This will be a major setback in the handling department though. Manufacturers have been working on reducing unsprung weight of cars for years. Most new cars have either cast aluminum control arms or individual strut rods. These are much lighter than the live axle of older cars.
By installing an electric motor on each wheel, you've significantly increased the unsprung weight.
Unsprung weight is directly tied to the "smoothness" one feels while driving over bumpy surfaces. You need a less agressive shock absorber with lighter unsprung components and the components have less inertia as well. An electric motor will have considerable inertia and cause ride quality issues.
The problem with OBD-II isn't the interface. There are $20 designs out on the net that work. The problem is that the protocol spec costs money. Any work that has been done on the software side was done via reverse engineering. The car companies are very tight lipped about their systems, and the automotive spec associations are paid lots of money to keep the information close to their vest. I don't believe you can buy the spec and just go posting it around, as that would violate the agreements you sign to get the information.
You can get commercial All-in-one readers for $350, less for specific car models. These will read out data, error codes, and reset the service lights, etc.
I know plenty of auto related companies, and I can tell you that it's far from "guesstimation". They don't just go off half assed and do something, there is a lot of engineering principle behind their products.
You asked about aerodynamics, engines, and mechanicals. In each of these areas there is a lot of work.
Aerodynamics is one of the most visible parts of design, and there is very little in the way of guessing (except, umm, for those tasteless wings and stuff that people put on their cars). A good source of information on Aerodynamics can be found via books. Specifically:
Fiberglass & Composite Materials: An Enthusiast's Guide to High Performance Non-Metallic Materials for Automotive Racing and Marine Use by Forbes Aird
Aerodynamics for Racing and Performance Cars by Forbes Aird
Competition Car Downforce: A Practical Guide by Simon McBeath
Race Car Aerodynamics: Designing for Speed by Joseph Katz
I have the Aird books, and they're very good.
Mechanical engineering is well understood and followed, especially by Cal Poly. The FSAE contests are a great proving grounds for designs.
Books by Forbes Aird and Carroll Smith are really good points to start with. The Smith books are phenomenally thorough and put you in awe. That guys has FORGOTTEN more, than most people KNOW. The Aird book is more down to earth and easier to read than the Smith books, both authors are tremendously entertaining.
Here are some books:
Race Car Chassis: Design and Construction by Forbes Aird
Tune to Win by Carroll Smith
Carroll Smith's Nuts, Bolts and Fasteners and Plumbing Handbook by Carroll Smith
Engineer to Win: The Essential Guide to Racing Car Materials Technology or How to Build Winners Which Don't Break by Carroll Smith
How to Make Your Car Handle by Fred Puhn
For engines and mechanical systems, I find that periodicals on the subject are very informative. I learned most of what I know about engines from reading Mustang magazines. There are books out there on rebuilding engines and performance.
Here are some good books:
Turbochargers by Hugh MacInnes
Mustang Performance Handbook : Engine and Drivetrain Modifications for Street, Drag Strip or Road Racing Use. Covers All Models of the Ford Mustang, 1979 to present. by William R. Mathis
Ford Fuel Injection & Electronic Engine Control : All Ford/Lincoln-Mercury Cars and Light Trucks 1988 to 1993 by Charles O. Probst
Fuel Injection: Installation, Performance Tuning, Modification by Jeff Hartman
And finally, if you want to do engine simulation on the bench, err, computer, check out Desktop Dyno 2000. It's from Motion Software, costs $50 with the Cam-Disk CD (over 2000 cam profiles). It's a great program, however like all software, garbage in, garbage out. If you expect to get reasonable data from the program, you must supply it with reasonable data.
All I see here is a bunch of people bitching about spoilers. Fer cryin' out loud, why not bitch about the serious audience fuck that Chris Carter pulled when he canceled the TLG series.
That's right, that bag of bones waste of space left the series hanging with a 2 parter ep. That was a monumental cluster fuck of the people watching the show. There they are stuck in a vault in a building and the BBP (Big Bad People) are coming to get them. We have *NO* fucking clue how they got out of the mess.
Damn him, damn him to all hell.
(for the clue impaired, this post is dripping with sarcasm and wit)
[NOTE: Fox canceled the show, they are proportionally responsible shitbags]
30 million? I thought surely there were more. I'm in California (the other CA) and we have 30 million people here. Although it's like 1/5th to 1/8th the size of Canada (which makes for a sucky commute and too many braindead people). So Tivo would possibly gain another state's worth of market. Gee, isn't Canada the state to the north anyway?;-)
I have one of the Protek PC ISA oscope cards. It's about a 4Mhz card and is dual trace. It works ok, but not well enough for analyzing video signals. It has some decent software and logging capabilites. It's manufactured by Hung Chang. Price: $220-$249
The other scope I have is a Velleman handheld. It works really well. For $249 it's the best thing I've seen. It's based on a PIC microprocesor and is single trace with a 5Mhz bandwidth. Some of them have PC interfaces, mine doesn't. Here's Velleman's website.
It's not a matter of whether the vehicle technically passes the EPA or CARB certifications, it's whether the manufacturer feels it necessary to pay for the certifications.
Many notable cars (Lotus Elise and Audi RS4 are prime examples) are not sold in the US because the manufacturer has no desire to certify the vehicle.
A 130hp Rover 4 cyl is obviously not a smog threat, but Rover has no interest in certifying it for Lotus, even though they are both owned by Ford. That's why you can get an Elise with an Acura 1.8 (heresy I say!) motor transplant in the US.
Only recently did a company go through the trouble of certifying the Nissan Skylines for CARB, DOT, and EPA rules. The reason is obvious too; they want $95,000 for a 285hp (I think less) sedan. I remember the 600hp Skylines being the shiznit.
That goes for the Subaru WRX. I desparately wanted one in 1999, but Subaru couldn't care. At that time the exports were 285hp with the Japanese model being 385hp. THAT is a badass car.
That Brabus MB could be badass and smog compliant, but unless they pay for certification it isn't gonna happen, which is a shame. Although MB just released their latest V12, a 'variable displacement' version that's more efficient than the previous version. Presumably it simply drops a bank of cylinders, rather than using the Cadillac 8-4-2 design.
I am aware that many European companies have success with tuning, but I am not authoritative on that, so I didn't want to comment.
One thing I'd like to point out is that many European cars use Bosch Motronic ECUs. This means that anyone with enough money can have access to the tuning equipment and information, and often this is what they do.
Off hand I know Volvo, Audi, and Ferrari use Bosch Motronic systems. It's a very versatile system, yet is limited to people with BIG pockets.
When you can't afford the minimum $1million pricetag for a Bosch development system, you choose something like Motec. They're based in Austrailia and provide tuning classes, support, and on-site custom tuning, all for a price.
I had a BMW 850i and it used BMW's proprietary ECU, 3 in fact, 1 for each bank of cylinders and a 3rd management ECU that handled synchronization and frills.
Engine tuning really boils down to how much money, time, and talent you have. I think that a lot of US companies have yet to learn that, citing that what they're doing is 'good enough'.
My personal vision is to see aftermarket solutions utilizing OEM ECUs that are more drivable than what the OEM did, but then you have to reengineer all the tools the OEM made in the first place. Perhaps one day we'll see a tunable computer that replaces OEM computers and is CARB legal (being the most pig-headed of the states).
You obviously don't know what you're talking about. Every advancement in car tuning has come at the hands of some VERY smart people. Ford doesn't publish information on how to tune their cars. Niether does GM, or Audi, or Volkswagen, or Honda, or Subaru, or BMW. All of these computers have been hacked in the truest sense of the word. There are people with logic analyzers sniffing the bus of running computers to figure out what's happening. People write emulators and disassemblers to understand where all the tables, functions, and scalars are.
OBD-II has made it a lot easier to hack computers, but the tuning of the engine is still an art practiced by people who have learned A LOT and still don't know everything. It's rare to find an aftermarket engine that is tuned to the quality of the OEM engine, it just doesn't happen all that often.
So what happens? There are several companies who manufacture aftermarket drop-in computers for controlling engine functions. For Fords SpeedBrain and the Ford SVO EPEC come to mind. For race cars the Edelbrock EFI, Accel DFI, Speedpro, and Motronic are used often. The upside to the aftermarket is that you get documentation and they rarely are as complex as OEM computers.
Here's a list off the top of my head of sensors and functions a Ford EEC-IV computer controls:
Mass Air Flow Sensor, Barometric pressure sensor, Throttle Position Sensor, Engine Coolant Temperature sensor, Air Charge Temperature sensor, O2 sensor, Vehicle Speed Sensor, Exhaust Gas Recirculator valve, Canister Purge Valve, Thermactor Control Valve, Thick Film Ignition module, Idle Stabilizer Valve, Automatic transmission accumulator pressure, 1st to 2nd gear shift point, 2nd to 3rd gear shift point, 3rd to 4th gear shift point, Torque Converter lockup RPM, Idle RPM, Automatic Transmission Drive Idle RPM, Neutral indicator, etc.
That's just sensors and some basic interactions. Most aftermarket computers don't use half those sensors, and on top of that they are usually Manifold Absolute Pressure based rather than Mass Air Flow.
So, as you can see, it isn't "Just buy a book". I have every book on Ford EFI, and none of them tell you the slightest thing about tuning an EEC-IV computer. Everything I've learned has been from the internet (there are enthusiasts who hack and document their hacks) and from hacking.
I've been there, I've done computer tweaking, and I know it's not simple or trivial, it's all just hacking and guesswork.
Perhaps signing every message isn't a good idea. See, if your signature is cracked, then they have a copy of your key, along with your signature fingerprint.
The more messages you sign and send, the more chance they have to crack your key, then your signatures AND PGP encrypted data is vulnerable.
Don't be gratuitous with your signatures, it can come back to bite you. That message to your (mom|dad|spouse|friend|coworker) telling them you'll be 10 minutes late to dinner doesn't need to be signed.
You obviously haven't looked at switching technology lately.
Most modern managable switches have the ability to perform a piggyback of a port. It's called the monitor port. Effectively all traffic sent to or from that port gets mirrored on another port. It's how you sniff packets on a switch.
This has no discernable effect on latency either. The machine sniffing the port may be overloaded with packets, but packet dropping happens then. It's of no consequence to day-to-day operations.
Sniffing all traffic is a bad economic and privacy move. The amount of money spent on trying to sniff all data would be quite high; switching hardware isn't cheap these days, especially high performance hardware. The privacy issues are obvious too.
The upside is twofold: educated geeks get employed by the government to operate, maintain, and advise. The other is any possible value this would have for recovering data that could prevent problems, terrorist or otherwise.
I don't like the possibility that this could happen though.
Although this is offtopic, I thought I'd put in a couple of words.
It's true that superchargers are lesser used in production vehicles than turbochargers. This is for several reasons.
First, turbos use exhaust energy instead of the crankshaft to drive them. Turbos have a lot of useful features that make them better than superchargers for production vehicles. Firstly they are more efficient (this is assuming a properly sized unit that is tuned by the factory), they can compensate for altitude, and they can be controlled by an emissions computer.
Superchargers on the other hand are not computer controlled, do not compensate for altitude, and (in production vehicles) have a higher air temperature than turbos (most all production vehicles have intercoolers).
The type of supercharger used on production vechicles is usually a roots/twin screw positive displacement variety. These produce almost instantaneous boost, but are inefficient at high boost values. Cosequently they usually don't go higher than 8 psi max, 4 or 5 psi nominal. These installations use aftercoolers (water cooled radiators in the manifold) to cool the intake charge, on vehicles with enough intake volume (such as the Ford Lightning). The primary manufacturer of these superchargers is Eaton.
Turbochargers on the other hand are very widely used and generally produce more power than superchargers. The 1984 Mustang SVO and Thunderbird Turbo Coupe saw about 18psi max. That is an HPT (High Pressure Turbo) design. Volvo uses LPT (Low Pressure Turbo) turbos in several of their vehicles, the S80 T6 to be one. LPT turbos provide a small amount of improvement over NA power, however they can be tuned via computer to produce much more power. Turbos suffer from an efficiency problem that many are not aware of. Specifically they have anywhere from a 2:1 up to 6:1 pressure differential between the exhaust port and intake port of cylinders. This means that if you have 10 psi boost, you have 20 to 60 psi backpressure. This is a significant limitation of turbo designs and what limits their output. Maximum compressor RPM is the other limitation. Most compressors do not exceed 120,000 RPM. Smaller turbos turn faster to move the same amount of air that larger turbos move at lower RPM.
In conclusion, superchargers are generally installed on cars that were originally naturally aspirated, because it's a relatively easy conversion. However, turbos do not easily adapt to naturally aspirated cars because they don't integrate with the engine control system easily.
Here's a list of cars that come with superchargers (that I know off the top of my head):
Volkswagen Corrado G60
Ford Thunderbird SC
Pontiac Grand Prix GTP
Mercedes SLK Kompressor
Jaguar XK8
Ford Lightning (1999+)
Nissan Frontier (2001+)
Aston Martin Coupe (Jaguar)
However the list of turbo cars is probably 20 times the above.
The first is 'Practical UNIX Programming: A Guide to Concurrency, Communication, and Multithreading' by Kay A. Robbins and Steven Robbins. This book covers a fairly large area of Unix isms. Specifics include MT, signals, shared memory, concurrency, IPC, and other black arts.
Another book I really like was 'Threads Primer: A Guide to Multithreaded Programming'. This book is Solaris centric, but provides a really good description of MT scheduling and how POSIX threads work with Solaris. It's an awesome book and is easily read.
Another book which I find invaluable is 'Algorithms in C++' by Robert Sedgewick. This book is the most awesome book I can recommend, it has many real world algorithms and sample code. It requires that you digest in the information about complex algorithms, over time. The Boyer-Moore search algorithm is really cool, but it takes a little time to understand.
If you are the least bit interested in Compilers, I would highly recommend the O'Reily book 'Lex and Yacc' by John R. Levine, Tony Mason, and Doug Brown. This book is a very practical text on Lex and Yacc, and their application to text parsing and compilers. I wrote a full compiler/interpreter after reading this book.
The 'Dragon' book is not recommended. I picked it up and it does not have any practical use. It's purely academic and does not relate to real world applications. There is another compiler book that comes highly recommended, but I can't think of it off the top of my head; I think the author has a russian name.
Other useful books are the TCP/IP series from Douglas Comer, and last but not least, the Internet RFCs. Someone has compiled the RFCs into several volumes that cover similar subjects. I don't know off the top of my head who the group was. Additionally a lot of protocol RFCs use Backer-Naur Form (BNF) to describe the protocol, since it's a really concise and compact form. This form is nearly identical to the syntax that Yacc uses, so the Lex & Yacc book is very useful here.
This means that checking UP TO the square root was not effective in this case.
The other point is that the big products appear to generally be 2x the number of digits of their factors. This means that to pick your starting point for the factors, you use the square root of the product. Fitting the numbers isn't something you can just easily brute force. In RSA130 the two factors had a difference of:
You say that Psions cost more than Palms, yet you bought one for $100. I don't see your logic.
Yes, the Revo has a lower res and smaller screen. It makes some apps difficult.
The task switcher is odd, but switching tasks is easier if you just click on the icon on the launcher bar, it does the same thing.
I have a 5mx and a Series 7. The 5mx is a little slower (for most things, but a lot for CPU intensive items). It works well, but the 7 has a 640x480 STN color screen and a larger keyboard. The 7 is a little bulky to carry, but the 5 isn't as nice to use for long periods.
All in all, a 5 is a killer item, and if you have a GSM phone (I bought one just for it), it integrates really well. Phoneman can manage your phone contacts and send SMS and ringtones.
The spreadsheet is killer, and Jotter (notepad) works really well for making little freeform databases (like conversion tables).
It has real SQL query support for database files, via the OPL interface. Also, the contacts/database functionality is pretty sophisticated.
If you can afford a Series 7, get it, it supports CF type 2 and PCMCIA type 2. It's fast and can hold 32MB of RAM. The enterprise version has an NE2000 ethernet adaptor built in. If you do a lot of writing, the keyboard on the 7 is awesome.
If you can't afford a 7, the 5mx is your next best choice. It has all the same features, yet it's B&W and smaller (about 40%). It uses 2 AA batteries and runs about 20hours without the backlight on. It's keyboard is functional, but many common characters require FN-key combinations.
The Revo is an excellent competitor to PIMs, but is too small for a lot of keyboard use. The screen is 480x240, so it has the display area of a 5 with the toolbars turned on. On the upside it has really tiny pixels which make everything look extra sharp. It also comes with a docking cradle and Phoneman builtin.
The EPOC series of devices are lightyears ahead of any other PIM/PDA OS and application suite. EPOC is by far the most functional OS for a PDA. It doesn't have handwriting recognition, but rather uses a keyboard. The pen is like a touch screen mouse. It is well laid out and intuitive to use. It makes very good use of screen real estate and file storage. The 16MB that comes in most is storage AND memory to run, which shows just how efficient EPOC is.
EPOC is the OS of the future for every handheld consumer device, Nokia switched to it for the new communicator series, and the new phones are awesome.
Does anyone think it's kinda stupid that it queues up URL requests if the machine isn't connected to the net?
Something like this *could* be useful if it was integrated with TV like hyperlinks are with the web. You would need Seinfeld to put these cues into the show at points that demand them.
I could really see this as useful for something like Junkyard wars or Connections3. The reliability is dubious too.
It seems like a niftier idea than the CueCat, but if they haven't gotten their crap together after the last time, who knows how bad it'll bomb.
Re:alternative to nvidia linux only drivers?
on
XFree 4.1.0 Out
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· Score: 1
See, that's what's the problem with you *BSD types. You say "How about *BSD support, it'd be trivial to port to all the BSDs". When the Linux people say: "Give me the specs so I can write a driver".
BSD is content with giving up their liberty so as long as they get that feature supported. The Linux people would rather do without than to live with a half hearted buggy release.
This is the perfect example of the free software ethos.
Be careful, you don't want anyone farting on the antimatter, it might cause an explosion the likes of which have never been seen outside of drunken beer bash BBQs.
Slashdot Mirror
This will be a major setback in the handling department though. Manufacturers have been working on reducing unsprung weight of cars for years. Most new cars have either cast aluminum control arms or individual strut rods. These are much lighter than the live axle of older cars.
By installing an electric motor on each wheel, you've significantly increased the unsprung weight.
Unsprung weight is directly tied to the "smoothness" one feels while driving over bumpy surfaces. You need a less agressive shock absorber with lighter unsprung components and the components have less inertia as well. An electric motor will have considerable inertia and cause ride quality issues.
I don't suppose that Sierra and Blizzard being owned by Vivendi had anything to do with it, huh?
The problem with OBD-II isn't the interface. There are $20 designs out on the net that work. The problem is that the protocol spec costs money. Any work that has been done on the software side was done via reverse engineering. The car companies are very tight lipped about their systems, and the automotive spec associations are paid lots of money to keep the information close to their vest. I don't believe you can buy the spec and just go posting it around, as that would violate the agreements you sign to get the information.
You can get commercial All-in-one readers for $350, less for specific car models. These will read out data, error codes, and reset the service lights, etc.
You make a lot of assumptions.
I know plenty of auto related companies, and I can tell you that it's far from "guesstimation". They don't just go off half assed and do something, there is a lot of engineering principle behind their products.
You asked about aerodynamics, engines, and mechanicals. In each of these areas there is a lot of work.
Aerodynamics is one of the most visible parts of design, and there is very little in the way of guessing (except, umm, for those tasteless wings and stuff that people put on their cars). A good source of information on Aerodynamics can be found via books. Specifically:
Fiberglass & Composite Materials: An Enthusiast's Guide to High Performance Non-Metallic Materials for Automotive Racing and Marine Use
by Forbes Aird
Aerodynamics for Racing and Performance Cars
by Forbes Aird
Competition Car Downforce: A Practical Guide
by Simon McBeath
Race Car Aerodynamics: Designing for Speed
by Joseph Katz
I have the Aird books, and they're very good.
Mechanical engineering is well understood and followed, especially by Cal Poly. The FSAE contests are a great proving grounds for designs.
Books by Forbes Aird and Carroll Smith are really good points to start with. The Smith books are phenomenally thorough and put you in awe. That guys has FORGOTTEN more, than most people KNOW. The Aird book is more down to earth and easier to read than the Smith books, both authors are tremendously entertaining.
Here are some books:
Race Car Chassis: Design and Construction
by Forbes Aird
Tune to Win
by Carroll Smith
Carroll Smith's Nuts, Bolts and Fasteners and Plumbing Handbook
by Carroll Smith
Engineer to Win: The Essential Guide to Racing Car Materials Technology or How to Build Winners Which Don't Break
by Carroll Smith
How to Make Your Car Handle
by Fred Puhn
For engines and mechanical systems, I find that periodicals on the subject are very informative. I learned most of what I know about engines from reading Mustang magazines. There are books out there on rebuilding engines and performance.
Here are some good books:
Turbochargers
by Hugh MacInnes
Mustang Performance Handbook : Engine and Drivetrain Modifications for Street, Drag Strip or Road Racing Use. Covers All Models of the Ford Mustang, 1979 to present.
by William R. Mathis
Ford Fuel Injection & Electronic Engine Control : All Ford/Lincoln-Mercury Cars and Light Trucks 1988 to 1993
by Charles O. Probst
Fuel Injection: Installation, Performance Tuning, Modification
by Jeff Hartman
And finally, if you want to do engine simulation on the bench, err, computer, check out Desktop Dyno 2000. It's from Motion Software, costs $50 with the Cam-Disk CD (over 2000 cam profiles). It's a great program, however like all software, garbage in, garbage out. If you expect to get reasonable data from the program, you must supply it with reasonable data.
But the windows aren't lighting up to say "Crash and Burn"!
:)
All I see here is a bunch of people bitching about spoilers. Fer cryin' out loud, why not bitch about the serious audience fuck that Chris Carter pulled when he canceled the TLG series.
That's right, that bag of bones waste of space left the series hanging with a 2 parter ep. That was a monumental cluster fuck of the people watching the show. There they are stuck in a vault in a building and the BBP (Big Bad People) are coming to get them. We have *NO* fucking clue how they got out of the mess.
Damn him, damn him to all hell.
(for the clue impaired, this post is dripping with sarcasm and wit)
[NOTE: Fox canceled the show, they are proportionally responsible shitbags]
30 million? I thought surely there were more. I'm in California (the other CA) and we have 30 million people here. Although it's like 1/5th to 1/8th the size of Canada (which makes for a sucky commute and too many braindead people). So Tivo would possibly gain another state's worth of market. Gee, isn't Canada the state to the north anyway? ;-)
I have one of the Protek PC ISA oscope cards. It's about a 4Mhz card and is dual trace. It works ok, but not well enough for analyzing video signals. It has some decent software and logging capabilites. It's manufactured by Hung Chang. Price: $220-$249
The other scope I have is a Velleman handheld. It works really well. For $249 it's the best thing I've seen. It's based on a PIC microprocesor and is single trace with a 5Mhz bandwidth. Some of them have PC interfaces, mine doesn't. Here's Velleman's website.
It's not a matter of whether the vehicle technically passes the EPA or CARB certifications, it's whether the manufacturer feels it necessary to pay for the certifications.
Many notable cars (Lotus Elise and Audi RS4 are prime examples) are not sold in the US because the manufacturer has no desire to certify the vehicle.
A 130hp Rover 4 cyl is obviously not a smog threat, but Rover has no interest in certifying it for Lotus, even though they are both owned by Ford. That's why you can get an Elise with an Acura 1.8 (heresy I say!) motor transplant in the US.
Only recently did a company go through the trouble of certifying the Nissan Skylines for CARB, DOT, and EPA rules. The reason is obvious too; they want $95,000 for a 285hp (I think less) sedan. I remember the 600hp Skylines being the shiznit.
That goes for the Subaru WRX. I desparately wanted one in 1999, but Subaru couldn't care. At that time the exports were 285hp with the Japanese model being 385hp. THAT is a badass car.
That Brabus MB could be badass and smog compliant, but unless they pay for certification it isn't gonna happen, which is a shame. Although MB just released their latest V12, a 'variable displacement' version that's more efficient than the previous version. Presumably it simply drops a bank of cylinders, rather than using the Cadillac 8-4-2 design.
I am aware that many European companies have success with tuning, but I am not authoritative on that, so I didn't want to comment.
One thing I'd like to point out is that many European cars use Bosch Motronic ECUs. This means that anyone with enough money can have access to the tuning equipment and information, and often this is what they do.
Off hand I know Volvo, Audi, and Ferrari use Bosch Motronic systems. It's a very versatile system, yet is limited to people with BIG pockets.
When you can't afford the minimum $1million pricetag for a Bosch development system, you choose something like Motec. They're based in Austrailia and provide tuning classes, support, and on-site custom tuning, all for a price.
I had a BMW 850i and it used BMW's proprietary ECU, 3 in fact, 1 for each bank of cylinders and a 3rd management ECU that handled synchronization and frills.
Engine tuning really boils down to how much money, time, and talent you have. I think that a lot of US companies have yet to learn that, citing that what they're doing is 'good enough'.
My personal vision is to see aftermarket solutions utilizing OEM ECUs that are more drivable than what the OEM did, but then you have to reengineer all the tools the OEM made in the first place. Perhaps one day we'll see a tunable computer that replaces OEM computers and is CARB legal (being the most pig-headed of the states).
You obviously don't know what you're talking about. Every advancement in car tuning has come at the hands of some VERY smart people. Ford doesn't publish information on how to tune their cars. Niether does GM, or Audi, or Volkswagen, or Honda, or Subaru, or BMW. All of these computers have been hacked in the truest sense of the word. There are people with logic analyzers sniffing the bus of running computers to figure out what's happening. People write emulators and disassemblers to understand where all the tables, functions, and scalars are.
OBD-II has made it a lot easier to hack computers, but the tuning of the engine is still an art practiced by people who have learned A LOT and still don't know everything. It's rare to find an aftermarket engine that is tuned to the quality of the OEM engine, it just doesn't happen all that often.
So what happens? There are several companies who manufacture aftermarket drop-in computers for controlling engine functions. For Fords SpeedBrain and the Ford SVO EPEC come to mind. For race cars the Edelbrock EFI, Accel DFI, Speedpro, and Motronic are used often. The upside to the aftermarket is that you get documentation and they rarely are as complex as OEM computers.
Here's a list off the top of my head of sensors and functions a Ford EEC-IV computer controls:
Mass Air Flow Sensor, Barometric pressure sensor, Throttle Position Sensor, Engine Coolant Temperature sensor, Air Charge Temperature sensor, O2 sensor, Vehicle Speed Sensor, Exhaust Gas Recirculator valve, Canister Purge Valve, Thermactor Control Valve, Thick Film Ignition module, Idle Stabilizer Valve, Automatic transmission accumulator pressure, 1st to 2nd gear shift point, 2nd to 3rd gear shift point, 3rd to 4th gear shift point, Torque Converter lockup RPM, Idle RPM, Automatic Transmission Drive Idle RPM, Neutral indicator, etc.
That's just sensors and some basic interactions. Most aftermarket computers don't use half those sensors, and on top of that they are usually Manifold Absolute Pressure based rather than Mass Air Flow.
So, as you can see, it isn't "Just buy a book". I have every book on Ford EFI, and none of them tell you the slightest thing about tuning an EEC-IV computer. Everything I've learned has been from the internet (there are enthusiasts who hack and document their hacks) and from hacking.
I've been there, I've done computer tweaking, and I know it's not simple or trivial, it's all just hacking and guesswork.
Perhaps signing every message isn't a good idea. See, if your signature is cracked, then they have a copy of your key, along with your signature fingerprint.
The more messages you sign and send, the more chance they have to crack your key, then your signatures AND PGP encrypted data is vulnerable.
Don't be gratuitous with your signatures, it can come back to bite you. That message to your (mom|dad|spouse|friend|coworker) telling them you'll be 10 minutes late to dinner doesn't need to be signed.
You obviously haven't looked at switching technology lately.
Most modern managable switches have the ability to perform a piggyback of a port. It's called the monitor port. Effectively all traffic sent to or from that port gets mirrored on another port. It's how you sniff packets on a switch.
This has no discernable effect on latency either. The machine sniffing the port may be overloaded with packets, but packet dropping happens then. It's of no consequence to day-to-day operations.
Sniffing all traffic is a bad economic and privacy move. The amount of money spent on trying to sniff all data would be quite high; switching hardware isn't cheap these days, especially high performance hardware. The privacy issues are obvious too.
The upside is twofold: educated geeks get employed by the government to operate, maintain, and advise. The other is any possible value this would have for recovering data that could prevent problems, terrorist or otherwise.
I don't like the possibility that this could happen though.
For pete's sake man, learn how to form meaningful sentences. You are giving me a headache.
Although this is offtopic, I thought I'd put in a couple of words.
It's true that superchargers are lesser used in production vehicles than turbochargers. This is for several reasons.
First, turbos use exhaust energy instead of the crankshaft to drive them. Turbos have a lot of useful features that make them better than superchargers for production vehicles. Firstly they are more efficient (this is assuming a properly sized unit that is tuned by the factory), they can compensate for altitude, and they can be controlled by an emissions computer.
Superchargers on the other hand are not computer controlled, do not compensate for altitude, and (in production vehicles) have a higher air temperature than turbos (most all production vehicles have intercoolers).
The type of supercharger used on production vechicles is usually a roots/twin screw positive displacement variety. These produce almost instantaneous boost, but are inefficient at high boost values. Cosequently they usually don't go higher than 8 psi max, 4 or 5 psi nominal. These installations use aftercoolers (water cooled radiators in the manifold) to cool the intake charge, on vehicles with enough intake volume (such as the Ford Lightning). The primary manufacturer of these superchargers is Eaton.
Turbochargers on the other hand are very widely used and generally produce more power than superchargers. The 1984 Mustang SVO and Thunderbird Turbo Coupe saw about 18psi max. That is an HPT (High Pressure Turbo) design. Volvo uses LPT (Low Pressure Turbo) turbos in several of their vehicles, the S80 T6 to be one. LPT turbos provide a small amount of improvement over NA power, however they can be tuned via computer to produce much more power. Turbos suffer from an efficiency problem that many are not aware of. Specifically they have anywhere from a 2:1 up to 6:1 pressure differential between the exhaust port and intake port of cylinders. This means that if you have 10 psi boost, you have 20 to 60 psi backpressure. This is a significant limitation of turbo designs and what limits their output. Maximum compressor RPM is the other limitation. Most compressors do not exceed 120,000 RPM. Smaller turbos turn faster to move the same amount of air that larger turbos move at lower RPM.
In conclusion, superchargers are generally installed on cars that were originally naturally aspirated, because it's a relatively easy conversion. However, turbos do not easily adapt to naturally aspirated cars because they don't integrate with the engine control system easily.
Here's a list of cars that come with superchargers (that I know off the top of my head):
Volkswagen Corrado G60
Ford Thunderbird SC
Pontiac Grand Prix GTP
Mercedes SLK Kompressor
Jaguar XK8
Ford Lightning (1999+)
Nissan Frontier (2001+)
Aston Martin Coupe (Jaguar)
However the list of turbo cars is probably 20 times the above.
The first is 'Practical UNIX Programming: A Guide to Concurrency, Communication, and Multithreading' by Kay A. Robbins and Steven Robbins. This book covers a fairly large area of Unix isms. Specifics include MT, signals, shared memory, concurrency, IPC, and other black arts.
Another book I really like was 'Threads Primer: A Guide to Multithreaded Programming'. This book is Solaris centric, but provides a really good description of MT scheduling and how POSIX threads work with Solaris. It's an awesome book and is easily read.
Another book which I find invaluable is 'Algorithms in C++' by Robert Sedgewick. This book is the most awesome book I can recommend, it has many real world algorithms and sample code. It requires that you digest in the information about complex algorithms, over time. The Boyer-Moore search algorithm is really cool, but it takes a little time to understand.
If you are the least bit interested in Compilers, I would highly recommend the O'Reily book 'Lex and Yacc' by John R. Levine, Tony Mason, and Doug Brown. This book is a very practical text on Lex and Yacc, and their application to text parsing and compilers. I wrote a full compiler/interpreter after reading this book.
The 'Dragon' book is not recommended. I picked it up and it does not have any practical use. It's purely academic and does not relate to real world applications. There is another compiler book that comes highly recommended, but I can't think of it off the top of my head; I think the author has a russian name.
Other useful books are the TCP/IP series from Douglas Comer, and last but not least, the Internet RFCs. Someone has compiled the RFCs into several volumes that cover similar subjects. I don't know off the top of my head who the group was. Additionally a lot of protocol RFCs use Backer-Naur Form (BNF) to describe the protocol, since it's a really concise and compact form. This form is nearly identical to the syntax that Yacc uses, so the Lex & Yacc book is very useful here.
(Please excuse the spaces in the numbers, it's to counter the lameness filter).
You are incorrect about the square root.
First of all, just look at RSA 130. It's a 130 digit number with 2, 65 digit prime numbers. In fact the 2 factors are:
45534498646 73597218840 36868972744 08864356301 26320506960 0999044599
and
39685999459 59745429016 11261628837 86067576449 11281006483 2555157243
The product of those 2 numbers is:
18070820886 87404805951 65616440590 55662781025 16769401349 17012702145 00566625402 44048387341 12759081230 33717818879 66563182013 214880557
Which has the square root of (approx):
42509788151 52346540745 26976625052 94703186899 16508643485 6734890373.3
Which is LESS than one of the factors.
This means that checking UP TO the square root was not effective in this case.
The other point is that the big products appear to generally be 2x the number of digits of their factors. This means that to pick your starting point for the factors, you use the square root of the product. Fitting the numbers isn't something you can just easily brute force. In RSA130 the two factors had a difference of:
58484991871 38517898242 56073439062 27967798521 50395004768 443887356
That is a lot of comparisons.
You say that Psions cost more than Palms, yet you bought one for $100. I don't see your logic.
Yes, the Revo has a lower res and smaller screen. It makes some apps difficult.
The task switcher is odd, but switching tasks is easier if you just click on the icon on the launcher bar, it does the same thing.
I have a 5mx and a Series 7. The 5mx is a little slower (for most things, but a lot for CPU intensive items). It works well, but the 7 has a 640x480 STN color screen and a larger keyboard. The 7 is a little bulky to carry, but the 5 isn't as nice to use for long periods.
All in all, a 5 is a killer item, and if you have a GSM phone (I bought one just for it), it integrates really well. Phoneman can manage your phone contacts and send SMS and ringtones.
The spreadsheet is killer, and Jotter (notepad) works really well for making little freeform databases (like conversion tables).
It has real SQL query support for database files, via the OPL interface. Also, the contacts/database functionality is pretty sophisticated.
If you can afford a Series 7, get it, it supports CF type 2 and PCMCIA type 2. It's fast and can hold 32MB of RAM. The enterprise version has an NE2000 ethernet adaptor built in. If you do a lot of writing, the keyboard on the 7 is awesome.
If you can't afford a 7, the 5mx is your next best choice. It has all the same features, yet it's B&W and smaller (about 40%). It uses 2 AA batteries and runs about 20hours without the backlight on. It's keyboard is functional, but many common characters require FN-key combinations.
The Revo is an excellent competitor to PIMs, but is too small for a lot of keyboard use. The screen is 480x240, so it has the display area of a 5 with the toolbars turned on. On the upside it has really tiny pixels which make everything look extra sharp. It also comes with a docking cradle and Phoneman builtin.
The EPOC series of devices are lightyears ahead of any other PIM/PDA OS and application suite. EPOC is by far the most functional OS for a PDA. It doesn't have handwriting recognition, but rather uses a keyboard. The pen is like a touch screen mouse. It is well laid out and intuitive to use. It makes very good use of screen real estate and file storage. The 16MB that comes in most is storage AND memory to run, which shows just how efficient EPOC is.
EPOC is the OS of the future for every handheld consumer device, Nokia switched to it for the new communicator series, and the new phones are awesome.
Gee, and I was thinking they meant comp.os.linux.announce!
Gee, it's funny how the domain system12.* doesn't have a hint of VA ownership. In fact is registered to "Propaganda", Dean Henrichsmeyer.
Perhaps you should take your beef up with him instead of publicly insulting VA.
Does anyone think it's kinda stupid that it queues up URL requests if the machine isn't connected to the net?
Something like this *could* be useful if it was integrated with TV like hyperlinks are with the web. You would need Seinfeld to put these cues into the show at points that demand them.
I could really see this as useful for something like Junkyard wars or Connections3. The reliability is dubious too.
It seems like a niftier idea than the CueCat, but if they haven't gotten their crap together after the last time, who knows how bad it'll bomb.
See, that's what's the problem with you *BSD types. You say "How about *BSD support, it'd be trivial to port to all the BSDs". When the Linux people say: "Give me the specs so I can write a driver".
BSD is content with giving up their liberty so as long as they get that feature supported. The Linux people would rather do without than to live with a half hearted buggy release.
This is the perfect example of the free software ethos.
And I was so looking forward to Hormel making spammers eat their weight in salty pork products. Now my hopes are dashed!
Be careful, you don't want anyone farting on the antimatter, it might cause an explosion the likes of which have never been seen outside of drunken beer bash BBQs.
I can see it now, the ultimate platform for playing CoreWars.
Better start writing your bots now!