This is why people hate computers. The Common Application is basically lying to its users, because its developers are too lazy to handle a situation that is both easy to stumble into and can produce really bad results. And your solution? Put the burden on the user to work around the developers' laziness.
If the limit is 1000 characters, then tell the user it's 1000 characters. Don't say "150 words". And make sure that you really can fit 1000 characters on the printed version of the application 100% of the time. This really isn't that hard.
I suspect this was far less of a hypothesis about aliens and far more social commentary on humans.
Most speculation on the behavior of aliens generally is. Which is why, 25 years ago, the proposed reason why there were no aliens was because all technologically-advanced civilizations eventually destroy themselves in global thermonuclear war. 25 years from now, the proposed reason will probably have something to do with the alien equivalent of Peak Oil.
I have a bunch of old DSDD 40-track hard-sector TRS-80 5.25" floppy disks (NEWDOS/80v2 format) that I'd love be able to read.
So get yourself a PCI Catweasel MK4 controller (or MK2, if you have an ISA slot), a Linux box, a 5.25" floppy drive, and this guy's software.
Done. And it took me all of two minutes on Google to find.
And, given that for every TRS-80 hard drive sold, I would guess that somewhere around 1 million CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drives have been sold, I'd say you'll still be able to find hardware to read CD-ROMs in 2105, never mind 2045.
Whether your CD-Rs will last that long is the real issue.
According to Microsoft, an average Longhorn system will need to have a 4-6GHz CPU. But if when Longhorn arrives, 4GHz CPUs are high-end parts and 6GHz CPUs don't exist, well...I don't predict good things for Microsoft. Longhorn in 2007, anyone? Or maybe 2008...
I recently got a couple of crowns; some 12 year-old fillings had failed, as they often do when they reach that age. I have a number of other fillings that will probably need to be replaced with crowns over the next few years.
At first I wished that the teeth could be replaced with new ones, but then I realized something. The originals lasted 10-12 years before succumbing to decay, and the filled teeth lasted another 12 years. The crowns are made of porcelain-coated steel. They look great, are impervious to decay, and will probably last for the rest of my life. Why would I want to replace them with the troublesome things that were there before?
This leads to a question I have: why isn't pencil and paper good enough in the United States?
One factor is that ballots in the United States tend to be quite long, due to our multiple levels of government and the fact that elected officials serve set terms (with terms at the various levels being synchronized). In the general election next year, for example, I'll be voting for three federal office (President, Representative, Senator), a state equivalent of a Representative, city council positions, a county council representative, various other boards (e.g. school board), probably a dozen statewide referendums and maybe one or two local (city- or county-wide) referendums. And it generally takes a month to certify an election, even with an automated counting process (which is why Arnold Schwarzenneger hasn't been sworn in as governor of California yet).
What's it like in Canada? Does a general election include anything other than federal MP? Do you have separate elections for sepearate offices?
In the 1950s, Europe enjoyed a similar level of prosperity to the USA.
No it didn't. In the 1950s, most of Europe was struggling to rebuild from the ruins of World War II, and in the West this rebuilding was initially subsidized by the (relatively undamaged) United States. Rationing in the U.K., for example, didn't end until 1954.
For some reason people started migrating from Unix to NT. So now I'm stuck using design and verification tools on 2000.
Speaking for Synopsys (I worked there in the 90s), the migration from Unix to NT was a mid-90s thing that was driven more by industry perception ("Unix is dead; time to move to NT!") than customer demand. The rise of Linux stopped that dead in its tracks. Synopsys's "primary platforms" are now SPARC Solaris, HPUX and Red Hat Linux, and have been for years. NT support, where it exists, is considered "secondary" (along with DEC Alpha, AIX, etc.). I've worked in two EDA startups since then, and neither has seriously considered releasing Windows software (SPARC and Linux are the big players, with HPUX coming in a distant third).
Linux support was driven by customer demand. Once there was enough demand, the folks at Synopsys got over their Linuxphobia ("all Linux users build their own custom kernels! How can we support that ?!?") and started releasing Linux ports.
If you want a MacOS X port of EDA software, and you are a user of EDA software, talk to your vendor. If enough people ask, there will be a port. Though not without some resistence: there are quite a few people in this industry for whom the important thing is not that the box be fast and run Unix, but that it not have that fruity little logo on the front. But that opinion will change given enough cash.
The funny thing is that in-house ASIC design at Apple is probably done on Solairs, HP, or NT.
Probably Solaris. I wonder how much Apple has leaned on their software vendors for OS X ports. Not enough, apparently.
I've been doing something like this with Linux for a while now. I use a D-Link DSB-R100 (unfortunately discontinued), sox, lame, and crontab. I used to burn the resulting MP3s on a CD-R and take them with me to work, but now I've got an iPod, so I use that instead.
I originally used this setup to record NPR talk shows that I couldn't get on the radio while at work (because of lousy radio reception), but now I also use it to record a local radio station'selectronic music show (which starts at 10pm on Saturday and runs for six hours!).
Close boxes in individual tabs - a bad idea
on
Hyatt Discusses Tabs
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
I have to disagree with David Hyatt's opinion about close boxes in tabs. I've used Galeon, and I hate having the close boxes in the individual tabs; a close box in a tab takes up such a large proportion of space that it is very easy to accidentally close a tab just by clicking on it. This happened to me so often that I stopped using Galeon and started using Mozilla.
I suppose having one close box on the right-hand side is conceptually inconsistent, but I find the Mozilla solution to be more usable. It never confused me: Mozilla's "close tab" button on the right balances with the "new tab" button on the left. I hope that Hyatt and Apple, before deciding on a solution for Chimera, do usability research with users and don't rely solely on theories of consistency.
sending a snail-mailing to my CA customer list informing them that as of February 28, 2003, we'd no longer have a physical presence in CA, so that if you'll just delay your purchase by three weeks, we'll be delighted save you an extra 8.25% over our CA-based competition.
At which point all your customers put down your letter and wonder who this nutcase is who thinks it takes three weeks to ship from Reno to California (hint: UPS ground does Reno->Bay Area in two days, the same length of time as LA->Bay Area). They then decide to use a sane distributor and you go out of business. Viva Capitalism!
'Is friendship inherited? How would you find out?'
I first learned C++ in 1991, from Ira Pohl, no less. In 1995 I took a graduate seminar in object-oriented programming, again by Dr. Pohl, while getting my MSCS. I have had a job programming in C++ since 1998. And I would have no idea how to answer that question other than "look it up in my copy of Stroustrup". Class friendship is something that I've needed so rarely in my work that I don't know how it works off the top of my head.
If one of your main criteria for what makes a good programmer is "knows every obscure detail of C++ by heart", then I'm not surprised your hires are not working out.
You can bet that a bunch of gun toting NRA members would stand by your side if any of the constitution rights were watered down. Their cause is of a great concern to them and they already have a large lobby and many voters.
Fine. I will become a lifetime member of the NRA, as soon as it breaks Jose Padilla and Yasir Hamdi out of jail.
I've listened for years as NRA members portray gun ownership as the first and last line against government tyranny. Seeing as how gun ownership did nothing to stop slavery, Jim Crow, Japanese internment during WWII, oppression of gays, etc., I've never been very impressed with that argument. But now, today, we have the US government violating American citizens' rights, well, just because. "Evidence? He's an enemy combatant because we say so! How dare you question us!" And what does the NRA do? Nothing.
NRA stand by my side? Feh. The ACLU would help me long before the ever NRA would, so they'll be getting my money (again) this year.
what digital format will still be readable in 25 years?
For pictures, JPEG and GIF. What determines if a standard survives is how open and widespread it is. ASCII is the ultimate example. It's 35 years old, still readable on any computer that an average person is likely to use (and virtually all other computers as well), and is in no danger of going away any time soon. I have no doubt that ASCII will be readable in 2025, and in 2125 as well.
As for JPEG and GIF, they're also very widespread and open. GIF is useless for photographs, so stick with JPEG and you'll be fine. When I digitized my pictures from a trip to Europe in 1997, I made up a simple HTML "album", with pictures and descriptions; it's just as viewable now as it was five years ago. And since HTML is just annotated ASCII, I seriously doubt it will become unviewable in my lifetime. Note that web browsers will display pages that are local files (i.e. not on the net), so setting up a local web server is not really necessary.
I am reminded of what J. Michael Straczynski, creator of Babylon 5, said about the sounds of explosions in space in B5. He said to think of it as music. In the real world, there's no music in the blackness of space, playing dramatically as ships go by, but even physicists don't get upset when they hear music in space in the movies. So think of the sounds of the explosions as music, added for effect.
BTW, I was mildly amused by the ego on display in their review of The Matrix:
The Matrix had real potential as a cerebral thriller.... We would have preferred less oracle mumbo jumbo.... The Matrix fails to meet its potential because it just can't leave the artificial science in the computer simulation along with the artificial intelligence.
Somehow, I don't think the creators were aiming to make it a "cerebral thriller". If the maintainers of intuitor.com didn't like The Matrix, that's fine, but they should review the difference between "fails to meet its potential" and "fails to meet your expectations."
Slashdot Mirror
This is why people hate computers. The Common Application is basically lying to its users, because its developers are too lazy to handle a situation that is both easy to stumble into and can produce really bad results. And your solution? Put the burden on the user to work around the developers' laziness.
If the limit is 1000 characters, then tell the user it's 1000 characters. Don't say "150 words". And make sure that you really can fit 1000 characters on the printed version of the application 100% of the time. This really isn't that hard.
Most speculation on the behavior of aliens generally is. Which is why, 25 years ago, the proposed reason why there were no aliens was because all technologically-advanced civilizations eventually destroy themselves in global thermonuclear war. 25 years from now, the proposed reason will probably have something to do with the alien equivalent of Peak Oil.
So get yourself a PCI Catweasel MK4 controller (or MK2, if you have an ISA slot), a Linux box, a 5.25" floppy drive, and this guy's software.
Done. And it took me all of two minutes on Google to find.
And, given that for every TRS-80 hard drive sold, I would guess that somewhere around 1 million CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drives have been sold, I'd say you'll still be able to find hardware to read CD-ROMs in 2105, never mind 2045.
Whether your CD-Rs will last that long is the real issue.
My synaesthesia is a feature, not a bug.
According to Microsoft, an average Longhorn system will need to have a 4-6GHz CPU. But if when Longhorn arrives, 4GHz CPUs are high-end parts and 6GHz CPUs don't exist, well...I don't predict good things for Microsoft. Longhorn in 2007, anyone? Or maybe 2008...
The same amount they paid me to use my Usenet postings.
I recently got a couple of crowns; some 12 year-old fillings had failed, as they often do when they reach that age. I have a number of other fillings that will probably need to be replaced with crowns over the next few years.
At first I wished that the teeth could be replaced with new ones, but then I realized something. The originals lasted 10-12 years before succumbing to decay, and the filled teeth lasted another 12 years. The crowns are made of porcelain-coated steel. They look great, are impervious to decay, and will probably last for the rest of my life. Why would I want to replace them with the troublesome things that were there before?
One factor is that ballots in the United States tend to be quite long, due to our multiple levels of government and the fact that elected officials serve set terms (with terms at the various levels being synchronized). In the general election next year, for example, I'll be voting for three federal office (President, Representative, Senator), a state equivalent of a Representative, city council positions, a county council representative, various other boards (e.g. school board), probably a dozen statewide referendums and maybe one or two local (city- or county-wide) referendums. And it generally takes a month to certify an election, even with an automated counting process (which is why Arnold Schwarzenneger hasn't been sworn in as governor of California yet).
What's it like in Canada? Does a general election include anything other than federal MP? Do you have separate elections for sepearate offices?
No it didn't. In the 1950s, most of Europe was struggling to rebuild from the ruins of World War II, and in the West this rebuilding was initially subsidized by the (relatively undamaged) United States. Rationing in the U.K., for example, didn't end until 1954.
Speaking for Synopsys (I worked there in the 90s), the migration from Unix to NT was a mid-90s thing that was driven more by industry perception ("Unix is dead; time to move to NT!") than customer demand. The rise of Linux stopped that dead in its tracks. Synopsys's "primary platforms" are now SPARC Solaris, HPUX and Red Hat Linux, and have been for years. NT support, where it exists, is considered "secondary" (along with DEC Alpha, AIX, etc.). I've worked in two EDA startups since then, and neither has seriously considered releasing Windows software (SPARC and Linux are the big players, with HPUX coming in a distant third).
Linux support was driven by customer demand. Once there was enough demand, the folks at Synopsys got over their Linuxphobia ("all Linux users build their own custom kernels! How can we support that ?!?") and started releasing Linux ports.
If you want a MacOS X port of EDA software, and you are a user of EDA software, talk to your vendor. If enough people ask, there will be a port. Though not without some resistence: there are quite a few people in this industry for whom the important thing is not that the box be fast and run Unix, but that it not have that fruity little logo on the front. But that opinion will change given enough cash.
Probably Solaris. I wonder how much Apple has leaned on their software vendors for OS X ports. Not enough, apparently.
A small black monolith has been spotted in the vicinity of the Jupiter model.
Researchers at the University of Maine had no comment.
One of those cool talking trees from The Two Towers.
I've been doing something like this with Linux for a while now. I use a D-Link DSB-R100 (unfortunately discontinued), sox, lame, and crontab. I used to burn the resulting MP3s on a CD-R and take them with me to work, but now I've got an iPod, so I use that instead.
I originally used this setup to record NPR talk shows that I couldn't get on the radio while at work (because of lousy radio reception), but now I also use it to record a local radio station's electronic music show (which starts at 10pm on Saturday and runs for six hours!).
Optimist.
I have to disagree with David Hyatt's opinion about close boxes in tabs. I've used Galeon, and I hate having the close boxes in the individual tabs; a close box in a tab takes up such a large proportion of space that it is very easy to accidentally close a tab just by clicking on it. This happened to me so often that I stopped using Galeon and started using Mozilla.
I suppose having one close box on the right-hand side is conceptually inconsistent, but I find the Mozilla solution to be more usable. It never confused me: Mozilla's "close tab" button on the right balances with the "new tab" button on the left. I hope that Hyatt and Apple, before deciding on a solution for Chimera, do usability research with users and don't rely solely on theories of consistency.
At which point all your customers put down your letter and wonder who this nutcase is who thinks it takes three weeks to ship from Reno to California (hint: UPS ground does Reno->Bay Area in two days, the same length of time as LA->Bay Area). They then decide to use a sane distributor and you go out of business. Viva Capitalism!
Uh huh. Well, my feelings are best summed up with the following quote:
Not surprising. My new robot is already chasing my cat around the living room.
"Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes hurtling down the highway."
Maybe.
I first learned C++ in 1991, from Ira Pohl, no less. In 1995 I took a graduate seminar in object-oriented programming, again by Dr. Pohl, while getting my MSCS. I have had a job programming in C++ since 1998. And I would have no idea how to answer that question other than "look it up in my copy of Stroustrup". Class friendship is something that I've needed so rarely in my work that I don't know how it works off the top of my head.
If one of your main criteria for what makes a good programmer is "knows every obscure detail of C++ by heart", then I'm not surprised your hires are not working out.
Fine. I will become a lifetime member of the NRA, as soon as it breaks Jose Padilla and Yasir Hamdi out of jail.
I've listened for years as NRA members portray gun ownership as the first and last line against government tyranny. Seeing as how gun ownership did nothing to stop slavery, Jim Crow, Japanese internment during WWII, oppression of gays, etc., I've never been very impressed with that argument. But now, today, we have the US government violating American citizens' rights, well, just because. "Evidence? He's an enemy combatant because we say so! How dare you question us!" And what does the NRA do? Nothing.
NRA stand by my side? Feh. The ACLU would help me long before the ever NRA would, so they'll be getting my money (again) this year.
For pictures, JPEG and GIF. What determines if a standard survives is how open and widespread it is. ASCII is the ultimate example. It's 35 years old, still readable on any computer that an average person is likely to use (and virtually all other computers as well), and is in no danger of going away any time soon. I have no doubt that ASCII will be readable in 2025, and in 2125 as well.
As for JPEG and GIF, they're also very widespread and open. GIF is useless for photographs, so stick with JPEG and you'll be fine. When I digitized my pictures from a trip to Europe in 1997, I made up a simple HTML "album", with pictures and descriptions; it's just as viewable now as it was five years ago. And since HTML is just annotated ASCII, I seriously doubt it will become unviewable in my lifetime. Note that web browsers will display pages that are local files (i.e. not on the net), so setting up a local web server is not really necessary.
BTW, I was mildly amused by the ego on display in their review of The Matrix:
Somehow, I don't think the creators were aiming to make it a "cerebral thriller". If the maintainers of intuitor.com didn't like The Matrix, that's fine, but they should review the difference between "fails to meet its potential" and "fails to meet your expectations."