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User: AC-x

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Comments · 1,259

  1. Why would you want to type at all? on Microsoft Develops Analog Keyboard For Wearables, Solves Small Display Dilemma · · Score: 3, Interesting

    it's Microsoft that might have the most logical solution for typing on small size displays running Google's Android Wear platform. Microsoft's research division has built an analog keyboard prototype for Android Wear that eliminates the need to tap at tiny letters, and instead has you write them out.

    Why would you want to type at all? There's reasonably good voice recognition now, that's got to be better than trying to finger-paint letters on a tiny watch screen?

  2. Re:They _Should_ Replace It on CSS Proposed 20 Years Ago Today · · Score: 1

    Simple things like a complex form, which would be trivial with a grid (and are trivial with tables) are an epic pain with CSS layouts.

    Sure in the pre-IE8 days it was a pain, but now it's trivial to do .form { display:table; }

  3. Re:Something More Modest on MIT Study Finds Fault With Mars One Colony Concept · · Score: 3, Informative

    Then we found out about the 450C sulfuric acid clouds, the molten tin lakes and the almost solid atmosphere...

    It's pretty nice at 50km up though...

  4. Re:Buffering.. on Test-Driving a $35 Firefox OS Smartphone · · Score: 2

    But then, the first iPhone wasn't 3G either...

  5. Re:Call it a "Driving Plane" not a "Flying Car" on A Production-Ready Flying Car Is Coming This Month · · Score: 1

    There's already a word for them, "Roadable Aircraft"

  6. Roadable aircraft aren't "flying cars" on A Production-Ready Flying Car Is Coming This Month · · Score: 2

    I wish they'd stop calling roadable aircraft "flying cars".

    Flying car: Something that allows you to take off from your home and fly directly to your destination.
    Roadable aircraft: An aircraft that you can drive to and from local airports.

    It's good for people who already fly light aircraft (no more worrying about transport once you fly to your destination), useless for the rest of us.

  7. Re:You mean our nightmare could become a reality on A Production-Ready Flying Car Is Coming This Month · · Score: 1

    I think the licence to operate an aircraft might be just a teensy bit harder to get than the licence to operate a car...

  8. Re:solution? on New OS X Backdoor Malware Roping Macs Into Botnet · · Score: 1

    Nix their entire search query?

  9. Having read TFA... on Grooveshark Found Guilty of Massive Copyright Infringement · · Score: 1

    perhaps that is in the evidence somewhere and just didn't make the summary.

    Yes, having read TFA there are some statements that ex-employees made:

    The opinion also took note of the testimony of ex-Grooveshark employees who testified on behalf of the record companies. They explained how their bosses ordered them to acquire "the most popular and current songs" and upload them into the Grooveshark system.

    As well as this:

    "Escape openly acknowledged that their business plan was to exploit popular label content in order to grow their service and then 'beg forgiveness' from the plaintiffs and seek licenses," wrote Griesa.

    So that coupled with the email seems to make it beyond reasonably doubt that the email was referring to downloading copyrighted music rather than looking for public domain music.

  10. Having read TFA... on Grooveshark Found Guilty of Massive Copyright Infringement · · Score: 2

    perhaps that is in the evidence somewhere and just didn't make the summary.

    Yes, there are some statements that ex-employees made:

    The opinion also took note of the testimony of ex-Grooveshark employees who testified on behalf of the record companies. They explained how their bosses ordered them to acquire "the most popular and current songs" and upload them into the Grooveshark system.

    As well as this:

    "Escape openly acknowledged that their business plan was to exploit popular label content in order to grow their service and then 'beg forgiveness' from the plaintiffs and seek licenses," wrote Griesa.

    So that coupled with the email seems to make it beyond reasonably doubt that the email was referring to downloading copyrighted music rather than looking for public domain music.

  11. Re:Will Capcom sue? on The Great Lightbulb Conspiracy · · Score: 1

    Whoops, actually meant MR16, but yeah 12v halogen replacements.

  12. Re:I dunno about LEDs, but CFLs don't last on The Great Lightbulb Conspiracy · · Score: 1

    every one that I've purchased - from multiple companies - has burned out prematurely

    Did you buy the cheapest, crappiest ones you could find or something? My house has a total of 21 Phillips GU10 and 4 Megaman MR11 (yes they're a real company) bulbs, all 6W (50W equiv) dimmable, and not a single one has failed in 3 years, including the ones in the bathroom (so hello high humidity and temperature swings).

    They're all modern warm white LEDs, they work fine on standard dimmers, and the light quality is indistinguishable from the halogen spotlights they replaced. My living room has the equivalent of 1000W of light for just 60W worth of LEDs.

  13. Re:Underwater? Yes. Robot? NO on Octopus-Inspired Robot Matches Real Octopus For Speed · · Score: 1

    "A robot is an automatic mechanical device ... "

    Quite a serviceable definition, and it covers what they are doing.

    But there's nothing automatic about their model; They manually attached it to a water hose to fill it, manually released it, and relied on fixed fins to provide passive stability.

    Sure the technology can be used on robots in the future, but this proof-of-concept model is as robotic as a water bottle rocket.

  14. Re:Some details about the 3D printer on SpaceX Launches Supplies to ISS, Including Its First 3D Printer · · Score: 1

    That's why you carry spare parts with you.

    Still, with mass at a premium it would be more efficient to send up a stockpile of raw plastic rather than many combinations of different spare parts. After all you can't perfectly predict which parts will fail and how often, so you could get caught short on a part that was supposed to be reliable but failed more than often it was predicted to.

  15. Re:Some details about the 3D printer on SpaceX Launches Supplies to ISS, Including Its First 3D Printer · · Score: 1

    Ever since Muslims were banned from going to Mars by a fatwa? I guess it is!

    Well, they're banned if the mission is one-way rather than two-way, mainly in response to that daft Mars One thing. Of course Islam doesn't have any central authority anyway so it's not like that "no suicide missions to Mars" fatwa is actually binding to anyone.

  16. Re:oh wow on SpaceX Launches Supplies to ISS, Including Its First 3D Printer · · Score: 1

    Thing is, you're melting plastic and placing that melted plastic where you want it to be. In gravity and endless atmosphere this is easy, the gravity helps feed the raw materials through a hopper and ensure that the plastic stays where you place it, and the essentially endless atmosphere carries away noxious fumes so that you don't poison yourself. Unfortunately on a space station or in a spacecraft you have no effective gravity and a very limited atmosphere, so you cannot pollute nor can you rely on gravity to make things go where you want them.

    Gravity making things go where you want them?? Gravity is a limiting factor in terrestrial 3D printers! The plastic is loaded as a filament and is mechanically pushed through the nozzle so no gravity required there, and without gravity you could get much better overhangs without requiring supports.

    As for the fumes it would be pretty easy to have the printer in a separate fume cupboard if they needed.

  17. Re: So we just gave all this money on SpaceX Launches Supplies to ISS, Including Its First 3D Printer · · Score: 1

    The X-37 isn't the launch vehicle, it's the payload...

  18. Re:Alright smart guy on Ask Slashdot: Is iOS 8 a Pig? · · Score: 1

    With an Android device, the manufacturer outright abandons updating the phone the moment their next handset is on sale. (Samsung seems to be the worst about this, but, even Google has done it to stock Nexus phones.)

    Pick your poison. Slow, or quick. ....then get ready for your next pill.

    At least with Android running a custom build is officially supported by the OS, and some handsets (especially the Nexus line) officially support rooting to install custom builds too. My nearly 4 year old Nexus S is running the latest version of KitKat just fine, and has actually got faster with the last few versions.

  19. Re:a collision wouldn't surprise me on 2 Mars Missions Set For Arrival, Both Prepare for Orbital Maneuvers · · Score: 2

    It just seems that any time a government spends a lot of money to do anything, it normally ends with a fail worthy of Monty Python

    Lets be fair here, the last thing they did on Mars was place a 1 ton nuclear powered tank on the surface using a rocket powered crane, so they've obviously come along way since that unfortunate units mixup...

  20. Re:a collision wouldn't surprise me on 2 Mars Missions Set For Arrival, Both Prepare for Orbital Maneuvers · · Score: 2

    What, this one? An autonomous rendezvous test satellite that bashed into the derelict satellite it was practising with?

    I mean, the whole point of that mission was to get close, tho not quite that close.

  21. Re:"CipherShed" on TrueCrypt Gets a New Life, New Name · · Score: 1

    personally I'd rather go for Serial Attached Small Computer System Interface over Small Form Factor 8470

    To be fair they do just go for "SAS" rather than "SASCSI"

  22. Re:lynx! on Browser To Facilitate Text Browsing In Emergencies · · Score: 2

    Why do you miss it? It's not gone anywhere -> sudo apt-get install lynx

  23. Re:I wish tech writers were more honest on 3D-Printed Car Takes Its First Test Drive · · Score: 1

    That "motor" is just another spring!

  24. Re:Tough as steel? on 3D-Printed Car Takes Its First Test Drive · · Score: 1

    Is it the same one who would win if you ran a "typical automobile" into a transport truck or a dump truck?

  25. Re:The biggest risk to the pyramids is Islam on Egypt's Oldest Pyramid Is Being Destroyed By Its Own Restoration Team · · Score: 1

    The Syrian civil war is a political conflict sparked by a violent crackdown on anti-Assad protests in 2011 you dolt. Some of the rebel fighters are literally backed by the US government. Does that mean the US government supports Islamic extremists? Maybe you're confusing it with ISIS, an Iraqi group which was at the time of your poll (May 2013) a largely unknown bit player?