About 450 disks? We find about 100 disks ever semester. One time I built a Depth 2 Menger Sponge out of the floppy disks. It's a type of 3D fractal. Unfortunately, the tape didn't hold and the whole thing fell apart. It was quite impressive while it lasted though.
Let's say I'm going on a vacation with my digital camera for two weeks (which I have). Would I rather carry around just the camera, or a stack of 100 floppy disks? One disk is about equal to 1, 128MB memory card. It's already hard carrying luggage around on trips, having a seperate bag for floppy disks wouldn't help.
It's only cheap if the data you are putting on it is cheap. Almost everyday I hear complaints about people losing their assignments, and all because they relied on saving it to a floppy disk. It's especially bad because you can't tell what physical condition the disks are in. At least with a CD you can see scratches and fingerprints that could indicate that the data needs to be moved before it is completely gone.
Actually, any laptop with a PCMCIA (PC Card) slot, which is basically all laptops, can read CF cards with a $15 adapter. I would suspect that floppy disks will disapear in laptops first before the desktop market, as the space is more precious.
You're paying to much for that CF card. You can get 128MB for about $60 or less now bringing the cost to $0.47/MB. Add to that better data reliablity, MUCH greater speed, and total storage capacity per unit the cost trade off is worth it. I have seen so much data lost to floppy drives that I think it is much more expensive that almost any other storage media.
How about compact flash cards or some other solid state media? I'm sure they could start to manufacture memory cards for far less than a zip disk costs now. All laptops can already read memory cards now, and many desktop PC's are starting to come with the card readers on the front of the case.
I never understood why Sony ever went with Floppy disks for digital cameras. With the new 4Mega pixel cameras, you probably couldn't even store 1 high resolution picture on one disk. Compact flash should definitely replace floppy drives as soon as possible. The media is smaller, faster, and it stores at least 100 times as much data.
'BonzaiCometGators' Those programs have been constantly installed on our computer lab systems that run Windows NT. Apparently, there is no possible way to prevent software from being installed on the local systems and starting up automatically. Even if the user does not have any admin passwords they can still install junk programs on the machines. We end up having to reimage systems all the time because of this.
Right. You can waste your CPU time and elecricity proving that encryption works:) at www.distributed.net. I say they would be able to finish a RC5-80 contest long before life on any other planet is found with SETI.
Re:Take Canada's Example
on
Fair IP Laws?
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· Score: 1
I have had a CDRW for years now and I have never used it for making illegal copies of software. I only use it to back up my important data, or to give friends copies of pictures I have taken. Why should I start paying an additional fee on something to support the illegal activities of others? If I'm paying extra money on CDR media so that other people can have free copies of audio CD's from friends, isn't that a form of socialism?
I think it should be the opposite. If people are caught copying music on a large scale they should pay a large fine and that money should be used to lower the costs of legally purchased software.
Yup, the internet has greatly contributed to more wasted paper. Our computer lab here goes through about 50 reams (25,000 sheets) of paper each week. I think at least half of that is just websites or PDF files printed from the net.
I think I remember reading in New Scientist an analisys of weather predictions vs. chaos. What they found was that it wasn't chaos that was causing weather to be predicted incorrectly, but the models that were actually used to make the predictions. They say that otherwise, it should be possible to predict weather almost perfectly accurately quite a few days in advance.
I wouldn't put to much faith in this simulation that they are proposing. It doesn't matter how much computing power you have, if your model isn't accurate and it doesn't account for EVERYTHING, you are not going to get good results.
It takes me about 3 years to go through a full toner cartridge for an HP LaserJet 4L. I think they are pretty affordable when you compare them to the cost of inkjet replacements.
Resale value? Yes, maybe if you have a Mac in an unopened box and it is 20 years old, you might be able to sell it on E-bay and make a nice profit. Or just save the computer box. People have sold those on E-bay for more than the price of the original computer:)
If you vote for your representatives based on what they think of MP3's/Copyright law that's just ridicules. There are FAR more important issues facing this country right now. Just search for his voting record in congress and see if you actually believe in what he votes for.
I find that most people don't understand encryption very well. I would use encryption everyday if I knew other people who actually had PGP or GPG. People would rather just talk over the phone as if that was actually secure, but it's even less so with todays cellular phone network. I think another problem is most people are more afraid of forgetting their passphrase. PGP requires a very long passphrase for adequate encryption.
Yes, they are already starting to put many of the same taxes on cell phones as exist on regular phones. I notice an extra charge on mine each month that seems to be at least a 5% tax. This kind of thing will probably continue forever until someone finally decides to dismantle the bureaucracy. All those itemized $0.50 fees add up.
Next thing you know, they will put a universal texting charge. A $0.01 tax on each text message sent so that people in rural areas can send text messages.:)
I use my "for spam only" hotmail account. It's funny how the so called spam filters on hotmail won't filter very obvious spam messages. It makes you wonder.
Even spam from a company that I have bought stuff from bothers me. If I was really interested in buying something from them, I would go to their website. They don't need to constantly nag me about stuff I don't want.
just a quick question about the rang() function. If you have a for loop with range(1000000) will it actually reserve that much memory just to do a long for loop, or is range interperetted like a counter?
I agree with you. As a CE major, I've found that doing things in Java is just so much easier than C++. Class templates work, but the syntax is far to complex and troublesome. I also like that java includes good standard libary files for doing things you would most often do.
Java's documentation is also very well done. Everything is documented in a consistant manner as a plain old HTML file. With Visual C++, trying to find ANYTHING on MSDN is a nightmare and it requires a huge installation.
I haven't seen any embedded products that actually run on java. It's a good idea, but I think there is too much overhead in the language for it to be very successful in that market. Most people who program micro controllers either use the native assembly language, or a compiled C version. The goal of embedded design isn't really to make elegant re-usable code, but to make one product that does something fast with as little code as possible.
I think the problem is mostly from the analog input to most digital flat panels. If one of the signal lines gets degraded on the way to the monitor it be slightly off color. So it's not the LCD but probably the decoding circuitry or the analog line.
Wouldn't a digital camera have been much easier for this? Just hook it up to a PC Card Type 3 hard drive and store a few Gb of pictures at a time instead of loading film every 36 miles.
Re:1 one-thousand, 2 one-thousand, ....
on
Deep Algorithms?
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· Score: 1
The counting. Actually, I'm sure most of the time is spent processing the PRINT statement. It is also an interpretted language so that further slows it down.
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About 450 disks? We find about 100 disks ever semester. One time I built a Depth 2 Menger Sponge out of the floppy disks. It's a type of 3D fractal. Unfortunately, the tape didn't hold and the whole thing fell apart. It was quite impressive while it lasted though.
Let's say I'm going on a vacation with my digital camera for two weeks (which I have). Would I rather carry around just the camera, or a stack of 100 floppy disks? One disk is about equal to 1, 128MB memory card. It's already hard carrying luggage around on trips, having a seperate bag for floppy disks wouldn't help.
It's only cheap if the data you are putting on it is cheap. Almost everyday I hear complaints about people losing their assignments, and all because they relied on saving it to a floppy disk. It's especially bad because you can't tell what physical condition the disks are in. At least with a CD you can see scratches and fingerprints that could indicate that the data needs to be moved before it is completely gone.
Actually, any laptop with a PCMCIA (PC Card) slot, which is basically all laptops, can read CF cards with a $15 adapter. I would suspect that floppy disks will disapear in laptops first before the desktop market, as the space is more precious.
You're paying to much for that CF card. You can get 128MB for about $60 or less now bringing the cost to $0.47/MB. Add to that better data reliablity, MUCH greater speed, and total storage capacity per unit the cost trade off is worth it. I have seen so much data lost to floppy drives that I think it is much more expensive that almost any other storage media.
How about compact flash cards or some other solid state media? I'm sure they could start to manufacture memory cards for far less than a zip disk costs now. All laptops can already read memory cards now, and many desktop PC's are starting to come with the card readers on the front of the case.
I never understood why Sony ever went with Floppy disks for digital cameras. With the new 4Mega pixel cameras, you probably couldn't even store 1 high resolution picture on one disk. Compact flash should definitely replace floppy drives as soon as possible. The media is smaller, faster, and it stores at least 100 times as much data.
I agree. Fitaly is like Dvorak for pen based input. It's designed to be more efficient. There are other input programs out there too that can help.
I wouldn't buy any handheld unit with a keyboard unless it allows me to change the keyboard layout.
'BonzaiCometGators' Those programs have been constantly installed on our computer lab systems that run Windows NT. Apparently, there is no possible way to prevent software from being installed on the local systems and starting up automatically. Even if the user does not have any admin passwords they can still install junk programs on the machines. We end up having to reimage systems all the time because of this.
Right. You can waste your CPU time and elecricity proving that encryption works :) at www.distributed.net. I say they would be able to finish a RC5-80 contest long before life on any other planet is found with SETI.
I have had a CDRW for years now and I have never used it for making illegal copies of software. I only use it to back up my important data, or to give friends copies of pictures I have taken. Why should I start paying an additional fee on something to support the illegal activities of others? If I'm paying extra money on CDR media so that other people can have free copies of audio CD's from friends, isn't that a form of socialism?
I think it should be the opposite. If people are caught copying music on a large scale they should pay a large fine and that money should be used to lower the costs of legally purchased software.
Yup, the internet has greatly contributed to more wasted paper. Our computer lab here goes through about 50 reams (25,000 sheets) of paper each week. I think at least half of that is just websites or PDF files printed from the net.
I think I remember reading in New Scientist an analisys of weather predictions vs. chaos. What they found was that it wasn't chaos that was causing weather to be predicted incorrectly, but the models that were actually used to make the predictions. They say that otherwise, it should be possible to predict weather almost perfectly accurately quite a few days in advance.
I wouldn't put to much faith in this simulation that they are proposing. It doesn't matter how much computing power you have, if your model isn't accurate and it doesn't account for EVERYTHING, you are not going to get good results.
It takes me about 3 years to go through a full toner cartridge for an HP LaserJet 4L. I think they are pretty affordable when you compare them to the cost of inkjet replacements.
Resale value? Yes, maybe if you have a Mac in an unopened box and it is 20 years old, you might be able to sell it on E-bay and make a nice profit. Or just save the computer box. People have sold those on E-bay for more than the price of the original computer :)
If you vote for your representatives based on what they think of MP3's/Copyright law that's just ridicules. There are FAR more important issues facing this country right now. Just search for his voting record in congress and see if you actually believe in what he votes for.
I find that most people don't understand encryption very well. I would use encryption everyday if I knew other people who actually had PGP or GPG. People would rather just talk over the phone as if that was actually secure, but it's even less so with todays cellular phone network. I think another problem is most people are more afraid of forgetting their passphrase. PGP requires a very long passphrase for adequate encryption.
Yes, they are already starting to put many of the same taxes on cell phones as exist on regular phones. I notice an extra charge on mine each month that seems to be at least a 5% tax. This kind of thing will probably continue forever until someone finally decides to dismantle the bureaucracy. All those itemized $0.50 fees add up.
:)
Next thing you know, they will put a universal texting charge. A $0.01 tax on each text message sent so that people in rural areas can send text messages.
I use my "for spam only" hotmail account. It's funny how the so called spam filters on hotmail won't filter very obvious spam messages. It makes you wonder. Even spam from a company that I have bought stuff from bothers me. If I was really interested in buying something from them, I would go to their website. They don't need to constantly nag me about stuff I don't want.
just a quick question about the rang() function. If you have a for loop with range(1000000) will it actually reserve that much memory just to do a long for loop, or is range interperetted like a counter?
I agree with you. As a CE major, I've found that doing things in Java is just so much easier than C++. Class templates work, but the syntax is far to complex and troublesome. I also like that java includes good standard libary files for doing things you would most often do.
Java's documentation is also very well done. Everything is documented in a consistant manner as a plain old HTML file. With Visual C++, trying to find ANYTHING on MSDN is a nightmare and it requires a huge installation.
I haven't seen any embedded products that actually run on java. It's a good idea, but I think there is too much overhead in the language for it to be very successful in that market. Most people who program micro controllers either use the native assembly language, or a compiled C version. The goal of embedded design isn't really to make elegant re-usable code, but to make one product that does something fast with as little code as possible.
I think the problem is mostly from the analog input to most digital flat panels. If one of the signal lines gets degraded on the way to the monitor it be slightly off color. So it's not the LCD but probably the decoding circuitry or the analog line.
Wouldn't a digital camera have been much easier for this? Just hook it up to a PC Card Type 3 hard drive and store a few Gb of pictures at a time instead of loading film every 36 miles.
The counting. Actually, I'm sure most of the time is spent processing the PRINT statement. It is also an interpretted language so that further slows it down.