Having just read the ccTLD admin's FAQ, it is clear that you need to read it too. It's quite informative. This guy ain't some power-mad geek, he's a responsible admin trying to do the job properly. He doesn't want to run the domain by himself. There is a process and model that have been defined by the local Internet community and the admin for an independent nonprofit corporation to administer the ccTLD with government *participation*, in line with the principles ICANN claims to follow and support. The sole issue there appears to be that the government wants *control* not *participation*, and they're willing to go to the wall for control. My reading of the matter is that the gov are being a buncha *** here.
I think the SA governments ONLY misconception is that ICANN will necessarily listen to them. I believe it should, but there is no real requirement that it must.
All I know here is what I'm reading, so I may be way off, but I get the impression the SA gov is doing a rather lousy job of qualifying itself to administer the ccTLD (which decision, if I understand things aright, is basically ICANN's to make). Perhaps ICANN, when they get around to thinking 'bout this one, actually shouldn't redelegate to the SA gov, if this is the case...
Many computer monitors run at horizontal scan rates different from the mains frequency (I'm running 800x600 at 75 Hz right now), so it's NOT really primarily a matter of EMF induced interference. What is really going on is that cheap, poorly-filtered HV and deflection supplies (such as those built into consumer-level TV sets) that are synched to the mains frequency won't show visible effects on-screen from mains-frequency ripple on their DC outputs. (Actually, the artifacts WILL be there, but as they they aren't actually moving, they aren't noticable without a tape measure; they appear as degraded vertical linearity (scan line height). High-quality system such as VGA monitors and HDTV sets generally have better-regulated DC supplies and suppress the ripple better.
As for the difference between PAL and SECAM, I will cynically suggest that it is due to French orneriness and a nationalistic desire to go their own way. Alas, this attitude is very transnational; as a species, we just cannot seem to agree on ONE standard for anything. (Video coding, modem standards, tone-dialing frequencies, power-line voltage/frequency, power-line freakin' PLUGS, you name it...)
I recently lost my Swiss Army knife of many years, and bought a Leatherman PST II. It's bigger and bulkier to carry, but wow! Now it's a permanent part of my attire. Very useful to have around.
I have a Deutsche Telekom cell phone for business trips (it was VERY cheap), and you pay $.16 or so all over Germany for calls you make, and $.05 or so per SMS you send (if I recall correctly, I may be off somewhat); NO charge for incoming anything from anywhere. It is, IMHO, a MUCH better setup than in the US, where I pay for incoming.
better acted. I found it really painful to watch the CGIs out-act the wetware; that kid who played Anakin had maybe one 15-second scene where he really did a decent job of acting (the reunion-with-Mom scene), vs. many where he was just not credible (the whining-to-Padme scene was simply awful). The CGI was fantastic, but I really think Lucas did much better when he was resource-limited and had to rely on archaic things like an interesting plot and good dialog. Show me the character in AOTC who is nearly as good as Harrison Ford in the original SW (not the most versatile actor in the world, but he fit in that role really well). There's *nothing* in AOTC that compares with some of the dialog in SW for wit and aliveness.
To some degree, AOTC is handicapped by being a "prequel" and having little real suspense; we know all the basics of the plot ahead of time. The next movie will be even worse, 'cause the course of its plot will be even more tightly restricted and suspenseless, and these two movies have to end on a downer anyway to fit the story sequence. However, even with these limitations, Lucas really hasn't done a great job.
On the other hand, the starship drive flames were a really cool special effect...
I guess the title says it most succinctly. Yes, many of the MPAA/RIAA members may tank as time goes on, but I seriously doubt that the world will be less rich in art/film/music for their passing. The artists surely won't suffer on the whole, 99% get cheated by the pimps^H^H^H^H^Hstudios as things are. In any case, there's not one thing the XXAA can do to stop the process -- except to adapt to a bits-are-essentially-free world. Some will survive, I'm sure.
Another poster wonders whether the XXAA want PCs to be merely set-top boxes: the answer is clearly and explicitly "Yes, they do." These mugs are very threatened by the general-purpoose PC and the distributed power the 'Net creates. Too bad for them...
I was a beta tester of some of Moreton Bay's dedicated firewall gear (later Lineo, now Snapgear), and it's VERY GOOD stuff. Alas, their $250+ prices just cannot compete with a (technically somewhat inferior, but still adequate) $99 D-Link or Netgear unit. Granted, the low-end D-Link doesn't have remote logging or VPN capabilities, but it's really, really hard even for a dedicated Linux advocate like me to pony up 2.5 times the price for functionality I don't use. I like and respect the Moreton/Lineo/Snapgear folks, but they have a really rough price point problem.
"... a CD-R as standard equipment... is unparalleled as a backup medium.... (DDS tapes do NOT fill all needs; CD-R is FAR more robust.)"
You are out of your mind.
I've seen many, many more bad backup tapes than I've seen bad CD-R disks in both my home and office environments. Plus, CD-R are portable, which DAT and HP Colorado are not, at least on my hardware. Poor statistics, maybe. Insanity, no more than the average geek.
"I'd have been glad to buy CD-R drives from Sun at the usual drastic markup..."
You are totally and completely out of your mind.
1) I tend to vote with my purchases. That's why I *pay for* Linux distros. Gotta feed that golden-egg-laying goose something...
2) It's not my money, but it IS my (expensive and irreplaceable) time spent setting 'em up instead of meeting schedule. 'Nuff said?
As you may have noticed from reading my post, I know about that; however, just try buying a CD-R drive from Sun, and you'll see what I'm complaining about. Many a manager prefers to buy the equipment without having to hack its hardware to use it...
I manage a number of Sun Ultra 5 stations running Solaris 7, and recently tried to buy CD recorders from Sun for them. To my amazed disappointment, the Sun salespeople told me that Sun does *NOT* sell or support CD-R for its workstations.
Lest the reader think this is a technical question, let me assure you it is not: The Ultra 5 internally uses standard IDE and floppy interfaces, and I've been able to use standard commodity replacement parts (even the power supply) with never a problem. In the present case, I was able to borrow a standard IDE CD-R drive from my MIS department, download cdrtools-1.10 from http://www.sunfreeware.com, and have CD recording capability running within 3 hours from start. The only weird part was writing scripts to turn volume management on and off (5 minutes work).
I have since talked to Sun sales and support people who have run into this before and are equally chagrined with this state of affairs. I'm not alone here, either: Last month, I talked with systems folk at a *BIG* aerospace firm who had the same unfulfilled need ('till I clued them in to the solution.) Sun, you're missing an important opportunity here! Every commodity Windows machine in my plant (hundreds!) has a CD-R as standard equipment, and it is unparalleled as a backup medium. For Sun not to support this medium is inexplicable; in today's world, CD-R is simply basic and essential. (DDS tapes do NOT fill all needs; CD-R is FAR more robust.) I'd have been glad to buy CD-R drives from Sun at the usual drastic markup, and the software is a trivial matter (apparently, Solaris 8 even includes the cdrtools package); Sun, by not selling CD-R for your iron, you're leaving unsatisfied a customer need you could be filling at a profit...
Now, if I could only use a *standard* keyboard with my Ultras, one with the backspace and ~ in the *right places*...
This whole Slashdot Effect (for you German speakers, I just mistyped it as "Slashtot", translates as Slashdead;-) can be mitigated by Slashdot caching or proxying the small-site pages they link to in their stories. The Slashdot Effect is so predictable by now, I'm surprised nobody has sent them a bill for the over-bandwidth charges their Slashdotted personal homepage has racked up. It seems very appropriate for Slashdot's servers to buffer the load that Slashdot stories generate.
I can certainly see no real legal reason not to mirror content, and there are technological solutions aplenty for the purpose. (I submitted an Ask Slashdot on this topic, but it was rejected.) I really hate to see us all trampling the sites we flock to see
Odds are high that this system, should it become sufficiently widespread to be useful, would be vulnerable to poisoning by spammers spoofing spambot traps and causing legitimate IPs (such as Googlebot or large blocks of Net users) to be incorrectly blocked. There are countermeasures against this, but my guess is that the resulting arms race would not result in an adequately-usable system for enough of the time to be worth it. (Remember, the blacklist must update with reasonable frequency for both additions AND expirations, and must have a VERY low rate of false-positives). The authentication of "legitimate" submitters is a serious weakness of such a system. Nice thought, though...
I just searched Yahoo with search terms: +Java +base64 +String, and I saw things that looked very like what you're describing. Some hits had just the 2 methods you describe in your comments. Bear in mind, the ziphead who stole this code in the first place got it through a basic Internet search, so a repeat search has a high probability of success if it's done correctly. A slightly over-broad search that produces a hundred hits can still be winnowed by hand in a practical length of time, and will have better probability of netting the desired target than a vary narrow search.
Sure I can. It's got a pair of LM386 ICs, held on with dull-gray blobs of solder on a printed circuit board that looks like the layout was done by a Parkinsons patient's left hand. Components will be skewed on the board, held in place only by cold solder joints. You might find it's actually built of discrete parts; I don't know and I don't care - but I assure you that there won't even be anything as substantial as a TDA2002 in them, despite the 250W claim.
Yep. And don't forget the REEAL simple power test: how BIG is the unit? Acoustically-good audio systems ted NOT to be extremely power-efficient, but even if it's relatively power-efficient, that means 50% or so at best, meaning that the box gotta DISSIPATE on the order of 250 watts, which means it has to have some size to it in order to get rid of that heat. I bet it doesn't even have a heatsink...
I have a pitiful few shares of HP stock from my time there, and over the past few months, I've received an absolute torrent of competing proxy solicitations from the HP board and Walter Hewlett. Every week, I got at least one new proxy card from each party with a "send this in Right Now" letter. This stuff arrived faster than one could conceivably respond (and even though I'd promptly returned the first green proxy card I got...) Towards the end, the HP board even priority-mailed me a prepaid Fedex envelope with another proxy card, and shortly thereafter a premetered ($3.50) priority-mail envelope. Last, and IMHO rather underhandedly, the board set up a phone-in-and-vote-your-proxy process during the last three or so days, something they would NEVER have let their opposition get away with. UN election monitors would NOT approve...
Also worthy of note is the tone of the cover letters: the Walter Hewlett "anti" camp focused on the bad business sense of the merger, but the Board quickly started a series of personal attacks on Walter Hewlett. This did NOT impress me with their confidence in their case: when you run out of logical arguments, slander your opponent's person.
It ain't over 'till the fat lady sings, and there is NO reliable way to guess who'll still be standing to deliver that final aria. The tons (literally!) of proxy cards sent in to the warring factions' accountants must be sorted and matched by sig and date to weed out proxies revoked by subsequently-sent proxies (and since so MANY cards were sent out, there'll be hundreds if not thousands of revotes); this will certainly take a week. Also consider (shock horror!) the possibility that the electronic or telephonic proxy-submission processes might have been manipulated. Carly's no Ken Lay, and it sure ain't the HP Way, but there's a LOT riding on this (several top management jobs, for example), so the possibility of skulduggery is NOT to be ignored.
For those who don't pay much attention to Lego-ings-on, Lego has a VERY ENLIGHTENED attitude to Mindstorms hackers. They don't explicitly support RCX-hacking, but they definitely approve. Based on their statements to the press, they understand that RCX-hacking helps both the users and Lego. They *want* people to go nuts with the thing. (It's a great toy, and I love it; I just wish it had a port-extender for more sensors/actuators. Maybe a piggyback module that communicates with the RCX via the IR port?)
There was an incident with the LegOS alternate operating system recently where Lego requested that the fellow change the name so as to not dilute Lego's trademark (see./ story a while back), but Lego were extremely reasonable and polite about the whole thing. (In trademark law, they MUST defend the trademark or else lose it).
As concerns DMCA, there's NO issue there, 'cause there's no attempt to prevent or control access to the brick's brains. Lego are the complete opposite of Sony in this regard.
One thing to note about tired plots (cribbed from some wiser person than I): There are basically only a few basic plots in the world to begin with, so similarities are to be expected. What makes the story interesting or not is good or bad storytelling and a fresh and original approach...
Ms. Bujold definitely has these; she tells an EXCELLENT story! I was particularly impressed with A Civil Affair, which is basically a romantic comedy in the space armor of a classic space opera (or at least in the Barrayar setting). See also The Spirit Ring for an original take on the ghosts-and-summoning-spirits-of-the-dead novel.
use STEEL Conduit instead of plastic
on
Wiring A New House?
·
· Score: 5, Informative
And if the contractor can't handle conduit (find a better contractor?!), you can do it yourself. Steel conduit is cheap (I know, 'cause I've done this), and conduit benders are not difficult to use. Of course, if you don't wanna use a conduit bender, you can buy prefab curved sections.
A few things to keep in mind:
0. Use METAL conduit rather than plastic - indefinite lifetime, RF shielding, and nailproof when hanging pictures. Also easily findable with stud-finder gadgets at need.
1. Use BENDS rather than square corners (and insist the contractor do so -- inspect before accepting...). Makes pulling cable more fun, and VITAL for fiber (if it ever comes to that)
2. If you do it yourself, make sure you debur the insides of all conduit ends with the little blade on the tubing cutter. It really sucks to have a short 'cause the conduit cut the insulation.
3. Check local codes and the building inspector on how to GROUND the conduit properly (one probably grounds this to the building safety ground at the electrical service entrance -- a definite building-inspector question). The building inspector can be made into a very handy resource if you social-engineer the interaction properly - you want him to take you seriously, and to understand that you want to, and are able to, do things right and with proper permits; at this point, he ceases to be an obstacle and becomes an ally. Also, be real clear to the building department that your conduit is LOW-VOLTAGE wiring and NOT power wiring; the code requirements are different.
Lastly, 3Com has a nifty mini-hub that fits into a wall box, seen on/. recently...
Then his grin would have been answered with "Hit the street right now. You're FIRED."
Issues of OS "treason" or "loyalty" are secondary to getting one's job done in ANY company, and vaping a user's OS and legitimate data files without authorization is NEVER an appropriate action for an IT support person. This isn't an example of Linux fascism, but rather one of a loose cannon of a technician who is a danger to the company.
The true betrayal was in people who didn't have any understanding of, or concern for, business realities selling Lutris's founders the open source bill of goods and encouraging them to go into business in a way that was foolish and self-destructive. The true betrayal was in proselytizing for a false religion.
I believe you are confusing two fundamentally different things here: 1) the "truth or falsity" of Open Source as a religion (a description that has much merit, BTW), and 2) the viability of a business model based on Open Source.
Evaluating the Open Source Religion's "truth" is waaay tricky: it all depends on how you define its premise. I think your implied premise, which clearly involves building profitable business models on Open Source software, is inapplicable. IMHO, the most applicable premise is something along the lines of, "Open Source produces technically superior and socially desirable software". This premise is demonstrably "true", at least in technical terms; it is also closer to most geeks' ideas of Open Source, and it has nothing whatever to do with making money. By the premise I described, and which I argue to be applicable, the Open Source religion clearly works, hence it cannot reasonably be described as "false". In the final analysis, Open Source and Making Money are no more inherently linked than Christianity and Making Money.
ESR himself has, in my hearing, publicly described what he thinks makes Open-Sourcing a software package a good or a bad idea for a business, and he was crystal-clear that NOT every project can or should be Open Sourced on business grounds. I cannot reconcile the presentation I heard ESR give, OR my reading of "The Cathedral and the Bazaar", with the idea that he has sold someone a "bill of goods". I see no evidence of misrepresentation there. To blame ESR for a corporation's starry-eyed rapture with the dot-com fashion is to misassign responsibility that properly belongs to business planners who failed to realistically analyze their business model (and in the dot-com bubble, there have been LOTS of those).
Try Bynari Software, at http://www.bynari.com; IIRC, they have at least partial work-alikes for Exchange client and server, some of which code is GPL and some not-free-but-reasonably-priced. I myself use a standard SMTP/POP3 mail client rather than Outlook to access my company Exchange server's SMTP interface. Look, Ma, no viruses! Of course, I also don't use the calendar/planner cruft, a Dayrunner never crashes...
I used to use a Moreton Bay Nettel (now it's named Snapgear) until lightning killed it; GREAT unit, I highly recommend it.
I now use a Linksys DI-704; good feature set, built-in 4-port hub, inexpensive at $99, but somewhat lacking in remote logging capabilities. Still, I recommend both units.
Slashdot Mirror
Having just read the ccTLD admin's FAQ, it is clear that you need to read it too. It's quite informative. This guy ain't some power-mad geek, he's a responsible admin trying to do the job properly. He doesn't want to run the domain by himself. There is a process and model that have been defined by the local Internet community and the admin for an independent nonprofit corporation to administer the ccTLD with government *participation*, in line with the principles ICANN claims to follow and support. The sole issue there appears to be that the government wants *control* not *participation*, and they're willing to go to the wall for control. My reading of the matter is that the gov are being a buncha *** here.
I think the SA governments ONLY misconception is that ICANN will necessarily listen to them. I believe it should, but there is no real requirement that it must.
All I know here is what I'm reading, so I may be way off, but I get the impression the SA gov is doing a rather lousy job of qualifying itself to administer the ccTLD (which decision, if I understand things aright, is basically ICANN's to make). Perhaps ICANN, when they get around to thinking 'bout this one, actually shouldn't redelegate to the SA gov, if this is the case...
Many computer monitors run at horizontal scan rates different from the mains frequency (I'm running 800x600 at 75 Hz right now), so it's NOT really primarily a matter of EMF induced interference. What is really going on is that cheap, poorly-filtered HV and deflection supplies (such as those built into consumer-level TV sets) that are synched to the mains frequency won't show visible effects on-screen from mains-frequency ripple on their DC outputs. (Actually, the artifacts WILL be there, but as they they aren't actually moving, they aren't noticable without a tape measure; they appear as degraded vertical linearity (scan line height). High-quality system such as VGA monitors and HDTV sets generally have better-regulated DC supplies and suppress the ripple better.
As for the difference between PAL and SECAM, I will cynically suggest that it is due to French orneriness and a nationalistic desire to go their own way. Alas, this attitude is very transnational; as a species, we just cannot seem to agree on ONE standard for anything. (Video coding, modem standards, tone-dialing frequencies, power-line voltage/frequency, power-line freakin' PLUGS, you name it...)
I recently lost my Swiss Army knife of many years, and bought a Leatherman PST II. It's bigger and bulkier to carry, but wow! Now it's a permanent part of my attire. Very useful to have around.
I have a Deutsche Telekom cell phone for business trips (it was VERY cheap), and you pay $.16 or so all over Germany for calls you make, and $.05 or so per SMS you send (if I recall correctly, I may be off somewhat); NO charge for incoming anything from anywhere. It is, IMHO, a MUCH better setup than in the US, where I pay for incoming.
better acted. I found it really painful to watch the CGIs out-act the wetware; that kid who played Anakin had maybe one 15-second scene where he really did a decent job of acting (the reunion-with-Mom scene), vs. many where he was just not credible (the whining-to-Padme scene was simply awful). The CGI was fantastic, but I really think Lucas did much better when he was resource-limited and had to rely on archaic things like an interesting plot and good dialog. Show me the character in AOTC who is nearly as good as Harrison Ford in the original SW (not the most versatile actor in the world, but he fit in that role really well). There's *nothing* in AOTC that compares with some of the dialog in SW for wit and aliveness.
To some degree, AOTC is handicapped by being a "prequel" and having little real suspense; we know all the basics of the plot ahead of time. The next movie will be even worse, 'cause the course of its plot will be even more tightly restricted and suspenseless, and these two movies have to end on a downer anyway to fit the story sequence. However, even with these limitations, Lucas really hasn't done a great job.
On the other hand, the starship drive flames were a really cool special effect...
I guess the title says it most succinctly. Yes, many of the MPAA/RIAA members may tank as time goes on, but I seriously doubt that the world will be less rich in art/film/music for their passing. The artists surely won't suffer on the whole, 99% get cheated by the pimps^H^H^H^H^Hstudios as things are. In any case, there's not one thing the XXAA can do to stop the process -- except to adapt to a bits-are-essentially-free world. Some will survive, I'm sure.
Another poster wonders whether the XXAA want PCs to be merely set-top boxes: the answer is clearly and explicitly "Yes, they do." These mugs are very threatened by the general-purpoose PC and the distributed power the 'Net creates. Too bad for them...
I was a beta tester of some of Moreton Bay's dedicated firewall gear (later Lineo, now Snapgear), and it's VERY GOOD stuff. Alas, their $250+ prices just cannot compete with a (technically somewhat inferior, but still adequate) $99 D-Link or Netgear unit. Granted, the low-end D-Link doesn't have remote logging or VPN capabilities, but it's really, really hard even for a dedicated Linux advocate like me to pony up 2.5 times the price for functionality I don't use. I like and respect the Moreton/Lineo/Snapgear folks, but they have a really rough price point problem.
"... a CD-R as standard equipment ... is unparalleled as a backup medium. ... (DDS tapes do NOT fill all needs; CD-R is FAR more robust.)"
..."
You are out of your mind.
I've seen many, many more bad backup tapes than I've seen bad CD-R disks in both my home and office environments. Plus, CD-R are portable, which DAT and HP Colorado are not, at least on my hardware. Poor statistics, maybe. Insanity, no more than the average geek.
"I'd have been glad to buy CD-R drives from Sun at the usual drastic markup
You are totally and completely out of your mind.
1) I tend to vote with my purchases. That's why I *pay for* Linux distros. Gotta feed that golden-egg-laying goose something...
2) It's not my money, but it IS my (expensive and irreplaceable) time spent setting 'em up instead of meeting schedule. 'Nuff said?
As you may have noticed from reading my post, I know about that; however, just try buying a CD-R drive from Sun, and you'll see what I'm complaining about. Many a manager prefers to buy the equipment without having to hack its hardware to use it...
I manage a number of Sun Ultra 5 stations running Solaris 7, and recently tried to buy CD recorders from Sun for them. To my amazed disappointment, the Sun salespeople told me that Sun does *NOT* sell or support CD-R for its workstations.
Lest the reader think this is a technical question, let me assure you it is not: The Ultra 5 internally uses standard IDE and floppy interfaces, and I've been able to use standard commodity replacement parts (even the power supply) with never a problem. In the present case, I was able to borrow a standard IDE CD-R drive from my MIS department, download cdrtools-1.10 from http://www.sunfreeware.com, and have CD recording capability running within 3 hours from start. The only weird part was writing scripts to turn volume management on and off (5 minutes work).
I have since talked to Sun sales and support people who have run into this before and are equally chagrined with this state of affairs. I'm not alone here, either: Last month, I talked with systems folk at a *BIG* aerospace firm who had the same unfulfilled need ('till I clued them in to the solution.) Sun, you're missing an important opportunity here! Every commodity Windows machine in my plant (hundreds!) has a CD-R as standard equipment, and it is unparalleled as a backup medium. For Sun not to support this medium is inexplicable; in today's world, CD-R is simply basic and essential. (DDS tapes do NOT fill all needs; CD-R is FAR more robust.) I'd have been glad to buy CD-R drives from Sun at the usual drastic markup, and the software is a trivial matter (apparently, Solaris 8 even includes the cdrtools package); Sun, by not selling CD-R for your iron, you're leaving unsatisfied a customer need you could be filling at a profit...
Now, if I could only use a *standard* keyboard with my Ultras, one with the backspace and ~ in the *right places*...
This whole Slashdot Effect (for you German speakers, I just mistyped it as "Slashtot", translates as Slashdead ;-) can be mitigated by Slashdot caching or proxying the small-site pages they link to in their stories. The Slashdot Effect is so predictable by now, I'm surprised nobody has sent them a bill for the over-bandwidth charges their Slashdotted personal homepage has racked up. It seems very appropriate for Slashdot's servers to buffer the load that Slashdot stories generate.
I can certainly see no real legal reason not to mirror content, and there are technological solutions aplenty for the purpose. (I submitted an Ask Slashdot on this topic, but it was rejected.) I really hate to see us all trampling the sites we flock to see
Odds are high that this system, should it become sufficiently widespread to be useful, would be vulnerable to poisoning by spammers spoofing spambot traps and causing legitimate IPs (such as Googlebot or large blocks of Net users) to be incorrectly blocked. There are countermeasures against this, but my guess is that the resulting arms race would not result in an adequately-usable system for enough of the time to be worth it. (Remember, the blacklist must update with reasonable frequency for both additions AND expirations, and must have a VERY low rate of false-positives). The authentication of "legitimate" submitters is a serious weakness of such a system. Nice thought, though...
I just searched Yahoo with search terms: +Java +base64 +String, and I saw things that looked very like what you're describing. Some hits had just the 2 methods you describe in your comments. Bear in mind, the ziphead who stole this code in the first place got it through a basic Internet search, so a repeat search has a high probability of success if it's done correctly. A slightly over-broad search that produces a hundred hits can still be winnowed by hand in a practical length of time, and will have better probability of netting the desired target than a vary narrow search.
Best of luck in your efforts.
Sure I can. It's got a pair of LM386 ICs, held on with dull-gray blobs of solder on a printed circuit board that looks like the layout was done by a Parkinsons patient's left hand. Components will be skewed on the board, held in place only by cold solder joints. You might find it's actually built of discrete parts; I don't know and I don't care - but I assure you that there won't even be anything as substantial as a TDA2002 in them, despite the 250W claim.
Yep. And don't forget the REEAL simple power test: how BIG is the unit? Acoustically-good audio systems ted NOT to be extremely power-efficient, but even if it's relatively power-efficient, that means 50% or so at best, meaning that the box gotta DISSIPATE on the order of 250 watts, which means it has to have some size to it in order to get rid of that heat. I bet it doesn't even have a heatsink...
to quote an old line from Saturday Night Live...
I have a pitiful few shares of HP stock from my time there, and over the past few months, I've received an absolute torrent of competing proxy solicitations from the HP board and Walter Hewlett. Every week, I got at least one new proxy card from each party with a "send this in Right Now" letter. This stuff arrived faster than one could conceivably respond (and even though I'd promptly returned the first green proxy card I got...) Towards the end, the HP board even priority-mailed me a prepaid Fedex envelope with another proxy card, and shortly thereafter a premetered ($3.50) priority-mail envelope. Last, and IMHO rather underhandedly, the board set up a phone-in-and-vote-your-proxy process during the last three or so days, something they would NEVER have let their opposition get away with. UN election monitors would NOT approve...
Also worthy of note is the tone of the cover letters: the Walter Hewlett "anti" camp focused on the bad business sense of the merger, but the Board quickly started a series of personal attacks on Walter Hewlett. This did NOT impress me with their confidence in their case: when you run out of logical arguments, slander your opponent's person.
It ain't over 'till the fat lady sings, and there is NO reliable way to guess who'll still be standing to deliver that final aria. The tons (literally!) of proxy cards sent in to the warring factions' accountants must be sorted and matched by sig and date to weed out proxies revoked by subsequently-sent proxies (and since so MANY cards were sent out, there'll be hundreds if not thousands of revotes); this will certainly take a week. Also consider (shock horror!) the possibility that the electronic or telephonic proxy-submission processes might have been manipulated. Carly's no Ken Lay, and it sure ain't the HP Way, but there's a LOT riding on this (several top management jobs, for example), so the possibility of skulduggery is NOT to be ignored.
For those who don't pay much attention to Lego-ings-on, Lego has a VERY ENLIGHTENED attitude to Mindstorms hackers. They don't explicitly support RCX-hacking, but they definitely approve. Based on their statements to the press, they understand that RCX-hacking helps both the users and Lego. They *want* people to go nuts with the thing. (It's a great toy, and I love it; I just wish it had a port-extender for more sensors/actuators. Maybe a piggyback module that communicates with the RCX via the IR port?)
./ story a while back), but Lego were extremely reasonable and polite about the whole thing. (In trademark law, they MUST defend the trademark or else lose it).
There was an incident with the LegOS alternate operating system recently where Lego requested that the fellow change the name so as to not dilute Lego's trademark (see
As concerns DMCA, there's NO issue there, 'cause there's no attempt to prevent or control access to the brick's brains. Lego are the complete opposite of Sony in this regard.
One thing to note about tired plots (cribbed from some wiser person than I): There are basically only a few basic plots in the world to begin with, so similarities are to be expected. What makes the story interesting or not is good or bad storytelling and a fresh and original approach...
Ms. Bujold definitely has these; she tells an EXCELLENT story! I was particularly impressed with A Civil Affair, which is basically a romantic comedy in the space armor of a classic space opera (or at least in the Barrayar setting). See also The Spirit Ring for an original take on the ghosts-and-summoning-spirits-of-the-dead novel.
And if the contractor can't handle conduit (find a better contractor?!), you can do it yourself. Steel conduit is cheap (I know, 'cause I've done this), and conduit benders are not difficult to use. Of course, if you don't wanna use a conduit bender, you can buy prefab curved sections.
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A few things to keep in mind:
0. Use METAL conduit rather than plastic - indefinite lifetime, RF shielding, and nailproof when hanging pictures. Also easily findable with stud-finder gadgets at need.
1. Use BENDS rather than square corners (and insist the contractor do so -- inspect before accepting...). Makes pulling cable more fun, and VITAL for fiber (if it ever comes to that)
2. If you do it yourself, make sure you debur the insides of all conduit ends with the little blade on the tubing cutter. It really sucks to have a short 'cause the conduit cut the insulation.
3. Check local codes and the building inspector on how to GROUND the conduit properly (one probably grounds this to the building safety ground at the electrical service entrance -- a definite building-inspector question). The building inspector can be made into a very handy resource if you social-engineer the interaction properly - you want him to take you seriously, and to understand that you want to, and are able to, do things right and with proper permits; at this point, he ceases to be an obstacle and becomes an ally. Also, be real clear to the building department that your conduit is LOW-VOLTAGE wiring and NOT power wiring; the code requirements are different.
Lastly, 3Com has a nifty mini-hub that fits into a wall box, seen on
Then his grin would have been answered with "Hit the street right now. You're FIRED."
Issues of OS "treason" or "loyalty" are secondary to getting one's job done in ANY company, and vaping a user's OS and legitimate data files without authorization is NEVER an appropriate action for an IT support person. This isn't an example of Linux fascism, but rather one of a loose cannon of a technician who is a danger to the company.
Any info on how that scene actually played out?
The true betrayal was in people who didn't have any understanding of, or concern for, business realities selling Lutris's founders the open source bill of goods and encouraging them to go into business in a way that was foolish and self-destructive. The true betrayal was in proselytizing for a false religion.
I believe you are confusing two fundamentally different things here: 1) the "truth or falsity" of Open Source as a religion (a description that has much merit, BTW), and 2) the viability of a business model based on Open Source.
Evaluating the Open Source Religion's "truth" is waaay tricky: it all depends on how you define its premise. I think your implied premise, which clearly involves building profitable business models on Open Source software, is inapplicable. IMHO, the most applicable premise is something along the lines of, "Open Source produces technically superior and socially desirable software". This premise is demonstrably "true", at least in technical terms; it is also closer to most geeks' ideas of Open Source, and it has nothing whatever to do with making money. By the premise I described, and which I argue to be applicable, the Open Source religion clearly works, hence it cannot reasonably be described as "false". In the final analysis, Open Source and Making Money are no more inherently linked than Christianity and Making Money.
ESR himself has, in my hearing, publicly described what he thinks makes Open-Sourcing a software package a good or a bad idea for a business, and he was crystal-clear that NOT every project can or should be Open Sourced on business grounds. I cannot reconcile the presentation I heard ESR give, OR my reading of "The Cathedral and the Bazaar", with the idea that he has sold someone a "bill of goods". I see no evidence of misrepresentation there. To blame ESR for a corporation's starry-eyed rapture with the dot-com fashion is to misassign responsibility that properly belongs to business planners who failed to realistically analyze their business model (and in the dot-com bubble, there have been LOTS of those).
Try Bynari Software, at http://www.bynari.com; IIRC, they have at least partial work-alikes for Exchange client and server, some of which code is GPL and some not-free-but-reasonably-priced. I myself use a standard SMTP/POP3 mail client rather than Outlook to access my company Exchange server's SMTP interface. Look, Ma, no viruses! Of course, I also don't use the calendar/planner cruft, a Dayrunner never crashes...
Proof one shouldn't post under the influence of glowing phosphors. Make that a D-Link DI-704, NOT Linksys...
I used to use a Moreton Bay Nettel (now it's named Snapgear) until lightning killed it; GREAT unit, I highly recommend it.
I now use a Linksys DI-704; good feature set, built-in 4-port hub, inexpensive at $99, but somewhat lacking in remote logging capabilities. Still, I recommend both units.