The entire circumference of the globe is about 24000 miles, which takes light 128ms (in a vacuum). The article's claim that the current time to send a packet from London to Tokyo is 230ms therefore seems doubtful. In this time, light can go 42840 miles in a vacuum -- or nearly twice around the the entire distance around the world (24091 miles). Light in a fiber is about 35% slower, but this still leaves time for 37177 miles.
My Thinkpad T410S has big black plastic areas above and below the screen, and a speakers positioned on the sides, i.e. the screen is wider than the keyboard, and isn't tall enough to fit the form factor. This is 16:10 aspect ratio -- the new models are 16:9 which is even worse.
Glossy vs. matte is a minor issue compared to the ever-widening aspect ratios. Except for watching movies, the usefulness of a screen is determined by its vertical size. The 4:3 aspect ratio is by far the most useful. 16:10 is dramatically worse. 16:9 is an evil plot to prevent computer users from doing their jobs. Yet, the LCD industry is increasingly cranking out displays that are wider and shorter. The pinnacle of laptop displays was the Thinkpad T60's FlexView (aka IPS) 1600x1200 display. It's all been downhill since then.
Interestingly, though, Apple seems to have figured this out. The 4:3 aspect ratio IPS display on the iPad is gorgeous -- and the right aspect ratio. The iPad display is a classic example of what makes Apple successful -- they push component manufacturers to produce what consumers desire, as opposed to assembling the cheapest components into an cheap, inelegant commodity product.
College want their admissions process to become a proxy for due diligence in hiring. ("Sally went to XYZ college, so she's more likely to be a valuable employee than Bob who went to a less selective school.") While this makes sense a little bit, it's also scary.
For example, does this mean that what kids do in high school will increasingly set their destinies for life? Are XYZ graduates actually better employees, or is it just marketing?
I was intrigued by the./ posting, which claimed that the tutorial would show how to exploit any NULL pointer dereference. The actual article, however, requires a CALL to the NULL pointer. While some NULL pointer bugs are function pointers, many are not. Kernel code that merely reads or writes data to a NULL pointer will not be exploitable as shown.
While it's possible to convert altitude into momentum, the energy harvested by doing this won't get you back to the same height.
If the wind is gusty, it could be possible to pick up a bit of energy, but nowhere near enough to power a useful transportation vehicle.
A possible exception: they could have a special way of harnessing energy from vomiting passengers...
This new ruling seems like it could conflict with some of the efforts to fight spam. The ruling says:
"After reviewing the decisions analyzing unauthorized electronic contact with computer systems as potential trespasses to chattels, we conclude that under California law the tort does not encompass, and should not be extended to encompass, an electronic communication that neither damages the recipient computer system nor impairs its functioning. Such an electronic communication does not constitute an actionable trespass to personal property," the high court says.
The ruling tried to address this ("Nor does our holding affect the legal remedies of Internet service providers
(ISP?s) against senders of unsolicited commercial bulk e-mail (UCE)..."), but reconciling this ruling with anti-spam rules may be tricky since this gives spammers a defence...
This isn't a problem because most people have extras of the body parts used for
most biometric schemes. For example, you probably a large supply of fingers (about ten),
so it doesn't matter if a few get compromised. Similarly, if you have two eyes, it's not
a big deal if your retinal print becomes known to bad guys.
(P.S. Please no replies from humor-impaired folks.)
They just squeaked by on the calendar. Under the new
California Law
that goes into effect on July 1, they would have to notify each of the
potentially-affected students after a breach like this.
Should be fascinating to see how people react as they start to find out
how often security problems actually occur...
This isn't a Los Angeles domain anymore than the.TV domain is
for TV stations. (FYI, it's for the island of Tuvalu, which gets a
bit of revenue by letting VeriSign control its domain.)
Using this argument, I guess the.uk domain is reserved for ucky food?
Technically, this sounds quite cool. I think they are playing tricks
with the polarization. (LCDs typically change the polarization of
the photons by 90 degrees. A polarizing filter then blocks
either the rotated or unrotated photons.)
I think the "Mirror LCD" technology can make the polarizing
filter reflective, instead of just blocking photons going
through. This would give a slightly dark mirror, but
satisfactory for bathroom-type purposes.
On the other hand, the business people behind this have
been, um, watching too much TV. A normal 17" LCD TV runs about $475 and a 17" mirror
about $25, so Philips thinks people will pay more than $1000 per
square foot for wall space. If wall space was this valuable,
wouldn't hotels would hang better paintings?
802.11g operates at the same frequency as 802.11b. The good news: existing antennas and other range extension techniques should work fine (Pringles can, anyone?). The bad news: interference is going to be a nightmare. In heavily-populated areas, it's common to have a dozen or more legacy 802.11b signals, which tend to hog the bandwidth that would otherwise be available for.11g. Add in microwave ovens (which interfere massively on the same band), and many people will be lucky to see even 20 Mbits/sec.
The security is also a mixed bag: although the WEP mess is improved, security is still going to be a headache, particularly for people who want to roam safely.
According to the contest page: "All costs, taxes, fees and expenses associated with entry into this Contest and any prizes received shall be the sole responsibility of the entrants and winners."
The federal income tax alone on the $350,000 Unreal Engine commercial license would, according to the latest IRS tables, be $103,832.
Slashdot Mirror
The entire circumference of the globe is about 24000 miles, which takes light 128ms (in a vacuum). The article's claim that the current time to send a packet from London to Tokyo is 230ms therefore seems doubtful. In this time, light can go 42840 miles in a vacuum -- or nearly twice around the the entire distance around the world (24091 miles). Light in a fiber is about 35% slower, but this still leaves time for 37177 miles.
My Thinkpad T410S has big black plastic areas above and below the screen, and a speakers positioned on the sides, i.e. the screen is wider than the keyboard, and isn't tall enough to fit the form factor. This is 16:10 aspect ratio -- the new models are 16:9 which is even worse.
Glossy vs. matte is a minor issue compared to the ever-widening aspect ratios. Except for watching movies, the usefulness of a screen is determined by its vertical size. The 4:3 aspect ratio is by far the most useful. 16:10 is dramatically worse. 16:9 is an evil plot to prevent computer users from doing their jobs. Yet, the LCD industry is increasingly cranking out displays that are wider and shorter. The pinnacle of laptop displays was the Thinkpad T60's FlexView (aka IPS) 1600x1200 display. It's all been downhill since then. Interestingly, though, Apple seems to have figured this out. The 4:3 aspect ratio IPS display on the iPad is gorgeous -- and the right aspect ratio. The iPad display is a classic example of what makes Apple successful -- they push component manufacturers to produce what consumers desire, as opposed to assembling the cheapest components into an cheap, inelegant commodity product.
College want their admissions process to become a proxy for due diligence in hiring. ("Sally went to XYZ college, so she's more likely to be a valuable employee than Bob who went to a less selective school.") While this makes sense a little bit, it's also scary. For example, does this mean that what kids do in high school will increasingly set their destinies for life? Are XYZ graduates actually better employees, or is it just marketing?
I was intrigued by the ./ posting, which claimed that the tutorial would show how to exploit any NULL pointer dereference. The actual article, however, requires a CALL to the NULL pointer. While some NULL pointer bugs are function pointers, many are not. Kernel code that merely reads or writes data to a NULL pointer will not be exploitable as shown.
While it's possible to convert altitude into momentum, the energy harvested by doing this won't get you back to the same height. If the wind is gusty, it could be possible to pick up a bit of energy, but nowhere near enough to power a useful transportation vehicle. A possible exception: they could have a special way of harnessing energy from vomiting passengers...
Computers are already too unstable and crash-prone. I hate to think how it'll be when my laptop is busy drinking alcohol while I'm trying to work...
"After reviewing the decisions analyzing unauthorized electronic contact with computer systems as potential trespasses to chattels, we conclude that under California law the tort does not encompass, and should not be extended to encompass, an electronic communication that neither damages the recipient computer system nor impairs its functioning. Such an electronic communication does not constitute an actionable trespass to personal property," the high court says.
The ruling tried to address this ("Nor does our holding affect the legal remedies of Internet service providers (ISP?s) against senders of unsolicited commercial bulk e-mail (UCE)..."), but reconciling this ruling with anti-spam rules may be tricky since this gives spammers a defence...
(P.S. Please no replies from humor-impaired folks.)
Should be fascinating to see how people react as they start to find out how often security problems actually occur...
Using this argument, I guess the .uk domain is reserved for ucky food?
Technically, this sounds quite cool. I think they are playing tricks with the polarization. (LCDs typically change the polarization of the photons by 90 degrees. A polarizing filter then blocks either the rotated or unrotated photons.) I think the "Mirror LCD" technology can make the polarizing filter reflective, instead of just blocking photons going through. This would give a slightly dark mirror, but satisfactory for bathroom-type purposes. On the other hand, the business people behind this have been, um, watching too much TV. A normal 17" LCD TV runs about $475 and a 17" mirror about $25, so Philips thinks people will pay more than $1000 per square foot for wall space. If wall space was this valuable, wouldn't hotels would hang better paintings?
802.11g operates at the same frequency as 802.11b. The good news: existing antennas and other range extension techniques should work fine (Pringles can, anyone?). The bad news: interference is going to be a nightmare. In heavily-populated areas, it's common to have a dozen or more legacy 802.11b signals, which tend to hog the bandwidth that would otherwise be available for .11g. Add in microwave ovens (which interfere massively on the same band), and many people will be lucky to see even 20 Mbits/sec.
The security is also a mixed bag: although the WEP mess is improved, security is still going to be a headache, particularly for people who want to roam safely.
According to the contest page: "All costs, taxes, fees and expenses associated with entry into this Contest and any prizes received shall be the sole responsibility of the entrants and winners." The federal income tax alone on the $350,000 Unreal Engine commercial license would, according to the latest IRS tables, be $103,832.