There's no machine I've ever heard of nor seen that could generate a truely random number the way humans can. While this is a "simple" operation, it often plays into our lives without us realizing it at the most critical conjunctions such as split-second decisions between two equal alternatives.
Possibly this point is moot if pseudo-random based on some external element that is more or less random in nature is an acceptable alternative to internally generating a random number.
I choose 156 -- why? Dunno. It sounded good at the time
Don't you wish somedays you had a few robot cockroaches for a little covert reconnaissance mission?
Zorg: Take this glass for instance. Sterile. Pristine. Boring. But if it's broken...
[glass breaks and many small robots come zooming out to clean up the mess]
Now look at that, a variable ballet ensues so full of form and color!
One of the worst offenders I've found of what one might call "arguably legitimate" spam are those websites calling themselves "fun pages" or "joke pages". All you need is a someone with a big email list and good intentions when they click on the "Send this to your friends" button.
The email you receive does indeed have a link to a page that you may or may not find humorous, but it also automatically signs you up to receive a constant stream of emails from that site and possibly other affiliates.
Most of the time you have the option to unsubscribe with a link, but where's the option to not subscribe in the first place?? (I know, I know...don't click on the link!) Currently I have one of those stupid spams arriving every day and have requested to unsubscribe multiple times, but it never works.
These sites seem to be trying very hard to avoid being labeled as spammers by playing off the gullibility of people who frequent the pages, find something humorous and want to share with their friends and family.
It gets even stickier when the mail sent from that site arrives in your whitelist-protected mailbox because it was sent on your friend's behalf.
Yahoo! and Hotmail both send your spam to a Junk Mail folder (or Bulk Mail) where you can browse it periodically and select from it those addresses you don't want blocked.
I recently ran into this problem of missing wanted email because of my whitelist. I didn't expect it, and when I was questioned about it, sure enough the message was in the to-be-deleted-if-you-don't-rescue-it bin.
Unless you were purposely testing to see if your spam-block worked, you didn't have to shut it off to find your sister's letter.
There's more factors than just what you do with your email address however. I've noticed (as I'm sure many others have) that Microsoft's Hotmail is notoriously bad for spam. If I didn't know better, I'd say Microsoft distributes their hotmail account names to anyone who comes knocking.
Anyway, I rarely use Hotmail for normal email since the spam rate is so high, but there is an advantage to keeping at least two email accounts -- one for spam-risk accounts (when a company requires your email to download anything) and one personal account that you only give out to your closest and most trusted friends with a repy-to address that's garbled (e.g. meya_temmyadiul.@ysathoo.com => my_email@yahoo.com with 'eatmydust' interlaced). It would probably be sufficent to simply garble the domain (e.g. my_email@hooyay.omcay => yahoo.com, pig-latin style)
I just noticed that in the past month, everytime I put on my green slippers in the morning it turned out to be a sunny day. My green slippers must be causing more sunny days!
I realize this is ridiculous, but so is such a short-term assumption as human (industrial) existance and the global temperature. If you look at the fluctuations (even simply major ones) in global temperature and its timeline as compared to the timeline of human existance with the capacity to create large amounts of greenhouse gases (CFC's, CO2), the global timeline can be wound into a baseball, while the human timeline can be used to lace your shoes.
Without fancy studies and without climate charts for the past 100 years we know (through palentology, archiology, and the like) that the earth's climate was very different (hotter) that it is today during the time of the dinosaurs. Then there was a shift to a very cold period (ice age) that helped carve out lots of our favorite tourist attractions (Grand Canyon, Mississippi River). Finally, it warmed up again, melted the ice, and allowed us to grow. Until that last stage happened, there weren't any influential humans to change the climate.
Do our emmissions make an interesting coincidence? Yes it's interesting. Is it a direct cause-and-effect? No. Why not? Because there's no substantial evidence that we have significantly altered our planet's biosphere enough to change the temperature on a global scale without any help from the sun or the lower layers of the earth (mantle) heating up pockets thoughout the oceans.
If you want a safe bet, go with the one that's already been shown - the climate changes beyond our control and it's not your fault (entirely), and what part you may have contributed was so insignificant that trying to reverse your contribution makes no difference.
Besides, didn't you watch A.I.? Our demise is an ice age, not a heat wave!:-)
I agree that I would not do something to (severely) jeaporidize my ability to live at or above my current standard of living. However, I disagree that witholding knowledge from people is a viable way to maintain my own position.
As a software developer/engineer it's my duty to learn and grow (and develop) new technologies as well as help the "newbies" grow and develop their skills. Perhaps in a perfect capitalist society, you're correct, I wouldn't give unless I've got a distinct benefit. Unfortunately we're not in a perfect capitalist society, nor should we be since capitalism inherently destroys itself by exhausting the very resources(people) that maintain it.
I also realize I'm human and humans have peaks they reach and pass. At some point I will peak and start to decline. Like it or not, the younger generation is going to have better ideas than mine and they will replace me in my job. But stiffling their growth to lengthen my "reign" is counter-productive just as a monopoly is counter-competitive and bad for an economy.
I'm not going to give my apprentice a knife and show him where in my back he can stick it to kill me the fastest, but I will give him the knife and show him how to fillet a fish and make life simpler for himself (as opposed to using sharp rocks or fingernails to do the same job).
Where'd that knife go? *Ouch* It's been stabbed into my back!
Not all the schools are at fault, and even those that are, aren't entirely at fault.
While I admit schools are certainly a prime source of censorship (even public schools), they can't be blamed entirely for not teaching the latest technologies.
The most affluent (and I use that term loosely) schools are still on a budget and usually in the minority as far as number of students "processed". Many poorer schools and school districts simply cannot afford to keep up with the rate of technological change - so how can they be expected to teach new technologies?
At the same time there have been cases where corporations (most noteably Microsoft and the BSA) have imposed stiff penalties against schools who attempt to use technologies "creatively" due to a limited budget. Instead of granting these stressed schools reduced-price or free software/hardware for educational purposes, the mega-corps drag them to court for copyright infringement.
Elitism occurs all to often in both developers, "technologists", and technology corporations all in the name of trade secrets and copyrightedness.
Please lay off the little guy who isn't as rich as you; doesn't live in your country; is not as smart as you; doesn't own as fancy a bike as you.
I can't help but notice how your argument to keep knowledge and skills out of the hands of lesser folk than yourself is along similar lines of thought in the days of slavery.
It went something like: Don't let them learn to read or write and they will have to stay subserviant to us forever [insert manical laughter]
If you want to be exhaulted for your knowledge, then you should teach those who come to you instead of kicking them away - you'll be revered as a very learned teacher instead of a self-centered programmer who needs to be toppled off his pedestal.
...it takes a minimum of 400 gigajoules to lift 100 kg to 100 km above Earth
That's only if you're trying to breach escape velocity in one bold stroke. I seem to recall some rather recent study/theories that take a chemical compound (something like Buckyballs) and produce incredibly tough carbon rods that could *theoretically* build a elevator to space.
Naturally, the technology is slightly beyond our reach and our budget (somewhere on the order of US$10 trillion to build). And I imagine it would be a rather long ride (hope you went to the bathroom BEFORE you got on the elevator!).
I think it depends on the size of the country and the number of people contained therein as well.
I do not know of which country you speak but without some sort of unique identifier for people in the U.S. things would get very confusing very quickly. I know because I work for a company that deals with Public Records and the sheer volumes of data that flow through our systems and into our database is staggering (into the 30 terabytes so far)!
$200 if you're lucky. It varies wildly depending on your school of course. At mine (a private institution, so that explains part of it), a single credit is $400. Nevermind the fact that a single course (4 credits) is $1600 plus books, plus software, plus room, plus board, plus entertainment (or you go crazy). Thankfully the school does give a relief if you're full-time: you get between 12 and 18 credits per quarter for a mere $25,000 per year! Mind you that doesn't includ books and software, or your own PC/Mac if you need one, or your house...and so on, and so on...
I suspect this article may not take fully into account the effect of more technologically advanced campuses that have oodles of computers loaded with the latest software for students to use.
Why should I have to steal Adobe Photoshop when I've got 2 hours between classes and the campus library has a zip drive and a decent computer for me to use? This is especially true for students who only need the software for one term.
Finally, you simply can't rely too heavily on statistics in general, but especially on surveys.
"Yes, hello. We'd like to ask you a few questions about the types and volumes of software/games/music you pirate (if any). Keep in mind this is a survey that is in no way affiliated with the law."
"Sure thing. I pirate all my software and all my friends software. When I run out of things to pirate, I start pirating my pirated stuff...oh, wait -- did you say something about 'law'...er...I mean I borrowed my friend's CD once, but I gave it back. That's legal right?"
Interesting article - a little to light on the "facts" and the background information to believe blindly though.
Re:Source code = preferred form for modification
on
Abusing the GPL?
·
· Score: 1
IANAL but I wish I had the language of legalese internalized so I could write an obfuscator that does just that.
Naturally, it wouldn't be very useful for obfuscating code, but it would be great entertainment writing and I'm sure more than a few people would enjoy running it just to see the results.
Thanks for a great idea!
see you in the funny papers
Re:Obfuscated source code is not GPLable.....
on
Abusing the GPL?
·
· Score: 1
But it doesn't matter so much how the company prefers to modify the code. If the method of modification that the company uses is privatized and the GPL'd "code" is unreadable/unusuable, then it violates the GPL since developers outside of the company cannot modify the code in a preferred manner.
Essentially, you can't GPL something that's unreadable just because you have the only secret decoder ring, it's readable to you, and you prefer to read the code using your ring.
Slashdot Mirror
There's no machine I've ever heard of nor seen that could generate a truely random number the way humans can. While this is a "simple" operation, it often plays into our lives without us realizing it at the most critical conjunctions such as split-second decisions between two equal alternatives.
Possibly this point is moot if pseudo-random based on some external element that is more or less random in nature is an acceptable alternative to internally generating a random number.
I choose 156 -- why? Dunno. It sounded good at the time
Don't you wish somedays you had a few robot cockroaches for a little covert reconnaissance mission?
Zorg: Take this glass for instance. Sterile. Pristine. Boring. But if it's broken...
[glass breaks and many small robots come zooming out to clean up the mess]
Now look at that, a variable ballet ensues so full of form and color!
One of the worst offenders I've found of what one might call "arguably legitimate" spam are those websites calling themselves "fun pages" or "joke pages". All you need is a someone with a big email list and good intentions when they click on the "Send this to your friends" button.
The email you receive does indeed have a link to a page that you may or may not find humorous, but it also automatically signs you up to receive a constant stream of emails from that site and possibly other affiliates.
Most of the time you have the option to unsubscribe with a link, but where's the option to not subscribe in the first place?? (I know, I know...don't click on the link!) Currently I have one of those stupid spams arriving every day and have requested to unsubscribe multiple times, but it never works.
These sites seem to be trying very hard to avoid being labeled as spammers by playing off the gullibility of people who frequent the pages, find something humorous and want to share with their friends and family.
It gets even stickier when the mail sent from that site arrives in your whitelist-protected mailbox because it was sent on your friend's behalf.
grrrrr...must kill fun pages
Yahoo! and Hotmail both send your spam to a Junk Mail folder (or Bulk Mail) where you can browse it periodically and select from it those addresses you don't want blocked.
I recently ran into this problem of missing wanted email because of my whitelist. I didn't expect it, and when I was questioned about it, sure enough the message was in the to-be-deleted-if-you-don't-rescue-it bin.
Unless you were purposely testing to see if your spam-block worked, you didn't have to shut it off to find your sister's letter.
Just an FYI.
spam spam eggs and spam
There's more factors than just what you do with your email address however. I've noticed (as I'm sure many others have) that Microsoft's Hotmail is notoriously bad for spam. If I didn't know better, I'd say Microsoft distributes their hotmail account names to anyone who comes knocking.
Anyway, I rarely use Hotmail for normal email since the spam rate is so high, but there is an advantage to keeping at least two email accounts -- one for spam-risk accounts (when a company requires your email to download anything) and one personal account that you only give out to your closest and most trusted friends with a repy-to address that's garbled (e.g. meya_temmyadiul.@ysathoo.com => my_email@yahoo.com with 'eatmydust' interlaced). It would probably be sufficent to simply garble the domain (e.g. my_email@hooyay.omcay => yahoo.com, pig-latin style)
I just noticed that in the past month, everytime I put on my green slippers in the morning it turned out to be a sunny day. My green slippers must be causing more sunny days!
:-)
I realize this is ridiculous, but so is such a short-term assumption as human (industrial) existance and the global temperature. If you look at the fluctuations (even simply major ones) in global temperature and its timeline as compared to the timeline of human existance with the capacity to create large amounts of greenhouse gases (CFC's, CO2), the global timeline can be wound into a baseball, while the human timeline can be used to lace your shoes.
Without fancy studies and without climate charts for the past 100 years we know (through palentology, archiology, and the like) that the earth's climate was very different (hotter) that it is today during the time of the dinosaurs. Then there was a shift to a very cold period (ice age) that helped carve out lots of our favorite tourist attractions (Grand Canyon, Mississippi River). Finally, it warmed up again, melted the ice, and allowed us to grow. Until that last stage happened, there weren't any influential humans to change the climate.
Do our emmissions make an interesting coincidence? Yes it's interesting. Is it a direct cause-and-effect? No. Why not? Because there's no substantial evidence that we have significantly altered our planet's biosphere enough to change the temperature on a global scale without any help from the sun or the lower layers of the earth (mantle) heating up pockets thoughout the oceans.
If you want a safe bet, go with the one that's already been shown - the climate changes beyond our control and it's not your fault (entirely), and what part you may have contributed was so insignificant that trying to reverse your contribution makes no difference.
Besides, didn't you watch A.I.? Our demise is an ice age, not a heat wave!
"Did you have any friends as a child?" - Ashley Judd [Something About You]
You mean it inserts REDMOND don't you?
Where do you want to go today? I'm sorry, that's not on the pre-planned route.
Dear Mr. Schlock,
[Clippy: Excuse me, it looks like you're writing a letter!]
IIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!
[What did I say?]
I agree that I would not do something to (severely) jeaporidize my ability to live at or above my current standard of living. However, I disagree that witholding knowledge from people is a viable way to maintain my own position.
As a software developer/engineer it's my duty to learn and grow (and develop) new technologies as well as help the "newbies" grow and develop their skills. Perhaps in a perfect capitalist society, you're correct, I wouldn't give unless I've got a distinct benefit. Unfortunately we're not in a perfect capitalist society, nor should we be since capitalism inherently destroys itself by exhausting the very resources(people) that maintain it.
I also realize I'm human and humans have peaks they reach and pass. At some point I will peak and start to decline. Like it or not, the younger generation is going to have better ideas than mine and they will replace me in my job. But stiffling their growth to lengthen my "reign" is counter-productive just as a monopoly is counter-competitive and bad for an economy.
I'm not going to give my apprentice a knife and show him where in my back he can stick it to kill me the fastest, but I will give him the knife and show him how to fillet a fish and make life simpler for himself (as opposed to using sharp rocks or fingernails to do the same job).
Where'd that knife go? *Ouch* It's been stabbed into my back!
Not all the schools are at fault, and even those that are, aren't entirely at fault.
While I admit schools are certainly a prime source of censorship (even public schools), they can't be blamed entirely for not teaching the latest technologies.
The most affluent (and I use that term loosely) schools are still on a budget and usually in the minority as far as number of students "processed". Many poorer schools and school districts simply cannot afford to keep up with the rate of technological change - so how can they be expected to teach new technologies?
At the same time there have been cases where corporations (most noteably Microsoft and the BSA) have imposed stiff penalties against schools who attempt to use technologies "creatively" due to a limited budget. Instead of granting these stressed schools reduced-price or free software/hardware for educational purposes, the mega-corps drag them to court for copyright infringement.
Elitism occurs all to often in both developers, "technologists", and technology corporations all in the name of trade secrets and copyrightedness.
Please lay off the little guy who isn't as rich as you; doesn't live in your country; is not as smart as you; doesn't own as fancy a bike as you.
I can't help but notice how your argument to keep knowledge and skills out of the hands of lesser folk than yourself is along similar lines of thought in the days of slavery.
It went something like: Don't let them learn to read or write and they will have to stay subserviant to us forever [insert manical laughter]
If you want to be exhaulted for your knowledge, then you should teach those who come to you instead of kicking them away - you'll be revered as a very learned teacher instead of a self-centered programmer who needs to be toppled off his pedestal.
Food for thought. Mmmmmm foood....
...it takes a minimum of 400 gigajoules to lift 100 kg to 100 km above Earth
That's only if you're trying to breach escape velocity in one bold stroke. I seem to recall some rather recent study/theories that take a chemical compound (something like Buckyballs) and produce incredibly tough carbon rods that could *theoretically* build a elevator to space.
Naturally, the technology is slightly beyond our reach and our budget (somewhere on the order of US$10 trillion to build). And I imagine it would be a rather long ride (hope you went to the bathroom BEFORE you got on the elevator!).
I think it depends on the size of the country and the number of people contained therein as well.
I do not know of which country you speak but without some sort of unique identifier for people in the U.S. things would get very confusing very quickly. I know because I work for a company that deals with Public Records and the sheer volumes of data that flow through our systems and into our database is staggering (into the 30 terabytes so far)!
$200 if you're lucky. It varies wildly depending on your school of course. At mine (a private institution, so that explains part of it), a single credit is $400. Nevermind the fact that a single course (4 credits) is $1600 plus books, plus software, plus room, plus board, plus entertainment (or you go crazy). Thankfully the school does give a relief if you're full-time: you get between 12 and 18 credits per quarter for a mere $25,000 per year! Mind you that doesn't includ books and software, or your own PC/Mac if you need one, or your house...and so on, and so on...
Why should I have to steal Adobe Photoshop when I've got 2 hours between classes and the campus library has a zip drive and a decent computer for me to use? This is especially true for students who only need the software for one term.
Finally, you simply can't rely too heavily on statistics in general, but especially on surveys.
"Sure thing. I pirate all my software and all my friends software. When I run out of things to pirate, I start pirating my pirated stuff...oh, wait -- did you say something about 'law'...er...I mean I borrowed my friend's CD once, but I gave it back. That's legal right?"
Interesting article - a little to light on the "facts" and the background information to believe blindly though.
IANAL but I wish I had the language of legalese internalized so I could write an obfuscator that does just that.
Naturally, it wouldn't be very useful for obfuscating code, but it would be great entertainment writing and I'm sure more than a few people would enjoy running it just to see the results.
Thanks for a great idea!
see you in the funny papers
But it doesn't matter so much how the company prefers to modify the code. If the method of modification that the company uses is privatized and the GPL'd "code" is unreadable/unusuable, then it violates the GPL since developers outside of the company cannot modify the code in a preferred manner.
Essentially, you can't GPL something that's unreadable just because you have the only secret decoder ring, it's readable to you, and you prefer to read the code using your ring.