A few places I might try to see if given the opportunity are:
SGI and Cray manufacturing facilities in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin
SGI Reality Center in Mountain View, California (call ahead to find if any public
viewings are scheduled)
The first and second tallest manmade structures in the world, both in North Dakota.
The KVLY (formerly KTHI) and KXJB
television towers.
The Omniplex in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. This is three museums in one complex: an interactive (childrens?) science museum (good fun first date place for the science-minded couple), an art museum, and an air and space museum.
Not tech related, but the Arts Institue of Minneapolis is free, and is simply outstanding (up close and personal with Monet, for example). While in the area you could check out tech companies like 3M and Medtronic (and make that side trip to Chippewa Falls Wisconsin).
IRIX has the capability to checkpoint and restart just as the original poster is asking for. It can successfully checkpoint and restart very complicated jobs, not just the simple programs that some of the posters have indicated.
There are a number of items which cannot be automatically checkpointed (i.e. open sockets). However, through the use of signals, any application written to cooperate with IRIX's checkpoint/restart will be given an opportunity to gracefully save the portion of its state that the kernel cannot automatically handle.
This is one of those capabilities of big mature UNIXes that is still awaiting implementation on most open-source UNIXes.
The Federal Aviation Administration, at least during my tenure there, relied heavily upon SGI IRIX systems.
While these systems were obviously used for such purposes as flight simulation, they were also used for design and validation of flight procedures, approach and departure procedures, and many many other critical operations.
The FAA got me hooked on SGI, and now I've been called home to the mother ship. Of course its hard not to get hooked when your first exposure was to an Onyx.:)
> Solaris still has the most scalable SMP tech. There's a lot to be learned by groveling through that code.
*cough* *cough*
Sorry, Solaris doesn't even come close to having the most scalable SMP code. That honor belongs to SGI's IRIX (currently 512P on Origin 2000 and Origin 3000) and Cray's Unicos/mk (approximately 1800P on the largest T3E I'm aware of). A measly little 64P Solaris UE10000 system cannot come anywhere making that claim.
Note: Yes, there may technically be some larger SMP systems in existence running one-off operating systems; I am limiting my discussion to commercially available (at some point) systems.
I will agree, however, that there is a lot to be gained from reading Solaris code. However, I wouldn't advise doing so and then bringing ideas into your operating system kernel of choice. Sun lawyers may very well have a heyday with you if that happens.
(Someone please mod this information up as it's
fairly important to combat the misinformation
raised in the extended posting.)
The SGI 1600SW is definitely still sold an supported and still winning awards. With the fairly new MultiLink Adapter it is no longer necessary to have special video cards -- absolutely any VGA signal capable of doing 60 Hz refresh can drive the screen.
Keep in mind however that a standard VGA signal will go through an analog stage so you lose some of the theoretically possible crispness of pure digital. To keep pure digital you would indeed need one of the supported digital cards.
The irony of managers having offices and the knowledge workers having cubes is that that's the exact opposite of what each group needs. Managers spend their time interacting with others -- making phone calls, interviewing, meeting, etc.
. . .
Knowledge workers, however, have the opposite needs. They spend their time focused on a single task for extended periods of time.
. . .
Unfortunately, I have yet to see an organization that hasn't been afflicted by the office royalty syndrome...
Then come work for SGI! At HQ the policy is basically that engineers get private offices (contractors have to double-up), but managers and above all have cubes. Heck, I've even seen VP levels with high-wall cubes. But the people who really need the peace-and-quiet, namely engineers, have their owrn offices and love it.
But it's even better out in the Twin Cities where we work at the former Cray Research facilities. Aside from some sales-droids and the receptionist, everyone has their own comfortable-size office. And almost every one of those offices has a window either to the outside or to large internal atriums. Throw in an Aeron chair for whoever wants one and the friendliest and most competent group of coworkers you could ever imagine, and it's just the absolute best working environment you can ever ask for.
It's nice to know that your employer really does understand the needs of the creative elements of their workforce.
If you are truly concerned about this issue, it is a very good idea to politely inform your ISP that you will refuse to do business with them should they participate in this kind of monitoring.
Just a short note to their sales department or administrators should be enough to let them know where you stand.
For your convenience I'm including a "form letter" that we can use to make our opinions known. Be sure to substitute your ISP's name in the appropriate 4 locations in this message, and to substitute your name at the end. ------------------------------------------------ -- Dear (ISP NAME HERE),
I wanted to take just a minute of your time to highlight an issue of some importance to me, a customer for (TIME PERIOD), by which I hope to make known at least one customer's views on some rather disturbing trends in Interenet access. Just a moment of your time to express my thoughts, and hopefully influence (ISP NAME HERE)'s future direction would be appreciated.
There is currently an initiative and offering by a company named Predictive Networks to engage ISPs in a scheme by which the ISP will monitor web traffic patterns from individual subscribers. This data would be given to Predictive Networks to create user profiles which are then used for marketing purposes.
In exchange for this information ISPs would presumably be financially compensated. This of course can only lead to coercion by ISPs upon subscribers to submit to this sort of monitoring lest they face either termination of service or higher service fees.
The discussion which brought this initiative to my attention can be found at the URL http://www.vortex.com/privacy/priv.09.13.
I have no desire to particpate in such data collection, and will vigorously oppose the imposition of any such policy upon me. As a satisfied customer of (ISP NAME HERE) to this date, I want to make known that I will refuse to conduct business with any ISP which chooses to participate in this venture. I sincerely hope that (ISP NAME HERE) will never consider detailed monitoring of their customer's Internet traffic.
Thank you for your time, (YOUR NAME HERE) ------------------------------------------------ --
Having just moved away from OKC in the last year, I have to say as far as culture it's a fairly decent place to live. There's enough museums, theatres, movie theatres, annual events, and just plain "stuff" going on to keep a person fairly occupied.
My biggest complaints: the weather and bandwidth. After the Summer of 1998 with several months of 100+ weather and no rain I knew it was time to get out of there. The cable companies are finally getting on the wagon, but I would hate to be running anything other than MS/Mac if you expect support. DSL? Maybe someday.
Now I'm in Minneapolis. Better weather by my personal preferences, though this winter has been nothing to write home about (the ground is supposed to be *white* in December dangit). Cable and DSL is fairly prominent, and despite the local whiners' protestations, the traffic is remarkably smooth (wouldn't want to work downtown though).
What do I want? (Not necessarily in this order)
1. Cheap cheap cheap bandwidth. (Still waiting) 2. Clean air. (Not yet) 3. Good theatres, both live and movie. (Check) 4. Four distinct seasons. (Check) 5. More cheap bandwidth. 6. UNIX jobs. (Check) 7. Did I mention cheap bandwidth? 8. Affordable housing. (Not as bad as SV, but nasty).
Here's an potential abuse of a stricter copyright law: DNS tables.
How long would it be until NSI declares that all cacheing of information in their databases is an infringement on their copyright? I give it about 4 hours. (Yes, this would be stupid for technical reasons, if nothing else, but hey it is NSI after all.)
I may be off-base on this next point, so someone please correct me if I'm wrong. Isn't there a concept known as a "compilation copyright" that can be used to protect a work such as a database. I think this is traditionally used to protect something like, oh, a printed collection of "The Best of alt.swedish.chef.bork.bork.bork", where the contents aren't individually copyrighted by the "author", but the compilation as a whole is.
Slashdot Mirror
IRIX has the capability to checkpoint and restart just as the original poster is asking for. It can successfully checkpoint and restart very complicated jobs, not just the simple programs that some of the posters have indicated.
There are a number of items which cannot be automatically checkpointed (i.e. open sockets). However, through the use of signals, any application written to cooperate with IRIX's checkpoint/restart will be given an opportunity to gracefully save the portion of its state that the kernel cannot automatically handle.
This is one of those capabilities of big mature UNIXes that is still awaiting implementation on most open-source UNIXes.
Hehe. So, everyone using that service would now be considered SOL?
The Federal Aviation Administration, at least during my tenure there, relied heavily upon SGI IRIX systems.
While these systems were obviously used for such purposes as flight simulation, they were also used for design and validation of flight procedures, approach and departure procedures, and many many other critical operations.
The FAA got me hooked on SGI, and now I've been called home to the mother ship. Of course its hard not to get hooked when your first exposure was to an Onyx. :)
> Solaris still has the most scalable SMP tech. There's a lot to be learned by groveling through that code.
*cough* *cough*
Sorry, Solaris doesn't even come close to having the most scalable SMP code. That honor belongs to SGI's IRIX (currently 512P on Origin 2000 and Origin 3000) and Cray's Unicos/mk (approximately 1800P on the largest T3E I'm aware of). A measly little 64P Solaris UE10000 system cannot come anywhere making that claim.
Note: Yes, there may technically be some larger SMP systems in existence running one-off operating systems; I am limiting my discussion to commercially available (at some point) systems.
I will agree, however, that there is a lot to be gained from reading Solaris code. However, I wouldn't advise doing so and then bringing ideas into your operating system kernel of choice. Sun lawyers may very well have a heyday with you if that happens.
(Someone please mod this information up as it's fairly important to combat the misinformation raised in the extended posting.)
The SGI 1600SW is definitely still sold an supported and still winning awards. With the fairly new MultiLink Adapter it is no longer necessary to have special video cards -- absolutely any VGA signal capable of doing 60 Hz refresh can drive the screen.
Keep in mind however that a standard VGA signal will go through an analog stage so you lose some of the theoretically possible crispness of pure digital. To keep pure digital you would indeed need one of the supported digital cards.
Here's a set of questions and answers about the 1600SW and the MultiLink Adapter.
I just wish I had one on my desk!
The irony of managers having offices and the knowledge workers having cubes is that that's the exact opposite of what each group needs. Managers spend their time interacting with others -- making phone calls, interviewing, meeting, etc.
. . .
Knowledge workers, however, have the opposite needs. They spend their time focused on a single task for extended periods of time.
. . .
Unfortunately, I have yet to see an organization that hasn't been afflicted by the office royalty syndrome...
Then come work for SGI! At HQ the policy is basically that engineers get private offices (contractors have to double-up), but managers and above all have cubes. Heck, I've even seen VP levels with high-wall cubes. But the people who really need the peace-and-quiet, namely engineers, have their owrn offices and love it.
But it's even better out in the Twin Cities where we work at the former Cray Research facilities. Aside from some sales-droids and the receptionist, everyone has their own comfortable-size office. And almost every one of those offices has a window either to the outside or to large internal atriums. Throw in an Aeron chair for whoever wants one and the friendliest and most competent group of coworkers you could ever imagine, and it's just the absolute best working environment you can ever ask for.
It's nice to know that your employer really does understand the needs of the creative elements of their workforce.
If you are truly concerned about this issue, it is a very good idea to politely inform your ISP that you will refuse to do business with them should they participate in this kind of monitoring.
- --
- --
Just a short note to their sales department or administrators should be enough to let them know
where you stand.
For your convenience I'm including a "form letter" that we can use to make our opinions known. Be
sure to substitute your ISP's name in the appropriate 4 locations in this message, and to substitute your name at the end.
-----------------------------------------------
Dear (ISP NAME HERE),
I wanted to take just a minute of your time to highlight an issue of some importance to me, a customer for (TIME PERIOD), by which I hope to make known at least one customer's views on some rather disturbing trends in Interenet access. Just a moment of your time to express my thoughts, and hopefully influence (ISP NAME HERE)'s future direction would be appreciated.
There is currently an initiative and offering by a company named Predictive Networks to engage ISPs in a scheme by which the ISP will monitor web traffic patterns from individual subscribers. This data would be given to Predictive Networks to create user profiles which are then used for marketing purposes.
In exchange for this information ISPs would presumably be financially compensated. This of course can only lead to coercion by ISPs upon subscribers to submit to this sort of monitoring lest they face either termination of service or higher service fees.
The discussion which brought this initiative to my attention can be found at the URL http://www.vortex.com/privacy/priv.09.13.
I have no desire to particpate in such data collection, and will vigorously oppose the imposition of any such policy upon me. As a satisfied customer of (ISP NAME HERE) to this date, I want to make known that I will refuse to conduct business with any ISP which chooses to participate in this venture. I sincerely hope that (ISP NAME HERE) will never consider detailed monitoring of their customer's Internet traffic.
Thank you for your time,
(YOUR NAME HERE)
-----------------------------------------------
My biggest complaints: the weather and bandwidth. After the Summer of 1998 with several months of 100+ weather and no rain I knew it was time to get out of there. The cable companies are finally getting on the wagon, but I would hate to be running anything other than MS/Mac if you expect support. DSL? Maybe someday.
Now I'm in Minneapolis. Better weather by my personal preferences, though this winter has been nothing to write home about (the ground is supposed to be *white* in December dangit). Cable and DSL is fairly prominent, and despite the local whiners' protestations, the traffic is remarkably smooth (wouldn't want to work downtown though).
What do I want? (Not necessarily in this order)
That's reasonable, right?
Here's an potential abuse of a stricter copyright law: DNS tables.
How long would it be until NSI declares that all cacheing of information in their databases is an infringement on their copyright? I give it about 4 hours. (Yes, this would be stupid for technical reasons, if nothing else, but hey it is NSI after all.)
I may be off-base on this next point, so someone please correct me if I'm wrong. Isn't there a concept known as a "compilation copyright" that can be used to protect a work such as a database. I think this is traditionally used to protect something like, oh, a printed collection of "The Best of alt.swedish.chef.bork.bork.bork", where the contents aren't individually copyrighted by the "author", but the compilation as a whole is.
My question is "Who needs all this anyway?"
We had standards for "instant messaging" long
before AOL or ICQ came along. Go read RFCs 1459,
821 (SEND in particular), talk(1), and talkd(1).
Standards, schmandards.