You're kind of proving the point that Linux isn't ready for the desktop. People who buy a Windows desktop generally get things working. People who end up with Linux are geeks, or being hand held by a geek. The "fact" that he bought the "wrong" TV and didn't have time or patience or desire to work with you on drivers absolutely proves the point.
My mother, who is 90, runs linux. Nobody would describe her as a geek.
I don't know why you were down modded, because you are correct. Yes, security is a big issue, but is it really up to my browser to determine what sites I am permitted to see or not? Instead of prohibiting a site with SHA-1, at best the browser should intercept the call and display a message that the site might not be secure. The browser's job is to display content, not to determine what sites a person I or anybody else might want to use. SHA-1 site? Fine, warn me, but it should still be my decision if I want to view it or not.
Yeah, the vehicle in question is a late 90s pickup. However, in the 20 years of its predecessor, never once was there a problem with the cable version. Even stepping motors is technology looking for a problem to solve.
I know that BMW and other high end vehicles use a HUD for GPS info. It doesn't show all that is on the GPS screen, but does tell that you will be turning or exiting in such and such distance and the street name. GPS aren't really the problem. Fiddling with them, while driving is. And like you, I tend to plan out my trip in advance -- besides, it seems the GPS is never up to date with detours and road construction and it is really irritating to keep hearing "Make a legal u-turn" or "You are driving in a restricted area."
There is a reason why every manufacture installed GPS starts up with a warning telling you not to program it while the car is moving. Then again, it seems simple enough, that it should be able to figure out the car is moving and disallow changing it. But, what consumer would want a system like that? No, the warning is to protect the manufacturer, so they can say "We told you so" because they know it is inherently dangerous.
Except that the there are studies that show those in dash LCDs are more dangerous than even talking on a cell phone. Take in dash GPS - you have to look down and away from the road to see what is going on. The old Tom Tom's and Garmins tended to be mounted above the dash where one could quickly see it without much movement. Phones can be mounted like that, too, except their screens are usually too small to see the details.
All of that said, any of them still beat trying to look at a map while driving.
That is a great point, I would far rather that a car be refined to have amazing mechanical systems where tolerances were such that over 100k miles not a creak would be heard from dash or other panels in the car. I would love the placement of dials and controls to be carefully thought out and more money spent on visibility and UX... instead we'll get 18 speakers and a few more ambient color-changing LED's. Sigh.
The heck with even 100K miles. My wife's car has electronic steering where a sensor determines how far to turn the wheels. Guess what failed while going down the highway at 70mph! Or on my car, instead of the vents being controlled by a cable to the dash controls, they dash controls tell a computer to engage a servo to use a vacuum to open and close the vents. That was a $600 repair that should not have been needed. Don't get me wrong, technology is great, but technology for the sake of technology, when a good mechanical system exists, is plain stupid.
Research dollars would be better spent on make better fuel efficient, safer more economical vehicles, than adding infotainment systems and electronic bling.
How far we've come... Remember back in the early 90s? All we dreamed about was cramming a computer into everything.
But with experience, our optimism has cooled a bit, hasn't it?
And we're the PRO-tech guys.
Well at least we got a little out of it, if you compare public perception of computers today with that of our childhood; back then, people really were afraid that monstrous computers would become all-knowing. Today, common people have realized that computers are NOT intelligent, are rather fragile and consequently have an appreciation of the gulf between what computers are and what they used to be afraid of.
Computers didn't become all knowing , but big business and government, through the use of those computers did. I'd say those scared folks were pretty much on the mark.
I also can't install many of the newer apps on it because its firmware revision is too ancient(?!).
I thought "maybe if I go to the telephone vendor and ask if they can upgrade the firmware"
"Naw, we can't update it, buy a new phone"
I'm afraid that in the future, that will be a car makers answer, too. Ford likes to advertise that 80% of all Fords F-150s are still on the road, or whatever the number is. But, they also know that means that they aren't selling new trucks to those people. Vehicles have gotten to the point where if they are maintained, they can be reliable transportation for 20 years or more and hundreds of thousands of miles.
In the future, it won't be you need a new car because the current one is worn out. It will be because we stopped offering software updates for it. In short, like iOS and Android, the manufacturers will simply cease to support older vehicles and you will be forced to upgrade to a new one.
It doesn't matter the weight of the bus. It does matter the weight of the bus spread over the contact area of the tires. Then you need to factor in the type of suspension and the speed of travel before you can calculate the forces applied to the pavement.
That said, what bus weights 22 tons? Most full size buses in the US, with passengers come in at 12-14 tons. Of course if the 40 passengers on that bus each drove, in succession, then there would be an addition 60 tons of vehicles (assuming each car was 3,000lbs).
Note, the weight of the people also would apply to each calculation, but even if each weight 200lbs, that would be adding 4 tons to each calculation. In addition, a bus will have a 400hp engine to move those 40 people, versus 40 200hp engines in the cars, which is why the average bus would consume far less fuel and have a smaller carbon footprint than 40 vehicles, but that is a separate discussion.
What state allows one to stop and backup on a ramp, effectively driving the wrong direction, and not be ticketed? Regardless of whether he was ticketed or not, does not mean the insurance pays. Also, one example does not actually prove a point.
As for the deer example, we aren't talking about panic stops, we are talking about an abrupt stop at a traffic light as it turns. Your Europe example is valid, however, so are the many states in the US that have no fault insurance and regardless of who is at fault, it is the owner of each vehicle whose insurance pays. As such, even if the autonomous vehicle is rear ended, it is the insurance for the autonomous vehicle that will go up.
The discussion is whose insurance would go up in one of these abrupt stops, not who would be ticketed. There are many things that don't get a ticket but do raise your insurance rates.
There is no doubt that DMV offices accross the country can be more efficient. However, The data collected is useful. For instance, where do the legal authorities get their information about licenses and registration? That database that DMV maintains. Property taxes use that information as do insurance companies. There is a cost to maintaining those systems along with paying wages, benefits, taxes, etc. for the employees.
As for driver testing, it, too, can probably be approved, but then again, there is still a cost and it is up to your state's legislature and DMV to redo it. While inefficient, it is still probably better than no testing.
As for being designed to extract money from your wallet, blame your legislature. In this era of no new taxes, they keep adding user fees. DMV licensing fee increases are a direct result of that.
A single 40 passenger urban transit bus does the same damage to the pavement as several thousand cars at the same speed. Heavy trucks do even more (damage is related to the 5th power of axle loading multiplied by speed)
This means that pushing more people into mass transit can have some unexpected effects on road longevity, but urban planners should have already taken that into account.
No, a bus doesn't, but a heavy truck does. You can google it if you want details.
"if an autonomous vehicle is twice as likely to be rear ended than a non-autonomous vehicle"
When a car is rear ended, unless you're from Mars, the legal position is that it is _ENTIRELY_ the fault of the following driver, no matter what the lead driver did, even if that was a panic stop for no reason on an freeway onramp
(The exact scenario above has happened to me - the "what the F?" reaction slowed me from hitting the brake enough that I did rear end the idiot (unlicensed and uninsured as it turned out) despite being at legal following distance, but it was still my fault for not stopping and my insurance company ate all the costs, including repairs to the car that was illegally on the road (it's a criminal offence here to drive without insurance, let alone without a license and cars are supposed to be impounded on the spot when caught but police didn't bother) and fighting off the driver and passenger's attempts to claim whiplash injuries.
Which means that (just as it is now) the raised insurance charges will go on the meatsack who didn't stop in time, not the computer which did.
You would think that would be the case, but you would be wrong. You have to have a valid reason for slamming on the brakes and causing an accident or your insurance will be paying. Try it for yourself and see what happens.
Without a breakthrough in battery technology, electric vehicles are a pipe dream, at least in the US. People simply are too spread out and need to drive too much. To be feasible, they need a 200 mile range and a 10 minute recharge. That technology simply doesn't exist today and isn't on the horizon.
A generator/electric car will use 75% less fuel than a current vehicle. So, even if the miracle breakthrough comes through, it would only drop another 5% from today's vehicles. As such, we are faced with hoping for a miracle breakthrough or doing something feasible right now.
Why use the battery at all? Diesel locomotives have been around for a very long time. The diesel engine turns an alternator (or generator) which powers electric traction motors. In a car, you wouldn't need a diesel. A small gas engine, optimized for it's most efficient rpm turning a generator to power the electric motor would do fine. Problem is, since it isn't zero emissions, the environmentalists won't go for it. On the other hand, neither is the power plant that generates electricity to recharge all of those batteries.
Musk is smart. The more competition he has in electric car manufacturers, the less is his share in the infrastructure of recharging stations, battery building, and the research and tech behind it all. The more companies that jump on the electric car path, the easier it is for him to sell cars (though he seems a little more high minded than that which is why I like him).
Musk is smart, but not for the reasons you mention. No, Musk is smart and has invested heavily in components required for EV. Every EV that Volkswagen would sell would be profit to him.
Thunderbird isn't approaching end of life. If anything, it is about to open up. The TB developers were frustrated by having to maintain compatibility with Firefox technologies that don't really apply to TB. They, the developers, were the ones who suggested Mozilla let them go to another entity. This isn't about finding a replacement for a dieing Thunderbird, but for Thunderbird being able to chart its own direction free from Firefox influence.
If you are refering to the odd curve in the US interstate system, they are placed there on purpose to keep the driver alert. The concern when laying out the interstate system was that long straight highways would lead to fatigue and accidents, so the curves were inserted as an intentional feature.
With regards to driving as safe as people feel physically safe, that is false. Here is a test to try. Take a stretch of highway where people regularly drive over the speed limit. Now park a police car on the shoulder -- people will slow down, even though their physical safety has not changed. While one does take into account how safe they feel while driving, ie. slowing down in the rain. When talking about driving over the speed limit, it has been shown that lack of enforcement of the speed limit is the major factor. In short, it's not that people drive as fast as they think safe, but as fast as they think they can get away with.
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All monopolies are creations of governments. They don't exist in a free market.
Governments may allow monopolies to exist, but they do not create them. Likewise, there is nothing in a free market to prevent them.
Governments are supposed to look out for the needs of the common good. Industry looks out for the needs of the shareholder.
Maybe we could have a Patriot Act OS version for the US. It will keep us safe from the terrorists.
What makes you think we don't?
Don't forget to fudge the data if it doesn't match your predictions. It isn't science, but it sure makes some people a lot of money.
Of course, that is also true with things like dark energy and dark matter and many other scientific predictions, so what's your point?
You're kind of proving the point that Linux isn't ready for the desktop. People who buy a Windows desktop generally get things working. People who end up with Linux are geeks, or being hand held by a geek. The "fact" that he bought the "wrong" TV and didn't have time or patience or desire to work with you on drivers absolutely proves the point.
My mother, who is 90, runs linux. Nobody would describe her as a geek.
Or my 2001 ranger with 312,000 miles and the only thing I have changed on the engine other than regular maintenance is the water pump.
Ford Ranger is actually a Mazda B3000 or B4000 depending which model of Ranger.
I don't know why you were down modded, because you are correct. Yes, security is a big issue, but is it really up to my browser to determine what sites I am permitted to see or not? Instead of prohibiting a site with SHA-1, at best the browser should intercept the call and display a message that the site might not be secure. The browser's job is to display content, not to determine what sites a person I or anybody else might want to use. SHA-1 site? Fine, warn me, but it should still be my decision if I want to view it or not.
Yeah, the vehicle in question is a late 90s pickup. However, in the 20 years of its predecessor, never once was there a problem with the cable version. Even stepping motors is technology looking for a problem to solve.
I know that BMW and other high end vehicles use a HUD for GPS info. It doesn't show all that is on the GPS screen, but does tell that you will be turning or exiting in such and such distance and the street name. GPS aren't really the problem. Fiddling with them, while driving is. And like you, I tend to plan out my trip in advance -- besides, it seems the GPS is never up to date with detours and road construction and it is really irritating to keep hearing "Make a legal u-turn" or "You are driving in a restricted area."
There is a reason why every manufacture installed GPS starts up with a warning telling you not to program it while the car is moving. Then again, it seems simple enough, that it should be able to figure out the car is moving and disallow changing it. But, what consumer would want a system like that? No, the warning is to protect the manufacturer, so they can say "We told you so" because they know it is inherently dangerous.
Except that the there are studies that show those in dash LCDs are more dangerous than even talking on a cell phone. Take in dash GPS - you have to look down and away from the road to see what is going on. The old Tom Tom's and Garmins tended to be mounted above the dash where one could quickly see it without much movement. Phones can be mounted like that, too, except their screens are usually too small to see the details.
All of that said, any of them still beat trying to look at a map while driving.
That is a great point, I would far rather that a car be refined to have amazing mechanical systems where tolerances were such that over 100k miles not a creak would be heard from dash or other panels in the car. I would love the placement of dials and controls to be carefully thought out and more money spent on visibility and UX... instead we'll get 18 speakers and a few more ambient color-changing LED's. Sigh.
The heck with even 100K miles. My wife's car has electronic steering where a sensor determines how far to turn the wheels. Guess what failed while going down the highway at 70mph! Or on my car, instead of the vents being controlled by a cable to the dash controls, they dash controls tell a computer to engage a servo to use a vacuum to open and close the vents. That was a $600 repair that should not have been needed. Don't get me wrong, technology is great, but technology for the sake of technology, when a good mechanical system exists, is plain stupid.
Research dollars would be better spent on make better fuel efficient, safer more economical vehicles, than adding infotainment systems and electronic bling.
How far we've come...
Remember back in the early 90s? All we dreamed about was cramming a computer into everything.
But with experience, our optimism has cooled a bit, hasn't it?
And we're the PRO-tech guys.
Well at least we got a little out of it, if you compare public perception of computers today with that of our childhood; back then, people really were afraid that monstrous computers would become all-knowing. Today, common people have realized that computers are NOT intelligent, are rather fragile and consequently have an appreciation of the gulf between what computers are and what they used to be afraid of.
Computers didn't become all knowing , but big business and government, through the use of those computers did. I'd say those scared folks were pretty much on the mark.
I also can't install many of the newer apps on it because its firmware revision is too ancient(?!).
I thought "maybe if I go to the telephone vendor and ask if they can upgrade the firmware"
"Naw, we can't update it, buy a new phone"
I'm afraid that in the future, that will be a car makers answer, too. Ford likes to advertise that 80% of all Fords F-150s are still on the road, or whatever the number is. But, they also know that means that they aren't selling new trucks to those people. Vehicles have gotten to the point where if they are maintained, they can be reliable transportation for 20 years or more and hundreds of thousands of miles.
In the future, it won't be you need a new car because the current one is worn out. It will be because we stopped offering software updates for it. In short, like iOS and Android, the manufacturers will simply cease to support older vehicles and you will be forced to upgrade to a new one.
It doesn't matter the weight of the bus. It does matter the weight of the bus spread over the contact area of the tires. Then you need to factor in the type of suspension and the speed of travel before you can calculate the forces applied to the pavement.
That said, what bus weights 22 tons? Most full size buses in the US, with passengers come in at 12-14 tons. Of course if the 40 passengers on that bus each drove, in succession, then there would be an addition 60 tons of vehicles (assuming each car was 3,000lbs).
Note, the weight of the people also would apply to each calculation, but even if each weight 200lbs, that would be adding 4 tons to each calculation. In addition, a bus will have a 400hp engine to move those 40 people, versus 40 200hp engines in the cars, which is why the average bus would consume far less fuel and have a smaller carbon footprint than 40 vehicles, but that is a separate discussion.
What state allows one to stop and backup on a ramp, effectively driving the wrong direction, and not be ticketed? Regardless of whether he was ticketed or not, does not mean the insurance pays. Also, one example does not actually prove a point.
As for the deer example, we aren't talking about panic stops, we are talking about an abrupt stop at a traffic light as it turns. Your Europe example is valid, however, so are the many states in the US that have no fault insurance and regardless of who is at fault, it is the owner of each vehicle whose insurance pays. As such, even if the autonomous vehicle is rear ended, it is the insurance for the autonomous vehicle that will go up.
The discussion is whose insurance would go up in one of these abrupt stops, not who would be ticketed. There are many things that don't get a ticket but do raise your insurance rates.
There is no doubt that DMV offices accross the country can be more efficient. However, The data collected is useful. For instance, where do the legal authorities get their information about licenses and registration? That database that DMV maintains. Property taxes use that information as do insurance companies. There is a cost to maintaining those systems along with paying wages, benefits, taxes, etc. for the employees.
As for driver testing, it, too, can probably be approved, but then again, there is still a cost and it is up to your state's legislature and DMV to redo it. While inefficient, it is still probably better than no testing.
As for being designed to extract money from your wallet, blame your legislature. In this era of no new taxes, they keep adding user fees. DMV licensing fee increases are a direct result of that.
OMG! What's next? How long until we have to pay a fee to register our cars!?
"and reduces wear and tear on the pavement."
A single 40 passenger urban transit bus does the same damage to the pavement as several thousand cars at the same speed.
Heavy trucks do even more (damage is related to the 5th power of axle loading multiplied by speed)
This means that pushing more people into mass transit can have some unexpected effects on road longevity, but urban planners should have already taken that into account.
No, a bus doesn't, but a heavy truck does. You can google it if you want details.
"if an autonomous vehicle is twice as likely to be rear ended than a non-autonomous vehicle"
When a car is rear ended, unless you're from Mars, the legal position is that it is _ENTIRELY_ the fault of the following driver, no matter what the lead driver did, even if that was a panic stop for no reason on an freeway onramp
(The exact scenario above has happened to me - the "what the F?" reaction slowed me from hitting the brake enough that I did rear end the idiot (unlicensed and uninsured as it turned out) despite being at legal following distance, but it was still my fault for not stopping and my insurance company ate all the costs, including repairs to the car that was illegally on the road (it's a criminal offence here to drive without insurance, let alone without a license and cars are supposed to be impounded on the spot when caught but police didn't bother) and fighting off the driver and passenger's attempts to claim whiplash injuries.
Which means that (just as it is now) the raised insurance charges will go on the meatsack who didn't stop in time, not the computer which did.
You would think that would be the case, but you would be wrong. You have to have a valid reason for slamming on the brakes and causing an accident or your insurance will be paying. Try it for yourself and see what happens.
Without a breakthrough in battery technology, electric vehicles are a pipe dream, at least in the US. People simply are too spread out and need to drive too much. To be feasible, they need a 200 mile range and a 10 minute recharge. That technology simply doesn't exist today and isn't on the horizon.
A generator/electric car will use 75% less fuel than a current vehicle. So, even if the miracle breakthrough comes through, it would only drop another 5% from today's vehicles. As such, we are faced with hoping for a miracle breakthrough or doing something feasible right now.
Why use the battery at all? Diesel locomotives have been around for a very long time. The diesel engine turns an alternator (or generator) which powers electric traction motors. In a car, you wouldn't need a diesel. A small gas engine, optimized for it's most efficient rpm turning a generator to power the electric motor would do fine. Problem is, since it isn't zero emissions, the environmentalists won't go for it. On the other hand, neither is the power plant that generates electricity to recharge all of those batteries.
Musk is smart. The more competition he has in electric car manufacturers, the less is his share in the infrastructure of recharging stations, battery building, and the research and tech behind it all. The more companies that jump on the electric car path, the easier it is for him to sell cars (though he seems a little more high minded than that which is why I like him).
Musk is smart, but not for the reasons you mention. No, Musk is smart and has invested heavily in components required for EV. Every EV that Volkswagen would sell would be profit to him.
Thunderbird isn't approaching end of life. If anything, it is about to open up. The TB developers were frustrated by having to maintain compatibility with Firefox technologies that don't really apply to TB. They, the developers, were the ones who suggested Mozilla let them go to another entity. This isn't about finding a replacement for a dieing Thunderbird, but for Thunderbird being able to chart its own direction free from Firefox influence.
This is a good thing, a very good thing!
If you are refering to the odd curve in the US interstate system, they are placed there on purpose to keep the driver alert. The concern when laying out the interstate system was that long straight highways would lead to fatigue and accidents, so the curves were inserted as an intentional feature.
With regards to driving as safe as people feel physically safe, that is false. Here is a test to try. Take a stretch of highway where people regularly drive over the speed limit. Now park a police car on the shoulder -- people will slow down, even though their physical safety has not changed. While one does take into account how safe they feel while driving, ie. slowing down in the rain. When talking about driving over the speed limit, it has been shown that lack of enforcement of the speed limit is the major factor. In short, it's not that people drive as fast as they think safe, but as fast as they think they can get away with.