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User: The_reformant

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  1. Re:Why isn't it treated lake any other utility? on BBC and ISPs Clash over iPlayer · · Score: 1

    Except you didnt factor in that the bandwidth required to use average internet services is increasing. So its like at first your house can hold 2 or 5 people and it doesnt cost you any more. But each of those 5 people took one of Alice's "EAT ME" cakes and grows until only 2 people fit in the house so you need to build another house and a half just to contain your existing cusomers (who are leaving in droves because their arms and legs are sticking out of the windows and the strain of the house keeps making it fall over).

  2. Re:x fonts/bg I use on What Font Color Is Best For Eyes? · · Score: 1

    I use vi for emacs

  3. Re:Sane police on The DIY Tank · · Score: 1

    Pfft airstrikes are for losers, just bungee rope onto the top of the tank and use a baseball bat (or hadoken) to smash them into the water

  4. Re:panzer tank ??? on The DIY Tank · · Score: 1

    Its like a checksum bit so you know the data didn't get garbled during transmission. Like if someone asks you for your "personal PIN chimp"*, you can easily detect that the redundant final redundant word has been garbled indicating that the message integrity has been compromised.

    *Not to be confused with if they ask for your "personal PIN, chimp" which might just indicate theyre being rude!

  5. Re:6 month ban seems rather lite.... on Lawyer Banned for Threatening File-Sharers · · Score: 1

    I agree, we can only hope that her current and prospective future employers take a dim view of a 6th month ban.

  6. Re:Teams Without Trophies - or Competent Coaches on College Board Kills AP Computer Science AB · · Score: 1

    I agree its going to be less understood than the offside rule.

  7. Re:Scare tactics on UK Banking Law Blames Customers For Insecure OS · · Score: 1

    It would be hopelessly outdated as soon as it was conceived, remember it was only a few years ago that a sophisticated scam consisted of writing an email purporting to be a distressed Nigerian gentleman trying to claim their rightful inheritance.

  8. Re:Totally Crapified Article about Egomaniacs on 11 Innovation Lessons From the Creators of World of Warcraft · · Score: 1

    eeeurgrgghh i dont wanna get involved in their public test burger.

  9. Re:Why? on Boot Sector Viruses & Rootkits Poised For Comeback · · Score: 1

    The obvious use being running a hypervisor which then boots the original OS.

  10. Re:Craplets on Why Microsoft Surface Took So Long To Deploy · · Score: 1

    The first time I plugged my loaded ipod into my laptop it wiped all the songs (from my desktop). That isnt more usable..and yes I know why *now* but when I plugged it in i expected to be able to add more songs like with most other mp3 players or external hard drives.

  11. Re:This isn't the Matrix... on Matrix-Like VR Coming in the Near Future? · · Score: 1

    Oh, and having many separate strong AIs all running on the same hardware...)
    I don't see how being able to enumerate derivable facts from a predetermined set of axioms in a logical calculus provides the gameplaying benefit you appear to be aiming for.
  12. Re:photorealistic != realistic on Matrix-Like VR Coming in the Near Future? · · Score: 1

    Can you imagine a colour that we haven't discovered?
    Like blurple?
  13. Re:complex math... on IBM Using Complex Math To Manage Natural Disasters · · Score: 2, Funny

    sqrt(-2) = Irrational Imaginary Natural Disaster

  14. Re:I should be so lucky on Should IT Shops Let Users Manage Their Own PCs? · · Score: 1

    Commercial grade workstation / laptop type hardware is cheap but it is very rarely hardware that goes wrong, and of course completely disregards heavier iron. The analogy to the auto mechanic (check it out its an inverse car-analogy) would be for a software engineer to provide all of their own software. For people working with enterprise applications this is going to very quickly become totally cost prohibitive (unless you only hire millionaires)

  15. Re:in the perfect world... on Should IT Shops Let Users Manage Their Own PCs? · · Score: 1

    "I'm trying to make an Internet on my desktop but I can't get the file to program."
    Windows Vista supports the internet file preprogrammed on the desktop for increased speed and security. Please log a support call with your Microsoft representative.
  16. Re:This is assuming... on Augmenting Data Beats Better Algorithms · · Score: 1

    ...that algorithms and data are, in fact, different animals. Algorithms are simply mapping functions, which can in turn be entirely represented as data. A true algorithm represents a set of statements which, when taken as a collective whole, will always be true. In other words, it's something that is generic, across-the-board. Think object-oriented design - you do not write one class for every variable. Pure data will contain a mix of the generic and the specific, with no trivial way to always identify which is which, or to what degree. Thus, an algorithm-driven design should always out-perform data-driven designs when knowledge of the specific is substantially less important than knowledge of the generic. Data-driven designs should always out-perform algorithm-driven design when the reverse is true. A blend of the two designs (in order to isolate and identify the nature of the data) should outperform pure implementations following either design when you want to know a lot about both. The key to programming is not to have one "perfect" methodology but to have a wide range at your disposal. For those who prefer mantras, have the serenity to accept the invariants aren't going to change, the courage to recognize the methodology will, and the wisdom to apply the difference.
    Thats complete nonsense, the class of algorithms which are mapping functions, and which be wholly represented by a finite data set is a tiny proportion of the algorithm space.
  17. Re:All things being equal... on Augmenting Data Beats Better Algorithms · · Score: 1

    Depends what the O(1) algorithm is really doesn't it. I doubt even the most talented people could make the algorithm "sleep for 100 years" faster than a poor implementation of the travelling salesman problem on say 1000 nodes.

  18. Re:Depends on the Problem on Augmenting Data Beats Better Algorithms · · Score: 1

    I actually wondered about whether only ever recommending the current unseen top blockbusters to customers would be a similar and more effective netflix algorithm. By definition these movies have high liklihood of being enjoyed (since that is the criteria you have selected them on)

  19. Re:Testing on Practical Experience As a Beginning Programmer? · · Score: 1

    I've done test and development and actually I found I wrote more code and had more design / architectural freedom in test than in dev. I still prefer dev though :D ..and manual testing sucks ass.

  20. Re:Already Free on Adobe Puts Free Photoshop Online · · Score: 1

    I prefer vi's colour correction

  21. Re:Why? on Roleplayers Seek Removal of Nerf Gun Ban · · Score: -1, Troll

    Clearly in the second case the parent should be charged as well. At the very least they have been criminally negligent in allowing a minor to gain access to their firearm. Really there are very few excuses (and they are *excuses*) for owning a gun in the first place.

  22. Re:Why? on Roleplayers Seek Removal of Nerf Gun Ban · · Score: -1, Troll

    If your 6 year old shoots someone I hope that you will be held responsible.

  23. Re:Webrings writ large on To Search Smarter, Find a Person? · · Score: 1

    For those who never partook: a webring is a loose community of related websites. It was moderated by a handful of people, and each site would put a little Webring script at the bottom of their page(s). This allowed users to surf between related content without having to go to some external website. It built more trust between the websites.
    For those that never partook; a webring is a loose collection of related websites, at least half of which no longer exist, are premantently "Under construction" or appear to exist for the main purpose of displaying animated gifs possible of fire and/or skulls and white on black hits counters.
  24. Re:ANyone who needs... on Head First JavaScript · · Score: 1

    Anyone who isn't willing to do whatever they need to do to learn good JavaScript isn't worthy of any programming/web design job
    I hope you meant any Web programming job. Some people still write applications which don't run in a web browser.
  25. Re:Quick Summary of Article - Breathless Hype on Using Excel As a 3D Graphics Engine · · Score: 1

    Trouble is this becomes unweildy pretty quickly, what does his spreadsheet look like if you need to rotate a tretahedron? A dodecahedron? 4 cubes? A set of 5000 arbitrary triangles some of which may obscure others?

    Not to mention that he his distributing his code over the structure of his data which would be really irritating to debug on a large scale.