Yeah. I was waiting for somebody mention that. I'm not really calculating in digital terms. I say pixels and mean "picture elements". Those might as well be analog. I don't say they're all placed in a perfect 4:3 image like on a CCD either. I might've made a couple of invalid assumptions: That the human eye has a higher number of pixels than a video camera, and that the chroma:luma ratio is the same for the human eye as for a video camera.
I still say 8 pulses/sec for one nerve sounds pretty low. I was expecting a higher number. One possibility though is that they're so tightly packed and fire off as differing times, thus "diffusing" this low individual nerve framerate into a higher total. Like television scanline interlacing but done as a diffusion dither instead. And I guess the cells could be intelligent enough to not fire too often if light levels remain constant over time. Etc, etc.
I guess the human eye must use some hellishly good compression. I suspect the human eye of having more 'pixels' than good DV camera. PAL DV resolution is 720x288 at 50 fields/second or 720x576 at 25 frames/second. The human eye has 1 type of luma sensor, plus 3 types of chroma sensors. Humans have fewer sets of chroma sensors, let's assume a quarter of the number of luma sensors (similar to what YUV 4:2:2 assumes) If we assume a very poor human eye with this kind of resolution, we get:
Let us assume a poor human eye that can see only 25 frames/second in bright light conditions.
518,400 elements * 25 FPS = 12,960,000 elements/second
Add to this that the human eye probably has at least 8 "bits" of color resolution. How is an eye nerve that only transmits 8 "bits" a second going to convey even this relatively poor quality image?
Here's my translation of the Norwegian Dagbladet.no article.
The Worlds Most Sophisticated Firehose
(Dagbladet.no): Tenk deg en situasjon hvor du er innestengt som følge av brann, snøras eller jordskjelv, og det er for farlig for hjelpemannskapet å gå inn og redde deg. Det er da Snakefighteren Anna Konda kommer glidende inn, på skrå sidelengs som en ørkenslange.
(Dagbladet.no): Imagine a situation where you're trapped due to a fire, snow avalaunch or earthquake, and it's too dangerous for the rescue crew to enter to save you. That's when the Snakefighter Anna Konda comes gliding in, sideways like a desert snake.
Hun er verdens sterkeste og mest avanserte brannslange, ifølge SINTEF-forskerne Pål Liljebäck og Øyvind Stavdal som har utviklet henne.
She's the world's strongest and most advanced firehose, according to SINTEF researchers Pål Liljebäck and Øyvind Stavdal, who developed her.
En Anakonda av metall, smidig, sterk og smart, inspirert av naturen selv. Hun kommer hun seg frem gjennom alt slags terreng, og har sanser som en vanlig slange ikke har.
An Anaconda of metal, agile, strong and smart, inspired by nature itself. She moves through all kinds of terrain, and has senses that a regular snake lacks.
Hun kan heve hodet og sprute vann, slå gjennom vegger med en slagkraft på 700 kg i tyngdefeltet, løfte vekk objekter for å frigjøre fastklemte dyr eller mennesker og bringe gassmasker. Ved hjelp av infrarødt kamera, ultralyd og sensorer skal hun kunne finne kropper og kartlegge et område.
She can lift her head and spray water, break down walls with a gravity of 700 kg, lift away objects to free trapped animals or people, and bring gas masks. With an infrared camera, ultrasound and sensors, she'll be able to find bodies and map an area.
- Snakefighteren representerer en ny æra i brannslukning, sier Pål Liljebäck ved SINTEFs avdeling for anvendt kybernetikk til Dagbladet.no.
- The Snakefighter represents a new era in fire extinguishing, says Pål Liljebäck at SINTEF's department for applied cybernetics to Dagbladet.no.
Han presiserer at slangen er et verktøy, ikke en erstatning for brannfolk, for hun er ikke skapt for å dra med seg objekter.
He notes that the snake is a tool, not a replacement for fire crews, since she wasn't created for towing objects.
Vannhydraulikk
Anna Konda drives av vannhydraulikk, som er nærmest et ikke-eksisterende fagfelt i dag, ifølge de to forskerne. Det vil si at det er vannkraft som driver musklene til den tre meter lange, 16 cm i diameter tjukke og 70 kilo tunge slangen. På et brannåsted kan hun tilkobles en brannslange. Er det snakk om en sammenrast bygning, kan hun ha en innebygget dieselmotor og ha med eget vann. Hun beveger seg med en hastighet på 20 - 30 cm i sekundet, men målet er en fart på en meter i sekundet.
Anna Konda is powered by water hydraulics, a virtually non-existing field today, according to the two scientists. This means that water power is powering the "muscles" of the 3 meter long, 16 cm in diameter thick and 70 kg heavy snake. In a fire location she can be connected to a firehose. In the case of a collapsed building, she can carry her own diesel engine and her own water. She moves with a speed of 20 - 30 cm per second, but the goal is a speed of 1 meter per second.
Slangen skal dels fjernstyres, dels ta egne avgjørelser. Hun bruker så kompliserte bevegelser at hun selv må greie føle seg frem i terrenget og beregne hvordan hun skal ta seg frem. Men en operatør skal kunne gi overordnede instrukser.
The snake will partly be remote controlled, partly make her own decisions. She uses such complex movements that she has to feel herself through the terrain and calc
I disagree. Although I don't like using Windows with extensions hidden, I don't think it's horrible UI design. Apple has done it for years, the only difference being that their "extensions" are stored in a special chunk. End users aren't supposed to edit INI files anyway.
It's not horrible UI design at all. Most people don't need to see extensions. I know many teenagers who are blissfully unaware of file extensions. This sounds like a person who was accustomed to file extensions, to later have them taken away. Of course that's going to cause problems.
I'm Norwegian. "Fart" means speed and "enorm" should be pretty obvious.;) I should also add that Norwegian for "speed bumps" is "fartshumper". Gotta tell you, I'm looking forward to seeing the face of some tourist reading that...
Same story for Norway. The license funds the NRK TV channels, akin to PBS in USA or BBC in England. I don't mind that NRK for all purposes is a pay channel, but I don't watch it, so I don't see why I should help fund it.
Google did this kind of thing when they launched Google Video too. Does anyone know why it excludes the rest of the world when launching new sites? It's the only company I personally know that has web pages that only work in certain countries.
Aren't hydroelectic plants pretty clean? Norway is almost exclusively powered by such plants. Norway is of course a small country population-wise and there's plenty of water, but it is at least a non-pollutant power source.
Reminds me very much of two other businesses: The print business and the music business. They're both crazy about Macs. You really aren't taken very seriously in the newspaper/print business unless you use a Mac with InDesign. And don't use anything but a Mac with ProTools or Cubase if you are recording music, because that's suspicious. I hate the former. I've had endless debates about how PCs have had better raw performance for years, and are just as stable as Macs. Also, I'm one of a minority who use Cakewalk, often considered a MIDI toy by professionals who haven't noticed that Pro Audio has been succeded by SONAR, that IMHO beats Cubase down its boots. Many people at the newspaper my father works at use Macs at home because that's what they're familiar with.
Selling cellphone services on ATMs isn't new. Many Norwegian ATMs let you refill credits to your prepaid/"cash" card and offer other related services too.
I think a good example of this is how there's supposedly freedom of speech in Belarus, but only select, pro-government newspapers are allowed to be sold in newskiosks. Sure, there's freedom of speech, just no audience to hear it...
I'm trying to click the link from Norway and it just brings me to the google.no front page... Google also insists on sending me to google.no, giving me the pages in Norwegian, when I search as normal. I have everything on my computer in English apart from the keyboard. Every program I try to install somehow guesses that I'm Norwegian. So annoying. >:(
(Bah! I forgot to select Plain Old Text for formatting.)
I agree. My problem with that has always been how to deal with the following situation:
Before he left, he stopped, looked her in the eyes, and said "We meet again.".
One period to end the sentence inside the quotes and one outside to end the main sentence. I don't want to remove the period inside because that's not correct English, sentences end in a period. I don't want to remove the period outside the quotes either, because it terminates the bigger sentence, and you can't start a new sentence right after a quote. It just looks wrong without a period there. The disadvantage is that it looks stupid with two periods on each side of a quote. I never know how to deal with it, so I just evade it:
Before he left, he stopped, looked her in the eyes, and said: - We meet again. Some new sentence here.
Looks cleaner. Phrases are easier to put inside quotes because they lack a period.
I agree. My problem with that has always been how to deal with the following situation:
Before he left, he stopped, looked her in the eyes, and said "We meet again.".
One period to end the sentence inside the quotes and one outside to end the main sentence. I don't want to remove the period inside because that's not correct English, sentences end in a period. I don't want to remove the period outside the quotes either, because it terminates the bigger sentence, and you can't start a new sentence right after a quote. It just looks wrong without a period there. The disadvantage is that it looks stupid with two periods on each side of a quote. I never know how to deal with it, so I just evade it:
Before he left, he stopped, looked her in the eyes, and said:
- We meet again.
Some new sentence here.
Looks cleaner. Phrases are easier to put inside quotes because they lack a period.
Any suggestions?
Most of the Pro software? That's kind of an overstatement. ProTools, Cubase and Reason exist in PC versions. Most plugins come in PC/Mac DXi/VST versions. I wonder why... My personal preference, SONAR, is PC only. Logic is the only major Pro recording software I can think of that doesn't have a PC version.
Slashdot Mirror
See my reply above. I give in, don't hit me. *grin*
Yeah. I was waiting for somebody mention that. I'm not really calculating in digital terms. I say pixels and mean "picture elements". Those might as well be analog. I don't say they're all placed in a perfect 4:3 image like on a CCD either. I might've made a couple of invalid assumptions: That the human eye has a higher number of pixels than a video camera, and that the chroma:luma ratio is the same for the human eye as for a video camera. I still say 8 pulses/sec for one nerve sounds pretty low. I was expecting a higher number. One possibility though is that they're so tightly packed and fire off as differing times, thus "diffusing" this low individual nerve framerate into a higher total. Like television scanline interlacing but done as a diffusion dither instead. And I guess the cells could be intelligent enough to not fire too often if light levels remain constant over time. Etc, etc.
I guess the human eye must use some hellishly good compression. I suspect the human eye of having more 'pixels' than good DV camera. PAL DV resolution is 720x288 at 50 fields/second or 720x576 at 25 frames/second. The human eye has 1 type of luma sensor, plus 3 types of chroma sensors. Humans have fewer sets of chroma sensors, let's assume a quarter of the number of luma sensors (similar to what YUV 4:2:2 assumes) If we assume a very poor human eye with this kind of resolution, we get:
720 * 576 = 414,720 luma
414,720 / 4 = 103,680 chroma
414,720 + 103,680 = 518,400 elements
Let us assume a poor human eye that can see only 25 frames/second in bright light conditions.
518,400 elements * 25 FPS = 12,960,000 elements/second
Add to this that the human eye probably has at least 8 "bits" of color resolution. How is an eye nerve that only transmits 8 "bits" a second going to convey even this relatively poor quality image?
The Worlds Most Sophisticated Firehose
(Dagbladet.no): Tenk deg en situasjon hvor du er innestengt som følge av brann, snøras eller jordskjelv, og det er for farlig for hjelpemannskapet å gå inn og redde deg. Det er da Snakefighteren Anna Konda kommer glidende inn, på skrå sidelengs som en ørkenslange.
(Dagbladet.no): Imagine a situation where you're trapped due to a fire, snow avalaunch or earthquake, and it's too dangerous for the rescue crew to enter to save you. That's when the Snakefighter Anna Konda comes gliding in, sideways like a desert snake.
Hun er verdens sterkeste og mest avanserte brannslange, ifølge SINTEF-forskerne Pål Liljebäck og Øyvind Stavdal som har utviklet henne.
She's the world's strongest and most advanced firehose, according to SINTEF researchers Pål Liljebäck and Øyvind Stavdal, who developed her.
En Anakonda av metall, smidig, sterk og smart, inspirert av naturen selv. Hun kommer hun seg frem gjennom alt slags terreng, og har sanser som en vanlig slange ikke har.
An Anaconda of metal, agile, strong and smart, inspired by nature itself. She moves through all kinds of terrain, and has senses that a regular snake lacks.
Hun kan heve hodet og sprute vann, slå gjennom vegger med en slagkraft på 700 kg i tyngdefeltet, løfte vekk objekter for å frigjøre fastklemte dyr eller mennesker og bringe gassmasker. Ved hjelp av infrarødt kamera, ultralyd og sensorer skal hun kunne finne kropper og kartlegge et område.
She can lift her head and spray water, break down walls with a gravity of 700 kg, lift away objects to free trapped animals or people, and bring gas masks. With an infrared camera, ultrasound and sensors, she'll be able to find bodies and map an area.
- Snakefighteren representerer en ny æra i brannslukning, sier Pål Liljebäck ved SINTEFs avdeling for anvendt kybernetikk til Dagbladet.no.
- The Snakefighter represents a new era in fire extinguishing, says Pål Liljebäck at SINTEF's department for applied cybernetics to Dagbladet.no.
Han presiserer at slangen er et verktøy, ikke en erstatning for brannfolk, for hun er ikke skapt for å dra med seg objekter.
He notes that the snake is a tool, not a replacement for fire crews, since she wasn't created for towing objects.
Vannhydraulikk
Anna Konda drives av vannhydraulikk, som er nærmest et ikke-eksisterende fagfelt i dag, ifølge de to forskerne. Det vil si at det er vannkraft som driver musklene til den tre meter lange, 16 cm i diameter tjukke og 70 kilo tunge slangen. På et brannåsted kan hun tilkobles en brannslange. Er det snakk om en sammenrast bygning, kan hun ha en innebygget dieselmotor og ha med eget vann. Hun beveger seg med en hastighet på 20 - 30 cm i sekundet, men målet er en fart på en meter i sekundet.
Anna Konda is powered by water hydraulics, a virtually non-existing field today, according to the two scientists. This means that water power is powering the "muscles" of the 3 meter long, 16 cm in diameter thick and 70 kg heavy snake. In a fire location she can be connected to a firehose. In the case of a collapsed building, she can carry her own diesel engine and her own water. She moves with a speed of 20 - 30 cm per second, but the goal is a speed of 1 meter per second.
Slangen skal dels fjernstyres, dels ta egne avgjørelser. Hun bruker så kompliserte bevegelser at hun selv må greie føle seg frem i terrenget og beregne hvordan hun skal ta seg frem. Men en operatør skal kunne gi overordnede instrukser.
The snake will partly be remote controlled, partly make her own decisions. She uses such complex movements that she has to feel herself through the terrain and calc
I disagree. Although I don't like using Windows with extensions hidden, I don't think it's horrible UI design. Apple has done it for years, the only difference being that their "extensions" are stored in a special chunk. End users aren't supposed to edit INI files anyway.
It's not horrible UI design at all. Most people don't need to see extensions. I know many teenagers who are blissfully unaware of file extensions. This sounds like a person who was accustomed to file extensions, to later have them taken away. Of course that's going to cause problems.
Norway is a small country? Everyone lives nearby? I smell a spoiled Oslo-centric Norwegian who couldn't point out Tromsø on the map...
And of course Slashdot just HAD to not support Unicode...
Ai feer it wud saund mö laik ei mix bitwiin e swiidis ef and ekoslovääkiun...
I'm Norwegian. "Fart" means speed and "enorm" should be pretty obvious. ;) I should also add that Norwegian for "speed bumps" is "fartshumper". Gotta tell you, I'm looking forward to seeing the face of some tourist reading that...
Same story for Norway. The license funds the NRK TV channels, akin to PBS in USA or BBC in England. I don't mind that NRK for all purposes is a pay channel, but I don't watch it, so I don't see why I should help fund it.
Beatles fan, huh?
Google did this kind of thing when they launched Google Video too. Does anyone know why it excludes the rest of the world when launching new sites? It's the only company I personally know that has web pages that only work in certain countries.
I don't know about other countries, but over here, our hydro plants have gates for the fish to swim through.
Aren't hydroelectic plants pretty clean? Norway is almost exclusively powered by such plants. Norway is of course a small country population-wise and there's plenty of water, but it is at least a non-pollutant power source.
Reminds me very much of two other businesses: The print business and the music business. They're both crazy about Macs. You really aren't taken very seriously in the newspaper/print business unless you use a Mac with InDesign. And don't use anything but a Mac with ProTools or Cubase if you are recording music, because that's suspicious. I hate the former. I've had endless debates about how PCs have had better raw performance for years, and are just as stable as Macs. Also, I'm one of a minority who use Cakewalk, often considered a MIDI toy by professionals who haven't noticed that Pro Audio has been succeded by SONAR, that IMHO beats Cubase down its boots. Many people at the newspaper my father works at use Macs at home because that's what they're familiar with.
Selling cellphone services on ATMs isn't new. Many Norwegian ATMs let you refill credits to your prepaid/"cash" card and offer other related services too.
It's a strict law, sure. But you can get up to 5 years of prison for the same thing here in Norway, so I don't see how this is new...
I think a good example of this is how there's supposedly freedom of speech in Belarus, but only select, pro-government newspapers are allowed to be sold in newskiosks. Sure, there's freedom of speech, just no audience to hear it...
I'm trying to click the link from Norway and it just brings me to the google.no front page... Google also insists on sending me to google.no, giving me the pages in Norwegian, when I search as normal. I have everything on my computer in English apart from the keyboard. Every program I try to install somehow guesses that I'm Norwegian. So annoying. >:(
(Bah! I forgot to select Plain Old Text for formatting.)
I agree. My problem with that has always been how to deal with the following situation:
Before he left, he stopped, looked her in the eyes, and said "We meet again.".
One period to end the sentence inside the quotes and one outside to end the main sentence. I don't want to remove the period inside because that's not correct English, sentences end in a period. I don't want to remove the period outside the quotes either, because it terminates the bigger sentence, and you can't start a new sentence right after a quote. It just looks wrong without a period there. The disadvantage is that it looks stupid with two periods on each side of a quote. I never know how to deal with it, so I just evade it:
Before he left, he stopped, looked her in the eyes, and said:
- We meet again.
Some new sentence here.
Looks cleaner. Phrases are easier to put inside quotes because they lack a period.
Any suggestions?
I agree. My problem with that has always been how to deal with the following situation: Before he left, he stopped, looked her in the eyes, and said "We meet again.". One period to end the sentence inside the quotes and one outside to end the main sentence. I don't want to remove the period inside because that's not correct English, sentences end in a period. I don't want to remove the period outside the quotes either, because it terminates the bigger sentence, and you can't start a new sentence right after a quote. It just looks wrong without a period there. The disadvantage is that it looks stupid with two periods on each side of a quote. I never know how to deal with it, so I just evade it: Before he left, he stopped, looked her in the eyes, and said: - We meet again. Some new sentence here. Looks cleaner. Phrases are easier to put inside quotes because they lack a period. Any suggestions?
Most of the Pro software? That's kind of an overstatement. ProTools, Cubase and Reason exist in PC versions. Most plugins come in PC/Mac DXi/VST versions. I wonder why... My personal preference, SONAR, is PC only. Logic is the only major Pro recording software I can think of that doesn't have a PC version.
...parents must acknowledge their responsibility and duty of care to ensure their children do not become victims.
Yesh! We all know that boobs are weapons of mass seduction!
The guy hasn't gotten a reply. Are we sure he isn't being scammed here?