TL:DR beyond first paragraph. I feel much the same way about time sheets. I really hate having to justify every minute of every day. Some days' are more productive than others, sometimes letting stuff percolate in my head is the most productive thing I can be doing, but it's hard to attribute to a specific project code.
I also get frustrated with companies that expect you to fill in time sheets at 100% utilization against billable work. When do they think admin and training gets done? I'm more effective if I can spend time planning out and prioritizing my workload, but it takes time.
In Victoria we only get 11 public holidays per year, not 13. Jeff also made it possible for them to fall on a weekend if you are unlucky (though most workplaces recognize a day in lieu to make up for it).
There used to be an Italian supermarket in Nth Carlton that sold leg bacon which was the size of a small dinner plate. I don't know if it's still available. We get short cut rindless bacon as a general rule. It doesn't tend to crisp up in the same way, thicker and with less fat, but it gets nicely caramelized.
Universal high speed internet will enable public services like tele-medicine for specialist consultants, tele-communting, the potential for delivering distance education for a broader range of subject and specialties.
The thing you may not realize is how big Australia is, and once you get outside of the major capitals, how far it can be between communities. Education and health professionals in rural areas are severely restricted, meaning an accelerating migration from the country to the city.
The indigenous population are especially affected, having a significantly lower average life span and are more likely to be welfare dependent due to a lack of education.
In the NT many of the children of station owners attended school by CB radio, imagine what broadband could do for lesson options. Even is less remote areas, I know I commuted over 30k daily to go to high school from a country town to the nearest regional centre. Even then I had to do several classes by correspondence in later years because our school wasn't big enough to offer them to Year 12. Back then, that literally meant posting envelopes of paper back and forth and having weeks between submitting work and getting a reply.
Iran's ideological position on women is archaic and disturbing. But to suggest that the West isn't fucked up in it's own special way (and doesn't have issues with how it treats women - seeing how this was your main argument for qualifying civilisation) is myopic to say the least.
As for painting all mulims with the same brush - why do you think so many of them are trying to immigrate if everything is so fabulous at home?
The Victorian Smart Meters collect data on 30 minute intervals (uploaded daily around midnight to the distributor).
The benefit, if any, to a debt collector, is to project usage patterns to see when it's most likely someone will be home - working on the assumption that consumption increases when the property is occupied.
Or do you actually have electricity rationing in Australia?
Answering this seriously, much of the smart networks design - of which smart meters is only a very small component of - is about load balancing the systems to supply energy more efficiently without needing to build excess generation capability. Most of the Victorian electricity generation market is scaled around a handful of hot days every summer (the day of the Black Saturday bushfire it was approximately 48C in Melbourne). In hot weather people crank up the air conditioners, fans, etc... and consume significantly more electricity than during normal peaks.
Historically, in order to stop the system from overloading, there have been rolling controlled blackouts to stop the switching networks from cutting out. This is hugely inconvenient for everyone - especially people on home based life support systems.
Part of the design spec for the smart meters is the capability to set a residential maximum draw, if you exceed it - you and only you will lose power. It will try to turn on again in 15 minutes, if you are below that max draw (say you turned off the clothes dryer, the X-box, the big screen TV) then the power will stay on, if you are still over your limit it will cut out again. Rinse, repeat. IIRC this capability was targeted to be implemented in a later phase and wasn't in the initial rollout of functions. I believe that there was also the capability for people who were having trouble paying their bills to ask to have it applied to keep their power bills down to a manageable level they agreed with the utility provider while not having them cut off totally.
I'm unusual enough that whatever I'm doing is probably an outlier in terms of marketin usefullness, whether it's power consumption, spending habits, location, etc.
That's OK, Homeland Security has flagged you as a terrorist and are coming around to investigate your buying habits more closely citizen.
There are some common misunderstandings about smart meters, prior to the remotely read interval meters being rolled out under the banner of smart meters, the term was previously used by retailers to describe meter which would run backwards to record micro-generation back to the grid.
The funny bit is that many of the early remotely read interval meters didn't support energy import (supply back to the grid), and will either need to be replaced later, or may be upgradeable via a remote firmware upgrade to support it.
The meters are provided by the electricity distributor, not the retailer. Generally the distributor is determined by geography, with different distributors having 'won' contracts with the government to supply for a given territory which is strictly defined.
Changing your retailer may change the payment plan you are on and who has secondary access to the information (the distributor and AEMO having primary access), but it won't change what data is collected or by whom.
The vast majority of appliances currently installed do not have the ability to be queried or remotely controlled via the power grind. Most houses are not wired to have remote control at an outlet level.
The Smart Meter project referred to in TFA has the capability to remotely activate or deactivate power at a meter by meter level (generally a single residence or small business), or to consumption limit you at a per meter level (if you exceed 'x' kwh consumtpion, shut off, try again in a few minutes), but to the best of my knowledge that hasn't been approved for use as yet.
Currently the way the distributors manage excess consumption is at a grid level where they turn off entire substations, such as they did several summers back where we had a run off excessively hot days and too many people were using their ACs to a level which was going to overload the grid.. What you may not be aware of is the large number of people in residential areas on some form of assisted life support that relies on electricity. In the even to of a blackout, many of these people need to be transferred to hospitals or other backup locations. The smart meter solution allows them to be left on when other houses are switched off in the event of load balancing blackouts.
Are you referring to the Radio Mesh installations or the WiMAX installations? There are two different network infrastructures being deployed in the Victorian Smart Meter rollout, depending on which distributor you are referencing.
Disclaimer - I spent 2 years working on the Smart Meter installation project involved primarily in change management for the network rollout.
It's highly likely that as someone not located in the US the previous Maps app didn't even support transit information in the first place. Regardless, I use the local PTV app (Public Transport Victoria) and for the most part it works pretty well. I just wish they would fix the disruptions tool, it only ever shows planned outages and not ad hoc outages, which the previous version of the app did just fine.
The last time I renewed my Australian passport I had to get my photo taken 3 times before they accepted it. It had to show both ears (or the absence thereof) - so you had to be square to the camera, I wasn't allowed to smile, it had to show my hair colour [1], however the hair had to be back off my face.
[1] Ironic given it changes every couple of months or so. Once place I worked previously made you have your security pass photo retaken if you changed hair colour. I had a collection of passes in my desk I would cycle through depending on what colour I'd dyed it last time around.
It was explained to me that while they don't expect anyone to answer 'yes' on the form, it becomes another charge that can levy against you 'lying on your immigration paperwork'.
Slashdot Mirror
TL:DR beyond first paragraph. I feel much the same way about time sheets. I really hate having to justify every minute of every day. Some days' are more productive than others, sometimes letting stuff percolate in my head is the most productive thing I can be doing, but it's hard to attribute to a specific project code.
I also get frustrated with companies that expect you to fill in time sheets at 100% utilization against billable work. When do they think admin and training gets done? I'm more effective if I can spend time planning out and prioritizing my workload, but it takes time.
In Victoria we only get 11 public holidays per year, not 13. Jeff also made it possible for them to fall on a weekend if you are unlucky (though most workplaces recognize a day in lieu to make up for it).
Unless you have gastroparesis, then it's more like 24-48.
This is quite distinct to saying something like "you're a gay horse". I dunno what a gay horse is, but let's pretend it's offensive.
I don't understand, could we get a car analogy to explain it?
There used to be an Italian supermarket in Nth Carlton that sold leg bacon which was the size of a small dinner plate. I don't know if it's still available. We get short cut rindless bacon as a general rule. It doesn't tend to crisp up in the same way, thicker and with less fat, but it gets nicely caramelized.
Universal high speed internet will enable public services like tele-medicine for specialist consultants, tele-communting, the potential for delivering distance education for a broader range of subject and specialties.
The thing you may not realize is how big Australia is, and once you get outside of the major capitals, how far it can be between communities. Education and health professionals in rural areas are severely restricted, meaning an accelerating migration from the country to the city.
The indigenous population are especially affected, having a significantly lower average life span and are more likely to be welfare dependent due to a lack of education.
In the NT many of the children of station owners attended school by CB radio, imagine what broadband could do for lesson options. Even is less remote areas, I know I commuted over 30k daily to go to high school from a country town to the nearest regional centre. Even then I had to do several classes by correspondence in later years because our school wasn't big enough to offer them to Year 12. Back then, that literally meant posting envelopes of paper back and forth and having weeks between submitting work and getting a reply.
Their fashion sense is pretty lethal. As is their choice of cars, tattoos, drinks and children's names.
Coopers.
Iran's ideological position on women is archaic and disturbing. But to suggest that the West isn't fucked up in it's own special way (and doesn't have issues with how it treats women - seeing how this was your main argument for qualifying civilisation) is myopic to say the least.
As for painting all mulims with the same brush - why do you think so many of them are trying to immigrate if everything is so fabulous at home?
Guns are largely controlled in Australia. There were guns, knives, dogs and in one case snakes wielded in anger at installers during the rollout.
The Victorian Smart Meters collect data on 30 minute intervals (uploaded daily around midnight to the distributor).
The benefit, if any, to a debt collector, is to project usage patterns to see when it's most likely someone will be home - working on the assumption that consumption increases when the property is occupied.
Or do you actually have electricity rationing in Australia?
Answering this seriously, much of the smart networks design - of which smart meters is only a very small component of - is about load balancing the systems to supply energy more efficiently without needing to build excess generation capability. Most of the Victorian electricity generation market is scaled around a handful of hot days every summer (the day of the Black Saturday bushfire it was approximately 48C in Melbourne). In hot weather people crank up the air conditioners, fans, etc... and consume significantly more electricity than during normal peaks.
Historically, in order to stop the system from overloading, there have been rolling controlled blackouts to stop the switching networks from cutting out. This is hugely inconvenient for everyone - especially people on home based life support systems.
Part of the design spec for the smart meters is the capability to set a residential maximum draw, if you exceed it - you and only you will lose power. It will try to turn on again in 15 minutes, if you are below that max draw (say you turned off the clothes dryer, the X-box, the big screen TV) then the power will stay on, if you are still over your limit it will cut out again. Rinse, repeat. IIRC this capability was targeted to be implemented in a later phase and wasn't in the initial rollout of functions. I believe that there was also the capability for people who were having trouble paying their bills to ask to have it applied to keep their power bills down to a manageable level they agreed with the utility provider while not having them cut off totally.
I'm unusual enough that whatever I'm doing is probably an outlier in terms of marketin usefullness, whether it's power consumption, spending habits, location, etc.
That's OK, Homeland Security has flagged you as a terrorist and are coming around to investigate your buying habits more closely citizen.
There are some common misunderstandings about smart meters, prior to the remotely read interval meters being rolled out under the banner of smart meters, the term was previously used by retailers to describe meter which would run backwards to record micro-generation back to the grid.
The funny bit is that many of the early remotely read interval meters didn't support energy import (supply back to the grid), and will either need to be replaced later, or may be upgradeable via a remote firmware upgrade to support it.
The meters are provided by the electricity distributor, not the retailer. Generally the distributor is determined by geography, with different distributors having 'won' contracts with the government to supply for a given territory which is strictly defined.
Changing your retailer may change the payment plan you are on and who has secondary access to the information (the distributor and AEMO having primary access), but it won't change what data is collected or by whom.
The vast majority of appliances currently installed do not have the ability to be queried or remotely controlled via the power grind. Most houses are not wired to have remote control at an outlet level.
The Smart Meter project referred to in TFA has the capability to remotely activate or deactivate power at a meter by meter level (generally a single residence or small business), or to consumption limit you at a per meter level (if you exceed 'x' kwh consumtpion, shut off, try again in a few minutes), but to the best of my knowledge that hasn't been approved for use as yet.
Currently the way the distributors manage excess consumption is at a grid level where they turn off entire substations, such as they did several summers back where we had a run off excessively hot days and too many people were using their ACs to a level which was going to overload the grid.. What you may not be aware of is the large number of people in residential areas on some form of assisted life support that relies on electricity. In the even to of a blackout, many of these people need to be transferred to hospitals or other backup locations. The smart meter solution allows them to be left on when other houses are switched off in the event of load balancing blackouts.
Are you referring to the Radio Mesh installations or the WiMAX installations? There are two different network infrastructures being deployed in the Victorian Smart Meter rollout, depending on which distributor you are referencing.
Disclaimer - I spent 2 years working on the Smart Meter installation project involved primarily in change management for the network rollout.
You are, Number 6...
I'd be pissed, nothing's getting between me and my 2pm sugar craving chocolate bar - oh look at the time...
It's highly likely that as someone not located in the US the previous Maps app didn't even support transit information in the first place. Regardless, I use the local PTV app (Public Transport Victoria) and for the most part it works pretty well. I just wish they would fix the disruptions tool, it only ever shows planned outages and not ad hoc outages, which the previous version of the app did just fine.
Modern flutes are rarely wood.
The last time I renewed my Australian passport I had to get my photo taken 3 times before they accepted it. It had to show both ears (or the absence thereof) - so you had to be square to the camera, I wasn't allowed to smile, it had to show my hair colour [1], however the hair had to be back off my face.
[1] Ironic given it changes every couple of months or so. Once place I worked previously made you have your security pass photo retaken if you changed hair colour. I had a collection of passes in my desk I would cycle through depending on what colour I'd dyed it last time around.
It was explained to me that while they don't expect anyone to answer 'yes' on the form, it becomes another charge that can levy against you 'lying on your immigration paperwork'.
So you're the one responsible for all those zero-day exploits?
TBH I didn't know it was a quote