I remember being amazed in high school when I found out that Ronald Reagan used to be an actor. I seriously had no idea that he was anything other than a politician.
When I was growing up, I just knew him as the president.
By that I hope you mean that it will take a long time, because 3.5" floppy drives have been around for a *really* long time: since about 1985 I believe.
It's a lot easier to smuggle a USB drive in and out than to take apart a computer and remove the hard drive. Taking apart a computer when you're not supposed to is not exactly inconspicuious.
Places that are really security-conscious will put any computers with sensitive data on an internal, secure, non-Internet-connected network, make their machines physically secure so that they cannot be opened without a key or special equipment, and disable any ports on the machine if they can. Apparently, USB ports are still a vulnerability that these security-conscious companies would like to take care of.
Of course, companies who are really *that* security-conscious shouldn't be running Windows in the first place. Linux would be much more suitable in that type of environment.
Germany has a far more devious plan. The invading soldiers will be liberally supplied with free German beer, getting them too plastered to do their job.
The soldiers' lives wouldn't be miserable (quite the opposite in fact), but they would have trouble getting anything accomplished.
"Dude, should we draft their DMCA legislation or go out an get a beer?"
It's entirely possible to have the occasional windmill in populated areas and save the wind farms for more remote areas.
In northern Germany, which is pretty windy, one sees the occasional large turbine here and there. One or two at a time doesn't actually look that bad, expecially when there are trees nearby so that it doesn't stand out as much.
Perhaps someone will come up with more aesthetically-pleasing turbines.
Or even better... you can have the window play a video. A guest will be enjoying the sight of trees swaying in the wind or something, and some thug-looking guy will suddenly be looking in the window, scaring the crap out of them.
Oh, the mischief you could make with those things!
Gunpowder has been kind of a mixed bag. It's been used to kill lots of people, but it's also been essential in the industrial era for use in mining, construction, and other areas that benefit society.
Alfred Nobel, the founder of the Nobel Peace prize also invented nitroglycerin, which is commonly used in explosives that kill people. He intended it to be used as a safer way of digging tunnels than gunpowder explosives, which could be unstable. Unfortunately, people used it to kill other people as well, and he earned a reputation as making money off of death. One newspaper referred to him as a "merchant of death". Not wanting to be remembered that way, he founded the Nobel Peace Prizes to promote peaceful endeavours.
Do keep in mind that if we didn't have gunpowder, we'd be happily killing each other with other methods. Most of the mass-killings in Rwanda were accomplished with machetes.
I'm also impressed with how far AMD has come. Part of me wants to see AMD clobber Intel, which had a monopoly for a long time, but it's probably best for each to have about 50% market share. It will keep both companies from getting fat and lazy, meaning more research and lower prices. Competition without a particular company dominating the market is generally a good thing for the consumer.
Whoa, it sounds like something is not right there. CPUs don't normally reach 95 C unless there is something wrong with the heatsink or fan. Since the fan is noisy, it's probably working just fine. I'm guessing there's a problem transferring heat from the CPU to the heatsink.
I have an XP2600+ with a normal heatsink and fan. I live in Sacramento, California where it gets pretty hot in summer (including inside my apartment), and I've never seen the CPU temp exceed 40 C.
Then again, my purchasing department doesn't seem to understand that there are computer makers other than Dell.
It's quite likely that your company has some kind of contract with Dell where they purchase exclusively from Dell in exchange for a better deal on those purchases
I believe it's relatively common for companies to do such a thing
Looked great??? From the very first moment I saw a preview for Catwoman, I was convinced it would be an absolutely terrible movie. It just looked so bad! You would have had to pay me to see such garbage.
Since then I've been hearing it is as bad as I originally suspected.
This Captain Sky movie looks like it could be decent or really, really bad. There didn't appear to be much in the way of plot from the previews, but I believe it has potential.
Unfortunately, films that tend to focus on special effects also have the tendency to be weak on plot. I'd rather have a well-written script than special effects any day.
...at least on the part of Microsoft. Microsoft isn't trying to keep you from using USB drives or iPods, silly. You'll be able to use them by default. It simply gives the system administrator the ability to control the computer by giving them the *option* to disable these features.
There are a lot of organizations that don't want people plugging in USB storage devices and walking off with their critical, sensitive data. This gives them the ability to make their computers more secure, so less scrupulous people won't walk away with data.
I would think that on a site full of Linux people, there would actually be celebration about having more control over your computer. I think Microsoft should be commended on this one.
I build my latest computer about a year ago from parts, and I decided I had no need for a floppy. All my floppies were collecting dust and I hadn't used one in over a year.
I got a nice new motherboard with SATA and a new SATA hard drive. The motherboard, unfortunately, came with the SATA drivers on floppy disk. When installing Windows XP, I had to load the SATA drivers from floppy disk. I tried burning them onto CD, but it didn't work. So I had to rip out the floppy drive from my old computer and connect it to my new one temporarily while I installed the drivers.
That was quite annoying. This was the only thing I needed a floppy for on my new computer. Either they should start including SATA drivers on some other medium and/or the Windows XP installer should learn how to load drivers from USB or CD (it may be capable of this, but I couldn't get it to work).
I hope I don't need a floppy drive to set up my next computer, because I no longer own one. USB keys are great. I have a 32MB one I got as a freebie, and it's enough for most files I care to transport. Anything larger is usually not a frequently-edited file, so I can safely burn those to CD.
I used to live in San Luis Obispo, not too far away from Vandenburg. The local newspaper often had information about rocket launches and even had photographs of the rocket going up into the sky. Rocket launches were a bit like public fireworks displays in that area.
It's not like the launches are hard to photograph: the rockets can probably be seen for a hundred miles around as they shoot up into the sky.
I've worked in both Germany and the United States, and believe me, the workplace in Germany is a lot less stressful. They work fewer hours per day and get a lot more vacation days per year.
I found that Germans do indeed have work ethic to an extent. They are a lot more productive during the hours they are at work, but despite popular belief, they are actually rather lazy. They don't like to work, but when they do work, they do it very efficiently.
I think the amount of work Americans do tends to wear them out a bit and makes them less productive per hour worked. That very well may lead to even more hours worked: not a good thing.
I got a lot more free time working in Germany than working in the U.S.
Not to mention you'll be able to get a 4Ghz computer for a mere fraction of the price if you just waited a few years.
It's really unnecessary to be constantly buying high-end computers. You'll save a lot more money if you buy mid-ranged computers that can run current games just fine instead of super fancy-shmancy expensive ones that will become obsolete only 6 months later than the mid-range ones.
Cell phones are commonly used as a transmitter to trigger explosives to blow up. If they couldn't use cell phones, they would just use some other small transmitter to trigger the explosives. It would be more inconvenient, but for anyone determined to blow something up, it's not a huge barrier.
I imagine such trasmitters can be easily disguised as other electronic equipment as well (I imagine laptops with some modifications would serve very well), so to be thorough, you would have to ban all electronic equipment, which is not very practical.
I figure that aliens probably don't act in unison like we all imagine. Some individuals might want to help us, some individuals might want to exploit us, some might want to enslave us, and others might find us completely uninteresting and ignore us.
Within our own species you find all sorts of different attitudes and cultures. Aliens might not be any different in that respect.
I always find it strange that in science fiction shows, alien planets usually only have one or two cultures and government. I find it more likely that they'll have numerous cultures and governments. I guess that, as with human cultures, outsiders all seem the same to us.
Indeed. There are enough accidents when cars are confined to the roads. There are so many factors involved in flight that would cause a large death rate if just anyone could fly their car around.
With so many people in the air, it would be utter chaos and people would be crashing into each other willy-nilly. Air traffic controllers have enough difficulty dealing with current numbers of aircraft. There's no way they could coordinate millions of flying cars.
Computer control of the flyig cars would be the only way to make it safe for everyone.
If I recall correctly, the Starbucks in Shrek wasn't actually called Starbucks, but something very similar. They did that with all the brand names that appeared in the movie.
I'm pretty sure that it was more for the sake of parody than advertisement.
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I remember being amazed in high school when I found out that Ronald Reagan used to be an actor. I seriously had no idea that he was anything other than a politician.
When I was growing up, I just knew him as the president.
By that I hope you mean that it will take a long time, because 3.5" floppy drives have been around for a *really* long time: since about 1985 I believe.
It's a lot easier to smuggle a USB drive in and out than to take apart a computer and remove the hard drive. Taking apart a computer when you're not supposed to is not exactly inconspicuious.
Places that are really security-conscious will put any computers with sensitive data on an internal, secure, non-Internet-connected network, make their machines physically secure so that they cannot be opened without a key or special equipment, and disable any ports on the machine if they can. Apparently, USB ports are still a vulnerability that these security-conscious companies would like to take care of.
Of course, companies who are really *that* security-conscious shouldn't be running Windows in the first place. Linux would be much more suitable in that type of environment.
Germany has a far more devious plan. The invading soldiers will be liberally supplied with free German beer, getting them too plastered to do their job.
The soldiers' lives wouldn't be miserable (quite the opposite in fact), but they would have trouble getting anything accomplished.
"Dude, should we draft their DMCA legislation or go out an get a beer?"
"Get a beer, of course!"
Even bad publicity can be good publicity. That advertising agency certainly succeeded in getting its name out there.
It would be interesting to know if business has picked up or slowed down because of that joke.
It's entirely possible to have the occasional windmill in populated areas and save the wind farms for more remote areas.
In northern Germany, which is pretty windy, one sees the occasional large turbine here and there. One or two at a time doesn't actually look that bad, expecially when there are trees nearby so that it doesn't stand out as much.
Perhaps someone will come up with more aesthetically-pleasing turbines.
Or even better... you can have the window play a video. A guest will be enjoying the sight of trees swaying in the wind or something, and some thug-looking guy will suddenly be looking in the window, scaring the crap out of them.
Oh, the mischief you could make with those things!
I could just imagine the shock of the guy's grandma coming over, looking out the window, and suddenly seeing the Windows BSOD appear in the window.
Gunpowder has been kind of a mixed bag. It's been used to kill lots of people, but it's also been essential in the industrial era for use in mining, construction, and other areas that benefit society.
Alfred Nobel, the founder of the Nobel Peace prize also invented nitroglycerin, which is commonly used in explosives that kill people. He intended it to be used as a safer way of digging tunnels than gunpowder explosives, which could be unstable. Unfortunately, people used it to kill other people as well, and he earned a reputation as making money off of death. One newspaper referred to him as a "merchant of death". Not wanting to be remembered that way, he founded the Nobel Peace Prizes to promote peaceful endeavours.
Do keep in mind that if we didn't have gunpowder, we'd be happily killing each other with other methods. Most of the mass-killings in Rwanda were accomplished with machetes.
I'm also impressed with how far AMD has come. Part of me wants to see AMD clobber Intel, which had a monopoly for a long time, but it's probably best for each to have about 50% market share. It will keep both companies from getting fat and lazy, meaning more research and lower prices. Competition without a particular company dominating the market is generally a good thing for the consumer.
Whoa, it sounds like something is not right there. CPUs don't normally reach 95 C unless there is something wrong with the heatsink or fan. Since the fan is noisy, it's probably working just fine. I'm guessing there's a problem transferring heat from the CPU to the heatsink.
I have an XP2600+ with a normal heatsink and fan. I live in Sacramento, California where it gets pretty hot in summer (including inside my apartment), and I've never seen the CPU temp exceed 40 C.
It's quite likely that your company has some kind of contract with Dell where they purchase exclusively from Dell in exchange for a better deal on those purchases
I believe it's relatively common for companies to do such a thing
Looked great??? From the very first moment I saw a preview for Catwoman, I was convinced it would be an absolutely terrible movie. It just looked so bad! You would have had to pay me to see such garbage.
Since then I've been hearing it is as bad as I originally suspected.
This Captain Sky movie looks like it could be decent or really, really bad. There didn't appear to be much in the way of plot from the previews, but I believe it has potential.
Unfortunately, films that tend to focus on special effects also have the tendency to be weak on plot. I'd rather have a well-written script than special effects any day.
...at least on the part of Microsoft. Microsoft isn't trying to keep you from using USB drives or iPods, silly. You'll be able to use them by default. It simply gives the system administrator the ability to control the computer by giving them the *option* to disable these features.
There are a lot of organizations that don't want people plugging in USB storage devices and walking off with their critical, sensitive data. This gives them the ability to make their computers more secure, so less scrupulous people won't walk away with data.
I would think that on a site full of Linux people, there would actually be celebration about having more control over your computer. I think Microsoft should be commended on this one.
I build my latest computer about a year ago from parts, and I decided I had no need for a floppy. All my floppies were collecting dust and I hadn't used one in over a year.
I got a nice new motherboard with SATA and a new SATA hard drive. The motherboard, unfortunately, came with the SATA drivers on floppy disk. When installing Windows XP, I had to load the SATA drivers from floppy disk. I tried burning them onto CD, but it didn't work. So I had to rip out the floppy drive from my old computer and connect it to my new one temporarily while I installed the drivers.
That was quite annoying. This was the only thing I needed a floppy for on my new computer. Either they should start including SATA drivers on some other medium and/or the Windows XP installer should learn how to load drivers from USB or CD (it may be capable of this, but I couldn't get it to work).
I hope I don't need a floppy drive to set up my next computer, because I no longer own one. USB keys are great. I have a 32MB one I got as a freebie, and it's enough for most files I care to transport. Anything larger is usually not a frequently-edited file, so I can safely burn those to CD.
That was absolutely hilarious. On behalf of all Slashdotters, I thank you. :D
I used to live in San Luis Obispo, not too far away from Vandenburg. The local newspaper often had information about rocket launches and even had photographs of the rocket going up into the sky. Rocket launches were a bit like public fireworks displays in that area.
It's not like the launches are hard to photograph: the rockets can probably be seen for a hundred miles around as they shoot up into the sky.
I've worked in both Germany and the United States, and believe me, the workplace in Germany is a lot less stressful. They work fewer hours per day and get a lot more vacation days per year.
I found that Germans do indeed have work ethic to an extent. They are a lot more productive during the hours they are at work, but despite popular belief, they are actually rather lazy. They don't like to work, but when they do work, they do it very efficiently.
I think the amount of work Americans do tends to wear them out a bit and makes them less productive per hour worked. That very well may lead to even more hours worked: not a good thing.
I got a lot more free time working in Germany than working in the U.S.
Not to mention you'll be able to get a 4Ghz computer for a mere fraction of the price if you just waited a few years.
It's really unnecessary to be constantly buying high-end computers. You'll save a lot more money if you buy mid-ranged computers that can run current games just fine instead of super fancy-shmancy expensive ones that will become obsolete only 6 months later than the mid-range ones.
Cell phones are commonly used as a transmitter to trigger explosives to blow up. If they couldn't use cell phones, they would just use some other small transmitter to trigger the explosives. It would be more inconvenient, but for anyone determined to blow something up, it's not a huge barrier.
I imagine such trasmitters can be easily disguised as other electronic equipment as well (I imagine laptops with some modifications would serve very well), so to be thorough, you would have to ban all electronic equipment, which is not very practical.
I figure that aliens probably don't act in unison like we all imagine. Some individuals might want to help us, some individuals might want to exploit us, some might want to enslave us, and others might find us completely uninteresting and ignore us.
Within our own species you find all sorts of different attitudes and cultures. Aliens might not be any different in that respect.
I always find it strange that in science fiction shows, alien planets usually only have one or two cultures and government. I find it more likely that they'll have numerous cultures and governments. I guess that, as with human cultures, outsiders all seem the same to us.
...and install Windows on it. That'll show em! :)
Wow, you sound really steamed. Maybe you should release the valve on your anger.
Indeed. There are enough accidents when cars are confined to the roads. There are so many factors involved in flight that would cause a large death rate if just anyone could fly their car around.
With so many people in the air, it would be utter chaos and people would be crashing into each other willy-nilly. Air traffic controllers have enough difficulty dealing with current numbers of aircraft. There's no way they could coordinate millions of flying cars.
Computer control of the flyig cars would be the only way to make it safe for everyone.
If I recall correctly, the Starbucks in Shrek wasn't actually called Starbucks, but something very similar. They did that with all the brand names that appeared in the movie.
I'm pretty sure that it was more for the sake of parody than advertisement.