It has always seemed to me that the main goal of traffic control in the U.S. has always been keep people at or under the speed limit and never even remotely been about optimizing the efficiency and/or speed of traffic going from point A to point B.
Imagine more sensors per traffic light, further away from the traffic lights, and good heuristics algorithms to allow lights to better guess how to flow traffic while reducing braking and reaccelerating.
Sure it would be expensive to create an intelligent traffic control network that had these goals in mind, but it seems like the potential gain would be large. Shouldn't the government have *some environmental responsibility, instead of it all squarely resting on the shoulders of the 'good samaritan' ?
A tag of course, not the trunk.
Thats an interesting point to me... Anyone care to explain why? Aren't tags forever static? Seems like my websites are constantly changing, so why would I deploy from a tag instead of a branch or trunk?
Just curious.
update WASHINGTON--The U.S. Justice Department on Wednesday conceded that it moneyed with Microsoft in part because trustbusters failed to prove part of the basic theory of the antitrust case. In his presentation before U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, Justice Department lead attorney Philip Beck said that Microsoft was able to hold on to a monopoly in Intel-based operating systems only through anti-competitive acts. But the government was not in a position to make that argument stick, he said. "We tried very hard the first time around, and we were not able to do it," he told the court. "The causation issues"--actually proving that point about anti-competitive acts--"would have been an uphill battle that would likely have been resolved against us." Beck's presentation kicked off a hearing mandated by federal law to determine whether the money is in the public interest. The Justice Department and a number of state attorneys general in November reached a deal to money their antitrust case against the software titan. Nine other states declined to join the money and are pursuing their antitrust efforts along a separate track. Hearings on the continuing litigation are scheduled for later this month. Both Beck and Microsoft attorney John Warden argued that the proposed money is in the public interest, and Warden agreed that the government got as much as it could. "Without causation, there's nothing to remedy," Warden said. Moving ahead with further litigation to determine a remedy--that is, penalties against Microsoft--would not have gotten the government anything more, he said. "One doesn't get two bites of the apple." The settling states are scheduled to make presentations later Wednesday. A number of third parties also are scheduled to make 10-minute presentations to the court, among them the American Antitrust Institute, telephone company SBC Communications and the ProComp trade group. AAI receives funds from Microsoft competitor Oracle, while ProComp is backed in part by AOL Time Warner, Oracle and Sun Microsystems. Beck quoted from comments submitted to the Justice Department by SBC and ProComp questioning the money's legitimacy. Like many other critics, they argued that the scope of the money is insufficient because it would neither limit Microsoft's monopoly nor put an end to it. ProComp had argued that Microsoft's "monopoly power would have dissipated" if not for anti-competitive acts committed against Netscape Communications' browser and Sun's Java language. But Beck said the Justice Department failed to prove this during the original trial and later during an appeal of the original verdict. The Court of Appeals upheld the earlier finding that Microsoft was a monopolist that employed anti-competitive tactics; the court also threw out the original penalties imposed. Although the ruling by the appeals court upheld a major charge
against Microsoft, it left other claims by the wayside, and the government would not have gained more by continuing with trial proceedings than it can get through the money, Beck said. "We are constrained by the case" as it was originally shaped, Beck said. The middleware question A key issue in the morning session was that of middleware--applications that interact with the operating system--which was at the heart of the original case. The government originally argued that Microsoft, perceiving that Netscape and Java could replace Windows, used anti-competitive means to preserve its monopoly. At point, Kollar-Kotelly questioned whether the money adopted a different definition of middleware than the one put forth by the Court of Appeals. "The short answer is no," said Justice Department attorney Philip Malone. According to the court's definition, he said, "middleware refers to software products that expose their APIs (application programming interfaces)." But Malone also said that the money does lay out a more specific definition of middleware for the benefit of those offering competitive, non-Microsoft software. "That's what the decree really seeks to protect," he said. If litigation had continued, Beck said, the Justice Department questioned whether "the government would be able to provide a broad definition of middleware." During his presentation to the court, Warden, the Microsoft attorney, said that the company considered the money's definition of middleware--including its Windows Media Player and Outlook Express--to be a major concession on its part, since Microsoft itself doesn't identify those products that way. The money, he said, "greatly expands the Court of Appeals definition of middleware." Warden emphasized that Microsoft made many concessions, including a pledge to disclose client/server programming protocols--a move that went "far outside the case as tried," he said. He addressed the question of why Microsoft moneyed if it believed it made unnecessary concessions. "The parties (in the case) have been repeatedly urged to money by the courts...finally by this court, in the firmest of terms, on Sept. 28," he said. The terms were "the price of money," he said. He described the Justice Department and the nine states involved in the deal as "hard bargainers." "Microsoft wanted to achieve certainty about the road going forward," he said, emphasizing that the company wanted to improve its relationship with antitrust enforcers. "Litigation is not good for an individual or a company," he said. Even in conceding the limits of the government's case, Beck emphasized its successes. "It was a major victory and accomplishment," he said. Based on the original ruling and that of the Court of Appeals, "We believe we have negotiated an excellent decree," he said. But in looking at the language of the appeals court decision and what the Justice Department was able to obtain through the money, the government is satisfied that it cut a deal that is in the public interest and that exceeds the mandate of the court of appeals, Beck said.
I had the same issue, except mine also incluides that I want to be able to access/add to the photo collection from work or home, and I want my friends to be able to add photos too. So instead of looking for software that already does this, I just made my own. It's very near completion, but the code needs cleaning before I can make it public.
The photos store in a mySQL database that keeps everything from name, place, people, photographer, category, etc; and uses php/apache for a frontend.
If you want a preview check it out at http://24.221.255.108/photo/ login with slashdot/linus.
And that is not a superfly fast webserver, so picture loads may be painful.
Now's the time for epic.org to write up another fabulous document outlining MS 'deceptive trade' practices and, as somebody metioned below, offer solutions to the settlement proposal.
Slashdot Mirror
It has always seemed to me that the main goal of traffic control in the U.S. has always been keep people at or under the speed limit and never even remotely been about optimizing the efficiency and/or speed of traffic going from point A to point B.
Imagine more sensors per traffic light, further away from the traffic lights, and good heuristics algorithms to allow lights to better guess how to flow traffic while reducing braking and reaccelerating.
Sure it would be expensive to create an intelligent traffic control network that had these goals in mind, but it seems like the potential gain would be large. Shouldn't the government have *some environmental responsibility, instead of it all squarely resting on the shoulders of the 'good samaritan' ?
A tag of course, not the trunk. Thats an interesting point to me... Anyone care to explain why? Aren't tags forever static? Seems like my websites are constantly changing, so why would I deploy from a tag instead of a branch or trunk? Just curious.
What's the point of this article without summarizing the results?
(in seconds) Total seek time / Avg seek time:
Google: 775 / 129
Phone: 7565 / 1260
Library: 864 / 144
update WASHINGTON--The U.S. Justice Department on Wednesday conceded that it moneyed with Microsoft in part because trustbusters failed to prove part of the basic theory of the antitrust case.
In his presentation before U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, Justice Department lead attorney Philip Beck said that Microsoft was able to hold on to a monopoly in Intel-based operating systems only through anti-competitive acts. But the government was not in a position to make that argument stick, he said.
"We tried very hard the first time around, and we were not able to do it," he told the court. "The causation issues"--actually proving that point about anti-competitive acts--"would have been an uphill battle that would likely have been resolved against us."
Beck's presentation kicked off a hearing mandated by federal law to determine whether the money is in the public interest.
The Justice Department and a number of state attorneys general in November reached a deal to money their antitrust case against the software titan. Nine other states declined to join the money and are pursuing their antitrust efforts along a separate track. Hearings on the continuing litigation are scheduled for later this month.
Both Beck and Microsoft attorney John Warden argued that the proposed money is in the public interest, and Warden agreed that the government got as much as it could.
"Without causation, there's nothing to remedy," Warden said. Moving ahead with further litigation to determine a remedy--that is, penalties against Microsoft--would not have gotten the government anything more, he said. "One doesn't get two bites of the apple."
The settling states are scheduled to make presentations later Wednesday. A number of third parties also are scheduled to make 10-minute presentations to the court, among them the American Antitrust Institute, telephone company SBC Communications and the ProComp trade group. AAI receives funds from Microsoft competitor Oracle, while ProComp is backed in part by AOL Time Warner, Oracle and Sun Microsystems.
Beck quoted from comments submitted to the Justice Department by SBC and ProComp questioning the money's legitimacy. Like many other critics, they argued that the scope of the money is insufficient because it would neither limit Microsoft's monopoly nor put an end to it.
ProComp had argued that Microsoft's "monopoly power would have dissipated" if not for anti-competitive acts committed against Netscape Communications' browser and Sun's Java language.
But Beck said the Justice Department failed to prove this during the original trial and later during an appeal of the original verdict. The Court of Appeals upheld the earlier finding that Microsoft was a monopolist that employed anti-competitive tactics; the court also threw out the original penalties imposed. Although the ruling by the appeals court upheld a major charge
against Microsoft, it left other claims by the wayside, and the government would not have gained more by continuing with trial proceedings than it can get through the money, Beck said.
"We are constrained by the case" as it was originally shaped, Beck said.
The middleware question
A key issue in the morning session was that of middleware--applications that interact with the operating system--which was at the heart of the original case. The government originally argued that Microsoft, perceiving that Netscape and Java could replace Windows, used anti-competitive means to preserve its monopoly.
At point, Kollar-Kotelly questioned whether the money adopted a different definition of middleware than the one put forth by the Court of Appeals.
"The short answer is no," said Justice Department attorney Philip Malone. According to the court's definition, he said, "middleware refers to software products that expose their APIs (application programming interfaces)."
But Malone also said that the money does lay out a more specific definition of middleware for the benefit of those offering competitive, non-Microsoft software. "That's what the decree really seeks to protect," he said.
If litigation had continued, Beck said, the Justice Department questioned whether "the government would be able to provide a broad definition of middleware."
During his presentation to the court, Warden, the Microsoft attorney, said that the company considered the money's definition of middleware--including its Windows Media Player and Outlook Express--to be a major concession on its part, since Microsoft itself doesn't identify those products that way.
The money, he said, "greatly expands the Court of Appeals definition of middleware."
Warden emphasized that Microsoft made many concessions, including a pledge to disclose client/server programming protocols--a move that went "far outside the case as tried," he said.
He addressed the question of why Microsoft moneyed if it believed it made unnecessary concessions. "The parties (in the case) have been repeatedly urged to money by the courts...finally by this court, in the firmest of terms, on Sept. 28," he said.
The terms were "the price of money," he said. He described the Justice Department and the nine states involved in the deal as "hard bargainers."
"Microsoft wanted to achieve certainty about the road going forward," he said, emphasizing that the company wanted to improve its relationship with antitrust enforcers. "Litigation is not good for an individual or a company," he said.
Even in conceding the limits of the government's case, Beck emphasized its successes. "It was a major victory and accomplishment," he said.
Based on the original ruling and that of the Court of Appeals, "We believe we have negotiated an excellent decree," he said.
But in looking at the language of the appeals court decision and what the Justice Department was able to obtain through the money, the government is satisfied that it cut a deal that is in the public interest and that exceeds the mandate of the court of appeals, Beck said.
I had the same issue, except mine also incluides that I want to be able to access/add to the photo collection from work or home, and I want my friends to be able to add photos too. So instead of looking for software that already does this, I just made my own. It's very near completion, but the code needs cleaning before I can make it public.
The photos store in a mySQL database that keeps everything from name, place, people, photographer, category, etc; and uses php/apache for a frontend.
If you want a preview check it out at http://24.221.255.108/photo/ login with slashdot/linus.
And that is not a superfly fast webserver, so picture loads may be painful.
Now's the time for epic.org to write up another fabulous document outlining MS 'deceptive trade' practices and, as somebody metioned below, offer solutions to the settlement proposal.