Hey, the reason we are all so fascinated with pension plans here in IBM is that we all feel that much closer to an enforced retirement than our ages would seem to indicate.
But bless them all! Every time something like this happens, I feel just that bit more secure in my job, since there will always be a call for people who can, to help clear up disasters after they happen.
I am looking forward to the NHS computer system re-vamp, with BT and others running the program. It should guarantee me employment from now till retirement.
Actually, isn't Euler's formula Exp[i*theta] = cos[theta] + i*sin[theta] ? and then substitute in the value of pi into theta, and the more famous result appears.
Don't knock jolly olde England too hard. We have electric lights AND carpets here, and Rupert Murdoch beams almost endless channels of video crap at us. Despite that, radio is a medium that has qualities that surpass visual forms. Amongst others there is the encouragement of using one's imagination to give the listener an experience unlike that of the televisual media. Some of the most persistent, enjoyable shows either began on radio before arriving on TV (The News Quiz, The Goon Show, HHG2TG).. some simply existed on radio and are still dearly loved for it (Round the Horn, I'm Sorry I'll read that again, The Goon Show). It is part of the point of a good book, or radio show that it doesn't fill in all of the detail for you. Our imaginations are more capable than that. Ever had a vivid dream that was super-real ? Where did those pictures come from?
I feel sorry for you Colonials, who miss out on quality programming like this. A good thing that technology such as the Internet means that those who care enough can enjoy HHG2TG as well.
Wow! what a breath of fresh air. Someone who has come to the same conclusions I have. For the record, I live in the city - not in suburbia, and I have a 25 mile journey to work every day. I've worked for the same company for more than 25 years, and they have moved me from place to place as they've downsized, outsourced, offshored, relocated and just plain MOVED me. I could move again to try to keep up with them, but it wouldn't last more than a couple of years before they found me somewhere else to work. I ride a motorcycle to work every day, since public transport sucks, and I am on call. I can do some of my work at home, and I do; but so much of my life - where the stores are, how I shop, where I go to work, how I heat my home are all out of my hands. I would drive an electric vehicle, but there is no provision for recharging. I would drive a fuel cell vehicle, but I can't do more than lobby for the govenrment to take global warming and the dwindling suppy of oil seriously, and give us all the ability to use these alternatives.
Thanks for your post; you've revived my passion.
One hopes that the authorities would encrypt the data in the hope of stopping people from simply adding to their card. It wouldn't stop the problem of people copying a card with 50 bucks on, and then restoring that image - and their 50 bucks - back onto the card. However, I know that a lot of places that use magstripe (and chip) cards for small amounts of money do a periodic check back to the main database; you need to get data back to the database from all places - machines, stores, news stands - where you can legitimately increase the value of a card. If the value of the card magically increases, and there is no corresponding revenue activity, send out to all of the card writers, when the card is seen next to mark it as 'unreadable'. I think the machines out there can maintain a list of card serial numbers that are due for deactivation when they are next seen.
Many companies (IBM for instance) have technical bulletin libraries for exactly this purpose; if they can't justify the cost of the patent process for a particular idea, then they publish the idea to record a date for prior art 'discussions'. Several of the ideas I had in development (in long past days) were published and not filed.
I think its a good idea - but to be honest, it doesn't need to be a centralised database. Anything somewhere on the web that google can find would do for anyone searching for prior art. I think the real question is why the USPTO doesn't seem to think out of the box when determining if an invention passes the tests of being novel, or non-obvious for someone practiced in the field.
I couldn't agree more.. the amp and guitar together are the instrument, and overload (pre-amp and power amp) is an essential part of the tonal qualities of electric guitar. There are other subtleties - like iron core transformers, valve rectifiers that give tube amps/guitar particular characteristics. Now, my son has recently bought a new DSP based tube amp modelling preamp - and it does a good job; it is certainly useful for recording a guitar onto a computer, and it does give pretty much instant access to a wide range of simulated amps and cabs - but it still doesn't sound like the real thing.
Ah, a DOS story at last.
I managed to break my brand new graphics workstation (running DOS +Irma + +) by accidentally missing the colon from the command delete a:*.*
Took me a little while to replace everything from my current directory whose name began with 'a'...
3.141592653589793238462643383279 is the bit I know.. it was a mnemonic published in Scientific American donkeys' years ago (Now I, even I would celebrate in rhymes unapt).. had pi wrong for years since I couldn't spell
And another thing.. there are still sites out there that require IE. My bank requires IE for its online service.. my CRM/siebel application at the office requires IE... still have to have the dang thing on the computer for some things. (and yes, have vigorously complained to responsible parties asking them why they have locked into IE).
I seem to remember Oliver North being found out by an ancient IBM PROFS system storing emails for much longer than Ollie North thought they would.
He learned a long time ago that anything you type into a computer system ceases to be under your control. You can't determine if and when it is destroyed; who will read it during its digital life and who they might propagate it to.
Nik
Please can we GNU/Linux on PPC peeps have one too
on
Flash 7 for Linux Released
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
I've had many emails passed back and forth with Macromedia tech support.. there are versions for most Unix implementations, and MacOS 9 and X.. but not for Linux/PPC *sigh*.. it wouldn't be that difficult to run just one more compile, would it ?
I was interested enough to click the link, but I get the following;
Sorry
We at Showtime Online express our apologies; however, these pages are intended for access only from within the United States.
I don't recall ever seeing such a message before. This is now intriguing me so much I may have to log into my employer's intranet, choose a North America based proxy to get out onto the real Internet and have another try.
Actually I do have a copy of Win NT version 3.51 and the ARC boot diskette for PPC (but only boots on PREP machines, and the F50 above is not a PREP machine;-) ).. It does boot, it kind of works OK and its fine as an OS goes , but things that run in that environment are scarce. I think IBM dropped NT in a deal with Microsoft when M$ dropped NT support for MIPS.
Slashdot Mirror
Hey, the reason we are all so fascinated with pension plans here in IBM is that we all feel that much closer to an enforced retirement than our ages would seem to indicate.
But bless them all! Every time something like this happens, I feel just that bit more secure in my job, since there will always be a call for people who can, to help clear up disasters after they happen. I am looking forward to the NHS computer system re-vamp, with BT and others running the program. It should guarantee me employment from now till retirement.
Actually, isn't Euler's formula Exp[i*theta] = cos[theta] + i*sin[theta] ? and then substitute in the value of pi into theta, and the more famous result appears.
Don't knock jolly olde England too hard. We have electric lights AND carpets here, and Rupert Murdoch beams almost endless channels of video crap at us. Despite that, radio is a medium that has qualities that surpass visual forms. Amongst others there is the encouragement of using one's imagination to give the listener an experience unlike that of the televisual media. Some of the most persistent, enjoyable shows either began on radio before arriving on TV (The News Quiz, The Goon Show, HHG2TG) .. some simply existed on radio and are still dearly loved for it (Round the Horn, I'm Sorry I'll read that again, The Goon Show). It is part of the point of a good book, or radio show that it doesn't fill in all of the detail for you. Our imaginations are more capable than that. Ever had a vivid dream that was super-real ? Where did those pictures come from?
I feel sorry for you Colonials, who miss out on quality programming like this. A good thing that technology such as the Internet means that those who care enough can enjoy HHG2TG as well.
Doesn't make anything a good idea. Take nuclear weapons, computer virii, adware as examples ..
Wow! what a breath of fresh air. Someone who has come to the same conclusions I have. For the record, I live in the city - not in suburbia, and I have a 25 mile journey to work every day. I've worked for the same company for more than 25 years, and they have moved me from place to place as they've downsized, outsourced, offshored, relocated and just plain MOVED me. I could move again to try to keep up with them, but it wouldn't last more than a couple of years before they found me somewhere else to work. I ride a motorcycle to work every day, since public transport sucks, and I am on call. I can do some of my work at home, and I do; but so much of my life - where the stores are, how I shop, where I go to work, how I heat my home are all out of my hands. I would drive an electric vehicle, but there is no provision for recharging. I would drive a fuel cell vehicle, but I can't do more than lobby for the govenrment to take global warming and the dwindling suppy of oil seriously, and give us all the ability to use these alternatives. Thanks for your post; you've revived my passion.
One hopes that the authorities would encrypt the data in the hope of stopping people from simply adding to their card. It wouldn't stop the problem of people copying a card with 50 bucks on, and then restoring that image - and their 50 bucks - back onto the card. However, I know that a lot of places that use magstripe (and chip) cards for small amounts of money do a periodic check back to the main database; you need to get data back to the database from all places - machines, stores, news stands - where you can legitimately increase the value of a card. If the value of the card magically increases, and there is no corresponding revenue activity, send out to all of the card writers, when the card is seen next to mark it as 'unreadable'. I think the machines out there can maintain a list of card serial numbers that are due for deactivation when they are next seen.
Many companies (IBM for instance) have technical bulletin libraries for exactly this purpose; if they can't justify the cost of the patent process for a particular idea, then they publish the idea to record a date for prior art 'discussions'. Several of the ideas I had in development (in long past days) were published and not filed. I think its a good idea - but to be honest, it doesn't need to be a centralised database. Anything somewhere on the web that google can find would do for anyone searching for prior art. I think the real question is why the USPTO doesn't seem to think out of the box when determining if an invention passes the tests of being novel, or non-obvious for someone practiced in the field.
I couldn't agree more .. the amp and guitar together are the instrument, and overload (pre-amp and power amp) is an essential part of the tonal qualities of electric guitar. There are other subtleties - like iron core transformers, valve rectifiers that give tube amps/guitar particular characteristics. Now, my son has recently bought a new DSP based tube amp modelling preamp - and it does a good job; it is certainly useful for recording a guitar onto a computer, and it does give pretty much instant access to a wide range of simulated amps and cabs - but it still doesn't sound like the real thing.
Ah, a DOS story at last. I managed to break my brand new graphics workstation (running DOS +Irma + +) by accidentally missing the colon from the command delete a:*.* Took me a little while to replace everything from my current directory whose name began with 'a' ...
3.141592653589793238462643383279 is the bit I know .. it was a mnemonic published in Scientific American donkeys' years ago (Now I, even I would celebrate in rhymes unapt) .. had pi wrong for years since I couldn't spell
And another thing .. there are still sites out there that require IE. My bank requires IE for its online service .. my CRM/siebel application at the office requires IE ... still have to have the dang thing on the computer for some things. (and yes, have vigorously complained to responsible parties asking them why they have locked into IE).
Guess we will have to compile ..
I seem to remember Oliver North being found out by an ancient IBM PROFS system storing emails for much longer than Ollie North thought they would. He learned a long time ago that anything you type into a computer system ceases to be under your control. You can't determine if and when it is destroyed; who will read it during its digital life and who they might propagate it to. Nik
I've had many emails passed back and forth with Macromedia tech support .. there are versions for most Unix implementations, and MacOS 9 and X .. but not for Linux/PPC *sigh* .. it wouldn't be that difficult to run just one more compile, would it ?
I was interested enough to click the link, but I get the following;
Sorry
We at Showtime Online express our apologies; however, these pages are intended for access only from within the United States.
I don't recall ever seeing such a message before. This is now intriguing me so much I may have to log into my employer's intranet, choose a North America based proxy to get out onto the real Internet and have another try.
Actually I do have a copy of Win NT version 3.51 and the ARC boot diskette for PPC (but only boots on PREP machines, and the F50 above is not a PREP machine ;-) ) .. It does boot, it kind of works OK and its fine as an OS goes , but things that run in that environment are scarce. I think IBM dropped NT in a deal with Microsoft when M$ dropped NT support for MIPS.