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User: flargleblarg

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  1. Re:Optimized for Macbook Air on Intel Haswell CPUs Debut, Put To the Test · · Score: 1

    A MacBook Air in typical use uses 10 to 20 Watts, but let's say for the sake of discussion that it uses the full 45 Watts of its power adapter. If you left it plugged in 24x7 for a month, drawing that much electricity, you would use about 33 kilowatts, or about $0.50 in electricity. So your figure of "If it saves you $50 in electricity per month" is off by a factor of 100 to 300.

  2. Re:trig on Ask Slashdot: How Important Is Advanced Math In a CS Degree? · · Score: 1

    Actually, you need both. If you're doing angular acceleration, say, a ship that's firing thrusters to rotate around its center of gravity, then you have to keep the orientation of the ship as an angle (in radians, say), and also its angular velocity, and you apply its angular acceleration to that angular velocity. That part simply can't be done as pure Cartesian vectors. Then, when you fire forward thrusters, you take the angular orientation and convert that to a Cartesian vector which you use when applying the thrust force to obtain a Cartesian acceleration vector.

    So most of the time (like 99%) you can simply use Cartesian vectors for everything. But you still need trig functions for some stuff. It's inescapable.

  3. Re:Anyone? on IBM Takes System/z To the Cloud With COBOL Update · · Score: 1

    3 {(Die) show} repeat

  4. Re:What's the difference? on DRM In HTML5 — Better Than the Alternative? · · Score: 1

    You seem to be assuming that content decryption keys would be the same across all copies of a digitally downloaded item. I think that is a false assumption. If an upstream content provider encrypts each stream differently for different destinations (e.g., viewers), then it is irrelevant whether the DRM mechanism is implemented as closed-source or open-source software. You will need to know your unique key for that particular viewing in order to decrypt the content. The only thing open-source might buy you there is an easier time finding some algorithmic flaw in the encryption method. But that is highly doubtful, and even if it were to happen, the content provider could simply change the encryption method on you at any time to patch the hole.

  5. Re:What's the difference? on DRM In HTML5 — Better Than the Alternative? · · Score: 1

    I don't think it's true that DRM in the browser requires a closed-source browser. If the content provider encrypted their content on a per-stream, per-user, per-viewing basis, then you could not simply redirect or strip off the DRM. You would atually need to purchase a one-use decryption key from the content provider.

    Now, that doesn't prevent you from recording the content and redistributing it DRM-free, but certainly nothing in the above requires a closed-source model of any sort.

  6. Re:Confused on Integer Overflow Bug Leads To Diablo III Gold Duping · · Score: 5, Interesting

    You couldn't be more wrong. Signed ints are usually the best way to go in C/C++.

    Actually, he's not wrong at all. He said signed integers don't behave in a very predictable manner, and he's right. Signed integers have undefined (actually, to be more precise, implementation-defined) behavior for mod and div of negative values. You cannot be sure whether -4 / 3 is -1 or -2, without knowing how your compiler implements it. Some round toward zero, others toward negative infinity. Recent drafts of C++ are trying to fix this.

  7. Re:I wrote a CFF renderer in C# on Google and Adobe Contribute Open Source Rasterizer to FreeType · · Score: 4, Informative

    Well, no. Hints are metadata embedded in the font file which provide hints/clues to the rasterizer. The rasterizer then uses the hints to improve its own selective varying of the proportions. You can do selectively varying of proportions without hints. The hints just improve the process.

    Finally, hinting is not the process of varying proportions. It's not even remotely that. Hinting is the process of adding hints to a font. A font designer takes a typeface and hints the font manually. Note that there are algorithms to assist with hint generation... hinting the hinting, if you will.

  8. Re:Now where's the cheap monitors? on High End Graphics Cards Tested At 4K Resolutions · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's not double, it's quadruple, which is why it's called 4k.

    Quadruple is ***NOT*** why it's called 4k.

    "4k" is short for 4000, e.g, pixels. The "4" in 4000 has absolutely nothing to do with the quadrupling. It's merely a coincidence.

  9. Re:hmmm on WWDC Sells Out In 2 Minutes; Ticket On eBay 45 Minutes Later · · Score: 1

    The keynote isn't simulcast live, but it is usually up within a couple hours. The sessions are usually up within a week or so.

  10. Re:Throw away email account on Israel Airport Security Allowed To Read Tourists' Email · · Score: 2

    Doubtful that NewEgg is spamming you. If you've purchased things there, then what they're sending you is targeted marketing, not spam. Spam is random garbage. You can opt out of NewEgg mailings; you cannot opt out of spam.

  11. Re:Conversion on Is Bitcoin Mining a Real-World Environmental Problem? · · Score: 2

    "About 982 megawatt hours a day, to be exact"
    982 MWh/day / 24 = ~41 megawatts
    Come on reporters, convert brain-dead units into normal units.

    Yeah, we want it 1.21 GW/day units, e.g., how many bolts of lighting per day.

  12. Re:I'll miss the old school special effects on Classic BBC Sci-fi Series Blake's 7 To Return On Syfy Channel · · Score: 1

    That is fucked up.

  13. Re:so old it must be replaced... on Extended TeX: Past, Present, and Future · · Score: 1

    Funny? It's actually largely true — and should be marked Insightful.

  14. Re:Maybe I'm not reading this right, but on SkyDrive 3.0: Microsoft Gave Up Fighting Apple's 30% Cut · · Score: 1

    I hate to be the one to have to break this to you, but 30% off of $1.30 is $0.91, not $1.00.

  15. Re:Laptop 7200rpm drives discontinued on New Seagate Hybrid Drives Hampered By Slow Mechanical Guts · · Score: 1

    Mod parent up! Awesome.

  16. Re:Swtor on Disney Closes LucasArts · · Score: -1, Redundant

    I am a subscriber. Will the servers shutdown?

    No, but they might shut down.

  17. Re:Fanboy attack on Alan Kay Says iPad Betrays Xerox PARC Vision · · Score: 1

    It really depends what you're doing. I happen to largely agree with you, but there are some good music and art applications out there. Also, if you're writing, say, a novel, then you can attach a bluetooth keyboard and be completely fine. I myself haven't done this, but it stands to reason, and others confirm that it works for them.

  18. Re:Fanboy attack on Alan Kay Says iPad Betrays Xerox PARC Vision · · Score: 1

    Parents.

  19. Re:Who else? on Apple Loses the iPad Mini Trademark · · Score: 1

    So while Samsung might not be able to name a product "iPad", they *CAN* name a product "iPad Mini".

    No, it does not mean that. At all.

    It means that Samsung can name a product Galaxy Mini.

  20. Leaped by 30%? *YAWN* on Animation Sophistication: The Croods Required 80 Million Compute Hours · · Score: 1

    I don't wanna sound like an ass, but "leaped by 30%" is not a leap. At the rate hard drive sizes have been increasing over the past 30 years, a 30% increase (e.g, 1.3x) is simply 7 months of industry progress. Wake me up when something leaps by 10x in size, not 1.3x.

  21. Re:chicken or egg? on GCC 4.8.0 Release Marks Completion of C++ Migration · · Score: 1

    Damn, that is cool. Thanks for sharing.

  22. Re:I don't like boost on Comparing the C++ Standard and Boost · · Score: 1

    bool CRC32_Init()
    unsigned int crc32_buffer( const unsigned char *pData, int nLength )

    Why do you use uppercase in the first function name and lowercase in the second function name?

  23. I must be tired... on Sunstone Unearthed From Sixteenth Century Shipwreck · · Score: 2

    I misread that headline at first as:

    Smartphone Unearthed From Sixteenth Century Shipwreck

  24. Re:What does StackOverflow run on? on Developers May Be Getting 50% of Their Documentation From Stack Overflow · · Score: 1

    Your code has a terrible, horrific bug. You're throwing away the array values.

    Here is what you want:

    my @outputarray = sort keys %{{ map {$_=>1} @inputarray }};

  25. Re:Chips are "reprogrammable" on Magnetic Transistor Could Cut Power Consumption and Make Chips Reprogrammable · · Score: 2

    Sorry, but CPUs have had microprogrammed instruction codes for decades.

    Sorry, but microprogrammed instruction codes are still several layers above the transistor switch level.