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User: Tim+the+Gecko

Tim+the+Gecko's activity in the archive.

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Comments · 243

  1. Re:Unity next on Ubuntu 15.04 Released, First Version To Feature systemd · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I've been using Unity for a few years and I like it. Typically I might have several browser windows, several terminals, and other windows like WireShark open. In the older UI these would have all been accessible from the bottom bar, and there might be twenty or so tabs there. Unity changes it around so you go to the side (a good place to put things on a 16:9 monitor) and select the browser, terminal, or another icon. With the muscle memory in place it has worked very well. Alt-tab also works as you might expect. I also have Mac laptops, and it's not especially annoying to go from one UI to the other.

  2. Re:Doublethink on Except For Millennials, Most Americans Dislike Snowden · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I wonder how those elderly will feel as their Social Security and Medicare programs are stripped clean in order to pay for that police state they champion so much...

    So the generation that votes wants to maintain Social Security and Medicare, even if it plunges future citizens into debt, and the generation that doesn't vote wants a different policy on Snowden. Which generation do you think politicians would listen to most?

  3. Re:Misleading on SpaceX Launch Postponed · · Score: 2

    Looks like it's been aborted for today due to the weather. The anvil cloud rule was violated. Next try is 4.10pm EDT tomorrow.

    Quick question. There are four towers, each with a cylinder on top. Around the cylinder there is some kind of spiral between the bottom and top. What are these cylinders called and what do they do?

  4. Re:Not a linguist, but... on Ask Slashdot: What Would a Constructed Language Have To Be To Replace English? · · Score: 1

    Thanks! I hope this usage comes back in American English.

  5. Re:Not a linguist, but... on Ask Slashdot: What Would a Constructed Language Have To Be To Replace English? · · Score: 1

    That link doesn't seem to work for me.

    Mignon Fogarty ("Grammar Girl") is in favor of moving to singular "they", and it is perfectly acceptable in British English.

  6. Re:Not faultless on Comcast's Incompetence, Lack of Broadband May Force Developer To Sell Home · · Score: 5, Funny

    How about if Comcast came out and shot the guy?

    We called to shoot you but you were out. Please call 1-800-XFINISHYOU to reschedule.

  7. Related poem on OS X Users: 13 Characters of Assyrian Can Crash Your Chrome Tab · · Score: 1

    The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,

    And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;

    And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,

    When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

    Byron

  8. Re:On odd artifact of affect... on Lost Beagle2 Probe Found 'Intact' On Mars · · Score: 1
    Colin Pillinger interview transcript (PDF):

    We've had lots of cats that have wandered off and... but that was the thing about the name, everybody congratulated us on the name Beagle 2 as inspirational, until after it didn't call in and we had all manner of e-mails, texts, telephone calls, letters saying didn't you realise that Beagles are the worst dogs you could possibly have to let off the leash - they run off, they chase something, they don't come back when they're called, they only come home when they're hungry and they show no sign of remorse.

  9. Re:Alogrithms on Amazon "Suppresses" Book With Too Many Hyphens · · Score: 1

    Hurrah pour Robur-le-Conquérant ! s’écria une voix ironique.

    Robur-le-Conqérant by Jules Verne has over 1000 hyphens.

  10. Re:Take a look at who you elected/reelected on Twitter Use By Romney and Obama In 2012 Highlight the Speed of Social Media · · Score: 4, Informative

    Democrats, Republicans... anyone who thinks there's actually a difference between them is a dumbass.

    It does seem to matter when it comes to picking Supreme Court Justices. Nobody would claim that Alito and Scalia are interchangeable with Kagan and Sotomayor. Are you really saying it doesn't matter who chooses the next few justices?

    And this has an impact on a lot of real world issues: http://www.newyorker.com/magaz...

    There is also the five-finger speech. It generally comes when a new clerk asks, in dismay and outrage, how a majority of the Court has arrived at a decision he or she feels is flagrantly unjust. Justice Brennan holds up his hand, wriggles his five fingers, and says, “Five votes. Five votes can do anything around here.”

  11. A thousand KBOs discovered, not dwarf planets on Pluto-Bound Spacecraft Ends Hibernation To Start Mission · · Score: 5, Informative

    The article confuses Kuiper Belt Objects (more than one thousand discovered), and dwarf planets. To quote Wikipedia: "The IAU recognizes five bodies as dwarf planets: Ceres, Pluto, Eris, Haumea, and Makemake".

    2015 will be a great year for looking at two of these. As well as New Horizons, there is also the Dawn probe on its way to orbit Ceres.

  12. Re:Can Iowa handle a circus that large? on Former HP CEO Carly Fiorina Considering US Presidential Run · · Score: 1

    Diffidence is "modesty or shyness resulting from a lack of self-confidence". I think you mean "deference".

  13. Elevator in the sky with diamonds on Scientists Discover Diamond Nanothreads · · Score: 2

    You wouldn't guess from the summary that the article title is "Going up! Cosmic elevator could reach space on a cable made of diamonds".

  14. Re:Fuck them sideways with a rusty chainsaw! on World's Smallest 3G Module Will Connect Everything To the Internet · · Score: 1

    ..in-car devices that insurance companies use to monitor policyholders' driving

    Over my dead body. *find tiny cellphone antenna* *SNIP*

    If you're a clever insurance company you ask people if they want tracking in return for lower premiums. If your competitors are charging $300, you make the "no" people pay $315 and the "yes" people people pay $285. Then all the bad drivers and all the people concerned about privacy go off to another insurance company. Given the success of Facebook and Twitter, it looks like only 0.001% of the population cares about privacy. Therefore 99+% of the people who move across to your competitors are probably not very profitable anyway. Win-win!

    So it's saying "yes" or "no" to the tracking device that is the important part, not the driving data. As long as you have enough blinky lights (and a few real 3G connections) so people think they might be monitored, then you are golden.

  15. Re:a collision wouldn't surprise me on 2 Mars Missions Set For Arrival, Both Prepare for Orbital Maneuvers · · Score: 4, Informative

    For somw reason, it wouldn't surprise me if these two craft collided, despite being the only two approaching the entire planet. 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 .

    There's a lot of exciting stuff happening right now. The Dawn mission is on its way to get a close look at Ceres in April next year. Rosetta is sending a lander onto a comet (which is about to do the exciting thing for comets - i.e. go near the sun). New Horizons is going to fly past Pluto next July. There are two rovers exploring Mars. Not to mention Cassini, Messenger, etc. You can be negative if you like, but I think these missions are pretty amazing.

  16. Re:$230 on Study: Ad-Free Internet Would Cost Everyone $230-a-Year · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...OK...where do I sign up?

    You can sign up for our flat rate Gold Plan at $1000, or the Silver Plan where we will nickel and dime you until you pay $2010 per year, or the Bronze Plan where you will get some carefully selected ads in return for a lower fee of $500.

    This service brought to you by your trustworthy ISP.

    Notes: (1) You may occasionally see ads, (2) Ads you don't see will still count against your bandwidth cap, (3) We hate you.

  17. Re:IPv6 How will it happen? on Comcast Carrying 1Tbit/s of IPv6 Internet Traffic · · Score: 3, Informative

    How do you [Slashdot users] see IPv6 transition actually happening?

    Will each internet user have dual stack?

    Yes. They will have a dual stack with the IPv6 address being used for a bigger and bigger proportion of traffic. Meanwhile IPv4 will probably traverse some NAT.

    Once IPv4 is the minority of traffic (many years in the future), it will turn into a legacy PITA to administer separately. But that is a while away.

    IPv6 is much more complex, how will companies support users who barely understand IP addressing when IPv6 is going to seem like a long string of meaningless characters?

    Those 30% of Comcast customers aren't calling a helpdesk and reading out hexadecimal digits. If DNS is working they will say things like "www.facebook.com". If DNS isn't working then they can't fix it by reading out or typing those "meaningless characters".

    Do you see something like a dynamic IPv6 to IPv4 DNS/NAT translator to hide IPv6 complexity from the user a viable solution?

    Not viable. It wouldn't help more than a single digit percentage of users anyway.

  18. Re:I think it's fine on Facebook's Emotion Experiment: Too Far, Or Social Network Norm? · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Facebook uses psychology to make minor changes in our happiness... Something must be done!

    Soda companies use psychology to sell huge buckets of sugar water... Hands off our soda, Mayor Bloomberg!

  19. Re:So after years of panic... on Microsoft Runs Out of US Address Space For Azure, Taps Its Global IPv4 Stock · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "Years of procrastination" might be a better description than "years of panic". Putting off action is my favorite strategy too, but I've heard it doesn't work forever.

  20. Re:If it's paid on FCC Looking Into Paid Peering Deals · · Score: 3, Informative

    This is the common definition:

    • Settlement free peering: Doesn't take money from you. Advertises their routes to you. Advertises your routes to their customers.
    • Paid peering: Takes money from you. Advertises their routes to you. Advertises your routes to their customers.
    • Transit: Takes money from you. Advertises the whole Internet routing table to you. Advertises your routes to their customers and peers.

    You will see that there is no technical difference between settlement free and paid. It's the same router configuration. The money flow is just the end result of the poker game of which peer needs the other more.

  21. Re:"using higher bandwidth than radio waves" on NASA Beams Hi-Def Video From Space Via Laser · · Score: 2

    What wavelengths get through without attenuation/distortion, then?

    1550nm, which is the same range used in long-range optical fiber transmission.

    More info on the projects linked from http://esc.gsfc.nasa.gov/267.h...

  22. Re:Or you could just you know... on Do Embedded Systems Need a Time To Die? · · Score: 1

    ipv6 (which no consumer ISP is supporting, not even comcast who was running trials)

    As of December last year, more than 25% of Comcast customers can get native dual stack broadband - see http://www.comcast6.net/

  23. Re:Many polite people on Traffic Optimization: Cyclists Should Roll Past Stop Signs, Pause At Red Lights · · Score: 1

    Thanks for this. Another year-round commuter here, and I get nice weather most of the time even in winter. I love your positive attitude, and it's sending me out on my Sunday morning ride in a much better mood. It will be even better if I don't see any driver looking down at his or her phone.

  24. Re:Might look like less of a on New French Law Prohibits After-Hours Work Emails · · Score: 1

    Looking at your mod score of zero I'm feeling whatever the French call Schadenfreude.

  25. Tapas Acupressure Technique on Jimmy Wales To 'Holistic Healers': Prove Your Claims the Old-Fashioned Way · · Score: 3, Funny

    Mmmm... Tapas!