US Army took 6 month to be able to operate. Now, if that could last 10 days to bring all the people on the battlefiled, imagine the strategic advantage.
What's the point in deploying people into the battlefield in 10 days, when they have to hang around there for a few months before the rest of the plans are worked out.
"This trial version of Earth 1.0 will expire in 50 years. Click OK to continue, click Order to go to the order webpage or click Register to enter your registration code."
The link in the article refers to the MacOS X port. Check out this for the "original" Unofficial Gameboy Advance SDK. It has been available for about a year or so. It has always worked on Win32 platforms too, so the submitter did a really bad job. The compiler in the SDK is actually GCC.
The problem I see, is whether the consumer should be able/have the right to
return perfectly functioning products. If I buy a tool at the hardware store I may be able to return it because it's broken or because it didn't do what I wanted it to do (wasn't powerful enough, didn't fit etc). You can say to the manager that the ladder was too small or the electric drill was too weak, and he'll probably accept that. If you go to a CD store and claims that the CD you bought the other day simply sucks, he has no way of validating that. The CD works just like it was supposed to do, but because (musical) taste is subjective, you're not walking out of the store with a guarantee that you will like the CD.
The solution is to just listen to (parts of) the CD in the store. If you listen to it for 10 minutes you should be able to at least tell if the CD is completely worthless or not. The problem is that not all stores, at least not where
I live, allow you to do that. Not only for CD's, but for computer games too. If
I want to buy a game, I am supposed to use my psychic abilities to select which game to buy. For PC games, game demos make life easier for many people, but not everyone are able to download several 100 MB demos. For console games, you can get demos on CD's that come with magazines, but what about cartridge based consoles (N64, GBA). Cartridge-writers aren't exactly common, although I have one for my GBA.
I think that if you have had the chance to preview the product you've bought
and there is nothing wrong with the product (it works just as it is supposed to do), returning the product, especially if it's easy to copy, shouldn't generally be an option. But with no previewing available, returning it should be just to give the CD/game/whatever back and say "I didn't like it, give me my money back".
A used book, on the other hand, generates none of the side businesses.
If the buyer likes the used book he buys, there is a chance he'll buy other books from the same author (or publisher if it's a tech book). If the price of the new book is too high and he can't get a used one/get one at the library, he may never buy anything from that author.
I've bought used book from some online bookstores. I would never have paid the full price for the book, since it was just a book about something that I might want to look more into if I get time.
With PS/2, the tech on the phone always has to think, "did this moron hook the keyboard into the mouse port?"
I actually spent several days with just this problem. I had to install some software to 3 PC's sitting in a 19" rack with monitors, mice and keyboards placed a few meters away. The cables where hidden in the wall. For some reason I managed to switch the mouse and keyboard on one of the machines. The result was that Windows 2000 wouldn't boot. I thought it maybe had something to do with IDE-stuff and loading the boot sector, so I tried to change the bios settings and stuff like that. I even tried to install Windows 2000 from scratch (booting off the CDROM), but the installer stopped (I can't remember when, but I think it was before it copied data do the disk). The funny thing is that the keyboard worked fine in the BIOS, but not in Windows 2000.
A novel idea (not really), but what I want is PDA-type apps for my GameBoy Advance.
Just write your own. With the space available (max 64 kB) for savegames, and 64 bytes/entry you should be able to store about 1000 names/phonenumbers.:)
After reading the paper I have a few questions. (Yeah, I know this is just research).
If this is implemented in the real world, are each user supposed to use his/her outgoing bandwidth for this? What about people unfortunate enough to have a monthly limit?
What if the same connection is used by more than one person/client? With 4 PeerCast nodes, or maybe just 1 PeerCast node on the same connection as a web-server, will PeerCast detect that there suddenly is a lot less bandwith available than just two minutes ago (maybe because of slashdotting:).
Got up at 1130 Saturday morning, checked my email and Slashdot. Reading this story (yes, the entire story) about a guy working out didn't actually make me feel good about myself.:)
At work all the servers have unique names taken from geographical locations nearby (kongsberg, flesberg etc). All the workstations have a prefix based on the system and a number. My Ultra10 is called sun342, another guy (with a new Blade 1000) got sun432. The linux-boxes I use are called linux3 and linux4 (you can probably guess our primary platform:), sgi-boxes are called sgi1 etc. On the other hand, the Windows-boxes are called KDP12345 (I can't remember the name of my windows machine) and so-on. This is harder to remember, but usually you don't access other peoples windowsmachines.
At home I've named all my machines and other network-capable devices after Star Wars-characters. amidala (amiga), obiwan (playstation 2), r2d2 (pc laptop), bobafett (pc), yoda (pc), hansolo (sgi challenge s), palpatine (sgi indigo2), anakin (sgi o2) and luke (sun sparcstation 5). This works fine, especially since I've got the darkside.no domain.:)
The funny thing about DVD-recorders is all the different speeds they support.
Like, "Hey, check out my new DVD-+RWRAM! A whopping 2x/1x/8x/4x/4x/2x/2x/24x/16x/10x/4x. Ain't that fast or what?"
Remember that all screenshots in the documents are just an 8 bit 2D representation of the data. The signal probably has much higher resolution. You may not see the fingers in the first image because the signal level is very low compared to the rest.
You should really read the story before you post a comment. The pdf describes exactly how this stuff works, and even comes with sample screens which were captured using this method. It really works. There were no problems seeing the 5 fingers on the standard windows hand cursor (the resolution was 640x480 at 85Hz). The image was captured from the "reflections from a nearby wall".
We've used smartboards in some systems at work. Basically it's just a digital whiteboard. The image is shown using a projector. Whenever one of the pens is picked up, the software on the computer detects it and freezes the image. You can then draw on the board, and lines are shown. It's of course possible to save the image. The problem is that you have to stand in front of the board, blocking the image. It comes with 4 "pens" (with different colors) and an eraser. The board is just touch sensitive. By detecting which pen (or eraser) the user picks up it uses the correct color (there is one place for each pen, if you put the green pen in the blue tray and vice versa a blue color will be used even if you pick up the green pen.
The software we used was for windows, but the web page says that some of the features are available for Mac and UNIX/Linux too.
If a piece of software (with some kind of copy-protection) runs on a computer, it can be cracked to run without that protection. Tools such as Procdump will start the program, and after the user has clicked yes on a nag box and the program is decryptet, procdump will scan the memory and rebuild the executable.
If a movie or music file is protected by some encryption it still has to be decrypted to be played. There are many ways to crack this. Crack the encryption, intercept the data stream after it has been decrypted or just record the analog stream. A small quality loss, but with no protection at all. I remeber reading an article by Tron Øgrim, where he had interviewed a boss in a publishing corporation or something like that about DeCSS and ways to protect digital data (movies in this case). He asked if they had some way to stop people from just using a camcorder to record the tv, and the boss-guy said no, and I had the impression that they just hadn't thought of it. They can protect their movies and music with super-strong encryption, but people still have to be able to watch the movies or listen to the music. If people can watch or listen to it, they will be able to record it.
Still it _IS_ dman sexy to have an SGI on your desktop!:-)
It's even more sexier with multiple SGIs on the desktop.:)
Seriously, I use my Indigo2 as primary workstation at home, ircing and writing software. It also runs the webserver. When I get myself a larger harddrive for the Challenge S I'll move the webserver to that one and maybe use the O2 as main workstation instead.
The SGIs are rock solid (and noisy) machines. But I like really them.
The software manager on IRIX does exactly this. It also displays a list of conflicts (if any) which gives the user an option to either install the requried packages or not install the "offending" package. The software manager is also used to manage installed packages. If you start the software manager from the toolchest menu as non-root you're prompted with a box asking for the root password.
On freeware.sgi.com you can download precompiled binaries for a lot of popular freeware tools, like Apache and GCC. Just press the install-button for the application you want to install (using netscape), and the package is downloaded and software manager is started when the download is done.
Slashdot Mirror
...and you'll probably need your own house since your dorm room is too small for an xbox.
What's the point in deploying people into the battlefield in 10 days, when they have to hang around there for a few months before the rest of the plans are worked out.
In MIL-STD 2525 friendly guys are blue and hostile guys are red.
...I really hate it when some other guy blockquackes me one nanosecond before I drop the long piece to get tetris. ARgH! :)
"This trial version of Earth 1.0 will expire in 50 years. Click OK to continue, click Order to go to the order webpage or click Register to enter your registration code."
Yep, someone has to make a crack or a keygen.
What about overclocking the microwave to 3 GHz? That way we can melt 330g sterling silver in less than 14 minutes!
The link in the article refers to the MacOS X port. Check out this for the "original" Unofficial Gameboy Advance SDK. It has been available for about a year or so. It has always worked on Win32 platforms too, so the submitter did a really bad job. The compiler in the SDK is actually GCC.
Check out www.gbadev.org and www.devrs.com/gba/ for some other GBA development stuff. (And while you're at it, check out my own GBA-page for some of the demos i've written for the GBA :)
Damn, I was going to grab that domain for my new business. Bugs Bunny-themed wok's with built-in ethernet and modem.
Check out this site for more info. I've also seen Discovery shows about this.
The problem I see, is whether the consumer should be able/have the right to return perfectly functioning products. If I buy a tool at the hardware store I may be able to return it because it's broken or because it didn't do what I wanted it to do (wasn't powerful enough, didn't fit etc). You can say to the manager that the ladder was too small or the electric drill was too weak, and he'll probably accept that. If you go to a CD store and claims that the CD you bought the other day simply sucks, he has no way of validating that. The CD works just like it was supposed to do, but because (musical) taste is subjective, you're not walking out of the store with a guarantee that you will like the CD.
The solution is to just listen to (parts of) the CD in the store. If you listen to it for 10 minutes you should be able to at least tell if the CD is completely worthless or not. The problem is that not all stores, at least not where I live, allow you to do that. Not only for CD's, but for computer games too. If I want to buy a game, I am supposed to use my psychic abilities to select which game to buy. For PC games, game demos make life easier for many people, but not everyone are able to download several 100 MB demos. For console games, you can get demos on CD's that come with magazines, but what about cartridge based consoles (N64, GBA). Cartridge-writers aren't exactly common, although I have one for my GBA.
I think that if you have had the chance to preview the product you've bought and there is nothing wrong with the product (it works just as it is supposed to do), returning the product, especially if it's easy to copy, shouldn't generally be an option. But with no previewing available, returning it should be just to give the CD/game/whatever back and say "I didn't like it, give me my money back".
If the buyer likes the used book he buys, there is a chance he'll buy other books from the same author (or publisher if it's a tech book). If the price of the new book is too high and he can't get a used one/get one at the library, he may never buy anything from that author.
I've bought used book from some online bookstores. I would never have paid the full price for the book, since it was just a book about something that I might want to look more into if I get time.
I actually spent several days with just this problem. I had to install some software to 3 PC's sitting in a 19" rack with monitors, mice and keyboards placed a few meters away. The cables where hidden in the wall. For some reason I managed to switch the mouse and keyboard on one of the machines. The result was that Windows 2000 wouldn't boot. I thought it maybe had something to do with IDE-stuff and loading the boot sector, so I tried to change the bios settings and stuff like that. I even tried to install Windows 2000 from scratch (booting off the CDROM), but the installer stopped (I can't remember when, but I think it was before it copied data do the disk). The funny thing is that the keyboard worked fine in the BIOS, but not in Windows 2000.
Just write your own. With the space available (max 64 kB) for savegames, and 64 bytes/entry you should be able to store about 1000 names/phonenumbers. :)
They probably mean a giant chemical laser which in case of no line of sight just makes it. :)
After reading the paper I have a few questions. (Yeah, I know this is just research).
If this is implemented in the real world, are each user supposed to use his/her outgoing bandwidth for this? What about people unfortunate enough to have a monthly limit?
What if the same connection is used by more than one person/client? With 4 PeerCast nodes, or maybe just 1 PeerCast node on the same connection as a web-server, will PeerCast detect that there suddenly is a lot less bandwith available than just two minutes ago (maybe because of slashdotting :).
Got up at 1130 Saturday morning, checked my email and Slashdot. Reading this story (yes, the entire story) about a guy working out didn't actually make me feel good about myself. :)
At work all the servers have unique names taken from geographical locations nearby (kongsberg, flesberg etc). All the workstations have a prefix based on the system and a number. My Ultra10 is called sun342, another guy (with a new Blade 1000) got sun432. The linux-boxes I use are called linux3 and linux4 (you can probably guess our primary platform :), sgi-boxes are called sgi1 etc. On the other hand, the Windows-boxes are called KDP12345 (I can't remember the name of my windows machine) and so-on. This is harder to remember, but usually you don't access other peoples windowsmachines.
At home I've named all my machines and other network-capable devices after Star Wars-characters. amidala (amiga), obiwan (playstation 2), r2d2 (pc laptop), bobafett (pc), yoda (pc), hansolo (sgi challenge s), palpatine (sgi indigo2), anakin (sgi o2) and luke (sun sparcstation 5). This works fine, especially since I've got the darkside.no domain. :)
The funny thing about DVD-recorders is all the different speeds they support. Like, "Hey, check out my new DVD-+RWRAM! A whopping 2x/1x/8x/4x/4x/2x/2x/24x/16x/10x/4x. Ain't that fast or what?"
Remember that all screenshots in the documents are just an 8 bit 2D representation of the data. The signal probably has much higher resolution. You may not see the fingers in the first image because the signal level is very low compared to the rest.
You should really read the story before you post a comment. The pdf describes exactly how this stuff works, and even comes with sample screens which were captured using this method. It really works. There were no problems seeing the 5 fingers on the standard windows hand cursor (the resolution was 640x480 at 85Hz). The image was captured from the "reflections from a nearby wall".
We've used smartboards in some systems at work. Basically it's just a digital whiteboard. The image is shown using a projector. Whenever one of the pens is picked up, the software on the computer detects it and freezes the image. You can then draw on the board, and lines are shown. It's of course possible to save the image. The problem is that you have to stand in front of the board, blocking the image. It comes with 4 "pens" (with different colors) and an eraser. The board is just touch sensitive. By detecting which pen (or eraser) the user picks up it uses the correct color (there is one place for each pen, if you put the green pen in the blue tray and vice versa a blue color will be used even if you pick up the green pen.
The software we used was for windows, but the web page says that some of the features are available for Mac and UNIX/Linux too.
If a piece of software (with some kind of copy-protection) runs on a computer, it can be cracked to run without that protection. Tools such as Procdump will start the program, and after the user has clicked yes on a nag box and the program is decryptet, procdump will scan the memory and rebuild the executable.
If a movie or music file is protected by some encryption it still has to be decrypted to be played. There are many ways to crack this. Crack the encryption, intercept the data stream after it has been decrypted or just record the analog stream. A small quality loss, but with no protection at all. I remeber reading an article by Tron Øgrim, where he had interviewed a boss in a publishing corporation or something like that about DeCSS and ways to protect digital data (movies in this case). He asked if they had some way to stop people from just using a camcorder to record the tv, and the boss-guy said no, and I had the impression that they just hadn't thought of it. They can protect their movies and music with super-strong encryption, but people still have to be able to watch the movies or listen to the music. If people can watch or listen to it, they will be able to record it.
It's even more sexier with multiple SGIs on the desktop. :)
Seriously, I use my Indigo2 as primary workstation at home, ircing and writing software. It also runs the webserver. When I get myself a larger harddrive for the Challenge S I'll move the webserver to that one and maybe use the O2 as main workstation instead.
The SGIs are rock solid (and noisy) machines. But I like really them.
Finally I can stop using methane to heat up my pants.
The software manager on IRIX does exactly this. It also displays a list of conflicts (if any) which gives the user an option to either install the requried packages or not install the "offending" package. The software manager is also used to manage installed packages. If you start the software manager from the toolchest menu as non-root you're prompted with a box asking for the root password.
On freeware.sgi.com you can download precompiled binaries for a lot of popular freeware tools, like Apache and GCC. Just press the install-button for the application you want to install (using netscape), and the package is downloaded and software manager is started when the download is done.