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  1. Re:A pretty low requirement on Turing Test Passed · · Score: 1

    I'm developing an open source IBM Watson analog and I don't really care *how* my brain works when solving this task, because I am dealing with a different computation platform. What my point was is, on the high level, what *function* does the brain perform. And my brain, in this task, acts like a search engine on the facts I have learnt - no matter how it does it.

  2. Re:A pretty low requirement on Turing Test Passed · · Score: 3, Insightful

    ...and your brain, during a game of Jeopardy, is what if not a search engine?

    Of course, (at least) advanced deductive capabilities are also important for general intelligence. That's the next goal now. (Watson had some deductive capabilities, but fairly simple and somewhat specialized.) We gotta take it piece by piece, give us another few years. :-)

  3. Re:Turing Test Failed on Turing Test Passed · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What has been conducted precisely matches Turing's proposed immitation game. I don't know what do you mean by a "full-blown Turing test", the immitiation game is what it has always meant, including the 30% bar (because the human has three options - human, machine, don't know). Of coure, it is nowadays not considered a final goal, but it is still a useful landmark even if we have a long way to go.

    That's the trouble with AI, the expectation are perpetuouly shifting. A few years in the past, a hard task is considered impossible for computers to achieve, or at least many years away. Then it's pased and the verdict prompty shifts to "well, it wasn't that hard anyway and doesn't mean much", and a year from now we take the new capability of machines as a given.

  4. Re:Thirty percent? on Turing Test Passed · · Score: 1

    The reaon is simple - the human is also allowed to answer "don't know" in Turing' immitation game. So with purely random anwers, the probability of each is 1/3.

    (I think forcing the judges to pick one would make the results more clear-cut, I'm not sure about Turing's reasons here.)

    Anyway, the 30% bar has been proposed in the original paper and this is what "Turing's test" was _always_ meaning.

  5. Games! on Ask Slashdot: Beginner To Intermediate Programming Projects? · · Score: 1

    Make a game. Or contribute to an existing open source game. You can easily set and adjust the scope and depth of the project so that it's fun and challenging. Chances are, you already play some games you like, and chances are you can get inspired for your own game project there. And perhaps others will even find it fun to play.

    Somehow, when I get playing a game for any period of time, sooner or later I slowly switch to hacking the codebase as it ends up being even more fun. :-) If you're interested in building a non-trivial game, you may find it interesting to take a look at the code of existing open source games and start hacking them. You will find fun and rewarding low-hanging fruit features lying all around. In strategies - Freeciv, OpenTTD, Wesnoth, Widelands..., arcades like Supertux or Stepmania or even FPS like Xonotic. Or UI or computer player for a board game.

    Games are also nice because they are very multi-faceted - you can start by adding simple features, but also work on optimization and better core algorithms, graphics programming, network programming, improve the user interface, porting it to a new platform or have a go at building an AI computer opponent. Hey, try building an AI for OpenTTD, none of them is perfect and they have a nice plugin system. And if you get more involved, imho they look pretty cool on a CV of any programmer.

  6. Re:It's not underresourced on Free Can Make You Bleed: the Underresourced Open Source · · Score: 1

    I actually think it's not really possible to do it fool-proof. You may eventually get right as in mathematically right in some formal system, but then the problem is in quality of your formal system.

    10 years ago, people often wouldn't account for timing attacks (though I admit they were proposed ~20 years ago) and things like that. It's still well possible that there are attacks noone concieved of yet and implementations may or may not be vulnerable. Heck, it's possible a specific sequence of instructions your single true implementation compiles to on some future architecture triggers a subtle bug.

    I still believe that even for the most basic plumbing, diversity is a good thing and it's not possible to get any slightly complex software 100% right, 100% foolproof in the real world, even if you manage to do it in an abstract formal system.

  7. Re:It's not underresourced on Free Can Make You Bleed: the Underresourced Open Source · · Score: 4, Insightful

    In some cases, fragmentation is bad. In case of critical infrastructure, fragmentation is great!

    Having multiple interoperating implementations has been always one of the basic requirements for internet standards, it ensures future growth and leaving out the worst warts, dependency on undocumented behavior etc. But most importantly, if a bug is found in one of the implementations, it cannot take out the complete internet infrastructure because large parts of it are running a different implementation. Even if a bug is found on a protocol level, some implementations may not implement that feature or implement it slightly differently and aren't involved. Fragmentation is essential to the robustness of internet.

  8. Re:Simple on C++ and the STL 12 Years Later: What Do You Think Now? · · Score: 1

    A lot of people in embedded are still bit twiddling on an AVR. :-) Or a smaller ARM uCU like in the mbed board.

  9. Re:Parent SHOULD NOT be modded flamebait on New Zero-Day Flash Bug Affects Windows, OS X, and Linux Computers · · Score: 2

    I just, like many others, wish someone would actually fucking *elaborate* on *concrete* *technical* hurdles of HTML5. We are not denying there are none, but just saying "you are clueless if you need to ask" is not going to help your position. We don't want to argue with you but we want you to actually explain yourselves. Gee, this thread is so frustrating.

  10. Re:more modern == less useful ? on GNU Mailman 3 Enters Beta · · Score: 1

    I completely agree that the mail archives UI is awful. Mailman2 archives could use many improvements (nicer thread browsing including cross-month threads, _optional_ threads collapsing, web-form replies, fulltext search, ...) but I don't really follow the direction in which HyperKitty is going - views like https://lists.stg.fedoraprojec... are a complete mess; having a one-mail per line concise view had great value...

    It's still beta, I'm not hopeless; I think HyperKitty could be made much more usable by a few simple UI tweaks (and hopefully things like comment voting are optional). Perhaps we will get / can make a "classic theme". :-)

  11. Re:WTF? on Heartbleed Sparks 'Responsible' Disclosure Debate · · Score: 2

    "Very well known?" This is very much *not* the way how for example many security bugs in linux distributions are handled (http://oss-security.openwall.org/wiki/mailing-lists/distros). Gradual disclosure along a well-defined timeline limits damage of exposure to blackhats and at the same time allows enough reaction time to prepare and push updates to the user. So typically, once the software vendor has fixed the issue, they would notify distributions, which would be given some time to prepare and test an updated package, then the update is pushed to users at a final disclosure date.

    For a bug of such severity, I'd agree that the embargo time of 7-14 days used by distros@ is way too long. But a 12-24 hour advance announcement would be quite reasonable. Large website operations typically may have suitable staffing to be able to bring a specific update for a critical bug (similar in potential damages to a service outage) online within 6-12 hours, so a next step would be passing the information from distributions to these users (e.g. via a support contract with distros@-subscribed vendor).

    In this timeframe, you have a good chance to prepare updated packages for major archs and do an emergency rollout. At the same time, even if there is a leak, the leak needs to propagate to skilled blackhat developers, they need to develop an exploit and this exploit needs to get propagated to people who would deploy it in the remaining time frame.

  12. Re:I take it this is a server concern on OpenSSL Bug Allows Attackers To Read Memory In 64k Chunks · · Score: 2

    I *think* it might be feasible to exploit your web browser to steal cookies or saved credentials if you connect to a rogue https site. Credentials are always nice for spamming. If you convince people to keep you open in another tab, you might get lucky and snoop some credit card numbers or banking credentials too. A regular person should fear mainly automated attacks like this.

    (Please do prove me wrong if I didn't get the attack potential here right.)

  13. Re:FTP? on Canonical Shutting Down Ubuntu One File Services · · Score: 1

    For one, you need an FTP _server_ to exchange files (or your desktops need to be always-on, with public IP addresses). The same with rsync or ssh. I have one and I'm fine without these cloud services, but the point here is that people don't have to set up their own.

    (A service that would allow an end-user to easily roll their own VPS or buy preconfigured RPi/whatever with pre-configured mail server, webmail client, file sharing etc. would be awesome. Some are in the works, none are ready yet. Which is why cloud services matter for users.)

  14. Re:The real puzzle on Engine Data Reveals That Flight 370 Flew On For Hours After It "Disappeared" · · Score: 1

    Hard to see indeed, but warnings can be overlooked/ignored. C.f. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H... from 2005. It flew for another hour after most everyone fell unconscious before it crashed into a mountain.

  15. Re:Nothing is proven on Should Newsweek Have Outed Satoshi Nakamoto's Personal Details? · · Score: 1

    Those people live(d) different lifestyles "appropriate" for their wealth. Their residence, for example, was somewhat different than a suburb house that's essentially trivial to break into. Also, the Bitcoin business is a little richer on violent criminals than IT.

  16. Re:maybe, but . . . on Can Electric Current Make People Better At Math? · · Score: 1

    Wow, that's awesome! But doesn't cosmology involve a lot of mathematics, actually quite crazy stuff? How did she get through that?

  17. Re:maybe, but . . . on Can Electric Current Make People Better At Math? · · Score: 2

    Reference needed wrt. "many who suffer from dyscalculia excel at higher math". Not understanding basic numbers and algebra like fractions means that you simply never have much chance to progress to anything higher and interesting. Especially if your first few teachers are incompetent. And without the technical skill and gained routine, it's quite difficult to acquire intuition about how many pieces of higher math work.

    Also, algebra is important for many other areas of science - biology, chemisty, any lab work; mixing solutions, configuring equipment, basic statistics, ... Discalculia means you have big trouble distinguishing between 10 and 100 or comparing 0.32 and 0.23 - you can't (at least easily) build an intuition for it and you have to always fall back to high-level reasoning and logic to work through it. It's possible to make a carreer in natural sciences with discalculia, but it requires huge motivation and effort.

    (I have been intensely teaching someone with discalculia for some time. It's one of the disabilities that's difficult to appreciate without experience.)

  18. Re:Here come the rednecks on Israeli Group To Attempt Moon Landing · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Individual groups of people all trying to accomplish the same thing or things is absolutely essential to get stuff done. It motivates people to focus and work hard on the problem, because they know that others are working hard too and they will likely reach similar quality and are progressing fast. The competition between people means competition between solutions, which allows the soundest solutions to prevail (up to exceptions).

    Competition can be friendly, especially if you are not too emotionally invested, and that's great especially for the people involved. Unfriendly competition is still great in the long run even though it introduces redundancies. The space race gave a big surge to the technological progress. Sport competitions give many athletes (or chess players or whoever) an incentive to improve. Computer Go programs evolved rapidly recently also thanks to competition. Recent Debian discussions about their next init system gave massive boost to openrc development.

    Without competition, people are lazy and slack, since any effort is not worth it! Competition is awesome!

  19. Re:One of OpenTTD 1.4.0 new features is CargoDist on Fancy Yourself a Tycoon? OpenTTD 1.4.0 On Its Way · · Score: 3, Informative

    It makes total sense for me, if you realize that your job is to be just a transport company, not a redistribution company.

    Up to now (and of course you can still stay in that mode in the new version), you would just take the lumber from a forest and deliver to whatever sawmill. But in reality, you should deliver it to whatever sawmill the forest has contract with! I.e., sawmills will make contracts with forests and use you just as a transport company - then your job is to get the cargo from the correct forest to the correct sawmill.

    (An important playability factor is that only reachable destinations are considered. So if you just created a dedicated line between two industries, you will not be asked to transport the cargo elsewhere.)

    (N.B. I didn't try the cargodist mode yet so I'm not 100% sure if it works the way I'd suppose it works. I'd also expect it to allow you to enable it just for passenger+mail, as these are really special cases compared to other cargo.)

  20. One of OpenTTD 1.4.0 new features is CargoDist on Fancy Yourself a Tycoon? OpenTTD 1.4.0 On Its Way · · Score: 5, Informative

    *The* big new feature of OpenTTD 1.4.0 is CargoDist, i.e. exactly that - passengers and cargo having specific destinations.

    If only the summary wouldn't be just a jumbled tangle of text... :-(

  21. glibc is also backwards-compatible (within the 2.x series, i.e. since before year 2000). The problem are other system components that change and evolve - things like image processing libraries, sound libraries (as you point out yourself), etc. The ones that the software relied on before are simply disappearing.

    However, I think that the situation is much more stabilized now than about five years ago and the ecosystem is fairly mature now. Two big question marks now are systemd and wayland, but the former shouldn't affect applications like games, and the latter should come with a good compatibility layer.

    Valve itself is also making sure that the situation stabilizes by specifying what the games can and cannot rely on.

  22. Re:i got some bitcoins on Bitcoin Exchange Value Halves After Chinese Ban · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Yes, just use Electrum or equivalent if running the full-blockchain is too bothersome (it is for most, now). Avoid putting your bitcoins on *any* online account, that is way too dangerous. With Electrum, you don't have to download a blockchain, but only you still have the wallet.

  23. Re:taxed as asset? on Norway Rejects Bitcoin As Currency; Taxes As Asset, Instead · · Score: 1

    To a degree, there is some common "fiscal policy" in the European Economic Area (EU+Norway+Iceland+...).

  24. Re:Bitcoin's "contract" capabiilty. on How a Bitcoin Transaction Actually Works · · Score: 1

    (And who's going to be a trusted intermediary that the seller will adhere blindly to their opinion, and who would need to be able to prove reasonably that you DID or DID NOT receive the product that was sent? Answer: Nobody.)

    What about the post office / delivery company? That's how much of it works when ordering stuff online now too (often you pay the delivery man, or you can refuse the package if the goods is damaged).

  25. Re:DRM? on Freedreno Graphics Driver Gets PRIME, Render Node Support · · Score: 0

    ...in here?