Cosm (that's a working name; we have trademark issues) is a 3D graphical MMORPG being developed to be runnable on x86 Linux. The current version works fine on Linux (it's still in the middle of development). It's the only MMORPG in dev for Linux that I know of.
We also run on Windows and will probably run on the Mac by release time.
We're not open source (although two spin-offs, the autoupdater and armi projects on sourceforge, are), and we're not based around plib (Java+Java3D), but I saw an opportunity for a plug;)
I am a contractor, working for my own S-Corp. Here are my additional expenses:
~$300 per month for minimal insurance. I have a high deductible, because I and my family don't go to the doctor much; my insurance is in case of catastrophe.
80*my hourly rate annually for vacation
8*n*my hourly rate for n sick days (very low for me)
I had an accountant do all the corporation paperwork for me, that was about $600 (in Texas).
Frankly, I have yet to see a salary that begins to compare to my hourly rate. Also consider that if you are salaried, your overtime is unpaid, whereas a contractor gets paid for the hours he works (and only those hours).
Another thing I like about contracting is that if I feel that something is worth taking time off, I take the time off. I have no guilt wondering if I am cheating the company by taking time off for a cold.
That said, contracting is better done when the economic climate is good (contractors are the first to be laid off), and when you have skills the company can't do without. I recommend waiting until you have two years experience in your field of expertise before you begin contracting. Over time, as you contract the most important thing is to KEEP UP WITH CURRENT TECHNOLOGY!! Making money hand over fist for three years contracting is great, but if you can't find the time to keep your skills up to date (and don't expect your companies to fund it), you'll find yourself with high dollar expenses and no job, and no hope of getting any but a low dollar job.
Also generally recommended is to live well below your means, but I think that goes for everyone. Money in the bank is as good as, well, money in the bank.
Re:For once, I'm sympathising with MS
on
al Qaeda Hacks XP?
·
· Score: 1
Yes, I know, I was being verbally lazy, but I wanted a quip, not a paragraph.
Re:For once, I'm sympathising with MS
on
al Qaeda Hacks XP?
·
· Score: 1
Good points all. Mostly, I saw your 'monkey people' post and wondered how you would respond to criticism. You passed;)
Re:For once, I'm sympathising with MS
on
al Qaeda Hacks XP?
·
· Score: 2
That's Arkansas, not arkensaw, and Colorado, not colerado. Thus speaks the Arkansawyer.
Re:Not enough superstition?
on
Emergence
·
· Score: 2
I believe that what the review writer is trying to say is that the author _did_ imply that a God figure may be there setting initial conditions, and the fact that the author implied this took credence away from otherwise good ideas.
1) I actually agree on that, but it is not universally accepted, even by reputable physicists.
2) Good point; I was wrong. It is indeed QM and GR that have problems playing nicely with each other. Although another AC poster claiming to be a physicist claims in this thread that QED is not as nice as it could be.
4) You may not have said it, but your vicious reply was in defense of someone who said it. Please read the parent post before you give an asinine reply. My post was in response to someone claiming proportional changes in time passage to the change in c. Your post was in defense of that post. Also, I see no credible evidence that an increase in the Planck time would cause everything to pass more slowly. In fact, as far as I know, we assume that the Planck time is "the fundamental unit of time" simply because a ratio of several of the fundamental constants happens to be a very small amount of time. AFAIK, the notion of a fundamental unit of time is a philosophical fiction, something that sounds nice but with no real evidence in favor or against.
1) As far as we know, all interactions are not mediated by particles, at least in the weirdest of cases (EPR paradox). I agree that all conventional interactions are mediated by particles.
2) Sure, particles can travel no faster than c as far as we know. As far as Heisenberg goes with respect to this, you're talking out of your hat. No one knows how to reconcile quantum mechanics and relativity.
3) I have a BS in Mathematics and in Physics. I didn't see that it was pertinent, we should discuss the topic, not our credentials.
4) You think that it's scientifically accurate to assert that the passage of time is proportional to the speed of light? You just pointed out that we can't change the speed of light in a vacuum. Thus we can't experiment. Thus there is no scientific data. Thus any assertions about it are hot air. Also, think carefully about the precise statement I made. Do you really want to be in the position of defending that the rate of passage of time is directly proportional to the speed of light? Based on what evidence? I don't even know of any formulae that would begin to imply that. Conceivably, with a bunch of pontificating and hand-waving, maybe you could assert that the rate of passage of time was proportional to 1/(1-[d^2]/[c^2]) (where d is the 'new' speed of light) based on standard special relativity equations, but that would still be making shit up. And it's nothing like the statement to which you made your asinine reply.
Actually, it's special relativity that asserts that the speed of light in a vacuum is constant and that various things (length in the direction of motion, passage of time, mass) are affected by the relative velocity of the observer. General relativity is about the effects of acceleration and gravity on these observed properties.
I'm not sure that I understand how that refutes anything that I said, though... special relativity certainly does not state that the speed of light must be 3x10^8 m/s, only that it is constant, and how the fact that it's constant must affect certain physical properties observed from a frame of reference in motion.
Let u= 1/(1-[v^2]/[c^2])
observed length is length*u (foreshortening)
observed passage of time is time/u
observed mass = mass/u
if I recall correctly, it's been a long time since University Physics 3.
Tracking the movement of a beam of light is a great way to make a clock, but that doesn't mean that the rate of passage of time is proportional to the speed of light any more than time slows when your watch does.
It's an axiom? So when I measure the average rate at which grains of sand fall from the top of an hourglass to the bottom, or by the rate at which some regulated spring rotates a hand around the face of a clock, etc., I'm not measuring time?
Special relativity is a new concept, the speed of light as a constant for all observers is a new concept, etc, etc.
You are spouting off bullshit to say that it is an axiom that the passage of time is a function of the speed of light. Until you can change the speed of light (which we can) and observe that the rate of the passage of time changes (which it doesn't) you aren't talking about science, you're stating your personal philosophy as fact.
That's an interesting thought, but I know of no evidence that it might be true. The passage of time is not a function of the speed of light. Observed passage of time is a function of the relative speed of the observer to the observee, but that's an entirely different thing.
I don't have anything much to say here, other than 'hear hear'! I'm not much of a Wesley Crusher fan, but after his enlightening interview, I have to say that I'm a Will Wheaton fan.
You've done a great job dealing with a tough situation, Will. Kudos.
This is bad because the two things are exactly the same. "Encrypting your transmission" is the same as "making a secure transmission". Only the emotional impact is different.
By using one label in one context and another label in a different context, 'they' (the gov't, the media, the megacorps, etc.) define how you see right and wrong, by manipulating you with emotionally charged words.
So, buying into the idea that it's perfectly OK for people to use emotionally charged words in whatever context they like without calling them on it is at least a partial buy in to the idea that you're going to be a sheeple puppet of the powers that be.
Oh, sorry. FastTrack is the network protocol used by KaZaA (it's laden with spyware crap, but it's a no-brainer to use on Windows and supports multi-source downloads well), giFT (an open source client), Morpheus, and Grokster (don't know anything about these two).
From what I'm told, it shares the files over port 80 so wget will get files from a FastTrack peer. The really great thing about it is the multi-source download. I can get full use of my bandwidth at home while I download the 300meg+ video files from multiple users. Of course, I only download bits to which I have a legal right.
Bobby Martin
Cosm Development Team
http://www.cosmgame.com
You left out the most important part. As I posted earlier, you need to sign the photo, fingerprint, etc. together with the name, birthdate, ID number, etc. as one document. Otherwise you can just lift the identifying information from one card and the signed ID from another and put 'em together to make a fake ID.
Choose 3 equidistant points on the screen: {x[0],y[0]},{x[1],y[1]},{x[2],y[2]}
Choose random coordinate on screen (x,y)
while no user input
choose random number n from {0,1,2}
x = (x + x[n])/2
y = (y + y[n])/2
plot (x,y)
loop
and the points don't actually have to be equidistant, any three points will work. You'll just get a warped triangle, which can look kind of cool.
Orthogonal can either mean that the two don't affect each other, or that they are at right angles to each other. In this case, it means both - the angle of polarization of one beam of light is orthogonal to the angle of polarization of the other, and thus a polarization filter parallel to one beam of light passes it through unhindered and completely blocks the other beam. In this way you can process the two beams separately even though they are running down the same fiber.
But, yeah, mutually orthogonal is redundant. You have to have something to be orthogonal to, and if you're orthogonal to it, it must be orthogonal to you.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, both rates of increase are exponential. His was exponential with a mantissa of 2, yours is exponential with a mantissa of 1.5
;)
That's a pretty good troll! You had me going there for a minute.
Another shameless plug...
Come see us at www.cosmgame.com. We won't be available for a year or more yet, but I think we'll satisfy your inclinations...
I'm an old Angband fan, too.
Cosm (that's a working name; we have trademark issues) is a 3D graphical MMORPG being developed to be runnable on x86 Linux. The current version works fine on Linux (it's still in the middle of development). It's the only MMORPG in dev for Linux that I know of.
;)
We also run on Windows and will probably run on the Mac by release time.
We're not open source (although two spin-offs, the autoupdater and armi projects on sourceforge, are), and we're not based around plib (Java+Java3D), but I saw an opportunity for a plug
I am a contractor, working for my own S-Corp. Here are my additional expenses:
~$300 per month for minimal insurance. I have a high deductible, because I and my family don't go to the doctor much; my insurance is in case of catastrophe.
80*my hourly rate annually for vacation
8*n*my hourly rate for n sick days (very low for me)
I had an accountant do all the corporation paperwork for me, that was about $600 (in Texas).
Frankly, I have yet to see a salary that begins to compare to my hourly rate. Also consider that if you are salaried, your overtime is unpaid, whereas a contractor gets paid for the hours he works (and only those hours).
Another thing I like about contracting is that if I feel that something is worth taking time off, I take the time off. I have no guilt wondering if I am cheating the company by taking time off for a cold.
That said, contracting is better done when the economic climate is good (contractors are the first to be laid off), and when you have skills the company can't do without. I recommend waiting until you have two years experience in your field of expertise before you begin contracting. Over time, as you contract the most important thing is to KEEP UP WITH CURRENT TECHNOLOGY!! Making money hand over fist for three years contracting is great, but if you can't find the time to keep your skills up to date (and don't expect your companies to fund it), you'll find yourself with high dollar expenses and no job, and no hope of getting any but a low dollar job.
Also generally recommended is to live well below your means, but I think that goes for everyone. Money in the bank is as good as, well, money in the bank.
Yes, I know, I was being verbally lazy, but I wanted a quip, not a paragraph.
Good points all. Mostly, I saw your 'monkey people' post and wondered how you would respond to criticism. You passed ;)
Anthrax is a bacterium, not a virus.
That's Arkansas, not arkensaw, and Colorado, not colerado. Thus speaks the Arkansawyer.
I believe that what the review writer is trying to say is that the author _did_ imply that a God figure may be there setting initial conditions, and the fact that the author implied this took credence away from otherwise good ideas.
Oops, looks as if I stuck my foot in my mouth. I agree with you 100%.
Certainly it was his fault that he wasn't accepted, but when society is wrong it is not wrong to choose to be unacceptable to it.
He chose the harder road and is probably a much better person today for it. Being a sell-out is easy. Being right when everyone else is wrong isn't.
1) I actually agree on that, but it is not universally accepted, even by reputable physicists.
2) Good point; I was wrong. It is indeed QM and GR that have problems playing nicely with each other. Although another AC poster claiming to be a physicist claims in this thread that QED is not as nice as it could be.
4) You may not have said it, but your vicious reply was in defense of someone who said it. Please read the parent post before you give an asinine reply. My post was in response to someone claiming proportional changes in time passage to the change in c. Your post was in defense of that post. Also, I see no credible evidence that an increase in the Planck time would cause everything to pass more slowly. In fact, as far as I know, we assume that the Planck time is "the fundamental unit of time" simply because a ratio of several of the fundamental constants happens to be a very small amount of time. AFAIK, the notion of a fundamental unit of time is a philosophical fiction, something that sounds nice but with no real evidence in favor or against.
1) As far as we know, all interactions are not mediated by particles, at least in the weirdest of cases (EPR paradox). I agree that all conventional interactions are mediated by particles.
2) Sure, particles can travel no faster than c as far as we know. As far as Heisenberg goes with respect to this, you're talking out of your hat. No one knows how to reconcile quantum mechanics and relativity.
3) I have a BS in Mathematics and in Physics. I didn't see that it was pertinent, we should discuss the topic, not our credentials.
4) You think that it's scientifically accurate to assert that the passage of time is proportional to the speed of light? You just pointed out that we can't change the speed of light in a vacuum. Thus we can't experiment. Thus there is no scientific data. Thus any assertions about it are hot air. Also, think carefully about the precise statement I made. Do you really want to be in the position of defending that the rate of passage of time is directly proportional to the speed of light? Based on what evidence? I don't even know of any formulae that would begin to imply that. Conceivably, with a bunch of pontificating and hand-waving, maybe you could assert that the rate of passage of time was proportional to 1/(1-[d^2]/[c^2]) (where d is the 'new' speed of light) based on standard special relativity equations, but that would still be making shit up. And it's nothing like the statement to which you made your asinine reply.
Actually, it's special relativity that asserts that the speed of light in a vacuum is constant and that various things (length in the direction of motion, passage of time, mass) are affected by the relative velocity of the observer. General relativity is about the effects of acceleration and gravity on these observed properties.
I'm not sure that I understand how that refutes anything that I said, though... special relativity certainly does not state that the speed of light must be 3x10^8 m/s, only that it is constant, and how the fact that it's constant must affect certain physical properties observed from a frame of reference in motion.
Let u= 1/(1-[v^2]/[c^2])
observed length is length*u (foreshortening)
observed passage of time is time/u
observed mass = mass/u
if I recall correctly, it's been a long time since University Physics 3.
Tracking the movement of a beam of light is a great way to make a clock, but that doesn't mean that the rate of passage of time is proportional to the speed of light any more than time slows when your watch does.
It's an axiom? So when I measure the average rate at which grains of sand fall from the top of an hourglass to the bottom, or by the rate at which some regulated spring rotates a hand around the face of a clock, etc., I'm not measuring time?
Special relativity is a new concept, the speed of light as a constant for all observers is a new concept, etc, etc.
You are spouting off bullshit to say that it is an axiom that the passage of time is a function of the speed of light. Until you can change the speed of light (which we can) and observe that the rate of the passage of time changes (which it doesn't) you aren't talking about science, you're stating your personal philosophy as fact.
That's an interesting thought, but I know of no evidence that it might be true. The passage of time is not a function of the speed of light. Observed passage of time is a function of the relative speed of the observer to the observee, but that's an entirely different thing.
Really? It must have taken a long time to gather that information. What a load of hyperbolistic bullshit.
I don't have anything much to say here, other than 'hear hear'! I'm not much of a Wesley Crusher fan, but after his enlightening interview, I have to say that I'm a Will Wheaton fan.
You've done a great job dealing with a tough situation, Will. Kudos.
This is bad because the two things are exactly the same. "Encrypting your transmission" is the same as "making a secure transmission". Only the emotional impact is different.
By using one label in one context and another label in a different context, 'they' (the gov't, the media, the megacorps, etc.) define how you see right and wrong, by manipulating you with emotionally charged words.
So, buying into the idea that it's perfectly OK for people to use emotionally charged words in whatever context they like without calling them on it is at least a partial buy in to the idea that you're going to be a sheeple puppet of the powers that be.
Oh, sorry. FastTrack is the network protocol used by KaZaA (it's laden with spyware crap, but it's a no-brainer to use on Windows and supports multi-source downloads well), giFT (an open source client), Morpheus, and Grokster (don't know anything about these two).
From what I'm told, it shares the files over port 80 so wget will get files from a FastTrack peer. The really great thing about it is the multi-source download. I can get full use of my bandwidth at home while I download the 300meg+ video files from multiple users. Of course, I only download bits to which I have a legal right.
Bobby Martin
Cosm Development Team
http://www.cosmgame.com
You left out the most important part. As I posted earlier, you need to sign the photo, fingerprint, etc. together with the name, birthdate, ID number, etc. as one document. Otherwise you can just lift the identifying information from one card and the signed ID from another and put 'em together to make a fake ID.
I think it's:
Choose 3 equidistant points on the screen: {x[0],y[0]},{x[1],y[1]},{x[2],y[2]}
Choose random coordinate on screen (x,y)
while no user input
choose random number n from {0,1,2}
x = (x + x[n])/2
y = (y + y[n])/2
plot (x,y)
loop
and the points don't actually have to be equidistant, any three points will work. You'll just get a warped triangle, which can look kind of cool.
Orthogonal can either mean that the two don't affect each other, or that they are at right angles to each other. In this case, it means both - the angle of polarization of one beam of light is orthogonal to the angle of polarization of the other, and thus a polarization filter parallel to one beam of light passes it through unhindered and completely blocks the other beam. In this way you can process the two beams separately even though they are running down the same fiber.
But, yeah, mutually orthogonal is redundant. You have to have something to be orthogonal to, and if you're orthogonal to it, it must be orthogonal to you.