Sure if you have $15k burning a hole in your pocket by all means get a fully articulated robot.
But for the rest of us, is there something similar that connects via WiFi? Only things I can think of are Robosapien (doesn't work via Wifi)...
I don't know exactly how Google is "crowdsourcing" the AP locations and similar (TFA doesn't clarify), but a competing firm to Google and Skyhoook, Navizon, uses similar tech.
The difference is that while it is unclear what method Google use, Navizon clearly states they will PAY users who have GPS installed in their phones, to roam around and collect Cell ID, APs, etc. and submit it to them. At the SAME time you get maps to see where you are, Buddies to see where your friends are, etc.
So in this instance, Navizon is paying for the crowd to submit the latest/updated data all the time. So if I drive around an area, and an AP that was there yesterday is no there anymore, you won't get the same error as Google where you suddenly appear to have gone to a different city/state/whatever, as I just personally updated the AP landscape.
Great stuff, and to get paid as well... I guess it is cheaper for Navizon to pay users a $10 or $20 dollars for a few hours of "driving" rather than run their own vans around trying to update APs all over the world, and this way the database is likely to stay very, very fresh!
Problem is, he doesn't specify which labs use more SNPs or "more useful" SNPs (which as you mentioned, should provide better/more accurate results).
The point of experiments and tests should be to draw some conclusion (even if the conclusion is that all fail) but clearly some services are performing better than others and are turning out more accurate. Why does he not state, in his professional and unbiased opinion, which one is better?
So which service produces, in his expert opinion, the better overall results/conclusions/advice?
I RTFA and fail to see what the pros/cons of each service is, and which one he recommends.
I know that would be a boon to whichever company is producing the better results, but who cares? If he is suppsoed to be independent, what does it matter if he gives his honest opinion?
Well, I created a system to track my car wherever it went, not quite tracking a kid, but to some people, almost as important;-) Navizon actually is a good service. You make money on it if you have GPS attached (yes, that is a referral link, but bear with me a sec), but that is besides the point... GPS doesn't work in an urban jungle, and from my experience, parking my car in a multi-storey carpark and near the edges (so the GPS is could sort of get a line-of-sight) still wasn't good enough for GPS to work constantly.
So the way I use Navizon, is that you can set it to output its multi-tracking (GPS, then WIFI, then Cell ID, in that order, as each is less successively less accurate) service to a port on your device, and let OTHER GPS-related programs access that port, so when GPS is out-of-sight and not working, your GPS application continues to get relatively accurate positioning based on WIFI, and then failing that, triangulation based on the Cell IDs.
They also recently added in Fireagle (the Yahoo service) so that you can update your location via Twitter and whatever else works with Fireagle. And Navizon has it's own API besides Yahoo's open API if you want to play with that. So since you wanted to write your own app to view it on a website/domain (which you can either use very simply on Navizon's own site, or if yo want to get fancy and update via Twitter or others services, Fireagle integration) then you can.
I even though, if people put my car into a warehouse or even inside a container, at some point during it's travels, even if its sealed, it hopefully would get at least a Cell ID or Wifi position, so even without GPS it'll be functional. It won't be hugely accurate, but it'll set you in the right direction at least. And it doesn't rely on any carrier either, so it's carrier neutral too.
Unless your website is about overthrowing Hong Kong/China, you could try: Zentek International.
Offshore hosting, payment by bank cheque and cash is possible, and they provide high privacy.
Sounds just like what you are talking about. Since they say they give 24x7 support, try sending them an email over the weekend and see when they reply...
Indeed the local magazines openly and freely sell sex all over the place in Hong Kong. Even the local non-shrink-wrapped magazines expose local celebs in their toilets, showers, etc., take pictures up their skirts during performances, etc. They also love discussing boob jobs, etc. and other stuff that would be immediately banned in China. Remember... half a MILLION (500,000) people in the past few years demonstrated IN THE STREETS against the local chief executive officer. They got him fired/out. Of course, they don't call it that (they don't call it impeachment like in the USA) but he was forced to stand down and be replaced BY CHINA. China considers Hong Kong to be special... somewhat like a testing ground for where it wants to be in maybe 10-20 years time with reforms. They're NOT trying to take it backwards, they're trying to move it forwards. They DON'T want chaos though. Considering there are 6-7 million people in Hong Kong (that includes babies, elderly,etc.) 500,000 people is a LOT.
If the same thing happened within China, not only would this not be in the newspapers, half of them might be dead or in "re-education camps".
Remember, Hong Kong people LOVE and CHERISH their freedoms. The local press push the limits ALL the time, and some of the stuff they show in the OPEN magazines (the ones that little children can pickup and read at a 7-11 or corner shop) would certainly be banned in the USA and have people screaming "would you pluuuuuuease think of the children!!!".
Porn CDs/DVDs are freely sold all over the place in almost all the computer malls. It's not quite as blatant as before (when they literally opened stalls outside high schools), but it is certainly still there.
There are even "hooker guides" hosted RIGHT in Hong Kong like http://www.sex141.com/en/main.php and many more like that. If you don't know what it says, it even has ratings for each prostitute based on looks, skills, performance, etc., her location/map, etc. KEEP IN MIND prostitution is SUPPOSED to be illegal!!!
A lot of what they do in HK is just set examples of people... but they don't actively enforce the laws. Sure, if you step on the wrong toes and post up something like pictures of some big-wig in China with his mistress or something you'll be in trouble (I think that would apply nearly anywhere in the World though), but as long as you don't piss them off directly, you're pretty much free to do ANYTHING you want... quite literally, as you can see from the examples above. And that means usually even MORE freedoms that in the USA especially now.
This is the ONE SINGLE deal breaker for me and pretty much everyone I know.
So many spammers set their clocks to the future (so they can get your stupid mail client to sort their mail to the top), so many stupid people set incorrect dates, that when you get a new incoming mail, you have to go through your ENTIRE LIST of emails hunting it down, since it might be wedged somewhere between 2007 and 2000 (or whatever the sender's computer's date is set to).
Sigh... I've seen people complain about this since the BEGINNING and they STILL have not fixed it? Even bloomin Outlook Express does it right!
Indeed! As with most things in Hong Kong, the government would rather not care at all, but since they are having pressure put on them, are giving a "real" push. Meanwhile, the HK police are found to be running pirated WinXP copies on their computers...
And I can tell you, this is the reality of how these kids are viewing it.
Only the "uncool" and "morons" are actually signing up. In fact, even those that do sign up, are just all reporting the same websites to gain "credits", they are not actively doing anything.
All the while, they are doing the searching on their pirated WinXP computers...
This brings to mind the issue of quality... what kind of quality are you looking for? HD level? Or would standard TV quality suffice?
As a side topic, for average quality (ie. webclip quality) for in-car video (perhaps with front and rear view so 2 cams required), what software is available? I've been looking for something similar for this, and haven't turned up much. It has to be able to process at least 30fps and encode live, so I'm guessing for 2 cams, the CPU is unlikely to be able to hold up and a hardware solution is required that WILL work with Linux... what are the options?
It really depends on your perspective. Sure the F1 cars of years ago were fast, but the drivers died when there was a big crash. Nowadays most F1 drivers, with all the advanced CAD desgiend rollcages and such can walk away from disasterous crashes with little more than a scratch and broken rib.
Cars like the Bugatti with 1001HP, can you imagine driving that without ABS, 4WD, various driver assists like traction control, etc.? I'm sure a pro driver would have no problem controlling it, but why let only the pros have all the fun?
For cars, technology is the great equalizer. You want to drive a raw car with little intervention and help, get a Lotus Elise. You want to go just as fast or faster for about the same kind of money, get a Mitsubishi Evolution or Subaru STi, and have a much easier time at it.
But personally, I'd like the car to warn me if there is something in my blind spot, especially during spirited driving. It doesn't replace me, it supplements me.
Is there any website or webpage describing what you need to buy, what software you need, to read cards? Are card readers able to write to the cards as well?
There are a few things you can do if you want to protect your privacy as much as you can.
You could get a offshore dedicated server and put a proxy on it (and possibly any data you want to have offshore for tax, privacy, or even backup/redundancy reasons). This way, your web browsing and others would only trace back to the proxy.
If you're only looking to put data offshore and privacy, just go for a offshore web hosting account.
You could also simply do a search on Google for offshore servers and you'd come up with a bunch of hits.
I am also experiementing with cheapo RAID cards (actually mostly software RAID cards, not the high end 3ware cards) and found that you really won't be able to use them as your boot disk, since they only become really RAID1 (or RAID5) with the driver loaded, and the way to get the driver loaded... you guessed it, is to have the operating system already loaded, like on a different HD, which sort of defeats the purpose of having a RAID card since you won't be able to boot if/dev/hda dies or whatever.
SPEWS is, indeed, not widely used as compared to SPAMHAUS and it's SBL or XBL lists or Spamcop. I dont know any large corporate network or mail service that uses SPEWS to block outright, simply because SPEWS regularly bans/blocks/lists entire ISPs, huge netblocks, etc. and the collateral damage is too high when you cannot afford to miss important emails.
They then want you to go to USENET groups to post about things, yet when you get there, all you'll find are a bunch of people all saying "i'm not SPEWS". So... go figure what company, corporation, or network of any size would use such a list. I suppose individual users could use it on a scoring-based system like Spamassassin without too much problem.
Actually, this "badge" is useless. The number of kids going around buying copy PS2 games, CDs, etc. is amazing in Hong Kong. I'd say over 99% of PS2 games, software, DVDs, etc. in Hong Kong are copies/counterfeit. No doubt, they'll just get the badge and continue on their merry way as usual.
Counterfeit software and goods is a way of life and culture in Hong Kong, China, and many places in Asia. You have "Woman's Street", which is an ENTIRE long street dedicated to fake goods. You even have police patrolling the area to keep it safe from pickpockets! But they are never shut down. Go there to find your "LV" bags, "Dior" rings, and "Rolex" watches.
In fact, now that they have made it safer to go to these places, MORE tourists are turning up. There are less seedy types and more goods now.
So I really think this is a pointless exercise. Now that China and HK are working together more, even MORE copy stuff is going to HK. And with HK's famous low crime rate and focus on making money and business, it is the IDEAL place to get these kind of things: total safe, cheap, available everywhere.
Has anyone else noticed the amazing level of redundancy the whole system has?
Upon reading the article at: http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/huygens_ image s_050114.html
you can see some facinating information that perhaps other projects (both space and non-space) can learn from.
For example: -------------
Huygens was originally expected to send more than 700 pictures taken during its 2.5-hour descent to the Titan surface, but one of the two communications channels on the satellite apparently malfunctioned, cutting by about half the number of images received by NASA's orbiting Cassini satellite and relayed to mission control here. ------------
So that means they actually had redundant comms that were obviously able to operate independently. I can think of one space project that failed because of NOT having this.
------------ Huygens has also been sending limited data directly to Earth, where it has been picked up by a network of telescopes. The detailed data about what it found on its way through Titan's thick atmosphere has been sent to NASA's Cassini orbiter overhead. -------------
So they had a backup plan, if Cassini failed to relay data back to Earth, Huygens would still be able to directly send limited data, so even in a worst case scenario where Cassini completely ignored Huygens, not all would be lost. This is great forward thinking by the designers.
I know this was not cheap to launch, and Nasa's new mantra is "cheap and often", but I can see almost everyone rather having a project take that extra bit of time and looking into the details (especially backup systems and what to do when things go wrong) rather than rushing projects out the door with no/little backup and redundancy in place.
Slashdot Mirror
YAY!
Bump up for "boogied" lol.
Sure if you have $15k burning a hole in your pocket by all means get a fully articulated robot. But for the rest of us, is there something similar that connects via WiFi? Only things I can think of are Robosapien (doesn't work via Wifi)...
The difference is that while it is unclear what method Google use, Navizon clearly states they will PAY users who have GPS installed in their phones, to roam around and collect Cell ID, APs, etc. and submit it to them. At the SAME time you get maps to see where you are, Buddies to see where your friends are, etc.
So in this instance, Navizon is paying for the crowd to submit the latest/updated data all the time. So if I drive around an area, and an AP that was there yesterday is no there anymore, you won't get the same error as Google where you suddenly appear to have gone to a different city/state/whatever, as I just personally updated the AP landscape.
Great stuff, and to get paid as well... I guess it is cheaper for Navizon to pay users a $10 or $20 dollars for a few hours of "driving" rather than run their own vans around trying to update APs all over the world, and this way the database is likely to stay very, very fresh!
Problem is, he doesn't specify which labs use more SNPs or "more useful" SNPs (which as you mentioned, should provide better/more accurate results).
The point of experiments and tests should be to draw some conclusion (even if the conclusion is that all fail) but clearly some services are performing better than others and are turning out more accurate. Why does he not state, in his professional and unbiased opinion, which one is better?
So which service produces, in his expert opinion, the better overall results/conclusions/advice?
I RTFA and fail to see what the pros/cons of each service is, and which one he recommends.
I know that would be a boon to whichever company is producing the better results, but who cares? If he is suppsoed to be independent, what does it matter if he gives his honest opinion?
Well, I created a system to track my car wherever it went, not quite tracking a kid, but to some people, almost as important ;-)
Navizon actually is a good service. You make money on it if you have GPS attached (yes, that is a referral link, but bear with me a sec), but that is besides the point... GPS doesn't work in an urban jungle, and from my experience, parking my car in a multi-storey carpark and near the edges (so the GPS is could sort of get a line-of-sight) still wasn't good enough for GPS to work constantly.
So the way I use Navizon, is that you can set it to output its multi-tracking (GPS, then WIFI, then Cell ID, in that order, as each is less successively less accurate) service to a port on your device, and let OTHER GPS-related programs access that port, so when GPS is out-of-sight and not working, your GPS application continues to get relatively accurate positioning based on WIFI, and then failing that, triangulation based on the Cell IDs.
They also recently added in Fireagle (the Yahoo service) so that you can update your location via Twitter and whatever else works with Fireagle. And Navizon has it's own API besides Yahoo's open API if you want to play with that. So since you wanted to write your own app to view it on a website/domain (which you can either use very simply on Navizon's own site, or if yo want to get fancy and update via Twitter or others services, Fireagle integration) then you can.
I even though, if people put my car into a warehouse or even inside a container, at some point during it's travels, even if its sealed, it hopefully would get at least a Cell ID or Wifi position, so even without GPS it'll be functional. It won't be hugely accurate, but it'll set you in the right direction at least. And it doesn't rely on any carrier either, so it's carrier neutral too.
Good aye?
Zentek International.
Offshore hosting, payment by bank cheque and cash is possible, and they provide high privacy.
Sounds just like what you are talking about. Since they say they give 24x7 support, try sending them an email over the weekend and see when they reply...
Very good point... could it have been very hardcore porn, animal porn, or EVEN have underage porn on it?
Indeed the local magazines openly and freely sell sex all over the place in Hong Kong. Even the local non-shrink-wrapped magazines expose local celebs in their toilets, showers, etc., take pictures up their skirts during performances, etc. They also love discussing boob jobs, etc. and other stuff that would be immediately banned in China. Remember... half a MILLION (500,000) people in the past few years demonstrated IN THE STREETS against the local chief executive officer. They got him fired/out. Of course, they don't call it that (they don't call it impeachment like in the USA) but he was forced to stand down and be replaced BY CHINA. China considers Hong Kong to be special... somewhat like a testing ground for where it wants to be in maybe 10-20 years time with reforms. They're NOT trying to take it backwards, they're trying to move it forwards. They DON'T want chaos though. Considering there are 6-7 million people in Hong Kong (that includes babies, elderly ,etc.) 500,000 people is a LOT.
If the same thing happened within China, not only would this not be in the newspapers, half of them might be dead or in "re-education camps".
Remember, Hong Kong people LOVE and CHERISH their freedoms. The local press push the limits ALL the time, and some of the stuff they show in the OPEN magazines (the ones that little children can pickup and read at a 7-11 or corner shop) would certainly be banned in the USA and have people screaming "would you pluuuuuuease think of the children!!!".
Porn CDs/DVDs are freely sold all over the place in almost all the computer malls. It's not quite as blatant as before (when they literally opened stalls outside high schools), but it is certainly still there.
There are even "hooker guides" hosted RIGHT in Hong Kong like http://www.sex141.com/en/main.php and many more like that. If you don't know what it says, it even has ratings for each prostitute based on looks, skills, performance, etc., her location/map, etc. KEEP IN MIND prostitution is SUPPOSED to be illegal!!!
A lot of what they do in HK is just set examples of people... but they don't actively enforce the laws. Sure, if you step on the wrong toes and post up something like pictures of some big-wig in China with his mistress or something you'll be in trouble (I think that would apply nearly anywhere in the World though), but as long as you don't piss them off directly, you're pretty much free to do ANYTHING you want... quite literally, as you can see from the examples above. And that means usually even MORE freedoms that in the USA especially now.
This is the ONE SINGLE deal breaker for me and pretty much everyone I know.
So many spammers set their clocks to the future (so they can get your stupid mail client to sort their mail to the top), so many stupid people set incorrect dates, that when you get a new incoming mail, you have to go through your ENTIRE LIST of emails hunting it down, since it might be wedged somewhere between 2007 and 2000 (or whatever the sender's computer's date is set to).
Sigh... I've seen people complain about this since the BEGINNING and they STILL have not fixed it? Even bloomin Outlook Express does it right!
Indeed! As with most things in Hong Kong, the government would rather not care at all, but since they are having pressure put on them, are giving a "real" push. Meanwhile, the HK police are found to be running pirated WinXP copies on their computers...
And I can tell you, this is the reality of how these kids are viewing it.
Only the "uncool" and "morons" are actually signing up. In fact, even those that do sign up, are just all reporting the same websites to gain "credits", they are not actively doing anything.
All the while, they are doing the searching on their pirated WinXP computers...
Indeed, I do not see that they have this.
And they don't even support overseas orders/sellers.
This brings to mind the issue of quality... what kind of quality are you looking for? HD level? Or would standard TV quality suffice?
As a side topic, for average quality (ie. webclip quality) for in-car video (perhaps with front and rear view so 2 cams required), what software is available? I've been looking for something similar for this, and haven't turned up much. It has to be able to process at least 30fps and encode live, so I'm guessing for 2 cams, the CPU is unlikely to be able to hold up and a hardware solution is required that WILL work with Linux... what are the options?
It really depends on your perspective. Sure the F1 cars of years ago were fast, but the drivers died when there was a big crash. Nowadays most F1 drivers, with all the advanced CAD desgiend rollcages and such can walk away from disasterous crashes with little more than a scratch and broken rib.
Cars like the Bugatti with 1001HP, can you imagine driving that without ABS, 4WD, various driver assists like traction control, etc.? I'm sure a pro driver would have no problem controlling it, but why let only the pros have all the fun?
For cars, technology is the great equalizer. You want to drive a raw car with little intervention and help, get a Lotus Elise. You want to go just as fast or faster for about the same kind of money, get a Mitsubishi Evolution or Subaru STi, and have a much easier time at it.
But personally, I'd like the car to warn me if there is something in my blind spot, especially during spirited driving. It doesn't replace me, it supplements me.
Is there any website or webpage describing what you need to buy, what software you need, to read cards? Are card readers able to write to the cards as well?
You could get a offshore dedicated server and put a proxy on it (and possibly any data you want to have offshore for tax, privacy, or even backup/redundancy reasons). This way, your web browsing and others would only trace back to the proxy.
If you're only looking to put data offshore and privacy, just go for a offshore web hosting account.
You could also simply do a search on Google for offshore servers and you'd come up with a bunch of hits.
Hope that provides some insight!
I know exactly what you mean...
/dev/hda dies or whatever.
I am also experiementing with cheapo RAID cards (actually mostly software RAID cards, not the high end 3ware cards) and found that you really won't be able to use them as your boot disk, since they only become really RAID1 (or RAID5) with the driver loaded, and the way to get the driver loaded... you guessed it, is to have the operating system already loaded, like on a different HD, which sort of defeats the purpose of having a RAID card since you won't be able to boot if
I can almost hear the explosion and the ensuring fire, and the screaming, and the water...
Indeed, i dont know of any large companies using Spews.
I think SPEWS is okay used in a scoring system like Spamassassin as ONE of the rules, but certainly not for blocking spam outright.
I recommend SPAMHAUS XBL and SBL lists for more accurate anti-spamming.
SPEWS is, indeed, not widely used as compared to SPAMHAUS and it's SBL or XBL lists or Spamcop. I dont know any large corporate network or mail service that uses SPEWS to block outright, simply because SPEWS regularly bans/blocks/lists entire ISPs, huge netblocks, etc. and the collateral damage is too high when you cannot afford to miss important emails.
They then want you to go to USENET groups to post about things, yet when you get there, all you'll find are a bunch of people all saying "i'm not SPEWS". So... go figure what company, corporation, or network of any size would use such a list. I suppose individual users could use it on a scoring-based system like Spamassassin without too much problem.
As usual, the media distorts the picture.
Actually, this "badge" is useless. The number of kids going around buying copy PS2 games, CDs, etc. is amazing in Hong Kong. I'd say over 99% of PS2 games, software, DVDs, etc. in Hong Kong are copies/counterfeit. No doubt, they'll just get the badge and continue on their merry way as usual.
Counterfeit software and goods is a way of life and culture in Hong Kong, China, and many places in Asia. You have "Woman's Street", which is an ENTIRE long street dedicated to fake goods. You even have police patrolling the area to keep it safe from pickpockets! But they are never shut down. Go there to find your "LV" bags, "Dior" rings, and "Rolex" watches.
In fact, now that they have made it safer to go to these places, MORE tourists are turning up. There are less seedy types and more goods now.
So I really think this is a pointless exercise. Now that China and HK are working together more, even MORE copy stuff is going to HK. And with HK's famous low crime rate and focus on making money and business, it is the IDEAL place to get these kind of things: total safe, cheap, available everywhere.
How soon will the first vulnerability be found in the "new and improved" IE7?
Has anyone else noticed the amazing level of redundancy the whole system has?
_ image s_050114.html
Upon reading the article at:
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/huygens
you can see some facinating information that perhaps other projects (both space and non-space) can learn from.
For example:
-------------
Huygens was originally expected to send more than 700 pictures taken during its 2.5-hour descent to the Titan surface, but one of the two communications channels on the satellite apparently malfunctioned, cutting by about half the number of images received by NASA's orbiting Cassini satellite and relayed to mission control here.
------------
So that means they actually had redundant comms that were obviously able to operate independently. I can think of one space project that failed because of NOT having this.
------------
Huygens has also been sending limited data directly to Earth, where it has been picked up by a network of telescopes. The detailed data about what it found on its way through Titan's thick atmosphere has been sent to NASA's Cassini orbiter overhead.
-------------
So they had a backup plan, if Cassini failed to relay data back to Earth, Huygens would still be able to directly send limited data, so even in a worst case scenario where Cassini completely ignored Huygens, not all would be lost. This is great forward thinking by the designers.
I know this was not cheap to launch, and Nasa's new mantra is "cheap and often", but I can see almost everyone rather having a project take that extra bit of time and looking into the details (especially backup systems and what to do when things go wrong) rather than rushing projects out the door with no/little backup and redundancy in place.