At a company I worked at about 15 years ago, they dismissed (let go/fired/etc) one of the employees who also happened to handle much of the computing environment.
The president and vice president (and I believe at least one corporate lawyer) asked him into the conference room where they told him that he was fired and not allowed to return to his office. He said "may I make a phone call?". They said sure. He picked up the phone, dialed a number and said "Implement Plan B" and hung up the phone.
The pres and vice pres and lawyer went totally ape-shit. The place went into instant lockdown and we were pretty much unable to use the corporate network for about a week while they went through everything, changed all codes... musta cost a small fortune in both time and money.
A couple of years later I ran into the guy who was fired and I said "wow, do you realize what happened after you said those words? BTW, what exactly was plan B?" He said "I called my wife and said "implement plan b" but she had no idea what that meant, I was just joking".
Wonderful payback to some really stupid employers (they totally deserved it). Totally made my day.
As a resident of the Big Island of Hawai'i - with a house only 15 miles from the active Pu'u O'o vent (and one of the houses actually sits on a cliff looking down into the HVNP (Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park) I feel somewhat compelled to respond to this horrid post.
First, Kilauea is not errupting per-say. Kilauea volcano, and the Kilauea caldera, are located within the park itself and the caldera is NOT errupting. Lava is (and has for many years now) been moving from under kilauea caldera towards the Pu'u O'o vent, about 15 or so miles away (as the Nene fly) where the lava both comes out in surface flows as well as moves through lava tubes. While Pu'u O'o does sit on, and is part of, kilauea caldera - and while one could technically say that kilauea volcano is errupting, it is a bit misleading.
Also... the 'rock face' of kilauea did NOT collapse. The rock face is just dandy and totally intact as it is only a mile from me - and has a very nice road all the way around it for people to enjoy.
What REALLY happened is that lava flowing through lava tubes from the Pu'u O'o vent, which sits at about 2500 feet above sea level, is moving down a steep pali (cliff) and out onto the flats near sea level. It continues allt he way to the ocean where it comes out of the cliff side and pours into the ocean. Over time a false chunk of land builds up - often many many acres in size. This new land is called a Lava Bench and it is extremely unstable as it is both very new, has active lava in it, and is being undercut by the ocean water. Over time (anywhere from days, to months) this bench builds to the point where it can't sustain it's own weight and other environmental factors, and at that point it breaks appart in a spectacular burst of lava and explosions and disappears into the ocean.
This has been going on for a very long time now. I personally have witnessed two lava benches collapse only yards from me (one in fact threw red hot lava up into the air, and over my head, to land behind me - needless to say we quickly retreated to a safer position).
As per the question being asked of who owns the new land... it depends on where the lava comes out. The lava tends to have about a 6 to 8 mile wide area that it likes to flow. Sometimes it is entirely on one side, placing it in the park boundries and thus under control of the feds. Other times it swings the other side and flows outside of park boundries, and away from the feds - to spots where we can have much more fun playing with lava.
And play we like to do... besides cooking in lava (die-hard slashdotters may require my question in the interview to Alton Brown on how cooking in lava works, and his flippant reply questioning the type of drugs I was on), dropping steel cable into lava tubes to pull out samples, and other more questionable practices that will go unmentioned here.
However, it was NOT the rock face of kilauea caldera (volcano) that has collapsed... it is merely the cliff side and lava bench which are extremely unstable and EXPECTED to collapse. This one made the news only because it was very very big - but not unexpected, not rare, not the caldera or volcano itself, and certainly not something which is unusual.
If you want more information about our wonderful volcano - and recipes for cooking in it, or poking things in it, or dangers of lava, or even how to walk on the hot stuff... see our portal below:
Fanciful as his creations may seem, FedEx is not amused. The shipping giant's lawyers have sent Avila letters demanding he take down the site he created to document his project, invoking, among other things, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (.pdf), or DMCA.
FedEx doesn't have to worry - slashdot already took his site down for them. I wonder how much we should charge them... 100,000 people clicking away.
If it's morning where I am in NYC, it's still going to be night in Hawaii regardless of what the clock says. I still need to remember that if I want to call somebody there, or otherwise communicate. Just because my watch says it's 4 AM (GMT) doesn't mean all those Hawaiians are going to be awake.
Aloha... MrIcee here in Hawai'i, where I might like to inform you that even though we *are* the most remote place in the world, if it is morning where you are in NYC it might very well be morning here in Hawai'i. We are only 5 to 6 hours off of you (depending on DST) - Hawai'i doesn't (and won't) observe DST and the new laws will not change our devices here (thank Pele).
Only if it is 6:00 AM or EARILER in NYC would it be before midnight in Hawai'i.
(Plus, most of us get up around 4-5 AM here on the Hilo/Volcano side here on the Big Island since it's the east side and the sun rises over an ocean).
First, note, I *DO* work for one of the worlds largest telescopes... that said...
My view on all this DST and Leap Second arguement is... let them, why the hell do we care?
So what if the ignorant Bush Administration wants to change time - is there going to be a penalty if we ignore them? Let them have their own time standard - fine. Who the fuck cares. We'll simply go on using the RIGHT and PROPER time, not some stupid time made-up by politicians who are only swayed by lavish gifts from special intrest groups.
What, are the FBI going to break down our doors and haul us off for using the wrong time?
This is the thing I don't get... nobody is going to FORCE us to change the time of our computers or our telescopes. What, is there now going to be a little winding button on our atomic clocks so we can 'adjust' them to match BUSH TIME? I don't think so.
Deep Impact is scheduled to occur on Jul 3rd at around 7:20 or so (my notes are not right handy at the moment). Luckly, here in Hawai'i the impact will be overhead, after the sun has gone down, with the impact side facing us.
A number of the observatories on Mauna Kea are planning on turning their telescopes to watch and record the event. I'm fairly sure that Keck, Gemini and Subaru domes will be observing and recording the event (The Subaru primary mirror is 27 feet in diameter, should make for a good view:).
So it won't only be NASA footage we will see - hopefully some of the scopes will capture spectacular images of the impact.
Once, many moons ago, we wrote an obscurifaction program that removed all documentation and modified all variables and function names to be random combinations of I's, O's, o's, 0's. and 1's (plus is created rather long names of fairly equal length). It also combined lines to make them all very long.
Especially useful on large programs it pretty much made the source totally unreadable, and a complete headache to try to unravel even if you countered with a similar program - because all meaning in the original names was lots.
However, when working as a contractor such programs can be useful insurance policies:)
Actually, starting at the high drive and moving to the low drive would be the best plan as once you wipe the C: drive, your pretty much hosed from wiping anything else.
Though who knows, I could be wrong, I havn't touched a windoze box in years.
While I am not a vision researcher I have spent countless years in digital imaging and understand some of the basics of what is going on.
The 60 hz frame rate (or actually, 2 fields at 30 hz) and the vertical retrace period can be viewed by just about any person - regardless of gifts....
Think you know someone who can't see the flicker? Have them stand about 15 feet away from a monitor and chew a stick of gum - they will be amazed to see the jitter (or just pretend to chew a stick of gum or bob or weave VERY slightly on your toes).
Not everyone is wired exactly the same and some of us have eye sensitivity - what we can actually consider a 'sample rate' that is higher, or lower, than the norm. In effect, what you are seeing when you see the jitter can be likened to aliasing effects - every now and then your sample rate syncs up (or desyncs slightly) and you catch the vertical blanking interval and/or scan itself.
It is well known that dogs and cats in general don't see TV like we do - because their vision system is at a faster rate than ours - to them the screen looks like a lot of weird angled lines. However, everyone knows about that ONE cat or ONE dog that DOES watch TV - most people think they are gifted but instead, they are 'slower' in their vision system.
Consider as well, car tires. As you go down the road they spin but you are very familiar with the effect of them 'apparently' spinning backwards - again, the sample rate of your eyes is just slightly out of sync with the rotation speed (or harmonic of) causing the hubcap to appear to turn backwords. And if your right in sync with the speed (or harmonic of) then the hubcap appears to be standing still (e.g., in it's rotational axis).
If you were to consider two people, looking at the same tire rotation, they would undoubtedly report slight differences in what they see. The same effect is happening on the screen - the refresh rate is similar to the rotating hubcap and you are just slightly faster or slower than it is.
(btw, yes, I've been able to see it for years and years and year)
... or the Hawaiian Islands will be forced to shut you down for dilution of the word "Hula". For example, uses such as "Hula Calendar" dilutes the calendar of events for hula competitions, such as our Merry Monarch International Hula Competition which takes place in May of each year.
I think there is an attractive solution here, Lycos just missed it.
Instead of attacking the site, the screensaver instead should have merely hit each URL in the email body once, just as the users EMail client would do. It should then take the most prevelant URL to the website in the spam (prevelant meaning the one appearing most) and fetch the page and again fetch each image (etc) url on that page, just as what would happen if the user had clicked on the link in the email.
Why do this? Well, for one, it will make the spammer a very very lot of money very quickly. But two, it will cost the spammers customer a huge amount of money without any sales. The cost of doing business this way would be too high (assuming enough screensavers to do this). and spammers would either have to shift their model or pick another industry.
...on the page where I can signup and it has a map and asks you to pick your state... I can't for the life of me find either Hawaii or Alaska. NORMALLY the weather channels put 'em near mexico:) but they are nowhere to be found on the map on this site (or at least I couldn't find it).
Are the designers so lame that they can't even name the 50-nifty-united states?
...is very important to me and I tend to get a new one about once every year or so.
I always try to go with the thinest wallet I can find and also prefer wallets that (1) allow me easy access to my drivers license and company security swipe card and (2) doesn't let things accidently fall out.
Currently I am using a two-fold (e.g., it opens only once) that has the OUTSIDE an additional transparent pocket. That works perfectly as my drivers license and swipe card (and Hawaii Volcanoes National Park Pass) go in the outside window. The inside are nice because the credit card holders face the inside of the wallet thus nothing will fall out. On one side I have my personal Credit Cards and the other my Corporate Credit Cards.
An additional nice thing about this wallet was an elastic band (the wallet is leather btw), that is easy to enclose (it's attached) the wallet making it even more secure.
As per those pesky grocery store cards... I don't keep them in my wallet, That would be an extra 5 cards for all the places I go - instead, I keep them in the car and then I can just pick the right one and take it into the store with me - so much more easy.
Oh ya, I also keep my wallet in my front pocket - more comfortable and more secure.
I tend to buy my wallets anywhere I find one that I really think would meet my criteria - however, this one I got at (yuck) Walmart.
Well, typical of outsourced crap... I've never once in my life voted Republican, and I'm certainly not going to start this year! But... this is the first year in my life that I:
Got a signed photo of the smirking liar Bush in the mail.
Got a signed photo of Bush and his charmless wife Laura in the mail
Got a RNC membership card in the mail last week
That and the irritating Indian guy that keeps calling (even though i'm on the DO NOT CALL LIST) to tell me I've been given a $10,000 government grant (from a 'private number' # no less).
If we're going to outsource, how about starting with the commander and thief.
...with my oven and fridge. I put some basic liquid ingredients into a pan, place the pan into my heated oven where, once properly forgotten, it turns into a solid.
Placing the solid into my fridge, and again forgetting it for say, 2 or 3 weeks, reduces the solid back into a liquid.
Though I havn't personally tried it, I'm fairly certain that if I were to return the liquid back to the oven, and again properly forget about it, that I would again get a solid.
heh... well, to clairfy for you. Years ago on IRC i used 'iceman' as a nick (ice as in security), but often had it squated on by others. One day someone suggested MrIcee and it stuck. That was before I moved to Hawai'i.
However, in Hawai'i there is also a rather well known Shaved Ice company named, strangely enough, Mr Icee - so the named worked here as well.
Although i'd like to see someone try to walk on [lava]
You might find our instructions for walking on hot lava here most useful. We also pick it up using special kevlar and spun glass gloves that can withstand 2000 F for 20 seconds without breaching.
Years ago I attended a debate between Gordon Liddy and Timothy Leary. I ended up sitting near an elderly couple, probably in their late 70's. For everything that Liddy said the old man would clap and cheer, and the woman would sit silently. For everything that Leary said the woman would clap and cheer and the man would sit silently.
A few years after that I happened to be lecturing at a conference that had Timothy Leary as the guest keynote speaker. Prior to the talks I ran into him and told him that story... he responded "isn't it wonderful that they could be together and have such differing views".
You suggest the Enfora Portfolio as an alternative for WIFI for non-enabled devices.
I have a Tungsten W and I purchased the Enfora. The first one I received did not work at all unless I was standing 2 feet from the antenna... trying to get support I was told on the phone that "we do not offer support for that device" - however, upon digging and digging further I did end up with a phone number to the support engineer for the portofolio - who was VERY nice and gave me a return code.
I returned the device and they replaced it with a newer model (had a different connector on it) - and told me the the unit I sent them had the internal antenna disconnected which is why it wasn't working.
The new one worked much better - good range, but keeping it connected was a pain because the connector is not solid and unless you pinch the unit hard it tends to disconnect (and will disconnect, for example, by the pressure of just tapping on the screen). Infinitly frustrating because it was hard to determine whether or not I was connected.
After about 2 months of use, one day I turned it on, the green light came on... then it went yellow, then it went out. Now it's dead. If I insert the palm, power goes to the palm and it charges but pushing the power button on the Enfora does nothing whatsoever. Dead as a doornail.
Quite frankly I can't recommend that device to anyone (not to mention the fact that the unit I received has NO FCC info on it at all - which seems fishy to me).
Slashdot Mirror
At a company I worked at about 15 years ago, they dismissed (let go/fired/etc) one of the employees who also happened to handle much of the computing environment.
The president and vice president (and I believe at least one corporate lawyer) asked him into the conference room where they told him that he was fired and not allowed to return to his office. He said "may I make a phone call?". They said sure. He picked up the phone, dialed a number and said "Implement Plan B" and hung up the phone.
The pres and vice pres and lawyer went totally ape-shit. The place went into instant lockdown and we were pretty much unable to use the corporate network for about a week while they went through everything, changed all codes... musta cost a small fortune in both time and money.
A couple of years later I ran into the guy who was fired and I said "wow, do you realize what happened after you said those words? BTW, what exactly was plan B?" He said "I called my wife and said "implement plan b" but she had no idea what that meant, I was just joking".
Wonderful payback to some really stupid employers (they totally deserved it). Totally made my day.
First, Kilauea is not errupting per-say. Kilauea volcano, and the Kilauea caldera, are located within the park itself and the caldera is NOT errupting. Lava is (and has for many years now) been moving from under kilauea caldera towards the Pu'u O'o vent, about 15 or so miles away (as the Nene fly) where the lava both comes out in surface flows as well as moves through lava tubes. While Pu'u O'o does sit on, and is part of, kilauea caldera - and while one could technically say that kilauea volcano is errupting, it is a bit misleading.
Also... the 'rock face' of kilauea did NOT collapse. The rock face is just dandy and totally intact as it is only a mile from me - and has a very nice road all the way around it for people to enjoy.
What REALLY happened is that lava flowing through lava tubes from the Pu'u O'o vent, which sits at about 2500 feet above sea level, is moving down a steep pali (cliff) and out onto the flats near sea level. It continues allt he way to the ocean where it comes out of the cliff side and pours into the ocean. Over time a false chunk of land builds up - often many many acres in size. This new land is called a Lava Bench and it is extremely unstable as it is both very new, has active lava in it, and is being undercut by the ocean water. Over time (anywhere from days, to months) this bench builds to the point where it can't sustain it's own weight and other environmental factors, and at that point it breaks appart in a spectacular burst of lava and explosions and disappears into the ocean.
This has been going on for a very long time now. I personally have witnessed two lava benches collapse only yards from me (one in fact threw red hot lava up into the air, and over my head, to land behind me - needless to say we quickly retreated to a safer position).
As per the question being asked of who owns the new land... it depends on where the lava comes out. The lava tends to have about a 6 to 8 mile wide area that it likes to flow. Sometimes it is entirely on one side, placing it in the park boundries and thus under control of the feds. Other times it swings the other side and flows outside of park boundries, and away from the feds - to spots where we can have much more fun playing with lava.
And play we like to do... besides cooking in lava (die-hard slashdotters may require my question in the interview to Alton Brown on how cooking in lava works, and his flippant reply questioning the type of drugs I was on), dropping steel cable into lava tubes to pull out samples, and other more questionable practices that will go unmentioned here.
However, it was NOT the rock face of kilauea caldera (volcano) that has collapsed... it is merely the cliff side and lava bench which are extremely unstable and EXPECTED to collapse. This one made the news only because it was very very big - but not unexpected, not rare, not the caldera or volcano itself, and certainly not something which is unusual.
If you want more information about our wonderful volcano - and recipes for cooking in it, or poking things in it, or dangers of lava, or even how to walk on the hot stuff... see our portal below:
http://www.instanthawaii.com/cgi-bin/hawaii?Volcan o
Mahalo nui loa!
FedEx doesn't have to worry - slashdot already took his site down for them. I wonder how much we should charge them... 100,000 people clicking away.
Aloha... MrIcee here in Hawai'i, where I might like to inform you that even though we *are* the most remote place in the world, if it is morning where you are in NYC it might very well be morning here in Hawai'i. We are only 5 to 6 hours off of you (depending on DST) - Hawai'i doesn't (and won't) observe DST and the new laws will not change our devices here (thank Pele).
Only if it is 6:00 AM or EARILER in NYC would it be before midnight in Hawai'i.
(Plus, most of us get up around 4-5 AM here on the Hilo/Volcano side here on the Big Island since it's the east side and the sun rises over an ocean).
My view on all this DST and Leap Second arguement is... let them, why the hell do we care?
So what if the ignorant Bush Administration wants to change time - is there going to be a penalty if we ignore them? Let them have their own time standard - fine. Who the fuck cares. We'll simply go on using the RIGHT and PROPER time, not some stupid time made-up by politicians who are only swayed by lavish gifts from special intrest groups.
What, are the FBI going to break down our doors and haul us off for using the wrong time?
This is the thing I don't get... nobody is going to FORCE us to change the time of our computers or our telescopes. What, is there now going to be a little winding button on our atomic clocks so we can 'adjust' them to match BUSH TIME? I don't think so.
A number of the observatories on Mauna Kea are planning on turning their telescopes to watch and record the event. I'm fairly sure that Keck, Gemini and Subaru domes will be observing and recording the event (The Subaru primary mirror is 27 feet in diameter, should make for a good view :).
So it won't only be NASA footage we will see - hopefully some of the scopes will capture spectacular images of the impact.
The fifth box is, of course, "coffin"
Once, many moons ago, we wrote an obscurifaction program that removed all documentation and modified all variables and function names to be random combinations of I's, O's, o's, 0's. and 1's (plus is created rather long names of fairly equal length). It also combined lines to make them all very long.
:)
Especially useful on large programs it pretty much made the source totally unreadable, and a complete headache to try to unravel even if you countered with a similar program - because all meaning in the original names was lots.
However, when working as a contractor such programs can be useful insurance policies
Though who knows, I could be wrong, I havn't touched a windoze box in years.
aloha :)
The 60 hz frame rate (or actually, 2 fields at 30 hz) and the vertical retrace period can be viewed by just about any person - regardless of gifts....
Think you know someone who can't see the flicker? Have them stand about 15 feet away from a monitor and chew a stick of gum - they will be amazed to see the jitter (or just pretend to chew a stick of gum or bob or weave VERY slightly on your toes).
Not everyone is wired exactly the same and some of us have eye sensitivity - what we can actually consider a 'sample rate' that is higher, or lower, than the norm. In effect, what you are seeing when you see the jitter can be likened to aliasing effects - every now and then your sample rate syncs up (or desyncs slightly) and you catch the vertical blanking interval and/or scan itself.
It is well known that dogs and cats in general don't see TV like we do - because their vision system is at a faster rate than ours - to them the screen looks like a lot of weird angled lines. However, everyone knows about that ONE cat or ONE dog that DOES watch TV - most people think they are gifted but instead, they are 'slower' in their vision system.
Consider as well, car tires. As you go down the road they spin but you are very familiar with the effect of them 'apparently' spinning backwards - again, the sample rate of your eyes is just slightly out of sync with the rotation speed (or harmonic of) causing the hubcap to appear to turn backwords. And if your right in sync with the speed (or harmonic of) then the hubcap appears to be standing still (e.g., in it's rotational axis).
If you were to consider two people, looking at the same tire rotation, they would undoubtedly report slight differences in what they see. The same effect is happening on the screen - the refresh rate is similar to the rotating hubcap and you are just slightly faster or slower than it is.
(btw, yes, I've been able to see it for years and years and year)
Mahalo nui loa
1) Buy Blackberry
2) Use it
3) *****
4) Visit Doctor
5) PROFIT!!!
Instead of attacking the site, the screensaver instead should have merely hit each URL in the email body once, just as the users EMail client would do. It should then take the most prevelant URL to the website in the spam (prevelant meaning the one appearing most) and fetch the page and again fetch each image (etc) url on that page, just as what would happen if the user had clicked on the link in the email.
Why do this? Well, for one, it will make the spammer a very very lot of money very quickly. But two, it will cost the spammers customer a huge amount of money without any sales. The cost of doing business this way would be too high (assuming enough screensavers to do this). and spammers would either have to shift their model or pick another industry.
...charge them for the time they spend online. Treat your house like an internet cafe.
Are the designers so lame that they can't even name the 50-nifty-united states?
No aloha for me I guess :(
I always try to go with the thinest wallet I can find and also prefer wallets that (1) allow me easy access to my drivers license and company security swipe card and (2) doesn't let things accidently fall out.
Currently I am using a two-fold (e.g., it opens only once) that has the OUTSIDE an additional transparent pocket. That works perfectly as my drivers license and swipe card (and Hawaii Volcanoes National Park Pass) go in the outside window. The inside are nice because the credit card holders face the inside of the wallet thus nothing will fall out. On one side I have my personal Credit Cards and the other my Corporate Credit Cards.
An additional nice thing about this wallet was an elastic band (the wallet is leather btw), that is easy to enclose (it's attached) the wallet making it even more secure.
As per those pesky grocery store cards... I don't keep them in my wallet, That would be an extra 5 cards for all the places I go - instead, I keep them in the car and then I can just pick the right one and take it into the store with me - so much more easy.
Oh ya, I also keep my wallet in my front pocket - more comfortable and more secure.
I tend to buy my wallets anywhere I find one that I really think would meet my criteria - however, this one I got at (yuck) Walmart.
- It's illegal in all 50 states
Not so for Hawai'i... here the law reads that it is LEGAL as long as at least ONE of the parties involved knows about it.That and the irritating Indian guy that keeps calling (even though i'm on the DO NOT CALL LIST) to tell me I've been given a $10,000 government grant (from a 'private number' # no less).
If we're going to outsource, how about starting with the commander and thief.
Placing the solid into my fridge, and again forgetting it for say, 2 or 3 weeks, reduces the solid back into a liquid.
Though I havn't personally tried it, I'm fairly certain that if I were to return the liquid back to the oven, and again properly forget about it, that I would again get a solid.
... and (c) Ugly
However, in Hawai'i there is also a rather well known Shaved Ice company named, strangely enough, Mr Icee - so the named worked here as well.
You might find our instructions for walking on hot lava here most useful. We also pick it up using special kevlar and spun glass gloves that can withstand 2000 F for 20 seconds without breaching.
Aloha
A few years after that I happened to be lecturing at a conference that had Timothy Leary as the guest keynote speaker. Prior to the talks I ran into him and told him that story... he responded "isn't it wonderful that they could be together and have such differing views".
Aloha
I have a Tungsten W and I purchased the Enfora. The first one I received did not work at all unless I was standing 2 feet from the antenna... trying to get support I was told on the phone that "we do not offer support for that device" - however, upon digging and digging further I did end up with a phone number to the support engineer for the portofolio - who was VERY nice and gave me a return code.
I returned the device and they replaced it with a newer model (had a different connector on it) - and told me the the unit I sent them had the internal antenna disconnected which is why it wasn't working.
The new one worked much better - good range, but keeping it connected was a pain because the connector is not solid and unless you pinch the unit hard it tends to disconnect (and will disconnect, for example, by the pressure of just tapping on the screen). Infinitly frustrating because it was hard to determine whether or not I was connected.
After about 2 months of use, one day I turned it on, the green light came on... then it went yellow, then it went out. Now it's dead. If I insert the palm, power goes to the palm and it charges but pushing the power button on the Enfora does nothing whatsoever. Dead as a doornail.
Quite frankly I can't recommend that device to anyone (not to mention the fact that the unit I received has NO FCC info on it at all - which seems fishy to me).