And thats why people will want a regular key. Its worked for hundreds of years on other things, so a car should be no problem.
No, they're not safe. The key merely turns a lock that closes a contact telling the computer it's okay to proceed. After my 2001 Sukuki GSXR was stolen and recovered, I had to learn a thing about hot-wiring ignitions because the thieves had changed the locks. Within the ignition tumbler was a small PCB that connected circuits to ground for parking lights, accessories and the ignition. The added "security" was that a resistor was used in the circuit for the ignition.
Turns out, the wiring harness for the ignition has a molex connector underneath the right side fairing, right about where my fairing had been shattered by blunt-force-trauma. With nothing more than some knowledge, a spare connector, some wires, a switch and a specifically rated resistor, you could build a plug that would "start" any modern GSXR in about 20 seconds.
Keys are no safer. As far as the computers are concerned, they're either on or off. RFID, challenge/response, better encryption, failed-attempt lockouts, these things are going to become more common because they do a better job slowing the thieves down.
In the end I tend to think the TiVO patent should have been rejected as obvious.
But it wasn't obvious when Tivo started. Otherwise, we would have already had it. Computers have been around for decades now. So have hard drives, video encoders/decoders, etc. All the parts were there, but the innovative idea to put them together in a new way and CHANGE the way we watched television... that was worth a patent.
And I mean "we" the masses, not "we" the bright hobbyists who were already dabbling with video capture at home, but not sharing the technology. Patents reward ideas that can be brought to market, not merely ideas.
Sure, now that it's been done it's easy to replicate independantly since all the parts and integration work are fairly obvious. But if someone (Tivo) hadn't gone out on a limb to build the first units and take on a lot of RISK to ship and sell those, we might never have found out what it was like to pause live TV.
So we have to reward them with a patent and allow them to reap the windfall for a few years or we stifle innovation and creativity in the future.
It's like having some large corporation lower 100,000 sub-management employee wages by $5 an hour instead of laying off one CEO who is making $500k per year.
Um, not to point out the obvious, but a company without a CEO tends to tear itself apart and operate inefficiently. Whereas reducing wages by $5/hr across 100,000 employees as your example states would save the company $1 billion per year. I'm no CEO, but I know which proposal I'd support.
Perhaps you were ranting and in a hurry, but I've found that poor math skills tend to be behind many bad decisions as one's calculation of expected results tends to be optimistic and predictably wrong. The same is true of the Global Warming debate.
Has the Earth gotten warmer in recent years? Certainly.
Do we know, without a doubt, what is causing that? Absolutely NOT.
Do we know what best to do about it? Um, no.
Without an accurate model of global climate, we cannot predict whether this warming is a solar maximum or a runaway CO2 problem. But let's assume it's a CO2 problem. What exactly is causing it?
Coal fired electrical generators? Natural gas? Oil? Human and agricultural respiration?
There's a serious problem with living on Earth and it is one of FINITE resources. We have a finite ecosystem with a finite capacity to absorb CO2 and regulate the climate. We have a finite amount of energy reserves and only intercept 4.62e-10 of the Sun's output. With finite power, we have finite capacity to generate fresh, potable water or scrub CO2 out of the atmosphere. On a related note, we also have finite land to live on and yet still impose height restrictions on buildings and zone areas as "wilderness" forcing people to move further away from centers of work.
So what should we do? Even if we get people out of their cars and turn their thermostats down, regulate the annual power allotement to a "sustainable" level (according to someone), we're still overpopulating the planet steadily. Should we also regulate procreation? Impose fertility rights? Mandate only two children per couple to hold steady? Or should we outlaw more than one child per mother to reduce our population? Will we make exceptions for the drug-addicted or mentally-ill that continue to get pregnant or just abort their fetus/children? Will we make exceptions for the brilliant or well-connected?
And as our resources run dry (think of the Earth as a big, solar charged battery) and we must rely on our limited solar radiation for power, will we have enough left to get off the planet?
Or should we allow people to breed like rabbits, drive their SUVs to their big jobs and run the economy up as fast as possible hoping that we obtain technological superiority quickly enough to get off this rock and start tapping into the nearly INFITE resources of the broader solar system? Hell, with a solar power station at the LaGrange points and microwave recievers at the poles, we could power CO2 scrubbers to terraform Earth back to any kind of climate you'd like.
Of course, if you think this problem can be solved by our politicians or by changing the habits of society's elite, then I fear for our future. I don't want politicians, who are predicably poor at math, determining the best course of action for our race: They tend to pander for votes, not solve problems. And I really don't think turning off those seven heated pools will make one whit of difference. But maybe one day, while relaxing in one of those heated pools at a party hosted by Mr. Rich Guy, a brilliant man will overhear another brilliant woman talking about a new engine design she's working on and we'll get a collaboration that leads to cheaper, mainstream access to orbit.
They say necessity is the mother of invention. I'd far rather burn bright and need to find more resources than regulate society to consume at a sustainable rate and live here on Earth quietly until an asteroid takes us all out.
Software is pointless if you don't have a process describing how you will organize the mess. How will you know which 2000 books you've inventoried and which 1500 you haven't?
The typical best practice solution here goes as follows:
Start by clearing a space, like a single shelf, ideally one in the logical top left corner of your space.
Mark shelf as "sorted" somehow. I use a piece of colored tape.
Pick an unsorted book and place it on the shelf in alphabetical order by author, title (SQL!).
Repeat step 3 until shelf is full.
Clear next logical shelf after previous shelf and mark as "sorted".
Goto step 3.
Note that this process can be completed in hours, days or years. The books don't care. You can perform your software-based inventory as you go along or when you are all done. Whether you use Excel, MySQL or Notepad is pretty irrelevant for the small volume you describe.
That order right there is what's important. If the guy had been informed of an investigation, and had then returned the laptop, wiped, he could be guilty of destroying evidence.
Yea, it does sound a lot like accusing a suspect of tampering with a crime scene because you couldn't find sufficient evidence to implicate him in the murder.
But I can also see the case that the company is trying to make. Upon termination, he should simply return the work computer in-situ. Since his computer was arguably wiped post termination, it can and is being argued that a non-employee erased data from a company computer.
It will be an interesting court case, but the lesson learned here is: "Wipe your incriminating data prior to turning in your resignation, kids!"
3 years is not a data set to base public policy OR firm geo science upon.
You base public policy on whatever data you have available. When you have large unknowns, you do a risk assessment and then decide if that possibility of destroying the planet is important to you or not.
Whatever data we have available?
I measured a temperature increase yesterday in my front yard from 35F to 55F over the course of 12 hours! By my calculations, that's a annual increase of 14600F per year!! I got really worried until my neighbor explained that the temperature went down each night while I slept.
So I adjusted my study and calculated the temperature change over the course of an ENTIRE DAY! The result? An increase of 2F per day. So I'm investing in sunblock companies as it's going to get really hot in the next year.
Measurements over a three year period or even a three hundred year period are meaningless to a 4.5 billion year old planet. Until we have a model showing cause and effect predictions accurately, its all scare mongering, FUD and an effort to introduce social change to placate uneducated fears. Chicken Little, thy name is Global Warming.
Next time you're at a stadium, or mall or event, try this experiment:
Walk toward the bathroom s-l-o-w-l-y with your arms stretched out to prevent people from passing you in the corridor and getting to the restroom first. Note the reaction of people you are blocking. Make sure you walk slowly enough to block people.
Why is this very rude behavior tolerated on our roads? Because the inconsiderate asshat is shielded in a box and incabable of hearing your complaints.
And that's why we pass on the right and weave in and out of traffic.
Just don't give me direct reports. It just makes them miserable, and me a nervous wreck. Don't blame me when they quit six months from now because I'm a bad boss, because I told you up front that I was.
You are not a bad boss. You seem to be aware of your limitations. Bad bosses are quite readily identified by a sullen work force and a clueless PHB. They operate convinced that they are doing the right work and behaving the right way and that it is the workers who don't understand.
Which is not to say that all tyrants are bad bosses. It depends on your measuring stick. Are you trying to ship products or grow a think-tank? Are you running a salt-mine or a day care? Sometimes employees don't understand which environment they are in and evaluate their boss under terms appropriate to another.
Having seen first hand the military's idea of medical dental care, I'm not surprised that they feel chewing gum can be an adequate replacement for brushing.
When Apple released the iPod Photo, I thought my mother would really like something she could listen to music on as well as haul around pictures of her family.
Now that Apple has released a video player, I'm thinking the same thing.
Last holiday-season, I got a new digital camera that takes 15fps video with sound. I spent the summer recording short films of our kids playing baseball, jumping off swingsets, doing cartwheels... exactly the kind of thing that a grandmother might want to carry around in a pocket size device that can also hold music, photos, contacts, notes and solitaire.
I'm thinking this may be the year my mom gets an iPod loaded with home movies.
If that's the case, and you want it anyway, don't buy it new, but used (for instance at ebay, amazon marketplace or even a used records store).
Buying used still supports the RIAA as it provides upward price pressure on the sale of previously-new RIAA records. Those unscrupulous lot who purchase RIAA records NIB and then grow disgusted with their lame, formulaic melodies seek new fundage at the used record store where good money is available for stock in demand.
Only buy reducing demand for all RIAA titles, used or otherwise, will you start to divert cash away from the RIAA.
He starts by saying that computers are now as smart as an insect -- which is unrefutable because nobody can quantify what that means...
If you think the Rapture or the Singularity is going to make all currently conceivable problems laughable, little things like massive extinction and global warming turn into somebody else's problem. They're not -- and our grandchildren, with their very fast and non-sentient computers, and their non-300-year lifespans, are going to be kind of ticked that you and I spoiled the planet.
Such a wonderfully worded teardown of Ray's optimistic predictions of bigger and better. I especially enjoyed the unquantifiable insect quote above.
But then you go and ruin it by standing on an unsupported soapbox about the doom and gloom of extinction and global warming -- both of them problems with a compelling lack of metrics since nobody knows what causes the changes to data we observe or how to predict how the data will change next. Global warming is the Cold-War/MAD/Nuclear-Winter fearmongering of this decade. But just try to corner a global warming scientist on why the average temperature of the Earth today is much colder than in previous millenia and you'll get a bunch of diversion back into the FUD: Cars produce CO2, CO2 is um, bad and may cause warming; Hey, look, it's getting warmer... in some places; Therefore cars cause warming, Q.E.D. GET OUT OF YOUR CARS!!
Except that it's not that simple. There are far more unanswered questions than weak unsupported theories. True science involves building a model that can explain and predict, not merely guess and extrapolate. We have a model for Physics that says if I drop a penny, I can predict with certainty that it is going to fall straight toward the Earth's core, unless there are substantial prevailing winds. I can make this prediction accurately time and again because it's a thoroughly tested model and tends to be consistent.
We need a similar model for Weather. The warming and cooling of the Earth is obviously a complex process. CO2 is certainly a contributing factor. What's not clear is whether it plays a 0.01% role or a 5% role. If you want to see global warming in action, put your hand over a fire or behind a tail pipe. Those are some points on Earth that are getting warmer. Does that count as global warming? Or one could try driving cross country in an open vehicle--ever notice how it's appreciably warmer near the cities than in the country? Is that from vehicle exhaust, CO2 reflection, Asphault heat-sinks or methane production? Perhaps it's from the lack of trees? Do you think temperatures near the city will increase on average as the city grows in population? Buildings? Parking lots?
Before we enact public policy designed to solve a tremendous problem at a tremendous cost, it seems only reasonable to expect a clear description of the problem and its causal factors--backed by a model that predicts the future of the system. Only from that point can a debate about the costs of mitigating those causal factors begin. From what I've seen, those who cast FUD about global warming are not yet prepared to come to the table, but their religion won't let them wait until they've gathered the data and built such a model; they want action now, misguided or not.
The nice thing about approaching The Singularity is that our faster insect-intelligence computers will be able to model exponentially complex systems and help us explain what is really going on with the weather.
Does anyone have any idea what someone like that should be making?
How much would it cost to replace you? Figure in costs of recruiting as well as down-time.
Okay, now that you have one really big whopping number, how much of a discount are you willing to give your employer to ensure their loyalty and prevent them from considering how much it would cost to replace you.
My interview was multi-stage, including a technical process. The questions they asked were laughable; "What is TCP/IP" and "What is DNS" and so forth. I pointed out that I was, in fact, an MCSE. They replied "We know - that's why we're asking."
Perhaps you should do more interviewing.
Resume inflation is very common. I'd bet 90% of all people do it, 50% quite flagrantly and 20% to an outrageous degree. I'm only speaking from my experience as a PHB interviewing over a thousand candidates over the last twenty years.
When people claim to have a $CERT, I ask them something they should know. If I don't know enough to determine the authenticity of their knowledge, I put someone on the interview loop who does. What commonly happens as a result of these probing questions is that you get one of the following answers:
1. <correct answer> ~50% of the time. 2. "Uh, it's been a while and I'd have to refer to the book." 40% of the time. 3. <complete b.s.> no more than 10% of the time.
I've had one candidate who confessed that he copied his friend's resume since they had the same job, but quite obviously not the same knowledge or abilities.
I've had other candidates who explained their lack of competency by claiming they're "nearly done" getting the $CERT they proclaimed on their resume.
I've had other candidates who actually have the $CERT, but cannot answer basic questions like "what's TCP?" sufficiently. And by sufficiently, I mean something like, "it's a connection based protocol that guarantees delivery through serialized acknowledgements to packet receipts." Many cannot even describe the three-way-handshake and return a blank stare when asked what that is.
So please forgive us PHBs our stupid questions. Answer with a smile, shake your head, mention that you never understood people that lied on their resume. And make sure that if you are no longer "current" in some technology, that you pull it off your resume _right now_ before you get your ass handed to you by some PHB that went and asked some experts for a couple basic questions and answers to shake someone down with.
I'm getting 250mph out of my SUV for the first few feet as well. Every morning, I get out and push to get the car rolling, then hop in and coast as long as possible until I start the engine.
Of course, I realize that I'm just displacing the energy consumption from the gasoline fired ICE to the metabolic unit in my gut, but it feels more efficient and I've been eating my Wheaties every morning so...
Given that government and societal pressure is biased toward creating high density communities, our housing costs are skyrocketting and crime is increasing. While this model works for certain demographic groups, it is driving others out to the suburbs and country. For those who must commute 20-100 miles per day just to get to work, your advice is akin to the following:
"don't work and you don't pay taxes..."
Unfortunately, neither are an option for most of us. Including the cops, who typically cannot afford housing in the communities they police. I follow many back and forth to work on a regular basis and they all speed.
The human brain doesn't calculate that way. We build dedicated circuits through repitition and practice until "catch that ball" is a single clock cycle instruction. This is why my three year old won't move his hands until after the ball hits him in the chest, but my fourteen year old will instinctively catch anything thrown within arm's reach. No thinking required.
I suppose the capacity to build such dedicated circuits is fairly impressive, especially since we are able to simultaneously host thousands of such dedicated sets for eating, playing, walking, etc.
But then we're just comparing apples and oranges. After all, dogs can catch frisbees and frogs can catch flies. Compared to them, a human catching a ball is no big deal.
This is a neat accomplishment, but I'm still waiting for a computer/robot/program that can teach itself to catch a ball.
All they'd have to do is make you send a copy of your driver's license or something in the mail and then if someone tries using your serial number that doesn't share the data on your driver's license, they go after them for infringement. That way, product activation doesn't harass law-abiding users.
Law-abiding users? Um, how are you going to tell which is which?
I take exception to your assumption that it is more difficult to steal your driver's license number than it is to steal your XP serial number. To say nothing of you giving both away for free to friends and family.
It used to be that we made money off of labor. If I built chairs, people would either pay for my chairs or build their own. I didn't care about knock-offs because I could build better chairs and people would pay for my quality. Or maybe the other guy was too busy to serve all the demand. And the presence of two chair builders in a small town would discourage a third from setting up shop.
Now that more and more products are digital and knock-offs are effectively originals, we're struggling to figure out how to protect the fruits of our "labor." Since anything can be cracked, hacked or stolen, you either accept it and focus on quality, building consumer loyalty and hoping for cash in return... or you fight it. Corporate industry has chosen to fight it.
Unfortunately, that means consumers are in the middle of a war.
Re:Still a single point of failure
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Basics of RAID
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· Score: 1
Disclaimer: I work in the storage industry for Isilon Systems.
With RAID, you still have a single point of failure. Instead of it being your hard drive, it is now your RAID controller. So what is the advantage?
Parent got modded up to Interesting? Okay, here is the clear advantage for RAID: While you may have a single point of failure such as a RAID controller or PSU or motherboard, your typically ghetto RAID (or JBOD) system still protects your data in the event of such a failure.
You can replace a mobo or RAID controller and get your array back online, intact. Try doing that with the single failed hard drive approach.
Since a RAID controller doesn't have moving parts, is it less likely than a hard drive to fail?
Yes. Oh, yes. Verily, yes. Hard drives are timebombs. It's never a question of IF, but always WHEN.
I've been informed on two separate occassions that if I get a third ticket within the three year window that my insurance will be dropped.
Okay, so I go get insurance with another provider?
Not so fast, I have preferential rates from a multi-billion-dollar insurance company. My 1000cc sport-bike costs only $400 per year to insure. I've gotten quotes from other top insurers. Because they don't know me, I get the regular rate: $3400/yr. I'm sure my auto coverage would increase from the reasonable $800/yr as well. Oh yea, and don't forget the high-risk surcharge because of all these tickets that caused me to get dropped in the first place.
So suddenly paying a few hundred to your lawyer to avoid the ticket with certainty makes a lot of sense.
And for those of you with useless advice like, "don't speed!" or "you do the crime, you do the time!" you can bite my ass. Everyone speeds. Cops routinely do 10-15 over, no lights. If I don't speed, I'm going to get run over. And if you "go with the flow" then you play the lottery. Given these two options, game theory says I might as well get where I'm going a bit faster.
Yea, I did that at my place of business. Scratched out two clauses I disagreed with regarding socialistic positions rather than non-compete issues. One of those issues was about weapons in the work-place and how not having them would make us all safer so I'm supposed to agree carrying a weapon is forbidden and a firing offense.
It is at this point that some large percentage of./ readers think, "WTF?" and another large percentage of readers think, "Oh, this poster is one of those lunatics." Fine--we understand each other.
Couple weeks later I got a call from the Director of HR asking me if I wanted to reconsider as he was about to take all the exceptions (like mine) to the CEO to discuss them.
Fortunately, this is a clause I don't mind breaking at will and won't affect my future career. But were it something as stupid as not working with a computer for another year, then you can either consider it unreasonable and therefore unenforceable and sign it, or quit. Chances are that unless you go to work for one of their competitors AND you have the ability to provide significant advantages to that competitor (which probably applies in this case between MSFT and Google), they aren't going to care to pursue you.
However, it is a contract and if you break it, you could be in for a headache and legal fees. If your employer is that stupid, do you really want to continue working there? Or is stupidity that prone to huge success?
This request is a lot like asking if you should switch to an underhanded hammer for pounding nails. Or learn to write code in LISP to maintain your cognitive skills. If that's what you want to do at home/work, fine I suppose, but it makes you much less versatile at your neighbor's cube, folk's house, etc.
I'm sure you can switch back and forth however, but you will be less accurate/fast spending time on two mappings than you would on one. I've found I'm quite comfortable switching between the following:
logitech trackball vs. msft mouse
xbox controller vs. PC keyboard
stick-shift vs. automatic transmission
laptop vs. desktop keyboards
Add Dvorak to your list and you've got an argument that you are cooler than I. One of the guys I work with has a keyboard with all the keys removed and replaced completely out of order. Many have their labels erased. I think he also uses a wacko key layout. Nobody can use his computer except him.
But as far as your goal of avoiding RSI, the interface doesn't matter as much as the method in which you use it. I started getting numb fingers about a decade ago, but paying attention to my posture and doing occassional stretches made it go away. Keeping your wrists from resting on the surface of anything has a lot to do with it--this closes the carpal tunnel and causes friction and irritation to the tendons and nerves, which swell and cause more problems.
So I prefer practicing on QWERTY keyboards since they are available everywhere. And I use overhand hammers for nailing. Taught myself a bit of C, C++ and perl for well-roundedness too.
I find it amusing that the PhD in CS candidate thinks a company is arrogant when it follows its own interviewing process. Apparently he feels that they should bow, get on their knees and roll out the red carpet for one of his stature. I mean:
"c'mon, I'm Arthur Sorkin... with an 'A.r.t.h...' yes, that Arthur Sorkin. Where's my job offer with ridiculous salary, stock AND options? What's this? You want me to impress an individual contributor and answer standard benchmark questions to see if my mind works the way my resume claims it does? Well, I never!"
[storms off in a huff]
I've been burned too many times making assumptions on a resume. I always ask questions to allow a candidate to prove that they know what they claim and see how well they can describe their experience. It's not uncommon to find that a highly credentialed resume is wrapped around a non-thinking candidate that is unable to talk the walk their "experience" indicates they have.
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And thats why people will want a regular key. Its worked for hundreds of years on other things, so a car should be no problem.
No, they're not safe. The key merely turns a lock that closes a contact telling the computer it's okay to proceed. After my 2001 Sukuki GSXR was stolen and recovered, I had to learn a thing about hot-wiring ignitions because the thieves had changed the locks. Within the ignition tumbler was a small PCB that connected circuits to ground for parking lights, accessories and the ignition. The added "security" was that a resistor was used in the circuit for the ignition.
Turns out, the wiring harness for the ignition has a molex connector underneath the right side fairing, right about where my fairing had been shattered by blunt-force-trauma. With nothing more than some knowledge, a spare connector, some wires, a switch and a specifically rated resistor, you could build a plug that would "start" any modern GSXR in about 20 seconds.
Keys are no safer. As far as the computers are concerned, they're either on or off. RFID, challenge/response, better encryption, failed-attempt lockouts, these things are going to become more common because they do a better job slowing the thieves down.
In the end I tend to think the TiVO patent should have been rejected as obvious.
But it wasn't obvious when Tivo started. Otherwise, we would have already had it. Computers have been around for decades now. So have hard drives, video encoders/decoders, etc. All the parts were there, but the innovative idea to put them together in a new way and CHANGE the way we watched television... that was worth a patent.
And I mean "we" the masses, not "we" the bright hobbyists who were already dabbling with video capture at home, but not sharing the technology. Patents reward ideas that can be brought to market, not merely ideas.
Sure, now that it's been done it's easy to replicate independantly since all the parts and integration work are fairly obvious. But if someone (Tivo) hadn't gone out on a limb to build the first units and take on a lot of RISK to ship and sell those, we might never have found out what it was like to pause live TV.
So we have to reward them with a patent and allow them to reap the windfall for a few years or we stifle innovation and creativity in the future.
Way to go Tivo!
It's like having some large corporation lower 100,000 sub-management employee wages by $5 an hour instead of laying off one CEO who is making $500k per year.
Um, not to point out the obvious, but a company without a CEO tends to tear itself apart and operate inefficiently. Whereas reducing wages by $5/hr across 100,000 employees as your example states would save the company $1 billion per year. I'm no CEO, but I know which proposal I'd support.
Perhaps you were ranting and in a hurry, but I've found that poor math skills tend to be behind many bad decisions as one's calculation of expected results tends to be optimistic and predictably wrong. The same is true of the Global Warming debate.
Has the Earth gotten warmer in recent years? Certainly.
Do we know, without a doubt, what is causing that? Absolutely NOT.
Do we know what best to do about it? Um, no.
Without an accurate model of global climate, we cannot predict whether this warming is a solar maximum or a runaway CO2 problem. But let's assume it's a CO2 problem. What exactly is causing it?
Coal fired electrical generators?
Natural gas?
Oil?
Human and agricultural respiration?
There's a serious problem with living on Earth and it is one of FINITE resources. We have a finite ecosystem with a finite capacity to absorb CO2 and regulate the climate. We have a finite amount of energy reserves and only intercept 4.62e-10 of the Sun's output. With finite power, we have finite capacity to generate fresh, potable water or scrub CO2 out of the atmosphere. On a related note, we also have finite land to live on and yet still impose height restrictions on buildings and zone areas as "wilderness" forcing people to move further away from centers of work.
So what should we do? Even if we get people out of their cars and turn their thermostats down, regulate the annual power allotement to a "sustainable" level (according to someone), we're still overpopulating the planet steadily. Should we also regulate procreation? Impose fertility rights? Mandate only two children per couple to hold steady? Or should we outlaw more than one child per mother to reduce our population? Will we make exceptions for the drug-addicted or mentally-ill that continue to get pregnant or just abort their fetus/children? Will we make exceptions for the brilliant or well-connected?
And as our resources run dry (think of the Earth as a big, solar charged battery) and we must rely on our limited solar radiation for power, will we have enough left to get off the planet?
Or should we allow people to breed like rabbits, drive their SUVs to their big jobs and run the economy up as fast as possible hoping that we obtain technological superiority quickly enough to get off this rock and start tapping into the nearly INFITE resources of the broader solar system? Hell, with a solar power station at the LaGrange points and microwave recievers at the poles, we could power CO2 scrubbers to terraform Earth back to any kind of climate you'd like.
Of course, if you think this problem can be solved by our politicians or by changing the habits of society's elite, then I fear for our future. I don't want politicians, who are predicably poor at math, determining the best course of action for our race: They tend to pander for votes, not solve problems. And I really don't think turning off those seven heated pools will make one whit of difference. But maybe one day, while relaxing in one of those heated pools at a party hosted by Mr. Rich Guy, a brilliant man will overhear another brilliant woman talking about a new engine design she's working on and we'll get a collaboration that leads to cheaper, mainstream access to orbit.
They say necessity is the mother of invention. I'd far rather burn bright and need to find more resources than regulate society to consume at a sustainable rate and live here on Earth quietly until an asteroid takes us all out.
A better April fools joke would be an OSX hack iso that allows install onto a modded XBOX.
The typical best practice solution here goes as follows:
Note that this process can be completed in hours, days or years. The books don't care. You can perform your software-based inventory as you go along or when you are all done. Whether you use Excel, MySQL or Notepad is pretty irrelevant for the small volume you describe.
That order right there is what's important. If the guy had been informed of an investigation, and had then returned the laptop, wiped, he could be guilty of destroying evidence.
Yea, it does sound a lot like accusing a suspect of tampering with a crime scene because you couldn't find sufficient evidence to implicate him in the murder.
But I can also see the case that the company is trying to make. Upon termination, he should simply return the work computer in-situ. Since his computer was arguably wiped post termination, it can and is being argued that a non-employee erased data from a company computer.
It will be an interesting court case, but the lesson learned here is: "Wipe your incriminating data prior to turning in your resignation, kids!"
You base public policy on whatever data you have available. When you have large unknowns, you do a risk assessment and then decide if that possibility of destroying the planet is important to you or not.
Whatever data we have available?
I measured a temperature increase yesterday in my front yard from 35F to 55F over the course of 12 hours! By my calculations, that's a annual increase of 14600F per year!! I got really worried until my neighbor explained that the temperature went down each night while I slept.
So I adjusted my study and calculated the temperature change over the course of an ENTIRE DAY! The result? An increase of 2F per day. So I'm investing in sunblock companies as it's going to get really hot in the next year.
Measurements over a three year period or even a three hundred year period are meaningless to a 4.5 billion year old planet. Until we have a model showing cause and effect predictions accurately, its all scare mongering, FUD and an effort to introduce social change to placate uneducated fears. Chicken Little, thy name is Global Warming.
Next time you're at a stadium, or mall or event, try this experiment:
Walk toward the bathroom s-l-o-w-l-y with your arms stretched out to prevent people from passing you in the corridor and getting to the restroom first. Note the reaction of people you are blocking. Make sure you walk slowly enough to block people.
Why is this very rude behavior tolerated on our roads? Because the inconsiderate asshat is shielded in a box and incabable of hearing your complaints.
And that's why we pass on the right and weave in and out of traffic.
Just don't give me direct reports. It just makes them miserable, and me a nervous wreck. Don't blame me when they quit six months from now because I'm a bad boss, because I told you up front that I was.
You are not a bad boss. You seem to be aware of your limitations. Bad bosses are quite readily identified by a sullen work force and a clueless PHB. They operate convinced that they are doing the right work and behaving the right way and that it is the workers who don't understand.
Which is not to say that all tyrants are bad bosses. It depends on your measuring stick. Are you trying to ship products or grow a think-tank? Are you running a salt-mine or a day care? Sometimes employees don't understand which environment they are in and evaluate their boss under terms appropriate to another.
Having seen first hand the military's idea of medical dental care, I'm not surprised that they feel chewing gum can be an adequate replacement for brushing.
When Apple released the iPod Photo, I thought my mother would really like something she could listen to music on as well as haul around pictures of her family.
Now that Apple has released a video player, I'm thinking the same thing.
Last holiday-season, I got a new digital camera that takes 15fps video with sound. I spent the summer recording short films of our kids playing baseball, jumping off swingsets, doing cartwheels... exactly the kind of thing that a grandmother might want to carry around in a pocket size device that can also hold music, photos, contacts, notes and solitaire.
I'm thinking this may be the year my mom gets an iPod loaded with home movies.
Buying used still supports the RIAA as it provides upward price pressure on the sale of previously-new RIAA records. Those unscrupulous lot who purchase RIAA records NIB and then grow disgusted with their lame, formulaic melodies seek new fundage at the used record store where good money is available for stock in demand.
Only buy reducing demand for all RIAA titles, used or otherwise, will you start to divert cash away from the RIAA.
Such a wonderfully worded teardown of Ray's optimistic predictions of bigger and better. I especially enjoyed the unquantifiable insect quote above.
But then you go and ruin it by standing on an unsupported soapbox about the doom and gloom of extinction and global warming -- both of them problems with a compelling lack of metrics since nobody knows what causes the changes to data we observe or how to predict how the data will change next. Global warming is the Cold-War/MAD/Nuclear-Winter fearmongering of this decade. But just try to corner a global warming scientist on why the average temperature of the Earth today is much colder than in previous millenia and you'll get a bunch of diversion back into the FUD: Cars produce CO2, CO2 is um, bad and may cause warming; Hey, look, it's getting warmer... in some places; Therefore cars cause warming, Q.E.D. GET OUT OF YOUR CARS!!
Except that it's not that simple. There are far more unanswered questions than weak unsupported theories. True science involves building a model that can explain and predict, not merely guess and extrapolate. We have a model for Physics that says if I drop a penny, I can predict with certainty that it is going to fall straight toward the Earth's core, unless there are substantial prevailing winds. I can make this prediction accurately time and again because it's a thoroughly tested model and tends to be consistent.
We need a similar model for Weather. The warming and cooling of the Earth is obviously a complex process. CO2 is certainly a contributing factor. What's not clear is whether it plays a 0.01% role or a 5% role. If you want to see global warming in action, put your hand over a fire or behind a tail pipe. Those are some points on Earth that are getting warmer. Does that count as global warming? Or one could try driving cross country in an open vehicle--ever notice how it's appreciably warmer near the cities than in the country? Is that from vehicle exhaust, CO2 reflection, Asphault heat-sinks or methane production? Perhaps it's from the lack of trees? Do you think temperatures near the city will increase on average as the city grows in population? Buildings? Parking lots?
Before we enact public policy designed to solve a tremendous problem at a tremendous cost, it seems only reasonable to expect a clear description of the problem and its causal factors--backed by a model that predicts the future of the system. Only from that point can a debate about the costs of mitigating those causal factors begin. From what I've seen, those who cast FUD about global warming are not yet prepared to come to the table, but their religion won't let them wait until they've gathered the data and built such a model; they want action now, misguided or not.
The nice thing about approaching The Singularity is that our faster insect-intelligence computers will be able to model exponentially complex systems and help us explain what is really going on with the weather.
Does anyone have any idea what someone like that should be making?
How much would it cost to replace you? Figure in costs of recruiting as well as down-time.
Okay, now that you have one really big whopping number, how much of a discount are you willing to give your employer to ensure their loyalty and prevent them from considering how much it would cost to replace you.
Supply, meet demand... ah, I see you've met.
My interview was multi-stage, including a technical process. The questions they asked were laughable; "What is TCP/IP" and "What is DNS" and so forth. I pointed out that I was, in fact, an MCSE. They replied "We know - that's why we're asking."
Perhaps you should do more interviewing.
Resume inflation is very common. I'd bet 90% of all people do it, 50% quite flagrantly and 20% to an outrageous degree. I'm only speaking from my experience as a PHB interviewing over a thousand candidates over the last twenty years.
When people claim to have a $CERT, I ask them something they should know. If I don't know enough to determine the authenticity of their knowledge, I put someone on the interview loop who does. What commonly happens as a result of these probing questions is that you get one of the following answers:
1. <correct answer> ~50% of the time.
2. "Uh, it's been a while and I'd have to refer to the book." 40% of the time.
3. <complete b.s.> no more than 10% of the time.
I've had one candidate who confessed that he copied his friend's resume since they had the same job, but quite obviously not the same knowledge or abilities.
I've had other candidates who explained their lack of competency by claiming they're "nearly done" getting the $CERT they proclaimed on their resume.
I've had other candidates who actually have the $CERT, but cannot answer basic questions like "what's TCP?" sufficiently. And by sufficiently, I mean something like, "it's a connection based protocol that guarantees delivery through serialized acknowledgements to packet receipts." Many cannot even describe the three-way-handshake and return a blank stare when asked what that is.
So please forgive us PHBs our stupid questions. Answer with a smile, shake your head, mention that you never understood people that lied on their resume. And make sure that if you are no longer "current" in some technology, that you pull it off your resume _right now_ before you get your ass handed to you by some PHB that went and asked some experts for a couple basic questions and answers to shake someone down with.
I'm getting 250mph out of my SUV for the first few feet as well. Every morning, I get out and push to get the car rolling, then hop in and coast as long as possible until I start the engine.
Of course, I realize that I'm just displacing the energy consumption from the gasoline fired ICE to the metabolic unit in my gut, but it feels more efficient and I've been eating my Wheaties every morning so...
Don't speed and you don't get caught...
Given that government and societal pressure is biased toward creating high density communities, our housing costs are skyrocketting and crime is increasing. While this model works for certain demographic groups, it is driving others out to the suburbs and country. For those who must commute 20-100 miles per day just to get to work, your advice is akin to the following:
"don't work and you don't pay taxes..."
Unfortunately, neither are an option for most of us. Including the cops, who typically cannot afford housing in the communities they police. I follow many back and forth to work on a regular basis and they all speed.
The human brain doesn't calculate that way. We build dedicated circuits through repitition and practice until "catch that ball" is a single clock cycle instruction. This is why my three year old won't move his hands until after the ball hits him in the chest, but my fourteen year old will instinctively catch anything thrown within arm's reach. No thinking required.
I suppose the capacity to build such dedicated circuits is fairly impressive, especially since we are able to simultaneously host thousands of such dedicated sets for eating, playing, walking, etc.
But then we're just comparing apples and oranges. After all, dogs can catch frisbees and frogs can catch flies. Compared to them, a human catching a ball is no big deal.
This is a neat accomplishment, but I'm still waiting for a computer/robot/program that can teach itself to catch a ball.
All they'd have to do is make you send a copy of your driver's license or something in the mail and then if someone tries using your serial number that doesn't share the data on your driver's license, they go after them for infringement. That way, product activation doesn't harass law-abiding users.
Law-abiding users? Um, how are you going to tell which is which?
I take exception to your assumption that it is more difficult to steal your driver's license number than it is to steal your XP serial number. To say nothing of you giving both away for free to friends and family.
It used to be that we made money off of labor. If I built chairs, people would either pay for my chairs or build their own. I didn't care about knock-offs because I could build better chairs and people would pay for my quality. Or maybe the other guy was too busy to serve all the demand. And the presence of two chair builders in a small town would discourage a third from setting up shop.
Now that more and more products are digital and knock-offs are effectively originals, we're struggling to figure out how to protect the fruits of our "labor." Since anything can be cracked, hacked or stolen, you either accept it and focus on quality, building consumer loyalty and hoping for cash in return... or you fight it. Corporate industry has chosen to fight it.
Unfortunately, that means consumers are in the middle of a war.
Disclaimer: I work in the storage industry for Isilon Systems.
With RAID, you still have a single point of failure. Instead of it being your hard drive, it is now your RAID controller. So what is the advantage?
Parent got modded up to Interesting? Okay, here is the clear advantage for RAID: While you may have a single point of failure such as a RAID controller or PSU or motherboard, your typically ghetto RAID (or JBOD) system still protects your data in the event of such a failure.
You can replace a mobo or RAID controller and get your array back online, intact. Try doing that with the single failed hard drive approach.
Since a RAID controller doesn't have moving parts, is it less likely than a hard drive to fail?
Yes. Oh, yes. Verily, yes. Hard drives are timebombs. It's never a question of IF, but always WHEN.
Insurance is THE only cost.
$100 for speeding is nothing in comparison.
I've been informed on two separate occassions that if I get a third ticket within the three year window that my insurance will be dropped.
Okay, so I go get insurance with another provider?
Not so fast, I have preferential rates from a multi-billion-dollar insurance company. My 1000cc sport-bike costs only $400 per year to insure. I've gotten quotes from other top insurers. Because they don't know me, I get the regular rate: $3400/yr. I'm sure my auto coverage would increase from the reasonable $800/yr as well. Oh yea, and don't forget the high-risk surcharge because of all these tickets that caused me to get dropped in the first place.
So suddenly paying a few hundred to your lawyer to avoid the ticket with certainty makes a lot of sense.
And for those of you with useless advice like, "don't speed!" or "you do the crime, you do the time!" you can bite my ass. Everyone speeds. Cops routinely do 10-15 over, no lights. If I don't speed, I'm going to get run over. And if you "go with the flow" then you play the lottery. Given these two options, game theory says I might as well get where I'm going a bit faster.
That's "DEF" Star, isn't it? And it's going to cost you something extra. Ten thousand in advance.
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I'm disappointed they didn't put the exhaust port in the trench. Bad form.
Yea, I did that at my place of business. Scratched out two clauses I disagreed with regarding socialistic positions rather than non-compete issues. One of those issues was about weapons in the work-place and how not having them would make us all safer so I'm supposed to agree carrying a weapon is forbidden and a firing offense.
./ readers think, "WTF?" and another large percentage of readers think, "Oh, this poster is one of those lunatics." Fine--we understand each other.
It is at this point that some large percentage of
Couple weeks later I got a call from the Director of HR asking me if I wanted to reconsider as he was about to take all the exceptions (like mine) to the CEO to discuss them.
Fortunately, this is a clause I don't mind breaking at will and won't affect my future career. But were it something as stupid as not working with a computer for another year, then you can either consider it unreasonable and therefore unenforceable and sign it, or quit. Chances are that unless you go to work for one of their competitors AND you have the ability to provide significant advantages to that competitor (which probably applies in this case between MSFT and Google), they aren't going to care to pursue you.
However, it is a contract and if you break it, you could be in for a headache and legal fees. If your employer is that stupid, do you really want to continue working there? Or is stupidity that prone to huge success?
I'm sure you can switch back and forth however, but you will be less accurate/fast spending time on two mappings than you would on one. I've found I'm quite comfortable switching between the following:
Add Dvorak to your list and you've got an argument that you are cooler than I. One of the guys I work with has a keyboard with all the keys removed and replaced completely out of order. Many have their labels erased. I think he also uses a wacko key layout. Nobody can use his computer except him.
But as far as your goal of avoiding RSI, the interface doesn't matter as much as the method in which you use it. I started getting numb fingers about a decade ago, but paying attention to my posture and doing occassional stretches made it go away. Keeping your wrists from resting on the surface of anything has a lot to do with it--this closes the carpal tunnel and causes friction and irritation to the tendons and nerves, which swell and cause more problems.
So I prefer practicing on QWERTY keyboards since they are available everywhere. And I use overhand hammers for nailing. Taught myself a bit of C, C++ and perl for well-roundedness too.
I find it amusing that the PhD in CS candidate thinks a company is arrogant when it follows its own interviewing process. Apparently he feels that they should bow, get on their knees and roll out the red carpet for one of his stature. I mean:
"c'mon, I'm Arthur Sorkin... with an 'A.r.t.h...' yes, that Arthur Sorkin. Where's my job offer with ridiculous salary, stock AND options? What's this? You want me to impress an individual contributor and answer standard benchmark questions to see if my mind works the way my resume claims it does? Well, I never!"
[storms off in a huff]
I've been burned too many times making assumptions on a resume. I always ask questions to allow a candidate to prove that they know what they claim and see how well they can describe their experience. It's not uncommon to find that a highly credentialed resume is wrapped around a non-thinking candidate that is unable to talk the walk their "experience" indicates they have.