A siphon (at least the kind in the article) generally means a u-shaped tube that pulls liquid up over the top and down again. I suppose a couple of bendy straws stuck together might work with a bit of tape, but holes are still a problem because it breaks the pressure seal and stops the slug of falling liquid from applying force to the container. I am sure in a couple of days we will all be able to see u-tube hypobaric siphon action on youtube.
I have to wonder... is there a chance that John McAfee did all of that far out stuff just to make his name look bad, so that Intel would stop using it? He sold the right to use the name a long time ago, but was still getting hate mail about the crappy software. Since he would have had no legal case to stop Intel from using the name, perhaps, just perhaps he was doing all this stuff in the last year to get the result announced at CES. Intel is going to re-brand the software this year.
Could it be that he is actually an evil genius who planned it this way? My personal suspicion was that the stuff in Belize was just as messed up as it seemed, but the ranting and raving on the internet and generally crafting such a bad-boy persona may have been brought up a couple notches to help get his name off the software. I can't imagine a guy like that wouldn't have at least considered making use of the media to push that personal agenda.
Not withstanding the scantily clad women, I would love to use his uninstall procedure one of these days. Too bad it's my work computer that is stuck with the software.
The switchover was simple - log in with my goolge account and authorize it. The layout is clean, and the app form on my phone is prompt and beautiful. Thanks google for making me switch... Feedly kicks google readers butt. Feedly may not be the beat alternative, but it was the only one I tried after reading a few reviews of the options. I didn't feel the need to look any further.
The best solution is to use this event as a jumping point into securing it right... No matter what technical solution you come up with, the weakest link are the people. Education, some firings, and getting a better vendor are the real next step. Remote access can be a marvellous tool to getting problems straightened out without flying people in, but it sounds like these are the kind of people you wouldn't let walk unescorted in the plant...
“The question is ‘Are they being negligent?’. The usual test is ‘Are they applying contemporary standards to the quality of their work?’,”
It seems to me that at the moment the contemporary standards are that almost all software has security holes. The "contemporary standards" are that this is acceptable -- very few customers with very specific needs can afford to insist otherwise, and even they have to build in redundancy and monitoring systems to handle the case where something doesn't work as advertised.
If the authors argument is based on contemporary standards, it's not a very good one.
There are many examples of "living fossils" -- living things that are essentially unchanged from dinosaur era fossil records including some varieties of crocodiles, fish, turtles, etc. A live 'dinosaur' would just be a bonus for these people.
What I find most telling is that these 'schools' choose the most ridiculous possible example rather than look for the obvious ones. The argument still wouldn't stand up to the vast number of samples of extinct and changing fossils over time, but it would at least be based on scientific observations that are reliable and readily confirmed.
Emacs vs VIM: Who cares?
on
Vim Turns 20
·
· Score: 2
Honestly, both are excellent text editors. I, like most programmers, use the one that was favored at my university. Not because it was necessarily better, but because lots of other people used it and helped me get over the learning curve. I still use VIM today on every operating system I use or am forced to use.
At the end of the day, the text editor I use has to be something I use so well that I am not thinking about the text editor - I am thinking about the text I want to edit.
I think that governments should be lobbied to enact patent reform to require patent holders to actively use and promote the patented technology within some timeframe of the patent being granted in order to continue to have patent protection. My reasoning is this: If a patent is so intrinsically valuable to you that it was worth filing the patent in the first place, then you must capitalize on it to be able to protect it. If you can't get funding or sell licenses to get a product to market within a reasonable amount of time, you lose the right to get the courts to do that for you. Seeing as most things truly deserving of patent protection are put in use and on sale while the patent is still pending or not yet filed, I don't think this would harm the kinds of industries that patents were designed to work for, while patent holding companies and trolls would be under the requirement to actually do something with their portfolio instead of waiting for someone else to do the hard work and then forcing them to pay through the courts. A side effect of this is that pharmaceuticals companies that decide a medicine is not worth selling and shut it down would also lose protection.
The core of the idea is to recognize that the ideas embodied by patents have no value unless someone is using them - 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration. If you have the idea, and develop far enough to patent it, you can get some time protection to get it into production, but there needs to be a limit to how long you get protection without making reasonable efforts.
Having followed closely academically organized meteorite finds, it turns out that what you need most of all is human eyes and lots of them. Assuming you have figured out where to look already, walking a grid pattern is one of the most effective ways. I suppose a metal detector will help with some kinds of meteorites, but really, the human eye is one of the best tools for the job.
On my feed reader, this item came up beside some stuff about http://www.fasterthanthewind.org/ where a vehicle made a record for sailing down wind at just shy of 3 times the speed of the wind. They did so by turning the problem on it's side and inside out a bit -- you can read more there if you want to. In any case, I was beginning to wonder if the concepts (not the mechanics, but the energy balances they achieved) could be used to make a solar sailing space craft that travels down the solar wind at some pretty impressive speeds.
Just a thought. I have no idea what that would look like, and the solar wind is pretty fast, so it may not make much sense (unless the system would at least increase the rate of accelleration over the current design of sail for the same surface area.) None the less, I would love to see if someone who understands the physics better than I could take a go at what such a system would look like, and what would have to be changed or discovered to make it happen.
4" is a wide definition. The focal length, optical type (a 4" refactor is a very different beast than a 4" reflector, and there are lots of options in-between), and available eyepieces factor in. None the less, planetary targets are usually impressive.
The moon is always a good choice. Don't wait for a full moon -- partial phases are more interesting because the lighting and shadows emphasize just how bumpy the moon is.
I have a 4" F13 scope (roughly 52" focal length -- 1350mm), and it's not bad for brighter nebulae as well, such as M42 in orion, and galaxies such as the Andromeda galaxy.
I expect that part of the problem here is the low population density compared to other markets. Simply put, Canada has about the same landmass of the continental united states (I had to look that up, but it's actually surprisingly close), but only 1/10 the number of people. The population density of the USA is listed as 32 people per km^2, Canada is 3.2/km^2. A few city-only serivces have existed: Fido, for example, but they were bought up because Canadians travel alot, and really really want good coverage on the major highways. When you are 200-300 km from anywhere, it's kinda nice to have a bar or two on your phone. That means that it is hard to draw customers to the city-only services in the long term.
Don't get me wrong: Rogers and friends are still turning an insane profit on our backs, but sometimes that is just the way it works. At least those profits are mostly staying in Canadian hands.
To build out a new cellular network takes a considerable amount of capital to provide coverage for enough people to make it worthwhile. I don't think the cell operators need collusion to keep the prices high -- since a new player either needs the money and time to build out a network, or they have to pay an existing player to offer a virtual cell network -- and you can bet that the existing players are .
The only reason we are getting new carriers finally is that the CRTC stepped in and is forcing existing players to provide that virtual network capability at a wholesale price that lets the new carriers compete. In other words, they are regulating a way to prevent the carriers from a making such a big profit and opening the field to competition. Some of that competition is being funded from non-canadian sources, which I am not sure is such a great thing: It will be years before the competition amongst carriers makes a dent in the rates we are paying, and in the meanwhile, that means sending the profits out of the country, which for Canada has never been such a good thing.
I think what it comes down to is that all the options suck, and the new options suck just as bad as the old ones, and it's only going to get worse.
I just wanted to point out that while they are not pure aluminum, Sapphire, ruby, and several other transparent or nearly transparent gem stones are crystals made up of aluminum oxide -- colors are caused by natural or synthetic doping with trace elements. Chances are, if you have an expensive analog watch, you probably have a piece of 'transparent aluminum' ensuring your time piece is readable and does not get scratched easily.
I have a real problem with getting too excited over this article, and clearly the people who did the work are playing on star trek's popularity to garner more media attention than is really warranted.
I have never had a flash drive long enough to wear out the flash cells, and I can't say I have seen them fail electrically.
I have however gone through at least 5 usb keys over the last few years, all due to physical abuse: -Laundry (went through at least twice without failing, 3rd time's the charm) -Loose/worn USB contacts: at least two different drives, after that I stopped buying the cheapest ones available -Soup: Spilled in my bike bag, and caused the usb key to corrode internally, and probably caused a short because I didn't notice the soup had leaked into the casing until after I plugged it in -Clumsiness: I dropped one on a hard wood floor, and then rolled over it with my desk chair. Another one broke the USB contacts off when I tripped and banged it with my leg. At least that one left a nice bruise in self defense.
I would love to see a completely sealed usb key that uses something like the Apple laptop power cable connections (mag safe, I think it is called) for the connection. Perhaps if it had a titanium case and complete water-proof seal, it might survive my abuse for more than 3 months!
The anonymous posters were allegedly posting hate speech. Hate speech becomes a problem because the people targeted by the hate speech have rights to personal safety and security vs. the posters rights to free speech. Note that hate speech is speech specifically pushing for hate crimes to be performed against individuals of the hated group, as opposed to just an exchange of opinions.
I wanted to point this out because while there is value in anonymous free speech, even for people who I disagree with, there is a point where this kind of speech leads to actual harm, and I fully support the court in bringing these people to justice.
I have one of these mercury key chains -- a christmas present -- and it does indeed present itself as a CDROM drive in order to get the autoplay to run.
Of course, I am still trying to figure out if this particular alert is an actual problem, or if it is just a packed executable to save space on the device.
I am not too worried on behalf of Lego -- I have used mega blocks many times, and frankly while they are compatible, the quality and tolerances are not even close to lego. They don't even stick to each other all that well.
Basically, while this might mean there is a flood of cheap bricks on the market, I will stick the to orgiginal for my kids when I have the choice because the quality is so much better.
Besides, when I step on them in bare feet, I want to curse their damn legos all over the floor -- it sounds better than damn mega blocks..
Do you or your organization research the societal implications of extreme long life? How will our cultures, society, and laws, and families/family structures have to change to accommodate long life? Are we ready for it?
IANAL, but my understanding of copyright law and law in general is that it is typically performance based. That means that If it is used and appears to have the purpose of distributing copyrighted material, no mathematical slight of hand in the middle changes the fact that copyrighted material is being moved. It may, however, offer some protection to the people operating the network, but anyone at the end points (providing/retrieving) is still likely to run into trouble. At the very least, it will be a costly argument to someone in court.
If the system offered substantial benefits to non-infringing users (and was used that way) over traditional ways of transferring files, then maybe they are ok, but if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it must be a duck.
If you have a good facial photo of the perp I suspect that most police forces would at least check and see if it is a person 'known to police'. And then, only if they are bored.
Let's face it, unless you have lots of money and connections, or something dangerous (i.e. firearms, explosives, DMCA prohibited circumvention tools) were stolen, you are small potatoes to an undoubtedly overworked police force. Unless your stuff turns up at a pawn shop (you have your serial numbers, right?) or is found in a bust related to some other crime, chances are the person will never be caught.
Total agreement here. I suspect that the whole free-will angle is just a great way to get press. Sure it might have been the goal of the experiment to study decision making and the impact of will, but the conclusion drawn is pure sensationalism and has nothing to do with science.
It seems to me that the TFA is using a fairly limited definition of free will -- i.e. that it must take place in the concious mind -- to draw the conclusions that they are.
I don't think the research is bad... but I suspect that the conclusion drawn is kinda hokey (but great for getting press, like/. and others.)
It is interesting that they have developed decent prediction models that connect a limited decision making situation to the brain activity leading up to it. To state that it implies that there is no free will is pushing it. Then they leave bolt holes about the experimental data claiming that maybe it happens at the last minute.
Legally, every bootleg copy or download is made equivalent to that person actually going to pay full price to watch or buy the movie.
In truth, I wonder just what percentage of people who buy bootlegs or download the movie would have been willing to pay instead of simply not watching it. I mean have you seen the tripe coming out of hollywood these days? Granted the whole point of those laws is that those people should not have seen the movie without paying, and so they have taken an undue 'benefit' or 'enrichment' in having seen the movie that way.
I figure in real life, the studios can't really call it a loss when they were never going to get that money in the first place, and meanwhile, they are dropping the spanish inquisition on students, single mothers, etc.
The best solution for them is to make better movies that are actually worth paying to see! I mean it's gotten so bad over the last few years, that I can't even be bothered to download them and waste an or so watching. My wife and I have at least three pairs of free movie tickets 1 of which is over 6 months old, and haven't used them in yet because every time we think about going to catch a movie, there is nothing worth watching on!
Slashdot Mirror
A siphon (at least the kind in the article) generally means a u-shaped tube that pulls liquid up over the top and down again. I suppose a couple of bendy straws stuck together might work with a bit of tape, but holes are still a problem because it breaks the pressure seal and stops the slug of falling liquid from applying force to the container. I am sure in a couple of days we will all be able to see u-tube hypobaric siphon action on youtube.
I have to wonder... is there a chance that John McAfee did all of that far out stuff just to make his name look bad, so that Intel would stop using it? He sold the right to use the name a long time ago, but was still getting hate mail about the crappy software. Since he would have had no legal case to stop Intel from using the name, perhaps, just perhaps he was doing all this stuff in the last year to get the result announced at CES. Intel is going to re-brand the software this year. Could it be that he is actually an evil genius who planned it this way? My personal suspicion was that the stuff in Belize was just as messed up as it seemed, but the ranting and raving on the internet and generally crafting such a bad-boy persona may have been brought up a couple notches to help get his name off the software. I can't imagine a guy like that wouldn't have at least considered making use of the media to push that personal agenda. Not withstanding the scantily clad women, I would love to use his uninstall procedure one of these days. Too bad it's my work computer that is stuck with the software.
The switchover was simple - log in with my goolge account and authorize it. The layout is clean, and the app form on my phone is prompt and beautiful. Thanks google for making me switch... Feedly kicks google readers butt. Feedly may not be the beat alternative, but it was the only one I tried after reading a few reviews of the options. I didn't feel the need to look any further.
The best solution is to use this event as a jumping point into securing it right... No matter what technical solution you come up with, the weakest link are the people. Education, some firings, and getting a better vendor are the real next step. Remote access can be a marvellous tool to getting problems straightened out without flying people in, but it sounds like these are the kind of people you wouldn't let walk unescorted in the plant...
It seems to me that at the moment the contemporary standards are that almost all software has security holes. The "contemporary standards" are that this is acceptable -- very few customers with very specific needs can afford to insist otherwise, and even they have to build in redundancy and monitoring systems to handle the case where something doesn't work as advertised.
If the authors argument is based on contemporary standards, it's not a very good one.
There are many examples of "living fossils" -- living things that are essentially unchanged from dinosaur era fossil records including some varieties of crocodiles, fish, turtles, etc. A live 'dinosaur' would just be a bonus for these people.
What I find most telling is that these 'schools' choose the most ridiculous possible example rather than look for the obvious ones. The argument still wouldn't stand up to the vast number of samples of extinct and changing fossils over time, but it would at least be based on scientific observations that are reliable and readily confirmed.
Honestly, both are excellent text editors. I, like most programmers, use the one that was favored at my university. Not because it was necessarily better, but because lots of other people used it and helped me get over the learning curve. I still use VIM today on every operating system I use or am forced to use.
At the end of the day, the text editor I use has to be something I use so well that I am not thinking about the text editor - I am thinking about the text I want to edit.
Can't we all just get along?
No more axes! Not only do they hack at trees, they could be used to break into a co-lo.
I think that governments should be lobbied to enact patent reform to require patent holders to actively use and promote the patented technology within some timeframe of the patent being granted in order to continue to have patent protection. My reasoning is this: If a patent is so intrinsically valuable to you that it was worth filing the patent in the first place, then you must capitalize on it to be able to protect it. If you can't get funding or sell licenses to get a product to market within a reasonable amount of time, you lose the right to get the courts to do that for you. Seeing as most things truly deserving of patent protection are put in use and on sale while the patent is still pending or not yet filed, I don't think this would harm the kinds of industries that patents were designed to work for, while patent holding companies and trolls would be under the requirement to actually do something with their portfolio instead of waiting for someone else to do the hard work and then forcing them to pay through the courts. A side effect of this is that pharmaceuticals companies that decide a medicine is not worth selling and shut it down would also lose protection.
The core of the idea is to recognize that the ideas embodied by patents have no value unless someone is using them - 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration. If you have the idea, and develop far enough to patent it, you can get some time protection to get it into production, but there needs to be a limit to how long you get protection without making reasonable efforts.
Having followed closely academically organized meteorite finds, it turns out that what you need most of all is human eyes and lots of them. Assuming you have figured out where to look already, walking a grid pattern is one of the most effective ways. I suppose a metal detector will help with some kinds of meteorites, but really, the human eye is one of the best tools for the job.
On my feed reader, this item came up beside some stuff about http://www.fasterthanthewind.org/ where a vehicle made a record for sailing down wind at just shy of 3 times the speed of the wind. They did so by turning the problem on it's side and inside out a bit -- you can read more there if you want to. In any case, I was beginning to wonder if the concepts (not the mechanics, but the energy balances they achieved) could be used to make a solar sailing space craft that travels down the solar wind at some pretty impressive speeds.
Just a thought. I have no idea what that would look like, and the solar wind is pretty fast, so it may not make much sense (unless the system would at least increase the rate of accelleration over the current design of sail for the same surface area.) None the less, I would love to see if someone who understands the physics better than I could take a go at what such a system would look like, and what would have to be changed or discovered to make it happen.
4" is a wide definition. The focal length, optical type (a 4" refactor is a very different beast than a 4" reflector, and there are lots of options in-between), and available eyepieces factor in. None the less, planetary targets are usually impressive.
The moon is always a good choice. Don't wait for a full moon -- partial phases are more interesting because the lighting and shadows emphasize just how bumpy the moon is.
I have a 4" F13 scope (roughly 52" focal length -- 1350mm), and it's not bad for brighter nebulae as well, such as M42 in orion, and galaxies such as the Andromeda galaxy.
I expect that part of the problem here is the low population density compared to other markets.
Simply put, Canada has about the same landmass of the continental united states (I had to look that up, but it's actually surprisingly close), but only 1/10 the number of people. The population density of the USA is listed as 32 people per km^2, Canada is 3.2/km^2. A few city-only serivces have existed: Fido, for example, but they were bought up because Canadians travel alot, and really really want good coverage on the major highways. When you are 200-300 km from anywhere, it's kinda nice to have a bar or two on your phone. That means that it is hard to draw customers to the city-only services in the long term.
Don't get me wrong: Rogers and friends are still turning an insane profit on our backs, but sometimes that is just the way it works. At least those profits are mostly staying in Canadian hands.
To build out a new cellular network takes a considerable amount of capital to provide coverage for enough people to make it worthwhile. I don't think the cell operators need collusion to keep the prices high -- since a new player either needs the money and time to build out a network, or they have to pay an existing player to offer a virtual cell network -- and you can bet that the existing players are .
The only reason we are getting new carriers finally is that the CRTC stepped in and is forcing existing players to provide that virtual network capability at a wholesale price that lets the new carriers compete. In other words, they are regulating a way to prevent the carriers from a making such a big profit and opening the field to competition. Some of that competition is being funded from non-canadian sources, which I am not sure is such a great thing: It will be years before the competition amongst carriers makes a dent in the rates we are paying, and in the meanwhile, that means sending the profits out of the country, which for Canada has never been such a good thing.
I think what it comes down to is that all the options suck, and the new options suck just as bad as the old ones, and it's only going to get worse.
So is that evidence of alien visitation?
I just wanted to point out that while they are not pure aluminum, Sapphire, ruby, and several other transparent or nearly transparent gem stones are crystals made up of aluminum oxide -- colors are caused by natural or synthetic doping with trace elements. Chances are, if you have an expensive analog watch, you probably have a piece of 'transparent aluminum' ensuring your time piece is readable and does not get scratched easily.
I have a real problem with getting too excited over this article, and clearly the people who did the work are playing on star trek's popularity to garner more media attention than is really warranted.
I have never had a flash drive long enough to wear out the flash cells, and I can't say I have seen them fail electrically.
I have however gone through at least 5 usb keys over the last few years, all due to physical abuse:
-Laundry (went through at least twice without failing, 3rd time's the charm)
-Loose/worn USB contacts: at least two different drives, after that I stopped buying the cheapest ones available
-Soup: Spilled in my bike bag, and caused the usb key to corrode internally, and probably caused a short because I didn't notice the soup had leaked into the casing until after I plugged it in
-Clumsiness: I dropped one on a hard wood floor, and then rolled over it with my desk chair. Another one broke the USB contacts off when I tripped and banged it with my leg. At least that one left a nice bruise in self defense.
I would love to see a completely sealed usb key that uses something like the Apple laptop power cable connections (mag safe, I think it is called) for the connection. Perhaps if it had a titanium case and complete water-proof seal, it might survive my abuse for more than 3 months!
The anonymous posters were allegedly posting hate speech. Hate speech becomes a problem because the people targeted by the hate speech have rights to personal safety and security vs. the posters rights to free speech. Note that hate speech is speech specifically pushing for hate crimes to be performed against individuals of the hated group, as opposed to just an exchange of opinions.
I wanted to point this out because while there is value in anonymous free speech, even for people who I disagree with, there is a point where this kind of speech leads to actual harm, and I fully support the court in bringing these people to justice.
I have one of these mercury key chains -- a christmas present -- and it does indeed present itself as a CDROM drive in order to get the autoplay to run.
Of course, I am still trying to figure out if this particular alert is an actual problem, or if it is just a packed executable to save space on the device.
I am not too worried on behalf of Lego -- I have used mega blocks many times, and frankly while they are compatible, the quality and tolerances are not even close to lego. They don't even stick to each other all that well.
Basically, while this might mean there is a flood of cheap bricks on the market, I will stick the to orgiginal for my kids when I have the choice because the quality is so much better.
Besides, when I step on them in bare feet, I want to curse their damn legos all over the floor -- it sounds better than damn mega blocks..
Do you or your organization research the societal implications of extreme long life? How will our cultures, society, and laws, and families/family structures have to change to accommodate long life? Are we ready for it?
IANAL, but my understanding of copyright law and law in general is that it is typically performance based.
That means that If it is used and appears to have the purpose of distributing copyrighted material, no mathematical slight of hand in the middle changes the fact that copyrighted material is being moved. It may, however, offer some protection to the people operating the network, but anyone at the end points (providing/retrieving) is still likely to run into trouble. At the very least, it will be a costly argument to someone in court.
If the system offered substantial benefits to non-infringing users (and was used that way) over traditional ways of transferring files, then maybe they are ok, but if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it must be a duck.
Long story short: Seek legal advice!
If you have a good facial photo of the perp I suspect that most police forces would at least check and see if it is a person 'known to police'. And then, only if they are bored.
Let's face it, unless you have lots of money and connections, or something dangerous (i.e. firearms, explosives, DMCA prohibited circumvention tools) were stolen, you are small potatoes to an undoubtedly overworked police force. Unless your stuff turns up at a pawn shop (you have your serial numbers, right?) or is found in a bust related to some other crime, chances are the person will never be caught.
Total agreement here. I suspect that the whole free-will angle is just a great way to get press. Sure it might have been the goal of the experiment to study decision making and the impact of will, but the conclusion drawn is pure sensationalism and has nothing to do with science.
It seems to me that the TFA is using a fairly limited definition of free will -- i.e. that it must take place in the concious mind -- to draw the conclusions that they are.
/. and others.)
I don't think the research is bad... but I suspect that the conclusion drawn is kinda hokey (but great for getting press, like
It is interesting that they have developed decent prediction models that connect a limited decision making situation to the brain activity leading up to it. To state that it implies that there is no free will is pushing it. Then they leave bolt holes about the experimental data claiming that maybe it happens at the last minute.
It's poor scientific writing, at any rate.
Legally, every bootleg copy or download is made equivalent to that person actually going to pay full price to watch or buy the movie.
In truth, I wonder just what percentage of people who buy bootlegs or download the movie would have been willing to pay instead of simply not watching it. I mean have you seen the tripe coming out of hollywood these days? Granted the whole point of those laws is that those people should not have seen the movie without paying, and so they have taken an undue 'benefit' or 'enrichment' in having seen the movie that way.
I figure in real life, the studios can't really call it a loss when they were never going to get that money in the first place, and meanwhile, they are dropping the spanish inquisition on students, single mothers, etc.
The best solution for them is to make better movies that are actually worth paying to see! I mean it's gotten so bad over the last few years, that I can't even be bothered to download them and waste an or so watching. My wife and I have at least three pairs of free movie tickets 1 of which is over 6 months old, and haven't used them in yet because every time we think about going to catch a movie, there is nothing worth watching on!