99 cents for an AAC track with Fairplay that will only play on one particular kind of portable music player and will suddenly cease to be functional after your operating system is upgraded or re-installed 5 times, on the other hand, is unsurprisingly much less popular.
You can reset the computers authorized to play the content by going to the "Store" menu and selecting "Deauthorize Computer". On your user page, you can Deauthorize All Computers to get your 5 systems back; this can be done once a year. (I assume to avoid abusing the 5 computer limit...)
Um... gigabits per square centimeter is a horrible storage density metric. We need to deal with volume - unless we suddenly moved to a 2-dimensional universe - and even volume isn't perfect. For a drive platter do you only count the magnetic medium, or the underlying material as well? What about the space between platters or the read/write mechanism? I could have great storage density, but it wouldn't do me much good if I needed an entire scanning tunneling microscoope to read it.
At Iowa State University we have wireless over our entire campus - including our 50 acre central campus green. Here is a map that shows all of the APs. The overall service is really good - both for signal strength and bandwidth.
If we think that both aspects - tradesmen and thinkers - are important, then we should train for both. I think the problem is that people focus far too much on what can be done in a 4-year program. Why are we limiting ourselves to those 4 years? An M.D. spends 3-4 years in a pre-med program, then 4 years in a medical school and then 3-7 years in residency. Why don't we increase the requirements to become a professional engineer?
We could keep a 4-year program at a University for the general background edcuation and any breadth requirements and then throw in a 2 year specialization program where you would learn the specifics of your engineering discipline. Once completed, you would go work at an engineering firm and complete a multi-year internship/residency/experiential program. This would allow a focus on "thinking" in university and picking up the tradesmen aspect at the engineering firm. I admit this would make education more expensive, and reduce the number of engineers, but it would probably create better engineers at the end of the program.
We could also change the titles so that completing the 4-year program makes you a General Engineer, the 2-year specialization a Engineer, (Computer Engineer, Chemical Engineer, etc.), and then a Professional Engineer.
I agree with your 2 categories of artifacts that could last that long. I should have added "non-trivial" to the description.
The problem with using people as the repair system on the ship is that they will still need infrastructure to work with. While we can keep large clocks in service, we need a machine shop, (or Ye Olde Blacksmith shop), to construct any parts or at least as the source of the material to make the parts. If they need materials, they rely on smelters, which rely on mines, etc. You can add redundancy to the system but, as things wear, spare parts run out. Imagine the size of a ship that would include an entire infrastructure.
Additionally, we can't be sure that the people themselves would survive the trip. We know, for humans, that there are side-effects from extended periods in low gravity plus there is the risk from radiation. While we can't guess as to the genetic makeup of any aliens, humans would need a large population, probably hundreds, to be genetically viable over even a few generations. To colonize a planet we would want thousands of people to ensure there was enough genetic diversity. Now the colonization ship would have to be monstrous, millions of tons at least, which would mean it is a LOT harder to accelerate to any meaningful velocity.
I agree that there would be enough volunteers for a one-way trip but being able to actually send the volunteers, and have them arrive in good health, would be the hard part.
I am surprised at how many comments there are dimissing this paper as using poor assumptions, being poorly thought out or lacking imagination.
First, why should we assume that the aliens would have god-like technology? The paper addresses a 1000x increase in speed for the probes and assumes they would incredibly well-engineered to not fail after thousands or millions of years. That seems like pretty advanced technology. I don't know of anything that we have built that would last 1000 years without some sort of maintenance or intervention. Sure, we could assume there are repair systems on board, but what repairs the repair system? Even if we ignore that, where does it get the materials to make repairs if something happens between solar systems?
Second, why would there be an urge to send thousands or millions of these probes? If the probes are going to be strong enough to survive, smart enough to avoid problems during the trip and detect any signs of intelligence/civilization they are probably fairly expensive and difficult to make. Sure, we can imagine a technological society where manufacturing is automated to the point where robots land on an asteroid, mine it, construct factories and shiny new probes are made, but this assumes a very high level of technology. While we may have an idea how to do it, we are absolutely nowhere near the technology required to actually do it.
Finally, remember that all solar systems aren't on a nice straight line and that you would actually have to maneuver to go near them and check for signs of civilization. Sure, we could fix that by using many more probes, but see paragraph #2. There is also some diminishing returns with this approach. You could make enough probes so there is 1 per solar system, but having half that many that steer slightly to visit 2 systems is probably cheaper. So, imagine all the acceleration that needs to occur for this to occur - which means more fuel and a lot of time spent at lower velocities.
Instead of pointing to video games or science fiction shows for the "right way" to do this, how about applying some real-world assumptions? I mean assuming that the aliens exist in the first place, (although it seems likely), have god-like tech and FTL, and would want to devote all of their resources to searching the galaxy seems pretty unreasonable to me. However, having moderately better tech and devoting a moderate amount of resources (in the number of probes) seems like reasonable assumptions to me.
There was a paper published about this years ago. The title of the paper is: Penetration Analysis of a XEROX Docucenter DC 230ST: Assessing the Security of a Multi-purpose Office Machine. link PDF Warning
But I have a G4, 1.33 GHz. Got it just after Apple announced the Macbook and stopped boasting about battery life.
There is no comparison between a G4 and a MacBook, let alone a MacBook Pro. The new systems are much, much faster. Remember, the G4s were dated even before the switch to Intel was announced, let alone completed.
Bollocks to you, this is about my Country. I do not agree with you at all.
That's fine, you don't have to. However, if you would like to learn a few things, I would recommend you read this. It does a nice comparison between coal and nuclear including a comparison of radioactive wastes (broken down by type), radiation exposure and consumption levels. It also points out how various regimes could use coal to get their weapons grade material.
Now, you can choose not to believe a scientist from Oak Ridge National Labs, but they are experts in the field. If you still don't believe them, check their references.
You obviously have no idea what you are talking about.
Fission power generates nuclear waste which I think we can all agree is bad.
I don't agree. A lot of people don't agree. Sure, I would prefer if there were no waste. However, the fact that there is waste doesn't instantly make it a bad thing. It actually creates less nuclear waste than burning coal. Also, from a scientific/engineering view, it is easy to handle. It is politics that gets in the way of handling this problem - no one wants a "nuclear waste dump" in their state/country. Heaven forbid we grind the waste into dust, mix it with a million tons of sand and sprinkle it across the entire Atlantic. We would irradiate all the fish! Right. Like a few tons of waste would completely irradiate the Atlantic. Just so you know, the estimate of Uranium that is dissolved in seawater is 4,300,000,000 metric tons.
If we could create Fusion power it would have its own problems, like our hydrogen supply would be used up in quick order.
Right... We are going to use up our supply of the most abundant element in the universe. Do you know what water (H2O) is made of?
Look, I agree with you that there are costs associated every type of power generation. Just make sure you have an idea of what those costs are before you talk about them. It is uninformed opions that have held back a lot of advances in power generation. Just look how a lot of people are starting to push nuclear power again. It is safe, clean and scalable. People need to realize that advances have been made and the dangers everyone is afraid of don't exist anymore.
You also lose half of your Q-bits at each repeater. Since it relies on the sender and receiver being in-phase with each other, there is a 50% chance they aren't and what the receiver detects is worthless. (Either + or x configuration.) So if we have 3 "routers" we only end up with 1/16 of the key bits originally sent - 1/(2^4) - since we also have to count the receiver as missing half of the bits.
If we are talking a New York to Los Angeles connection, with only 120km per link, we would need at least 30 repeaters so would get 1/1000000000 of the bits through. Definitely NOT a long range solution.
6. "Engineering" software and "programming" are more different than you realize.
Both should involve a formal process (although not all processes which people have in place are constructive or even useful). However, real "engineering" seems to rarely apply to software development. I still haven't decided if that's a good thing or a bad thing overall.
There is no good comparison between engineering and programming. Analogy: A general construction worker can design and build a garage and maybe a house. However, they shouldn't design and build a 30-story building or a large bridge or even a highway overpass. The skills and methodologies are there for a reason. With that said, not every job requires an engineer. If I want to build a shed in my backyard, I will do it myself.
The problem with engineering is it takes a lot of time, effort and specialized knowledge. If you don't have the time or money for the engineering process, you can't use it. If your requirements are changing, you can't use the engineering process. You can't call up an engineer and tell them you want the 30-story building to be 50-stories and include a bridge - unless you are willing to have them start over. So, for most software out there, engineering is a non-issue.
Now, in those cases where you are spending millions, or even billions, of dollars on a software project, you better not forget the engineering process. I don't mean you need some engineering for the design - I mean engineering down to the guy who writes the documentation. If a small problem can hold up a billion dollar project, you are in trouble. I've seen a multi-billion dollar project get delayed because of bad documentation - the internal, but independent, lab had trouble getting started on their testing because the documentation wasn't correct.
So, engineering IS a good thing - in the right environment. However, you don't use a bulldozer to dig holes for your tomato plants, so don't use an engineering process when you can't use it properly. If you try, you'll get the added overhead without any of the benefits.
Our professor, along with a guest lecturer who runs the Career Management Offices (or something like that), both said that many jobs now are offering contracts that will "promise" to allow for engineers to stay in engineering and not get bumped to management, while also getting continued pay raises and promotions, so they aren't just getting stuck in engineering with no chance for advancement.
The problem that I've seen is that there is the opportunity to stay in engineering, but there aren't as many opportunities. There may be 2 or 3 technical/engineering spots in the upper management areas, but there are 10x as many "regular" spots. So, yes - you can get raises and promotions staying on a technical track, but not as much or as fast as on a more traditional management track.
When I was in the U.S. Marines, we used a low-tech, low-cost solution that was used in Vietnam...
We would tie a string to the end of our M16 or a long, thin stick, and have it hang to the ground. You move forward slowly and watch the string. If it stops hanging straight down, you need to stop moving forward and find out what is blocking the string.
The advantage is that it forces you to move more deliberately that just shooting silly string. The downside is you are right next to the tripwire when you find it.
One thing colleges have to accept is that they need to make their students employable once they have completed their degrees. If the students can't get jobs, then no one is going to go to that school to get their degree. The result of this is schools must spend time teaaching how to program in a specific language. It would also be nice to learn about Operating Systems in general instead of learning a specific one. Unfortunately, this doesn't work either. If a company uses Visual Studio, they aren't going to hire you and train you on it. They are going to look for Visual Studio experience on the resume.
What skills are taught is largely a function of what types of industry are in the area. In Des Moines, there are a large number of Insurance Companies, so COBOL is used. If you know Java, C++ and Scheme, you can learn COBOL fairly easily. However, they want a COBOL programmer and not someone they can train to use COBOL. I doubt there is a high demand for COBOL in Silicon Valley, (but I could be wrong). In some cities, there is a single major employer. If you are in Rochester, MN there is the Mayo Clinic and IBM. If you are targetting IBM, (depending on department), you should have some Linux experience. I don't know what Mayo uses, but it's healthcare so there is probably a stronger focus on Microsoft products.
So, while it would be great to teach WHY, reality says you also have to teach HOW. Sure, some schools with an incredibly strong reputation (MIT) can get away without the HOW, most schools can't.
They are thinking that if it breaks at all then they are in trouble, where as if it breaks with a currently supported hardware/software then they have someone to call, even if vender support can't do anything.
I disagree with your underlying premise: No one would want to actually fix the problem.
Imagine that you are responsible for a large financial network that handles billions of dollars every day. Now, if there is a new vulnerability discovered, do you want someone to whine to, blame and cover your ass, or do you want to fix the problem? Yes, there are some people who want think CYA. Others, who are paid very well for actually getting stuff done, want to do something. If it is third-party software, if you want to fix the problem, you have to work with the vender. However, if the vendor has warned you that support will end, there is now no way to fix the problem. This could lead you to a risky upgrade, ON YOUR OWN TERMS, instead of having a critical vulnerability and having to rush through the upgrade.
Yes it's illogical, no it makes little to no sence. I agree that just sticking with what works is usually the most inexpensive, and best choice.
It all depends on the situation. Sometimes sticking with what works will cost more and, even if it is cheaper, isn't the best choice. In the financial case, weigh the risk of a controlled problem as compared to the risk of an unfixable vulnerability that doesn't have a workaround. If there are billions at risk every day, you can't gamble on no critical vulnerabilities showing up.
While full-time testers are often made fun of, ("Those who can't code, test."), or it is considered a secondary role that developers can perform on their own, there is no replacement for an experienced tester.
Testing is an important part of the development process. If you have an expensive and complex application, do yourself a favor, and hire a test team. Don't try to do it yourself, unless you have no choice. You may do an OK job of it, but it sounds like you don't have the experience to do it properly. This isn't a critique of your skills, it is a fact that you have a different skillset. You don't expect an embedded programmer to develop web apps or vice-versa. Could they do it? Sure. But it will be a long and difficult road as they make the mistakes an experienced person already known how to avoid.
If you have decided that comprehensive testing is important, (and some people decide it isn't), then do the right thing and get professional (test) help.
If an M16 is jamming a lot it is the fault of the operator for not properly maintaining it.
I am a former U.S. Marine infantryman and I have put thousands of rounds through various M16s. I had 3 or 4 jams in 4 years and one was from a bad magazine. (It had a bad spring and didn't feed the last round properly.)
Does the M16 require more maintenance than an AK-47? Yes. However, it only needs a 2 minute cleaning 2-3 times a day, (we usually did it when we grabbed something to eat, or before getting some sleep). This was in the field with mud, sand and rain.
So, people who are complaining that the M16 jams a lot need to think about what they are doing wrong and not what the weapon is doing wrong. Do you expect your car to work if you don't change the oil or clean it every so often? Why would you expect a firearm to work if you don't do the same thing?
I would like to think that I am not a techno idiot - I am working on my Ph.D. in computer engineering so I have to read and review a lot of technical papers. However, I am not sure how I (or anyone else) would teach someone how to judge web pages in an entire semester, let alone a single class period.
I have seen a couple of lists on how to judge a site. The one from Cornell has points like:
Is the author different than the webmaster?
What URL/domain is used?
Is it an information page or an advertisesment?
Modified date/is it current?
Are the links correct and match the page?
Sure, these are nice - but they hardly apply everywhere. There are a lot of things in the sciences that haven't changed, so a date of 1998 hardly impacts the validity of the page. There are also a lot of old pages with broken links. Still doesn't impact their information. This happens quite a bit when you find a white paper and an organization decided to redesign their entire site. You can still find the paper through Google, but the old URL is useless.
Same problem with requiring contact information for the author. A lot of government agencies only list the webmaster as a contact in the page footer. Does that mean the page is invalid? No. It means that government sources don't have specific authors. A USDA report is still a USDA report even if it is 5 years old, doesn't list an author and has broken links. How do we teach when the rules don't matter?
I think the problem is people are trying to come up with rules to apply, and there are a lot of exceptions. Remember Dihydrogen Monoxide? it was a complete joke - but the site "passed" the criteria. So it must be a valid source. Right? If people were trained to think on their own, instead of being taught how to apply rules, I think we would be better off.
The "dirsuption of the gulf stream" is pure journalistic gibberish. It is dynamically impossible according to basic theorems in physical oceanography.
What are these theories? Is there a reference to them?
I can give a link to a story where a Cambridge ocean physics professor is concerned that the Gulf Stream is slowing because some of the "chimneys" that help power the Gulf Stream are disappearing. There used to be 12 of them and now there are 2 of them. Does slowing count as disruption? This professor has been working in the Arctic for 30+ years so would be pretty familiar with historical trends. He is concerned Northern Eurpoe might not get as much heat as it used to.
I agree. However, we can't install password cracking software on even a single machine in our labs since it is a security risk. Installing it on the supercomputer is OK since no one else has access to it during that time period.
Besides, if you had a TOP500 supercomputer sitting around, wouldn't you use it? Just for fun? Just for the nerd factor? Because you could?
We have #141 on the list at Iowa State and we booked time on it so it could be used as a password cracker at one of our Cyber Defense Competitions.
I don't know if it actually got used, or if it was deemed "unfair" for the red team (attackers) to use it. It would have been pretty sweet if they were allowed to.
These competitions are pretty cool, and have some pretty good challenges like the red team pulling the fire alarm at 3:00AM, forcing the blue team (defenders) to evacuate the building. More info can be found at the ISU Information Assurance Student Group website, or the competition website.
My only question is whether or not hydrogen scales well enough to power airplanes or ships.
Yes.
Planes: We can have them carry fewer passengers and we can make them out of lighter materials. As a last resort we can just fly slower - which would really save fuel. The problem is it would make it more expensive to fly - like it was 50 - 60 years ago.
Ships: There are some plans for using giant kites to replace sails and reduce fuel consumption. Also, we used wind power long before we knew how to make the internal combustion engine. It might not be as convenient or as fast, but we would have them just the same.
I think the real question is: Can we maintain our current levels of convenience and speed using hydrogen?
I think the answer is yes. We might lose a little bit of capacity but that can be handled by reducing luggage allowances by a few pounds per passenger. For a ship, the ratio of their fuel to their cargo is small, (ships can carry a LOT of weight), so losing a few tons to carry more fuel is nothing.
There might be some increased risk by having giant tanks of liquid hydrogen installed on a plane or a ship but, as someone pointed out before (too lazy to find it), when a hydrogen tank ruptures, the dangerous gas goes away. It doesn't sit in a pool and continue burning like gasoline does.
Slashdot Mirror
99 cents for an AAC track with Fairplay that will only play on one particular kind of portable music player and will suddenly cease to be functional after your operating system is upgraded or re-installed 5 times, on the other hand, is unsurprisingly much less popular.
You can reset the computers authorized to play the content by going to the "Store" menu and selecting "Deauthorize Computer". On your user page, you can Deauthorize All Computers to get your 5 systems back; this can be done once a year. (I assume to avoid abusing the 5 computer limit...)
Um... gigabits per square centimeter is a horrible storage density metric. We need to deal with volume - unless we suddenly moved to a 2-dimensional universe - and even volume isn't perfect. For a drive platter do you only count the magnetic medium, or the underlying material as well? What about the space between platters or the read/write mechanism? I could have great storage density, but it wouldn't do me much good if I needed an entire scanning tunneling microscoope to read it.
At Iowa State University we have wireless over our entire campus - including our 50 acre central campus green. Here is a map that shows all of the APs. The overall service is really good - both for signal strength and bandwidth.
If we think that both aspects - tradesmen and thinkers - are important, then we should train for both. I think the problem is that people focus far too much on what can be done in a 4-year program. Why are we limiting ourselves to those 4 years? An M.D. spends 3-4 years in a pre-med program, then 4 years in a medical school and then 3-7 years in residency. Why don't we increase the requirements to become a professional engineer?
We could keep a 4-year program at a University for the general background edcuation and any breadth requirements and then throw in a 2 year specialization program where you would learn the specifics of your engineering discipline. Once completed, you would go work at an engineering firm and complete a multi-year internship/residency/experiential program. This would allow a focus on "thinking" in university and picking up the tradesmen aspect at the engineering firm. I admit this would make education more expensive, and reduce the number of engineers, but it would probably create better engineers at the end of the program.
We could also change the titles so that completing the 4-year program makes you a General Engineer, the 2-year specialization a Engineer, (Computer Engineer, Chemical Engineer, etc.), and then a Professional Engineer.
I agree with your 2 categories of artifacts that could last that long. I should have added "non-trivial" to the description.
The problem with using people as the repair system on the ship is that they will still need infrastructure to work with. While we can keep large clocks in service, we need a machine shop, (or Ye Olde Blacksmith shop), to construct any parts or at least as the source of the material to make the parts. If they need materials, they rely on smelters, which rely on mines, etc. You can add redundancy to the system but, as things wear, spare parts run out. Imagine the size of a ship that would include an entire infrastructure.
Additionally, we can't be sure that the people themselves would survive the trip. We know, for humans, that there are side-effects from extended periods in low gravity plus there is the risk from radiation. While we can't guess as to the genetic makeup of any aliens, humans would need a large population, probably hundreds, to be genetically viable over even a few generations. To colonize a planet we would want thousands of people to ensure there was enough genetic diversity. Now the colonization ship would have to be monstrous, millions of tons at least, which would mean it is a LOT harder to accelerate to any meaningful velocity.
I agree that there would be enough volunteers for a one-way trip but being able to actually send the volunteers, and have them arrive in good health, would be the hard part.
I am surprised at how many comments there are dimissing this paper as using poor assumptions, being poorly thought out or lacking imagination.
First, why should we assume that the aliens would have god-like technology? The paper addresses a 1000x increase in speed for the probes and assumes they would incredibly well-engineered to not fail after thousands or millions of years. That seems like pretty advanced technology. I don't know of anything that we have built that would last 1000 years without some sort of maintenance or intervention. Sure, we could assume there are repair systems on board, but what repairs the repair system? Even if we ignore that, where does it get the materials to make repairs if something happens between solar systems?
Second, why would there be an urge to send thousands or millions of these probes? If the probes are going to be strong enough to survive, smart enough to avoid problems during the trip and detect any signs of intelligence/civilization they are probably fairly expensive and difficult to make. Sure, we can imagine a technological society where manufacturing is automated to the point where robots land on an asteroid, mine it, construct factories and shiny new probes are made, but this assumes a very high level of technology. While we may have an idea how to do it, we are absolutely nowhere near the technology required to actually do it.
Finally, remember that all solar systems aren't on a nice straight line and that you would actually have to maneuver to go near them and check for signs of civilization. Sure, we could fix that by using many more probes, but see paragraph #2. There is also some diminishing returns with this approach. You could make enough probes so there is 1 per solar system, but having half that many that steer slightly to visit 2 systems is probably cheaper. So, imagine all the acceleration that needs to occur for this to occur - which means more fuel and a lot of time spent at lower velocities.
Instead of pointing to video games or science fiction shows for the "right way" to do this, how about applying some real-world assumptions? I mean assuming that the aliens exist in the first place, (although it seems likely), have god-like tech and FTL, and would want to devote all of their resources to searching the galaxy seems pretty unreasonable to me. However, having moderately better tech and devoting a moderate amount of resources (in the number of probes) seems like reasonable assumptions to me.
There was a paper published about this years ago. The title of the paper is: Penetration Analysis of a XEROX Docucenter DC 230ST: Assessing the Security of a Multi-purpose Office Machine. link PDF Warning
Is this about discovering a vulerability, or trying to discover a vulnerability?
This seems to be the essence of the law. The federal law uses the word intentionally for a reason. Link to the text of 18 U.S.C. 1030.
For those who read the legal text remember "damage" could cover a lot of things including log files or time stamps.
But I have a G4, 1.33 GHz. Got it just after Apple announced the Macbook and stopped boasting about battery life.
There is no comparison between a G4 and a MacBook, let alone a MacBook Pro. The new systems are much, much faster. Remember, the G4s were dated even before the switch to Intel was announced, let alone completed.
Bollocks to you, this is about my Country. I do not agree with you at all.
That's fine, you don't have to. However, if you would like to learn a few things, I would recommend you read this. It does a nice comparison between coal and nuclear including a comparison of radioactive wastes (broken down by type), radiation exposure and consumption levels. It also points out how various regimes could use coal to get their weapons grade material.
Now, you can choose not to believe a scientist from Oak Ridge National Labs, but they are experts in the field. If you still don't believe them, check their references.
You obviously have no idea what you are talking about.
Fission power generates nuclear waste which I think we can all agree is bad.
I don't agree. A lot of people don't agree. Sure, I would prefer if there were no waste. However, the fact that there is waste doesn't instantly make it a bad thing. It actually creates less nuclear waste than burning coal. Also, from a scientific/engineering view, it is easy to handle. It is politics that gets in the way of handling this problem - no one wants a "nuclear waste dump" in their state/country. Heaven forbid we grind the waste into dust, mix it with a million tons of sand and sprinkle it across the entire Atlantic. We would irradiate all the fish! Right. Like a few tons of waste would completely irradiate the Atlantic. Just so you know, the estimate of Uranium that is dissolved in seawater is 4,300,000,000 metric tons.
If we could create Fusion power it would have its own problems, like our hydrogen supply would be used up in quick order.
Right... We are going to use up our supply of the most abundant element in the universe. Do you know what water (H2O) is made of?
Look, I agree with you that there are costs associated every type of power generation. Just make sure you have an idea of what those costs are before you talk about them. It is uninformed opions that have held back a lot of advances in power generation. Just look how a lot of people are starting to push nuclear power again. It is safe, clean and scalable. People need to realize that advances have been made and the dangers everyone is afraid of don't exist anymore.
You also lose half of your Q-bits at each repeater. Since it relies on the sender and receiver being in-phase with each other, there is a 50% chance they aren't and what the receiver detects is worthless. (Either + or x configuration.) So if we have 3 "routers" we only end up with 1/16 of the key bits originally sent - 1/(2^4) - since we also have to count the receiver as missing half of the bits.
If we are talking a New York to Los Angeles connection, with only 120km per link, we would need at least 30 repeaters so would get 1/1000000000 of the bits through. Definitely NOT a long range solution.
6. "Engineering" software and "programming" are more different than you realize.
Both should involve a formal process (although not all processes which people have in place are constructive or even useful). However, real "engineering" seems to rarely apply to software development. I still haven't decided if that's a good thing or a bad thing overall.
There is no good comparison between engineering and programming. Analogy: A general construction worker can design and build a garage and maybe a house. However, they shouldn't design and build a 30-story building or a large bridge or even a highway overpass. The skills and methodologies are there for a reason. With that said, not every job requires an engineer. If I want to build a shed in my backyard, I will do it myself.
The problem with engineering is it takes a lot of time, effort and specialized knowledge. If you don't have the time or money for the engineering process, you can't use it. If your requirements are changing, you can't use the engineering process. You can't call up an engineer and tell them you want the 30-story building to be 50-stories and include a bridge - unless you are willing to have them start over. So, for most software out there, engineering is a non-issue.
Now, in those cases where you are spending millions, or even billions, of dollars on a software project, you better not forget the engineering process. I don't mean you need some engineering for the design - I mean engineering down to the guy who writes the documentation. If a small problem can hold up a billion dollar project, you are in trouble. I've seen a multi-billion dollar project get delayed because of bad documentation - the internal, but independent, lab had trouble getting started on their testing because the documentation wasn't correct.
So, engineering IS a good thing - in the right environment. However, you don't use a bulldozer to dig holes for your tomato plants, so don't use an engineering process when you can't use it properly. If you try, you'll get the added overhead without any of the benefits.
Our professor, along with a guest lecturer who runs the Career Management Offices (or something like that), both said that many jobs now are offering contracts that will "promise" to allow for engineers to stay in engineering and not get bumped to management, while also getting continued pay raises and promotions, so they aren't just getting stuck in engineering with no chance for advancement.
The problem that I've seen is that there is the opportunity to stay in engineering, but there aren't as many opportunities. There may be 2 or 3 technical/engineering spots in the upper management areas, but there are 10x as many "regular" spots. So, yes - you can get raises and promotions staying on a technical track, but not as much or as fast as on a more traditional management track.
When I was in the U.S. Marines, we used a low-tech, low-cost solution that was used in Vietnam...
We would tie a string to the end of our M16 or a long, thin stick, and have it hang to the ground. You move forward slowly and watch the string. If it stops hanging straight down, you need to stop moving forward and find out what is blocking the string.
The advantage is that it forces you to move more deliberately that just shooting silly string. The downside is you are right next to the tripwire when you find it.
Actually, it depends.
One thing colleges have to accept is that they need to make their students employable once they have completed their degrees. If the students can't get jobs, then no one is going to go to that school to get their degree. The result of this is schools must spend time teaaching how to program in a specific language. It would also be nice to learn about Operating Systems in general instead of learning a specific one. Unfortunately, this doesn't work either. If a company uses Visual Studio, they aren't going to hire you and train you on it. They are going to look for Visual Studio experience on the resume.
What skills are taught is largely a function of what types of industry are in the area. In Des Moines, there are a large number of Insurance Companies, so COBOL is used. If you know Java, C++ and Scheme, you can learn COBOL fairly easily. However, they want a COBOL programmer and not someone they can train to use COBOL. I doubt there is a high demand for COBOL in Silicon Valley, (but I could be wrong). In some cities, there is a single major employer. If you are in Rochester, MN there is the Mayo Clinic and IBM. If you are targetting IBM, (depending on department), you should have some Linux experience. I don't know what Mayo uses, but it's healthcare so there is probably a stronger focus on Microsoft products.
So, while it would be great to teach WHY, reality says you also have to teach HOW. Sure, some schools with an incredibly strong reputation (MIT) can get away without the HOW, most schools can't.
They are thinking that if it breaks at all then they are in trouble, where as if it breaks with a currently supported hardware/software then they have someone to call, even if vender support can't do anything.
I disagree with your underlying premise: No one would want to actually fix the problem.
Imagine that you are responsible for a large financial network that handles billions of dollars every day. Now, if there is a new vulnerability discovered, do you want someone to whine to, blame and cover your ass, or do you want to fix the problem? Yes, there are some people who want think CYA. Others, who are paid very well for actually getting stuff done, want to do something. If it is third-party software, if you want to fix the problem, you have to work with the vender. However, if the vendor has warned you that support will end, there is now no way to fix the problem. This could lead you to a risky upgrade, ON YOUR OWN TERMS, instead of having a critical vulnerability and having to rush through the upgrade.
Yes it's illogical, no it makes little to no sence. I agree that just sticking with what works is usually the most inexpensive, and best choice.
It all depends on the situation. Sometimes sticking with what works will cost more and, even if it is cheaper, isn't the best choice. In the financial case, weigh the risk of a controlled problem as compared to the risk of an unfixable vulnerability that doesn't have a workaround. If there are billions at risk every day, you can't gamble on no critical vulnerabilities showing up.
While full-time testers are often made fun of, ("Those who can't code, test."), or it is considered a secondary role that developers can perform on their own, there is no replacement for an experienced tester.
Testing is an important part of the development process. If you have an expensive and complex application, do yourself a favor, and hire a test team. Don't try to do it yourself, unless you have no choice. You may do an OK job of it, but it sounds like you don't have the experience to do it properly. This isn't a critique of your skills, it is a fact that you have a different skillset. You don't expect an embedded programmer to develop web apps or vice-versa. Could they do it? Sure. But it will be a long and difficult road as they make the mistakes an experienced person already known how to avoid.
If you have decided that comprehensive testing is important, (and some people decide it isn't), then do the right thing and get professional (test) help.
If an M16 is jamming a lot it is the fault of the operator for not properly maintaining it.
I am a former U.S. Marine infantryman and I have put thousands of rounds through various M16s. I had 3 or 4 jams in 4 years and one was from a bad magazine. (It had a bad spring and didn't feed the last round properly.)
Does the M16 require more maintenance than an AK-47? Yes. However, it only needs a 2 minute cleaning 2-3 times a day, (we usually did it when we grabbed something to eat, or before getting some sleep). This was in the field with mud, sand and rain.
So, people who are complaining that the M16 jams a lot need to think about what they are doing wrong and not what the weapon is doing wrong. Do you expect your car to work if you don't change the oil or clean it every so often? Why would you expect a firearm to work if you don't do the same thing?
I have seen a couple of lists on how to judge a site. The one from Cornell has points like:
- Is the author different than the webmaster?
- What URL/domain is used?
- Is it an information page or an advertisesment?
- Modified date/is it current?
- Are the links correct and match the page?
Sure, these are nice - but they hardly apply everywhere. There are a lot of things in the sciences that haven't changed, so a date of 1998 hardly impacts the validity of the page. There are also a lot of old pages with broken links. Still doesn't impact their information. This happens quite a bit when you find a white paper and an organization decided to redesign their entire site. You can still find the paper through Google, but the old URL is useless.Same problem with requiring contact information for the author. A lot of government agencies only list the webmaster as a contact in the page footer. Does that mean the page is invalid? No. It means that government sources don't have specific authors. A USDA report is still a USDA report even if it is 5 years old, doesn't list an author and has broken links. How do we teach when the rules don't matter?
I think the problem is people are trying to come up with rules to apply, and there are a lot of exceptions. Remember Dihydrogen Monoxide? it was a complete joke - but the site "passed" the criteria. So it must be a valid source. Right? If people were trained to think on their own, instead of being taught how to apply rules, I think we would be better off.
The "dirsuption of the gulf stream" is pure journalistic gibberish. It is dynamically impossible according to basic theorems in physical oceanography.
What are these theories? Is there a reference to them?
I can give a link to a story where a Cambridge ocean physics professor is concerned that the Gulf Stream is slowing because some of the "chimneys" that help power the Gulf Stream are disappearing. There used to be 12 of them and now there are 2 of them. Does slowing count as disruption? This professor has been working in the Arctic for 30+ years so would be pretty familiar with historical trends. He is concerned Northern Eurpoe might not get as much heat as it used to.
So... If you inventory of 5.4kg/m2 is correct, then how can the rain scrub 800 kg/m2? Where does the other 794.6kg/m2 come from?
I'm not trying to be a troll - I'm just asking...
I agree. However, we can't install password cracking software on even a single machine in our labs since it is a security risk. Installing it on the supercomputer is OK since no one else has access to it during that time period.
Besides, if you had a TOP500 supercomputer sitting around, wouldn't you use it? Just for fun? Just for the nerd factor? Because you could?
We have #141 on the list at Iowa State and we booked time on it so it could be used as a password cracker at one of our Cyber Defense Competitions.
I don't know if it actually got used, or if it was deemed "unfair" for the red team (attackers) to use it. It would have been pretty sweet if they were allowed to.
These competitions are pretty cool, and have some pretty good challenges like the red team pulling the fire alarm at 3:00AM, forcing the blue team (defenders) to evacuate the building. More info can be found at the ISU Information Assurance Student Group website, or the competition website.
My only question is whether or not hydrogen scales well enough to power airplanes or ships.
Yes.
Planes: We can have them carry fewer passengers and we can make them out of lighter materials. As a last resort we can just fly slower - which would really save fuel. The problem is it would make it more expensive to fly - like it was 50 - 60 years ago.
Ships: There are some plans for using giant kites to replace sails and reduce fuel consumption. Also, we used wind power long before we knew how to make the internal combustion engine. It might not be as convenient or as fast, but we would have them just the same.
I think the real question is: Can we maintain our current levels of convenience and speed using hydrogen?
I think the answer is yes. We might lose a little bit of capacity but that can be handled by reducing luggage allowances by a few pounds per passenger. For a ship, the ratio of their fuel to their cargo is small, (ships can carry a LOT of weight), so losing a few tons to carry more fuel is nothing.
There might be some increased risk by having giant tanks of liquid hydrogen installed on a plane or a ship but, as someone pointed out before (too lazy to find it), when a hydrogen tank ruptures, the dangerous gas goes away. It doesn't sit in a pool and continue burning like gasoline does.