"Financial evaluations" offer little value to customers, and generally are entirely to Primerica's benefit: they serve to qualify a prospect (i.e. pat the potential client's pockets down and peek in their wallet), and to apply decision-influencing selling techniques which hope to end by separating the rube from their cash.
The prospect gets to hear all about Primerica's financial service products, with probably arm-twisting that you would be a fool to do business elsewhere.
No cost other than the salesman's time, and perhaps some brochures and a "Free Financial Evaluation Printout!" at the end (of no value to the prospect outside the Primerica context), are incurred by Primerica. That's NOTHING next to the enormous investment made in OSS by all the collective authors, and the huge value offered in giving away a free operating system.
...far more damage to that reputation... rumors have had a tremendous chilling effect... no way to undo that damage
Your post reflects SCO's approach to their entire Linux IP adventure: High drama, low plot value.
Those I've met who seriously thought Linux or IBM's legitimacy damaged were those who already had a vested interest against them. Like Microsofties, and the odd BSDer. Most consider SCO's hystrioncs artificial and a thoroughly transparent attempt to manipulate both the software market and the stock market alike.
You can choose to take it that way -Seriously, as you are preferring to quote an opinion-based source, Fox News, a "fair and balanced" news organization whose objectivity on industry vs. environment is clearly nonexistent, I have to say I enjoyed it.;)
Personally, I think that the conservative-liberal dichotomy in American discourse is just a form of therapy -people sorting thru their feelings. But don't let that keep you from taking another shot!:)
I should know better than to respond to somebody who quotes Fox News as a source on science (particularly when the opening paragraph contains the words "junk," "science," and "environmental" -cheerleaders for the smokestack lobby), but if you feel so good about DDT, why not try sprinkling some on your morning breakfast cereal?
First, Rachel Carson is not a researcher, so Fox's refuting of her writings, and her interpretation of one of the researchers she quotes, doesn't address the largebody of research regarding correlations between DDT and its effects on wildlife.
Can't find the article, but yes there was a California-based ocean water gold extraction outfit in the 1980s, according to my uncle the geologist. This is a cheat, but there was also beach sand extraction.
The important point is that the trend of toxin accumulation is observed. It should be monitored so that correlations become better known. In this industrialized world, it ain't goin' away!
There are many, many examples of pollution wreaking havoc on humans and other species, for example the plummet in bald eagle population due to DDT. Estrogen analogs triggering gender ratio changes and mutations among amphibians. Lead's effects on humans date back to the Romans, mercury is still a factor today...
life expectancy has increased tremendously over the past hundred years, although medical advances probably greatly outweigh any negatives caused by pollutants.
Maybe true in the broadest sense (across entire populations), but at this time cancer cures haven't reached the magic bullet phase, so I'll venture that mortality from pollutant-induced illness is probably going up, not down.
As a species, humans are going through a "population bloom" that is rightly attributed to the medical, and also hygiene, improvements that have occurred since the middle ages.
The negatives include that we're seeing higher rates of what were previously the more exotic diseases and cancers, in individuals. People are living longer, but the pollutants and toxins are causing triggering more illness.
PDP-11/03 with teletype and FOCAL on paper tape
on
First Computers
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· Score: 1
My pop brought this home from work one weekend. Its clockrate was less than 1 MHz, and had 32 kilowords of RAM (16-bit words.) This was in 1976.
The neatest thing about it was, when you powered it on, it presented a "machine language monitor" to whatever console device was hooked (e.g. teletype.) With it, you could store octal words to memory locations, list the octal value of memory, and execute programs (like FOCAL)
In fact, that was how you booted the damn thing. To boot a disk drive (we eventually got two 8" floppy drives), you'd type in the start address of teh boot loader EPROM, followed by 'G', and off it'd go. We ran RT-11, and eventually RSX-11S. Both were command-line O/Sen. Here I learned how to write code, mostly in the PDP-11 instruction set, which even back then was a better design than the 80x86 set.
It's a real antique now, in boxes in the folk's garage. We eventually got a "video terminal kit," which to make operational, we had to hand-solder each and every resister and capacitor onto a circuit board. Fortunately it worked first time out, unlike many of our other hand-built projects!
Overall, this was as good an introduction to computers as I could expect, as it taught me the innards of computers -fundamentals like bits, bytes, registers, etc.
The formerly tranked-up, aptly-named "Rush", may yet have his day in court. Given his advocacy of turning up prosecutorial heat on white drug abusers, he should strongly consider turning himself in and admitting his guilt in being the primary beneficiary of a private, high-dollar drug ring..
The best irony is that this man, who best liked the sound of his own voice, will in old age probably hear only his own voice. I hope this means we won't be hearing any more of his voice in the future!
Don't go with the portable 10-15,000 BTU units
on
Cooling the Server Room?
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· Score: 2, Interesting
They generate more heat than they take away, and you'll have trouble exhausting away all the heat they produce.
1 watt-hour == 3.41 BTUs. Say your typical rackmount PC, without monitor, draws around 100 watts, that's 341 BTUs. 40 machines plus two monitors and UPSs, plus some odd heat from lights and whatnot, call it about 14,000 BTUs. All that heat rises, and the best thing to do with it is duct it away, then replace it with cold air.
DO NOT SIMPLY DRAW IT INTO THE DROP CEILING, unless there is predictable airflow beyond the ceiling tiles, or a duct, with negative pressure relative to the server room. If there is not a definite exit from the ceiling, or if you're just pushing it up there and hoping it ends up someplace else, forget about it, it just lingers.
Portable AC-on-wheels: they generate decent BTUs removal, but their exchaust is ferocious. If you must use one, cut a hole in the wall for the exit hose, or mount it in a nearby window, just get it away. Don't even think of emptying it into the walls or drop-ceiling, it'll linger and boost the ambient temp.
If you have a window within 50 feet, you could mount a 20-25,000 BTU AC unit, and send the output through an insulated duct to the server room. If the duct runs more than 20-25 feet, you should put a draw fan on it to reduce back-pressure at the AC. Back-pressure can cause all sorts of trouble, so don't force through a tiny or too-long pipe.
Eh, if any of this seems confusing, hire a contractor!
The most important thing to do is monitor temperature in the room. If any of your PCs is recent, it'll have both "system" and "cpu" temp monitoring. There are temperature logging apps for *nix and Windows.
In an about-face that could have a dramatic impact in the Java tools space, Sun Microsystems Inc. has indicated it might be willing to join the IBM-sponsored Eclipse open-source development platform effort--but only if momentum to spin off the effort into an independent organization continues.
Eclipse already seems to be moving from an IBM-led organization to an independent one. The inclusion of Sun in the Eclipse group would be a major move in the Java development space, bringing the two largest Java development organizations together. It would also bolster the Java community against Microsoft Corp.'s.Net architecture and Visual Studio.Net development tools.
Rich Green, vice president of Sun developer tools and Java software, in Santa Clara, Calif., made overtures toward the Eclipse effort in an interview with eWEEK last week, saying he favors a standard that open-source development platform developers can access to build Java applications and Web services.
The Eclipse effort was started in 2001 as an alternative to Sun's Java-based NetBeans open-source tools platform. The name was chosen to signify an effort to overshadow Sun's efforts in the area.
Green, however, said he does not see the two efforts as conflicting and said that with the "hint that Eclipse might be changing their structure and maybe separating from IBM," Sun would be interested in working with the organization.
Joining Sun's new Project Rave developer program with Eclipse would put more developers toward the 10- million-developer goal Sun officials have set for the Java ranks.
Skip McGaughey, chairman of Eclipse and an IBM official on loan to the organization, said the Eclipse board of stewards has been working to transition to an independent organization for the last six months and will probably take another three months before it can completely spin off from its IBM sponsorship.
Once the transition occurs, McGaughey said, he expects Eclipse membership to increase. Speaking on whether independence could affect the group's membership, McGaughey said, "I think so, yes. There are a couple of companies that are industry leaders, such as Sun and BEA [Systems Inc.], that we would like to see join Eclipse."
McGaughey said that in March of last year, the Eclipse board of stewards voted to invite Sun and BEA into its fold, "and we've been working since then to try to bring them in."
Part of the transition to an independent organization will include the selection of a board of directors--separate from the board of stewards--to run the organization as a business entity, McGaughey said.
Green said that although Sun is considering involvement with Eclipse, the company would not be moving its core development platform to Eclipse.
"Just like you're not going to see Oracle [Corp.] or Borland [Software Corp.] [both Eclipse members] substitute out their core for Eclipse. That would take up to 24 months," Green said.
Todd Williams, an Eclipse user and vice president of technology at Genuitec LLC, a Dallas-based software consulting and development company, said, "I think as more companies join and share the organization's vision of common frameworks that are flexible and extensible, the better it will be for Java development."
A major point hampering interaction between the camps has been Eclipse's support of the Standard Widget Toolkit and NetBeans' support of the AWT (Abstract Windowing Toolkit) and Swing as their graphics platforms. The technologies are incompatible.
"Sun believes that Eclipse will hit a wall in terms of performance and compatibility because of distinctions between its NetBeans... approach and Eclipse's... approach, but at the moment, Eclipse is the clear leader,
You do not know whether or not these fish pose any sort of trouble in their modified form. At this point we can only hope it's none, as their release to the wild is imminent. In risk-management terms, hope is a pretty shitty place to be.
After that, it's microbiology and game theory...
Predators find glowfish more easily, due to their greater-than-ambient luminosity, and glowfish don't survive that ecosystem
Glowfish don't have natural predators in a given ecosystem and thrive
Glowfish are able to dine by night thanks to built-in lighting, increasing their size and mating potential, leading to population bloom
Population bloom outstrips local species at same spot on food chain, forcing its decline
Etc.
Local ecosystem factors provide additional variables to permute gaming outcomes. Who can say how this will turn out? You can't. I can't. Therefore, introducing a new species into myriad ecosystems around the glove is a risky venture. See my other message about alien species introductions that have brought economic and ecosystem disaster.
I wouldn't expect the effects of introducing a genetically engineered species to be much different than say
Than say kudzu to the Southern/Eastern U.S.? Or zebra mussel to North America's waterways? Or Japanese beetles to the forests? Or Gambian pouched rats? Or loosestrife to northeast farmlands?
All are foreign pests that have caused tremendous economic and environmental damage.
You can't predict in advance what effect releasing a new species into an ecosystem will have. Too many variables. The best you can do is either to not do it, or accept there will be unknown effects. Given the above examples, California's step is prudent.
I'm not sure why you think your guess is valid at all.
I'm not, it's just one possible outcome. Another question is will the GE salmon reach reproductive maturity faster? I don't know the answer, but salmon have this long voyage as part of their mating process... for the ones that escaped the sterility measure, wonder how their early physical maturity would affect the journey and their reproductive timing.
From what I've read, the sterilisation step is performed on the eggs, its not engineered into the genome.
That's the theory... do you really want to test that against the existence of a species? Seems to me the other possible outcome can't be ignored, you can't hope it won't happen, because it's entirely possible it will. Russian roulette with a three-chamber revolver: 1) Wild salmon die out, 2) Engineered salmon die out, 3) Wild and engineered interbreed and become something else.
Coexistence may also happen, but I don't think we should be testing that on a global scale in the wild! At worst, it should happen in an enclosed facility.... question is, will that testing ever happen? Shouldn't be left up to buncha guys in a boardroom sayin' "Yeah, there's no way we'll fuck anything up! Dudes, we'll be sellin' millions of these fish this time next year!! Woo-hoo, Vegas here I come!!!"
viruses reproduce by injecting their genetic material into...
DNA's not as sacred as you think it is.
Good response! For me, it's simple fear of the unknown, that we'll engineer a fuckup. Something that, lose in the wild, throws off ecosystem balance. I don't think this science is good or maybe mature enough to know if it can forecast and prevent the triggering of ecological trouble.
Engineered crops are now loose in the wild, and some have known unintended negative consequences. Once loose onto the winds of the world...
Humans are just getting started in the "god" business, creating new species variants. What we produce now will seem abacus-like fifty years from now, when we'll probably do more than just insert new sequences.
My hope is that profit not remain the primary criterion for a design, that broader research into that organism's effects on nature will be done. It's complex and probably impossible to know all ramifications.
Breeding and genetic engineering are two, distinct areas of science. You've bought into the propaganda, because you cannot assert that selective breeding would produce the crossing of, for example, the arctic flounder, a bacterium with a tomato plant -the Flavr-Savr tomato.
Genetic engineering allows introduction into a species of genes that express proteins (and other molecules) not available within the host species' existing gene pool.
Whether or not that's a good thing is not known, as the U.S. government does not currently require either environmental impact testing nor FDA safety-type testing. Those regulations were swept away during the Clinton administration so that biotech firms could more quicly bring products to market and thereby boost their revenues -but at what cost?
Genetic engineering is actually being tested on an enormous scale -every one of us is a subject.
Personally, I'm not against development of GE products, but believe they really need to be tested. One day there may come a product whose consequences aren't foreseen, and the impact could mean the loss of another species, or worse.
An example of this is the salmon that grows seven times faster than wild salmon. The developers of these want to raise them in netted pens off the coasts of North America, as salmon are currently farmed.
But what would the consequences be of an accidental release of those fish to the wild? A salmon that grows seven times faster than its wild relatives? C'mon, it doesn't take a genius to figure out what the impact would be -the wild salmon would probably get starved out of existence, and it'd be impossible to prevent that from happening. Once in the wild, you couldn't sweep them up.
The question is whether sterilisation can effectively be achieved. It would be insane to assume that it's safe to release them to the environment when the research of its impact obviously can't be ascertained, because this planet has thousands of ecosystems Because of the fish's novelty, this little fish will become ubiquitous around the world. Zebra mussel anyone?
Then there's the very real and frightening specter of species jumping of genetic modifications. It has already been documented in engineered plants (corn to maize in Mexico, for example.) One of the most popular genetic modifications to corn causes it to produce a pesticide. It's gotten into the wild now.
If a block on breeding is not exactly 100% effective, then they will find their way into the wild, where they will breed with compatible locals.
This one's a poster child for fighting software patents. I hope somebody with deep enough pockets decides to fight... but my sense is that anybody who's based a product upon FAT has probably got their own dubious software patents to product, and therefore would rather settle than fight.
Hmm, that's a toughie... lessee... where wuz that battered scrap of paper? Oh, here it is! It's in, would you believe, The Bill of Rights... and it's the first "right," AKA the First Amendment, otherwise known as the Religion Clauses:
http://memory.loc.gov/const/bor.html
Google for: congress law respecting religion -and you'll get many articles explaining the context and limits the First Amendment have placed upon our government. The Religion Clauses do, in fact, establish a clear boundary between the religions practiced by citizens and residents of the U.S., and the government.
The courts have ruled over the years that the government cannot limit the practice of religion (so long as no laws are broken), and it cannot pass laws that favor a religion or its institutions.
It's better that way. Would you want to end up living in a country ruled by fundamentalists? Oh, wait, our Pres...
At worst, they argue for separation of church and state, which is part of the Constitution's featureset, if you weren't aware. You want to run a religion, mainstream or not, well it's up to you to seek funding and favor from the people, not the government.
Funding of religion education from my tax dollars? Over my dead body.
"Minimize the majority to accomodate the minority."
Uh, propaganda anybody? Until recently, the minority was pretty much under the bootheel of the majority, and it still ain't grand being non-white / non-christian in the U.S.
If ACLU and other defenders of liberty relax on this, how quickly do you think the race back to the bottom will begin? It's already underway, as the thinly-veiled efforts of Bush and friends show us.
You've been listening too much to the tranked-up Mister Limbaugh. Do some reading. Get out into the world. Visit the favelas of Brasil, or take a job as a busboy or dishwasher, and find out just how difficult life is for the half that wasn't born "the majority."
The handheld systems of today may be not up to scale of MS's software, however eventually they will be.
That, I believe, is why MS shoehorns in more requirement and code than needed or is reasonable -to get developers and users used to their presence, so that 5-10 years from now, when battery, storage and processing power are up to par, MS will be ready.
It's a strategy that dooms today's users to slow applications with technology bound inappropriately to the local machine (rather than on the server), but this appears to be MS's strategy. I don't condone it, merely observing.
I tend to agree; nevertheless, compact computing devices will continue to grow in capacity and speed. They will accomodate even the capacious appetites of Microsoft-engineered software. Developers learned to accept MS's engineering bloat on desktop/server operating systems, and it will be no different here.
Already handheld devices are at the performance level of desktops of the early-to-mid 1990s, albeit without rotating mass storage. But SD-Flash is in the multi-gigabyte range, which is more storage than we had on desktops in those days.
Slashdot Mirror
gives out financial evaluations for free
"Financial evaluations" offer little value to customers, and generally are entirely to Primerica's benefit: they serve to qualify a prospect (i.e. pat the potential client's pockets down and peek in their wallet), and to apply decision-influencing selling techniques which hope to end by separating the rube from their cash.
The prospect gets to hear all about Primerica's financial service products, with probably arm-twisting that you would be a fool to do business elsewhere.
No cost other than the salesman's time, and perhaps some brochures and a "Free Financial Evaluation Printout!" at the end (of no value to the prospect outside the Primerica context), are incurred by Primerica. That's NOTHING next to the enormous investment made in OSS by all the collective authors, and the huge value offered in giving away a free operating system.
...far more damage to that reputation ... rumors have had a tremendous chilling effect... no way to undo that damage
Your post reflects SCO's approach to their entire Linux IP adventure: High drama, low plot value.
Those I've met who seriously thought Linux or IBM's legitimacy damaged were those who already had a vested interest against them. Like Microsofties, and the odd BSDer. Most consider SCO's hystrioncs artificial and a thoroughly transparent attempt to manipulate both the software market and the stock market alike.
There have been a number of surveys recently, clearly indicating there have been no chilling effects on the Linux marketplace.
personal attack
;)
:)
You can choose to take it that way -Seriously, as you are preferring to quote an opinion-based source, Fox News, a "fair and balanced" news organization whose objectivity on industry vs. environment is clearly nonexistent, I have to say I enjoyed it.
Personally, I think that the conservative-liberal dichotomy in American discourse is just a form of therapy -people sorting thru their feelings. But don't let that keep you from taking another shot!
Eh? Not at all. The "roman thing" is quite well documented.
I should know better than to respond to somebody who quotes Fox News as a source on science (particularly when the opening paragraph contains the words "junk," "science," and "environmental" -cheerleaders for the smokestack lobby), but if you feel so good about DDT, why not try sprinkling some on your morning breakfast cereal?
First, Rachel Carson is not a researcher, so Fox's refuting of her writings, and her interpretation of one of the researchers she quotes, doesn't address the large body of research regarding correlations between DDT and its effects on wildlife.
Do people farm the ocean for gold?
Can't find the article, but yes there was a California-based ocean water gold extraction outfit in the 1980s, according to my uncle the geologist. This is a cheat, but there was also beach sand extraction.
The important point is that the trend of toxin accumulation is observed. It should be monitored so that correlations become better known. In this industrialized world, it ain't goin' away!
There are many, many examples of pollution wreaking havoc on humans and other species, for example the plummet in bald eagle population due to DDT. Estrogen analogs triggering gender ratio changes and mutations among amphibians. Lead's effects on humans date back to the Romans, mercury is still a factor today...
life expectancy has increased tremendously over the past hundred years, although medical advances probably greatly outweigh any negatives caused by pollutants.
Maybe true in the broadest sense (across entire populations), but at this time cancer cures haven't reached the magic bullet phase, so I'll venture that mortality from pollutant-induced illness is probably going up, not down.
As a species, humans are going through a "population bloom" that is rightly attributed to the medical, and also hygiene, improvements that have occurred since the middle ages.
The negatives include that we're seeing higher rates of what were previously the more exotic diseases and cancers, in individuals. People are living longer, but the pollutants and toxins are causing triggering more illness.
My pop brought this home from work one weekend. Its clockrate was less than 1 MHz, and had 32 kilowords of RAM (16-bit words.) This was in 1976.
The neatest thing about it was, when you powered it on, it presented a "machine language monitor" to whatever console device was hooked (e.g. teletype.) With it, you could store octal words to memory locations, list the octal value of memory, and execute programs (like FOCAL)
In fact, that was how you booted the damn thing. To boot a disk drive (we eventually got two 8" floppy drives), you'd type in the start address of teh boot loader EPROM, followed by 'G', and off it'd go. We ran RT-11, and eventually RSX-11S. Both were command-line O/Sen. Here I learned how to write code, mostly in the PDP-11 instruction set, which even back then was a better design than the 80x86 set.
It's a real antique now, in boxes in the folk's garage. We eventually got a "video terminal kit," which to make operational, we had to hand-solder each and every resister and capacitor onto a circuit board. Fortunately it worked first time out, unlike many of our other hand-built projects!
Overall, this was as good an introduction to computers as I could expect, as it taught me the innards of computers -fundamentals like bits, bytes, registers, etc.
Rush hasn't been charged with anything
Yet. As evidence accumulates, it may be difficult to avoid charging him.
although he was part of an investigation
He may still be under investigation.
The formerly tranked-up, aptly-named "Rush", may yet have his day in court. Given his advocacy of turning up prosecutorial heat on white drug abusers, he should strongly consider turning himself in and admitting his guilt in being the primary beneficiary of a private, high-dollar drug ring..
The best irony is that this man, who best liked the sound of his own voice, will in old age probably hear only his own voice. I hope this means we won't be hearing any more of his voice in the future!
They generate more heat than they take away, and you'll have trouble exhausting away all the heat they produce.
1 watt-hour == 3.41 BTUs. Say your typical rackmount PC, without monitor, draws around 100 watts, that's 341 BTUs. 40 machines plus two monitors and UPSs, plus some odd heat from lights and whatnot, call it about 14,000 BTUs. All that heat rises, and the best thing to do with it is duct it away, then replace it with cold air.
DO NOT SIMPLY DRAW IT INTO THE DROP CEILING, unless there is predictable airflow beyond the ceiling tiles, or a duct, with negative pressure relative to the server room. If there is not a definite exit from the ceiling, or if you're just pushing it up there and hoping it ends up someplace else, forget about it, it just lingers.
Portable AC-on-wheels: they generate decent BTUs removal, but their exchaust is ferocious. If you must use one, cut a hole in the wall for the exit hose, or mount it in a nearby window, just get it away. Don't even think of emptying it into the walls or drop-ceiling, it'll linger and boost the ambient temp.
If you have a window within 50 feet, you could mount a 20-25,000 BTU AC unit, and send the output through an insulated duct to the server room. If the duct runs more than 20-25 feet, you should put a draw fan on it to reduce back-pressure at the AC. Back-pressure can cause all sorts of trouble, so don't force through a tiny or too-long pipe.
Eh, if any of this seems confusing, hire a contractor!
The most important thing to do is monitor temperature in the room. If any of your PCs is recent, it'll have both "system" and "cpu" temp monitoring. There are temperature logging apps for *nix and Windows.
More beer please.
Eclipse (which Sun have also shunned)
.Net architecture and Visual Studio .Net development tools.
... approach and Eclipse's ... approach, but at the moment, Eclipse is the clear leader,
This has recently begun changing:
Sun Mulls Joining Java Eclipse Effort
In an about-face that could have a dramatic impact in the Java tools space, Sun Microsystems Inc. has indicated it might be willing to join the IBM-sponsored Eclipse open-source development platform effort--but only if momentum to spin off the effort into an independent organization continues.
Eclipse already seems to be moving from an IBM-led organization to an independent one. The inclusion of Sun in the Eclipse group would be a major move in the Java development space, bringing the two largest Java development organizations together. It would also bolster the Java community against Microsoft Corp.'s
Rich Green, vice president of Sun developer tools and Java software, in Santa Clara, Calif., made overtures toward the Eclipse effort in an interview with eWEEK last week, saying he favors a standard that open-source development platform developers can access to build Java applications and Web services.
The Eclipse effort was started in 2001 as an alternative to Sun's Java-based NetBeans open-source tools platform. The name was chosen to signify an effort to overshadow Sun's efforts in the area.
Green, however, said he does not see the two efforts as conflicting and said that with the "hint that Eclipse might be changing their structure and maybe separating from IBM," Sun would be interested in working with the organization.
Joining Sun's new Project Rave developer program with Eclipse would put more developers toward the 10- million-developer goal Sun officials have set for the Java ranks.
Skip McGaughey, chairman of Eclipse and an IBM official on loan to the organization, said the Eclipse board of stewards has been working to transition to an independent organization for the last six months and will probably take another three months before it can completely spin off from its IBM sponsorship.
Once the transition occurs, McGaughey said, he expects Eclipse membership to increase. Speaking on whether independence could affect the group's membership, McGaughey said, "I think so, yes. There are a couple of companies that are industry leaders, such as Sun and BEA [Systems Inc.], that we would like to see join Eclipse."
McGaughey said that in March of last year, the Eclipse board of stewards voted to invite Sun and BEA into its fold, "and we've been working since then to try to bring them in."
Part of the transition to an independent organization will include the selection of a board of directors--separate from the board of stewards--to run the organization as a business entity, McGaughey said.
Green said that although Sun is considering involvement with Eclipse, the company would not be moving its core development platform to Eclipse.
"Just like you're not going to see Oracle [Corp.] or Borland [Software Corp.] [both Eclipse members] substitute out their core for Eclipse. That would take up to 24 months," Green said.
Todd Williams, an Eclipse user and vice president of technology at Genuitec LLC, a Dallas-based software consulting and development company, said, "I think as more companies join and share the organization's vision of common frameworks that are flexible and extensible, the better it will be for Java development."
A major point hampering interaction between the camps has been Eclipse's support of the Standard Widget Toolkit and NetBeans' support of the AWT (Abstract Windowing Toolkit) and Swing as their graphics platforms. The technologies are incompatible.
"Sun believes that Eclipse will hit a wall in terms of performance and compatibility because of distinctions between its NetBeans
Thank you, my point from the beginning.
You do not know whether or not these fish pose any sort of trouble in their modified form. At this point we can only hope it's none, as their release to the wild is imminent. In risk-management terms, hope is a pretty shitty place to be.
After that, it's microbiology and game theory...
Predators find glowfish more easily, due to their greater-than-ambient luminosity, and glowfish don't survive that ecosystem
Glowfish don't have natural predators in a given ecosystem and thrive
Glowfish are able to dine by night thanks to built-in lighting, increasing their size and mating potential, leading to population bloom
Population bloom outstrips local species at same spot on food chain, forcing its decline
Etc.
Local ecosystem factors provide additional variables to permute gaming outcomes. Who can say how this will turn out? You can't. I can't. Therefore, introducing a new species into myriad ecosystems around the glove is a risky venture. See my other message about alien species introductions that have brought economic and ecosystem disaster.
I wouldn't expect the effects of introducing a genetically engineered species to be much different than say
Than say kudzu to the Southern/Eastern U.S.? Or zebra mussel to North America's waterways? Or Japanese beetles to the forests? Or Gambian pouched rats? Or loosestrife to northeast farmlands?
All are foreign pests that have caused tremendous economic and environmental damage.
You can't predict in advance what effect releasing a new species into an ecosystem will have. Too many variables. The best you can do is either to not do it, or accept there will be unknown effects. Given the above examples, California's step is prudent.
I'm not sure why you think your guess is valid at all.
I'm not, it's just one possible outcome. Another question is will the GE salmon reach reproductive maturity faster? I don't know the answer, but salmon have this long voyage as part of their mating process... for the ones that escaped the sterility measure, wonder how their early physical maturity would affect the journey and their reproductive timing.
From what I've read, the sterilisation step is performed on the eggs, its not engineered into the genome.
That's the theory... do you really want to test that against the existence of a species? Seems to me the other possible outcome can't be ignored, you can't hope it won't happen, because it's entirely possible it will. Russian roulette with a three-chamber revolver: 1) Wild salmon die out, 2) Engineered salmon die out, 3) Wild and engineered interbreed and become something else.
Coexistence may also happen, but I don't think we should be testing that on a global scale in the wild! At worst, it should happen in an enclosed facility.... question is, will that testing ever happen? Shouldn't be left up to buncha guys in a boardroom sayin' "Yeah, there's no way we'll fuck anything up! Dudes, we'll be sellin' millions of these fish this time next year!! Woo-hoo, Vegas here I come!!!"
viruses reproduce by injecting their genetic material into...
DNA's not as sacred as you think it is.
Good response! For me, it's simple fear of the unknown, that we'll engineer a fuckup. Something that, lose in the wild, throws off ecosystem balance. I don't think this science is good or maybe mature enough to know if it can forecast and prevent the triggering of ecological trouble.
Engineered crops are now loose in the wild, and some have known unintended negative consequences. Once loose onto the winds of the world...
Humans are just getting started in the "god" business, creating new species variants. What we produce now will seem abacus-like fifty years from now, when we'll probably do more than just insert new sequences.
My hope is that profit not remain the primary criterion for a design, that broader research into that organism's effects on nature will be done. It's complex and probably impossible to know all ramifications.
Breeding and genetic engineering are two, distinct areas of science. You've bought into the propaganda, because you cannot assert that selective breeding would produce the crossing of, for example, the arctic flounder, a bacterium with a tomato plant -the Flavr-Savr tomato.
Genetic engineering allows introduction into a species of genes that express proteins (and other molecules) not available within the host species' existing gene pool.
Whether or not that's a good thing is not known, as the U.S. government does not currently require either environmental impact testing nor FDA safety-type testing. Those regulations were swept away during the Clinton administration so that biotech firms could more quicly bring products to market and thereby boost their revenues -but at what cost?
Genetic engineering is actually being tested on an enormous scale -every one of us is a subject.
Personally, I'm not against development of GE products, but believe they really need to be tested. One day there may come a product whose consequences aren't foreseen, and the impact could mean the loss of another species, or worse.
An example of this is the salmon that grows seven times faster than wild salmon. The developers of these want to raise them in netted pens off the coasts of North America, as salmon are currently farmed.
But what would the consequences be of an accidental release of those fish to the wild? A salmon that grows seven times faster than its wild relatives? C'mon, it doesn't take a genius to figure out what the impact would be -the wild salmon would probably get starved out of existence, and it'd be impossible to prevent that from happening. Once in the wild, you couldn't sweep them up.
The question is whether sterilisation can effectively be achieved. It would be insane to assume that it's safe to release them to the environment when the research of its impact obviously can't be ascertained, because this planet has thousands of ecosystems Because of the fish's novelty, this little fish will become ubiquitous around the world. Zebra mussel anyone?
Then there's the very real and frightening specter of species jumping of genetic modifications. It has already been documented in engineered plants (corn to maize in Mexico, for example.) One of the most popular genetic modifications to corn causes it to produce a pesticide. It's gotten into the wild now.
If a block on breeding is not exactly 100% effective, then they will find their way into the wild, where they will breed with compatible locals.
Murphy's law applies.
This one's a poster child for fighting software patents. I hope somebody with deep enough pockets decides to fight... but my sense is that anybody who's based a product upon FAT has probably got their own dubious software patents to product, and therefore would rather settle than fight.
Welcome to the second Microsoft Tax!
Hmm, that's a toughie... lessee... where wuz that battered scrap of paper? Oh, here it is! It's in, would you believe, The Bill of Rights... and it's the first "right," AKA the First Amendment, otherwise known as the Religion Clauses:
http://memory.loc.gov/const/bor.html
Google for: congress law respecting religion -and you'll get many articles explaining the context and limits the First Amendment have placed upon our government. The Religion Clauses do, in fact, establish a clear boundary between the religions practiced by citizens and residents of the U.S., and the government.
The courts have ruled over the years that the government cannot limit the practice of religion (so long as no laws are broken), and it cannot pass laws that favor a religion or its institutions.
It's better that way. Would you want to end up living in a country ruled by fundamentalists? Oh, wait, our Pres...
ACLU persecutes mainstream religion?!
At worst, they argue for separation of church and state, which is part of the Constitution's featureset, if you weren't aware. You want to run a religion, mainstream or not, well it's up to you to seek funding and favor from the people, not the government.
Funding of religion education from my tax dollars? Over my dead body.
"Minimize the majority to accomodate the minority."
Uh, propaganda anybody? Until recently, the minority was pretty much under the bootheel of the majority, and it still ain't grand being non-white / non-christian in the U.S.
If ACLU and other defenders of liberty relax on this, how quickly do you think the race back to the bottom will begin? It's already underway, as the thinly-veiled efforts of Bush and friends show us.
You've been listening too much to the tranked-up Mister Limbaugh. Do some reading. Get out into the world. Visit the favelas of Brasil, or take a job as a busboy or dishwasher, and find out just how difficult life is for the half that wasn't born "the majority."
Jesus ain't no id10t, yew are! Yo' mama so fat, she wears army trucks instead of boots!
yo! ya hear me?!! first stupid post!!
The handheld systems of today may be not up to scale of MS's software, however eventually they will be.
That, I believe, is why MS shoehorns in more requirement and code than needed or is reasonable -to get developers and users used to their presence, so that 5-10 years from now, when battery, storage and processing power are up to par, MS will be ready.
It's a strategy that dooms today's users to slow applications with technology bound inappropriately to the local machine (rather than on the server), but this appears to be MS's strategy. I don't condone it, merely observing.
I tend to agree; nevertheless, compact computing devices will continue to grow in capacity and speed. They will accomodate even the capacious appetites of Microsoft-engineered software. Developers learned to accept MS's engineering bloat on desktop/server operating systems, and it will be no different here.
Already handheld devices are at the performance level of desktops of the early-to-mid 1990s, albeit without rotating mass storage. But SD-Flash is in the multi-gigabyte range, which is more storage than we had on desktops in those days.