I am not an electrician, but since you asked, I recommend you take off your shoes and socks first. Wrap tinfoil around your ankles and wire them securely to an earth ground.
Now, take the panel off and start removing that electrical tape. Don't bother turning off the power: that's what the breakers are for (duh)--if you end up shorting something out, the breakers will open to protect you.
One of the things you'll want to do is strip the insulation off all the wires as soon as they enter the box. Insulation wastes vaulable space, especially in small electrical boxes, and is a fire hazard.
Oh, and wet down your hands. If your hands are dry, they might catch fire from the sparks. Get a garden hose near the box and soak down the insides as well to reduce the risk of fire. Safety first!
As a corrolary to that question, is the business model presented by such stores viable? I assume major labels had examined many variations on online music and ruled it out as not profitable. Is that the case? I guess Sony did try it, but I wasn't very interested in the small selection they offered, but I haven't seen any other label even suggest they're making an online download store.
It wasn't "seniors" as much as it was other, more valuable students like star football players, average football players, anyone else on or associated with the football players, and anyone whose daddy was a cop or in the mob--double if both. If you were there to get an education, or, say, get an ASE certification so you could get a job when you graduated, well, you just weren't worth enough to keep in school if you got in a fight.
Most companies have a conflict of interest statement somewhere that prevents people from receiving "gifts" from companines. A friend of mine once signed up for a contest at a company he worked with, and when he won, he checked around and found he couldn't accept the gift because it was akin to a bribe.
In my opinion, though, I think the company is foolish for trying to claim the PDA's. Most places can't budget an occasional $20 for pizza for their employees, so being able to give people a cool gift for $0 out of their pocket seems like a pretty good deal.
Note the distance from your ear to the earphone diaphragm.
Since sound level is reduced by the square of the distance, mash the headphones into your ear so the distance is 0.63 (sqrt(10^-0.4)) the original distance.
This will increase the amount of sound reaching your ears by 4dB.
So you want to make sure people can only vote once but you don't want to require that they have ID cards? How about biometrics?
You go to vote, get a retinal scan stored with your vote. If you vote more than once, [insert appropriate action here: {use the most recent vote | use only unchanged votes | throw away vote | some other action}].
The big security hole is fake retinas being inserted into the database. There's always a point of weakness in the security hierarchy where you might be able to slip in fake data. It's plausible to be able to detect fake retinal images, but that may not be possible. Of course, false data is the bane of any electronic voting device.
The good part, though, is that it allows people to vote anonymously and vote only once without being identified--as long as there's no database that correlates retinas to names, that is.
It's bad enough that someone is in the circumstance of not being able to move, but to force upon them some crazy wheelchair commanding them through mind control is just unconscionable.
In considering possible solutions, I would take a crack at PDF. I've never done PostScript programming, but as I understand it, you can create vectors, arcs, and splines pretty well. Actually, since I don't have a good graph-generating package myself, I may just look into this... hmm.
For my own use I would also look into CAD software formats... what was it, DXF? I gather that's pretty simple for vector stuff, but it's not readily supported in browsers.
I'll generally sign up for AOL for a little while around the time I travel in December. I did this last year and when I called to cancel, they offered me something like 150 hours per month for $4.95. I turned them down because I really only needed the service for two weeks in December. I'm surprised the article doesn't mention this.
The bad news is that I couldn't find any information on this option on the AOL site.
Re:Kids today... [... may just be smarter]
on
The Big Kerplop
·
· Score: 1
They may just be smarter and walk in the opposite direction, 3 miles downhill each day.
I never understood why Escher's soliders liked the stairmaster so much.
(Aww heck, why not go for the Trifecta...)
And Sisyphus should have just redefined the problem, considered it done, and left.
(Thanks for the advice... I'll keep my day job as long as they keep paying me to read Slashdot.)
I have a general idea of what "intellectual property" is, mostly based on the words itself and some of the contexts. Could you help me refine that definition and my understanding of the limits of the law by providing some examples? I'm curious about examples of open-and-shut cases (those for which there is near certainty in the outcome beforehand) versus cases in the "gray area" (those for which it comes down to the opinion of the judge.) For instance:
An example of a case in the gray area where an individual stole IP from a corporation.
An example of a case where the IP was owned by an individual.
An example of a case where one corporation took IP from another, but it wasn't clear whether it was legal.
An example where the defendant claimed what they were doing was "fair use" and you were surprised that the judge found in favor of the defendant.
An example where the defendant claimed what they were doing was "fair use" and you were surprised that the judge found in favor of the prosecution.
Free is such a strong word. Don't you think you'll be paying an extra $30/month so you can keep your number? Heck, my local company charges me to keep my number from my last apartment, and I can see the place from where I live now. I guarantee this will be just like ATM fees... if it's a benefit to you, they'll charge you, regardless if it costs them anything, or even if it saves them money.
... if she really likes me at all for being able to explain why all the functions should be arranged alphabetically. thankfully my antidepressants have kept me from killing myself.
June 12
aagh! i'm in bag hell. why won't my ui look like i want? bags in grids in flows... i sound like dr. sues. roflmao. lol.
i was feeling good so i stopped taking my anti-depressants today.
June 13
i tried to touch my mouse but i think it hates me. i've been listening to the same depeche mode song over and over today.
i hate swing. i decided to just make one big flow and let all the buttons go where they want. it'll make a sh!tty calculator but who cares. does anyone care?
June 14
i woke up this morning finally manic. i got a grid layout for the number buttons and flowed the function buttons. it looks awesome!!!!!!! the support code is rock solid and i got junit installed and made 175 test cases. woo hoo!
my mom called and i talked to her while i called. she said i shouldn't have stopped taking my antidepressants. i told her i was on the cordless so i could be outside to finish my painting and i brought the laptop to the porch so i could code more test cases while i was on the phone.
At what point did putting a bunch of PAN devices that broadcast a moderatly high frequency signal all over ones body become a good idea?
[smacks own head; rolls eyes]
I was just thinking about how people don't understand this ionizing/non-ionizing radiation. Consider a 100 watt light bulb. How long would it take for you to burn to death at 1 meter? Consider a 10,000 watt light bulb. How long would it take for you to burn to death at 1 meter?
Consider a 1000 watt microwave oven versus a 0.400 watt microwave oven (i.e. ~2GHz cell phone) in the same respects.
Coincidental relationships
on
Crime Prediction
·
· Score: 1, Interesting
I would be very satisfied with simple software that watched trends of crime and allowed police to select areas where crimes are more likely so they can increase forces there.
According to the article, they seem to be grasping at straws:
With models similar to those used in macroeconomics to warn of recession or inflation, Gorr said researchers matched criminal reports, 911 calls on shots fired, and census data along with a mishmash of yellow page listings and seasonal variations to predict crime numbers.
They are apparently matching coincidental data with crime statistics rather than finding causal relationships. By this I mean they can correlate such weird things as percentage of dirt versus grass in yards, average number of health club memberships, and population density to crime rates, but that doesn't mean they have a reliable means to accurately predict crimes.
Further, finding causal relationships in a system as complex as human social interaction is impossible. A simple example is the relationship that poverty causes robberies.
The first flaw is that there are numerous counter examples, both where impoverished individuals do not rob, and where non-poor people do rob (how many pens do you have from work at home, thief?)... for the causality to be true, there should be a somewhat proportional relationship (how can it be that the richest people *cough*Enron*cough* still rob?)
Second, and more importantly, is that this is a correlation--if you can find a statistic that correlates poverty to higher crime rates, this does not show that one causes the other--is it the crime that causes the poverty or the poverty that causes the crimes? You can find more obtuse correlations... oh, I don't know, how about that there are more crimes committed where there is street lighting. A causal relationship would say that removing the street lighting would reduce the crime, but that seems kinda silly.
Anyway, I went around the block just to say that a fair predictive system should deal only with causal relationships to ensure long-term accuracy. I'm sure an impartial computer analysis would find that high crime areas also have a lot of police patrols... coincidence?
Please clarify park versus preserve
on
Geocaching Crackdown?
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
This is something that bugs me every time. To me there are social parks, nature parks, and preserves. In a social park, you go have a picnic and play frisbee--erosion and general wear is part of the deal. In a nature park, you generally hike and observe--it is not a park to be used, but to be seen, so erosion and wear is a strong consideration. Finally, in a preserve, you're trying to avoid all erosion while still allowing people to witness natural wonders.
In my opinion, all local parks are social parks. I was furious when they banned mountain biking (all parks in Monroe County, NY--near Rochester, NY) but still allowed horses. If erosion was the issue, then it's not a social park, and you should treat it as a nature park and only allow people on foot (or equivalent.)
The root cause is that we need to determine the purpose of our parks. Once the definitions are established, the allowable and not allowable behaviors become clear. The short answer for now is that if there's barbeques or a frisbee golf course, you can geocache; if there's a sign-in sheet and dedicated nature paths, you can't.
Hopefully someone can answer this litle question of mine.
Since Mercury orbits the sun in only 88 days, why can we see transists more often than about 13 times a century (according to space.com)?
I'm no expert in these matters, but maybe the transits occur primarily at night when the sun is switched off. This would make sense because Mercury would probably catch on fire if it were to pass so close to the sun while it were hot.
Slashdot Mirror
Now, take the panel off and start removing that electrical tape. Don't bother turning off the power: that's what the breakers are for (duh)--if you end up shorting something out, the breakers will open to protect you.
One of the things you'll want to do is strip the insulation off all the wires as soon as they enter the box. Insulation wastes vaulable space, especially in small electrical boxes, and is a fire hazard.
Oh, and wet down your hands. If your hands are dry, they might catch fire from the sparks. Get a garden hose near the box and soak down the insides as well to reduce the risk of fire. Safety first!
As a corrolary to that question, is the business model presented by such stores viable? I assume major labels had examined many variations on online music and ruled it out as not profitable. Is that the case? I guess Sony did try it, but I wasn't very interested in the small selection they offered, but I haven't seen any other label even suggest they're making an online download store.
From the Doctor Fun Archive, see "In his secret lab deep beneath Mt. Rainier, Doctor Watson "detects" another error."
Pick two:
In other words: this may take a while.
It wasn't "seniors" as much as it was other, more valuable students like star football players, average football players, anyone else on or associated with the football players, and anyone whose daddy was a cop or in the mob--double if both. If you were there to get an education, or, say, get an ASE certification so you could get a job when you graduated, well, you just weren't worth enough to keep in school if you got in a fight.
In my opinion, though, I think the company is foolish for trying to claim the PDA's. Most places can't budget an occasional $20 for pizza for their employees, so being able to give people a cool gift for $0 out of their pocket seems like a pretty good deal.
This will increase the amount of sound reaching your ears by 4dB.
You go to vote, get a retinal scan stored with your vote. If you vote more than once, [insert appropriate action here: {use the most recent vote | use only unchanged votes | throw away vote | some other action}].
The big security hole is fake retinas being inserted into the database. There's always a point of weakness in the security hierarchy where you might be able to slip in fake data. It's plausible to be able to detect fake retinal images, but that may not be possible. Of course, false data is the bane of any electronic voting device.
The good part, though, is that it allows people to vote anonymously and vote only once without being identified--as long as there's no database that correlates retinas to names, that is.
(Oh my god ... I didn't just use "OMG" did I?)
It's bad enough that someone is in the circumstance of not being able to move, but to force upon them some crazy wheelchair commanding them through mind control is just unconscionable.
In considering possible solutions, I would take a crack at PDF. I've never done PostScript programming, but as I understand it, you can create vectors, arcs, and splines pretty well. Actually, since I don't have a good graph-generating package myself, I may just look into this ... hmm.
For my own use I would also look into CAD software formats ... what was it, DXF? I gather that's pretty simple for vector stuff, but it's not readily supported in browsers.
The bad news is that I couldn't find any information on this option on the AOL site.
I never understood why Escher's soliders liked the stairmaster so much.
(Aww heck, why not go for the Trifecta...)
And Sisyphus should have just redefined the problem, considered it done, and left.
(Thanks for the advice ... I'll keep my day job as long as they keep paying me to read Slashdot.)
- An example of a case in the gray area where an individual stole IP from a corporation.
- An example of a case where the IP was owned by an individual.
- An example of a case where one corporation took IP from another, but it wasn't clear whether it was legal.
- An example where the defendant claimed what they were doing was "fair use" and you were surprised that the judge found in favor of the defendant.
- An example where the defendant claimed what they were doing was "fair use" and you were surprised that the judge found in favor of the prosecution.
Thanks.Free is such a strong word. Don't you think you'll be paying an extra $30/month so you can keep your number? Heck, my local company charges me to keep my number from my last apartment, and I can see the place from where I live now. I guarantee this will be just like ATM fees ... if it's a benefit to you, they'll charge you, regardless if it costs them anything, or even if it saves them money.
June 12
aagh! i'm in bag hell. why won't my ui look like i want? bags in grids in flows ... i sound like dr. sues. roflmao. lol.
i was feeling good so i stopped taking my anti-depressants today.
June 13
i tried to touch my mouse but i think it hates me. i've been listening to the same depeche mode song over and over today.
i hate swing. i decided to just make one big flow and let all the buttons go where they want. it'll make a sh!tty calculator but who cares. does anyone care?
June 14
i woke up this morning finally manic. i got a grid layout for the number buttons and flowed the function buttons. it looks awesome!!!!!!! the support code is rock solid and i got junit installed and made 175 test cases. woo hoo!
my mom called and i talked to her while i called. she said i shouldn't have stopped taking my antidepressants. i told her i was on the cordless so i could be outside to finish my painting and i brought the laptop to the porch so i could code more test cases while i was on the phone.
...
[smacks own head; rolls eyes]
I was just thinking about how people don't understand this ionizing/non-ionizing radiation. Consider a 100 watt light bulb. How long would it take for you to burn to death at 1 meter? Consider a 10,000 watt light bulb. How long would it take for you to burn to death at 1 meter?
Consider a 1000 watt microwave oven versus a 0.400 watt microwave oven (i.e. ~2GHz cell phone) in the same respects.
According to the article, they seem to be grasping at straws:
They are apparently matching coincidental data with crime statistics rather than finding causal relationships. By this I mean they can correlate such weird things as percentage of dirt versus grass in yards, average number of health club memberships, and population density to crime rates, but that doesn't mean they have a reliable means to accurately predict crimes.
Further, finding causal relationships in a system as complex as human social interaction is impossible. A simple example is the relationship that poverty causes robberies.
The first flaw is that there are numerous counter examples, both where impoverished individuals do not rob, and where non-poor people do rob (how many pens do you have from work at home, thief?) ... for the causality to be true, there should be a somewhat proportional relationship (how can it be that the richest people *cough*Enron*cough* still rob?)
Second, and more importantly, is that this is a correlation--if you can find a statistic that correlates poverty to higher crime rates, this does not show that one causes the other--is it the crime that causes the poverty or the poverty that causes the crimes? You can find more obtuse correlations ... oh, I don't know, how about that there are more crimes committed where there is street lighting. A causal relationship would say that removing the street lighting would reduce the crime, but that seems kinda silly.
Anyway, I went around the block just to say that a fair predictive system should deal only with causal relationships to ensure long-term accuracy. I'm sure an impartial computer analysis would find that high crime areas also have a lot of police patrols ... coincidence?
In my opinion, all local parks are social parks. I was furious when they banned mountain biking (all parks in Monroe County, NY--near Rochester, NY) but still allowed horses. If erosion was the issue, then it's not a social park, and you should treat it as a nature park and only allow people on foot (or equivalent.)
The root cause is that we need to determine the purpose of our parks. Once the definitions are established, the allowable and not allowable behaviors become clear. The short answer for now is that if there's barbeques or a frisbee golf course, you can geocache; if there's a sign-in sheet and dedicated nature paths, you can't.
Perhaps you've seen too much already. V-chip knows.
Don't tell me the Sims now want to direct ...
Increasing your font size rnight fix the problern.
If these two lines look the same, increasing your font size might fix the problem.
Yeah, this whole big tornado season reminds me of that movie ... Playing God. That sucked too.
I'm no expert in these matters, but maybe the transits occur primarily at night when the sun is switched off. This would make sense because Mercury would probably catch on fire if it were to pass so close to the sun while it were hot.