All you'd have to do is get a 6-axis milling machine and mill out the part from the block. It would have to be a big machine to mill out a 600 pound block, but still, the idea is similar. I'd estimate the costs for making the first part to be less than what you'll get paid for the part. You'd be looking at about $50M tops for the machine and labour, so you'd be in good shape after the first payment. It's a viable business model.
The problem, I think, is liability. Where are you going to find someone willing to sign off on the part, saying that it is absolutely guaranteed to work in a nuclear reactor?
Both multiplication and division are "heavy" operations in the embedded world. Incorporating them into the code even once can mean that your code won't fit into the footprint. One chip I used in 2006 has 512 bytes of Flash and 24 bytes of RAM. Not for a trivial application either - there are tens of thousands of that product out in use right now, and people depend on the device to live.
Sure, a few chips have built-in single-line multipliers, but I don't think that's what they use in pacemakers.The pacemaker chips are probably running at 32kHz (kilohertz) for battery efficiency.
I don't think that the very remote chance of a pacemaker hack with technology that doesn't exist is a sufficient threat to require encryption on the pacemaker. If thousands of people start dying as a direct result of this hack, then I might change my mind.
Ah, finally, someone understands something! Most programmers think that EVERYTHING that can be programmed has a multi-core architecture with a hard drive, monitor, etc. You haven't seen most of the computers that you use on a daily basis. Do you think your elevator runs a Duo-core? Your apartment buzzer controller isn't made by AMD.
I'm an EE with a lot of embedded experience in RF devices. I've had to make recalls because the standby current* was 50uA instead of 12uA. (For a GPS tracking board with VHF transmitter.)
The level of misunderstanding that's required to think that you can surreptitiously reprogram somebody's pacemaker without their knowledge is astounding. If you've got a pacemaker and someone tries to walk up to you and reprogram your chest, just walk away, man. Walk away. It's not like it's going to take 2 seconds to line everything up correctly. Even if all the technical details are magically sorted, a different brand could make your hack useless. So could temperature, humidity, clothing, chest hair, and any of the other RF voodoo things that you have to deal with.
*(Technically "quiescent" but I'm not sure everyone knows what that means.)
The other critical factor is that in Canada, the loser automatically pays all court costs.
If the CRIA sues me and they lose, they have to pay not only their own legal fees, but all of my fees. This includes, but is not limited to, my:
1. lawyer's fees. 2. filing costs. 3. lost wages for showing up in court when I could have been at work making money. 4. extra expenses incurred while defending myself.
If they drop the charges against someone who has a defence (like the RIAA does in the states) they still have to pay those fees. That's why we'll never get RIAA-style litigation here.
If you adopted the same idea in the US, you'd end legal threatening. "Well, we've got millions. You're a student. Your money will run out first. You'll be bankrupted......unless you settle."
Technically, the distinction here in Canada is that you can download music, but you can't upload it. I'm sure if you kept 35% Canadian content on your shared drive, you could argue that you're an unlicenced broadcaster, not a music pirate.
It's the operator, not the location that's the key to enforcement. So, if Taco moved all the/. servers to Nunavut (easy cooling), he could still be in trouble as the operator if he logged in while in Kentucky.
It's better to study the old exams (your professors will reuse the questions they developed over the years) and develop a rapport with the TAs / professors (they are people and like people who like them.)
The first responder radios they have in my city are being upgraded...... to 97% uptime.
First responders are police, paramedics, firefighters, etc. There was an incident about a year ago where two cops were being assaulted (and losing the fight) in a basement. Their radios were not working, so they couldn't call for backup.
Luckily for them, a bystander called 911 on their cell phone.
Lucky for me, too, since I got called to the carpet for calling the reliability of the system into question. I probably would have been fired, but the above-mentioned incident was in the paper the morning of my "meeting".
The new radios are controlled by internet-connected computers. As the Farkism goes, "this should end well."
Why would I spend hundreds on a card for gaming when I can just buy a console? Hmm, a 512MB PCI-e card with SomeFeature(tm) for $300 or a PS3? Oh, wait, my motherboard doesn't support PCI-e, so I'd have to get another MB. Oh. I guess I have to buy an new CPU too. Oh, and RAM. So, for just $1000, I can play PC ports for the games I could be playing on the PS3. Heck, I could get an Xbox360 at the same time and still come out ahead. (I already have a Wii.)
I don't want to take part in the video card arms race anymore. The last two times I bought a card, I got hosed by the model numbers being sequenced in a totally bizarre way. I've spent about $200 each on the last two cards. Neither of them have been worth the money. I bought an ATI card after the nVidia card from the time before was (IMHO) mis-labeled. It's bullshit, I'm tired of it, and I'm taking my money and going home.
When my existing video card dies, I will abandon my computer. (Okay, I'll move it into the basement, turn it into a server, and use a virtual machine on it.) That's unlikely to happen, as I don't overclock my system and keep my everything nice and cool. (I also use a static strap and static mat when doing maintenance.)
For work, I can just get a CAD card and get them to pay for it.
2. Don't blame ATI. Yeah, yeah, "they're unprofessional and their drivers suck".
AND
3. Don't say, "you should buy a new video card lol" when someone asks for help. I will never buy another video card again. The End.
I wiped Ubuntu and went back to Win2k so I could use a 1280 resolution at 75Hz. Apparently 1024 at 60 was considered "good enough" by the forum folks.
Apart from the "eyestrain-o-vision", it was decent enough to work with. I use it at work all the time for running the CNC machine with EMC2. I thought it would be reasonable to try it out at home.
Apparently not.
Watch this - I'll be modded as a troll, or maybe flamebait.
Make sure you have content (aka renter's) insurance. Install smoke detectors and test them regularly. Smoking is one of the top 3 causes of building fires. (Along with dryer malfunctions and careless cooking, I think.)
If you can't use detectors because the smoke sets them off, then your neighbour has likely tampered with his. It's quite common. A recent fire in Toronto showed that the detectors were tampered with. The landlords have to run the power to the bathrooms through the smoke detectors so that if they don't work, the bathroom stays dark and people complain.
Anyway, make sure you have working smoke detectors and make sure your belongings are covered by your insurance.
Yeah, can we use statistical analysis to compare the number of people who die in terrorist-related airplane accidents compared to, say, the number of people who die in car accidents or toilet-related accidents?
I think the line is: "On Sept 11, 2001, 40,000 children starved to death."
But yeah, your air-marshal plan kicks ass and you should get a cheque. Never mind some ridiculously over-priced chemical sniffer (hello, dogs?) or facial recognition software (hello, it's fooled by smiling).
Just have a guy (or girl) with a gun on every flight. Perfect solution.
Oh, add a Faraday cage to every plane so remote explosives can't get their signals.
I can't tell you how many times looking at the ASM output (on CCS-C) has saved my butt. Not as many times as a good diff program, but close.
You know you're getting close when you replace some ASM code with your own because the compiler didn't do a tight enough job. It's even better when you get a 6% reduction in code footprint. You know you're crazy when you're doing the same thing on the compiled HEX output.
I remember once when my boss came in and said, "Wow, now THAT'S programming - just... a page of HEX."
I've done a fair bit of Embedded C. One chip I used had 512 bytes of Flash and 24 bytes of RAM.
The truth is that we all programming in machine code. The abstractions that we use to understand the machine's language (or to make it understand ours) have to be fully understood to prevent serious errors. Even people programming in a high-level language that will run on an abstraction layer (i.e. JRE,.NET) should be aware of what your target audience is. That audience is the machines that will eventually run your code.
What you write as one line could, in fact, be interrupted in the middle of execution. Assembly is as close to machine code as you can get.
Take the easiest example:
i++;
You can't get much easier than that in C. Now let's look at it in pseudo-assembly:
LOAD i ADD 1 OUT i
What's the difference here? One appears to be an impenetrable one-line function, but it is in fact about three lines. The difference can be significant:
LOAD i INTERRUPT HEY WHAT HAPPENED TO THE ACCUMULATOR VALUES ADD 1 OUT i
Usually, the stack will take care of keeping track of what happened in the accumulator during the interrupt. That's what everyone will tell you. This is not true in real life, at least not always.
And yes, I speak from personal experience.
Feel free to list "Assembly" as an obsolete language. I can understand it and use it. I've paid bills with it as recently as 10 months ago. The fewer there are that can use it, the more I can charge.
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Making the part itself would be easy.
All you'd have to do is get a 6-axis milling machine and mill out the part from the block. It would have to be a big machine to mill out a 600 pound block, but still, the idea is similar. I'd estimate the costs for making the first part to be less than what you'll get paid for the part. You'd be looking at about $50M tops for the machine and labour, so you'd be in good shape after the first payment. It's a viable business model.
The problem, I think, is liability. Where are you going to find someone willing to sign off on the part, saying that it is absolutely guaranteed to work in a nuclear reactor?
It's a golden age for Blu-Ray - a golden age that will last forever.
Both multiplication and division are "heavy" operations in the embedded world. Incorporating them into the code even once can mean that your code won't fit into the footprint. One chip I used in 2006 has 512 bytes of Flash and 24 bytes of RAM. Not for a trivial application either - there are tens of thousands of that product out in use right now, and people depend on the device to live.
Sure, a few chips have built-in single-line multipliers, but I don't think that's what they use in pacemakers.The pacemaker chips are probably running at 32kHz (kilohertz) for battery efficiency.
I don't think that the very remote chance of a pacemaker hack with technology that doesn't exist is a sufficient threat to require encryption on the pacemaker. If thousands of people start dying as a direct result of this hack, then I might change my mind.
Ah, finally, someone understands something! Most programmers think that EVERYTHING that can be programmed has a multi-core architecture with a hard drive, monitor, etc. You haven't seen most of the computers that you use on a daily basis. Do you think your elevator runs a Duo-core? Your apartment buzzer controller isn't made by AMD.
I'm an EE with a lot of embedded experience in RF devices. I've had to make recalls because the standby current* was 50uA instead of 12uA. (For a GPS tracking board with VHF transmitter.)
The level of misunderstanding that's required to think that you can surreptitiously reprogram somebody's pacemaker without their knowledge is astounding. If you've got a pacemaker and someone tries to walk up to you and reprogram your chest, just walk away, man. Walk away. It's not like it's going to take 2 seconds to line everything up correctly. Even if all the technical details are magically sorted, a different brand could make your hack useless. So could temperature, humidity, clothing, chest hair, and any of the other RF voodoo things that you have to deal with.
*(Technically "quiescent" but I'm not sure everyone knows what that means.)
The other critical factor is that in Canada, the loser automatically pays all court costs.
...unless you settle."
If the CRIA sues me and they lose, they have to pay not only their own legal fees, but all of my fees. This includes, but is not limited to, my:
1. lawyer's fees.
2. filing costs.
3. lost wages for showing up in court when I could have been at work making money.
4. extra expenses incurred while defending myself.
If they drop the charges against someone who has a defence (like the RIAA does in the states) they still have to pay those fees. That's why we'll never get RIAA-style litigation here.
If you adopted the same idea in the US, you'd end legal threatening. "Well, we've got millions. You're a student. Your money will run out first. You'll be bankrupted...
Technically, the distinction here in Canada is that you can download music, but you can't upload it. I'm sure if you kept 35% Canadian content on your shared drive, you could argue that you're an unlicenced broadcaster, not a music pirate.
IANAL.
Don't offshore. Nearshore to Canada.
/. servers to Nunavut (easy cooling), he could still be in trouble as the operator if he logged in while in Kentucky.
It's the operator, not the location that's the key to enforcement. So, if Taco moved all the
How can that be the fault of the patent owner?
I dunno, maybe it's their fault for getting the chips made by the lowest bidder in a country that doesn't respect IP laws.
Physical access = security is meaningless.
If they could access the firewire port via an internet connection, THEN I'd consider this a leak.
You could also tweak the system by opening the case and removing the hard drive, or just attaching a thumb drive and copying all the data.
It's better to study the old exams (your professors will reuse the questions they developed over the years) and develop a rapport with the TAs / professors (they are people and like people who like them.)
The first responder radios they have in my city are being upgraded... ... to 97% uptime.
First responders are police, paramedics, firefighters, etc. There was an incident about a year ago where two cops were being assaulted (and losing the fight) in a basement. Their radios were not working, so they couldn't call for backup.
Luckily for them, a bystander called 911 on their cell phone.
Lucky for me, too, since I got called to the carpet for calling the reliability of the system into question. I probably would have been fired, but the above-mentioned incident was in the paper the morning of my "meeting".
The new radios are controlled by internet-connected computers. As the Farkism goes, "this should end well."
Why would I spend hundreds on a card for gaming when I can just buy a console? Hmm, a 512MB PCI-e card with SomeFeature(tm) for $300 or a PS3? Oh, wait, my motherboard doesn't support PCI-e, so I'd have to get another MB. Oh. I guess I have to buy an new CPU too. Oh, and RAM. So, for just $1000, I can play PC ports for the games I could be playing on the PS3. Heck, I could get an Xbox360 at the same time and still come out ahead. (I already have a Wii.)
I don't want to take part in the video card arms race anymore. The last two times I bought a card, I got hosed by the model numbers being sequenced in a totally bizarre way. I've spent about $200 each on the last two cards. Neither of them have been worth the money. I bought an ATI card after the nVidia card from the time before was (IMHO) mis-labeled. It's bullshit, I'm tired of it, and I'm taking my money and going home.
When my existing video card dies, I will abandon my computer. (Okay, I'll move it into the basement, turn it into a server, and use a virtual machine on it.) That's unlikely to happen, as I don't overclock my system and keep my everything nice and cool. (I also use a static strap and static mat when doing maintenance.)
For work, I can just get a CAD card and get them to pay for it.
1. ATI Support.
AND
2. Don't blame ATI. Yeah, yeah, "they're unprofessional and their drivers suck".
AND
3. Don't say, "you should buy a new video card lol" when someone asks for help. I will never buy another video card again. The End.
I wiped Ubuntu and went back to Win2k so I could use a 1280 resolution at 75Hz. Apparently 1024 at 60 was considered "good enough" by the forum folks.
Apart from the "eyestrain-o-vision", it was decent enough to work with. I use it at work all the time for running the CNC machine with EMC2. I thought it would be reasonable to try it out at home.
Apparently not.
Watch this - I'll be modded as a troll, or maybe flamebait.
Make sure you have content (aka renter's) insurance. Install smoke detectors and test them regularly. Smoking is one of the top 3 causes of building fires. (Along with dryer malfunctions and careless cooking, I think.)
If you can't use detectors because the smoke sets them off, then your neighbour has likely tampered with his. It's quite common. A recent fire in Toronto showed that the detectors were tampered with. The landlords have to run the power to the bathrooms through the smoke detectors so that if they don't work, the bathroom stays dark and people complain.
Anyway, make sure you have working smoke detectors and make sure your belongings are covered by your insurance.
Yeah, can we use statistical analysis to compare the number of people who die in terrorist-related airplane accidents compared to, say, the number of people who die in car accidents or toilet-related accidents?
I think the line is: "On Sept 11, 2001, 40,000 children starved to death."
But yeah, your air-marshal plan kicks ass and you should get a cheque. Never mind some ridiculously over-priced chemical sniffer (hello, dogs?) or facial recognition software (hello, it's fooled by smiling).
Just have a guy (or girl) with a gun on every flight. Perfect solution.
Oh, add a Faraday cage to every plane so remote explosives can't get their signals.
I can't tell you how many times looking at the ASM output (on CCS-C) has saved my butt. Not as many times as a good diff program, but close.
You know you're getting close when you replace some ASM code with your own because the compiler didn't do a tight enough job. It's even better when you get a 6% reduction in code footprint. You know you're crazy when you're doing the same thing on the compiled HEX output.
I remember once when my boss came in and said, "Wow, now THAT'S programming - just... a page of HEX."
I've done a fair bit of Embedded C. One chip I used had 512 bytes of Flash and 24 bytes of RAM.
OR:
.NET) should be aware of what your target audience is. That audience is the machines that will eventually run your code.
Debugging.
The truth is that we all programming in machine code. The abstractions that we use to understand the machine's language (or to make it understand ours) have to be fully understood to prevent serious errors. Even people programming in a high-level language that will run on an abstraction layer (i.e. JRE,
What you write as one line could, in fact, be interrupted in the middle of execution. Assembly is as close to machine code as you can get.
Take the easiest example:
i++;
You can't get much easier than that in C. Now let's look at it in pseudo-assembly:
LOAD i
ADD 1
OUT i
What's the difference here? One appears to be an impenetrable one-line function, but it is in fact about three lines. The difference can be significant:
LOAD i
INTERRUPT HEY WHAT HAPPENED TO THE ACCUMULATOR VALUES
ADD 1
OUT i
Usually, the stack will take care of keeping track of what happened in the accumulator during the interrupt. That's what everyone will tell you. This is not true in real life, at least not always.
And yes, I speak from personal experience.
Feel free to list "Assembly" as an obsolete language. I can understand it and use it. I've paid bills with it as recently as 10 months ago. The fewer there are that can use it, the more I can charge.
Why not a small internal combustion engine coupled with the electric motor?
That way, you could still run the light in a power failure by running the small ICE.
Hey, you could make the engine a little bigger and add some outlets so you could power other lamps.
(The outside of my tooth is delicious.)
No.
I (and and many others) suspect that the Democratic presidential candidates are those who have been wiretapped illegally.
Yes, which is why I said to consult a LOCAL lawyer. The rules change depending on where you are and how far the last case went.
I'm in Canada. I play by different rules, eh?
If you get rid of the shrinkwrap EULAs, they'll just put them up online:
"By installing this software, you agree to the terms listed at http://yoursoftware.eulas.co.uk/gibberish/southhampshire/new/eula/contracts/ty282-12273sre/legal/agreement.html
IF YOU DON NOT AGREE TO THOSE TERMS DO NOT INSTALL THE SOFTWARE."
(Website may be down "periodically" for "maintenance".)
No, they probably wouldn't stand up in court. You don't get the chance to review the contract before you sign it.
A lawyer I know told me, "If you ever get presented with a gratuitously unfair contract, just sign it because it isn't binding anyway."
That advice is worth what you paid for it. Consult a local lawyer.
Some anti-* programs (e.g. Spybot) can lock your hosts file.
I imagine that the next version will lock your DNS settings.
If they learn how to program from us, we'll be fine.
We can survive salt water, high EMP fields, and power outages. A computer can't handle carpet.
My money's always going to be on the meatbags.
So, you're saying that today's games use two joysticks.
That's all the analog sticks are - joysticks.
I live on the west coast of Canada.
I'd lose.