The concept that we're ever going to "run out" of oil is just so spectacularly dumb it boggles the mind. Let's say that tommorow we discover that we have reached our peak capacity and we are never going to be able to produce as much oil as we did last Tuesday.
First, gas prices will rise modestly, into the $3 - $4 range. Industries that can switch away (trains instead of trucks, etc) will start to do so. More people will choose hybrids, more people will ride the bus. It won't be enough, and gas prices will continue to rise over the course of a year or so, probably into the $5 - $6 range. People will start driving even less. More hybrids and motorcycles will be sold. SUV sales will dry up significantly. Trains will continue to subsitute for trucks. Venezuela's massive heavy oil deposits will become profitable to operate. This will cause the rise to dampen, but not stop. Let's say over the next two years the price will rise to $8/gallon. New condos in large urban centers will become more attractive, and more will be built. Many more people will telecommute and take mass transit to work. New drilling platforms will be opened in the Gulf and around Alaska. Signicant advances in fuel efficiency will provide major improvements to car mpg. Grocery and other delivery services will become common again. People will spend more time at and near their homes, and more parks and sidewalks will spring up. around the neighborhoods. Carbon forcing into the atmosphere will drop dramatically.
Let's say this still isn't enough, and the price rises to, say, $10/gallon over the next three years after that. More telecommuting. More delivery services. More intown renewal. More mass transit. Continued innovation in oil extraction from other sources (Shale and tar sands, for example). More electric vehicles with improved battery technology.
Your lifestyle will be somewhat different. You will have to pay more for gas, but you will buy less of it. You are not an automaton, with no ability to respond to financial incentives and disincentives. Why is it that you believe that everyone else is? Why is it that you believe that soccer moms will gleefully pay $100/gallon for gas in a frenzied drive to purchase the last few drops? (which, btw, is also a myth - it's a long slow decline after the peak, not a cliff). Why is it that you have convinced yourself that technology does not advance, that entrepreneurs do not find ways to make money helping people save money? Why is it that you have convinced yourself that governments will not respond to the needs of their citizens with increased funding of mass transit? How can you be old enough to read and write articles on Slashdot and not understand the concept of supply, demand and prices? In the month after Katrina, gasoline use plummeted in the US even though there were no shortages outside of the hurricane-struck areas. People stopped driving so much. And that was at $3/gallon gas. Can you imagine how frugal people will be with their driving if it doubles from that?
Calls for forced cessation of copper distribution, and the creation of a ministry of copper, who will deploy it in a strategic and intelligent manner, rather than all this free market crap
Calls for extensive government investment into research into alternative conductors
Bush is a shill for "Big Copper"
James Lovelock declares that the copper shortage will mean the end of civilization as we know it
Environmentalists everywhere tell people to 'go silver'.
Belkin, et. al. start producing high-end 'copper-plated' wires and connectors, instead of those passe 20th century 'gold' connectors
Pennies are replaced by casino chips, with embedded RFID
"All I want is a proper cup of coffee, made in a proper copper coffee pot" is re-released as an agnst-filled blues song.
Yes, but if you tilt your head 15 degrees to the left, this one looks like Death Star V2 (only partially finished)
There's room for both in our solar system, I think!
6,438,125 seems like it is earlier than both of those...
A method and system for redirecting web page requests on a TCP/IP network is described. The method may be performed by a web traffic monitor that intercepts at least a portion of web-based traffic from a client/subscriber on a network.
Having read the book, taken the ScrumMaster course and implemented Scrum in my organization, I think I have a somewhat different take on the value of the beast. (I, btw, also have almost 1.5 decades of experience in software development)
First, SCRUM is not trying to supplant XP. It is trying to supplant RUP and waterfall. If you don't believe me, check out www.xbreed.net, which tries crossbreed SCRUM and XP, and was written by one of the authors of SCRUM.
Second, SCRUM specifically says that is is a "candy bar wrapper, not a candy bar" (i.e. it is a wrapper around development practices, not a replacement for them). I recognize that the name might be confusing, and I accept that. But the book does not ever say that you shouldn't use good development practices within the SCRUM model.
Third, SCRUM simplifies reporting and tracking, in ways that are analogous to, and quite possibly simpler than XP (I've used XP too). I know all you code monkeys disdain reporting and deliverables and tracking all that, but those of us who manage you monkeys need to be able to report some sense of progress, and SCRUM gives us tools that do exactly that.
Fourth, SCRUM establishes an additional goal for each 30 day sprint - deliver something of demonstrable value to the customer. That, by itself, is a very powerful mindset, because it strips away a lot of the bs programming, leaving stuff that the customer will use. Ideally, the customer would be there every day, but I have yet to see that happen, except when the customer is in the office/cube down the hall.
More than anything else, I'm amused. It's like you got the elves coming up to Helm's Deep to aid in the fight against the Uruk-Hai, and the humans in the castle attack the elves for having different weapons! Nothing about SCRUM is in any way contradictory to XP w/a 4 week iteration If anything, it provides some additional benefits. We use the core set of XP development memes (UT, daily builds, PP and Refactoring, etc), and we use SCRUM to help guide the month's worth of work. And it works very well for us.
The point of the article was to come up with lists and discuss. So here's mine:
Sexual:
Masturbatory habits ("Hey Chuck, what'd you do last night?" "Oh, I stayed home and surfed for porn - had two great orgasms!")
Fetishes ("So Julie, what did you get for Christmas?" "Oh! A batman cape? I can't reach orgasm unless my lover is wearing one!")
Adultery (although this might be legitimate)
Violence:
"Sure I hit my wife - when she deserves it!" (this is probably less of a taboo than it should be)
Religion:
In most of middle america, announcing that you're an atheist is pretty eyebrow-raising.
Language:
You can't say 'nigger', unless you're black.
You can't usually use a racial slur at all unless you're either kidding or in a particular bigoted crowd.
You know, most taboos are only taboo in a particular circle you're in. For example, announcing that the War on Drugs is destroying this country would be applauded in one circle I travel in, and ignored or shrugged off in several others.
Bull hockey.
The books (I've read the series at least 5 times in my 33 years) are visionary and epic. But I found the characters in the books generally flat and uninteresting.
Boromir, Smeagol, Faramir, Elrond and Aragorn are all much more interesting and complex in the movie than they are in the book. Boromir seems much more distraught over the gravity of his countries peril in the movie. Smeagol's emotions are clearer and more profound. Faramir's emotional bond to his brother and problems with his father are better. Elrond is clearly extremely upset at the prospect of his daughter's mortal peril. Aragorn is uncertain, and worried - in the book he says "I am Isildur's heir, not Isildur himself", while in the movie, it is Arwen who says it to him - because he is afraid of the burden he has to bear.
I think PJ did an excellent job making the characters more lifelike and interesting. Re-read the books and imagine that Aragorn in the movie - always perfectly certain of his action, unquestioned by his followers and lacking in any real demonstrable emotion other than humor.
One of the weaknesses of a group mind - they never wrote any software viruses, so they never learned to build anti-virus software.
If they had A/V software, we never would have been able to send them that virus to drop their shields.
Your throwaway assertion that children will be owned by companies is ludicrous. Logically consistent? Perhaps. But when you attempt to apply that logic in the real world, it completely falls apart.
Just imagine the advertising:
"Attention, prospective parents! Looking to have children? Want to make sure that they will be part of Dogbert's New Ruling Class? Well, with our new Sauron(tm) genetic enhancement kit, you'll ensure your potential children are the overlords of the Earth, and not the underlings of the scrap yard. The Sauron(tm) kit guarantees incredible beauty, rippling muscles, supple agility, exceptional motor skills, a lifetime of long, thick, luxurious hair, 8% body fat, 300+ IQs and a beautiful self-cleaning smile. But wait, there's more! After going through the 9 months of effort to carry your child, we take over from there! That's right - once you use the Sauron(tm) genetic enhancement kit, you'll no longer be burdened with the tedium of parenting. No late night feedings. No messy diaper changes. You just spit 'em out, and we'll raise them for you in our Gamma X baby factories, teaching them to be productive and yet obedient members of society. And at only $100,000, you're ensured of an eternity of genetic superiority."
People do not have kids so that they can be owned by someone else. And no rational, modern, semi-democratic state would tolerate the concept of people owned by anyone.
You are just about 100% wrong. One or more of those "bad genes" are likely, in the long run, to help ensure the survival of a branch of humanity from a extinction-level crisis.
Virtually all evolutionary advances are initially bad, or at best neutral in the organism's life. But along comes an extinction crisis, and suddenly the organisms with the bad gene are doing a lot better.
For example, Sickle Cell Anemia is (if I recall correctly) somewhat effective at preventing malaria.
The danger is much more likely to come from the elimination of bad genes from our genetic makeup, than from the continued survival of bad genes.
Genetics: Where today's bad luck is tommorrow's survival mechanism.
My goodness you people must be young. History doesn't end. There is no plausible scenario that would ensure that we "never go back into space". It's like when I tell my 5 year old that he can't have ice cream for dessert and he falls on the floor wailing "I'll never get to eat ice cream again!!!".
The journey into space is a journey. It will take a long time, and there will be plenty of hiccups along the way, but it will happen. The first pioneer from New York who wanted to settle California probably didn't make it all the way - he probably stopped part way, and helped establish a town, and the next guy coming through was able to get farther.
Maybe the ISS isn't the right answer. Maybe space elevators are the right way to enable large-scale space travel. No one knows. But claiming that we're going to stop going into space because of a relatively minor setback is foolish. Where else are we going to go?
Re:Since the author didnt mention it...
on
Design Patterns
·
· Score: 5, Informative
Design Patterns is an extremely valuable reference book. It uses C++ examples, but in almost all cases these can be translated into Java (which is the only other language I use regularly right now).
It suffers from an overdependence on GUI-based descriptions, which were difficult for me to absorb, given my back-end system focus. However, every few weeks or months something will fall into place and I'll suddenly get the usage of one of the patterns that I didn't understand before.
Patterns are a great "show off" tool - useful to intimidate those who haven't learned about them yet. Since you'll be on the intimidatee side until you read it, it is good to have a copy for that reason as well.
Some of the patterns are easy to understand and easy to use - Singleton and Observer. Others take more time before you "get it", and many you may never learn, nor need to.
But all in all, I think you'll feel smarter for having read it (even if you only "get" pieces of it), and it will probably help your architectural sophistication, and might even present a handy solution to a frustrating design problem.
I was born on April 2nd, 1970. I have $70K in an IRA, $55K in home equity.
At one point I had over $100k in my 401K. Luckily, over the next 30 years, it should appreciate
The point is - it wasn't that hard. I didn't have to get lucky with the market or stock options. All I had to do was go to work while it was still dark, work hard, and not buy a ton of expensive toys. The "best years of our lives are behind us" is pure stupidity, in the same genre as 'There is only a worldwide market for 5 or 6 computers' and '640K should be enough for anyone.'
Write this guy's name down, and stick that quote in your sig file. It will be as laughable as Gates' comment someday.
I'm one. $70k in IRA, $55K in home equity. Masters In Computer Science. I had $10k in cash saved up earlier this year, but spent it all over the 5 months after my company shut down before I found a new job. Less than $1000 in college loans still out. I have one car loan
Born 4/2/1970, so I'm almost exactly 32.5 years old.
I got a lot of calls from a lot of vendors for tools and platforms. Here's where they caught my interest:
1) I could see viable, useful products/applications/software built from them.
I can't stress this too much. People are always trying to sell me a platform with nothing on it, and keep getting upset/annoyed that I don't "see the potential". Well, color me jade, but I've seen too many "next big things" turn out to fizzle, so I refuse to be first. *Except* when I know the company really well, and they're interesting in having me help them make the product better.
2) Don't be "buzzword" laden As other people have referenced, I hate the fancy "new buzzword of the week" systems that try to make the product seem new and exciting. All they accomplish is to make me feel annoyed and uncomfortable.
3) 'Is this for you'?
It would be nice if you had a section on your website that asked a set of germane, intelligent questions about my problems and challenges. At the end it should spit out a rough estimate as to whether this platform/toolset will help me. DO NOT MAKE IT ALWAYS ANSWER YES. WE CAN SEE THROUGH THAT.
4) Long trial period.
I like to kick the tires, and I hate having 30 day evaluations. Given everything else in my day, how am I supposed to figure out if this product is useful or not (especially if you called me) in 30 days. Most especially with your first few potential customers, give them a lot of handholding and patience. Let them get used to having it before you ask them to pay for it.
5) Put up open discussion forums I think the Cluetrain Manifesto hit it right on the head here - if I can see raw, unadulterated commentary from the rest of the world, I will feel better that if I like the product, I haven't been snookered.
This case illustrates the failure of law enforcement agencies to implement adequate protection against the abuse of information they collect.
No. Fundamentally, this case illustrates the corruption of power. Governments are made up of lots of individuals, with their own problems, stresses and challenges. They are not angels. If the opportunity to profit from their position appears, many will take it. Putting more levels of bureaucracy and control is just a form of "moving the problem around."
If you want to grant the government more power to accomplish things, abuse of power is the natural, and practically inevitable result. Get used to it. It will happen more and more often over time as we surrender more and more of our freedoms. Especially for the never-ending war on terrorism.
The question we should be asking is "Why does the FBI have this data in the first place?", not "why aren't there sufficient controls to protect this data?"
Slashdot Mirror
Catalina Con Caesar Cipher Cracked by Cunning Cryptologist's Kid Sister
First, gas prices will rise modestly, into the $3 - $4 range. Industries that can switch away (trains instead of trucks, etc) will start to do so. More people will choose hybrids, more people will ride the bus. It won't be enough, and gas prices will continue to rise over the course of a year or so, probably into the $5 - $6 range. People will start driving even less. More hybrids and motorcycles will be sold. SUV sales will dry up significantly. Trains will continue to subsitute for trucks. Venezuela's massive heavy oil deposits will become profitable to operate. This will cause the rise to dampen, but not stop. Let's say over the next two years the price will rise to $8/gallon. New condos in large urban centers will become more attractive, and more will be built. Many more people will telecommute and take mass transit to work. New drilling platforms will be opened in the Gulf and around Alaska. Signicant advances in fuel efficiency will provide major improvements to car mpg. Grocery and other delivery services will become common again. People will spend more time at and near their homes, and more parks and sidewalks will spring up. around the neighborhoods. Carbon forcing into the atmosphere will drop dramatically.
Let's say this still isn't enough, and the price rises to, say, $10/gallon over the next three years after that. More telecommuting. More delivery services. More intown renewal. More mass transit. Continued innovation in oil extraction from other sources (Shale and tar sands, for example). More electric vehicles with improved battery technology.
Your lifestyle will be somewhat different. You will have to pay more for gas, but you will buy less of it. You are not an automaton, with no ability to respond to financial incentives and disincentives. Why is it that you believe that everyone else is? Why is it that you believe that soccer moms will gleefully pay $100/gallon for gas in a frenzied drive to purchase the last few drops? (which, btw, is also a myth - it's a long slow decline after the peak, not a cliff). Why is it that you have convinced yourself that technology does not advance, that entrepreneurs do not find ways to make money helping people save money? Why is it that you have convinced yourself that governments will not respond to the needs of their citizens with increased funding of mass transit? How can you be old enough to read and write articles on Slashdot and not understand the concept of supply, demand and prices? In the month after Katrina, gasoline use plummeted in the US even though there were no shortages outside of the hurricane-struck areas. People stopped driving so much. And that was at $3/gallon gas. Can you imagine how frugal people will be with their driving if it doubles from that?
Yes, but if you tilt your head 15 degrees to the left, this one looks like Death Star V2 (only partially finished) There's room for both in our solar system, I think!
All I remember was at 3:57 I was operating normally, and then it was suddenly 4:45. I wasn't aware of any "blackout".
First, SCRUM is not trying to supplant XP. It is trying to supplant RUP and waterfall. If you don't believe me, check out www.xbreed.net, which tries crossbreed SCRUM and XP, and was written by one of the authors of SCRUM.
Second, SCRUM specifically says that is is a "candy bar wrapper, not a candy bar" (i.e. it is a wrapper around development practices, not a replacement for them). I recognize that the name might be confusing, and I accept that. But the book does not ever say that you shouldn't use good development practices within the SCRUM model.
Third, SCRUM simplifies reporting and tracking, in ways that are analogous to, and quite possibly simpler than XP (I've used XP too). I know all you code monkeys disdain reporting and deliverables and tracking all that, but those of us who manage you monkeys need to be able to report some sense of progress, and SCRUM gives us tools that do exactly that.
Fourth, SCRUM establishes an additional goal for each 30 day sprint - deliver something of demonstrable value to the customer. That, by itself, is a very powerful mindset, because it strips away a lot of the bs programming, leaving stuff that the customer will use. Ideally, the customer would be there every day, but I have yet to see that happen, except when the customer is in the office/cube down the hall.
More than anything else, I'm amused. It's like you got the elves coming up to Helm's Deep to aid in the fight against the Uruk-Hai, and the humans in the castle attack the elves for having different weapons! Nothing about SCRUM is in any way contradictory to XP w/a 4 week iteration If anything, it provides some additional benefits. We use the core set of XP development memes (UT, daily builds, PP and Refactoring, etc), and we use SCRUM to help guide the month's worth of work. And it works very well for us.
- Masturbatory habits ("Hey Chuck, what'd you do last night?" "Oh, I stayed home and surfed for porn - had two great orgasms!")
- Fetishes ("So Julie, what did you get for Christmas?" "Oh! A batman cape? I can't reach orgasm unless my lover is wearing one!")
- Adultery (although this might be legitimate)
Violence:- "Sure I hit my wife - when she deserves it!" (this is probably less of a taboo than it should be)
Religion:- In most of middle america, announcing that you're an atheist is pretty eyebrow-raising.
Language:- You can't say 'nigger', unless you're black.
- You can't usually use a racial slur at all unless you're either kidding or in a particular bigoted crowd.
You know, most taboos are only taboo in a particular circle you're in. For example, announcing that the War on Drugs is destroying this country would be applauded in one circle I travel in, and ignored or shrugged off in several others.Bull hockey. The books (I've read the series at least 5 times in my 33 years) are visionary and epic. But I found the characters in the books generally flat and uninteresting. Boromir, Smeagol, Faramir, Elrond and Aragorn are all much more interesting and complex in the movie than they are in the book. Boromir seems much more distraught over the gravity of his countries peril in the movie. Smeagol's emotions are clearer and more profound. Faramir's emotional bond to his brother and problems with his father are better. Elrond is clearly extremely upset at the prospect of his daughter's mortal peril. Aragorn is uncertain, and worried - in the book he says "I am Isildur's heir, not Isildur himself", while in the movie, it is Arwen who says it to him - because he is afraid of the burden he has to bear. I think PJ did an excellent job making the characters more lifelike and interesting. Re-read the books and imagine that Aragorn in the movie - always perfectly certain of his action, unquestioned by his followers and lacking in any real demonstrable emotion other than humor.
One of the weaknesses of a group mind - they never wrote any software viruses, so they never learned to build anti-virus software. If they had A/V software, we never would have been able to send them that virus to drop their shields.
Your throwaway assertion that children will be owned by companies is ludicrous. Logically consistent? Perhaps. But when you attempt to apply that logic in the real world, it completely falls apart. Just imagine the advertising: "Attention, prospective parents! Looking to have children? Want to make sure that they will be part of Dogbert's New Ruling Class? Well, with our new Sauron(tm) genetic enhancement kit, you'll ensure your potential children are the overlords of the Earth, and not the underlings of the scrap yard. The Sauron(tm) kit guarantees incredible beauty, rippling muscles, supple agility, exceptional motor skills, a lifetime of long, thick, luxurious hair, 8% body fat, 300+ IQs and a beautiful self-cleaning smile. But wait, there's more! After going through the 9 months of effort to carry your child, we take over from there! That's right - once you use the Sauron(tm) genetic enhancement kit, you'll no longer be burdened with the tedium of parenting. No late night feedings. No messy diaper changes. You just spit 'em out, and we'll raise them for you in our Gamma X baby factories, teaching them to be productive and yet obedient members of society. And at only $100,000, you're ensured of an eternity of genetic superiority." People do not have kids so that they can be owned by someone else. And no rational, modern, semi-democratic state would tolerate the concept of people owned by anyone.
You are just about 100% wrong. One or more of those "bad genes" are likely, in the long run, to help ensure the survival of a branch of humanity from a extinction-level crisis.
Virtually all evolutionary advances are initially bad, or at best neutral in the organism's life. But along comes an extinction crisis, and suddenly the organisms with the bad gene are doing a lot better.
For example, Sickle Cell Anemia is (if I recall correctly) somewhat effective at preventing malaria.
The danger is much more likely to come from the elimination of bad genes from our genetic makeup, than from the continued survival of bad genes.
Genetics: Where today's bad luck is tommorrow's survival mechanism.
The journey into space is a journey. It will take a long time, and there will be plenty of hiccups along the way, but it will happen. The first pioneer from New York who wanted to settle California probably didn't make it all the way - he probably stopped part way, and helped establish a town, and the next guy coming through was able to get farther.
Maybe the ISS isn't the right answer. Maybe space elevators are the right way to enable large-scale space travel. No one knows. But claiming that we're going to stop going into space because of a relatively minor setback is foolish. Where else are we going to go?
It suffers from an overdependence on GUI-based descriptions, which were difficult for me to absorb, given my back-end system focus. However, every few weeks or months something will fall into place and I'll suddenly get the usage of one of the patterns that I didn't understand before.
Patterns are a great "show off" tool - useful to intimidate those who haven't learned about them yet. Since you'll be on the intimidatee side until you read it, it is good to have a copy for that reason as well.
Some of the patterns are easy to understand and easy to use - Singleton and Observer. Others take more time before you "get it", and many you may never learn, nor need to.
But all in all, I think you'll feel smarter for having read it (even if you only "get" pieces of it), and it will probably help your architectural sophistication, and might even present a handy solution to a frustrating design problem.
It looks like they'll have to drastically open up their middleware for third party replacements. Very interesting.
This is going to give them fits to change in only 3 months though.
At one point I had over $100k in my 401K. Luckily, over the next 30 years, it should appreciate
The point is - it wasn't that hard. I didn't have to get lucky with the market or stock options. All I had to do was go to work while it was still dark, work hard, and not buy a ton of expensive toys. The "best years of our lives are behind us" is pure stupidity, in the same genre as 'There is only a worldwide market for 5 or 6 computers' and '640K should be enough for anyone.'
Write this guy's name down, and stick that quote in your sig file. It will be as laughable as Gates' comment someday.
Born 4/2/1970, so I'm almost exactly 32.5 years old.
1) I could see viable, useful products/applications/software built from them.
I can't stress this too much. People are always trying to sell me a platform with nothing on it, and keep getting upset/annoyed that I don't "see the potential". Well, color me jade, but I've seen too many "next big things" turn out to fizzle, so I refuse to be first. *Except* when I know the company really well, and they're interesting in having me help them make the product better.
2) Don't be "buzzword" laden
As other people have referenced, I hate the fancy "new buzzword of the week" systems that try to make the product seem new and exciting. All they accomplish is to make me feel annoyed and uncomfortable.
3) 'Is this for you'?
It would be nice if you had a section on your website that asked a set of germane, intelligent questions about my problems and challenges. At the end it should spit out a rough estimate as to whether this platform/toolset will help me. DO NOT MAKE IT ALWAYS ANSWER YES. WE CAN SEE THROUGH THAT.
4) Long trial period.
I like to kick the tires, and I hate having 30 day evaluations. Given everything else in my day, how am I supposed to figure out if this product is useful or not (especially if you called me) in 30 days. Most especially with your first few potential customers, give them a lot of handholding and patience. Let them get used to having it before you ask them to pay for it.
5) Put up open discussion forums
I think the Cluetrain Manifesto hit it right on the head here - if I can see raw, unadulterated commentary from the rest of the world, I will feel better that if I like the product, I haven't been snookered.
No. Fundamentally, this case illustrates the corruption of power. Governments are made up of lots of individuals, with their own problems, stresses and challenges. They are not angels. If the opportunity to profit from their position appears, many will take it. Putting more levels of bureaucracy and control is just a form of "moving the problem around."
If you want to grant the government more power to accomplish things, abuse of power is the natural, and practically inevitable result. Get used to it. It will happen more and more often over time as we surrender more and more of our freedoms. Especially for the never-ending war on terrorism.
The question we should be asking is "Why does the FBI have this data in the first place?", not "why aren't there sufficient controls to protect this data?"