The comment in question compares the relative damage of the SCO saga vs systemd issues. Although it's easy to get sidetracked from there I do think the comparison is a relevant contribution. SCO is often assumed to have been one of the biggest ever threats to Linux. Comparing it to the systemd situation, with relevant arguments and examples, puts the SCO story in perspective.
I for one agree with this perspective. I'm not a server admin myself but I was involved in our business decisions during the SCO "scare". There was never any question that we would pay a fee or drop Linux - it was always going to be business as usual. Other issues have had an impact though, and although we still use it for web servers we've since dropped Linux on most of our desktop computers. So in summary I think it is relevant to mention that there have always been bigger threats than SCO.
Recently they've been talking up other aspects of their business and trying get generate enthusiasm for possibilities such as fast trans-continental flights. It seems they see the writing on the wall and are putting less emphasis on sub-orbital spaceflight as the main attraction in itself. Rightly so; as others such as SpaceX move steadily closer to crewed orbital flights it's hard to see much future in sub-orbital space tourism.
"In physics, gravitational waves are ripples in the curvature of spacetime which propagate as waves, travelling outward from the source." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
"In fluid dynamics, gravity waves are waves generated in a fluid medium or at the interface between two media when the force of gravity or buoyancy tries to restore equilibrium. An example of such an interface is that between the atmosphere and the ocean, which gives rise to wind waves." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Catholicism is the largest Christian denomination in the world and its official stance is that the Big Bang theory is just fine with them.
My mother is an Anglican priest and, like most of her congregation, she accepts the Big Bang theory along with natural selection and pretty much every other established scientific theory.
I think the perception of Christians as anti-science is largely an American thing. Not completely - we do have that type here in New Zealand too - but apparently not to the extend as in the USA.
I really wish there was a way to edit your comment after you've posted it, just to fix mistakes. Sorry but I'm blind to grammatical errors when I preview. I can only see them after I've posted.
Obama's policy may be uninspiring but that's still an improvement over Bush's plan which was untenable.
A better option would be to have an inspiring goal (eg return to the Moon or go to Mars) but with a public-private funding model. The age of large-scale government-only space projects such as the Bush proposal are no longer feasible. Meanwhile we have a burgeoning private space industry that can make significant, cost-effective contributions.
It's interesting that ballots still list candidates in alphabetical order, despite studies showing that the position of a candidate in the ballot can influence election results (e.g. https://pprg.stanford.edu/wp-c... (PDF) and http://openaccess.city.ac.uk/4...). Our local government elections have been using randomized ballot order for a while now. Voting papers have the candidates in different orders so all candidates appear in all positions. The order any particular voter sees is random. Apparently it's easy enough to implement and it really does help make elections fairer.
Forgive my ignorance but this is an honest question - am I missing something?
I run about 50 websites, some for myself and some for local non-profit organizations. They're all simple information/brochure websites with no real interaction or sensitive content. For the life of me I can't conceive of any reason to encrypt any of these websites, yet it's going to cost me a small fortune in certificates to keep them alive in the future.
Why would I need to encrypt a website that offers nothing more than, for example, a list of local historical sites to visit? Thanks for any insights.
The speed limit is for things travelling through space, not space itself. It's the fabric of spacetime that's expanding and there is no speed limit for that.
Think of yourself walking across a room from one wall to the opposite wall. Let's say you have a speed limit of 1 metre per second. After 5 seconds you can't be more than 5 metres from the wall behind you. Now imagine that the entire room is expanding in all directions. You're still walking at 1m/s but the wall behind is now receding at a higher rate than your speed limit.
I've heard this argument before but I don't buy it; I think it's another example of it being easier to use the measurements you're familiar with.
There may be some measurements that suit Fahrenheit better but I've honestly never even thought about what temperature I'll die at. How is that an "everyday life" issue? For me it's far more convenient to have zero degrees mean freezing and 100 meaning boiling. That has an impact on my life... Will there be a frost so I need to cover my plants? Will I have to get ice off my car in the morning? Is the food in my fridge getting too close to freezing? These and many more daily examples would be lost if I had to convert to Fahrenheit, which to me seems like the system that's "stupid and arbitrary".
Like most people in my country I know that my stride is close to a metre, so if I want to measure a room I simply walk it. Most people know how to stretch or shorten their stride slightly to make a more accurate metre if they want to. I've seen people trying to measure imperial feet by waddling along like a penguin and it takes three times as long, but it does have the advantage of looking hilarious.
You'll find examples of convenience and inconvenience in both systems, but as someone who has lived with both it's my opinion that metric is far more convenient overall. Not just maths (which it obviously kills at), but simple everyday measurements as well.
Slashdot Mirror
The comment in question compares the relative damage of the SCO saga vs systemd issues. Although it's easy to get sidetracked from there I do think the comparison is a relevant contribution. SCO is often assumed to have been one of the biggest ever threats to Linux. Comparing it to the systemd situation, with relevant arguments and examples, puts the SCO story in perspective.
I for one agree with this perspective. I'm not a server admin myself but I was involved in our business decisions during the SCO "scare". There was never any question that we would pay a fee or drop Linux - it was always going to be business as usual. Other issues have had an impact though, and although we still use it for web servers we've since dropped Linux on most of our desktop computers. So in summary I think it is relevant to mention that there have always been bigger threats than SCO.
Recently they've been talking up other aspects of their business and trying get generate enthusiasm for possibilities such as fast trans-continental flights. It seems they see the writing on the wall and are putting less emphasis on sub-orbital spaceflight as the main attraction in itself. Rightly so; as others such as SpaceX move steadily closer to crewed orbital flights it's hard to see much future in sub-orbital space tourism.
For the pedants..
"In physics, gravitational waves are ripples in the curvature of spacetime which propagate as waves, travelling outward from the source." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
"In fluid dynamics, gravity waves are waves generated in a fluid medium or at the interface between two media when the force of gravity or buoyancy tries to restore equilibrium. An example of such an interface is that between the atmosphere and the ocean, which gives rise to wind waves." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Catholicism is the largest Christian denomination in the world and its official stance is that the Big Bang theory is just fine with them.
My mother is an Anglican priest and, like most of her congregation, she accepts the Big Bang theory along with natural selection and pretty much every other established scientific theory.
I think the perception of Christians as anti-science is largely an American thing. Not completely - we do have that type here in New Zealand too - but apparently not to the extend as in the USA.
I really wish there was a way to edit your comment after you've posted it, just to fix mistakes. Sorry but I'm blind to grammatical errors when I preview. I can only see them after I've posted.
Obama's policy may be uninspiring but that's still an improvement over Bush's plan which was untenable.
A better option would be to have an inspiring goal (eg return to the Moon or go to Mars) but with a public-private funding model. The age of large-scale government-only space projects such as the Bush proposal are no longer feasible. Meanwhile we have a burgeoning private space industry that can make significant, cost-effective contributions.
It's interesting that ballots still list candidates in alphabetical order, despite studies showing that the position of a candidate in the ballot can influence election results (e.g. https://pprg.stanford.edu/wp-c... (PDF) and http://openaccess.city.ac.uk/4...). Our local government elections have been using randomized ballot order for a while now. Voting papers have the candidates in different orders so all candidates appear in all positions. The order any particular voter sees is random. Apparently it's easy enough to implement and it really does help make elections fairer.
Forgive my ignorance but this is an honest question - am I missing something?
I run about 50 websites, some for myself and some for local non-profit organizations. They're all simple information/brochure websites with no real interaction or sensitive content. For the life of me I can't conceive of any reason to encrypt any of these websites, yet it's going to cost me a small fortune in certificates to keep them alive in the future.
Why would I need to encrypt a website that offers nothing more than, for example, a list of local historical sites to visit? Thanks for any insights.
The speed limit is for things travelling through space, not space itself. It's the fabric of spacetime that's expanding and there is no speed limit for that.
Think of yourself walking across a room from one wall to the opposite wall. Let's say you have a speed limit of 1 metre per second. After 5 seconds you can't be more than 5 metres from the wall behind you. Now imagine that the entire room is expanding in all directions. You're still walking at 1m/s but the wall behind is now receding at a higher rate than your speed limit.
Don't forget Ship Captains! They can marry people.
That's not actually true. http://www.straightdope.com/co...
I've heard this argument before but I don't buy it; I think it's another example of it being easier to use the measurements you're familiar with.
There may be some measurements that suit Fahrenheit better but I've honestly never even thought about what temperature I'll die at. How is that an "everyday life" issue? For me it's far more convenient to have zero degrees mean freezing and 100 meaning boiling. That has an impact on my life... Will there be a frost so I need to cover my plants? Will I have to get ice off my car in the morning? Is the food in my fridge getting too close to freezing? These and many more daily examples would be lost if I had to convert to Fahrenheit, which to me seems like the system that's "stupid and arbitrary".
Like most people in my country I know that my stride is close to a metre, so if I want to measure a room I simply walk it. Most people know how to stretch or shorten their stride slightly to make a more accurate metre if they want to. I've seen people trying to measure imperial feet by waddling along like a penguin and it takes three times as long, but it does have the advantage of looking hilarious.
You'll find examples of convenience and inconvenience in both systems, but as someone who has lived with both it's my opinion that metric is far more convenient overall. Not just maths (which it obviously kills at), but simple everyday measurements as well.