The consensus is that LEGO probably will not stop production of Mindstorms, though they may drop from 'public' perception and possibly only be available through LEGO educations resellers like Pitsco Lego/Dacta.
I will not mourn the loss of the Harry Potter and other movie tie-in crap. Sounds too much like MBA-fodder and not the genius that makes Lego what they are.
I have the (Linux-based!) 721 dual-stream receiver/PVR. It is pretty good, with the latest software. It has had some flaky bugs, but it's still the best PVR I've ever used.
I'm sure the 921 will have some quirks too, but if it runs the same core PVR application, it should be pretty good.
I'm not planning on getting a 921 as I already watch too much TV as it is, and there's not enough HD stuff being broadcast yet to warrant the expensive display I'd need.
This was a pet peeve of mine two years ago during Colorado's wildfire season. One of the fires was within about a mile of my house. No useful information whatsoever about it was broadcast by the media or the public officials.
First tip: Get an analog radio scanner. You won't need one of the fancy new digital models, most of the fire response stuff happens on older frequencies that are set aside for interagency response. I spent about $200 on a Radio Shack model two years ago. Look for a frequency chart, or scanner enthusiast mailing list or newsgroup for your areas. Radio geeking can become a whole new field for you!;)
You want to find out what frequencies are in active use for what. Here's a chart for Aspen, Colorado: Chart
Usually the FERN (Fire Emergency Radio Network) channels have some informative traffic. Sometimes a local Radio Shack (yes, occasionally they have a clue!) might have a local freq chart. A lot of coordination traffic and information is passed along by HAMs on the Amateur Radio Relay League, so lots of useful info can be found there about evacuation and other logistics.
Click on the middle button (wildfire mapping) and let the Java viewer load. It's not always the most current, but it is used for interagency coordination, so it's usually pretty close to up-to-date.
I would love it if public agencies would do something like what I (and other users of my software) do:
There are several reasons to want a take-home receipt. I'm not sure which ones we're trying to address here, but here's an idea:
If you want one, you punch a button and get a copy for yourself. But it wouldn't be the same as the copy kept at the polls.
The paper copy kept on file for recounts would have all the info on what you voted for in the clear (human-readable) but the voter identity (name, address, etc) unreadable except for your anonymous voter ID number. Below the human-readable info is a coded copy in barcode form or something graphical like that. Something you can visually compare, and is machine-scannable.
The paper copy you get has your voter id info (in human-readable form) but no human-readable account of what you voted for. It's there, stored in that machine-scannable form that you compared against the deposited copy before you left the poll. However, even if you had a machine/scanner to read it, the coded data is encrypted to a public key that only the polling authorities have.
If you like, after the election, anyone could go in with their paper receipt and demand to see if their 'counted' vote matches what is on the paper, but you won't be told what you voted for, and you'll never see the deposited paper copy. If needed though, a court order could compare the two.
Anyone who brings in a paper receipt after the election that decodes properly and is signed by the proper key, but doesn't match the 'recorded' vote, well, this sets off major alarm bells.
I won't get into an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of this system. That's the job of the voting researchers and companies, who have totally FAILED to convince us that they've done their jobs properly.
I have about 20Gb of MP3s. They're all mine. Ripped from CD's I own. Occasionally my CD was too badly damaged to get a good rip, so I've gotten a copy of a rip from a friend who owns the same album. Legal nit-picking aside, I think I have every legal right to do that.
I've never bothered with Napster, Kazaa, Gnutella or their like. I make intellectual property for a living, and I believe artists and creators ought to get paid for their work. (A discussion as to whether they actually _do_ get paid anything by the music publishers is beyond the scope of this rant.)
I want to buy more MP3s, legally. But I'm not going to bother with these half-assed more-expensive, more-restricted offerings. Sooner or later, they'll realize they have to offer equivalent or greater value to the consumer to win their business.
I want to listen to my newly-purchased songs in WinAmp, right along side my existing rips that I legally own. And if I want to put them on my laptop and listen to them while traveling, so be it. And MP3 players, while cycling. And maybe burn some to a CD to listen to in my car. It's my music, I can do what I want with it. Anything less is unacceptible.
Buying an entire album one song at a time and ending up paying _more_ than that album costs down the street at a bricks & mortar store? And getting a crippled, compressed, proprietary format that locks you to one CPU (what if it dies?) and only certain players? Who thought that was a clever idea?
The end of insane music publishing margins and selling the same music multiple times to a consumer (vinyl, tape, CD, DVD-Audio, MP3, etc) is here. The industry needs to learn to trim the fat like everyone else, and actually deliver value. And, to treat their customers like customers, not criminals.
I want to buy music. A lot of it. I'd probably drop $300 the first week such a reasonable system were available. And that's just the start. But lose this stupid business and operational model that they keep coming up with. Nobody wants less for more.
Beware of MSG (Monosodium Glutamate). I know several people who get migraines (real migraines, not just bad headaches) triggered by MSG. Lots of information at http://www.nomsg.com/
Imitrex seems to work well, but read the label carefully. It has many bad side effects.
Excellent story. I still have and treasure a copy of this issue, not the least of which because of Robyn Wood's incredible cover art.
I was so influenced by this story that I transcribed it for a friend's local BBS, and later he and I ended up writing our own ORPG (single-line BBSes kinda prevented the MM part) inspired by it.
>I wonder if it delves into human pornography, and the fact that humans (and other animals) get excited by looking at pictures of a member of the opposite sex.
The Free-IP project, put together by a friend of mine, aimed to do just this. They have a 6502 design, and a RISC processor as well. Unfortunately, other contributions were sparse, and Real Work has gotten in the way of him creating and giving away any other designs.
Actually, this is a project I've been dreaming about for a number of years. I'm a big Lego Mindstorms tinkerer, and have a fondness for sensing/mapping devices.
In short, what I would propose is a pair of optical/LIDAR mapping units, with a tripod or other stable mount. One would also be equipped with a GPS for initialization. The way they would work is:
Set up the GPS-equipped unit outside the entrance to the underground system. Allow it to acquire a GPS fix to reference the entire system to the real world. This is optional if you don't care about georeferencing.
Next, set up the other unit just inside the entrance, within line of sight of the first unit. Trigger the second unit. It communicates with the first unit over short range digital networking (IR, Bluetooth, WiFi, FM modem). They negotiate who will go first. The winner begins firing a low-power IR laser 360 degrees panoramically around itself, waiting for the other unit to signal via the network that "I've been hit". When the hit is detected, the firing unit records the direction (angle/elevation/azimuth) to the other unit. Now, the two trade off, and previously firing unit becomes inert waiting to be struck by its mate. When it is, it signals its mate and they once again communicate the angles and bearing between them. They both perform a laser rangefinding (LIDAR) measurement to record the distance between them.
Now the spatial relationship between the two is known, and if the original unit outside the cave had determined its position by GPS, the real-world position of the interior unit can also be determined. Now, the outside unit can be packed up and moved.
At this time, the interior unit could be commanded (from a short distance, by a WiFi-equipped Palm or PocketPC) to perform a LIDAR vicinity scan, perhaps waiting a few seconds to allow the intrepid spelunkers to get out of the picture.
A vicinity scan would fire the IR LIDAR panoramically again, but not looking to hit the original unit, rather seeking to map the distance to the first obstacle in all directions, low, and high. Optionally, a visible light emitter and color sensor could record the color of the surface in each direction, creating a sort of panoramic Quicktime VR.
The mapping unit would signal when the vicinity scan was complete. The other unit would then be transported to a new location deeper into the complex, still within line of sight of the currently-parked unit. Once the deeper unit was securely parked on its tripod, it would be switched on, and the process begins again.
The deeper third station (actually the same hardware as the first station) calculates its position relative to the second unit, which now knows its position courtesy of the (now removed) first unit. It scans its vicinity, and adds the data points to the shared map (stored onboard, or on the controlling mapping handheld computer).
Lather, rinse, repeat.
Mindstorms are not sophisticated enough to do this -- too few IO ports, not fast enough processing to do real LIDAR, poor internode communications network. However, all of the individual techniques used in the design are singly possible with Mindstorms. All of the technologies together would be possible using a slightly more powerful development system (advanced PIC or Dragonball) and dedicated hardware. Accurate LIDAR systems are available COTS (Commercial Off The Shelf) but are pricey. A number of hobbyists use ultrasound for rangefinding. A combination of IR laser (for directional beacon) and Ultrasound (rangefinding) could be used to cut costs.
I use Dreamhost for some of my hosting, and Communitech for some.
I haven't (yet) experienced the problems that other CTech customers have.
Dreamhost is not without problems, no ISP is. I would recommend Dreamhost. I'm not changing from CTech for the moment because we have a sweet grandfathered 'unlimited bandwidth flat rate' deal from way back.
I have a Toshiba 5105-S501 myself. P4, 1.7Ghz, 512Mb of RAM, 30Gb HD, NVidia Gf4Go, DVD-ROM/CDwriter, Ethernet, modem, nice 1400x1050 display. Added WiFi as an option.
There's almost nothing I can't do with it. It's about 10 months old, and already phased out in favor of a beefier model with more HDD. I'm going to pump it up to a Gb of RAM and 60Gb HD, and then it's basically a mobile version of my desktop.
It's very well made, runs XP very nicely. I am going to install Mandrake 9.1 dual-boot on it after the upgrade, but I doubt your traveling gal needs that.
It's a bit chunky, but it has everything. No widgets or plug-in expansions needed. Well, it doesn't have a floppy drive internal, but a USB external is included. I've never used it, and don't know where it is right now.
If you want massive on-the-go power, check out the ncharge external battery system. Half in thick, slim and powerful. Not too heavy. Definitiely for the power user -- 8-9 hours (for real!) on top of your internal battery. http://www.valence.com/ncharge.asp
Thanks for clarifying that SSH only incorporates the crypto code from SSL, and does not use the affected protocol handling code.
However, is it known for sure that SSH does not suffer from a similar timing-based information leak in its own protocol handling code? I don't know, and I don't know if such an examination has been done (yet).
It is possible that SSH could be exposed to a similar attack if it were used regularly to initiate sessions. For example if you had an entry in crontab to SSH a job onto another machine at regular intervals, you might amass enough sessions to make you vulnerable to this sort of exploit, should one exist in SSH.
Let me be clear, I have no evidence that this is the case in SSH at all, but it seems like a good stimuli to review SSH to ensure it doesn't. Unfortunately, I'm not qualified to do so. Knowing the reputation of the OpenSSH crowd, if has not been done and could be a risk, it will be done.
Many eyes, shallow bugs.
ObMicrosoft: Anyone know if IIS's HTTPS implementation suffers from this weakness?
The article neither confirms not denies if this will impact the SSH protocol or its implementations. I expect it probably does not, but I recall last time I compiled SSH I think it required an SSL library. It probably only uses the crypto routines, and not the actual protocol code (which this leakage occurred in), but I wonder if any (Open)SSH experts can comment on this, and if any similar timing information leakage exploits might exist in the SSH protocols.
*) In ssl3_get_record (ssl/s3_pkt.c), minimize information leaked via timing by performing a MAC computation even if incorrrect block cipher padding has been found. This is a countermeasure against active attacks where the attacker has to distinguish between bad padding and a MAC verification error. (CAN-2003-0078)
I interpret this to mean that all implementations of SSL, including OpenSSL, _could_ have this information leakage behaviour, depending on how they are implemented. OpenSSL did happen to have this behaviour, and has now been altered to take the same amount of time in either case, thus not giving the attacker any useful information.
First, to understand where I'm coming from, you should peruse my report and video on the DC-X project, currently graciously hosted by John Carmack's Armadillo Aerospace site.
The Aerospace industry has collapsed, leaned down, merged and consolidated since the end of the cold war. We now have Boeing, Lockheed-Martin, and a few small fish. All the big fish merged together into these two big fish.
NASA has proven that it is a Government agency in the classic sense of the word, and does not have the proper motivations to perform its tasks quickly and efficiently. No offense to anyone at NASA. Most everyone I know there understands this as well as I do. Government agencies, and their funding and operations process are generally not conducive to fast efficient development. In addition, NASA has to live in fear of budget and political cuts from year to year. This is not conducive to good planning and development.
The Space Shuttle is still the most complex machine ever built by mankind. It is large, powerful, flexible and high-maintenance. We use the shuttle for a lot of missions that it is overkill for. We need a wider variety of launch vehicles that can take off some of the load of the shuttle. At a current catastrophic failure rate of 1.7% (2 failures in 113 launches), we need to reserve shuttle capability for only those missions that really require its capabilities. For most launches we should be relying on Atlas, Arianne, Proton or Pegasus (or the like) vehicles, and developing additional non-shuttle launch vehicles to assume any possible additional roles the shuttle currently can deliver that other existing systems cannot. Very promising systems such as DC-X and Roton have floundered when we most need them. Either one of these systems could have most likely been finished and flying using the budget NASA allocated to the failed and now cancelled VentureStar project.
For the most part, a lot of the ISS missions could probably be fulfilled by these less complex systems. Missions such as the Hubble servicing missions are what the shuttle was designed for. We should be able to use the ISS to its full manned capacity -- doing so would reduce the need for the shuttle itself to carry research missions up just to let them float around in zero-G space. This is what the ISS was built for. We aren't using it to full capability because we can't man it to capacity. We can't man it to capacity because it currently only has a 3-person escape vehicle, therefore only three staff can remain on ISS when the shuttle leaves. We only have a 3-person Soyuz escape craft because the development project for the ISS escape pod vehicle was cancelled by NASA due to technological problems and cost overruns.
The private sector seems to have a better record at taking risks in R&D, especially space R&D. This is rocket science, but it's now a science, not voodoo. We have companies capable of designing, building, testing and flying safe reliable launch vehicles. The reason they're failing is NASA. NASA holds the keys to space -- they determine who is certified to launch using criteria known to no-one but NASA. NASA has no motivation to endorse private-sector solutions -- these are seen as detrimental to NASA and of course will not be ruled in favor of.
Now, some research in space will only be possible with government support and funding. I believe NASA's role should shift from being a research/development and logistics operation, to a mostly research operation, leaving development and operations logistics more to the private sector, who will bid competitively to build and launch vehicles and research/craft and systems for NASA. NASA already has many of their systems built by subcontractors. They need to shed the day-to-day operations and drudgery of space launch and focus on the real research.
The one-of-a-kind facilities that NASA already owns/operates (Deep Space Network, launch sites, Mission Control) should be leased to a private contractor to operate. NASA (and others!) can then lease time, space and delivered capability from this contractor, with a contractual guarantee of a desired level of quality, reliability and availability. This should be done at market cost, no subsidies or discounts. Level the playing field. If then, another supplier can provide the desired level of quality, etc to a customer (NASA or otherwise), then the customer can seek out the supplier of the proper level of cost/benefit required for each individual mission. Not all missions require the massive support infrastructure of Kennedy Space Center and Mission Control. Even today a lot of missions are not launched from Kennedy -- we need to expand this. Outsource launches to Baikonaur, or to SeaLaunch or Pegasus if practical.
The last thing we should do is build another shuttle to replace Columbia. It will be over-budget, delayed and just as complex and risky as today's shuttles. We need to allow private ventures to flourish, and ensure they have a fair competitive stake in future space business. Only then will we be able to start bringing the cost per pound of orbital launch down to levels that actually encourage new research and commercialization of space, yes, even Tourism. Space travel need not be Rocket Science anymore.
When I was there (McMurdo) in '94/'95, the convention was to drive the 'American' way. Scott Base, a New Zealand facility, is right next to McMurdo, and shares a lot of its infrastructure: airstrips, ship docks, etc. I expect the American convention won out because the American station has a lot more vehicles than the Kiwis.
I am curious about how they're going to lay fiber over the ice, and keep it intact. The ice does shift, and the conditions (wind and cold) are brutal.
Currently all comms traffic leaves McMurdo for the unmanned earth station at Black Island, just to the southwest. (Black Island can see geosync birds over Mt Erebus, Erebus obscures the view from McMurdo itself.) The traffic to BI (telephony and data/internet) goes over a microwave link. When I was there we did helo and GPS surveys with NASA of areas closer to MacTown to try to find a place to build an earthstation that could be linked by fiber, for greater bandwidth. No one had yet figured out how to keep fiber alive atop shifting ice in those conditions.
I can't cite patent numbers of prior art, because every prior creator felt it was too obvious to patent.
However, if their patents do in fact claim ownership of tranferring compressed digital media over a medium (let's be as vague in our patent claims as possible!) in less than real-time, to a device, for later viewing in real time, then they're sunk.
How about downloading compressed true-color (12-bit) animations (some synthetic 3D, some actual captured video, not that it matters) from BBSes (and even the fledgling Internet). These 5-second clips often took an hour to download, so we'd leave the modem going and let the BBS idle-disconnect us, frequently going to bed while it DLed.
Later, you'd watch the (pitifully crude by today's standards) animation in awe.
One such early delta-compressed video clip has been converted into a more modern format. It, and the excruciatingly well-documented history of such media, is found at:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/erniew/juggler.htm l
I encourage any of the Acacia defendents to have their legal staff examine the prior art documented here very seriously.
I too own one of the Doctor series disk polishing devices. As far as I can tell they're all basically the same. I am very happy with it, and have used it to resurrect a number of worn CDs of mine so I could rip them. They weren't all perfect when I was finished, but they were much better, good enough to rip.
I have not tried it with and data CD-ROMs, as I tend to take better care of those.
Following the instructions properly (about using water to lubricate the polishing wheel) and buffing the polished disk with the white abrasive pad are both critical to success.
I wouldn't recommend it for volume work. It is manual labor, and your arm can get very tired after a few disks.
There are commercial disk-polishing and cleaning operations. In quantity of less than 100 disks per batch they were >$3 per disk though, so it would add up.
See, I have a bit of an objection to this. I feel too many people will mark down a UI because it's 'non-standard'. What few take the time to realize is that most modern UI design principles were created by those envisioning making word processors and spreadsheets and maybe paint programs and databases.
These interface paradigms are _not_ necessarily the best choice for rapidly interacting with sophisticated 3D environments. Lightwave, Max, Maya and SoftImage all have utilized UI concepts far from the norm (Marking Menus, Views, widgets that capture the input focus for various purposes). Most of these are in violation of one or more conventional UI design 'guidelines' on one platform or another.
This does not mean they're wrong. In fact, most of the users of these programs, once they've mastered and understood the underlying rationale for the violations, embrace the new methods and love them. Before long, you won't be able to pry them from their cold dead clutching mouse-fingers.
As a cross-platform developer, I try to make my application look and feel as much like the 'native' L&F as possible. But sometimes it's just not proper. It makes no sense to use convention menu layouts and UI principles when you're not working with a 'document' in the normal sense.
Also, we strive to allow our customers the maximum freedom of choice for platforms. We want to allow them to migrate between Windows and Mac (and possibly Linux, SGI, etc and some of us even did BeOS and Amiga). To this end, it's necessary to unify the placement and behavior of all controls. What if you bought a tutorial book and found it was unusable because all the controls were different because it was written for a different platform?
Programs like A:W Maya, Lightwave and SoftImage are more redily portable to Mac or Windows or Linux because they have built their own UI toolkit, which allows them to ensure consistent behavior on all platforms once they've ported the underlying toolkit. It's much easier that way, than for those of us that do not use such a toolkit and maintain ports to multiple platforms. The downside is because they look the same everywhere, they usually don't look 'native'.
All I ask is that end-users understand that support for multiple platforms is a Good Thing, but often it requires UI standardization concessions that make such an app not always look & feel like MS Word or Photoshop on the native platform.
If you want an example of UI platform abstraction taken to an extreme, look at the Metatools/Metacreations UI, specifically Bryce. Looks the same -- like no computer UI ever shipped -- on every platform they've ever supported.
I've been following the Newtek/Luxology spectacle for a while, and I would not call it a bitter divorce. For purposes of ensuring their continued viability should Newtek be bought out by someone, the Lightwave programmers decided to clarify what has been the case all along. Newtek does not develop or own Lightwave. Newtek is the exclusive publisher of Lightwave. This has been the case all along. Lightwave is developed and owned by a small group of programmers, who now call themselves Luxology.
There have been hints that Luxology might develop some 3D software of their own that would not be published through Newtek. I believe this is probably true, but it doesn't mean it will compete with LW, or that LW is dead. In fact, I suspect they are probably contractually prohibited from competing with Newtek/LW.
I have used LW since version 1.0 on the Amiga, and have used it on (nearly) every platform they've made it for (except the short-lived Sun and SGI ports). I think LW is an excellent all around package, and is generally a great modeller and renderer, as well as being powerful but easily learned. The polygonal modelling tools are considered some of the best in the industry both for realistic work and for realtime games modelling.
I have used 3DSMax since Max V1 (never used 3DS for DOS). It's also a good program, and very powerful and extensible. It has a strong following in the Architectural and CAD fields (due to the tie-ins with AutoCAD) and games industries (because of GMax). People with Cad/Drafting experience find it more intuitive than LW. People without this kind of background often find Max to be rigid and unintuitive compared to LW.
Maxon Cinema 4D, Hash Animation Master, Realsoft 3D, Strata, Carrara, Truespace and a handful of others all occupy a tier in the market where you get a heck of a lot of great features for a great price. Generally there is something percieved about each of these programs that makes people exclude them for 'professional' work. Often, this is complete bunk. You can get the job done with most any modern package, but some do make getting the end result easier. In any case, they're great for starters, and learning, and you can always buy something pricier later if/when you feel you have outgrown the capabilities you have.
Maya and SoftImage used to be the Kings of the industry. Max and Lightwave have steadily carved the foundation out from under this preconceived notion, and a lot of top-end work is now done in LW and Max. Nonetheless, there Big Guys do still have some edges. They are generally more expandable, scriptable, customizable and plugin-able. They often let you get deeper into the guts of the system than the other packages. This comes with a cost though -- it makes the programs very complex, and many find SI and AW:Maya to be difficult and overwhelming at first. Many people 'graduate' to the big guys after years of being happy with the functionality of other programs. SI and AW:Maya used to be very expensive, but market forces have slashed the prices of all 3D software recently, making this less of an issue.
ElectricImage has been a Mac program all along, but appears to be on unsound ground -- not even sure who owns them now (Play?) and if it's being developed.
MacOSX concerns: I know LW, Hash A:M, EI, MaxonC4D are all available now with varying degrees of Mac-ishness. I thought either SI or A:W Maya was coming, but don't remember which, or when. 3DSMax (or its sister package 3DSViz) will never be Mac because they're built entirely around Windows MFC. They couldn't even get a port to DEC Alpha WinNT to work. Not sure where Strata, Carrara, Real or Truespace stand as far as Mac ports. Also, most cross-platform apps (LW, SI, AW:Maya) have their own look & feel to be consistent with themselves on all platforms. This means they don't look like the UI-du-jour of any particular platform. Many people claim this is a Very Bad Thing, but as a cross-platform developer myself, I disagree somewhat. Don't let this be your sole deciding factor.
Oh, and shameless self-promotion: If you want to do landscapes, check out my software, World Construction Set. We even have a Mac version, though it's not MacOSX yet.
I have to put in my two-cents here. I think if you're interested in landscape rendering, you should compare all the options. Bryce, Vue d'Esprit, World Builder, and my own software, World Construction Set.
Slashdot Mirror
The consensus is that LEGO probably will not stop production of Mindstorms, though they may drop from 'public' perception and possibly only be available through LEGO educations resellers like Pitsco Lego/Dacta.
I will not mourn the loss of the Harry Potter and other movie tie-in crap. Sounds too much like MBA-fodder and not the genius that makes Lego what they are.
I have the (Linux-based!) 721 dual-stream receiver/PVR. It is pretty good, with the latest software. It has had some flaky bugs, but it's still the best PVR I've ever used.
I'm sure the 921 will have some quirks too, but if it runs the same core PVR application, it should be pretty good.
I'm not planning on getting a 921 as I already watch too much TV as it is, and there's not enough HD stuff being broadcast yet to warrant the expensive display I'd need.
This was a pet peeve of mine two years ago during Colorado's wildfire season. One of the fires was within about a mile of my house. No useful information whatsoever about it was broadcast by the media or the public officials.
;)
First tip: Get an analog radio scanner. You won't need one of the fancy new digital models, most of the fire response stuff happens on older frequencies that are set aside for interagency response. I spent about $200 on a Radio Shack model two years ago. Look for a frequency chart, or scanner enthusiast mailing list or newsgroup for your areas. Radio geeking can become a whole new field for you!
You want to find out what frequencies are in active use for what. Here's a chart for Aspen, Colorado:
Chart
Usually the FERN (Fire Emergency Radio Network) channels have some informative traffic. Sometimes a local Radio Shack (yes, occasionally they have a clue!) might have a local freq chart. A lot of coordination traffic and information is passed along by HAMs on the Amateur Radio Relay League, so lots of useful info can be found there about evacuation and other logistics.
Also, check out the GeoMac web site:
http://geomac2.cr.usgs.gov/
Click on the middle button (wildfire mapping) and let the Java viewer load. It's not always the most current, but it is used for interagency coordination, so it's usually pretty close to up-to-date.
I would love it if public agencies would do something like what I (and other users of my software) do:
Deckers
High Meadows
Bullock Fire Map Series
There are several reasons to want a take-home receipt. I'm not sure which ones we're trying to address here, but here's an idea:
If you want one, you punch a button and get a copy for yourself. But it wouldn't be the same as the copy kept at the polls.
The paper copy kept on file for recounts would have all the info on what you voted for in the clear (human-readable) but the voter identity (name, address, etc) unreadable except for your anonymous voter ID number. Below the human-readable info is a coded copy in barcode form or something graphical like that. Something you can visually compare, and is machine-scannable.
The paper copy you get has your voter id info (in human-readable form) but no human-readable account of what you voted for. It's there, stored in that machine-scannable form that you compared against the deposited copy before you left the poll. However, even if you had a machine/scanner to read it, the coded data is encrypted to a public key that only the polling authorities have.
If you like, after the election, anyone could go in with their paper receipt and demand to see if their 'counted' vote matches what is on the paper, but you won't be told what you voted for, and you'll never see the deposited paper copy. If needed though, a court order could compare the two.
Anyone who brings in a paper receipt after the election that decodes properly and is signed by the proper key, but doesn't match the 'recorded' vote, well, this sets off major alarm bells.
I won't get into an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of this system. That's the job of the voting researchers and companies, who have totally FAILED to convince us that they've done their jobs properly.
But only on reasonable terms.
I have about 20Gb of MP3s. They're all mine. Ripped from CD's I own. Occasionally my CD was too badly damaged to get a good rip, so I've gotten a copy of a rip from a friend who owns the same album. Legal nit-picking aside, I think I have every legal right to do that.
I've never bothered with Napster, Kazaa, Gnutella or their like. I make intellectual property for a living, and I believe artists and creators ought to get paid for their work. (A discussion as to whether they actually _do_ get paid anything by the music publishers is beyond the scope of this rant.)
I want to buy more MP3s, legally. But I'm not going to bother with these half-assed more-expensive, more-restricted offerings. Sooner or later, they'll realize they have to offer equivalent or greater value to the consumer to win their business.
I want to listen to my newly-purchased songs in WinAmp, right along side my existing rips that I legally own. And if I want to put them on my laptop and listen to them while traveling, so be it. And MP3 players, while cycling. And maybe burn some to a CD to listen to in my car. It's my music, I can do what I want with it. Anything less is unacceptible.
Buying an entire album one song at a time and ending up paying _more_ than that album costs down the street at a bricks & mortar store? And getting a crippled, compressed, proprietary format that locks you to one CPU (what if it dies?) and only certain players? Who thought that was a clever idea?
The end of insane music publishing margins and selling the same music multiple times to a consumer (vinyl, tape, CD, DVD-Audio, MP3, etc) is here. The industry needs to learn to trim the fat like everyone else, and actually deliver value. And, to treat their customers like customers, not criminals.
I want to buy music. A lot of it. I'd probably drop $300 the first week such a reasonable system were available. And that's just the start. But lose this stupid business and operational model that they keep coming up with. Nobody wants less for more.
Beware of MSG (Monosodium Glutamate). I know several people who get migraines (real migraines, not just bad headaches) triggered by MSG. Lots of information at http://www.nomsg.com/
Imitrex seems to work well, but read the label carefully. It has many bad side effects.
This was somewhat foreseen long ago.
Catacomb, by Henry Melton
Excellent story. I still have and treasure a copy of this issue, not the least of which because of Robyn Wood's incredible cover art.
I was so influenced by this story that I transcribed it for a friend's local BBS, and later he and I ended up writing our own ORPG (single-line BBSes kinda prevented the MM part) inspired by it.
>I wonder if it delves into human pornography, and the fact that humans (and other animals) get excited by looking at pictures of a member of the opposite sex.
Yes. Actually, it does.
The Free-IP project, put together by a friend of mine, aimed to do just this. They have a 6502 design, and a RISC processor as well. Unfortunately, other contributions were sparse, and Real Work has gotten in the way of him creating and giving away any other designs.
Actually, this is a project I've been dreaming about for a number of years. I'm a big Lego Mindstorms tinkerer, and have a fondness for sensing/mapping devices.
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In short, what I would propose is a pair of optical/LIDAR mapping units, with a tripod or other stable mount. One would also be equipped with a GPS for initialization. The way they would work is:
Set up the GPS-equipped unit outside the entrance to the underground system. Allow it to acquire a GPS fix to reference the entire system to the real world. This is optional if you don't care about georeferencing.
Next, set up the other unit just inside the entrance, within line of sight of the first unit. Trigger the second unit. It communicates with the first unit over short range digital networking (IR, Bluetooth, WiFi, FM modem). They negotiate who will go first. The winner begins firing a low-power IR laser 360 degrees panoramically around itself, waiting for the other unit to signal via the network that "I've been hit". When the hit is detected, the firing unit records the direction (angle/elevation/azimuth) to the other unit. Now, the two trade off, and previously firing unit becomes inert waiting to be struck by its mate. When it is, it signals its mate and they once again communicate the angles and bearing between them. They both perform a laser rangefinding (LIDAR) measurement to record the distance between them.
Now the spatial relationship between the two is known, and if the original unit outside the cave had determined its position by GPS, the real-world position of the interior unit can also be determined. Now, the outside unit can be packed up and moved.
At this time, the interior unit could be commanded (from a short distance, by a WiFi-equipped Palm or PocketPC) to perform a LIDAR vicinity scan, perhaps waiting a few seconds to allow the intrepid spelunkers to get out of the picture.
A vicinity scan would fire the IR LIDAR panoramically again, but not looking to hit the original unit, rather seeking to map the distance to the first obstacle in all directions, low, and high. Optionally, a visible light emitter and color sensor could record the color of the surface in each direction, creating a sort of panoramic Quicktime VR.
The mapping unit would signal when the vicinity scan was complete. The other unit would then be transported to a new location deeper into the complex, still within line of sight of the currently-parked unit. Once the deeper unit was securely parked on its tripod, it would be switched on, and the process begins again.
The deeper third station (actually the same hardware as the first station) calculates its position relative to the second unit, which now knows its position courtesy of the (now removed) first unit. It scans its vicinity, and adds the data points to the shared map (stored onboard, or on the controlling mapping handheld computer).
Lather, rinse, repeat.
Mindstorms are not sophisticated enough to do this -- too few IO ports, not fast enough processing to do real LIDAR, poor internode communications network. However, all of the individual techniques used in the design are singly possible with Mindstorms. All of the technologies together would be possible using a slightly more powerful development system (advanced PIC or Dragonball) and dedicated hardware. Accurate LIDAR systems are available COTS (Commercial Off The Shelf) but are pricey. A number of hobbyists use ultrasound for rangefinding. A combination of IR laser (for directional beacon) and Ultrasound (rangefinding) could be used to cut costs.
http://www.greenwich-observatory.co.uk/leicalrf800
http://www.ascscientific.com/impulse.html
http://www.rieglusa.com/
http://www.circuitcellar.com/library
I use Dreamhost for some of my hosting, and Communitech for some.
I haven't (yet) experienced the problems that other CTech customers have.
Dreamhost is not without problems, no ISP is. I would recommend Dreamhost. I'm not changing from CTech for the moment because we have a sweet grandfathered 'unlimited bandwidth flat rate' deal from way back.
I have a Toshiba 5105-S501 myself. P4, 1.7Ghz, 512Mb of RAM, 30Gb HD, NVidia Gf4Go, DVD-ROM/CDwriter, Ethernet, modem, nice 1400x1050 display. Added WiFi as an option.
There's almost nothing I can't do with it. It's about 10 months old, and already phased out in favor of a beefier model with more HDD. I'm going to pump it up to a Gb of RAM and 60Gb HD, and then it's basically a mobile version of my desktop.
It's very well made, runs XP very nicely. I am going to install Mandrake 9.1 dual-boot on it after the upgrade, but I doubt your traveling gal needs that.
It's a bit chunky, but it has everything. No widgets or plug-in expansions needed. Well, it doesn't have a floppy drive internal, but a USB external is included. I've never used it, and don't know where it is right now.
If you want massive on-the-go power, check out the ncharge external battery system. Half in thick, slim and powerful. Not too heavy. Definitiely for the power user -- 8-9 hours (for real!) on top of your internal battery. http://www.valence.com/ncharge.asp
Thanks for clarifying that SSH only incorporates the crypto code from SSL, and does not use the affected protocol handling code.
However, is it known for sure that SSH does not suffer from a similar timing-based information leak in its own protocol handling code? I don't know, and I don't know if such an examination has been done (yet).
It is possible that SSH could be exposed to a similar attack if it were used regularly to initiate sessions. For example if you had an entry in crontab to SSH a job onto another machine at regular intervals, you might amass enough sessions to make you vulnerable to this sort of exploit, should one exist in SSH.
Let me be clear, I have no evidence that this is the case in SSH at all, but it seems like a good stimuli to review SSH to ensure it doesn't. Unfortunately, I'm not qualified to do so. Knowing the reputation of the OpenSSH crowd, if has not been done and could be a risk, it will be done.
Many eyes, shallow bugs.
ObMicrosoft: Anyone know if IIS's HTTPS implementation suffers from this weakness?
The article neither confirms not denies if this will impact the SSH protocol or its implementations. I expect it probably does not, but I recall last time I compiled SSH I think it required an SSL library. It probably only uses the crypto routines, and not the actual protocol code (which this leakage occurred in), but I wonder if any (Open)SSH experts can comment on this, and if any similar timing information leakage exploits might exist in the SSH protocols.
*) In ssl3_get_record (ssl/s3_pkt.c), minimize information leaked via timing by performing a MAC computation even if incorrrect block cipher padding has been found. This is a countermeasure against active attacks where the attacker has to distinguish between bad padding and a MAC verification error. (CAN-2003-0078)
I interpret this to mean that all implementations of SSL, including OpenSSL, _could_ have this information leakage behaviour, depending on how they are implemented. OpenSSL did happen to have this behaviour, and has now been altered to take the same amount of time in either case, thus not giving the attacker any useful information.
Oddly enough, I have an opinion on this.
First, to understand where I'm coming from, you should peruse my report and video on the DC-X project, currently graciously hosted by John Carmack's Armadillo Aerospace site.
The Aerospace industry has collapsed, leaned down, merged and consolidated since the end of the cold war. We now have Boeing, Lockheed-Martin, and a few small fish. All the big fish merged together into these two big fish.
NASA has proven that it is a Government agency in the classic sense of the word, and does not have the proper motivations to perform its tasks quickly and efficiently. No offense to anyone at NASA. Most everyone I know there understands this as well as I do. Government agencies, and their funding and operations process are generally not conducive to fast efficient development. In addition, NASA has to live in fear of budget and political cuts from year to year. This is not conducive to good planning and development.
The Space Shuttle is still the most complex machine ever built by mankind. It is large, powerful, flexible and high-maintenance. We use the shuttle for a lot of missions that it is overkill for. We need a wider variety of launch vehicles that can take off some of the load of the shuttle. At a current catastrophic failure rate of 1.7% (2 failures in 113 launches), we need to reserve shuttle capability for only those missions that really require its capabilities. For most launches we should be relying on Atlas, Arianne, Proton or Pegasus (or the like) vehicles, and developing additional non-shuttle launch vehicles to assume any possible additional roles the shuttle currently can deliver that other existing systems cannot. Very promising systems such as DC-X and Roton have floundered when we most need them. Either one of these systems could have most likely been finished and flying using the budget NASA allocated to the failed and now cancelled VentureStar project.
For the most part, a lot of the ISS missions could probably be fulfilled by these less complex systems. Missions such as the Hubble servicing missions are what the shuttle was designed for. We should be able to use the ISS to its full manned capacity -- doing so would reduce the need for the shuttle itself to carry research missions up just to let them float around in zero-G space. This is what the ISS was built for. We aren't using it to full capability because we can't man it to capacity. We can't man it to capacity because it currently only has a 3-person escape vehicle, therefore only three staff can remain on ISS when the shuttle leaves. We only have a 3-person Soyuz escape craft because the development project for the ISS escape pod vehicle was cancelled by NASA due to technological problems and cost overruns.
The private sector seems to have a better record at taking risks in R&D, especially space R&D. This is rocket science, but it's now a science, not voodoo. We have companies capable of designing, building, testing and flying safe reliable launch vehicles. The reason they're failing is NASA. NASA holds the keys to space -- they determine who is certified to launch using criteria known to no-one but NASA. NASA has no motivation to endorse private-sector solutions -- these are seen as detrimental to NASA and of course will not be ruled in favor of.
Now, some research in space will only be possible with government support and funding. I believe NASA's role should shift from being a research/development and logistics operation, to a mostly research operation, leaving development and operations logistics more to the private sector, who will bid competitively to build and launch vehicles and research/craft and systems for NASA. NASA already has many of their systems built by subcontractors. They need to shed the day-to-day operations and drudgery of space launch and focus on the real research.
The one-of-a-kind facilities that NASA already owns/operates (Deep Space Network, launch sites, Mission Control) should be leased to a private contractor to operate. NASA (and others!) can then lease time, space and delivered capability from this contractor, with a contractual guarantee of a desired level of quality, reliability and availability. This should be done at market cost, no subsidies or discounts. Level the playing field. If then, another supplier can provide the desired level of quality, etc to a customer (NASA or otherwise), then the customer can seek out the supplier of the proper level of cost/benefit required for each individual mission. Not all missions require the massive support infrastructure of Kennedy Space Center and Mission Control. Even today a lot of missions are not launched from Kennedy -- we need to expand this. Outsource launches to Baikonaur, or to SeaLaunch or Pegasus if practical.
The last thing we should do is build another shuttle to replace Columbia. It will be over-budget, delayed and just as complex and risky as today's shuttles. We need to allow private ventures to flourish, and ensure they have a fair competitive stake in future space business. Only then will we be able to start bringing the cost per pound of orbital launch down to levels that actually encourage new research and commercialization of space, yes, even Tourism. Space travel need not be Rocket Science anymore.
Typical vehicles:
c a/ben_truck.jpg c a/ben_sib_truck.jpg . jpg
a .gif
i e=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en
c a/SnowSchool.jpg
Jacked up pickup trucks: (Ford)
http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~kimberly/images/Antarcti
http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~kimberly/images/Antarcti
http://tiger.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/truck_tracks_sm
Deltas: (built by Canadian Foremost)
http://astro.uchicago.edu/cara/vtour/mcmurdo/delt
http://www.theice.org/gifs/delta.gif
http://www.gmra.org/n0nhp/antarctica/mendelta.jpg
Ivan the Terra Bus: (Foremost)
http://images.google.com/images?q=ivan+terra+bus&
Other odd specialized vehicles:
Haagelund
http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~kimberly/images/Antarcti
Sprite: (Thiokal)
http://tiger.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/sprite.jpg
Nodwell: (Tracked Delta)
http://tiger.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/nodwell.jpg
Tracked Crash/Fire vehicle:
http://www.theice.org/gifs/1frtrax.gif
When I was there (McMurdo) in '94/'95, the convention was to drive the 'American' way. Scott Base, a New Zealand facility, is right next to McMurdo, and shares a lot of its infrastructure: airstrips, ship docks, etc. I expect the American convention won out because the American station has a lot more vehicles than the Kiwis.
I am curious about how they're going to lay fiber over the ice, and keep it intact. The ice does shift, and the conditions (wind and cold) are brutal.
Currently all comms traffic leaves McMurdo for the unmanned earth station at Black Island, just to the southwest. (Black Island can see geosync birds over Mt Erebus, Erebus obscures the view from McMurdo itself.) The traffic to BI (telephony and data/internet) goes over a microwave link. When I was there we did helo and GPS surveys with NASA of areas closer to MacTown to try to find a place to build an earthstation that could be linked by fiber, for greater bandwidth. No one had yet figured out how to keep fiber alive atop shifting ice in those conditions.
I can't cite patent numbers of prior art, because every prior creator felt it was too obvious to patent.
m l
However, if their patents do in fact claim ownership of tranferring compressed digital media over a medium (let's be as vague in our patent claims as possible!) in less than real-time, to a device, for later viewing in real time, then they're sunk.
How about downloading compressed true-color (12-bit) animations (some synthetic 3D, some actual captured video, not that it matters) from BBSes (and even the fledgling Internet). These 5-second clips often took an hour to download, so we'd leave the modem going and let the BBS idle-disconnect us, frequently going to bed while it DLed.
Later, you'd watch the (pitifully crude by today's standards) animation in awe.
One such early delta-compressed video clip has been converted into a more modern format. It, and the excruciatingly well-documented history of such media, is found at:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/erniew/juggler.ht
I encourage any of the Acacia defendents to have their legal staff examine the prior art documented here very seriously.
You fell victim to one of the classic blunders.
The most famous is: Never get involved in a land war in Asia.
Only slightly less well known is this:
Never go in against a geek when technology is on the line.
Original quote from The Princess Bride.
Everything I've ready by Williams rocked. He did Cyberpunk better than almost any other. The only book that comes close to Hardwired was Bad Voltage.
I too own one of the Doctor series disk polishing devices. As far as I can tell they're all basically the same. I am very happy with it, and have used it to resurrect a number of worn CDs of mine so I could rip them. They weren't all perfect when I was finished, but they were much better, good enough to rip.
I have not tried it with and data CD-ROMs, as I tend to take better care of those.
Following the instructions properly (about using water to lubricate the polishing wheel) and buffing the polished disk with the white abrasive pad are both critical to success.
I wouldn't recommend it for volume work. It is manual labor, and your arm can get very tired after a few disks.
There are commercial disk-polishing and cleaning operations. In quantity of less than 100 disks per batch they were >$3 per disk though, so it would add up.
See, I have a bit of an objection to this. I feel too many people will mark down a UI because it's 'non-standard'. What few take the time to realize is that most modern UI design principles were created by those envisioning making word processors and spreadsheets and maybe paint programs and databases.
These interface paradigms are _not_ necessarily the best choice for rapidly interacting with sophisticated 3D environments. Lightwave, Max, Maya and SoftImage all have utilized UI concepts far from the norm (Marking Menus, Views, widgets that capture the input focus for various purposes). Most of these are in violation of one or more conventional UI design 'guidelines' on one platform or another.
This does not mean they're wrong. In fact, most of the users of these programs, once they've mastered and understood the underlying rationale for the violations, embrace the new methods and love them. Before long, you won't be able to pry them from their cold dead clutching mouse-fingers.
As a cross-platform developer, I try to make my application look and feel as much like the 'native' L&F as possible. But sometimes it's just not proper. It makes no sense to use convention menu layouts and UI principles when you're not working with a 'document' in the normal sense.
Also, we strive to allow our customers the maximum freedom of choice for platforms. We want to allow them to migrate between Windows and Mac (and possibly Linux, SGI, etc and some of us even did BeOS and Amiga). To this end, it's necessary to unify the placement and behavior of all controls. What if you bought a tutorial book and found it was unusable because all the controls were different because it was written for a different platform?
Programs like A:W Maya, Lightwave and SoftImage are more redily portable to Mac or Windows or Linux because they have built their own UI toolkit, which allows them to ensure consistent behavior on all platforms once they've ported the underlying toolkit. It's much easier that way, than for those of us that do not use such a toolkit and maintain ports to multiple platforms. The downside is because they look the same everywhere, they usually don't look 'native'.
All I ask is that end-users understand that support for multiple platforms is a Good Thing, but often it requires UI standardization concessions that make such an app not always look & feel like MS Word or Photoshop on the native platform.
If you want an example of UI platform abstraction taken to an extreme, look at the Metatools/Metacreations UI, specifically Bryce. Looks the same -- like no computer UI ever shipped -- on every platform they've ever supported.
I've been following the Newtek/Luxology spectacle for a while, and I would not call it a bitter divorce. For purposes of ensuring their continued viability should Newtek be bought out by someone, the Lightwave programmers decided to clarify what has been the case all along. Newtek does not develop or own Lightwave. Newtek is the exclusive publisher of Lightwave. This has been the case all along. Lightwave is developed and owned by a small group of programmers, who now call themselves Luxology.
There have been hints that Luxology might develop some 3D software of their own that would not be published through Newtek. I believe this is probably true, but it doesn't mean it will compete with LW, or that LW is dead. In fact, I suspect they are probably contractually prohibited from competing with Newtek/LW.
I have used LW since version 1.0 on the Amiga, and have used it on (nearly) every platform they've made it for (except the short-lived Sun and SGI ports). I think LW is an excellent all around package, and is generally a great modeller and renderer, as well as being powerful but easily learned. The polygonal modelling tools are considered some of the best in the industry both for realistic work and for realtime games modelling.
I have used 3DSMax since Max V1 (never used 3DS for DOS). It's also a good program, and very powerful and extensible. It has a strong following in the Architectural and CAD fields (due to the tie-ins with AutoCAD) and games industries (because of GMax). People with Cad/Drafting experience find it more intuitive than LW. People without this kind of background often find Max to be rigid and unintuitive compared to LW.
Maxon Cinema 4D, Hash Animation Master, Realsoft 3D, Strata, Carrara, Truespace and a handful of others all occupy a tier in the market where you get a heck of a lot of great features for a great price. Generally there is something percieved about each of these programs that makes people exclude them for 'professional' work. Often, this is complete bunk. You can get the job done with most any modern package, but some do make getting the end result easier. In any case, they're great for starters, and learning, and you can always buy something pricier later if/when you feel you have outgrown the capabilities you have.
Maya and SoftImage used to be the Kings of the industry. Max and Lightwave have steadily carved the foundation out from under this preconceived notion, and a lot of top-end work is now done in LW and Max. Nonetheless, there Big Guys do still have some edges. They are generally more expandable, scriptable, customizable and plugin-able. They often let you get deeper into the guts of the system than the other packages. This comes with a cost though -- it makes the programs very complex, and many find SI and AW:Maya to be difficult and overwhelming at first. Many people 'graduate' to the big guys after years of being happy with the functionality of other programs. SI and AW:Maya used to be very expensive, but market forces have slashed the prices of all 3D software recently, making this less of an issue.
ElectricImage has been a Mac program all along, but appears to be on unsound ground -- not even sure who owns them now (Play?) and if it's being developed.
MacOSX concerns: I know LW, Hash A:M, EI, MaxonC4D are all available now with varying degrees of Mac-ishness. I thought either SI or A:W Maya was coming, but don't remember which, or when. 3DSMax (or its sister package 3DSViz) will never be Mac because they're built entirely around Windows MFC. They couldn't even get a port to DEC Alpha WinNT to work. Not sure where Strata, Carrara, Real or Truespace stand as far as Mac ports. Also, most cross-platform apps (LW, SI, AW:Maya) have their own look & feel to be consistent with themselves on all platforms. This means they don't look like the UI-du-jour of any particular platform. Many people claim this is a Very Bad Thing, but as a cross-platform developer myself, I disagree somewhat. Don't let this be your sole deciding factor.
Oh, and shameless self-promotion: If you want to do landscapes, check out my software, World Construction Set. We even have a Mac version, though it's not MacOSX yet.
I have to put in my two-cents here. I think if you're interested in landscape rendering, you should compare all the options. Bryce, Vue d'Esprit, World Builder, and my own software, World Construction Set.