How well do any of them do when running for 24 hours straight? The Le Mans is designed to test reliability of the cars as well as their speed.
It's one thing to be able to run the shortest lap time. It's another to put in the most laps over a long period of time. Different design criteria, different cars.
In a Rolls-Royce he could have pulled over to the side of the road, borrowed a passing motorist's cell phone, and had them send a tow truck to the nearest town, where they would put him up in a hotel, while they flew a mechanic to him.
(Or at least, that used to be their policy. I've heard some amazing stories about the level of service they give. Of course, if you charge that much for a car, I'd expect amazing service.)
Actually, if you wanted to do something like this, the best way would be to use the loophole the RIAA was trying to close and the judge re-opened: Simply open the file in some video-editing program, add a picture or two as a video track, and save.
Now you have a music video that will likely be able to play in any recent music player program, and is immune to the search. It's a bit bigger, but disk space is cheap.
Because I'd rather they hacked my glasses (which I can take off) than my brain?
(Find me an OS or similar level project with zero security breaks, and I'll consider letting that team of programmers near a system I'd install in my head.)
Maybe, maybe not: It is a new project after all. Sure, there may be resources that can be used from other projects, but it's also possible that this is in addition to the other projects, and therefore is a new cost.
Regardless, the ongoing costs will be billed to this new project, and so would have to be included in the total.
Ok, now you can't just stand up 50 machines to handle email. They have to be coordinated (and load-balanced).
Plus you have to have test and dev boxes. (Because you aren't doing that on live boxes, right?)
So, lets add a few high-end ethernet switches in. And don't forget things like DNS boxes (to cache, so you have decent performance for all the DNS lookups most spam systems do these days), and a few really high-end firewalls. Oh, and racks to mount these all in, plus cabling. And a power supply. (Not the ones in the boxes, the one outside the building converting the mains power to 110. You'll need at least one extra.) Oh, which reminds me: Better have a backup generator. And a failover UPS for the whole place.
Heck, you may need a new building to put all this in. Which will need an HVAC system, of course.
Oh, and those machines won't run themselves. So you'll need to hire a few people; fairly qualified admins.
Which mean they need desks, computers, monitors, chairs, phones, pagers, possibly laptops.
And it's a decent-sized team, so remember to fund their manager, and possibly an HR person for them too.
We haven't mentioned the actual data line yet. It's going to have to be a big one, probably installed especially for this. Oh, and you'll want it redundant. So, make that two. (And better remember how much it is going to cost just to negotiate for those lines: That's several man-months of time, most likely.)
Of course, we haven't talked software yet: Likely you'll want Unix/Linux, but for this you'll probably want an official support contract. Which covers the OS. We'll also want one on whatever anti-spam package we are using. And possibly one on a monitoring package, to help keep track of when it is up. There may be others as well.
Oh, and for full redundancy, you'll probably want to set up at least two separate sites. So, double most of the above. (We'll use the same admins for both.)
Hmm. Haven't talked backups yet. That's probably going off-site. A few more computers, a tape machine, off-site transport, admins to run all of it...
So, um, how long is that $100 million supposed to last for anyway?
Heh. Yes, that was hard: The machine in question doesn't have access to CPAN.
And even then, the above just tries to download and compile the DBD. Which fails on many RedHat installs: You need to swizzle the build flags. Which gives it a chance of working, unless your build flags for Perl were wrong. Or the ones for MySQL. Or both.
You'll be glad to hear about the autovacuum built into PostgreSQL versions 8.1+. (Ok, so it's not on by default yet. One configuration switch.)
I could give you the good reasons for having VACUUM run separately, (Actually, it's often easier to know from outside when your database is going to be busy...), but in general I agree having to run VACUUM was a pain. I'm glad it's no longer needed.
MySQL is not well documented. It's got horrible documentation. Granted, it's got lots of it (and everything is there somewhere), but it's all horrible: Specifics of syntax and usage are often spread through half-dozen pages for a single command, with no linkage between them in the HTML.
As for 'playing nicely'... You've obviously never tried to get the Perl DBI working with MySQL on RedHat. As far as I can tell, the process is 'Recompile it. All of it. Again.' I spent two weeks trying to get it to work. Our scripts (that have to work with MySQL) currently output to a temp file and then run that via a call to shell.
I'll give you 'available on nearly every hosting package'. But then, so is Windows.
Well, in the case of the Atari games, it is fairly obvious that the programmers used the effects to create nicer-looking graphics without going to extra work. Sort of a reverse anti-aliasing effect.
Take a look at some of the comparison images in the article. The 'Enduro' image is particularly interesting: The skyline looks extremely fake on an LCD, but with the CRT emulation it looks almost realistic. The effect basically gives a continuous-color blend which would be impossible using just the colors available to the program.
So really, you can argue that this is how the games were meant to be seen like this, and this is actually how it should look.
Depends. If it's nearly as cheap as patters per GB and nearly as fast as flash, it might be a good deal: You could get drives that were both large and fast. (Oh, and it's smaller too: you could hold that 500 GB in a thumb drive, most likely.)
Nope. The people illegally copying copyrighted works are simply performing an illegal act. They are not asking for the assistance of the judicial system as they do so. (They just rely on it not reaching them.) That's not abuse: That's just ignoring the system.
The RIAA is actively using the assistance of the judicial system to further quasi-legal (at best) ends. That's abuse.
It's probably one of those cases where they can do whatever they like, but if objected to their data can't be used in a legal proceeding. (In general, you can use any data you want in a legal proceeding. Unless the other side has a valid objection.)
So they aren't doing anything criminally liable (so the police can't get involved) and the RIAA is basically only using them in their first stage (before they are allowing the defendants to get involved), and the result is that there is no one in position to call them on it. (Except the judge, if they so desire, but I'm not sure what the rules are there.)
Frankly I do not believe they need internet access outside of what is required to finish a class assignment.
Ok, now create a system that A: Knows all student's current class and extra-credit assignments, at all times; B: Knows what student is accessing which computer wherever they are on the campus; C: Knows what websites are relevant to each assignment and student at all times; D: Can then enforce that on a case-by-case basis.
B is difficult, but could probably be dealt with. If you solved all the rest, D is not a major problem. A and C are nearly impossible: They actually require the system to know more than the teachers (A) (remember: many assignments are along the line of 'pick a topic and write a report on it') and Google (C) simultaneously.
Good luck with that. In the meantime, I can see why schools would put in blocks on 'known non-relevant' sites, for sites that should never be needed for any class assignment. (And, since it's not on adults, I can even see decent arguments for doing so.)
If CAPTCHAs do continue, I'd like the next problem to be facial recognition software. I'd love a package that could look at a picture and tag it "Nicholas and Andrea" or "Glen and Helene". Digital camera software everywhere could benefit from this technology. Not sure how you'd bake that into a CAPTCHA, but it's a good problem to solve.
The current pirate problem is caused by pirates who don't actually have any use for the ship's cargo: They just hold it for ransom. A computer-controlled ship with no way to override would be less useful to them: They could destroy it, but they can't hold it up or delay it significantly.
Because I, the ISP, have formed a pact with your local government to prevent Speakeasy (or any other meaningful competition) from servicing your area of the country.
If anything, consumers should be weary of 3G lock-in. Who cares if an app only works via wifi? Why the hell would you use voip on your phone if you are already paying for the phone connection? Isn't that antithetical to any reason consumers would prefer voip to more traditional solutions?
Quick example of why: My parents are moving to Ethiopia soon. AT&T will charge $1.19 a minute for a call. Skype will charge $0.458 a minute. If I can use plan minutes and Skype, I'll spend less than half the money to talk to them on the phone. And I'd still be able to talk to them anywhere, not just someplace where I can get a wifi signal.
This is a bit of an extreme case, but all the numbers are real.
I would think it's a matter of being able to access data which is on the Internet, regardless of protocol.
So I'm entitled to run live streaming video over carrier pigeons and social networks?
Sure you are.
The right to be stupid, however, does not mean you have the right to succeed by being stupid. (However much big business is trying to convince people otherwise.)
In other words: You have the right to do so, provided you pay the required costs, etc. And we have the right to laugh at you.
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How well do any of them do when running for 24 hours straight? The Le Mans is designed to test reliability of the cars as well as their speed.
It's one thing to be able to run the shortest lap time. It's another to put in the most laps over a long period of time. Different design criteria, different cars.
In a Rolls-Royce he could have pulled over to the side of the road, borrowed a passing motorist's cell phone, and had them send a tow truck to the nearest town, where they would put him up in a hotel, while they flew a mechanic to him.
(Or at least, that used to be their policy. I've heard some amazing stories about the level of service they give. Of course, if you charge that much for a car, I'd expect amazing service.)
Actually, if you wanted to do something like this, the best way would be to use the loophole the RIAA was trying to close and the judge re-opened: Simply open the file in some video-editing program, add a picture or two as a video track, and save.
Now you have a music video that will likely be able to play in any recent music player program, and is immune to the search. It's a bit bigger, but disk space is cheap.
Because I'd rather they hacked my glasses (which I can take off) than my brain?
(Find me an OS or similar level project with zero security breaks, and I'll consider letting that team of programmers near a system I'd install in my head.)
Who cares what they can prove? Do they have enough to claim and hold all his possible computing devices as evidence?
That's deterrent enough for a lot of things, really.
Maybe, maybe not: It is a new project after all. Sure, there may be resources that can be used from other projects, but it's also possible that this is in addition to the other projects, and therefore is a new cost.
Regardless, the ongoing costs will be billed to this new project, and so would have to be included in the total.
Ok, now you can't just stand up 50 machines to handle email. They have to be coordinated (and load-balanced).
Plus you have to have test and dev boxes. (Because you aren't doing that on live boxes, right?)
So, lets add a few high-end ethernet switches in. And don't forget things like DNS boxes (to cache, so you have decent performance for all the DNS lookups most spam systems do these days), and a few really high-end firewalls. Oh, and racks to mount these all in, plus cabling. And a power supply. (Not the ones in the boxes, the one outside the building converting the mains power to 110. You'll need at least one extra.) Oh, which reminds me: Better have a backup generator. And a failover UPS for the whole place.
Heck, you may need a new building to put all this in. Which will need an HVAC system, of course.
Oh, and those machines won't run themselves. So you'll need to hire a few people; fairly qualified admins.
Which mean they need desks, computers, monitors, chairs, phones, pagers, possibly laptops.
And it's a decent-sized team, so remember to fund their manager, and possibly an HR person for them too.
We haven't mentioned the actual data line yet. It's going to have to be a big one, probably installed especially for this. Oh, and you'll want it redundant. So, make that two. (And better remember how much it is going to cost just to negotiate for those lines: That's several man-months of time, most likely.)
Of course, we haven't talked software yet: Likely you'll want Unix/Linux, but for this you'll probably want an official support contract. Which covers the OS. We'll also want one on whatever anti-spam package we are using. And possibly one on a monitoring package, to help keep track of when it is up. There may be others as well.
Oh, and for full redundancy, you'll probably want to set up at least two separate sites. So, double most of the above. (We'll use the same admins for both.)
Hmm. Haven't talked backups yet. That's probably going off-site. A few more computers, a tape machine, off-site transport, admins to run all of it...
So, um, how long is that $100 million supposed to last for anyway?
Heh. Yes, that was hard: The machine in question doesn't have access to CPAN.
And even then, the above just tries to download and compile the DBD. Which fails on many RedHat installs: You need to swizzle the build flags. Which gives it a chance of working, unless your build flags for Perl were wrong. Or the ones for MySQL. Or both.
You'll be glad to hear about the autovacuum built into PostgreSQL versions 8.1+. (Ok, so it's not on by default yet. One configuration switch.)
I could give you the good reasons for having VACUUM run separately, (Actually, it's often easier to know from outside when your database is going to be busy...), but in general I agree having to run VACUUM was a pain. I'm glad it's no longer needed.
MySQL is not well documented. It's got horrible documentation. Granted, it's got lots of it (and everything is there somewhere), but it's all horrible: Specifics of syntax and usage are often spread through half-dozen pages for a single command, with no linkage between them in the HTML.
As for 'playing nicely'... You've obviously never tried to get the Perl DBI working with MySQL on RedHat. As far as I can tell, the process is 'Recompile it. All of it. Again.' I spent two weeks trying to get it to work. Our scripts (that have to work with MySQL) currently output to a temp file and then run that via a call to shell.
I'll give you 'available on nearly every hosting package'. But then, so is Windows.
Perhaps someone can buy whatever rights they thought they had and donate everything to the FSF.
I'll bid $1 towards that.
Well, in the case of the Atari games, it is fairly obvious that the programmers used the effects to create nicer-looking graphics without going to extra work. Sort of a reverse anti-aliasing effect.
Take a look at some of the comparison images in the article. The 'Enduro' image is particularly interesting: The skyline looks extremely fake on an LCD, but with the CRT emulation it looks almost realistic. The effect basically gives a continuous-color blend which would be impossible using just the colors available to the program.
So really, you can argue that this is how the games were meant to be seen like this, and this is actually how it should look.
Depends. If it's nearly as cheap as patters per GB and nearly as fast as flash, it might be a good deal: You could get drives that were both large and fast. (Oh, and it's smaller too: you could hold that 500 GB in a thumb drive, most likely.)
Of course, I'll believe it when I see it...
Don't worry; we'll just have CleverNickName come by and reverse the polarity of the anti-tachion field and we'll be fine.
Nope. The people illegally copying copyrighted works are simply performing an illegal act. They are not asking for the assistance of the judicial system as they do so. (They just rely on it not reaching them.) That's not abuse: That's just ignoring the system.
The RIAA is actively using the assistance of the judicial system to further quasi-legal (at best) ends. That's abuse.
It's probably one of those cases where they can do whatever they like, but if objected to their data can't be used in a legal proceeding. (In general, you can use any data you want in a legal proceeding. Unless the other side has a valid objection.)
So they aren't doing anything criminally liable (so the police can't get involved) and the RIAA is basically only using them in their first stage (before they are allowing the defendants to get involved), and the result is that there is no one in position to call them on it. (Except the judge, if they so desire, but I'm not sure what the rules are there.)
Or you can use SQLite, get more speed, and still have transactions. (Although fulltext indexing does require a loadable extension.)
Frankly I do not believe they need internet access outside of what is required to finish a class assignment.
Ok, now create a system that A: Knows all student's current class and extra-credit assignments, at all times; B: Knows what student is accessing which computer wherever they are on the campus; C: Knows what websites are relevant to each assignment and student at all times; D: Can then enforce that on a case-by-case basis.
B is difficult, but could probably be dealt with. If you solved all the rest, D is not a major problem. A and C are nearly impossible: They actually require the system to know more than the teachers (A) (remember: many assignments are along the line of 'pick a topic and write a report on it') and Google (C) simultaneously.
Good luck with that. In the meantime, I can see why schools would put in blocks on 'known non-relevant' sites, for sites that should never be needed for any class assignment. (And, since it's not on adults, I can even see decent arguments for doing so.)
If CAPTCHAs do continue, I'd like the next problem to be facial recognition software. I'd love a package that could look at a picture and tag it "Nicholas and Andrea" or "Glen and Helene". Digital camera software everywhere could benefit from this technology. Not sure how you'd bake that into a CAPTCHA, but it's a good problem to solve.
No need for CAPTCHA's: Apple's got you covered.
Another bonus: It makes 'just blow them up' a much more acceptable option.
The current pirate problem is caused by pirates who don't actually have any use for the ship's cargo: They just hold it for ransom. A computer-controlled ship with no way to override would be less useful to them: They could destroy it, but they can't hold it up or delay it significantly.
Because I, the ISP, have formed a pact with your local government to prevent Speakeasy (or any other meaningful competition) from servicing your area of the country.
The 1990s called: they want their benchmarks back.
Maybe he meant developer performance.
If anything, consumers should be weary of 3G lock-in. Who cares if an app only works via wifi? Why the hell would you use voip on your phone if you are already paying for the phone connection? Isn't that antithetical to any reason consumers would prefer voip to more traditional solutions?
Quick example of why: My parents are moving to Ethiopia soon. AT&T will charge $1.19 a minute for a call. Skype will charge $0.458 a minute. If I can use plan minutes and Skype, I'll spend less than half the money to talk to them on the phone. And I'd still be able to talk to them anywhere, not just someplace where I can get a wifi signal.
This is a bit of an extreme case, but all the numbers are real.
I would think it's a matter of being able to access data which is on the Internet, regardless of protocol.
So I'm entitled to run live streaming video over carrier pigeons and social networks?
Sure you are.
The right to be stupid, however, does not mean you have the right to succeed by being stupid. (However much big business is trying to convince people otherwise.)
In other words: You have the right to do so, provided you pay the required costs, etc. And we have the right to laugh at you.