Well sort of... but I don't think it's that simple even in concept.
I put up the oversimplified example because people were not even getting the undlying concept behind the undlying concept behind the undlying concept behind the undlying concept.
Consider a case of a credit card number. A CC# consists of 15 digits plus a check digit for 16 digits total.
Now, in encrypting, validate the check digit and then drop it. Take the remaining 15 digits and express them as a binary value. It should be around 50 bits. XOR it against a 50-bit mask, and that will be your ciphertext value.
To decrypt, XOR against that same value and recompute the check digit.
Any incorrect value will produce a number that passes basic validation (as long as it doesn't exceed 2^15).
For bonus points, you can probably encode the first digit in only 2 bits, because most cards begin with 3, 4, 5 or 6, depending on the issuer.
Now, is this a good encryption scheme? Maybe not, but it does at least demonstrate the concept.
In regards to 1., wholesale electric prices do fluctuate. What that doesn't change, though, is that the price of gas fluctuated to where it was more economical to use jet fuel for a period. In such circumstances, the gas turbines are, appropriately, selected.
An RTO is a Regional Transmission Operator. RTOs are responsible for maintaining and operating the buik grid (wholesale level). RTOs schedule generators to run based on demand and market conditions.
Burning jet fuel, by the way, is not unconventional. It is just undesirable because of the cost. Quite often, the gas turbine generators can also be run on natural gas or on a mixture of the two fuels. It is preferable, however, to have other types of generators carrying as much of the load as possible -- steam turbines, for instance, produce much more output for the same fuel input, but can't be started/stopped quickly.
I will also put in my vote for DirectNIC. Their domains are a little pricier than, say, GoDaddy, but after seeing how they weathered Hurricane Katrina (with their data centre located in New Orleans), I was hooked. Their disaster survival went way above and beyond.
Except now all you have is a ratio of two masses, rather than an absolute quantity. What exactly would you balance the kilogram reference against?
You would use it to callibrate another mass as being a kilogram. I know this is kind of a circular problem, but that's really why the fluctuating mass is troubling, because that's supposed to be the stable benchmark, and it has proven not to be so stable.
Or do you have another method involved for determining the mass of an object used as the constant for measuring mass?
Placing two masses on a balance is the usual method . . . . and it is gravity-independent. Gravity is necessary, of course, but it only needs to be constant across the two platters of the balance.
I would also imagine that, given the weather I see outside my window right now (snowing), they would be an utter disaster here. You try to stop and end up skidding into the intersection, whereupon you get ticketed. Now, of course, some people caught this way will have just been going too fast, but I think more would be caught by the yellow light that is fine for normal conditions being too short for slippery roads.
It is entirely possible that they did, indeed, halt a plot, just as they said they did. It is also possible they did not. It's very difficult to tell at this point, because the one thing of which I am sure of, and I speculate most Americans are as well, is that they lie and they do it without hesitation. My confidence in anything they say is near enough to zero that the difference can be written off as rounding error.
As a consequence, it really does not matter what they say.
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I put up the oversimplified example because people were not even getting the undlying concept behind the undlying concept behind the undlying concept behind the undlying concept.
Consider a case of a credit card number. A CC# consists of 15 digits plus a check digit for 16 digits total.
Now, in encrypting, validate the check digit and then drop it. Take the remaining 15 digits and express them as a binary value. It should be around 50 bits. XOR it against a 50-bit mask, and that will be your ciphertext value.
To decrypt, XOR against that same value and recompute the check digit.
Any incorrect value will produce a number that passes basic validation (as long as it doesn't exceed 2^15).
For bonus points, you can probably encode the first digit in only 2 bits, because most cards begin with 3, 4, 5 or 6, depending on the issuer.
Now, is this a good encryption scheme? Maybe not, but it does at least demonstrate the concept.
In regards to 1., wholesale electric prices do fluctuate. What that doesn't change, though, is that the price of gas fluctuated to where it was more economical to use jet fuel for a period. In such circumstances, the gas turbines are, appropriately, selected.
I work in this industry.
An RTO is a Regional Transmission Operator. RTOs are responsible for maintaining and operating the buik grid (wholesale level). RTOs schedule generators to run based on demand and market conditions.
Burning jet fuel, by the way, is not unconventional. It is just undesirable because of the cost. Quite often, the gas turbine generators can also be run on natural gas or on a mixture of the two fuels. It is preferable, however, to have other types of generators carrying as much of the load as possible -- steam turbines, for instance, produce much more output for the same fuel input, but can't be started/stopped quickly.
I will also put in my vote for DirectNIC. Their domains are a little pricier than, say, GoDaddy, but after seeing how they weathered Hurricane Katrina (with their data centre located in New Orleans), I was hooked. Their disaster survival went way above and beyond.
You would use it to callibrate another mass as being a kilogram. I know this is kind of a circular problem, but that's really why the fluctuating mass is troubling, because that's supposed to be the stable benchmark, and it has proven not to be so stable.
So if it weighs the same as a duck . . .
Um . . . didn't we just do that? Isn't that what the article is about?
Placing two masses on a balance is the usual method . . . . and it is gravity-independent. Gravity is necessary, of course, but it only needs to be constant across the two platters of the balance.
Thanks for the validation. Too often, participants on /. tend to forget that they're dealing with human beings who sometimes make mistakes.
It appears nobody has considered this marvellously simple approach:
Hit "reply". Type four words: "This is not me." Hit send.
This extends the courtesy to the misdirector of the email of letting them know that they've got bad info.
Agreed. Ford can say they won't supply it, but they've just made a public statement that they have discoverable records.
Says the baby who is an anonymous coward . . . .
Well, eventually, yes . . . but most of us not today.
Yeah, probably.
They kept telling people "We are from France" as their cover story . . . .
Yeah, that's not really good enough. You need to go to at least quintuple for ROT26 to display any security.
Berkshire Hathaway was once a textile manufacturer. That has nothing to do with their present business.
It is just trading one imaginary currency for another.
And you don't have a name. Bye.
I never said it was likely, only possible.
That's kind of interesting, actually.
Note the remarkable silence in response to my last query.
I would also imagine that, given the weather I see outside my window right now (snowing), they would be an utter disaster here. You try to stop and end up skidding into the intersection, whereupon you get ticketed. Now, of course, some people caught this way will have just been going too fast, but I think more would be caught by the yellow light that is fine for normal conditions being too short for slippery roads.
It is entirely possible that they did, indeed, halt a plot, just as they said they did. It is also possible they did not. It's very difficult to tell at this point, because the one thing of which I am sure of, and I speculate most Americans are as well, is that they lie and they do it without hesitation. My confidence in anything they say is near enough to zero that the difference can be written off as rounding error.
As a consequence, it really does not matter what they say.