Jitter is a problem for electrical engineers and programmers. By the time we're done with the system, you won't be able to tell whether there is any jitter or not, nevermind how much. Regardless, there WILL be jitter.
Unless, of course, all your units have synchronized clocks, or each have their own atomic clock.
Unlikely, to say the least.
Jitter is not a problem the average prosumer really needs to worry about, nevermind the average consumer.
The audiophiles who care about it care the same way about their tubes, oxygen-free cables, and green highlighters. Whatever gives you a warm fuzzy feeling, man.
But, technically, it does exist, and it is a problem that results in either doubling up on samples, skipping samples, or some sort of macabre clock synchronization scheme that only ends in tears.
You have encountered a beligerent floor scrubbing bot. Do you
A) Obey, and leave your +10 leather boots behind
B) Leave
C) Disable the bot
D) Ignore the bot
:D
*WHIRRRRR*
You are in a dungeon kitchen. A cleaning bot appears to be polishing your boots. Exits are N, W , S.
they build the most deadly blade-like weapons imaginable and then forget to include little details like hilts.
A hilt is meant to protect you from your enemy's blade as it slides along your blade. Since the only thing that can stop their blade is another blade, the only thing they could make a hilt out of is more light saber.
I can think of a lot of reasons why they might not have done this, from special effects perspectives (you want us to rotoscope not just the blade, but also the hilt!?) to theoretical technical imitations (can't cut cyrstals in a way to make a good hilt, can't fit the requisite crystals into the unit, etc) to aesthetic reasons (a jedi with a hilt? Nice training wheels, Anakin!)
It is unlikely that they "accidently" left out the hilt or "forgot". It is much more likely that they actively chose not to include one for the original movies.
As far as the balcony rails, they are all over the place, but not everywhere someone could possible go. The places that shouldn't get much (if any) traffic don't need rails. The places that get a lot of traffic aften have rails. The inbetween places may not have them for a variety of reasons.
So you are saying that I shouldn't get to choose where my taxes go regarding morally ambiguous activities?
The federal funds that go into scientific research are always moderated by various groups that push and pull based on morals they feel are important, as well as those who push based on monetary objectives. Eventually, no doubt, stem cell research will be given more federal money.
Further, limited or restricted use federal funds does not mean lack of funds, nor does it make this research illegal. It does restrict it somewhat since the way most research institutions are set up they can't seperate their different monetary uses enough such that if any one of them are doing stem cell research outside of the federal funding it puts other research there at jepardy for more federal funding.
It is worthwhile to note that many, if not most, new areas of research do not get any federal funding until they've been proven using other funding or in other institutions/countries. The Gov't is very conservative at the beginning of new technologies, especially those which have such heavy ethical complications.
The fact that the government is only providing very limited funding is very much in line with what they've done in the past, and I hope what they do in the future. I suspect too much money, for instance, was sunk into fusion at the beginning - everyone wanted to 'win' that race.
Exactly. This could have been us...but now we get to play catch-up.
It's often cheaper (and more rewarding the long run) to wait and play catch up. And believe me, if there is a real breakthrough you know that we'll catch up and likely surpass the leaders - and just as likely it won't be due to or held back by federal funds in any way.
1) Don't be cynical.
2) Apply
3) Follow up with a phone call within one week
4) Hope for the best, prepare for the worst
5)...
6) Profit! (sorry - obligatory Slashdot list ending. Remember to always consider your audience in technical writing)
As is often trumpeted by Google founders, search is FAR from solved.
And as is pointed out in the article, search is a result of a fundamentally flawed web.
Search is unsolvable - one of the reasons so many companies do it is that there is no end. Search is and will always be a service.
What Ballmer is getting at is the same thing Tim Berners-Lee has been trumpeting for years - the semantic web.
The essential nugget of this concept is that web pages will hold content and meta-content about that content - in other words, machine readable content.
Currently the real problem search is trying to solve is parsing human communication. Previously this was simply done by using keywords. Google improved by adding a layer of human networking on keywords, but at the base of things we're still searching for words - not ideas.
Either the machines have to improve to understand us, or we have to add another layer of communication at a lower level.
Google will not go away, even if search becomes solved or dies. In this case Ballmer is performing his duty as spokesperson, and it is nothing more than a hook to draw people into a larger discussion on web technology.
If you could get exactly what you wanted from the internet without using a traditional search engine you would not give a second thought to Google Search.
Of course, if Slashdot were about discussing the impact of technology more than sensationalizing the geeks in the world, this would have been a very different discussion. Blame the story submitters first, but the editors have their hand on the rudder and deserve their share.
What Netscape doesn't understand is that by putting the IE engine as an option, web sites will start making IE only websites, and say "Netscape or IE". They will then instruct the user to configure their browser to use the IE rendering engine by default, and the web will become a little less standards friendly.
The new form factor is to compete with cell phones and the games that come with them.
The "new" handheld is the DS. Nintendo doesn't need another new handheld, except to keep up with current market conditions, which this new form factor accomplishes.
If Sony really wants to eat everyone for lunch, they'll use these extra few months after the XBox comes out to polish up an emulation layer so they can charge more for the machine because it'll do double duty. Play XBox and XBox 360 games as well as all the PS, PSII, and PSIII games on one box *and* play HD-DVDs. Throw in gamestation compatability and they could shut everyone else down.
Yes, I've read through the specs. It would be difficult - not impossible - but very, very difficult to emulate the XBox 360 on the PS3 with an acceptable quality.
But imagine the rewards of doing so...
</pipedream>
Note: It may be impossible to do in a practical time frame and amount of resources, but I still claim it's possible. I doubt the inverse is possible - the XBox 360 playing PS3 games.
And what about those who don't wish to participate? Is there a black level which indicates that the data is not in the data base, and should the data become available to the database through whatever means then the data is rejected (ie, not inserted into the database)?
The problem most people have with the data being publicly electronic is not that it's available - the problem is that it becomes easy to correlate with other public (or private) information.
Your 'solution' pre-correlates all that data, and practically mandates that everyone exist in the database. The access levels don't actually provide the security you think they will, when a court order is just a document or a digital signature, and the database is available to every police station or library. No amount of security or encryption is going to solve the huge undertaking it would be to create an access database that actually works, nevermind securing the machines from even simple attacks.
The author likely measured average consumption sans peaks. In other words, the multimeter he used does not respond to short huge current demands. Depending on the meter, in fact, and the switching regulator inside the mini he may have a very bad reading. This kind of measurement is difficult to take accurately without equipment meant to measure this - one which integrates the current consumption over time, including peaks, for instance.
The cells are rated for 4AH, but there's no guarantee that he charged them to capacity, or that their usable capacity is 4AH.
There are four cells at 3.7V making a 14.8V battery, multiply times 4AH to find that the pack's maximum charge is actually some 59WH.
His initial measurements were made with a power supply of 18V, and he is supply under 15V. It is likely that the mini's switching regulator is less efficient at the lower voltage.
To obtain the maximum energy from a battery you typically must limit consumption. In other words, you can get more energy out of a battery when drawing 100mA than you'll get when drawing 500mA. He is drawing over 1A from these cells (perhaps as much as 2A, with peaks of many Amps), and the efficiency of the battery is lower at this discharge rate. You can see this effect by taking a laptop with two batteries - use them one at a time and they'll last for 2x minutes, where x is the amount of time you would get from one. Use them simultaneously and you should get more than 2x (should, because some manufacturers still consume from only one available battery even when two are available).
There are many other factors affecting this, such as keyboard power consumption (100mA, or 1/2 watt), heat, and other efficiency variations.
I remember reading a cartoon one of these days where basically before a job interview, the interviewer starts to mention all this "nasty" stuff about the interviewee because he checked the interviewee's Orkut and found all the groups where he belongs to, etc. I've also heard about people getting dumped because of Orkut. Many people have already closed their accounts because of this. If you are evil, you can find out A LOT about the person's life and do them harm.
I fail to see how that's different than a google search of someone.
You don't control a lot of information that is online about you, but the stuff on Orkut and most other websites you do have control over. I'm fairly certian that my current employer "googled" me before hiring me.
In the end, if you don't want people to know certain things about you, don't put them online. If you're involved in activities that you don't want others to know about and that information goes online despite your wishes, then it's your fault for participating. The simple fact is that if you can't be proud of your affiliations, then either you need to change your affiliations or yourself.
In general movie reviews are relatively useless unless you know a reviewer well
Movie reviews, like political commentary, are aimed at the fence sitters and those who haven't heard of the movie yet.
A review won't easily change one's mind if they've already decided whether to watch a movie or not. Often they'll convince those who haven't made up their mind even if the reader doesn't know the reviewer well.
The number of fence sitters and those who haven't heard of the movie or haven't decided often outnumber those that know before release whether they'll watch the movie or not. Reviews play a critical role in the movie ecosystem.
Randomness isn't a lack of understanding, it's a fundamental part of the universe.
I may be wrong, but I believe this is only a principle, and not a law. Is it not possible that some future methods may be able to measure both position and velocity simultaneously? (perhaps destroying the item being measured, or some other process)
In other words, we are limited now, but that does not mean that this limitation is fundamental to the universe.
I expect, however, that by the time we are able to do this we will have found other things that are similarily difficult to deal with.
Before seeing some analysis of significance, I don't believe anything...
You realize that this is no place for calm, rational thinking, don't you? Maybe you're new to Slashdot. If so let me provide some assistance with your response:
1) Anything Microsoft does is bad
2) If you think they've done something good, or you can't tell whether something they've done is good or bad please review (1).
That should help you fit in around these parts a little better. There are some nuances that you'll learn over time, but I've covered the basics. If you have difficulty with these concepts, please visit room 101 for assistance.
If you want to do precision inertial measurements then cheap GPS will not work well.
A good system would be GPS coupled with an accelerometer and microcontroller. Use the GPS for absolute positioning, and to calibrate the accelerometer. Use the accelerometer for speed and position updates as quickly as you need them.
It would probably take about 40-60 hours of work to develop and test the concept, and probably cost about $200 per prototype unit. Thereafter one could probably make them for $100 apiece. Assuming a cheap engineer at $60/hr you're looking at $2,800 to $4,000 for the first 2 prototypes.
If you want to go the cheap and quick route, you can skip the GPS and simply use an accelerometer. One such gizmo is here. This person created a simple acceleration meter that analyzes a few car parameters by monitoring acceleration during a 0-60 test. This doesn't match up directly with what you need, but with some work you can take this and make it do what you're looking for.
One problem here is that it is impossible to provide a fool-proof way to get the right of power to the right devices given stupid consumers. You likely have two devices that have the same plug. Are they the same polarity? Same voltage? Do they have special needs such as inrush current limiting, special filtering, etc? Can you trust yourself to program a "universal power brick" to do everything correctly when the laptop manufacturer won't give you complete information? Can you trust joe average? Do you want to pay a lot of money up front to include every kind of connector that there exists, or do you want to special order each connector for $5 each after spending $300 on this power supply? When the manufacturer stops supporting your model with the latest connectors, are you going to swallow another $300 unit, or complain again?
No manufacturer is going to take this on because of the customer service issues, even if liability wasn't a problem.
Further, it would have to be mass produced to even approach the cost of buying seperate bricks, and many, if not most, consumers would rather save the 20% increase and deal with a few extra bricks.
Finally, such a supply could not be nearly as efficient as seperate bricks and still be remotely cost effective. The most efficient supplies are switching power supplies. The most efficient switching power supplies are fixed voltage, and have a peak efficiency at a particular current. Each brick is designed for the device it powers. While one can design an adjustable output supply it is optimizable for one voltage and one current - the rest of the range is very poor. This makes for a hotter brick, nevermind the cost of the additional electricity.
The best option is to have a universal supply at one voltage which can easily be converted by the target device into the power that it needs.
This is called AC distribution, and works quite well.
The real problems are consumers who complain to manufacturers that they want light/smaller/portable devices, and manufacturers who fulfill those requests by taking the AC power converter out of the device.
No, we're not going to run DC around the house because you either need high DC voltages (which can be more dangerous than AC due to muscle dynamics) or high currents which are a greater fire hazard.
No, we're not going to create a 'universal power supply' because universal for you is not universal for joe average, and even if you would be willing to pay $300 to power 5 devices, it's not a mass market item.
No, manufacturers aren't going to put the power supply back in the laptop/cellphone/monitor/etc. It's cheaper with the bricks, and they can sell worldwide with different bricks instead of completely different parts.
-Adam
Perhaps you'll understand this explanation...
on
Bluetooth on an Airplane?
·
· Score: 3, Informative
Have you ever played with those science exhibits where two parabolic reflectors are seperated by a large distance in a room? You talk towards one, and someone at the other reflector can hear you clearly while others between you cannot.
Have you ever driven a car that, at a certain speed or on a certian road, the car got *very* loud, and all you had to do was speed up or slow down to dampen the noise?
The first example has to do with reflection. The second has to do with resonance.
In a flying tin can you cannot possibly know where the reflections and resonance will occur. You do not know what equipment may or may not be affected by your transmissions.
While holding your cell phone next to an avionics box may have no effect, sitting in seat J23 with the cellphone in your pocket as it broadcasts at maximum power (because, see, you're in a tin can) may be just the spot to form a nice reflection which, coupled with a resonance, would put a very strong signal right at the wrong spot of an important piece of equipment.
Your blue tooth has the same problem, though the frequencies are difference, and the power *should* be less. This doesn't actually make it any less dangerous, however.
The plane you are riding in is likely very old. The equipment can easily be more than 20 years old, and if the equipment itself isn't, the design is.
The long and short of it is: Planes are a bad place to use equipment that intentionally radiates (ie, transmits). They aren't so great for devices that unintentionaly radiate either.
While "testing" does take place there is no way to ensure that everything will operate properly in real conditions - only a complete design analysis could come close to providing that information.
They also report that it is impossible to know for sure that a given system is clean from within it, but that defeating their tool would require a level of sophistication not yet seen.
Now that's some interesting circular logic.
"We haven't seen the kind of rootkit that we wouldn't be able to detect. Therefore such a rootkit does not exist. QED."
Slashdot Mirror
>>People who write code because they think they're going to change the world never do.
>Richard Stallman might disagree with you.
Might? Richard Stallman might think he's changed the world???
I think we can all agree that RMS believes he has changed the world.
-Adam
Jitter is a problem for electrical engineers and programmers. By the time we're done with the system, you won't be able to tell whether there is any jitter or not, nevermind how much. Regardless, there WILL be jitter.
Unless, of course, all your units have synchronized clocks, or each have their own atomic clock.
Unlikely, to say the least.
Jitter is not a problem the average prosumer really needs to worry about, nevermind the average consumer.
The audiophiles who care about it care the same way about their tubes, oxygen-free cables, and green highlighters. Whatever gives you a warm fuzzy feeling, man.
But, technically, it does exist, and it is a problem that results in either doubling up on samples, skipping samples, or some sort of macabre clock synchronization scheme that only ends in tears.
Only, technically, that's not jitter either.
-Adam
You don't need 197 lasers to annoy aircraft, you just need one automatic aircraft tracking laser
-Adam
You have encountered a beligerent floor scrubbing bot. Do you
A) Obey, and leave your +10 leather boots behind
B) Leave
C) Disable the bot
D) Ignore the bot
*WHIRRRRR*
You are in a dungeon kitchen. A cleaning bot appears to be polishing your boots. Exits are N, W , S.
-Adam
they build the most deadly blade-like weapons imaginable and then forget to include little details like hilts.
A hilt is meant to protect you from your enemy's blade as it slides along your blade. Since the only thing that can stop their blade is another blade, the only thing they could make a hilt out of is more light saber.
I can think of a lot of reasons why they might not have done this, from special effects perspectives (you want us to rotoscope not just the blade, but also the hilt!?) to theoretical technical imitations (can't cut cyrstals in a way to make a good hilt, can't fit the requisite crystals into the unit, etc) to aesthetic reasons (a jedi with a hilt? Nice training wheels, Anakin!)
It is unlikely that they "accidently" left out the hilt or "forgot". It is much more likely that they actively chose not to include one for the original movies.
As far as the balcony rails, they are all over the place, but not everywhere someone could possible go. The places that shouldn't get much (if any) traffic don't need rails. The places that get a lot of traffic aften have rails. The inbetween places may not have them for a variety of reasons.
-Adam
So you are saying that I shouldn't get to choose where my taxes go regarding morally ambiguous activities?
The federal funds that go into scientific research are always moderated by various groups that push and pull based on morals they feel are important, as well as those who push based on monetary objectives. Eventually, no doubt, stem cell research will be given more federal money.
Further, limited or restricted use federal funds does not mean lack of funds, nor does it make this research illegal. It does restrict it somewhat since the way most research institutions are set up they can't seperate their different monetary uses enough such that if any one of them are doing stem cell research outside of the federal funding it puts other research there at jepardy for more federal funding.
It is worthwhile to note that many, if not most, new areas of research do not get any federal funding until they've been proven using other funding or in other institutions/countries. The Gov't is very conservative at the beginning of new technologies, especially those which have such heavy ethical complications.
The fact that the government is only providing very limited funding is very much in line with what they've done in the past, and I hope what they do in the future. I suspect too much money, for instance, was sunk into fusion at the beginning - everyone wanted to 'win' that race.
Exactly. This could have been us...but now we get to play catch-up.
It's often cheaper (and more rewarding the long run) to wait and play catch up. And believe me, if there is a real breakthrough you know that we'll catch up and likely surpass the leaders - and just as likely it won't be due to or held back by federal funds in any way.
-Adam
I don't know what to do, really
...
1) Don't be cynical.
2) Apply
3) Follow up with a phone call within one week
4) Hope for the best, prepare for the worst
5)
6) Profit! (sorry - obligatory Slashdot list ending. Remember to always consider your audience in technical writing)
-Adam
As is often trumpeted by Google founders, search is FAR from solved.
And as is pointed out in the article, search is a result of a fundamentally flawed web.
Search is unsolvable - one of the reasons so many companies do it is that there is no end. Search is and will always be a service.
What Ballmer is getting at is the same thing Tim Berners-Lee has been trumpeting for years - the semantic web.
The essential nugget of this concept is that web pages will hold content and meta-content about that content - in other words, machine readable content.
Currently the real problem search is trying to solve is parsing human communication. Previously this was simply done by using keywords. Google improved by adding a layer of human networking on keywords, but at the base of things we're still searching for words - not ideas.
Either the machines have to improve to understand us, or we have to add another layer of communication at a lower level.
Google will not go away, even if search becomes solved or dies. In this case Ballmer is performing his duty as spokesperson, and it is nothing more than a hook to draw people into a larger discussion on web technology.
If you could get exactly what you wanted from the internet without using a traditional search engine you would not give a second thought to Google Search.
Of course, if Slashdot were about discussing the impact of technology more than sensationalizing the geeks in the world, this would have been a very different discussion. Blame the story submitters first, but the editors have their hand on the rudder and deserve their share.
-Adam
I don't understand
What you don't understand is called branding.
What Netscape doesn't understand is that by putting the IE engine as an option, web sites will start making IE only websites, and say "Netscape or IE". They will then instruct the user to configure their browser to use the IE rendering engine by default, and the web will become a little less standards friendly.
-Adam
The new form factor is to compete with cell phones and the games that come with them.
The "new" handheld is the DS. Nintendo doesn't need another new handheld, except to keep up with current market conditions, which this new form factor accomplishes.
-Adam
If Sony really wants to eat everyone for lunch, they'll use these extra few months after the XBox comes out to polish up an emulation layer so they can charge more for the machine because it'll do double duty. Play XBox and XBox 360 games as well as all the PS, PSII, and PSIII games on one box *and* play HD-DVDs. Throw in gamestation compatability and they could shut everyone else down.
Yes, I've read through the specs. It would be difficult - not impossible - but very, very difficult to emulate the XBox 360 on the PS3 with an acceptable quality.
But imagine the rewards of doing so...
</pipedream>
Note: It may be impossible to do in a practical time frame and amount of resources, but I still claim it's possible. I doubt the inverse is possible - the XBox 360 playing PS3 games.
-Adam
And what about those who don't wish to participate? Is there a black level which indicates that the data is not in the data base, and should the data become available to the database through whatever means then the data is rejected (ie, not inserted into the database)?
The problem most people have with the data being publicly electronic is not that it's available - the problem is that it becomes easy to correlate with other public (or private) information.
Your 'solution' pre-correlates all that data, and practically mandates that everyone exist in the database. The access levels don't actually provide the security you think they will, when a court order is just a document or a digital signature, and the database is available to every police station or library. No amount of security or encryption is going to solve the huge undertaking it would be to create an access database that actually works, nevermind securing the machines from even simple attacks.
-Adam
Several things:
The author likely measured average consumption sans peaks. In other words, the multimeter he used does not respond to short huge current demands. Depending on the meter, in fact, and the switching regulator inside the mini he may have a very bad reading. This kind of measurement is difficult to take accurately without equipment meant to measure this - one which integrates the current consumption over time, including peaks, for instance.
The cells are rated for 4AH, but there's no guarantee that he charged them to capacity, or that their usable capacity is 4AH.
There are four cells at 3.7V making a 14.8V battery, multiply times 4AH to find that the pack's maximum charge is actually some 59WH.
His initial measurements were made with a power supply of 18V, and he is supply under 15V. It is likely that the mini's switching regulator is less efficient at the lower voltage.
To obtain the maximum energy from a battery you typically must limit consumption. In other words, you can get more energy out of a battery when drawing 100mA than you'll get when drawing 500mA. He is drawing over 1A from these cells (perhaps as much as 2A, with peaks of many Amps), and the efficiency of the battery is lower at this discharge rate. You can see this effect by taking a laptop with two batteries - use them one at a time and they'll last for 2x minutes, where x is the amount of time you would get from one. Use them simultaneously and you should get more than 2x (should, because some manufacturers still consume from only one available battery even when two are available).
There are many other factors affecting this, such as keyboard power consumption (100mA, or 1/2 watt), heat, and other efficiency variations.
-Adam
I remember reading a cartoon one of these days where basically before a job interview, the interviewer starts to mention all this "nasty" stuff about the interviewee because he checked the interviewee's Orkut and found all the groups where he belongs to, etc. I've also heard about people getting dumped because of Orkut. Many people have already closed their accounts because of this. If you are evil, you can find out A LOT about the person's life and do them harm.
I fail to see how that's different than a google search of someone.
You don't control a lot of information that is online about you, but the stuff on Orkut and most other websites you do have control over. I'm fairly certian that my current employer "googled" me before hiring me.
In the end, if you don't want people to know certain things about you, don't put them online. If you're involved in activities that you don't want others to know about and that information goes online despite your wishes, then it's your fault for participating. The simple fact is that if you can't be proud of your affiliations, then either you need to change your affiliations or yourself.
-Adam
In general movie reviews are relatively useless unless you know a reviewer well
Movie reviews, like political commentary, are aimed at the fence sitters and those who haven't heard of the movie yet.
A review won't easily change one's mind if they've already decided whether to watch a movie or not. Often they'll convince those who haven't made up their mind even if the reader doesn't know the reviewer well.
The number of fence sitters and those who haven't heard of the movie or haven't decided often outnumber those that know before release whether they'll watch the movie or not. Reviews play a critical role in the movie ecosystem.
-Adam
Those people over there in the United States of Texas are really ignorant...
What, you want us to go back to being The United States of Arkansas?
-Adam
Sodium's not liquid at room temps or anywhere near water's boiling point.
That's true. Anywhere near boiling water Sodium is more explosive than liquid.
-Adam
Randomness isn't a lack of understanding, it's a fundamental part of the universe.
I may be wrong, but I believe this is only a principle, and not a law. Is it not possible that some future methods may be able to measure both position and velocity simultaneously? (perhaps destroying the item being measured, or some other process)
In other words, we are limited now, but that does not mean that this limitation is fundamental to the universe.
I expect, however, that by the time we are able to do this we will have found other things that are similarily difficult to deal with.
-Adam
Before seeing some analysis of significance, I don't believe anything...
You realize that this is no place for calm, rational thinking, don't you? Maybe you're new to Slashdot. If so let me provide some assistance with your response:
1) Anything Microsoft does is bad
2) If you think they've done something good, or you can't tell whether something they've done is good or bad please review (1).
That should help you fit in around these parts a little better. There are some nuances that you'll learn over time, but I've covered the basics. If you have difficulty with these concepts, please visit room 101 for assistance.
-Adam
If you want to do precision inertial measurements then cheap GPS will not work well.
A good system would be GPS coupled with an accelerometer and microcontroller. Use the GPS for absolute positioning, and to calibrate the accelerometer. Use the accelerometer for speed and position updates as quickly as you need them.
It would probably take about 40-60 hours of work to develop and test the concept, and probably cost about $200 per prototype unit. Thereafter one could probably make them for $100 apiece. Assuming a cheap engineer at $60/hr you're looking at $2,800 to $4,000 for the first 2 prototypes.
If you want to go the cheap and quick route, you can skip the GPS and simply use an accelerometer. One such gizmo is here. This person created a simple acceleration meter that analyzes a few car parameters by monitoring acceleration during a 0-60 test. This doesn't match up directly with what you need, but with some work you can take this and make it do what you're looking for.
-Adam
One problem here is that it is impossible to provide a fool-proof way to get the right of power to the right devices given stupid consumers. You likely have two devices that have the same plug. Are they the same polarity? Same voltage? Do they have special needs such as inrush current limiting, special filtering, etc? Can you trust yourself to program a "universal power brick" to do everything correctly when the laptop manufacturer won't give you complete information? Can you trust joe average? Do you want to pay a lot of money up front to include every kind of connector that there exists, or do you want to special order each connector for $5 each after spending $300 on this power supply? When the manufacturer stops supporting your model with the latest connectors, are you going to swallow another $300 unit, or complain again?
No manufacturer is going to take this on because of the customer service issues, even if liability wasn't a problem.
Further, it would have to be mass produced to even approach the cost of buying seperate bricks, and many, if not most, consumers would rather save the 20% increase and deal with a few extra bricks.
Finally, such a supply could not be nearly as efficient as seperate bricks and still be remotely cost effective. The most efficient supplies are switching power supplies. The most efficient switching power supplies are fixed voltage, and have a peak efficiency at a particular current. Each brick is designed for the device it powers. While one can design an adjustable output supply it is optimizable for one voltage and one current - the rest of the range is very poor. This makes for a hotter brick, nevermind the cost of the additional electricity.
The best option is to have a universal supply at one voltage which can easily be converted by the target device into the power that it needs.
This is called AC distribution, and works quite well.
The real problems are consumers who complain to manufacturers that they want light/smaller/portable devices, and manufacturers who fulfill those requests by taking the AC power converter out of the device.
No, we're not going to run DC around the house because you either need high DC voltages (which can be more dangerous than AC due to muscle dynamics) or high currents which are a greater fire hazard.
No, we're not going to create a 'universal power supply' because universal for you is not universal for joe average, and even if you would be willing to pay $300 to power 5 devices, it's not a mass market item.
No, manufacturers aren't going to put the power supply back in the laptop/cellphone/monitor/etc. It's cheaper with the bricks, and they can sell worldwide with different bricks instead of completely different parts.
-Adam
Have you ever played with those science exhibits where two parabolic reflectors are seperated by a large distance in a room? You talk towards one, and someone at the other reflector can hear you clearly while others between you cannot.
Have you ever driven a car that, at a certain speed or on a certian road, the car got *very* loud, and all you had to do was speed up or slow down to dampen the noise?
The first example has to do with reflection. The second has to do with resonance.
In a flying tin can you cannot possibly know where the reflections and resonance will occur. You do not know what equipment may or may not be affected by your transmissions.
While holding your cell phone next to an avionics box may have no effect, sitting in seat J23 with the cellphone in your pocket as it broadcasts at maximum power (because, see, you're in a tin can) may be just the spot to form a nice reflection which, coupled with a resonance, would put a very strong signal right at the wrong spot of an important piece of equipment.
Your blue tooth has the same problem, though the frequencies are difference, and the power *should* be less. This doesn't actually make it any less dangerous, however.
The plane you are riding in is likely very old. The equipment can easily be more than 20 years old, and if the equipment itself isn't, the design is.
The long and short of it is: Planes are a bad place to use equipment that intentionally radiates (ie, transmits). They aren't so great for devices that unintentionaly radiate either.
While "testing" does take place there is no way to ensure that everything will operate properly in real conditions - only a complete design analysis could come close to providing that information.
-Adam
They also report that it is impossible to know for sure that a given system is clean from within it, but that defeating their tool would require a level of sophistication not yet seen.
Now that's some interesting circular logic.
"We haven't seen the kind of rootkit that we wouldn't be able to detect. Therefore such a rootkit does not exist. QED."
-Adam
Apple seems to have quietly updated
The quieter they are about something, the more free advertising they seem to get from places like this.
It's just a music player with more space. There's absolutely nothing revolutionary about it, and the evolutionary aspect is expected.
Slow news day, I guess.
-Adam
Because right now the only thing I can think is that people just don't know how to pronounce "Postgres".
Gesundheit.
-Adam