Users doing the occassional word-processing, checking email, and web surfing will be perfectly happy with an 8 year old PC.
Users who wish to use their PCs for CPU-intensive tasks like video editing, or just playing the latest games will NOT be content with an 8 year old PC. My 3 year old PC was more than adequate for coding, but hopeless for editing HD video.
Yeah, but 99% of people don't use their real name as an online alias. People can generally google for my full name, and will not find the 10000's of posts I made on various forums.
I generally try to keep my online aliases seperate from my real name and private contact details. Googling for my real name or work-related email address will not bring up posts such as this one.
Only a few people in real-life know the alias I go by online, and vice versa. Of course someone determined to stalk me could probably figure out a few links, but I doubt a few spelling mistakes on a forum or IRC channel will come back to haunt me in real life;)
A little-known hacker secret known as "//" or comment sequence is being used to illegally remove protections in computer software
"It's a nightmare for the industry, the// sequence is being used to defeat protections in hundreds of thousands of software programs, costing the industry trillions of dollars in lost revenue" said Robert Holleyman, president of the Washington-based Business Software Alliance (BSA).
While Linus Trovalds confirmed that the// sequence may be a powerful tool for removing protections, he downplayed the threat, stating that only software for which the code is freely availble can be cracked using the method.
Various anti-piracy groups are pressuring congress to pass an extention to the DMCA laws, which will effectively outlaw commenting out parts of computer code. Under the new law it will also be illegal to manufacture a computer keyboard with the forward slash '/' key.
Johansen, also known as 'DVD Jon' for his work on decrypting DVD security codes, has created a patch for the Google Video Viewer--less than 24 hours after the search giant shipped the video playback plug-in, a tool based on the open-source VideoLAN media player.
The patch, released on Johansen's 'So Sue Me' blog, effectively disables a modification Google made to the VideoLAN code to prevent users from playing videos that are not hosted on Google's servers."
ROFLMAO!?! Ahahahahaha:p... Talk about a sensational news article:)
Jon made a modification to an OPEN SOURCE media player, removing a trivial protection, and Yahoo news posts a story about him cracking yet another protection mechanism, implying parallels with his past work. This news then spreads to Slashdot.
Awww, come on... I've made countless little mods to open-source apps in order to get them to behave the way I'd like. I've never gotten news coverage for adding "//" before an 'if(condition)' statment.
Next they'll be putting Windows Mobile on these things too, and it will take 45+ seconds to 'boot' the damn thing, like with the Orange C500 phones....
At least Windows Mobile is nice and responsive when it does boot...
Also, look around a little and I'm sure you'll find a copy of WM2005 to stick on your C500... boots a hell of a lot faster than WM2003.
No headlines on Duke Nukem Forever's planned release in 2057 either.../me ducks
Re:Old news, with GSM this has been possible for a
on
Forget GPS, Hello WPS
·
· Score: 1
Yeah, GSM CellID is a great way for getting a quick-and-dirty position. Since most people always have their phones with them, some kewk stuff can be done:
The downside is that accuracy sucks. Even the 50m you gave is wishful thinking, and probably assumes a city with a high density of cells, and nice linear relation between signal strength and distance.
We should be more concerned about someone with a Knoppix live-cd or something along those line. That thing has thus far given me unfettered access to more than 98% of the computer system into which I have booted it.
If you have physical access to a computer, it's hardly surprising that you can gain full control over it. Similarly, if you give someone else physical access to your computer, it's not your computer anymore.
Of course noone should be storing sensitive data in plaintext on a workstation's hard drive.
We never really use our inkjet at home. Most stuff gets sent to the ageing (7 y/o) Panasonic b/w laser printer, which was only 200UKP new - probably 120UKP for today's equivalent - and is on only its third toner cartridge.
Laser rocks:) Even colour laser printers are quite cheap nowadays, at £300 GBP. Print quality is great, print speed makes it frustrating to go back to inkjet, and there's no more hassle with changing tiny ink cartridges every few weeks, cleaning print heads, etc.
Digital photos are printed on proper photographic paper using a web-based service which returns the (non-fading, and remarkably cheap) prints in the post two days later.
What service are you using for this? I've always got digital photos printed at the local Boots/Tesco/whatever, but an online service would be a lot more convenient.
We never really use our inkjet at home. Most stuff gets sent to the ageing (7 y/o) Panasonic b/w laser printer, which was only 200UKP new - probably 120UKP for today's equivalent - and is on only its third toner cartridge. Laser rocks:) Even colour laser printers are quite cheap nowadays, at Digital photos are printed on proper photographic paper using a web-based service which returns the (non-fading, and remarkably cheap) prints in the post two days later.
What service are you using for this? I've always got digital photos printed at the local Boots/Tesco/whatever, but an online service would be a lot more convenient.
You mean the panties with hidden GPS sensor and wireless transmitter which transmits signals that can be received on "up to four devices" isn't enough of a giveaway already?;)
It might be a significant achievment, but there's no use for it at present.
If you knew a way to solve the problem, your best bet would be taking the $250K. Your other choice would be trying to sell your idea when people are in desperate need for it, which is unlikely to happen in your lifetime.
They produce oxygen from carbon dioxide, not from the soil they grow in. If there was an abundant supply of CO2 on the moon, making oxygen would be a hell of a lot easier, and there'd be no need to extract it from lunar soil.
If you get spam from user1@gmail.com you most likely won't block the whole gmail.com domain, just user1. If you get spam from abcdef-1032@uber-leet-viagra.com, you'll want to block the whole domain.
If honest Joe Bloggs mail client can send email via his ISP, so can any malware installed on his PC. So what happens when you start getting 1000's of emails from [randomuser]@gmail.com. You can't block the whole domain without impacting legitimate mail. You can block each of the aliases which send you spam, but most likely each one would only be used once anyway.
Your solution would not be immune to the majority of techniques spammers use today. A spammer will also have no problems with buying a disposable domain for $10, using it only once, and not giving a fuck if it gets blocked after that. The domain registration fee is a small price to pay for the ability to send thousands of messages before people realise and block you.
I'm missing one piece - a small, 720P camera for video acquisition.
Good luck! Only several 'pro-sumer' HD video cameras exist nowadays, and neither of them could be classed as small.
I've recently bought a Sony HDR-FX1e camera - for recording some music videos for my brother's band. The recording quality (1080i, 3CCD) is absolutely fantastic. However I'm not sure about it's suitability for video conferencing:
1. The camera is large. I guess in a fixed setup this isn't a major problem - the camera could be positioned on a tripod next to the screen or preferably projector.
2. Video is sent via firewire as MPEG, at DV datarates (18Mbit or something like that). Unless you have that kind of bandwidth to transmit the data without recompression, you need to reencode the video on-the-fly. Reencoding 60 mins of video to 720p WMV-HD takes me 8 hours on a 3GHz P4. My system struggles with realtime playback of the full-bitrate HD MPEG. I'm not sure if any codecs could easilly transcode the stream in realtime without some expensive hardware accelleration.
My Windows MCE 2005 box seems to do all of those nicely. It plays back all my MPEG, DivX, OGG, files (and anything with a codec) without any issues.
The recorded TV is stored in a semi-proprietary format, which is nothing other than MPEG with some ASF framing and additional metadata, which can be stripped into a plain MPEG or converted to any other video standard.
I have been running windows on one of my computers for ages. I've never once been infected with a virus.
My PC isn't "coddled and needs special treatment (anti-spyware tools, anti-virus tools, careful application selection to avoid such things)". In fact I don't use an antivirus program - I'm simply selective about running executables of any kind, and usually run them as a guest/limited user if I have my doubts.
If anything, Windows has a better-thought-out permissions system than linux. I can give read access to a directory to one group, write access to two other groups, and then add my own per-user exceptions. AFAIK this isn't possible with Linux's primitive chmod system.
I'm talking about the stupidity and naivity of the users who think "woah... kewl! I just got an email telling me that if I run this file I'll be rich, see [insert celebrity name here] nude, and have my penis enlarged. [click]".
The vast majority of viruses spread because users will run anything and everything they are sent. The fact that the operating system lets someone destroy their computer is not a flaw with the OS. The OS is doing just what it's designed to do - follow the users orders. It's not supposed to question the orders "I'm sorry Dave, I can't let you run that file... I don't know if it's safe".
In some rare cases like Blaster, viruses spread without the user actually running them - this was because of a flaw in the OS. However these flaws were rare, and promptly fixed. 99.99% of viruses exist because people are willing to run files without questioning what they do and who they are from.
Slashdot Mirror
Modded funny? Wtf?!
Here's another bugfix:
{
popup.innerHTML += "<div><a href="'+array[i]+'"></a></div> ";
}
It depends...
Users doing the occassional word-processing, checking email, and web surfing will be perfectly happy with an 8 year old PC.
Users who wish to use their PCs for CPU-intensive tasks like video editing, or just playing the latest games will NOT be content with an 8 year old PC. My 3 year old PC was more than adequate for coding, but hopeless for editing HD video.
Sell 20% of your prize then, and you've still got a good deal :)
Yeah, but 99% of people don't use their real name as an online alias. People can generally google for my full name, and will not find the 10000's of posts I made on various forums.
;)
I generally try to keep my online aliases seperate from my real name and private contact details. Googling for my real name or work-related email address will not bring up posts such as this one.
Only a few people in real-life know the alias I go by online, and vice versa. Of course someone determined to stalk me could probably figure out a few links, but I doubt a few spelling mistakes on a forum or IRC channel will come back to haunt me in real life
A little-known hacker secret known as "//" or comment sequence is being used to illegally remove protections in computer software
// sequence is being used to defeat protections in hundreds of thousands of software programs, costing the industry trillions of dollars in lost revenue" said Robert Holleyman, president of the Washington-based Business Software Alliance (BSA).
// sequence may be a powerful tool for removing protections, he downplayed the threat, stating that only software for which the code is freely availble can be cracked using the method.
"It's a nightmare for the industry, the
While Linus Trovalds confirmed that the
Various anti-piracy groups are pressuring congress to pass an extention to the DMCA laws, which will effectively outlaw commenting out parts of computer code. Under the new law it will also be illegal to manufacture a computer keyboard with the forward slash '/' key.
"'DVD Jon' Breaks Google Video Lock
:p ... Talk about a sensational news article :)
Johansen, also known as 'DVD Jon' for his work on decrypting DVD security codes, has created a patch for the Google Video Viewer--less than 24 hours after the search giant shipped the video playback plug-in, a tool based on the open-source VideoLAN media player.
The patch, released on Johansen's 'So Sue Me' blog, effectively disables a modification Google made to the VideoLAN code to prevent users from playing videos that are not hosted on Google's servers."
ROFLMAO!?! Ahahahahaha
Jon made a modification to an OPEN SOURCE media player, removing a trivial protection, and Yahoo news posts a story about him cracking yet another protection mechanism, implying parallels with his past work. This news then spreads to Slashdot.
Awww, come on... I've made countless little mods to open-source apps in order to get them to behave the way I'd like. I've never gotten news coverage for adding "//" before an 'if(condition)' statment.
Next they'll be putting Windows Mobile on these things too, and it will take 45+ seconds to 'boot' the damn thing, like with the Orange C500 phones....
At least Windows Mobile is nice and responsive when it does boot...
Also, look around a little and I'm sure you'll find a copy of WM2005 to stick on your C500... boots a hell of a lot faster than WM2003.
No headlines on Duke Nukem Forever's planned release in 2057 either... /me ducks
Yeah, GSM CellID is a great way for getting a quick-and-dirty position. Since most people always have their phones with them, some kewk stuff can be done:
http://www.zone-mr.net/?act=CellTrack
The downside is that accuracy sucks. Even the 50m you gave is wishful thinking, and probably assumes a city with a high density of cells, and nice linear relation between signal strength and distance.
Sure :p
> search -url:www.asciipr0n.com -q 8===D d-:
We should be more concerned about someone with a Knoppix live-cd or something along those line. That thing has thus far given me unfettered access to more than 98% of the computer system into which I have booted it.
If you have physical access to a computer, it's hardly surprising that you can gain full control over it. Similarly, if you give someone else physical access to your computer, it's not your computer anymore.
Of course noone should be storing sensitive data in plaintext on a workstation's hard drive.
Errr... I'll use the preview button this time.
:) Even colour laser printers are quite cheap nowadays, at £300 GBP. Print quality is great, print speed makes it frustrating to go back to inkjet, and there's no more hassle with changing tiny ink cartridges every few weeks, cleaning print heads, etc.
We never really use our inkjet at home. Most stuff gets sent to the ageing (7 y/o) Panasonic b/w laser printer, which was only 200UKP new - probably 120UKP for today's equivalent - and is on only its third toner cartridge.
Laser rocks
Digital photos are printed on proper photographic paper using a web-based service which returns the (non-fading, and remarkably cheap) prints in the post two days later.
What service are you using for this? I've always got digital photos printed at the local Boots/Tesco/whatever, but an online service would be a lot more convenient.
We never really use our inkjet at home. Most stuff gets sent to the ageing (7 y/o) Panasonic b/w laser printer, which was only 200UKP new - probably 120UKP for today's equivalent - and is on only its third toner cartridge. :) Even colour laser printers are quite cheap nowadays, at Digital photos are printed on proper photographic paper using a web-based service which returns the (non-fading, and remarkably cheap) prints in the post two days later.
Laser rocks
What service are you using for this? I've always got digital photos printed at the local Boots/Tesco/whatever, but an online service would be a lot more convenient.
Good point. However what's there to say that our universe is the only one?
So 40% of the people in the US are arrogant enough to think that in an infinite universe they are alone?
You mean the panties with hidden GPS sensor and wireless transmitter which transmits signals that can be received on "up to four devices" isn't enough of a giveaway already? ;)
It might be a significant achievment, but there's no use for it at present.
If you knew a way to solve the problem, your best bet would be taking the $250K. Your other choice would be trying to sell your idea when people are in desperate need for it, which is unlikely to happen in your lifetime.
They produce oxygen from carbon dioxide, not from the soil they grow in. If there was an abundant supply of CO2 on the moon, making oxygen would be a hell of a lot easier, and there'd be no need to extract it from lunar soil.
Some potential problems...
If you get spam from user1@gmail.com you most likely won't block the whole gmail.com domain, just user1. If you get spam from abcdef-1032@uber-leet-viagra.com, you'll want to block the whole domain.
If honest Joe Bloggs mail client can send email via his ISP, so can any malware installed on his PC. So what happens when you start getting 1000's of emails from [randomuser]@gmail.com. You can't block the whole domain without impacting legitimate mail. You can block each of the aliases which send you spam, but most likely each one would only be used once anyway.
Your solution would not be immune to the majority of techniques spammers use today. A spammer will also have no problems with buying a disposable domain for $10, using it only once, and not giving a fuck if it gets blocked after that. The domain registration fee is a small price to pay for the ability to send thousands of messages before people realise and block you.
I'm missing one piece - a small, 720P camera for video acquisition.
Good luck! Only several 'pro-sumer' HD video cameras exist nowadays, and neither of them could be classed as small.
I've recently bought a Sony HDR-FX1e camera - for recording some music videos for my brother's band. The recording quality (1080i, 3CCD) is absolutely fantastic. However I'm not sure about it's suitability for video conferencing:
1. The camera is large. I guess in a fixed setup this isn't a major problem - the camera could be positioned on a tripod next to the screen or preferably projector.
2. Video is sent via firewire as MPEG, at DV datarates (18Mbit or something like that). Unless you have that kind of bandwidth to transmit the data without recompression, you need to reencode the video on-the-fly. Reencoding 60 mins of video to 720p WMV-HD takes me 8 hours on a 3GHz P4. My system struggles with realtime playback of the full-bitrate HD MPEG. I'm not sure if any codecs could easilly transcode the stream in realtime without some expensive hardware accelleration.
... which is apparently here.
Get a server outside the regime. A dedicated linux or windows server is perfect for this.
Then simply connect to this server using an encrypted connection such as SSH, X over SSH, Windows Remote Desktop, or whatever.
Use the remote box for all your activities.
Not really.
My Windows MCE 2005 box seems to do all of those nicely. It plays back all my MPEG, DivX, OGG, files (and anything with a codec) without any issues.
The recorded TV is stored in a semi-proprietary format, which is nothing other than MPEG with some ASF framing and additional metadata, which can be stripped into a plain MPEG or converted to any other video standard.
I'm not forced to use only DRMed content with it.
I have been running windows on one of my computers for ages. I've never once been infected with a virus.
My PC isn't "coddled and needs special treatment (anti-spyware tools, anti-virus tools, careful application selection to avoid such things)". In fact I don't use an antivirus program - I'm simply selective about running executables of any kind, and usually run them as a guest/limited user if I have my doubts.
If anything, Windows has a better-thought-out permissions system than linux. I can give read access to a directory to one group, write access to two other groups, and then add my own per-user exceptions. AFAIK this isn't possible with Linux's primitive chmod system.
I'm talking about the stupidity and naivity of the users who think "woah... kewl! I just got an email telling me that if I run this file I'll be rich, see [insert celebrity name here] nude, and have my penis enlarged. [click]".
The vast majority of viruses spread because users will run anything and everything they are sent. The fact that the operating system lets someone destroy their computer is not a flaw with the OS. The OS is doing just what it's designed to do - follow the users orders. It's not supposed to question the orders "I'm sorry Dave, I can't let you run that file... I don't know if it's safe".
In some rare cases like Blaster, viruses spread without the user actually running them - this was because of a flaw in the OS. However these flaws were rare, and promptly fixed. 99.99% of viruses exist because people are willing to run files without questioning what they do and who they are from.