How long until some obscure software project named Vista comes out of the woodwork to sue Microsoft, eventually to settle for approx. $1M plus publicity?
the "Modem Dialer" example from the first edition has been removed
According to the book's official site, the modem chapter was pulled from the print edition, but it was still revised, and is available as a PDF or Postscript file.
(The site is chock full of frames, but here's the inner content page talking about it and linking to the chapter's files.)
You're right, I am increasing my chances of being mugged. And I may look at things differently if that ever happens to me.
But right now, there's little benefit to worrying about getting mugged -- little enough that I've decided not to.
No, I'm not going to walk around in the "wrong neighborhood" in the middle of the night and drop $100s on the ground and block my hearing with those pretty white earphones. That would be begging for trouble. But in a well-trafficked downtown area in broad daylight? Eh. I'll take the chance. You can choose not to, if that's more appropriate for your temperament and situation.
Like jpkunst, I use it for real-time arrival information for Seattle busses. Given a route number and a cryptic four-digit code associated with a bus stop (which you have to look up with a full HTML browser, not a WAP browser), it'll show you when the next bus or three are expected to arrive. The next bus is usually accurate to within a minute or two, which can be useful when deciding whether to wait for the faster bus or take the slower one that's arriving sooner.
Just a thought: Use the 56kbps modem for latency-sensitive purposes (e.g. SSH, where throughput isn't so important), and use satellite for browsing, downloading, etc.
while "invitation only" to begin with, doesn't necessarily ensure the quality of the network in the future.
If I were doing this service, I'd start with it invitation-only, to help shake out bugs and performance and usability issues, and then, when it's ready to go live, open it to the public without invitation. Google/Orkut might be doing this. Friendster might have benefitted from this process (or, if they did that, from an extended form of the process).
(Of course, at a certain point, "invitation only" becomes equivalent to "open to the public", more or less, as TheRealMindChild implies. That might be a nice way to do a "soft launch" -- let it "naturally" ramp up, rather than opening the floodgates.)
What should I do to allow for secure wireless internet access?
Well, what I'd do (though I'm not in IT, and I can see the maintenance and usability hassles here) would be to tunnel SSH from the wireless client to a host just on the wired side of the wireless network. From there, unencrypted transmissions can go across the wire with whatever degree of security you've got on the wires.
Problems: Users may have trouble knowing the difference between a secure and an insecure connection; troublesome to update all clients when a new secure port is added; etc. I'd love to hear how professionals have retrofitted security onto 802.11b.
Actually, the dock is lockable, on a per-user basis, in one of the System Preferences panes named "Account Settings" or something like that. (It might be better to make the dock lockable by right-clicking on it or something, but I don't think it works that way.)
No, for three reasons: (1) it was a hack that I'm not happy with; (2) it was to the 4.2.x codebase (it's now at 5.0.x); and (3) I wasn't aware of the list until recently (which may have helped solve (1)).
I'm planning on rewriting it in the next few weeks; I plan on posting the changes to the developers list at that time.
Don't forget the open-source server. I managed to hack up Unicode support of sorts (converting UTF-8 encoded ID3 tags on my MP3s to whatever ISO encoding the SliMP3 uses) with only a little effort.
Don't forget that "without too much trouble" includes implementation (acknowledged that there are free implementations out there), debugging (often non-trivial), and support ("why does my player catch fire whenever I try to play the file encoded with strange options using buggy software?"). But you're right, MP3 and Ogg would be desirable.
(Of course, the original poster seemed to be suggesting Ogg support instead of MP3 support.)
People buy stuff that works. The SliMP3 works, and I can't think of why the Squeezebox won't. Ogg is like Betamax -- while theoretically better, isn't Better Enough to make 99.9% of the world care about it. I'd be as thrilled as anyone if it took off some day, but in the meantime, while you're fuming about formats, I'm enjoying my MP3s streamed to my SliMP3 player (and casting envious looks at that Squeezebox).
I have a SliMP3 (predecessor device). MP3s are served up by an open-source streaming server, to which the SliMP3 (and Squeezebox) connect. The server runs on Unix, OS X, and Windows -- pretty much any OS with a modern Perl implementation. The device can connect to multiple servers running on different boxes; the server also plays nicely with iTunes.
Other streaming MP3 clients can connect to the server, e.g. iTunes, etc.
Playlists can be built with a web server built in to the streaming server (or via the remote, but that's a little less convenient).
I've worked with two headhunters who I'd be happy to work with again, and a third who I might (though I didn't work with that one enough to be certain). The first two were both at Hall Kinion.
I'm in the process of dropping my Nextel service, and so changed my rate plan to the cheapest they offer. When I did so, the customer service person told me something to the effect of "with this plan, land line callers may pay more to call you". I didn't give it much thought, but this is certainly what they meant. Perhaps more expensive wireless plans cover that fee on behalf of the caller... ?
There are currently two different models of snap-on cameras ("CommuniCam") for these phones....
The new model is the the MCA-20, which currently works only with the T68i, afaik.
So, I just bought a T68i last week, thinking that at some point I might want this, or some other (currently non-existent) cool device. How does the MCA-20 compare to a similarly-priced digital camera -- image quality, download-to-PC options & speed, etc.? (The download opt My hunch tells me that it's probably more than a comparable-quality standalone camera....
(Jeez, this sounds like a shill, or a troll-for-a-shill. Apologies. But I do actually want to know.)
Of historical interest, from the RFC (written in 1990): "Extremely well-known hostnames such as 'sri-nic' and 'uunet' should be avoided since they are understood in conversation as absolute addresses even without a domain." I consider myself a bit of an old-timer, but though I recognize uunet, I've never even heard of sri-nic. I'm sure someone knows about this; please inform!
"Cuz remember programmers: in the real world you are fired if you consult with a co-worker;)"
Yes, but one of the goals of a CS department should be to produce programmers who are capable of doing work themselves. Would you want to work with (or supervise) a slacker who couldn't code his way out of a paper bag, but who graduated anyway because he cut-and-pasted the work of his (harder-working) classmates?
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How long until some obscure software project named Vista comes out of the woodwork to sue Microsoft, eventually to settle for approx. $1M plus publicity?
According to the book's official site, the modem chapter was pulled from the print edition, but it was still revised, and is available as a PDF or Postscript file.
(The site is chock full of frames, but here's the inner content page talking about it and linking to the chapter's files.)
You're wondering "Who's next?". I'm wondering "Who?".
When I say "4000 people", I mean "4000 coffee drinkers", which should go without saying, but perhaps not everybody is as caffeine addicted as I am....
Per starbucks.com, Seattle has ~131 locations (searching for all retail stores within 10 miles of Seattle (city center), discarding suburb locations).
Seattle has ~560000 people, ~510000 > 14 years old), so that's about 1 Starbucks per 4000 people.
There are also two "Urban Coffee Opportunities", whatever those are.
There are 319 locations within 50 miles of Seattle's city center.
You're right, I am increasing my chances of being mugged. And I may look at things differently if that ever happens to me.
But right now, there's little benefit to worrying about getting mugged -- little enough that I've decided not to.
No, I'm not going to walk around in the "wrong neighborhood" in the middle of the night and drop $100s on the ground and block my hearing with those pretty white earphones. That would be begging for trouble. But in a well-trafficked downtown area in broad daylight? Eh. I'll take the chance. You can choose not to, if that's more appropriate for your temperament and situation.
Like jpkunst, I use it for real-time arrival information for Seattle busses. Given a route number and a cryptic four-digit code associated with a bus stop (which you have to look up with a full HTML browser, not a WAP browser), it'll show you when the next bus or three are expected to arrive. The next bus is usually accurate to within a minute or two, which can be useful when deciding whether to wait for the faster bus or take the slower one that's arriving sooner.
Just a thought: Use the 56kbps modem for latency-sensitive purposes (e.g. SSH, where throughput isn't so important), and use satellite for browsing, downloading, etc.
If I were doing this service, I'd start with it invitation-only, to help shake out bugs and performance and usability issues, and then, when it's ready to go live, open it to the public without invitation. Google/Orkut might be doing this. Friendster might have benefitted from this process (or, if they did that, from an extended form of the process).
(Of course, at a certain point, "invitation only" becomes equivalent to "open to the public", more or less, as TheRealMindChild implies. That might be a nice way to do a "soft launch" -- let it "naturally" ramp up, rather than opening the floodgates.)
Well, what I'd do (though I'm not in IT, and I can see the maintenance and usability hassles here) would be to tunnel SSH from the wireless client to a host just on the wired side of the wireless network. From there, unencrypted transmissions can go across the wire with whatever degree of security you've got on the wires.
Problems: Users may have trouble knowing the difference between a secure and an insecure connection; troublesome to update all clients when a new secure port is added; etc. I'd love to hear how professionals have retrofitted security onto 802.11b.
Actually, the dock is lockable, on a per-user basis, in one of the System Preferences panes named "Account Settings" or something like that. (It might be better to make the dock lockable by right-clicking on it or something, but I don't think it works that way.)
No, for three reasons: (1) it was a hack that I'm not happy with; (2) it was to the 4.2.x codebase (it's now at 5.0.x); and (3) I wasn't aware of the list until recently (which may have helped solve (1)).
I'm planning on rewriting it in the next few weeks; I plan on posting the changes to the developers list at that time.
Don't forget the open-source server. I managed to hack up Unicode support of sorts (converting UTF-8 encoded ID3 tags on my MP3s to whatever ISO encoding the SliMP3 uses) with only a little effort.
Don't forget that "without too much trouble" includes implementation (acknowledged that there are free implementations out there), debugging (often non-trivial), and support ("why does my player catch fire whenever I try to play the file encoded with strange options using buggy software?"). But you're right, MP3 and Ogg would be desirable.
(Of course, the original poster seemed to be suggesting Ogg support instead of MP3 support.)
People buy stuff that works. The SliMP3 works, and I can't think of why the Squeezebox won't. Ogg is like Betamax -- while theoretically better, isn't Better Enough to make 99.9% of the world care about it. I'd be as thrilled as anyone if it took off some day, but in the meantime, while you're fuming about formats, I'm enjoying my MP3s streamed to my SliMP3 player (and casting envious looks at that Squeezebox).
I have a SliMP3 (predecessor device). MP3s are served up by an open-source streaming server, to which the SliMP3 (and Squeezebox) connect. The server runs on Unix, OS X, and Windows -- pretty much any OS with a modern Perl implementation. The device can connect to multiple servers running on different boxes; the server also plays nicely with iTunes.
Other streaming MP3 clients can connect to the server, e.g. iTunes, etc.
Playlists can be built with a web server built in to the streaming server (or via the remote, but that's a little less convenient).
I've worked with two headhunters who I'd be happy to work with again, and a third who I might (though I didn't work with that one enough to be certain). The first two were both at Hall Kinion.
You only gave this book a 92% rating? What a hypocrite. Your review made it sound like a solid 93%.
I'm in the process of dropping my Nextel service, and so changed my rate plan to the cheapest they offer. When I did so, the customer service person told me something to the effect of "with this plan, land line callers may pay more to call you". I didn't give it much thought, but this is certainly what they meant. Perhaps more expensive wireless plans cover that fee on behalf of the caller ... ?
Snarky comments about Wheaton and/or Crusher in 3... 2... 1...
(Jeez, this sounds like a shill, or a troll-for-a-shill. Apologies. But I do actually want to know.)
Very interesting.
Of historical interest, from the RFC (written in 1990): "Extremely well-known hostnames such as 'sri-nic' and 'uunet' should be avoided since they are understood in conversation as absolute addresses even without a domain." I consider myself a bit of an old-timer, but though I recognize uunet, I've never even heard of sri-nic. I'm sure someone knows about this; please inform!
For those who care, Yamhill is a small town WSW of Portland (the little red star at the lower left).
Fascinating info can be found at cityofyamhill.com, naturally.
Yes, but one of the goals of a CS department should be to produce programmers who are capable of doing work themselves. Would you want to work with (or supervise) a slacker who couldn't code his way out of a paper bag, but who graduated anyway because he cut-and-pasted the work of his (harder-working) classmates?