Seriously. We've done this at work (both satellite batteries and replacements), and had one go kaboom when H2 gas caught a spark. The top of the battery dented the ceiling, and we had to throw baking soda all over everything to neutralize the sulfuric acid. If anyone had been in the area at the time they wouldn't been in a world of hurt.
A co-worker had seen the exact same thing happen in his last job.
I'm not familiar with what "VRLA" means, but unless the battery is sealed gel-type and rated for deep discharge and repeated cycling, I'd wouldn't use it.
Re:Yet another "reliable UDP" layer
on
Replacing TCP?
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· Score: 1
Indeed. I'm curious how it handles saturation conditions. A poorly designed UDP protocol can turn into packet storms when throughput approaches theoretical limit.
Make sure you're using the unstable build and network. The stable build/network sucks.
Pump up your data store size. A LOT.
Read the freenet mailing list archives, this issue is discussed periodically
How, exactly, are they going to catch people on Freenet? Assuming they have the key for a given file -- if they don't, they can't even find it -- there's no way to determine who posted it, and no way to determine what a given node has in its local cache? It would be like finding a note on a public bulletin board, with no attribution, no fingerprints, and no way of tracking it.
Oh, even if they could identify who posted a file, they can't remove it anyway.
If Linux wants to eat Windows' lunch, it has to become easier to develop on. An IDE needs to be developed that is comparable to Visual Studio.
Enabling and encouraging people who don't know programming to write code for your platform is no better than encouraging people who don't know civil engineering to build bridges for your roads. There's no lack of unemployed competent programmers who are quite comfortable with a compiler, a debugger, and the editor of their choice. The last thing we need is a flood of insecure, buggy crap giving Linux a bad name. Reliability and security are big advantages for Linux; sacrificing those would be idiotic.
If the Linux development community needs anything, it's fundamentals -- a deeper understanding of computer science (as opposed to code monkeying), relational database theory, functional languages, interface design (not that MS is much better), etc. We need better software more than we need more software.
Bah. The parent may be a troll, but please don't add insult to injury. The engineering classes I took weren't easier than the CS classes; they're entirely different disciplines. I know several programmers who sucked at EE, too.
A few years back, the local university here moved the CS dept from the Arts + Sciences college to the Engineering college. Several other universities have done this as well.
Technically, computer science and computer engineering are (or should be) distinct, in the same way that chemistry and chemical engineering are distinct. Most people I know with CS degrees fall somewhere in between the two. Some universities seem to focus more on the science end (in many cases the CS dept grew out of the math dept, CS -- as opposed to computer engineering -- is basically mathematics); some focus more on engineering.
I don't see why you would consider your trade degraded because some people calling themselves computer engineers are more computer scientists. I didn't find EE inherently more (or less!) challenging than CS, it just used different abilities.
It's been my experience that it helps to have both computer scientists and computer engineers on any project that's sufficiently complex to be interesting, because they tend to have complementary knowledge and abilities.
Furthermore I wonder why the RIAA hasn't gone after.binaries newsgroups
Usenet wasn't intended for file sharing and the RIAA can't make a case to that effect. A lot of Usenet admins also claim common carrier status. I don't know whether this has ever been upheld in court, and it's by no means the case that every Usenet personality agrees this is a good idea (c.f. Karl Denninger, who as I recall was the one who came up with "megabytes and megabytes of copyright violations" as the description for alt.binaries.pictures.erotica).
I expect if the RIAA does anything it will be to go after individual Usenet posters, not Usenet itself. On the other hand, people still post clearly illegal material on Usenet and seem to get away with it. Complicating matters for the RIAA and company, US citizens can use a Usenet server outside of the country, and that server's admins can tell the RIAA to go fuck itself.
torrents
They're certainly aware of it. We just got a DMCA notice for one of our users who was sharing movies using BitTorrent (I don't know the tracker). This has been going on for several months at least.
or some of the other networks where people have been "sharing" high quality MP3's
You mean like Direct Connect? Edonkey? Gnutella2? AFAIK every popular P2P protocol has users who've been hit with DMCAs, and many have been subject to more aggressive action.
To my knowledge outside of Freenet (and others which offer similar protections) there are no P2P networks immune to DMCA and lawsuits.
Low frequency RF *may* suppress DLMO (dim light melatonin onset, which is mediated by the pineal gland); this is debated but I think there's some evidence for it. Other effects like changes in pain tolerance to immune markers have been reported and, to varying degree, supported or not.
And of course if you're talking about magnetic fields there's plenty of proven effects, both in low field strength (is Michael Persinger still publishing?) and high (the kinder gentler ECT uses magnetic fields).
For more information on ELF and melatonin go to PubMed and query for "melatonin electromagnetic", or just browse the past year or two of Bioelectromagnetics and enjoy the debate.
As for mechanisms, a current favorite is that low-frequency RF -- or the magnetic component thereof -- can affect certain chemical reactions (this is also the current favorite on how many birds sense the Earth's magnetic field). Translating that into health effects usually involves some degree of handwaving about melatonin's effect on cancer growth, stress hormones, susceptible subpopulations, etc.
Whether low-frequency RF has measurable effects on humans, and whether RF causes cancer, are two entirely different questions. Frankly, I don't find much support for assertions of the latter (I'm not saying it's false, only that I'm not convinced). On the other hand, I think it's arrogant to assume that we know so much about biochemistry that we can rule on the latter question solely on the basis of the former.
Yet another piece of fnorderific irony in this whole debacle is that Katie's Place sounds a lot like Katie's World. This particular Katie is over 18 now but she formerly did non-nude modelling when she was underage. If I recall correctly from the newspaper article I read about her site (Katie's World, not Katie's Place), she was the one of the first, if not the first, of many non-nude underage models, some of whom are very young (pre-adolescent).
It must be nice having your parents pimp you online to make money off pedophiles. I don't know if any of these kids ended up like the protagonist of "Katie.com", but I suspect it'll happen eventually. It's a beautiful world, huh?
it is entirely possible that the original thread poster believes that popsicles, aircraft carriers and cars should also be banned
I think it's a lot more likely the poster was using sarcasm to make a point. Let's not be disingenuous here; "Think Of the Children" is a favorite debate (or flame war, depending on perspective) here and elsewhere, and "why don't we just ban cars" is the usual ironic response.
I didn't make that statement degradingly
No, I suppose stereotyping half of your opponents as "15 year olds afraid that Daddy is going to put a RFID baseball cap on them" isn't degrading at all.
(nor did I state anything about ignorance)
except insofar as it's an obvious (though not ubiquitous) difference between 15 year olds and adults, and in is implied by your characterization of the debate as "futile" and consisting of "hyper polarized fear mongering".
but rather I truly believe that there is a large portion of the current Slashdot readership that actually personally, directly feels threatened by this because of their young age
Long before there was a Slashdot, before the Endless September, back in the early days of the Internet (and even before that, back on Usenet), the frequency of fifteen year olds in any given newsgroup or other debate forum was basically zero. The participants consisted largely of college faculty and staff, college students, and IT professionals. The anarchic, libertarian, and anti-authoritarian (and occasionally paranoid) undercurrents here are basically the same (although arguably not as extreme) as they were in those glory days. While I'm sure there are 15 year olds here, I don't think that's relevant in this case. It's been several decades since I was fifteen and I still think lojacking your kids is bad for the kids and worse for society.
the defensiveness wouldn't be seen in, say, a more mature board
And I suppose you don't consider that degrading either. At the very least it's argumentum ad hominem.
As I live where civil liberties (usually) outweigh public sentiment, I have no problem with you doing so willingly. Just don't expect everyone else to agree.
Presuming that the data was secured from monitoring by nefarious agents
which it won't be, given that governments make mistakes just like any institution,
in that all data is encrypted and can't be retrieved without a public court order for a specific location/time
because, of course, corrupt people never wind up in positions of power.
In any case, it's an absurd derivative - the story is about the monitoring of children
except that these children are being conditioned to view being lojacked as acceptable (or at least inevitable), and some may, when they become adults, make public policy with that in mind. Or they may just go apeshit when the tags come off, which is arguably better for civil rights but worse for them.
I guarantee that there would be concerned parents lining up to sign their children up
and I guarantee that many of those same children would find a way to remove or disable those tags, and do incredibly risky and stupid things.
Uh, no that would be a solution to an entirely different problem
I think you missed the point. The parent wasn't seriously advocating banning cars. Instead, parent was pointing out, via analogy, that preventing harm to children is not an automatic justification for anything. Recall that the post that started this whole debate asserted that RFID tags were justified if they saved just one child. While the safety of children is important, it is not a trump card.
This is a futile point to debate on Slashdot
- ultimately about 50% of the posters are 15 year olds...
What a coincidence, that's my favorite debate strategy too! When in doubt, assert the naivete and ignorance of your opponents. It's so much easier than an actual rebuttal or (heaven forbid) accepting that other people may have sound reasons for disagreeing.
Media attention to the contrary, kidnapping isn't that common, and when it does occur it's usually done by a parent or relative. The introduction of Amber Alert programs has greatly increased media coverage of kidnappings; an unfortunate side effect of this is a mistaken perception that kidnappings are common and increasing occurrances.
Banning school athletics programs would save far more children's lives. So would banning automobiles, eliminating all foods that include potential allergens, and placing all children in gated institutions until 18, just to think of a few examples.
Maybe things are different where you live, but everywhere I've been, children who are prevented from learning how to handle risk tend towards one of two extremes. Either they react by doing incredibly stupid things (unprotected sex, reckless driving, etc.) and tend to get hurt, or they have no idea how to handle adult risks and responsibilities once they grow up and are no longer safely ensconced in bubble wrap.
I do realize that when people have children, the genetic imperative hijacks behaviour to varying degree. Maybe this made sense back when society was simpler, risks more easily understood and addressed, and the capacity for smothering and control limited. That does not make it a rational or effective strategy for raising children to be functional adults in today's society.
Patrick Henry did not learn the courage to utter "give me liberty or give me death" by being raised by parents whose mantras were "think of the children" and "if it saves just one child...".
I'm sorry, but I don't buy that the economy will collapse if one industry becomes more efficient. I suppose that we'd all work a lot more if there were no EE textbooks or engineering colleges, and every company had to rediscover Ohm's law, but I think society as a whole would suffer substantially from that sort of nonsense.
Nor, for that matter, do I believe that the economy must function the way it does (buying and selling useless crap) in order for people to accumulate wealth. I'm under no delusions that this is going to change soon, because most people seem to want useless crap (personally, I'd rather forego the crap and save for a house, but I guess I'm crazy). If OSS changes the economy it'll probably just lead to people buying different kinds of crap than they buy now.
my company still uses a DOS program of the '80s working under XP
That's funny, mine still uses DOS programs of the 80s working under Linux. You do have a valid point about compatibility, it's a problem throughout the industry. Linux hasn't had much incentive to do anything about it until recently because, let's face it, until recently most people using it were used to it and a lot compiled their own software anyway. Nowadays, you can use your favorite package management tool and just grab the compatibility libraries.
if OSS becomes much more popular in the future, it will be a problem for software engineers. You devalue your own profession.
in much the same way, I suppose, that physicists, physicians, and engineers devalue their professions when they publish findings of general interest in research journals. Personally I'm much happier getting paid to do interesting things using OSS as a code base than I ever was inventing the same old wheel for the Nth time. I have yet to own or work at any company where the existence of OSS was anything but a benefit.
Remember, there will always be custom software to write. Not every application is of sufficient interest to everyone to work as an OSS project. Many jobs I've done have been like that -- maybe a dozen potential customers (in one case, one customer) with a well-defined need.
Remember also that some of the knowledge we now regard as public domain was once intellectual property closely held within the guild system. Nowadays you can go to the library or the net and learn everything you need to know about, say, glass blowing or forging. This wasn't always the case. I suspect a lot of artisans lost job security when the guild system broke down, but I'm quite sure society as a whole benefitted.
I did provide a link, and Google has more, but I'm not going to go to the library and scan metallurgical lit articles to satisfy your skepticism. If you don't want to believe it, that's your business, but I find it baffling... I just don't see what's so extraordinary about a known phenomenon (Zn whisker growth in electroplated coatings) and a known failure mode in electronics gear, just because it's showing up in a new environment (data centers). This is NOT new, it's just new in this environment.
Given it's a recently understood phenomenon (in data centers), I doubt anyone can quantify the risk. I certainly can't. I'm not trying to hype a risk, I'm trying to dispute repeated claims that this is bogus or exceptionally rare. I certainly don't have any financial interest in this, I've got better things to do with my life than vacuum wood-core subfloor panels.
Oh, and metallurgy isn't my current field, but despite that I've run across this personally. So I started reading, and was amazed to find out how well known it was given I'd never heard of it. Turns out several engineers I knew (and one military data center guy) were familiar with it too.
Keep in mind what the parent of my post said: You simply cannot convince me that this is a real problem that we need to worry about. Not, that this is a common problem, or a problem everyone should worry about. His or her claim was much stronger than that: it it's either unreal, or we don't have to worry about it (i.e., infinitessimal or zero risk).
Furthermore, I found it telling that s/he said "you cannot convince me" instead of "you haven't convinced me". Not the best indicator of logical thought in my experience, but maybe it was just a poor choice of words.
Like I said, believe what you want. Just let me know if you're running a data center in case I ever need to colo.
Most of the zinc-plated ducts I've seen are galvanized, not electroplated. It's only a problem with electroplated zinc (not alloy), galvanized doesn't have the same stresses inducing whisker growth.
Worked with many switching power supplies? We aren't talking about bulky transformers here where all signals are high current and you can slap a crowbar across the secondary and still not kill it.
Switching power supplies can be surprisingly fragile. I've killed a couple working on TVs (that's basically what a flyback circuit is) and you can do it in one or two cycles (of your AC, not CPU cycles). And no, you don't want to know how much those power transistors cost. And I've killed computer PS by shorting across IC pins. There's not a lot of current going through these, and a 50-200 ohm short will definitely do the job. Remember, it only has to conduct long enough to nuke the chip.
Or maybe you'd prefer to ask the Cisco power engineer about it. Naah, he probably doesn't know what he's talking about.
Those rackmounts you're talking about are frequently built for shop environments... and older equipment was a lot more rugged anyway. You probably wouldn't have to worry about a PDP-11. I've seen metal dust kill sensitive equipment, I have no doubt it happens.
Metal whiskers aren't usually a problem on the mobo itself (everything is conformal coated) but on exposed metal -- surface mount devices for example -- and especially in power supplies.
And even then, it's only a problem if you can't take (or blow through) a 50-300 ohm short every now and then. Newer equipment is a lot more sensitive -- denser boards, less slop in timing and signals, etc... and of course manufacturers cut costs wherever they can, even on networking and server equipment. Unless you can afford NEBS or industrial grades, "server grade" rackmounts aren't necessarily any more rugged these days than consumer grade crap.
But it has been a problem outside of data centers, especially where you're looking at small (analog) signals with high input impedence. Examples include medical monitoring equipment and scientific research equipment, and it's why you don't see established manufacturers of either using uncoated, unalloyed zinc electroplating, especially in humid environments.
It's also worth noting that, at the finishing.com link I gave above, you'll find Cisco and well-known companies have known about this problem since at least 1996. Or perhaps finishing.com is involved in the conspiracy, or Cisco power engineers are idiots.
You simply cannot convince me that this is a real problem that we need to worry about.
and therein lies the problem: you just asserted that this is an item of faith for you, not reason; facts be damned, you cannot be convinced.
Never mind that there are several companies who do raised subfloors who've been addressing this problem for some time. They're all peddling snake oil, and NASA is helping them do it.
Never mind that Zn whiskers grow slowly, Zn-electroplated subfloor panels in data centers aren't that old, and PC board density has been increasing. Or that they only occur on electroplated zinc, and only grow long enough to be problematic in very low traffic areas. Nope, must be bogus.
Never mind that hospitals are affected as well and take this seriously. Or that the condition is well known among electroplaters and materials engineers, and was discussed at least ten years ago in the literature. Or that it's been involved in at least one product liability case. Or that Bell Labs has known about it for over fifty years (since 1948).
And never mind you could have found everything I mentioned above within the first 30 google results for "Zinc Whiskers". Nope. It must all be a myth, because there's no such thing as newly discovered age-related problems.
(Oh, and I hear that automobile corrosion is a myth too... I went to the new car lot and looked around and didn't see any, so it must not exist)
There's more than one "drug culture". You and I may associate (or refuse to associate) with different crowds of stoners and psychedelic enthusiasts. Although there are exceptions, those I spend time with tend to be:
Intelligent and able to think logically and speak coherently. Obviously, this doesn't apply while intoxicated, but then I'm sure even Nobel Prize winners can turn into idiots when they're overindulged, and none of us have won a Nobel Prize yet.
Clean and well-groomed. Backwoods camping doesn't count (I'd like to see how you look after a few days in the woods), and I think one really ought to make allowances for festivals where shower facilities are limited or nonexistent (e.g., Burning Man. It's a fucking waste of water. Baby wipes only go so far in a dust storm).
Diverse in musical taste. Which can make for some long arguments when trying to choose trip music.
But then, I tend to associate with people who view drugs as tools, means to an end rather than an end itself. Sometimes that end is fun, sometimes it's self-exploration, sometimes spirituality, sometimes social lubrication, but rarely is it just to be high or satisfy a craving (that's what caffeine is for dammit!)
OK, so the drumming thing is true... but have you ever been around a drum circle where the drummers actually know what they're doing? I've been to several (not as a drummer, I'm not that good!). Babatunde used to teach at my favorite summer festival and that made a huge difference. Drum circles are like any other team: experience matters.
Oh, and I don't really do MDMA (didn't like it much... left me dysphoric) so I don't see much of the random stranger hugging.
in the real world, where I live, this is just dumb. Don't get in the way of the big corps
Yes, whatever you do, don't take any risks in life, and don't get in the way of somebody with more power than you. After all, this never accomplishes anything, and it never makes you feel better to throw a pie in the face of someone who deserves it.
Puh-leaze. Parent isn't suggesting running an anonymous FTP site full of pirated music, just baiting a lawsuit that he can win, assuming it ever goes to trial. Other than the fact that it won't work (the MD5 and SHA1 checksums don't match so they won't take the bait), it sounds like a great way to shield actual P2P traffic and induce the RIAA to waste time and money.
It's not as if the RIAA is going to send out death squads when they realize they've been conned. The worst case scenario is you have to hire a lawyer, and spend awhile paying legal bills. Been there, done that. I don't know where in the real world you are, but in the real world where I live, we still have our balls.
Slashdot Mirror
If stupidity weren't painful, people would have no incentive to quit being stupid.
A co-worker had seen the exact same thing happen in his last job.
I'm not familiar with what "VRLA" means, but unless the battery is sealed gel-type and rated for deep discharge and repeated cycling, I'd wouldn't use it.
Indeed. I'm curious how it handles saturation conditions. A poorly designed UDP protocol can turn into packet storms when throughput approaches theoretical limit.
Make sure you're using the unstable build and network. The stable build/network sucks. Pump up your data store size. A LOT. Read the freenet mailing list archives, this issue is discussed periodically
Oh, even if they could identify who posted a file, they can't remove it anyway.
Enabling and encouraging people who don't know programming to write code for your platform is no better than encouraging people who don't know civil engineering to build bridges for your roads. There's no lack of unemployed competent programmers who are quite comfortable with a compiler, a debugger, and the editor of their choice. The last thing we need is a flood of insecure, buggy crap giving Linux a bad name. Reliability and security are big advantages for Linux; sacrificing those would be idiotic.
If the Linux development community needs anything, it's fundamentals -- a deeper understanding of computer science (as opposed to code monkeying), relational database theory, functional languages, interface design (not that MS is much better), etc. We need better software more than we need more software.
Bah. The parent may be a troll, but please don't add insult to injury. The engineering classes I took weren't easier than the CS classes; they're entirely different disciplines. I know several programmers who sucked at EE, too.
Technically, computer science and computer engineering are (or should be) distinct, in the same way that chemistry and chemical engineering are distinct. Most people I know with CS degrees fall somewhere in between the two. Some universities seem to focus more on the science end (in many cases the CS dept grew out of the math dept, CS -- as opposed to computer engineering -- is basically mathematics); some focus more on engineering.
I don't see why you would consider your trade degraded because some people calling themselves computer engineers are more computer scientists. I didn't find EE inherently more (or less!) challenging than CS, it just used different abilities.
It's been my experience that it helps to have both computer scientists and computer engineers on any project that's sufficiently complex to be interesting, because they tend to have complementary knowledge and abilities.
Usenet wasn't intended for file sharing and the RIAA can't make a case to that effect. A lot of Usenet admins also claim common carrier status. I don't know whether this has ever been upheld in court, and it's by no means the case that every Usenet personality agrees this is a good idea (c.f. Karl Denninger, who as I recall was the one who came up with "megabytes and megabytes of copyright violations" as the description for alt.binaries.pictures.erotica).
I expect if the RIAA does anything it will be to go after individual Usenet posters, not Usenet itself. On the other hand, people still post clearly illegal material on Usenet and seem to get away with it. Complicating matters for the RIAA and company, US citizens can use a Usenet server outside of the country, and that server's admins can tell the RIAA to go fuck itself.
torrents
They're certainly aware of it. We just got a DMCA notice for one of our users who was sharing movies using BitTorrent (I don't know the tracker). This has been going on for several months at least.
or some of the other networks where people have been "sharing" high quality MP3's
You mean like Direct Connect? Edonkey? Gnutella2? AFAIK every popular P2P protocol has users who've been hit with DMCAs, and many have been subject to more aggressive action.
To my knowledge outside of Freenet (and others which offer similar protections) there are no P2P networks immune to DMCA and lawsuits.
And of course if you're talking about magnetic fields there's plenty of proven effects, both in low field strength (is Michael Persinger still publishing?) and high (the kinder gentler ECT uses magnetic fields).
For more information on ELF and melatonin go to PubMed and query for "melatonin electromagnetic", or just browse the past year or two of Bioelectromagnetics and enjoy the debate.
As for mechanisms, a current favorite is that low-frequency RF -- or the magnetic component thereof -- can affect certain chemical reactions (this is also the current favorite on how many birds sense the Earth's magnetic field). Translating that into health effects usually involves some degree of handwaving about melatonin's effect on cancer growth, stress hormones, susceptible subpopulations, etc.
Whether low-frequency RF has measurable effects on humans, and whether RF causes cancer, are two entirely different questions. Frankly, I don't find much support for assertions of the latter (I'm not saying it's false, only that I'm not convinced). On the other hand, I think it's arrogant to assume that we know so much about biochemistry that we can rule on the latter question solely on the basis of the former.
It must be nice having your parents pimp you online to make money off pedophiles. I don't know if any of these kids ended up like the protagonist of "Katie.com", but I suspect it'll happen eventually. It's a beautiful world, huh?
I think it's a lot more likely the poster was using sarcasm to make a point. Let's not be disingenuous here; "Think Of the Children" is a favorite debate (or flame war, depending on perspective) here and elsewhere, and "why don't we just ban cars" is the usual ironic response.
I didn't make that statement degradingly
No, I suppose stereotyping half of your opponents as "15 year olds afraid that Daddy is going to put a RFID baseball cap on them" isn't degrading at all.
(nor did I state anything about ignorance)
except insofar as it's an obvious (though not ubiquitous) difference between 15 year olds and adults, and in is implied by your characterization of the debate as "futile" and consisting of "hyper polarized fear mongering".
but rather I truly believe that there is a large portion of the current Slashdot readership that actually personally, directly feels threatened by this because of their young age
Long before there was a Slashdot, before the Endless September, back in the early days of the Internet (and even before that, back on Usenet), the frequency of fifteen year olds in any given newsgroup or other debate forum was basically zero. The participants consisted largely of college faculty and staff, college students, and IT professionals. The anarchic, libertarian, and anti-authoritarian (and occasionally paranoid) undercurrents here are basically the same (although arguably not as extreme) as they were in those glory days. While I'm sure there are 15 year olds here, I don't think that's relevant in this case. It's been several decades since I was fifteen and I still think lojacking your kids is bad for the kids and worse for society.
the defensiveness wouldn't be seen in, say, a more mature board
And I suppose you don't consider that degrading either. At the very least it's argumentum ad hominem.
As I live where civil liberties (usually) outweigh public sentiment, I have no problem with you doing so willingly. Just don't expect everyone else to agree.
Presuming that the data was secured from monitoring by nefarious agents
which it won't be, given that governments make mistakes just like any institution,
in that all data is encrypted and can't be retrieved without a public court order for a specific location/time
because, of course, corrupt people never wind up in positions of power.
In any case, it's an absurd derivative - the story is about the monitoring of children
except that these children are being conditioned to view being lojacked as acceptable (or at least inevitable), and some may, when they become adults, make public policy with that in mind. Or they may just go apeshit when the tags come off, which is arguably better for civil rights but worse for them.
I guarantee that there would be concerned parents lining up to sign their children up
and I guarantee that many of those same children would find a way to remove or disable those tags, and do incredibly risky and stupid things.
I think you missed the point. The parent wasn't seriously advocating banning cars. Instead, parent was pointing out, via analogy, that preventing harm to children is not an automatic justification for anything. Recall that the post that started this whole debate asserted that RFID tags were justified if they saved just one child. While the safety of children is important, it is not a trump card.
This is a futile point to debate on Slashdot - ultimately about 50% of the posters are 15 year olds...
What a coincidence, that's my favorite debate strategy too! When in doubt, assert the naivete and ignorance of your opponents. It's so much easier than an actual rebuttal or (heaven forbid) accepting that other people may have sound reasons for disagreeing.
Media attention to the contrary, kidnapping isn't that common, and when it does occur it's usually done by a parent or relative. The introduction of Amber Alert programs has greatly increased media coverage of kidnappings; an unfortunate side effect of this is a mistaken perception that kidnappings are common and increasing occurrances.
Banning school athletics programs would save far more children's lives. So would banning automobiles, eliminating all foods that include potential allergens, and placing all children in gated institutions until 18, just to think of a few examples.
Maybe things are different where you live, but everywhere I've been, children who are prevented from learning how to handle risk tend towards one of two extremes. Either they react by doing incredibly stupid things (unprotected sex, reckless driving, etc.) and tend to get hurt, or they have no idea how to handle adult risks and responsibilities once they grow up and are no longer safely ensconced in bubble wrap.
I do realize that when people have children, the genetic imperative hijacks behaviour to varying degree. Maybe this made sense back when society was simpler, risks more easily understood and addressed, and the capacity for smothering and control limited. That does not make it a rational or effective strategy for raising children to be functional adults in today's society.
Patrick Henry did not learn the courage to utter "give me liberty or give me death" by being raised by parents whose mantras were "think of the children" and "if it saves just one child...".
Nor, for that matter, do I believe that the economy must function the way it does (buying and selling useless crap) in order for people to accumulate wealth. I'm under no delusions that this is going to change soon, because most people seem to want useless crap (personally, I'd rather forego the crap and save for a house, but I guess I'm crazy). If OSS changes the economy it'll probably just lead to people buying different kinds of crap than they buy now.
That's funny, mine still uses DOS programs of the 80s working under Linux. You do have a valid point about compatibility, it's a problem throughout the industry. Linux hasn't had much incentive to do anything about it until recently because, let's face it, until recently most people using it were used to it and a lot compiled their own software anyway. Nowadays, you can use your favorite package management tool and just grab the compatibility libraries.
if OSS becomes much more popular in the future, it will be a problem for software engineers. You devalue your own profession.
in much the same way, I suppose, that physicists, physicians, and engineers devalue their professions when they publish findings of general interest in research journals. Personally I'm much happier getting paid to do interesting things using OSS as a code base than I ever was inventing the same old wheel for the Nth time. I have yet to own or work at any company where the existence of OSS was anything but a benefit.
Remember, there will always be custom software to write. Not every application is of sufficient interest to everyone to work as an OSS project. Many jobs I've done have been like that -- maybe a dozen potential customers (in one case, one customer) with a well-defined need.
Remember also that some of the knowledge we now regard as public domain was once intellectual property closely held within the guild system. Nowadays you can go to the library or the net and learn everything you need to know about, say, glass blowing or forging. This wasn't always the case. I suspect a lot of artisans lost job security when the guild system broke down, but I'm quite sure society as a whole benefitted.
Given it's a recently understood phenomenon (in data centers), I doubt anyone can quantify the risk. I certainly can't. I'm not trying to hype a risk, I'm trying to dispute repeated claims that this is bogus or exceptionally rare. I certainly don't have any financial interest in this, I've got better things to do with my life than vacuum wood-core subfloor panels.
Oh, and metallurgy isn't my current field, but despite that I've run across this personally. So I started reading, and was amazed to find out how well known it was given I'd never heard of it. Turns out several engineers I knew (and one military data center guy) were familiar with it too.
Keep in mind what the parent of my post said: You simply cannot convince me that this is a real problem that we need to worry about. Not, that this is a common problem, or a problem everyone should worry about. His or her claim was much stronger than that: it it's either unreal, or we don't have to worry about it (i.e., infinitessimal or zero risk).
Furthermore, I found it telling that s/he said "you cannot convince me" instead of "you haven't convinced me". Not the best indicator of logical thought in my experience, but maybe it was just a poor choice of words.
Like I said, believe what you want. Just let me know if you're running a data center in case I ever need to colo.
Most of the zinc-plated ducts I've seen are galvanized, not electroplated. It's only a problem with electroplated zinc (not alloy), galvanized doesn't have the same stresses inducing whisker growth.
Switching power supplies can be surprisingly fragile. I've killed a couple working on TVs (that's basically what a flyback circuit is) and you can do it in one or two cycles (of your AC, not CPU cycles). And no, you don't want to know how much those power transistors cost. And I've killed computer PS by shorting across IC pins. There's not a lot of current going through these, and a 50-200 ohm short will definitely do the job. Remember, it only has to conduct long enough to nuke the chip.
Or maybe you'd prefer to ask the Cisco power engineer about it. Naah, he probably doesn't know what he's talking about.
Metal whiskers aren't usually a problem on the mobo itself (everything is conformal coated) but on exposed metal -- surface mount devices for example -- and especially in power supplies. And even then, it's only a problem if you can't take (or blow through) a 50-300 ohm short every now and then. Newer equipment is a lot more sensitive -- denser boards, less slop in timing and signals, etc ... and of course manufacturers cut costs wherever they can, even on networking and server equipment. Unless you can afford NEBS or industrial grades, "server grade" rackmounts aren't necessarily any more rugged these days than consumer grade crap.
But it has been a problem outside of data centers, especially where you're looking at small (analog) signals with high input impedence. Examples include medical monitoring equipment and scientific research equipment, and it's why you don't see established manufacturers of either using uncoated, unalloyed zinc electroplating, especially in humid environments.
It's also worth noting that, at the finishing.com link I gave above, you'll find Cisco and well-known companies have known about this problem since at least 1996. Or perhaps finishing.com is involved in the conspiracy, or Cisco power engineers are idiots.
and therein lies the problem: you just asserted that this is an item of faith for you, not reason; facts be damned, you cannot be convinced.
Never mind that there are several companies who do raised subfloors who've been addressing this problem for some time. They're all peddling snake oil, and NASA is helping them do it.
Never mind that Zn whiskers grow slowly, Zn-electroplated subfloor panels in data centers aren't that old, and PC board density has been increasing. Or that they only occur on electroplated zinc, and only grow long enough to be problematic in very low traffic areas. Nope, must be bogus.
Never mind that hospitals are affected as well and take this seriously. Or that the condition is well known among electroplaters and materials engineers, and was discussed at least ten years ago in the literature. Or that it's been involved in at least one product liability case. Or that Bell Labs has known about it for over fifty years (since 1948).
And never mind you could have found everything I mentioned above within the first 30 google results for "Zinc Whiskers". Nope. It must all be a myth, because there's no such thing as newly discovered age-related problems.
(Oh, and I hear that automobile corrosion is a myth too ... I went to the new car lot and looked around and didn't see any, so it must not exist)
But then, I tend to associate with people who view drugs as tools, means to an end rather than an end itself. Sometimes that end is fun, sometimes it's self-exploration, sometimes spirituality, sometimes social lubrication, but rarely is it just to be high or satisfy a craving (that's what caffeine is for dammit!)
OK, so the drumming thing is true ... but have you ever been around a drum circle where the drummers actually know what they're doing? I've been to several (not as a drummer, I'm not that good!). Babatunde used to teach at my favorite summer festival and that made a huge difference. Drum circles are like any other team: experience matters.
Oh, and I don't really do MDMA (didn't like it much ... left me dysphoric) so I don't see much of the random stranger hugging.
Yes, whatever you do, don't take any risks in life, and don't get in the way of somebody with more power than you. After all, this never accomplishes anything, and it never makes you feel better to throw a pie in the face of someone who deserves it.
Puh-leaze. Parent isn't suggesting running an anonymous FTP site full of pirated music, just baiting a lawsuit that he can win, assuming it ever goes to trial. Other than the fact that it won't work (the MD5 and SHA1 checksums don't match so they won't take the bait), it sounds like a great way to shield actual P2P traffic and induce the RIAA to waste time and money.
It's not as if the RIAA is going to send out death squads when they realize they've been conned. The worst case scenario is you have to hire a lawyer, and spend awhile paying legal bills. Been there, done that. I don't know where in the real world you are, but in the real world where I live, we still have our balls.