Correct, Lilienfeld had the theory down but couldn't build a working device due to poorly understood and unknown surface effects. The transistor he described was a field effect transistor (FET.) This was also the type of transistor that Bardeen, Brattain and Schockley wanted to build. However, as I understand it, the point-contact transistor (which is a bipolar junction transistor, quite different from a FET) they created in 1947 was an "accident" while trying to build a FET.
Ah... stop with this nonsense, I hear this excuse often when it comes to broadband and mobile phone coverage, but lets look at some numbers...
Lets average over a large, less densely populated region than the United States, but with similar GDP's per capita. I have for this purpose selected Norway, Sweden and Finland, a relatively homogeneous region. Adding the populations and dividing by the total area (from Wikipedia) we get a density of: (5238460+9127058+4695134)/(338145+449964+385155) = 16.2 people / km^2... compared to the United States' 31 people / km^2
Now lets look at an article which shows the broadbandpenetration in all these countries. As we can plainly see the United States lags behind them with its 50.7% compared to Sweden's 51.6%, Finland's 59.52% and Norway's 59.7%... weighing against population we get a total for the three countries of: (9127058*0.5176+5238460*0.5952+4695134*0.5970)/(52 38460+9127058+4695134) = 55.85%... which is 5% higher than the United States's. Not much you might say, but remember your argument... low population density -> lower broadband penetration and we are talking about a region with almost half the population density of the United States, and with comparable economies (in fact I would not be surprised to find that laying copper is more expensive in the aforementioned countries.)
Now the population distribution could probably contribute to the problems of getting broadband, however I'm guessing that this would fall in the United States' disfavor, it probably being more condensed in places (though numbers on this is hard to find.)
Lastly I will say that an argument based on population density is not without merit, but it's way overplayed and I think there are other, more important factor to the US's lackluster broadband adoption.
Wikipedia seems to disagree with you. See: article about the Pound and Avoirdupois article. It seems to have been defined as weight initially but 1 pound is now defined as exactly 453.59237 grams... which is mass. So TFA is infact correct stating that 330 punds = 150 kg (with an error less than 0.3%).
do we really have problem with interference in fiber where we have to use coaxial cable???
Most (all?) fiber optical cables have a co-axial design. Simplified; there is a core and a cladding, with the cladding having a lower refractive index than the core; thus creating total reflection (multimode fibers.) Now the cladding could be the air surrounding the cable, but it's probably not, thus as you see the co-axial design is a reasonable one. (Though you could probably get a away with some off axis designs, at least for multimode fibers.)
As for the GP, he might be joking but that is actually a serious concern. To get the correct electromagnetic modes in the fiber you need to align your fiber with your source carefully. obviously this isn't easy when for instance connecting this 300 nm fiber to some chip... probably mostly useful for integrated stuff. (NIDNRTFA)
Since always... Getting a 10% performance gain in a 500,000 servers data center could mean a cost saving of 50,000 servers. On 5 servers you wouldn't bother because you wouldn't save anything. The resources we are talking about here are in essence entirely economical and pragmatical. Adding 50,000 servers is not easily done nor particularly cheap.
Actually, according to the fine article, they measured the net spin of ~10,000 phosphorous atoms. Previously it was only possible to measure the net spin of billions of phosphorous atoms. So it's a big improvement (but still not single atoms.) Furthermore, spin isn't a property of electrons only. The article mentions that they are trying to measure the atom nuclei's spin indirectly by measuring the electron spin, since these are connected.
The closest extrasolar planet is (according to this) Gliese 876. It's situatet 15 lightyears from us which works out to 15years*300000km/s*86400s*364.25days=472068000km. The planetary radius is 0.1 times the solar radius (our sun). Which gives a diameter of (according to wikipedia) 1392000km*0.1=139200km. Thus (according to Python) the angle is; atan(139200km/472068000km)~2.9*10^-4 radians, which is ~0.017 degrees. A supprisingly big number in my opinion.
After reading the executive summary and conclusion I see that you admit that the sample size (3 Windows admins and 3 Novell Linux admins) is to small to make any strong conclusions and that repeating the experiment on a larger sample set would be interesting. (Personally, 6 admins seem way to few to make any conclusions on the merits of either operating system.) The question is; do you think your report is about the merits of the operating systems or more about the method used in the report? And does the media (and/. flameboys) reflect what you're saying, or are they more interested in "flamewars"?
As a side question; what results do you think you would get if you had a large sample size of administrators (a few hundreds on each OS)?
One of those 'picosatellites' is the NCUBE-2 (cue bad la^Hgamer puns.) Sadly, at the moment it seems like it's a dead duck. HAMs can help listen for it, information on the NCUBE homepage. The other satellites are reported to be communicating with ground stations.
Isn't this a bit flawed. Isn't it so that each implementation must be put through testing thus if company A puts an implementation through testing company B still needs to go through testing with their implementation? Had B made an exact copy of company A's implementation then they would be infringing on A's copyright (or some other similar law.) And even if they created an exact copy wouldn't they still need to go through testing to get their copy approved? Thus both company would compete on equal terms, patent or no patent.
Perhaps the pinhole part has a mirror, the disk with the pinhole would be able to spin around a central axis (obviously it need some counterweight.) And inside this central axis there is are huge arrays of mirrors (the mirror surface needs to be as large as the pinhole) that can be used to aim the light at the trailing craft.
(And no, this is slashdot, so I didn't read the article either.)
I think you'll need more sattelites than that. Remember that the earth spins inside their orbits so when the tenth satellite passes over Japan the first will be on the same latitude as Japan, but on a rather different longitude. Thus you'll need more satellites to cover Japan 24/7.
Why have we been wasting time with rockets when there's a (semi solid) interplanetary sandtrap we could travel on. Not to mention that it can not be that far when they managed to hit a golfball over it in one shot. Afterall the summary said that they scored an interplanetary hole-in-one.
If you want to stop light from scattering back to the observer's eyes you could use a new, hot technology. We call it _black_paint_ where I come frome.
For those wondering; the following was still true the last time I checked:
- It's legal to aquire publically avaiable copies og music, paintings etc. (IIRC not software) for personal use. This makes downloading music from any site (or network) legal. However this law is probably going to change so that the source must be legal, (as in copyright holder agrees to publication (like radio or TV.)) - It's legal to copy music from family and _close_ friends. Thus uploading to a P2P network is illegal. - It's also legal to reverse engineer legally aquired software, alter its contents, and learn from your findings.
Some of these things may change (INFOSOC??) and som things may already have change so anyone with any updated information are welcome to correct me.
CNN-reporter: I'm standing here with Mr. Carter, first human on Mars. So, tell me, Mr. Carter, how was it like?
Mr. Carter: *Gasp* I don't know. O.K. I guess, but I had this wonderful dream about a great pink mushroom and a sea of chockolate. Ahh... if only I could return. Maybe tonight.
Don't usually reply to myself (though I often find myself talking to myself,) but after reading the Wikipedia article on the Kyoto accord I would like to make another point which I forgot to point out in the previous point. Namely that giving quotas to developing nations will tempt them to sell these at the cost of further development. It's sad but true, but development comes at an environmental cost. However as another post pointed out, industrialized nations can afford environmentalism, developing nations can't.
This may not be strictly true in a longterm perspective, but a countrys economy tends to be governed (sometimes not governed) by short term goals. If there's peace then that's often feeding the hungry, educating them and giving them clean water. If the energy needed comes from coal, so be it, it's cheap.
I'm a bit confused by the angle of your post. It seems to me that you would want China to reduce its emmissions too. However according to wikipedia China emits 2.3 tons per capita of CO2 while the U.S. 20.1 tons per capita (Europe at 8.5 tons per capita.) and isn't this the way to look at emissions? I believe that there is a base energy requirement to support one person and that for most of the world this - sadly - means burning fossil fuels. (At least at present time.) Thus shouldn't China really be allowed to release 5 times (gross product) as much as the U.S?
Now there aren't AFAIK any restrictions on China or other developing countries, but China has ratified the agreement and when they really step up as an industrialized country they will have restrictions imposed thus it is in their interest to stay within the future requirements.
Had there been placed restrictions on China or other developing countries they probably never would have signed the agreement because it might have inhibited their growth. (Now what is the real reason the U.S. isn't signing?)
Furthermore I don't think the true objective is reduced emissions, we're far to spoiled to let that happen. The point is getting a situation under control before it gets out of hand.
(P.S. I know slashdotters have a penchant for insulting people, but please try to keep your replies civil. I don't know everything, so correct me in a polite manner. Thank you.) Ditto
One X-Prize contestant going there
on
After the X Prize
·
· Score: 1
Interorbital Systems (IOS) is already aiming at that goal. Now I can't base my comment on anything but their website and the X-Prize site, but it seems that their Neptune rocket will be capable of doing the things specified. They plan to launch their Nano SLV in 2005 (testing and further development is in progress) It being the first privately developed launch vehicle capable of putting sattelites into LEO. Their site states that theyr aim is having the Neptune ready for space tourism by 2006. A wee bit optimistic maybe, but - still - they may have a head start.
Re:Subjective view follows (hilarity ensues)
on
Is Math A Sport?
·
· Score: 1
I said that all games have rules (you may disagree) and so does all sports (except Calvinball.) Some things are games, but not sports, ergo sports is a subset of games.
Slashdot Mirror
Correct, Lilienfeld had the theory down but couldn't build a working device due to poorly understood and unknown surface effects. The transistor he described was a field effect transistor (FET.) This was also the type of transistor that Bardeen, Brattain and Schockley wanted to build. However, as I understand it, the point-contact transistor (which is a bipolar junction transistor, quite different from a FET) they created in 1947 was an "accident" while trying to build a FET.
You do know that to most Slashdotters, Bruce Schneider is the Chuck Norris of cryptography and security?
Ah ... stop with this nonsense, I hear this excuse often when it comes to broadband and mobile phone coverage, but lets look at some numbers...
... compared to the United States' 31 people / km^2
... weighing against population we get a total for the three countries of: (9127058*0.5176+5238460*0.5952+4695134*0.5970)/(52 38460+9127058+4695134) = 55.85% ... which is 5% higher than the United States's. Not much you might say, but remember your argument ... low population density -> lower broadband penetration and we are talking about a region with almost half the population density of the United States, and with comparable economies (in fact I would not be surprised to find that laying copper is more expensive in the aforementioned countries.)
Lets average over a large, less densely populated region than the United States, but with similar GDP's per capita. I have for this purpose selected Norway, Sweden and Finland, a relatively homogeneous region. Adding the populations and dividing by the total area (from Wikipedia) we get a density of: (5238460+9127058+4695134)/(338145+449964+385155) = 16.2 people / km^2
Now lets look at an article which shows the broadbandpenetration in all these countries. As we can plainly see the United States lags behind them with its 50.7% compared to Sweden's 51.6%, Finland's 59.52% and Norway's 59.7%
Now the population distribution could probably contribute to the problems of getting broadband, however I'm guessing that this would fall in the United States' disfavor, it probably being more condensed in places (though numbers on this is hard to find.)
Lastly I will say that an argument based on population density is not without merit, but it's way overplayed and I think there are other, more important factor to the US's lackluster broadband adoption.
Wikipedia seems to disagree with you. See: article about the Pound and Avoirdupois article. It seems to have been defined as weight initially but 1 pound is now defined as exactly 453.59237 grams ... which is mass. So TFA is infact correct stating that 330 punds = 150 kg (with an error less than 0.3%).
do we really have problem with interference in fiber where we have to use coaxial cable???
... probably mostly useful for integrated stuff. (NIDNRTFA)
Most (all?) fiber optical cables have a co-axial design. Simplified; there is a core and a cladding, with the cladding having a lower refractive index than the core; thus creating total reflection (multimode fibers.) Now the cladding could be the air surrounding the cable, but it's probably not, thus as you see the co-axial design is a reasonable one. (Though you could probably get a away with some off axis designs, at least for multimode fibers.)
Wikipedia on fiber optics
As for the GP, he might be joking but that is actually a serious concern. To get the correct electromagnetic modes in the fiber you need to align your fiber with your source carefully. obviously this isn't easy when for instance connecting this 300 nm fiber to some chip
Since always ... Getting a 10% performance gain in a 500,000 servers data center could mean a cost saving of 50,000 servers. On 5 servers you wouldn't bother because you wouldn't save anything. The resources we are talking about here are in essence entirely economical and pragmatical. Adding 50,000 servers is not easily done nor particularly cheap.
Actually, according to the fine article, they measured the net spin of ~10,000 phosphorous atoms. Previously it was only possible to measure the net spin of billions of phosphorous atoms. So it's a big improvement (but still not single atoms.) Furthermore, spin isn't a property of electrons only. The article mentions that they are trying to measure the atom nuclei's spin indirectly by measuring the electron spin, since these are connected.
The summary is correct. How could 11.1 km == 25.6 km?!?
What it means is; 17 torr ~ 2.3 kPa which probably is the pressure at 25.5 km (as indicated by this table.)
Ooops, seems like I punched this into Python: 15*86400*364.25
That would explain why my answer was so big, eh.
The closest extrasolar planet is (according to this) Gliese 876. It's situatet 15 lightyears from us which works out to 15years*300000km/s*86400s*364.25days=472068000km. The planetary radius is 0.1 times the solar radius (our sun). Which gives a diameter of (according to wikipedia) 1392000km*0.1=139200km. Thus (according to Python) the angle is; atan(139200km/472068000km)~2.9*10^-4 radians, which is ~0.017 degrees. A supprisingly big number in my opinion.
After reading the executive summary and conclusion I see that you admit that the sample size (3 Windows admins and 3 Novell Linux admins) is to small to make any strong conclusions and that repeating the experiment on a larger sample set would be interesting. (Personally, 6 admins seem way to few to make any conclusions on the merits of either operating system.) The question is; do you think your report is about the merits of the operating systems or more about the method used in the report? And does the media (and /. flameboys) reflect what you're saying, or are they more interested in "flamewars"?
As a side question; what results do you think you would get if you had a large sample size of administrators (a few hundreds on each OS)?
One of those 'picosatellites' is the NCUBE-2 (cue bad la^Hgamer puns.) Sadly, at the moment it seems like it's a dead duck. HAMs can help listen for it, information on the NCUBE homepage. The other satellites are reported to be communicating with ground stations.
Isn't this a bit flawed. Isn't it so that each implementation must be put through testing thus if company A puts an implementation through testing company B still needs to go through testing with their implementation? Had B made an exact copy of company A's implementation then they would be infringing on A's copyright (or some other similar law.) And even if they created an exact copy wouldn't they still need to go through testing to get their copy approved? Thus both company would compete on equal terms, patent or no patent.
Perhaps the pinhole part has a mirror, the disk with the pinhole would be able to spin around a central axis (obviously it need some counterweight.) And inside this central axis there is are huge arrays of mirrors (the mirror surface needs to be as large as the pinhole) that can be used to aim the light at the trailing craft.
(And no, this is slashdot, so I didn't read the article either.)
I think you'll need more sattelites than that. Remember that the earth spins inside their orbits so when the tenth satellite passes over Japan the first will be on the same latitude as Japan, but on a rather different longitude. Thus you'll need more satellites to cover Japan 24/7.
Why have we been wasting time with rockets when there's a (semi solid) interplanetary sandtrap we could travel on. Not to mention that it can not be that far when they managed to hit a golfball over it in one shot. Afterall the summary said that they scored an interplanetary hole-in-one.
If you want to stop light from scattering back to the observer's eyes you could use a new, hot technology. We call it _black_paint_ where I come frome.
For those wondering; the following was still true the last time I checked:
- It's legal to aquire publically avaiable copies og music, paintings etc. (IIRC not software) for personal use. This makes downloading music from any site (or network) legal. However this law is probably going to change so that the source must be legal, (as in copyright holder agrees to publication (like radio or TV.))
- It's legal to copy music from family and _close_ friends. Thus uploading to a P2P network is illegal.
- It's also legal to reverse engineer legally aquired software, alter its contents, and learn from your findings.
Some of these things may change (INFOSOC??) and som things may already have change so anyone with any updated information are welcome to correct me.
[...], on the other hand can we really expect NASA to effect serious changes and find a focused direction with leadership changes every 4 years?
Funny you should mention that. Isn't that the period of time most statesmen around the world is elected for?
But don't worry, a green-friendly Humvee is fairly low-priority on the DoD's list of innovations.
So relax, will ya... The DoD's not going to start respecting things. And with the Hummer you don't have to either.
CNN-reporter: I'm standing here with Mr. Carter, first human on Mars. So, tell me, Mr. Carter, how was it like?
... if only I could return. Maybe tonight.
Mr. Carter: *Gasp* I don't know. O.K. I guess, but I had this wonderful dream about a great pink mushroom and a sea of chockolate. Ahh
Don't usually reply to myself (though I often find myself talking to myself,) but after reading the Wikipedia article on the Kyoto accord I would like to make another point which I forgot to point out in the previous point. Namely that giving quotas to developing nations will tempt them to sell these at the cost of further development. It's sad but true, but development comes at an environmental cost. However as another post pointed out, industrialized nations can afford environmentalism, developing nations can't.
This may not be strictly true in a longterm perspective, but a countrys economy tends to be governed (sometimes not governed) by short term goals. If there's peace then that's often feeding the hungry, educating them and giving them clean water. If the energy needed comes from coal, so be it, it's cheap.
I'm a bit confused by the angle of your post. It seems to me that you would want China to reduce its emmissions too. However according to wikipedia China emits 2.3 tons per capita of CO2 while the U.S. 20.1 tons per capita (Europe at 8.5 tons per capita.) and isn't this the way to look at emissions? I believe that there is a base energy requirement to support one person and that for most of the world this - sadly - means burning fossil fuels. (At least at present time.) Thus shouldn't China really be allowed to release 5 times (gross product) as much as the U.S?
Now there aren't AFAIK any restrictions on China or other developing countries, but China has ratified the agreement and when they really step up as an industrialized country they will have restrictions imposed thus it is in their interest to stay within the future requirements.
Had there been placed restrictions on China or other developing countries they probably never would have signed the agreement because it might have inhibited their growth. (Now what is the real reason the U.S. isn't signing?)
Furthermore I don't think the true objective is reduced emissions, we're far to spoiled to let that happen. The point is getting a situation under control before it gets out of hand.
(P.S. I know slashdotters have a penchant for insulting people, but please try to keep your replies civil. I don't know everything, so correct me in a polite manner. Thank you.)
Ditto
Interorbital Systems (IOS) is already aiming at that goal. Now I can't base my comment on anything but their website and the X-Prize site, but it seems that their Neptune rocket will be capable of doing the things specified. They plan to launch their Nano SLV in 2005 (testing and further development is in progress) It being the first privately developed launch vehicle capable of putting sattelites into LEO. Their site states that theyr aim is having the Neptune ready for space tourism by 2006. A wee bit optimistic maybe, but - still - they may have a head start.
.jpg page) home page.
Their X-Prize page and their (WARNING! all
I said that all games have rules (you may disagree) and so does all sports (except Calvinball.) Some things are games, but not sports, ergo sports is a subset of games.