Ars Technica, who is that? Oh yes, that's one of those annoying sites I don't read anymore, because they insist upon breaking every story into a dozen pages so they can push more ads.
Hey Ars, here's some advice:
(buy Brawndo capacitors - they got electrolytics, its what current craves!) (1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
Rather than making me search for a Print link
(Buy BigJuggs Disks - you KNOW what you want to store!) (1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
So that I can read your site quickly
(Play NoLife for free for the next three minutes- only $123.99!) (1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
and actually use ALL of my screen, instead of just the middle
(Host your site on NotWorking Pollution!) (1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
why don't you put it on one page
(Microsoft, we aren't sociopathic monopolists, we just act like one) (1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
And see if that works. (visit our sister site ICanHasContent!) (1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
(post us to Wastebook!) (Post us to Shovel!) (Post us to DidntReadIt!) (Post us to NoLife!) (1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
ALL people remember what is important to them, and do so by relating it to things they already understand. We software types can relate messages like "too few file descriptors" to things we understand - WE know what a "file descriptor" is. Imagine that the error message instead said something like "LO VCO UNLOCK", or "Wrong mode for DX window": while some of the people here might understand those messages, unless you are a radio guy they are meaningless, and you have nothing in your world experience to which to relate them. I'm sure many of you can add your own problem-domain specific errors here.
Adding error numbers: "Error -522: LO VCO UNLOCK" doesn't help - unless the number "-522" has some special meaning to you, you still won't be able to relate it to your world.
However, thinks like puppies, colors (save for those who are color blind), and simple shapes are things most people can relate to. So the idea of "[image of sad puppy] LO VCO UNLOCK" can resonate with users of all stripes.
I'd suggest that any such errors log the details, even across runs, and that there be a way to retrieve the error data and send it onward to you as well.
"I work on an embedded medical device and we use Elo touch screens (www.elotouch.com). Technically, the devices don't require drivers at all - just plug-into USB or serial. You do need the drivers if you want to run the calibration, or use any of the fancy features."
Considering that without calibration, where you touch won't match AT ALL where the system thinks you are touching, thus voiding most of the utility of a touchscreen, I think drivers are somewhat important.
Moreover, I have seen too many touchscreen devices that: 1) Don't ID themselves as a HID, but some non-standard device 2) ID as a touchscreen, but incorrectly report their data on non-standard axis (e.g. on the rudder and throttle axis rather than X and Y). 3) ID as a touchscreen, but then send packets that are NOT the standard HID packets.
I've been trying to find touchscreens to incorporate into an embedded system, and few of the touchscreen vendors have drivers for anything other than Windows - as such they get eliminated from my consideration.
I've just check Displax's site, and a search for "linux" gives no hits - so either: a) They are just doing the actual sensing system, and letting somebody else build the actual interface chips or b) They only support Windows.
Which makes them a non-starter in my line of work.
I'm holding out for 1000 miles per charge, and no, I am not being facetious. I think THAT will be the real game changer, and here's why:
One thousand miles is pretty much the limit on what you can drive in one day - that's getting on the Interstate and just rolling, with minimal stops, for about 12 hours. I don't know about anybody else, but I find that's pretty much the limit for me.
Now, let us consider a car with 400 mile per charge range - that's about what most gas or diesel cars can get on a tank of fuel. You have to refuel about 3 times a day, more or less. Right now, the average gas car can refuel in about 4 minutes from the time you pull up to the pump to the time you pull away (and that's assuming a slow pump and a big tank).
OK, first, consider what happens when you extend the refuel time from 4 minutes to 16 minutes - which is still a pretty fast charge time for an electric vehicle. No matter what, a refuel/recharge station on the interstate is going to have to service the same number of vehicles per hour, so if you increase the refuel time by 4, you have to increase the number of refueling sites (analogous to the number of gas pumps) by 4, and thus you have increased the land required for the station - roughly by 4 as well (I'm assuming that all the people that are waiting 16 minutes for their car to charge are going to go into the store, so the store gets bigger too). I'll leave the cases of longer charge times yet to the reader.
OK, now, no matter what the charging time is, assuming electric vehicles don't get much more efficient, you are going to have to deliver the same number of watts to the station, and that is a LOT of watts. (again, if each car takes X watt-hours of energy, and a station has to service Y cars per hour, then the result is the station needs X*Y watts of power, no matter how long a charge takes.) Go watch your average interstate gas station (or hell, ANY gas station), and record how many cars an hour it services. Now, look at how many watt-hours you need for a 250 mile Roadster to charge up (and then multiply by 400/250 to get the energy for something with the same range as a gas burner). Work out how many TENS of megawatts the station is going to need - you are pretty much talking a substation dedicated to the station.
OK, but how does that magic 1000 miles change anything? Simple - instead of adding all the electric car infrastructure at filling stations, you instead can add it at motels and homes, AND you can increase the charging time to about 6 hours or so. You spread out the load across a larger number of sites, and reduce the power per site. If I can roll up to a Motel 6, get my room, plug my car into a post (and lock things so that the annoying kiddies cannot unplug my car during the night), swipe my card on the post, catch 6-8 hours of sleep, and have my car ready for another day's driving, I'm all set. Likewise, if I can charge my car at home, over night, and know I have enough energy to meet the day's needs - not just for a typical short run commute, but for anything, even the first leg of a cross-contry trip - then I am all set.
Now, several people are likely thinking (and getting ready to reply) "Then have 2 cars: an electric commuter and a combustion-powered long haul car." That would be great in some places, but where I live owning more than one car gets very expensive even excluding the cost of the car itself - tags, taxes, insurance all go up. I've run the numbers, and economically it makes more sense for me to buy gas than to buy another car.
And the sad thing is that if Costa Rica tells us to go fsck ourselves, while it will hurt Costa Rica's economy, all it will do here is help sell even more High Fructose Corn Syrup and help the corn lobby here.
How long until it is possible to pull up the main page on Slashdot, using nothing but IPv6 packets?
IMHO, every time one of these "OMFG IPv4 gonna run out RSN!!!1!11!" stores hits the front page, the Slashcrew should have to state where THEY are in becoming IPv6, and what is preventing them from doing so already.
"Why doesn't Microsoft just disable autoreplies like this?"
OK, so suppose Microsoft were to do so. They have to expend a non-trivial amount of time to write a program to scan the Hotmail database, locate a set of potentially cracked accounts, and flip the bit - that's going to cost some amount of money.
Then there is the very significant risk that they will piss off some users by incorrectly disabling their perfectly innocent autoreplies, which can lead to complaints that cost money to process.
Then there is the risk that, having taken responsibility to deal with THIS particular spam attack, somebody could then hold them legally responsible for some OTHER spam attack - "You took this action, why did you not take these other actions?" Yes, rational people might find that silly, but this is the legal system we are talking about here, and Microsoft DOES have a lot of money.
So, there is a non-zero risk of cost to Microsoft. So, where in all of this does Microsoft make a million dollars? Where it the UPSIDE to Microsoft to do this?
That thundering silence you hear in coming up with an upside is why Microsoft doesn't do this.
(NOTE: you can search-and-replace Microsoft with $RANDOM(EMAIL_PROVIDER) or $RANDOM(ISP) and not really change this argument - I'm not picking on Microsoft here.)
"Why can't I buy a frame that simply displays a URL?" "Why can't I buy a frame that simply watches for a specific browsable SMB share and directory, and every time it appears on the network, sync to the local copy, plus sync every 15 minutes thereafter?" "Why can't I buy a frame that simply displays a.RSS on the internet? Not a monthly pay service."
Because then how can the manufacturer of the frame monitize you from a worthless waste of baryonic matter into a shining revenue stream? You forget your place, consumer: you are to consume product and crap cash on demand, month in, month out. Now get to work!
Well, he serves a purpose. At least when I'm traveling in my Grand Marquis with 2 dual-band VHF/UHF antennas, a cell antenna, and a HF Screwdriver, I don't feel so bad.
Now if everybody would stop SLOWING DOWN when I pull up.
"...but is it legal to deny someone a job opportunity based on an alleged crime for which they were completely pardoned?"
The problem isn't denying the person the job - as in "No, we won't hire you because you once tied the Dean's underwear to the flagpole" - the problem is your CV never making it past the first level HR drone in the first place. In many cases, they reject hundreds of applicants, for a myriad of reasons from poor spelling to ripped paper to "that guy has the same first name as my recent ex", turning over only the top 10% to the people who will be doing the real interviewing.
So, you won't have any idea you were rejected because of that unfortunate flag-pole incident - just that you never heard back from the company.
And you'll never be the wiser, unless you have a very rare job skill - one that means you won't have much competition for the job. And in that case, that "flag-pole" incident won't matter, so long as you follow one simple rule:
When asked about it, DON'T LIE. Be honest: "I was young and stupid, and have regretted that mistake ever since. I've learned not to do dumb things like that, and it has made me more cautious about considering my actions before acting."
You lie, and they find out about it (and let's face it, if they've asked you about it, they already have found out), and you are out on your ass.
And what good is a printer with no ink, which will require expensive ink cartridges, be to the Salvation Army? Or to put it another way, what makes you think they will have any more use for it than the poster has?
This is like the folks that will give the Salvation Army their old 486 and think they are doing the Salvation Army a favor, when in truth all you are doing is making the Salvation Army pay for disposal.
I am sure that kdawson is just following the new Slashdot guidelines requiring that all politicians be identified with their party affiliation, no matter what party that might be, when the politician does something against the Slashdot zeitgeist.
No.
Wait.
I'm being handed a correction.
Stand by one.
It seems that there is no such guideline, and that indeed Slashdot policy is to identify Republicans, Libertarians, and other more conservative parties when one of their members does something dumb, but to not identify Democrats, Greens, and other more liberal parties when their members do something dumb.
I'll give you more of the benefit of the doubt than the moderators, and assume you don't truly know the difference between particle accelerator energies and normal energies.
When somebody says "this particle accelerator takes particles to 1TeV", that means the kinetic energy of each particle is equivalent to the energy a single electron would get if you let it move between the terminals of a 1 trillion volt battery. Now, in one second a current of one amp carries 6.241 509 629 152 65 × 10^18 electrons, so 1 TeV is equal to about 1/ 6.241 509 629 152 65 × 10^8) (less than one sixth of one hundredth of one millionth) of the energy your typical light bulb burns in one second.
True, there are lots of particles in the stream at LHC, but they still are in the billions, not the billions of billions of billions it would take to add up to significant amounts of energy on the global warming scale.
Let me correct a statement: when I said "The Higgs is somewhere north of 1TeV", what I meant was "the energies needed to form a Higgs within a reasonable period of time are north of 1TeV" - the actual mass is currently thought to be in the low hundreds of GeV.
If the Higgs were actually 1TeV in mass that would REALLY screw up the Standard Model.
(now, there are some theorized particles in the same family as the Higgs that are thought to be 1TeV or more, but....)
Actually, yes, if the paper is moving fast enough, you could. Of course, that would have to be REALLY REALLY fast - assume a sheet of paper to be roughly 100 grams (.1 kg), and a Grand Marquis wet is about 2000kg, the paper would have to be going at least 0.999999999c. Then you'd have to do it a bunch of times before 2 Grand Marquis popped out.
Cheaper to just get the dealer incentives and finance it yourself....
Let me honor/. tradition and use a car analogy here:
If you smash 2 GM Metros together, you CANNOT put together 2 Grand Marquis from the debris - there just isn't enough metal.
However, if you smash 2 Peterbuilts together, you can, at least in theory, put together 2 Grand Marquis from that debris - there's enough metal.
-----
When you smash particles together, there has to be enough mass-energy (enough metal) to form the particles you are looking for, or they won't appear. Mass is energy, energy is mass, speed is kinetic energy, and thus mass.
The Higgs is somewhere north of 1TeV - how much north of that varies from theory to theory. If the Higgs is a Grand Marquis, right now, the Tevatron and the LHC are smashing together Tauruses. Soon, the LHC will be up to stretch limos. At full power, the LHC will be at the Hummer3 level.
And cosmic rays are at the freight train level, but since that's not happening in the lab, it does no good: what fun is a collision if nobody caught it on video?
The title of this comment should be "How do these mice prevent finger movement from causing mouse movement", but due to the limits/. places on comment titles....
OK, so let us say I have the Mac Mouse, and I swipe my fingers over the surface to do a horizontal scroll of a document. * How do I prevent my finger motion from moving the mouse itself, and thus the pointer of the mouse? * Does the mouse have such a high coefficient of static friction that the CoF between my fingers and the shell * the force my fingers apply is too small to break the mouse loose? * What does that imply about normal mouse usage? ** Will I lose the ability to move the mouse by small amounts due to the stiction? ** Will I have to completely change my grip on the mouse to transition from mousing to swiping?
The issue wasn't that there were lots of people saying "That's a stupid idea" or "That's a stupid implementation of an otherwise good idea."
The issue was lots of people saying "You are stupid."
There is a big difference.
I'd weighed in on this, because in the embedded systems I design this actually would have been useful - I have to support different processor types with what is, ideally, the same software load. (Just because MY embedded systems are much larger than some 4-bit microcontroller running 16K of code doesn't make them any less embedded.) People called ME stupid - not "That's a stupid design" or "That's a stupid reason to want FatELF", but "You are stupid."
Yes, developing a thick skin, so that when somebody says "That's a stupid idea" you realize that it is the IDEA, and not YOU, that they are criticizing, is important to any engineer.
But at the same time, saying to somebody "You are stupid" just because you don't like their idea, or don't see how it applies to your needs, is immature and unprofessional.
"What I'd love to see happen with the Linux desktop is some serious re-thinkng of how a UI should be done."
Hear Hear! Yes, I too am a little disappointed that the "zenith" of Free Software seems to be cloning the look and feel of Windows, which is cloning the Mac, etc.
What about some real ground-breaking stuff - how about a marriage of GUI and Unix-y pipe goodness, where you could connect applications together in a GUI and have them do data flow type work - take the Unix filters approach one (or more) steps further?
What about getting RID of the file selector, and just using the normal file views + drag and drop to open and save files? Drag a file to your word processor, and it opens. Drag the tab from the word processor to a disk, and you save. Drag a section of a file, and you save that section. Drag that section to the desktop, and you save a cut buffer, and you can have as many cut buffers as you want.
Hell, why can't I just drag a file to a printer icon to print it? Why do I have to OPEN the file, then print it?
Let's look at the old OS/2 Workplace shell - let's make every file an object, with methods, selectable via drag or via right click.
Rather than using 3D just to view 2D windows in a glitzy way, let's try to do something meaningful with it.
Yes, some of the above ideas may not work out, but let's at least start exploring them and finding out WHICH ones don't work and which ones do?
Let's not let the "But people are used to the way Windows does things, and thus we cannot change anything away from that paradigm" ball-and-chain keep us from moving forward.
Why can't we tie man pages/info pages and other help into one source, so that we can have the advantages of both being able to search a global help database (apropos printing), being able to view the man pages for a program without running it (man lpr), AND still having those pages be context-linked into the programs?
Slashdot Mirror
"Hmm. Mis-spellings on the box. A sticker of a fan. A solid block of metal for the CPU.
I'd say the buyers were
<removes sunglasses>
mis-lead."
YEEAAAAAAAAH!
Ars Technica, who is that? Oh yes, that's one of those annoying sites I don't read anymore, because they insist upon breaking every story into a dozen pages so they can push more ads.
Hey Ars,
here's some
advice:
(buy Brawndo capacitors - they got electrolytics, its what current craves!)
(1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
Rather than
making me
search for
a Print link
(Buy BigJuggs Disks - you KNOW what you want to store!)
(1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
So that I
can read
your site
quickly
(Play NoLife for free for the next three minutes- only $123.99!)
(1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
and actually
use ALL of
my screen,
instead of
just the
middle
(Host your site on NotWorking Pollution!)
(1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
why don't
you put it
on one page
(Microsoft, we aren't sociopathic monopolists, we just act like one)
(1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
And see
if that
works.
(visit our sister site ICanHasContent!)
(1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
(post us to Wastebook!)
(Post us to Shovel!)
(Post us to DidntReadIt!)
(Post us to NoLife!)
(1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next)
ALL people remember what is important to them, and do so by relating it to things they already understand. We software types can relate messages like "too few file descriptors" to things we understand - WE know what a "file descriptor" is. Imagine that the error message instead said something like "LO VCO UNLOCK", or "Wrong mode for DX window": while some of the people here might understand those messages, unless you are a radio guy they are meaningless, and you have nothing in your world experience to which to relate them. I'm sure many of you can add your own problem-domain specific errors here.
Adding error numbers: "Error -522: LO VCO UNLOCK" doesn't help - unless the number "-522" has some special meaning to you, you still won't be able to relate it to your world.
However, thinks like puppies, colors (save for those who are color blind), and simple shapes are things most people can relate to. So the idea of "[image of sad puppy] LO VCO UNLOCK" can resonate with users of all stripes.
I'd suggest that any such errors log the details, even across runs, and that there be a way to retrieve the error data and send it onward to you as well.
"I work on an embedded medical device and we use Elo touch screens (www.elotouch.com). Technically, the devices don't require drivers at all - just plug-into USB or serial. You do need the drivers if you want to run the calibration, or use any of the fancy features."
Considering that without calibration, where you touch won't match AT ALL where the system thinks you are touching, thus voiding most of the utility of a touchscreen, I think drivers are somewhat important.
Moreover, I have seen too many touchscreen devices that:
1) Don't ID themselves as a HID, but some non-standard device
2) ID as a touchscreen, but incorrectly report their data on non-standard axis (e.g. on the rudder and throttle axis rather than X and Y).
3) ID as a touchscreen, but then send packets that are NOT the standard HID packets.
Thanks AC, that link helped - good to see that they are getting some drivers for Linux.
However, it's pretty distressing that their own web site search function couldn't find that page - somebody ought to flog their web master.
I've been trying to find touchscreens to incorporate into an embedded system, and few of the touchscreen vendors have drivers for anything other than Windows - as such they get eliminated from my consideration.
I've just check Displax's site, and a search for "linux" gives no hits - so either:
a) They are just doing the actual sensing system, and letting somebody else build the actual interface chips
or
b) They only support Windows.
Which makes them a non-starter in my line of work.
I'm holding out for 1000 miles per charge, and no, I am not being facetious. I think THAT will be the real game changer, and here's why:
One thousand miles is pretty much the limit on what you can drive in one day - that's getting on the Interstate and just rolling, with minimal stops, for about 12 hours. I don't know about anybody else, but I find that's pretty much the limit for me.
Now, let us consider a car with 400 mile per charge range - that's about what most gas or diesel cars can get on a tank of fuel. You have to refuel about 3 times a day, more or less. Right now, the average gas car can refuel in about 4 minutes from the time you pull up to the pump to the time you pull away (and that's assuming a slow pump and a big tank).
OK, first, consider what happens when you extend the refuel time from 4 minutes to 16 minutes - which is still a pretty fast charge time for an electric vehicle. No matter what, a refuel/recharge station on the interstate is going to have to service the same number of vehicles per hour, so if you increase the refuel time by 4, you have to increase the number of refueling sites (analogous to the number of gas pumps) by 4, and thus you have increased the land required for the station - roughly by 4 as well (I'm assuming that all the people that are waiting 16 minutes for their car to charge are going to go into the store, so the store gets bigger too). I'll leave the cases of longer charge times yet to the reader.
OK, now, no matter what the charging time is, assuming electric vehicles don't get much more efficient, you are going to have to deliver the same number of watts to the station, and that is a LOT of watts. (again, if each car takes X watt-hours of energy, and a station has to service Y cars per hour, then the result is the station needs X*Y watts of power, no matter how long a charge takes.) Go watch your average interstate gas station (or hell, ANY gas station), and record how many cars an hour it services. Now, look at how many watt-hours you need for a 250 mile Roadster to charge up (and then multiply by 400/250 to get the energy for something with the same range as a gas burner). Work out how many TENS of megawatts the station is going to need - you are pretty much talking a substation dedicated to the station.
OK, but how does that magic 1000 miles change anything? Simple - instead of adding all the electric car infrastructure at filling stations, you instead can add it at motels and homes, AND you can increase the charging time to about 6 hours or so. You spread out the load across a larger number of sites, and reduce the power per site. If I can roll up to a Motel 6, get my room, plug my car into a post (and lock things so that the annoying kiddies cannot unplug my car during the night), swipe my card on the post, catch 6-8 hours of sleep, and have my car ready for another day's driving, I'm all set. Likewise, if I can charge my car at home, over night, and know I have enough energy to meet the day's needs - not just for a typical short run commute, but for anything, even the first leg of a cross-contry trip - then I am all set.
Now, several people are likely thinking (and getting ready to reply) "Then have 2 cars: an electric commuter and a combustion-powered long haul car." That would be great in some places, but where I live owning more than one car gets very expensive even excluding the cost of the car itself - tags, taxes, insurance all go up. I've run the numbers, and economically it makes more sense for me to buy gas than to buy another car.
And the sad thing is that if Costa Rica tells us to go fsck ourselves, while it will hurt Costa Rica's economy, all it will do here is help sell even more High Fructose Corn Syrup and help the corn lobby here.
Once again, I'll ask a simple question:
How long until it is possible to pull up the main page on Slashdot, using nothing but IPv6 packets?
IMHO, every time one of these "OMFG IPv4 gonna run out RSN!!!1!11!" stores hits the front page, the Slashcrew should have to state where THEY are in becoming IPv6, and what is preventing them from doing so already.
"Why doesn't Microsoft just disable autoreplies like this?"
OK, so suppose Microsoft were to do so. They have to expend a non-trivial amount of time to write a program to scan the Hotmail database, locate a set of potentially cracked accounts, and flip the bit - that's going to cost some amount of money.
Then there is the very significant risk that they will piss off some users by incorrectly disabling their perfectly innocent autoreplies, which can lead to complaints that cost money to process.
Then there is the risk that, having taken responsibility to deal with THIS particular spam attack, somebody could then hold them legally responsible for some OTHER spam attack - "You took this action, why did you not take these other actions?" Yes, rational people might find that silly, but this is the legal system we are talking about here, and Microsoft DOES have a lot of money.
So, there is a non-zero risk of cost to Microsoft. So, where in all of this does Microsoft make a million dollars? Where it the UPSIDE to Microsoft to do this?
That thundering silence you hear in coming up with an upside is why Microsoft doesn't do this.
(NOTE: you can search-and-replace Microsoft with $RANDOM(EMAIL_PROVIDER) or $RANDOM(ISP) and not really change this argument - I'm not picking on Microsoft here.)
"Why can't I buy a frame that simply displays a URL?" .RSS on the internet? Not a monthly pay service."
"Why can't I buy a frame that simply watches for a specific browsable SMB share and directory, and every time it appears on the network, sync to the local copy, plus sync every 15 minutes thereafter?"
"Why can't I buy a frame that simply displays a
Because then how can the manufacturer of the frame monitize you from a worthless waste of baryonic matter into a shining revenue stream? You forget your place, consumer: you are to consume product and crap cash on demand, month in, month out. Now get to work!
The guy's call sign is AF4KK:
http://www.arrl.org/fcc/fcclook.php3?call=af4kk
I've seen this car in person at Dayton.
Well, he serves a purpose. At least when I'm traveling in my Grand Marquis with 2 dual-band VHF/UHF antennas, a cell antenna, and a HF Screwdriver, I don't feel so bad.
Now if everybody would stop SLOWING DOWN when I pull up.
"...but is it legal to deny someone a job opportunity based on an alleged crime for which they were completely pardoned?"
The problem isn't denying the person the job - as in "No, we won't hire you because you once tied the Dean's underwear to the flagpole" - the problem is your CV never making it past the first level HR drone in the first place. In many cases, they reject hundreds of applicants, for a myriad of reasons from poor spelling to ripped paper to "that guy has the same first name as my recent ex", turning over only the top 10% to the people who will be doing the real interviewing.
So, you won't have any idea you were rejected because of that unfortunate flag-pole incident - just that you never heard back from the company.
And you'll never be the wiser, unless you have a very rare job skill - one that means you won't have much competition for the job. And in that case, that "flag-pole" incident won't matter, so long as you follow one simple rule:
When asked about it, DON'T LIE. Be honest: "I was young and stupid, and have regretted that mistake ever since. I've learned not to do dumb things like that, and it has made me more cautious about considering my actions before acting."
You lie, and they find out about it (and let's face it, if they've asked you about it, they already have found out), and you are out on your ass.
You must be new here, let me welcome you to "The Internet". I hope you enjoy your visit.
Hosting companies don't give a pair of fetid dingo's kidneys about such matters, so long as the people responsible for the hosting pay good money.
Even the hosting companies that claim to be anti-spam, and who's acceptable use policies state that ANY support of spam, including hosting spamvertized web sites, when confronted with multiple, on-going violations, will ignore all reports, remove all forum posts calling attention to those posts, and continue to cash the checks from the spammers.
And what good is a printer with no ink, which will require expensive ink cartridges, be to the Salvation Army? Or to put it another way, what makes you think they will have any more use for it than the poster has?
This is like the folks that will give the Salvation Army their old 486 and think they are doing the Salvation Army a favor, when in truth all you are doing is making the Salvation Army pay for disposal.
I am sure that kdawson is just following the new Slashdot guidelines requiring that all politicians be identified with their party affiliation, no matter what party that might be, when the politician does something against the Slashdot zeitgeist.
No.
Wait.
I'm being handed a correction.
Stand by one.
It seems that there is no such guideline, and that indeed Slashdot policy is to identify Republicans, Libertarians, and other more conservative parties when one of their members does something dumb, but to not identify Democrats, Greens, and other more liberal parties when their members do something dumb.
My mistake.
Carry on.
http://www.20q.net/startg_enUS.html
I'll give you more of the benefit of the doubt than the moderators, and assume you don't truly know the difference between particle accelerator energies and normal energies.
When somebody says "this particle accelerator takes particles to 1TeV", that means the kinetic energy of each particle is equivalent to the energy a single electron would get if you let it move between the terminals of a 1 trillion volt battery. Now, in one second a current of one amp carries 6.241 509 629 152 65 × 10^18 electrons, so 1 TeV is equal to about 1/ 6.241 509 629 152 65 × 10^8) (less than one sixth of one hundredth of one millionth) of the energy your typical light bulb burns in one second.
True, there are lots of particles in the stream at LHC, but they still are in the billions, not the billions of billions of billions it would take to add up to significant amounts of energy on the global warming scale.
Let me correct a statement: when I said "The Higgs is somewhere north of 1TeV", what I meant was "the energies needed to form a Higgs within a reasonable period of time are north of 1TeV" - the actual mass is currently thought to be in the low hundreds of GeV.
If the Higgs were actually 1TeV in mass that would REALLY screw up the Standard Model.
(now, there are some theorized particles in the same family as the Higgs that are thought to be 1TeV or more, but....)
Actually, yes, if the paper is moving fast enough, you could. Of course, that would have to be REALLY REALLY fast - assume a sheet of paper to be roughly 100 grams (.1 kg), and a Grand Marquis wet is about 2000kg, the paper would have to be going at least 0.999999999c. Then you'd have to do it a bunch of times before 2 Grand Marquis popped out.
Cheaper to just get the dealer incentives and finance it yourself....
Let me honor /. tradition and use a car analogy here:
If you smash 2 GM Metros together, you CANNOT put together 2 Grand Marquis from the debris - there just isn't enough metal.
However, if you smash 2 Peterbuilts together, you can, at least in theory, put together 2 Grand Marquis from that debris - there's enough metal.
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When you smash particles together, there has to be enough mass-energy (enough metal) to form the particles you are looking for, or they won't appear. Mass is energy, energy is mass, speed is kinetic energy, and thus mass.
The Higgs is somewhere north of 1TeV - how much north of that varies from theory to theory. If the Higgs is a Grand Marquis, right now, the Tevatron and the LHC are smashing together Tauruses. Soon, the LHC will be up to stretch limos. At full power, the LHC will be at the Hummer3 level.
And cosmic rays are at the freight train level, but since that's not happening in the lab, it does no good: what fun is a collision if nobody caught it on video?
The title of this comment should be "How do these mice prevent finger movement from causing mouse movement", but due to the limits /. places on comment titles....
OK, so let us say I have the Mac Mouse, and I swipe my fingers over the surface to do a horizontal scroll of a document.
* How do I prevent my finger motion from moving the mouse itself, and thus the pointer of the mouse?
* Does the mouse have such a high coefficient of static friction that the CoF between my fingers and the shell * the force my fingers apply is too small to break the mouse loose?
* What does that imply about normal mouse usage?
** Will I lose the ability to move the mouse by small amounts due to the stiction?
** Will I have to completely change my grip on the mouse to transition from mousing to swiping?
The issue wasn't that there were lots of people saying "That's a stupid idea" or "That's a stupid implementation of an otherwise good idea."
The issue was lots of people saying "You are stupid."
There is a big difference.
I'd weighed in on this, because in the embedded systems I design this actually would have been useful - I have to support different processor types with what is, ideally, the same software load. (Just because MY embedded systems are much larger than some 4-bit microcontroller running 16K of code doesn't make them any less embedded.) People called ME stupid - not "That's a stupid design" or "That's a stupid reason to want FatELF", but "You are stupid."
Yes, developing a thick skin, so that when somebody says "That's a stupid idea" you realize that it is the IDEA, and not YOU, that they are criticizing, is important to any engineer.
But at the same time, saying to somebody "You are stupid" just because you don't like their idea, or don't see how it applies to your needs, is immature and unprofessional.
No, he meant "sapient".
My friend's dog is sentient - it senses, is aware of its surroundings, etc.
It most certainly is NOT sapient - it is not wise.
Too many SF writers use "sentient" when they mean "sapient".
You should perhaps look more closely at the very links you included.
"What I'd love to see happen with the Linux desktop is some serious re-thinkng of how a UI should be done."
Hear Hear! Yes, I too am a little disappointed that the "zenith" of Free Software seems to be cloning the look and feel of Windows, which is cloning the Mac, etc.
What about some real ground-breaking stuff - how about a marriage of GUI and Unix-y pipe goodness, where you could connect applications together in a GUI and have them do data flow type work - take the Unix filters approach one (or more) steps further?
What about getting RID of the file selector, and just using the normal file views + drag and drop to open and save files? Drag a file to your word processor, and it opens. Drag the tab from the word processor to a disk, and you save. Drag a section of a file, and you save that section. Drag that section to the desktop, and you save a cut buffer, and you can have as many cut buffers as you want.
Hell, why can't I just drag a file to a printer icon to print it? Why do I have to OPEN the file, then print it?
Let's look at the old OS/2 Workplace shell - let's make every file an object, with methods, selectable via drag or via right click.
Rather than using 3D just to view 2D windows in a glitzy way, let's try to do something meaningful with it.
Yes, some of the above ideas may not work out, but let's at least start exploring them and finding out WHICH ones don't work and which ones do?
Let's not let the "But people are used to the way Windows does things, and thus we cannot change anything away from that paradigm" ball-and-chain keep us from moving forward.
Why can't we tie man pages/info pages and other help into one source, so that we can have the advantages of both being able to search a global help database (apropos printing), being able to view the man pages for a program without running it (man lpr), AND still having those pages be context-linked into the programs?