The dummies who cooked up the hair-brained scheme are as resource-wasteful as AOL is. A movement has been afoot to force AOL to collect and properly shred/recycle the 10s of millions of disks they've dumped on millions of people over the years.
When I worked at an encoder/mux video tech company, I advocated and communicated that virtually ALL manufacturers equipment using umpteen amounts of plastic, foam, cardboard, wood, and metal should be required to recover and recycle or at least reuse the materials.
One problem is that for refund or RMA reasons, the recipients of the goods protected by all that material have to hang on to it so the goods are safely returned. Many can, and probably do, recycle them. However, the manufacturers would be forced to innovate and shrink their large products to things very small.
Merchandise packaging also needs to be reduced. I once heard and watched on a news expose (I suppose it could be referred to as such a thing) that MOST packaging is intentionally bright and colorful to induce impulse buying. Moreover the stuff is large to deter or prevent or expose shoplifting.
I have a strange and sad feeling that most people, especially in non-recycling communities (home-owners associations (some of my friends live in some), lazily-managed apartments, and poor areas) are STILL not doing enough to increase recycling.
The best way to deal with this problem is to educate people to not buy products that don't use recyclable packaging. A demo product can be on display, but the bought product gets taken home in the lowest-grade of ink possible so that recycling can be facilitated. A discount could be offered for purchasers who buy without the packaging. It would take getting used to, but it could be swung.
Well, it would be "a gas". They'd probably be pushed into another (likely very undesirable) orbit or course.
What would REALLy be interesting is to find out if they will take inflatable dolls or REALDOLLS.
Inflatables save space, but REALDOLLS are closer to the real thing, except still inanimate, but articulable. The astro/cosmo/labidonauts would have firm, reliable, pliant company and not break too many rules.
I wonder if some boby will get a test case for this and bring back the weird NASA/Aerospace days, such as when a real live bear was ejected from an airplane to test the ejection system (hmmm, wouldn't a bear's body withstand an ejection better than a human's?), or when monkeys/chimps purportedly were placed into orbit.
Latex, in the FINAL frontier; these are lurid tales of the inflata-broth(el)-- sexer-prise her ongoing mission, to seek out new styles, and stable positions-- to boldly pose... how no 'nauts have posed before...
I am VERY suspicous of Akamai. I think they are an extension of carnivore, double-click and others unnamed to date. I tend to block them in my IDS/firewall.
Admittedly, I have not dug into them, but ANYbody can have a company front for an intelligence/security activity.
But, imagine if civil disobedience crowds wore this stuff. I wonder what it would look like from heli-cams or orbital devices.
It might confuse the hell out of sharks, too. Especially if the makers can keep it from shorting out, and if it can project menacing images to deter the shark. Maybe it might be better to just give chemical repellents to the people in this predicament.
Halloween parties could be really freaky, especially if the shimmering effects make the kids laugh.
But, we would have problems if people in these digs (with audio effects) were running around shimmering and growling in Leisure World. Might kick some tickers into overdrive.
Yes, velcro does make more noise when unfastening. Considering today's "integrated" (US) units (and our often exposed gender-immaturity when it comes to certain organizations being forced to deal with the issue), it is tempting (and probably underscores the concerns of some in the upper echelons) that mixing males and females in situations where they can get a little quick groin action is not good for morale. I personally don't mind, as long as the rest of the involved UNIT is mature and not pimping or sharing each other due to inadequate pay or such....
But, when I was in the bushes at Fort Ord, envying that pair, yes, back then we had buttons, and belts, and one zipper. Of course, I guess those fanny-zippers or U-shaped slats (yes, with an "a") must be comical AND worrisome...
You're right: they could care less about privacy. Likely thing is, tho, the squad leader probably had so much blood rushing thru his ears he didn't hear me *not* move forward. I was already covered/concealed and I think he lost track of me. I guess I wanted to vicariously savor the moment under moonlight juxtaposed with being hunted down by trained search teams.
As for paintball guns, my point is not to KILL the incoming/invading occupiers, but to put the fear of HELL into them that they COULD have been struck lethally. I generally prefer non-denigrating, non-violent, non-lethal, less-than-lethal interaction. I think that for a nation being invaded that wants help, but not full-on occupation, paintballing the excess occupation would send a clear signal that less-than-lethal is on the minds of the paintballers. But, it makes it so inconvenient for those struck, since they are not likely to be carrying an extra pair of uniforms with which to swap.
Alternatively, a deceptive and unwelcoming set of city dwellers could use this type of ruse to disorient, delude, and demoralize by following up with, as you suggest (and which I also earlier implied or stated) REAL guns. The "crazy moustrap like action" serves a useful purpose of extra training for the indigenous, non-lethal target practice at the expense of the excess troop body/head count.
Dropping/pouring paint from the rooftops is hellaciously messy and environmentally-unfriendly, but it sure as hell would make it inconvenient and dangerous for nice and dry troops to venture in too deep. My kind of "assymetric" wafare is a David-style of PsyOps, counter-ops. I don't need to use (or even suggest) lethal, bruising, or puncturing/burning implements. Anyone resorting to such barbary is lower than scum and deserves the most brutal of punishments, lingering and to the bring of death. Torture really is abused and used on too many who don't merit it. Most people presented with it probably don't merit it.
(I am wondering if a little bit of Hollyweird slipped into the minds of the clothiers and generals in the Pentagon... Sure, urban warfare is a legit concern, but indigenous people expecting to be invaded can also passively nullify the uniforms by changing the ground and next 4 floors's walls' colors. Psychologically, the generals must feel a need to show decorum by taking the "jungle" look and "city-boying" it. I do admit it looks "kinda dumb" to be traipsing around a concrete, glass and steel city in jungle cammo...)
Anyway, I mainly wanted to suggest that if the uniforms are supposed to be some sort of solution or panacea, the locals almost ALWAYS have the least expensive, near-term (and maybe long-term) home advantage.... Well, unless satellites, laser designators, and defectors root out the home defenses. I advocate defensive posture, and not offensive on other's soil unless a majority world vote OK's it. Unilateral action is for pushovers. Pushovers usually get pushed out. VN is a good example of the homefield advantage. Afghanistan is another. One was wet, mushy, filled with boobytraps, tics, leeches, and brutally capable, tho greatly less technical forces. The second is a set of people who don't need to acclimatize in Denver or the Appalachians o
The new uniforms won't be worth a DAMN if the urban warfare enemies get ahold of paint guns and manage to hit their marks or set off non-leathal booby-trapped paint cylinders disguised as transformers or telco boxes. One painter for every attacking squad.... Pelletize one or more new-uniform-wearing guys. Any number of parked vehicles on the procession/line of advance can do the trick. Or, unruly, unwelcoming citizens atop the buildings will paint an UGLY picture. Even just pouring paint on the ground will force troops to detour. DAMN! Wonder what RAND and others in Pentagon (Pin-tu-guhn) are thinking about THAT!
But, with a twist: Put UV/day-glo/night-glo paint balls in the gun. Fire away! For even more twist, if I were the enemy, I'd place urban Geiger counters about the place in advance of being invaded. Then, after painting the "enemy" wearing so-called new/valuable uniforms, I'd paint and roentgen their asses. Of course, they could drop Geiger-confusing isotopes to dampen or mask their own relative positions, but...
Seems to me the new uniforms are NOT going to get the mileage the taxpayer is being fed to believe...
Other information regarding replacing the zippers with velcro..
Replacing the zippers with velcro means that......men and men or men and women or women and women soliders, ummm, soldiers in the field cannot "covertly" or quietly undress and fondle each other and get away with it, too.
I know, personally, because when I was in Navy ROTC (1983-1984), our uniforms had buttons and zippers. At Monterey, (Fort Ord) during "Boot Camp Week", we were out at night on a SERE (survival/escape/resistance/evasion) maneuver, to see how long we could forage along in the woods without being caught by real Army guys. (We were pretty good... one Active-Duty Army squad walked RIGHT OVER us. They were inches from stepping on me, but missed us all (the squad I was in, at least, but later--HOURS later, near the end, we eventually were caught, but HOURS later). SHIT! We were GOOD. And, at least they didnt' cheat with NVG (night vision goggles) or the like, but they did use flares and other stuff to try to flush us out.) Some of us regularly on the weekends played 'wargames' in the woods of Ed Levin Park in Milpitas, often making the senior citizens there think "Red Dawn" was happening for real....
Anyway, a squad leader (male high school student) and another cadet/student (female) from two diff h/s had a "thing" for each other. The squad leader had the rest of us move along, and they fell back to have some private time. They were screwing only some 8 to 15 feet away from me... I was jealous, but I didn't report them.
So, I thought of all that when I read about the zippers being replaced... Velcro might make it easier to undress people in medical emergencies, but in the woods, it destroys privacy for same-squad sex/booty buddies...
What you have to go through to get a point across: http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/beta
Vibrant/active SmartSuite users community:
http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/ssforum.nsf?OpenData ba se and: http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/ssforum.nsf/ SortedAllT hreadedweb?OpenView&ExpandView&RestricttoCategory= Approach
FileMaker Pro http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_title= FileMaker-Pro-Gets-Overhaul&story_id=23323&categor y=databases#story-start --- I watched the flash of the Flipstart. It show, clearly, ms win ce (wince/twitch) on the screen.
Well, maybe hardware manufacturers should REALLY start to "wince", since so many are still reluctant or intransigent about openly and actively adapting their roadmaps to quickly uptake the Linux kernel and Open Source software to move their hardware.
I am sure the cost of the wince-inducing win-ce costs must be a "heart-stop" to Flashtart. The cost of their production and development can dramatically come down if they appoint some pre-tested Linux/C/C++/Java developers who steer or guide or mentor their own developers. The cost of having a team of Linux-oriented developers could be something like granting them free devices for remaining on the team as a consultant of sorts. Maybe the retainer could include an opportunity to be paid, hired, or given more challenging work so as to build their individual resumes.
These companies need to become more creative and more adaptive and less schizoid about "oooh, or proprietary code... our investors will "flip-OUT"". No, such investors my be needing to be flipped-off and flung out, if they stodgily, intransigently hold back a company from taking a critical but necessary leap of faith.
If the leap of faith is unpalatable to the existing structure, then they should spin off one with the right to fold it back in once it proves itself as a proof of concept. If it bombs, at least it is outside of the main structure and can be gradually deprecated and suppressed if it is embarrassing enough. Otherwise, to just run one train and let it consume all the fuel is like refusing to offer a higher-speed, alternate express car between the regular runs. All they need is a spur and a shunt, and a diversion of resources to an open, but less-consuming set of eyes, assists, and sneak previews and some enticements plans.
An ideal I have to help get images and spreadsheets out of tiny and therefore almost useless PDAs is to make the PDA project the data to a receptive wall panel. The panels should run off AC, be light, carryable, and hangable. They could have an amplifier and a small Linux kernel that allows the flexi-screen to replace flatpanels. The device could act as a router or bridge or amplifier of data inputs so that multiple parties in a conference room can merge database data.
MySQL would be great tool for this, since InnoDB is transactional. People in meetings could ad-hoc create databases, run what-if scenarios, and maybe get a LOT more work done in such meetings.
Nurses and inventory personnel could move from room to room where the reception room or stockroom window itself is a smart-assed- piece of glass that reduces an undersized PDA to a mere input/conversation device that projects and receives data from a large screen.
In a fallback scenario, the device could be provided with a traditional AC adapter so it can have more oomph to deliver the images onto a standard, dark wall. So, if a stockroom has a flat surface, even the floor, the user could punch in or call up data, then project the information long enough to read i
I should have remembered TOW-2. I know that some tanks in use have had Chobham armor maybe before 1989. I wouldn't be surprised if the UK mfr and the US FMC (Bradley FV builder) shared reactive armor insights.
As for the 1500 hp and 70+ tons momentum, I thinking of some sort of slacking system by which the paired double-tap strike allows **just** enough slack in the energizing/zapping cable. Maybe it would need to pay out at such a rate that even if the target tank tries to lurch, the slackened cable would not immediately snap.
I do admit the problem of trying to zap the occupants. In a mean, cruel, brutal world, I guess I could only say try to create a tactical neutron device.
Slight tangent:
My feeling, my GUT feeling, is that when you're outgunned, out teched, and out inteled, then you simply have to play dirty, no question about it. If I were a potential adversary of the US or UK, I'd be paying a staff the best money I could to counter every or any tactic that could be used against me. Then, I'd have hit teams that used dissimilar tactics, even during a joint strike. Predictability is the bane of most attack plans, and lacking trillion-dollar budgets should not disqualify me or anyone completely from the game.
(Rant mode On)
David Syes (formerly nick-named TAO/Tactical Action Officer)
That is why when I was a sailor sprung with only 5 minutes to plan and start a security alert on my ship, I decided to get even with the command duty officers. See, the first few times of selecting me (for being gung-ho a sailor) they gave me 45 minutes to plan and set into motion an idea along the general guideline SOPA (Senior Officer Present Ashore) laid out for ships berthed at that given base. Typical crap like "Reason for Security Alert: Morphene Locker broken into"/"Ship's Post Office broken into"... I got sick of that and got a bit unconventional, being devious enough to "kill off" officers and if I accidentally called out "bang-bang; your'e dead" to an enlistedman, I'd resurrect them, just to watch them stand around stupid, not passing the word.
I got to the point in one scenario that I almost got myself shot. One guy locked and loaded his Mossbruger/12 guage on me after witnessing me aurally identify and verbally halt each approaching SecAlert Team member while I was holed up in an Aux Machinery room. I countered every single wishy-washy-wuss-assed attempt of the Command Duty Officer to "secure security alert" on me. Every time he refused to cooperate with my "terrorist" demands, I chopped 5 or 10 minutes off the hour I gave him. When I unrealistically reduced the time for him to react to my demands, I let him know what kind of "casing of the ship" I did to embarrass him. In seconds I seized upon the idea, but posited it to him as though I'd planned it for weeks. Since my courier bag (I was a radioman) was leather, the guy with the shotgun hearing me bitch at the CDO over the squawk box didn't know if I was real or not, and with all my adrenaline and bloold-rush going a mile a second I didn't register his locking and loading on me. I did let him approach because I needed a "talker" to relate first-hand observation of my adaptivity to a 5-minute scenario that I dragged on for over 45 minutes to an hour. I was intent on making the 8-O'Clock repors be late, and I was intent on making this particular duty section of officers (some of them, at least) miss the beginning of some movie. And, I wanted to prove to them that we (at the time, 1987) had LOUSY training for the enlisteds to actually secure and move the ship out of a hostile siege-type situation. In this case, tho, we were in LBNSY (Long Beach Naval Ship Yard), and to drive my point home about lousy screening, I claimed I had high-shooters in the pier cranes ready to kill anyone attempting to board or debark from the ship, and that if I were shot were I stood, a "pressure-sensitive, electro-actuated, time-activated detonator" would set off charges I placed in strategic locations about t
Second, nearly-simultaneous shot: pile of metal shards, similar to the stuff that knocks out enemy powerplants.
So, if a military opponent has the finances or resources, they might consider letting the first round be "sacrificial" so that the tank's/vehicle's defensive electric circuit is activated.
Then, the death-blow might be the two-seconds-later drop of grounding/shorting chips.
Alternatively, here is another type of weapon: Close-In-Shorting-Weapon... CISW...
The enemy (whomever it is) has cabled or tethered missiles that don't aim to penetrate sabot-style. It just fuses itself upon an immediate slow-down at the tank or vehicle. Upon fusing, it activates a mega-amp/mega-watt, mega-joule "special delivery" to zap the shit out of whomever and whatever is in the tank. It could ignite fuel, any liquids such as blood, coolants, lubricants, and even external equipment.
I imagine the deliver payload would have to come in subsonic, near-to-overhead, brake, then deploy a zap-net onto the target, and then activate itself from the cabled launching vehicle. But, this means an immense power supply, probably a tank with an auxiliary turbine just to deliver the charge.
On the other hand, a small nuclear cell could non-explosion-wise activate delivered huge, melting capacitor that fuzes onto the tank some electrically-activated goo. Maybe it seals the air intakes to immobilize the tank. Maybe it melts or obstructs the driver's view ports; maybe it welds the turret so it cannot turn nor permit elevation of the gun barrel. Maybe it welds the struck tracks so the tank or tracked vehicle pushes it's own ass into a violent, vulnerable circular path.
Actually, the OSDL is NOT in Portland. It is a bit off Hwy 26, but the Max and Trimet go there. I once met Bill Kerr, who used to live in my very apartment complex. He thought I was an engineer, but I professed honestly that I only dabbled in Linux. But, it was hard then and now, at my level, to get even a jr tech assist position. Funny thing is I didn't know until after Feb or March 2003 that OSDL existed, and that I several times drove by it and rode by it on the bus.
Now, I'm back in San Jose, but I still miss the Portland area. Especially Powell's City of Books.
Linus, maybe you'll be at the Open Source convention in Portland by July. It would be cool if once in a while you can give talks at Powell's Technical Books.
WELCOME to the Portland area.... Be sure to try the restaurants. For those who like to see wild things, hang out near Burnside. There is a pizza parlor catercorner to Powell's City of Books. LOTS of teens and older adults ride things on wheels from atop the hill, down some 2 to 4 miles I understand. I never got a chance to see it, but it's supposed to be a "thing" to see in Portland.
BTW, if you like yacts that look like surface ships, see the 223' Skat, by Lu^..rseen (sorry I don't know how to create uumlat, or the double dots above the "u")
http://www.tankfill.com/yachtjobs/hpcompressors/ sk at233lurssen/
http://www.tankfill.com/yachtjobs/hpcompressors/ sk at233lurssen/doorway.html
Subarines:
http://www.tankfill.com/submersibles/submersible s. shtm
A rendering, with questions about when Larry Ellison was going to buy his new yacht is at:
http://powerandmotoryacht.zeroforum.com/zerothre ad ?id=55&postid=1020
Maybe the Swedish stealth craft use these kinds of underwater lights (from whatever nation provides competitive pricing, I suppose... the one I linked here is just for visual use...):
What if the car has an onboard amplifier/booster to ensure that the driver's own license RFID is tied to the operation of the vehicle, or at least logged. This means it would be hard to say, "Your Honor, I lent my car to a friend, a friend whom I now cannot find..."
Actually police could just "interrogate" the cars as they pass by. This could facilitate finding perps ANY time of the day, if they're dumb enough to stay in one place.
Imagine Dragnet meets Hussein... The cops are setting up a stealth-net trying to track down and put away their bread and butter (reason for existence) and the bad guys end up living in the sewers, hiding in culverts, dumpsters, and (if they can afford to pay off the right people) atop skyscrapers.
Cops (in some states, reminiscing the Elliot Ness Days): "C'mon on OUT, JOHNNY! We know you're in 'der. We'r'a read'n' 'ya 5-by-5"
Cops (maybe in Tx?): "Steh-yup... aoutt uvvv the vee-hick-hul. Hou'd up ya' ID card and stick outtt yur face so we can verify yo' face agayunst yo' ee-lek-tronuk infero-telemetry- sig-noll..."
Anyway, Blade Runner, Logan's Run, Terminal Man, and Terminator might be closer than we think... Just toss in some 1984, Soylent Green, Rage, and Mad Max Beyond Thunder Dome, Escape From New York, and some serious Mad Cow Disease, there WILL be a reason to tag all of us...
Would it become illegal to swap tires with a buddy? It currently is not illegal, as long as the tires fit the rims and the rims are safe for the vehicle. Normally, in some states, you're required to report to your DMV when you move into or out of the state, some within 5-20 days of leaving and 30 of arriving.
I wonder what would happen to people who fire pellet gun shot at all the license plates (if/when it arrives here in the US). I guess we'll have to cough up taxes to have anti-vandal cameras mounted streetside, and more for transportation, doc, tax and title fees for cars to be equipped with forensic sensors...
"Several weeks ago, unconfirmed reports from Germany said the author of the Phatbot Trojan worm was also involved in the theft. In both instances, neither Valve nor the authorities offered any comment."
For a moment, this made me wonder if Valve and others, including microsoft (lower-casing/deprecation intentional) routinely insert trojans into their source code so that it can lie dormant, awaiting the "Wake UP! Report your location" code.
Is it plausible that companies paranoid of losing their IP during or after development cycles would insert code that has to be "shut down" to prevent "sounding the alarm"?
This is what I mean: Rather than inserting into beta or gold or release software some passive code that waits to be polled, instead the code has to be periodically shut down.
Of course, if a technical person ran a packet sniffer to find out what or whether their copy of the software was leaking burst signals "to call home and report its location", there'd likely be some serous, umm, serious hell to pay.
On the other hand, I guess I don't personally have a problem with such a scheme, since I'd rather have a legit, unique, assigned-to-me authorization code. But, if the software does NOT enforce a unique code, then I have to suppose the maker or disributor secretly wants maximum diffusion or user exposure in the hopes that the users will "come clean" or go legit.
They ARE ships. Affectionately, and for "community differentiation" the sneakers make sure they are different from the blackshoes (surface community), just as the brownshoes (aviation) community does.
Submarines over 50 feet long essentially are boats in "parlance" but not in practicality. They can sail for months, remain submerged til their food runs out or they suffer a fire or some other environment-poisoning casualty, or have been lobbed some depth bombs which migth be the international code for "surface-on your own in one piece, or we shall FORCE you to surface or break you up for not surfacing under orders."
Boats are craft that can be hauled aboard a servicing or mother ship. Or they can be craft that are somewhat too large to haul aboard any number of sihps, but more often than not they have such limited duration for independent operation that they effectively depend upon outside resources to resupply, refuel, and repair.
Subs initially were so small they were boats that could, for a limited duration, submerge. Now, thanks to nuclear power and long-charge batteries, subs as big as they are, effectively are ships that submerge.
However, or moreover, submarines' endurance can exceed that of some surface craft described as "ships".
Here is an idea I have, and I incorporated it into some drawings I created to supplant the Burkes, in my effort to create a UN/new UN world police force, the fictitous or real mission of which is to "deprecate all flag-waving/power-projecting navies into nothing more than own-shore coastal patrol units".
My idea is this: Take several of the Harpoon cannisters (or if insufficient, resize them or replace them, such as with some of the VLM silos) and insert into them missile bodies which deploy surveillance drones. They can be autonomous, or they can be self-hovering by gas or other device. They act in the same manner for surface contacts as the P-3 Orion/its successor for subs.
Alternatively, for plane guard duties in really hot areas, a cannister can be a launcher for small rubber boats with a motor, medkit, food, and small arms for the pilot who ditches but is too much of a risk for the action group to stop for. At least with the small boat, and small radar signature, such a downed or ditched pilot could at least keep near the unit, or better yet, act as a live decoy. Even better, the rescue drones could be deployed to act as decoys if atmospheric and other variables lend favor to the fleet trying to gain tactical advantage.
USS Brooke was nicknamed "The Broke-dick Brooke", since she reputedly was always having problems getting underway...
Ahh, the affectionate names we came up for our ships.
My first ship was the USS Flint (AE-32), an ammo ship, named after Flint, Michigan. Many ammo ships have names like Pyro, Haleakala, etc. We nicknamed ours "Flexible Flint", since our then-CO, a Commander, was charging hard for Rear Admiral. Seems we got volunteered for almost anything ServGru One in Alameda had going.
My second ship was USS John A. Moore (FFG-19), nicknamed "The Jammin' John", since we seemed to charge hard for stuff. Our main space seemed to be spiffy, and that might be why, when as a NRF (Naval Reserve Force) ship, we were selected for advanced deployment to the Gulf in Nov 1987, from a pool of several other FFGs. But, we were given official notice maybe July. We got there.
But, remember the Yorktown, which, while using winbloze NT, went broke-dick in the Atlantic and had to be towed in disgrace, thanks to a divide by zero error. Has to STILL be embarassing for the USN.
As for finding the stealth ship... Just fly some RPV (drones) that drop or spew their own dronelets. Build a mesh over the target area. Anything that moves is going to be found, even small wave caps. Same principle as to how the stealth planes over Iraq were detected years ago: A bunch (or few) innocuous cell phone towers were built in strategic locations. The towers were sort of like inverse radars: Always on, but any aircraft passing thru created disruptions in the "mesh", giving away the location of the low-flying aircraft.
If enough "mesh-making" dronelets are spewed over an op area, NO navy, not even the vaunted USN would stay invisible except in the presence of extremely foul weather and the absence of aircraft or RORSAT. Maybe the subs would be the only hard-to-detect ships, but blue-green laser and other improvements might upset that advantage in some scenarios.
David Syes "TAO" (not the real one, just the nick-named one, due to my on-the-spot scenarios, such as: "Why do the Russians need to TORPEDO a carrier? Why not just swarm-lob low-yield nukes in the direction of the carriers, warp the flight deck, and make it tough for aloft birds to land. A CV without a flight deck is almost USEless..."
How **timely** this is:
http://trends.newsforge.com/trends/04/06/09/144724 5.shtml?tid=136&tid=137&tid=20&tid=85
and the "scathing attack" reply...
Regards...
No, it IS the fault of ms, too. To use your analogy, I could go and rape someone on an island not governed by law. Nevermind her citizenship on another land, right?
That ms has an army of purportedly non-stupid (however arrogant or greedy) lawyers says they surely must come to a consensus that it's ultimately a toss-up, a grab bag. So, why not go for it, right? They're so voracious a bunch of ogres that they must not have bothered looking for prior art.
One problem with the patent law is that a broad enough, baseless, yet awarded patent could cause untold grief and stop-development/stop-ship out of fear that ms will come along and demand royalties or outright cessation of work.
Yes, the blame goes to the USPTO for upholding questionable practices or rule/regulations, but the business or individual filing when said filing is specious or warrantless at best also shares part of the fault.
No, microsoft is NOT off the hook, not by a longshot.
(Lower-casing/deprecation of microsoft (aka microshaft's) name is intentional, irreversible, and enduring. I guess they'll go and get a patent on forcing the proper-casing of electronic representation of corporate and other propernames in any electronic medium, whether search engine, home computer or PDA or cell phone, or LED signage... Sheesh)
Give us a break, USPTO/desperate/frivolous patent filers.
It's an OBVIOUS thing. The analog is putting a bunch of Post-Its in a book to come back later for review.
Break points in apps sort of do the same thing, even if only for the duration of that debugging session, don't they?
The USPTO is full of buffons subject to whatever corporation can bog them down and distract them.
Patents should be open to PUBLIC review BEFORE the public has to find out after the fact when the USPTO is already too reluctant to reverse the granting or even politically spineless enough so they don't fine ms or other companies for such shenanigans.
It shouldn't MATTER that ms is doing this in some mode of helping the developer return to an unfinished section. The analog is there in many ways in life: didn't finish painting a room? Put up some tape. Got an open manhole cover? Put up a guard, some orange cones, and part a heavy-assed truck in the way.
Baking a cake, and don't trust the oven's timer? Set it anyway, and set the separate counter-top kitchen timer.
What ms is claiming patent status for is not a novel or non-inevitable thing. They're just trying to bog down inventors and threaten others out of developing on a scale that might someday annoy ms.
It's why I feel that microsoft must perish, unless they clean up their act. They won't, so they must perish.
Slashdot Mirror
Ven veelll the ting be "svelt", mahnn?
The dummies who cooked up the hair-brained scheme are as resource-wasteful as AOL is. A movement has been afoot to force AOL to collect and properly shred/recycle the 10s of millions of disks they've dumped on millions of people over the years.
When I worked at an encoder/mux video tech company, I advocated and communicated that virtually ALL manufacturers equipment using umpteen amounts of plastic, foam, cardboard, wood, and metal should be required to recover and recycle or at least reuse the materials.
One problem is that for refund or RMA reasons, the recipients of the goods protected by all that material have to hang on to it so the goods are safely returned. Many can, and probably do, recycle them. However, the manufacturers would be forced to innovate and shrink their large products to things very small.
Merchandise packaging also needs to be reduced. I once heard and watched on a news expose (I suppose it could be referred to as such a thing) that MOST packaging is intentionally bright and colorful to induce impulse buying. Moreover the stuff is large to deter or prevent or expose shoplifting.
I have a strange and sad feeling that most people, especially in non-recycling communities (home-owners associations (some of my friends live in some), lazily-managed apartments, and poor areas) are STILL not doing enough to increase recycling.
The best way to deal with this problem is to educate people to not buy products that don't use recyclable packaging. A demo product can be on display, but the bought product gets taken home in the lowest-grade of ink possible so that recycling can be facilitated. A discount could be offered for purchasers who buy without the packaging. It would take getting used to, but it could be swung.
Well, it would be "a gas". They'd probably be pushed into another (likely very undesirable) orbit or course.
....)
What would REALLy be interesting is to find out if they will take inflatable dolls or REALDOLLS.
Inflatables save space, but REALDOLLS are closer to the real thing, except still inanimate, but articulable. The astro/cosmo/labidonauts would have firm, reliable, pliant company and not break too many rules.
I wonder if some boby will get a test case for this and bring back the weird NASA/Aerospace days, such as when a real live bear was ejected from an airplane to test the ejection system (hmmm, wouldn't a bear's body withstand an ejection better than a human's?), or when monkeys/chimps purportedly were placed into orbit.
Latex, in the FINAL frontier;
these are lurid tales of the inflata-broth(el)-- sexer-prise
her ongoing mission, to seek out
new styles, and stable positions--
to boldly pose...
how no 'nauts have posed before...
(Luuu-rid, lurid- lu-lu-rid
loo-loo-rid, luu-rid, lu-lu-lu-lu-rid...
Yeh, you know what the parod subject is...
I am VERY suspicous of Akamai. I think they are an extension of carnivore, double-click and others unnamed to date. I tend to block them in my IDS/firewall.
Admittedly, I have not dug into them, but ANYbody can have a company front for an intelligence/security activity.
DAVID the suspicious...
WOW! I love that.
But, imagine if civil disobedience crowds wore this stuff. I wonder what it would look like from heli-cams or orbital devices.
It might confuse the hell out of sharks, too. Especially if the makers can keep it from shorting out, and if it can project menacing images to deter the shark. Maybe it might be better to just give chemical repellents to the people in this predicament.
Halloween parties could be really freaky, especially if the shimmering effects make the kids laugh.
But, we would have problems if people in these digs (with audio effects) were running around shimmering and growling in Leisure World. Might kick some tickers into overdrive.
David Syes
Yes, velcro does make more noise when unfastening. Considering today's "integrated" (US) units (and our often exposed gender-immaturity when it comes to certain organizations being forced to deal with the issue), it is tempting (and probably underscores the concerns of some in the upper echelons) that mixing males and females in situations where they can get a little quick groin action is not good for morale. I personally don't mind, as long as the rest of the involved UNIT is mature and not pimping or sharing each other due to inadequate pay or such....
But, when I was in the bushes at Fort Ord, envying that pair, yes, back then we had buttons, and belts, and one zipper. Of course, I guess those fanny-zippers or U-shaped slats (yes, with an "a") must be comical AND worrisome...
You're right: they could care less about privacy. Likely thing is, tho, the squad leader probably had so much blood rushing thru his ears he didn't hear me *not* move forward. I was already covered/concealed and I think he lost track of me. I guess I wanted to vicariously savor the moment under moonlight juxtaposed with being hunted down by trained search teams.
As for paintball guns, my point is not to KILL the incoming/invading occupiers, but to put the fear of HELL into them that they COULD have been struck lethally. I generally prefer non-denigrating, non-violent, non-lethal, less-than-lethal interaction. I think that for a nation being invaded that wants help, but not full-on occupation, paintballing the excess occupation would send a clear signal that less-than-lethal is on the minds of the paintballers. But, it makes it so inconvenient for those struck, since they are not likely to be carrying an extra pair of uniforms with which to swap.
Alternatively, a deceptive and unwelcoming set of city dwellers could use this type of ruse to disorient, delude, and demoralize by following up with, as you suggest (and which I also earlier implied or stated) REAL guns. The "crazy moustrap like action" serves a useful purpose of extra training for the indigenous, non-lethal target practice at the expense of the excess troop body/head count.
Dropping/pouring paint from the rooftops is hellaciously messy and environmentally-unfriendly, but it sure as hell would make it inconvenient and dangerous for nice and dry troops to venture in too deep. My kind of "assymetric" wafare is a David-style of PsyOps, counter-ops. I don't need to use (or even suggest) lethal, bruising, or puncturing/burning implements. Anyone resorting to such barbary is lower than scum and deserves the most brutal of punishments, lingering and to the bring of death. Torture really is abused and used on too many who don't merit it. Most people presented with it probably don't merit it.
(I am wondering if a little bit of Hollyweird slipped into the minds of the clothiers and generals in the Pentagon... Sure, urban warfare is a legit concern, but indigenous people expecting to be invaded can also passively nullify the uniforms by changing the ground and next 4 floors's walls' colors. Psychologically, the generals must feel a need to show decorum by taking the "jungle" look and "city-boying" it. I do admit it looks "kinda dumb" to be traipsing around a concrete, glass and steel city in jungle cammo...)
Anyway, I mainly wanted to suggest that if the uniforms are supposed to be some sort of solution or panacea, the locals almost ALWAYS have the least expensive, near-term (and maybe long-term) home advantage.... Well, unless satellites, laser designators, and defectors root out the home defenses. I advocate defensive posture, and not offensive on other's soil unless a majority world vote OK's it. Unilateral action is for pushovers. Pushovers usually get pushed out. VN is a good example of the homefield advantage. Afghanistan is another. One was wet, mushy, filled with boobytraps, tics, leeches, and brutally capable, tho greatly less technical forces. The second is a set of people who don't need to acclimatize in Denver or the Appalachians o
The new uniforms won't be worth a DAMN if the urban warfare enemies get ahold of paint guns and manage to hit their marks or set off non-leathal booby-trapped paint cylinders disguised as transformers or telco boxes. One painter for every attacking squad.... Pelletize one or more new-uniform-wearing guys. Any number of parked vehicles on the procession/line of advance can do the trick. Or, unruly, unwelcoming citizens atop the buildings will paint an UGLY picture. Even just pouring paint on the ground will force troops to detour. DAMN! Wonder what RAND and others in Pentagon (Pin-tu-guhn) are thinking about THAT!
...men and men or men and women or women and women
4 06 14/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/army_new_uniform_3
But, with a twist: Put UV/day-glo/night-glo paint balls in the gun. Fire away! For even more twist, if I were the enemy, I'd place urban Geiger counters about the place in advance of being invaded. Then, after painting the "enemy" wearing so-called new/valuable uniforms, I'd paint and roentgen their asses. Of course, they could drop Geiger-confusing isotopes to dampen or mask their own relative positions, but...
Seems to me the new uniforms are NOT going to get the mileage the taxpayer is being fed to believe...
Other information regarding replacing the zippers with velcro..
Replacing the zippers with velcro means that...
soliders, ummm, soldiers in the field cannot "covertly" or quietly undress and fondle each other and get away with it, too.
I know, personally, because when I was in Navy ROTC (1983-1984), our uniforms had buttons and zippers. At Monterey, (Fort Ord) during "Boot Camp Week", we were out at night on a SERE (survival/escape/resistance/evasion) maneuver, to see how long we could forage along in the woods without being caught by real Army guys. (We were pretty good... one Active-Duty Army squad walked RIGHT OVER us. They were inches from stepping on me, but missed us all (the squad I was in, at least, but later--HOURS later, near the end, we eventually were caught, but HOURS later). SHIT! We were GOOD. And, at least they didnt' cheat with NVG (night vision goggles) or the like, but they did use flares and other stuff to try to flush us out.) Some of us regularly on the weekends played 'wargames' in the woods of Ed Levin Park in Milpitas, often making the senior citizens there think "Red Dawn" was happening for real....
Anyway, a squad leader (male high school student) and another cadet/student (female) from two diff h/s had a "thing" for each other. The squad leader had the rest of us move along, and they fell back to have some private time. They were screwing only some 8 to 15 feet away from me... I was jealous, but I didn't report them.
So, I thought of all that when I read about the
zippers being replaced... Velcro might make it easier to undress people in medical emergencies, but in the woods, it destroys privacy for same-squad sex/booty buddies...
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/200
Archerite. I wonder if they can run to their court and rename the 1-year old...
You know, that's got to be an "astronomical hole in one". It even bounced after falling into the cup.
Fortunately, the young archer was phase-shifted or time-displaced from the area of impact.
Links: inspiring: http://slashdot.org/articles/04/06/13/1325218.shtm l?tid=100&tid=137&tid=193
Others: http://www.flipstartpc.com/
What you have to go through to get a point across: http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/beta
Vibrant/active SmartSuite users community:
http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/ssforum.nsf?OpenData ba se
and:
http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/ssforum.nsf/ SortedAllT hreadedweb?OpenView&ExpandView&RestricttoCategory= Approach
Others:
Approach Users: http://www.xpertss.com/
Approach users: http://jabrown.customer.netspace.net.au/approach/i ndex.htm
FileMaker Pro http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_title= FileMaker-Pro-Gets-Overhaul&story_id=23323&categor y=databases#story-start
---
I watched the flash of the Flipstart. It show, clearly, ms win ce (wince/twitch) on the screen.
Well, maybe hardware manufacturers should REALLY start to "wince", since so many are still reluctant or intransigent about openly and actively adapting their roadmaps to quickly uptake the Linux kernel and Open Source software to move their hardware.
I am sure the cost of the wince-inducing win-ce costs must be a "heart-stop" to Flashtart. The cost of their production and development can dramatically come down if they appoint some pre-tested Linux/C/C++/Java developers who steer or guide or mentor their own developers. The cost of having a team of Linux-oriented developers could be something like granting them free devices for remaining on the team as a consultant of sorts. Maybe the retainer could include an opportunity to be paid, hired, or given more challenging work so as to build their individual resumes.
These companies need to become more creative and more adaptive and less schizoid about "oooh, or proprietary code... our investors will "flip-OUT"". No, such investors my be needing to be flipped-off and flung out, if they stodgily, intransigently hold back a company from taking a critical but necessary leap of faith.
If the leap of faith is unpalatable to the existing structure, then they should spin off one with the right to fold it back in once it proves itself as a proof of concept. If it bombs, at least it is outside of the main structure and can be gradually deprecated and suppressed if it is embarrassing enough. Otherwise, to just run one train and let it consume all the fuel is like refusing to offer a higher-speed, alternate express car between the regular runs. All they need is a spur and a shunt, and a diversion of resources to an open, but less-consuming set of eyes, assists, and sneak previews and some enticements plans.
An ideal I have to help get images and spreadsheets out of tiny and therefore almost useless PDAs is to make the PDA project the data to a receptive wall panel. The panels should run off AC, be light, carryable, and hangable. They could have an amplifier and a small Linux kernel that allows the flexi-screen to replace flatpanels. The device could act as a router or bridge or amplifier of data inputs so that multiple parties in a conference room can merge database data.
MySQL would be great tool for this, since InnoDB is transactional. People in meetings could ad-hoc create databases, run what-if scenarios, and maybe get a LOT more work done in such meetings.
Nurses and inventory personnel could move from room to room where the reception room or stockroom window itself is a smart-assed- piece of glass that reduces an undersized PDA to a mere input/conversation device that projects and receives data from a large screen.
In a fallback scenario, the device could be provided with a traditional AC adapter so it can have more oomph to deliver the images onto a standard, dark wall. So, if a stockroom has a flat surface, even the floor, the user could punch in or call up data, then project the information long enough to read i
Points well taken.
I should have remembered TOW-2. I know that some tanks in use have had Chobham armor maybe before 1989. I wouldn't be surprised if the UK mfr and the US FMC (Bradley FV builder) shared reactive armor insights.
As for the 1500 hp and 70+ tons momentum, I thinking of some sort of slacking system by which the paired double-tap strike allows **just** enough slack in the energizing/zapping cable. Maybe it would need to pay out at such a rate that even if the target tank tries to lurch, the slackened cable would not immediately snap.
I do admit the problem of trying to zap the occupants. In a mean, cruel, brutal world, I guess I could only say try to create a tactical neutron device.
Slight tangent:
My feeling, my GUT feeling, is that when you're outgunned, out teched, and out inteled, then you simply have to play dirty, no question about it. If I were a potential adversary of the US or UK, I'd be paying a staff the best money I could to counter every or any tactic that could be used against me. Then, I'd have hit teams that used dissimilar tactics, even during a joint strike. Predictability is the bane of most attack plans, and lacking trillion-dollar budgets should not disqualify me or anyone completely from the game.
(Rant mode On)
David Syes (formerly nick-named TAO/Tactical Action Officer)
That is why when I was a sailor sprung with only 5 minutes to plan and start a security alert on my ship, I decided to get even with the command duty officers. See, the first few times of selecting me (for being gung-ho a sailor) they gave me 45 minutes to plan and set into motion an idea along the general guideline SOPA (Senior Officer Present Ashore) laid out for ships berthed at that given base. Typical crap like "Reason for Security Alert: Morphene Locker broken into"/"Ship's Post Office broken into"... I got sick of that and got a bit unconventional, being devious enough to "kill off" officers and if I accidentally called out "bang-bang; your'e dead" to an enlistedman, I'd resurrect them, just to watch them stand around stupid, not passing the word.
I got to the point in one scenario that I almost got myself shot. One guy locked and loaded his Mossbruger/12 guage on me after witnessing me aurally identify and verbally halt each approaching SecAlert Team member while I was holed up in an Aux Machinery room. I countered every single wishy-washy-wuss-assed attempt of the Command Duty Officer to "secure security alert" on me. Every time he refused to cooperate with my "terrorist" demands, I chopped 5 or 10 minutes off the hour I gave him. When I unrealistically reduced the time for him to react to my demands, I let him know what kind of "casing of the ship" I did to embarrass him. In seconds I seized upon the idea, but posited it to him as though I'd planned it for weeks. Since my courier bag (I was a radioman) was leather, the guy with the shotgun hearing me bitch at the CDO over the squawk box didn't know if I was real or not, and with all my adrenaline and bloold-rush going a mile a second I didn't register his locking and loading on me. I did let him approach because I needed a "talker" to relate first-hand observation of my adaptivity to a 5-minute scenario that I dragged on for over 45 minutes to an hour. I was intent on making the 8-O'Clock repors be late, and I was intent on making this particular duty section of officers (some of them, at least) miss the beginning of some movie. And, I wanted to prove to them that we (at the time, 1987) had LOUSY training for the enlisteds to actually secure and move the ship out of a hostile siege-type situation. In this case, tho, we were in LBNSY (Long Beach Naval Ship Yard), and to drive my point home about lousy screening, I claimed I had high-shooters in the pier cranes ready to kill anyone attempting to board or debark from the ship, and that if I were shot were I stood, a "pressure-sensitive, electro-actuated, time-activated detonator" would set off charges I placed in strategic locations about t
First shot: initial blaster/penetrator.
Second, nearly-simultaneous shot: pile of metal shards, similar to the stuff that knocks out enemy powerplants.
So, if a military opponent has the finances or resources, they might consider letting the first round be "sacrificial" so that the tank's/vehicle's defensive electric circuit is activated.
Then, the death-blow might be the two-seconds-later drop of grounding/shorting chips.
Alternatively, here is another type of weapon: Close-In-Shorting-Weapon... CISW...
The enemy (whomever it is) has cabled or tethered missiles that don't aim to penetrate sabot-style. It just fuses itself upon an immediate slow-down at the tank or vehicle. Upon fusing, it activates a mega-amp/mega-watt, mega-joule "special delivery" to zap the shit out of whomever and whatever is in the tank. It could ignite fuel, any liquids such as blood, coolants, lubricants, and even external equipment.
I imagine the deliver payload would have to come in subsonic, near-to-overhead, brake, then deploy a zap-net onto the target, and then activate itself from the cabled launching vehicle. But, this means an immense power supply, probably a tank with an auxiliary turbine just to deliver the charge.
On the other hand, a small nuclear cell could non-explosion-wise activate delivered huge, melting capacitor that fuzes onto the tank some electrically-activated goo. Maybe it seals the air intakes to immobilize the tank. Maybe it melts or obstructs the driver's view ports; maybe it welds the turret so it cannot turn nor permit elevation of the gun barrel. Maybe it welds the struck tracks so the tank or tracked vehicle pushes it's own ass into a violent, vulnerable circular path.
David Syes,
TAO (Tactical Action Officer, (by nickname))
And so is Hillsboro.
/ Br onze-fiberglass.pdf
Actually, the OSDL is NOT in Portland. It is a bit off Hwy 26, but the Max and Trimet go there. I once met Bill Kerr, who used to live in my very apartment complex. He thought I was an engineer, but I professed honestly that I only dabbled in Linux. But, it was hard then and now, at my level, to get even a jr tech assist position. Funny thing is I didn't know until after Feb or March 2003 that OSDL existed, and that I several times drove by it and rode by it on the bus.
Now, I'm back in San Jose, but I still miss the Portland area. Especially Powell's City of Books.
Linus, maybe you'll be at the Open Source convention in Portland by July. It would be cool if once in a while you can give talks at Powell's Technical Books.
http://www.underwaterlightsusa.com/pdf/products
WELCOME to the Portland area.... Be sure to try the restaurants. For those who like to see wild things, hang out near Burnside. There is a pizza parlor catercorner to Powell's City of Books. LOTS of teens and older adults ride things on wheels from atop the hill, down some 2 to 4 miles I understand. I never got a chance to see it, but it's supposed to be a "thing" to see in Portland.
Regards...
Thanks.
/ sk at233lurssen/
/ sk at233lurssen/doorway.html
e s. shtm
2 00 3-Articles/The-Best-of-the-Best-2003-Megayachts-Lu rssen.asp
7
e ad ?id=55&postid=1020
/ Br onze-fiberglass.pdf
BTW, if you like yacts that look like surface ships, see the 223' Skat, by Lu^..rseen (sorry I don't know how to create uumlat, or the double dots above the "u")
http://www.tankfill.com/yachtjobs/hpcompressors
http://www.tankfill.com/yachtjobs/hpcompressors
Subarines:
http://www.tankfill.com/submersibles/submersibl
http://www.robbreport.com/Articles/Wings-Water/
http://www.yachtforums.com/forumdisplay.php?f=4
A rendering, with questions about when Larry Ellison was going to buy his new yacht is at:
http://powerandmotoryacht.zeroforum.com/zerothr
Maybe the Swedish stealth craft use these kinds of underwater lights (from whatever nation provides competitive pricing, I suppose... the one I linked here is just for visual use...):
http://www.underwaterlightsusa.com/pdf/products
Tell me, Derek,
How can I get modded up to your score? It seems we both agree, in tone and detail...
David Syes
And, to take it a bit further...
What if the car has an onboard amplifier/booster to ensure that the driver's own license RFID is tied to the operation of the vehicle, or at least logged. This means it would be hard to say, "Your Honor, I lent my car to a friend, a friend whom I now cannot find..."
Actually police could just "interrogate" the cars as they pass by. This could facilitate finding perps ANY time of the day, if they're dumb enough to stay in one place.
Imagine Dragnet meets Hussein... The cops are setting up a stealth-net trying to track down and put away their bread and butter (reason for existence) and the bad guys end up living in the sewers, hiding in culverts, dumpsters, and (if they can afford to pay off the right people) atop skyscrapers.
Cops (in some states, reminiscing the Elliot Ness Days): "C'mon on OUT, JOHNNY! We know you're in 'der. We'r'a read'n' 'ya 5-by-5"
Cops (maybe in Tx?): "Steh-yup... aoutt uvvv the vee-hick-hul. Hou'd up ya' ID card and stick outtt yur face so we can verify yo' face agayunst yo' ee-lek-tronuk infero-telemetry- sig-noll..."
Anyway, Blade Runner, Logan's Run, Terminal Man, and Terminator might be closer than we think... Just toss in some 1984, Soylent Green, Rage, and Mad Max Beyond Thunder Dome, Escape From New York, and some serious Mad Cow Disease, there WILL be a reason to tag all of us...
So, then,
Would it become illegal to swap tires with a buddy? It currently is not illegal, as long as the tires fit the rims and the rims are safe for the vehicle. Normally, in some states, you're required to report to your DMV when you move into or out of the state, some within 5-20 days of leaving and 30 of arriving.
I wonder what would happen to people who fire pellet gun shot at all the license plates (if/when it arrives here in the US). I guess we'll have to cough up taxes to have anti-vandal cameras mounted streetside, and more for transportation, doc, tax and title fees for cars to be equipped with forensic sensors...
"Several weeks ago, unconfirmed reports from Germany said the author of the Phatbot Trojan worm was also involved in the theft. In both instances, neither Valve nor the authorities offered any comment."
For a moment, this made me wonder if Valve and others, including microsoft (lower-casing/deprecation intentional) routinely insert trojans into their source code so that it can lie dormant, awaiting the "Wake UP! Report your location" code.
Is it plausible that companies paranoid of losing their IP during or after development cycles would insert code that has to be "shut down" to prevent "sounding the alarm"?
This is what I mean: Rather than inserting into beta or gold or release software some passive code that waits to be polled, instead the code has to be periodically shut down.
Of course, if a technical person ran a packet sniffer to find out what or whether their copy of the software was leaking burst signals "to call home and report its location", there'd likely be some serous, umm, serious hell to pay.
On the other hand, I guess I don't personally have a problem with such a scheme, since I'd rather have a legit, unique, assigned-to-me authorization code. But, if the software does NOT enforce a unique code, then I have to suppose the maker or disributor secretly wants maximum diffusion or user exposure in the hopes that the users will "come clean" or go legit.
They ARE ships. Affectionately, and for "community differentiation" the sneakers make sure they are different from the blackshoes (surface community), just as the brownshoes (aviation) community does.
Submarines over 50 feet long essentially are boats in "parlance" but not in practicality. They can sail for months, remain submerged til their food runs out or they suffer a fire or some other environment-poisoning casualty, or have been lobbed some depth bombs which migth be the international code for "surface-on your own in one piece, or we shall FORCE you to surface or break you up for not surfacing under orders."
Boats are craft that can be hauled aboard a servicing or mother ship. Or they can be craft that are somewhat too large to haul aboard any number of sihps, but more often than not they have such limited duration for independent operation that they effectively depend upon outside resources to resupply, refuel, and repair.
Subs initially were so small they were boats that could, for a limited duration, submerge. Now, thanks to nuclear power and long-charge batteries, subs as big as they are, effectively are ships that submerge.
However, or moreover, submarines' endurance can exceed that of some surface craft described as "ships".
Here is an idea I have, and I incorporated it into some drawings I created to supplant the Burkes, in my effort to create a UN/new UN world police force, the fictitous or real mission of which is to "deprecate all flag-waving/power-projecting navies into nothing more than own-shore coastal patrol units".
My idea is this: Take several of the Harpoon cannisters (or if insufficient, resize them or replace them, such as with some of the VLM silos) and insert into them missile bodies which deploy surveillance drones. They can be autonomous, or they can be self-hovering by gas or other device. They act in the same manner for surface contacts as the P-3 Orion/its successor for subs.
Alternatively, for plane guard duties in really hot areas, a cannister can be a launcher for small rubber boats with a motor, medkit, food, and small arms for the pilot who ditches but is too much of a risk for the action group to stop for. At least with the small boat, and small radar signature, such a downed or ditched pilot could at least keep near the unit, or better yet, act as a live decoy. Even better, the rescue drones could be deployed to act as decoys if atmospheric and other variables lend favor to the fleet trying to gain tactical advantage.
David Syes/"TAO"
And, the USS Ranger became "The Danger Ranger";
Kitty Hawk became "The SHITTY KITTY"
USS Brooke was nicknamed "The Broke-dick Brooke", since she reputedly was always having problems getting underway...
Ahh, the affectionate names we came up for our ships.
My first ship was the USS Flint (AE-32), an ammo ship, named after Flint, Michigan. Many ammo ships have names like Pyro, Haleakala, etc. We nicknamed ours "Flexible Flint", since our then-CO, a Commander, was charging hard for Rear Admiral. Seems we got volunteered for almost anything ServGru One in Alameda had going.
My second ship was USS John A. Moore (FFG-19), nicknamed "The Jammin' John", since we seemed to charge hard for stuff. Our main space seemed to be spiffy, and that might be why, when as a NRF (Naval Reserve Force) ship, we were selected for advanced deployment to the Gulf in Nov 1987, from a pool of several other FFGs. But, we were given official notice maybe July. We got there.
But, remember the Yorktown, which, while using winbloze NT, went broke-dick in the Atlantic and had to be towed in disgrace, thanks to a divide by zero error. Has to STILL be embarassing for the USN.
As for finding the stealth ship... Just fly some RPV (drones) that drop or spew their own dronelets. Build a mesh over the target area. Anything that moves is going to be found, even small wave caps. Same principle as to how the stealth planes over Iraq were detected years ago: A bunch (or few) innocuous cell phone towers were built in strategic locations. The towers were sort of like inverse radars: Always on, but any aircraft passing thru created disruptions in the "mesh", giving away the location of the low-flying aircraft.
If enough "mesh-making" dronelets are spewed over an op area, NO navy, not even the vaunted USN would stay invisible except in the presence of extremely foul weather and the absence of aircraft or RORSAT. Maybe the subs would be the only hard-to-detect ships, but blue-green laser and other improvements might upset that advantage in some scenarios.
David Syes
"TAO" (not the real one, just the nick-named one, due to my on-the-spot scenarios, such as: "Why do the Russians need to TORPEDO a carrier? Why not just swarm-lob low-yield nukes in the direction of the carriers, warp the flight deck, and make it tough for aloft birds to land. A CV without a flight deck is almost USEless..."
Umm. I meant how timely as a re-posting, since it's from Sept 2003. Nevertheless, the refresher is good timing...
How **timely** this is: http://trends.newsforge.com/trends/04/06/09/144724 5.shtml?tid=136&tid=137&tid=20&tid=85
and the "scathing attack" reply ...
Regards...
No, it IS the fault of ms, too. To use your analogy, I could go and rape someone on an island not governed by law. Nevermind her citizenship on another land, right?
That ms has an army of purportedly non-stupid (however arrogant or greedy) lawyers says they surely must come to a consensus that it's ultimately a toss-up, a grab bag. So, why not go for it, right? They're so voracious a bunch of ogres that they must not have bothered looking for prior art.
One problem with the patent law is that a broad enough, baseless, yet awarded patent could cause untold grief and stop-development/stop-ship out of fear that ms will come along and demand royalties or outright cessation of work.
Yes, the blame goes to the USPTO for upholding questionable practices or rule/regulations, but the business or individual filing when said filing is specious or warrantless at best also shares part of the fault.
No, microsoft is NOT off the hook, not by a longshot.
(Lower-casing/deprecation of microsoft (aka microshaft's) name is intentional, irreversible, and enduring. I guess they'll go and get a patent on forcing the proper-casing of electronic representation of corporate and other propernames in any electronic medium, whether search engine, home computer or PDA or cell phone, or LED signage... Sheesh)
Give us a break, USPTO/desperate/frivolous patent filers.
So what?
It's an OBVIOUS thing. The analog is putting a bunch of Post-Its in a book to come back later for review.
Break points in apps sort of do the same thing, even if only for the duration of that debugging session, don't they?
The USPTO is full of buffons subject to whatever corporation can bog them down and distract them.
Patents should be open to PUBLIC review BEFORE the public has to find out after the fact when the USPTO is already too reluctant to reverse the granting or even politically spineless enough so they don't fine ms or other companies for such shenanigans.
It shouldn't MATTER that ms is doing this in some mode of helping the developer return to an unfinished section. The analog is there in many ways in life: didn't finish painting a room? Put up some tape. Got an open manhole cover? Put up a guard, some orange cones, and part a heavy-assed truck in the way.
Baking a cake, and don't trust the oven's timer? Set it anyway, and set the separate counter-top kitchen timer.
What ms is claiming patent status for is not a novel or non-inevitable thing. They're just trying to bog down inventors and threaten others out of developing on a scale that might someday annoy ms.
It's why I feel that microsoft must perish, unless they clean up their act. They won't, so they must perish.
Moderator, THIS one should be modded up to at least a 4... I COMMAND YOU-- In the Name of the David, The Mac, and the Goalie Host...