I did a bit of searching to find out what it is. His idea is simply to take files from a machine, and make them accessible on the web. (Potentially via your own subdomain of parakey.com.) To that end, it will probably be a program that would automatically handle the upload of things like digital images from your camera, and important documents to the web. It's conceivable that it's implemented as a virtual file system, but it could be something as simple as a right click menu item that says, "Send to Parakey". It could even be a set of drivers to handle things like digital images automatically. We'll have to see.
No, the question is if this is an efficient use of power today.
In context, we are. The XBox 360 is no power slouch itself. (~160 watts.) Now if you compare 3 cores + GPU to 8 cores + GPU, it becomes clear that the PS3 is simply going to draw more power. A lot more. Proportionally, it should be drawing ~60% more power. The PS3 PSU is proportional (~57% more power) to the capacity of the XBox 360's. We don't know how much of a safety margin was built into these machines, so the actual difference in power usage may be less than 57%. But the maximum is well within the proportional difference of the PS3 vs. the 360.
Personally I think the extremely parallel nature of the PS3 is going to not pan out well. Parallel processing is difficult except for specialized tasks. Everything I've read about video games points to them not being particularly parallel tasks.
I generally agree. However, Sony wants to do more than play video games with it. I think their real failure is in how half-baked their multimedia center plan is vs. the hardware design. If they weren't going to need all this parallel power, they shouldn't have paid the price to install it. Unfortunately, Sony thinks they'll come up with the exact usage later, just as long as its in the hardware now. Someone should really explain to them about $600 being a lot of money for such a loose marketing strategy.
Stop believing that a majority even knows and even if they did know that would care about any of those assholish and idiotic actions by sony
The "majority" doesn't have $600+ to shell out at launch. (If some of the reports are to be believed, all the preorders are going to scalpers. So early adopters will be paying a LOT more.) The "majority" be saving up and waiting for a price drop. The "early adopters" (i.e. the same ones who shell out $2000 for an HDTV, and use Lik-Sang to import expensive games from across the ocean) are usually tech concious folks. Exactly the type you'll find on Slashdot, Digg, Arstechnica, Penny Arcade, GameSpot, IGN, etc.
Sony needs to prove their machine's worth out of the gate. Otherwise the "majority" are going to give into peer pressure and get a Wii instead. They can't prove their machine's worth if the early adopters don't advertise its benefits for them. Since they've pissed off those early adopters, it would seem that Sony has royally f***ed themselves over.
Are modern console hardware designers getting sloppy?
Only if you consider a console with more processing power than older Cray Supercomputers for a fraction of the energy cost to be "sloppy". Let me put that in context to explain what I mean.
One of the things that Digital pioneered with its Alpha chips was the matter of clocking CPUs at incredibly high speeds (for the time); easily breeching 200MHz. With the fabrication technology of the time, however, such high speeds were found to have major issues with problems like metastability. By upping the amount of power applied to the chip, they found that they could force the logic to switch faster and thus reduce these issues. This research was the basis for modern chip design. The more power you apply, the faster you can clock the CPU. (With various caveats freely sprinkled in.)
Now put yourself in Sony's place. You decide you want to build the most powerful game console EVER; with cost being no barrier. So you go and pick up this super-computer-on-a-chip technology from IBM. (The Cell) You then ask NVidia for their latest GPU technology to combine with that processor. You then take a look at the system, to decide how high you should clock it. You decide to max out the GPU for MAXIMUM PERFORMANCE. (Who wouldn't?) So you're now chewing upwards of 100 watts just on your GPU. Then you decide that a power friendly 1.5GHz isn't going to cut it in this competitive race. (Especially if you've got spies over at Microsoft, who are reporting back 3GHz chips.) So you look at it, and decide to ramp up for MAXIMUM CPU PERFORMANCE. Now you've got 3GHz, but your CPU is also using 100+ watts.
So it's really no surprise that the PS3 is consuming so much power. The real issue is whether the super-computer-on-a-chip idea was really the way to go. Some people seem to think so. Some even believe that it's a requirement to hit 1080p resolutions. Only time will prove them out, though. In the meantime, Sony is banking on the consumers being taken with an uber-powerful system. If they'll purchase Aibos and HDTVs, they'll purchase a $600 PS3, right?
Separate Note: Of course, Sony keeps shooting themselves in the foot. This strategy *might* have worked reasonably well if confidence in Sony was still high. But with people boycotting them over everything from rootkits to Lik-Sang, PLUS Sony's extremely poor E3 presentations, PLUS their general arrogance when handling the public, I seriously doubt that they're going far this generation.
You'll only need a desktop browser to bootstrap the web app browser.
You laugh, but that's pretty close to what the Mozilla-based browsers do. They are basically an empty window that gets filled by some sort of web technology. (XUL in the case of FireFox.) The HTML rendering pane is just another control inside a web document. That rendering pane could theoretically hold another copy of FireFox inside of it, as it can render XUL just as well as HTML.
I have actually done a web browser inside of a webbrowser by using DHTML and an IFrame. The only issue that prevents the browser from becoming fully functional is the security restrictions placed on the History and Location objects. A signed script could (theoretically) give you a complete interface with working back/forward buttons, bookmarks, location bar updates when clicking a link, etc.
Is there any chance that this could be used in court cases to challenge polygraph test results?
Polygraphs are already inadmissable as court evidence, and can no longer be used to screen employees. Pretty much the only area you'll run into them is in federal jobs requiring security clearance. Investigators also use them on occasion to determine if the suspect is misleading them during an investigation, but the results can't be held against the subject of the test.
The truth is that the polygraph is a form of psychological testing. The results are meaningless unless the "operator" is a well trained psychologist. Even then, he may be unable to extract the "truth" from you; partly because "truth" is a subjective matter. In addition, some people don't do well (or do TOO well) under stress testing. So the results can be bogus in those cases. Basically, polygraphs are unreliable at best, and should never be counted on for accurate information.
I did Babelfish and Google translations of the page. While both (annoyingly) drop the "Live" part of "do!Live", it does appear I was correct. The slogan is "do!Game, do!Choice, do!Live", with each of the three standing for the features I was referring to. I'm still unclear on the spacing (i.e. is it "do!Game" or "do! Game"), but I think the mystery is otherwise solved.:-)
I dunno. The article seems to suggest that the slogan is actually:
do!Game, do!Choice, do!Live
The "do!XBox 360" is only in the title. The rest of the article (what I can decipher, anyway) dissects the three contructs above. Look a little lower, and you'll even see them each discussed in a table. It would appear that each "do!" is intended to represent some sort of attribute about the XBox 360.
i.e.:
do!Game - Possibly representing the game library available. do!Choice - Possibly referring to "chosing" the hardware and accessories to meet your gaming and multimedia lifestyle. do!Live - Almost certainly referring to the connectivity of the console.
Really? I guess that would make the manga/movie X a little hard for them to swallow. Not to mention the Japanese rock band X Japan.
Most countries that don't use the Roman character set are still quite familiar with it. In fact, you'll find common examples of English in nearly every country in the world. It always amazes me when I'm given a box of candy from Russia that has the label in English. Go figure.
In China, we don't have software blocking Internet sites. Sometimes we have trouble accessing them.
I didn't lose it, I just don't remember where I put it.
I'm not lost, I just don't know where I am.
I'm not paranoid, everyone IS out to get me!
I'm not sleeping, I'm just resting my eyes.
Are we really going to trust a nation that doesn't even follow its own constitution*? Oh, that's right. There's an escape clause in there that says, "the government can steamroll the people, no matter what the Constitution says. You just can't steamroll each other." Well that's peachy keen.
* Disclaimer: Link is to an article on my blog. Do not click if you're afraid of people who link to their own blogs. P.S. Boo.
How do you keep a turkey in suspense? Don't interview any of the attendees to find out what they thought of Nintendo's booth! (GRRR!)
Unfortunately, all of the articles on Google News are just Newswire reprints of the link in the summary. I had to do some serious digging to find a story that had a bit more substance. This link gives a few reactions, photos of the event, and a video of an older fellow playing the Wii. He seems to have an uncertain, yet fascinated look on his face as he picks up a spare in Wii Sports Bowling. Very interesting stuff!
Instead of developing new talent or cultivating the talent they already have, companies "develop" new technology by gobbling up other companies.
Now you know why entrepreneurship is such a hot market at the moment. The business plan is:
1. Boss won't listen about developing new technology. 2. Leave to found new company based on technology. 3. Technology is very cool, but no massive coporate support. 4. Corporations see that your boss was an idiot (without actually blaming your boss) and purchase your company. 5. You profit!!!
Additional steps:
6. Key developers hate the new corporate work environment because their boss won't listen, and leave for the next startup. 7. Cycle repeats.
I think the problem stems from just so many great jobs available for great designers and developers in the industry these days. We've been looking for an Interactive Creative Director for a few months now, with no impressive resumes coming in.
Of course not. Because candidates are more than the sum of their resumes. One candidate might have a super-impressive resume, but only be a mediocre programmer. (In some cases, they're lousy.) Another candidate may appear to have a mediocre resume, but ends up being a perfect fit for the role. As a result, "superstar" programmers are almost never found through resume searches. They're found through word of mouth or networking. Sometimes you accidently hire someone for another role who happens to fill the other role perfectly. But I guarantee that you would throw out the resume of a candidate who could meet your needs.
Seriously, the entire hiring process needs to be revamped. Your on the job experience is often less important these days than your off the job experience. So perhaps we should start asking for examples of work. However, that would also require that employers list what skills they find important, and not the technologies in particular.
For example, I could nail your HTML/CSS/JavaScript/etc. requirements easily. I can make demos that would make you cry, "I didn't know you could do that in a web browser!" But that might not make me a good fit for your positions. Most likely, you really want an artist who is technically competent. Yet you're asking for a strong programmer, which is going to get you a completely different class of resume. The two are rarely one and the same.
Of course, I may be misreading your ads. However, I've interviewed with a few companies like yours in the Madison area. What they ask for and what they want are almost never the same thing.
Instead, DIRECT would be ready in either 2010 or 2011. Big difference.
You shouldn't put so much stock in what it says on paper. If the DIRECT program goes forward, it will NOT be flying by 2010. Nor 2011. In fact, we'll be lucky if it's flying by 2016. After all, it's based on the same technology as the Ares-V. Simply scaling it back does little to improve the schedule of the program. It may seem like it on paper, but the reality of this has never held true.
OTH, DIRECT can do 2/3 of the weight for a fraction of the cost of development as well as cheaper to launch.
It does this on paper, not with figures that can be easily backed up. The Space Shuttle was supposed to save massive amounts of cash on launches as well. Notice how well that prediction worked out.
DIRECT will not be the jack of all trade.
That is what it is being sold as. If you sell this to Congress and renege, they'll come back and demand to know why it isn't being used as the jack of all trades. It's almost guaranteed that the DIRECT would be forced into multiple roles.
In addition, the massive cost savings that you see (on paper) are a result of combining the Ares-I and Ares-V development into a single vehicle. If you go off and man-rate some other vehicle, then you're back to where you started in respect to costs. The costs may even increase, since you'd be developing a vehicle that's more complicated than is required by the mission profile. (i.e. Why do you need a complex staged design if you're never going to launch a single-stage version?)
In particular, it will allow for sending up a larger version of the BA-330 (perhaps the BA-500 with lots of fuel and supplies).
You could build a very large inflatible space station with the cargo capacity of either of these rockets. Where you actually need the capacity is for vehicles that depart low earth orbit. Heavy things like Lunar Landers, Mars Orbiters, Mars Landers, Asteroid Mining Missions, Moon Base Supplies, etc.
Offhand, I would guess that DIRECT is exactly what we need.
That's exactly the problem. Offhand it looks great. It's only once you dig in that it becomes clear that the idea is unsound. For example, why the use of the RS-68 engines? They're not rated for manned flight, and were not going to be used on the Ares-I. Rating these engines for the intended use would likely delay the DIRECT program past the 2010 deadline. As you said yourself, if we're not flying, then the manned space program is dead.
The CEV Program ensures space access by reserving the RS-68 for the larger Ares-V. The Ares-I would require NO new technology, making it more likely to fly by 2010. Even if the Ares-V isn't. As I said, the CEV Program is the more pragmatic approach. Warts and all.
NASA doesn't need the extra weight that the Ares V can throw.
And you know that... how? In fact, NASA will need all the weight it can throw going forward. Sure, a simple moon mission might not require it, but what about a Mars mission? There will need to be significantly more fuel and hardware boosted for that operation. And what about a lunar transfer point in LEO? That was one of the original intentions of the ISS. The DIRECT would require at least three flights to lift the weight of the current ISS design, while the Ares-V could do it in two. More advanced concepts (e.g. a spinning station) would require even larger tonnage. I won't even get into the issue of launching materials for a moon or Mars base, much less an asteroid mining operation.
Further, this launch platform is more likely to be replaced by commercial launch capability than the Ares V. This would hasten NASA's exodus from the launch market.
Currently, there are no commercial launchers that can even touch either the DIRECT or the Ares-V designs. It's unlikely that this will change, leaving NASA (and the military by extension) severely underpowered for space operations.
I'm missing something here. Glancing at the DIRECT design, I don't see why it would require an engine to be man-rated before it is "ready". After all, they could test new design changes by launching cargo.
You are missing something. The RS-68 has flown only six times, with mixed results. To "man-rate" the vehicle, it would need to fly a lot more. The CEV Program addresses this issue by flying the RS-68 on a cargo-only craft. The man-rated craft will fly with the highly reliable J-2 engines used in the Saturn V. The J-2 is designed for in-flight restart, a key feature in these plans. AFAIK, the RS-68 is not designed for restarts, nor has it been tested for such.
There was a crash program underway to design a restart system for the RS-68, but NASA found the use of the J-2 to be a safer and more economical solution.
It seems to me that you would start with a configuration that isn't man-rated and work out the problems with relatively low-value cargo launches.
Launching what exactly? The DIRECT program does away with manned space travel until the RS-68 is man-rated. However, Project Constellation calls for the cargo booster and passenger vehicle to be used in conjunction. If there are no people to launch, there is no cargo to launch. Especially for something as powerful as a Super Booster. I suppose we could lift weapons platforms like the Russians did, but I doubt that the international community would be very happy.
But the CEV is vehicle agnostic, right?
The Orion is (theoretically) vehicle agnostic. The CEV Program is the plan to build the Ares-I, the Ares-V, and the Orion.
I don't see any problem with launching it on a DIRECT rocket or some commercial vehicle, should one of sufficient capability come out while the CEV is still in service.
I don't see a problem with a commercial vehicle, either. I *do* see a lot of problems with the DIRECT plan, as outlined above.
Single-flight Lunar missions in the same style as Apollo are planned - mainly to be used for Crew Rotation to the planned Lunar science base.
Got a link? The last plan that NASA announced was to launch the Lunar Lander + Moon Booster as cargo, then have the Orion dock with the lunar module. This was what was shown in NASA's presentation video. This plan did NOT call for the Ares-V to be man-rated.
If that's changed, then you should probably update the Wikipedia Info on Project Constellation. Remember to cite your sources.
And NASA's already planning on using RS-68 for the *man-rated* Ares-V "big brother" - assuming it is ever built.
The Ares-V *is* the big brother. To the best of my knowledge, it will not be man-rated. It is intended as a purely cargo-carrying craft used to deliver raw materials, space platforms, and interplanetary vehicles into orbit. The man-rated vehicle will be the Ares-I, which will use the classic J-2 engines for reliability, weight, and and restart capabilities. It will carry the crew to the various destinations and vehicles that the Ares-V will lift.
This compares to the current shuttle lift capacity of 16+ metric ton.
The shuttle has an absolute lift power of ~120 metric tonnes. The fact that the majority of the lift power is used in lifting the Space Shuttle itself brings the maximum cargo lift weight down to ~25 metric tonnes.
Son, packaged correctly, you could launch the entire remaining ISS sections into space at one time.
Why wouldn't the 130 metric tonne to LEO Ares V do the same? With the DIRECT, you could finish the Space Station. (A useless piece of junk in the wrong orbit.) With the Ares V, you could launch a new one in only two flights.
I frankly don't know how they plan to get that much more thrust and lift capability out of those SRBs and new engines...but if they think they can do it, I'd be inclined to support them whole heartedly.
All these technologies are "shuttle derived". Which means that the Super Booster capabilities of the Shuttle are separated from the Space Shuttle vehicle, and placed into a more traditional stack. Through the use of more engines and staging, NASA plans to launch more absolute weight with the Ares V than the Shuttle can launch today. The DIRECT would actually scale back the absolute weight.
The Ares has an upgrade path (read: even more tonnage per launch) through the development of better engines. The DIRECT design anticipates those engines, and demands that they be manrated before they are ready. Which should raise a lot of red flags.
Basically, the DIRECT design stands out as a beautiful paper concept. It all seems to come together into the perfect solution, but ignores the realities of the situation. More likely than not, we'd never get a craft off the ground if we went with the DIRECT design. Warts or not, the CEV is the pragmatic solution. We need to follow the program through to conclusion, and not get distracted by the paper ideas that jump out at us.
That would be great... if the ISS were on a more equitorial orbit.
Who mentioned the ISS? They were talking about construction yards on the Moon.
As for the ISS, it's too bad that it's a political boondoggle. It's essentially worthless right now, but at least allows us to fly the flag. (Hey look! We got a Space Station!) Once the Ares V comes online, the ISS will be worthless, useless, and easily replaceable. Being able to launch 130 metric tonnes to LEO means that we could launch a complete ISS replacement in only two launches! It has taken 17 shuttle flights to get the ISS to its currently incomplete state. In that time, the hardware that's already in space has been deteriorating due to the difficulties in maintaining the build/maintenance schedules, and compatibility issues between American and Russian hardware.
If we wanted to fly JIMO, we'd take the money out of the ISS's budget. It's too bad that would effectively kill the Shuttle Program. Killing the Shuttle Program would mean political suicide for manned flight, which would lead to the implosion of the CEV program.
Limiting ourselves to this design means severely limiting our throw power, limiting our hardware options, and limiting the mindset of those in the Space Program. Think about that last one for a moment. The mindset for the last 20 years has been "it *must* be the Space Shuttle". If you build this craft, then you'll get the mindset, "It *must* be the DIRECT."
As we introduce new and varied space vehicle, we can help break that mindset and push launch technology forward. As the parent said, a modified Delta or Atlas could easily meet the needs of the Aries I. If we have separate crew vs. cargo craft, then there can finally be a push to reach a more flexible mindset.
We must not tie ourselves to any one space technology. Build what we need to, but leave the door open for new innovations.
No, this is a very bad idea. Hasn't the Space Shuttle proven anything? If you build a space vehicle that's the jack of all trades, you end up with a vehicle that's the master of none.
A lot of people would point to the Saturn V as a successful implementation of the DIRECT concept. Indeed, it would appear to have been an exceptional program, capable of carrying both humans and cargo depending on the configuration. What those same people don't realize, however, is that operating the Saturn V as a crew vehicle was incredibly expensive. Far more expensive than simple space shots with lighter rockets. At the time it made sense, because the end goal was a single moonshot. We didn't particularly care that we were wasting thousands of tonnes of hardware just to bring back a tonne or two after each flight. We got to the f**king moon, man!
Unfortunately, the scientists and engineers working at NASA in those days knew that such expensive flights were unsustainable. Thus the ideas of the Space Shuttle and Big Gemini were proposed. The latter offered more crew per launch, meaning that it could effectively staff a space station for costs competitive with the then current two/three man launches. The former would have been able to handle a smaller crew, but at a drastically reduced launch cost.
Enter politics. The idea of two vehicles was killed by the Nixon administration, and the Space Shuttle was forced to become the jack of all trades. The result was a vehicle so expensive to fly, that it offered no actual savings over the previous Saturn V flights. It would seem that Super Boosters are expensive to fly. So it should have taught us to make sure that each kilogram our Super Boosters carry is worth the cost of flying it. (The Space Shuttle wastes the majority of its Super Booster power on its own bulk.)
When Mike Griffin took control of NASA, he was well aware of this issue. So he worked with the engineers to develop a separate rocket for crew, and a separate rocket for cargo. The two would be based on the same technology (for cost savings), but would have wildly different certifications and cost per launch figures. They would also offer the flexibility of launching massive amounts of cargo (far in excess of the DIRECT plan) that could be utilized by the astronauts flying on the cheaper vehicle. Concepts like a single-launch space station, or pre-fabbed Mars vehicle were reasonble cargos for this vehicle.
Now the DIRECT concept wants to revive all the same mistakes made with the Shuttle. It seems like a very bad idea to me. Maybe I'll change my mind as I review more and more of the information on the proposal, but my gut says that we shouldn't mess with the CEV program. We've got a good thing going there, so we need to get it done. Not reinvent the concept every few years in typical NASA fashion.:(
You wouldn't. The virus/rootkit would. The fact that the features exist are enough for it to exploit. If you were already running virtualization, you'd probably be safer.
Slashdot Mirror
I did a bit of searching to find out what it is. His idea is simply to take files from a machine, and make them accessible on the web. (Potentially via your own subdomain of parakey.com.) To that end, it will probably be a program that would automatically handle the upload of things like digital images from your camera, and important documents to the web. It's conceivable that it's implemented as a virtual file system, but it could be something as simple as a right click menu item that says, "Send to Parakey". It could even be a set of drivers to handle things like digital images automatically. We'll have to see.
In context, we are. The XBox 360 is no power slouch itself. (~160 watts.) Now if you compare 3 cores + GPU to 8 cores + GPU, it becomes clear that the PS3 is simply going to draw more power. A lot more. Proportionally, it should be drawing ~60% more power. The PS3 PSU is proportional (~57% more power) to the capacity of the XBox 360's. We don't know how much of a safety margin was built into these machines, so the actual difference in power usage may be less than 57%. But the maximum is well within the proportional difference of the PS3 vs. the 360.
I generally agree. However, Sony wants to do more than play video games with it. I think their real failure is in how half-baked their multimedia center plan is vs. the hardware design. If they weren't going to need all this parallel power, they shouldn't have paid the price to install it. Unfortunately, Sony thinks they'll come up with the exact usage later, just as long as its in the hardware now. Someone should really explain to them about $600 being a lot of money for such a loose marketing strategy.
The "majority" doesn't have $600+ to shell out at launch. (If some of the reports are to be believed, all the preorders are going to scalpers. So early adopters will be paying a LOT more.) The "majority" be saving up and waiting for a price drop. The "early adopters" (i.e. the same ones who shell out $2000 for an HDTV, and use Lik-Sang to import expensive games from across the ocean) are usually tech concious folks. Exactly the type you'll find on Slashdot, Digg, Arstechnica, Penny Arcade, GameSpot, IGN, etc.
Sony needs to prove their machine's worth out of the gate. Otherwise the "majority" are going to give into peer pressure and get a Wii instead. They can't prove their machine's worth if the early adopters don't advertise its benefits for them. Since they've pissed off those early adopters, it would seem that Sony has royally f***ed themselves over.
Only if you consider a console with more processing power than older Cray Supercomputers for a fraction of the energy cost to be "sloppy". Let me put that in context to explain what I mean.
One of the things that Digital pioneered with its Alpha chips was the matter of clocking CPUs at incredibly high speeds (for the time); easily breeching 200MHz. With the fabrication technology of the time, however, such high speeds were found to have major issues with problems like metastability. By upping the amount of power applied to the chip, they found that they could force the logic to switch faster and thus reduce these issues. This research was the basis for modern chip design. The more power you apply, the faster you can clock the CPU. (With various caveats freely sprinkled in.)
Now put yourself in Sony's place. You decide you want to build the most powerful game console EVER; with cost being no barrier. So you go and pick up this super-computer-on-a-chip technology from IBM. (The Cell) You then ask NVidia for their latest GPU technology to combine with that processor. You then take a look at the system, to decide how high you should clock it. You decide to max out the GPU for MAXIMUM PERFORMANCE. (Who wouldn't?) So you're now chewing upwards of 100 watts just on your GPU. Then you decide that a power friendly 1.5GHz isn't going to cut it in this competitive race. (Especially if you've got spies over at Microsoft, who are reporting back 3GHz chips.) So you look at it, and decide to ramp up for MAXIMUM CPU PERFORMANCE. Now you've got 3GHz, but your CPU is also using 100+ watts.
So it's really no surprise that the PS3 is consuming so much power. The real issue is whether the super-computer-on-a-chip idea was really the way to go. Some people seem to think so. Some even believe that it's a requirement to hit 1080p resolutions. Only time will prove them out, though. In the meantime, Sony is banking on the consumers being taken with an uber-powerful system. If they'll purchase Aibos and HDTVs, they'll purchase a $600 PS3, right?
Separate Note: Of course, Sony keeps shooting themselves in the foot. This strategy *might* have worked reasonably well if confidence in Sony was still high. But with people boycotting them over everything from rootkits to Lik-Sang, PLUS Sony's extremely poor E3 presentations, PLUS their general arrogance when handling the public, I seriously doubt that they're going far this generation.
You laugh, but that's pretty close to what the Mozilla-based browsers do. They are basically an empty window that gets filled by some sort of web technology. (XUL in the case of FireFox.) The HTML rendering pane is just another control inside a web document. That rendering pane could theoretically hold another copy of FireFox inside of it, as it can render XUL just as well as HTML.
I have actually done a web browser inside of a webbrowser by using DHTML and an IFrame. The only issue that prevents the browser from becoming fully functional is the security restrictions placed on the History and Location objects. A signed script could (theoretically) give you a complete interface with working back/forward buttons, bookmarks, location bar updates when clicking a link, etc.
Polygraphs are already inadmissable as court evidence, and can no longer be used to screen employees. Pretty much the only area you'll run into them is in federal jobs requiring security clearance. Investigators also use them on occasion to determine if the suspect is misleading them during an investigation, but the results can't be held against the subject of the test.
The truth is that the polygraph is a form of psychological testing. The results are meaningless unless the "operator" is a well trained psychologist. Even then, he may be unable to extract the "truth" from you; partly because "truth" is a subjective matter. In addition, some people don't do well (or do TOO well) under stress testing. So the results can be bogus in those cases. Basically, polygraphs are unreliable at best, and should never be counted on for accurate information.
I did Babelfish and Google translations of the page. While both (annoyingly) drop the "Live" part of "do!Live", it does appear I was correct. The slogan is "do!Game, do!Choice, do!Live", with each of the three standing for the features I was referring to. I'm still unclear on the spacing (i.e. is it "do!Game" or "do! Game"), but I think the mystery is otherwise solved. :-)
I dunno. The article seems to suggest that the slogan is actually:
do!Game, do!Choice, do!Live
The "do!XBox 360" is only in the title. The rest of the article (what I can decipher, anyway) dissects the three contructs above. Look a little lower, and you'll even see them each discussed in a table. It would appear that each "do!" is intended to represent some sort of attribute about the XBox 360.
i.e.:
do!Game - Possibly representing the game library available.
do!Choice - Possibly referring to "chosing" the hardware and accessories to meet your gaming and multimedia lifestyle.
do!Live - Almost certainly referring to the connectivity of the console.
Really? I guess that would make the manga/movie X a little hard for them to swallow. Not to mention the Japanese rock band X Japan.
Most countries that don't use the Roman character set are still quite familiar with it. In fact, you'll find common examples of English in nearly every country in the world. It always amazes me when I'm given a box of candy from Russia that has the label in English. Go figure.
I didn't lose it, I just don't remember where I put it.
I'm not lost, I just don't know where I am.
I'm not paranoid, everyone IS out to get me!
I'm not sleeping, I'm just resting my eyes.
Are we really going to trust a nation that doesn't even follow its own constitution*? Oh, that's right. There's an escape clause in there that says, "the government can steamroll the people, no matter what the Constitution says. You just can't steamroll each other." Well that's peachy keen.
* Disclaimer: Link is to an article on my blog. Do not click if you're afraid of people who link to their own blogs. P.S. Boo.
How do you keep a turkey in suspense? Don't interview any of the attendees to find out what they thought of Nintendo's booth! (GRRR!)
Unfortunately, all of the articles on Google News are just Newswire reprints of the link in the summary. I had to do some serious digging to find a story that had a bit more substance. This link gives a few reactions, photos of the event, and a video of an older fellow playing the Wii. He seems to have an uncertain, yet fascinated look on his face as he picks up a spare in Wii Sports Bowling. Very interesting stuff!
Hey, leave me out of this!
Do not taunt happy-fun battery.
Now you know why entrepreneurship is such a hot market at the moment. The business plan is:
1. Boss won't listen about developing new technology.
2. Leave to found new company based on technology.
3. Technology is very cool, but no massive coporate support.
4. Corporations see that your boss was an idiot (without actually blaming your boss) and purchase your company.
5. You profit!!!
Additional steps:
6. Key developers hate the new corporate work environment because their boss won't listen, and leave for the next startup.
7. Cycle repeats.
Of course not. Because candidates are more than the sum of their resumes. One candidate might have a super-impressive resume, but only be a mediocre programmer. (In some cases, they're lousy.) Another candidate may appear to have a mediocre resume, but ends up being a perfect fit for the role. As a result, "superstar" programmers are almost never found through resume searches. They're found through word of mouth or networking. Sometimes you accidently hire someone for another role who happens to fill the other role perfectly. But I guarantee that you would throw out the resume of a candidate who could meet your needs.
Seriously, the entire hiring process needs to be revamped. Your on the job experience is often less important these days than your off the job experience. So perhaps we should start asking for examples of work. However, that would also require that employers list what skills they find important, and not the technologies in particular.
For example, I could nail your HTML/CSS/JavaScript/etc. requirements easily. I can make demos that would make you cry, "I didn't know you could do that in a web browser!" But that might not make me a good fit for your positions. Most likely, you really want an artist who is technically competent. Yet you're asking for a strong programmer, which is going to get you a completely different class of resume. The two are rarely one and the same.
Of course, I may be misreading your ads. However, I've interviewed with a few companies like yours in the Madison area. What they ask for and what they want are almost never the same thing.
You shouldn't put so much stock in what it says on paper. If the DIRECT program goes forward, it will NOT be flying by 2010. Nor 2011. In fact, we'll be lucky if it's flying by 2016. After all, it's based on the same technology as the Ares-V. Simply scaling it back does little to improve the schedule of the program. It may seem like it on paper, but the reality of this has never held true.
It does this on paper, not with figures that can be easily backed up. The Space Shuttle was supposed to save massive amounts of cash on launches as well. Notice how well that prediction worked out.
That is what it is being sold as. If you sell this to Congress and renege, they'll come back and demand to know why it isn't being used as the jack of all trades. It's almost guaranteed that the DIRECT would be forced into multiple roles.
In addition, the massive cost savings that you see (on paper) are a result of combining the Ares-I and Ares-V development into a single vehicle. If you go off and man-rate some other vehicle, then you're back to where you started in respect to costs. The costs may even increase, since you'd be developing a vehicle that's more complicated than is required by the mission profile. (i.e. Why do you need a complex staged design if you're never going to launch a single-stage version?)
You could build a very large inflatible space station with the cargo capacity of either of these rockets. Where you actually need the capacity is for vehicles that depart low earth orbit. Heavy things like Lunar Landers, Mars Orbiters, Mars Landers, Asteroid Mining Missions, Moon Base Supplies, etc.
That's exactly the problem. Offhand it looks great. It's only once you dig in that it becomes clear that the idea is unsound. For example, why the use of the RS-68 engines? They're not rated for manned flight, and were not going to be used on the Ares-I. Rating these engines for the intended use would likely delay the DIRECT program past the 2010 deadline. As you said yourself, if we're not flying, then the manned space program is dead.
The CEV Program ensures space access by reserving the RS-68 for the larger Ares-V. The Ares-I would require NO new technology, making it more likely to fly by 2010. Even if the Ares-V isn't. As I said, the CEV Program is the more pragmatic approach. Warts and all.
And you know that... how? In fact, NASA will need all the weight it can throw going forward. Sure, a simple moon mission might not require it, but what about a Mars mission? There will need to be significantly more fuel and hardware boosted for that operation. And what about a lunar transfer point in LEO? That was one of the original intentions of the ISS. The DIRECT would require at least three flights to lift the weight of the current ISS design, while the Ares-V could do it in two. More advanced concepts (e.g. a spinning station) would require even larger tonnage. I won't even get into the issue of launching materials for a moon or Mars base, much less an asteroid mining operation.
Currently, there are no commercial launchers that can even touch either the DIRECT or the Ares-V designs. It's unlikely that this will change, leaving NASA (and the military by extension) severely underpowered for space operations.
You are missing something. The RS-68 has flown only six times, with mixed results. To "man-rate" the vehicle, it would need to fly a lot more. The CEV Program addresses this issue by flying the RS-68 on a cargo-only craft. The man-rated craft will fly with the highly reliable J-2 engines used in the Saturn V. The J-2 is designed for in-flight restart, a key feature in these plans. AFAIK, the RS-68 is not designed for restarts, nor has it been tested for such.
There was a crash program underway to design a restart system for the RS-68, but NASA found the use of the J-2 to be a safer and more economical solution.
Launching what exactly? The DIRECT program does away with manned space travel until the RS-68 is man-rated. However, Project Constellation calls for the cargo booster and passenger vehicle to be used in conjunction. If there are no people to launch, there is no cargo to launch. Especially for something as powerful as a Super Booster. I suppose we could lift weapons platforms like the Russians did, but I doubt that the international community would be very happy.
The Orion is (theoretically) vehicle agnostic. The CEV Program is the plan to build the Ares-I, the Ares-V, and the Orion.
I don't see a problem with a commercial vehicle, either. I *do* see a lot of problems with the DIRECT plan, as outlined above.
Got a link? The last plan that NASA announced was to launch the Lunar Lander + Moon Booster as cargo, then have the Orion dock with the lunar module. This was what was shown in NASA's presentation video. This plan did NOT call for the Ares-V to be man-rated.
If that's changed, then you should probably update the Wikipedia Info on Project Constellation. Remember to cite your sources.
The Ares-V *is* the big brother. To the best of my knowledge, it will not be man-rated. It is intended as a purely cargo-carrying craft used to deliver raw materials, space platforms, and interplanetary vehicles into orbit. The man-rated vehicle will be the Ares-I, which will use the classic J-2 engines for reliability, weight, and and restart capabilities. It will carry the crew to the various destinations and vehicles that the Ares-V will lift.
The shuttle has an absolute lift power of ~120 metric tonnes. The fact that the majority of the lift power is used in lifting the Space Shuttle itself brings the maximum cargo lift weight down to ~25 metric tonnes.
Why wouldn't the 130 metric tonne to LEO Ares V do the same? With the DIRECT, you could finish the Space Station. (A useless piece of junk in the wrong orbit.) With the Ares V, you could launch a new one in only two flights.
All these technologies are "shuttle derived". Which means that the Super Booster capabilities of the Shuttle are separated from the Space Shuttle vehicle, and placed into a more traditional stack. Through the use of more engines and staging, NASA plans to launch more absolute weight with the Ares V than the Shuttle can launch today. The DIRECT would actually scale back the absolute weight.
The Ares has an upgrade path (read: even more tonnage per launch) through the development of better engines. The DIRECT design anticipates those engines, and demands that they be manrated before they are ready. Which should raise a lot of red flags.
Basically, the DIRECT design stands out as a beautiful paper concept. It all seems to come together into the perfect solution, but ignores the realities of the situation. More likely than not, we'd never get a craft off the ground if we went with the DIRECT design. Warts or not, the CEV is the pragmatic solution. We need to follow the program through to conclusion, and not get distracted by the paper ideas that jump out at us.
Who mentioned the ISS? They were talking about construction yards on the Moon.
As for the ISS, it's too bad that it's a political boondoggle. It's essentially worthless right now, but at least allows us to fly the flag. (Hey look! We got a Space Station!) Once the Ares V comes online, the ISS will be worthless, useless, and easily replaceable. Being able to launch 130 metric tonnes to LEO means that we could launch a complete ISS replacement in only two launches! It has taken 17 shuttle flights to get the ISS to its currently incomplete state. In that time, the hardware that's already in space has been deteriorating due to the difficulties in maintaining the build/maintenance schedules, and compatibility issues between American and Russian hardware.
If we wanted to fly JIMO, we'd take the money out of the ISS's budget. It's too bad that would effectively kill the Shuttle Program. Killing the Shuttle Program would mean political suicide for manned flight, which would lead to the implosion of the CEV program.
Stupid politics.
Mod parent up. (What's with the AC post?)
Limiting ourselves to this design means severely limiting our throw power, limiting our hardware options, and limiting the mindset of those in the Space Program. Think about that last one for a moment. The mindset for the last 20 years has been "it *must* be the Space Shuttle". If you build this craft, then you'll get the mindset, "It *must* be the DIRECT."
As we introduce new and varied space vehicle, we can help break that mindset and push launch technology forward. As the parent said, a modified Delta or Atlas could easily meet the needs of the Aries I. If we have separate crew vs. cargo craft, then there can finally be a push to reach a more flexible mindset.
We must not tie ourselves to any one space technology. Build what we need to, but leave the door open for new innovations.
No, this is a very bad idea. Hasn't the Space Shuttle proven anything? If you build a space vehicle that's the jack of all trades, you end up with a vehicle that's the master of none.
A lot of people would point to the Saturn V as a successful implementation of the DIRECT concept. Indeed, it would appear to have been an exceptional program, capable of carrying both humans and cargo depending on the configuration. What those same people don't realize, however, is that operating the Saturn V as a crew vehicle was incredibly expensive. Far more expensive than simple space shots with lighter rockets. At the time it made sense, because the end goal was a single moonshot. We didn't particularly care that we were wasting thousands of tonnes of hardware just to bring back a tonne or two after each flight. We got to the f**king moon, man!
Unfortunately, the scientists and engineers working at NASA in those days knew that such expensive flights were unsustainable. Thus the ideas of the Space Shuttle and Big Gemini were proposed. The latter offered more crew per launch, meaning that it could effectively staff a space station for costs competitive with the then current two/three man launches. The former would have been able to handle a smaller crew, but at a drastically reduced launch cost.
Enter politics. The idea of two vehicles was killed by the Nixon administration, and the Space Shuttle was forced to become the jack of all trades. The result was a vehicle so expensive to fly, that it offered no actual savings over the previous Saturn V flights. It would seem that Super Boosters are expensive to fly. So it should have taught us to make sure that each kilogram our Super Boosters carry is worth the cost of flying it. (The Space Shuttle wastes the majority of its Super Booster power on its own bulk.)
When Mike Griffin took control of NASA, he was well aware of this issue. So he worked with the engineers to develop a separate rocket for crew, and a separate rocket for cargo. The two would be based on the same technology (for cost savings), but would have wildly different certifications and cost per launch figures. They would also offer the flexibility of launching massive amounts of cargo (far in excess of the DIRECT plan) that could be utilized by the astronauts flying on the cheaper vehicle. Concepts like a single-launch space station, or pre-fabbed Mars vehicle were reasonble cargos for this vehicle.
Now the DIRECT concept wants to revive all the same mistakes made with the Shuttle. It seems like a very bad idea to me. Maybe I'll change my mind as I review more and more of the information on the proposal, but my gut says that we shouldn't mess with the CEV program. We've got a good thing going there, so we need to get it done. Not reinvent the concept every few years in typical NASA fashion.
You wouldn't. The virus/rootkit would. The fact that the features exist are enough for it to exploit. If you were already running virtualization, you'd probably be safer.