Purely a coincidence AFAIK... The network here for some reason slowed to a trickle for about 30 minutes. I tried to post the message three times and it timed out everytime.
When the Amstrad made Spectrum +3 came out, 3" disks were already an almost 'dead' technology, having been beaten by the superior 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks were "proper" disks with tracks, 3" disks used a single spiral track going from the outside of the disk to the inside. 3" disks had to be explicitly ejected and turned-around to use both sides, where true double sided capable drives were becoming available for 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks, as mentioned, were therefore obviously superior to the 3" disks.
There was a claim in the Spectrum magazines at the time of the Amstrad Spectrum +3 release that Amstrad had done a deal with a manufacturer/distributor of 3" drives and had got a "job lot" at bargain basement prices. Though I don't know if there was any truth in this story, there was no technical reason to have used 3" disks.
When the Amstrad made Spectrum +3 came out, 3" disks were already an almost 'dead' technology, having been beaten by the superior 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks were "proper" disks with tracks, 3" disks used a single spiral track going from the outside of the disk to the inside. 3" disks had to be explicitly ejected and turned-around to use both sides, where true double sided capable drives were becoming available for 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks, as mentioned, were therefore obviously superior to the 3" disks.
There was a claim in the Spectrum magazines at the time of the Amstrad Spectrum +3 release that Amstrad had done a deal with a manufacturer/distributor of 3" drives and had got a "job lot" at bargain basement prices. Though I don't know if there was any truth in this story, there was no technical reason to have used 3" disks.
When the Amstrad made Spectrum +3 came out, 3" disks were already an almost 'dead' technology, having been beaten by the superior 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks were "proper" disks with tracks, 3" disks used a single spiral track going from the outside of the disk to the inside. 3" disks had to be explicitly ejected and turned-around to use both sides, where true double sided capable drives were becoming available for 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks, as mentioned, were therefore obviously superior to the 3" disks.
There was a claim in the Spectrum magazines at the time of the Amstrad Spectrum +3 release that Amstrad had done a deal with a manufacturer/distributor of 3" drives and had got a "job lot" at bargain basement prices. Though I don't know if there was any truth in this story, there was no technical reason to have used 3" disks.
The Opus Discovery 3.5" disks *were* the modern 3.5" disks. Of course in those days they had just been developed, that's why the disks were single sided, single density, rather than the later double sided double density capacities. The Opus Discovery disk could store 180K formated. Not very much these days but much more than the mircodrive's 85 - 100K and much faster and more reliable.
Re:low unemployment compared to europe
on
The Jobs Crunch
·
· Score: 1
FULL employment - total rubbish. You're believing the government's lies. Next you'll believe Iraq had WMD! Very funny.
See my other post regarding this. People are "encouraged" to register for disability benefit rather than register as unemployed. We have 1 million unemployed but 2.7 million receiving some kind of disibility benefit. If that doesn't work the government pays employers to give people jobs.
I'm unemployed (but not registered), my mother was unemployed, my older brother hasn't got a job (effectively he is self employed doing whatever he can find), but is not registered unemployed. Both my cousins are unemployed. Oh yes, we've full employment at the moment. Remove you head from out of your arse.
You also forget we have 1 million unemployed, but 2.7 million on some kind of disability benefit, which is simply unemployed but called a different name.
Incidently, I'm jobless, looking for a job, but NOT registered unemployed. My mother was umemployed, getting benefits, but to retain them has had to go back to work for 15 hours per week, BUT the government will pay her employer to employ her. Both my cousins are umemployed AND my older brother. What do you say about FULL employment. Bollocks.
I don't the UK "government" with the unemployment statistics or anything else.
The UK doesn't view putting people in space as a cost efficient way of doing science
Unfortunately more often than not the UK doesn't view doing any science/technology as cost effective. Better to leave it to the Americans. That way you pay for all the R&D (much more cost effective), the fact we have to kiss your asses for it seems beside the point.
It's becoming necessary to go to the States to do any PhD level science/technology job not just if you want to be an astronaut.
If you disagree then name one thing the UK is still world class in science or technology. I can't think of anything.
While it's nice to know IT salaries are increasing in the US, it's definately not happening in the UK or Europe.
I'm currently looking for a IT job and the salaries are the same or lower than I was paid in 2001. At my last job I didn't get a pay increase during the three years I was there, and I don't know anyone who has received a pay rise.
People have commented the rise is only because all the low paid jobs have been outsourced from the US. In the UK/Europe every IT job has gone - experienced/mid-level/junior the lot. In fact the majority of jobs in the UK are listed as entry level jobs because they're paying peanuts (the same amount of money I was getting in 1997).
The UK and Europe has lost out particularly badly because we're playing 'piggy in the middle'. The high-skill jobs are in the states, the low-paid jobs are in India/China and the UK/Europe gets nothing. The UK doesn't invest enough to get the high-skill jobs and is too expensive for the low pay stuff.
G: Wonder why you have a PhD, got offered a job at Google, but have instead spent 2 1/2 months unemployed after rejecting them. I get the impression I seriously f*cked up somewhere.
the writer (who is as stupid as you are) doesn't know what "advanced technical research" is, much less who is doing it.
Actually you're wrong. Your definition of "advanced technical research" harks back to the 60s and 70s. Today with corporates focussed on quarterly results, "advanced technical research" means anything which will take more than six months work. Of course this attitude is wrong, but not liking it (which I don't) doesn't change the fact this is how coporates work these days.
Before you reply, I would like to point out I have 4 years post doc research (+PhD) in academia, and 8 years+ experience in industrial R&D, and so unlike a lot of people here, I do know what I'm talking about.
BTW insulting people by calling them dumbass isn't big and contrary to what you think, it does nothing to improve your argument...
Engineers do not "advanced technology research." Scientists do research. Engineers do shit that's already been done by scientsts. Which is rather my point.
This is just words. What researchers call themselves while they're doing research is up to them, "research engineer" makes just as much sense as "research scientist". Go and ask a researcher in an engineering department at a university, they're be happy to be called a "research engineer". Just because you seem to dislike the term engineer doesn't mean everyone else does too.
That's where the US perhaps differs to the UK. I couldn't get an IT job paying 20%-30% less in the UK. In the UK when they see a PhD and principal engineer experience, they assume you'll leave at the first opportunity for a better higher paying job.
In general when companies ask for a 'graduate engineer' (an an example) that's what they want, some-one inexperienced, docile and easily trained to their way of thinking. Its no good being an experienced guy who insists he's happy with the money and the responsibility. They won't believe you.
You're right. However, this could be a bad thing. It decreases the amount of common currency between people (perhaps relative strangers). In the UK with only 5 (3 in the 70s) main channels, people can discuss the latest TV series/programmes because everyone's watching the same stuff. Plus, how many times have you watched a programme that was on, just because it was on, and you found it interesting, but you would not actually chosen to watch it?
The result of total choice will ultimately lead to the increasing cultural isolation of people. It is an exact opposite of what it promises.
Microsoft writes the (closed source) os, when it writes the applications you always feel they've got an unfair advantage because they (and only they) know the os inside out and design the os API. With Linux no-one has the unfair advantage, every-one in theory is free to know how the os works and to build the best ever application. You are only limited by your talent and free time. You trust Linux because you know what's there.
OCCAM isn't mentioned (nor CSP from which it was derived). OCCAM was the parallel programming language of choice for the transputer back in the late 80s. While it was a little too PASCAL like it had some nice concepts borrowed from CSP. I'm surprised it didn't get a mention because at one time the transputer was the most advanced and innovative parallel processor around. But there again, both the transputer and OCCAM were British. Enough said.
I was like you as a teenager, interested in everything, the occult, radio theory (early radio design of the 20s/30s), computing, history. Deep interest for a while then complete boredom until the next interest. Always an obsession with one then moving onto the next, to the exclusion of other interests.
School work (including the degree) was always a struggle, never any interest, it was either something I was not interested in (having strong views on everything), which meant it was a struggle to do well, or it was something I was interested in, which meant I'd already done it to a far greater degree than it was taught, leaving the teaching boring slow and patronising (as I thought then). Either way I always found it difficult to do as well as people who I considered of lower ability (in my not very humble opinion then).
The PhD was completely different, no taught component (British PhD), just an ability to spend three years obsessionally doing something I wanted to do. In the process my academic performance changed from so-so (upper second degree rather than the 1st I was easily capable of), to PhD work which was (in my opinion and others) one of the best and most innovative PhD research produced in the department.
The difference? Not having to deal with slow teaching, accomodate other people's views and being able to do a very individual PhD.
The problem (as I realised later) is all those pieces of paper are important to get because no body is going to take any notice if you've not got them! I always hoped my brilliance and clever projects undertaken in preference to the school work would be recognised, rather than the boring pointless assignments and exams. They were not. I learnt I should have treated all the taught work as a game, play the game and get the marks.
The problem post PhD is that everything is as plodding and constrained as the degree. Become an academic, be prepared to put up with lots of rules and regulations, pointless teaching (I found setting assignments and exams as pointless as I found taking them as a student), corporate IT is of course even worse.
Your intelligence and iconoclasm will always make you an outsider and misfit. Ultmately you have to learn to accept it, and know when you have to play the game even when you don't want to.
Any company which starts an interview by saying what a privilege it is to work for them are arseholes. It up to you to make that decision, and you should always remember an interview is a two-way process.
Google never did anything so crass or stupid as this, contrary to what the original poster claims. It's also worth pointing out that Google interviews are carried out by the engineers themselves not PHBs or HR, and so your comment about HR doesn't really apply here (although I have had a lot of experience with HR in other companies which does tend to back up your comment).
Your comment seems to be nothing but a spiteful immature whine, sent because Google dared to reject you.
I have also interviewed at Google (and was offered the job BTW), and I recognise nothing in your post. Not only did it appear that they had studied my CV (resume), but the people I interviewed with were very bright and very knowledgeable.
Please do yourself a favour, if the only thing you can do is criticise - shut up.
Prior art probably won't be an issue. Sure, most of the geeks claim it was possible back in '96
Wrong - doing this was possible in the early 90's if you were prepared to pay enough. A lot of stuff then was done using parallel processing, e.g. transputers (remember them?). Intel used a transputer machine (a Meiko computing surface) to encode video for DVI. I used five transputers running in parallel for my video fileserver in 1991. Granted, this was not consumer level technology, but patents are awarded for novel techniques, not whether it was possible for consumer devices.
The problem with the linked news article is it is too vague to know what Tivo is claiming is infringed.
The concepts of trick-play and time-shifting are arguably obvious, the non obvious thing is how to do it technically. The big question here is how vague are their patents? i.e. how many ways to implement it technically do they think their patents encompass. This, of course, affects whether all DVRs that do trick-play etc. are reckoned to infringe or only DVRs which follow the same techniques.
Now any one doing this has three technical challenges: how to lay the data out on disk to ensure correct replay/storage (remember video and audio are real-time and therefore data has to arrive in a guaranteed time); how to encode the individual streams; and how to construct indexes into the individual data that point to data that can be discretely played whilst in trick mode.
Now there are a lot of papers around from the early 90s (I did some of this research) that tackle the design of filesystems to guarantee timely retrieval. A lot of this pre-dates Tivo.
The encoding of the data on disk affects ability to do playback in reverse. If each video frame was encoded separately (intra-coding), then reverse play is easy. The problem comes with inter-coding techniques like MPEG, which encodes frames based on previous frames, which means the data can only be played back forwards. Here, reverse play can only be done on the separate encoded frames (so-called I frames in MPEG, which typically occur 4 times per second). There are many possible ways of locating these I frames, pre-built indexes or dynamic scanning of the stream are two examples.
There are many ways of doing trick-play and time shifting; to re-iterate, the important question is how vague are their patents, and what do they think is infringing.
Cloop (compressed loopback filesystem) used in many liveCDs is quite inefficient in the way it constantly re-reads the CD. It doesn't cache very much information and throws a lot of the data it does read and decompress away before it reaches the filesystem. This is because cloop does not understand the filesystem it is compressing, and therefore cannot use any clever caching strategies.
LiveCDs using squashfs as the compressed filesystem are much faster. Try dynebolic.org... As the writer of squashfs I am however a bit biased:-)
Slashdot Mirror
Purely a coincidence AFAIK ... The network here for some reason slowed to a trickle for about 30 minutes. I tried to post the message three times and it timed out everytime.
When the Amstrad made Spectrum +3 came out, 3" disks were already an almost 'dead' technology, having been beaten by the superior 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks were "proper" disks with tracks, 3" disks used a single spiral track going from the outside of the disk to the inside. 3" disks had to be explicitly ejected and turned-around to use both sides, where true double sided capable drives were becoming available for 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks, as mentioned, were therefore obviously superior to the 3" disks.
There was a claim in the Spectrum magazines at the time of the Amstrad Spectrum +3 release that Amstrad had done a deal with a manufacturer/distributor of 3" drives and had got a "job lot" at bargain basement prices. Though I don't know if there was any truth in this story, there was no technical reason to have used 3" disks.
When the Amstrad made Spectrum +3 came out, 3" disks were already an almost 'dead' technology, having been beaten by the superior 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks were "proper" disks with tracks, 3" disks used a single spiral track going from the outside of the disk to the inside. 3" disks had to be explicitly ejected and turned-around to use both sides, where true double sided capable drives were becoming available for 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks, as mentioned, were therefore obviously superior to the 3" disks.
There was a claim in the Spectrum magazines at the time of the Amstrad Spectrum +3 release that Amstrad had done a deal with a manufacturer/distributor of 3" drives and had got a "job lot" at bargain basement prices. Though I don't know if there was any truth in this story, there was no technical reason to have used 3" disks.
When the Amstrad made Spectrum +3 came out, 3" disks were already an almost 'dead' technology, having been beaten by the superior 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks were "proper" disks with tracks, 3" disks used a single spiral track going from the outside of the disk to the inside. 3" disks had to be explicitly ejected and turned-around to use both sides, where true double sided capable drives were becoming available for 3.5" disks. 3.5" disks, as mentioned, were therefore obviously superior to the 3" disks.
There was a claim in the Spectrum magazines at the time of the Amstrad Spectrum +3 release that Amstrad had done a deal with a manufacturer/distributor of 3" drives and had got a "job lot" at bargain basement prices. Though I don't know if there was any truth in this story, there was no technical reason to have used 3" disks.
The Opus Discovery 3.5" disks *were* the modern 3.5" disks. Of course in those days they had just been developed, that's why the disks were single sided, single density, rather than the later double sided double density capacities. The Opus Discovery disk could store 180K formated. Not very much these days but much more than the mircodrive's 85 - 100K and much faster and more reliable.
FULL employment - total rubbish. You're believing the government's lies. Next you'll believe Iraq had WMD! Very funny.
See my other post regarding this. People are "encouraged" to register for disability benefit rather than register as unemployed. We have 1 million unemployed but 2.7 million receiving some kind of disibility benefit. If that doesn't work the government pays employers to give people jobs.
I'm unemployed (but not registered), my mother was unemployed, my older brother hasn't got a job (effectively he is self employed doing whatever he can find), but is not registered unemployed. Both my cousins are unemployed. Oh yes, we've full employment at the moment. Remove you head from out of your arse.
You also forget we have 1 million unemployed, but 2.7 million on some kind of disability benefit, which is simply unemployed but called a different name.
Incidently, I'm jobless, looking for a job, but NOT registered unemployed. My mother was umemployed, getting benefits, but to retain them has had to go back to work for 15 hours per week, BUT the government will pay her employer to employ her. Both my cousins are umemployed AND my older brother. What do you say about FULL employment. Bollocks.
I don't the UK "government" with the unemployment statistics or anything else.
When I was 12 kids didn't have computers. There was no IBM PC. You're not old ... :-)
Unfortunately more often than not the UK doesn't view doing any science/technology as cost effective. Better to leave it to the Americans. That way you pay for all the R&D (much more cost effective), the fact we have to kiss your asses for it seems beside the point.
It's becoming necessary to go to the States to do any PhD level science/technology job not just if you want to be an astronaut.
If you disagree then name one thing the UK is still world class in science or technology. I can't think of anything.
While it's nice to know IT salaries are increasing in the US, it's definately not happening in the UK or Europe.
I'm currently looking for a IT job and the salaries are the same or lower than I was paid in 2001. At my last job I didn't get a pay increase during the three years I was there, and I don't know anyone who has received a pay rise.
People have commented the rise is only because all the low paid jobs have been outsourced from the US. In the UK/Europe every IT job has gone - experienced/mid-level/junior the lot. In fact the majority of jobs in the UK are listed as entry level jobs because they're paying peanuts (the same amount of money I was getting in 1997).
The UK and Europe has lost out particularly badly because we're playing 'piggy in the middle'. The high-skill jobs are in the states, the low-paid jobs are in India/China and the UK/Europe gets nothing. The UK doesn't invest enough to get the high-skill jobs and is too expensive for the low pay stuff.
Personally I prefer G:
G: Wonder why you have a PhD, got offered a job at Google, but have instead spent 2 1/2 months unemployed after rejecting them. I get the impression I seriously f*cked up somewhere.
Actually you're wrong. Your definition of "advanced technical research" harks back to the 60s and 70s. Today with corporates focussed on quarterly results, "advanced technical research" means anything which will take more than six months work. Of course this attitude is wrong, but not liking it (which I don't) doesn't change the fact this is how coporates work these days.
Before you reply, I would like to point out I have 4 years post doc research (+PhD) in academia, and 8 years+ experience in industrial R&D, and so unlike a lot of people here, I do know what I'm talking about.
BTW insulting people by calling them dumbass isn't big and contrary to what you think, it does nothing to improve your argument...
Engineers do not "advanced technology research." Scientists do research. Engineers do shit that's already been done by scientsts. Which is rather my point.
This is just words. What researchers call themselves while they're doing research is up to them, "research engineer" makes just as much sense as "research scientist". Go and ask a researcher in an engineering department at a university, they're be happy to be called a "research engineer". Just because you seem to dislike the term engineer doesn't mean everyone else does too.
That's where the US perhaps differs to the UK. I couldn't get an IT job paying 20%-30% less in the UK. In the UK when they see a PhD and principal engineer experience, they assume you'll leave at the first opportunity for a better higher paying job.
In general when companies ask for a 'graduate engineer' (an an example) that's what they want, some-one inexperienced, docile and easily trained to their way of thinking. Its no good being an experienced guy who insists he's happy with the money and the responsibility. They won't believe you.
The cost living in the UK maybe 50% more than America, but the wages are 40% LESS than in America for IT employees.
It's probably only Americans who can tell the difference. As a British person, Canadians sound the same to me.
You miss the point. The choice is between earning 40%+ less doing something else, or earning 40% less by moving north. The high paying IT job is gone.
You're right. However, this could be a bad thing. It decreases the amount of common currency between people (perhaps relative strangers). In the UK with only 5 (3 in the 70s) main channels, people can discuss the latest TV series/programmes because everyone's watching the same stuff. Plus, how many times have you watched a programme that was on, just because it was on, and you found it interesting, but you would not actually chosen to watch it?
The result of total choice will ultimately lead to the increasing cultural isolation of people. It is an exact opposite of what it promises.
Microsoft writes the (closed source) os, when it writes the applications you always feel they've got an unfair advantage because they (and only they) know the os inside out and design the os API. With Linux no-one has the unfair advantage, every-one in theory is free to know how the os works and to build the best ever application. You are only limited by your talent and free time. You trust Linux because you know what's there.
OCCAM isn't mentioned (nor CSP from which it was derived). OCCAM was the parallel programming language of choice for the transputer back in the late 80s. While it was a little too PASCAL like it had some nice concepts borrowed from CSP. I'm surprised it didn't get a mention because at one time the transputer was the most advanced and innovative parallel processor around. But there again, both the transputer and OCCAM were British. Enough said.
School work (including the degree) was always a struggle, never any interest, it was either something I was not interested in (having strong views on everything), which meant it was a struggle to do well, or it was something I was interested in, which meant I'd already done it to a far greater degree than it was taught, leaving the teaching boring slow and patronising (as I thought then). Either way I always found it difficult to do as well as people who I considered of lower ability (in my not very humble opinion then).
The PhD was completely different, no taught component (British PhD), just an ability to spend three years obsessionally doing something I wanted to do. In the process my academic performance changed from so-so (upper second degree rather than the 1st I was easily capable of), to PhD work which was (in my opinion and others) one of the best and most innovative PhD research produced in the department.
The difference? Not having to deal with slow teaching, accomodate other people's views and being able to do a very individual PhD.
The problem (as I realised later) is all those pieces of paper are important to get because no body is going to take any notice if you've not got them! I always hoped my brilliance and clever projects undertaken in preference to the school work would be recognised, rather than the boring pointless assignments and exams. They were not. I learnt I should have treated all the taught work as a game, play the game and get the marks.
The problem post PhD is that everything is as plodding and constrained as the degree. Become an academic, be prepared to put up with lots of rules and regulations, pointless teaching (I found setting assignments and exams as pointless as I found taking them as a student), corporate IT is of course even worse.
Your intelligence and iconoclasm will always make you an outsider and misfit. Ultmately you have to learn to accept it, and know when you have to play the game even when you don't want to.
Google never did anything so crass or stupid as this, contrary to what the original poster claims. It's also worth pointing out that Google interviews are carried out by the engineers themselves not PHBs or HR, and so your comment about HR doesn't really apply here (although I have had a lot of experience with HR in other companies which does tend to back up your comment).
I have also interviewed at Google (and was offered the job BTW), and I recognise nothing in your post. Not only did it appear that they had studied my CV (resume), but the people I interviewed with were very bright and very knowledgeable.
Please do yourself a favour, if the only thing you can do is criticise - shut up.
Wrong - doing this was possible in the early 90's if you were prepared to pay enough. A lot of stuff then was done using parallel processing, e.g. transputers (remember them?). Intel used a transputer machine (a Meiko computing surface) to encode video for DVI. I used five transputers running in parallel for my video fileserver in 1991. Granted, this was not consumer level technology, but patents are awarded for novel techniques, not whether it was possible for consumer devices.
The concepts of trick-play and time-shifting are arguably obvious, the non obvious thing is how to do it technically. The big question here is how vague are their patents? i.e. how many ways to implement it technically do they think their patents encompass. This, of course, affects whether all DVRs that do trick-play etc. are reckoned to infringe or only DVRs which follow the same techniques.
Now any one doing this has three technical challenges: how to lay the data out on disk to ensure correct replay/storage (remember video and audio are real-time and therefore data has to arrive in a guaranteed time); how to encode the individual streams; and how to construct indexes into the individual data that point to data that can be discretely played whilst in trick mode.
Now there are a lot of papers around from the early 90s (I did some of this research) that tackle the design of filesystems to guarantee timely retrieval. A lot of this pre-dates Tivo.
The encoding of the data on disk affects ability to do playback in reverse. If each video frame was encoded separately (intra-coding), then reverse play is easy. The problem comes with inter-coding techniques like MPEG, which encodes frames based on previous frames, which means the data can only be played back forwards. Here, reverse play can only be done on the separate encoded frames (so-called I frames in MPEG, which typically occur 4 times per second). There are many possible ways of locating these I frames, pre-built indexes or dynamic scanning of the stream are two examples.
There are many ways of doing trick-play and time shifting; to re-iterate, the important question is how vague are their patents, and what do they think is infringing.
Cloop (compressed loopback filesystem) used in many liveCDs is quite inefficient in the way it constantly re-reads the CD. It doesn't cache very much information and throws a lot of the data it does read and decompress away before it reaches the filesystem. This is because cloop does not understand the filesystem it is compressing, and therefore cannot use any clever caching strategies.
:-)
LiveCDs using squashfs as the compressed filesystem are much faster. Try dynebolic.org... As the writer of squashfs I am however a bit biased