Exactly what I was thinking. Is a flying squirrel similarly adapted today?
Or is this supposedly flight enhanced brain just the ability to visualize and process one's movements in a 3d space significantly larger than one's own body size?
If so, it might be nothing more than the ability to conceive/visualize converging trajectories beyond the immediate reach of teeth and claws. Typical predator pursuit behavior, in other words.
Before geeks.com they were compgeeks.com. And before compgeeks.com they were computergeeks.com.
They were one of the first places I shopped that talked about Linux compatibility in their product descriptions. I missed that feature when it went away. I was willing to buy lesser known and more expensive gear because compgeeks said it worked with Linux so I wouldn't have to do the research myself. Doing my own research I was more likely to buy the cheapest and most popular gear instead, and frequently found the Linux mention in reviews at NewEgg so that is where I bought.
I mostly quit buying monitors from them because I did not like their LCD dead pixel policy.
I mostly quit buying power supplies and cases from them because I got tired of the compromises in the "cheapest possible" gear and could afford to buy better quality.
I'm guessing a lot of their former customers have similar stories.
But I still use a GeekU can cozy with the www.computergeeks.com URL.
1. Many wild animals will MOST DEFINITELY hang out around people "clomping towards them." Or maybe you just make way too much noise? They come and peer in my back door frequently, and I have nearly tripped over them many times in my driveway, patio or porch after coming home from work 4+ months of the year and after late activities any time of the year.
2. Skunks don't typically stink. What they spray stinks but they don't spray themselves unless they are dying or other nearly as rare situations.
You sound like you have zero experience with wildlife.
A flashlight (torch) is not sufficient to avoid startling a skunk, badger, coon or even a barn cat. All of them will hide just off the edge of the path and start in a random direction right beside you. Hope you don't startle easily.
How exactly is a plant which is at or below ambient going to trigger an infrared motion sensor?
I have a lot of plants that move with the wind, but I've never seen that trigger the motion sensor lighting. Never. The coons and deer, yes. The neighbors' teenagers smoking/drinking in the back corner, yes. Never the wind moving the grass, alfalfa, iris, lilacs, arbor-vita, cottonwoods,....
Residential areas absolutely need lighting. Unless you live without lights you have no grounds to claim other people do not need lights.
That is why I have multiple motion sensing lights in my house as well as basic garage illumination on a motion sensor. (Same bulbs as the garage door opener.) Most of the time the motion sensing lighting is sufficient and avoids fumbling for a light switch with occupied hands or the temptation to act on the thought "there is enough light already on the stairs."
For all of you with the exceeding strong faith in your global climate change religion, whom have felt the need to attack the facts, please post your definition of the scientific method so that rational people will know how to converse with you.
For those who think a "provable" hypothesis is somehow different from a "falsifiable" hypothesis, I encourage you to keep studying the language. English is demonstrably difficult even for native speakers.
Actually I agree with the mutual fund comment. I decided in 2002 that mutual funds were not for me and currently invest well over 90% of my portfolio in personally selected, individual securities.
Mutual fund goals do not match my goals. Their incentives do not target my goals. Their results do not track my goals. But the funny thing is, by focusing on my goals I've also beat their goals and their results.
Same goes for using an intermediary to store my data "in the cloud." I get what I want, when I want, and avoid what I do not want by storing the data myself.
Linux as a serious OS has been around for what, 10 years ?
Given I've been running Linux since early 1992 just to poke around, and then as a serious server since 1995, your estimate of 10 years is a bit off.
Yet almost no one uses it. At some point, you have to say, the market has spoken. For whatever reason, people don't like it. I work with a set of modest geeks, and none of them (not one) uses linux for anything
"not one uses linux for anything?"
I find it hard to believe that nobody in your "set of modest geeks" uses Android, and you're so totally unfamiliar with Android market penetration that you could claim "people don't like it."
Or maybe you don't like choice so you don't want to include Android as Linux.
My main system at home has been Linux since 2004 and an early beta of Ubuntu. Several hard disks and a few processors and motherboards later it is still Linux, never booted Windows, never reinstalled but currently running Raring.
Over the same time to keep 1 windows desktop operational has required several reinstalls and at least $300 in operating system license fees for failed hardware and both hardware and software upgrades.
Administration Costs
With 7 of us in the house there is 1 Mac, 1 Windows desktop, 2 dual-boot notebooks that mostly run Linux, 2 Linux desktops, 1 Linux server (and several embedded Linux appliances not to mention 1 iOS and several Android mobiles). It is trivial to remotely admin all the Linux workstations and servers even over a slow 'net. It is possible to do the Mac. Windows is an exercise in frustration and doomed to fail.
Employment Costs
My current and previous employment centers/ed around developing on and for Linux. My secondary system at both jobs was licensed to run Windows but did so only when necessary to access some corporate app (rare access to clearcase on the previous job, even more rare access to Microsoft Project on this job).
Conclusion
Windows? It's a choice, not a requirement. It's a choice that takes too much pain and expense to keep operational.
Bennet started off wrong, and everything he wrote after that is based on that initial wrong assumption.
He writes, ''I've never seen what's so great about the Fifth Amendment "right against self-incrimination"''
Well, duh.
The purpose is not a "right against self-incrimination" but rather the right not to be punished for refusing to incriminate oneself.
You absolutely can incriminate yourself. People do it all the time. You cannot later go recant and say "the Fifth Amendment says I have a right against self-incrimination" or any other variant of that phrase.
People go to jail regularly for refusing to answer questions in court.
People do not go to jail for refusing to answer questions which might incriminate them.
For instance, concurrent code can be fun to develop, but in practice, all the interlocks required to make it work can reduce many tasks to near-serial performance. Sometimes, though, a better approach is to look for ways to split the task into subtasks that can run in separate processes that rarely interact. I've done this on occasion to produce huge increases in speed. Of course, this isn't really a question of programming, but rather a question of reanalyzing the task and finding a way to handle it with minimal coupling of a set of independent subtasks.
True. However multiple processes is simply one form of concurrency where the OS handles your isolation. If you can divide into separate processes then you can also do it multi-threaded with minimal if any "interlocks needed to make it work."
Further, multiple threads has less overhead than multiple processes (especially on one particular prominent platform) and may be preferable. Or if the problem does easily lend itself to multiple processes, that may be good enough or sometimes even better (e.g. python with the GIL).
So the problem really could be the guy has a problem with concurrent code of any variety.
How come I never have mod points when I need them? Absolutely, positively, yes. If you are the guy's manager, he needs to hear feedback from you on his skills, job performance, and future relevance. If you are not his manager, in your next 1-on-1 with your manager, you need to express your concerns with concrete examples (specific defects, specific commits causing the mess in revision control, etc).
And now, perhaps it is your time to shine -- figure out how to become a trusted resource so the problem employee will value your assistance and feedback. Then help, not by doing his work, but by being willing and able to teach when the opportunity presents. Not just the "how to do" but the "why it is better for you if you do" until the "how do I" question comes.
Always love your country -- but never trust your government!... A government that can give you everything can take everything away.
--Robert Novak, the Prince of Darkness, 1931-2009
I've given some thought to mitigating that issue as you can see by my proposal which while imposing costs on the losing plaintiff, would provide a firm limit to that cost under the control of the plaintiff. If you have a better solution to the problem of nuisance lawsuits, or to improve my idea, I'm probably not the only one who'd like to hear your idea.
I am completely sick of threatened and nuisance lawsuits with no purpose other than to intimidate or force others to make some arbitrary change in their socially acceptable behavior.
Filing a law suit should at an absolute minimum require the plaintiff to pay some costs to the defendant (perhaps the smaller of the legal costs incurred by either side) should the plaintiff lose. This will help to minimize the number of frivolous lawsuits and so minimize the quelling impact of such lawsuits on society.
Threatening a law suit in a public forum instead of contacting the defendant privately or simply filing said suit is nothing more than creating a spectacle trying to achieve the same quelling without even paying the cost to file. As such it should be punishable via a simple civil action with a default judgment (e.g. similar to junk fax) with the fine to be split equally between the wronged party and whomever pursues action to completion.
While we are at it, anyone who threatens or actually does file a suit against an inanimate object should face the same penalty as does one threatening a suit. The penalty should be faced both by the individual and additionally the organization (if any) who sponsors their lawsuit activity and by all their superiors within that organization.
I've also used IMAP as a temporary conversion measure for people switching e-mail clients so even if you aren't sure, it makes a good first step.
I don't understand the concern about too many e-mails. I can access my email back to 1992. With multiple folders it shouldn't be a problem and with modern indexing a search shouldn't be an issue.
People with only a Keynesian understanding of monetary theory tend to believe, as did Keynes, that all deflation is as bad as the deflation caused by the bursting of a credit bubble. You can point out all the real world examples of good deflation you like, but they still don't believe deflation can be OK, much less beneficial.
I don't buy a gun for "technology" or for the ways it stops itself from doing what it is supposed to do. I buy a gun for reliably doing what it is supposed to do.
That's why improvements such as firing pin or transfer bar safeties have been widely adopted. And why with the Browning Hi Power which has had a magazine safety for decades, the number one modification is to remove said "safety."
Slashdot Mirror
Exactly what I was thinking. Is a flying squirrel similarly adapted today?
Or is this supposedly flight enhanced brain just the ability to visualize and process one's movements in a 3d space significantly larger than one's own body size?
If so, it might be nothing more than the ability to conceive/visualize converging trajectories beyond the immediate reach of teeth and claws. Typical predator pursuit behavior, in other words.
Before geeks.com they were compgeeks.com. And before compgeeks.com they were computergeeks.com.
They were one of the first places I shopped that talked about Linux compatibility in their product descriptions. I missed that feature when it went away. I was willing to buy lesser known and more expensive gear because compgeeks said it worked with Linux so I wouldn't have to do the research myself. Doing my own research I was more likely to buy the cheapest and most popular gear instead, and frequently found the Linux mention in reviews at NewEgg so that is where I bought.
I mostly quit buying monitors from them because I did not like their LCD dead pixel policy.
I mostly quit buying power supplies and cases from them because I got tired of the compromises in the "cheapest possible" gear and could afford to buy better quality.
I'm guessing a lot of their former customers have similar stories.
But I still use a GeekU can cozy with the www.computergeeks.com URL.
1. Many wild animals will MOST DEFINITELY hang out around people "clomping towards them." Or maybe you just make way too much noise? They come and peer in my back door frequently, and I have nearly tripped over them many times in my driveway, patio or porch after coming home from work 4+ months of the year and after late activities any time of the year.
2. Skunks don't typically stink. What they spray stinks but they don't spray themselves unless they are dying or other nearly as rare situations.
You sound like you have zero experience with wildlife.
A flashlight (torch) is not sufficient to avoid startling a skunk, badger, coon or even a barn cat. All of them will hide just off the edge of the path and start in a random direction right beside you. Hope you don't startle easily.
How exactly is a plant which is at or below ambient going to trigger an infrared motion sensor?
I have a lot of plants that move with the wind, but I've never seen that trigger the motion sensor lighting. Never. The coons and deer, yes. The neighbors' teenagers smoking/drinking in the back corner, yes. Never the wind moving the grass, alfalfa, iris, lilacs, arbor-vita, cottonwoods, ....
Residential areas absolutely need lighting. Unless you live without lights you have no grounds to claim other people do not need lights.
That is why I have multiple motion sensing lights in my house as well as basic garage illumination on a motion sensor. (Same bulbs as the garage door opener.) Most of the time the motion sensing lighting is sufficient and avoids fumbling for a light switch with occupied hands or the temptation to act on the thought "there is enough light already on the stairs."
For all of you with the exceeding strong faith in your global climate change religion, whom have felt the need to attack the facts, please post your definition of the scientific method so that rational people will know how to converse with you.
For those who think a "provable" hypothesis is somehow different from a "falsifiable" hypothesis, I encourage you to keep studying the language. English is demonstrably difficult even for native speakers.
It is not science if your hypothesis is not falsifiable.
Actually I agree with the mutual fund comment. I decided in 2002 that mutual funds were not for me and currently invest well over 90% of my portfolio in personally selected, individual securities.
Mutual fund goals do not match my goals. Their incentives do not target my goals. Their results do not track my goals. But the funny thing is, by focusing on my goals I've also beat their goals and their results.
Same goes for using an intermediary to store my data "in the cloud." I get what I want, when I want, and avoid what I do not want by storing the data myself.
Linux as a serious OS has been around for what, 10 years ?
Given I've been running Linux since early 1992 just to poke around, and then as a serious server since 1995, your estimate of 10 years is a bit off.
Yet almost no one uses it.
At some point, you have to say, the market has spoken.
For whatever reason, people don't like it.
I work with a set of modest geeks, and none of them (not one) uses linux for anything
"not one uses linux for anything?"
I find it hard to believe that nobody in your "set of modest geeks" uses Android, and you're so totally unfamiliar with Android market penetration that you could claim "people don't like it."
Or maybe you don't like choice so you don't want to include Android as Linux.
Lots and lots of terminal windows.
System $ Costs
My main system at home has been Linux since 2004 and an early beta of Ubuntu. Several hard disks and a few processors and motherboards later it is still Linux, never booted Windows, never reinstalled but currently running Raring.
Over the same time to keep 1 windows desktop operational has required several reinstalls and at least $300 in operating system license fees for failed hardware and both hardware and software upgrades.
Administration Costs
With 7 of us in the house there is 1 Mac, 1 Windows desktop, 2 dual-boot notebooks that mostly run Linux, 2 Linux desktops, 1 Linux server (and several embedded Linux appliances not to mention 1 iOS and several Android mobiles). It is trivial to remotely admin all the Linux workstations and servers even over a slow 'net. It is possible to do the Mac. Windows is an exercise in frustration and doomed to fail.
Employment Costs
My current and previous employment centers/ed around developing on and for Linux. My secondary system at both jobs was licensed to run Windows but did so only when necessary to access some corporate app (rare access to clearcase on the previous job, even more rare access to Microsoft Project on this job).
Conclusion
Windows? It's a choice, not a requirement. It's a choice that takes too much pain and expense to keep operational.
Bennet started off wrong, and everything he wrote after that is based on that initial wrong assumption.
He writes, ''I've never seen what's so great about the Fifth Amendment "right against self-incrimination"''
Well, duh.
The purpose is not a "right against self-incrimination" but rather the right not to be punished for refusing to incriminate oneself.
You absolutely can incriminate yourself. People do it all the time. You cannot later go recant and say "the Fifth Amendment says I have a right against self-incrimination" or any other variant of that phrase.
People go to jail regularly for refusing to answer questions in court.
People do not go to jail for refusing to answer questions which might incriminate them.
Why? The Fifth.
For instance, concurrent code can be fun to develop, but in practice, all the interlocks required to make it work can reduce many tasks to near-serial performance. Sometimes, though, a better approach is to look for ways to split the task into subtasks that can run in separate processes that rarely interact. I've done this on occasion to produce huge increases in speed. Of course, this isn't really a question of programming, but rather a question of reanalyzing the task and finding a way to handle it with minimal coupling of a set of independent subtasks.
True. However multiple processes is simply one form of concurrency where the OS handles your isolation. If you can divide into separate processes then you can also do it multi-threaded with minimal if any "interlocks needed to make it work."
Further, multiple threads has less overhead than multiple processes (especially on one particular prominent platform) and may be preferable. Or if the problem does easily lend itself to multiple processes, that may be good enough or sometimes even better (e.g. python with the GIL).
So the problem really could be the guy has a problem with concurrent code of any variety.
Duh! That seems like management 101 to me.
How come I never have mod points when I need them? Absolutely, positively, yes. If you are the guy's manager, he needs to hear feedback from you on his skills, job performance, and future relevance. If you are not his manager, in your next 1-on-1 with your manager, you need to express your concerns with concrete examples (specific defects, specific commits causing the mess in revision control, etc).
And now, perhaps it is your time to shine -- figure out how to become a trusted resource so the problem employee will value your assistance and feedback. Then help, not by doing his work, but by being willing and able to teach when the opportunity presents. Not just the "how to do" but the "why it is better for you if you do" until the "how do I" question comes.
We have a phantom space station now?
Or was it a space station phantom leak?
I wonder where/why Discovery came up with "phantom" ? Really poor editing, Discovery!
Always love your country -- but never trust your government! ... A government that can give you everything can take everything away.
--Robert Novak, the Prince of Darkness, 1931-2009
So I hire a no-win-no-fee lawyer, and if I lose, I don't have to pay anything.
I believe most judges are smart enough to realize that the lack of a bill from lawyer to client does not mean no costs have been incurred.
I've given some thought to mitigating that issue as you can see by my proposal which while imposing costs on the losing plaintiff, would provide a firm limit to that cost under the control of the plaintiff. If you have a better solution to the problem of nuisance lawsuits, or to improve my idea, I'm probably not the only one who'd like to hear your idea.
I am completely sick of threatened and nuisance lawsuits with no purpose other than to intimidate or force others to make some arbitrary change in their socially acceptable behavior.
Filing a law suit should at an absolute minimum require the plaintiff to pay some costs to the defendant (perhaps the smaller of the legal costs incurred by either side) should the plaintiff lose. This will help to minimize the number of frivolous lawsuits and so minimize the quelling impact of such lawsuits on society.
Threatening a law suit in a public forum instead of contacting the defendant privately or simply filing said suit is nothing more than creating a spectacle trying to achieve the same quelling without even paying the cost to file. As such it should be punishable via a simple civil action with a default judgment (e.g. similar to junk fax) with the fine to be split equally between the wronged party and whomever pursues action to completion.
While we are at it, anyone who threatens or actually does file a suit against an inanimate object should face the same penalty as does one threatening a suit. The penalty should be faced both by the individual and additionally the organization (if any) who sponsors their lawsuit activity and by all their superiors within that organization.
Just IMAP it all.
I went IMAP in 1997 and have never looked back.
I've also used IMAP as a temporary conversion measure for people switching e-mail clients so even if you aren't sure, it makes a good first step.
I don't understand the concern about too many e-mails. I can access my email back to 1992. With multiple folders it shouldn't be a problem and with modern indexing a search shouldn't be an issue.
I'm one of the complainers.
I complained about getting the spam, not that I paid and did not receive.
But I'll still settle for just my gift card.
People with only a Keynesian understanding of monetary theory tend to believe, as did Keynes, that all deflation is as bad as the deflation caused by the bursting of a credit bubble. You can point out all the real world examples of good deflation you like, but they still don't believe deflation can be OK, much less beneficial.
Any documented instance of mosquitoes ignoring DDT?
Just another obsolete bureaucracy.
One of these years they will discover the Internet and totally freak.
It seems if it were a paint it might help. Once. The second coat could be problematic.
Do customers have any say?
I don't buy a gun for "technology" or for the ways it stops itself from doing what it is supposed to do. I buy a gun for reliably doing what it is supposed to do.
That's why improvements such as firing pin or transfer bar safeties have been widely adopted. And why with the Browning Hi Power which has had a magazine safety for decades, the number one modification is to remove said "safety."
Keep your hands off my guns.
sdb