Unfortunately, many are also switching frequencies, sometimes bands. So all those "HD" antennas they were pushing in the big box stores, might not work to receive all the HD channels after the change. Some people might need to add a VHF antenna or switch to a combo unit.
With recent developments in VDPAU, the HD capable GPU acceleration for Linux, I could use this board. The only thing I would change is to make it wider and move all the ports to the back. Include an LCD or VFD if you want to get fancy, and and IR receiver on the front. Perfect MythTV frontend machine. I would like the dual-channel RAM though, to help with 1080i playback.
Put it in a nice small case like those used for modern DVD players, and they have a winner.
I don't know why people think current hybrids are dangerously slow. I have owned a Prius since early 2006. I can keep up with any small 4-cyl gas car on the road. I do better than many 6-cyl SUVs at getting up to highway speeds.
The electric motors alone are rated for 250-lb/ft of torque. That's more than most common gas engines produce at the top of their torque curve. And electrics generate that torque from ZERO RPM. Add the CVT (no shift delays) and the gas motor, and I can get up to speed pretty quick. Speed changes on the freeway are also quite fast. Can I keep up with a Vette? Not even close. But do I need to? Nope.
It's not a "performance" car. But it's also not marketed as one.
People are going to have to get used to the "fugly" shape if they want efficiency. The Prius is that shape to lower wind resistance while maximizing interior space. Wind resistance is the enemy of efficient high speed transportation. So pick your poison.
Not every market is doing what yours is. Here, all the stations are staying on the new UHF frequencies. So they could indeed broadcast the message to the idiots that haven't been paying attention.
Even in markets like yours, they could just replace the analog broadcast with the information message without changing anything else. Then make the switch later. At least then the warning gets out loud and FAWKING clear.
NO TV FOR YOU, BUY THE DAMN CONVERTER BOX WE'VE BEEN TELLING YOU TO GET FOR THE LAST 10 YEARS!!!! WE EVEN GAVE YOU COUPONS TO GET FREE ONES YOU LAZY FAWKERS!
Or at the very least a format that DOES look the same on different computers and software. Perhaps PDF? At least then you can have your fancy formatting and charts, graphs, pictures, whatever. Plain text might be a little too much to ask for.
Umm... The gov did help out the poor and such by offering the free converter box coupons. They have been available for at least a year now. All you had to do was all a 1-800 number or use a website IIRC. If you were watching TV at all during that time you got bombarded with commercials and other notices telling you about it. I didn't get any because I don't need them. I only have 1 TV that lacks a digital tuner, and I don't use it for OTA, so I left them for people that really did need them.
A directional antenna takes care of most multipath problems. You don't even need to mount it outside if you get a good one, though you get a better signal if you do. A good directional is reasonably cheap, and thanks to most stations switching to UHF, reasonably small as well.
Note that an hour @720p is about 2GB with h264. Assuming a decent bitrate (about 3.5Mbps). Of course, once you cut out the ~15min of commercials, you get about 1.2GB.
I've found that gets me quite good quality HDTV playback from transcoded recordings.
MPEG2 ATSC is about 8GB/hr, depending on the station. Nobody would transmit that over the net though. Not when h264 works so well at significantly lower bitrates.
Which would be a great idea, if they would loosen up a little. They NEED to support common video formats, like mkv, and allow things like a MythTV Frontend to be written for it and use the full power of the GPU and cell processors. This would allow Myth, XBMC, Windows Media Center extenders, etc..
Until they do that, they are just trying to lock everyone into all Sony all the time. Not interesting for many people that already have an investment in other technologies. However, if they opened up a little, they could become the #1 convergence box. The thing has enough power to decode 1080p video and still do other stuff. So you could get the perfect set-top box that could play any video, Blu-Ray, and killer games all in one machine.
Sadly, it will likely never happen as Sony has the media side of the business to appease. Worries over people downloading content from the internet and copying games will prevent it. Of course, they could then sell said content over the net for a decent price and get more customers, but whatever.
I kind of agree here. I would like the games to give me the option when I create a new game. For example, I've played all the Zelda games. I really don't WANT the help offered by the little companions in the recent games. Don't tell me where to fscking go, or how to kill the latest enemy/boss. I want to figure it out myself. That's part of the fun for me, but I'm an experienced player of those games. I expect it would be frustrating as hell to someone that isn't familiar with them.
The modes could also include things like modifying the damage/hit points. So it's easier to get killed in the harder modes. It doesn't have to be a big shift, but when I can play a more modern Zelda game without death or potions, it's too easy for the core audience.
That said, I recently bought PoP for the PS3 as I heard some good things about it and I liked the old PoP games. It's quite fun, but a little repetitive. If they added some items and such, make it a little more RPGish, it would be a great game, IMO. The "powers" you unlock do help a little there though. I do see myself replaying levels to go get the rest of those light balls though. That's going to be somewhat irritating. I do like the combat system, and the auto-save thing is kind of nice. It lets me explore areas that I would avoid in other games as I know I can keep playing even if I fall.
You can thank the cable companies that you can't get Myth compatible cablecard tuners. They refuse the allow anyone to use cablecard in a computer if it's not DRMed all to hell and back.
The only option for cable based HD right now is the Haupage HD-PVR. A component video capture device. It outputs h264 to a USB connection and is supported in Linux and Myth (Myth needs patches right now, the next version will have support).
Try a modern Myth setup, it's a LOT easier to deal with than it used to be. I'm running it as our sole PVR at this point with an antenna for OTA channels and it's working very well. I used Mythbuntu, it was as easy to set up as a standard Ubuntu install.
Not all the kids are as smart as many here. However, one of them may know someone that is and doesn't think the restrictions are useful. And it only takes one. Just like DRM, you only need a single crack, then everyone is good to go.
For example, there's re-partitioning and installing another OS on the same drive. Boot the school OS when at school, boot the open OS at home. Problem solved. Use a USB stick if you want to be undetectable at school. If you want to get fancy, use truecrypt on the drive and they can't see it.:)
I think the replies suggesting that they filter the school internet connection and leave the machines themselves pretty much open are the way to go. The school network they can protect, but with physical access all bets are off on the machines themselves. Make sure parents and students are aware of the issues and sign a statement absolving the school from all issues regarding the computers when they are not at school or modified in any way.
I have OSX using NFS shares right now. They work far better than SMB or AFP did with the automounter that comes with OSX. It required a little work on the OSX box to get the UID/GID situation set up properly so security works, but it wasn't really that hard to do.
OSX doesn't deal with sleep and such very well with the automounter and SMB/AFP. NFS seems to work just fine though. Interesting, I would have thought AFP would be better. The Linux fileserver is running all three protocols and they all work well. I find I use NFS the most as I have it serve movies and such to the Myth systems.
The only high speed option with competition. I use a local WISP (rapidwave.net) and I don't pay for anything I don't use. It's not as fast as some cable providers, but it's 5/2 so it's not bad. About $50/mo. Most areas seem to be served by a WISP these days, check into it a little and you might be able to find something.
They also provide me with a static IP so I can run server processes. It's a "don't break things" kind of arrangement. If I don't cause problems, they leave me alone to do my thing.
The OP is talking about a first PROGRAMMING course. Not a CS degree specifically. The goals are not really the same. If you're teaching someone to program you don't really want to start with the low level stuff. A CS grad needs to know that stuff, but I don't see why it should be covered as "Intro to Programming".
As far as paradigm, imperative. Why? Because it's going to be kind of familiar to newbs.
Language? BASIC or Python. Java is nuts. I shouldn't have to tell a newb about classes and objects. Or, worse, to tell them to ignore the magic statements. You can do "Hello World" in a single line of BASIC. No magic. Python is similar, but with a better library.
Teaching programming should be about programming, not machine level interactions. Teach things like variables, operators, conditionals, and loops. Teach it in BASIC first, then Python. You're not teaching syntax or algorithms here. Once they can do those, you can move to more complex stuff like functions. After that is the time to start talking about objects. A newb can start making sense of what an object is and why they should care to use them at this point.
Functional programming is very different from how most people seem to think. It's useful to learn it though, so perhaps the last month or so can be dedicated to functional. Show how to do some of the things we already did in a functional way. That way, the student can see that there are different tools that might be better for various problems.
Pointers, memory management, objects, classes, and other such things aren't really "into" concepts. They layer on other concepts. A good programmer needs to know them, but they don't need to start there.
OK. New York City. I don't see such connections/prices there, yet the population density is certainly on par with Japan. I'd be a lot more forgiving if even the most populous areas were competitive with Europe and Asia.
I used Mythbuntu to install my current setup. It was as easy as anything else has been in Windows. Boot from CD, answer some questions, let it copy files and reboot. Then tell it that it's OK to install the binary NVidia driver and that all worked fine. I did have to tweak the XOrg.conf a little, but I understand that the new release of XOrg doesn't even require the conf file now. And my changes were more to make the TV output a little more how I like it than anything else, it worked fine out of the box. Then I told Myth what my tuner device was (HDHomeRun) and it found it and did a channel scan. Then I gave it my login info to Schedules Direct and it was up and running. Probably about an hours work from CD boot to working Myth install.
Note that I did pick my hardware for Linux and Myth compatibility. I knew that's what I was going to be using the hardware for, so I chose accordingly. It's still a hacker's TiVo, but I hacked my TiVo boxes, and Myth was easier than that.
If the kid is interested in computers, micros are awesome. Audrino is great. PIC based systems are fun too. The UBW is a great little USB board that is very easy to use. And you don't need a programming device to use it. A breadboard and a basic microcontroller board with a bag of misc components would be great fun for a kid with an interest in such subjects.:)
Soldering, well, no time like the present to learn. Get a ratshack 15W iron, some solder and some simple perfboards and such. Practice on junk components to get the hang of it, and off he goes.
I use them for wires and such, but I've read that using them on sensitive electronic parts is bad. The tips are also quite large compared to even a cheap Radio Shack iron.
For a 6 year old, breadboards are fine. The kid probably wants to use it because he sees daddy using it and it looks interesting. I learned to solder at about 8 though, so it's not like it's impossible.:)
In my mind, the only solution to the capping and other BS the ISPs are pulling is to take the monopoly away. That means we need an open, fiber network. The best model I've seen for such a thing is Utopia. The government bonds to pay for the infrastructure build out. Then has access fees for anyone to make connections on the fiber backbone. So any ISP can serve customers over it, no playing favorites. So Quest, Comcast, and the local mom and pop ISP all pay the same rates. Equal footing. From there, they can all compete without a monopoly on the wire getting in the way of changing providers.
I don't see any other reasonable way to deal with the situation. Wireless isn't up to next generation bandwidth requirements, and the incumbent telcos and cablecos aren't going to do it. We need to get together and start pushing at the city/state level to get this done. And the incumbents can't really complain as the government isn't competing with them, they are just providing an alternate delivery system that those same companies are welcome to make use of.
I see it as being the same thing as the governments paying for the roads. They build the roads, then people pay for access to them via gas taxes. In this case, they would build the road for data, and people would pay an access charge to push their data over it. And the ISPs offering services can deal with the issues of connectivity to the rest of the internet. The network I'm thinking of would be local only, at least to start with. So no hassles with peering and such.
Given where we are, I'd guess the poster is referring to Ron Paul. I agree enough with Paul that I would vote for him in this election. I disagree with the D and R candidates enough that I will be voting third party this election. They both suck.
Hell, maybe I'll write in Paul. Not sure yet on Pres.
I think you're trying to cover it in 7, but I would include an explicit provision that ALL votes in both the House and Senate be recorded IN WRITING. No "voice votes". Every representative has to go ON PUBLIC RECORD with EVERY SINGLE VOTE. Including not voting on a bill and/or not being present. If they are passing laws, they should be held accountable to the people they claim to represent.
This could be streamlined with electronic means, but I would want a printed paper trail as well.
Other than that, I very much like your ideas. I think this kind of thing is the only way to make real change. It would need to start as a grassroots type effort to elect some congress critters though.
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Maybe you should be downloading. When you aren't streaming, you can tolerate periods of high latency.
Unfortunately, many are also switching frequencies, sometimes bands. So all those "HD" antennas they were pushing in the big box stores, might not work to receive all the HD channels after the change. Some people might need to add a VHF antenna or switch to a combo unit.
Are you willing to pay a lawyer to argue that in court? That's what it will take to get rid of this sort of thing.
With recent developments in VDPAU, the HD capable GPU acceleration for Linux, I could use this board. The only thing I would change is to make it wider and move all the ports to the back. Include an LCD or VFD if you want to get fancy, and and IR receiver on the front. Perfect MythTV frontend machine. I would like the dual-channel RAM though, to help with 1080i playback.
Put it in a nice small case like those used for modern DVD players, and they have a winner.
I don't know why people think current hybrids are dangerously slow. I have owned a Prius since early 2006. I can keep up with any small 4-cyl gas car on the road. I do better than many 6-cyl SUVs at getting up to highway speeds.
The electric motors alone are rated for 250-lb/ft of torque. That's more than most common gas engines produce at the top of their torque curve. And electrics generate that torque from ZERO RPM. Add the CVT (no shift delays) and the gas motor, and I can get up to speed pretty quick. Speed changes on the freeway are also quite fast. Can I keep up with a Vette? Not even close. But do I need to? Nope.
It's not a "performance" car. But it's also not marketed as one.
People are going to have to get used to the "fugly" shape if they want efficiency. The Prius is that shape to lower wind resistance while maximizing interior space. Wind resistance is the enemy of efficient high speed transportation. So pick your poison.
Not every market is doing what yours is. Here, all the stations are staying on the new UHF frequencies. So they could indeed broadcast the message to the idiots that haven't been paying attention.
Even in markets like yours, they could just replace the analog broadcast with the information message without changing anything else. Then make the switch later. At least then the warning gets out loud and FAWKING clear.
NO TV FOR YOU, BUY THE DAMN CONVERTER BOX WE'VE BEEN TELLING YOU TO GET FOR THE LAST 10 YEARS!!!! WE EVEN GAVE YOU COUPONS TO GET FREE ONES YOU LAZY FAWKERS!
Or at the very least a format that DOES look the same on different computers and software. Perhaps PDF? At least then you can have your fancy formatting and charts, graphs, pictures, whatever. Plain text might be a little too much to ask for.
Umm... The gov did help out the poor and such by offering the free converter box coupons. They have been available for at least a year now. All you had to do was all a 1-800 number or use a website IIRC. If you were watching TV at all during that time you got bombarded with commercials and other notices telling you about it. I didn't get any because I don't need them. I only have 1 TV that lacks a digital tuner, and I don't use it for OTA, so I left them for people that really did need them.
A directional antenna takes care of most multipath problems. You don't even need to mount it outside if you get a good one, though you get a better signal if you do. A good directional is reasonably cheap, and thanks to most stations switching to UHF, reasonably small as well.
+1
Note that an hour @720p is about 2GB with h264. Assuming a decent bitrate (about 3.5Mbps). Of course, once you cut out the ~15min of commercials, you get about 1.2GB.
I've found that gets me quite good quality HDTV playback from transcoded recordings.
MPEG2 ATSC is about 8GB/hr, depending on the station. Nobody would transmit that over the net though. Not when h264 works so well at significantly lower bitrates.
Which would be a great idea, if they would loosen up a little. They NEED to support common video formats, like mkv, and allow things like a MythTV Frontend to be written for it and use the full power of the GPU and cell processors. This would allow Myth, XBMC, Windows Media Center extenders, etc..
Until they do that, they are just trying to lock everyone into all Sony all the time. Not interesting for many people that already have an investment in other technologies. However, if they opened up a little, they could become the #1 convergence box. The thing has enough power to decode 1080p video and still do other stuff. So you could get the perfect set-top box that could play any video, Blu-Ray, and killer games all in one machine.
Sadly, it will likely never happen as Sony has the media side of the business to appease. Worries over people downloading content from the internet and copying games will prevent it. Of course, they could then sell said content over the net for a decent price and get more customers, but whatever.
I kind of agree here. I would like the games to give me the option when I create a new game. For example, I've played all the Zelda games. I really don't WANT the help offered by the little companions in the recent games. Don't tell me where to fscking go, or how to kill the latest enemy/boss. I want to figure it out myself. That's part of the fun for me, but I'm an experienced player of those games. I expect it would be frustrating as hell to someone that isn't familiar with them.
The modes could also include things like modifying the damage/hit points. So it's easier to get killed in the harder modes. It doesn't have to be a big shift, but when I can play a more modern Zelda game without death or potions, it's too easy for the core audience.
That said, I recently bought PoP for the PS3 as I heard some good things about it and I liked the old PoP games. It's quite fun, but a little repetitive. If they added some items and such, make it a little more RPGish, it would be a great game, IMO. The "powers" you unlock do help a little there though. I do see myself replaying levels to go get the rest of those light balls though. That's going to be somewhat irritating. I do like the combat system, and the auto-save thing is kind of nice. It lets me explore areas that I would avoid in other games as I know I can keep playing even if I fall.
You can thank the cable companies that you can't get Myth compatible cablecard tuners. They refuse the allow anyone to use cablecard in a computer if it's not DRMed all to hell and back.
The only option for cable based HD right now is the Haupage HD-PVR. A component video capture device. It outputs h264 to a USB connection and is supported in Linux and Myth (Myth needs patches right now, the next version will have support).
Try a modern Myth setup, it's a LOT easier to deal with than it used to be. I'm running it as our sole PVR at this point with an antenna for OTA channels and it's working very well. I used Mythbuntu, it was as easy to set up as a standard Ubuntu install.
Not all the kids are as smart as many here. However, one of them may know someone that is and doesn't think the restrictions are useful. And it only takes one. Just like DRM, you only need a single crack, then everyone is good to go.
For example, there's re-partitioning and installing another OS on the same drive. Boot the school OS when at school, boot the open OS at home. Problem solved. Use a USB stick if you want to be undetectable at school. If you want to get fancy, use truecrypt on the drive and they can't see it. :)
I think the replies suggesting that they filter the school internet connection and leave the machines themselves pretty much open are the way to go. The school network they can protect, but with physical access all bets are off on the machines themselves. Make sure parents and students are aware of the issues and sign a statement absolving the school from all issues regarding the computers when they are not at school or modified in any way.
I have OSX using NFS shares right now. They work far better than SMB or AFP did with the automounter that comes with OSX. It required a little work on the OSX box to get the UID/GID situation set up properly so security works, but it wasn't really that hard to do.
OSX doesn't deal with sleep and such very well with the automounter and SMB/AFP. NFS seems to work just fine though. Interesting, I would have thought AFP would be better. The Linux fileserver is running all three protocols and they all work well. I find I use NFS the most as I have it serve movies and such to the Myth systems.
The only high speed option with competition. I use a local WISP (rapidwave.net) and I don't pay for anything I don't use. It's not as fast as some cable providers, but it's 5/2 so it's not bad. About $50/mo. Most areas seem to be served by a WISP these days, check into it a little and you might be able to find something.
They also provide me with a static IP so I can run server processes. It's a "don't break things" kind of arrangement. If I don't cause problems, they leave me alone to do my thing.
The OP is talking about a first PROGRAMMING course. Not a CS degree specifically. The goals are not really the same. If you're teaching someone to program you don't really want to start with the low level stuff. A CS grad needs to know that stuff, but I don't see why it should be covered as "Intro to Programming".
As far as paradigm, imperative. Why? Because it's going to be kind of familiar to newbs.
Language? BASIC or Python. Java is nuts. I shouldn't have to tell a newb about classes and objects. Or, worse, to tell them to ignore the magic statements. You can do "Hello World" in a single line of BASIC. No magic. Python is similar, but with a better library.
Teaching programming should be about programming, not machine level interactions. Teach things like variables, operators, conditionals, and loops. Teach it in BASIC first, then Python. You're not teaching syntax or algorithms here. Once they can do those, you can move to more complex stuff like functions. After that is the time to start talking about objects. A newb can start making sense of what an object is and why they should care to use them at this point.
Functional programming is very different from how most people seem to think. It's useful to learn it though, so perhaps the last month or so can be dedicated to functional. Show how to do some of the things we already did in a functional way. That way, the student can see that there are different tools that might be better for various problems.
Pointers, memory management, objects, classes, and other such things aren't really "into" concepts. They layer on other concepts. A good programmer needs to know them, but they don't need to start there.
OK. New York City. I don't see such connections/prices there, yet the population density is certainly on par with Japan. I'd be a lot more forgiving if even the most populous areas were competitive with Europe and Asia.
I used Mythbuntu to install my current setup. It was as easy as anything else has been in Windows. Boot from CD, answer some questions, let it copy files and reboot. Then tell it that it's OK to install the binary NVidia driver and that all worked fine. I did have to tweak the XOrg.conf a little, but I understand that the new release of XOrg doesn't even require the conf file now. And my changes were more to make the TV output a little more how I like it than anything else, it worked fine out of the box. Then I told Myth what my tuner device was (HDHomeRun) and it found it and did a channel scan. Then I gave it my login info to Schedules Direct and it was up and running. Probably about an hours work from CD boot to working Myth install.
Note that I did pick my hardware for Linux and Myth compatibility. I knew that's what I was going to be using the hardware for, so I chose accordingly. It's still a hacker's TiVo, but I hacked my TiVo boxes, and Myth was easier than that.
If the kid is interested in computers, micros are awesome. Audrino is great. PIC based systems are fun too. The UBW is a great little USB board that is very easy to use. And you don't need a programming device to use it. A breadboard and a basic microcontroller board with a bag of misc components would be great fun for a kid with an interest in such subjects. :)
Soldering, well, no time like the present to learn. Get a ratshack 15W iron, some solder and some simple perfboards and such. Practice on junk components to get the hang of it, and off he goes.
I use them for wires and such, but I've read that using them on sensitive electronic parts is bad. The tips are also quite large compared to even a cheap Radio Shack iron.
For a 6 year old, breadboards are fine. The kid probably wants to use it because he sees daddy using it and it looks interesting. I learned to solder at about 8 though, so it's not like it's impossible. :)
In my mind, the only solution to the capping and other BS the ISPs are pulling is to take the monopoly away. That means we need an open, fiber network. The best model I've seen for such a thing is Utopia. The government bonds to pay for the infrastructure build out. Then has access fees for anyone to make connections on the fiber backbone. So any ISP can serve customers over it, no playing favorites. So Quest, Comcast, and the local mom and pop ISP all pay the same rates. Equal footing. From there, they can all compete without a monopoly on the wire getting in the way of changing providers.
I don't see any other reasonable way to deal with the situation. Wireless isn't up to next generation bandwidth requirements, and the incumbent telcos and cablecos aren't going to do it. We need to get together and start pushing at the city/state level to get this done. And the incumbents can't really complain as the government isn't competing with them, they are just providing an alternate delivery system that those same companies are welcome to make use of.
I see it as being the same thing as the governments paying for the roads. They build the roads, then people pay for access to them via gas taxes. In this case, they would build the road for data, and people would pay an access charge to push their data over it. And the ISPs offering services can deal with the issues of connectivity to the rest of the internet. The network I'm thinking of would be local only, at least to start with. So no hassles with peering and such.
Given where we are, I'd guess the poster is referring to Ron Paul. I agree enough with Paul that I would vote for him in this election. I disagree with the D and R candidates enough that I will be voting third party this election. They both suck.
Hell, maybe I'll write in Paul. Not sure yet on Pres.
I think you're trying to cover it in 7, but I would include an explicit provision that ALL votes in both the House and Senate be recorded IN WRITING. No "voice votes". Every representative has to go ON PUBLIC RECORD with EVERY SINGLE VOTE. Including not voting on a bill and/or not being present. If they are passing laws, they should be held accountable to the people they claim to represent.
This could be streamlined with electronic means, but I would want a printed paper trail as well.
Other than that, I very much like your ideas. I think this kind of thing is the only way to make real change. It would need to start as a grassroots type effort to elect some congress critters though.