I seem to remember Xoom/Nbci had some free movies on their site (free if you became a member that is).Hmm, Looks like they are gone now. I want an MPG archive of all the Marx Brothers Movies =)
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Whenever I see these things I keep thinking where do these things fit in ?. Way back I was given an Ergo power"brick" which was a 386 sx25 in a "handy" brick format (and weight). The idea was similar but the brick looked cooler with it's purple enamel coating =).
Surely these things (as cool as they are) will be squeezed out by laptops ? I suppose the niche market is impromtue Halflife/Quake/Diablo Lan parties. --
I forgot the figure of objects NASA tracks the moment but it's , pardon the pun, astronomical. Do we really need more ?
If you have a serious experiment that needs time in space why don't you contact your friendly university who, if your experiment is worth it, gladly contact [insert favourite space agency] on your behalf. --
I have seen that tech around for a little while. Trek I think are the original manufacturers and offer 8Mb to 512Mb versions as well as Encrypted drives up to 128Mb [product link].
From the specification page at the above site:
(Secure version of product)
Password Protection Max 15 Characters
Operating Temperature 0C ~ +50C
Storage Temperature -20C ~ +80C
Relative Humidity under operating 20% ~ 80%
Relative Humidity under storage 5% ~ 95%
Insertion 5000 cycles
Data Reading Speed(ThumbDrive Secure to Host) 750Kbytes/Sec(Depending on PC system)
Data Writing Speed(Host to ThumbDrive Secure) 350Kbytes/Sec(Depending on PC system)
Safety Compliance FCC class B, CE
I doubt sincerely that his is a great idea, all they are trying to do is to avoid direct competition with technically superior products (such as the PS2 or even the XBox).
I was under the impression the original Dreamcast had pretty much the necessary capabilities to be a set-top box. With the current shift away from desktop PCs, the "new" set top arrangement with the integrated Dreamcast will still face competition from Sony, TiVo, Microsoft, etc in both the game console and set-top markets. So it basically hasn't changed it's position.
I want a set top box that emulates (older) game consoles , SNES or MAME stuff would be great !! --
Hmm , I do think this is possible but I can only think of one good reason why we'd use them - flexible circuits, maybe i just have a limited imagination. I figure that the good (smart) people at AMD/Transmeta/Intel have a good reason not to use plastics in chip design (short of the fact that you'd have to use a very high melting point plastic =)).
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Hiya,
I work for a school in OZ, given the size of the country and the spread of people in the land they tend to use distance ed quite extensively down here (although not always satisfactorily).
We started a distance ed part beween the "mothership" (main school grounds) and an school in the Snowy Mountains (it does snow in Australia =)). For the moment we are using PC Sharevision (the old creative labs stuff) which has worked remarkably well so far BUT it's point to point. The computer at the remote side is connected to a TV monitor rather then a 15" screen which (at a loss of resultion) allows others in teh class to "see" the teacher. Audio works fine. This is the only way Language classes (requiring usually specialised teachers) was available to the students in the mountains.
If the distance education was for Computing science or other "text based" subjects I wouldn't have gone that way - I would have invested in a Web based system such as WebCt(or for that matter written my own =)).
Just my 2 cents worth =) --
"off-topicish, but id disagree. e.coli is used extensively for genetic research. inserting dna into e.coli's bacteria allows for much of the genetic research in vitro today. splicing vectors in and out allows you to research what genes in humans, and other animals, are responsible for production of certain proteins, etc."
I didn't mean to imply that research with the bacterium is bad. I concur (I wasn't aware that e.coli was used as a host for the gene vectors as you pointed out) it may be a very useful research tool. I was referring to the articles mention of the fact that e.coli "in the wild" often pics up bits of genetic material from it's host (which no doubt is related to what you mentioned) and hence makes it hard to identify & treat.
Just a clarification of my point - I understand what you mean =) --
Other genomes mapped recently include...
on
Rice Genome Mapped
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· Score: 1
e.coli bacteria genome (that is one nasty-arse bacteria)
and Cholera (I assume mapping the genome is the same as decoding it ? I am not sure on this one)
I suppose we can just sit back as people decode anything within reach - Still I don't like it when we(humans) mess with the building blocks of life - I'm sure we'll stuff soemthing up. --
As a joke we once thought we'd auction off the proxy logs from our school to the highest bidder - Some of the sites these "Kids" go to are well below the generally accepted level of decency =). I imagine we'd have had a few high bids too =). --
One of the Professors in this project was interviewed on Sky TV yesterday, they asked him weather SETI like system was necessary and he replied that due to the fact that this was just one "telescope" there was no need for that sort of size approach - but he noticed seti running on a few journalists PCs on his way though the studio =).. hehe
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Indirectly you will be competing with OSDN (if I got the text of teh article right?) and place like that - they have corporate sized money to throw at advertisement and other site associated costs.
I run an Asia-Pac "Nerd" News site called CORE and spend a sh*tload of time just sifting though online news sites and other places of interest (enough time probably to make this a 9-5 Job). So there might be need for wages (eating is non-optional) - and where there is wages there is accountants..etc etc =).
"use any tool you like but don't tell us about it - we'll assume it was Linux".
It's the inclusion of the line "Frankly, most of us don't have a clue about how to check for violations. Just do it. We trust you." that has me wondering - it's not really needed and the whole thing would be much more effective without it so why put it there?
From their point of view it would be bad press if they had to admit that Linux wasn't up to it (and arguably it can't beat the MacOS tools out there for high end stuff).There was a similar thing going on with Linux Journal and why they didn't use Linux tools to do the layout of the magazine.
Doesn't mean Linux can't do the logo - I was considering using Blender which I think is capable of some good stuff (note the link is on "stuff", not "good" =)). --
Best teachers (at Uni) because I can hardly think back to school (actually I can remember a few good ones there too - but I work with them now =) ). Basically anyone that had two qualities : 1. Not showing a "smarter than thou" attitude although they probably were and hence being approachable
2. People that showed where common sense applied and used it to derive the entire set of rules from basic principles - that is just cool.
You can read on if you like but unless you know these people it probably won't make much sense to you =).
Here is my list of people that come to mind immediately. Best Teacher/Lecturer :
Prof. M. Johnson & Dr. L. Hamey , Computing Science at Macquarie Uni Sydney. (Hamey winning the best use of Powerpoint award- yes I know it's MS, but you gotta see that sliding window presentation folks.)
Honorary mention : Prof. L. Maciazek (apologies if mispelled) for being human , and laughing at my silly cartoons =)
Dr. M. Battey Macquarie Uni Sydney Electronics for being human.(Honorary award goes to K. Imrie for bringing common sense into the practicals and for being truely an academic =) and for being able to decifer the mess of wires on my desk as a barrel shift encoder)
This is happening in Australia too - but we're suffering from some sort of failure of takeup =). Here's an article to that point . You can see why the idea is appealing to the law enforcement ppl. It's like a fingerprint database just a little more comprehensive (accurate?).
I think it more sinister having those damn security cameras everywhere - I am not in the actors guild but heck I am sure I get on film just as much...
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Re:"Simple" problems for machine translation
on
Wearable Translators
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· Score: 2
I couldn't agree with you more. That was a pretty damn well written analysis of the article, this sort of thing is what I read slashdot for.
I'd say,due to the complexity of the problem, we would need a different class of computer (neural?) before we could arrive at a workable solution for a synchronous translation machine.
However, in this case a few thing will probably come to aid this device:
Limited "universe" of usage. The phrase translation topics and the use are limited to single languages (two including the "output language" and single areas of use)
That should reduce the number of variations on a meaning a device needs to check before it can generate the output.
"Cross training" There would probably be some for of cross training occuring when used frequently. The wearer would adjust to the machine in the same way the machine adjusts to the wearer (Just look at my handwriting after months use of JOT for the palmpilot =))
L&H have folded, perhaps it was just too difficult? =)
Not sure about heads up displays, or for that matter head mounted. I want displays on(in?) any transparent surface that needs to show info. (think transparent tabletop screens, windows, etc) --
I think you'll find that a lot of cool Computer stuff comes out of finland (Linux, Future Crew stuff , Nokia) because when you have 3 tonnes of snow in front of the door there just isn't much to do other then cut code...
Another mirror here for the.txt , bz2 and.pdb format.
(I can't link to them directly because ci-hosting considers this outside of the unlimited traffic allowance) --
Ok , firstly to remark on the timing of that release.
As many US people are aware Australians love to hate our local communications carrier Telstra - and mostly for a good reason too, what some US people might not have realized is that the Aussie government had this grand plan of outsourceing a lot of public IT work (link from the same paper as the one mentioned in the article). This was no chicken feed deal either - $5 billion dollars worth (~ $US 2.8 billion) - but the plan looks to have crashed and a lot of IT companies banking on this deal got burned. Most likely some companies with reasonable ties to MS as well (Wang would come to mind - MS outsources it's own stuff as well).
So the timing is "peculiar". Also, as some people pointed out, this is not new - Uncle Bill came downunder about 6 months ago and spoke at length about why Australian broadband had a long way to go etc etc..(tried to find the link for this but couldn't oh well..it was done via webcast to all major Australian Universities)
Or perhaps it is because Bill is a little pissed about his treatment in the media (check out the headings on this search done of the fairfax web search =)) --
That is my guess as well - BUT it wouldn't surpise me if a big fat warning would appear on the guy's terminal if a non-registered number would appear.
(on the other hand different timezones have different numbers on their servers). In any case it's interesting to think of the security aspects of this =)..
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jon --
Slashdot Mirror
I seem to remember Xoom/Nbci had some free movies on their site (free if you became a member that is).Hmm, Looks like they are gone now. I want an MPG archive of all the Marx Brothers Movies =)
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Surely these things (as cool as they are) will be squeezed out by laptops ? I suppose the niche market is impromtue Halflife/Quake/Diablo Lan parties.
--
If you have a serious experiment that needs time in space why don't you contact your friendly university who, if your experiment is worth it, gladly contact [insert favourite space agency] on your behalf.
--
From the specification page at the above site:
(Secure version of product)
Password Protection Max 15 Characters
Operating Temperature 0C ~ +50C
Storage Temperature -20C ~ +80C
Relative Humidity under operating 20% ~ 80%
Relative Humidity under storage 5% ~ 95%
Insertion 5000 cycles
Data Reading Speed(ThumbDrive Secure to Host) 750Kbytes/Sec(Depending on PC system)
Data Writing Speed(Host to ThumbDrive Secure) 350Kbytes/Sec(Depending on PC system)
Safety Compliance FCC class B, CE
--
..not faster cpu's that hide the flaws. Case in point "Wordperfect 5 (or 4.2)".
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I was under the impression the original Dreamcast had pretty much the necessary capabilities to be a set-top box. With the current shift away from desktop PCs, the "new" set top arrangement with the integrated Dreamcast will still face competition from Sony, TiVo, Microsoft, etc in both the game console and set-top markets. So it basically hasn't changed it's position.
I want a set top box that emulates (older) game consoles , SNES or MAME stuff would be great !!
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...the MS story on Segfault. What I crave is originality in my humour.
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Damned .. I completely missed that. Damn.
P-l-astic. =(
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Hmm , I do think this is possible but I can only think of one good reason why we'd use them - flexible circuits, maybe i just have a limited imagination. I figure that the good (smart) people at AMD/Transmeta/Intel have a good reason not to use plastics in chip design (short of the fact that you'd have to use a very high melting point plastic =)).
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If the distance education was for Computing science or other "text based" subjects I wouldn't have gone that way - I would have invested in a Web based system such as WebCt(or for that matter written my own =)). Just my 2 cents worth =)
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I didn't mean to imply that research with the bacterium is bad. I concur (I wasn't aware that e.coli was used as a host for the gene vectors as you pointed out) it may be a very useful research tool. I was referring to the articles mention of the fact that e.coli "in the wild" often pics up bits of genetic material from it's host (which no doubt is related to what you mentioned) and hence makes it hard to identify & treat. Just a clarification of my point - I understand what you mean =)
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Cholera (I assume mapping the genome is the same as decoding it ? I am not sure on this one)
I suppose we can just sit back as people decode anything within reach - Still I don't like it when we(humans) mess with the building blocks of life - I'm sure we'll stuff soemthing up.
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As a joke we once thought we'd auction off the proxy logs from our school to the highest bidder - Some of the sites these "Kids" go to are well below the generally accepted level of decency =). I imagine we'd have had a few high bids too =).
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The logical extension of this is paintings, drawings and such
Has anyone started that project yet ?.. Do painting's "copyright" ever expire ?
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One of the Professors in this project was interviewed on Sky TV yesterday, they asked him weather SETI like system was necessary and he replied that due to the fact that this was just one "telescope" there was no need for that sort of size approach - but he noticed seti running on a few journalists PCs on his way though the studio =) .. hehe
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I run an Asia-Pac "Nerd" News site called CORE and spend a sh*tload of time just sifting though online news sites and other places of interest (enough time probably to make this a 9-5 Job). So there might be need for wages (eating is non-optional) - and where there is wages there is accountants ..etc etc =).
Makes me tired just thinking about it...
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It's the inclusion of the line "Frankly, most of us don't have a clue about how to check for violations. Just do it. We trust you." that has me wondering - it's not really needed and the whole thing would be much more effective without it so why put it there? From their point of view it would be bad press if they had to admit that Linux wasn't up to it (and arguably it can't beat the MacOS tools out there for high end stuff).There was a similar thing going on with Linux Journal and why they didn't use Linux tools to do the layout of the magazine. Doesn't mean Linux can't do the logo - I was considering using Blender which I think is capable of some good stuff (note the link is on "stuff", not "good" =)).
--
1. Not showing a "smarter than thou" attitude although they probably were and hence being approachable
2. People that showed where common sense applied and used it to derive the entire set of rules from basic principles - that is just cool.
You can read on if you like but unless you know these people it probably won't make much sense to you =).
Here is my list of people that come to mind immediately. Best Teacher/Lecturer :
Prof. M. Johnson & Dr. L. Hamey , Computing Science at Macquarie Uni Sydney. (Hamey winning the best use of Powerpoint award- yes I know it's MS, but you gotta see that sliding window presentation folks.)
Honorary mention : Prof. L. Maciazek (apologies if mispelled) for being human , and laughing at my silly cartoons =)
Dr. M. Battey Macquarie Uni Sydney Electronics for being human.(Honorary award goes to K. Imrie for bringing common sense into the practicals and for being truely an academic =) and for being able to decifer the mess of wires on my desk as a barrel shift encoder)
There are many more (Thank you to you all)
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I think it more sinister having those damn security cameras everywhere - I am not in the actors guild but heck I am sure I get on film just as much...
--
Limited "universe" of usage.
The phrase translation topics and the use are limited to single languages (two including the "output language" and single areas of use) That should reduce the number of variations on a meaning a device needs to check before it can generate the output.
"Cross training"
There would probably be some for of cross training occuring when used frequently. The wearer would adjust to the machine in the same way the machine adjusts to the wearer (Just look at my handwriting after months use of JOT for the palmpilot =))
L&H have folded, perhaps it was just too difficult? =)
--
Not sure about heads up displays, or for that matter head mounted. I want displays on(in?) any transparent surface that needs to show info. (think transparent tabletop screens, windows, etc)
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(I am probably going to pay for this..oh yes)
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Another mirror here for the .txt , bz2 and .pdb format.
(I can't link to them directly because ci-hosting considers this outside of the unlimited traffic allowance)
--
So the timing is "peculiar". Also, as some people pointed out, this is not new - Uncle Bill came downunder about 6 months ago and spoke at length about why Australian broadband had a long way to go etc etc ..(tried to find the link for this but couldn't oh well..it was done via webcast to all major Australian Universities)
Or perhaps it is because Bill is a little pissed about his treatment in the media (check out the headings on this search done of the fairfax web search =))
--
That is my guess as well - BUT it wouldn't surpise me if a big fat warning would appear on the guy's terminal if a non-registered number would appear. (on the other hand different timezones have different numbers on their servers). In any case it's interesting to think of the security aspects of this =).. -- jon
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