In the mountains, as in Afghanistan, the energy of a nuclear blast would
be deflected upward.
If you have ever seen the map documenting blast damage in the area of the
Japanese city of Nagasaki, you would be surprised at the effect that local
topographical features such as narrowing valleys and mountain passes can
have in concentrating the blast energy from one of these "puffs", even at
seemingly faraway locations.
Oh yes, one more thing. The images of Palestinians celebrating in Israel
you have seen on the news are most likely fake. In a manner of speaking,
anyway. They are from 1991 and unrelated to anything going on currently.
Even if these images are current, all I saw was the same footage of
a handful of people celebrating in a small Palestinian neighborhood, mostly
children and young teenagers. The same footage, over and over again.
It was not like there were thousands or even hundreds celebrating in the
streets. Pure propaganda, designed to direct our anger
and channel it in an "appropriate" direction.
Automatic surveillance would release police resources, which are currently
being stretched to the limit, to more useful purposes like responding quickly
to emergencies.
...more useful purposes, like enforcing the DMCA, harvesting the
streets using speed traps, getting our friends, sons and daughters thrown
into a prison full of rapists for smoking marijuana, violently attacking
peaceful antiglobalization protesters, erecting 10-foot walls around the
White House...
The question is, more useful for whom? Jane and Joe Median?
It's surprising to see how anti-law enforcement the/. crowd really
is. The only thing that's keeping you, your families and your property safe
is a robust law enforcement system. Without law enforcement your precious
computers and consoles would be stolen in no time.
What many/.'ers oppose is not law enforcement in general, but the enforcement
of unjust laws. Not all laws are based on concepts of justice, some
laws are created through corruption or flaws in the political system. Any
reasonable intelligent human that spends some time considering the difference
between the legal system and the human sense of natural justice
comes to similar conclusions.
Re:USB 2.0 technologically inferior to IEEE 1394
on
USB 2.0 For Linux
·
· Score: 1
Arghh! Where is that "Slow down cowboy" warning when you really need it?
Let's try "Overall, USB remains an inferior technology to IEEE 1394 for applications requiring high bandwidth with deterministic, isochornous transmission".
Apologies to readers for the hurried post.
Re:USB 2.0 technologically inferior to IEEE 1394
on
USB 2.0 For Linux
·
· Score: 1
Just to be clear,
150 Mb/s is meant to be 150 Mbit/s.
USB 2.0 technologically inferior to IEEE 1394
on
USB 2.0 For Linux
·
· Score: 2, Informative
With a transfer rate of 480mbps (more than firewire's 400mbps) it seems
promising."
The theoretical transfer rate of USB is misleading. Overall, USB
remains an inferior technology to USB for applications requiring high bandwidth
with deterministic, isochronous transmission. This
article provides a good explanation of some of the issues involved.
In one of the projects I have been leading, we have been involved in developing
the Linux IP over 1394 drivers, and have obtained over 150 Mb/s point-to-point
bandwidth using IEEE 1394 asynchronous mode, with room for left for further
optimization . The increased function call overhead of USB makes
even this modest performance level unlikely.
We are saddled with this inferior technological solution due to the
recalcitrance and greed of Intel, who, as usual, are elevating their
hidden agenda borne of backroom deals and "strategic partnerships" above
the interests of their customers.
I abhor the forced imposition of religious or philosophical values, whether it be perpetrated by liberals or conservatives.
Of course, the term "politically correct" is widely misused in the USA. What is really politically correct speech is anything that doesn't conflict with the pro-corporate, pseudo-Christian, consumerist, social Darwinist state religion.
I don't think I would be any more successful getting advertising time for my new Jesus(tm) Condoms (The Ultimate Protection) on the Fox Network than David Horowitz was getting ads into those college newspapers.
Ok, so if you are liberal, your thoughts are OK because you are OPEN.
But if you are conservative, you're thinking is CLOSED? If you're open
to diversity of opinion, then you must accept ALL types of thinking!
The difference is that those who you are identifying (in your apparently
limited absolutist vocabulary) as "conservative" are forcing everyone else
to accept their will, essentially imposing their minority religious views
on the entire country. As a result, those who are suffering from
a wide range of serious illnesses are denied hope and condemned to die,
all so the religious zealots can go to bed feeling that warm righteous
glow that they crave as much as a crack addict craves his high.
Bush (not my favorite president to say the least) was struggling
with some legitimate moral issues regarding stem cells from aborted fetus.
Before you can come to any logical conclusion on this or any other issue,
you need to check your premises. In this case, even a cursory reading
of the popular media would inform you that the stem cells in question do
*not* come from aborted fetuses.
Everything you've said about Europe being better basically has to do
with the difference in the size of the US vs. Europe---both in people and
in area. (...)
Maybe true for Nebraska or Montana, but not really true when you consider
many major population centers. The Boston to DC corridor especially
comes to mind, along with many other smaller metroplexes. We need
to face the fact that we *are* falling behind technologically, that
the US brand of capitalism tends strongly to monopoly and oligopoly, with
the attendant suppression of innovation and research.
Frankly, I can't believe how quickly intelligent people want to go
down this stem cell road. (...)
Maybe you are in no hurry, but I am not looking forward to the arthritis,
Alzheimer's, circulatory disease, and all the other lovely degenerative
illnesses that are coming my way courtesy of the the inevitable aging process
over the next couple of decades. Perhaps people already suffering
have an even more urgent need, don't you think? Maybe if you weren't
still in the rosy glow of youth, you would feel a little differently about
the pace of research, much less the hypocrisy of the fundamentalist religious
zealots who are determined to sacrifice the health of us all for the sake
of their ancient tribal superstitions.
The topic under discussion is the DMCA and its effect on scientific inquiry. Is it your position that the public will trust music industry executives to decide what constitutes valid areas of scientific inquiry? No matter how low your esteem for your fellow citizen, you will have a hard time defending your point.
As a matter of ethics, scientists and college professors are prohibited from abusing their position of authority by offering "expert" opinion on topics outside of their area of expertise. Not that it doesn't happen, but such actions are widely recognized as unethical. But on the topic of the DMCA and its chilling and suppressive effect on scientific inquiry, who better than those very researchers being threatened to attest to the consequences? Is it your position that Professor Felten is unqualified to offer his expert opinion on this "real world matter"?
Re:I'm sorry
on
ACM vs. RIAA
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Sorry, I do not buy into this type of self-defeating cynicism. Note how the RIAA backed down in the case of Prof. Felten, denying that they had ever threatened to sue him. The public perception that the money-bloated purveyors of "decadent" popular music are attacking academics and scientific progress is a sure loser for the RIAA. Our task is to get this picture out into the view of the public.
Re:I'm sorry
on
ACM vs. RIAA
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
RIAA may have the money, but the ACM has a much greater degree of prestige and trust in the eyes of the public. Every computer science and computer engineering professor, and all of their students as well, will line up behind the the ACM against the RIAA as this conflict gains media exposure. The public will trust the scientists and college professors over the corrupt music industry moneyboys. Most politicians will be forced to fall in line. The key to this happening is that this conflict is brought to the forefront, in full view of the public, by every means possible - public protests, bumperstickers, letters to the editor, internet forums and mailing lists, word-of-mouth...
BTW, one of the best readings I have found on this topic is "The Great Transformation" by Karl Polyani. Polyani provides extensive documentation and exposition for the development of today's market economies over the last two centuries. In particular, he points out the tremendous amount of effort spent on social engineering to accomplish the commodification of land, labor and capital. The market economy is a very modern feature of human existence, put into place only with a great deal of social dislocation and cultural destruction over the past 200 years.
6 PROFESSION - Software engineers shall advance the integrity and reputation
of the profession consistent with the public interest.
One implication of this principle is that we all need to stay informed
on events related to the intergrity and reputation of our profession in
order to defend ourselves against unjustified external attacks. Clearly,
the Sklyarov case represents an attack of unprecedented ferocity on the
profession of software engineering. Iam currently teaching
2 sections of a graduate-level software engineering course, and in an informal
poll last week Iwas shocked to learn that less than five out of sixty
students had heard of the DMCA or Dmitri Sklyarov. I emphasized that
it is our professional duty to keep informed and to speak out against the
persecution of software engineers. Besides linking to information
on this and related cases on my course webpages, Iam considering
some type of assignment that will encourage students to respond in some
way to the threat represented by the DMCA. Letter writing campaign?
Protest actions? I am writing slashdot to solicit recommendations.
Under NAFTA, foreign corporations may sue local democratic governments based on laws that may violate the rights of the corporations under the treaty. Our right to a representative government is thus violated in favor of corporate rights to make a profit.
One possible application of an HML specification not mentioned is to provide
a basis in which to solve the aggregation/disaggregation problem in distributed
interactive battlefield training simulations used by the DoD. The problem
involves attempting to correlate human group (brigade/batallion) behaviors
represented in high-level constructive simulations used to train officers,
such as WarSim
, with lower-level computer generated forces (
CGF
) applications that represent human behaviors at the level of the individual
battlefield entity (infantrymen, tank, aircraft, etc.), such as
OneSAF.
Of particular interest to many/.'ers is that these technologies always find
their way into the gaming industry, eventually. For example, much of
the distributed gaming technology that is used now was developed (or at least
anticipated) by DoD distributed training programs dating back to the
SimNet
program begun in the early 1980's. I know of many cases of people
that have acquired their initial training by working in this field that have
moved on to work in the gaming and entertainment industries.
(...) the simplified statistics look like a trap; he treats them
as a simple metric of the bomber's vulnerability to attack from different
angles
(...) or perhaps less experienced pilots would tend to mount attacks
from behind.
I see your point. If the opposition's tactics were such that
the likelihood of an attack from the rear as opposed to a frontal attack
was greater than 70/3, then this would indicate that even more tactical protection
was required for the rear, rather than the front. Time dependence of
enemy tactics beginning with the initial engagment should also enter into
the analysis, as you suggest.
Actually, we are putting together an array of Beowulf clusters that will
consist of a collective 396 AMD processors. The lab will service about 50
students per semester for educational purposes, plus 10-20 researchers and
their students. And yes, you are correct on the number of grad students and
software engineers employed in my lab, about 10 at any given time.
Admittedly, still just a drop in the bucket, but multiply my program by all
the other professors and researchers operating their labs using Linux, and
I am sure will have a sizeable and growing fraction of the market.
And the market for 4th grade reading games that sing and dance is, let's
say, a couple million people? You may want to ask some of your lab research
assistants and graduate students how many of them owned a Speak and Spell
when they were 3.
Some publishers cater to primary education, others cater to the academic
market. Elsevier, or even O'Reilly, certainly care more about my needs
than the needs of a 4th grade teacher
Clearly, economic modelling is not your group's forte.
Non sequitar. Why do I need to do any economic modeling for the publishers?
That is their problem. I was just trying to be helpful, and I end up
getting attacked by a couple of closet Microsoft fanatics.
And what if her stuff is really good? Would you deny your students
and coworkers access to her material on the basis of OS zealotry?
Professor, huh? More like the Professor on Gilligan's Island.
Sorry, I run a research laboratory, not a web-surfing nursery. The
basis of my OS choice? Linux offers the ideal path to transition away
from SGI platforms. My new Linux lab is going to be used for cluster
computing research and software engineering education, not for learning how
to make Powerpoint presentations.
Re:Web browsing is not a strong point
on
Linux Win In Schools
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Jennifer - Just a data point for you. I am a professor at a major University. I have a great deal of research funding, run a research lab (mostly linux boxes), specify purchases for equipment and textbooks, and I am setting up a new Linux lab this semester on campus. Your shockwave content? I'll never see it, and neither will my students and employees.
You should really consider making your content available in an alternative format.
If it came up in a popular vote, the proposed restrictions would probably lose. I think the majority of the people in this country realize they're getting screwed by the growing corporate aristocracy, but they are too busy just trying to make ends meet to understand the issues, and are underinformed by the corporate-owned news media.
For us, these issues are job-related, so they are fresh in our minds and close to our hearts. But I'd wager we aren't any better informed than the average populace on legislative issues affecting othe professionals, say, for example, trial lawyers or medical doctors. We're not stupid, we are just all isolated from each other, through overwork and lack of communication.
I've noticed a growing anti-democratic strain in political discussions over the last few years, that I think comes more from frustration with our own corrupt political and ecomomic system than from valid objections to the concept of democracy.
Slashdot Mirror
Is this based on independent, peer-reviewed testing, or is this from the comapnies marketing literature?
Just curious...
In the mountains, as in Afghanistan, the energy of a nuclear blast would
be deflected upward.
If you have ever seen the map documenting blast damage in the area of the
Japanese city of Nagasaki, you would be surprised at the effect that local
topographical features such as narrowing valleys and mountain passes can
have in concentrating the blast energy from one of these "puffs", even at
seemingly faraway locations.
Oh yes, one more thing. The images of Palestinians celebrating in Israel
you have seen on the news are most likely fake. In a manner of speaking,
anyway. They are from 1991 and unrelated to anything going on currently.
Even if these images are current, all I saw was the same footage of
a handful of people celebrating in a small Palestinian neighborhood, mostly
children and young teenagers. The same footage, over and over again.
It was not like there were thousands or even hundreds celebrating in the
streets. Pure propaganda, designed to direct our anger
and channel it in an "appropriate" direction.
Automatic surveillance would release police resources, which are currently being stretched to the limit, to more useful purposes like responding quickly to emergencies.
...more useful purposes, like enforcing the DMCA, harvesting the streets using speed traps, getting our friends, sons and daughters thrown into a prison full of rapists for smoking marijuana, violently attacking peaceful antiglobalization protesters, erecting 10-foot walls around the White House...
The question is, more useful for whom? Jane and Joe Median?
It's surprising to see how anti-law enforcement the /. crowd really
is. The only thing that's keeping you, your families and your property safe
is a robust law enforcement system. Without law enforcement your precious
computers and consoles would be stolen in no time.
What many /.'ers oppose is not law enforcement in general, but the enforcement
of unjust laws. Not all laws are based on concepts of justice, some
laws are created through corruption or flaws in the political system. Any
reasonable intelligent human that spends some time considering the difference
between the legal system and the human sense of natural justice
comes to similar conclusions.
Arghh! Where is that "Slow down cowboy" warning when you really need it?
Let's try "Overall, USB remains an inferior technology to IEEE 1394 for applications requiring high bandwidth with deterministic, isochornous transmission".
Apologies to readers for the hurried post.
Just to be clear,
150 Mb/s is meant to be 150 Mbit/s.
The theoretical transfer rate of USB is misleading. Overall, USB remains an inferior technology to USB for applications requiring high bandwidth with deterministic, isochronous transmission. This article provides a good explanation of some of the issues involved. In one of the projects I have been leading, we have been involved in developing the Linux IP over 1394 drivers, and have obtained over 150 Mb/s point-to-point bandwidth using IEEE 1394 asynchronous mode, with room for left for further optimization . The increased function call overhead of USB makes even this modest performance level unlikely.
We are saddled with this inferior technological solution due to the recalcitrance and greed of Intel, who, as usual, are elevating their hidden agenda borne of backroom deals and "strategic partnerships" above the interests of their customers.
I abhor the forced imposition of religious or philosophical values, whether it be perpetrated by liberals or conservatives.
Of course, the term "politically correct" is widely misused in the USA. What is really politically correct speech is anything that doesn't conflict with the pro-corporate, pseudo-Christian, consumerist, social Darwinist state religion.
I don't think I would be any more successful getting advertising time for my new Jesus(tm) Condoms (The Ultimate Protection) on the Fox Network than David Horowitz was getting ads into those college newspapers.
The difference is that those who you are identifying (in your apparently limited absolutist vocabulary) as "conservative" are forcing everyone else to accept their will, essentially imposing their minority religious views on the entire country. As a result, those who are suffering from a wide range of serious illnesses are denied hope and condemned to die, all so the religious zealots can go to bed feeling that warm righteous glow that they crave as much as a crack addict craves his high.
Bush (not my favorite president to say the least) was struggling with some legitimate moral issues regarding stem cells from aborted fetus.
Before you can come to any logical conclusion on this or any other issue, you need to check your premises. In this case, even a cursory reading of the popular media would inform you that the stem cells in question do *not* come from aborted fetuses.
Everything you've said about Europe being better basically has to do
with the difference in the size of the US vs. Europe---both in people and
in area. (...)
Maybe true for Nebraska or Montana, but not really true when you consider
many major population centers. The Boston to DC corridor especially
comes to mind, along with many other smaller metroplexes. We need
to face the fact that we *are* falling behind technologically, that
the US brand of capitalism tends strongly to monopoly and oligopoly, with
the attendant suppression of innovation and research.
Frankly, I can't believe how quickly intelligent people want to go
down this stem cell road. (...)
Maybe you are in no hurry, but I am not looking forward to the arthritis,
Alzheimer's, circulatory disease, and all the other lovely degenerative
illnesses that are coming my way courtesy of the the inevitable aging process
over the next couple of decades. Perhaps people already suffering
have an even more urgent need, don't you think? Maybe if you weren't
still in the rosy glow of youth, you would feel a little differently about
the pace of research, much less the hypocrisy of the fundamentalist religious
zealots who are determined to sacrifice the health of us all for the sake
of their ancient tribal superstitions.
The topic under discussion is the DMCA and its effect on scientific inquiry. Is it your position that the public will trust music industry executives to decide what constitutes valid areas of scientific inquiry? No matter how low your esteem for your fellow citizen, you will have a hard time defending your point.
As a matter of ethics, scientists and college professors are prohibited from abusing their position of authority by offering "expert" opinion on topics outside of their area of expertise. Not that it doesn't happen, but such actions are widely recognized as unethical. But on the topic of the DMCA and its chilling and suppressive effect on scientific inquiry, who better than those very researchers being threatened to attest to the consequences? Is it your position that Professor Felten is unqualified to offer his expert opinion on this "real world matter"?
Sorry, I do not buy into this type of self-defeating cynicism. Note how the RIAA backed down in the case of Prof. Felten, denying that they had ever threatened to sue him. The public perception that the money-bloated purveyors of "decadent" popular music are attacking academics and scientific progress is a sure loser for the RIAA. Our task is to get this picture out into the view of the public.
RIAA may have the money, but the ACM has a much greater degree of prestige and trust in the eyes of the public. Every computer science and computer engineering professor, and all of their students as well, will line up behind the the ACM against the RIAA as this conflict gains media exposure. The public will trust the scientists and college professors over the corrupt music industry moneyboys. Most politicians will be forced to fall in line. The key to this happening is that this conflict is brought to the forefront, in full view of the public, by every means possible - public protests, bumperstickers, letters to the editor, internet forums and mailing lists, word-of-mouth...
BTW, one of the best readings I have found on this topic is "The Great Transformation" by Karl Polyani. Polyani provides extensive documentation and exposition for the development of today's market economies over the last two centuries. In particular, he points out the tremendous amount of effort spent on social engineering to accomplish the commodification of land, labor and capital. The market economy is a very modern feature of human existence, put into place only with a great deal of social dislocation and cultural destruction over the past 200 years.
I think it is your precedence that has a problem. Democracy preceded capitalism, which in turn preceded corporations.
6 PROFESSION - Software engineers shall advance the integrity and reputation of the profession consistent with the public interest.
One implication of this principle is that we all need to stay informed on events related to the intergrity and reputation of our profession in order to defend ourselves against unjustified external attacks. Clearly, the Sklyarov case represents an attack of unprecedented ferocity on the profession of software engineering. Iam currently teaching 2 sections of a graduate-level software engineering course, and in an informal poll last week Iwas shocked to learn that less than five out of sixty students had heard of the DMCA or Dmitri Sklyarov. I emphasized that it is our professional duty to keep informed and to speak out against the persecution of software engineers. Besides linking to information on this and related cases on my course webpages, Iam considering some type of assignment that will encourage students to respond in some way to the threat represented by the DMCA. Letter writing campaign? Protest actions? I am writing slashdot to solicit recommendations.
Under NAFTA, foreign corporations may sue local democratic governments based on laws that may violate the rights of the corporations under the treaty. Our right to a representative government is thus violated in favor of corporate rights to make a profit.
One possible application of an HML specification not mentioned is to provide a basis in which to solve the aggregation/disaggregation problem in distributed interactive battlefield training simulations used by the DoD. The problem involves attempting to correlate human group (brigade/batallion) behaviors represented in high-level constructive simulations used to train officers, such as WarSim , with lower-level computer generated forces ( CGF ) applications that represent human behaviors at the level of the individual battlefield entity (infantrymen, tank, aircraft, etc.), such as OneSAF
Of particular interest to many
That was supposed to be (70/3) to 1
Similar results are known to occur when a competitor shows up on your search committee, or ends up voting on your tenure.
(...) the simplified statistics look like a trap; he treats them
as a simple metric of the bomber's vulnerability to attack from different
angles
(...) or perhaps less experienced pilots would tend to mount attacks
from behind.
I see your point. If the opposition's tactics were such that
the likelihood of an attack from the rear as opposed to a frontal attack
was greater than 70/3, then this would indicate that even more tactical protection
was required for the rear, rather than the front. Time dependence of
enemy tactics beginning with the initial engagment should also enter into
the analysis, as you suggest.
And your lab is a "market" of - what, 10 people?
Actually, we are putting together an array of Beowulf clusters that will
consist of a collective 396 AMD processors. The lab will service about 50
students per semester for educational purposes, plus 10-20 researchers and
their students. And yes, you are correct on the number of grad students and
software engineers employed in my lab, about 10 at any given time.
Admittedly, still just a drop in the bucket, but multiply my program by all
the other professors and researchers operating their labs using Linux, and
I am sure will have a sizeable and growing fraction of the market.
And the market for 4th grade reading games that sing and dance is, let's
say, a couple million people? You may want to ask some of your lab research
assistants and graduate students how many of them owned a Speak and Spell
when they were 3.
Some publishers cater to primary education, others cater to the academic
market. Elsevier, or even O'Reilly, certainly care more about my needs
than the needs of a 4th grade teacher
Clearly, economic modelling is not your group's forte.
Non sequitar. Why do I need to do any economic modeling for the publishers?
That is their problem. I was just trying to be helpful, and I end up
getting attacked by a couple of closet Microsoft fanatics.
And what if her stuff is really good? Would you deny your students
and coworkers access to her material on the basis of OS zealotry?
Professor, huh? More like the Professor on Gilligan's Island.
Sorry, I run a research laboratory, not a web-surfing nursery. The
basis of my OS choice? Linux offers the ideal path to transition away
from SGI platforms. My new Linux lab is going to be used for cluster
computing research and software engineering education, not for learning how
to make Powerpoint presentations.
Jennifer - Just a data point for you. I am a professor at a major University. I have a great deal of research funding, run a research lab (mostly linux boxes), specify purchases for equipment and textbooks, and I am setting up a new Linux lab this semester on campus. Your shockwave content? I'll never see it, and neither will my students and employees.
You should really consider making your content available in an alternative format.
If it came up in a popular vote, the proposed restrictions would probably lose. I think the majority of the people in this country realize they're getting screwed by the growing corporate aristocracy, but they are too busy just trying to make ends meet to understand the issues, and are underinformed by the corporate-owned news media.
For us, these issues are job-related, so they are fresh in our minds and close to our hearts. But I'd wager we aren't any better informed than the average populace on legislative issues affecting othe professionals, say, for example, trial lawyers or medical doctors. We're not stupid, we are just all isolated from each other, through overwork and lack of communication.
I've noticed a growing anti-democratic strain in political discussions over the last few years, that I think comes more from frustration with our own corrupt political and ecomomic system than from valid objections to the concept of democracy.