Just wondering if you can name anything thats come out of Microsoft Research that qualifies as revolutionary or groundbreaking? Spending money on research and collecting big names like Akeley and Blinn, for example, in their graphic department doesn't mean they're producing anything that will have lasting impact, like Unix and C did. Microsoft reputation, which they have a hard time shaking no matter how many billions they spend on research is all the groundbreaking stuff happens elsewhere, they just embrace, extend and exploit, as in the case of the Internet are often rather late to the dance.
Two big splashes Microsoft made in graphics, I can recall, are Talisman and Fahrenheit, both long dead. I see Cleartype in their list which is nice but not sure they actually invented it nor that its exactly ground breaking. I see video textures described as a "new medium" on their list, like its something revolutionary, when in fact SGI was doing those more than a decade ago.
They were certainly prolific in papers at SIGGRAPH 2005, though its hard to gage SIGGRAPH papers for how big the real impact of the research will be. In the mid 90's Talisman Microsoft's next generation graphics architecture, completely dominated attention at a SIGGRAPH only to die soon thereafter while all the real action was at 3Dlabs, Nvidia and ATI. Its also a bit disturbing when you see the lions share of their current graphics research is coming out of that bastion of democracy and free enterprise, the People's Republic of China.
Maybe the sick part was the non stop media bombardment with the same video of her when she was a vegetable, over and over. It brings to mind the SouthPark episode where Kenny is a vegetable, and the lawyer lost the last page of his living will. So Kenny ends up exploited on TV by Cartman's pull the plug faction, and Stan and Kyle's keep him alive faction. When the lawyer finds the last page of the will his one wish is if he ends up a vegetable DON'T PUT HIM ON TV.
"Now, government IS the solution to many problems..."
Dude, your funny. Spend 3 paragraphs denying you believe that government is the solution to every problem, or most problems....oh but you do believe it is the solution to many problems. LOL!!!
To be honest I can't think of anything the Federal government has done for me my entire life except bleed me white with taxes.
It will be a miracle if any of the vast amounts I've paid in to Social Security or Medicare will be there when I reach 65. Those two liberal dreams worked great for seniors up till now but everyone below 45 is going to get screwed because the Social Security "Trust" Fund has been squandered and the only way to replace it is with new taxes, borrowing or slashing benefits.
Education, maybe there is a government role, except it should be state and local governments doing it. No child left behind is the brand of insanity you get when the Fed's can force one politician's agenda on the whole country. As bad as American education is, especially K-12 its more of a case study in how government failed than anything supporting your case.
I can see a need for a national defense, especially during World War II, but today we need one a small fraction of the one we have and it shouldn't be meddling in every other country on the planet.
I guess I've driven on their Interstates but to be honest I think the country would be better with state highways that go through towns instead of sterile superhighways.
It would be nice to have universal health care but you can't do it without a huge percentage of people abusing it, and running up huge tabs searching for phantom illnesses. Thats all one of my elder inlaws uses Medicare for, to go to a new doctor once a week, demanding expensive tests to find out whats wrong with her, when her dominant problem is she is old. You just can't offer people something that is expensive for free without people squandering it and ruining it for everyone.
I appreciate some things state, county and local governments do, but nope, to be honest can't think of much the Federal government has done that justifies it existence at a fraction of the price. Its to bad states rights was tarred by slavery and the civil war because having a Federal government a twentieth the size and a hundreth the power of the one we have would be a vast improvement.
"If you oppose abortion, which I have a feeling you do, then you should support sex education."
Well you would be quite wrong. I think I said that already. I'm totally cool with someone choosing an abortion, assuming its not partial birth and late term just because its gruesome. But I also understand why people would oppose it.
The libertarian in me says people ought to be able to make their own decisions on things as long as that decision doesn't cause harm to others. A reasonably early abortion should be up to the mother first and the father second. If you oppose it don't get one but don't stop others from getting one. If your for it get one if you decide you need it but don't promote it. Its a gruesome last resort, not something you should be doing cavalierly.
Then maybe this would be more your style. Its the design for the CXV, a proposed crew transfer vehicle to to get 4 people to and from LEO and the ISS, also being worked on by Scaled Composites along with Transformational Space. Currently its under a small NASA contract, that is a lesser known little brother to the CEV, though you can tell this is intended to be the orbital successor to SpaceShipOne and they want to use it for private space travel. I'm hoping they can scrape together the funds to make it a reality.
They've drop tested a 23% scale model launch stack at Mojave, and dropped tested the capsule parachute system off Crescent City, CA.
The Airforce is funding the Falcon two stage launch vehicle under its QuickReach program. Its fuled by LOX and Propane. Its a VAPAK pressure fed system with no expensive turbopumps. You heat the fuel and build up pressure in the tank instead of using pumps. This isn't viable for launch for sea level but works great for air launches.
So of course this craft is also air launched like SpaceShipOne for a lot of reasons listed on the web site. A big challenge is they need either a very large new version of White Knight or a used 747 with major changes to the landing gear to accomadate slinging the spacecraft underneath it.
The capsule is based on scaled up version of the well proven Discover/Corona capsules used 400+ times to return film from spy satellites. The capsule is reusable with minor refurbishment between launches. It uses 2 layers of SIRCA thermal tiles developed at NASA Ames. It ocean lands with parachutes like Apollo, partially since this make it possible to safely land on 2/3rds of the Earth's surface in an emergency.
"I think that having cheap, easy access to birth control is important. I said nor implied anything about "hand outs."
If you want it to be cheaper than it already is on the free market then you are talking about government subsidy whatever word you want to use for it. Its a really bad idea to subsidize things like abortion and birth control that a large percentage of the tax paying public vehemently oppose. You just encourage them to mobilize and replace your government with extremist nut jobs like we have now to smack you down. Instead of just getting rid of the subsidies they then have the temptation and momentum to overcorrect and start banning birth control and abortion all together.
Liberals should have just been happy with getting abortion legalized and birth control reasonably available, but NOOOOOOO, you have to keep pushing it, to get 13 year olds access to government subsidized condoms and abortions without parents knowledge or consent, and you wonder why there is a backlash.
"Being a liberal I support making children go to school, and imposing "education" on them and "forcing" "views" on them, although I prefer to call them "facts".
When you delve in to sexual practice, birth control and especially abortion unfortunately your facts tread heavily on religious faith and family moral values. Like I said if you have a class that is voluntary and parents authorize it I see no problem with it. Forcing kids in to a class like you describe, and denying their parents a say in it is just going to energize them to fight it to the bitter end.
Liberals are held in such increasingly low regard because you can never stop yourselves from coming up with new ways to use government to force people to do things "for their own good", things many people find detestable especially when imposed on them by government, especially Federal government, against their will. You are your own worst enemies.
In case you haven't figured it out by now I'm half left wing radical and half Libertarian. I'd probably be arguing your side half the time here on ole/. but I really have no use for the concept more government is the solution to every problem.
"Fear is the mind killer."
This is a nice slogan, have no idea how you managed to apply it here, I guess you just liked the sound of it. Don't remember fear ever being an issue in any of this.
" let's tell kids in health classes "if'n you don't wanna have a baby, here's what ya do.""
Like I said, you want to force you're sexual views on everyone in mandatory classes everyone has to attend. And you want the government to hand out birth control, condoms and abortions to all comers at tax payers expense. Just say it, everyone knew thats what you wanted 5 posts back. There are people who just as fervently want to ban abortion, and hinder access to birth control.
You are both wrong. Birth control and education should be available, but the government shouldn't be pushing it on people either.
Acessd to abortions is alway going to be a problem. I'm of the view people who want them should be able to get them but again I can see how some people would consider it murder. I can totally see how those people would be opposed to funding it out of their tax dollars. I generally wish people would mind their own business and let people get abortions if they want them, but you are totally wrong if you think its OK for government to advocate or fund them.
I'd personally have no problem with my tax dollars going for all this, it is probably beneficial to society in the long run, but I can totally understand the point of view of people who think this is a completely inappropriate role for government, especially because you are trampling their religious beliefs and trying to indoctrinate their children in practices they don't approve of. When you reach that kind of impasse the appropriate role for government is to stay out of it. Religions are a pain but the beauty of our Consitutution is the state isn't supposed to endorse or sponsor them, nor is it supposed to trample them.
Well I've had enough fun for one day baiting you. Each successive post it become more and more obvious how out of control angry you are. You sound dangerous so I think I better not play with matches near you anymore because you are about to explode. One word of advice dude, chill, you are taking this crap way to serious.
Just a suggestion but you really need to tone down the language. You might have some good arguments under there but once you starting cussing a blue streak everyone is going to ignore your arguments because you sound completely out of control and like you are about to lose it.
"Want EDUCATION about it? Here's a website / brochure."
Dude anybody who can use Google can find all the education they need about it. They don't need the Federal government or you getting on your high horse fretting over whether there are enough web sites on condoms, the pill or abortion for all the pitiful poor people.
"Fact #1: Meth mostly affects rural America."
Here is a random URL from 5 seconds of googling, indicating Meth abuse is getting just as bad in cities. It early appeal in rural areas was it was easy to make and get. There is no reason it isn't going to hammer cities just as much as it is rural areas other than that part of your obssession with the plight of the poor hillbillies.
" Fact #2: Rural residents tend to have worse health care"
Well I think you mean poor people have worse health care. Only hurdle rural residents have is there are fewer doctors per capita and they tend to be farther away. That is just a fact of life due to economics and geography, and you aren't going to change it. I doubt its much of a factor in access to birth control. Urban poor have dismal healthcare too.
All in all I'd say I'm left with the attitude most people have towards bleeding heart liberals, why don't you mind your own business and stop operating under the illusion anyone wants or needs you telling them how to live.
"The right to access information about birth control, and even use it whenever you want?"
Access is great. You used the word "education" which has two paths. One you sponsor a voluntary class which no one attends, or two you want to inject it in to schools or otherwise force it on people through less than voluntary classes on the subject or maybe you want some bleeding heart liberals or civil servants going door to door forcing it on people handing out pamphlets, free condoms, etc. Most people don't want people going door to door lecturing them on sex and handing out condoms.
You really didn't say which route you wanted. Since we were talking about a Federal program, space exploration, you wanted to replace with your birth control "education" program the inference is you wanted a Federal program to hand out pamphlets and run classes. Believe it or not I wager most people know at an early age what a condom is and how to use it. They really aren't hard to get unless you are under 18. Most of the "brown trash" you hate so much aren't going to use them because they are Catholic, not because of anything relating to education or access.
Of course the other implication is for all the poor people who can't afford condoms or the pill I'm assuming you want the government to buy it for them. Maybe buy them abortions, why stop there why don't you go the China route and place mandatory caps on the number of children people have if you really want to fix your problem.
As for all your ranting, foul language and slinging "Fascist" ever third world all you did was prove my point, rabid bleeding heart liberals like yourself are just as nuts as right wing wackos. Your embarrassing man, your why people are embarrassed to be called liberal these days, and why people don't want to vote your way any more.
"Which manifests itself in the political and education systems."
Well if the constitutional separation of church and state, embattled as it is, holds, religion is completely separate from politics and education. You have zero right to try to force people to abandon their religious beliefs because you dislike their consequences. I may not like it either but I dislike people who think they can trample a basic civil liberty even more.
"You really nailed it."
Doesn't take much intelligence or psychic powers since you're plugging Air America radio in your login which pretty much matches bleeding heart liberal. I'd like to see some good liberal radio in this country to match all the right wing crap, but I'm not sure Jerry Springer and Al Franken qualify. I hear recently one former exec at AirAmerica apparently looted boys/girls club of $800k to keep it on the air.
You are also wringing your hands about the need to force population control on people you deem to be your inferiors. In fact you are going so far as to advocate a behavior modification program up to and including overriding personal religious beliefs. Thats pretty bleeding heart liberal.
Just curious do you still live in rural Texas or did you flee to the city.
"They can't afford a dentist but they can pump out the future white/brown trash/meth dealers of America at an astonishing rate."
Nice. Hate to break it to you but your prejudice has nothing to do with rural versus urban. You'll find no shortage of people in the city with the same problem. My key point here was singling out rural Americans for your behavior modification program is misguided at best, prejudiced at worst.
"Turn off Limbaugh, fucktard."
Chill dude I was just asking. If you had looked at my sig or read any of my historical slashdot posts you'd find I'm no right winger. I just don't have any use for bleeding heart liberals either. They are so goofy they almost make right wing nut cases look sane by comparison.
Not sure I've ever met a prejudiced, bleeding heart, liberal before. Maybe it's a Texas thing.
"Giving a rural family access to and education about birth control is FAR more beneficial.."
I hope your referring to rural families who live outside the U.S. because believe it or not people who live in rural America do in fact go to school, know about rubbers and the pill, have television and the Internet, go to doctors, etc. The biggest problem you have on the birth control front is religious opposition to it, not in eduction or access.
Just curious, are you a bleeding heart, liberal, urbanite... a sophisticated city slickers who feels its his duty, and a national imperative, to teach all the dumb, inbred, hillbillies to not make any more babies, and leave the world to the yuppies?
"that can't be overcome with enough will and funding. That doesn't make either activity likely or sensible."
I'll repeat it again because you missed it, if we can justify spending $300 billion on replacing one bad government with another in Iraq its WAAAYYY more sensible to spend $200 billion on starting a colony on Mars. The American calculus for sensible is totally out of whack when you whine about space exploration while your government engages in rampant and expensive stupidity elsewhere.
"Posts about technical ideas to make space activity more affordable can be interesting."
Dude, if you were following this thread some place back up there I posted an interesting article on Transformational space doing just that and the Nimrod I was replying to came back with:
"is the silliness of the slashbots raving about how since Burt Rutan can scrape the bottom of LEO in a jumped-up jetplane...."
I'm the only one in this thread that did what you are talking about. Everyone else is WHINING, space travel is hard..... Waaaaaaa.... let's just give up..... Waaaaaaaa.
"But posts about how we've lost the Will! the Vision! the Can-Do Spirit of our Ancestors! remain as boring as when they first appeared on Sumerian/."
Well its ten times worse listening to people whine that manned space travel is impossible, and we should just give up.
At this point I quit on this thread. I'm getting sick of the lamers that seem to be hanging out on Slashdot today. What happened to all the engineers and hackers around this place anyway?
" slashbots raving about how since Burt Rutan can scrape the bottom of LEO in a jumped-up jetplane"
Its even more silly to see people on slashdot, like yourselves, who aren't interested in some one like Rutan engaged in innovative engineering and trying to solve hard problems like getting in to space affordably. Is he doing something never done before, no, people have been to LEO lots of times, but coming up with a way to get there cheaply is a very worthwhile goal and its a fascinating engineering problem. That is what engineering is all about, coming up with better ways to do things.
Maybe you two should consider hanging out on some other website, like maybe one for Luddites or flat earthers. You don't really belong on Slashdot, or at least the slashdot of old which was for engineers and hackers.
"it's how the fiscal black-holes of the ISS and space shuttle are somehow a better use of NASA budget than pure science and unmanned probes."
That is a whole different issue from where this thread started. This thread was started by someone who was claiming insurmountable barriers in physics to manned space travel.
What you are referring to here is bureaucratic incompetence not the laws of physics. It has nothing to with physics and it is most definitely surmountable.
I'm all for using unmanned satellites wherever appropriate but when it comes to Mars the interesting part is colonizing it with people, not machines. How many people do you think care about the latest rock Opportunity or Spirit looked at today.
"will likely never be able to flit about the galaxy"
Dude, once again you are the one leaping off on a tangent that had nothing to do with where this thread started. The original post was writing off going to or colonizing Mars not "flitting about the galaxy" using warp drive. I would be the first to condemn as nuts anyone who thought interstellar space travel was something worth bothering with at this point anyplace outside of a sci-fi script ot story.
Going to Mars doesn't require interstellar space travel, it can be done with chemical rockets, big versions of the ones we already have. Going to Mars is completely feasible in our lifetimes. Going to Mars would open up a second biosphere which is a far more worthwhile goal than for example spending $300 billion dollars, and killing tens of thousands of people replacing one messed up regime in Iraq with a different messed up regime in Iraq.
In the last century man went from always having frontiers for the restless, bold and adventurous to explore to today where there isn't an inch of the planet that hasn't been trampled underfoot. How completely boring the future your painting will be as we just slowly fill up and use up this planet. All the people with the frontiersman spirit will just suffocate, and go nuts.
"a fundamental lack of education into the physical sciences, imo."
That is complete BS. There are no physical barriers to going to mars that can't be overcome with enough will and funding. On the funding side he U.S. has squandered more in an insane dead end in Iraq than it would have take to fund an ambitious Mars program.
But I guess I see your point. You two are probably right. It probably is impossible to do anything in space any more. In the 60's people weren't dwelling on why it couldn't be done they were problem solving and doing it.
Today we have people like yourselves insisting it can't be done and would rather just make it through life going to boring jobs, doing boring things, and keeping food on the table. Keeping food on the table is a good thing, but going through life afraid to do anything because its hard is pretty sad. Kennedy put it best:
"We chose to go to the moon, and do these other things in this decade, not because they are easy, but because they are hard!"
I'd say, assuming you are Americans, that this thread is mostly just an indicator of how much America has declined in the last 40 years.
"We can't get to anything beyond the solar system without FTL travel...."
The parent wasn't talking about travel beyond our solar system, he was talking about doing ANYTHING in space, in particular going to Mars, which is most definitely just an incremental step past going to the moon, though its a big increment.
Your arguments are the absurd ones. It is already completely possible to go to Mars with the chemical propulsion technology we have. Are there problems to overcome? Yes, in particular dealing with the radiation exposure. Would it be nice if the trip were faster? Sure, but is it physically impossible? No, and you acting like it is, is the absurdity here. Travelling to another star obviously impossible until and unless there is a major breakthrough. Manned travel to the moons of Jupiter would be very challenging without some significant advances, but impossible, no.
"The costs for getting off-planet have not been significantly reduced in the 40 years since the Apollo missions."
This project almost certainly will if they can scrape together the funding.
The cost of Soyuz launches are already pretty cheap. The U.S. squanders the equivalent money in a day or two in Iraq.
Just because the Shuttle was an expensive disaster is no indicator of anything. To turn your own logic on you, past failure is no indication of future performance
All in all you are just such a downer I'm not seeing any point in continuing the conversation.
This isn't insightful, its just blatant pessimism. If this had been the dominant mindset in mankind we wouldn't have crossed mountains, oceans, the Wright brothers would never have flown, and we wouldn't have gone to the Moon. Mankind would still be huddled in a little spot in Africa with rocks and sticks as the pinnacle of toolmaking, or maybe we would have deadended in extinction.
The people who count are ones that do things that no one thought could be done, not the people that said don't even try because its not possible.
I am glad to say that Burt Rutan, Scaled Composites and Transformational Space are already working on for the LEO successor to SpaceShipOne and it looks to be a really promisign start if they can put together the funding. They are working on a shoestring budget from NASA for the CXV program, a lesser known counterpart to the CEV program. CXV is intended to develop a low cost, reliable, safe, launch vehicle to get crews to and from the ISS or elsewhere in LEO.
Like SpaceShipOne this vehicle is air launched though from a much larger mother ship so there is no expensive launch complex. The capsule is derived from the Discover/Corona capsules used to return film from spy satellites and is a very well understood design. It has an innovative new heat shield, will deploy parachutes and water land like Apollo. The capsule is reusable. It is very focused on safety, reliability and low cost which is exactly what we need at the moment for a manned vehicle.
They've dropped tested a 23% scale model of the launch vehicle in Mojave and a week or two did a first drop test of the parachute system off Crescent City, CA.
You are really overstating your case for things to do in space. Its really bad to undertake something as expensive as space exploration with naive dreaming about the payoff.
Their is a payoff in tourism certainly. Colonization on Mars has a payoff. Mining may eventually be worthwhile especially when Earth's resources achieve serious scarcity though that its a long ways off before the payoff justifies the enormous expense.
The one thing space exploration offers is somewhat intangible. Its a frontier to be explored which appeals to a certain type of person. Outside of the depths of the oceans the Earth is almost completely devoid of frontiers. Climbing Mt. Everest is no longer much of an accomplishment.
I am glad to say that Burt Rutan, Scaled Composites and Transformational Space are already working on for the LEO successor to SpaceShipOne. They are working on a shoestring budget from NASA for the CXV program, a lesser known counterpart to the CEV program. CXV is intended to develop a low cost, reliable, safe, launch vehicle to get crews to and from the ISS or elsewhere in LEO.
Like SpaceShipOne this vehicle is air launched though from a much larger mother ship so there is no expensive launch complex. The capsule is derived from the Discover/Corona capsules used to return film from spy satellites and is a very well understood design. It has an innovative new heat shield, will deploy parachutes and water land like Apollo. The capsule is reusable. It is very focused on safety, reliability and low cost which is exactly what we need at the moment for a manned vehicle.
The CAIB report is not gospel. It is just another bureaucratic committee coming from a different angle.
It glosses over the fact NASA has spent over a $100 billion on the ISS due to both political interference and just plain bad management. The price tag just to keep the ISS and Shuttle going until 2010 and maybe finish ISS if they are lucky is $60 billion according to Mike Griffin's congressional testimony before he became administrator.
By comparison he cites the total cost for the entire Apollo program as $130 billion in today's dollars. Apollo started from scratch and actually did something, versus the $160 billion or so for the baby steps it took to build the ISS and it does nothing.
Griffin's optimistic assessment for return to the moon is $25 billion. The amount allocated for CEV, return to moon and other new launch vehicles through 2010 is less than that allocated just to keep the ISS and Shuttle jobs program going.
Another thing about NASA's budget problem is they are a job's program and everyone knows it. Its how they get their congressional support, by putting high quality jobs in the districts of their congressional backers especially in Florida, Texas, Utah and Mississippi. It takes at least 6,000 people to keep the Shuttle program going, whether it flies or not, not counting all the contractors that build parts. If Griffin tries to cut back the Shuttle/ISS jobs program to rein in costs he is going to run in to serious fricition from Congress. As a result he may be forced to maintain the employment levels of the status quo so he can never rein in costs.
I think I can just as easily say NASA, the agency that does to little with to much, at least as far as their manned space program goes. The Russians are the ones who do a lot with very little.
All that said when you see George W. squandering hundreds of billions on the misguided war in Iraq then yes NASA's budget is chicken feed by comparison. But, I'm very afraid if you gave NASA a budget of $50-100 billion a year the ways they would find to squander it would sicken. I suspect Mike Griffin might be a good manager, though it remains to be seen, but the entrenched career bureaucrats and contractors at NASA have a proven track record for squandering money to no good end.
DirectTV is dropping Tivo in favor of PVR's built by NDS which is a subsidiary of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp, which also owns a big stake in DirectTV and Fox. You can apparently still buy Tivo's from DirectTV but you have to ask for them, they are going to pitch NDS boxes instead by default.
DirectTV is relying on its recent deal with Comcast for its future since the majority of its new subscribers come from DirectTV at the moment.
I've used the original BeOS pretty extensively and still do use it off and on. Its a bit dated obviously, gcc for example, but it is very usable in general. There are free downloads available for the original BeOS and its an easy install if you have a spare partition. The original network stack is quirky and slow though there is a more modern one available now called BONE.
In terms of multimedia support, audio and video, it is IMHO superior to Linux, that coming from someone who's run Linux on my desktop for years. The multimedia architecture is powerful and very well designed. There are still professional theatrical productions that use it for that reason every day in very demanding situations.
Would I use it on a server, no. But, if you do a lot of multimedia work its probably a better choice than Linux and up there with OSX.
Another obvious plus over Linux is there is one reasonably well done set of C++ API's to do everything, versus the fragmentation in API's and religious wars you find on Linux between Gnome and KDE in particular. The BeOS API's aren't entirely mature in areas due to its limited user and developer base, but having one consistent set of API's which leads to applications which all work together, look and behave consistently is a huge plus. You pretty much have to go to KDE and stay within the KDE application set to match it on Linux, but multimedia support in KDE isn't the greatest.
There is a whitepaper on Linux Devices on Georgia Tech's Debian Sarge powered Mongoose. It didn't fare well overall but it was their first year there and won best newcomer.
Thank you, thank you, thank you!!! That worked great. I'm eternally in your debt.
I was playing WoW but the grinding and dungeon crawls get old and predictable. Only interesting part after a while is the economy and WoW's economy is poor compared to EQ.
I bought "Nexus: The Jupiter Incident" a few weeks ago but got tired of it after two nights of being lead through preplanned scenarios ala "Wing Commander". Made me crave a game of Alpha Centauri and I was bummed when it didn't work on the new computer.
You know its a good game when you NEVER get tired of playing it, even with its lame ass AI's.
I saw this on linuxdevices.com today, though the link to the detained writeup was broken when I was there.
"Linux powers XScale-based RFID reader - Alien Technology used embedded Linux to build a multi-protocol RFID reader that it says exploits features in the latest EPC (electronic product code) specifications, including DRM (dense reader mode). The ALR-9800 can be programmed for remote management or sensor-based actuation using an optional Java/.Net SDK....
Have to doubt it will be able to touch all the gubermint issue RFID tags though.
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Just wondering if you can name anything thats come out of Microsoft Research that qualifies as revolutionary or groundbreaking? Spending money on research and collecting big names like Akeley and Blinn, for example, in their graphic department doesn't mean they're producing anything that will have lasting impact, like Unix and C did. Microsoft reputation, which they have a hard time shaking no matter how many billions they spend on research is all the groundbreaking stuff happens elsewhere, they just embrace, extend and exploit, as in the case of the Internet are often rather late to the dance.
Two big splashes Microsoft made in graphics, I can recall, are Talisman and Fahrenheit, both long dead. I see Cleartype in their list which is nice but not sure they actually invented it nor that its exactly ground breaking. I see video textures described as a "new medium" on their list, like its something revolutionary, when in fact SGI was doing those more than a decade ago.
They were certainly prolific in papers at SIGGRAPH 2005, though its hard to gage SIGGRAPH papers for how big the real impact of the research will be. In the mid 90's Talisman Microsoft's next generation graphics architecture, completely dominated attention at a SIGGRAPH only to die soon thereafter while all the real action was at 3Dlabs, Nvidia and ATI. Its also a bit disturbing when you see the lions share of their current graphics research is coming out of that bastion of democracy and free enterprise, the People's Republic of China.
Maybe the sick part was the non stop media bombardment with the same video of her when she was a vegetable, over and over. It brings to mind the SouthPark episode where Kenny is a vegetable, and the lawyer lost the last page of his living will. So Kenny ends up exploited on TV by Cartman's pull the plug faction, and Stan and Kyle's keep him alive faction. When the lawyer finds the last page of the will his one wish is if he ends up a vegetable DON'T PUT HIM ON TV.
"Now, government IS the solution to many problems..."
Dude, your funny. Spend 3 paragraphs denying you believe that government is the solution to every problem, or most problems....oh but you do believe it is the solution to many problems. LOL!!!
To be honest I can't think of anything the Federal government has done for me my entire life except bleed me white with taxes.
It will be a miracle if any of the vast amounts I've paid in to Social Security or Medicare will be there when I reach 65. Those two liberal dreams worked great for seniors up till now but everyone below 45 is going to get screwed because the Social Security "Trust" Fund has been squandered and the only way to replace it is with new taxes, borrowing or slashing benefits.
Education, maybe there is a government role, except it should be state and local governments doing it. No child left behind is the brand of insanity you get when the Fed's can force one politician's agenda on the whole country. As bad as American education is, especially K-12 its more of a case study in how government failed than anything supporting your case.
I can see a need for a national defense, especially during World War II, but today we need one a small fraction of the one we have and it shouldn't be meddling in every other country on the planet.
I guess I've driven on their Interstates but to be honest I think the country would be better with state highways that go through towns instead of sterile superhighways.
It would be nice to have universal health care but you can't do it without a huge percentage of people abusing it, and running up huge tabs searching for phantom illnesses. Thats all one of my elder inlaws uses Medicare for, to go to a new doctor once a week, demanding expensive tests to find out whats wrong with her, when her dominant problem is she is old. You just can't offer people something that is expensive for free without people squandering it and ruining it for everyone.
I appreciate some things state, county and local governments do, but nope, to be honest can't think of much the Federal government has done that justifies it existence at a fraction of the price. Its to bad states rights was tarred by slavery and the civil war because having a Federal government a twentieth the size and a hundreth the power of the one we have would be a vast improvement.
"If you oppose abortion, which I have a feeling you do, then you should support sex education."
Well you would be quite wrong. I think I said that already. I'm totally cool with someone choosing an abortion, assuming its not partial birth and late term just because its gruesome. But I also understand why people would oppose it.
The libertarian in me says people ought to be able to make their own decisions on things as long as that decision doesn't cause harm to others. A reasonably early abortion should be up to the mother first and the father second. If you oppose it don't get one but don't stop others from getting one. If your for it get one if you decide you need it but don't promote it. Its a gruesome last resort, not something you should be doing cavalierly.
Then maybe this would be more your style. Its the design for the CXV, a proposed crew transfer vehicle to to get 4 people to and from LEO and the ISS, also being worked on by Scaled Composites along with Transformational Space. Currently its under a small NASA contract, that is a lesser known little brother to the CEV, though you can tell this is intended to be the orbital successor to SpaceShipOne and they want to use it for private space travel. I'm hoping they can scrape together the funds to make it a reality.
They've drop tested a 23% scale model launch stack at Mojave, and dropped tested the capsule parachute system off Crescent City, CA.
The Airforce is funding the Falcon two stage launch vehicle under its QuickReach program. Its fuled by LOX and Propane. Its a VAPAK pressure fed system with no expensive turbopumps. You heat the fuel and build up pressure in the tank instead of using pumps. This isn't viable for launch for sea level but works great for air launches.
So of course this craft is also air launched like SpaceShipOne for a lot of reasons listed on the web site. A big challenge is they need either a very large new version of White Knight or a used 747 with major changes to the landing gear to accomadate slinging the spacecraft underneath it.
The capsule is based on scaled up version of the well proven Discover/Corona capsules used 400+ times to return film from spy satellites. The capsule is reusable with minor refurbishment between launches. It uses 2 layers of SIRCA thermal tiles developed at NASA Ames. It ocean lands with parachutes like Apollo, partially since this make it possible to safely land on 2/3rds of the Earth's surface in an emergency.
"I think that having cheap, easy access to birth control is important. I said nor implied anything about "hand outs."
If you want it to be cheaper than it already is on the free market then you are talking about government subsidy whatever word you want to use for it. Its a really bad idea to subsidize things like abortion and birth control that a large percentage of the tax paying public vehemently oppose. You just encourage them to mobilize and replace your government with extremist nut jobs like we have now to smack you down. Instead of just getting rid of the subsidies they then have the temptation and momentum to overcorrect and start banning birth control and abortion all together.
Liberals should have just been happy with getting abortion legalized and birth control reasonably available, but NOOOOOOO, you have to keep pushing it, to get 13 year olds access to government subsidized condoms and abortions without parents knowledge or consent, and you wonder why there is a backlash.
"Being a liberal I support making children go to school, and imposing "education" on them and "forcing" "views" on them, although I prefer to call them "facts".
When you delve in to sexual practice, birth control and especially abortion unfortunately your facts tread heavily on religious faith and family moral values. Like I said if you have a class that is voluntary and parents authorize it I see no problem with it. Forcing kids in to a class like you describe, and denying their parents a say in it is just going to energize them to fight it to the bitter end.
Liberals are held in such increasingly low regard because you can never stop yourselves from coming up with new ways to use government to force people to do things "for their own good", things many people find detestable especially when imposed on them by government, especially Federal government, against their will. You are your own worst enemies.
In case you haven't figured it out by now I'm half left wing radical and half Libertarian. I'd probably be arguing your side half the time here on ole
"Fear is the mind killer."
This is a nice slogan, have no idea how you managed to apply it here, I guess you just liked the sound of it. Don't remember fear ever being an issue in any of this.
" let's tell kids in health classes "if'n you don't wanna have a baby, here's what ya do.""
Like I said, you want to force you're sexual views on everyone in mandatory classes everyone has to attend. And you want the government to hand out birth control, condoms and abortions to all comers at tax payers expense. Just say it, everyone knew thats what you wanted 5 posts back. There are people who just as fervently want to ban abortion, and hinder access to birth control.
You are both wrong. Birth control and education should be available, but the government shouldn't be pushing it on people either.
Acessd to abortions is alway going to be a problem. I'm of the view people who want them should be able to get them but again I can see how some people would consider it murder. I can totally see how those people would be opposed to funding it out of their tax dollars. I generally wish people would mind their own business and let people get abortions if they want them, but you are totally wrong if you think its OK for government to advocate or fund them.
I'd personally have no problem with my tax dollars going for all this, it is probably beneficial to society in the long run, but I can totally understand the point of view of people who think this is a completely inappropriate role for government, especially because you are trampling their religious beliefs and trying to indoctrinate their children in practices they don't approve of. When you reach that kind of impasse the appropriate role for government is to stay out of it. Religions are a pain but the beauty of our Consitutution is the state isn't supposed to endorse or sponsor them, nor is it supposed to trample them.
Well I've had enough fun for one day baiting you. Each successive post it become more and more obvious how out of control angry you are. You sound dangerous so I think I better not play with matches near you anymore because you are about to explode. One word of advice dude, chill, you are taking this crap way to serious.
Just a suggestion but you really need to tone down the language. You might have some good arguments under there but once you starting cussing a blue streak everyone is going to ignore your arguments because you sound completely out of control and like you are about to lose it.
Oops forgot to answer a couple
"Want EDUCATION about it? Here's a website / brochure."
Dude anybody who can use Google can find all the education they need about it. They don't need the Federal government or you getting on your high horse fretting over whether there are enough web sites on condoms, the pill or abortion for all the pitiful poor people.
"Fact #1: Meth mostly affects rural America."
Here is a random URL from 5 seconds of googling, indicating Meth abuse is getting just as bad in cities. It early appeal in rural areas was it was easy to make and get. There is no reason it isn't going to hammer cities just as much as it is rural areas other than that part of your obssession with the plight of the poor hillbillies.
" Fact #2: Rural residents tend to have worse health care"
Well I think you mean poor people have worse health care. Only hurdle rural residents have is there are fewer doctors per capita and they tend to be farther away. That is just a fact of life due to economics and geography, and you aren't going to change it. I doubt its much of a factor in access to birth control. Urban poor have dismal healthcare too.
All in all I'd say I'm left with the attitude most people have towards bleeding heart liberals, why don't you mind your own business and stop operating under the illusion anyone wants or needs you telling them how to live.
"The right to access information about birth control, and even use it whenever you want?"
Access is great. You used the word "education" which has two paths. One you sponsor a voluntary class which no one attends, or two you want to inject it in to schools or otherwise force it on people through less than voluntary classes on the subject or maybe you want some bleeding heart liberals or civil servants going door to door forcing it on people handing out pamphlets, free condoms, etc. Most people don't want people going door to door lecturing them on sex and handing out condoms.
You really didn't say which route you wanted. Since we were talking about a Federal program, space exploration, you wanted to replace with your birth control "education" program the inference is you wanted a Federal program to hand out pamphlets and run classes. Believe it or not I wager most people know at an early age what a condom is and how to use it. They really aren't hard to get unless you are under 18. Most of the "brown trash" you hate so much aren't going to use them because they are Catholic, not because of anything relating to education or access.
Of course the other implication is for all the poor people who can't afford condoms or the pill I'm assuming you want the government to buy it for them. Maybe buy them abortions, why stop there why don't you go the China route and place mandatory caps on the number of children people have if you really want to fix your problem.
As for all your ranting, foul language and slinging "Fascist" ever third world all you did was prove my point, rabid bleeding heart liberals like yourself are just as nuts as right wing wackos. Your embarrassing man, your why people are embarrassed to be called liberal these days, and why people don't want to vote your way any more.
"Which manifests itself in the political and education systems."
Well if the constitutional separation of church and state, embattled as it is, holds, religion is completely separate from politics and education. You have zero right to try to force people to abandon their religious beliefs because you dislike their consequences. I may not like it either but I dislike people who think they can trample a basic civil liberty even more.
"You really nailed it."
Doesn't take much intelligence or psychic powers since you're plugging Air America radio in your login which pretty much matches bleeding heart liberal. I'd like to see some good liberal radio in this country to match all the right wing crap, but I'm not sure Jerry Springer and Al Franken qualify. I hear recently one former exec at AirAmerica apparently looted boys/girls club of $800k to keep it on the air.
You are also wringing your hands about the need to force population control on people you deem to be your inferiors. In fact you are going so far as to advocate a behavior modification program up to and including overriding personal religious beliefs. Thats pretty bleeding heart liberal.
Just curious do you still live in rural Texas or did you flee to the city.
"They can't afford a dentist but they can pump out the future white/brown trash/meth dealers of America at an astonishing rate."
Nice. Hate to break it to you but your prejudice has nothing to do with rural versus urban. You'll find no shortage of people in the city with the same problem. My key point here was singling out rural Americans for your behavior modification program is misguided at best, prejudiced at worst.
"Turn off Limbaugh, fucktard."
Chill dude I was just asking. If you had looked at my sig or read any of my historical slashdot posts you'd find I'm no right winger. I just don't have any use for bleeding heart liberals either. They are so goofy they almost make right wing nut cases look sane by comparison.
Not sure I've ever met a prejudiced, bleeding heart, liberal before. Maybe it's a Texas thing.
"Giving a rural family access to and education about birth control is FAR more beneficial.."
... a sophisticated city slickers who feels its his duty, and a national imperative, to teach all the dumb, inbred, hillbillies to not make any more babies, and leave the world to the yuppies?
I hope your referring to rural families who live outside the U.S. because believe it or not people who live in rural America do in fact go to school, know about rubbers and the pill, have television and the Internet, go to doctors, etc. The biggest problem you have on the birth control front is religious opposition to it, not in eduction or access.
Just curious, are you a bleeding heart, liberal, urbanite
"that can't be overcome with enough will and funding. That doesn't make either activity likely or sensible."
..... Waaaaaaa .... let's just give up ..... Waaaaaaaa.
/."
I'll repeat it again because you missed it, if we can justify spending $300 billion on replacing one bad government with another in Iraq its WAAAYYY more sensible to spend $200 billion on starting a colony on Mars. The American calculus for sensible is totally out of whack when you whine about space exploration while your government engages in rampant and expensive stupidity elsewhere.
"Posts about technical ideas to make space activity more affordable can be interesting."
Dude, if you were following this thread some place back up there I posted an interesting article on Transformational space doing just that and the Nimrod I was replying to came back with:
"is the silliness of the slashbots raving about how since Burt Rutan can scrape the bottom of LEO in a jumped-up jetplane...."
I'm the only one in this thread that did what you are talking about. Everyone else is WHINING, space travel is hard
"But posts about how we've lost the Will! the Vision! the Can-Do Spirit of our Ancestors! remain as boring as when they first appeared on Sumerian
Well its ten times worse listening to people whine that manned space travel is impossible, and we should just give up.
At this point I quit on this thread. I'm getting sick of the lamers that seem to be hanging out on Slashdot today. What happened to all the engineers and hackers around this place anyway?
" slashbots raving about how since Burt Rutan can scrape the bottom of LEO in a jumped-up jetplane"
Its even more silly to see people on slashdot, like yourselves, who aren't interested in some one like Rutan engaged in innovative engineering and trying to solve hard problems like getting in to space affordably. Is he doing something never done before, no, people have been to LEO lots of times, but coming up with a way to get there cheaply is a very worthwhile goal and its a fascinating engineering problem. That is what engineering is all about, coming up with better ways to do things.
Maybe you two should consider hanging out on some other website, like maybe one for Luddites or flat earthers. You don't really belong on Slashdot, or at least the slashdot of old which was for engineers and hackers.
"it's how the fiscal black-holes of the ISS and space shuttle are somehow a better use of NASA budget than pure science and unmanned probes."
That is a whole different issue from where this thread started. This thread was started by someone who was claiming insurmountable barriers in physics to manned space travel.
What you are referring to here is bureaucratic incompetence not the laws of physics. It has nothing to with physics and it is most definitely surmountable.
I'm all for using unmanned satellites wherever appropriate but when it comes to Mars the interesting part is colonizing it with people, not machines. How many people do you think care about the latest rock Opportunity or Spirit looked at today.
"will likely never be able to flit about the galaxy"
Dude, once again you are the one leaping off on a tangent that had nothing to do with where this thread started. The original post was writing off going to or colonizing Mars not "flitting about the galaxy" using warp drive. I would be the first to condemn as nuts anyone who thought interstellar space travel was something worth bothering with at this point anyplace outside of a sci-fi script ot story.
Going to Mars doesn't require interstellar space travel, it can be done with chemical rockets, big versions of the ones we already have. Going to Mars is completely feasible in our lifetimes. Going to Mars would open up a second biosphere which is a far more worthwhile goal than for example spending $300 billion dollars, and killing tens of thousands of people replacing one messed up regime in Iraq with a different messed up regime in Iraq.
In the last century man went from always having frontiers for the restless, bold and adventurous to explore to today where there isn't an inch of the planet that hasn't been trampled underfoot. How completely boring the future your painting will be as we just slowly fill up and use up this planet. All the people with the frontiersman spirit will just suffocate, and go nuts.
"a fundamental lack of education into the physical sciences, imo."
That is complete BS. There are no physical barriers to going to mars that can't be overcome with enough will and funding. On the funding side he U.S. has squandered more in an insane dead end in Iraq than it would have take to fund an ambitious Mars program.
But I guess I see your point. You two are probably right. It probably is impossible to do anything in space any more. In the 60's people weren't dwelling on why it couldn't be done they were problem solving and doing it.
Today we have people like yourselves insisting it can't be done and would rather just make it through life going to boring jobs, doing boring things, and keeping food on the table. Keeping food on the table is a good thing, but going through life afraid to do anything because its hard is pretty sad. Kennedy put it best:
"We chose to go to the moon, and do these other things in this decade, not because they are easy, but because they are hard!"
I'd say, assuming you are Americans, that this thread is mostly just an indicator of how much America has declined in the last 40 years.
"We can't get to anything beyond the solar system without FTL travel ...."
The parent wasn't talking about travel beyond our solar system, he was talking about doing ANYTHING in space, in particular going to Mars, which is most definitely just an incremental step past going to the moon, though its a big increment.
Your arguments are the absurd ones. It is already completely possible to go to Mars with the chemical propulsion technology we have. Are there problems to overcome? Yes, in particular dealing with the radiation exposure. Would it be nice if the trip were faster? Sure, but is it physically impossible? No, and you acting like it is, is the absurdity here. Travelling to another star obviously impossible until and unless there is a major breakthrough. Manned travel to the moons of Jupiter would be very challenging without some significant advances, but impossible, no.
"The costs for getting off-planet have not been significantly reduced in the 40 years since the Apollo missions."
This project almost certainly will if they can scrape together the funding.
The cost of Soyuz launches are already pretty cheap. The U.S. squanders the equivalent money in a day or two in Iraq.
Just because the Shuttle was an expensive disaster is no indicator of anything. To turn your own logic on you, past failure is no indication of future performance
All in all you are just such a downer I'm not seeing any point in continuing the conversation.
This isn't insightful, its just blatant pessimism. If this had been the dominant mindset in mankind we wouldn't have crossed mountains, oceans, the Wright brothers would never have flown, and we wouldn't have gone to the Moon. Mankind would still be huddled in a little spot in Africa with rocks and sticks as the pinnacle of toolmaking, or maybe we would have deadended in extinction.
The people who count are ones that do things that no one thought could be done, not the people that said don't even try because its not possible.
I am glad to say that Burt Rutan, Scaled Composites and Transformational Space are already working on for the LEO successor to SpaceShipOne and it looks to be a really promisign start if they can put together the funding. They are working on a shoestring budget from NASA for the CXV program, a lesser known counterpart to the CEV program. CXV is intended to develop a low cost, reliable, safe, launch vehicle to get crews to and from the ISS or elsewhere in LEO.
Like SpaceShipOne this vehicle is air launched though from a much larger mother ship so there is no expensive launch complex. The capsule is derived from the Discover/Corona capsules used to return film from spy satellites and is a very well understood design. It has an innovative new heat shield, will deploy parachutes and water land like Apollo. The capsule is reusable. It is very focused on safety, reliability and low cost which is exactly what we need at the moment for a manned vehicle.
They've dropped tested a 23% scale model of the launch vehicle in Mojave and a week or two did a first drop test of the parachute system off Crescent City, CA.
"Space offers extreme opportunities"
You are really overstating your case for things to do in space. Its really bad to undertake something as expensive as space exploration with naive dreaming about the payoff.
Their is a payoff in tourism certainly. Colonization on Mars has a payoff. Mining may eventually be worthwhile especially when Earth's resources achieve serious scarcity though that its a long ways off before the payoff justifies the enormous expense.
The one thing space exploration offers is somewhat intangible. Its a frontier to be explored which appeals to a certain type of person. Outside of the depths of the oceans the Earth is almost completely devoid of frontiers. Climbing Mt. Everest is no longer much of an accomplishment.
I am glad to say that Burt Rutan, Scaled Composites and Transformational Space are already working on for the LEO successor to SpaceShipOne. They are working on a shoestring budget from NASA for the CXV program, a lesser known counterpart to the CEV program. CXV is intended to develop a low cost, reliable, safe, launch vehicle to get crews to and from the ISS or elsewhere in LEO.
Like SpaceShipOne this vehicle is air launched though from a much larger mother ship so there is no expensive launch complex. The capsule is derived from the Discover/Corona capsules used to return film from spy satellites and is a very well understood design. It has an innovative new heat shield, will deploy parachutes and water land like Apollo. The capsule is reusable. It is very focused on safety, reliability and low cost which is exactly what we need at the moment for a manned vehicle.
"A lavish budget is not."
The CAIB report is not gospel. It is just another bureaucratic committee coming from a different angle.
It glosses over the fact NASA has spent over a $100 billion on the ISS due to both political interference and just plain bad management. The price tag just to keep the ISS and Shuttle going until 2010 and maybe finish ISS if they are lucky is $60 billion according to Mike Griffin's congressional testimony before he became administrator.
By comparison he cites the total cost for the entire Apollo program as $130 billion in today's dollars. Apollo started from scratch and actually did something, versus the $160 billion or so for the baby steps it took to build the ISS and it does nothing.
Griffin's optimistic assessment for return to the moon is $25 billion. The amount allocated for CEV, return to moon and other new launch vehicles through 2010 is less than that allocated just to keep the ISS and Shuttle jobs program going.
Another thing about NASA's budget problem is they are a job's program and everyone knows it. Its how they get their congressional support, by putting high quality jobs in the districts of their congressional backers especially in Florida, Texas, Utah and Mississippi. It takes at least 6,000 people to keep the Shuttle program going, whether it flies or not, not counting all the contractors that build parts. If Griffin tries to cut back the Shuttle/ISS jobs program to rein in costs he is going to run in to serious fricition from Congress. As a result he may be forced to maintain the employment levels of the status quo so he can never rein in costs.
I think I can just as easily say NASA, the agency that does to little with to much, at least as far as their manned space program goes. The Russians are the ones who do a lot with very little.
All that said when you see George W. squandering hundreds of billions on the misguided war in Iraq then yes NASA's budget is chicken feed by comparison. But, I'm very afraid if you gave NASA a budget of $50-100 billion a year the ways they would find to squander it would sicken. I suspect Mike Griffin might be a good manager, though it remains to be seen, but the entrenched career bureaucrats and contractors at NASA have a proven track record for squandering money to no good end.
"1. Direct TV will drop Tivo eventually (they announced last week), Tivo loses majority of its subscriber base."
Except you are leaving out the fact Tivo signed a deal with Comcast that could make up for losing DirectTV, assuming it works out.
DirectTV is dropping Tivo in favor of PVR's built by NDS which is a subsidiary of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp, which also owns a big stake in DirectTV and Fox. You can apparently still buy Tivo's from DirectTV but you have to ask for them, they are going to pitch NDS boxes instead by default.
DirectTV is relying on its recent deal with Comcast for its future since the majority of its new subscribers come from DirectTV at the moment.
I've used the original BeOS pretty extensively and still do use it off and on. Its a bit dated obviously, gcc for example, but it is very usable in general. There are free downloads available for the original BeOS and its an easy install if you have a spare partition. The original network stack is quirky and slow though there is a more modern one available now called BONE.
In terms of multimedia support, audio and video, it is IMHO superior to Linux, that coming from someone who's run Linux on my desktop for years. The multimedia architecture is powerful and very well designed. There are still professional theatrical productions that use it for that reason every day in very demanding situations.
Would I use it on a server, no. But, if you do a lot of multimedia work its probably a better choice than Linux and up there with OSX.
Another obvious plus over Linux is there is one reasonably well done set of C++ API's to do everything, versus the fragmentation in API's and religious wars you find on Linux between Gnome and KDE in particular. The BeOS API's aren't entirely mature in areas due to its limited user and developer base, but having one consistent set of API's which leads to applications which all work together, look and behave consistently is a huge plus. You pretty much have to go to KDE and stay within the KDE application set to match it on Linux, but multimedia support in KDE isn't the greatest.
There is a whitepaper on Linux Devices on Georgia Tech's Debian Sarge powered Mongoose. It didn't fare well overall but it was their first year there and won best newcomer.
Thank you, thank you, thank you!!! That worked great. I'm eternally in your debt.
I was playing WoW but the grinding and dungeon crawls get old and predictable. Only interesting part after a while is the economy and WoW's economy is poor compared to EQ.
I bought "Nexus: The Jupiter Incident" a few weeks ago but got tired of it after two nights of being lead through preplanned scenarios ala "Wing Commander". Made me crave a game of Alpha Centauri and I was bummed when it didn't work on the new computer.
You know its a good game when you NEVER get tired of playing it, even with its lame ass AI's.
I saw this on linuxdevices.com today, though the link to the detained writeup was broken when I was there.
...
"Linux powers XScale-based RFID reader - Alien Technology used embedded Linux to build a multi-protocol RFID reader that it says exploits features in the latest EPC (electronic product code) specifications, including DRM (dense reader mode). The ALR-9800 can be programmed for remote management or sensor-based actuation using an optional Java/.Net SDK.
Have to doubt it will be able to touch all the gubermint issue RFID tags though.