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User: PPH

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Comments · 16,789

  1. Book of Mozilla on Slashdot Asks: What's Your Favorite Easter Egg? (slashdot.org) · · Score: 1

    Enter about:mozilla in a Firefox location bar.

  2. Re:Solution to the gun problem on 33,000 Sign Online Petition Promoting Guns At Republican Convention (cnet.com) · · Score: 1

    The state grants the right

    Nope. States were preempted by the US Constitution. It's not the States' right to grant (or not).

    If it turns out you're unfit for duty due to the voices, you're barred from the militia, and ipso facto, no firearm for you.

    That's a precondition. Current membership in the militia permits firearm possession. And it violates the "shall not be infringed" part as well as violating Part 1, Section 8 of the Constitution, which grants the right to arm militias to Congress.

  3. Re:First post? on Unmanned Cargo Ship Reaches ISS On Resupply Mission (telegraph.co.uk) · · Score: 1

    7,900 lbs of potatoes.

  4. First phones. Next, chewing gum.

  5. Re:Solution to the gun problem on 33,000 Sign Online Petition Promoting Guns At Republican Convention (cnet.com) · · Score: 1

    So: Make everyone with a firearm serve in the state militia.

    That would infringe on the right to keep and bear by placing a precondition on it. First of all, you have misquoted the amendment. Second, the Constitution itself restricts the right to arm a militia to Congress. So, absent the second amendment protection for the people at large to be armed, states would not be able to organize a militia (police force, etc. ) and THEN arm them. Or allow them to be armed as a result. The only right your local cop has to carry his or her gun is as a private citizen*.

    *Full auto weapons in my state are provided to the police through the loophole of a federal program.

  6. Re:All gun laws are anti constitutional. But... on 33,000 Sign Online Petition Promoting Guns At Republican Convention (cnet.com) · · Score: 1

    If the public is permitted on the property,

    By invitation. So it's technically not a 'public event' or 'open to the public'. You could make that argument about something like a shopping mall and it may or may not stand. But definitely not in this instance.

  7. Re:I wonder... on 33,000 Sign Online Petition Promoting Guns At Republican Convention (cnet.com) · · Score: 4, Interesting

    What do you think would happen if in the midsts of all this, somebody were to yell "GUN!" ?

    It would probably be a lot like what happened to the guy in a Florida McDonalds that yelled "Gun!" when someone carrying concealed accidentally pulled his tee-shirt up to get his wallet out, revealing it. The clerk just stared with a blank look, like "So what?" The customer offered to show his concealed carry permit. The manager came out and said, "We don't have a problem with people legally carrying in our establishment." The guy kept yelling "Gun!" and eventually the police were called. After determining that the guy screaming "Gun!" wasn't just attempting to create a public nuisance but was actually having a hopolophobic reaction, he was detained and checked into a mental health facility for observation.

    The story was related by the McDonald's customer with the CCW on a Youtube video (posted on /k/) and is most certainly still out there.

  8. that takes either lower resolutions

    Not going to happen that way. Because VR is being sold to the gamer set and they obsess over things like resolution.

    I vaguely recall an incident at least a decade ago related to the release of a new graphic card. It was state of the art at the time, offering a major increase in frame rates from something like 60 fps to 90 (my recollection might be wrong). The gamers loved it, posting how it eliminated flicker and, stopped triggering their migraines. Almost a year after the card's release, a bug was discovered in the Windows driver. Although the resolution setting offered the higher frame rate, apparently the card was still set to a slower speed. Suddenly, everyone noticed the poor performance of the card. Migraines reappeared and the same graphics that looked great the week before were judged to be shit. It had nothing to do with actual performance, but everything to do with suggestibility.

    I've worked with VR simulation software that was driven by low lag, low resolution graphics systems years ago. They work fine, if you are willing to accept walking through a 'cartoon' world little better then a wire frame. Some interesting work was done to develop sensors and a technique to detect a viewer's direction of vision and selectively increase resolution nearer the focus of attention. But there are users who will obsess over resolution and frame rate and your VR product will not survive the bad publicity if it is revealed that your system is 'cheating' with lower res. in their visual periphery.

    This might be a reason that Occulus isn't supporting open source platforms. Too many people digging around in the source code are liable to find these compression and speed-up tricks. With Windows, you can hide them in proprietary drivers, report any performance you want and the gamers will buy it.

  9. Re:Stupid on Tribeca Film Festival, Robert De Niro Pull Anti-Vaccination Film · · Score: 1

    I don't think the movie is being blocked or censored. The Tribeca Film Festival is a private event. Inclusion in this event could be seen as an endorsement by its organizers.

  10. Ahem. Flying cars.

  11. Re:Hyphens in last names? on Names That Break Computers (bbc.com) · · Score: 1

    I'm sure at one point this was discussed by Mr Cowboy and Ms Neal.

  12. Re:Air gapped on USB Trojan Hides In Portable Applications, Targets Air-Gapped Systems · · Score: 1

    Stuxnet.

    If you want to attack an air-gapped system, it's still possible. Defense in depth helps, but then it works well for connected systems as well. The one thing that an air gap does is to slow down (or effectively stop) probing systems by external hostile actors.

  13. Doesn't matter on Bill Introduced To Require ID When Purchasing "Burner Phones" (house.gov) · · Score: 2

    Phones used in Paris were acquired hours before the attacks. The terrorists most likely had no expectation of surviving. The suicide bombers in Paris and Brussels certainly didn't. So unless this information raises a flag with law enforcement immediately, identification is pointless. The next attack will be coordinated using phones purchased with proper identification. So the next step will be to provide law enforcement with real time subscriber information from the telecoms. And maybe a blacklist, like the TSA's no-fly list, of suspects not allowed to purchase phones. Maybe a five day waiting period as well.

  14. I should ... on Brain Implant Can Automatically Adjust Dopamine Levels (ieee.org) · · Score: 2

    ... point out the obvious problems with this. But I feel strangely at ease with the whole concept.

  15. ... my 'Cthulhu in 2016' sticker.

    I suppose I could get on the FBI's good side by adding a 'Lavrentiy Beria for US Attorney General' sticker.

  16. Re:Spoofing on 'Flash Crash' Trader Navinder Sarao Faces US Extradition · · Score: 1

    No trading platform will let you do that.

    No trading platform can tell the difference between a HFT system and a bunch of individual day traders, each with a slightly different estimate of equity valuation.

    'Power trader' accounts are easy to get. Every trading system and brokerage is falling over themselves to get a piece of the high volume, low margin business. Just start a rumor that your platform is throttling trades and business will go elsewhere.

  17. Re:Air gapped on USB Trojan Hides In Portable Applications, Targets Air-Gapped Systems · · Score: 1

    Slow I/O. OK for producing 'golden master' application CD/DVDs. But I wouldn't even carry a USB drive back and forth to that air gapped machine unless I really trusted its manufacturer. Anyone remember SanDisk U3 flash drives? Ever wonder what the hell that s/w might be doing on your system when you plugged it in? Ever try to remove it from a USB stick?

    There are methods of key signing that can effectively secure a private key from inspection even on a networked and compromised O/S system. Think USB connected micro controller running some type of secure enclave key management app. The key pair is generated on-chip and the private key is held by secure storage on the controller (IF you trust the uC hardware). Plaintext in is encrypted on the chip and ciphertext (and a public key) returned.

  18. Re:Air gapped on USB Trojan Hides In Portable Applications, Targets Air-Gapped Systems · · Score: 1

    a CD or DVD that you then go and bring with you into your secure server room to load onto the servers. The disk then lives in that room until it gets fed to a shredder.

    This assumes that you have air gapped the servers in that server room. Otherwise someone will just skip the steps needed to infect the CD/DVD iso and attack the servers directly. So now the question is: What good is a server room full of servers that can't talk to anything beyond the walls? Some applications do exist for such architecture deep within the CIA/NSA/DoD/etc. But they are not much use to anyone who needs I/O beyond physical printouts, people working inside the perimeter or to control dedicated hardware (process control or missile launch commands, for example).

  19. Re:Linux? BSD? on USB Trojan Hides In Portable Applications, Targets Air-Gapped Systems · · Score: 1

    But does it work in Linux?

    systemd unit files.

  20. Re:Just a phase on Microsoft's 'Teen Girl' AI Experiment Becomes a 'Neo-Nazi Sex Robot' · · Score: 1

    But that requires .... effort!

    It should be an avocation that you are willing and eager to undertake. Otherwise, don't have a kid.

    Your responsibility, as a father, is to keep your daughter off the brass pole.

  21. Re:Spoofing on 'Flash Crash' Trader Navinder Sarao Faces US Extradition · · Score: 2

    You place a bunch of orders, spread across a price range. When you see which prices attract bids/offers, you quickly cancel the less lucrative offers. That's the simple explanation for what is a very complex game.

  22. Five Minute Trailer? on Pornhub Unveils Free VR Porn Channel (pcworld.com) · · Score: 1

    What am I supposed to do with the remaining four minutes?

  23. Re:Possibilities for secure passwords? on Researchers Propose Neural Network To Assess Your State of Mind From Your Voice (thestack.com) · · Score: 1

    Imagine a computer that uses voice recognition to gain access,

    "You'll never take me alive, copper. I'm armed to the teeth."*

    Honest, officer. That's my pass phrase.

    *In my best James Cagney voice (I know, he never said that).

  24. Gotta work on my Nicholson imitation.

  25. Re:Puts the concept of "natives" into question. on The Irish Not of Celtic Origin? · · Score: 1

    recent genetic analysis of Kennewick Man

    Following a big court fight and the site of the discovery being destroyed. So what happens when we find the next artifacts?