Even with pessistimistic estimates for Chernobyl and Fukushima death rates nuclear power still kills less people per unit of energy than any other form of electrical generation.
If you want to complain about the safety of nuclear power tell us what you want to replace it with. Be honest and include the expected change in fatalities resulting from switching over to your alternative.
One of the fundamental techniques of process improvement (regardless of which flavor) is learning to ask the right questions.
The problem here is most of the staff don't know how to send reports meaningful enough to get us devs started on solving their problems without constant back and forth correspondence that wastes both developer time and theirs.
It sounds like the actual problem is that the software does not meet the needs of the users (and presumably the organization). This is where you ask "why" recursively at least 5 levels deep to figure out what is actually going on before you assume that the problem is a lack of proper bug reporting. It may turn out that something more fundamental needs to be fixed first which makes the bug reporting issue irrelevant.
And if they track any IP address from Switzerland, they are breaking the Swiss data protection laws and can be sued for damages for collecting the IP and breach of privacy.
I'm sure that the Russian courts take the enforcement of Swiss data protection laws and civil judgments very seriously.
Let's use Microsoft Sync as an example. I bought a new car with it in 2009 and while it works relatively well there are a few problems.
The hardware is built into the car and thus it never gets updated unless I buy a new car.
Software updates are infrequent and a PITA to accomplish
It came with a 1 year free trial of some crappy voice navigation feature that I never ended up using because the Google Navigation app on my phone is superior
I'm already paying for a data connection as part of my phone bill so any apps on my phone.
The peripheral hardware in the car will always be superior to the hardware in a mobile device: there's the audio system, conveniently-located buttons on the steering wheel, large screen in the dashboard, etc. In the hardware department the only place a phone might win is in the CPU department. On the other hand the phone will generally have superior software due to faster update cycles and the fact that it gets used a lot more than the software in cars thus tends to be more integrated. So build a standard dock for phones that exports all that hardware functionality as USB devices. Then we can install an app on the phone that controls it and we can have the best of both worlds.
I don't really want a lot of intelligence built into my car. Instead of having a screen built into the dashboard I'd rather have a standard way of docking my phone so that I could use its built-in navigation and audio functions.
On top of that, they also use numerous precious metals including gold, platinum and silicon.
Gold, sure; platinum, no problem; silicon, WTF?
Currently used as a strengthening agent in plastic, molybdenite is abundant in the natural word. Speaking to the BBC, Prof Andras Kis, the director of the Laboratory of Nanoscale Electronics and Structures (LANES) in Lausanne, said that his team’s research could transform the world of computing. ”[Currently] there is something like 19 million metric tonnes around,” Prof Kis said in an interview. ”You can just go on some websites on the internet and buy a 1cm by 1cm crystal for around $100 [£64].”
Abundant as compared to what? Silicon is the third most abundant element on earth and makes up 15% of its mass. Molybdenum is a rare earth element. Also, you can't use the current price of some element based on it not being used to make microprocessors and expect that the cost won't change if you increase the demand for it by many orders of magnitude.
There might be good reasons for building microprocessors from molybdenite but replacing scarce silicon with abundant molybdenite is not one of them.
How often are IT messes due to shortsighted bosses as compared to the times that they result from some deal in the past in which a contractor was paid a lot of money (much of which funneled back to management in the form of kickbacks) to "fix" a problem at the shareholder's expense?
You can tell me to refrain from murdering, raping or stealing from you. All of those prohibitions can be shown to be logically consistent and universal.
"Buy this service, whether or not you want or use it, or else I will send armed thugs to kidnap you, confiscate your property and shoot you if you resist" is immoral regardless of which words are written on some hypothetical paper.
Is there solid state technology to convert up to the kV level?
You need to combine solid state components with reactive components (inductors and/or capacitors) but can be done.
The easiest and most logical place to do that conversion would be at the point of generation as part of the rectification process since most forms of creating power involve rotating prime movers and naturally produce AC anyway.
You can still regulate voltage that way but instead of being 95% efficient your computer's power supply would be about 60%, with a huge increase in power consumption, size and heat generation.
Switching power supplies do create high frequency noise that must be filtered out but that's the price you pay for the increased efficiency.
If the ~10,000 V lines that you see bringing the power into your neighborhood carried DC instead of AC the only difference it would make is that instead of a transformer feeding wires that supply your house it would be an inverter.
The thing is that it doesn't really matter which way you conceptualize it, except for some specific situations like trying to understand how a vacuum tube or CRT works.
To be more specific the danger comes from the the fault current capability.
1 millivolt could could vaporize an (unrealistically) low resistance wrench that fell across some bus bars as long as the power source could maintain 1 millivolt output with a billion amps of fault current for a few milliseconds.
On the other hand, shorting a couple 26 AWG wires together that are hooked up to a 12 volt power supply aren't going to create a situation anything like shorting the terminals of a battery because those little wires have too much resistance to allow a dangerous level of fault current (It still might break the power supply though).
Voltage only determines if it can overcome the resistance of your skin (and maybe clothing). Beyond that, it doesn't matter. Amperage, on the other hand, determines the power -- the amount of damage the current will cause.
10 milliamps can kill you. But without at least several dozen volts behind it, it won't make it through your body.
Maybe you do understand voltage, current and resistance but they way you are using your words makes it sound you are making a very common mistake. Amperage is an effect of two things: voltage and resistance.
If I touch a 1000 volt wire that is carrying 100 amps and resistance of the return path (including my body) is 1 megaohm then exactly 1 milliamp will flow through my body.
It wouldn't matter if the wire was carrying 10 amps, 1,000 amps or a 1 million amps. 1000 amps / 1 megaohm creates 1 milliamp of current regardless how large the wire is or how much current it carrying through other paths.
In practice, the size of the wire does matter because you can create fault currents that can not be sustained by a given wire and the actual voltage falls off when you try but regardless the point stands - amperage is a function of voltage and resistance (impedance) in a given situation, not an independent quantity.
Slashdot Mirror
Even with pessistimistic estimates for Chernobyl and Fukushima death rates nuclear power still kills less people per unit of energy than any other form of electrical generation.
If you want to complain about the safety of nuclear power tell us what you want to replace it with. Be honest and include the expected change in fatalities resulting from switching over to your alternative.
The problem here is most of the staff don't know how to send reports meaningful enough to get us devs started on solving their problems without constant back and forth correspondence that wastes both developer time and theirs.
It sounds like the actual problem is that the software does not meet the needs of the users (and presumably the organization). This is where you ask "why" recursively at least 5 levels deep to figure out what is actually going on before you assume that the problem is a lack of proper bug reporting. It may turn out that something more fundamental needs to be fixed first which makes the bug reporting issue irrelevant.
Just because it's internet doesn't mean you can do whatever you want and there are no consequences.
Be that as it may it doesn't stop a lot of people from acting otherwise.
It sounds like a service that's just asking to be trolled.
I'm sure that the Russian courts take the enforcement of Swiss data protection laws and civil judgments very seriously.
Let's use Microsoft Sync as an example. I bought a new car with it in 2009 and while it works relatively well there are a few problems.
The hardware is built into the car and thus it never gets updated unless I buy a new car.
Software updates are infrequent and a PITA to accomplish
It came with a 1 year free trial of some crappy voice navigation feature that I never ended up using because the Google Navigation app on my phone is superior
I'm already paying for a data connection as part of my phone bill so any apps on my phone.
The peripheral hardware in the car will always be superior to the hardware in a mobile device: there's the audio system, conveniently-located buttons on the steering wheel, large screen in the dashboard, etc. In the hardware department the only place a phone might win is in the CPU department. On the other hand the phone will generally have superior software due to faster update cycles and the fact that it gets used a lot more than the software in cars thus tends to be more integrated. So build a standard dock for phones that exports all that hardware functionality as USB devices. Then we can install an app on the phone that controls it and we can have the best of both worlds.
I don't really want a lot of intelligence built into my car. Instead of having a screen built into the dashboard I'd rather have a standard way of docking my phone so that I could use its built-in navigation and audio functions.
Gold, sure; platinum, no problem; silicon, WTF?
Abundant as compared to what? Silicon is the third most abundant element on earth and makes up 15% of its mass. Molybdenum is a rare earth element. Also, you can't use the current price of some element based on it not being used to make microprocessors and expect that the cost won't change if you increase the demand for it by many orders of magnitude. There might be good reasons for building microprocessors from molybdenite but replacing scarce silicon with abundant molybdenite is not one of them.
At least, not as it is currently understood.
How often are IT messes due to shortsighted bosses as compared to the times that they result from some deal in the past in which a contractor was paid a lot of money (much of which funneled back to management in the form of kickbacks) to "fix" a problem at the shareholder's expense?
People still watch TV?
That's a ridiculous question.
Laws are just words written on paper.
You can tell me to refrain from murdering, raping or stealing from you. All of those prohibitions can be shown to be logically consistent and universal.
"Buy this service, whether or not you want or use it, or else I will send armed thugs to kidnap you, confiscate your property and shoot you if you resist" is immoral regardless of which words are written on some hypothetical paper.
I don't care about the answer to that question as long as I'm allowed to purchase my garbage service from another provider.
Some municipalities legally forbid private companies from competing with the municipal service.
This is manifestly untrue in certain jurisdictions, especially where the trash collectors are unionized.
If there weren't cities out there forbidding private companies from picking up trash this wouldn't even be an issue.
I completely accept that there are people who think otherwise. All I insist is that you don't shoot me for disagreeing with you.
For all non-negative values of X the answer is:
No
You need to combine solid state components with reactive components (inductors and/or capacitors) but can be done.
The easiest and most logical place to do that conversion would be at the point of generation as part of the rectification process since most forms of creating power involve rotating prime movers and naturally produce AC anyway.
You don't think there's a chance that you may be over reacting?
You can still regulate voltage that way but instead of being 95% efficient your computer's power supply would be about 60%, with a huge increase in power consumption, size and heat generation.
Switching power supplies do create high frequency noise that must be filtered out but that's the price you pay for the increased efficiency.
If the ~10,000 V lines that you see bringing the power into your neighborhood carried DC instead of AC the only difference it would make is that instead of a transformer feeding wires that supply your house it would be an inverter.
The thing is that it doesn't really matter which way you conceptualize it, except for some specific situations like trying to understand how a vacuum tube or CRT works.
To be more specific the danger comes from the the fault current capability.
1 millivolt could could vaporize an (unrealistically) low resistance wrench that fell across some bus bars as long as the power source could maintain 1 millivolt output with a billion amps of fault current for a few milliseconds.
On the other hand, shorting a couple 26 AWG wires together that are hooked up to a 12 volt power supply aren't going to create a situation anything like shorting the terminals of a battery because those little wires have too much resistance to allow a dangerous level of fault current (It still might break the power supply though).
Sorry, while that may have been true at the beginning of the 20th century it certainly isn't true at the beginning of the 21st.
Maybe you do understand voltage, current and resistance but they way you are using your words makes it sound you are making a very common mistake. Amperage is an effect of two things: voltage and resistance.
If I touch a 1000 volt wire that is carrying 100 amps and resistance of the return path (including my body) is 1 megaohm then exactly 1 milliamp will flow through my body.
It wouldn't matter if the wire was carrying 10 amps, 1,000 amps or a 1 million amps. 1000 amps / 1 megaohm creates 1 milliamp of current regardless how large the wire is or how much current it carrying through other paths.
In practice, the size of the wire does matter because you can create fault currents that can not be sustained by a given wire and the actual voltage falls off when you try but regardless the point stands - amperage is a function of voltage and resistance (impedance) in a given situation, not an independent quantity.