Here in Norway it is still being described as a terrorist attack.
The attack at Utøya is described as a massacre while the bomb was obviously a bombing. These two attacks has to be differentiated when described for clarity so they are described that way. Overall it is described as "the terrorist attacks" or a variation of that.
Do not for a second think this is some "downgrading" because of the nutjob being Norwegian.
I dont know who you feel are pushing it under the rug, but I dont see anything like that happening -here-.
Or if it had been an HP server using iLO would allow him to press the power-button remotely.
During the few times I need to power-cycle a server it beats going down to the basement server room to push a button... or in a worst case scenario going out to a damn oil rig to do it....
Nope, but if nobody resets the clock, the day/night cycles might break.
Quite a lot of traffic lights are tuned to traffic patterns in 2,4 or even 8 'blocks' of the day. That way you can have one pattern during the rush hour 'blocks' and a completely different one at 4am.
If this starts drifting out of sync one could end up with a "night" pattern during rush hour which would be bad;)
All modern systems use proper oscillators and not the frequency of the AC supply for timekeeping though... but there is a whole lot of old legacy stuff out there...
I work in a major supplier of process automation systems in the oil/gas industry. A few years back one of the things which was done was to make everyone aware that while you might be a technical person that does not mean you cant also influence the customer.
Things I do while doing work at a local gas refinery/transmission plant:
* If I hit a hurdle which would be less cumbersome using our new system I discuss the pros and cons with the customer (if they're interested in hearing. * During times of waiting for various compilers and system restarts I discuss possible modifications to the system to make their life easier. * Chitchat with the customer as usually have something they love to chat/bitch about when it comes to our system, dont all customers at some point?;) * Look for things that are wrong, and fix them.. even if said things are not part of my "scope" when at the site. This includes things like renaming old control logic diagrams to their new standard. This makes everyone happy, especially the technical guys:p * One strange one: I do tech support for THEIR tech staff on things that are completely unrelated to my task when at the site. Only during downtime while waiting for various time consuming system restarts and such, but it has made their people much more likely to listen when I propose changes.
Oh... and most importantly, I try to have a sense of humor when they bitch about our sales people being a bit pushy. My take is that unfortunately they kinda end up that way due to their job description but sometimes they actually -do- have good ideas, just need someone to filter out the poo. And -that- would be the technical people at the customer site. (The guys I'm talking with. doesnt harm to inflate their ego a bit:p)
All of this amounts to what? During a 1.5 year project I managed to increase the billable time at site by about 10% for my team due to extra "variation orders" from the customer. Direct results from suggestions I made to make the system much easier to maintain. We dont do that kind of maintenance so it just saves the in-house people they have a lot of work. The sales people love me because I let them have all the financial credit for it. The important thing for me is that my boss knows what I do and approves. This simply means she is a hell of a lot more likely to approve that second 24" display I want, or that brand spanking new work machine a year before the lease on the previous one is up... Getting the tools I -want- instead of just what I "must have" is plenty of a perk for me... that and not being given tasks any more, I'm asked if I want the tasks or not:p I get to pick and choose *grin*
So... Dont be a pushy arse about it, but when you see a place where one of your companies products would be a good idea, dis cuss the pros and cons with the customer but only if they're actually interested. Works for me. YMMV
Pardon me for not having included the safety aspect.
To clarify:
Quite a lot of the current plants have a whole lot less security systems compared to any modern and much less dangerous plant. While it is certainly possible to refit an existing plant with an electronic control system it -will- be hugely expensive. Not because the control system itself is, but because of the certification process involved.
To give an example.. To achieve SIL-3 certification (which some oil rigs now are) every piece of equipment must have a failure rate determined and added to a fairly elaborate analysis of the overall signal path. Usually the electronics are simple to do.. It is a major pain in the ass (ie, hugely expensive) to do the same for existing hardware like transmitters and even the pipes themselves.
Another issue causing modifications to be hugely expensive is that they can only really be performed during a complete shutdown. Or of course, one can do it during operations and hope that nothing goes to hell... Not something I'd want anyone to try on a nuclear reactor:p
That aside, quite an impressive ad hominem I must say. Well done;)
We have much the same on most oil rigs in the north sea.
While the whole HMI system is computerized there is also a "Critical Action Panel" that contains hardwired safety functions. For example, you can trigger an "Abandon Platform Shutdown" from a single push button should the need arise. This button is independent from the computerized control system.
For something as important as a nuclear plant I would sure hope they have hardwired redundancy for the important functions.
Most of the oil rigs in the North Sea and the land plants supporting them are programmed using windows XP machines. Some of the rigs also have HMI systems (800xA by ABB) that run on win2003 servers.
There really are no modern control systems that do not have a windows component.. not if they have the feature-set required by most customers.
It isnt remotely perfect, but the options to avoid it are extremely limited.
I have three 22 inch 1920x1080 displays. How exactly would one cram that amount of space into a 5-10 year old notebook?
The issue isnt the software solution, it is the physical limitations of having a small screen.
Reducing the size of the displayed information rapidly makes it harder to read, so why do it when you can avoid it?
And mobility is obviously not an issue with a triple-head setup unless one is crazy enough to lug it around in a crate:p Notebooks are also really not relevant at all in this case.
While a projector might work better for gaming (I disagree personally) it doesnt work nearly as well when you're doing other stuff.
Coding in particular is something I spend quite a lot of time doing, and it is nice to be able to keep reference docs and 4-5 pages of code on the screen at the same time. No more alt-tabbing your brain out to get to the right window either.
Personally I find that I often play games just on the center monitor in my 3x setup. Usually this is because I keep IM/IRC on the right one, and various other 'important' things on the left screen.
While programming it is also hugely useful to be able to keep more stuff visible. Having reference docs visible while writing code is quite spiffy.
Oh... and I dont have to alt-tab nearly as much these days and that makes me happy:p
On the "hoards" comment I'd point out that I have 3 friends who use a 3x setup, so the amount of people doing it is on the raise;)
Luckily Norway has consumer protection laws that make such class action suits pointless.
If there is an issue with a laptop or anything else I buy I get a new product without the issue. Hell, I get warranty replacements on stuff all the time and not once have I had to fight the company.
If the goods are meant to last more than 2 years they have a 5 year warranty by law. Fun stuff.
That is why some clever bastards join forces and split the cost of ONE textbook between 8-10 people, slit the back off it and feed it through a scanner with a hopper....
I'm all for quality textbooks, but 200 dollars is too much to demand for a mediocre one....
Slashdot Mirror
It wasnt "downgraded".
Here in Norway it is still being described as a terrorist attack.
The attack at Utøya is described as a massacre while the bomb was obviously a bombing.
These two attacks has to be differentiated when described for clarity so they are described that way.
Overall it is described as "the terrorist attacks" or a variation of that.
Do not for a second think this is some "downgrading" because of the nutjob being Norwegian.
I dont know who you feel are pushing it under the rug, but I dont see anything like that happening -here-.
In Norway it is legal to get copies of such material from friends and family.
Yay
There is an FPS limiting option now.
Or if it had been an HP server using iLO would allow him to press the power-button remotely.
During the few times I need to power-cycle a server it beats going down to the basement server room to push a button... or in a worst case scenario going out to a damn oil rig to do it....
Nope, but if nobody resets the clock, the day/night cycles might break.
Quite a lot of traffic lights are tuned to traffic patterns in 2,4 or even 8 'blocks' of the day. That way you can have one pattern during the rush hour 'blocks' and a completely different one at 4am.
If this starts drifting out of sync one could end up with a "night" pattern during rush hour which would be bad ;)
All modern systems use proper oscillators and not the frequency of the AC supply for timekeeping though... but there is a whole lot of old legacy stuff out there...
Oooh, havent done serial communication yet... Any chance you have schematics? ^.^
I work in a major supplier of process automation systems in the oil/gas industry. A few years back one of the things which was done was to make everyone aware that while you might be a technical person that does not mean you cant also influence the customer.
Things I do while doing work at a local gas refinery/transmission plant:
* If I hit a hurdle which would be less cumbersome using our new system I discuss the pros and cons with the customer (if they're interested in hearing. ;) :p
* During times of waiting for various compilers and system restarts I discuss possible modifications to the system to make their life easier.
* Chitchat with the customer as usually have something they love to chat/bitch about when it comes to our system, dont all customers at some point?
* Look for things that are wrong, and fix them.. even if said things are not part of my "scope" when at the site. This includes things like renaming old control logic diagrams to their new standard. This makes everyone happy, especially the technical guys
* One strange one: I do tech support for THEIR tech staff on things that are completely unrelated to my task when at the site. Only during downtime while waiting for various time consuming system restarts and such, but it has made their people much more likely to listen when I propose changes.
Oh... and most importantly, I try to have a sense of humor when they bitch about our sales people being a bit pushy. My take is that unfortunately they kinda end up that way due to their job description but sometimes they actually -do- have good ideas, just need someone to filter out the poo. And -that- would be the technical people at the customer site. (The guys I'm talking with. doesnt harm to inflate their ego a bit :p)
All of this amounts to what? :p I get to pick and choose *grin*
During a 1.5 year project I managed to increase the billable time at site by about 10% for my team due to extra "variation orders" from the customer. Direct results from suggestions I made to make the system much easier to maintain. We dont do that kind of maintenance so it just saves the in-house people they have a lot of work.
The sales people love me because I let them have all the financial credit for it. The important thing for me is that my boss knows what I do and approves. This simply means she is a hell of a lot more likely to approve that second 24" display I want, or that brand spanking new work machine a year before the lease on the previous one is up... Getting the tools I -want- instead of just what I "must have" is plenty of a perk for me... that and not being given tasks any more, I'm asked if I want the tasks or not
So...
Dont be a pushy arse about it, but when you see a place where one of your companies products would be a good idea, dis cuss the pros and cons with the customer but only if they're actually interested. Works for me. YMMV
Pardon me for not having included the safety aspect.
To clarify:
Quite a lot of the current plants have a whole lot less security systems compared to any modern and much less dangerous plant.
While it is certainly possible to refit an existing plant with an electronic control system it -will- be hugely expensive.
Not because the control system itself is, but because of the certification process involved.
To give an example.. To achieve SIL-3 certification (which some oil rigs now are) every piece of equipment must have a failure rate determined and added to a fairly elaborate analysis of the overall signal path. Usually the electronics are simple to do.. It is a major pain in the ass (ie, hugely expensive) to do the same for existing hardware like transmitters and even the pipes themselves.
Another issue causing modifications to be hugely expensive is that they can only really be performed during a complete shutdown. Or of course, one can do it during operations and hope that nothing goes to hell... Not something I'd want anyone to try on a nuclear reactor :p
That aside, quite an impressive ad hominem I must say. Well done ;)
Assuming of course that the HMI will run with a stripped down OS.
One of the major control system vendors in the world running thousands of plants recently required .NET 3.5 to even start...
It is hugely expensive to modify plants.
It is much cheaper to actually build a new plant...
If only companies were allowed to build new plants on the condition that they shut down the old nasty ones... meh
Redundancy.
We have much the same on most oil rigs in the north sea.
While the whole HMI system is computerized there is also a "Critical Action Panel" that contains hardwired safety functions.
For example, you can trigger an "Abandon Platform Shutdown" from a single push button should the need arise. This button is independent from the computerized control system.
For something as important as a nuclear plant I would sure hope they have hardwired redundancy for the important functions.
Because of cost.
Plain and simple.
Most of the oil rigs in the North Sea and the land plants supporting them are programmed using windows XP machines.
Some of the rigs also have HMI systems (800xA by ABB) that run on win2003 servers.
There really are no modern control systems that do not have a windows component.. not if they have the feature-set required by most customers.
It isnt remotely perfect, but the options to avoid it are extremely limited.
There are some trust issues with the redirect lists but other than that it is nice
I have three 22 inch 1920x1080 displays. How exactly would one cram that amount of space into a 5-10 year old notebook?
The issue isnt the software solution, it is the physical limitations of having a small screen.
Reducing the size of the displayed information rapidly makes it harder to read, so why do it when you can avoid it?
And mobility is obviously not an issue with a triple-head setup unless one is crazy enough to lug it around in a crate :p
Notebooks are also really not relevant at all in this case.
While a projector might work better for gaming (I disagree personally) it doesnt work nearly as well when you're doing other stuff.
Coding in particular is something I spend quite a lot of time doing, and it is nice to be able to keep reference docs and 4-5 pages of code on the screen at the same time. No more alt-tabbing your brain out to get to the right window either.
Personally I find that I often play games just on the center monitor in my 3x setup. Usually this is because I keep IM/IRC on the right one, and various other 'important' things on the left screen.
While programming it is also hugely useful to be able to keep more stuff visible. Having reference docs visible while writing code is quite spiffy.
Oh... and I dont have to alt-tab nearly as much these days and that makes me happy :p
On the "hoards" comment I'd point out that I have 3 friends who use a 3x setup, so the amount of people doing it is on the raise ;)
Luckily Norway has consumer protection laws that make such class action suits pointless.
If there is an issue with a laptop or anything else I buy I get a new product without the issue.
Hell, I get warranty replacements on stuff all the time and not once have I had to fight the company.
If the goods are meant to last more than 2 years they have a 5 year warranty by law. Fun stuff.
Nobody said it was a good idea, but that was supposedly the reason they did it.
Geohot (I think it was?) found some flaws in the hypervisor and a bit later they yanked the option altogether.
That is why some clever bastards join forces and split the cost of ONE textbook between 8-10 people, slit the back off it and feed it through a scanner with a hopper....
I'm all for quality textbooks, but 200 dollars is too much to demand for a mediocre one....
National Geographic still runs quite a lot of good stuff.
Discovery though has spiraled into the pit of reality shows :p
If you want videos archived post the links and we'll add it to the central download queue for the Archive.org downloading effort :)
--ksh @ #googlegrape EFNet
Post the google video link and we'll add it to the central download queue for the Archive.org downloading effort :)
--ksh @ #googlegrape EFNet
Destroying government property is rarely a good idea :p
Makes more sense than scientology ;)