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User: zippthorne

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  1. Re:What I care about on The Ambiguity of "Open" and VP8 Vs. H.264 · · Score: 1

    It's been stated many times that VP8 can use the very same hardware for acceleration that H.264 uses, I believe there was even an example presented in a slashdot story a few months ago.

  2. Re:Beat me to it. on Advice On Teaching Linux To CS Freshmen? · · Score: 1

    No, you should use the older method because you don't have to move your hand off of the home row (especially if you remap capslock and control to each other). Nethack supports arrow keys now, too.

    But you shouldn't use hjkl OR arrow keys for moving around too much, when there are so very many much more efficient motions. The basics are just the basics.

  3. Re:Iridium on Cell Phone Industry's Six Biggest Failed Schemes · · Score: 1

    ...snapped up a fully functional constellation for $25 million have been doing just fine with it.

    It's a trap?

  4. Re:Beat me to it. on Advice On Teaching Linux To CS Freshmen? · · Score: 2

    Vi is like a car with a key, and a flap you could open to crank it if you wanted to. Or you could set it up so that the door opens automatically for you when you get close to the car, and it starts automatically when you sit down, and drives to your five most common destinations on its own....

  5. Re:Beat me to it. on Advice On Teaching Linux To CS Freshmen? · · Score: 2

    Vi *is* simple, but it's also simply different from what you're used to: it's a modal text editor, while you're used to text editors with just a single mode.

    It came from an era before we had menus and freakin' arrow keys, but you can get by quite easily knowing only that you can drop into text mode with 'a' (append) or 'i' (insert), get back into normal mode with <escape> or control-[, and move the cursor around in normal mode with h/l (left/right) and j/k (up/down), and get into command mode with ':', where the commands for "save" will be ':w' and the command to quit is ':q'.

    You can improve your vocabulary of motions by using the build-in help as you find a need. It's very powerful, even to the point of regex motions, but you aren't required to use the powerful features just to make a few tweaks to config files.

  6. Re:Yo, /. geeks pay attention! on Advice On Teaching Linux To CS Freshmen? · · Score: 1

    The title of the article is, "Advice on Teaching Linux To CS Freshmen"...

  7. Re:before you do it on Extinct Mammoth, Coming To a Zoo Near You · · Score: 1

    Spears... and cliffs....

  8. Re:So... why did it fail? on US Scraps Virtual Fence Along Mexican Border · · Score: 1

    If you're suggesting that we don't even have the manufacturing capacity to produce enough steel wire for two 1,000 mile fences, we're in more trouble than just immigration.

  9. Re:Like leaving the front door open on US Scraps Virtual Fence Along Mexican Border · · Score: 1

    That poem is installed in a giant, hollow statue, which was enigmatically presented to us by a former enemy...

  10. Re:Like leaving the front door open on US Scraps Virtual Fence Along Mexican Border · · Score: 2

    Exactly like that. And you see how well it worked out for them. Do you really want to find out what it's like from from their perspective?

  11. Re:So, to price my app correctly... on Amazon, Not Developers, Will Set New App Store's Prices · · Score: 1

    Except that they can't do that: you have control over the price floor of your product, it's 1/5 of your SRP.

  12. Re:This a re-org for the foreign offices only on Stars Remain In Their Usual Places; People Panic · · Score: 0

    What if I don't really feel like making the effort to not care to the absolute limit of apathy.

  13. Re:Why, oh why.. on US Scraps Virtual Fence Along Mexican Border · · Score: 1

    Bah, you can achieve the same result by throwing rocks at windows.

  14. Re:So, to price my app correctly... on Amazon, Not Developers, Will Set New App Store's Prices · · Score: 1

    Well, it depends on your market research. But basically, you should chose a MSRP such that what you actually think is the ideal retail price is between that number and 2/7ths of that number. You could choose it to be *exactly* 2/7ths, but that doesn't give amazon the leeway to drop the price below your guess in the event that your estimate was too high.

    This can be a feature or flaw: it allows you to leverage Amazon's pricing research, if you can trust Amazon to act in a mutually beneficial manner.

  15. Re:database design is at fault on Pentagon Credit Union Database Compromised · · Score: 1

    When managing critical information like SSN's or embassy cables, clear text is just asking for a compromise.

    Both of those things are run by people who think that it's their job to compromise...

  16. Re:"Medical marijuana" is such a scam on Pot Grower's Privacy Challenged · · Score: 1

    A little bulky compared to an (let me wiki-search that for you) electric cigarette, neither of which constitutes smoking, which requires combustion.

    However, most nicotine addicts don't use 'em, and I find it difficult to believe that THC addicts are significantly different in their choice of delivery systems.

    The nicotine systems do give you some control over dosing, though, because you're not using a dried tobacco leaf. You're using an aqueous nicotine solution, which the factory can produce at arbitrarily specific molarities.

    How are you feeding the marijuana nebulizer?

  17. Re:Small thefts add up on EMC Engineer Steals Almost $1 Million of Kit One Piece at a Time · · Score: 1

    That last one is the "more to it" I was referring to. And I think a "snitch's rep" is a dubious claim when you're talking about people literally stealing from the company.

    I mean, misappropriated office supplies are one thing (that's still theft, but one can easily see how people would "just want to get along" over something that's "not that big a deal"), but taking money out of a fare box is a little too extreme to file under harmless workplace mischief. I can't imagine any coworkers looking down on "the snitch" except the thugs who were in on the scam.

  18. Re:Small thefts add up on EMC Engineer Steals Almost $1 Million of Kit One Piece at a Time · · Score: 1

    "I did not want to be the one responsible for pointing out to superiors or anything that there was anything wrong going on," he testified. "The thing was I didn't want to be involved in it." He was later fired.

    Sounds like there's a lot more to that story. Why would he be afraid of reporting it?

  19. Re:reminds me... on EMC Engineer Steals Almost $1 Million of Kit One Piece at a Time · · Score: 1

    To sell them, of course. What other reason could there be?

  20. Re:Disabled man gets a visit to an Amsterdam prost on Pot Grower's Privacy Challenged · · Score: 1

    A 300 pound hooker doesn't sound like such a great plan.

  21. Re:Decriminalize it on Pot Grower's Privacy Challenged · · Score: 1

    Just because people can be harmed by using it doesn't mean that it should be illegal. You can get high off of Windex, and it will seriously harm you while doing so. Should we make that illegal as well? A woman was killed by water poisoning a few years ago in a radio contest to win a Wii console. Perhaps we should make it illegal to possess more than one pint of water at a time.

    Should we make everything people can do that might hurt themselves illegal?

    In a just society, the only activities you ban are the ones that hurt other people.

  22. Re:"Medical marijuana" is such a scam on Pot Grower's Privacy Challenged · · Score: 1

    The terrible thing about "medical marijuana" is twofold:

    1) The compounds involved are suspected to have actual medicinal benefits, however we'll never actually know for sure because "medicinal marijuana" isn't an easily controlled pill, it's just a term we've slapped onto regular, smoked marijuana, which is difficult to dose correctly, and has all the harmful effects of cigarette smoking (except for nicotine addiction) on top of it.

    2) it eases pressure to end prohibition, by providing "legal" way for people to get their fix. If the problem is solved for you you might be less likely to fight for it to be solved for good. So we get to keep the tyrannical, capriciously enforced unjust laws for that much longer.

  23. Re:Going Bust on Social Security Information Systems Near Collapse · · Score: 2

    When it takes in less revenue than it pays out, it will already be insolvent. The "surplus" was "invested" in treasure bonds. Who do you think pays those back..

  24. Re:*HOW* Much?! on Social Security Information Systems Near Collapse · · Score: 1

    Yeah, and? A $50, 1 TB hard drive could hold 3 kilobytes of information for every citizen in the US. So, the real question is..

    Just how much information are they storing here, and how frequently are they accessing it, anyway?

  25. Re:2012 on Social Security Information Systems Near Collapse · · Score: 1

    I'm pretty sure debt isn't transferrable like that...