X11 beta still semi-randomly quits on me, almost always when launching another app. This happens on all three of my Macs, running 10.2.3 or 10.2.4.
It doesn't seem to matter which app I launch, and whether X11 is in the foreground or not, or hidden or not, during the launching. Nor does it quit every time another app is launched - just a fraction of the time. I'm in the habit now of launching every conceivable app I can think of that I might need prior to starting X11. Needless to say, that's sub-optimal. Maybe the next beta?
I subscribe to the penguin theory of learning. After a certain point, your brain only holds so many recallable facts, just like an iceberg can hold only so many penguins. After that, for each new one you add, an old one must be shoved off...
Sherlock Holmes opines similarly in A Study in Scarlet, the first Holmes story. Dr. Watson had just discovered that Sherlock didn't know the Earth revolves around the Sun, and explained the Copernican system to him. Sherlock replies:
"Now that I do know it I shall do by best to forget it."
"To forget it!" [Watson exclaims]
"You see," [Sherlock] explained," I consider that a man's brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose. A fool take in lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things, so that he has difficulty in laying his hands upon it... Depend upon it there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones."
"But the Solar System!"
"What the deuce is it to me?" he interrupted impatiently...
[In my case, I think I reached this point at age 40. I have to wonder what got shoved out by my remembering this passage;-)]
That, and the movie before that, Star Trek - Insurrection wasn't good at all.
No offense, but now here I am wondering if I'm one of the few who actually liked Insurrection and perhaps the only one who would put it atop of the Star Trek heap.
It's long been recognized that Star Trek movies tend to alternate between more action-oriented fare and movies with more philosophical themes. I generally like the action flicks tho they don't wear particularly well with me. Further, it's not hard to identify examples of both genres that have fallen short, but IMHO Insurrection is not one of them.
Insurrection has the idealism that lies at the heart of the franchise and puts that idealism to the test. The scene in which Geordi is able to see a sunrise "as we see it" for the first time is pivotal and powerful.
I intended a more passionate defense, but instead I just say that I think Gene Roddenberry would have liked Insurrection very much.
This article reminded me of something I read in S. Junger's "The Perfect Storm", which told the tale of a N Atlantic storm and its effects. Keeping in mind this is an undocumented, nonscientific source, and the fact I'm neither oceanographer nor marine biologist, the passage reads (p. 121):
There is some evidence that average wave heights are slowly rising, and that freak waves of eighty or ninety feet are becoming more common. Wave heights off the coast of England have risen an average of 25% over the last couple of decades. One cause may be [less oil pollution, since oil] inhibits the generation of capillary waves, which in turn prevent the wind from getting a 'grip' on the sea. Plankton releases a chemical that has the same effect, and plankton levels in the North Atlantic have dropped dramatically...
Presuming the author got his facts straight, I wonder whether the ostensible plankton disappearance is related to changes in the salinity levels discussed in this article.
Another very useful add-on is FruitMenu, which also has been updated for Jaguar. FruitMenu allows you to organize the Apple menu in the Classic manner.
I like ASM because sometimes it's faster to peruse a text list of apps than to decipher sometimes overly cluttered and/or not very distinctive icons. Apple intended to build much of the old Apple Menu functionality into the Finder, but hitting the Apple Menu is much faster for me and its contents are available from every app.
This wouldn't be a problem for the average user running OS X and classic, since the OS 9 version of software update wouldn't ever be launched.
Actually, Classic regularly launches OS 9's Software Update on my Cube, every Monday night. A holdover from when I was using OS 9 as my main system, more than 1 year ago.
I realize now that the reason I didn't deactivate it is because I'm not an average user. I thought I was just being lazy;-)
Isn't atari the equivilent of "check" in the game japanese board game "go".
Yes. I recall that "atari" formally means hitting, or success in hitting, and its use in the game Go implies a warning to one's opponent that s/he is about to be overwhelmed.
Slashdot Mirror
... such as the Little Ice Age. Take a gander at this article from The Economist 12/20/2003; find it here. Not conclusive, by any means, but food for thought.
Quote:
"Three times in the past 2,000 years, there have been periods of cooling (most recently, the "little ice age" of the 17th and 18th centuries). These, he notes, followed the three largest known periods of plague, when the human population shrank in various parts of the world. The first period was a series of plagues that racked the Roman empire from the third to the sixth centuries. The second was the Black Death and its aftermath. The third was the epidemic of smallpox and other diseases that reduced the population of the Americas from some 50m to about 5m in the centuries after Europeans arrived, and which coincided with the little ice age. In each case, a lot of previously farmed land turned back into forest, sucking carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and cooling the climate. As environmentalists are wont to observe, mankind is part of nature. These observations show just how intimate the relationship is."
Even when a thunderstorm is raging in the next county and heading in your direction there is no model that will predict if and when it will arrive.
:-)
Actually, that's not true. The sub-regional scale models tend to be pretty good with thunderstorms and their movements, especially organized thunderstorm complexes. Larger scale models do suffer because they're not actually resolving the storms; they're trying to capture the effects of such storms on the resolved scale atmosphere. Increasingly, however, higher resolution models are being used over relatively short terms (less than 48 hours) where they are revealing some skill.
What is much more difficult is convective initiation -- predicting when and where a storm will occur. Even in this there are frequent successes. A few weeks ago, the Los Angeles area saw a freak hailstorm that just sat over south-central LA and dumped over 5" of rain in a raingage located in Lynwood. My own forecast for this day, made using a 6 km resolution model and available hours in advance, captured this storm beautifully. The problem is... believing it when it happens
The really arrogant folks are those who use models to predict global weather 50 years from now, even when they limit their 'predictions' to general high temperature 'averages' for regions like North America or Africa.
You need to learn the distinction between weather and climate models. Think of the Lorenz equations, in which the solution hops around capriciously from one 'arm' of the Lorenz attractor 'butterfly' to another. Actually, what's happening is the modeled circulation is reversing between clockwise and counterclockwise in these hops. However, you can think of the two arms as 'rainy' vs. 'sunny' if you wish.
Any point on the trajectory at any instant of time is the 'weather', and after a while you're bound to be wrong. But the whole 'butterfly' itself is the climate. The climate model is asking: is the 'butterfly' as a whole changing. I'm not saying that climate models are perfect -- they surely aren't -- but it's possible to get the climate right and the weather wrong.
I wonder what relationship (if any) exists between current weather models and the ones created by Lorenz back in the '60s. Those simple equations can produce some very chaotic behavior, and were the influence for the infamous "butterfly effect."
:-)
Lorenz' equations were extremely simplified versions of equations employed in weather models. Indeed, unlike weather models, Lorenz' model doesn't attempt to simulate a system with a stupendously large number of degrees of freedom (points or grid cells in space, field variables like three velocity components, temperature, pressure, various forms of water substance, unresolvable mixing, etc.). Instead, it was a simplified representation of "convection rolls", as might be produced in a vessel heated from below. These can be more faithfully simulated with more sophisticated numerical models, tho at far greater expense.
It isn't really the number of degrees of freedom that makes prediction of both global weather and the Lorenz system so difficult, though, it's the nonlinear terms. Though extremely streamlined, the Lorenz system has nonlinear terms.
What we call the Lorenz model started with a two-dimensional fluid (bounded by free surfaces above and below, as I recall) and, by making assumptions about the structure the convection rolls would take, boiled (no pun) the problem down to three simple equations in three unknowns. The variables were called X (proportional to the intensity of the fluid motion), Y (proportional to the horizontal temperature difference) and Z (reflecting the vertical temperature difference that drives the convection).
The deceptively simple equations are
dX/dt = -sX+sY
dY/dt = -XZ+rX=-Y
dZ/dt = XY-bZ
The equations are coupled (changing X affects Y, etc.) but the interesting terms are XZ and XY, the nonlinear terms. Without them, the equations are very dull
Many weather models take a 3D domain and divide it into grid cells and then solve equations numerically for the airflows in and out of the cells and cell-average properties like temperature, pressure, humidity, etc.. The equations yield, for each grid cell, a time rate of change for each variable. The forecast is then made by starting with a present value for each field and extrapolating the estimated time rate of change over a specified time step. That becomes the present state used to recalculate the time rate of change, producing the next forecast in the sequence. The final forecast is the end product of a very long time stepping sequence.
So, essentially, the procedure is a sequence of extrapolation and recalculation based on the extrapolation. That doesn't sound very encouraging, but really that's only because of the nonlinear terms.
Wow, I'm surprised that a resolution of 10 cubic kilometers is enough to actually make any predictions besides the most general of weather trends.
Think of the variation between the state of air at sea level and then at the ceiling of a 10km cell... that's some severe approximation.
It would be a horrifically bad approximation, yes, but you cannot compare horizontal resolutions and scales with vertical ones. The temperature variation over the lowest 10 km is about 70C (130F). At that height, pressure and density are both about 20% of their sea level values. You'll never find that kind of variation in the horizontal over any distance, never mind adjacent 10 km grid squares.
There is much that cannot be resolved at 10 km, but at this point in time 10 km horizontal resolution on a global scale is fantastic.
What is Telstar 4? A satellite, certainly.
:-)
It's also the name of a 1990-ish Ford automobile, sold mainly in Australasia. However, I suspect that a Ford going down wouldn't be front page news, even on Slashdot.
From the FAQ at cubeowner.com. Click on "Miscellaneous FAQs and Figures".
They [Apple] sold a total of 148,000 Cubes during the entire lifetime of Cube.
It sold 12,000 units in the quarter ended in March, 2001.
The Cube was introduced at a price of $1,799 in July 2000; the price was cut to $1,499 in January 2001.
I got my Cube (original version) for $899 when the CD-RW equipped appeared to displace it. If Apple could have hit that price point profitably, they would have sold a whole lot more. Despite its limitations, it is a very nice machine (and still my main home computer).
...20 minutes later the tech called back and said they would take a look at it "just to see" if it was an Apple problem, and I would see a pre-labelled post-paid return shipping box in the mail tomorrow. I sent it in and FOUR DAYS LATER had my Pismo back in hand with a brand new screen at no charge...
:-)
I've had nothing but good experiences with Apple Support. Of course, the best thing has been that I haven't needed much support
Remember when the Wallstreet PowerBook G3 AC adapters were being recalled and replaced? I had to replace one on my own a few months prior to the recall. I bought the exact same adapter that Apple had just started shipping in the recall program. It made for a tight fit in the AC adapter plug, but it didn't seem too bad.
After a few months, tho, the wear and tear owing to that snug fit broke whatever board the adapter plug is attached to. This was just as the recall program had gotten into full swing. My PB was long out of warranty, so when I called Apple to explain the problem, I wasn't looking for any service. I called to warn them they were looking at a looming issue. The guy who fielded the call passed it to a supervisor who (to my astonishment) offered to fix my PB for free.
That's not all. The supervisor called back several hours later, asking me if I would mind shipping my PB to Apple HQ rather than the repair center. I would not be getting the PB back, tho. On receipt, they would ship me a brand new TiBook. I did, and had the TiBook the next day.
Soon thereafter, Apple started shipping a replacement for their replacement adapters. These didn't fit as snugly.
Part of my story is luck and timing. The rest is explained by killer support.
And, ironically enough, you can add tornadoes. California has a much higher incidence of tornadoes than even its own residents appreciate. They tend to be weak, but incidents per square mile are comparable to places on the fringes of Tornado Alley. [rah-rah]We got it all![/rah-rah]
Source: An issue of "Weather and Forecasting" appearing in 1994 had back-to-back articles on California tornadoes, by Blier and Batten and Monteverdi and Quadros.
How long did it take them to get a decent OS X version of their software out?
With respect to Illustrator, I'm still waiting. Illustrator 10.0.3 in OS X can be annoyingly slow, while Illustrator 7 in the Classic environment (or when booted into OS 9) on the same hardware flies. I don't know where the blame lies, but it's irritating.
I think it's quite telling that for several years the biggest-selling and most popular application for Windows was what?
:-)
A screen saver! (After Dark)
And now it's anti-virus software. This is improvement?
I had the Application Enhancer running as well as Fruit Menu.
From my reading of Unsanity's website, FruitMenu contains AE anyway, so deep-sixing AE probably isn't enough. I also use FruitMenu - and another app, ASM (which enables an app switching menu), as well. They make OS X into... what it should be, IMHO. It's going to be harder for me to give them up.
The first Mac OS X Server, nee Rhapsody, contained a fully functional Apple menu - one that was actually more easily customizable than in any Classic Mac OS. I, for one, lament how this very useful yet unobtrusive tool has been enervated. If anyone hasn't seen MOSXS/Rhapsody, here are two screenshots highlighting the Apple menu:
Apple menu dropped down
Customizing the Apple menu
Unfortunately, the latest X11 beta still semi-randomly quits on me, almost always when launching another app. This happens on all three of my Macs, running 10.2.3 or 10.2.4.
It doesn't seem to matter which app I launch, and whether X11 is in the foreground or not, or hidden or not, during the launching. Nor does it quit every time another app is launched - just a fraction of the time. I'm in the habit now of launching every conceivable app I can think of that I might need prior to starting X11. Needless to say, that's sub-optimal. Maybe the next beta?
I subscribe to the penguin theory of learning. After a certain point, your brain only holds so many recallable facts, just like an iceberg can hold only so many penguins. After that, for each new one you add, an old one must be shoved off...
;-)]
Sherlock Holmes opines similarly in A Study in Scarlet, the first Holmes story. Dr. Watson had just discovered that Sherlock didn't know the Earth revolves around the Sun, and explained the Copernican system to him. Sherlock replies:
"Now that I do know it I shall do by best to forget it."
"To forget it!" [Watson exclaims]
"You see," [Sherlock] explained," I consider that a man's brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose. A fool take in lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things, so that he has difficulty in laying his hands upon it... Depend upon it there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones."
"But the Solar System!"
"What the deuce is it to me?" he interrupted impatiently...
[In my case, I think I reached this point at age 40. I have to wonder what got shoved out by my remembering this passage
That, and the movie before that, Star Trek - Insurrection wasn't good at all.
No offense, but now here I am wondering if I'm one of the few who actually liked Insurrection and perhaps the only one who would put it atop of the Star Trek heap.
It's long been recognized that Star Trek movies tend to alternate between more action-oriented fare and movies with more philosophical themes. I generally like the action flicks tho they don't wear particularly well with me. Further, it's not hard to identify examples of both genres that have fallen short, but IMHO Insurrection is not one of them.
Insurrection has the idealism that lies at the heart of the franchise and puts that idealism to the test. The scene in which Geordi is able to see a sunrise "as we see it" for the first time is pivotal and powerful.
I intended a more passionate defense, but instead I just say that I think Gene Roddenberry would have liked Insurrection very much.
This article reminded me of something I read in S. Junger's "The Perfect Storm", which told the tale of a N Atlantic storm and its effects. Keeping in mind this is an undocumented, nonscientific source, and the fact I'm neither oceanographer nor marine biologist, the passage reads (p. 121):
There is some evidence that average wave heights are slowly rising, and that freak waves of eighty or ninety feet are becoming more common. Wave heights off the coast of England have risen an average of 25% over the last couple of decades. One cause may be [less oil pollution, since oil] inhibits the generation of capillary waves, which in turn prevent the wind from getting a 'grip' on the sea. Plankton releases a chemical that has the same effect, and plankton levels in the North Atlantic have dropped dramatically...
Presuming the author got his facts straight, I wonder whether the ostensible plankton disappearance is related to changes in the salinity levels discussed in this article.
Another very useful add-on is FruitMenu, which also has been updated for Jaguar. FruitMenu allows you to organize the Apple menu in the Classic manner.
I like ASM because sometimes it's faster to peruse a text list of apps than to decipher sometimes overly cluttered and/or not very distinctive icons. Apple intended to build much of the old Apple Menu functionality into the Finder, but hitting the Apple Menu is much faster for me and its contents are available from every app.
This wouldn't be a problem for the average user running OS X and classic, since the OS 9 version of software update wouldn't ever be launched.
;-)
Actually, Classic regularly launches OS 9's Software Update on my Cube, every Monday night. A holdover from when I was using OS 9 as my main system, more than 1 year ago.
I realize now that the reason I didn't deactivate it is because I'm not an average user. I thought I was just being lazy
Isn't atari the equivilent of "check" in the game japanese board game "go".
Yes. I recall that "atari" formally means hitting, or success in hitting, and its use in the game Go implies a warning to one's opponent that s/he is about to be overwhelmed.
Robert Woodhead can be found here (literally; he has a webcam): http://www.selfpromotion.com