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  1. Re:I live in the *same* area outside St. Louis as on Experiences with Alternate Local Phone Companies? · · Score: 1

    I'm an Excel representative, and it is a good deal. You get "all you can eat" long distance for $50 a month plus taxes. Includes caller id, call waiting, 3-way etc.

    My mom and my mother in law live in Florida and the LD charges were killing me until I switched to Excel for my own lines. Check here to see if it's available in your area. You can sign up on-line.

    Not a bad business to be in these days.

  2. Re:Other Applications on Hydrodemolition Robot Crushes With Water · · Score: 1

    Ever heard of hydrofracking ?

  3. Re:Unions on Hydrodemolition Robot Crushes With Water · · Score: 1

    Nope. Sorry, that position has to be held by local or state police details. At least in my state it's the law. Flagmen/women are not allowed.

  4. Re:I think the article counters the headline best. on Cable TV Ruins Bhutan · · Score: 1

    So who's going to play Harold Hill in Bhutan?

  5. Re:Redundant??? on QBASIC Programming for Dummies · · Score: 1

    Not a grandpa yet. My oldest is only 13. Hoping to remain a non-grandpa for another 10 years or so.

  6. Re:Redundant??? on QBASIC Programming for Dummies · · Score: 2, Interesting

    You got to start with a keyboard ? And a CRT ?

    I started with Basic on mark-sense cards processed on some HP system that I only saw once.

    The compile-edit loop was one week. Our stacks only ran on friday evening. This was 1972 in West Vancouver, BC.

    It was a big step up in '72 (in Massachusetts) to basic on a PDP-8 and a teletype with paper tape storage.

    And I was in heaven in '73 with some Wang box that had all the basic commands bound to keys. So command-P gave you "print" wow.

    But I didn't start the "real programming" until '78 with Basic+ on RSTS/E and a PDP 11/45.

    Pascal came later, and I saw the light. But I never really became a C programmer, alas, and now am a perl & php guy.

  7. Re:No charge????????? on Do We Still Need Telcos (and ISPs)? · · Score: 1

    I would mod the parent up but I don't have points today.

    It brings up an interesting point. If you have a self-organizing p2p wireless net, then the nature of routing changes dramatically. Instead of routing through the physical network topology, you're routing through the physical world itself !

    Cell phones do this, but with the benefit of central authority. Without one, whew that's a chewy problem.

    Sounds like a great simulation project.

  8. Re:Thanks michael on IE6 SP1 Will Be Last Standalone Version · · Score: 1

    I imagine there'll be some crypto handshake to initialize the DRM layers.. probably inside TLS (SSL). This will fail on browsers that don't support the DRM. And the user will get a message that says "This page 'optimized' for Windows 2005". :P

  9. Re:Snort, Tripwire, Etc... on Intrusion Detection with Snort · · Score: 1

    Snort can be run in a chroot jail, with some caveats.

  10. "Woman, what have I to do with thee?" on Shocking Clothing · · Score: 1

    It wasn't always like that. Jesus got away with it.

    John 2:1-4 And he's talking to his mother !

    1 And the third day there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee; and the mother of Jesus was there: 2 And both Jesus was called, and his disciples, to the marriage. 3 And when they wanted wine, the mother of Jesus saith unto him, They have no wine. 4 Jesus saith unto her, Woman, what have I to do with thee? mine hour is not yet come.

  11. do what your POLICY says on Blow the Whistle, Lose Your Job? · · Score: 1

    Coming late to this discussion, but...

    I'm in the midst of studying for my GSEC recert exam, and there's a section that addresses this pretty directly.

    The recommendation is that you need to have a written policy on what to do in this case. And it needs to be signed by your boss and your boss's boss. You should have already decided beforehand in what cases the cops should be called.

    Also, it points out that you can't even make a copy of child porn files you find on someone's computer, without violating the law yourself.

  12. Re:Measurement units on Bombing the Moon for Water · · Score: 1

    I was hoping to see pictures of the 2 meters of plywood.. That'd please the spud gun fans.

  13. Re:Viable idea on Presenting The CDR-ROM · · Score: 1

    In 1970 I invented the "electronic battleship" game.
    I was 9.

    Wah.

  14. elevator cable would generate a lot of power too on Highlift Systems' Space Elevator In The News Again · · Score: 1

    Imagine how much voltage would be across the ends of a 35KM long carbon (conductive?) cable being swung through the earth's magnetic field.

    Like a collosal version of the space tetherexperiment.

    You might not need those solar power sats.. anyone care to do the math ?

  15. Take Our Word For It ! on A Word a Day · · Score: 1

    Another good site for the logophile is Take Our Word For It, the weekly word-orgin webzine.

    This week the spotlight is on plural diseases. Ooh! Mumps, Measles, Hives, Shingles. Why are they all plural. That and more fun.

  16. you are an idiot on Is Windows Ready For Joe Longneck? · · Score: 1

    like
    this ?

  17. first book I bought on PHP -or- MYSQL on PHP and MySQL Web Development · · Score: 1

    I had already started using PHP and MySQL, but after going through this book (and I did pretty much read it front to back) I had a much better idea of what *could* be done with PHP and MySQL.

    Now I've built a couple of special-purpose content management systems, and with the framework the book gave me, I'm able to better use the resources available on the web.

    BTW, I think you can safely extend LAMP to LAMPS (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP & Smarty).

  18. Re:Superbowl - what a rip on Superbowl XXXVII · · Score: 1

    No, actually in 2006 it will be the Extra-Large Superbowl.

  19. Re:BULLITT (1968) on Segway Banned In San Francisco · · Score: 1

    At a Smashing Pumpkins concert they showed the chase scene on a big screen with the sound up somewhere in the 110db range and a subharmonic generator. Then they turned it up, and up again. Just to "grungify" the audience's ears.

    It was a life-changing experience. And I was wearing my aluminum labyrinth earplugs.

  20. Re:spoken like a true american on Slashback: :CueCat, Exercise, Wormage · · Score: 1

    Dipshit. Adderal is just a timed-release mixture of three amphetamine salts. It *is* speed. But I must admit it helped my kid more than the Ritalin. I did have to be dragged kicking and screaming into agreeing with this, though.

  21. Re:Serious add-on idea on Linux-Based Bar-Monkey · · Score: 1

    he did say "1/2 inch acrylic over the screen", though...

  22. I have an 11/70 front panel on Collecting Classic Computers · · Score: 1

    The whole machine would have been a bit much to carry around with me through a half-dozen moves.

    At one point we replaced the original front panels on the 11/70s with a micro-processor controlled version that saved you doing the old "177660, load address, start" thing. Of course I probably don't remember the right address. I stashed the old front panel away and some years later took it home. I have it wrapped in bubble pack and some day I will make a frame for it. Maybe I could even find a way to make the LEDs light up. Any ideas on thie front ?

    The first PC I got I still have. It was a Packard Bell 486sx-25. Of course now it's a DX2-50 with 24MB and a scsi controller and three DEC RZ26 1GB drives. Still worked last time I turned it on. It's running Turbo-Linux I think.

    Remembering the days of trumpet winsock and mosaic and a 9600 bps coffee-cup-warmer modem.

  23. Re:PDP-11 on Collecting Classic Computers · · Score: 1

    My first task when I got promoted from computer operator to sysadmin at DEC in 1981 (1982?) was to install a big KL10 with 3 PDP-11 front-ends. 2 were for racks of DZ-11 terminal muxes wired to a big MICOM switch (that was my 2nd task). The third front-end was for DMC-11 synchronous IO cards to connect to the budding "Easynet".

    Oh yeah, and lots of rewiring VT52s to support EIA RS-232 instead of 20ma current-loop.

    The boss got it shipped before FA&T (final assembly and test) to "save time" and I spent a month hunting down all the missing cables.

    It was a TOPS-10 machine. Then we got a VAX 11/780 with serial #3. That was my third task, since it had been scavenged by the VMS group before they shipped it to us...

  24. well... on What's Your Earliest Memory? · · Score: 1

    I remember my father beating the shit of me when I was 18 months old. He had "issues". I remember the pink tile in the bathroom where the attack occurred.

    I remember the nursery school I went to when I was 4. I remember the heavy iron fire door between the nursery school and the town library on the other side of the building. Don't know why. I remember playing "giant steps" in the nursery school, and the piles of mats we climbed over.

    I remember chasing my brother up the stairs when I was 5 or 6 and sticking him in the ass with a table knife. He carried the scar until he died.

    I remember watching Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon in grainy black and white in whatever year that was.. I was born in '61 so do the math.

  25. Xored Web Studio on GNU Christmas Gift: Free Eclipse · · Score: 1

    Xored Web Studio is an IDE for PHP, implemented as a plugin for Eclipse. It's on my short list to check out in the new year.