is really also depending on the ease of use. Two issues remains here: The format war, which makes it hard for users to select and the question of the DRM castrating the usability of the formats.
What all those DRM lobbyists don't realize is that they effectively CREATES a market for pirate copies by imposing the DRM. If it is overly complicated to circumvents then it is also worth some money investment to circumvent. Compare this to the alcohol legislation in the US during the 20s. It created a market for bootleggers and smugglers which fueled the organized crime.
And as I see it, DVD:s are sufficient for the majority of films that are produced. Only a very few films will actually benefit from a better format, but then we still need a better display than the ordinary flat panel we use. I'm not thinking about HDTV 1080p, but IMAX instead.
What I really want a better format than DVD for is actually file backups. With storage capacities in the terabyte range it's not good to make backups on DVD:s, and tapes aren't really god either since they are cumbersome to operate when restoring a specific file. So essentially - the HD-DVD and Blue-ray formats seems to be a blind alley like the laserdisc, Betamax and 8-track tapes.
The reliability of internet access is really critical today. I'm currently doing the majority of my work via a VPN connection, which means that if the connection goes down so does my ability to do anything meaningful.
Many other businesses and projects are today depending on the availability of the internet. You use it to get current documentation, you use it to promote your services and you use it to communiate between different parts of a project which today with internet access really allows you do run projects on multiple continents. Doing it right may even speed up things. Develop the software in Europe, test it in the US and do fault report management in Malaysia. (Not my idea actually). Gives a new meaning to 'daily builds'...
And the internet is also providing the ability for businesses to serve their own internal telephony in a cheap way without the need for expensive leased line arrangements. Setting up Asterisk servers with IAX2 communications may do the trick.
So YES the internet is vital today for businesses. Actually even more than ordinary telephony. The problem is that not all ISP:s have understood this yet and fails to set up the redundancy needed. One way around this may be to buy internet access from more than one ISP.
since this will actually help in disabling the gene with new types of drugs. Getting caught in a depression loop is no fun at all... There is a difference between being resistent to depression and always happy. Unhappiness is one thing, which goes up quickly and goes away quickly. A depression is something that builds up over time accumulating through failures and that needs some kind of treatment.
The point here is to catch on to better treatments because even if the depression-triggering factors are removed the depression may still be present and self-sustaining.
was that the IBM PC wasn't the best machine around and it actually killed a lot of machines that were far better...
How many remebers the OKI 800, Commodore Pet, HP-85B, Osborne 1 or Luxor ABC80/800???
A lot of other computers has also been manufactured with different functionality. OK the bad thing was that they weren't standardized, but on the other hand, how funny is it really with all computers around running the same core hardware configuration...
In the 50's - Don't forget McCarthy and the anti-communist propaganda.
And I agree that there is a lot of money-wasting in governments (not only the US). A government is there to serve it's citizens - not the other way around which all to often happens...
The problem is that on one hand the government wants to be centralized which in the case of the US is that they want all agencys in the vicinity of DC (exceptions may exists for special cases). Attempt to re-locate agencies to other locations happens, but there is a downside of it - not all employees wants to move (family reasons etc.) and then there will be a drain of competence. (OK - if the government wants to downsize an agency - then they move it.)
Anyway - by locating close to the source of energy that would save a lot energy and increase the reliability. The transmission losses in the electrical grid are considerable. (but compared to other types of energy actually acceptable) Some details that you may note are the cooling fins on the transformers, the noise you can hear from high-voltage electrical lines - especially during wet weather etc.
And sure - using energy-effecient computer technology is also effective. Sometimes you get more bang with a dual-processor with laptop CPU:s than you get with a single-processor "full" cpu. The downside is that the size and the complexity of the equipment will rise along with the price tag.
One problem that exists is that energy actually is far too cheap, which means that we have been stuck with our devices with low efficiency for a long time now. And it doesn't help that all software running on our computers is inefficient either. Just consider our favourite toy for speeding up our transition to the next world - the car. Gasoline engines are in the range of 20% while diesel engines can reach up to 45% (with variations of course). And don't trust the MPG figures either - your driving conditions will have a large impact. Some cars may actually consume less doing 65MPH than doing 30MPH. (I have noted this on a car with automatic gearbox where the transmission losses are humungous at lower speeds). So just start kick your local politican to inform them that cutting down on energy not necessarily means that you have to cut your living standard.
Simple things - use flourescent light or even better - LED light - instead of the normal bulbs or halogen lamps. Some tweaking may be necessary - but nothing that's impossible.
Be more flexible with the ventilation - full throttle may save time - but not energy. Using a variable-RPM fan and shutting of the sections of your house that you don't use can also save a lot. Air condition units that deploys their heat into the surrounding air isn't the most efficient cooling you can do. By using the AC to heat a swimmingpool instead (or whatever you like) you can make some use of that waste. The efficiency may actually also be improved if the condenser (the hot part of the AC) is sprayed with a fine mist of water, since evaporating water takes out a considerable amount of energy. And pre-cooling the air by seawater from deep seas/lakes is feasible in some cases. If you can't do that - consider drilling two wells of water in your backyard separated by several meters and then draw water from one and return the heated water to the other. During the winter - run it backwards. (depends on how the water flow is underground if it works during the winter).
Doing a lot of things on a large scale may prove more efficient, but then it will take politicians and well....
isn't really the database used. The majority of database usage in a web application really don't need much of what the complaints are about, and it seems like the author is complaining of things regarding MySQL that were an issue in 3.23, but now 5.1 is coming up.
Of course - MySQL doesn't do the things you expect them all the time, but it is really good at what it does. I have tried PostgreSQL and wasn't very satisfied with it - performance like a slug or something compared to what you can get out of MySQL. The command-line UI wasn't that easy to work with either.
And still - the major issue that is causing problems doing maintenance of a web site - that is the core code that actually does the whole thing. It doesn't depend on that it's written under Linux, that you are using Apache or MySQL, but the last letter - PHP/Perl/JSP/whatever. The best way around it is to don't use a scripting language at all but a compiling language and do Java Servlets utilizing Apache ECS or whatever your favourite language is.
Downside is that still ECS is lacking some features that I would like to see, but it helps on the way anyway. By also checking the result with the HTML Validator you will get the best result. (but maybe not the flashiest)
By using a compiling language you will ensure that end-users doesn't get nasty surprises if a change is done to a file that was included by a zillion of other files. Of course - you will still have a few problems left, but that is more of a documentation issue.
Which brings me flashbacks from the early 90's when the only answer you could get from M$ was "Try to re-install".
Nothing new here - please move along...
So obviously there is a long way between reality and M$ Management. Considering all those commercials that M$ puts up right now about them "stopping viruses" and so on - It's on the level of almost being as good as a Monty Python play. Just consider that IE 6 (whet about earlier versions?) has been rated among the top-10 worst technologies provided to the public.
And here is some more of our favourite subject SPAM:-) .
you must really ask yourself if you REALLY need a commercial certificate (or a certificate signed by a well-known CA) or if you actually can do what you need with a self-signed certificate.
In most cases you can actually do a lot with a self-signed certificate. Especially if your aim actually is just to provide encrypted web pages and handle secure emails within your organization.
And even if you are providing public services you actually don't need a commercial certificate - you can run your own CA, as long as you provide sufficient information to your customers about what the situation is and how they can add your services to their list of trusted services.
that some people have too much time to play with toys.
Anyway - it is actually an interesting piece of work. The original cube itself is also very nice. One must recognize that even the original cube does actually contain more than one solution. If you replace the stickers on an original cube with 6 different images then you will reduce the number of solutions to one single. The catch is that the center piece can on an original cube have four different positions that all are correct. This means that the original cube in theory actually has 4096 different solutions.
One variation on the 3D cube that I have been considering is actually doing a 5x5x5 cube instead. It is a mechanical challenge since it requires better precision to avoid falling apart.
since VB isn't type-safe. It may be easy to write in VB, but you lack a lot of the safety offered by C# or Java.
And if you really have to stick with VB, you have to impose strict coding rules, like requiring "OPTION EXPLICIT" on ALL code, be strict about variable naming and so on.
Better be so strict about the rules that you actually end up with C#.
by using an IDE like Visual Studio or Eclipse you will get a lot "free", but I think it's essential to also know how to do it by the command-line.
When it comes to programming there are actually two things to learn:
Knowledge of the language and runtime libraries.
Knowledge of the development tools.
So personally I think that it is best to learn the tools of the trade first with rather simple and stupid programs and then learn the language using the preferred IDE for the task.
Anyway - when teaching a programming language there are two parts to consider too, and one is the language sematics and another is how to break down the language in useful modules. You can actually cut even more into the art of programming, but I think it is essentially to teach how to think modules since newbie programmers tends to think in a huge blob resulting in the famous spaghetti programming syndrome.
One advantage of an IDE like Eclipse is that it has support for breaking out code to a separate java method with a simple operation. Other IDE:s may have similar functions.
And don't forget to mention programming style, which is important, especially the generic variable naming shortcuts that can be taken (i,j,k,i0,i1 etc) for index variables instead of longname index variables that tends to clutter the code.
When it comes to code formatting I think that the guidelines offered by JavaRanch is a good start. Most formatting rules can actually be applied cross-language. Any decent IDE will allow you to do code formatting and can be configured to the preferred style.
It's one thing to have it fixed in CVS
on
The CVS Cop-Out
·
· Score: 1
or whatever version control system you use another is when it is integrated and released in a tested release. There are a myriad of things that occurs in a version control system and not all modifications are what you want in a release.
Some fixes are more critical than others and has to be prioritized during a build. The good thing is that as soon as it is in the main branch of a version control system then it's in and will pop up sooner or later.
buy an XBox at all? Most games are available for PC as well, and one way to actually stop manufacturers from limiting the options for users is to avoid closed systems like closed game consoles.
In most cases you don't need encryption for the information you pass around, but you will sure want encryption on your login and password when accessing your mail server.
So anyone not using SMTPS (if you need to log in when sending emails) and POP3S/IMAPS should actually think again. This will at least make things a little harder for the bad guys that wants access to your accounts.
And another thing to consider - Encryption technology is useful for hiding information in an obvious way, but obfuscation is better when you want to be really secret. Steganography or use of different names in various conversations so that it is context-dependent. If you can't convince them - confuse them.
You can go back to the cold war era with spies and secrets. The various ways that were used to propagate information and diversions are actually still valid today. 99% of all information propagated isn't critical, it's the 1% that is. And sometimes it's even better to spread the most critical information in clear text since the other side can't really believe that it's true.
There is a story of a british agent that were captured somewhere by the german forces in the second world war just before D day, and as soon as they asked him where the landings were to be he provided them with the correct information, but they didn't belive him and when pressed he gave them false information. - I don't know if it's a true story, but it's a good one.
since by using the W3C validators YOU have made the best effort available to make sure that the majority of browsers around is able to display your web page correctly.
Of course - some browsers fails anyway, but in that case it is more a problem of the browser than anything else. If it is a major browser that fails (usually IE) then there are ways around that problem, and maybe your design is formally correct, but not semantically correct. Designing a web page is like writing - you can mix words wildly and get a grammatically correct sentence, but it may come out as complete nonsense.
And if you still have problems with a browser - use a warning on your web page that indicates that the browser in question doesn't adhere to standards.
One example is Internet Explorer (at least up to version 6, I don't know about IE7) that can't handle transparent PNG images. Looks like shit if you use transparent PNG:s and IE. And in that case it isn't even in the scope of W3C.
So adhering to standards and using the validation tools available will be counted as "best effort". By testing against a certain browser and accepting the layout as acceptable is way below "best effort" since what will happen if the browser is updated and it then provides a different result?
and to be skilled at that art you have to do your own mistakes.
Too often I see things done in Java (or whatever language) that I made mistakes about in early Basic programming stages. The advantage with programming in Basic (not VB or something like that) is that you get the instant feedback and all bread and butter is already there so it's no need to declare a mountain before you climb it.
Of course - Basic isn't a good language when it comes to design skills, but it's a good language when it comes to learning the fundamentals.
Not too long ago Pascal (Classic style) was involved in the learning curve of programs, and it's actually not a bad language, but a little aged. Anyway - the step from Basic to Pascal isn't very large. And with Pacal you can actually do some design work too by modularization which classic Basic doesn't allow you.
The step to C from Pascal is a little larger, since it will require the programmer to consider two major things; Which include file to use and how pointers works. (and a pile of other small issues too). But if you have done Pascal before C you will have learnt a lot about structuring your code.
And the downside today is that there is no easy starting language. Visual Basic isn't easy to learn, and I wouldn't recommend it for beginners since it's permitting too much that can be considered bad manner. Classic Basic isn't really good here either, but you are at least limited to differ between Integers, Floats and Strings while VB is also having a big pile of objects with unknown properties to make a mess with.
Windows lacks sufficient possibilities to allow a user to execute different applications with diffferent privileges in an easy way. (there are a few third-party tools that can drop your rights).
Some applications need more rights than other. A few varies from time to time what they need. If the web browser were to be executed in a hidden sandbox then it would be a lot easier to catch malicious effects. Every start of the web browser would mean a new sandbox, which will put a definitive end to cross-contamination.
Of course - by using a quarantine folder it should still be possible to download files.
Why not set up a 900-number or whatever applies to your area for incoming faxes? Or maybe use the caller-ID to bill the sender for processing cost? No caller-ID - No answer on that number.
Or just throw away the faxmachine - require signed emails instead or have a web interface where signed PDF:s can be uploaded. With a challenge/response on the web interface it will be tricky for anybody that want to spam you since they will have to do it manually...
There are a few problems running Linux in an embedded environment, but as far as I have seen the problems are more of the questions regarding power economy and ability to go into suspension and deep sleep for a defined period of time and then wake up and continue from where I was when I got to sleep.
There are already a surprising large amount of drivers around that actually works well on embedded devices as well, as long as you behave nicely and issues ordinary shutdowns. And if there isn't a device driver around - it's not that hard to write one!
Another problem is that the size of the kernel and support applications sometimes are a little large for an embedded solution.
if the cutting is done by heat then you may also consider the effect a cutting torch is having on steel where the majority of the residue is actually falling out away from the user.
On the other hand - a lightsaber may involve a different kind of physics where the material is actually displaced by other force and the light is actually only a visual representation caused by the displacement field.
Whatever - you have to study the physics of the StarWars universe first to come out with a solution to the problem.
Since I'm not familiar with the current regulations regarding voting in the US I have to ask the question: "Am I as a voter able to cast a vote without using a voting machine if I don't trust the voting machine?"
Anyway - I think that the regulations concerning gambling machines should be applied to voting machines as well.
Now there is actually somebody that has figured out that it's the thickness of the phone that is the major problem. Anyway - I'm still looking for a phone that is at most 10mm thick and with a casing in hard rubber. I wouldn't mind if the phone is a little wider and longer than today's phones since the current phones have a tendency to get stuck sideways in my breast pocket with the result that when I finally have succeeded in digging out the phone the caller has hung up...
And those clamshell phones - they aren't useful at all. You could as well put a tennis ball in your pocket instead... About the same comfort level...
is here to stay. One big mistake that is made already is that when a farm gets infected every bird is killed. This will interrupt the natural selection that allows the individuals that can survive the virus to propagate their genes. It may seem cruel, but if I have a stock that is able to survive the bird flu at the next hit I will be better off next time. Of corse that the farms has to be isolated, but that is relatively easy in western society.
Humankind has survived several pandemics already, like the black death that had a large impact in Europe during the middle ages. Of course it had a general impact on society, but the long-time effects weren't serious overall. Today we have a better knowledge about how diseases spread, and a cross-species infection is generally accepted. Use that knowledge, but let also evolution have it's way.
Slashdot Mirror
What all those DRM lobbyists don't realize is that they effectively CREATES a market for pirate copies by imposing the DRM. If it is overly complicated to circumvents then it is also worth some money investment to circumvent. Compare this to the alcohol legislation in the US during the 20s. It created a market for bootleggers and smugglers which fueled the organized crime.
And as I see it, DVD:s are sufficient for the majority of films that are produced. Only a very few films will actually benefit from a better format, but then we still need a better display than the ordinary flat panel we use. I'm not thinking about HDTV 1080p, but IMAX instead.
What I really want a better format than DVD for is actually file backups. With storage capacities in the terabyte range it's not good to make backups on DVD:s, and tapes aren't really god either since they are cumbersome to operate when restoring a specific file. So essentially - the HD-DVD and Blue-ray formats seems to be a blind alley like the laserdisc, Betamax and 8-track tapes.
Many other businesses and projects are today depending on the availability of the internet. You use it to get current documentation, you use it to promote your services and you use it to communiate between different parts of a project which today with internet access really allows you do run projects on multiple continents. Doing it right may even speed up things. Develop the software in Europe, test it in the US and do fault report management in Malaysia. (Not my idea actually). Gives a new meaning to 'daily builds'...
And the internet is also providing the ability for businesses to serve their own internal telephony in a cheap way without the need for expensive leased line arrangements. Setting up Asterisk servers with IAX2 communications may do the trick.
So YES the internet is vital today for businesses. Actually even more than ordinary telephony. The problem is that not all ISP:s have understood this yet and fails to set up the redundancy needed. One way around this may be to buy internet access from more than one ISP.
The point here is to catch on to better treatments because even if the depression-triggering factors are removed the depression may still be present and self-sustaining.
How many remebers the OKI 800, Commodore Pet, HP-85B, Osborne 1 or Luxor ABC80/800???
A lot of other computers has also been manufactured with different functionality. OK the bad thing was that they weren't standardized, but on the other hand, how funny is it really with all computers around running the same core hardware configuration...
In the 50's - Don't forget McCarthy and the anti-communist propaganda. And I agree that there is a lot of money-wasting in governments (not only the US). A government is there to serve it's citizens - not the other way around which all to often happens... The problem is that on one hand the government wants to be centralized which in the case of the US is that they want all agencys in the vicinity of DC (exceptions may exists for special cases). Attempt to re-locate agencies to other locations happens, but there is a downside of it - not all employees wants to move (family reasons etc.) and then there will be a drain of competence. (OK - if the government wants to downsize an agency - then they move it.) Anyway - by locating close to the source of energy that would save a lot energy and increase the reliability. The transmission losses in the electrical grid are considerable. (but compared to other types of energy actually acceptable) Some details that you may note are the cooling fins on the transformers, the noise you can hear from high-voltage electrical lines - especially during wet weather etc. And sure - using energy-effecient computer technology is also effective. Sometimes you get more bang with a dual-processor with laptop CPU:s than you get with a single-processor "full" cpu. The downside is that the size and the complexity of the equipment will rise along with the price tag. One problem that exists is that energy actually is far too cheap, which means that we have been stuck with our devices with low efficiency for a long time now. And it doesn't help that all software running on our computers is inefficient either. Just consider our favourite toy for speeding up our transition to the next world - the car. Gasoline engines are in the range of 20% while diesel engines can reach up to 45% (with variations of course). And don't trust the MPG figures either - your driving conditions will have a large impact. Some cars may actually consume less doing 65MPH than doing 30MPH. (I have noted this on a car with automatic gearbox where the transmission losses are humungous at lower speeds). So just start kick your local politican to inform them that cutting down on energy not necessarily means that you have to cut your living standard. Simple things - use flourescent light or even better - LED light - instead of the normal bulbs or halogen lamps. Some tweaking may be necessary - but nothing that's impossible. Be more flexible with the ventilation - full throttle may save time - but not energy. Using a variable-RPM fan and shutting of the sections of your house that you don't use can also save a lot. Air condition units that deploys their heat into the surrounding air isn't the most efficient cooling you can do. By using the AC to heat a swimmingpool instead (or whatever you like) you can make some use of that waste. The efficiency may actually also be improved if the condenser (the hot part of the AC) is sprayed with a fine mist of water, since evaporating water takes out a considerable amount of energy. And pre-cooling the air by seawater from deep seas/lakes is feasible in some cases. If you can't do that - consider drilling two wells of water in your backyard separated by several meters and then draw water from one and return the heated water to the other. During the winter - run it backwards. (depends on how the water flow is underground if it works during the winter). Doing a lot of things on a large scale may prove more efficient, but then it will take politicians and well....
are the customers - without competition we would have been paying a lot more for the power we get.
Of course - MySQL doesn't do the things you expect them all the time, but it is really good at what it does. I have tried PostgreSQL and wasn't very satisfied with it - performance like a slug or something compared to what you can get out of MySQL. The command-line UI wasn't that easy to work with either.
And still - the major issue that is causing problems doing maintenance of a web site - that is the core code that actually does the whole thing. It doesn't depend on that it's written under Linux, that you are using Apache or MySQL, but the last letter - PHP/Perl/JSP/whatever. The best way around it is to don't use a scripting language at all but a compiling language and do Java Servlets utilizing Apache ECS or whatever your favourite language is.
Downside is that still ECS is lacking some features that I would like to see, but it helps on the way anyway. By also checking the result with the HTML Validator you will get the best result. (but maybe not the flashiest)
By using a compiling language you will ensure that end-users doesn't get nasty surprises if a change is done to a file that was included by a zillion of other files. Of course - you will still have a few problems left, but that is more of a documentation issue.
Nothing new here - please move along...
So obviously there is a long way between reality and M$ Management. Considering all those commercials that M$ puts up right now about them "stopping viruses" and so on - It's on the level of almost being as good as a Monty Python play. Just consider that IE 6 (whet about earlier versions?) has been rated among the top-10 worst technologies provided to the public.
And here is some more of our favourite subject SPAM :-) .
In most cases you can actually do a lot with a self-signed certificate. Especially if your aim actually is just to provide encrypted web pages and handle secure emails within your organization.
And even if you are providing public services you actually don't need a commercial certificate - you can run your own CA, as long as you provide sufficient information to your customers about what the situation is and how they can add your services to their list of trusted services.
Anyway - it is actually an interesting piece of work. The original cube itself is also very nice. One must recognize that even the original cube does actually contain more than one solution. If you replace the stickers on an original cube with 6 different images then you will reduce the number of solutions to one single. The catch is that the center piece can on an original cube have four different positions that all are correct. This means that the original cube in theory actually has 4096 different solutions.
One variation on the 3D cube that I have been considering is actually doing a 5x5x5 cube instead. It is a mechanical challenge since it requires better precision to avoid falling apart.
And if you really have to stick with VB, you have to impose strict coding rules, like requiring "OPTION EXPLICIT" on ALL code, be strict about variable naming and so on.
Better be so strict about the rules that you actually end up with C#.
When it comes to programming there are actually two things to learn:
- Knowledge of the language and runtime libraries.
- Knowledge of the development tools.
So personally I think that it is best to learn the tools of the trade first with rather simple and stupid programs and then learn the language using the preferred IDE for the task.Anyway - when teaching a programming language there are two parts to consider too, and one is the language sematics and another is how to break down the language in useful modules. You can actually cut even more into the art of programming, but I think it is essentially to teach how to think modules since newbie programmers tends to think in a huge blob resulting in the famous spaghetti programming syndrome.
One advantage of an IDE like Eclipse is that it has support for breaking out code to a separate java method with a simple operation. Other IDE:s may have similar functions.
And don't forget to mention programming style, which is important, especially the generic variable naming shortcuts that can be taken (i,j,k,i0,i1 etc) for index variables instead of longname index variables that tends to clutter the code.
When it comes to code formatting I think that the guidelines offered by JavaRanch is a good start. Most formatting rules can actually be applied cross-language. Any decent IDE will allow you to do code formatting and can be configured to the preferred style.
Some fixes are more critical than others and has to be prioritized during a build. The good thing is that as soon as it is in the main branch of a version control system then it's in and will pop up sooner or later.
buy an XBox at all? Most games are available for PC as well, and one way to actually stop manufacturers from limiting the options for users is to avoid closed systems like closed game consoles.
So anyone not using SMTPS (if you need to log in when sending emails) and POP3S/IMAPS should actually think again. This will at least make things a little harder for the bad guys that wants access to your accounts.
And another thing to consider - Encryption technology is useful for hiding information in an obvious way, but obfuscation is better when you want to be really secret. Steganography or use of different names in various conversations so that it is context-dependent. If you can't convince them - confuse them.
You can go back to the cold war era with spies and secrets. The various ways that were used to propagate information and diversions are actually still valid today. 99% of all information propagated isn't critical, it's the 1% that is. And sometimes it's even better to spread the most critical information in clear text since the other side can't really believe that it's true.
There is a story of a british agent that were captured somewhere by the german forces in the second world war just before D day, and as soon as they asked him where the landings were to be he provided them with the correct information, but they didn't belive him and when pressed he gave them false information. - I don't know if it's a true story, but it's a good one.
Of course - some browsers fails anyway, but in that case it is more a problem of the browser than anything else. If it is a major browser that fails (usually IE) then there are ways around that problem, and maybe your design is formally correct, but not semantically correct. Designing a web page is like writing - you can mix words wildly and get a grammatically correct sentence, but it may come out as complete nonsense.
And if you still have problems with a browser - use a warning on your web page that indicates that the browser in question doesn't adhere to standards.
One example is Internet Explorer (at least up to version 6, I don't know about IE7) that can't handle transparent PNG images. Looks like shit if you use transparent PNG:s and IE. And in that case it isn't even in the scope of W3C.
So adhering to standards and using the validation tools available will be counted as "best effort". By testing against a certain browser and accepting the layout as acceptable is way below "best effort" since what will happen if the browser is updated and it then provides a different result?
Really good for a noisy environment - just put them on and you can run any fan you like in your PC! :->
Too often I see things done in Java (or whatever language) that I made mistakes about in early Basic programming stages. The advantage with programming in Basic (not VB or something like that) is that you get the instant feedback and all bread and butter is already there so it's no need to declare a mountain before you climb it.
Of course - Basic isn't a good language when it comes to design skills, but it's a good language when it comes to learning the fundamentals.
Not too long ago Pascal (Classic style) was involved in the learning curve of programs, and it's actually not a bad language, but a little aged. Anyway - the step from Basic to Pascal isn't very large. And with Pacal you can actually do some design work too by modularization which classic Basic doesn't allow you.
The step to C from Pascal is a little larger, since it will require the programmer to consider two major things; Which include file to use and how pointers works. (and a pile of other small issues too). But if you have done Pascal before C you will have learnt a lot about structuring your code.
And the downside today is that there is no easy starting language. Visual Basic isn't easy to learn, and I wouldn't recommend it for beginners since it's permitting too much that can be considered bad manner. Classic Basic isn't really good here either, but you are at least limited to differ between Integers, Floats and Strings while VB is also having a big pile of objects with unknown properties to make a mess with.
Windows lacks sufficient possibilities to allow a user to execute different applications with diffferent privileges in an easy way. (there are a few third-party tools that can drop your rights).
Some applications need more rights than other. A few varies from time to time what they need. If the web browser were to be executed in a hidden sandbox then it would be a lot easier to catch malicious effects. Every start of the web browser would mean a new sandbox, which will put a definitive end to cross-contamination.
Of course - by using a quarantine folder it should still be possible to download files.
Or just throw away the faxmachine - require signed emails instead or have a web interface where signed PDF:s can be uploaded. With a challenge/response on the web interface it will be tricky for anybody that want to spam you since they will have to do it manually...
There are already a surprising large amount of drivers around that actually works well on embedded devices as well, as long as you behave nicely and issues ordinary shutdowns. And if there isn't a device driver around - it's not that hard to write one!
Another problem is that the size of the kernel and support applications sometimes are a little large for an embedded solution.
On the other hand - a lightsaber may involve a different kind of physics where the material is actually displaced by other force and the light is actually only a visual representation caused by the displacement field.
Whatever - you have to study the physics of the StarWars universe first to come out with a solution to the problem.
Since I'm not familiar with the current regulations regarding voting in the US I have to ask the question: "Am I as a voter able to cast a vote without using a voting machine if I don't trust the voting machine?"
Anyway - I think that the regulations concerning gambling machines should be applied to voting machines as well.
And those clamshell phones - they aren't useful at all. You could as well put a tennis ball in your pocket instead... About the same comfort level...
Hmmm... Flamebait? - maybe....
Humankind has survived several pandemics already, like the black death that had a large impact in Europe during the middle ages. Of course it had a general impact on society, but the long-time effects weren't serious overall. Today we have a better knowledge about how diseases spread, and a cross-species infection is generally accepted. Use that knowledge, but let also evolution have it's way.