I don't know why this is making slashdot... 'el cheap-o tablets are already here in every form you could ask for. Most of the cheap ones sacrifice battery life first, which sucks, but corners must be cut if you're going to be the cheapest thing with a touchscreen... and in some cases, a short battery life is not a deal breaker (ex. car computer; kitchen wall mounted touch display; media controller; etc).
We can't stop people from drinking and driving, so let's not regulate that either.
Shooting people is already regulated. Banning 3-D printed guns would be akin to (in your analogy) either outlawing alcohol (prohibition) or cars.
Or how about the booze angle... alcohol distribution is regulated, right? However, loads of people are legally making alcohol (especially wine and beer) at home, and the kits can be readily purchased all over the place, even in places that have made 99% of firearm ownership illegal (NYC).
Again, it's something anyone can make, just like with booze and an innumerable number of other things. Regulate the part that can be regulated if you must - sale and distribution of the physical product....but that's more-or-less already been done, and this is all just fear mongering (how many people have died as a result of printed weapons so far?)
So while they may have patented a design for a rectangular device, a competing device would need to infringe not only on that claim, but also on all of the other claims as well before it could be considered to be infringing on the patent itself.
Granted, the GP oversimplified the design patent, but what in that patent really made it all that worth of the design patent? If they had submitted just a rectangle, it would have been rejected, right? So there is a level of simplicity that is rejected. The elements they have laid claim on from that patent are, IMO, not only obvious, and with past precident, but natural to that type of device. Rounded corners? duh... no one would want really sharp corners in their pocket. Grid layout of icons? a grid... really... a grid? Square icons with round corners? Nah, I've never seen that before, nor would be be extremely obvious on a device that has both horizontal and vertical orientations, right?
I get what your'e saying, but you haven't listed all the features that made it worthy, and you provided no justification for them, and just made it sound more complex than it really was. The GP didn't list them all either, and over simplified it (to make a point). I read the GP's post as saying he believes the design patent covered far to simple/obvious of a thing, and it's silly that it was granted. I'm not sure if you're saying it was deserving of the patent or not, but I don't think anyone would argue it was for more than a rectangle. The question is, was it enough? The rectangle, and in particular the proportions, size, and contour, were at the center of the case, regardless if that is not all that was in the patent.
While I agree in spirit to much of what you're saying, I don't believe the requirements are as tight as you state, and the filesystem analogy is weak.
While most linux distros (maybe all) default to using an ext variant, they also work with many other filesystems. Tools have been updated to support multiple filesystems, and others remain filesystem-specific. The same could happen for Mir/X/Wayland.
Consider Mac OSX for a minute. It can run any X application after some re-compiling, but its native window manager doesn't do it. It's X support is not as good as a native X server, but it's good enough. Most popular apps have been patched or forked to support the native gui stuff. If QT and GTK gained Mir and Wayland compatibility, most apps could be recompiled to render directly to Mir/Wayland. For the edge cases, using a X compatibility layer that isn't quite as good would probably be just fine... at the very least, most users won't care or even notice.
The network transparency part has been discussed in depth. In the end, there needs to be a way to export a display from a remote machine to the local machine, which the compatibility layer will likely handle without a problem (any advanced features like 3d are unlikely to work well in those situations anyway). And there needs to be a way to export a local app to a remote machine - this will probably require using a different tool/protocol on the receiving end (ex vnc), but that's going to be sufficient for most of those edge cases that needed that as well.
Mir and Wayland will need a way to support X applications, but if they get proper support from the toolsets, then it doesn't need to be better, or even on par. As long as it works well enough and is stable, that'd be enough to start migration. I don't think either is there yet though.
Personally, I'd like to see someone implement the opposite - get Wayland running on top of X. It'd be pointless in the long run, but it would let the user choose which gets first class support on their system (ie. they could still run a mix of apps using both, and app developers don't have to worry about how few people are on Mir/Wayland). I'd be surprised if someone out there hasn't toyed with this yet, and maybe even demo'd it.
Basically the lousiest GPU you can buy, so long as it supports HDMI 1.4 or Displayport, can at least drive a 4k screen, probably even with basic-Windows-acceleration-effects, and screaming gamer gear should be able to even run relatively modern games at that resolution.
I'm all for the 4k tv's, cause I want one as a monitor, but your statement isn't entirely true. HDMI 1.4 can't drive 4k at the refresh rates we're all accustomed to - it only does 30fps. There are some screens out there that actually present themselves to the PC as two monitors... they take either two HDMI 1.4 inputs, or a displayport with a demux. On bootup on those split screens, you'll see all your screen squished into one half the monitor. It's an ugly hack to get 60fps. DVI-D can't handle it either. Point is, it'll need a new interface (HDMI 2, or display port, or thunderbolt) to perform normally, so none of those lousy GPU's are going to work well. They'll still function, and 30fps is enough for most day-to-day work, but I'm going to wait it out a bit:-)
85th percentile speed drivers are often going above the posted limit. So, on most highways they would be giving a rate break to those who speed and penalizing those who obey the speed limit?
The law fully supports going with the flow of traffic. If everyone is going 20mph in a 60mph zone because it's foggy, you'd better be doing around 20 yourself as well, even if you can see just fine, even though 45 is supposed to be the minimum speed. Ditto if everyone is doing 70 in a 45.. if you're doing 40, you're a hazard, even if that's the speed. So yes, they should give a break to those that are within the 85th percentile.
Also, if this is just a device that monitors speed, acceleration, driving distance etc it's not going to know about some of the stupidest/most dangerous driving decisions - running red lights, talking on a cell/texting/eating while driving, cutting people off, tailgating, road rage, etc.
Many of those will directly correlate to the values they are monitoring. Ex. tailgating and road rage will result in sharp acceleration and hard braking while going fast (on the highway). Sharply swerving because you weren't paying attention (texting, eating, etc) will also show as short sharp lateral acceleration (if it records that). I'm not saying it's perfect, but it can provide a lot of insight without being overly intrusive (gps + association with current speed, etc).
I do have concerns about its use under legal settings (response to some accident). Then again, many new cars these days already keep a short log of this sort of information. This also sounds a lot more like a progressive commercial than an actual article. Oh well.
I say it again: something was lost with the death of Blockbuster. Online streaming may be more convenient, but it's definitely not better.
I'm happy to see Blockbuster go, but only because that keeps the door open for mom-and-pops video rental places. In my experience, they're cheaper, friendlier, less strict on late fees and such, and the selection is great (rather than 100 copies of the latest blockbuster, there's a couple, and a couple of all kinds of other stuff too), and they can order stuff in if asked.
That said, I think there's a huge missed opportunity from the cable companies. Technically, they should be able to offer on demand of all programming they offer, at least for a few days past air date. Localize the data in existing distribution points. They're already pulling the data down there. The on demand would only use the last mile. Should be cheaper and faster than what anyone else can offer. It'd be like Akamai, but the incoming data feed is already there, and they could have far more distribution and no need for renting their own space (ie. much cheaper). Content licensing is another issue, but I'm ignoring that cause it's an artificial barrier:-)
Oh well, let's burn up a ton of bandwidth from end to end and shut down the reasonable businesses. Heck, if cable/satalite wasn't so (artificially) expensive, much of the streaming would never have happened.
Ugh... did you not read the parent post at all? He didn't say all bicyclists were super respectful and safe there. Quite the opposite in fact. The point is one CAN be safe, and its often the poor choices of a cyclist that cause the issues (not always, and drivers and pedestrians could do a lot better too).
For a long time (maybe still occuring) there is one road on Stanford land where the bikes will ride side by side blocking the entire lane while ignoring the bike lanes
I would be surprised if local laws say that's wrong. It's also well established that, when a bike lane is more-or-less the gutter or berm of the road, it's far safer to travel in the actual lane with traffic. Most driving laws state that cars must treat bicycles as vehicles, so they may not pass them unless it is completely safe. If there is just one bike in the actual lane, the car should not pass unless there is another lane or they are on a dashed-line divided road where they can go into the oncoming traffic lane safely. However, most cars will try to squeeze by if there is just one bike near the side of the road, which can be dangerous. Furthermore, the drier is less likely to even see the cyclist if it's over to the far right all by themselves - driving double wide is considered by many to be a safety measure.
In short, I doubt they're doing it to piss off drivers. Pissed off drivers are the most dangerous, and it's obvious who wins if they play bumper cars.
As far the trails, I don't know what you are referring to specifically, but my experience has been that usually happens when the trail is a shared trail, and the trail clearly states that slower runners/walkers/cyclists/etc should remain to the right. If there's a group walking side-by-side, they are going to get yelled at by anyone jogging, running, skating, cycling, etc. It's like two cars side by side on the highway doing 50 in a 65 zone - that's violating the law, rules, and social contract, so get the fuck out of the way.
I'm not trying to be an apologist for all cyclists. Many of them are assholes, as are many people using all modes of transportation. But that's was kinda the GP's point - you always have to expect everyone else to be making mistakes. It's rule one of defensive driving, and applies to all modes of transit.
If you're biking on a sidewalk you're wrong (99.999% of the time). If you're jaywalking, you're wrong (99...etc) If you're driving in the bus or bike lane; wrong. If you're walking in the bike lane; wrong. Loitering in the middle of the street (one of your example); wrong. If you think you have some exclusive right to the place you are going, wrong. This isn't difficult, but it feels like you have a bias against cyclists, whether your on foot on in your car. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe your coworker is right, and you should get on a bike, if not for daily commute, then just so you understand that group better. I hope I'm just wrong, and you're just ranting:-)
The HD2000 series from 3 generations ago already beat your 8800GT. The current Iris 5200 sits between a GeForce 9800 and a GeForce 280 in terms of performance.
That page shows the HD 2000 on par with cards like Nvidia FX 5800, or ATI X1400. HD 3000 is shows around Nvidia 6600 GT, or ATI X1600 PRO. HD 4000 is shows around Nvidia 6800 GT or 7600 GT, or ATI X800 XT or HD 3650. The HD 2500, HD 4200, HD 4400, HD 4600, HD 5000, Iris 5100, and Iris 5200 are not listed there.
I know that's not a benchmark, and I was curious, so I looked up some random PassMark G3D scores: PassMark - G3D Mark 4255 Radeon 7870 4116 GeForce GTX 660 1677 Radeon 5770 (came with mac pro in 2012) 1572 GeForce GT 750M (what's in macbook pro 15" now) 1288 GeForce 640 922 Intel Iris Pro 5200 757 GeForce 8800 GT 718 GeForce 9800 GT 711 Radeon HD 5570 654 GeForce GT 240 632 Radeon HD 2900 PRO 628 Intel Iris 5100 606 GeForce 8800 GTS 599 Intel HD 4600 598 Intel HD 5200 544 Radeon HD 4670 515 Intel HD 5000 490 Intel HD 4400 487 GeForce GT 335M 477 Intel HD 4600 476 Radeon HD 7550M 461 Intel HD 4000 306 Intel HD 3000 216 GeForce 7900 GS 208 Radeon HD 7340
The Iris Pro 5200 looks alright, but it's far from common (the MacBook Pro is the only line I can find with one in a laptop), and I really doubt an HD 2000 is going to compare at all with an 8800GT. The above benchmark isn't the greatest, but it should get the ballpark right.
The advantage over rsnapshot is efficiency and simplicity. All those zillions of hard links behind rsnapshot's strategy are time consuming to create and delete.
I love rsnapshot, but the zillions of hard links can indeed be difficult to work with. I recently had to copy the backup data to another server/disk. I initially reached for rsync to do the job, and it couldn'thandle it (same issue with BackupPC pools, btw) - ran out of memory. Ended up using cpio (I think it was something like "find . -depth -print | cpio -pdm/destination/path"). One can stick ssh in the pipe too to get it to a remote location if needed. While this worked, it still took a LONG LONG time, and it's not a solution for keeping two copies of the rsnapshot destination in sync (would need something like block level mirroring, like raid1 on ndb). Long story short, zfs elegantly solves many of the edge cases that other systems still struggle with.
Question 5 was my favorite WTF. ==== 5. Find the missing part.
Write the numbers.
[9]
o o o o [ ]
___ ___
part I know missing part ==== (the o's are pennies, and the [ ] is a box) (slashdot is messing up the formatting, or I'm not doing it right) The student filled in: _9_ _5_...and got it wrong. Yeah, they *wanted* a different answer, but he's still right. What part does he know? The big "9" in the box. What part was missing? The 5, which he got right.
If this were for an older student, and if the style of questions was explained and examples provided, then I'd understand that they should listen and comprehend what is expected with certain types of questions, but this is a first grader. The expectations should be very obvious.
Before you write that off as something the student should have understood, take question 6, which is right next to it:
==== Complete the picture. Write a subtraction sentence. 6. Jennifer has 6 guitar picks.
She gives 4 guitar picks to
her students. How many
guitar picks are left?
[6]
| o | |
| o | |
| o | |
| o | |
__ - __ = __ ==== The student got this one right: _6_ - _4_ = _2_... but the "6" is right under the part of the picture that has 4 dots in it (and yes, they're black circles, not triangles as a guitar pick would be... that's just one more stupid little detail that doesn't matter much, but shows the poor quality of the test).
So what is it? Do they write the number that represents the whole first, or the number that represents the dots above the answer line?
There's so much wrong with this test. Even the way it was marked by the teacher is, IMO, in bad form. Incorrect answers have their question number circled, and correct ones have a check mark in the middle of the question space. To see why that's wrong, just look at the students answer in question 8. It's a multiple choice question. He put an "X" through the three he thought were wrong, and circled the one he thought was right. "Circle" means right; "X" means wrong". They expect the child to circle correct answers, but they circle incorrect questions.
BTW, anyone know when they started referring to math problems as "number sentences" and "subtraction stories"? Mixing reading comprehension and math seems like another unnecessary complication for a first grade test.
Can someone tell me why these financial institutions are never forced to compensate the *individuals* that suffer from these events?
Seriously? Because that would complete the loop, and someone has to be putting in more than they're taking out.
Granted, "financial institutions" is a pretty broad term, so I'm not entirely certain which situation you are talking about, but since you mentioned the mortgage stuff, I'm currently assuming you mean the big thing involving the banks and the gov't bail out to them. Doesn't really matter which situation though... someone has to lose. It's just like Vegas - lots of individuals put in money hoping for a payout; the house takes a healthy cut; most people lose; enough win that it still looks attractive to suckers; regulations keep it from being outright robbery.
Regardless of how we got there, the banks needed bailed out or loads more people would get hurt. We, the people, bailed them out (taxes -> gov't -> them). If they turned around and compensated the individuals that lost, we'd just be paying ourselves, but with the overhead of gov't and banks skimming a lot of it... what's the point in that? Someone has to take the hit. In this case, the hit was spread out out amongst the people. In most other cases, where it's some company, the company should take the hit (IMO), which seems like what happened here.
I'll second the vote for Brother. I have a HL-2170W (monochrome workgroup laser printer with wired and wireless networking). It's been working great for years. I don't print much, but it's been very reliable when I need to print anything. My toner supposedly ran out over a year ago, and I just put a piece of tape over the thing that lets it see it's out of toner, and it just keeps printing. I have a new toner package ready to go, but just haven't needed it.
Depending on how small your SOHO is, this could be worth getting. It's cheap, laser, networked, and works with linux with no issue at all. I have no idea about multifunction printers though (those with built in scanners).
Therefore if you run such a service and you don't want to be in a position where you are basically a slave who has to lie to your customers every day or go to jail and are not allowed to even seek your own legal advice you had better shut said service down first.
That applies to any and all businesses. This isn't about an actual threat. It's the boogyman. He may be real, and it may be proven that he has come after others, and he may come after you someday. Do you run and hide before you are ever even faced with the threat? WTF? If the mere thought of maybe being threatened with jail, not actually having the threat nor is jail guaranteed, but just the looming possibility that you may receive such a threat someday is enough to make you give up your livelyhood, don't expect me to feel bad for you. If there was an actual order sent to the company in question, then shutting their doors would almost certainly violate it just as much as deleting their keys. Regardless, they still have the option of fighting it, even if the paper they were handed says otherwise.
Not that many customers are going to be scared off.... Businesses care about competitors reading their data, not the NSA.
So customers aren't being scared off, but this business and other vpn providers are still shuttering their shops?
I really don't understand why any of these companies are shutting their doors. They should just release a new statement, allow current members to get a refund on their remaining subscription if they want to leave, and acknowledge what has always been in their contract - they will comply with law enforcement demands and warrents as do all companies in the US that want to stay in business.
This really sucks, and it should be more public**, and more people need to know about it, but boycotting in this fasion isn't going to help. If anything , it reduces the amount of money going into the hands of businesses that are on our side and could lobby.
On top of it all, while I understand there is the threat of arrest, they DO have the option of not complying and not turning over the keys. They could even make it a well known statement that, if they are asked to do so, they'll destroy the related private keys and simply tell those asking that they no longer exist. Yes, that would be in violation of what they are supposedly maybe possibly going to be asked someday, but they can cross that bridge when they come to it. It does seem like a convenient exit plan if they've wanted to get out of the VPN business and existing contracts.
I don't know what their usage stats are, but I wouldn't be surprised if the bulk of the traffic transitting their VPN service is for streaming video from sites that detect country of origin based on IP (ex. non-UK to UK BBC, non-US to US Hulu/Netflix, other provides like HBOgo etc), and for downloading stuffs from bittorrent and friends. That's probably expensive, and probably degrades the QoS of those that really need the service. The relevence of this is that it wouldn't shock me if the opperators were just tired of running it, and this was just the straw that broke the camels back, so to speak.
AFAICT (please correct me if I'm wrong): * They weren't forced to shut down. * They didn't shut down because of an actual incident. * They supposedly shut down based on the idea that they may be threatened with such a demand in the future. (and it is a threat - comply and keep your mouth shut, or we'll put you in jail... has anyone called them on it, or even had a legit reason to do so?)
** or much much more private, like a spy org should be, with no info getting out, not even to other law enforcement agencies, much like I imagine they were before "NSA" was a well known acronym.
It's very similar with credit card numbers, especially bank account ones. The first 6 digits idenfity the issuer. The last digit is just a check digit (usually via Luhn algorithm). That leaves 9 digits for the user account for most cards. However, many banks use a heirarchal system that identifies the branch where you got the card in the first 4 digits of that. The last 4 digits (3 account digits + checksum) and the expiration are usually printed on reciepts and such, as is the type of card (visa/mastercard/etc). If you know a little about the person, you can guess their branch, which leaves only 2 digits unknown. Along with the checksum, you can deduce those, or at least narrow it down to a couple possibiities.
Guessing the branch might seem difficult. However, the college I went to, and I assume many others, has a bank offer to sign up all freshmen for free checking accounts with a debit card. All those signing up with get the same first 10 digits (possibly 11 or 12). It leaves very little to guesswork.
FWIW, I'm not sure if the aforementioned practices are current. Maybe they do things differently now. Regardless, the last 4 digits are the most significant and specific digits, just as with the SSN. Hiding the leading digits provides a false sense of security to the end users (there is still some security added, but nowhere near what the average person would assume), and it retains the most unique parts so the company using it still benefits almost as much as having the full thing printed/supplied.
Did you reply to the wrong post or something? AFAICT, the AC did not make the assumptions you claim, and he/she was right.
"by even Debian" is just dumb as it makes it appear Debian has the lowest standards when the reverse is true.
And you should consider learning just a little about Debian and Debian repositories. There's nothing to stop the game being distributed by Debian in the non-free repo except maybe the willingness of some one to package it.
Which has absolutely nothing to do with copyright limitations (in response to a complete rewrite under the hood). It is the worst example I could think of regarding copyrights limiting innovation.
Even if we completely ignore the zero innovation parts (characters, behaviors, level design, graphics, sound, gameplay, etc) and focus only on those parts that are new (the engine and html5/javascript/etc work), it still isn't innovative - it's a reimplementation. That may still be impressive, it may add value, it may be useful, but it's not innovative. In addition, those parts are not threatened by copyright!
If anything, this is a good example to use when defending current copyright laws. FWIW, I'm way on the other side of that issue, and I greatly favor copyleft and no software patents.
Then it actually has a standard 2.5mm earphone/mic jack, very much like the xbox 360.
So, while I have no faith in Sony, I also think it's unlikely that it'll be difficult to support most headsets. They sell a lot of standard headsets too... why would they shoot themselves in the foot? And if it does need an adapter, then there's their money, and who cares what headset people use. It's all speculation at this point though.
However, looking at the PS4 controller, there appears to be some sort of wide proprietary jack in the same spot
That isn't ideal,but it's not the worst thing either. Assuming that's the case, there would probably be some power, mic, and stereo audio. If so, and adapter plug will almost certainly come out for normal headphone/mic, and it's possible that an adapter may be able to be built that'd support bluetooth and/or usb, or an alternate controller that has built in bluetooth (that'd be kinda nice, since it'd virtually remove all signal issues since you'd be so close to it).
I don't trust Sony at all, but I don't think there's much to be said until there are some more details regarding what WILL work.
This is all the more reason NOT to add a DRM standard for HTML 5.
Flash, for example, can do what they want already. From the average user perspective, what's the difference? It also allows them to continue their split of set-top content vs PC content (though that's really stupid). It's not much more difficult to work with from the developer side either... in many ways, it's easier (ex. browser compatibility and fallbacks).
The majority of the content producers could/should care less. By that, I mean the major networks and such. Netflix and Hulu are no real threat because they can take away access at any time, and they control the releases and availability. And then look at HBOGo, which should be an independent offering, but you MUST sign up for HBO through your TV provider - why not let people buy it on its own? None of the tech matters at this point because they don't really care about availability and access and standards - they're not even letting you get what you want to pay for - so they can force you to use flash or silverlight or whatever they want, and, for now, they don't care if you say no.
This, w3c approved DRM, isn't going to change anything for the better. What I do think it will do is open up use of DRM on much of the content that is currently available without it: personal websites, band sites, youtube, porn sites, etc.
I'll stick with your former opinion: browser vendors shouldn't implement EME. Maybe a new plugin API is in order.
Slashdot Mirror
Has no one here shopped online?
Here: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA3DC17C8972
It's $44. Granted, that's $6 more, but that's certainly in the same ballpark, and it has (arguably) better specs (dual core, dual cameras, android 4.2, etc).
Or here: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=0EJ-0019-00005
This one is just $34.99. It's only 4.3", but it has a 1.2GHz A8, and Android 4.2.
I don't know why this is making slashdot... 'el cheap-o tablets are already here in every form you could ask for. Most of the cheap ones sacrifice battery life first, which sucks, but corners must be cut if you're going to be the cheapest thing with a touchscreen... and in some cases, a short battery life is not a deal breaker (ex. car computer; kitchen wall mounted touch display; media controller; etc).
We can't stop people from drinking and driving, so let's not regulate that either.
Shooting people is already regulated.
Banning 3-D printed guns would be akin to (in your analogy) either outlawing alcohol (prohibition) or cars.
Or how about the booze angle... alcohol distribution is regulated, right? However, loads of people are legally making alcohol (especially wine and beer) at home, and the kits can be readily purchased all over the place, even in places that have made 99% of firearm ownership illegal (NYC).
Again, it's something anyone can make, just like with booze and an innumerable number of other things. Regulate the part that can be regulated if you must - sale and distribution of the physical product. ...but that's more-or-less already been done, and this is all just fear mongering (how many people have died as a result of printed weapons so far?)
So while they may have patented a design for a rectangular device, a competing device would need to infringe not only on that claim, but also on all of the other claims as well before it could be considered to be infringing on the patent itself.
Granted, the GP oversimplified the design patent, but what in that patent really made it all that worth of the design patent? If they had submitted just a rectangle, it would have been rejected, right? So there is a level of simplicity that is rejected. The elements they have laid claim on from that patent are, IMO, not only obvious, and with past precident, but natural to that type of device. Rounded corners? duh... no one would want really sharp corners in their pocket. Grid layout of icons? a grid... really... a grid? Square icons with round corners? Nah, I've never seen that before, nor would be be extremely obvious on a device that has both horizontal and vertical orientations, right?
I get what your'e saying, but you haven't listed all the features that made it worthy, and you provided no justification for them, and just made it sound more complex than it really was. The GP didn't list them all either, and over simplified it (to make a point). I read the GP's post as saying he believes the design patent covered far to simple/obvious of a thing, and it's silly that it was granted. I'm not sure if you're saying it was deserving of the patent or not, but I don't think anyone would argue it was for more than a rectangle. The question is, was it enough? The rectangle, and in particular the proportions, size, and contour, were at the center of the case, regardless if that is not all that was in the patent.
While I agree in spirit to much of what you're saying, I don't believe the requirements are as tight as you state, and the filesystem analogy is weak.
While most linux distros (maybe all) default to using an ext variant, they also work with many other filesystems. Tools have been updated to support multiple filesystems, and others remain filesystem-specific. The same could happen for Mir/X/Wayland.
Consider Mac OSX for a minute. It can run any X application after some re-compiling, but its native window manager doesn't do it. It's X support is not as good as a native X server, but it's good enough. Most popular apps have been patched or forked to support the native gui stuff. If QT and GTK gained Mir and Wayland compatibility, most apps could be recompiled to render directly to Mir/Wayland. For the edge cases, using a X compatibility layer that isn't quite as good would probably be just fine... at the very least, most users won't care or even notice.
The network transparency part has been discussed in depth. In the end, there needs to be a way to export a display from a remote machine to the local machine, which the compatibility layer will likely handle without a problem (any advanced features like 3d are unlikely to work well in those situations anyway). And there needs to be a way to export a local app to a remote machine - this will probably require using a different tool/protocol on the receiving end (ex vnc), but that's going to be sufficient for most of those edge cases that needed that as well.
Mir and Wayland will need a way to support X applications, but if they get proper support from the toolsets, then it doesn't need to be better, or even on par. As long as it works well enough and is stable, that'd be enough to start migration. I don't think either is there yet though.
Personally, I'd like to see someone implement the opposite - get Wayland running on top of X. It'd be pointless in the long run, but it would let the user choose which gets first class support on their system (ie. they could still run a mix of apps using both, and app developers don't have to worry about how few people are on Mir/Wayland). I'd be surprised if someone out there hasn't toyed with this yet, and maybe even demo'd it.
Basically the lousiest GPU you can buy, so long as it supports HDMI 1.4 or Displayport, can at least drive a 4k screen, probably even with basic-Windows-acceleration-effects, and screaming gamer gear should be able to even run relatively modern games at that resolution.
I'm all for the 4k tv's, cause I want one as a monitor, but your statement isn't entirely true. HDMI 1.4 can't drive 4k at the refresh rates we're all accustomed to - it only does 30fps. There are some screens out there that actually present themselves to the PC as two monitors... they take either two HDMI 1.4 inputs, or a displayport with a demux. On bootup on those split screens, you'll see all your screen squished into one half the monitor. It's an ugly hack to get 60fps. DVI-D can't handle it either. Point is, it'll need a new interface (HDMI 2, or display port, or thunderbolt) to perform normally, so none of those lousy GPU's are going to work well. They'll still function, and 30fps is enough for most day-to-day work, but I'm going to wait it out a bit :-)
85th percentile speed drivers are often going above the posted limit. So, on most highways they would be giving a rate break to those who speed and penalizing those who obey the speed limit?
The law fully supports going with the flow of traffic. If everyone is going 20mph in a 60mph zone because it's foggy, you'd better be doing around 20 yourself as well, even if you can see just fine, even though 45 is supposed to be the minimum speed. Ditto if everyone is doing 70 in a 45.. if you're doing 40, you're a hazard, even if that's the speed. So yes, they should give a break to those that are within the 85th percentile.
Also, if this is just a device that monitors speed, acceleration, driving distance etc it's not going to know about some of the stupidest/most dangerous driving decisions - running red lights, talking on a cell/texting/eating while driving, cutting people off, tailgating, road rage, etc.
Many of those will directly correlate to the values they are monitoring. Ex. tailgating and road rage will result in sharp acceleration and hard braking while going fast (on the highway). Sharply swerving because you weren't paying attention (texting, eating, etc) will also show as short sharp lateral acceleration (if it records that). I'm not saying it's perfect, but it can provide a lot of insight without being overly intrusive (gps + association with current speed, etc).
I do have concerns about its use under legal settings (response to some accident). Then again, many new cars these days already keep a short log of this sort of information. This also sounds a lot more like a progressive commercial than an actual article. Oh well.
I say it again: something was lost with the death of Blockbuster. Online streaming may be more convenient, but it's definitely not better.
I'm happy to see Blockbuster go, but only because that keeps the door open for mom-and-pops video rental places. In my experience, they're cheaper, friendlier, less strict on late fees and such, and the selection is great (rather than 100 copies of the latest blockbuster, there's a couple, and a couple of all kinds of other stuff too), and they can order stuff in if asked.
That said, I think there's a huge missed opportunity from the cable companies. Technically, they should be able to offer on demand of all programming they offer, at least for a few days past air date. Localize the data in existing distribution points. They're already pulling the data down there. The on demand would only use the last mile. Should be cheaper and faster than what anyone else can offer. It'd be like Akamai, but the incoming data feed is already there, and they could have far more distribution and no need for renting their own space (ie. much cheaper). Content licensing is another issue, but I'm ignoring that cause it's an artificial barrier :-)
Oh well, let's burn up a ton of bandwidth from end to end and shut down the reasonable businesses. Heck, if cable/satalite wasn't so (artificially) expensive, much of the streaming would never have happened.
Ugh... did you not read the parent post at all? He didn't say all bicyclists were super respectful and safe there. Quite the opposite in fact. The point is one CAN be safe, and its often the poor choices of a cyclist that cause the issues (not always, and drivers and pedestrians could do a lot better too).
For a long time (maybe still occuring) there is one road on Stanford land where the bikes will ride side by side blocking the entire lane while ignoring the bike lanes
I would be surprised if local laws say that's wrong. It's also well established that, when a bike lane is more-or-less the gutter or berm of the road, it's far safer to travel in the actual lane with traffic. Most driving laws state that cars must treat bicycles as vehicles, so they may not pass them unless it is completely safe. If there is just one bike in the actual lane, the car should not pass unless there is another lane or they are on a dashed-line divided road where they can go into the oncoming traffic lane safely. However, most cars will try to squeeze by if there is just one bike near the side of the road, which can be dangerous. Furthermore, the drier is less likely to even see the cyclist if it's over to the far right all by themselves - driving double wide is considered by many to be a safety measure.
In short, I doubt they're doing it to piss off drivers. Pissed off drivers are the most dangerous, and it's obvious who wins if they play bumper cars.
As far the trails, I don't know what you are referring to specifically, but my experience has been that usually happens when the trail is a shared trail, and the trail clearly states that slower runners/walkers/cyclists/etc should remain to the right. If there's a group walking side-by-side, they are going to get yelled at by anyone jogging, running, skating, cycling, etc. It's like two cars side by side on the highway doing 50 in a 65 zone - that's violating the law, rules, and social contract, so get the fuck out of the way.
I'm not trying to be an apologist for all cyclists. Many of them are assholes, as are many people using all modes of transportation. But that's was kinda the GP's point - you always have to expect everyone else to be making mistakes. It's rule one of defensive driving, and applies to all modes of transit.
If you're biking on a sidewalk you're wrong (99.999% of the time). :-)
If you're jaywalking, you're wrong (99...etc)
If you're driving in the bus or bike lane; wrong.
If you're walking in the bike lane; wrong.
Loitering in the middle of the street (one of your example); wrong.
If you think you have some exclusive right to the place you are going, wrong.
This isn't difficult, but it feels like you have a bias against cyclists, whether your on foot on in your car. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe your coworker is right, and you should get on a bike, if not for daily commute, then just so you understand that group better. I hope I'm just wrong, and you're just ranting
Lazers.
The HD2000 series from 3 generations ago already beat your 8800GT. The current Iris 5200 sits between a GeForce 9800 and a GeForce 280 in terms of performance.
You sure? Got any benchmark comparisons? I'm honestly curious because the comparisons I've seen don't jive. For example:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-graphics-card-review,3107-7.html
That page shows the HD 2000 on par with cards like Nvidia FX 5800, or ATI X1400.
HD 3000 is shows around Nvidia 6600 GT, or ATI X1600 PRO.
HD 4000 is shows around Nvidia 6800 GT or 7600 GT, or ATI X800 XT or HD 3650.
The HD 2500, HD 4200, HD 4400, HD 4600, HD 5000, Iris 5100, and Iris 5200 are not listed there.
I know that's not a benchmark, and I was curious, so I looked up some random PassMark G3D scores:
PassMark - G3D Mark
4255 Radeon 7870
4116 GeForce GTX 660
1677 Radeon 5770 (came with mac pro in 2012)
1572 GeForce GT 750M (what's in macbook pro 15" now)
1288 GeForce 640
922 Intel Iris Pro 5200
757 GeForce 8800 GT
718 GeForce 9800 GT
711 Radeon HD 5570
654 GeForce GT 240
632 Radeon HD 2900 PRO
628 Intel Iris 5100
606 GeForce 8800 GTS
599 Intel HD 4600
598 Intel HD 5200
544 Radeon HD 4670
515 Intel HD 5000
490 Intel HD 4400
487 GeForce GT 335M
477 Intel HD 4600
476 Radeon HD 7550M
461 Intel HD 4000
306 Intel HD 3000
216 GeForce 7900 GS
208 Radeon HD 7340
The Iris Pro 5200 looks alright, but it's far from common (the MacBook Pro is the only line I can find with one in a laptop), and I really doubt an HD 2000 is going to compare at all with an 8800GT. The above benchmark isn't the greatest, but it should get the ballpark right.
+1 to parent.
The advantage over rsnapshot is efficiency and simplicity. All those zillions of hard links behind rsnapshot's strategy are time consuming to create and delete.
I love rsnapshot, but the zillions of hard links can indeed be difficult to work with. I recently had to copy the backup data to another server/disk. I initially reached for rsync to do the job, and it couldn'thandle it (same issue with BackupPC pools, btw) - ran out of memory. Ended up using cpio (I think it was something like "find . -depth -print | cpio -pdm /destination/path"). One can stick ssh in the pipe too to get it to a remote location if needed. While this worked, it still took a LONG LONG time, and it's not a solution for keeping two copies of the rsnapshot destination in sync (would need something like block level mirroring, like raid1 on ndb). Long story short, zfs elegantly solves many of the edge cases that other systems still struggle with.
Question 5 was my favorite WTF.
====
5. Find the missing part.
Write the numbers.
[9]
o o o o [ ]
___ ___ ...and got it wrong.
part I know missing part
====
(the o's are pennies, and the [ ] is a box)
(slashdot is messing up the formatting, or I'm not doing it right)
The student filled in:
_9_ _5_
Yeah, they *wanted* a different answer, but he's still right.
What part does he know? The big "9" in the box.
What part was missing? The 5, which he got right.
If this were for an older student, and if the style of questions was explained and examples provided, then I'd understand that they should listen and comprehend what is expected with certain types of questions, but this is a first grader. The expectations should be very obvious.
Before you write that off as something the student should have understood, take question 6, which is right next to it:
====
Complete the picture.
Write a subtraction sentence.
6. Jennifer has 6 guitar picks.
She gives 4 guitar picks to
her students. How many
guitar picks are left?
[6]
| o | |
| o | |
| o | |
| o | |
__ - __ = __ ... but the "6" is right under the part of the picture that has 4 dots in it (and yes, they're black circles, not triangles as a guitar pick would be... that's just one more stupid little detail that doesn't matter much, but shows the poor quality of the test).
====
The student got this one right:
_6_ - _4_ = _2_
So what is it? Do they write the number that represents the whole first, or the number that represents the dots above the answer line?
There's so much wrong with this test. Even the way it was marked by the teacher is, IMO, in bad form. Incorrect answers have their question number circled, and correct ones have a check mark in the middle of the question space. To see why that's wrong, just look at the students answer in question 8. It's a multiple choice question. He put an "X" through the three he thought were wrong, and circled the one he thought was right. "Circle" means right; "X" means wrong". They expect the child to circle correct answers, but they circle incorrect questions.
BTW, anyone know when they started referring to math problems as "number sentences" and "subtraction stories"? Mixing reading comprehension and math seems like another unnecessary complication for a first grade test.
We'll both go swimming with our phones and see who's has real world features that matter.
You mean like the Samsung Galaxy S4 Active, or Sony Xperia Z (both of which are in that "BingPhone" category you and GGP seem to think is useless.
Can someone tell me why these financial institutions are never forced to compensate the *individuals* that suffer from these events?
Seriously? Because that would complete the loop, and someone has to be putting in more than they're taking out.
Granted, "financial institutions" is a pretty broad term, so I'm not entirely certain which situation you are talking about, but since you mentioned the mortgage stuff, I'm currently assuming you mean the big thing involving the banks and the gov't bail out to them. Doesn't really matter which situation though... someone has to lose. It's just like Vegas - lots of individuals put in money hoping for a payout; the house takes a healthy cut; most people lose; enough win that it still looks attractive to suckers; regulations keep it from being outright robbery.
Regardless of how we got there, the banks needed bailed out or loads more people would get hurt. We, the people, bailed them out (taxes -> gov't -> them). If they turned around and compensated the individuals that lost, we'd just be paying ourselves, but with the overhead of gov't and banks skimming a lot of it... what's the point in that? Someone has to take the hit. In this case, the hit was spread out out amongst the people. In most other cases, where it's some company, the company should take the hit (IMO), which seems like what happened here.
I'll second the vote for Brother. I have a HL-2170W (monochrome workgroup laser printer with wired and wireless networking). It's been working great for years. I don't print much, but it's been very reliable when I need to print anything. My toner supposedly ran out over a year ago, and I just put a piece of tape over the thing that lets it see it's out of toner, and it just keeps printing. I have a new toner package ready to go, but just haven't needed it.
Depending on how small your SOHO is, this could be worth getting. It's cheap, laser, networked, and works with linux with no issue at all. I have no idea about multifunction printers though (those with built in scanners).
Therefore if you run such a service and you don't want to be in a position where you are basically a slave who has to lie to your customers every day or go to jail and are not allowed to even seek your own legal advice you had better shut said service down first.
That applies to any and all businesses.
This isn't about an actual threat. It's the boogyman. He may be real, and it may be proven that he has come after others, and he may come after you someday. Do you run and hide before you are ever even faced with the threat? WTF? If the mere thought of maybe being threatened with jail, not actually having the threat nor is jail guaranteed, but just the looming possibility that you may receive such a threat someday is enough to make you give up your livelyhood, don't expect me to feel bad for you.
If there was an actual order sent to the company in question, then shutting their doors would almost certainly violate it just as much as deleting their keys. Regardless, they still have the option of fighting it, even if the paper they were handed says otherwise.
Not that many customers are going to be scared off. ...
Businesses care about competitors reading their data, not the NSA.
So customers aren't being scared off, but this business and other vpn providers are still shuttering their shops?
I really don't understand why any of these companies are shutting their doors. They should just release a new statement, allow current members to get a refund on their remaining subscription if they want to leave, and acknowledge what has always been in their contract - they will comply with law enforcement demands and warrents as do all companies in the US that want to stay in business.
This really sucks, and it should be more public**, and more people need to know about it, but boycotting in this fasion isn't going to help. If anything , it reduces the amount of money going into the hands of businesses that are on our side and could lobby.
On top of it all, while I understand there is the threat of arrest, they DO have the option of not complying and not turning over the keys. They could even make it a well known statement that, if they are asked to do so, they'll destroy the related private keys and simply tell those asking that they no longer exist. Yes, that would be in violation of what they are supposedly maybe possibly going to be asked someday, but they can cross that bridge when they come to it. It does seem like a convenient exit plan if they've wanted to get out of the VPN business and existing contracts.
I don't know what their usage stats are, but I wouldn't be surprised if the bulk of the traffic transitting their VPN service is for streaming video from sites that detect country of origin based on IP (ex. non-UK to UK BBC, non-US to US Hulu/Netflix, other provides like HBOgo etc), and for downloading stuffs from bittorrent and friends. That's probably expensive, and probably degrades the QoS of those that really need the service. The relevence of this is that it wouldn't shock me if the opperators were just tired of running it, and this was just the straw that broke the camels back, so to speak.
AFAICT (please correct me if I'm wrong):
* They weren't forced to shut down.
* They didn't shut down because of an actual incident.
* They supposedly shut down based on the idea that they may be threatened with such a demand in the future. (and it is a threat - comply and keep your mouth shut, or we'll put you in jail... has anyone called them on it, or even had a legit reason to do so?)
** or much much more private, like a spy org should be, with no info getting out, not even to other law enforcement agencies, much like I imagine they were before "NSA" was a well known acronym.
It's very similar with credit card numbers, especially bank account ones. The first 6 digits idenfity the issuer. The last digit is just a check digit (usually via Luhn algorithm). That leaves 9 digits for the user account for most cards. However, many banks use a heirarchal system that identifies the branch where you got the card in the first 4 digits of that. The last 4 digits (3 account digits + checksum) and the expiration are usually printed on reciepts and such, as is the type of card (visa/mastercard/etc). If you know a little about the person, you can guess their branch, which leaves only 2 digits unknown. Along with the checksum, you can deduce those, or at least narrow it down to a couple possibiities.
Guessing the branch might seem difficult. However, the college I went to, and I assume many others, has a bank offer to sign up all freshmen for free checking accounts with a debit card. All those signing up with get the same first 10 digits (possibly 11 or 12). It leaves very little to guesswork.
FWIW, I'm not sure if the aforementioned practices are current. Maybe they do things differently now. Regardless, the last 4 digits are the most significant and specific digits, just as with the SSN. Hiding the leading digits provides a false sense of security to the end users (there is still some security added, but nowhere near what the average person would assume), and it retains the most unique parts so the company using it still benefits almost as much as having the full thing printed/supplied.
Did you reply to the wrong post or something? AFAICT, the AC did not make the assumptions you claim, and he/she was right.
"by even Debian" is just dumb as it makes it appear Debian has the lowest standards when the reverse is true.
And you should consider learning just a little about Debian and Debian repositories. There's nothing to stop the game being distributed by Debian in the non-free repo except maybe the willingness of some one to package it.
Which has absolutely nothing to do with copyright limitations (in response to a complete rewrite under the hood).
It is the worst example I could think of regarding copyrights limiting innovation.
Even if we completely ignore the zero innovation parts (characters, behaviors, level design, graphics, sound, gameplay, etc) and focus only on those parts that are new (the engine and html5/javascript/etc work), it still isn't innovative - it's a reimplementation. That may still be impressive, it may add value, it may be useful, but it's not innovative. In addition, those parts are not threatened by copyright!
If anything, this is a good example to use when defending current copyright laws. FWIW, I'm way on the other side of that issue, and I greatly favor copyleft and no software patents.
If this post is accurate:
http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=4339417&cid=45133031 ...which simply links here: http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://analogaddiction.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/ps4-controller-03.jpg%3Fw%3D604%26h%3D402&imgrefurl=http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/179714/ps4-it-only-does-everything-for-399/p40&h=403&w=604&sz=17&tbnid=BKnH1bQnw-W1vM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=135&zoom=1&usg=__QVMeRlB5thbd6WBd0-p4eg4PDvE=&docid=sE8G7y1O1GNOjM&sa=X&ei=GWZdUoS3H4q0kAeamIDYCA&ved=0CD8Q9QEwBQ
Then it actually has a standard 2.5mm earphone/mic jack, very much like the xbox 360.
So, while I have no faith in Sony, I also think it's unlikely that it'll be difficult to support most headsets. They sell a lot of standard headsets too... why would they shoot themselves in the foot? And if it does need an adapter, then there's their money, and who cares what headset people use. It's all speculation at this point though.
However, looking at the PS4 controller, there appears to be some sort of wide proprietary jack in the same spot
That isn't ideal,but it's not the worst thing either. Assuming that's the case, there would probably be some power, mic, and stereo audio. If so, and adapter plug will almost certainly come out for normal headphone/mic, and it's possible that an adapter may be able to be built that'd support bluetooth and/or usb, or an alternate controller that has built in bluetooth (that'd be kinda nice, since it'd virtually remove all signal issues since you'd be so close to it).
I don't trust Sony at all, but I don't think there's much to be said until there are some more details regarding what WILL work.
IE 11+ doesn't allow plugins. No flash, no 3rd-party DRM.
What's your definition of plugin? AFAICT, Flash works on IE 11 today.
This is all the more reason NOT to add a DRM standard for HTML 5.
Flash, for example, can do what they want already. From the average user perspective, what's the difference? It also allows them to continue their split of set-top content vs PC content (though that's really stupid). It's not much more difficult to work with from the developer side either... in many ways, it's easier (ex. browser compatibility and fallbacks).
The majority of the content producers could/should care less. By that, I mean the major networks and such. Netflix and Hulu are no real threat because they can take away access at any time, and they control the releases and availability. And then look at HBOGo, which should be an independent offering, but you MUST sign up for HBO through your TV provider - why not let people buy it on its own? None of the tech matters at this point because they don't really care about availability and access and standards - they're not even letting you get what you want to pay for - so they can force you to use flash or silverlight or whatever they want, and, for now, they don't care if you say no.
This, w3c approved DRM, isn't going to change anything for the better. What I do think it will do is open up use of DRM on much of the content that is currently available without it: personal websites, band sites, youtube, porn sites, etc.
I'll stick with your former opinion: browser vendors shouldn't implement EME. Maybe a new plugin API is in order.