This is exactly the kind of 1337 crap that the majority of computer users _DON'T CARE ABOUT_.
That is very true. However, the beauty of Mac OSX is that it can be user friendly for my Mom and hacker friendly for me. I have never even thought of buying a Mac until now. Since OSX I'm curious, I'm actually interested in developing for a Mac whereas before OSX I just laughed at the machines. I'm not the only one either. Although I cannot substantiate this, I would venture to say that with OSX Steve Jobs is probably getting alot more developer interest.
I used a system that was tied to my mag card / student ID for many years there. You can buy cokes, pizza, food of any type, etc.. with the swipe of a card. The vending machines are the best because there is no need for change anymore! Everyone at A&M loves Aggie Bucks.
BTW, here is a link for businesses involved. I know this doesn't help directly with the software, but it proves it has been done on a wide scale with great success. You may want to contact those involved in implementing this, or learn from their example. Good luck.
Whatever. TI's calcs don't suck. I love my TI-89 and all the wondorous goodies it has to offer. I wrote some programs for it in one of my "accounting for engineers" classes which allowed me to run circles around everyone else in the class. Basically the program extended the solver functionality to calculate the results to all the easy and tedious equations in any order and combination. I'll bet the HP-48ers who were lamelessly pounding away at the keyboard were quite envious. Oh well what does finishing the final an hour before anyone else in the class prove? Can you write a program like that on your beloved RPN calc? Nope. RPN is cool, but calcs should do alot more these days. 'Nuff said.
"I'm really pretty proud of what we did," Kaley said. "Was it perfect? No. Could we be second-guessed? Sure. But I think we mostly did what any company would do, even today."
This statement hits the nail on the head and shows why pure Libertarianism would fail in real life. Pure capitalism produces companies that have no regard for the environment.
The level of disregard for human and non-human life displayed by this company is disgusting. I don't care about context, or how this report was taken without regarding the times which Monsato was operating. Basic common sense tells you that if you dip a fish in water and its skin falls off that you should not be dumping that shit directly into the river. A complete disregard for the tens of thousands of people and their children. These people should be tried as criminals because they knowingly allowed the release of obviously harmful chemicals. There are no excuses for this behavior. They knew what they were doing was wrong because they had to cover their own internal memos. What an extreme disgrace. I'll stop ranting now because I could go on for hours.
Yes, I know. Our proxy sucks. Our admins are freaking overzealous. And ftp is the proper way to download files. Doesn't help me a bit.
You should write a very short memo about this and pass it along. If enough people did this your FTP should open up. If no one bitches then it stays the same for sure.
hehe.. I used to use a password similar to that. But I got the idea from my skater days.. rememeber the shirts that used to say "shutup and sk8"? Well my password borrowed from that idea and became "fornic8". This password is no longer used in any of my accounts anywhere so I'm glad to share.
Well SCSI is inherently more expensive because some complex controller logic is also built into the drive. This allows SCSI to be smart and utilize less CPU cycles for all tasks. I notice a big difference when transferring large (>200MB) files from one SCSI drive to another vs one IDE to another. The difference is my computer is still really responsive, almost like there is no file transfer at all. Now, I know you guys are screaming DMA you dumb@ss. Well DMA is fine, but on big file transfers IDE drives still slow down your computer. IDE drives are cheap because they rely on the CPU to do their extra tasks. Yes, DMA on IDE is awesome, but SCSI is still better. I just wish these jerky manufacturers would go to economics class and learn about supply and demand. Although I am a big fan of SCSI, I cannot justify the extremely high pricing for SCSI drives:(
Move over Decepticons
on
Lunar Lasers
·
· Score: 1
I say while you are at it you might as well collect the energy in cubes like the transformers and have Galvitron fly them back to earth. Seriously though, I have to admit that having microwave rays beam the energy back to earth is more than a little disconcerting.
I remeber when I was at Texas A&M I could get really good ping times on servers at Harvard, University of Texas (gasp), and other schools on the I2 for playing quake. Its funny what a traceroute will turn up. Thank you Internet2:)
I too have used National Instrument's LabVIEW and I recommend it as well. Compared to the $5k benchtop oscopes this is inexpensive, and you'll get great results. You can get away with somewhere under $1k maybe even around $500 for a good DAQ card and some software. Their software is awesome and easy to use. LabVIEW contains a graphical programming language that makes working with complex stuff as easy as drag and drop. Serial, TCP/IP, almost anthing is simple as pie. Hell, I believe they even include a sample oscope app somewhere (either online or with LabVIEW software). If you can get the educational price you are in for some cost savings as well. Definitely the way to go for precise measurements. They have products you can plug into your PCI slot that run the gamut from low end more affordable systems to the high end. I used their stuff in school alot and I love it.
JOhn
Re:So if most of your apps are Windows...
on
Dashboard Linux
·
· Score: 2
Thats a good idea, and I had thought about that. If the designer of this system was to do this he would have to build a basic UPS interface to present to Windows. However, what is the standard for building the simplest, most basic UPS device? What is the standard for communicating to Windows you are a UPS device? I'm not sure. It may be really simple. It may require a microcontroller (pic or otherwise) to implement on the UPS device side. I'm not really sure. Both solutions require that you know serial port communications and electronics interfacing. The Windows solution would require that knowledge and the knowledge of UPS systems. Both would work. I feel more comfortable implementing this in Linux, but thats just me. I still think doing the job in Linux would be easier because I can get access to the serial ports with no problem in Linux (IMHO a pain in the ass in Win32), and I can roll my own circuitry in Linux without having to implement the UPS interface and protocol (whatever they may be). Clearly though, like all solutions there is more than one path.
JOhn
"How queer" would be more appropriate
on
Binary Watch
·
· Score: 2
You're right gay is not the correct word. I mean no disrespect in saying this, but if he had said "how queer" that would have been more appropriate since one of the meanings of queer deals with the odd or unconventional. As we all know the word gay has several meanings, one of which is happiness another meaning deals with sexual orientation. On the other hand, one meaning of queer has to do with the unconventional. Another meaning of queer is geared towards those of the same sex. Therefore, many people cross the use of the slang term gay as a synonym for the "unconventional" since it is a synonym for sexual orientation. Obviously, this is incorrect because the watch can not be happy and cannot choose its fate as you have. However, we are free to label the watch as queer since it is very odd and very unconventional:)
JOhn
Re:So if most of your apps are Windows...
on
Dashboard Linux
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
Well the article mentions some logic tied into the auxilliary power on the car. If he is using Linux he can design a rudimentary program which will shutdown the OS nicely when the car is shutoff (aux power off). If he is using Windows the task isn't trivial. Thats just one reason to use Linux. Good question though. The appropriate tool should always be used for the task at hand.
Just because no one can see who you are doesn't mean you have to be an @ss. Its people like you that bring down great sites like Slashdot and turn them into a cesspool of trolls. Oh well, what you say reflects who you are and if you're a troll, well.. you're a troll.
I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to say here, but you're right the RISC CPUs do kinda chunk the microcode overboard. If you want more details I suggest you check out the Black Papers on ArsTechnica. They have a great article on CISC vs. RISC.
JOhn
Re:IT's not for you!
on
This is IT?
·
· Score: 2, Offtopic
Not meant as a flame, but why would it be Asian American if the person was in China? A man in China has nothing to do with America.
You are right, but fundamentally as a people we were at one time guaranteed in plain English the Bill of Rights. It was written in plain English, not legalese. Through the years all the "what ifs" are added and the lawyers have fooled us into thinking there are all these clauses where the Bill of Rights does not apply and whadaya know.. the damn constitution doesn't mean a thing. We keep tacking on all these clauses where the constituion doesn't apply and shit.. well we might as well throw away the first ten amendments because we have fooled ourselves into thinking we are free. We're a free country when it comes to waving the flag and patriotism, but in the real world for good intentions or bad the lawyers and the people (including myself) who have sat idly by have allowed the circumvention of the Bill of Rights.
Congress made the law that Apple is using as leverage to file the lawsuit. I wish Congress would do a better job keeping the constitution (CDA, CDA-II, etc..) in mind when passing laws. Oh well, at least our courts are doing a better job. If you ask me Congress likes to pass the buck so they can get re-elected. Thats a whole other subject though.
Anyway, you're right anyone can sue for anything. That is where intimidation and money come in. Winning a law suit is another matter. Thanks for pointing that out.
I would like to mention that the post by dillon_rinker regarding copyright was very informative, and brings into perspective why fundamentally Apple has a leg to stand on and why some of our copyright laws are the way they are.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Hmm... maybe some, but not necessarily all. As a matter of fact I don't know of any. Keep in mind that not all embedded tools have the sophistication of your Microsoft VC++ toolset. Also, instead of being a twit, hiding behind your AC status, and sending out jabbing remarks flame boy perhaps you could enlighten us on how to do it. I come to slashdot to learn from my peers. Perhaps you could grow up and do the same.
Embedded developers don't want to include an entire library if all they need is one function. I am an embedded developer myself and I don't use common c functions like printf or scanf unless I know I have some memory to spare. The reason is because as soon as you use one of these functions the whole dern library with all the other zillion functions is linked into your executable, and this of course makes a big executable. Sometimes you can't fit your program into the scarce memory because of it.
However, there is an elegant solution. The solution, which I discovered by using some ThreadX code, is to implement each function in a separate file. That way you only link in the functions you need on a function by function basis! The result for ThreadX is an extremely configurable kernel with very lean code size.
Therefore, I think you should keep the library licensed as LGPL and separate all of the functions into individual source files. As you guys know the LGPL only governs the library not any of the files that use the library like GPL. So if you or anyone else (embedded developers too) makes changes to the library they are required to let everyone else know about it. This has nothing to do with the application. In this case the embedded developers seem to want the BSD license so they can only put in what they need of the code, or in a worst case scenario they may want to rape and pillage the code and not give back to the community.
In summary, by keeping the code licensed under LGPL and separating your files out function by function your library will be lean for embedded developers, keep developers both commercial and non-commercial contributing to your code and prevent parasitic companies from making money off of your hard work without giving back a thing.
As an additional guide here are some links regarding the license models:
Slashdot Mirror
ROFL.. I really hope you intended to be humorous.
JOhn
This is exactly the kind of 1337 crap that the majority of computer users _DON'T CARE ABOUT_.
That is very true. However, the beauty of Mac OSX is that it can be user friendly for my Mom and hacker friendly for me. I have never even thought of buying a Mac until now. Since OSX I'm curious, I'm actually interested in developing for a Mac whereas before OSX I just laughed at the machines. I'm not the only one either. Although I cannot substantiate this, I would venture to say that with OSX Steve Jobs is probably getting alot more developer interest.
JOhn
I used a system that was tied to my mag card / student ID for many years there. You can buy cokes, pizza, food of any type, etc.. with the swipe of a card. The vending machines are the best because there is no need for change anymore! Everyone at A&M loves Aggie Bucks.
BTW, here is a link for businesses involved. I know this doesn't help directly with the software, but it proves it has been done on a wide scale with great success. You may want to contact those involved in implementing this, or learn from their example. Good luck.
JOhn
Whatever. TI's calcs don't suck. I love my TI-89 and all the wondorous goodies it has to offer. I wrote some programs for it in one of my "accounting for engineers" classes which allowed me to run circles around everyone else in the class. Basically the program extended the solver functionality to calculate the results to all the easy and tedious equations in any order and combination. I'll bet the HP-48ers who were lamelessly pounding away at the keyboard were quite envious. Oh well what does finishing the final an hour before anyone else in the class prove? Can you write a program like that on your beloved RPN calc? Nope. RPN is cool, but calcs should do alot more these days. 'Nuff said.
JOhn
"I'm really pretty proud of what we did," Kaley said. "Was it perfect? No. Could we be second-guessed? Sure. But I think we mostly did what any company would do, even today."
This statement hits the nail on the head and shows why pure Libertarianism would fail in real life. Pure capitalism produces companies that have no regard for the environment.
The level of disregard for human and non-human life displayed by this company is disgusting. I don't care about context, or how this report was taken without regarding the times which Monsato was operating. Basic common sense tells you that if you dip a fish in water and its skin falls off that you should not be dumping that shit directly into the river. A complete disregard for the tens of thousands of people and their children. These people should be tried as criminals because they knowingly allowed the release of obviously harmful chemicals. There are no excuses for this behavior. They knew what they were doing was wrong because they had to cover their own internal memos. What an extreme disgrace. I'll stop ranting now because I could go on for hours.
JOhn
Yes, I know. Our proxy sucks. Our admins are freaking overzealous. And ftp is the proper way to download files. Doesn't help me a bit.
You should write a very short memo about this and pass it along. If enough people did this your FTP should open up. If no one bitches then it stays the same for sure.
JOhn
hehe.. I used to use a password similar to that. But I got the idea from my skater days.. rememeber the shirts that used to say "shutup and sk8"? Well my password borrowed from that idea and became "fornic8". This password is no longer used in any of my accounts anywhere so I'm glad to share.
JOhn
I dunno.. sounds alot like RedHat, or Debian, or SuSe, or any other commercial distro you can buy support from.
JOhn
Well SCSI is inherently more expensive because some complex controller logic is also built into the drive. This allows SCSI to be smart and utilize less CPU cycles for all tasks. I notice a big difference when transferring large (>200MB) files from one SCSI drive to another vs one IDE to another. The difference is my computer is still really responsive, almost like there is no file transfer at all. Now, I know you guys are screaming DMA you dumb@ss. Well DMA is fine, but on big file transfers IDE drives still slow down your computer. IDE drives are cheap because they rely on the CPU to do their extra tasks. Yes, DMA on IDE is awesome, but SCSI is still better. I just wish these jerky manufacturers would go to economics class and learn about supply and demand. Although I am a big fan of SCSI, I cannot justify the extremely high pricing for SCSI drives :(
JOhn
Bankruptcy
Spelling police.. sounding off.
JOhn
I say while you are at it you might as well collect the energy in cubes like the transformers and have Galvitron fly them back to earth. Seriously though, I have to admit that having microwave rays beam the energy back to earth is more than a little disconcerting.
JOhn
I remeber when I was at Texas A&M I could get really good ping times on servers at Harvard, University of Texas (gasp), and other schools on the I2 for playing quake. Its funny what a traceroute will turn up. Thank you Internet2 :)
JOhn
I too have used National Instrument's LabVIEW and I recommend it as well. Compared to the $5k benchtop oscopes this is inexpensive, and you'll get great results. You can get away with somewhere under $1k maybe even around $500 for a good DAQ card and some software. Their software is awesome and easy to use. LabVIEW contains a graphical programming language that makes working with complex stuff as easy as drag and drop. Serial, TCP/IP, almost anthing is simple as pie. Hell, I believe they even include a sample oscope app somewhere (either online or with LabVIEW software). If you can get the educational price you are in for some cost savings as well. Definitely the way to go for precise measurements. They have products you can plug into your PCI slot that run the gamut from low end more affordable systems to the high end. I used their stuff in school alot and I love it.
JOhn
Thats a good idea, and I had thought about that. If the designer of this system was to do this he would have to build a basic UPS interface to present to Windows. However, what is the standard for building the simplest, most basic UPS device? What is the standard for communicating to Windows you are a UPS device? I'm not sure. It may be really simple. It may require a microcontroller (pic or otherwise) to implement on the UPS device side. I'm not really sure. Both solutions require that you know serial port communications and electronics interfacing. The Windows solution would require that knowledge and the knowledge of UPS systems. Both would work. I feel more comfortable implementing this in Linux, but thats just me. I still think doing the job in Linux would be easier because I can get access to the serial ports with no problem in Linux (IMHO a pain in the ass in Win32), and I can roll my own circuitry in Linux without having to implement the UPS interface and protocol (whatever they may be). Clearly though, like all solutions there is more than one path.
JOhn
You're right gay is not the correct word. I mean no disrespect in saying this, but if he had said "how queer" that would have been more appropriate since one of the meanings of queer deals with the odd or unconventional. As we all know the word gay has several meanings, one of which is happiness another meaning deals with sexual orientation. On the other hand, one meaning of queer has to do with the unconventional. Another meaning of queer is geared towards those of the same sex. Therefore, many people cross the use of the slang term gay as a synonym for the "unconventional" since it is a synonym for sexual orientation. Obviously, this is incorrect because the watch can not be happy and cannot choose its fate as you have. However, we are free to label the watch as queer since it is very odd and very unconventional :)
JOhn
Well the article mentions some logic tied into the auxilliary power on the car. If he is using Linux he can design a rudimentary program which will shutdown the OS nicely when the car is shutoff (aux power off). If he is using Windows the task isn't trivial. Thats just one reason to use Linux. Good question though. The appropriate tool should always be used for the task at hand.
JOhn
The listed software includes VMware. So it looks like your windows theories are true, but only by emulation.
JOhn
Just because no one can see who you are doesn't mean you have to be an @ss. Its people like you that bring down great sites like Slashdot and turn them into a cesspool of trolls. Oh well, what you say reflects who you are and if you're a troll, well.. you're a troll.
JOhn
I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to say here, but you're right the RISC CPUs do kinda chunk the microcode overboard. If you want more details I suggest you check out the Black Papers on ArsTechnica. They have a great article on CISC vs. RISC.
JOhn
Not meant as a flame, but why would it be Asian American if the person was in China? A man in China has nothing to do with America.
JOhn
You are right, but fundamentally as a people we were at one time guaranteed in plain English the Bill of Rights. It was written in plain English, not legalese. Through the years all the "what ifs" are added and the lawyers have fooled us into thinking there are all these clauses where the Bill of Rights does not apply and whadaya know.. the damn constitution doesn't mean a thing. We keep tacking on all these clauses where the constituion doesn't apply and shit.. well we might as well throw away the first ten amendments because we have fooled ourselves into thinking we are free. We're a free country when it comes to waving the flag and patriotism, but in the real world for good intentions or bad the lawyers and the people (including myself) who have sat idly by have allowed the circumvention of the Bill of Rights.
JOhn
Congress made the law that Apple is using as leverage to file the lawsuit. I wish Congress would do a better job keeping the constitution (CDA, CDA-II, etc..) in mind when passing laws. Oh well, at least our courts are doing a better job. If you ask me Congress likes to pass the buck so they can get re-elected. Thats a whole other subject though.
Anyway, you're right anyone can sue for anything. That is where intimidation and money come in. Winning a law suit is another matter. Thanks for pointing that out.
I would like to mention that the post by dillon_rinker regarding copyright was very informative, and brings into perspective why fundamentally Apple has a leg to stand on and why some of our copyright laws are the way they are.
JOhn
Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
JOhn "Non-Hancock"
Hmm... maybe some, but not necessarily all. As a matter of fact I don't know of any. Keep in mind that not all embedded tools have the sophistication of your Microsoft VC++ toolset. Also, instead of being a twit, hiding behind your AC status, and sending out jabbing remarks flame boy perhaps you could enlighten us on how to do it. I come to slashdot to learn from my peers. Perhaps you could grow up and do the same.
JOhn
However, there is an elegant solution. The solution, which I discovered by using some ThreadX code, is to implement each function in a separate file. That way you only link in the functions you need on a function by function basis! The result for ThreadX is an extremely configurable kernel with very lean code size.
Therefore, I think you should keep the library licensed as LGPL and separate all of the functions into individual source files. As you guys know the LGPL only governs the library not any of the files that use the library like GPL. So if you or anyone else (embedded developers too) makes changes to the library they are required to let everyone else know about it. This has nothing to do with the application. In this case the embedded developers seem to want the BSD license so they can only put in what they need of the code, or in a worst case scenario they may want to rape and pillage the code and not give back to the community.
In summary, by keeping the code licensed under LGPL and separating your files out function by function your library will be lean for embedded developers, keep developers both commercial and non-commercial contributing to your code and prevent parasitic companies from making money off of your hard work without giving back a thing.
As an additional guide here are some links regarding the license models:
Enjoy.
JOhn