I've got an arcade hobby... or does it have me? I've finally reduced my apartment to only seven uprights. I've got one JAMMA compatible Japanese sit-down arcade game with a 29" screen
The Taito Egret 29 which I got for a great price on eBay (and shipping from California to the central US was $200). Picking up a generic JAMMA cabinet is a *great* way to get into the hobby, and the sit-at Japanese cabinets are pretty light and very cool looking.
You'll see in my tag line that I've taken a generic Sega sit-at cabinet (Aero City) and removed all the guts from it. I replaced the control panel with a keyboard and mouse area. I placed a pedestal within the cabinet to set the normal computer monitor on top of. The marquee is lit on top, and it makes for one heck of a computer workstation.
This hobby is addictive, the barrier to entry is low, and as long as you don't destroy things, you're actually collecting electronics that regularly increase in value! Few tech hobbies can claim that.
I, too, am sick of the increasing number of junk buttons and junk features that have been creaping into Netscape. I don't use them. I want them eradicated. They provide negative value to me.
The author complained about the lack of the official Ethernet port. I agree, but for a different reason. The purpose of the TiVo is to put a simple interface, logic, and automation, around things that we are already capable of doing today. It is important that this is wrapped up as an appliance, and not a computer component.
Now that I have a TiVo, I'm addicted. But I see a great deal of possibility for service enhancement.
Mr. Corporate Executive: are you listening? Here's what I want! A bone-fide "open" video format that is used by a number of encoders. It allows content providers to put information in a format which can be downloaded into a DVR for playback.
Download AVI movie previews? HA! I want to download them to my DVR. I don't care if it has to happen in the background.
If you're looking for revenue that YOU can cash in on, how about allowing people to download (PPV) *unique* content. Things that wouldn't be on PPV but, say, would be in a video store or elsewhere. For example, an episode of Doctor Who.
Bringing this back on topic, something like Singularis is good. I'm not going to knock points off because it has a so-so web interface. But I wish that it was capable of downloading programs into my TiVo. Heck, they could do music, too.
I'm hoping that ReplayTV/TiVo do not go out of business, or adopt a strange revenue model. This type of product has a mass amount of untapped potential.
The camera by, I think it was Sony, that when set into infrared light mode during daylight, would see through soft clothing? I wonder if it would be possible to create an infrared amplifying lense (with a reactive substance to convert it to the normal spectrum) in order to give human infrared vision without electronics.
Congratulations, then. Time to call it a success and to implement SDMI, isn't it? I'd love to see them say that as their final opinion. SDMI is flawed and they know it. I'd rather they implement a flawed technology than we can handle than to come up with something even more wretched.
I prefer to compare first gen to first gen) or TTT to Soul Calibre, I don't see any amazing advance.
But you don't compare a first generation Atari 2600 work to a first generation Nintendo work, do you? If a game console is released TWO YEARS after the competitor, you'd expect a better first generation product than the competitor. If they're mearly equal, it doesn't bode well for the new player.
This answer jives with the number in the article. The maximum SPEED is 80 mph. The maximum DISTANCE is 150 miles. Assuming maximum distance could be reached at maximum speed (which is, of course, untrue), then the thing can fly for 1 hour, 52 minutes. Of course, if you're optimizing for distance, the time you spend aloft is probably going to be much longer.
So, you can probably make a safe assumption that you'll get anywhere from 1.5-3.0 hours flying time on a tank of gas, not taking into account things like crashes, engine failures, bathroom breaks (!), etc.
I don't know if this is really stupid, or really smart. But what if someone patentened the 1/2 click? No, this isn't a troll. Read on.
If a "one click" is defined as clicking on the mouse button and releasing it (as is needed for any web browser), then a "half click" could be defined simply as the act of clicking on an object (without regard to releasing or not).
Make a javascript a submit button, and viola! You've got 1/2 click shopping. Amazon's patent becomes irrelevant.
A coworker of mine picked up something *very close* to this at a gift store in St. Louis. We haven't been able to find it again. It works very close to this, but is different.
This is a complete clock that consists of a base stand, and what looks like a pendulum (or a metronome) with a bar that sticks upwards. The bar is spring loaded, and in a vertical position. In order to see the time, you move the pendulum all the way to the left, then let go.
As the arm swings back and forth, it displays the time "in the air" using a single column of LEDs. It has a sensor on it so when it is travelling to the left, it starts up so that by the time the arm is swinging to the right, it displays the time.
Its really neat. I wish I was able to find one again (did the best internet searches I could) but I have not been able to yet. This rotating clock is even better in that you have to take no action for the time to be displayed. Sounds commercially viable to me. A good geek toy.
> continued setup and managed to avoid the peice of paper issue.....
> but i still to this day cant figure how you could think a peice
> of paper interacts with windows in that way......
Perhaps they just forgot to load the drivers for their barcode reader? (evil grin)
Patent submission: An online system for the creation of Prior Art
NOTE: Prior Art created by myself three days before Roblimo's post.
A system where participants are asked to develop patentable systems for the purpose of creating prior art for parodying the existing patent system and/or invalidating subsequent patents where:
(1) Patentable systems are publicly posted and available to third parties without access restrictions.
(2) Enticement to post patentable systems may be encouraged by means of contest.
(3) Scoring of patentable systems may be made by a random moderation system of registered users of the system.
(4) Meta-moderation of such moderation may also be performed by a moderation system with random and voluntary participation by registered users.
(5) A pre-selected panel of implementors may choose between the most highly moderated systems in order to bestow a reward based on originality (or lack thereof), believability (or lack thereof), and humor value (or lack thereof).
(6) Systems related to "Zero Click Shopping" may be moderated down to a score of (-1, Redundant).
(7) Systems related to the exciting "First Post Technology" may be moderated randomly.
(8) Systems related to a system for creation of prior art may be moderated as (5, Insightful).
I'm sorry, Roblimo. But I patented your contest just days before it happened. I demand you remove this contest IMMEDIATELY or legal action may be taken against you, Slashdot, Andover, and/or the Open Source Development Network.
Submission: "A real-world delivery method for World Wide Web Content"
A real-world method by which the World Wide Web is fully accessable to users without the aid of computer access where (1) The user is sent a form in the mail requesting a starting URL via scan-tron type alpha-numeric bubbles and (2) the user sends the form back to the service via self-addressed stamped envelope and (3) the service processes the user data and sends the user back a form with the URL requested where (4) the form is annotated with numbers representing links that can be clicked and number representing form fields that can be filled out in a scan-tron type alpha-number method where (5) the user fills in the appropriate bubble to select the link or (6) completed the form data and selects the link appropriate to the submission button where (7) the user sends the completed form back to the service where the procedure is then repeated starting at step 3.
That's right. "The ultimate in offline Internet access." This is a method where people can surf the web via snail-mail and scantron bubbles.
Patent Submission: Delivery of USENET Newsgroups via FAX Machine
"A novel delivery method by which a user may subscribe to USENET Newsgroups, and said newsgroups are delivered to the user by FAX, either on a per-article basis, or by daily summary. Features include, but are not limited to, automatic extraction and conversion to FAX format of images that are normaly represented as encoded ASCII data."
That's right! Get a subscription to alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.spanking" sent right to your boss' FAX machine.
Submission follows: "A method for the pay-per-view delivery of pornographic material via a telephone faximile device where (1) the user dials a 1-900 reverse-charge telephone number and (2) selects a destination fax number and (3) selects an image type and (4) selects the number of deliveries. Said service then randomly selects the predetermined number of images, and transmits them via electronic telephone faximile process to the predetermined fax device."
Scary. It could actually make money. (1-900-FAX-PORN or 1-900-PORN-FAX I suppose.)
REVISION
Stupid Patent Pool Submission: "Slashdot Effect"
"A method of harnessing the collective click streams by harvesting the eyeballs of a devoted interest group in order to provide a positive reward stream to media outlets which provide stories of value to said interest group. The reward stream is generated by the number of advertising impressions generated by the volumatic traffic, and the innevitable and accidental click-throughs to said advertisements."
Stupid Patent Pool Submission: "E-commerce Patent Creation Methodology"
"A method of taking a widely used activity (including, but not limited to: walking, banking, or listening to answering machine messages), and adding the synergistic effect of an electronic and/or online component in order to create a novel idea which is patentable."
The real kicker for this patent is that if it was actually granted, it could put an end to more of those silly e-commerce patents being granted. Well, at least, without the owner of this patent being the part owner of subsequent e-commerce patents.
Okay, admittedly, all of us would really like to see the record company fall on its own sword and ruin itself by releasing the "perfect" distribution system for music online, having some hardware manufacturers go full-steam and produce products, the record industry puts out their songs, THEN it is cracked.
That, by the way, is why the hardware groups oppose it. They know it is going to die because it won't work. They want it proven before they spend incredible amounts of time and money engineering and producing a dead product.
Now, if I were to crack it before they are committed, they have a chance to put another solution in place. I really doubt that if someone produced the magic bullet that kills watermarking that the RIAA will say, "Okay. We're not going to protect our music." They'll just come up with something else.
By hacking later, it also buys time. And it also destroys the RIAA's reputation so when they're working on a "second solution", their sphere of influence will be diminished. And in the mean time, you'll get access to all the watermarked songs they've released.
Hack now? No thank you. But I do feel badly for the engineers who are being forced to create a lemon.
You don't know what you're talking about. The first three items are already true for the E10k. Absolutely nothing new (unless #2 extends to their middle range servers). The GUI? Sun has always given the GUI/CLI option. Don't know if this'll stick around or not. About the frame relay thing... if it *is* _required_, I'm with you. Don't want it.
Did anyone else read this? (I heard it earlier in a NDA.) You can mix different speed CPUs in the same system. Talk about major cool. So if you're in a tight squeeze, and you need some extra juice, and you've got an older or newer processor laying around, use it! Yummy.
This is really scary. To have a government case against you, and to not be able to tell anyone about it unless the government gives you permission. YIKES! Talk about a police state!
Let's say you've got an applicaiton that has 'maxed out' a Sun Sparc Server 1000E. Would you rather spend your $1M to try to make it better, or just purchase a Sun Ultra Enterprise 10000? In a similar matter, upgrading an existing SETI project to scale to that level wouldn't be cost efficient. Nevermind that you don't have to interface and involve yourself with the politics of even more groups when you build your own SETI.
Although I am amused/puzzled by something. They're designing something *now* for implementation in 2015. By the time it is in place, it'll be long obsolete!
Re:Sun is a hardware vender first Unix vender seco
on
A Praise To Unix
·
· Score: 1
> A 32 cpu Intel will smoke a 10000 with same number of chips/memory/etc...
Might be true if you are comparing Intel's latest generation with Sun's current generation, but not the next. Sun has published their CPU roadmap -- they're getting close again. Besides, when are you going to find an Intel based OS that'll properly scale up to 32 processors and still be halfway efficient?
The article almost seemed to suggest that UNIX is dying and the future is Linux. While Linux does have a very bright future, one UNIX vendor is not only doing very well, but thriving. None other that good 'ole Sun Microsystems.
They've absorbed a great deal of market share. It its because they are truly innovating -- in hardware and software. What they've done today is great, but I've received my non-disclosure brefing on the new technology coming out. You think Microsoft listens to their customers? Sun has ABSOLUTELY listened to their customers about the hardware and innovated new products which address the complaints about the current line.
The software/hardware combination (which is hard to get without a major backer -- maybe Compaq can pull it off) is incredible. When you've got a production system which is choking all of the sudden and needs more CPU and memory, what other system do you know of that will allow you to add (or subtract) CPU/Memory/IO devices on the fly, while the operating system continues to run, without missing a beat? It's saved our butts more than a few times.
I'm just a little put off on the spin of the article that seems to ignore that UNIX is alive and doing well. Sun absolutely has their act together.
I think up until here recently, most of us probably thought that we were pirating music when we gave a copy to a friend. Now, thanks to RIAA's publicity, we know that isn't the case. And the law could very well be interpreted to say that an online distro method like Napster is legal, too.
Okay. In a way, I consider this a license to steal. But for once, I thank congress. Let's hope Napster prevails!
Slashdot Mirror
You'll see in my tag line that I've taken a generic Sega sit-at cabinet (Aero City) and removed all the guts from it. I replaced the control panel with a keyboard and mouse area. I placed a pedestal within the cabinet to set the normal computer monitor on top of. The marquee is lit on top, and it makes for one heck of a computer workstation.
This hobby is addictive, the barrier to entry is low, and as long as you don't destroy things, you're actually collecting electronics that regularly increase in value! Few tech hobbies can claim that.
I, too, am sick of the increasing number of junk buttons and junk features that have been creaping into Netscape. I don't use them. I want them eradicated. They provide negative value to me.
The author complained about the lack of the official Ethernet port. I agree, but for a different reason. The purpose of the TiVo is to put a simple interface, logic, and automation, around things that we are already capable of doing today. It is important that this is wrapped up as an appliance, and not a computer component.
Now that I have a TiVo, I'm addicted. But I see a great deal of possibility for service enhancement.
Mr. Corporate Executive: are you listening? Here's what I want! A bone-fide "open" video format that is used by a number of encoders. It allows content providers to put information in a format which can be downloaded into a DVR for playback.
Download AVI movie previews? HA! I want to download them to my DVR. I don't care if it has to happen in the background.
If you're looking for revenue that YOU can cash in on, how about allowing people to download (PPV) *unique* content. Things that wouldn't be on PPV but, say, would be in a video store or elsewhere. For example, an episode of Doctor Who.
Bringing this back on topic, something like Singularis is good. I'm not going to knock points off because it has a so-so web interface. But I wish that it was capable of downloading programs into my TiVo. Heck, they could do music, too.
I'm hoping that ReplayTV/TiVo do not go out of business, or adopt a strange revenue model. This type of product has a mass amount of untapped potential.
The camera by, I think it was Sony, that when set into infrared light mode during daylight, would see through soft clothing? I wonder if it would be possible to create an infrared amplifying lense (with a reactive substance to convert it to the normal spectrum) in order to give human infrared vision without electronics.
Congratulations, then. Time to call it a success and to implement SDMI, isn't it? I'd love to see them say that as their final opinion. SDMI is flawed and they know it. I'd rather they implement a flawed technology than we can handle than to come up with something even more wretched.
I have a Geek Throne in my bathroom, but I wouldn't quite call it a "chair".
But you don't compare a first generation Atari 2600 work to a first generation Nintendo work, do you? If a game console is released TWO YEARS after the competitor, you'd expect a better first generation product than the competitor. If they're mearly equal, it doesn't bode well for the new player.
This answer jives with the number in the article. The maximum SPEED is 80 mph. The maximum DISTANCE is 150 miles. Assuming maximum distance could be reached at maximum speed (which is, of course, untrue), then the thing can fly for 1 hour, 52 minutes. Of course, if you're optimizing for distance, the time you spend aloft is probably going to be much longer.
So, you can probably make a safe assumption that you'll get anywhere from 1.5-3.0 hours flying time on a tank of gas, not taking into account things like crashes, engine failures, bathroom breaks (!), etc.
I don't know if this is really stupid, or really smart. But what if someone patentened the 1/2 click? No, this isn't a troll. Read on.
If a "one click" is defined as clicking on the mouse button and releasing it (as is needed for any web browser), then a "half click" could be defined simply as the act of clicking on an object (without regard to releasing or not).
Make a javascript a submit button, and viola! You've got 1/2 click shopping. Amazon's patent becomes irrelevant.
[Note: Devil's in the details, tho'.]
A coworker of mine picked up something *very close* to this at a gift store in St. Louis. We haven't been able to find it again. It works very close to this, but is different.
This is a complete clock that consists of a base stand, and what looks like a pendulum (or a metronome) with a bar that sticks upwards. The bar is spring loaded, and in a vertical position. In order to see the time, you move the pendulum all the way to the left, then let go.
As the arm swings back and forth, it displays the time "in the air" using a single column of LEDs. It has a sensor on it so when it is travelling to the left, it starts up so that by the time the arm is swinging to the right, it displays the time.
Its really neat. I wish I was able to find one again (did the best internet searches I could) but I have not been able to yet. This rotating clock is even better in that you have to take no action for the time to be displayed. Sounds commercially viable to me. A good geek toy.
> continued setup and managed to avoid the peice of paper issue.....
> but i still to this day cant figure how you could think a peice
> of paper interacts with windows in that way......
Perhaps they just forgot to load the drivers for their barcode reader? (evil grin)
NOTE: Prior Art created by myself three days before Roblimo's post.
A system where participants are asked to develop patentable systems for the purpose of creating prior art for parodying the existing patent system and/or invalidating subsequent patents where:
(1) Patentable systems are publicly posted and available to third parties without access restrictions.
(2) Enticement to post patentable systems may be encouraged by means of contest.
(3) Scoring of patentable systems may be made by a random moderation system of registered users of the system.
(4) Meta-moderation of such moderation may also be performed by a moderation system with random and voluntary participation by registered users.
(5) A pre-selected panel of implementors may choose between the most highly moderated systems in order to bestow a reward based on originality (or lack thereof), believability (or lack thereof), and humor value (or lack thereof).
(6) Systems related to "Zero Click Shopping" may be moderated down to a score of (-1, Redundant).
(7) Systems related to the exciting "First Post Technology" may be moderated randomly.
(8) Systems related to a system for creation of prior art may be moderated as (5, Insightful).
I'm sorry, Roblimo. But I patented your contest just days before it happened. I demand you remove this contest IMMEDIATELY or legal action may be taken against you, Slashdot, Andover, and/or the Open Source Development Network.
A real-world method by which the World Wide Web is fully accessable to users without the aid of computer access where (1) The user is sent a form in the mail requesting a starting URL via scan-tron type alpha-numeric bubbles and (2) the user sends the form back to the service via self-addressed stamped envelope and (3) the service processes the user data and sends the user back a form with the URL requested where (4) the form is annotated with numbers representing links that can be clicked and number representing form fields that can be filled out in a scan-tron type alpha-number method where (5) the user fills in the appropriate bubble to select the link or (6) completed the form data and selects the link appropriate to the submission button where (7) the user sends the completed form back to the service where the procedure is then repeated starting at step 3.
That's right. "The ultimate in offline Internet access."
This is a method where people can surf the web via snail-mail and scantron bubbles.
"A novel delivery method by which a user may subscribe to USENET Newsgroups, and said newsgroups are delivered to the user by FAX, either on a per-article basis, or by daily summary. Features include, but are not limited to, automatic extraction and conversion to FAX format of images that are normaly represented as encoded ASCII data."
That's right! Get a subscription to alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.spanking" sent right to your boss' FAX machine.
Scary. It could actually make money. (1-900-FAX-PORN or 1-900-PORN-FAX I suppose.)
Stupid Patent Pool Submission: "Slashdot Effect"
"A method of harnessing the collective click streams by harvesting the eyeballs of a devoted interest group in order to provide a positive reward stream to media outlets which provide stories of value to said interest group. The reward stream is generated by the number of advertising impressions generated by the volumatic traffic, and the innevitable and accidental click-throughs to said advertisements."
"A method of taking a widely used activity (including, but not limited to: walking, banking, or listening to answering machine messages), and adding the synergistic effect of an electronic and/or online component in order to create a novel idea which is patentable."
The real kicker for this patent is that if it was actually granted, it could put an end to more of those silly e-commerce patents being granted. Well, at least, without the owner of this patent being the part owner of subsequent e-commerce patents.
Okay, admittedly, all of us would really like to see the record company fall on its own sword and ruin itself by releasing the "perfect" distribution system for music online, having some hardware manufacturers go full-steam and produce products, the record industry puts out their songs, THEN it is cracked.
That, by the way, is why the hardware groups oppose it. They know it is going to die because it won't work. They want it proven before they spend incredible amounts of time and money engineering and producing a dead product.
Now, if I were to crack it before they are committed, they have a chance to put another solution in place. I really doubt that if someone produced the magic bullet that kills watermarking that the RIAA will say, "Okay. We're not going to protect our music." They'll just come up with something else.
By hacking later, it also buys time. And it also destroys the RIAA's reputation so when they're working on a "second solution", their sphere of influence will be diminished. And in the mean time, you'll get access to all the watermarked songs they've released.
Hack now? No thank you. But I do feel badly for the engineers who are being forced to create a lemon.
You don't know what you're talking about. The first three items are already true for the E10k. Absolutely nothing new (unless #2 extends to their middle range servers). The GUI? Sun has always given the GUI/CLI option. Don't know if this'll stick around or not. About the frame relay thing... if it *is* _required_, I'm with you. Don't want it.
Did anyone else read this? (I heard it earlier in a NDA.) You can mix different speed CPUs in the same system. Talk about major cool. So if you're in a tight squeeze, and you need some extra juice, and you've got an older or newer processor laying around, use it! Yummy.
This is really scary. To have a government case against you, and to not be able to tell anyone about it unless the government gives you permission. YIKES! Talk about a police state!
Let's say you've got an applicaiton that has 'maxed out' a Sun Sparc Server 1000E. Would you rather spend your $1M to try to make it better, or just purchase a Sun Ultra Enterprise 10000? In a similar matter, upgrading an existing SETI project to scale to that level wouldn't be cost efficient. Nevermind that you don't have to interface and involve yourself with the politics of even more groups when you build your own SETI.
Although I am amused/puzzled by something. They're designing something *now* for implementation in 2015. By the time it is in place, it'll be long obsolete!
Might be true if you are comparing Intel's latest generation with Sun's current generation, but not the next. Sun has published their CPU roadmap -- they're getting close again. Besides, when are you going to find an Intel based OS that'll properly scale up to 32 processors and still be halfway efficient?
They've absorbed a great deal of market share. It its because they are truly innovating -- in hardware and software. What they've done today is great, but I've received my non-disclosure brefing on the new technology coming out. You think Microsoft listens to their customers? Sun has ABSOLUTELY listened to their customers about the hardware and innovated new products which address the complaints about the current line.
The software/hardware combination (which is hard to get without a major backer -- maybe Compaq can pull it off) is incredible. When you've got a production system which is choking all of the sudden and needs more CPU and memory, what other system do you know of that will allow you to add (or subtract) CPU/Memory/IO devices on the fly, while the operating system continues to run, without missing a beat? It's saved our butts more than a few times.
I'm just a little put off on the spin of the article that seems to ignore that UNIX is alive and doing well. Sun absolutely has their act together.
I think up until here recently, most of us probably thought that we were pirating music when we gave a copy to a friend. Now, thanks to RIAA's publicity, we know that isn't the case. And the law could very well be interpreted to say that an online distro method like Napster is legal, too.
Okay. In a way, I consider this a license to steal. But for once, I thank congress. Let's hope Napster prevails!