Exactly how do you have your preferences set up? Have you a bazillion fonts on your Mac? Have you tried trashing your preferences? Have you tried using the applications on another "user" on your machine? Have you tried asking about speedups on the OS X FAQ Forum? There is help out there if you need it.
The New York Times had a recent article about how one foreign language department was using Apple's music player to record and play back language lab materials. I have found a grant proposal while looking for a link to the article. The Times article suggested the use of iPod voice recorders as well.
Of course you are looking for specific technology and technologies, as opposed to curriculum and methodologies but I have a dear friend who teaches the more advanced courses using a mix of history and the country's literature. I found his methods very good.
Many companies insist that if you work in IT for them, you must report any and all side work to your supervisor, whereupon you will not be permitted to do the side-work if it as seen in any way as competitive.
My brother did side work doing perl and SQL programming for websites. He has also done other small coding jobs. Additionally, his "side job" while he was working for one company was to go to school and complete a Masters Degree program. Your skills get rusty if you don't keep up and getting a Masters got him into a nicer position -- until AO-Hell bought and destroyed the company he was in.
I have purchased a fair amount of shareware from people who have IT jobs and then do a little development on the side at home. One says that the money he makes off his shareware will go to his son's education (great idea, as his son is still in diapers presently).
Then there are times when one just wants to go to sleep when one gets home. I think everyone's been there.
This is where I strongly resent the way my tax dollars are being used. I have long been a proponent of more manned space missions. I am also a strong oponent of the way the government currently spends a lot of its money. We're in a government-created budget deficit that will make it impossible to support "entitlement" programs of the future. We will wind up with loads of discretionary spending being cut off entirely just because we have to continue to service our national debt.
NASA is the kind of program that spends the kind of big-budget money and supports many of the same industries as the Department of Defense (which seems to be the Department of Attack these days). If we are going to do a "pork" program to support these industries, then NASA is absolutely appropriate because it does not bomb civilians, ruin other countries or make foreign nationals hate us.
Instead, we underfund NASA, we deny CAL Tech (JPL) funding to continue programs and we have become a country that makes "decisions by committee" with respect to this new frontier called Space. We ought to be on the moon with a colony. We ought to have killed the shuttle program in favor of a reusable craft that was not built to the specifications of the Department of Defense. We ought to have a fully functioning low earth orbit space station and shuttles back and forth to and from the moon as well as concrete plans for manned missions to Mars.
But we have given the money that ought to be used for our future to those who want to limit our future.
I recall that President Andrew Jackson vetoed a federal highway bill that would have been the first inter-state highway in the United States. He felt that such a highway would favor one State over the others and he also felt that a federal expenditure to construct a highway was unconstitutional.
What the public expects out of our government has expanded considerably since then. We expect our local governments to install, if not maintain, community sewage systems to handle rainwater during floods and to treat wastewater so that we do not pollute the environment. These kinds of systems were built by localities when the public was apprised of the health benefits of decreasing the number of pools of still water (mosquito breeding grounds) around municipalities and preventing outbreaks of disease from raw sewage. They have not always done these things and there seems to be some evidence that many of the waterworks of Roman cities were not necessarily public works.
To make a certain quality of Internet access free to all sets a standard within a community above which other service providers, like Verizon, would have to provide in order to sell their service. A publically-funded WiFi service is the kind of thing that could attract more high-tech industry and could increase the level of education within a municipality. Were voters to decide to pay for the taxes necessary to install and maintain that kind of a service, I'd see it as the kind of expansion of what government does (like trash pickup) that is not necessarily vital to the community but an "added perk" that makes living in that municipality more preferrable than other, surrounding communities.
For Verizon to try to limit what the public may choose to pay their taxes to support is another example of how corporations are attempting to place themselves in charge; to govern by fiat. Voters should consider the bedfellows of those representatives they vote for more than anything else. It was felt by the framers of our Constitution in the US that religion ought to be seperated from politics. Increasingly, our arguments need to be turned toward the Corporate interests. Campaign finance reform was one such argument. I predict, as time goes on, these discussions of corporate interests versus the interests of the common man (as a voting bloc) will become sharper.
I read the article and it's a fairly good review of new technology that suggests that one could edit out the bad takes to free up hard disk space. Nonetheless, one still has to dump the contents of the drie to a pee cee to edit with the material.
Pogue writes that it will not work with Apple's Final Cut Pro or iMovie and that the software that it is sold with (for pee cees only) is really awful. One has to transfer really poorly-named files from the mini-drive. They're poorly-named because they are not distinguishable from other files on the drive that contain no video and because they are in folders that are similarly, poorly named.
One might assume that JVC will improve their software eventually but only if the cameras they're selling take off.
But I have a problem with the title of the article on/. HD to me means high definition.
I worked for several years for a post-production facility that had strong ties into the film industry. For review purposes they would crank out videos in NTSC and PAL formats to send to reviewers who could not attend viewings. We were all told that if anyone found out that we had copies of these (not yet in theaters) films, we'd be fired.
I was never tempted. I did see a lot of very new films at the facility as we also screened films for critics and I could go in to a screening whenever I wanted (BTW, a private screening is very nice as the print has been treated with kid gloves and the facility is ultra-comfortable).
While some of the material out on the streets is, indeed, taken from theaters with amateur mini-DV cameras, there are industry insiders who have much better access and it is those people who most probably do the most (and highest-quality) bootlegging.
The increase in bootlegging is driven by the decrease in the costs of copying media, not in more "artful dodgers."
Thanks for the link, I shall bookmark it, though at this read, I see only Intel and AMD processor articles
I must disagree that Byte lost its focus and redirected itself towards the "suits" as one poster put it. They covered processor evolution, covering the Intel P6 a full two years before rollout.
They would be the only reliable and fair testers to show the real differences between the AMD processors and Intel processors, eschewing all routines that the processors might have been tuned to beat. And they would be fair and reliable about the real performance difference between the Power PC processors with slower clock speeds and the processors you see in pee cees with faster clock speeds. I cannot trust Apple or the Windows magazines to tell me the truth, they have too many reasons to lie.
The thing that irks me is that there is no general computing source any more. Things have pretty much descended into the various "camps" with pee cee people reading about those new processors and the Mac people reading about the Power PC processor.
I used to be able to keep up with processor design in Byte Magazine. It also kept me apprised of each different computer that came out back when no one computer type and operating system had over 90% of the market and I think that Byte helped serve those who didn't want to see Microsoft-Intel become as dominant as they have become.
The death of Byte is still a sore spot with me. I ran an Intel platofrm for many years and was able to keep up with what Motorola and Sun were doing with their designs. There were even columns on embedded applications. I felt like I had a really good handle on the microprocessor universe and the differences. Sadly, not so now (or should I use Jerry Pournelle's frequent "Alas...").
If you go back another generation and also to the first generation, you get the true floating point units on different chips, with the 8086 and 8087 co-processor and the 80287 coprocessor for the 80286 processor.
The next generation after the 80286 processor used the "enable" "disable" scam along with the strange naming conventions, all of which you may find here. So I would agree that the 80287 was a true floating point co-processor; I'm not so sure about all of the 80387 co-processors.
The advantage of having these floating point operations on the same die is, of course, speed. I wonder if the "Alti-Vec" enhancements to the G4 and G5 IBM-Motorola RISC processors is along the same lines as a multi-core processor with different functions in the two cores.
I was actually thinking of the hurricane-spawned type, not the "Auntie Em it's a twister" type. Hurricanes tend to spawn multiple tornadoes which, when combined with the effects of a hurricane, cause total destruction on the order of the Coventry bombings during WW II.
I would refer the right honourable gentleman to the statement given some moments ago.
I have lived in a home with slate shingles. They do last a long time but they are fastened to wood, which is what is holding up the roof. It is that wood that you do not want to have growing mold and rotting, else your nice slate-shingled roof will tumble down.
One must have an airflow between the wood sheathing onto which all shingles are laid and the insulation. It prevents that.
Very good point, especially as I was recommending that he seal up his home as well as possible. I should mention that my father "survived" his entire childhood on Coleman "white gas" lanterns, though his parents' house may have been more drafty than I remember it to be when I visited them.
My father grew up without electricity and it was not until he went away to University that his parents got electricity in their home. The REA later the Rural Utilities Service had not reached their home until then.
So, depending on draftiness, a mantle-type lantern is recommended for the amount of illumination it offers but caution ought to be used.
As he is in the UK, I have a feeling that shipping costs might prohibit his ordering from there.
I've been in ice storms here in the US and the resultant power outages (for up to two weeks) aren't fun. Towards the end of the outage, you just want to be in a warm building and take off your coat and just breathe in warm air. It's episodes like that which encourage older people to move to Florida, though I'll bet the hurricanes this year convinced many that cool winter weather might be better than losing one's house to a hurricane or tornado spawned by one (something the English never see in their own country)
Also these packs don't prevent water pipes from freezing inside one's own home. But I wonder if any part of England, save very close to Scotland, gets significantly below freezing for long enough for that to happen. Perhaps in the hills -- what they call mountains.
You live in the UK, which tends to not have enough sun to make photovoltaic worthwhile. Either you need a positively huge array (and the one in the picture on the website you link to looks like it fairly covers all available space on the roof) or you need lots of sun and Britain just doesn't have that.
Your best (but polluting) source of electricity is a honda generator. You can buy them all over and I'd imagine a DIY outlet will have a few models to choose from. One member here mentions that he did quite well after a hurricane with one. Do not ever run one indoors. They create carbon monoxide so their exhaust needs to be away from the house so that it cannot seep in through a window, vent or other entrance.
You will need a UPS with a generator if you are running a computer, but you don't need one for equipment that may be shut off and restarted, like fans, washers, dryers, refrigerators, etc. You need enough battery life to be able to survive a power outage until you can get the generator running. So if your computer needs to run all of the time, make sure your battery will last long enough for you to wake up, put on clothes and go tend to the generator.
Insulation and sealing are the best non-polluting way to increase heat -- and you will save money on heating fuel all winter, so it pays for itself.
The more insulation you have in your walls and on the roof, the better you are. Be sure there is an air pocket that runs up your eaves on your roof so that you don't get mold on your rafters and shingles and you're all set. You want to add to your "R-Value" in such a way so that you can keep enough home heat inside to keep warm in any full-day power outage.
The homes I've visited in England have tended to be fairly drafty as compared to US homes. So look at your doors and windows and make sure they seal well when you close them. Windows ought to be double-pane windows, which hold in heat four times better than single-pane.
I don't necessarily recommend that you keep up the electricity lifestyle during a power outage. Turn off your computer, unless you need it for work. Use hurricane lanterns and "Coleman" white gas lanters with mantles to light up your home (they'll also add heat but not as efficiently, perhaps, as a real heater). Run up your heater on your generator until it is quite warm inside and then shut it off until things cool down just under bearable temperatures. Don't open any windows to moderate the heat and keep things sealed up as best you can. Don't use the television, save to get information about the power emergency (a radio is usually better anyway for up-to-the-moment information anyway). Run your generator sparingly.
And talk to your local MP and ask why your area is so ill-served with electricity. Ask if his district is not one of second-class citizenry if your power goes out as often as is predicted. Gather your friends and neighbors to help him think more clearly (if he sees you as a voting bloc, he'll think clearly) about the need to introduce a change in the system.
I have been thinking that the American system of healthcare is a direct violation of the Hippocratic Oath but after some cursory study, I find the oath to be wanting as it is translated into English.
The United States allows abortion and I personally think that is a good thing (allowing it) because of a study finished some years ago by the United Nations Fund for Population Activities that showed women find their value in society increases in direct correlation to their access to contraception.
It is my opinion that, if society is going to make a mistake in its laws, those mistakes ought to be the kind of mistakes that increase the worth of the citizenry of that society, not decrease their worth. Thus I feel that abortion should remain legal as a "last resource" method of contreception and in cases of rape or incest in a society that claims to value women.
The hippocratic oath specifically prohibits that: "I will not give to a woman an abortive remedy...."
So I don't know what doctors are swearing to.
I think that the healthcare system in the United States uses two methods of triage: financial and injury or disease. The idea behind the hippocratic oath is that doctors will work to save lives and to serve and educate people, regardless of their standing, without prejudice and with honor. This is certainly at odds with the American system of healthcare delivery.
Lawsuits are not necessarily to blame just as the level of medical education and the quality of the medical schools aren't either. I will agree that there is disfunction but one cannot point to one sole cause for the price of healthcare in the US.
Perhaps it's the "what the market will bear" attitude we have here that we apply to everything, including the public welfare. That, combined with a "survival of the fittest" ethic coming from our government these days, has created a system that is not fixable from within the system. The solution must come from outside of the system and it would appear that the global market might do that.
We cannot buy drugs from nations that control the prices of dtugs because "those drugs may be unsafe" (according to politicans and the drug companies). Never mind that these drugs are perfectly safe for the citizenry of the non-US country and are made by the same manufacturers. Drug companies tell us they're doing research when they're really researching how they can take over other drug companies and laboratories to get their patents as well as how they can use the US court system to extend their existing patents to maximize their profit cycle. They have stopped educating doctors and started using advertising to "educate" their potential customers, all the while passing the cost of national television and magazine advertising campaigns on to the customers.
Doctors have to request additional tests to protect themselves from litigation which results in more waiting for treatment that works, and adds about 1 to 2% to the costs of healthcare.
And the poor don't see a doctor in a timely way, winding up in an emergency room with an acute illness because they cannot afford either health insurance or the cost of a doctor.
In the meantime, we have lobbyists writing our laws and taxpayers footing the bill for a system that works for most but is very costly.
If there is a doctor in the house, I would specifically request a copy of or a link to the actual hippocratic oath now sworn to. And, perhaps, we need patients to swear another oath, to see a doctor regularly and to treat him as a good samaratin.
how is what Apple is doing any different from what Microsoft does?
I think someone has all ready alluded to your question: Apple is primarily a hardware company that also creates software and a nice operating system that goes really well with it.
Microsoft developing OS software must be a whole lot like herding cats in that they do wish to push hardware developers in particular directions but really cannot force them to adopt certain hardware standards. Even back when Apple allowed clones (and their stock was at $14), they always pre-approved all hardware configurations. Microsoft has never had that kind of power over the hardware.
This is why operating an Apple Macintosh always conveys a complete experience that tends to be seamless and more friendly for the consumer. In much the same way that Mercedes Benz or Volvo can afford to innovate and offer new standards for the experience of driving their cars, Apple can offer a new innovation or adopt new standards (like Firewire, USB and hardware support for Open GL) that requires at least a year of coaxing from Microsoft.
Additionally, if Apple wants a better driver for something they want to hang on their box, it comes with the operating system or is available through Software Update. Microsoft has to coax the hardware manufacturer or count on user base demands to improve theirs. As a result, Microsoft's OS will have a tendency to have multiple DLLs and configuration files that fight with each other about what the expectation is for hardware and software. This is very much akin to the problems Macintosh users used to have with their System Software before OS X. One used to need several sets of Control Panels and System Extensions in order to have trouble-free operation with certain software. I had one set for Final Cut Pro use, another for graphics work and another for general use, each requiring a restart to change from one setup to another. The problem with Microsoft's OS is that there are no tools to disable some system settings and enable others. They're not helping the user in this respect even though needing to reboot to change settings is a pain.
Part of the Macintosh experience that I find so enjoyable is due, in part, to its status as the less-popular operating system. While it is certainly possible to create virus programs, worms, spyware and remote-control attack bots for Macintosh computers, Microsoft's operating systems present the more popular target. I have to regularly run repair programs on my girlfriend's computer to prevent malware from getting past its defenses, I don't have to with my Mac. While Apple is being vigilant about releasing repairs to their operating system, the concern is never as deep as with Microsoft's systems.
Microsoft is supporting more versions of their operating system. Apple isn't and doesn't have to. I know that Apple is still releasing patches for 10.2.x (Jaguar) even though 10.3.x is the latest OS. Microsoft has a very large user base still using Windows 2000 and must support both XP and XP Professional because they have decided to continue to bifurcate their operating system releases. One could argue the merits of that decision and I have heard Microsoft engineers talk about unifying the code "in the next release," but many large corporations are still using Windows NT because that's what their IT people know best and retraining takes time. Supporting the latest OS from Apple tends to be easier and more straightforward. In any case, Microsoft is frequently called upon to continue to support their legacy operating system software by their larger clientele -- Apple doesn't seem to have that problem.
I think the real activity from Apple has been about supporting innovations in hardware. Tiger's big attraction is 64-bit processing and Apple's current workstation class computers (along with some of the low-price computers, like the iMac) are 64-bit boxes. With Microsoft's OS, the software tends to lag hardware innovation more.
I have dealt with ADP as a union treasurer and, as far as I can determine, they do not outsource payroll to a foreign company. And lots of small businesses use them, even though they're fairly expensive in some ways. But with ADP you pay for peace of mind. If ADP makes a mistake and does not send proper monies to the US or State treasuries, they pay for the mistake, not your company. I like peace of mind when it comes to payroll.
But I do work for a large multinational corporation (under the auspices of that union). And that large multinational uses a company in Florida called CBSI. And I know that payroll information also goes to Newfoundland, Canada and also to Mexico for some processing (to cut costs for service). But that specific information is up to date as of two years ago, as I am no longer a union treasurer (and not in position to demand answers from the company like I was before). I know the company outsourced IT to India, so why not payroll, too.
I do agree with the comment that one may sue for the illicit sale of one's private information (like a social security number, address, date of birth and so on) but one could never win such a lawsuit crossing so many international boundaries.
And that is why I brought the issue up.
By the way, outsourcing IT to India for the kind of work we're doing is a disaster. It may take as many as three weeks to solve a simple problem of a roaming profile able to log on to any computer in the company. I speak from experience and the experience of many others with whom I work.
I would refer you to my earlier comment below on the press and its role in all of this
I recall that we (the United States) ran many of your early elections after the second world war. And we, of course, didn't learn from our own teachers.
I wholeheartedly agree with you on your comments about war. You should understand the lots of Americans feel that way as well. We are making exactly the same mistakes in Iraq that we did in Vietnam with only one difference -- we don't have a military draft to keep swelling the ranks of our ground forces. That may change soon.
I believe you may have your "pecking order" incorrect; number 2 is actually number 1 -- large corporations (including the one for which I work) have greater control over a politician's vote than the politician's peers and even he has whenever he places his re-election before the interests of the people.
We have, unfortunately, become a very conservative country with no interest in the social welfare of our citizens. Presently our politicians have been telling us (in many ways), "It's every man for himself and if you don't or cannot make it to an easy retirement, it's your own fault." This bothers me because my older sister is disabled and my mother has leukemia and I don't think that either one of them sat down one day and decided to "fail" by contracting an incurable illness.
I would urge you to keep talking to Americans, one-to-one. It would appear that our one-time students have much to teach us.
This may be seen as slightly offtopic, but the company I work for has outsourced payroll. Payroll includes the information supposedly stolen from this database, Social security numbers, home addresses, age, date of birth as well as a lot of financial information giving access to the earnings of many for many years.
I'm wondering when the Indian company (or some person within that company) decides to legally sell that information to some Moldavian Mafiosi. I'll bet there are no Indian laws regarding the release of Social Security numbers and financial information of Americans. Might violate a contract but who's paying more?
I have been using "electronic" voting machines for quite some time now. They have levers that clearly indicate with a black "X" that I have voted for a particular candidate or proposition and they are lever-based. They were developed in the 1950s and "feel" mechanical. I think they are probably trustworthy.
But the issue here is not the machines, and we (the press) are guilty of not being completely honest with the public. The issue here is that there is a feeling that, in the year 2000, the election was stolen. The purchase of new machines to tally votes is really a side issue.
We have made little of the fact that Al Gore won the popular vote and lost the electoral college. We have made nothing of the fact that the US Supreme Court completely ignored States Rights when it comes to the States deciding for themselves how to apportion their Electoral College vote -- Even agreeing to consider the case of Bush v. Gore was extra-Constitutional, it was all ready in State Court in Florida.
Instead, the people I work for called it a "Constitutional Crisis," which is really funny because our Constitution has specific instructions for times when the Electoral College vote is questionable. Everyone paid lots of attention to a bunch of "Activist" Supreme Court judges who wished to pre-decide a State matter. Outside election observers should have commented on that.
Now, we're reporting about "lack of paper trail" and "hackable voting machines" because we're all excited about the possibility of great ratings if there is any question in this close election again.
In other words, we're not really interested in fully informing the American People, we're interested in trying to make them watch our "news" shows.
Fact is, all ballot boxes can be stuffed. All totals may be altered. All elections may be rigged. What's important is the believability of the process in the mind of the majority of the voters. And the press (which is what this article was truly aimed at) is more interested in sowing fear, uncertainty and doubt in hopes that it creates ratings and sells newspapers.
Back in the Middle Ages (the 1980s) I had a group of about ten people, male and female playing regularly. We played one dungeon for about four months and it was then that I started allowing everyone to keep their characters and started reading history in order to accomodate their increasing character strengths and abilities.
We were also playing games on Apple ][ computers...
Sadly, I moved out of the area we were playing in to accept a job where I have now lived for 20 years. Last I heard the group still met, though once monthly. One of the girls in our group married one of the boys (they were well-suited for each other even though I always thought their characters took out their relationship frustrations on each other) and they now have two children.
"So, Daddy, how did you meet mommy?"
"Actually, she cast a spell that felled an orc that was just about to kill me."
Another one of the girls married, then divorced one of the boys -- then married another boy from the group. They have no children, which is probably a good thing if my memory about their temperment serves me
"So how did you two meet, anyway?"
"I was married to one knight when he came in and swept me off my feet and onto his white charger, while fighting off an underworld demon. I cast a spell of enchantment on him and the rest is history."
Slashdot Mirror
Exactly how do you have your preferences set up? Have you a bazillion fonts on your Mac? Have you tried trashing your preferences? Have you tried using the applications on another "user" on your machine? Have you tried asking about speedups on the OS X FAQ Forum? There is help out there if you need it.
The New York Times had a recent article about how one foreign language department was using Apple's music player to record and play back language lab materials. I have found a grant proposal while looking for a link to the article. The Times article suggested the use of iPod voice recorders as well.
Of course you are looking for specific technology and technologies, as opposed to curriculum and methodologies but I have a dear friend who teaches the more advanced courses using a mix of history and the country's literature. I found his methods very good.
One wonders whether or not one could hear ones self think with one of these installed.
Seriously though, three cheers to Gigabyte. They've outsped their competition by thinking outside of the box.
Many companies insist that if you work in IT for them, you must report any and all side work to your supervisor, whereupon you will not be permitted to do the side-work if it as seen in any way as competitive.
My brother did side work doing perl and SQL programming for websites. He has also done other small coding jobs. Additionally, his "side job" while he was working for one company was to go to school and complete a Masters Degree program. Your skills get rusty if you don't keep up and getting a Masters got him into a nicer position -- until AO-Hell bought and destroyed the company he was in.
I have purchased a fair amount of shareware from people who have IT jobs and then do a little development on the side at home. One says that the money he makes off his shareware will go to his son's education (great idea, as his son is still in diapers presently).
Then there are times when one just wants to go to sleep when one gets home. I think everyone's been there.
This is where I strongly resent the way my tax dollars are being used. I have long been a proponent of more manned space missions. I am also a strong oponent of the way the government currently spends a lot of its money. We're in a government-created budget deficit that will make it impossible to support "entitlement" programs of the future. We will wind up with loads of discretionary spending being cut off entirely just because we have to continue to service our national debt.
NASA is the kind of program that spends the kind of big-budget money and supports many of the same industries as the Department of Defense (which seems to be the Department of Attack these days). If we are going to do a "pork" program to support these industries, then NASA is absolutely appropriate because it does not bomb civilians, ruin other countries or make foreign nationals hate us.
Instead, we underfund NASA, we deny CAL Tech (JPL) funding to continue programs and we have become a country that makes "decisions by committee" with respect to this new frontier called Space. We ought to be on the moon with a colony. We ought to have killed the shuttle program in favor of a reusable craft that was not built to the specifications of the Department of Defense. We ought to have a fully functioning low earth orbit space station and shuttles back and forth to and from the moon as well as concrete plans for manned missions to Mars.
But we have given the money that ought to be used for our future to those who want to limit our future.
I recall that President Andrew Jackson vetoed a federal highway bill that would have been the first inter-state highway in the United States. He felt that such a highway would favor one State over the others and he also felt that a federal expenditure to construct a highway was unconstitutional.
What the public expects out of our government has expanded considerably since then. We expect our local governments to install, if not maintain, community sewage systems to handle rainwater during floods and to treat wastewater so that we do not pollute the environment. These kinds of systems were built by localities when the public was apprised of the health benefits of decreasing the number of pools of still water (mosquito breeding grounds) around municipalities and preventing outbreaks of disease from raw sewage. They have not always done these things and there seems to be some evidence that many of the waterworks of Roman cities were not necessarily public works.
To make a certain quality of Internet access free to all sets a standard within a community above which other service providers, like Verizon, would have to provide in order to sell their service. A publically-funded WiFi service is the kind of thing that could attract more high-tech industry and could increase the level of education within a municipality. Were voters to decide to pay for the taxes necessary to install and maintain that kind of a service, I'd see it as the kind of expansion of what government does (like trash pickup) that is not necessarily vital to the community but an "added perk" that makes living in that municipality more preferrable than other, surrounding communities.
For Verizon to try to limit what the public may choose to pay their taxes to support is another example of how corporations are attempting to place themselves in charge; to govern by fiat. Voters should consider the bedfellows of those representatives they vote for more than anything else. It was felt by the framers of our Constitution in the US that religion ought to be seperated from politics. Increasingly, our arguments need to be turned toward the Corporate interests. Campaign finance reform was one such argument. I predict, as time goes on, these discussions of corporate interests versus the interests of the common man (as a voting bloc) will become sharper.
I read the article and it's a fairly good review of new technology that suggests that one could edit out the bad takes to free up hard disk space. Nonetheless, one still has to dump the contents of the drie to a pee cee to edit with the material.
/. HD to me means high definition.
Pogue writes that it will not work with Apple's Final Cut Pro or iMovie and that the software that it is sold with (for pee cees only) is really awful. One has to transfer really poorly-named files from the mini-drive. They're poorly-named because they are not distinguishable from other files on the drive that contain no video and because they are in folders that are similarly, poorly named.
One might assume that JVC will improve their software eventually but only if the cameras they're selling take off.
But I have a problem with the title of the article on
So let me get this straight:
HP printer drivers require that you be hooked up to the Internet.
Since when was that a requirement for printing?
I worked for several years for a post-production facility that had strong ties into the film industry. For review purposes they would crank out videos in NTSC and PAL formats to send to reviewers who could not attend viewings. We were all told that if anyone found out that we had copies of these (not yet in theaters) films, we'd be fired.
I was never tempted. I did see a lot of very new films at the facility as we also screened films for critics and I could go in to a screening whenever I wanted (BTW, a private screening is very nice as the print has been treated with kid gloves and the facility is ultra-comfortable).
While some of the material out on the streets is, indeed, taken from theaters with amateur mini-DV cameras, there are industry insiders who have much better access and it is those people who most probably do the most (and highest-quality) bootlegging.
The increase in bootlegging is driven by the decrease in the costs of copying media, not in more "artful dodgers."
Thanks for the link, I shall bookmark it, though at this read, I see only Intel and AMD processor articles
I must disagree that Byte lost its focus and redirected itself towards the "suits" as one poster put it. They covered processor evolution, covering the Intel P6 a full two years before rollout.
They would be the only reliable and fair testers to show the real differences between the AMD processors and Intel processors, eschewing all routines that the processors might have been tuned to beat. And they would be fair and reliable about the real performance difference between the Power PC processors with slower clock speeds and the processors you see in pee cees with faster clock speeds. I cannot trust Apple or the Windows magazines to tell me the truth, they have too many reasons to lie.
Thanks again for the link
The thing that irks me is that there is no general computing source any more. Things have pretty much descended into the various "camps" with pee cee people reading about those new processors and the Mac people reading about the Power PC processor.
I used to be able to keep up with processor design in Byte Magazine. It also kept me apprised of each different computer that came out back when no one computer type and operating system had over 90% of the market and I think that Byte helped serve those who didn't want to see Microsoft-Intel become as dominant as they have become.
The death of Byte is still a sore spot with me. I ran an Intel platofrm for many years and was able to keep up with what Motorola and Sun were doing with their designs. There were even columns on embedded applications. I felt like I had a really good handle on the microprocessor universe and the differences. Sadly, not so now (or should I use Jerry Pournelle's frequent "Alas...").
If you go back another generation and also to the first generation, you get the true floating point units on different chips, with the 8086 and 8087 co-processor and the 80287 coprocessor for the 80286 processor.
The next generation after the 80286 processor used the "enable" "disable" scam along with the strange naming conventions, all of which you may find here. So I would agree that the 80287 was a true floating point co-processor; I'm not so sure about all of the 80387 co-processors.
The advantage of having these floating point operations on the same die is, of course, speed. I wonder if the "Alti-Vec" enhancements to the G4 and G5 IBM-Motorola RISC processors is along the same lines as a multi-core processor with different functions in the two cores.
I was actually thinking of the hurricane-spawned type, not the "Auntie Em it's a twister" type. Hurricanes tend to spawn multiple tornadoes which, when combined with the effects of a hurricane, cause total destruction on the order of the Coventry bombings during WW II.
I would refer the right honourable gentleman to the statement given some moments ago.
I have lived in a home with slate shingles. They do last a long time but they are fastened to wood, which is what is holding up the roof. It is that wood that you do not want to have growing mold and rotting, else your nice slate-shingled roof will tumble down. One must have an airflow between the wood sheathing onto which all shingles are laid and the insulation. It prevents that.
Very good point, especially as I was recommending that he seal up his home as well as possible. I should mention that my father "survived" his entire childhood on Coleman "white gas" lanterns, though his parents' house may have been more drafty than I remember it to be when I visited them.
My father grew up without electricity and it was not until he went away to University that his parents got electricity in their home. The REA later the Rural Utilities Service had not reached their home until then.
So, depending on draftiness, a mantle-type lantern is recommended for the amount of illumination it offers but caution ought to be used.
As he is in the UK, I have a feeling that shipping costs might prohibit his ordering from there.
I've been in ice storms here in the US and the resultant power outages (for up to two weeks) aren't fun. Towards the end of the outage, you just want to be in a warm building and take off your coat and just breathe in warm air. It's episodes like that which encourage older people to move to Florida, though I'll bet the hurricanes this year convinced many that cool winter weather might be better than losing one's house to a hurricane or tornado spawned by one (something the English never see in their own country)
Also these packs don't prevent water pipes from freezing inside one's own home. But I wonder if any part of England, save very close to Scotland, gets significantly below freezing for long enough for that to happen. Perhaps in the hills -- what they call mountains.
You live in the UK, which tends to not have enough sun to make photovoltaic worthwhile. Either you need a positively huge array (and the one in the picture on the website you link to looks like it fairly covers all available space on the roof) or you need lots of sun and Britain just doesn't have that.
Your best (but polluting) source of electricity is a honda generator. You can buy them all over and I'd imagine a DIY outlet will have a few models to choose from. One member here mentions that he did quite well after a hurricane with one. Do not ever run one indoors. They create carbon monoxide so their exhaust needs to be away from the house so that it cannot seep in through a window, vent or other entrance.
You will need a UPS with a generator if you are running a computer, but you don't need one for equipment that may be shut off and restarted, like fans, washers, dryers, refrigerators, etc. You need enough battery life to be able to survive a power outage until you can get the generator running. So if your computer needs to run all of the time, make sure your battery will last long enough for you to wake up, put on clothes and go tend to the generator.
Insulation and sealing are the best non-polluting way to increase heat -- and you will save money on heating fuel all winter, so it pays for itself.
The more insulation you have in your walls and on the roof, the better you are. Be sure there is an air pocket that runs up your eaves on your roof so that you don't get mold on your rafters and shingles and you're all set. You want to add to your "R-Value" in such a way so that you can keep enough home heat inside to keep warm in any full-day power outage.
The homes I've visited in England have tended to be fairly drafty as compared to US homes. So look at your doors and windows and make sure they seal well when you close them. Windows ought to be double-pane windows, which hold in heat four times better than single-pane.
I don't necessarily recommend that you keep up the electricity lifestyle during a power outage. Turn off your computer, unless you need it for work. Use hurricane lanterns and "Coleman" white gas lanters with mantles to light up your home (they'll also add heat but not as efficiently, perhaps, as a real heater). Run up your heater on your generator until it is quite warm inside and then shut it off until things cool down just under bearable temperatures. Don't open any windows to moderate the heat and keep things sealed up as best you can. Don't use the television, save to get information about the power emergency (a radio is usually better anyway for up-to-the-moment information anyway). Run your generator sparingly.
And talk to your local MP and ask why your area is so ill-served with electricity. Ask if his district is not one of second-class citizenry if your power goes out as often as is predicted. Gather your friends and neighbors to help him think more clearly (if he sees you as a voting bloc, he'll think clearly) about the need to introduce a change in the system.
I have been thinking that the American system of healthcare is a direct violation of the Hippocratic Oath but after some cursory study, I find the oath to be wanting as it is translated into English.
The United States allows abortion and I personally think that is a good thing (allowing it) because of a study finished some years ago by the United Nations Fund for Population Activities that showed women find their value in society increases in direct correlation to their access to contraception.
It is my opinion that, if society is going to make a mistake in its laws, those mistakes ought to be the kind of mistakes that increase the worth of the citizenry of that society, not decrease their worth. Thus I feel that abortion should remain legal as a "last resource" method of contreception and in cases of rape or incest in a society that claims to value women.
The hippocratic oath specifically prohibits that: ..."
"I will not give to a woman an abortive remedy.
So I don't know what doctors are swearing to.
I think that the healthcare system in the United States uses two methods of triage: financial and injury or disease. The idea behind the hippocratic oath is that doctors will work to save lives and to serve and educate people, regardless of their standing, without prejudice and with honor. This is certainly at odds with the American system of healthcare delivery.
Lawsuits are not necessarily to blame just as the level of medical education and the quality of the medical schools aren't either. I will agree that there is disfunction but one cannot point to one sole cause for the price of healthcare in the US.
Perhaps it's the "what the market will bear" attitude we have here that we apply to everything, including the public welfare. That, combined with a "survival of the fittest" ethic coming from our government these days, has created a system that is not fixable from within the system. The solution must come from outside of the system and it would appear that the global market might do that.
We cannot buy drugs from nations that control the prices of dtugs because "those drugs may be unsafe" (according to politicans and the drug companies). Never mind that these drugs are perfectly safe for the citizenry of the non-US country and are made by the same manufacturers. Drug companies tell us they're doing research when they're really researching how they can take over other drug companies and laboratories to get their patents as well as how they can use the US court system to extend their existing patents to maximize their profit cycle. They have stopped educating doctors and started using advertising to "educate" their potential customers, all the while passing the cost of national television and magazine advertising campaigns on to the customers.
Doctors have to request additional tests to protect themselves from litigation which results in more waiting for treatment that works, and adds about 1 to 2% to the costs of healthcare.
And the poor don't see a doctor in a timely way, winding up in an emergency room with an acute illness because they cannot afford either health insurance or the cost of a doctor.
In the meantime, we have lobbyists writing our laws and taxpayers footing the bill for a system that works for most but is very costly.
If there is a doctor in the house, I would specifically request a copy of or a link to the actual hippocratic oath now sworn to. And, perhaps, we need patients to swear another oath, to see a doctor regularly and to treat him as a good samaratin.
over_exposed wrote:
how is what Apple is doing any different from what Microsoft does?
I think someone has all ready alluded to your question: Apple is primarily a hardware company that also creates software and a nice operating system that goes really well with it.
Microsoft developing OS software must be a whole lot like herding cats in that they do wish to push hardware developers in particular directions but really cannot force them to adopt certain hardware standards. Even back when Apple allowed clones (and their stock was at $14), they always pre-approved all hardware configurations. Microsoft has never had that kind of power over the hardware.
This is why operating an Apple Macintosh always conveys a complete experience that tends to be seamless and more friendly for the consumer. In much the same way that Mercedes Benz or Volvo can afford to innovate and offer new standards for the experience of driving their cars, Apple can offer a new innovation or adopt new standards (like Firewire, USB and hardware support for Open GL) that requires at least a year of coaxing from Microsoft.
Additionally, if Apple wants a better driver for something they want to hang on their box, it comes with the operating system or is available through Software Update. Microsoft has to coax the hardware manufacturer or count on user base demands to improve theirs. As a result, Microsoft's OS will have a tendency to have multiple DLLs and configuration files that fight with each other about what the expectation is for hardware and software. This is very much akin to the problems Macintosh users used to have with their System Software before OS X. One used to need several sets of Control Panels and System Extensions in order to have trouble-free operation with certain software. I had one set for Final Cut Pro use, another for graphics work and another for general use, each requiring a restart to change from one setup to another. The problem with Microsoft's OS is that there are no tools to disable some system settings and enable others. They're not helping the user in this respect even though needing to reboot to change settings is a pain.
Part of the Macintosh experience that I find so enjoyable is due, in part, to its status as the less-popular operating system. While it is certainly possible to create virus programs, worms, spyware and remote-control attack bots for Macintosh computers, Microsoft's operating systems present the more popular target. I have to regularly run repair programs on my girlfriend's computer to prevent malware from getting past its defenses, I don't have to with my Mac. While Apple is being vigilant about releasing repairs to their operating system, the concern is never as deep as with Microsoft's systems.
Microsoft is supporting more versions of their operating system. Apple isn't and doesn't have to. I know that Apple is still releasing patches for 10.2.x (Jaguar) even though 10.3.x is the latest OS. Microsoft has a very large user base still using Windows 2000 and must support both XP and XP Professional because they have decided to continue to bifurcate their operating system releases. One could argue the merits of that decision and I have heard Microsoft engineers talk about unifying the code "in the next release," but many large corporations are still using Windows NT because that's what their IT people know best and retraining takes time. Supporting the latest OS from Apple tends to be easier and more straightforward. In any case, Microsoft is frequently called upon to continue to support their legacy operating system software by their larger clientele -- Apple doesn't seem to have that problem.
I think the real activity from Apple has been about supporting innovations in hardware. Tiger's big attraction is 64-bit processing and Apple's current workstation class computers (along with some of the low-price computers, like the iMac) are 64-bit boxes. With Microsoft's OS, the software tends to lag hardware innovation more.
Fine. Time wounds all heels. We did sort of leave the center thread of the topic.
I have dealt with ADP as a union treasurer and, as far as I can determine, they do not outsource payroll to a foreign company. And lots of small businesses use them, even though they're fairly expensive in some ways. But with ADP you pay for peace of mind. If ADP makes a mistake and does not send proper monies to the US or State treasuries, they pay for the mistake, not your company. I like peace of mind when it comes to payroll.
But I do work for a large multinational corporation (under the auspices of that union). And that large multinational uses a company in Florida called CBSI. And I know that payroll information also goes to Newfoundland, Canada and also to Mexico for some processing (to cut costs for service). But that specific information is up to date as of two years ago, as I am no longer a union treasurer (and not in position to demand answers from the company like I was before). I know the company outsourced IT to India, so why not payroll, too.
I do agree with the comment that one may sue for the illicit sale of one's private information (like a social security number, address, date of birth and so on) but one could never win such a lawsuit crossing so many international boundaries.
And that is why I brought the issue up.
By the way, outsourcing IT to India for the kind of work we're doing is a disaster. It may take as many as three weeks to solve a simple problem of a roaming profile able to log on to any computer in the company. I speak from experience and the experience of many others with whom I work.
I would refer you to my earlier comment below on the press and its role in all of this
I recall that we (the United States) ran many of your early elections after the second world war. And we, of course, didn't learn from our own teachers.
I wholeheartedly agree with you on your comments about war. You should understand the lots of Americans feel that way as well. We are making exactly the same mistakes in Iraq that we did in Vietnam with only one difference -- we don't have a military draft to keep swelling the ranks of our ground forces. That may change soon.
I believe you may have your "pecking order" incorrect; number 2 is actually number 1 -- large corporations (including the one for which I work) have greater control over a politician's vote than the politician's peers and even he has whenever he places his re-election before the interests of the people.
We have, unfortunately, become a very conservative country with no interest in the social welfare of our citizens. Presently our politicians have been telling us (in many ways), "It's every man for himself and if you don't or cannot make it to an easy retirement, it's your own fault." This bothers me because my older sister is disabled and my mother has leukemia and I don't think that either one of them sat down one day and decided to "fail" by contracting an incurable illness.
I would urge you to keep talking to Americans, one-to-one. It would appear that our one-time students have much to teach us.
This may be seen as slightly offtopic, but the company I work for has outsourced payroll. Payroll includes the information supposedly stolen from this database, Social security numbers, home addresses, age, date of birth as well as a lot of financial information giving access to the earnings of many for many years.
I'm wondering when the Indian company (or some person within that company) decides to legally sell that information to some Moldavian Mafiosi. I'll bet there are no Indian laws regarding the release of Social Security numbers and financial information of Americans. Might violate a contract but who's paying more?
Does your company outsource payroll?
I have been using "electronic" voting machines for quite some time now. They have levers that clearly indicate with a black "X" that I have voted for a particular candidate or proposition and they are lever-based. They were developed in the 1950s and "feel" mechanical. I think they are probably trustworthy.
But the issue here is not the machines, and we (the press) are guilty of not being completely honest with the public. The issue here is that there is a feeling that, in the year 2000, the election was stolen. The purchase of new machines to tally votes is really a side issue.
We have made little of the fact that Al Gore won the popular vote and lost the electoral college. We have made nothing of the fact that the US Supreme Court completely ignored States Rights when it comes to the States deciding for themselves how to apportion their Electoral College vote -- Even agreeing to consider the case of Bush v. Gore was extra-Constitutional, it was all ready in State Court in Florida.
Instead, the people I work for called it a "Constitutional Crisis," which is really funny because our Constitution has specific instructions for times when the Electoral College vote is questionable. Everyone paid lots of attention to a bunch of "Activist" Supreme Court judges who wished to pre-decide a State matter. Outside election observers should have commented on that.
Now, we're reporting about "lack of paper trail" and "hackable voting machines" because we're all excited about the possibility of great ratings if there is any question in this close election again.
In other words, we're not really interested in fully informing the American People, we're interested in trying to make them watch our "news" shows.
Fact is, all ballot boxes can be stuffed. All totals may be altered. All elections may be rigged. What's important is the believability of the process in the mind of the majority of the voters. And the press (which is what this article was truly aimed at) is more interested in sowing fear, uncertainty and doubt in hopes that it creates ratings and sells newspapers.
Back in the Middle Ages (the 1980s) I had a group of about ten people, male and female playing regularly. We played one dungeon for about four months and it was then that I started allowing everyone to keep their characters and started reading history in order to accomodate their increasing character strengths and abilities.
We were also playing games on Apple ][ computers...
Sadly, I moved out of the area we were playing in to accept a job where I have now lived for 20 years. Last I heard the group still met, though once monthly. One of the girls in our group married one of the boys (they were well-suited for each other even though I always thought their characters took out their relationship frustrations on each other) and they now have two children.
"So, Daddy, how did you meet mommy?"
"Actually, she cast a spell that felled an orc that was just about to kill me."
Another one of the girls married, then divorced one of the boys -- then married another boy from the group. They have no children, which is probably a good thing if my memory about their temperment serves me
"So how did you two meet, anyway?"
"I was married to one knight when he came in and swept me off my feet and onto his white charger, while fighting off an underworld demon. I cast a spell of enchantment on him and the rest is history."
Funny thing is, I'm still unmarried.
"Sincere, erudite dungeonmaster seeks....