..pictures are starting to come in from the 2004 Venus Transit..
The photographic record of a Venus transit is nothing surprising. What astonishes me is that photographs are coming in from an event that is going to happen 2 days in the future.
Oh man, I'd kill to have one of these Pascal posters. I worked at a company writing Apple Pascal software, I had one hanging over my desk. It saved many hours leafing through Wirth's Pascal book for the syntax diagrams. Our coding work was heavily based on these Wirth's Pascal reference book and his "Algorithms + Data Structures = Programs" as well as a few extra algorithms from Knuth. Everything was designed with Nassi-Schneiderman flow charts which were easy to code using the Pascal syntax charts.
Read the Pretec website, they also released an MMC 4.0 spec memory card reader. Wouldn't be a very useful memory card if there wasn't a compatible reader.
Software hacks and the price differential of a few hundred bucks are fairly irrelevant when the camera's power can really only be unleashed with pro lenses costing $1500 or $2000 (and up) rather than the cheap crap lens that comes with a stock Rebel unit. It's not uncommon for a serious photog to have tens of thousands of bucks invested in lenses. Do you really think that this sort of pro would balk at the 10D's price and get a hacked Rebel instead?
You remind me of an old friend of mine who was in the National Guard during the 1970s. He was a truck driver, he told me the big Army trucks had engines designed to run on any fuel, so that they could scavenge for fuel on the battlefield. He said they'd run on anything from whiskey to cooking oil.
Even regular diesel fuel engines have trouble in freezing temperatures. Most diesel owners that live in cold weather climates have to plug the car into an electric heater at night if they want their cars to start on a winter morning. Of course there are also plenty of garage fires caused by people who installed the engine heaters incorrectly.
I worry about my own circumstances as a photographer. For the last 30 years, I've made photo prints using antiquated photographic processes. Many "alternative processes" use highly toxic chemical compounds that include cyanide, chromium, etc. and some of these toxic processes like Cyanotype are quite common, I remember learning how to make Cyanotypes in High School. I bought large stocks of chemicals about 30 years ago, because it was almost impossible to buy them in smaller quantities. And by "large stocks," I mean like a small bottle of about 500 grams, which I've used about half of in 30 years.. So if the FBI ever decides to turn my house upside down, they'd probably find enough toxics to kill a small city full of people. I hope I don't ever run out, I can buy the chemicals from places like Photographer's Formulary, but I'm sure that the FBI gets a look at all their hazardous chemical purchases.
My friend said he went there every year, always brought gifts, but never made such an impact as with the knives. In fact, on a previous trip he asked the locals what would make good gifts and was told to bring knives since they were so scarce.
My textbook came with cassette tapes, modern textbooks often come with CDRoms, you could even rip the CD and put it on your computer or iPod. This is an especially useful way to practice, no more rewinding tapes to hear the last 15 seconds over again. I even know of one textbook that has an online web page with software for exercises and testing. But ultimately, nothing will perfect your pronounciation except continual contact with native speakers. You will naturally adopt the pronounciation and speech patterns of the people you are most in contact with, so your language will really only improve once you get into the full native-language environment and start using the language on a daily basis. Your pronounciation is self-correcting once you start interacting with native speakers.
Very good. Also consider what your time is worth. Is it more cost-effective to take an expensive class and learn in 2 years what would take you 5 years on your own?
Books are portable, have high storage density, require no power source, and boot up instantly. There are very few good Japanese textbooks, it is known to educators as an "infrequently taught language." The people who have written good Japanese textbooks have spent years developing their work, usually in conjunction with other instructors at a university, do you really think they're likely to give it away for free? Japanese textbooks are notoriously expensive since they're usually printed in Japan and imported at unfavorable exchange rates. But still, the best money I ever spent was the $90 introductory textbook set for my first Japanese class. I used it for four semesters, and still use it occasionally for reference. Japanese instructors are notoriously technophobic, and advancements in computer aided instruction have been very slow. Good instructors are too busy updating the existing learning systems to modern standards to bother with computerizing them too. There are a few gadgets that will help certain areas, like kanji flashcard gadgets. I've used many of them, but none of them are much better than conventional methods (i.e. flashcards). And flashcards aren't going to teach you the whole language, it is just a reinforcement for a small subset of your primary studies. Electronic dictionaries are freely available online, but this is only going to speed up your word lookups, again, it's merely a support activity, not a primary learning tool. The best tool to learn Japanese is a structured study plan, either with a teacher, or with a textbook with a graduated series of exercises that build up your knowledge according to planned curriculum. You can't just go at this by stumbling through native language materials like comic books and trying to figure it out as you go along.
I note your comments, but my friend was a wool importer and spent his time out in rural areas where they really DO herd goats. He described the people as living in "stone age conditions" and I have no reason to dispute his accounts, especially since he showed me photos. These were people who could not afford expensive luxuries like metal knives. Do you really think their lives would be improved by solar powered computers with wifi?
This is so typical of the polarization of today's society, if someone disagrees with you, they're totally wrong and a dick. Better check your mirror and see where the problem is here.
So in response to your pedantic definition of spyware, let's use the more appropriate term "malware," meaning the sort of gadgets that are so well known on Windoze web browsers, stuff that infests your machine through insecure Windoze mechanisms like ActiveX, and once installed, does stupid stunts in your browser, like push porn popups, hijack ads, etc.
OK, so now that we have a new term, malware, let me explain it to you again.
THERE IS NO SUCH THING ON MACOS X.
This guy had a simple prefs problem and he leaps to the massively incorrect conclusion that he has some sort of malware that infected a MacOS X machine and got installed in some sort of virus-like method, screwing up his browser. But it didn't happen that way becuause THERE IS NO SUCH THING ON MACOS X.
Yes, I use Little Snitch, I've only found one app (BBEdit) that phones home to check serials, and that's not what the guy who started this thread is talking about. Yes, I know there's a new exploit for Safari and a couple of other browsers. A software update was released a couple of days ago, and another one was released tonight. Nobody's managed to exploit it with malware so far. Malware DOES NOT EXIST on MacOS X. Call me a dick all you want, but that will not change the facts. The guy had a prefs problem, he cried wolf, I called BS on him, and I'm right and he's wrong. So there.
You still don't get it, braniac. No, it wasn't "spyware that was dependent on a prefs or.plist problem," because there WAS NO spyware. There is no such thing as spyware on the Mac. Nobody has ever found a single instance of browser spyware on a MacOS X system. Pull your head out of Bill Gates' ass and recognize that MacOS X has a different security model than Windows, and does not have the problems you are used to on your PeeCee.
The problem you encountered is fairly common on MacOS X, plists and prefs get corrupted often enough. You just delete the defective plist or pref and it will be recreated the next time you run the app. There are even terminal scripts that will check plists for well-formed XML, so it is easier to locate busted plists. You could either create a new user with fresh, virgin prefs & plists, or you could do it the right way, locate the damaged file, delete it, and it will be recreated when it's needed.
High-tech technology is exactly what will help out these places.
Yeah, high tech like metal knives. A friend of mine went to Nepal and was treated like a god because he brought Swiss Army Knives as gifts. Metal mining is considered unclean and miners defile the earth, so miners are an untouchable caste. It should come as no surprise there is virtually no metals industry in Nepal. So even metal knives are relatively rare in Nepal, they have to import them, which is also pretty rare.
SO, are you getting the picture here? We're talking about a country where goat-herding is a high-tech dream job people aspire to. These people don't need high tech crap like computers, they need high tech crap like metal knives, electric lights, indoor plumbing, refrigerators, vitamins, etc.
I call Bullshit. There is no such thing as MacOS X spyware. What happened is that a.plist or pref got fucked up and you couldn't alter the prefs. This has been documented in various places, like:
The easiest way to detect bad prefs is to create a new user and test the software in a new userspace. The new user will have fresh prefs and.plists copied directly from the newuser template. If it works in a new user and not in your old user, you have a prefs or.plist problem. This is what you discovered, not spyware. Don't cry wolf every time you have a problem you can't figure out. Horror stories about viruses and spyware are for Windoze lusers. Think Different.
You've got a dirty mind. My "uncomfortable places" are spots like the top of my ankle, where it flexes constantly and causes discomfort, or the top of my thigh, where I seem to hit it constantly whenever I let my arms relax while seated, or my nose, right where my eyeglasses sit on the stitches. If you want discomfort, just have surgery right where you need to sit the bridge of your glasses. And to anticipate your next question, yes, I used to work outdoors wearing shorts and sandals.
And yes, apparently it is standard practice to excise precancerous moles. No, not every mole is precancerous, but there are indicators that they should be removed for biopsy. Don't ask me what the signs are, ask a dermatologist. I thought the signs were just if it oozed or grew, but she's the expert. I just asked her about a little bump on my leg, she said, "that's nothing significant, but I don't like the look of that mole next to it." So she pulled out a magnifier, examined it for a minute, and said, "it will have to come off." And that was just a cursory examination, she decided I needed to have every square inch of my skin examined under a magnifier, which is going to take about an hour. I can't wait to hear how many little spots she's going to cut off.
Direct sunlight is bad for you, why would you want to sit outside in the sun when everyone knows the proper environment for programming is a batcave? I'm not kidding. I just came back from my dermatologist, who gleefully cut away every little precancerous mole she could find, now I've got stitches in extremely uncomfortable places that won't be removed for another week. I used to work outside when I was a kid, mowing lawns and gardening, but now I regret it, since it apparently increased my likelihood of skin cancer. The whole REASON I studied computer programming was because I hated working out in the hot sun in dirty environments full of allergy-inducing pollen, I vastly preferred air-conditioned, dark offices. So I figured that computing was the best profession, back in those days, computers were always installed in glassed-in rooms with intense air conditioning and filtered air.
I think you're missing the point of passphrases. I always explain it like this: you pick a pass phrase, an especially good one would be something with numbers in it too, my demo example is "I'm gonna cry 96 tears." Then you take the initial letters and your password becomes "Igc96t".. The point of pass phrases is to make cryptic passwords that are memorable but hard to crack.
Slashdot Mirror
OK, checked my clock, make that 1 DAY in the future.
The photographic record of a Venus transit is nothing surprising. What astonishes me is that photographs are coming in from an event that is going to happen 2 days in the future.
Oh man, I'd kill to have one of these Pascal posters. I worked at a company writing Apple Pascal software, I had one hanging over my desk. It saved many hours leafing through Wirth's Pascal book for the syntax diagrams. Our coding work was heavily based on these Wirth's Pascal reference book and his "Algorithms + Data Structures = Programs" as well as a few extra algorithms from Knuth. Everything was designed with Nassi-Schneiderman flow charts which were easy to code using the Pascal syntax charts.
Read the Pretec website, they also released an MMC 4.0 spec memory card reader. Wouldn't be a very useful memory card if there wasn't a compatible reader.
Software hacks and the price differential of a few hundred bucks are fairly irrelevant when the camera's power can really only be unleashed with pro lenses costing $1500 or $2000 (and up) rather than the cheap crap lens that comes with a stock Rebel unit. It's not uncommon for a serious photog to have tens of thousands of bucks invested in lenses. Do you really think that this sort of pro would balk at the 10D's price and get a hacked Rebel instead?
No, I'm talking about areas well south of you, where gas engines have no troubles starting up in cold weather but diesels don't.
You remind me of an old friend of mine who was in the National Guard during the 1970s. He was a truck driver, he told me the big Army trucks had engines designed to run on any fuel, so that they could scavenge for fuel on the battlefield. He said they'd run on anything from whiskey to cooking oil.
Even regular diesel fuel engines have trouble in freezing temperatures. Most diesel owners that live in cold weather climates have to plug the car into an electric heater at night if they want their cars to start on a winter morning. Of course there are also plenty of garage fires caused by people who installed the engine heaters incorrectly.
I worry about my own circumstances as a photographer. For the last 30 years, I've made photo prints using antiquated photographic processes. Many "alternative processes" use highly toxic chemical compounds that include cyanide, chromium, etc. and some of these toxic processes like Cyanotype are quite common, I remember learning how to make Cyanotypes in High School.
I bought large stocks of chemicals about 30 years ago, because it was almost impossible to buy them in smaller quantities. And by "large stocks," I mean like a small bottle of about 500 grams, which I've used about half of in 30 years.. So if the FBI ever decides to turn my house upside down, they'd probably find enough toxics to kill a small city full of people. I hope I don't ever run out, I can buy the chemicals from places like Photographer's Formulary, but I'm sure that the FBI gets a look at all their hazardous chemical purchases.
My friend said he went there every year, always brought gifts, but never made such an impact as with the knives. In fact, on a previous trip he asked the locals what would make good gifts and was told to bring knives since they were so scarce.
You missed the point. They were just happy to have a new knife. They didn't care if it was Swiss or Swedish or whatever.
My textbook came with cassette tapes, modern textbooks often come with CDRoms, you could even rip the CD and put it on your computer or iPod. This is an especially useful way to practice, no more rewinding tapes to hear the last 15 seconds over again. I even know of one textbook that has an online web page with software for exercises and testing.
But ultimately, nothing will perfect your pronounciation except continual contact with native speakers. You will naturally adopt the pronounciation and speech patterns of the people you are most in contact with, so your language will really only improve once you get into the full native-language environment and start using the language on a daily basis. Your pronounciation is self-correcting once you start interacting with native speakers.
Very good. Also consider what your time is worth. Is it more cost-effective to take an expensive class and learn in 2 years what would take you 5 years on your own?
Books are portable, have high storage density, require no power source, and boot up instantly.
There are very few good Japanese textbooks, it is known to educators as an "infrequently taught language." The people who have written good Japanese textbooks have spent years developing their work, usually in conjunction with other instructors at a university, do you really think they're likely to give it away for free? Japanese textbooks are notoriously expensive since they're usually printed in Japan and imported at unfavorable exchange rates. But still, the best money I ever spent was the $90 introductory textbook set for my first Japanese class. I used it for four semesters, and still use it occasionally for reference.
Japanese instructors are notoriously technophobic, and advancements in computer aided instruction have been very slow. Good instructors are too busy updating the existing learning systems to modern standards to bother with computerizing them too.
There are a few gadgets that will help certain areas, like kanji flashcard gadgets. I've used many of them, but none of them are much better than conventional methods (i.e. flashcards). And flashcards aren't going to teach you the whole language, it is just a reinforcement for a small subset of your primary studies. Electronic dictionaries are freely available online, but this is only going to speed up your word lookups, again, it's merely a support activity, not a primary learning tool.
The best tool to learn Japanese is a structured study plan, either with a teacher, or with a textbook with a graduated series of exercises that build up your knowledge according to planned curriculum. You can't just go at this by stumbling through native language materials like comic books and trying to figure it out as you go along.
IHBT.
I note your comments, but my friend was a wool importer and spent his time out in rural areas where they really DO herd goats. He described the people as living in "stone age conditions" and I have no reason to dispute his accounts, especially since he showed me photos. These were people who could not afford expensive luxuries like metal knives. Do you really think their lives would be improved by solar powered computers with wifi?
This is so typical of the polarization of today's society, if someone disagrees with you, they're totally wrong and a dick. Better check your mirror and see where the problem is here.
So in response to your pedantic definition of spyware, let's use the more appropriate term "malware," meaning the sort of gadgets that are so well known on Windoze web browsers, stuff that infests your machine through insecure Windoze mechanisms like ActiveX, and once installed, does stupid stunts in your browser, like push porn popups, hijack ads, etc.
OK, so now that we have a new term, malware, let me explain it to you again.
THERE IS NO SUCH THING ON MACOS X.
This guy had a simple prefs problem and he leaps to the massively incorrect conclusion that he has some sort of malware that infected a MacOS X machine and got installed in some sort of virus-like method, screwing up his browser. But it didn't happen that way becuause THERE IS NO SUCH THING ON MACOS X.
Yes, I use Little Snitch, I've only found one app (BBEdit) that phones home to check serials, and that's not what the guy who started this thread is talking about. Yes, I know there's a new exploit for Safari and a couple of other browsers. A software update was released a couple of days ago, and another one was released tonight. Nobody's managed to exploit it with malware so far. Malware DOES NOT EXIST on MacOS X. Call me a dick all you want, but that will not change the facts. The guy had a prefs problem, he cried wolf, I called BS on him, and I'm right and he's wrong. So there.
You still don't get it, braniac. No, it wasn't "spyware that was dependent on a prefs or .plist problem," because there WAS NO spyware. There is no such thing as spyware on the Mac. Nobody has ever found a single instance of browser spyware on a MacOS X system. Pull your head out of Bill Gates' ass and recognize that MacOS X has a different security model than Windows, and does not have the problems you are used to on your PeeCee.
The problem you encountered is fairly common on MacOS X, plists and prefs get corrupted often enough. You just delete the defective plist or pref and it will be recreated the next time you run the app. There are even terminal scripts that will check plists for well-formed XML, so it is easier to locate busted plists. You could either create a new user with fresh, virgin prefs & plists, or you could do it the right way, locate the damaged file, delete it, and it will be recreated when it's needed.
Yeah, high tech like metal knives. A friend of mine went to Nepal and was treated like a god because he brought Swiss Army Knives as gifts. Metal mining is considered unclean and miners defile the earth, so miners are an untouchable caste. It should come as no surprise there is virtually no metals industry in Nepal. So even metal knives are relatively rare in Nepal, they have to import them, which is also pretty rare.
SO, are you getting the picture here? We're talking about a country where goat-herding is a high-tech dream job people aspire to. These people don't need high tech crap like computers, they need high tech crap like metal knives, electric lights, indoor plumbing, refrigerators, vitamins, etc.
I call Bullshit. There is no such thing as MacOS X spyware. What happened is that a .plist or pref got fucked up and you couldn't alter the prefs. This has been documented in various places, like:
http://daringfireball.net/2004/05/internet_helper
.plists copied directly from the newuser template. If it works in a new user and not in your old user, you have a prefs or .plist problem. This is what you discovered, not spyware. Don't cry wolf every time you have a problem you can't figure out. Horror stories about viruses and spyware are for Windoze lusers. Think Different.
http://daringfireball.net/2004/05/energy_saver
The easiest way to detect bad prefs is to create a new user and test the software in a new userspace. The new user will have fresh prefs and
Yeah right. When you were 12 years old, were you worrying about getting skin cancer when you were 45?
You've got a dirty mind. My "uncomfortable places" are spots like the top of my ankle, where it flexes constantly and causes discomfort, or the top of my thigh, where I seem to hit it constantly whenever I let my arms relax while seated, or my nose, right where my eyeglasses sit on the stitches. If you want discomfort, just have surgery right where you need to sit the bridge of your glasses. And to anticipate your next question, yes, I used to work outdoors wearing shorts and sandals.
And yes, apparently it is standard practice to excise precancerous moles. No, not every mole is precancerous, but there are indicators that they should be removed for biopsy. Don't ask me what the signs are, ask a dermatologist. I thought the signs were just if it oozed or grew, but she's the expert. I just asked her about a little bump on my leg, she said, "that's nothing significant, but I don't like the look of that mole next to it." So she pulled out a magnifier, examined it for a minute, and said, "it will have to come off." And that was just a cursory examination, she decided I needed to have every square inch of my skin examined under a magnifier, which is going to take about an hour. I can't wait to hear how many little spots she's going to cut off.
Direct sunlight is bad for you, why would you want to sit outside in the sun when everyone knows the proper environment for programming is a batcave?
I'm not kidding. I just came back from my dermatologist, who gleefully cut away every little precancerous mole she could find, now I've got stitches in extremely uncomfortable places that won't be removed for another week. I used to work outside when I was a kid, mowing lawns and gardening, but now I regret it, since it apparently increased my likelihood of skin cancer.
The whole REASON I studied computer programming was because I hated working out in the hot sun in dirty environments full of allergy-inducing pollen, I vastly preferred air-conditioned, dark offices. So I figured that computing was the best profession, back in those days, computers were always installed in glassed-in rooms with intense air conditioning and filtered air.
I think you're missing the point of passphrases. I always explain it like this: you pick a pass phrase, an especially good one would be something with numbers in it too, my demo example is "I'm gonna cry 96 tears." Then you take the initial letters and your password becomes "Igc96t".. The point of pass phrases is to make cryptic passwords that are memorable but hard to crack.
Well, be fair, XGrid is just a demonstration, it's hardly even beta. But QMaster rocks. I wish I had a 5U rack of XServes to run it.