I still have a Digital 386SX laptop running Windows 3.1. It includes such state-of-the-art items as an 80 MB HDD, a 14.4Kbps fax/modem, a monochrome screen, and a nifty little Logitech trackball that clips to the side of the keyboard.
First of all, HIPAA is only in the US. It wouldn't apply outside US borders (though, other countries may have similar laws, I don't know).
My guess, however, whoever is funding it will probably try to make some money off of it --> installing and servicing systems (hardware/software), that means they are a vendor, and can come under the Business Associate Agreements.
I would see problems if the IT staff of the hospital tried to make their owns changes to the source code without consulting the vendor. In open source it would be their right, but it would probably invalidate a service contract.
Not necessarily. They can get the job done and have open source code. That would probably depend on any stipulations for the grant.
As for the money, I don't know the specifics of their project, but the money could be used to buy computers, equipment, etc. I work for a university based hospital, and have dealt a bit with research proposals, grants, etc. The grants I have dealt with are typically used to pay for things that come up in the course of research, or buys things that the department might not be able to buy on it's own. It might also be used to pay someone's salary, but I'm guessing they're not looking to get rich.
As far as who is providing the grant, my guess would be that they want to do a Netscape/Mozilla kind of thing, or they might want make money on installing the systems (service and hardware).
You should check out the Smithsonian Institution. It has links to the (US) National Zoo, the Air and Space Museum, and much more. Probably one of the best uses of our tax dollars (at least in the US).
IIRC, Estes is privately owned. It's the largest employer in the very small town of Penrose, Colorado (where I used to live).
They've got the market cornered on model rockets, but I think the rockets mentioned in this story are in a different class. I don't think they have anything with a 6 second burn time, as the story mentioned.
First - The Sierra Club had it's biggest membership when James Watt was Secretary of the Interior under Reagan.
Two - even though we just had mid-term elections, make it a political issue for upcoming elections. Presidential candidates are already lining up. Send emailto their campaigns and find out where they stand on the issue. Or, go back and see how they voted on this issue (and the DMCA).
RIAA to consumers - "Stop ripping us off"
Consumers to RIAA - "Stop ripping us off"
Not all of us can afford to spend $20++ for a CD. We certainly don't want to pay $$$ for a CD that only has one or two good songs on it with filler tracks for the rest.
Troll bait, I know, but I get pissed of at having to buy whole CD's to get one or two songs I like, and 10 tracks I can't stand. I hope they get better methods of selling songs individually, without ripping us off ($1 is a good price)
Last week I was told I am now on my department's HIPAA committee. Since I figured I should know what's going on, I hit Google and went here to read (and print) the actual act.
From what I understand, HIPAA only requires reasonable precautions. Depending on how anal your compliance officer is (if you have one), this may or may not be a problem. I work for a group that owns three hospitals, one of them a teaching hospital, and our compliace officer is a lawyer, so she knows her stuff. In a meeting to all staff we were told to use "reasonable precautions". You don't have to be paranoid, just use some common sense.
To me, Red Hat is just another distro. I've used Mandrake and SuSE, but not Red hat. From what I've heard though, Red Hat is to the US what SuSE is to Germany and Mandrake is to France. It may be more popular here, but it is not the only distro. The US Linux/computer press would naturally make the comparison between Micrsoft and Red Hat, but it doesn't mean it's true.
I don't use them, but I don't have anything against them either.
Wavelengths
on
Solar Surgery
·
· Score: 3, Informative
The article was a little short on details. I work for some ophthalmologists, and they use different types of lasers for different purposes. The way it was explained to me, the main differences were in the wavelengths they use. Excimer lasers are good for LASIK and such, while argon or krypton lasers are used for retinal repairs. Carbon dioxide produces an infrared laser for photocoagulation or for cutting.
Since it's still in the nascent stage,it will be interesting to see what they eventually come up with, especially if they can isolate different wavelengths.
Aren't liberals supposed to be for free-speech and against censorship?
/--begin rant
I have never believed Columbine happened because some asswipes were playing Quake or Doom. Nobody ever killed themselves by listening to Judas Priest. Get real! These kids were messed up to begin with. Millions of people play these games, listen to KMFDM, and watch voilent movies without feeling the need to go on a shooting spree.
People are looking for a scapegoat for their own poor parenting. If they actually paid attention to what their kids listened to, or played, they might actually have some kind of impact in their kid's life. /--end rant
Still, fighting for a person's civil liberties seems like something a liberal would do. I'll leave it to the conservatives to take them away (thanks, PATRIOT act and AG Ashcroft).
On the other hand, Tipper Gore was head of the PMRC and Joe lieberman whined that sexy and violent movies were being targeted at kids.
It's probably because it's in the early stages. But they might also be trying to avert complications due to radio-frequency interference. AFAIK, the FCC hasn't alloted spectrum for bodily implants, so using wirless introduces a whole new set of problems.
Well, I may be a little rusty, I'm relying on some things I read about years ago.
I think the issues I read about related to why the Navy didn't use lasers/light for some things (I forget what they were...mapping terrain, communications, etc), rather than acoustics/sonar. Apparently sounds work better than light underwater for those types of things. Anyway...
While light will bend at the difference in optical densities (like a prism), the problem with using a laser underwater is dispersion (signal:noise). Water holds a lot of particulate matter. This is supposed to take place in a large outdoor tank, so it probably has a lot of stuff suspended in the water. It's may be too small to see, but it would probably make using lasers difficult. The closer they got to the barcode, the easier it would be to use a laser, since the distance would be shorter (more signal, less noise). They could probably play with the software to account for some variability.
Also, since water pressure increases as you go deeper, it may affect the density (it's Saturday, I don't want to think too hard). In a lab, "pure" water is supposed to have a specific gravity of 1 (weight/volume). Again, we are not talking about "pure" water, because it's a large tank outside. Water temperature will affect the density, as well as the content (particulate matter, etc). If you read enough Tom Clancy books, you know that the thermocline layer can affect acoustics/sonar, but that probably wouldn't affect this, since it's in a tank, not the ocean.
Another engineering point would be inertia. These robots aren't going to stop on a dime. They can stop the props, but they will keep moving, so they would probably have to read a moving target. And even though it is a pool, there may be some currents from divers, pumps, etc.
I thought they would use some sort of acoustics to find the objects, and then use the webcam/whatever to read the code. I read the rules, and the object in the center will have an acoustic pinger (probably to orient the robot to the tank). From this, the robot could (theoretically) calculate where the other objects are in the tank and go to each one and take a picture (so to speak).
Anyway, I'm not saying these things can't be done. Each team looked at the challenges and decided how they would go about solving them. They are all engineering issues, which is what competitions like these are all about. I look forward to reading some of the journal articles afterwards to see what the teams learned from the experience. I imagine that will answer these questions better (i.e. experience)
I don't think the gizmo that found the Titanic was autonomous. It had an umbilical that was connected to someone in a sub or ship, where it was controlled by a person.
First off, having worked on a few engineering projects at school, I can tell you that it's very unlikely that any tuition is going to pay for projects like this...aside from instructor salaries and the facilities to make the projects. Most of these projects are paid for by the students, clubs, friends, families, and instructors. They will use materials from old projects (cannibalize) and beg/borrow to get the projects going. They will also usually work with companies in the area to either donate money or supplies (in this case, a dive shop would be a great sponsor).
Second, why is it "obvious military technology?" The PC you have is a descendant of machines that were used to calculate artillery tables and break codes during WWII. The Internet is a descendant of ARPAnet/Milnet. You are also overlooking any positive aspects that might come from this technology. In the future, these robots could be used to clean our harbors of toxic waste (i.e. oil drums and such tossed off of ships). They could be used for SAR missions in the cases of shipwrecks or natural disasters. Or, in light of recent events, they could be used to hunt down and kill Chinese walking fish (LOL, sorry it had to be said).
On the other side of the coin, tuition is used to fund a great many extracurricular activities (at least partially), such as marching bands, sports teams, theater, art exhibits, and much more. At the school I went to, I probably didn't realize all of the activities and such my school had to offer, but I'm sure they must have been worthwhile for someone. I certainly appreciated it when they had a Clerks/Mallrats double feature, and when they showed Cannibal: The Musical, but that's just me.
Lasers don't work that well underwater because water distorts light and various wavelengths. The deeper you go for instance, the less natural light would be recieved (less light = more noise).
Plus, most supermarket scanners use a red laser to scan barcodes, and red is one of first wavelengths to fade as you go deeper. Kodak even sells special underwater film that is extra sensitive to red wavelengths so you can take more natural looking pictures further down.
My guess is they are using webcams because the refractive qualities of water makes using lasers more difficult than getting a webcam and some image processing software.
Slashdot Mirror
I still have a Digital 386SX laptop running Windows 3.1. It includes such state-of-the-art items as an 80 MB HDD, a 14.4Kbps fax/modem, a monochrome screen, and a nifty little Logitech trackball that clips to the side of the keyboard.
First of all, HIPAA is only in the US. It wouldn't apply outside US borders (though, other countries may have similar laws, I don't know).
My guess, however, whoever is funding it will probably try to make some money off of it --> installing and servicing systems (hardware/software), that means they are a vendor, and can come under the Business Associate Agreements.
I would see problems if the IT staff of the hospital tried to make their owns changes to the source code without consulting the vendor. In open source it would be their right, but it would probably invalidate a service contract.
There is/was Slashmed, but the lest few times I checked, it was never updated.
Imho they are very different goals.
Not necessarily. They can get the job done and have open source code. That would probably depend on any stipulations for the grant.
As for the money, I don't know the specifics of their project, but the money could be used to buy computers, equipment, etc. I work for a university based hospital, and have dealt a bit with research proposals, grants, etc. The grants I have dealt with are typically used to pay for things that come up in the course of research, or buys things that the department might not be able to buy on it's own. It might also be used to pay someone's salary, but I'm guessing they're not looking to get rich. As far as who is providing the grant, my guess would be that they want to do a Netscape/Mozilla kind of thing, or they might want make money on installing the systems (service and hardware).
I wish them luck
I think its called "astroturfing" - essentially a fake "grassroots" effort.
Hmmm. According to the Soundex, I'm a haggis.
Does that mean I'm not fit to fly?
OTOH, he can't say there's no prior art. NASA (etc.) has him trumped there. Even as far as commercial space travel goes, Russia has him trumped.
Good Job. We all know how secure Microsft products are.
/troll
/sarcasm
I nominate Hillary Rosen to be the next Cybersecurity advisor
You should check out the Smithsonian Institution. It has links to the (US) National Zoo, the Air and Space Museum, and much more. Probably one of the best uses of our tax dollars (at least in the US).
IIRC, Estes is privately owned. It's the largest employer in the very small town of Penrose, Colorado (where I used to live).
They've got the market cornered on model rockets, but I think the rockets mentioned in this story are in a different class. I don't think they have anything with a 6 second burn time, as the story mentioned.
First - The Sierra Club had it's biggest membership when James Watt was Secretary of the Interior under Reagan.
Two - even though we just had mid-term elections, make it a political issue for upcoming elections. Presidential candidates are already lining up. Send emailto their campaigns and find out where they stand on the issue. Or, go back and see how they voted on this issue (and the DMCA).
It's the weekend. Beer is calling.
RIAA to consumers - "Stop ripping us off"
Consumers to RIAA - "Stop ripping us off"
Not all of us can afford to spend $20++ for a CD. We certainly don't want to pay $$$ for a CD that only has one or two good songs on it with filler tracks for the rest.
Troll bait, I know, but I get pissed of at having to buy whole CD's to get one or two songs I like, and 10 tracks I can't stand. I hope they get better methods of selling songs individually, without ripping us off ($1 is a good price)
Last week I was told I am now on my department's HIPAA committee. Since I figured I should know what's going on, I hit Google and went here to read (and print) the actual act.
From what I understand, HIPAA only requires reasonable precautions. Depending on how anal your compliance officer is (if you have one), this may or may not be a problem. I work for a group that owns three hospitals, one of them a teaching hospital, and our compliace officer is a lawyer, so she knows her stuff. In a meeting to all staff we were told to use "reasonable precautions". You don't have to be paranoid, just use some common sense.
Good luck with it.
To me, Red Hat is just another distro. I've used Mandrake and SuSE, but not Red hat. From what I've heard though, Red Hat is to the US what SuSE is to Germany and Mandrake is to France. It may be more popular here, but it is not the only distro. The US Linux/computer press would naturally make the comparison between Micrsoft and Red Hat, but it doesn't mean it's true.
I don't use them, but I don't have anything against them either.
The article was a little short on details. I work for some ophthalmologists, and they use different types of lasers for different purposes. The way it was explained to me, the main differences were in the wavelengths they use. Excimer lasers are good for LASIK and such, while argon or krypton lasers are used for retinal repairs. Carbon dioxide produces an infrared laser for photocoagulation or for cutting.
Since it's still in the nascent stage,it will be interesting to see what they eventually come up with, especially if they can isolate different wavelengths.
Let's not forget the leap year
/--cliche
/--end cliche
500 dollars * 3,000,000 in just one day = 1.5 billion dollars.
You know what they say, a billion here, a billion there, sooner or later you start talking real money.
Aren't liberals supposed to be for free-speech and against censorship?
/--begin rant
/--end rant
I have never believed Columbine happened because some asswipes were playing Quake or Doom. Nobody ever killed themselves by listening to Judas Priest. Get real! These kids were messed up to begin with. Millions of people play these games, listen to KMFDM, and watch voilent movies without feeling the need to go on a shooting spree.
People are looking for a scapegoat for their own poor parenting. If they actually paid attention to what their kids listened to, or played, they might actually have some kind of impact in their kid's life.
Still, fighting for a person's civil liberties seems like something a liberal would do. I'll leave it to the conservatives to take them away (thanks, PATRIOT act and AG Ashcroft).
On the other hand, Tipper Gore was head of the PMRC and Joe lieberman whined that sexy and violent movies were being targeted at kids.
net is full of spam one way to stop the spammer quick swift painless death
SPECIAL
Now with every purchase of a CD or DVD you get a free subpoena!!
Act now! Supplies are unlimited!!
It's probably because it's in the early stages. But they might also be trying to avert complications due to radio-frequency interference. AFAIK, the FCC hasn't alloted spectrum for bodily implants, so using wirless introduces a whole new set of problems.
The terrorists have already won...or did they??
Well, I may be a little rusty, I'm relying on some things I read about years ago.
I think the issues I read about related to why the Navy didn't use lasers/light for some things (I forget what they were...mapping terrain, communications, etc), rather than acoustics/sonar. Apparently sounds work better than light underwater for those types of things. Anyway...
While light will bend at the difference in optical densities (like a prism), the problem with using a laser underwater is dispersion (signal:noise). Water holds a lot of particulate matter. This is supposed to take place in a large outdoor tank, so it probably has a lot of stuff suspended in the water. It's may be too small to see, but it would probably make using lasers difficult. The closer they got to the barcode, the easier it would be to use a laser, since the distance would be shorter (more signal, less noise). They could probably play with the software to account for some variability.
Also, since water pressure increases as you go deeper, it may affect the density (it's Saturday, I don't want to think too hard). In a lab, "pure" water is supposed to have a specific gravity of 1 (weight/volume). Again, we are not talking about "pure" water, because it's a large tank outside. Water temperature will affect the density, as well as the content (particulate matter, etc). If you read enough Tom Clancy books, you know that the thermocline layer can affect acoustics/sonar, but that probably wouldn't affect this, since it's in a tank, not the ocean.
Another engineering point would be inertia. These robots aren't going to stop on a dime. They can stop the props, but they will keep moving, so they would probably have to read a moving target. And even though it is a pool, there may be some currents from divers, pumps, etc.
I thought they would use some sort of acoustics to find the objects, and then use the webcam/whatever to read the code. I read the rules, and the object in the center will have an acoustic pinger (probably to orient the robot to the tank). From this, the robot could (theoretically) calculate where the other objects are in the tank and go to each one and take a picture (so to speak).
Anyway, I'm not saying these things can't be done. Each team looked at the challenges and decided how they would go about solving them. They are all engineering issues, which is what competitions like these are all about. I look forward to reading some of the journal articles afterwards to see what the teams learned from the experience. I imagine that will answer these questions better (i.e. experience)
I don't think the gizmo that found the Titanic was autonomous. It had an umbilical that was connected to someone in a sub or ship, where it was controlled by a person.
First off, having worked on a few engineering projects at school, I can tell you that it's very unlikely that any tuition is going to pay for projects like this...aside from instructor salaries and the facilities to make the projects. Most of these projects are paid for by the students, clubs, friends, families, and instructors. They will use materials from old projects (cannibalize) and beg/borrow to get the projects going. They will also usually work with companies in the area to either donate money or supplies (in this case, a dive shop would be a great sponsor).
Second, why is it "obvious military technology?" The PC you have is a descendant of machines that were used to calculate artillery tables and break codes during WWII. The Internet is a descendant of ARPAnet/Milnet. You are also overlooking any positive aspects that might come from this technology. In the future, these robots could be used to clean our harbors of toxic waste (i.e. oil drums and such tossed off of ships). They could be used for SAR missions in the cases of shipwrecks or natural disasters. Or, in light of recent events, they could be used to hunt down and kill Chinese walking fish (LOL, sorry it had to be said).
On the other side of the coin, tuition is used to fund a great many extracurricular activities (at least partially), such as marching bands, sports teams, theater, art exhibits, and much more. At the school I went to, I probably didn't realize all of the activities and such my school had to offer, but I'm sure they must have been worthwhile for someone. I certainly appreciated it when they had a Clerks/Mallrats double feature, and when they showed Cannibal: The Musical, but that's just me.
Maybe a little more info.
Lasers don't work that well underwater because water distorts light and various wavelengths. The deeper you go for instance, the less natural light would be recieved (less light = more noise).
Plus, most supermarket scanners use a red laser to scan barcodes, and red is one of first wavelengths to fade as you go deeper. Kodak even sells special underwater film that is extra sensitive to red wavelengths so you can take more natural looking pictures further down.
My guess is they are using webcams because the refractive qualities of water makes using lasers more difficult than getting a webcam and some image processing software.