Unfortunately, [O2 Deutschland's UMTS] white-space stripper breaks XML-wellformedness, which makes me unable to view any of my own sites with Firefox (unless I disable application/xhtml+xml as an Accepted content type). How the heck did they manage to break well-formedness? The only thing I can think of offhand is if they were somehow removing separator spaces between attributes, but that'd break normal HTML too (I hope...)
Grid computing and distributed computing are related, but not the same. With distributed computing, the focus is mainly on getting large numbers of machines that are functionally the same in some way (e.g. large numbers of SETI@home processing units). With grid computing, the focus is mainly on dealing with heterogeneity and varying access rules between different organizations. The two approaches deal with different things, but can be (and often are) used together.
On a side note, I'm wondering when we hit the floor on practical CMOS voltage levels. Surely the band-gap will come into play in the near future, and then what? Actually (IIRC) you start to get into trouble at about 1V as you hit problems getting the signal off the chip. On the other hand, if they can run different parts of the chip at different voltage levels, they may be able to reduce things quite a bit further. That would probably require a redesign of the motherboard/memory interface though, since putting power regulators on the memory modules seems like a poor idea to me, so that may be a while coming.
Hm, a woman alone on vacant property with the suspicion that there are bad people there? Yeah, you're right, there's no potential for emergency there. Honestly, sometimes I wish Slashdot didn't allow AC posts. It would solve a lot of hot wind problems like this one. So tell/. to not show you posts of score 0 or below. End of problem.
Can someone please tell me what the columns are in English? While it's great to know how much "NI" Firefox has, I'd rather see the memory usage. That's an ignorable column. Instead, pay attention to "VIRT" (virtual memory used) and "RES" (approximately the physical memory used). In particular, note that both of those figures are relatively lower once a few sites are visited, meaning that FF3.0b1 is both less memory hungry and less inclined to touch pages that it is using (i.e. should be better performance in practice, especially if you're doing other things with the machine too, such as running an IDE.)
Some books don't have chapters. Some go really easy on the paragraphs too. But each of those literary devices makes the overall work far harder to read; breaking stuff up into chunks makes it easier for humans to digest. Small wonder that that's true for games too (though too many games are too obnoxious with their loading and/or make it happen too often).
(Yes, I realize that's a Microsoft-centric view, and the same thing could be accomplished in many ways, even with something as simple as a CVS server and web interface. But when you're talking about pushing around Excel, Word, Powerpoint, etc documents you may as well share them around in the Microsoft way, since the Office apps understand how to read files from and save files to SharePoint, including the check-in/out process.) If you're having to interop between lots of different platforms, subversion works superbly (it handles binary files better than CVS) and there are good tools about for integrating it with Windows.
What surprises me most is the small size of their software, only 10 thousands lines of source code (I think that the average car processor already have these for today's cars -ignition & braking systems-). Given a team of a dozen programmers working for a year, I was expecting at least 50KLOC, or maybe 200KLOC (for example, the GCC compiler is 3MLOC, and the linux kernel has comparable size.) Ah, but that 10kLOC needs to be the right 10k, and not all lines of code are the same (incrementing a variable is quite a bit simpler than calling a complex method). Plus you also don't know how many lines of code they threw away.
You might also note: companies are no allowed to drive around at 1am with a giant bullhorn aimed at homes, selling their products. CENSORSHIP!?!? No. Round here we call that "prevention of lynch mobs".
Those aren't serious allegations. These are run of the mill things. Who doesn't fudge budgets? Well, while short-term fudging is common (due to things like payments getting delayed, etc.) long-term fudging is serious and indicates that there's probably serious trouble hidden. Uncovering this sort of thing is exactly what auditors are supposed to do.
Who doesn't use their position to advance themselves or their relatives (ie., nepotism)? Nepotism is a serious allegation. If the relative is any good, they can get their position without it, and who would want to hire someone who isn't good? (Answer: someone not fit for the job)
Who doesn't spy on their employees (ie., read employee email or go hunting for personal webpages)? Those two things are different. Employee email is generally sent with the expectation of some degree of privacy, but personal webpages are voluntary publication to anyone who cares to read. Looking for public info isn't spying, looking for confidential info is. OK?
The thing is, unless these administrators are angels (and they're probably human, not angel), the allegations are probably true. These are things people of average moral character do on a normal basis. People of good moral character usually don't do this, but then again, I doubt they'd make it into a management position. Management usually goes to 'yes' people, not people with strong morals. Sounds like you've had to suffer from terrible management somewhere along the line. I really feel for you.
1) If a company tries to use software patents the way they were intended, it will only be successful against companies smaller than themselves. The big boys will insist on a portfolio exchange; if that fails, one party will end up looking like SCO. This is Patent MADness.
2) The only way to get money out of the "big infringers" is to have a company with zero liability of patent infringement, such as one with a litigation-based business model. Or to be a company that has changed what sector it operates in. Does happen (e.g. that's what really happened to Eolas which meant that MS couldn't get back at them).
3) Software patents are a barrier to entry for small companies, and a perpetual liability. Not perpetual. Just a long time. (And submarine patents manage to make a mockery of even that. I think the patent protection period should be from date of filing, which strongly discourages submarine patents.)
I don't have the time or resources to take calls from Joe in Seattle who wants to sell me his company's ASP.NET expertise (especially when I'm a LAMP operation)! Remember, you're allowed to just say "Fuck off." and put the phone down.
Arizona and Hawaii don't recognize Daylight Saving Time. Well, since Hawaii's tropical, not using daylight saving time makes a lot of sense. The length of day just doesn't vary that much there. (Compare with Alaska...)
"I was tired of North Korea's harsh penalties for being a citizen. That's why I moved to Iran!";) The problem with that analogy is that Iran is a much better place to live than North Korea. So the GP should have said Burma instead of Iran. (Mind you, even there isn't as rubbishy as NK...)
Small shops, usually, just don't have what you want and big places like Fry's and Best Buy hire idiots. My mileage is slightly different: the big places hire idiots and still just don't have what I want.
Businesses will try to whore their wares for top dollar but customers (I despise the label "consumer") will try to find the best deal possible. FYI, the difference between a Customer and a Consumer is that it is the Customer who pays and the Consumer who gets to use the product or service. Sometimes they're the same person, but not always (e.g. Google's customers are advertisers, but their consumers are you and me). Consumer is pretty much synonymous with User, with all that that implies...
To overcome these problems, you could make lots of small plates, but then joining them becomes a problem. It's called Scale Armour and it's been invented before.
I don't think any of us UKians really appreciate the size of the USA until we've watched it grind by through an airplane window or discovered that, if you fly from London to California, when you cross the N American coast you're not even half way there. Speaking as someone who does that journey (well, one very similar) fairly often, half way is about Baffin Island. And a good time to think about getting some sleep so that you're fit to drive at the other end. After all, northern Canada is very dull from the air (Iceland and Greenland are much more interesting...)
Slashdot Mirror
That change-of-address card is really nice.
Grid computing and distributed computing are related, but not the same. With distributed computing, the focus is mainly on getting large numbers of machines that are functionally the same in some way (e.g. large numbers of SETI@home processing units). With grid computing, the focus is mainly on dealing with heterogeneity and varying access rules between different organizations. The two approaches deal with different things, but can be (and often are) used together.
Some books don't have chapters. Some go really easy on the paragraphs too. But each of those literary devices makes the overall work far harder to read; breaking stuff up into chunks makes it easier for humans to digest. Small wonder that that's true for games too (though too many games are too obnoxious with their loading and/or make it happen too often).
Delete the part where you ask them to not eat your shorts. Then add a bit saying "see you in court". And get ready with the counter-suit.
I can't draw...