In the real world, the majority of servers are *nix based, with the majority of those being Linux. You'll find them all over the place.
Yes, you'll need to learn the CLI to do it right. Playing point and click just doesn't cut it in the higher levels. Even in the higher levels of Microsoft stuff, you'll need to know how to use their CLI, except it's not well documented, and a quick Google search won't tell you all the answers.
Wait until you have to start programming. Don't worry, if you get beyond help desk support for your local ISP, telling people how to renew their DHCP lease, you'll have to (oh my gosh) actually type things. Since you're probably unaware, the nifty point and click programs were actually written out and compiled. They didn't just start life as pretty interfaces. When you start scripting (batch, VB, Perl, PHP, or whatever) you'll live in the CLI. That is, unless you live on crutches provided to you by others.
I'm a *nix/Linux admin. I get pulled into the Windows arena on occasion. Because I'm really good at what I do, it's assumed I'm good at anything. The truth is, I'll figure it out faster than most people, which is why they call me. Once I had to add several hundred new sites to an IIS web server. They were pointing and clicking, and wondering why the occasional one didn't work (you missed a click). I wiped out the 10 sites that they had done by hand, and scripted the whole thing. My script took less than 20 minutes to write, and less than a minute to execute. It would have taken them days to get all the sites entered and fixed, and even still, customers would have called complaining because particular check boxes weren't clicked when they should have been.
Linux and open source are in the enterprise, and they're going to stay. They are the future, and Microsoft is struggling to keep up. But hey, MS is all you know, it's what you learned in your tech school, so you could get your MSCE, and now you hang it proudly in your cube at your call center. Congratulations. If you want to succeed, pick up some more skills. Linux, Solaris, and AIX are a start. MySQL, and Oracle, Apache are good too. Pick up Perl, PHP, shell scripting, and maybe get some decent exposure to C*. Go get your Cisco cert too. Once you're there, then you're allowed to play with the big boys. Until then, sush up and answer your support calls from housewives who can't figure out what the mouse is. Don't forget those winning Microsoft skills you picked up. Once you've shown that you are great at what you do, you'll still be asked to fix office computers because they have malware or some mysterious crashing problem.
Exactly. They pick an arbitrary reason, and then the tester has to be part mind reader to get the right answers.
When I was presented with the question, I came back with quite a few answers, which all were just as reasonable. If I remember right, I came back with "A". Once I knew the answer (because it was a learning exercise), when I was presented with it on another test, I was able to answer it correctly.
The "right" answer was "B", because it was the only letter with curves.
Using their same logic, "A" could have been a right answer, because it was the only letter with diagonal lines.
There are always nice clean questions with very definite answers. Then there are the questions that can be argued in any fashion, and there's no way to know the right answer without having reviewed the test material before, and have knowledge of the right answers.
I like the very precise ones, that take a little thinking. Off the top of my head here's another one. There are two men (A and B) standing at a spot. A challenges B to a duel Standing back to back, they each walk 30 feet forward. They then each turn 90 degrees to their right, walk an additional 30 feet and stop. How far apart are the men?
It had multiple choices. Of course, a little basic geometry answers the question.:) One answer had the total distance the men traveled, which wasn't the answer to the actual question. One answer was the straight-line distance between the men. Two other answers were "correct"-ish, if the math was done wrong, and one was just plain wrong.
Sometimes they'll provide not so clean questions, which does not allow you to actually know the answer (insufficient information), but since they're multiple choice, you can eliminate the absolutely incorrect answers, leaving one possibly correct answer.
Now, these are more complex problems. The questions in the original article are much simpler statements, that cannot have right answers. "Sometimes I get angry." They don't define "Angry". Angry could be a level of frustration. Sure, we're all frustrated by things on occasion. I'm frustrated that my finger hurts while I'm typing this, and have mistyped a few words because of the bandage. Angry could also be a level of emotion where you'd reach over your cube wall, and punch a coworker (or worse). Being that I'm talking to a prospective employer, do I want to give the impression that I may go postal? Probably not. Employers like happy people who do what they're told and smile about it. Anger shouldn't show to coworkers or customers.
I believe the logic to this question would expect a "yes" answer. Their logic is that everyone gets angry. If you answer "no", you're lying. But hey, I could be wrong, and "yes" means that you're mentally unstable. Damned if you do. Damned if you don't.
Cache of guns. $10,000
Cache of ammunition: $10,000
Gold and silver conins: $10,000
Shooting a militant conspiracy nut in the head while he goes to check his mail, with the ATF and FBI standing back watching and laughing, but technically seeing "nothing": Priceless
The problem with that logic is, I've taken many many intelligence tests over the years. I was in the gifted program from 1st grade through my senior year of high school. We took the tests not only to retest ourselves, but as mental challenges. Quite often, you're not looking for the idiot on the street answer, you're looking for the "what is the author asking".
Like, which of these letters is out of place. I won't give the answer in this message, I'll come back later and put the right one.
A B E F H
And oddly enough, there are again two answers, even based on the absolutely correct answer.
Sorry, your site is down. I needed a couple dirty hippies to handle some dirty work. Too bad I can't order them today. Maybe your site will be up tomorrow.:)
I'm not sure he quite caught on. I'll clarify some more for the dense.:)
United States federal minimum wage, effective July 24, 2009 is $7.25. That puts a minimum wage employee at $290/wk, or $15,080/yr. That would in turn put the executive at 7x the minimum pay, at $105,560.
So, they pay the guy cleaning floors $10/yr, which raises him to $20,800/yr, and the executive at $145,600.
But, the "salary" of the executive isn't everything. It's very rarely even significant. An executive can make a $1/yr salary, and still live VERY comfortably. The executive gets perks. It's not unheard of for a prized executive to live in a company owned home, with company paid utilities, and driving a company owned car. Vacations are taken on the company owned airplane, to the company paid for hotel room (for the "business conference", they'll assure you), and of course cash will find it's way to him, to ensure the conference goes smoothly. Bonuses aren't usually considered part of the salary. If an executive does something good that increases company profit, he deserves a bonus. Sometimes he has a company owned girlfriend (the pretty secretary-with-benefits). Hey, that wasn't sexist. Complain to the guys doing it. I went down from the neighborhood of the executive pay, to the janitor pay, so I don't get any perks. Damn this economy.
BTW, if anyone needs an executive who works twice as hard as he's paid for, give me a call.:) I don't neven need the company owned girlfriend, car, or "business conference" trips to Bermuda. Not that I'd complain, I just don't need them.:)
Fair use is a gray area though. It all depends on how it's used.
If I took a 1000 question test, copied 100 questions from it, and sold that test, I'd clearly be in violation even though I didn't copy the whole thing.
If you took 100 of 1000 questions, used them for illustrative purposes, and wrote a long commentary on it, you'd be much safer.
In the real message, it was posted by itself. Not cited with a dialogue for a larger work.
For example, it could have been....
"In reviewing the MMPI-2 test, we found that some questions such as question #410 [blah][blah] are not helpful, and actually detrimental to the accurate evaluation of [blah][blah][blah]. In comparison, the 2009 Jones and Jones report titled "what do psych tests do" indicate [blah][blah][blah]."
Regardless of the later discussion on the board, that was a passage taken directly off of their copyrighted work, and a substantial portion at that.
It could be argued, but is it really worth it?
I've received C&D's in the past. I usually post the C&D in replacement of the material(s) cited in that.
[soap box mode on]
Personally, I hate those test. Well, I hate IQ tests too. They are cut and dry "this is the answer", but you don't have the opportunity to find out what the answer is, so you're doomed to fail unless you cheat. If it were a GOOD test, either the answer would be clearly calculated with no second answer that is correct, or where two answers are correct the answer can be explained and proven to the proctor. That simply doesn't happen.
For example, on one IQ test, it had a question very similar to the following. All along during this test, they've had comparison of the letters used, the length of the string, the shape of the letters, etc, etc.
Q: Which of these are least similar
1) Apple
2) Pear
3) Peach
4) Potato
So, we have 4 answers.
Answers 1 and 3 have 5 letters, so we have two odd answers (1 and 4)
Answers 2,3,4 all start with the letter "P", leaving answer 1 as being the odd answer.
Answers 1,2,3 all have the letter "E" in them, leaving answer 4 as being the odd answer.
Answers 1 and 4 have a letter repeated, giving 2 odd answers (2,3).
Answers 2,3,4 are dark yellow (tan to brown), while answer 1 is red.
Answers 1,2,3 are high in sugar, while 4 is high in starch.
I have 8 potential answers. Based on the number of times I matched the comparisons above, they rank:
1 37.5%
4 37.5%
3 12.5%
2 12.5%
Well, go with the better candidate based on the previous questions, which were more letter matching, It must be that all the answers starting with "P" are the same, and the odd one is "A". I picked my choice, and have a clear reason for choosing it. "Apple" is the odd answer.
Wrong. It was #4, Potato. The reasoning behind the "correct" answer is, the first three are grown above ground. The fourth is grown underground.
Unless properly proctored and graded by someone who is actually as intelligent or more intelligent than me (like, umm, can listen to all the words that I say and comprehend them), these "pick an answer" tests with a set it stone grade sheet are absolutely worthless.
But hey, I've taken several IQ tests, and score very very well on them. I could score better if I could argue the merits of my choices, rather than just conceding that the test was poorly designed. I'd still get some wrong, and I am wil
Sure. Would you mind meeting me in the datacenter? Yes, right through that door. No, disregard the sign that says "Caution: bare live wires" and "Beware of the Leopard". They're just... a formality.
Draek looks a little confused, yet star struck, and walks straight into the datacenter. 30 feet in he hears the slams of the firedoors, followed by click of the contactors as all the lights go out.
"Oh, do mind your step, we may have a few loose floor tiles" Smythe says over the intercom, watching carefully with the infrared cameras.
"Wha..."
{{BOOM}}
{{CRACK}}
"MY LEG! I'VE BROKEN MY LEG!"
Really, we can't have any witnesses now, can we. PFY, would you mind letting the leopard out for a run, I think he's hungry.
Leopards are amazingly useful for both planning offices and datacenters. If you don't already have one, you should really consider it. Especially if you have such BOFH tendencies as I do.
I've seen businesses make decisions on thousands of lines of code in meetings after meetings, where they don't actually bring a computer, nor a line of code in. They theorize. They ponder. They wonder. They question. Then they come out of the meeting, and tell the developer how he screwed up. The theory and the reality very rarely coincide.
I like to throw them, by giving them a dozen different yet plausible theories as quickly as I can. Different people will pick up on various ideas that I threw out to them. Then some will try to converge on a single idea, and fail miserably. It would be funnier if you could just slide a few swords across the table, and watch them have at it.
Of course, none of the theories I threw out in the meeting had any basis in reality, they were just fun to watch people fight over.
Solar flares.
Years ago, I actually proved to management, that solar radiation made one server crash, and didn't touch the hundreds around it. That was regardless of the fact that there was a 10 story building above it, and it was 30 feet underground, in a hardened bunker, surrounded by well grounded metal. It was the end result of a micro solar flare. I think we were lucky no one was standing there when it happened.
I'm a firm believer that theory is like being a lawyer. If you can convince enough people (or the right people) of it, it must be true.
I'm sorry, I'm not familiar with that archaic term.
You either live in the urban area, the metro area, or the suburban area. Otherwise, there is no civilization. I hear the zombies roam free out there. People could never survive outside of the cities, unless they stay inside their cars.
I had some volcanic gas a while ago. It was more of a release than an ingestion though. The gas was deadly, but not the only concern. There was some explosive decompression associated with it. I don't know what I ate, but my posterior feels like a volcano spewed lava through it.
At least I used the bathroom at work. The toxic gasses should be lingering in there for hours.:) If you think it'll do anything for male enhancement, just take a walk through. For anyone else, I recommend full a full NBC suit with self contained air. You can try a gas mask, but I'd be afraid it'll melt.
Oh, what was that? I think I felt a little rumbling under the surface. There may be another eruption coming soon.
I've made the drive from Anchorage to Wasilla. It's hard to really consider a suburb, but there really isn't much there, so I'd be hard pressed to call it a "city" either. But hey, out there, where it's a long drive to the next thing resembling anything, sure, call it the 'burbs.:)
In a past life, I've hired my assistants (read: all SysAdmins lower than the top).
The worst ones I've hired had schooling.
The best ones I've had messed around with it at home, did some freelance work, and can tell me the distro they run at home, and the pro's and con's of it.
Usually the ones that messed around with it at home effectively had years of practice. They worked hard on doing trivial things, but they worked hard. They're the ones that had to learn to thrive, or else they'd be using something easier (and less secure, like Windows).
I also had people with A+ and MCSE certs apply. They couldn't tell me the first thing about a Linux environment, even though the position clearly stated that it's a Linux SysAdmin job. Some went above and beyond the requirements of the position, working on their own web sites, helping newbie friends, etc. That means a lot more to me than the person who took classes, and did "ok" in a corporate environment because they had other people to fall back onto.
On the topic of the wrong people... One guy was in tech school, ready to graduate. His resume looked acceptable. He had completed the Cisco class with an A. I needed a simple job done. Give a brand new switch an IP, and set the passwords. Easy enough, anyone who knows anything about Cisco equipment should be able to do it. I was going to do the rest remotely. It sat on the desk for several days. I asked the first day if he needed help. "No, I can do it." On the second day, he said he hadn't finished yet. On the third day, he said he was working on it. On the fourth day, I needed to deliver it to the datacenter, so I hooked it up. He hadn't even started, because he didn't know what he was doing. He didn't have a clue how to hook up the console cable. On that day, I told the office manager I don't want him any more. He was moved to another department, where he hoped he could slack and get people to "help" him do his work. The office manager was nicer than me. He gave him a month, and then fired him due to inability to accomplish the required tasks for the position.
One guy was a Y2K programmer on AIX equipment. We hired him on about January of 2000.:) I asked about his Linux experience. He had played with it at home. I asked to see a sample of his code. I didn't want the company secrets, I wanted to see how clean his code was. It looked good. He had a good attitude. He did great with us.
So, my advice to the article poster is, do something. Anything. Set up your own sites. Show off your own work. Practice, practice, practice. When interview time comes, show that off. A good interviewer will see that you know what you're doing, even if you don't have 10 years in the field. You have 10 years working harder on your own stuff, which must be related.
I apologize in advance for taking your comments out of order and replying to them.
I'd have to review some of the designs of the GM ignition systems. Honestly, I don't recall any resisters before the primary coil. I do know exactly the module you're talking about for Dodge though. It was the size of a cigarette pack, 4 connections, and I've changed several of them over the years.:)
I won't argue any of the finer points though, since this isn't a car forum.:) We all agree that you can make fire with low voltages, which was the original point.:)
On the charcoal powder, ya, that's a fine one. Actually, almost any combustible material in powder form can burn violently. Think about grain silo explosions. It's not high explosives in it, it's just the powder from the grain falling into the silo.
Ya, all you need is something that can burn. Most roofs won't just burn easily. It takes plenty of applied heat to start a fire. Think about holding a match to a piece of plywood in the middle. It may turn brown or black, but it won't just burst into flames. The same applies to fire wood. Anyone who's started a fireplace with real wood knows, you have to have a tinder that will heat up the logs, because the heat will transfer through the rest of the mass, and not let the single spot catch on fire.
I gave up on model rockets, not because they aren't cool, but they don't have the control capabilities that I desire. I lost several because they'd fly up out of sight, and even after the parachute deployment, they were so far away there was no way to find them again. I was actually pretty good most of the time, and could manage touchdown somewhere close to the launch point.
My design dreams (that haven't become a reality, unfortunately) involve aircraft with various propulsion systems. Traditional propulsion (prop or jet) with rocket assist at high altitudes would be SO much fun.:) Think a LEO RC airplane.:) I hope someday I have an income that can support building some of my ideas. I was close to having it once, but that is gone, and the current state of the economy won't support the idea of getting a job that will pay the bills and let me have extravagant hobbies. Until I have the money, I can dream.
Well, most cars don't have a resistor to bring the voltage down from 12v. They do pulse it to the coil(s), which convert it way up in the tens of thousands of volts, which brings the amperage down to virtually nothing. Some cars use a resistant ignition wire, and/or spark plugs, but that's after the original 12v hits the coil. It starts out as 12v though, which was the original argument.:) Most cars are ok down around 7v. When I was racing, the higher class cars would run without alternators, to save a few horsepower. They'd run strictly on the regular car battery. They'd be severely discharged by the end of the races (sometimes at the beginning of the race if they forgot to recharge). A HEI ignition system starts to suffer at about 7v. I don't know what the lower limit is for a points ignition.
I'm tempted to make videos sometime this weekend of starting fires with low voltages, just so I can post it to this thread.:)
I was thinking about it. When I was a kid, I was into model rocketry. We launched those rockets with 6v batteries. It was enough to very quickly heat the thin wire of the igniter, which had a little powder on it (like a small match head), which was enough to get the motor burning.
He's not my son. I'm an older father-type figure that he knows he can confide in, which is something he doesn't do with any other parental-type figures. I don't care if it gets back to his mother that I gave him that advice. Actually, I told her about the hand holding advice. She wasn't enthused, but she was ok with it.
When the condom time starts, the last thing I need is for him to accidentally say it in school. "Oh ya, JW gives me condoms so I'll be safe with my girl." That gets to a concerned parent or a teacher, and it won't be long before I'll be in court explaining why *I* am facilitating underage sex. There's a fine line between facilitating safety in something they're going to do, and being investigated as a pedophile, even if I was never there, and never saw anything. As far as the legal system goes, I'd probably be up on some sort of charges. Accessory to statutory rape? Sex between two minors is still sex involving minors. I'm happy being a good parental-type figure. I'm not happy with the idea that I could be labeled a sex offender. Even the charge can ruin a person's life, even if there's no conviction.
Have you read up on Dihydrogen Monoxide? Dangerous stuff! Dihydrogen Monoxide has killed more people than coal ever has! It's a component in nuclear weapons! It's even essential in coal plants and virtually every commercial form of power generation!
Your car makes fire with 12VDC. It sparks at each spark plug, which ignites the air/fuel mix. Your car cigarette lighter works on 12VDC, which makes enough heat to light a cigarette.
You can take a very thin gauge wire, coil it, and make enough heat from a small battery at 1.5VDC (like AA, C, D) to start a fire.
120V works better. 30KV works even better. It all depends on what your combustible is. The panels themselves probably won't go, unless you've done something really stupid.
And yes, a truck falling 17m would be more destructive than a bicycle falling 100m. The truck has more air resistance, and won't be moving as fast, but it has a LOT more mass. The bicycle, while moving faster with less air resistance, doesn't have the same kind of mass.
Drop a truck from 17 meters, and you'll have a big dent in the concrete sidewalk. Drop the bicycle, and you may have a little damage, but nowhere near the same.
I wouldn't want to be hit on the head with either, but if I had to choose, I'd take the truck. I'd be squished like a pancake, and would be dead before I realized what happened. The bicycle has a good chance of leaving me badly injured.
I had the argument with someone of, "hypothetically, there's a nuclear bomb in the city. It will go off in the next 5 minutes. In that 5 minutes, you can get to it, but won't have time to attempt stopping it. You can also get far enough away to not be immediately killed. What do you do?" They chose run. Why? You'll die from radiation poisoning, if the heat wave doesn't burn you so badly you'll die within hours. I'd want to be leaning against it. I wouldn't know anything about what happened. Either way, I'd be dead. Maybe, just maybe, I'd get lucky enough to get to it, and see a big red switch that says "Disable Bomb" on it, and I could shut it off. I wouldn't be betting on that though.
Potential bad design can make up for a lot of safety in power.
What if you hooked 1000 AA batteries in series? You'd have roughly 1500VDC until something melted.:) What if #300 was backwards? Then you'd have a nice little pop.:)
I was helping a friend with a prototype cell phone. It had a bad bug. The charging circuit was controlled by the running OS. If the OS isn't running, it can't charge. It also can't start just on wall power. Talk about a sweet design. The "fix" was to charge the battery on an external charger, and then reinstall it. It will run on wall power, once it's booted, but not before.
Unfortunately, we checked everywhere locally and couldn't find an external charger for this battery. It required 3.5 to 5 volts to run. I disposed of my collection of old power cords, so I couldn't just "jump start" it by hooking on to the battery connections with the battery installed. I tried hooking up two AA batteries, but they didn't provide enough amps. I was going to try 3 D cell batteries. When I checked the voltage on 2 batteries, which at 1.5V each should make 3V, it made 3.8. Who am I to argue with it. We used two, and it started right up like it should. I let it run like that for a few minutes, and on wall power, and then yanked my leads off. It still works.:)
It could be exactly what you are implying. It's not the fault of the panel. It could (and very likely was) installer error. Of course, there was no formal investigation to establish the cause of the fire. Maybe a panel was wired backwards. Maybe wire of an insufficient gauge was used. Maybe one of the connections wasn't a good strong electrical connection, which would generate heat. Maybe one of the wires was almost (but not quite) broken, which overheated because only a couple strands were trying to pass the whole load. Maybe the whole thing was wired up wrong, so maybe the unit drawing power wasn't drawing power from just the battery, but through the panels first (like in series, rather than parallel). I'm sure there are hundreds of more maybe's.
I like the most right above this one (well, just above for now), that says he hooked up 10 "marine batteries" and "a" solar cell. Which batteries? If they were group 8D batteries, they are capable of 1200A and 275Ah each. Were they in series or parallel? 10 of those would make for 12,000A or 144,000W at 12VDC, or 1,200A at 120VAC. (assuming I did all my math right) I'm assuming that there was no need for that kind of power, but if there was a wiring mistake, sure something would catch fire.
More than likely, if a professional had reviewed the plans, which is required in most places, they would have said "NO!" My RV requires group 8D batteries to start, because it's a big diesel motor (DD 6v92). I once, out of desperation, tried to start it with 4 car batteries, and couldn't even make it turn over. But, what if the leads inside the battery can't take the load of 10 of them being hooked together? You'd melt the battery, which isn't the best thing to do. What if you had been charging before that? A little hydrogen buildup, and BOOM.
The article seems like a valid idea. A lot of work, but still. I wouldn't mind trying sometime, but I don't have an application for it right now. I have a small panel on my RV, keeping my batteries charged. But yes, it's done through a charge controller. Important little things so you don't catch things on fire.
Don't worry, lots of people will be offended too. "What do you mean I'm suppose to parent my children? Isn't that what TV and the computer are for. I bought them both, and stuck them in his room, so I wouldn't have to deal with him."
I'd say that's all in humor, but sadly enough it's an attitude I've seen and heard a lot of. Some parents barely see their kids. They walk to the bus themselves, go to school, come home, make themselves food, and stay in their room the rest of the time. I'm surprised there haven't been more news reports of missing kids, where the parents didn't know they were missing for several days.
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You just got out of Microsoft school, didn't you?
In the real world, the majority of servers are *nix based, with the majority of those being Linux. You'll find them all over the place.
Yes, you'll need to learn the CLI to do it right. Playing point and click just doesn't cut it in the higher levels. Even in the higher levels of Microsoft stuff, you'll need to know how to use their CLI, except it's not well documented, and a quick Google search won't tell you all the answers.
Wait until you have to start programming. Don't worry, if you get beyond help desk support for your local ISP, telling people how to renew their DHCP lease, you'll have to (oh my gosh) actually type things. Since you're probably unaware, the nifty point and click programs were actually written out and compiled. They didn't just start life as pretty interfaces. When you start scripting (batch, VB, Perl, PHP, or whatever) you'll live in the CLI. That is, unless you live on crutches provided to you by others.
I'm a *nix/Linux admin. I get pulled into the Windows arena on occasion. Because I'm really good at what I do, it's assumed I'm good at anything. The truth is, I'll figure it out faster than most people, which is why they call me. Once I had to add several hundred new sites to an IIS web server. They were pointing and clicking, and wondering why the occasional one didn't work (you missed a click). I wiped out the 10 sites that they had done by hand, and scripted the whole thing. My script took less than 20 minutes to write, and less than a minute to execute. It would have taken them days to get all the sites entered and fixed, and even still, customers would have called complaining because particular check boxes weren't clicked when they should have been.
Linux and open source are in the enterprise, and they're going to stay. They are the future, and Microsoft is struggling to keep up. But hey, MS is all you know, it's what you learned in your tech school, so you could get your MSCE, and now you hang it proudly in your cube at your call center. Congratulations. If you want to succeed, pick up some more skills. Linux, Solaris, and AIX are a start. MySQL, and Oracle, Apache are good too. Pick up Perl, PHP, shell scripting, and maybe get some decent exposure to C*. Go get your Cisco cert too. Once you're there, then you're allowed to play with the big boys. Until then, sush up and answer your support calls from housewives who can't figure out what the mouse is. Don't forget those winning Microsoft skills you picked up. Once you've shown that you are great at what you do, you'll still be asked to fix office computers because they have malware or some mysterious crashing problem.
Exactly. They pick an arbitrary reason, and then the tester has to be part mind reader to get the right answers.
When I was presented with the question, I came back with quite a few answers, which all were just as reasonable. If I remember right, I came back with "A". Once I knew the answer (because it was a learning exercise), when I was presented with it on another test, I was able to answer it correctly.
The "right" answer was "B", because it was the only letter with curves.
Using their same logic, "A" could have been a right answer, because it was the only letter with diagonal lines.
There are always nice clean questions with very definite answers. Then there are the questions that can be argued in any fashion, and there's no way to know the right answer without having reviewed the test material before, and have knowledge of the right answers.
I like the very precise ones, that take a little thinking. Off the top of my head here's another one. There are two men (A and B) standing at a spot. A challenges B to a duel Standing back to back, they each walk 30 feet forward. They then each turn 90 degrees to their right, walk an additional 30 feet and stop. How far apart are the men?
It had multiple choices. Of course, a little basic geometry answers the question. :) One answer had the total distance the men traveled, which wasn't the answer to the actual question. One answer was the straight-line distance between the men. Two other answers were "correct"-ish, if the math was done wrong, and one was just plain wrong.
Sometimes they'll provide not so clean questions, which does not allow you to actually know the answer (insufficient information), but since they're multiple choice, you can eliminate the absolutely incorrect answers, leaving one possibly correct answer.
Now, these are more complex problems. The questions in the original article are much simpler statements, that cannot have right answers. "Sometimes I get angry." They don't define "Angry". Angry could be a level of frustration. Sure, we're all frustrated by things on occasion. I'm frustrated that my finger hurts while I'm typing this, and have mistyped a few words because of the bandage. Angry could also be a level of emotion where you'd reach over your cube wall, and punch a coworker (or worse). Being that I'm talking to a prospective employer, do I want to give the impression that I may go postal? Probably not. Employers like happy people who do what they're told and smile about it. Anger shouldn't show to coworkers or customers.
I believe the logic to this question would expect a "yes" answer. Their logic is that everyone gets angry. If you answer "no", you're lying. But hey, I could be wrong, and "yes" means that you're mentally unstable. Damned if you do. Damned if you don't.
Good, now I know where to pick up supplies.
Cache of guns. $10,000
Cache of ammunition: $10,000
Gold and silver conins: $10,000
Shooting a militant conspiracy nut in the head while he goes to check his mail, with the ATF and FBI standing back watching and laughing, but technically seeing "nothing": Priceless
The problem with that logic is, I've taken many many intelligence tests over the years. I was in the gifted program from 1st grade through my senior year of high school. We took the tests not only to retest ourselves, but as mental challenges. Quite often, you're not looking for the idiot on the street answer, you're looking for the "what is the author asking".
Like, which of these letters is out of place. I won't give the answer in this message, I'll come back later and put the right one.
A B E F H
And oddly enough, there are again two answers, even based on the absolutely correct answer.
Sorry, your site is down. I needed a couple dirty hippies to handle some dirty work. Too bad I can't order them today. Maybe your site will be up tomorrow. :)
I'm not sure he quite caught on. I'll clarify some more for the dense. :)
United States federal minimum wage, effective July 24, 2009 is $7.25. That puts a minimum wage employee at $290/wk, or $15,080/yr. That would in turn put the executive at 7x the minimum pay, at $105,560.
So, they pay the guy cleaning floors $10/yr, which raises him to $20,800/yr, and the executive at $145,600.
But, the "salary" of the executive isn't everything. It's very rarely even significant. An executive can make a $1/yr salary, and still live VERY comfortably. The executive gets perks. It's not unheard of for a prized executive to live in a company owned home, with company paid utilities, and driving a company owned car. Vacations are taken on the company owned airplane, to the company paid for hotel room (for the "business conference", they'll assure you), and of course cash will find it's way to him, to ensure the conference goes smoothly. Bonuses aren't usually considered part of the salary. If an executive does something good that increases company profit, he deserves a bonus. Sometimes he has a company owned girlfriend (the pretty secretary-with-benefits). Hey, that wasn't sexist. Complain to the guys doing it. I went down from the neighborhood of the executive pay, to the janitor pay, so I don't get any perks. Damn this economy.
BTW, if anyone needs an executive who works twice as hard as he's paid for, give me a call. :) I don't neven need the company owned girlfriend, car, or "business conference" trips to Bermuda. Not that I'd complain, I just don't need them. :)
There will be cake and grief counseling at the end of the experiment. Good luck. You'll need it.
Fair use is a gray area though. It all depends on how it's used.
If I took a 1000 question test, copied 100 questions from it, and sold that test, I'd clearly be in violation even though I didn't copy the whole thing.
If you took 100 of 1000 questions, used them for illustrative purposes, and wrote a long commentary on it, you'd be much safer.
In the real message, it was posted by itself. Not cited with a dialogue for a larger work.
For example, it could have been....
"In reviewing the MMPI-2 test, we found that some questions such as question #410 [blah][blah] are not helpful, and actually detrimental to the accurate evaluation of [blah][blah][blah]. In comparison, the 2009 Jones and Jones report titled "what do psych tests do" indicate [blah][blah][blah]."
Regardless of the later discussion on the board, that was a passage taken directly off of their copyrighted work, and a substantial portion at that.
It could be argued, but is it really worth it?
I've received C&D's in the past. I usually post the C&D in replacement of the material(s) cited in that.
[soap box mode on]
Personally, I hate those test. Well, I hate IQ tests too. They are cut and dry "this is the answer", but you don't have the opportunity to find out what the answer is, so you're doomed to fail unless you cheat. If it were a GOOD test, either the answer would be clearly calculated with no second answer that is correct, or where two answers are correct the answer can be explained and proven to the proctor. That simply doesn't happen.
For example, on one IQ test, it had a question very similar to the following. All along during this test, they've had comparison of the letters used, the length of the string, the shape of the letters, etc, etc.
Q: Which of these are least similar
1) Apple
2) Pear
3) Peach
4) Potato
So, we have 4 answers.
Answers 1 and 3 have 5 letters, so we have two odd answers (1 and 4)
Answers 2,3,4 all start with the letter "P", leaving answer 1 as being the odd answer.
Answers 1,2,3 all have the letter "E" in them, leaving answer 4 as being the odd answer.
Answers 1 and 4 have a letter repeated, giving 2 odd answers (2,3).
Answers 2,3,4 are dark yellow (tan to brown), while answer 1 is red.
Answers 1,2,3 are high in sugar, while 4 is high in starch.
I have 8 potential answers. Based on the number of times I matched the comparisons above, they rank:
1 37.5%
4 37.5%
3 12.5%
2 12.5%
Well, go with the better candidate based on the previous questions, which were more letter matching, It must be that all the answers starting with "P" are the same, and the odd one is "A". I picked my choice, and have a clear reason for choosing it. "Apple" is the odd answer.
Wrong. It was #4, Potato. The reasoning behind the "correct" answer is, the first three are grown above ground. The fourth is grown underground.
Unless properly proctored and graded by someone who is actually as intelligent or more intelligent than me (like, umm, can listen to all the words that I say and comprehend them), these "pick an answer" tests with a set it stone grade sheet are absolutely worthless.
But hey, I've taken several IQ tests, and score very very well on them. I could score better if I could argue the merits of my choices, rather than just conceding that the test was poorly designed. I'd still get some wrong, and I am wil
[pondering the possibilities]
Sure. Would you mind meeting me in the datacenter? Yes, right through that door. No, disregard the sign that says "Caution: bare live wires" and "Beware of the Leopard". They're just ... a formality.
Draek looks a little confused, yet star struck, and walks straight into the datacenter. 30 feet in he hears the slams of the firedoors, followed by click of the contactors as all the lights go out.
"Oh, do mind your step, we may have a few loose floor tiles" Smythe says over the intercom, watching carefully with the infrared cameras.
"Wha..."
{{BOOM}}
{{CRACK}}
"MY LEG! I'VE BROKEN MY LEG!"
Really, we can't have any witnesses now, can we. PFY, would you mind letting the leopard out for a run, I think he's hungry.
Leopards are amazingly useful for both planning offices and datacenters. If you don't already have one, you should really consider it. Especially if you have such BOFH tendencies as I do.
It all depends on where you work.
I've seen businesses make decisions on thousands of lines of code in meetings after meetings, where they don't actually bring a computer, nor a line of code in. They theorize. They ponder. They wonder. They question. Then they come out of the meeting, and tell the developer how he screwed up. The theory and the reality very rarely coincide.
I like to throw them, by giving them a dozen different yet plausible theories as quickly as I can. Different people will pick up on various ideas that I threw out to them. Then some will try to converge on a single idea, and fail miserably. It would be funnier if you could just slide a few swords across the table, and watch them have at it.
Of course, none of the theories I threw out in the meeting had any basis in reality, they were just fun to watch people fight over.
Solar flares.
Years ago, I actually proved to management, that solar radiation made one server crash, and didn't touch the hundreds around it. That was regardless of the fact that there was a 10 story building above it, and it was 30 feet underground, in a hardened bunker, surrounded by well grounded metal. It was the end result of a micro solar flare. I think we were lucky no one was standing there when it happened.
I'm a firm believer that theory is like being a lawyer. If you can convince enough people (or the right people) of it, it must be true.
You haven't been to a farm lately, have you? There's some definate biology there. Usually enough to make you wonder how people eat meat.
(footnote: I am an avid carnivore, but farm animals are still dirty nasty things that I wouldn't invite into my house, unless served on a plate)
Hey now, I'm a subscriber, so I saw it before most folks. I just didn't get back to get first post saying....
She's cute... And brilliant. And smarter than the experts in particle physics. I'm in love. :)
I'm sorry, I'm not familiar with that archaic term.
You either live in the urban area, the metro area, or the suburban area. Otherwise, there is no civilization. I hear the zombies roam free out there. People could never survive outside of the cities, unless they stay inside their cars.
His side was won quite a while ago, when she started doing interviews.
I had some volcanic gas a while ago. It was more of a release than an ingestion though. The gas was deadly, but not the only concern. There was some explosive decompression associated with it. I don't know what I ate, but my posterior feels like a volcano spewed lava through it.
At least I used the bathroom at work. The toxic gasses should be lingering in there for hours. :) If you think it'll do anything for male enhancement, just take a walk through. For anyone else, I recommend full a full NBC suit with self contained air. You can try a gas mask, but I'd be afraid it'll melt.
Oh, what was that? I think I felt a little rumbling under the surface. There may be another eruption coming soon.
I've made the drive from Anchorage to Wasilla. It's hard to really consider a suburb, but there really isn't much there, so I'd be hard pressed to call it a "city" either. But hey, out there, where it's a long drive to the next thing resembling anything, sure, call it the 'burbs. :)
In a past life, I've hired my assistants (read: all SysAdmins lower than the top).
The worst ones I've hired had schooling.
The best ones I've had messed around with it at home, did some freelance work, and can tell me the distro they run at home, and the pro's and con's of it.
Usually the ones that messed around with it at home effectively had years of practice. They worked hard on doing trivial things, but they worked hard. They're the ones that had to learn to thrive, or else they'd be using something easier (and less secure, like Windows).
I also had people with A+ and MCSE certs apply. They couldn't tell me the first thing about a Linux environment, even though the position clearly stated that it's a Linux SysAdmin job. Some went above and beyond the requirements of the position, working on their own web sites, helping newbie friends, etc. That means a lot more to me than the person who took classes, and did "ok" in a corporate environment because they had other people to fall back onto.
On the topic of the wrong people... One guy was in tech school, ready to graduate. His resume looked acceptable. He had completed the Cisco class with an A. I needed a simple job done. Give a brand new switch an IP, and set the passwords. Easy enough, anyone who knows anything about Cisco equipment should be able to do it. I was going to do the rest remotely. It sat on the desk for several days. I asked the first day if he needed help. "No, I can do it." On the second day, he said he hadn't finished yet. On the third day, he said he was working on it. On the fourth day, I needed to deliver it to the datacenter, so I hooked it up. He hadn't even started, because he didn't know what he was doing. He didn't have a clue how to hook up the console cable. On that day, I told the office manager I don't want him any more. He was moved to another department, where he hoped he could slack and get people to "help" him do his work. The office manager was nicer than me. He gave him a month, and then fired him due to inability to accomplish the required tasks for the position.
One guy was a Y2K programmer on AIX equipment. We hired him on about January of 2000. :) I asked about his Linux experience. He had played with it at home. I asked to see a sample of his code. I didn't want the company secrets, I wanted to see how clean his code was. It looked good. He had a good attitude. He did great with us.
So, my advice to the article poster is, do something. Anything. Set up your own sites. Show off your own work. Practice, practice, practice. When interview time comes, show that off. A good interviewer will see that you know what you're doing, even if you don't have 10 years in the field. You have 10 years working harder on your own stuff, which must be related.
I apologize in advance for taking your comments out of order and replying to them.
I'd have to review some of the designs of the GM ignition systems. Honestly, I don't recall any resisters before the primary coil. I do know exactly the module you're talking about for Dodge though. It was the size of a cigarette pack, 4 connections, and I've changed several of them over the years. :)
I won't argue any of the finer points though, since this isn't a car forum. :) We all agree that you can make fire with low voltages, which was the original point. :)
On the charcoal powder, ya, that's a fine one. Actually, almost any combustible material in powder form can burn violently. Think about grain silo explosions. It's not high explosives in it, it's just the powder from the grain falling into the silo.
Ya, all you need is something that can burn. Most roofs won't just burn easily. It takes plenty of applied heat to start a fire. Think about holding a match to a piece of plywood in the middle. It may turn brown or black, but it won't just burst into flames. The same applies to fire wood. Anyone who's started a fireplace with real wood knows, you have to have a tinder that will heat up the logs, because the heat will transfer through the rest of the mass, and not let the single spot catch on fire.
I gave up on model rockets, not because they aren't cool, but they don't have the control capabilities that I desire. I lost several because they'd fly up out of sight, and even after the parachute deployment, they were so far away there was no way to find them again. I was actually pretty good most of the time, and could manage touchdown somewhere close to the launch point.
My design dreams (that haven't become a reality, unfortunately) involve aircraft with various propulsion systems. Traditional propulsion (prop or jet) with rocket assist at high altitudes would be SO much fun. :) Think a LEO RC airplane. :) I hope someday I have an income that can support building some of my ideas. I was close to having it once, but that is gone, and the current state of the economy won't support the idea of getting a job that will pay the bills and let me have extravagant hobbies. Until I have the money, I can dream.
Well, most cars don't have a resistor to bring the voltage down from 12v. They do pulse it to the coil(s), which convert it way up in the tens of thousands of volts, which brings the amperage down to virtually nothing. Some cars use a resistant ignition wire, and/or spark plugs, but that's after the original 12v hits the coil. It starts out as 12v though, which was the original argument. :) Most cars are ok down around 7v. When I was racing, the higher class cars would run without alternators, to save a few horsepower. They'd run strictly on the regular car battery. They'd be severely discharged by the end of the races (sometimes at the beginning of the race if they forgot to recharge). A HEI ignition system starts to suffer at about 7v. I don't know what the lower limit is for a points ignition.
I'm tempted to make videos sometime this weekend of starting fires with low voltages, just so I can post it to this thread. :)
I was thinking about it. When I was a kid, I was into model rocketry. We launched those rockets with 6v batteries. It was enough to very quickly heat the thin wire of the igniter, which had a little powder on it (like a small match head), which was enough to get the motor burning.
He's not my son. I'm an older father-type figure that he knows he can confide in, which is something he doesn't do with any other parental-type figures. I don't care if it gets back to his mother that I gave him that advice. Actually, I told her about the hand holding advice. She wasn't enthused, but she was ok with it.
When the condom time starts, the last thing I need is for him to accidentally say it in school. "Oh ya, JW gives me condoms so I'll be safe with my girl." That gets to a concerned parent or a teacher, and it won't be long before I'll be in court explaining why *I* am facilitating underage sex. There's a fine line between facilitating safety in something they're going to do, and being investigated as a pedophile, even if I was never there, and never saw anything. As far as the legal system goes, I'd probably be up on some sort of charges. Accessory to statutory rape? Sex between two minors is still sex involving minors. I'm happy being a good parental-type figure. I'm not happy with the idea that I could be labeled a sex offender. Even the charge can ruin a person's life, even if there's no conviction.
Have you read up on Dihydrogen Monoxide? Dangerous stuff! Dihydrogen Monoxide has killed more people than coal ever has! It's a component in nuclear weapons! It's even essential in coal plants and virtually every commercial form of power generation!
There's some disinformation here.
And finally, the real truth comes out, from the people that you can trust. They evaluated the report as TRUE! It is evil!
And, ya, I know what it is. I'm making the point.
Bullshit.
Your car makes fire with 12VDC. It sparks at each spark plug, which ignites the air/fuel mix. Your car cigarette lighter works on 12VDC, which makes enough heat to light a cigarette.
You can take a very thin gauge wire, coil it, and make enough heat from a small battery at 1.5VDC (like AA, C, D) to start a fire.
120V works better. 30KV works even better. It all depends on what your combustible is. The panels themselves probably won't go, unless you've done something really stupid.
And yes, a truck falling 17m would be more destructive than a bicycle falling 100m. The truck has more air resistance, and won't be moving as fast, but it has a LOT more mass. The bicycle, while moving faster with less air resistance, doesn't have the same kind of mass.
Drop a truck from 17 meters, and you'll have a big dent in the concrete sidewalk. Drop the bicycle, and you may have a little damage, but nowhere near the same.
I wouldn't want to be hit on the head with either, but if I had to choose, I'd take the truck. I'd be squished like a pancake, and would be dead before I realized what happened. The bicycle has a good chance of leaving me badly injured.
I had the argument with someone of, "hypothetically, there's a nuclear bomb in the city. It will go off in the next 5 minutes. In that 5 minutes, you can get to it, but won't have time to attempt stopping it. You can also get far enough away to not be immediately killed. What do you do?" They chose run. Why? You'll die from radiation poisoning, if the heat wave doesn't burn you so badly you'll die within hours. I'd want to be leaning against it. I wouldn't know anything about what happened. Either way, I'd be dead. Maybe, just maybe, I'd get lucky enough to get to it, and see a big red switch that says "Disable Bomb" on it, and I could shut it off. I wouldn't be betting on that though.
Potential bad design can make up for a lot of safety in power.
What if you hooked 1000 AA batteries in series? You'd have roughly 1500VDC until something melted. :) What if #300 was backwards? Then you'd have a nice little pop. :)
I was helping a friend with a prototype cell phone. It had a bad bug. The charging circuit was controlled by the running OS. If the OS isn't running, it can't charge. It also can't start just on wall power. Talk about a sweet design. The "fix" was to charge the battery on an external charger, and then reinstall it. It will run on wall power, once it's booted, but not before.
Unfortunately, we checked everywhere locally and couldn't find an external charger for this battery. It required 3.5 to 5 volts to run. I disposed of my collection of old power cords, so I couldn't just "jump start" it by hooking on to the battery connections with the battery installed. I tried hooking up two AA batteries, but they didn't provide enough amps. I was going to try 3 D cell batteries. When I checked the voltage on 2 batteries, which at 1.5V each should make 3V, it made 3.8. Who am I to argue with it. We used two, and it started right up like it should. I let it run like that for a few minutes, and on wall power, and then yanked my leads off. It still works. :)
{sigh} really. The whole argument is silly.
It could be exactly what you are implying. It's not the fault of the panel. It could (and very likely was) installer error. Of course, there was no formal investigation to establish the cause of the fire. Maybe a panel was wired backwards. Maybe wire of an insufficient gauge was used. Maybe one of the connections wasn't a good strong electrical connection, which would generate heat. Maybe one of the wires was almost (but not quite) broken, which overheated because only a couple strands were trying to pass the whole load. Maybe the whole thing was wired up wrong, so maybe the unit drawing power wasn't drawing power from just the battery, but through the panels first (like in series, rather than parallel). I'm sure there are hundreds of more maybe's.
I like the most right above this one (well, just above for now), that says he hooked up 10 "marine batteries" and "a" solar cell. Which batteries? If they were group 8D batteries, they are capable of 1200A and 275Ah each. Were they in series or parallel? 10 of those would make for 12,000A or 144,000W at 12VDC, or 1,200A at 120VAC. (assuming I did all my math right) I'm assuming that there was no need for that kind of power, but if there was a wiring mistake, sure something would catch fire.
More than likely, if a professional had reviewed the plans, which is required in most places, they would have said "NO!" My RV requires group 8D batteries to start, because it's a big diesel motor (DD 6v92). I once, out of desperation, tried to start it with 4 car batteries, and couldn't even make it turn over. But, what if the leads inside the battery can't take the load of 10 of them being hooked together? You'd melt the battery, which isn't the best thing to do. What if you had been charging before that? A little hydrogen buildup, and BOOM.
The article seems like a valid idea. A lot of work, but still. I wouldn't mind trying sometime, but I don't have an application for it right now. I have a small panel on my RV, keeping my batteries charged. But yes, it's done through a charge controller. Important little things so you don't catch things on fire.
Don't worry, lots of people will be offended too. "What do you mean I'm suppose to parent my children? Isn't that what TV and the computer are for. I bought them both, and stuck them in his room, so I wouldn't have to deal with him."
I'd say that's all in humor, but sadly enough it's an attitude I've seen and heard a lot of. Some parents barely see their kids. They walk to the bus themselves, go to school, come home, make themselves food, and stay in their room the rest of the time. I'm surprised there haven't been more news reports of missing kids, where the parents didn't know they were missing for several days.