I agree. We need more USB slots and maybe one or two Firewire slots. I've never used the PCMCIA slot on my laptop, and unfortunately it only came with 2 USB slots, which I use both of almost always (swapping is quite a hassle). I wish they'd forget about the PCMCIA slot and maybe added 2-3 more USB ports.
Of course, those who have their wireless card connect via PCMCIA might not agree, but I've integrated wireless.
Nothing quite like sizing random furniture to fit between other furniture, then expecting it to blink, bloop, and points to be added to my hud on the top right.
Now, don't get me started about my dreams^H^H^H^H^H^Hnightmares.
I've been playing it on linux for almost a month, using WineX. Works great. It crashes occasionally but I'm betting that's my videocard's drivers' fault (ATI victim here). Otherwise, no lag what-so-ever.
That is sarcasm, btw. I, too, am using gentoo and love it.:-)
Re:And let's not forget who is funding a lot of th
on
New and Improved SETI
·
· Score: 1
How can anyone be labelled altruistic if their deeds are not known?
- shazow
Re:Different kinds of multitasking, too
on
Life Interrupted
·
· Score: 1
Agreed. I can't study while doing anything else, aside from maybe some background music. Preferably non-lyrical.
I can usually code, listen to music, and chat, while looking up API. But I usually chat in coding-intervals. In between problems, so to speak.
Readings news, articles, etc. I can do easily while listening to music and chatting.
Watching a movie or tv show, I can't do while doing anything else. I have to immerse myself in it, otherwise I wont fully enjoy it and probably miss out on half the obscure details that make many shows sooo good.
Same goes for reading books.
- shazow
Different kinds of multitasking, too
on
Life Interrupted
·
· Score: 1
I for one, too, enjoy reading multiple sites, while talking to people, while listening to music, maybe evening coding.
But there's no way I can do all that while watching TV or a movie.
I've friends that never go on the computer without having a TV right beside them or a movie window in the corner. I just can't do it.
Difference is, I guess, is that the movie/tv stream is continuous, while reading and coding can be easily interrupted and suspended until a message is replied to or a new post has been read. But when I watch TV or a movie, I tend to immerse myself completely in it, I don't like any distraction.
I find the PSP to be the perfect candidate for my girlfriend. Ever since I got a laptop (and later a PDA), she's been dying to waste money on getting one for herself. What for? To play games and watch movies on it. Now the PSP comes out, which has most of her favourite PS2 games ported, and it plays movies from the memory stick, and is half the price of a decent PDA. Seems like a saviour for many.
From blaming contraceptives for STDs and unplanned pregnancies, to straws for spitballs, to computers for distraction.
Computers are a very powerful tool in such a way that they can be used for almost whatever you might desire. Is this not a good thing?
If one desired distraction and could not find a computer, I'm sure said one would find a gaming console or a limping dog or a spot on the wall.
Computers are a tool to allow people to explore whatever it is they want to explore. Can't blame computers for allowing peoples' bad habits to show through.
Before computers, TV prevented me from doing my homework. Before TV, it was drawing and blankly staring out the window. Before windows, it was the faint light breaking through the ovum.
I know what I'm doing when I want to do it. I just don't like homework. >.
I'm actually majoring in Psychology (and also majoring in Computer Science), and I don't see it taking anywhere near 12 years. Maybe about 9 years or so if I get a PhD or something.
Some people go into school for the sake of learning. Others go into school for the sake of more money. I'd say the majority do it for the latter. If you want to learn, that's not going to be a problem except for the fact that people are going to be in more debt than ever unless they moderate their learning to working.
If people just want to make money, I don't see them being in a hurry to learn what they need to get a high paying job right away. They'll probably spend a majority of their life screwing off.
Yeah, you're right. I was more referring to the latter, the "start off on some other cinredulous project that they never quite finish." Now they'd have plenty of time to finish AND see the sun every once in a while.:-)
What about if they devise some sort of contract that whomever decides to accept this medicine, they have to sign a contract that by age x (say... 200?) they are required to leave the planet. Of course, they can come back to visit their great great great great great great not so great great great grandchildren every once in a while and suches, but for the most part, they'd be living elsewhere.
I think since most geniuses don't hit their peak of invention until nearing the ends of their lives, extending it will either push it much further back or... make huge leaps in technology.
But what about education? Most people today only ever go to school because they want to make the most of their short life. They want to graduate, get a good job, live a good life. If you have 984 years to go, would you really be interested in pursuing higher education? Would this "dumben down" our populace?
We'll either get a lot of smart people, or a lot of patient lazy people.
... we debated what is the definition of a "person" (which I think is sufficiently vague to be used as a premise for other debates, as opposed to the strict definition of 'human' which simply defines a species and not its place.)
Anyways, I forget the precise aspects of it that came about but the consensus was that a "person" is something that is, in general, self-aware, and conscious, has perception of time, not necessarily human. I don't believe that temporary states of unawareness qualify to de-personify you. You go to sleep, you don't lose your place in humanity.
So, in that sense, some particularly developed animals/fish can qualify as persons. Perhaps dolphins or more some species of monkeys. Ooo oo ah aa! Errm sorry.
But yeah, somehow I don't think a sheep with a few human organs, brain aside, will develop self-consciousness and perception of time.
Yes but by assigning known colours to things, couldn't you extrapolate the remaining colours by relativity of said brightness?
Like say you know the person's shirt in the photo was blue, and the truck behind him was green, and so forth, couldn't you extrapolate the colour of something relative to all the other known colours?
Or would red, blue and green look identical under the same brightness?
They DO look different under GIMP.
IE. Draw a 255 red line, a 255 blue line, and a 255 green line. Convert the image to grayscale, and they do look different shades. Similarly, you could use the difference in shades to extrapolate possibile colours, could you not? Of course it would not be 100% accurate but it could present several possibilities and you could choose the most reasonable one.
Different colours appear differently when a photo is monochromed. By comparing the overall contrast and brightness of the photo, they may be able to extrapolate relative colours.
Don't know how reasonable my explination is, but doesn't really seem impossible?
Slashdot Mirror
I appreciate slashdot not for the news stories, but the invaluable comments. Slashdot is like a huge forum with dozens of new topics each day.
:-)
Anyone who thinks otherwise is in denial.
- shazow
Impressive. In many cases, the speed of retrieval of the data is a lot more important than the compression speed.
:-)
It may take several days to compile a program, but it's all worth it if it only takes a few moments to run it.
- shazow
How long did it take to decompress/view the image? Was it significantly longer than viewing the original? Would it be a viable format for webviewing?
- shazow
Indeed.
They may have not made a native port, but at least they made an effort to make our lives (the linux users') a bit easier.
Much appreciated.
- shazow
I agree. We need more USB slots and maybe one or two Firewire slots. I've never used the PCMCIA slot on my laptop, and unfortunately it only came with 2 USB slots, which I use both of almost always (swapping is quite a hassle). I wish they'd forget about the PCMCIA slot and maybe added 2-3 more USB ports.
Of course, those who have their wireless card connect via PCMCIA might not agree, but I've integrated wireless.
- shazow
Nothing quite like sizing random furniture to fit between other furniture, then expecting it to blink, bloop, and points to be added to my hud on the top right.
Now, don't get me started about my dreams^H^H^H^H^H^Hnightmares.
- shazow
I installed it from under linux. No real trouble.
- shazow
Highly recommended.
- shazow
Wow, I never would have guessed...
That is sarcasm, btw. I, too, am using gentoo and love it.
How can anyone be labelled altruistic if their deeds are not known?
- shazow
Agreed. I can't study while doing anything else, aside from maybe some background music. Preferably non-lyrical.
I can usually code, listen to music, and chat, while looking up API. But I usually chat in coding-intervals. In between problems, so to speak.
Readings news, articles, etc. I can do easily while listening to music and chatting.
Watching a movie or tv show, I can't do while doing anything else. I have to immerse myself in it, otherwise I wont fully enjoy it and probably miss out on half the obscure details that make many shows sooo good.
Same goes for reading books.
- shazow
I for one, too, enjoy reading multiple sites, while talking to people, while listening to music, maybe evening coding.
But there's no way I can do all that while watching TV or a movie.
I've friends that never go on the computer without having a TV right beside them or a movie window in the corner. I just can't do it.
Difference is, I guess, is that the movie/tv stream is continuous, while reading and coding can be easily interrupted and suspended until a message is replied to or a new post has been read. But when I watch TV or a movie, I tend to immerse myself completely in it, I don't like any distraction.
Did that make sense?
- shazow
If you don't want Jupiter, I'll take it. :D
- shazow
It still doesn't stop you from downloading something that is not Firefox, thinking it is.
- shazow
I find the PSP to be the perfect candidate for my girlfriend. Ever since I got a laptop (and later a PDA), she's been dying to waste money on getting one for herself. What for? To play games and watch movies on it.
Now the PSP comes out, which has most of her favourite PS2 games ported, and it plays movies from the memory stick, and is half the price of a decent PDA.
Seems like a saviour for many.
- shazow
That grammy must have a nice speaker system to fool someone that the cops aren't coming from a small box in the other room.
And a playstation two too, that's one hip grandma.
- shazow
From blaming contraceptives for STDs and unplanned pregnancies, to straws for spitballs, to computers for distraction.
Computers are a very powerful tool in such a way that they can be used for almost whatever you might desire. Is this not a good thing?
If one desired distraction and could not find a computer, I'm sure said one would find a gaming console or a limping dog or a spot on the wall.
Computers are a tool to allow people to explore whatever it is they want to explore. Can't blame computers for allowing peoples' bad habits to show through.
Before computers, TV prevented me from doing my homework. Before TV, it was drawing and blankly staring out the window. Before windows, it was the faint light breaking through the ovum.
I know what I'm doing when I want to do it. I just don't like homework. >.
Now that I have slashdot... things are different.
Or not.
Back to homework now.
- shazow
I'm actually majoring in Psychology (and also majoring in Computer Science), and I don't see it taking anywhere near 12 years. Maybe about 9 years or so if I get a PhD or something.
Some people go into school for the sake of learning. Others go into school for the sake of more money. I'd say the majority do it for the latter. If you want to learn, that's not going to be a problem except for the fact that people are going to be in more debt than ever unless they moderate their learning to working.
If people just want to make money, I don't see them being in a hurry to learn what they need to get a high paying job right away. They'll probably spend a majority of their life screwing off.
- shazow
Yeah, you're right. I was more referring to the latter, the "start off on some other cinredulous project that they never quite finish." Now they'd have plenty of time to finish AND see the sun every once in a while. :-)
- shazow
What if P2P was integrated into a major OS?
Like, the next Windows... And more than 60% of all users had it, and it was fully standard and transparent.
Yumm...
What about if they devise some sort of contract that whomever decides to accept this medicine, they have to sign a contract that by age x (say... 200?) they are required to leave the planet. Of course, they can come back to visit their great great great great great great not so great great great grandchildren every once in a while and suches, but for the most part, they'd be living elsewhere.
I think since most geniuses don't hit their peak of invention until nearing the ends of their lives, extending it will either push it much further back or... make huge leaps in technology.
But what about education? Most people today only ever go to school because they want to make the most of their short life. They want to graduate, get a good job, live a good life.
If you have 984 years to go, would you really be interested in pursuing higher education? Would this "dumben down" our populace?
We'll either get a lot of smart people, or a lot of patient lazy people.
So, where do I sign?
- shazow
... we debated what is the definition of a "person" (which I think is sufficiently vague to be used as a premise for other debates, as opposed to the strict definition of 'human' which simply defines a species and not its place.)
Anyways, I forget the precise aspects of it that came about but the consensus was that a "person" is something that is, in general, self-aware, and conscious, has perception of time, not necessarily human. I don't believe that temporary states of unawareness qualify to de-personify you. You go to sleep, you don't lose your place in humanity.
So, in that sense, some particularly developed animals/fish can qualify as persons. Perhaps dolphins or more some species of monkeys. Ooo oo ah aa! Errm sorry.
But yeah, somehow I don't think a sheep with a few human organs, brain aside, will develop self-consciousness and perception of time.
- shazow
Am I the only one that actually clicked that link in hopes that such a page would actually exist.
:-(
I'll go back to sleep now.
- shazow
Yes but by assigning known colours to things, couldn't you extrapolate the remaining colours by relativity of said brightness?
Like say you know the person's shirt in the photo was blue, and the truck behind him was green, and so forth, couldn't you extrapolate the colour of something relative to all the other known colours?
Or would red, blue and green look identical under the same brightness?
They DO look different under GIMP.
IE. Draw a 255 red line, a 255 blue line, and a 255 green line. Convert the image to grayscale, and they do look different shades. Similarly, you could use the difference in shades to extrapolate possibile colours, could you not? Of course it would not be 100% accurate but it could present several possibilities and you could choose the most reasonable one.
Seems possible.
Different colours appear differently when a photo is monochromed. By comparing the overall contrast and brightness of the photo, they may be able to extrapolate relative colours.
Don't know how reasonable my explination is, but doesn't really seem impossible?
- shazow