Wait, I have a bridge...er...car....flying car ...
on
Personal SUV of the Sky
·
· Score: 2, Funny
to sell to you.
I sense the niche market of people with $400k burning a hole in their pocket. I will get a Doctorate degree from one of those e-mails I keep getting. Then, I will get a picture of a Geo or Yugo and strap a sheet of plywood across the back of it with duck tape (all DIY's love duck tape)and only charge $395k.
Naturally, this is only in pre-prototype and Photoshop, but hey, there has to be at least one taker out there who will pay me for the hour I used to set up the web site. Two takers will even buy me the Geo for the prototype and four would allow me to fill it with gas and move to Hawaii.
Only drawback is the wing does not fold but disattaches at 50 mph on the highway. Part of the "extras" kit is 100 mph tape (much better than duck tape, but much more expensive...at least when priced as an option for my G Aero).
Oh yeah, since it is not even in prototype yet, its specs are: air speed is supersonic, air range is to moon and back, on road it goes 55 mph and 350 miles on one tank of gas.
I have seen what seemed like really bad decisions and asked how could someone make it. I prayed these people were on the take since I feared a leadership that would be so stupid to actually think it was a good choice.
Now that I am older and much more disenchanted, I realize some of the constraints placed on the military. For instance, I can not get a part for a squadron, but I have plenty of money to travel there and tell them in person that I could not buy them the $300 dollar widget and there are no funds to procure it.
If the different colors of money could be combined into one pot, much more intelligent decisions could be made based on need and not merely expending different funds.
First, people are already being videotaped in stores without any signs being posted.
Second, I pick it up off the shelf and hand it to my wife who always has the checkbook. Does she go to jail or me for not picking it up and being the same person buying it. Third, how many security guards will you have to pay to compare the photos. Maybe they can hire a facial recognition programming expert at $100 an hour to write software to track this clearly criminal behaviour. I am sure the RIAA is behind all of this.
Strong encryption,
I love the idea that we are using images (worth a thousand words apiece = 4k) to create the number space of the possible answers. As IBM has proven with their past "random number generator", once the "random" solutions are placed through a filter of n-dimensional space, patterns immerge. Even with every human (6B plus) having a different idea (most likely not since culture should divide the answers) and multiple permutations, I imagine this still falls far below modern standards of encryption. Since I am not a mathematician, but I play one on TV;), I am confident the real folks who know this stuff will confirm or deny the results of this "randomness" is not just smoke and mirrors.
I have recently made up that 98.73 percent of all people use fake statistics in their conversations. Luckily, I am above average about half of the time;)
I used to have an Epson. Luckily, I bought it through a warehouse chain..Costco. I have since moved coasts and new store. One year later, two changes of ink trying to "deep clean" the cartridge (25% of the ink each time you try).
I called Epson help desk, and the help desk said I was screwed...for the low, low price of what you originally payed 10 months ago, you can have a new one. I trumped by stating that I would return it to the warehouse store. Quote, "Well, good on you, I would not give you a dime for that piece of crap and neither will Epson."
So, I ran as fast as I could, grabbed the no question return policy, and bought a HP. Quality, great. Ink lasted about six months. I am actually pleased...but I will never buy another Epson.
Every seat rolled out gets a payoff. In fact, I have payed for two of my sub-contractors even though they do not have NMCI seats. I am told that we will get the money back when we initiate the final claim against EDS. So, you have at least $8000 that you have not yet (if ever) earned.
Let's move on to a small detail of the contract...you must remove equipment currently onsite. We pay you to do this. However, something that just arrived on this base was a $6 Million dollar PBX Cisco router that you just removed. I do not blame EDS, I blame the fool that wrote the contract...don't worry, they received bonuses also. They left the current router in place and, as if by magic, we still have the same quality phone service as before NMCI was here.
Final note, the latest practices of these theives is that they are not even updating the hardware. They take legacy machines (600 MHZ and below that were already in place), update the operating system to Win 2K and give them back. Wow, $4K lease for Win2K now. Don't tell Microsoft, they may get jealous and raise the prices of Win2003.
I wish we could. Our money is controlled at the Congressional level..one or two (ok, light years beyond my pay scale). Unfortunately, no one will say the emporer has no clothes. I can only assume massive payoffs. Could the crumbs from $8 billion buy a congressman or two? Heck for a bililon, I am pretty sure I could roll out the Dell's myself...even something a little more powerful than 900 Mhz. I mean, can you even surf ebay and find a 900 Mhz any more. It must be a bitch to ask Dell to scour all of the factory refurbishements to find somthing so slow. These costs are so high, I am sure that no sanity is prevalent.
I have even heard a rumor (I have not confirmed this...so please don't flame) that NMCI headquarters was built in downtown Honolulu. If this is true, it is criminal. Most companies would be near their customers and not pick the world's top most expensive real estate just because they could.
I am on the pointy end of the NMCI stick as one of the first 30,000 of the supposed 350,000 seats that EDS is supposed to roll out for the government. The contract is three years behind schedule (hey, it was a four year contract) and Congress recently approved them for two more years (I guess they were doing a really good job).
The contract costs my boss $4,000 a year to rent (yes, rent)a 900 MHZ Dell Laptop. But, without that rental, we will no longer be able to communicate with the rest of the organization. If I want to upgrade to a CD burner or heavens forbid a DVD player, they are an extra $350 a year to rent..each. That is OK since I have to have NMCI tech support install the drivers at $150 a tech support call.
Oh that is right, EDS is cash strapped. Apparently $8 billion to roll out 350,000 1998 Dells is just not enough.
When will the madness end?
I would think that a business would purchase the most economical, fastest, distributed, etc file system storage available. While a single disk is highly transportable and small, most businesses using data that could fill this volume would want the data available to multiple users at any given time. If it is concerned with price, CD's or EIDE drives are still the most economical. It would make even less sense to purchase multiple Blue Laser DVD systems to set up a distributed backup that would be tolerant to fire, earthquake, etc. I will have to wait for the price to come down before I could justify the expense. However, I am always up for playing with new toys.
who will be the first to offer mod chips?
on
Barebones Notebook
·
· Score: 2, Funny
Oh crap, there is nothing to mod!!! Maybe I can use my dremel on the case.
If I leave the house and my kids or the babysitter installs Kazza on my machine, am I liable? If I get a c&d letter, and my kids reinstall the program, am I going to jail? Can minors be prosecuted for breaking a copyright contract?
I know, lock down the computer so they can not gain access to the internet...or just stand over their shoulder the whole time they are on the web...or just stop subscribing to an isp. Wasn't the internet designed to share ideas and knowledge? I don't agree with breaking the law, but two wrongs don't make a legal decision.
I see the real threat of GPS jammers when GPS is incorportated into cell phones. 911 calls are supposed to send your "exact" position to call for help. It would be the tool of choice for car jackers. Simply jam the signal, people think that help is on the way, but it does not arrive.
The next step is to jam the signal in a way that allows your GPS receiver to think you are somewhere else. Now, before a million dollar silicon hauling truck from San Jose is hijacked, the jackers simply make the GPS believe it is 20 miles away. The 911 call from the truck driver actually helps the criminals since it sends the police to the wrong location.
When I wrote my thesis for MS in Computer Science, my advisor strongly suggested that I include several references to his previous work, the work of several of his past students and a Professor at another school that would write reviews of his books (he would review the other Prof's books). All of this occurred during the final chop and two weeks from graduation. If it was up to me, I would not have included any of these references. But I was not the one signing off the last two years of my life as complete.
The funny part is that I received the largest portion of help from a couple of Sun engineers who were able to get me through some code which my advisor could not and except for the acknowledgement, their contribution was poorly documented (at least in my mind, not the advisor's).
So, if you read my paper, you would think that I am an idiot because some of the referenced work is so basic and at other times a super genius because the code was assisted by some great programmers (after all, how many people read the acknowledgements).
This topic is less about coding than it is about teaching, learning and evaluating. Every subject matter has its own unique style. Every teacher has his own unique method of evaluating.
If we are strictly keeping with writing computer code, did the class teach how to use an ide, were particular data strucures or patterns presented, how tolerent is the teacher of unique programming styles? One class that I attended had a set style guide (deviate and lose ten points; I print in all caps and spent more time correcting to lowercase). Another class asked for pseudo code first so that it became the comments, and bonus points for correct code. Yes, there is always the typical jackoff who can not understand that you used ten lines of code to accomplish his hundred, but is that good programming for a large project where no one else can use your module(job security only goes so far)?
My two cents, if you are training people to use a language in a production environment, give them the tools they would have. Multiple projects have always been the best source of improving one's code. Also, don't trust a computer scientist who is afraid to use a computer.
Slashdot Mirror
to sell to you.
I sense the niche market of people with $400k burning a hole in their pocket. I will get a Doctorate degree from one of those e-mails I keep getting. Then, I will get a picture of a Geo or Yugo and strap a sheet of plywood across the back of it with duck tape (all DIY's love duck tape)and only charge $395k.
Naturally, this is only in pre-prototype and Photoshop, but hey, there has to be at least one taker out there who will pay me for the hour I used to set up the web site. Two takers will even buy me the Geo for the prototype and four would allow me to fill it with gas and move to Hawaii.
Only drawback is the wing does not fold but disattaches at 50 mph on the highway. Part of the "extras" kit is 100 mph tape (much better than duck tape, but much more expensive...at least when priced as an option for my G Aero).
Oh yeah, since it is not even in prototype yet, its specs are: air speed is supersonic, air range is to moon and back, on road it goes 55 mph and 350 miles on one tank of gas.
I am sure the anti-trust judges will merely (and quite easily) remove IE from their Windows desktops and not even worry about security issues.
WE could have found out about it when our sytems started acting up.
I have seen what seemed like really bad decisions and asked how could someone make it. I prayed these people were on the take since I feared a leadership that would be so stupid to actually think it was a good choice.
Now that I am older and much more disenchanted, I realize some of the constraints placed on the military. For instance, I can not get a part for a squadron, but I have plenty of money to travel there and tell them in person that I could not buy them the $300 dollar widget and there are no funds to procure it.
If the different colors of money could be combined into one pot, much more intelligent decisions could be made based on need and not merely expending different funds.
http://www.innersports.org/indiabiketrip.htm
This guy did it in India about two years ago.
First, people are already being videotaped in stores without any signs being posted. Second, I pick it up off the shelf and hand it to my wife who always has the checkbook. Does she go to jail or me for not picking it up and being the same person buying it. Third, how many security guards will you have to pay to compare the photos. Maybe they can hire a facial recognition programming expert at $100 an hour to write software to track this clearly criminal behaviour. I am sure the RIAA is behind all of this.
Strong encryption, I love the idea that we are using images (worth a thousand words apiece = 4k) to create the number space of the possible answers. As IBM has proven with their past "random number generator", once the "random" solutions are placed through a filter of n-dimensional space, patterns immerge. Even with every human (6B plus) having a different idea (most likely not since culture should divide the answers) and multiple permutations, I imagine this still falls far below modern standards of encryption. Since I am not a mathematician, but I play one on TV;), I am confident the real folks who know this stuff will confirm or deny the results of this "randomness" is not just smoke and mirrors.
I have recently made up that 98.73 percent of all people use fake statistics in their conversations. Luckily, I am above average about half of the time;)
I used to have an Epson. Luckily, I bought it through a warehouse chain..Costco. I have since moved coasts and new store. One year later, two changes of ink trying to "deep clean" the cartridge (25% of the ink each time you try).
I called Epson help desk, and the help desk said I was screwed...for the low, low price of what you originally payed 10 months ago, you can have a new one. I trumped by stating that I would return it to the warehouse store. Quote, "Well, good on you, I would not give you a dime for that piece of crap and neither will Epson."
So, I ran as fast as I could, grabbed the no question return policy, and bought a HP. Quality, great. Ink lasted about six months. I am actually pleased...but I will never buy another Epson.
The IEEE is trying to take SE to this level with the Certified
Software Development Professional exam. It definitely reminds one of the PE exam.
Additionally, the title requires more than the exam...there are
college degree requirements, hours on the job, etc.
I have not taken the exam, but it looks promising.I am just not sure how well it will be respected or if it will add any value to a job interview.
Info can be found at http://www.computer.org/certification/
Let's move on to a small detail of the contract...you must remove equipment currently onsite. We pay you to do this. However, something that just arrived on this base was a $6 Million dollar PBX Cisco router that you just removed. I do not blame EDS, I blame the fool that wrote the contract...don't worry, they received bonuses also. They left the current router in place and, as if by magic, we still have the same quality phone service as before NMCI was here.
Final note, the latest practices of these theives is that they are not even updating the hardware. They take legacy machines (600 MHZ and below that were already in place), update the operating system to Win 2K and give them back. Wow, $4K lease for Win2K now. Don't tell Microsoft, they may get jealous and raise the prices of Win2003.
I wish we could. Our money is controlled at the Congressional level..one or two (ok, light years beyond my pay scale). Unfortunately, no one will say the emporer has no clothes. I can only assume massive payoffs. Could the crumbs from $8 billion buy a congressman or two? Heck for a bililon, I am pretty sure I could roll out the Dell's myself...even something a little more powerful than 900 Mhz. I mean, can you even surf ebay and find a 900 Mhz any more. It must be a bitch to ask Dell to scour all of the factory refurbishements to find somthing so slow. These costs are so high, I am sure that no sanity is prevalent. I have even heard a rumor (I have not confirmed this...so please don't flame) that NMCI headquarters was built in downtown Honolulu. If this is true, it is criminal. Most companies would be near their customers and not pick the world's top most expensive real estate just because they could.
I am on the pointy end of the NMCI stick as one of the first 30,000 of the supposed 350,000 seats that EDS is supposed to roll out for the government. The contract is three years behind schedule (hey, it was a four year contract) and Congress recently approved them for two more years (I guess they were doing a really good job). The contract costs my boss $4,000 a year to rent (yes, rent)a 900 MHZ Dell Laptop. But, without that rental, we will no longer be able to communicate with the rest of the organization. If I want to upgrade to a CD burner or heavens forbid a DVD player, they are an extra $350 a year to rent..each. That is OK since I have to have NMCI tech support install the drivers at $150 a tech support call. Oh that is right, EDS is cash strapped. Apparently $8 billion to roll out 350,000 1998 Dells is just not enough. When will the madness end?
My "military style" computer is a Dell Pentium 400.
http://www.longnow.org/
I would think that a business would purchase the most economical, fastest, distributed, etc file system storage available. While a single disk is highly transportable and small, most businesses using data that could fill this volume would want the data available to multiple users at any given time. If it is concerned with price, CD's or EIDE drives are still the most economical. It would make even less sense to purchase multiple Blue Laser DVD systems to set up a distributed backup that would be tolerant to fire, earthquake, etc.
I will have to wait for the price to come down before I could justify the expense. However, I am always up for playing with new toys.
Oh crap, there is nothing to mod!!! Maybe I can use my dremel on the case.
I always thought that you had to be a 14 year old highschool drop out to hack Windows. Whew..glad that has changed.
If I leave the house and my kids or the babysitter installs Kazza on my machine, am I liable? If I get a c&d letter, and my kids reinstall the program, am I going to jail? Can minors be prosecuted for breaking a copyright contract? I know, lock down the computer so they can not gain access to the internet...or just stand over their shoulder the whole time they are on the web...or just stop subscribing to an isp. Wasn't the internet designed to share ideas and knowledge? I don't agree with breaking the law, but two wrongs don't make a legal decision.
I see the real threat of GPS jammers when GPS is incorportated into cell phones. 911 calls are supposed to send your "exact" position to call for help. It would be the tool of choice for car jackers. Simply jam the signal, people think that help is on the way, but it does not arrive. The next step is to jam the signal in a way that allows your GPS receiver to think you are somewhere else. Now, before a million dollar silicon hauling truck from San Jose is hijacked, the jackers simply make the GPS believe it is 20 miles away. The 911 call from the truck driver actually helps the criminals since it sends the police to the wrong location.
When I wrote my thesis for MS in Computer Science, my advisor strongly suggested that I include several references to his previous work, the work of several of his past students and a Professor at another school that would write reviews of his books (he would review the other Prof's books). All of this occurred during the final chop and two weeks from graduation. If it was up to me, I would not have included any of these references. But I was not the one signing off the last two years of my life as complete.
The funny part is that I received the largest portion of help from a couple of Sun engineers who were able to get me through some code which my advisor could not and except for the acknowledgement, their contribution was poorly documented (at least in my mind, not the advisor's).
So, if you read my paper, you would think that I am an idiot because some of the referenced work is so basic and at other times a super genius because the code was assisted by some great programmers (after all, how many people read the acknowledgements).
This topic is less about coding than it is about teaching, learning and evaluating. Every subject matter has its own unique style. Every teacher has his own unique method of evaluating. If we are strictly keeping with writing computer code, did the class teach how to use an ide, were particular data strucures or patterns presented, how tolerent is the teacher of unique programming styles? One class that I attended had a set style guide (deviate and lose ten points; I print in all caps and spent more time correcting to lowercase). Another class asked for pseudo code first so that it became the comments, and bonus points for correct code. Yes, there is always the typical jackoff who can not understand that you used ten lines of code to accomplish his hundred, but is that good programming for a large project where no one else can use your module(job security only goes so far)? My two cents, if you are training people to use a language in a production environment, give them the tools they would have. Multiple projects have always been the best source of improving one's code. Also, don't trust a computer scientist who is afraid to use a computer.