I've hosted a few LAN parties at my house, and we're doing it more now (2 in the last 2 weeks). It's usually 8 to 15 people. Nobody's got any amazing hardware, just a few 8 port 10Base-T hubs, although we'll be going 100mbps soon.
Things that are important to us:
DHCP - I know people say its simpler to let Windows arrange the networking by itself, but generally all my friends houses (that are big enough to have a LAN party at) aleardy have DHCP, and Windows messes it up sometimes anyway when there's lots of people. Plus, DHCP will set up your internet gateway and DNS too:-)
Air conditioning - Even with 5 people in a small room on a cold day it gets pretty warm pretty quickly
Be near a shop - No matter how prepared you are, you'll always need more food (unless you're rich and over-buy to start with
Someone experienced in networking - It sucks when people get confused about what an uplink socket is for. You should have someone that knows all about it overseeing the network setup.
Installation Disks/CDs - We had one computer refuse to see the network and refuse to re-install its network drivers, so it needed Windows re-installed (typical); and another lost its registry and didnt have it backed up. it's always a good idea to have Video, Sound, Network and Windows installation CDs with you.
Internet - People need a break from gaming at some point and most geeks need to check their mail. I've also found this to be useful for downlaoding latest patches, using USENET (or Google) to find the answer to some strange compatability problems, etc.
Music - The louder the better. And make sure there is one source of music (people's PC should be playing sound effects - not music. If its' mp3 music, get it all onto the machine thats's going to play it at the start so SMB file transfers aren't slowing down the network during gameplay.
My friends and I haven't ventured into the organized type of party where there are tournaments and prizes, but I think we'll be trying that next time, just for a change.
P.S. Why do people try to bring up the subject of terrorist attacks in nearly every slashdot discussion? That's really annoying to some people. If you're going to discuss terrorism, do it in a newsgroup about terrorism, or current events.
I seriously thought this article was about some geeks discovering that ZX81s could do something extremely useful in the 21st century and were planning to take over the world with them.
Geek#1: My spectrum's running sendmail
Geek#2: So what, I've got Exchange Server on mine
Geek#3: My spectrum's rendering the Final Fantasy movie.
Hmmm... maybe they're not that good!
Still, with useable OSs getting as small as MenuetOS, maybe Spectrum's could be used for up-to-date things. <flame-resistant-suit>if only it was more portable than x86 asm</flame-resistant-suit>
Reading about the big companies like Dell saying they won't provide support if you try differet OSs or reset the BIOS, I remember problems I had with my Compaq laptop and how amazingly helpful Compaq were. When it was about 6 months old the IDE cable became loose, which made it very unstable. Compaq understood that I needed it and couldn't go without it for more than a couple of days so a really helpful tech guy from Compaq called me back and talked me through opening it up and fixing the problem myself. I was amazed at that, since I've heard of the attitude other vendors take to such things. Since then though, I tried to run the "Quick Restore" CD (restores the hard disk to its original state) and it told me that it wasn't running on the hardware it was shipped with, and promtly cancelled the restore operation. Looks like tech support take a very different attitude to the people who build the systems (or software).
I opened your link in Opera, and was presented with a page with "undefined" as the first word, and big squares before and after a few words, which I presume were meant to be "smart quotes" or some other thing that is not part of normal HTML outside Microsoft's world. I'll stick with the product with the better web page.
From a web developer's point of view, if they didn't, how would your log-in information be retained when you look at a web page that isnt dynamicly (sp?) created, then look back at one of the comments.pl pages? huh?
If all of the site was dynamic content, then i suppose authentication info could be embedded into each page. But not all pages are dynamic, so the information's gotta be stored somewhere - and that somewhere isn't server-side (think what happens if you're on a dial-up connection and you pull your plug, someone else gets your IP and without cookies, the server doesn't know that its a different person).
Cookies have their valid uses, and I'm sure slashdot knows that and that's why they use them. I think its time people stopped being upset about every site that uses cookies and start focusing on only the ones that do Nasty Things with them.
Here in the UK, phone calls are never cheaper than text messages. we don't have to pay for text messages or WAP, because we've got companies like Genie Mobile that offer free and extremely reliable services. Most people use Nokia phones like this which have predictive text which means you only press one key for each letter you want. People can type on their phones without looking, and while doing other things, which also brings new problems such as people texting while driving.
Linuxworld invites you to design the LSB logo. "The winner will be announced on LinuxWorld.com and will become eligible for an award given at the August LinuxWorld Conference and Expo in San Francisco. Best of all, this logo will appear on every Linux product box that conforms to the LSB standard."
Not too much extra info there though:-(
In the UK, "Nova" cars were manufactured by Vauxhall, which was/is owned by the US firm GM (General Motors). A few years ago (perhaps 5) the rest of Europe had a car that looked identical, but was called the "Corsa". Now it's a new shape and called the "Corsa" everywhere. I guess that mistake you pointed out was the reason for the name change.
I live in the UK and have used several different ISPs in the last year. I found the mail server of BT Internet to be less reliable than I would have liked, so I set up a mail server on my home network that acted as a smart host, deciding where outgoing e-mail from my LAN was being delivered to. This worked fine when I used BTi as my ISP, and appeared to be much more reliable than their e-mail services were.
I recently moved to FreeServe since it's service is unmetered (and, at the time BTi wasn't). I've niticed that FreeServe take all the e-mail that's sent out by my mail server (no matter what host it was intended to be sent to) and route it through their mail server (well, actually it's PlanetOnline's server).
IMO, this is better than just blocking your mail server. I know this isn't exactly the problem we're discussing here, but it's the only similar experience I've had (as I've never had a problem sending mail from my server to another mail server), and I thought it was partially relevant.
Coors put its slogan, "Turn it loose," into Spanish where it was read as "Suffer from diarrhea."
Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an American campaign: Nothing sucks like an Electrolux.
Clairol introduced the "Mist Stick", a curling iron, into German only to find out that "mist" is slang for manure. Not too many people had use for the "manure stick."
When Gerber started selling baby food in Africa, they used the same packaging as in the US, with the beautiful Caucasian baby on the label.
Later they learned that in Africa, companies routinely put pictures on the label of what's inside, since most people can't read.
Colgate introduced a toothpaste in France called Cue, the name of a notorious porno magazine.
An American T-shirt maker in Miami printed shirts for the Spanish market which promoted the Pope's visit. Instead of "I saw the Pope" (el papa), the shirts read "I saw the potato" (la papa).
Pepsi's "Come alive with the Pepsi Generation" translated into "Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave", in Chinese.
Frank Perdue's chicken slogan, "it takes a strong man to make a tender chicken" was translated into Spanish as "it takes an aroused man to make a chicken affectionate."
The Coca-Cola name in China was first read as "Ke-kou-ke-la", meaning "Bite the wax tadpole" or "female horse stuffed with wax", depending on the dialect. Coke then researched 40,000 characters to find a phonetic equivalent "ko-kou-ko-le", translating into "happiness in the mouth."
When Parker Pen marketed a ball-point pen in Mexico, its ads were supposed to have read, "it won't leak in your pocket and embarrass you."
Instead, the company thought that the word "embarazar" (to impregnate) meant to embarrass, so the ad read: "It won't leak in your pocket and make you pregnant."
Maybe someone'll think twice before using this translator:-)
Re:Canada Space Geeks Ueber Alles!
on
Space Diving
·
· Score: 1
Since when did the US have control over what goes on in space and/or the upper atmosphere? AFAIK, it doesn't belong to a particular country... people can do what they like there:-)
Someone suggested that this could be used for playing games when booting. Good idea, but my Mandrake box takes about 30 seconds to boot. It would be more useful to be able to do something like playing GTK Tetris while your new distro is installing. Imagine the screen split in half, with blocks falling down one side and package info scrolling up the other side. Installing takes 30 mins - booting takes 30 seconds. Go think what one you'd rather play a game while waiting on.
I live in the UK. My both my home phone lines and mobiles have 11 digit phone numbers. When I call someone, I select their name from the list on my phone and press the "call" button. I couldn't care less how many digits are in the number since the only time I see it is when entering it into the phone book.
What I'd really like to see is phones (obviously digital cellular phones or VoIP (voice over IP) phones) having the ability to automagically change their internal phone book numbers when the telco they're connected through is aware of changes in phone numbers (like the one in this article). That way nobody would care at all when they change since they wouldn't have to update all their phone book entries.
Surely the magnet in their lab judders because there are other objects (besides the magnet) in it's magentic field? If it was in space, it would be the only thing in it's magnetic field so what would cause it to move? My guess is nothing. So I don't see that this is going to work. THe only way they can prove it will work is by testing it in a location where it has no surrounding objects. Going by NASA's previous record for spending lots of money on things that don't work properly or aren't thought through, there's a fair chance that they'll test it in space;-)
Slashdot Mirror
Things that are important to us:
- DHCP - I know people say its simpler to let Windows arrange the networking by itself, but generally all my friends houses (that are big enough to have a LAN party at) aleardy have DHCP, and Windows messes it up sometimes anyway when there's lots of people. Plus, DHCP will set up your internet gateway and DNS too
:-)
- Air conditioning - Even with 5 people in a small room on a cold day it gets pretty warm pretty quickly
- Be near a shop - No matter how prepared you are, you'll always need more food (unless you're rich and over-buy to start with
- Someone experienced in networking - It sucks when people get confused about what an uplink socket is for. You should have someone that knows all about it overseeing the network setup.
- Installation Disks/CDs - We had one computer refuse to see the network and refuse to re-install its network drivers, so it needed Windows re-installed (typical); and another lost its registry and didnt have it backed up. it's always a good idea to have Video, Sound, Network and Windows installation CDs with you.
- Internet - People need a break from gaming at some point and most geeks need to check their mail. I've also found this to be useful for downlaoding latest patches, using USENET (or Google) to find the answer to some strange compatability problems, etc.
- Music - The louder the better. And make sure there is one source of music (people's PC should be playing sound effects - not music. If its' mp3 music, get it all onto the machine thats's going to play it at the start so SMB file transfers aren't slowing down the network during gameplay.
My friends and I haven't ventured into the organized type of party where there are tournaments and prizes, but I think we'll be trying that next time, just for a change.P.S. Why do people try to bring up the subject of terrorist attacks in nearly every slashdot discussion? That's really annoying to some people. If you're going to discuss terrorism, do it in a newsgroup about terrorism, or current events.
I seriously thought this article was about some geeks discovering that ZX81s could do something extremely useful in the 21st century and were planning to take over the world with them.
Geek#1: My spectrum's running sendmail
Geek#2: So what, I've got Exchange Server on mine
Geek#3: My spectrum's rendering the Final Fantasy movie.
Hmmm... maybe they're not that good!
Still, with useable OSs getting as small as MenuetOS, maybe Spectrum's could be used for up-to-date things. <flame-resistant-suit>if only it was more portable than x86 asm</flame-resistant-suit>
Reading about the big companies like Dell saying they won't provide support if you try differet OSs or reset the BIOS, I remember problems I had with my Compaq laptop and how amazingly helpful Compaq were. When it was about 6 months old the IDE cable became loose, which made it very unstable. Compaq understood that I needed it and couldn't go without it for more than a couple of days so a really helpful tech guy from Compaq called me back and talked me through opening it up and fixing the problem myself. I was amazed at that, since I've heard of the attitude other vendors take to such things. Since then though, I tried to run the "Quick Restore" CD (restores the hard disk to its original state) and it told me that it wasn't running on the hardware it was shipped with, and promtly cancelled the restore operation. Looks like tech support take a very different attitude to the people who build the systems (or software).
I opened your link in Opera, and was presented with a page with "undefined" as the first word, and big squares before and after a few words, which I presume were meant to be "smart quotes" or some other thing that is not part of normal HTML outside Microsoft's world. I'll stick with the product with the better web page.
#include "troll.h"
#define COUPLE 3
readArticle();
/* funny, I thought "couple" was two */
Svefg Cbfg!
Hey slashdot's bugging us!
From a web developer's point of view, if they didn't, how would your log-in information be retained when you look at a web page that isnt dynamicly (sp?) created, then look back at one of the comments.pl pages? huh?
If all of the site was dynamic content, then i suppose authentication info could be embedded into each page. But not all pages are dynamic, so the information's gotta be stored somewhere - and that somewhere isn't server-side (think what happens if you're on a dial-up connection and you pull your plug, someone else gets your IP and without cookies, the server doesn't know that its a different person).
Cookies have their valid uses, and I'm sure slashdot knows that and that's why they use them. I think its time people stopped being upset about every site that uses cookies and start focusing on only the ones that do Nasty Things with them.
"Trolltech Spills Beans On Qt 3.0" :0)
Seriously made me think that this story was about JavaBeans being implemented in QT
Here in the UK, phone calls are never cheaper than text messages. we don't have to pay for text messages or WAP, because we've got companies like Genie Mobile that offer free and extremely reliable services. Most people use Nokia phones like this which have predictive text which means you only press one key for each letter you want. People can type on their phones without looking, and while doing other things, which also brings new problems such as people texting while driving.
Linuxworld invites you to design the LSB logo. "The winner will be announced on LinuxWorld.com and will become eligible for an award given at the August LinuxWorld Conference and Expo in San Francisco. Best of all, this logo will appear on every Linux product box that conforms to the LSB standard." Not too much extra info there though :-(
In the UK, "Nova" cars were manufactured by Vauxhall, which was/is owned by the US firm GM (General Motors). A few years ago (perhaps 5) the rest of Europe had a car that looked identical, but was called the "Corsa". Now it's a new shape and called the "Corsa" everywhere. I guess that mistake you pointed out was the reason for the name change.
I recently moved to FreeServe since it's service is unmetered (and, at the time BTi wasn't). I've niticed that FreeServe take all the e-mail that's sent out by my mail server (no matter what host it was intended to be sent to) and route it through their mail server (well, actually it's PlanetOnline's server).
IMO, this is better than just blocking your mail server. I know this isn't exactly the problem we're discussing here, but it's the only similar experience I've had (as I've never had a problem sending mail from my server to another mail server), and I thought it was partially relevant.
Maybe someone'll think twice before using this translator
The nanobots have escaped from Red Dwarf!
Since when did the US have control over what goes on in space and/or the upper atmosphere? AFAIK, it doesn't belong to a particular country... people can do what they like there :-)
Someone suggested that this could be used for playing games when booting. Good idea, but my Mandrake box takes about 30 seconds to boot. It would be more useful to be able to do something like playing GTK Tetris while your new distro is installing. Imagine the screen split in half, with blocks falling down one side and package info scrolling up the other side. Installing takes 30 mins - booting takes 30 seconds. Go think what one you'd rather play a game while waiting on.
I live in the UK. My both my home phone lines and mobiles have 11 digit phone numbers. When I call someone, I select their name from the list on my phone and press the "call" button. I couldn't care less how many digits are in the number since the only time I see it is when entering it into the phone book.
What I'd really like to see is phones (obviously digital cellular phones or VoIP (voice over IP) phones) having the ability to automagically change their internal phone book numbers when the telco they're connected through is aware of changes in phone numbers (like the one in this article). That way nobody would care at all when they change since they wouldn't have to update all their phone book entries.
Surely the magnet in their lab judders because there are other objects (besides the magnet) in it's magentic field? If it was in space, it would be the only thing in it's magnetic field so what would cause it to move? My guess is nothing. So I don't see that this is going to work. THe only way they can prove it will work is by testing it in a location where it has no surrounding objects. Going by NASA's previous record for spending lots of money on things that don't work properly or aren't thought through, there's a fair chance that they'll test it in space ;-)