I second that motion. I don't know how hard it would be using an interpreted language, but I would definately look into using something other than C. Think of how cool it would be if your OS was written in Haskell or OCaml or Erlang or prolog. If you pick one of those, you're pretty much guarenteed to be breaking new ground in OS research.
Now we need to do a follow-up question and answer session. Here's my question: Since hardware is apparently cheap and the wired infrastructure is so bad, are Iraqi's using 802.11 for their networking? Seems like VoIP over wireless might also be a popular option.
If websites don't want to give us content without paying for it (by watching their ad), I think they need to standardize on a HTML meta tag. Something like...
<meta advertising="more crap than necessary">
...and then I need a version Mozilla which refuses to load any page with this tag. This way they don't waste any bandwidth on free-loading scum such as myself, and I don't waste any time seeing their crufty coma-inducing ads. It's a win-win.
Yeah, everything is a net win if you don't have to account for opportunity costs. So you shouldn't just look at what benefits came from the space program, you also need to look at what opportunities were passed up because people (taxpayers/investors/entrepreneurs/inventors/etc.) couldn't spend their money in the way they wanted to.
Here's a slightly different question. Let's say someone is going to write their own symbolic math application. What's slashdot's opinion on which language should be used to implement it. prolog, haskell, lisp, perl?
You might be interested in a little something by Richard Feynman
I would like to add something that's not essential to the science, but something I kind of believe, which is that you should not fool the layman when you're talking as a scientist. I am not trying to tell you what to do about cheating on your wife, or fooling your girlfriend, or something like that, when you're not trying to be a scientist, but just trying to be an ordinary human being. We'll leave those problems up to you and your rabbi. I'm talking about a specific, extra type of integrity that is not lying, but bending over backwards to show how you're maybe wrong, that you ought to have when acting as a scientist. And this is our responsibility as scientists, certainly to other scientists, and I think to laymen.
For example, I was a little surprised when I was talking to a friend who was going to go on the radio. He does work on cosmology and astronomy, and he wondered how he would explain what the applications of his work were. "Well," I said, "there aren't any." He said, "Yes, but then we won't get support for more research of this kind." I think that's kind of dishonest. If you're representing yourself as a scientist, then you should explain to the layman what you're doing-- and if they don't support you under those circumstances, then that's their decision.
I've known very few programmers who are great debuggers and optimizers.
Maybe I wasn't clear in my original post. I want the _machines_ to do the optimization. Someone writes a special version of gcc (the -fbeowulf-cluster option) which takes advantage of the vast computing resources of clients on the 'Net to do optimizations that would otherwise seem infeasable.
Consider what was done years ago with assembly. The performance was incredible, and the amount of superfluous garbage in the code was minimal.
In this age of distributed everything else, why aren't we doing distributed complier optimizations? Take a large open source app like mozilla (or your favorite). I wonder how much closer it could be to hand crafted assembler if there were 100,000 volunteers using their computers idle time help optimize it. Anyone know of a compelling reason why this wouldn't produce much tighter code?
Considering that I get over 350 high quality, FIVE megapixel photos onto my 512 MB CF card, how many people really need to store thousands of photos before uploading them to a PC???
How about when that digicam can also do video? And what about putting one of those drives in your Linux based firewall/router appliance? I'm sure there are hundreds of uses someone will dream up for these drives.
I thought the main moral justification for patents was that inventors wouldn't create new products without the incentive provided by government hand-outs in the form of idea monopolies. So I have to ask, does it seem likely that we would have no PVRs today if this patent wasn't granted? If you believe TiVo Inc. wouldn't have been founded without the protection provided by the patent, and you're confident that we'd all still be using VCR's today, then the patent is justified. For the rest of us, it seems like "Intellectual Property" lawsuits are a cheaper way to harass your competitors (cheaper than, say, improving your product, lowering price, etc.).
Most of the time I don't really care what something is, (If it is an integer it doesn't matter if it is a long, int, short, byte, or long long, all the math operators work, and I can mix and match)
It seems to me that they're taking the approach that if the applicant can hold a reasonable argument for a process they don't understand, they issue the patent under the assumption that the courts will sort out the garbage fromt the useful patents.
That's half the story. The other half is that the courts presume the patent is valid since the patent was granted after close inspection of the PTO. This shifts the burden of proof to the defendent (to show the patent is bogus).
Since he's been subpoenead, he won't be allowed to view the courtroom proceedings, lest he be tainted by other witnesses testimony. Prosecutors some times supoena criminal defendant's friends and family members just so that the defendant is more disoriented by not seeing any familar faces in the courtroom. Although I suspect that's not the case here.
Yeah, the end product will probably be boring, but that doesn't mean it'll be useless. Think of IETF RFCs, IEEE/ANSI standards, product specs, user manuals (like HOWTOs etc.), and legislation. When was the last time you found anyone of those a page turner?
Not that I'm advocating it, but if you're worried about bandwidth, we could always adopt the teergrube tactic. You don't actually download much of anything, you just open up TCP connections and keep them alive until their servers run out of process space.
The spammers are *already* one step ahead. How are we going to DDoS an operation getting free bandwidth from
400,000 compromized machies as open proxies?
Slashdot Mirror
I second that motion. I don't know how hard it would be using an interpreted language, but I would definately look into using something other than C. Think of how cool it would be if your OS was written in Haskell or OCaml or Erlang or prolog. If you pick one of those, you're pretty much guarenteed to be breaking new ground in OS research.
Now we need to do a follow-up question and answer session. Here's my question: Since hardware is apparently cheap and the wired infrastructure is so bad, are Iraqi's using 802.11 for their networking? Seems like VoIP over wireless might also be a popular option.
Orkut? They'll have to do quite a bit of work to give their members the prestige that's associated with having a Slashdot fan.
Yeah, everything is a net win if you don't have to account for opportunity costs. So you shouldn't just look at what benefits came from the space program, you also need to look at what opportunities were passed up because people (taxpayers/investors/entrepreneurs/inventors/etc.) couldn't spend their money in the way they wanted to.
Here's a slightly different question. Let's say someone is going to write their own symbolic math application. What's slashdot's opinion on which language should be used to implement it. prolog, haskell, lisp, perl?
I thought the main moral justification for patents was that inventors wouldn't create new products without the incentive provided by government hand-outs in the form of idea monopolies. So I have to ask, does it seem likely that we would have no PVRs today if this patent wasn't granted? If you believe TiVo Inc. wouldn't have been founded without the protection provided by the patent, and you're confident that we'd all still be using VCR's today, then the patent is justified. For the rest of us, it seems like "Intellectual Property" lawsuits are a cheaper way to harass your competitors (cheaper than, say, improving your product, lowering price, etc.).
You're in luck because there is new search engine competition popping up all the time.
For all of those who are having trouble identifying fruit, may I suggest the mighty fruit perceptron.
Since he's been subpoenead, he won't be allowed to view the courtroom proceedings, lest he be tainted by other witnesses testimony. Prosecutors some times supoena criminal defendant's friends and family members just so that the defendant is more disoriented by not seeing any familar faces in the courtroom. Although I suspect that's not the case here.
Yeah, the end product will probably be boring, but that doesn't mean it'll be useless. Think of IETF RFCs, IEEE/ANSI standards, product specs, user manuals (like HOWTOs etc.), and legislation. When was the last time you found anyone of those a page turner?
I personally think rule 30 would be a better logo, but may we should pick something from the Game of Real Life.
Sounds like the architecture. of the Hurd.
Not that I'm advocating it, but if you're worried about bandwidth, we could always adopt the teergrube tactic. You don't actually download much of anything, you just open up TCP connections and keep them alive until their servers run out of process space.
The spammers are *already* one step ahead. How are we going to DDoS an operation getting free bandwidth from 400,000 compromized machies as open proxies?