I cannot tell you how irritating it is to talk tech with anyone who uses "backward slash" (it's "backslash"!) and (more irritatingly) "forward slash" (IT'S JUST PLAIN "SLASH", DAMMIT!). Generally these people insist on saying the whole thing every time, and won't accept input from you, either, unless you adopt their brain damage for the duration of the conversation. Feh.
I prefer the heroic epic The Story of Mel . Makes me tear up every time I read it. [sniffle]
RIP, Bob.
Mods, that's not +1 Funny, it's +1 Informative
on
Mutation Creates SuperKid
·
· Score: 2, Informative
As your Subject: line says, evolution IS a beauty contest -- at least, in large part. Vast numbers of the traits of organisms are a direct result of sexual competition, or of sexual competition in combination with some other, more necessary, survival trait.
You don't think female humans have breasts that large because mammary glands take up a lot of space, do you? Even the flattest-chested woman can breastfeed her children handily. The breasts of apes are all pancake-like, yet they work perfectly well. No, large human breasts are mostly fat -- and they're that way because human men like them that way.
As for why men like them that way in the first place, check out some of Desmond Morris's work sometime.
I still enter URL's into the address bar. Doesn't mean that I have to or that it is the easiest. I am just set in my ways and don't use bookmarks for everything.
No matter what happens there will always be the "first to adopt" and those that hang on to their set ways forever.
I never use bookmarks, and they have always been available to me. First web browser I used was probably Netscape 3.0, which of course had bookmarks. I used some for awhile, at first as a convenience measure -- places I always went. But I found I was constantly at some other computer than the one where I put them in, and so had to type the URLs anyway. After awhile, though, I began to use it as a repository to store URLs I knew I would forget about -- kind of a reminder, "to do" list. But whenever you upgrade browsers or operating systems or have to reformat or move to a new machine, it's a pain to bring that stuff over.
So, I now do this: I just remember the URLs I always use (or, if they're large (where large generally means anything besides name.{com,org,net} -- local government sites, or stuff in the UK or whatever), I remember what keywords bring that site up first in Google, then hit "I'm Feeling Lucky". As for the reminder function, now I save them in a Yahoo! Notepad note, which is accessible from (more or less) any machine.
As a side note, I never click on the location bar to do this typing; I invariably hit the key combo to bring up the "Go to URL" dialog. This generally confuses almost everyone who sees me do it.
How can the screen know which photons came from the projector and which came from the incandescent lamp? The lamp is spewing all wavelengths, including whatever frequencies the projector is spewing. So how does this help?
...just mixed. We have imported (and continue to import) a lot of words into English, and we tend to preserve the pronunciation and spelling from the original language, more or less. So all the words obey standardized spelling systems (more or less) -- just several of them.
Aeron chairs??? Those things dig into your legs! OW!
Oh, and cubicles (it's NOT "cubes") offer the illusion of privacy. In fact, they do nothing of the sort. Everyone can spy on you, and everyone's sound bothers you. Big open rooms are a nightmare -- "grand central station" springs to mind. No, give me a separate, enclosed, real, no-foolin' OFFICE of my own every time. With a door I'm allowed to close, too, thank you very much.
One thing you didn't mention: quit it with the fascist network policies. This encompasses everything from logon scripts that overwrite your preferences in the registry to not having access to your own C: drive to "Unacceptable Use Detected" internet intercept screens. HANDS OFF, please. If you don't trust me to do my work, how do you trust me at all?
I don't know how this happens, but lately Popular Science seems to consistently scooping Slashdot (!). I'll get my dead-tree, long-lead-time, paid-for, old-media issue of PopSci, read it, then maybe three or four weeks later I'll see one or more stories that were in it on Slashdot.
Can someone explain this to me? 'Cuz I don't get it.
Yeah, I was in the same boat as you. I updated every driver and swapped out more or less every component in an attempt to solve the constant blue screens. Eventually what solved it was putting in a bunch of extra fans on a bracket above the card area, blowing directly on the AIW (and other places, just for good measure). I think the thing (the AIW) was just overheating -- the chips were too hot to touch.
Then maybe you can explain to me where Huffman coding is used in MP3s (and why)? As you point out, it's lossy. Why bother with a lossless compression technique in addition to lossy ones, when you could just use lossy all the way and probably get better results? Is it for the info tags or something?
Thats not the fucking point, Chief. The point is that he shouldn't be able to get dragged off to jail because he was smoking a cigarette on the side of the road and doesn't feel like telling an openly confrontational police dickhead his name.
In case you hadn't noticed, "Chief", we're on the same side of the issue. That shouldn't happen? Agreed. However, it did happen.
Now, how do you address an abuse of police authority like this? That's right...through the courts. The fact that the courts let this get past step one is sad -- much less going up through all the appeals courts and to the Supreme Court. And even then, they dropped the ball. Which is multiply sad. Which was my "fucking point".
Seems to me all the guy would have to do would be to demand a jury trial (in a previous appeal, or even on initial trial). What jury would find that people are legally compelled to give their names?
How come these Rich-O-Meters are always in Pounds and compare to either worldwide or the UK? How about a US one? Or, better, one that will let you pick your country?
Me too. Completely took me by surprise -- I logged in Monday morning and BAM, everything's different. (No warning! How did Yahoo! manage to do this without tipping off Slashdot??) New look, 2GB storage, no graphical ads, more filters, more address blocks, disposable addresses, trainable spam filter, and so on and so on. Ever since Yahoo! bought Rocketmail and turned it into Yahoo! Mail, I've had to have a.sig explaining that the following lines were an ad and not from me. Well, I've finally taken it off. No more in-mail ads!!
The old Atari 8-bit computers had I/O that relied on the sound chip for clocking, and as a side effect, I/O always resulted in at least some small amount of sound. In fact, the designers took advantage of this when it came to storage by purposely turning up the volume for disk (and tape) I/O. You'd get hissy beeps for disk reads (one per sector) and hissy thumps for writes. (The hiss was the actual data modulating the waveform.) After using one for not too long, you'd get very accustomed to the sounds of various operations (booting, saving, loading, etc., each had their own rhythm) and you'd immediately know by the sound when something was wrong.
Start comment with "I'll be modded down for saying this, but" or end it with "Feel free to mod me down now.". Then take a polarized stance on the subject at hand (or even one of the standard Slashdot subjects -- MS vs. Linux, RIAA vs. everyone, etc., as long as you make some tenuous link to the topic) -- and try to sound defiant about it, as though you're the little guy, standing up to someone lording it over you.
Make a smart-assed remark and make it pithily (if it wraps, it's too long).
Write up a long and fascinating/hilarious/frightening personal anecdote, preferably about what a geek you are, preferably somehow linked to the topic.
Compose a lengthy, in-depth analysis of the topic and end the post with the paragraph: "Oh, and by the way, IAA___." where ___ is replaced with the initials of whatever vocation would be most authoritative on the subject (TL = Tax Lawyer, PP = Particle Physicist, TC = Tugboat Captain, etc.).
If you're feeling lazy, try these:
Subject: "Site slowing, here's article text". Body: Cut and paste the article text.
Subject "Reg-free link". Body: The Google partnered, Google cached, or otherwise unencumbered link equivalent to the article's link to the New York Times or other soul-sucking registration-required site.
Subject: "Mirror". Body: Link to a separately-hosted copy of the large media files that are the article's main draw. (If desperate, use freecache.)
Your final score: +5. Rinse and repeat as neccessary.
Slashdot Mirror
...not a single backslash in there.
I cannot tell you how irritating it is to talk tech with anyone who uses "backward slash" (it's "backslash"!) and (more irritatingly) "forward slash" (IT'S JUST PLAIN "SLASH", DAMMIT!). Generally these people insist on saying the whole thing every time, and won't accept input from you, either, unless you adopt their brain damage for the duration of the conversation. Feh.
...that the "10000" in this context shall be pronounced as "one hundred hundred", not "the year ten thousand".
Signed,
Atario
Friday, June Twenty-Fifth, Twenty Oh Four
Dammit. Preview Button, Preview Button, Preview Button.
The Story of Mel was supposed to be linked.
We sincerely apoligize and those responsible for the error have been sacked.
I prefer the heroic epic The Story of Mel . Makes me tear up every time I read it. [sniffle]
RIP, Bob.
As your Subject: line says, evolution IS a beauty contest -- at least, in large part. Vast numbers of the traits of organisms are a direct result of sexual competition, or of sexual competition in combination with some other, more necessary, survival trait.
You don't think female humans have breasts that large because mammary glands take up a lot of space, do you? Even the flattest-chested woman can breastfeed her children handily. The breasts of apes are all pancake-like, yet they work perfectly well. No, large human breasts are mostly fat -- and they're that way because human men like them that way.
As for why men like them that way in the first place, check out some of Desmond Morris's work sometime.
What happens when we get to the Industrial Age of the Internet? Or the Atomic Age? Or -- wait for it -- the Information Age?
All our heads asplode, that's what happens.
So, I now do this: I just remember the URLs I always use (or, if they're large (where large generally means anything besides name.{com,org,net} -- local government sites, or stuff in the UK or whatever), I remember what keywords bring that site up first in Google, then hit "I'm Feeling Lucky". As for the reminder function, now I save them in a Yahoo! Notepad note, which is accessible from (more or less) any machine.
As a side note, I never click on the location bar to do this typing; I invariably hit the key combo to bring up the "Go to URL" dialog. This generally confuses almost everyone who sees me do it.
How can the screen know which photons came from the projector and which came from the incandescent lamp? The lamp is spewing all wavelengths, including whatever frequencies the projector is spewing. So how does this help?
...just mixed. We have imported (and continue to import) a lot of words into English, and we tend to preserve the pronunciation and spelling from the original language, more or less. So all the words obey standardized spelling systems (more or less) -- just several of them.
...to everyone when you don't have to spend 30-60 minutes each way each day to cram your way through freeways with insufficient automobile bandwidth.
Just imagine if everyone who could work at home did work at home. The few who did have to commute would fly along on a nigh-empty freeway.
And all the fuel saved...and the environmental improvement...and the lessened dependence on foreign petroleum...
Aeron chairs??? Those things dig into your legs! OW!
Oh, and cubicles (it's NOT "cubes") offer the illusion of privacy. In fact, they do nothing of the sort. Everyone can spy on you, and everyone's sound bothers you. Big open rooms are a nightmare -- "grand central station" springs to mind. No, give me a separate, enclosed, real, no-foolin' OFFICE of my own every time. With a door I'm allowed to close, too, thank you very much.
One thing you didn't mention: quit it with the fascist network policies. This encompasses everything from logon scripts that overwrite your preferences in the registry to not having access to your own C: drive to "Unacceptable Use Detected" internet intercept screens. HANDS OFF, please. If you don't trust me to do my work, how do you trust me at all?
[Exhales] Sorry. Bit of a rant there.
I don't know how this happens, but lately Popular Science seems to consistently scooping Slashdot (!). I'll get my dead-tree, long-lead-time, paid-for, old-media issue of PopSci, read it, then maybe three or four weeks later I'll see one or more stories that were in it on Slashdot.
Can someone explain this to me? 'Cuz I don't get it.
Yeah, I was in the same boat as you. I updated every driver and swapped out more or less every component in an attempt to solve the constant blue screens. Eventually what solved it was putting in a bunch of extra fans on a bracket above the card area, blowing directly on the AIW (and other places, just for good measure). I think the thing (the AIW) was just overheating -- the chips were too hot to touch.
Then maybe you can explain to me where Huffman coding is used in MP3s (and why)? As you point out, it's lossy. Why bother with a lossless compression technique in addition to lossy ones, when you could just use lossy all the way and probably get better results? Is it for the info tags or something?
You really confused me till I realised "b n" was "be no" instead of "be an".
I think you need to turn up the quality level on your lossy compression.
Now, how do you address an abuse of police authority like this? That's right...through the courts. The fact that the courts let this get past step one is sad -- much less going up through all the appeals courts and to the Supreme Court. And even then, they dropped the ball. Which is multiply sad. Which was my "fucking point".
Seems to me all the guy would have to do would be to demand a jury trial (in a previous appeal, or even on initial trial). What jury would find that people are legally compelled to give their names?
On the other hand, people do tend to be stupid.
Ask me again, I'll tell ya the same.
Mine is over 280 megapixels. The depth of field is rather limited, though, and the focus range is rather short. Still, not bad for a ~$100 purchase.
How come these Rich-O-Meters are always in Pounds and compare to either worldwide or the UK? How about a US one? Or, better, one that will let you pick your country?
Me too. Completely took me by surprise -- I logged in Monday morning and BAM, everything's different. (No warning! How did Yahoo! manage to do this without tipping off Slashdot??) New look, 2GB storage, no graphical ads, more filters, more address blocks, disposable addresses, trainable spam filter, and so on and so on. Ever since Yahoo! bought Rocketmail and turned it into Yahoo! Mail, I've had to have a .sig explaining that the following lines were an ad and not from me. Well, I've finally taken it off. No more in-mail ads!!
Thank you, Google!
The old Atari 8-bit computers had I/O that relied on the sound chip for clocking, and as a side effect, I/O always resulted in at least some small amount of sound. In fact, the designers took advantage of this when it came to storage by purposely turning up the volume for disk (and tape) I/O. You'd get hissy beeps for disk reads (one per sector) and hissy thumps for writes. (The hiss was the actual data modulating the waveform.) After using one for not too long, you'd get very accustomed to the sounds of various operations (booting, saving, loading, etc., each had their own rhythm) and you'd immediately know by the sound when something was wrong.
I kinda miss that.
- Start comment with "I'll be modded down for saying this, but" or end it with "Feel free to mod me down now.". Then take a polarized stance on the subject at hand (or even one of the standard Slashdot subjects -- MS vs. Linux, RIAA vs. everyone, etc., as long as you make some tenuous link to the topic) -- and try to sound defiant about it, as though you're the little guy, standing up to someone lording it over you.
- Make a smart-assed remark and make it pithily (if it wraps, it's too long).
- Write up a long and fascinating/hilarious/frightening personal anecdote, preferably about what a geek you are, preferably somehow linked to the topic.
- Compose a lengthy, in-depth analysis of the topic and end the post with the paragraph: "Oh, and by the way, IAA___." where ___ is replaced with the initials of whatever vocation would be most authoritative on the subject (TL = Tax Lawyer, PP = Particle Physicist, TC = Tugboat Captain, etc.).
If you're feeling lazy, try these:- Subject: "Site slowing, here's article text". Body: Cut and paste the article text.
- Subject "Reg-free link". Body: The Google partnered, Google cached, or otherwise unencumbered link equivalent to the article's link to the New York Times or other soul-sucking registration-required site.
- Subject: "Mirror". Body: Link to a separately-hosted copy of the large media files that are the article's main draw. (If desperate, use freecache.)
Your final score: +5. Rinse and repeat as neccessary.