Well, actually, the American invasion of Canada in 1812 (it started in 1812... hence the name: War of 1812) was completely stalled at the border. In the south a force consisting of a British military garrison, the Canadian militia, and aboriginal warriors captured Fort Detroit and the American invasion army there, which would remain in British/Canadian hands for most of the rest of the war. A short time later the American army was stopped again by British troops and the Canadian militia along the Niagara River.
In 1813 the Americans would have slightly more success, burning York (now Toronto, then captial of Upper Canada) and destroying the British fleet on the Great Lakes, but they never managed to hold onto any signifigant amount of territory in Canada. The war largely ended in a draw, with neither the Americans capturing much of Canada nor the British capturing much of the US (British attempts to capture Baltimore and New Orleans were horrible failures).... Of course, the British were sort of busy in Europe at the time, and only sent relatively few re-enforcements. The war ended because the war in Europe ended and the American became afraid of battle-hardened British troops from Europe arriving in North America. Britian, on the other hand, didn't really want to spend the money to continue fighting the war.
according to this
the International Astronomical Union (IAU) still considers Pluto to be a planet. This is probably mostly due to tradition than to any technical definition, although this press release by the Lowell Observatory meantions reasons like Pluto's atmosphere, its satillate Charon (which doesn't seem like much of a reason for the planetary classifaction given the subject at hand), and that it seems to undergo seasonal changes.
Since the advent of the Web, I find myself wishing more and more physical media was indexed and searchable.
Ever read "Fellowship of the Ring" and wish you could search the book you're holding?
Yea, all the time, and so I eventually came out with a truely ingenious way to do this for non-interactive print media. First we go through all the words in the book and find out what pages they appear on then make a list of these words with their corresponding pages. Of course some words (like "the") appear to often so should be dropped from the list. What your left with is a list of the words most likely to be searched for (names, locations, times, etc.) and where they appear.
Next - this is really ingenius - we arrange these words in an arbitrary order that is the same for all books. Unfortunately we would have to force everyone to learn this order. I was thinking we should make it really confusing just because we can, like say a vowel followed by three consonants, then another vowel, and so on.... for example: A B C D E F..... Personally I think this isn't asking too much of people.
Then we take this index and include it in some convient place in the book. Say, at the back. We could even call it "the index". It's so simple, yet so powerful, I wonder why nobody has ever thought of this before. Hey, I should patent this idea....
And, although it doesn't meantion this on the webpage, if you d/l the driver file you'll find that its distributed as sourcecode and is licensed under the GNU GPL.
Actually, the ISS is being built by several different countries. The US is by far the biggest contributor (in terms of both money and hardware), but the European Space Agency (run a bunch of different European countries, i can't remember off hand how many) is building a pressurized module or two, Japan is building a pressurized lab module, Canada is building a big robotic arm, even Brazil is contributing some money.
There are really two, maybe three reasons why Russia is being brought into this. Probably the biggest reason is simply to keep Russian rocket scientists employed in Russia rather then employed in Iraq or North Korea (or even India or Pakistan). The US (understandable) wants to keep orbital rocket technology away from as many countries as possible (orbital rockets = ICBM technology). The other is Russian experience in building and maintaining space stations, and in long duration human missions to them. The US has only built one space station before, Skylab, while the Russians have built 8 (Salyut 1 through 7, and Mir). Thirdly the Russians also have a lot of experience in launching heavy payloads (they currently have the largest rocket in active service (largest in that it can carry the heaviest loads into orbit): Energia (actually, i'm not sure this rocket is still in service, but a few years ago it was the largest,... originally designed to boost the Soviet space shuttle clone into orbit, it was later adapted to launch pieces of Mir).
ok, I can't be sure I got this whole thing down pat, I tryed to follow this as it went on, but its just such a mess that i'm not sure i have this all right, but, from my recollection, this is how the rights to the "civilization" name got passed around:
Some company (can't recall the name, i'll call it "Company A") created a board game called "Civilization"
Company A licensed the right to "Civilization" to another campany (again can't recall the name, so "Company B") to create another, different board game... i believe this one went under the title "Advanced Civilization"
Company B then licensed the rights to create a computer version of this game to Mircoprose (actually, the computer version ended up being only vaguely like the board game version). This is the version of Civilization (civ I) that Sid did.
Micropose (and Sid) went on to create CivNet and Civilization II (civ II was actually more Brian's fault than Sid's, but anyway...).... BUT, as we shall find out shortly, Mircoproses original license of the Civilization name might not have covered these games.
Microprose is taken over by.... um, who was it again.... Spectrom Hobbyte (sp?) i think it was
Company B creates their own computer version of their board game (Advanced Civilization... that game nobody remembers anymore).
Company B, after failing with this new computer version (actually, this was a few years ago... around the same time civII came out) decides to relicense the name "civilization" to another company, but not Microprose, instead to Activision.
Sid and Brian don't like the results of the Microprose takeover so they leave and form their own company: Firaxis. The have NO rights to the civilization game.
(confusing enough yet?)
Microprose releases two expansion packs for "CivII: CivII: Conflicts in Civilization" and "CivII: Fantastic Worlds". Notice the names, no longer "Civilization II" but "CivII"... the legal troubles are beginning.
Microprose (actually, their parent company, but for simplicties sake i'll keep calling them Microprose) wants the rights to the civilization name back, so they buy Company A (remmeber them?) and claim that they now own all the rigts to the "civilization" name in relation to board and computer games.
Activision is now mad because they got the rights to the "Civilization" name from Company B. So somebody sues somebody who sues somebody else (I forget who sued who first).... big legal battle results, but lets skip to the end result:
Microprose owns the Civilization name, but has licensed out the rights to the Civilization name to Activision for "Civilization: Call To Power" (Microprose also licensed to microprose the rights to the port of civII for the PlayStation), although i'm not sure who sequels to C:CTP (if there will be any) figure into this. Company B is left with no rights (except maybe to continue selling their original board game version).
Firaxis resleases "Alpha Centuri" which many hail as the "One True Sequel" to civII because it was created by Brian and Sid.
Activision releases "Civilization: Call To Power" (and Loki is licensed by Activision to port it to linux).
Micropose releases "Civilization II: Gold Edition" (civII + 2 expansion packs + multi-player support (finally)), and, a few months later, "Civilization II: Test of Time" (civII + multi-player support + updated graphics and interface and other stuff).
Hasbro Interactive purchases Microprose (or, rather, their parent company, but anyway...) and Hasbro turns around and licenses out the rigts to "Civilization III" (yes, civIII) to..... Firaxis! So, in a year or two, Brian and Sid should, finally, release the "Official" sequel to civII.
Slashdot Mirror
In 1813 the Americans would have slightly more success, burning York (now Toronto, then captial of Upper Canada) and destroying the British fleet on the Great Lakes, but they never managed to hold onto any signifigant amount of territory in Canada. The war largely ended in a draw, with neither the Americans capturing much of Canada nor the British capturing much of the US (British attempts to capture Baltimore and New Orleans were horrible failures). ... Of course, the British were sort of busy in Europe at the time, and only sent relatively few re-enforcements. The war ended because the war in Europe ended and the American became afraid of battle-hardened British troops from Europe arriving in North America. Britian, on the other hand, didn't really want to spend the money to continue fighting the war.
according to this the International Astronomical Union (IAU) still considers Pluto to be a planet. This is probably mostly due to tradition than to any technical definition, although this press release by the Lowell Observatory meantions reasons like Pluto's atmosphere, its satillate Charon (which doesn't seem like much of a reason for the planetary classifaction given the subject at hand), and that it seems to undergo seasonal changes.
Actually, my copies of LOTR has an index in the back of 'The Return of the King' (not the other two though).
/me gets up to look at edition information
"This Paperback edition 1993"
"Printed in Great Britian by HaperCollinsManufacturing Glosgow"
Since the advent of the Web, I find myself wishing more and more physical media was indexed and searchable.
Ever read "Fellowship of the Ring" and wish you could search the book you're holding?
Yea, all the time, and so I eventually came out with a truely ingenious way to do this for non-interactive print media. First we go through all the words in the book and find out what pages they appear on then make a list of these words with their corresponding pages. Of course some words (like "the") appear to often so should be dropped from the list. What your left with is a list of the words most likely to be searched for (names, locations, times, etc.) and where they appear.
Next - this is really ingenius - we arrange these words in an arbitrary order that is the same for all books. Unfortunately we would have to force everyone to learn this order. I was thinking we should make it really confusing just because we can, like say a vowel followed by three consonants, then another vowel, and so on .... for example: A B C D E F ..... Personally I think this isn't asking too much of people.
Then we take this index and include it in some convient place in the book. Say, at the back. We could even call it "the index". It's so simple, yet so powerful, I wonder why nobody has ever thought of this before. Hey, I should patent this idea ....
There are also linux drivers/kernel modules avaliable for FlashPath floppy adapters:
P ath%20for%20Linux.htm
http://www.smartdisk.com/Downloads/Software/Flash
And, although it doesn't meantion this on the webpage, if you d/l the driver file you'll find that its distributed as sourcecode and is licensed under the GNU GPL.
Actually, the ISS is being built by several different countries. The US is by far the biggest contributor (in terms of both money and hardware), but the European Space Agency (run a bunch of different European countries, i can't remember off hand how many) is building a pressurized module or two, Japan is building a pressurized lab module, Canada is building a big robotic arm, even Brazil is contributing some money.
There are really two, maybe three reasons why Russia is being brought into this. Probably the biggest reason is simply to keep Russian rocket scientists employed in Russia rather then employed in Iraq or North Korea (or even India or Pakistan). The US (understandable) wants to keep orbital rocket technology away from as many countries as possible (orbital rockets = ICBM technology). The other is Russian experience in building and maintaining space stations, and in long duration human missions to them. The US has only built one space station before, Skylab, while the Russians have built 8 (Salyut 1 through 7, and Mir). Thirdly the Russians also have a lot of experience in launching heavy payloads (they currently have the largest rocket in active service (largest in that it can carry the heaviest loads into orbit): Energia (actually, i'm not sure this rocket is still in service, but a few years ago it was the largest, ... originally designed to boost the Soviet space shuttle clone into orbit, it was later adapted to launch pieces of Mir).
ok, I can't be sure I got this whole thing down pat, I tryed to follow this as it went on, but its just such a mess that i'm not sure i have this all right, but, from my recollection, this is how the rights to the "civilization" name got passed around:
Some company (can't recall the name, i'll call it "Company A") created a board game called "Civilization"
Company A licensed the right to "Civilization" to another campany (again can't recall the name, so "Company B") to create another, different board game ... i believe this one went under the title "Advanced Civilization"
Company B then licensed the rights to create a computer version of this game to Mircoprose (actually, the computer version ended up being only vaguely like the board game version). This is the version of Civilization (civ I) that Sid did.
Micropose (and Sid) went on to create CivNet and Civilization II (civ II was actually more Brian's fault than Sid's, but anyway ...) .... BUT, as we shall find out shortly, Mircoproses original license of the Civilization name might not have covered these games.
Microprose is taken over by .... um, who was it again .... Spectrom Hobbyte (sp?) i think it was
Company B creates their own computer version of their board game (Advanced Civilization ... that game nobody remembers anymore).
Company B, after failing with this new computer version (actually, this was a few years ago ... around the same time civII came out) decides to relicense the name "civilization" to another company, but not Microprose, instead to Activision.
Sid and Brian don't like the results of the Microprose takeover so they leave and form their own company: Firaxis. The have NO rights to the civilization game.
(confusing enough yet?)
Microprose releases two expansion packs for "CivII: CivII: Conflicts in Civilization" and "CivII: Fantastic Worlds". Notice the names, no longer "Civilization II" but "CivII" ... the legal troubles are beginning.
Microprose (actually, their parent company, but for simplicties sake i'll keep calling them Microprose) wants the rights to the civilization name back, so they buy Company A (remmeber them?) and claim that they now own all the rigts to the "civilization" name in relation to board and computer games.
Activision is now mad because they got the rights to the "Civilization" name from Company B. So somebody sues somebody who sues somebody else (I forget who sued who first) .... big legal battle results, but lets skip to the end result:
Microprose owns the Civilization name, but has licensed out the rights to the Civilization name to Activision for "Civilization: Call To Power" (Microprose also licensed to microprose the rights to the port of civII for the PlayStation), although i'm not sure who sequels to C:CTP (if there will be any) figure into this. Company B is left with no rights (except maybe to continue selling their original board game version).
Firaxis resleases "Alpha Centuri" which many hail as the "One True Sequel" to civII because it was created by Brian and Sid.
Activision releases "Civilization: Call To Power" (and Loki is licensed by Activision to port it to linux).
Micropose releases "Civilization II: Gold Edition" (civII + 2 expansion packs + multi-player support (finally)), and, a few months later, "Civilization II: Test of Time" (civII + multi-player support + updated graphics and interface and other stuff).
Hasbro Interactive purchases Microprose (or, rather, their parent company, but anyway ...) and Hasbro turns around and licenses out the rigts to "Civilization III" (yes, civIII) to ..... Firaxis! So, in a year or two, Brian and Sid should, finally, release the "Official" sequel to civII.
ok, got that? i'm not sure i do ....