I found most things on that page to be nit-picking. Sure there are holes in the stories but nothing extreme. Compare it to the typical Spielberg or Lucas movie where they don't even manage to keep thir own ideas consistent for 2 hours.
It would be great if it were made as an anime. But I doubt we'll see that happening anytime soon.
Besides, anime has a pretty good track record at keeping to the story. There are also a lot of anime which is in that general area. Ie kids in a war situation and being changed by it. Eg Saikano (Saishuu Heiki Kanojo) and "Now and then, Here and there".
Damn, now I just made myself which that Hollywood would never produce another one of my favourite stories as a movie. I'm doomed to constant dissapointment.
I haven't read it myself (haven't found a copy yet) but I heard through a friend that it ends pretty much the same. But the last words on screen are "The next year there were 168 murders in DC" or something to that effect.
It may not be dark, but at least it's greyish. Kind of like the ending of Clockwork Orange. They have a working system, but they bail out on using it.
I guess it also depends on what type of reader you are. I remember reading some books by Eddings a few years back, and I remember I liked the first series. But when I got to the Mallorean I had begun to outgrow it. Suddenly the boring characters and trivial story began to annoy me instead of making it fun (ie easy) to read.
It's true that Atlas Shrugged has a lot of politics, I can't say that I agree that there are all that many questions though. IMHO it suffers from a complete lack of contrast. The idea that the smart people, or prima movers as she calls them, go on strike is interesting. But I think that the idea that no other people can take over is naive at best.
The book also suffers from the idea that "the market will make everything right". Quite obviously this isn't true, if it was I wouldn't be paying $18 for a new CD.
So the ideas in it are IMHO too naive and the situations in the story fits too well with her ideas to be interesting. The basic plot is quite good but it sure as hell isn't 1000+ pages worth of material. And the book isn't written in a style which makes me stimulated to read it.
I'd second "Kallocain" by Boye, particularly if you're Swedish, like me and as the parent seem to be. Not all that often one gets to read SF written in Swedish as an original language. (Peter Nilsson is another notable exception.)
"Atlas Shrugged" is another story though. I feel inclined to quote officer Barbrady from Southpark when commenting on that book.
Yes, at first I was happy to be learning how to read. It seemed exciting and magical. But, then, I read this: Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand. I read every last word of this garbage, and because of this piece of [expletive deleted], I will never read again!
No I didn't like it, but apparently a lot of people did. (Amazon is a good demonstration of this.) So if nothing else it might be good way to get ammunition if you ever find yourself in a discussion with a "Randite".
When it comes to Anne McCaffery I have a tip for everyone. Stay/away/ from the Freedom series. (The first one is Freedoms Landing I think.) It is very inventive in it's use of bad plot, poor characters and a total lack of believable universe.
The first book is ok, enough to read it at least. After that it becomes extremely boring and the main characters always succeed in whatever they attempt. In it's use of stereotypical characters is second only to Ayn Rands "Atlas Shrugged". (Stay away from that one too.) All the good guys are good looking and intelligent, the bad guys are ugly and stupid. (Actually I believe there is one evil and smart guy in the Freedom series. But I got the feeling that he was just made evil to create a conflict, he never shows any motive for being the way he is.)
I haven't read Pern though, never can seem to stumble across the first book.
Yeah, Use of Weapons is a really good book. Not only is the plot good and interesting characters / solid universe for background. The story is told well with every other chapter being a "flashback" in reverse chronological order. (Further back in time as the story progress, though with larger jumps than eg Memento.) The other chapters are like a normal story./Really/ good stuff. I enjoyed Escession as well, but UoW was great.
I remember reading and interview with Chris Barrie (Rimmer). Apparently it's not uncommon that fans show their appreciation of him with a "Oi! Smeghead!" when they meet him.
That just shows that you haven't seen the episodes. The first few were a bit tame but after a while it picks up the pace. And what I like about it is that you don't have them walking around being "Starfleet", instead they act like a bunch of criminals with a truce.
In Firefly I liked that the characters sometimes do the most practical thing instead of the "right" thing. For instance:
*Spoiler for DNA Mad scientist*
How most of the crew ganging up on the pilot and chopping off one of his arms, so they can trade it for information? You don't see that happening in Star Trek.
*End spoiler*
And if you ask me the puppets in Farscape are very well done. Much better than a half-assed blue screen is. (Watch Andromeda if you want to be subjected to that.)
It's not all clean and documented like the theoretical drivel they feed you in college. [...] Hopefully colleges will catch up the the reality of IT some day, but I seriously doubt it.
As a more general statement than how it was ment. If you're talking about teaching network technicians than you may very well be right. I have no idea about how those types of schools work. There's a huge difference between technical school and a science/engineering school. In that technical teach you how to go out and do things with current technology. Science/Engineering generally teach you how to create new technology.
If you hire someone with a CS/CE background as a network tech then you are getting the wrong man for the job. CS/CE are typically over-educated for that (ie they have too abstract knowledge).
Perhaps you should just try to find your applicants from other universities. I know that I have had to reverse engineer production code (from companies around where I study) and eg implement TCP/IP and webservers on custom hardware in C/C++ as part of one course. Many other courses I've taken also required similar skills. Ie for me to take an existing system and extend it in different ways to do new things. And in a variaty of languages.
We are also required to have spend a couple of weeks out "in the real world", 12 weeks as of now. And that sure taught me a lot of things. Mainly company politics and how many ways you can spend your day trying to start solving your problem. (For all the normal Dilbert-esque reasons.)
And I don't really get what you mean about the "if a biologist didn't know how to identify a microscope..." analogy. Are you insinuating that your new recruits didn't know what a compiler and similar was? Then, as I stated above, recruit from a different place. Or get rid of the HR person who hired interviewed them and get someone competent on that job.
In this case you are talking about the poorest and most disliked people in the galaxy. (They were rebels and they lost the war, they are as far from the center of the universe as possible.) Sure it could be that somewhere there is incredibly high-tech ways of farming. As someone else pointed out, the people we see in this series are not the powerful G8 nations, it's the farmers in Africa or Afganistan and similar places.
No wonder they don't have high-tech, someone just bombed them back into the stone age.
Actually Trigun is a pretty close match. Well if you only count the atmosphere. Trigun has a much more complicated story behind it as usual.
Perhaps it's time for SF writers to go to a 13 or 26 (half or two season) format instead. Just like they often do with anime. That way they'd have a goal to get the story in within that time and they're likely to be cancelled in any case after that time frame.
The point of going to university/college isn't to learn the details of how to maintain a specific network. The point is to learn the basics and learn how to learn new material and adapt quickly.
There will never be a college which teaches you exactly how to do your work at a specific workplace (at least not one worth going to) that's called job experience.
Sometimes you might need to get someone with a lot of experience. One potential benefit of getting newly gradutated people is that they are already accustomed to learning. So training one of them to suit your needs might prove a lot cheaper than trying to convert someone who already know how to do things "best".
IIRC Carmack made a plan about this a long time ago. But for that you wouldn't use glasses like this but eg a web camera. (To watch how the user moves his head.)
It would be a neat project to do. As always time is a limiting factor. Another spinn-off idea would be to have a 3D effect on your desktop windows. So you could look "behind" the current window at another window in the background. I doubt it would be useful but it could be a neat thing to show to show your friends.
While I'm sure that THG get's a lot of flac from people just because they disagree on something I don't think you can attribute all to that.
I began reading THG when it was/the/ tech site online. And I've found that I find it less and less interesting. A good example is the "CPU with failing fan" article from some time back. THG blamed AMD for this problem while it apparently was the motherboard which had a bug in the temperature controller. (It couldn't detect changes larger than 1 degree per second or something like that.)
Apparently they didn't contact AMD about the problem, in which case the article could have been changed from "AMD sucks" to "This MB sucks".
You have an ID in the thousands and just noticed that sites linked to from Slashdot have a tendency to be "hosed"? Are you often told that you are very perceptive?;-)
There's a lot of cards which enable MPEG2 recording. The ATI ALL in wonder line has had it for a few generations IIRC. And I see no mention of any specific hardware in the Alienware box to do it. Just a regular GF4 card. (Which seems like an odd choice to me. I have a GF4 4200 card and the TV-Out is pretty bad compared to my old G400Max.)
In conclusion, you can record MPEG2 just fine with other solutions. (Even the free MythTV.)
I have a GF4 Ti4200 and while I like it I wouldn't call the TV-Out good. The colour balance is off, and I haven't been able to fix it with the built in tools.
I have tried stuff like TV-Tools, but it doesn't work if you have multiple gfx cards in your box.
So for a HTPC I'd go with something other than nVida. The ATI All-in-wonder series seem to be popular.
The latter can't record as of yet AFAIK. While MythTV is more or less a complete TiVo replacement. (But apparently it's a bit of a bitch to get installed.) None of these are actual distros BTW. Both are just programs you run.
I don't think identification of eg persons are the intended goal of RFID. But the vulnerabilities are interesting none the less.
If it replaces bar codes in stores then attacks could be "useful" if you want to shoplift. (I.e. just hide the item from the scanner.) Or if you want to see who bought a porno mag. But barcodes have zero security, and they seem to work quite fine.
Everything doesn't have to be cryptographic as long as you don't try to use one tech for all applications.
Slashdot Mirror
I found most things on that page to be nit-picking. Sure there are holes in the stories but nothing extreme. Compare it to the typical Spielberg or Lucas movie where they don't even manage to keep thir own ideas consistent for 2 hours.
It would be great if it were made as an anime. But I doubt we'll see that happening anytime soon.
Besides, anime has a pretty good track record at keeping to the story. There are also a lot of anime which is in that general area. Ie kids in a war situation and being changed by it. Eg Saikano (Saishuu Heiki Kanojo) and "Now and then, Here and there".
Damn, now I just made myself which that Hollywood would never produce another one of my favourite stories as a movie. I'm doomed to constant dissapointment.
There are also ties between the Foundation and Robots series in Foundation and Earth. I've never gotten hold of the Empire series though. Annoying!
*More spoilers on ending of MR*
I haven't read it myself (haven't found a copy yet) but I heard through a friend that it ends pretty much the same. But the last words on screen are "The next year there were 168 murders in DC" or something to that effect.
It may not be dark, but at least it's greyish. Kind of like the ending of Clockwork Orange. They have a working system, but they bail out on using it.
I guess it also depends on what type of reader you are. I remember reading some books by Eddings a few years back, and I remember I liked the first series. But when I got to the Mallorean I had begun to outgrow it. Suddenly the boring characters and trivial story began to annoy me instead of making it fun (ie easy) to read.
It's true that Atlas Shrugged has a lot of politics, I can't say that I agree that there are all that many questions though. IMHO it suffers from a complete lack of contrast. The idea that the smart people, or prima movers as she calls them, go on strike is interesting. But I think that the idea that no other people can take over is naive at best.
The book also suffers from the idea that "the market will make everything right". Quite obviously this isn't true, if it was I wouldn't be paying $18 for a new CD.
So the ideas in it are IMHO too naive and the situations in the story fits too well with her ideas to be interesting. The basic plot is quite good but it sure as hell isn't 1000+ pages worth of material. And the book isn't written in a style which makes me stimulated to read it.
"Atlas Shrugged" is another story though. I feel inclined to quote officer Barbrady from Southpark when commenting on that book.
No I didn't like it, but apparently a lot of people did. (Amazon is a good demonstration of this.) So if nothing else it might be good way to get ammunition if you ever find yourself in a discussion with a "Randite".
When it comes to Anne McCaffery I have a tip for everyone. Stay /away/ from the Freedom series. (The first one is Freedoms Landing I think.) It is very inventive in it's use of bad plot, poor characters and a total lack of believable universe.
The first book is ok, enough to read it at least. After that it becomes extremely boring and the main characters always succeed in whatever they attempt. In it's use of stereotypical characters is second only to Ayn Rands "Atlas Shrugged". (Stay away from that one too.) All the good guys are good looking and intelligent, the bad guys are ugly and stupid. (Actually I believe there is one evil and smart guy in the Freedom series. But I got the feeling that he was just made evil to create a conflict, he never shows any motive for being the way he is.)
I haven't read Pern though, never can seem to stumble across the first book.
Yeah, Use of Weapons is a really good book. Not only is the plot good and interesting characters / solid universe for background. The story is told well with every other chapter being a "flashback" in reverse chronological order. (Further back in time as the story progress, though with larger jumps than eg Memento.) The other chapters are like a normal story. /Really/ good stuff. I enjoyed Escession as well, but UoW was great.
I remember reading and interview with Chris Barrie (Rimmer). Apparently it's not uncommon that fans show their appreciation of him with a "Oi! Smeghead!" when they meet him.
That just shows that you haven't seen the episodes. The first few were a bit tame but after a while it picks up the pace. And what I like about it is that you don't have them walking around being "Starfleet", instead they act like a bunch of criminals with a truce.
In Firefly I liked that the characters sometimes do the most practical thing instead of the "right" thing. For instance:
*Spoiler for DNA Mad scientist*
How most of the crew ganging up on the pilot and chopping off one of his arms, so they can trade it for information? You don't see that happening in Star Trek.
*End spoiler*
And if you ask me the puppets in Farscape are very well done. Much better than a half-assed blue screen is. (Watch Andromeda if you want to be subjected to that.)
As a more general statement than how it was ment. If you're talking about teaching network technicians than you may very well be right. I have no idea about how those types of schools work. There's a huge difference between technical school and a science/engineering school. In that technical teach you how to go out and do things with current technology. Science/Engineering generally teach you how to create new technology.
If you hire someone with a CS/CE background as a network tech then you are getting the wrong man for the job. CS/CE are typically over-educated for that (ie they have too abstract knowledge).
Oh my, we are cranky aren't we?
Perhaps you should just try to find your applicants from other universities. I know that I have had to reverse engineer production code (from companies around where I study) and eg implement TCP/IP and webservers on custom hardware in C/C++ as part of one course. Many other courses I've taken also required similar skills. Ie for me to take an existing system and extend it in different ways to do new things. And in a variaty of languages.
We are also required to have spend a couple of weeks out "in the real world", 12 weeks as of now. And that sure taught me a lot of things. Mainly company politics and how many ways you can spend your day trying to start solving your problem. (For all the normal Dilbert-esque reasons.)
And I don't really get what you mean about the "if a biologist didn't know how to identify a microscope..." analogy. Are you insinuating that your new recruits didn't know what a compiler and similar was? Then, as I stated above, recruit from a different place. Or get rid of the HR person who hired interviewed them and get someone competent on that job.
In this case you are talking about the poorest and most disliked people in the galaxy. (They were rebels and they lost the war, they are as far from the center of the universe as possible.) Sure it could be that somewhere there is incredibly high-tech ways of farming. As someone else pointed out, the people we see in this series are not the powerful G8 nations, it's the farmers in Africa or Afganistan and similar places.
No wonder they don't have high-tech, someone just bombed them back into the stone age.
Actually Trigun is a pretty close match. Well if you only count the atmosphere. Trigun has a much more complicated story behind it as usual.
Perhaps it's time for SF writers to go to a 13 or 26 (half or two season) format instead. Just like they often do with anime. That way they'd have a goal to get the story in within that time and they're likely to be cancelled in any case after that time frame.
The point of going to university/college isn't to learn the details of how to maintain a specific network. The point is to learn the basics and learn how to learn new material and adapt quickly.
There will never be a college which teaches you exactly how to do your work at a specific workplace (at least not one worth going to) that's called job experience.
Sometimes you might need to get someone with a lot of experience. One potential benefit of getting newly gradutated people is that they are already accustomed to learning. So training one of them to suit your needs might prove a lot cheaper than trying to convert someone who already know how to do things "best".
IIRC Carmack made a plan about this a long time ago. But for that you wouldn't use glasses like this but eg a web camera. (To watch how the user moves his head.)
It would be a neat project to do. As always time is a limiting factor. Another spinn-off idea would be to have a 3D effect on your desktop windows. So you could look "behind" the current window at another window in the background. I doubt it would be useful but it could be a neat thing to show to show your friends.
I began considering what having GNU prepended to your name would insinuate.
The horror, the horror.
While I'm sure that THG get's a lot of flac from people just because they disagree on something I don't think you can attribute all to that.
/the/ tech site online. And I've found that I find it less and less interesting. A good example is the "CPU with failing fan" article from some time back. THG blamed AMD for this problem while it apparently was the motherboard which had a bug in the temperature controller. (It couldn't detect changes larger than 1 degree per second or something like that.)
I began reading THG when it was
Apparently they didn't contact AMD about the problem, in which case the article could have been changed from "AMD sucks" to "This MB sucks".
You have an ID in the thousands and just noticed that sites linked to from Slashdot have a tendency to be "hosed"? Are you often told that you are very perceptive? ;-)
Well yes. The ATI cards don't have hardware encoding. But from what I can see the Alienware box doesn't either.
There's a lot of cards which enable MPEG2 recording. The ATI ALL in wonder line has had it for a few generations IIRC. And I see no mention of any specific hardware in the Alienware box to do it. Just a regular GF4 card. (Which seems like an odd choice to me. I have a GF4 4200 card and the TV-Out is pretty bad compared to my old G400Max.)
In conclusion, you can record MPEG2 just fine with other solutions. (Even the free MythTV.)
I have a GF4 Ti4200 and while I like it I wouldn't call the TV-Out good. The colour balance is off, and I haven't been able to fix it with the built in tools.
I have tried stuff like TV-Tools, but it doesn't work if you have multiple gfx cards in your box.
So for a HTPC I'd go with something other than nVida. The ATI All-in-wonder series seem to be popular.
Well there's MythTV and FreeVo.
The latter can't record as of yet AFAIK. While MythTV is more or less a complete TiVo replacement. (But apparently it's a bit of a bitch to get installed.) None of these are actual distros BTW. Both are just programs you run.
I don't think identification of eg persons are the intended goal of RFID. But the vulnerabilities are interesting none the less.
If it replaces bar codes in stores then attacks could be "useful" if you want to shoplift. (I.e. just hide the item from the scanner.) Or if you want to see who bought a porno mag. But barcodes have zero security, and they seem to work quite fine.
Everything doesn't have to be cryptographic as long as you don't try to use one tech for all applications.