Sure, I've got a terrible memory for many things, facilitated by my computer and fiancée. And I'm an advocate of teaching students the importance of problem solving and learning how to find the answer, rather than rote memorization of a fixed set of solutions.
BUT...operating with this mindset assumes that the information will be available. How many people here have had their DSL/Cable 'net connection go down and decide to call tech support to report it...only to discover that the only way you know how to find their phone number is from the web site? Certain information vital to your survival/lifestyle you need to memorize, in case the external sources become unavailable.
How screwed would Dr. Bowman have been in 2001 if he didn't know how to manually blow the explosive bolts, repressurize the airlock, etc. in 2001 when HAL went bye-bye? Don't become too dependent upon complex tools which may fail...
Uhm, Yahoo uses Google on the back-end. That's why the results you got are relevant.
Who Reads EULA? According to Nielsen, few.
on
EULA In Games
·
· Score: 2
Jakob Nielsen wrote an article in September 2000 discussing 'regulatory usability', about the need for increased comprehendability (my word) in the plethora of legal nonsense we have to wade through.
He particularly mentions EULA and disclaimers at the end of the article, stating:
From usability studies, we know that users almost never bother to read legal documents when they come across them on a website. People just click the I Accept button without even glancing at the text. Since everybody knows that users don't read these agreements, it is interesting whether they will even hold up in court.
I will be very interested how an EULA holds up in court when (not if) the day comes. Full article here...
OK, we do have two eyes and that gives us depth perception, but advocates of "3D" environments often say, "We live in a 3D world, why should our interfaces be 2D?"
But while the world may be 3D, we only see in 2D. Depth perception and peripheral vision aside, our retinae receive a flattened version of the world.
Are signs 3D, with information layerd behind other information? No. Are alphabet letters 3D, with features hidden behind others? No.
Good interface design shows you want you need to see, and lays it out in a clear manner which draws your eye to the important information. In this respect only could I see a use for '3d' -- an interface which used 3D layering so more important items were visually closer to us.
I know, love Open Source, hate MS. But are you open to the possibility that Apache may not perform as well?
This is not a troll, but a serious point for all--make certain that your loves, hatreds, and desires don't over-rule what may be a valid goal.
If the goal for your project (as specified by the powers-that-be) is performance over ethical ideals, then be certain you know what you're really looking for before you go looking.
The authors of this article don't seem to realize that 16-bit color is 15-bit color. As a brief primer:
8-bit color is indexed color--256 indices into a palette of colors (defined by the system or elsewhere, like in a GIF).
15/16-bit color and 24/32-bit color are direct mode colors. 24/32-bit color is 24 bits of information (8-bits each for red, green, and blue) plus 8-bits of padding (which can be used for an alpha channel). This is here because it's faster to move data in a single 32-bit chunk than it is to move three 8-bit chunks. If it were really 32-bit color, you'd have over 4-billion colors (2^32) instead of 16.7 million (2^24)
Similarly, 15/16-bit color is three 5-bit channels and a 1-bit padding/alpha channel, yielding 32768 colors, not 65536.
This (and some other inaccuracies in the article) cast some doubt as to how much the authors really understood what they were saying. For example, the web-safe palette still does protect you from dithering, and that's important.
Now, essentially the argument against this boils down to one simple statement: Do you trust the government? There is plenty of reason not to trust the government....
In general I don't trust the government...but like so many others I know that there are bad people, and I want someone else to try and stop them.
The government is supposed to be on our side, hired by us for us. But now (IMO) it's just too big for us to properly police it by voting people/laws in/out.
How do we get ourselves to a position where we can trust someone else to use technology for our advantage, against the bad people?
iCab isn't even final yet. It's not iCab v2.1, it's iCab Preview Release 2.1 (see their site). So when the article says:
For example, you have to turn on InScript, which is iCab's partial implementation of JavaScript, because it's not enabled by default.
it's because they haven't worked out all the bugs in it yet. iCab comes configured in a way that allows it to best work for the user. When InScript is finished (when the browser is finished) it will be on by default.
One other note...they say it's slow on fast connections. It's snappier on my G4 over ADSL than IE5 is...connections are swifter, layout goes faster, etc. My only complaint with this version is that it doesn't support CSS yet. But it's coming.
In any case, this sets a dangerous precedent for the internet.
Do you presume they'll win? IANAL, but IMO the instantiation of a lawsuit isn't the important 'precedent'. What's important is the ruling which comes out of the trial.
Depending on how things go, this could be a very good precedent...
Re:Hmmmm some interesting fallout from that...
on
Focusing Audio
·
· Score: 1
Ya ever gone to make a presentation with your handy portable computer projector, and used a white wall because no screen was available? It seems that this would be a practical extension--mount a sound projector on the normal projector, and you bounce the sound off the wall, as if it's the source.
Why is this cool? Added realism--the sound is coming from the image itself. You get an instant-setup movie-theater, where traditionally the speakers have been behind the screen. Portable video conferencing, with the audio coming from the person talking...yow!
My only concern is that it only goes down to "a few hundred hertz" currently. Gotta lug along a subwoofer (but at least that sound is basically non-directional anyhow, right?) for strong quality sound.
If AOL loses, maybe mp3board.com makes lots of money.
If AOL wins (lots of $$$, lots of lawyers), then mp3board.com probably gets some valid arguments and precedents for its own lawsuit, (or appeals thereafter), right?
Seems to me that mp3board.com has just forced AOL to enter the fray and throw their considerable legal weight towards the defense. Rather tricky, IMO.
I am an ADSL customer of SWBell in MO. I have noticed, since returning home in August, that my NNTP access has been consistently capped at 15k/s.
However, I just started using a multi-threaded newsreader (MT-Newswatcher for MacOS) and have found that while the first thread of binary downloads is still capped at 15k/s, the 2nd download thread stays up at around 28k/s.
Possible solution--just run many download threads at once. (Note that I can't guarantee that the NNTP server speed is capped, but given that it tops out at 15 k/s at all times of day, with no variation, while the rest of the connection is damned speedy...it seems quite likely.
why didn't they put the proper modules up to maintain orbit first?
If you read this article, you'll notice that it says, "It's losing about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) a week in altitude because of increased solar activity." (emphasis mine).
Slipped schedules not withstanding, it looks like they didn't expect it to be getting pushed out of orbit this much.
I have been solely telecommuting from St. Louis to Philadelphia for almost 9 months now. My work is web-tech design and implementation. I just went back to work at the office for a week, so I am able to make a good comparison. Following are some of the less-obvious pros and cons I've found:
CONS:
1) The biggest problem, and not often addressed, is social isolation. When in Philadelphia, I loved working alongside my coworkers. It's a very fun environment. To not see or talk to another person all day, every day, is very depressing. [And, as an aside, you'll find that not opening your mouth nearly as much causes the smell of your breath to become worse, and to degrade more quickly.] There are cycles of good weeks and bad weeks. (Depression level exacerbated by project difficulty/confusion level.) I find that here, remotely, 3pm comes very slowly, and drags on forever into 5pm. At the office, 5pm would show up and I couldn't believe it happened. Time went much more quickly with others.
2) You need a VPN. I'm the first full-time telecommuter, and my company still doesn't have a VPN in place, so it's more difficult to work on the same project with other people. I don't have access to all the files I need, and have to make phone/email requests to get them pushed to the server I can FTP to.
3) Interactivity suffers. It's just not f2f. When working on a project without source control, it's important to be able to yell to your neighbor, "I have to do a mass find/replace...don't touch anything for 30 seconds." You just can't have that kind of interactivity remotely. Because of this it's most efficient to get large, isolated chunks of work that can be done solo with little interaction. However, I personally need variety in my day, and if I'm on a tedious project, there's no way I can do it all day long, even with 10 minute breaks interspersed.
4) It's harder to make friends in a new area. I moved fresh to St. Louis, and don't have co-workers to show me the local areas and to organize poker games with. Fortunately my fiancée goes to college, and I've found a pick-up group of Ultimate Frisbee players.
5) Distractions abound. I don't have children, so I'm safe there, but I do have cats, and delivery people and television. You must be committed to your work (or your office must have some good checks and balances in place to ensure that you aren't slacking). On the whole, I am more productive here (measured by work accomplished/time period). [This may partly explain why time disappeared so fast at the office--I got less done.]
6) It's easy to do too much work. My office is in my house...I try to stop at a certain time, but sometimes I find myself wanting to solve a problem and working after/during dinner. Great for the employer, not so good for keeping you from getting burnt out.
PROS:
1) Fabulous location. Depends on how nice your home office is--I have a fabulous room on the 2nd floor with windows on three sides that all open! In nice weather, overlooking my backyard and garden, as the trees swish in the window and warm air flows through...that's fabulous. And, even if you don't have a great office in the house, where your house is may be very important. For example, I love my job, I love my company, but I couldn't commute from St. Louis to Philadelphia every day.
2) You can easily do extra work. The flipside to con #6 above. You don't have to stay late at the office, annoying your spouse, when you have more work to do. You don't have to drive xx minutes to/from the office after dinner. You just go do the needed work and then *poof* you're home again. Nice.
3) Your own hours. Because the projects tend to be very 'me' oriented, if I feel the need to take a break and watch TV for an hour, or go for a walk, I can. I can always make it up later.
4) Work computer/home computer the same. No synchronization of email/programs/files. All work functionality is yours at home. Your company should pay for the equipment, too, so you may get nicer equipment at home than you'd be willing to pay for yourself. Add to that an ergonomic chair/desk (really should be bought by your employer) and you're getting some sweet equipment for off-work enjoyment.
Oh, there are other pros too, but I'm too lazy to type them all.:)
ADVICE:
1) Visit the office occasionally. Not only to keep from being 'marginalized', but to keep in touch with worker friends and keep social interactions alive. Find a way to make the company pay for the trip if it's a big one:)
2) Get a social life. Do something outside the house. It's important.
3) Finally, don't get the sole bathroom in your house remodelled--working all day without a working toilet is a problem!:)
Progressive disclosure is the best tool so far: show people the basics first, and once they understand that, allow them to get to the expert features.
A long time ago, Kai Krause (or someone at then-HSC Software) tried this in KPT Convolver. There was a 'stars' system where after you performed certain types of actions enough times you got a new star and a new tool (or toolset) which assisted in what you were doing and broadened the possibilities. It was much-hyped, at least by HSC.
As a general-computer power user, it bothered me. A lot. Shortly I found a 'secret' document which detailed what you had to do in order to get each star, and tediously repeated the tasks until I had all the stars. (Or all but one...I think the document was from HSC and didn't detail the last star, but just hinted.)
Part of the problem was that there was no simple way to enable all the options, you had to "earn" them. If you decide to embrace progressive disclosure in your next project, please consider the power users and provide a way to easily switch to Full disclosure.
This is true, but have you actually died in a dream?
Frequently. I've drowned, I've been shot in the head (that was an abrupt death), I've smashed through glass and felt my jaw tear off. It sucks.:) But yes, I have died in a dream.
Data is not owned by those who are described by it--if I came up with my own arbitrary system for categorizing the globe, that doesn't make it the globe's property.
Further, Americans may have paid for the ZIP development through taxes, but that doesn't mean that it should necessarily be publicly available to the world.
I strongly love the notion that "information should be free", but what justification can you offer in this case, other than "because I want it to be"?
The Mining Co. (apparently now called "About.com") is the wave of the future, IMO--using intelligent people to try and distill down the data.
I find it telling how recently this post and the one on saving/. from Natalie Portman/Trolls have come up together--both are the result of Too Much Information needing to be distilled down./. turned to moderators. About.com is all about that, too.
I first learned the term "reintermediation" from an article by Nicholas Negroponte in WIRED magazine. In another article by him (which I can't find right now) he says that while some people believe that librarians will be out of jobs, he predicts that there will be a new form of librarian. The old librarian could help you find what book you were looking for in the library. The new librarian will help you find the content you need from the 'net.
As a personal aside, I'm shocked and dismayed that search engines don't index database queries--I *just* finished rolling out my new personal web site which is totally database-driven, and thorhoughly meant to be indexed. Now you're telling me that because all my URLs look like this "content.asp?nodeid=dejavu" that search engines won't find all the delicious content I'm creating? Botheration!
I suppose *a* workaround here is to create an application which traverses the site and builds some mirrored heirarchy of it in static pages for the search engine to index, which uses JavaScript to bounce the user to the *right* page once they get there.
The most important advice I have: if you're going to decide to use a password scheme, think of a good one and decide to use it before you start toying with schemes. I originally came up with a pretty lame scheme, but I now have so many accounts based off of it that it would be hell to attempt to convert them all. I'll likely change over eventually, but my point is that while dealing with legacy computer systems sucks, remembering legacy password schemes (and when and when not to use the old scheme) really sucks!
If you haven't thought of a password scheme for yourself, here's an example idea. I (don't) use something along the following lines:
Use one or two different usernames. (Perhaps have a general-security username, and a high-security username.)
Pick a word or two as the password base.
Use the URL/Name of the site to encode it.
For example (truly not my scheme) let's say the base word is "cheeze", and the algorithm is to alphanumerically add (with modulus) the name of the site, postpending the number of letters in the site name. "cheeze" encoded with "slashdot" is:
cheese + slashd -------- = vtfxai8
The scheme may not be terribly secure, but someone who steals your password to slashdot isn't going to automatically know how you came up with it.
Disclaimer: I sure ain't a see-curity pro-feshinul. This advice could be really dumb.
It's all conjecture. The front-page blurb says: "It actually can be played at notes around 10MHz" but all the article says is: "Plucking the tiny strings would produce a high-pitched sound..."
They haven't tested it, they don't know for sure. My guess is that angels would pour forth from the device and flock to the nearest needle-point.
Either that or Hemos would explode. I think we need a raging ethical debate as to whether or not we should risk Hemos to try and answer an old, old question.
I disagree. As a previous poster asserted, I too believe that Universities are not the only source of information and intelligence. It's good of them to recognize this fact and publicly state that they think Linus has done work and has intelligence equivalent to that of someone who has taken the standard route to a PhD.
In response to the poster who said that he should 'reject it out of hand': why? They are clearly stating that they acknowledge that they are not the fount of all intellect. They are saying "Linus, you rock! You didn't take the normal road, and look how successful you've become! For all those who might spurn your status because you don't have an official doctorate, here! We want to say that we think what you've done is as good or better than someone else's doctorate."
Power to those who pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. And congratulations, Linus!
Slashdot Mirror
Sure, I've got a terrible memory for many things, facilitated by my computer and fiancée. And I'm an advocate of teaching students the importance of problem solving and learning how to find the answer, rather than rote memorization of a fixed set of solutions.
BUT...operating with this mindset assumes that the information will be available. How many people here have had their DSL/Cable 'net connection go down and decide to call tech support to report it...only to discover that the only way you know how to find their phone number is from the web site? Certain information vital to your survival/lifestyle you need to memorize, in case the external sources become unavailable.
How screwed would Dr. Bowman have been in 2001 if he didn't know how to manually blow the explosive bolts, repressurize the airlock, etc. in 2001 when HAL went bye-bye? Don't become too dependent upon complex tools which may fail...
Uhm, Yahoo uses Google on the back-end. That's why the results you got are relevant.
Jakob Nielsen wrote an article in September 2000 discussing 'regulatory usability', about the need for increased comprehendability (my word) in the plethora of legal nonsense we have to wade through.
He particularly mentions EULA and disclaimers at the end of the article, stating:
I will be very interested how an EULA holds up in court when (not if) the day comes. Full article here...
Registered users of v4.0 do not have to pay to upgrade to v5.0. See: http://www.opera.com/press/opera5_4questions.html
OK, we do have two eyes and that gives us depth perception, but advocates of "3D" environments often say, "We live in a 3D world, why should our interfaces be 2D?"
But while the world may be 3D, we only see in 2D. Depth perception and peripheral vision aside, our retinae receive a flattened version of the world.
Are signs 3D, with information layerd behind other information? No. Are alphabet letters 3D, with features hidden behind others? No.
Good interface design shows you want you need to see, and lays it out in a clear manner which draws your eye to the important information. In this respect only could I see a use for '3d' -- an interface which used 3D layering so more important items were visually closer to us.
I know, love Open Source, hate MS. But are you open to the possibility that Apache may not perform as well?
This is not a troll, but a serious point for all--make certain that your loves, hatreds, and desires don't over-rule what may be a valid goal.
If the goal for your project (as specified by the powers-that-be) is performance over ethical ideals, then be certain you know what you're really looking for before you go looking.
The authors of this article don't seem to realize that 16-bit color is 15-bit color. As a brief primer:
Similarly, 15/16-bit color is three 5-bit channels and a 1-bit padding/alpha channel, yielding 32768 colors, not 65536.
This (and some other inaccuracies in the article) cast some doubt as to how much the authors really understood what they were saying. For example, the web-safe palette still does protect you from dithering, and that's important.
In general I don't trust the government...but like so many others I know that there are bad people, and I want someone else to try and stop them.
The government is supposed to be on our side, hired by us for us. But now (IMO) it's just too big for us to properly police it by voting people/laws in/out.
How do we get ourselves to a position where we can trust someone else to use technology for our advantage, against the bad people?
iCab isn't even final yet. It's not iCab v2.1, it's iCab Preview Release 2.1 (see their site). So when the article says:
it's because they haven't worked out all the bugs in it yet. iCab comes configured in a way that allows it to best work for the user. When InScript is finished (when the browser is finished) it will be on by default.
One other note...they say it's slow on fast connections. It's snappier on my G4 over ADSL than IE5 is...connections are swifter, layout goes faster, etc. My only complaint with this version is that it doesn't support CSS yet. But it's coming.
Do you presume they'll win? IANAL, but IMO the instantiation of a lawsuit isn't the important 'precedent'. What's important is the ruling which comes out of the trial .
Depending on how things go, this could be a very good precedent...
Ya ever gone to make a presentation with your handy portable computer projector, and used a white wall because no screen was available? It seems that this would be a practical extension--mount a sound projector on the normal projector, and you bounce the sound off the wall, as if it's the source.
Why is this cool? Added realism--the sound is coming from the image itself. You get an instant-setup movie-theater, where traditionally the speakers have been behind the screen. Portable video conferencing, with the audio coming from the person talking...yow!
My only concern is that it only goes down to "a few hundred hertz" currently. Gotta lug along a subwoofer (but at least that sound is basically non-directional anyhow, right?) for strong quality sound.
If AOL wins (lots of $$$, lots of lawyers), then mp3board.com probably gets some valid arguments and precedents for its own lawsuit, (or appeals thereafter), right?
Seems to me that mp3board.com has just forced AOL to enter the fray and throw their considerable legal weight towards the defense. Rather tricky, IMO.
However, I just started using a multi-threaded newsreader (MT-Newswatcher for MacOS) and have found that while the first thread of binary downloads is still capped at 15k/s, the 2nd download thread stays up at around 28k/s.
Possible solution--just run many download threads at once. (Note that I can't guarantee that the NNTP server speed is capped, but given that it tops out at 15 k/s at all times of day, with no variation, while the rest of the connection is damned speedy...it seems quite likely.
why didn't they put the proper modules up to maintain orbit first?
If you read this article, you'll notice that it says, "It's losing about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) a week in altitude because of increased solar activity." (emphasis mine).
Slipped schedules not withstanding, it looks like they didn't expect it to be getting pushed out of orbit this much.
CONS:
1) The biggest problem, and not often addressed, is social isolation. When in Philadelphia, I loved working alongside my coworkers. It's a very fun environment. To not see or talk to another person all day, every day, is very depressing. [And, as an aside, you'll find that not opening your mouth nearly as much causes the smell of your breath to become worse, and to degrade more quickly.] There are cycles of good weeks and bad weeks. (Depression level exacerbated by project difficulty/confusion level.) I find that here, remotely, 3pm comes very slowly, and drags on forever into 5pm. At the office, 5pm would show up and I couldn't believe it happened. Time went much more quickly with others.
2) You need a VPN. I'm the first full-time telecommuter, and my company still doesn't have a VPN in place, so it's more difficult to work on the same project with other people. I don't have access to all the files I need, and have to make phone/email requests to get them pushed to the server I can FTP to.
3) Interactivity suffers. It's just not f2f. When working on a project without source control, it's important to be able to yell to your neighbor, "I have to do a mass find/replace...don't touch anything for 30 seconds." You just can't have that kind of interactivity remotely. Because of this it's most efficient to get large, isolated chunks of work that can be done solo with little interaction. However, I personally need variety in my day, and if I'm on a tedious project, there's no way I can do it all day long, even with 10 minute breaks interspersed.
4) It's harder to make friends in a new area. I moved fresh to St. Louis, and don't have co-workers to show me the local areas and to organize poker games with. Fortunately my fiancée goes to college, and I've found a pick-up group of Ultimate Frisbee players.
5) Distractions abound. I don't have children, so I'm safe there, but I do have cats, and delivery people and television. You must be committed to your work (or your office must have some good checks and balances in place to ensure that you aren't slacking). On the whole, I am more productive here (measured by work accomplished/time period). [This may partly explain why time disappeared so fast at the office--I got less done.]
6) It's easy to do too much work. My office is in my house...I try to stop at a certain time, but sometimes I find myself wanting to solve a problem and working after/during dinner. Great for the employer, not so good for keeping you from getting burnt out.
PROS:
1) Fabulous location. Depends on how nice your home office is--I have a fabulous room on the 2nd floor with windows on three sides that all open! In nice weather, overlooking my backyard and garden, as the trees swish in the window and warm air flows through...that's fabulous. And, even if you don't have a great office in the house, where your house is may be very important. For example, I love my job, I love my company, but I couldn't commute from St. Louis to Philadelphia every day.
2) You can easily do extra work. The flipside to con #6 above. You don't have to stay late at the office, annoying your spouse, when you have more work to do. You don't have to drive xx minutes to/from the office after dinner. You just go do the needed work and then *poof* you're home again. Nice.
3) Your own hours. Because the projects tend to be very 'me' oriented, if I feel the need to take a break and watch TV for an hour, or go for a walk, I can. I can always make it up later.
4) Work computer/home computer the same. No synchronization of email/programs/files. All work functionality is yours at home. Your company should pay for the equipment, too, so you may get nicer equipment at home than you'd be willing to pay for yourself. Add to that an ergonomic chair/desk (really should be bought by your employer) and you're getting some sweet equipment for off-work enjoyment.
Oh, there are other pros too, but I'm too lazy to type them all. :)
ADVICE:
1) Visit the office occasionally. Not only to keep from being 'marginalized', but to keep in touch with worker friends and keep social interactions alive. Find a way to make the company pay for the trip if it's a big one :)
2) Get a social life. Do something outside the house. It's important.
3) Finally, don't get the sole bathroom in your house remodelled--working all day without a working toilet is a problem! :)
A long time ago, Kai Krause (or someone at then-HSC Software) tried this in KPT Convolver. There was a 'stars' system where after you performed certain types of actions enough times you got a new star and a new tool (or toolset) which assisted in what you were doing and broadened the possibilities. It was much-hyped, at least by HSC.
As a general-computer power user, it bothered me. A lot. Shortly I found a 'secret' document which detailed what you had to do in order to get each star, and tediously repeated the tasks until I had all the stars. (Or all but one...I think the document was from HSC and didn't detail the last star, but just hinted.)
Part of the problem was that there was no simple way to enable all the options, you had to "earn" them. If you decide to embrace progressive disclosure in your next project, please consider the power users and provide a way to easily switch to Full disclosure.
Or rather id Software's own Graeme Devine didn't. See his .plan entry for the 28th.
Frequently. I've drowned, I've been shot in the head (that was an abrupt death), I've smashed through glass and felt my jaw tear off. It sucks. :) But yes, I have died in a dream.
And now I've come to get you...Further, Americans may have paid for the ZIP development through taxes, but that doesn't mean that it should necessarily be publicly available to the world.
I strongly love the notion that "information should be free", but what justification can you offer in this case, other than "because I want it to be"?
I find it telling how recently this post and the one on saving /. from Natalie Portman/Trolls have come up together--both are the result of Too Much Information needing to be distilled down. /. turned to moderators. About.com is all about that, too.
I first learned the term "reintermediation" from an article by Nicholas Negroponte in WIRED magazine. In another article by him (which I can't find right now) he says that while some people believe that librarians will be out of jobs, he predicts that there will be a new form of librarian. The old librarian could help you find what book you were looking for in the library. The new librarian will help you find the content you need from the 'net.
As a personal aside, I'm shocked and dismayed that search engines don't index database queries--I *just* finished rolling out my new personal web site which is totally database-driven, and thorhoughly meant to be indexed. Now you're telling me that because all my URLs look like this "content.asp?nodeid=dejavu" that search engines won't find all the delicious content I'm creating? Botheration!
I suppose *a* workaround here is to create an application which traverses the site and builds some mirrored heirarchy of it in static pages for the search engine to index, which uses JavaScript to bounce the user to the *right* page once they get there.
*sigh*
If you haven't thought of a password scheme for yourself, here's an example idea. I (don't) use something along the following lines:
For example (truly not my scheme) let's say the base word is "cheeze", and the algorithm is to alphanumerically add (with modulus) the name of the site, postpending the number of letters in the site name. "cheeze" encoded with "slashdot" is:
cheese
+ slashd
--------
= vtfxai8
The scheme may not be terribly secure, but someone who steals your password to slashdot isn't going to automatically know how you came up with it.
Disclaimer: I sure ain't a see-curity pro-feshinul. This advice could be really dumb.
See the BBC SciTech article for more info.
"It actually can be played at notes around 10MHz"
but all the article says is:
"Plucking the tiny strings would produce a high-pitched sound..."
They haven't tested it, they don't know for sure. My guess is that angels would pour forth from the device and flock to the nearest needle-point.
Either that or Hemos would explode. I think we need a raging ethical debate as to whether or not we should risk Hemos to try and answer an old, old question.
In response to the poster who said that he should 'reject it out of hand': why? They are clearly stating that they acknowledge that they are not the fount of all intellect. They are saying "Linus, you rock! You didn't take the normal road, and look how successful you've become! For all those who might spurn your status because you don't have an official doctorate, here! We want to say that we think what you've done is as good or better than someone else's doctorate."
Power to those who pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. And congratulations, Linus!