I don't know how important this would be to the general audience, but as a musician what I'm waiting (and would pay good money for) are songs where I can break out individual tracks to better study what the artists were doing. This is especially useful when, for instance, a guitar player double-tracks playing slightly different riffs - I have a hard time hearing them as separate entities in the final mix.
If they are developing a different standard then why not craft if so 3rd party authors can easily build 'sheet music' and tablature scores that sync in automatically with the song?
Not only do many industrial HMI products use Windows, but it is almost always the only option for PLC programming tools, motion controller software, variable speed drive and process controller configuration - you name it.
Linux-based tools are few and far between.
"The Art of Electronics" is great.
You might also want to look up Nuts and Volts magazine http://www.nutsvolts.com/, Steve Ciarcia's Circuit Cellar, http://www.circellar.com/ and pick up a couple of Don Lancaster's "Cookbook" series http://www.tinaja.com/.
Steve and Don are hardware gurus that have been around since the beginning of home computers, and there is much insight to be gained.
It is an odd thing, but often older books on 'obsolete' technology are easier to grasp, and give background no longer explained in modern volumes. For instance, I have a circa 1920's transformer handbook that speaks clearly on topics that are either glossed over, or not covered at all in many newer introductory texts.
When you say multiple strands of Cat5e adding up to 12 AWG for speaker cables... do you mean two Cat5e (4 pair twisted pair; 8 wires each) cables in parallel? 24 AWG is ~0.0859 ohms/meter, and 12 AWG is ~0.00532 ohms/meter, so you'd need sixteen (actually, 16.15) 24 AWG wires to yield the same DC resistance as 12 AWG.
Seems it would work fine - skin effects for 24 AWG solid wire breakover at 68 KHz (that is, 100% of the wire diameter is involved with conduction up to that frequency).
"Destination Moon" is probably the closest in 'feel' to how Heinlein portrayed characters and situations in his books. "The Puppet Masters" movie adaptation was painful to watch, and I couldn't make it through the whole thing. "Starship Troopers" wasn't a bad action Sci-Fi flick, but missed nearly every important point RAH was trying to get across.
It should be possible for someone to make a good Heinlein movie. These recent attempts put me in mind of the movie version of Frank Herbert's "Dune" (chock-a-block with special effects; heartplugs? wierding modules?, but missing the point) versus the vastly superior, IMHO, SciFi channel TV series.
A couple of years ago, probably after SST failed to excite me, I wrote J. Michael Straczynski (who, I believe, would do a far better job), and asked if he ever considered doing a R.A. Heinlein movie. He replied that all of the Heinlein properties are optioned...
I just hope whoever does the next one hits the mark.
I don't buy a lot of music, but when I do, it is usually still in CD format so I can do with it as I wish. For instance, it is necessary for me to have some tracks in WAV format when learning a song, and using WorldWideWoodshed's SlowGold utility.
Every once in a while I'll buy and download a tune from MusicMatch's service, but with full knowledge it'll be necessary to use a DRM stripper, or re-record it in some fashion if I want to use SlowGold. One black mark against DRM.
Anyway, a couple weeks back I had a failed install of the msxml4-KB925672 hotfix, and, after getting *that* to work, found MusicMatch would only play a few seconds of certain songs, but work normally on others. Found (when using Windows Media Player v10 directly) a 'secure storage protection error'.
After several hours figured out how to get the licenses back, and did so, but the more I mucked around the less impressed I was with DRM in general, and Microsoft's implementation in particular.
What I really loved reading was this snippet from KB article 810422.
"A license cannot be found for this media file. (Error code 0xC00D274D) . This issue occurs if the restore operation was unsuccessful. To resolve this issue, recopy the content from the original source (for example, the audio CD), or acquire and purchase a new license from the content provider."
Now, I'm just fine with the idea of paying a reasonable amount for songs, but this DRM crap is total insanity. If I hadn't been tenacious in researching, and fluent enough with computers to fix the problem (traits in abundance among/. readers, but less so in the general population) I'd have been out about $100 in music. DRM, in essence, may force me to go illegal... and that doesn't make sense.
When I was a young man I played guitar in typical mid to late '70s' bar/wedding bands. In the first band we started out buying sheet music, but found it was nearly always less accurate (and often wildly wrong), and it was better to transcribe lyrics, and mark up tablature by listening to records. I'd also watch musicians on "The Midnight Special", and other music programs to catch a glimpse of guitarist's fretting styles, where on the neck they played certain passages, and so on.
Fast forward to 2006... I no longer play except for my own amusement, but have noticed sheet music hasn't gotten any better, although it has become harder to find (at least, in 'brick and mortar' stores).
There are several useful programs that aid in learning songs (wish they were around back then; beats slowing down 45's to 33-1/3 RPM, and retuning)... I use World Wide Woodshed's "Slowgold". Problem is, it needs files in WAV or MP3 in order to slow down passages, which is fine for songs ripped from CD, but blows when the song in question was purchased and downloaded from a legitimate DRM-enabled source. Of course, I can work around that by patching the sound output into a line input, and re-recording the song, but its a pain in the butt.
One of the bright spots are tablature sites and programs such as GuitarPro where users upload their interpretations of song passages and chord patterns, and share them with the community at large.
My personal opinion is RIAA should leave free lyric and tab sites alone, and allow them to comprise a "commons" tier, and, if they want to rake in cash, to develop their own standard content offering superior value-added features.
There are a wide range of things that could be done, for instance, accredited lyric sheets and tab scores vetted by the original musicians, video segments of them showing their own particular playing styles, alternative tuning, etc. (call them mini-instructional vids), notes on their instrument and sound reinforcement choices (what guitar was played, string choice, bridge setup, amplifiers, what sound FX stuff), and maybe a bit of history on how the songs came into being... I'd buy stuff like that, especially if I knew the musicians were getting the lion's share of the proceeds.
I don't follow computer education trends, but, from what I've read here, it doesn't sound too promising. I recall being in the first computer course my high school offered in my Freshman year, and we programmed in a Univac BASIC dialect using #2 pencil to mark up Hollerith cards - one card per line of code. In college I 'graduated' to Fortran IV, but at least we has a couple of card punch terminals. Back then programming was much more difficult than today, but, perhaps because resources were so limited, it may have yielded a better understanding of programming basics.
It is too bad Microsoft allowed QBASIC to die on the vine rather than paralleling it with VB... in my view, it is easier to program in than VB, and offers less distractions. For a while I had a copy of VB6, but I program infrequently these days, and something whacked the installation to the point where VB would no longer load. Instead of reinstalling it I looked around on the web, and found a replacement more suited to my temperament called JustBasic http://www.justbasic.com/ that does what I need it to do.
I'd like to see the equations and assumptions used. It must have been figured for massive increases in capability as time passed, because (given that the starting figures are correct, and that in itself appears dubious) my math works out quite differently.
The article claims 170 TB has already been indexed. Lets say this was since Google turned on the lights - late 1997, so call it 1998, or about 7 years. 170 TB/7 years is roughly 25 TB/year. 5,000,000 TB (remaining to be indexed)/25 TB per Yr is 200,000 years give or take.
By this you'd need to index 17000TB per year to cover 5 million terabytes in 300 years.
>> Why should the average person understand how their cell phone works?
Because without a basic understanding of technology people cannot make sound decisions. I suspect many of our public policy problems have their genesis here - how can an average person make informed choices if they are ignorant of the essentials of how things work?
I don't eat anything that wouldn't, if given half the chance, try to eat me first. Vegetables are very good at freezing in position, but make terrible stalkers, and just don't have the killer instinct.
That said, I suppose it would be possible to build a structure of laminated hi mu silicon steel around a residential dwelling providing both magnetic and electrostatic shielding so long as no windows were provided, the door(s) fabricated to minimize leakage, and special measures were taken at entry points for air and so forth.
EM field strength within such an enclosure would be effectively zero so long as all electrical devices of any sort (120/240V line supplies, phone lines, battery operated devices, etc.) remained outside the building.
Not much of a home. Cheaper to build a cabin in a deep wilderness setting, and become a pre-1900's farmer/hunter/gather.
>> However, the PC is also a platform for a variety of other things:
Furthering that thought I'd mention that PC hardware is used in a wide range of niche applications due to it's ubiquity, and availability of many programming tools. Considered together these applications are a major force, and don't so easily fit into a 'network-uber-alle' model.
For instance, if an industrial user wants to program a PLC (Programmable Logic Controller), a robot, vision system, etc. for a particular task the configuration software is almost always written for a PC platform. For that matter, several manufacturers use PC hardware as the PLC itself.
Once the PLC has been programmed (unless the task is very rudimentary) some sort of HMI needs to be provided so the machine operator can enter setpoints, trend variables such as pressure and temperature, and the like. Especially on the higher end, many of these HMIs are built using a PC, and HMI software such as WonderWare, Lookout, or any of perhaps 50 others (or are purpose-built using a C variant, Visual Basic, et al.).
While network connectivity back to a server is a good thing I don't believe the idea it can replace PCs with modern equivalents to dumb terminals will fly.
Yes, it does seem odd that Space Above and Beyond (or Star Trek:Deep Space 9, for that matter) aren't on The Boston Globe's reviewer's radars, yet shows which have no to little Sci-Fi content (Buffy, Xena, Tales from the Crypt... mostly fantasy, horror, and occult themes) are.
Sci-Fi, after all, means Science Fiction - a genre considering the implications of science (both by extending known physical laws, and speculating what would happen under a different set of physical laws) upon individuals and society at large.
Space Above and Beyond closely matches, to my mind at least, a vision of Science Fiction compatible to that posited by masters of the 'golden age' - Asimov, Heinlein, A.C. Clarke, Bradbury, et al., and did a good job of exploring that realm. Too bad it was produced for only one season.
It is interesting to note that ten percent of the listed series (five of fifty) have strong linkage back to Gene Roddenbury's vision - the three Star Trek series, as well as Earth Final Conflict and Andromeda.
40kV is nothing. Anyone who has worked in a plastics factory (and snooped around with an electrostatic field meter) has routinely seen levels up to the 100 to 150 kV range, and sometimes beyond.
The typical outcome is a small shock no worse that what you get after sliding over a car seat on a cold, dry morning, and touching the car door latch on your way out.
We used to produce 50" wide x 40 mil polystyrene rollstock at 50 FPM, and it would sometimes be necessary to troubleshoot in the area. Every so often you'd get zapped... up to 5" long "bolts"... in this case, very uncomfortable, and nerve-rattling, but none of us exploded into flame.
The only truly dangerous ES potentials were when a worn through section of 3" diameter aluminum pipe (used in a material scrap suction system to feed roll trim back to a grinder) was replaced with PVC by someone who didn't know better. End result was a Vandergraff generator of significant potential, and ended up knocking the guy off his feet later in the day when feeding ribbon into it.
Other good things about Flash-based HDDs are superior vibration and shock resistance, and, depending on just how horrifically expensive you mind going, the ability to run at insane temperature extremes (-60C to 90C, and sometimes even higher, for the mil-spec stuff).
It might make sense to put swap files, and other temp files to a regular HDD, and the OS and applications on the Flash drive. Then, when the bearings go buzzzz/head crashes into platter/etc. just format and install a replacement, recreate any necessary directory structure, etc. - no need to reload apps.
There are a fair number of industrial applications where Flash drives (or simply CF media) are used. For instance, last night I was working on one - a DOS-based CTC touchscreen HMI monitor using a 16MB CF module (made bootable to MSDOS v6.22) with DOS, and all the HMI application's binaries and config files.
Re:Use of text books for longer than 5 months
on
Textbooks With EULAs
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· Score: 1
I have to agree. I don't dig through them often (maybe a dozen times a year) but still refer to engineering graphics, physics, and electronics textbooks purchased in 1979!
The concept of self-destructing e-books for education strikes me as the wrong paradigm, and insanely so.
I too adored Northgate's Omnikey both for crisp tactile feedback and left hand function key placement. This just always made more sense to me from an ergonomic perspective, and especially when using programs with pre-Windows roots where a lot of shortcuts were Alt-Ctrl-Shift combos with function keys).
Although I'm not happy with some design changes (the cable isn't replaceable anymore; can't recall if the config DIP switches were retained) Creative Vision Technologies (comprised partially of ex-Northgate employees) builds a nearly exact replacement - the Avant Stellar - and it has the same good feel.
Also read a more informative piece in
http://www.drhoffman.com/page.cfm/444
which references "Strontium ranelate boosts bone density in elderly women" from N Engl J Med 2004;350:459-468. This article outlines different forms of Strontium that have been used in medicine, and their effects. Looks like Sr actually aids in increasing bone density, and tooth integrity.
BTW, Sr-90, being a good beta emitter, is used in nuclear gauging. Years ago I maintained and calibrated Betamike(TM) gauging systems measuring extruded plastic web from 0.010" up to approx. 0.100" thick (control system maintenance only; we farmed out all the 'hot' work).
Sr-90 (28.78 yr half-life, pure beta emitter) breaks down to Yttrium-90 (64.1 hour half-life, also beta), then to Zirconium 90 (stable). Does a good job, but, after 15 to 20 years, and enough of the the source has changed to Zr it is necessary to boost amplifier gain pretty high resulting in a poor s/n ratio.
Before you start doing the LED lighting conversion look into high energy capacitors (so-called "Supercaps"). I haven't run the numbers, but my guess is they aren't at a good price point yet.
A design built around them would have the advantage of zero maintenance, and a working lifespan of about 10 years.
Gotta second running w/scissors analysis... even if they meant 25 cubic meters per minute (about 883 CFM) that would be fan enough to cool a 100 HP DC motor, and use about 2 HP.
54,000 CFM... that's more than four times the air flow needed to cool a 4000 HP DC motor! I'd hate to be in the same room with the sucker - the noise would be spectacular.
If you want to see just how whacky software patenting can get dive into the following links.
Now that Rockwell has stepped in it looks like Solaia is going down, but not until after a slew of smaller organizations (and even GE Fanuc) ponied up the bucks out of court.
Schneider (an Euro conglomerate that bought up Square D, Modicon, etal. years back) sold the patent rights to Solaia for $1, plus a cut of whatever licensing Solaia could squeeze out of it.
Solaia's modus operandi was to hit up organizations for big enough bucks, but not so big as to make it worthwhile to make a legal battle of it. They were trying in the worst way to keep Rockwell (with some of the deepest pockets in this market segment) out of it precisely because the patent is junk.
Why this is important is the equipment involved (PLCs - Programmable Logic Controllers) are the backbone of many manufacturing plants, and, IMHO, putting sprags-for-sprags-sake in industry's wheels is a monumentally bad idea.
What MS needs to do is completely forget their notion of what a GUI should look like, and listen to people who use computers, and people who understand how to interact with information (Edward Tufte comes to mind).
Long filenames are better than 8x3, but why squander characters uselessly? "C:\Documents and Settings\Owner\My Documents" comes to mind...
Why default to having filename extensions turned off? Is giving the 'type' field "Microsoft Powerpoint Presentation" and hiding the extension really better than showing the ".PPT" extension?
What in the world was on their minds when conceiving the 'improved' file search functions in XP's Explorer? This UI is just plain wrong...
If you double-click on an unknown file type Explorer now defaults to a web search to find what program is likely to open it by generating a URL like this one... http://shell.windows.com/fileassoc/0409/xml/r edir. asp?Ext=0rb
Problem is, if Firefox is the default browser then this doesn't do anything (haven't tried it with Opera or others, so don't know if only IE will work, but kinda suspect this is the case).
Part two of this is, if you choose the other option - "Select the program from a list" - then the next dialog box *still* defaults to "Always use the selected program to open this kind of file". I don't know how many times I've had to "fix" someone's computer where they didn't have the required program installed, said, "Yes" here, and related, for instance, a PDF file to open with "America Online".
Why have error messages become even more cryptic over the years? Why is it the embedded help is next to useless? Even DOS commands have the "HELP command" or "command/?" forms; why do I need to scour the web to learn what command switches work with Windows programs like Explorer? Would it have freak'n killed someone to add these more 'advanced' topics to the help system?
Why was it a good idea to 'integrate' IE into the OS? In IE v3 and earlier if I linked to a XLS worksheet the browser would open an instance of the program associated to that extension (Excel, in this case), and the user would get full usability.
In IE v4 and later the viewer that renders XLS file strips out Excel's print formatting capability and gives me the browser's much weaker one (I know - there are ways around it, but why take something simple, and useful, then transform it to a more complex and less useful entity)?
Why... why... aghh... burble... aw, sorry 'bout that, my head just exploded. Gotta go clean it up now;)
I'd be interested to see JMS's take on the ST multiverse.
Years ago, asked in an email if he'd ever considered adapting R.A. Heinlein's works to the screen (he had, but there were options on everything). IMHO, every recent effort, in particular, The Puppet Masters, has missed the mark by a wide margin. Don't think the problem is that classic Heinlein tales can't translate to the big screen, but rather that his work was more about exploring the possibilities - how changes in technology effect people, and their interactions with one another. I hate to imagine what goes through "the suits" mind's when they get hold of a good Sci-Fi script, but fear it involves separating wheat from chaff, and throwing away the wheat.
Hollywood has gone stark raving, and not only in the Sci-Fi realm. One of my fave movies is 'Flight of the Phoenix' - solid cast, good writing... the works. Saw a trailer not too long ago for an FX-heavy remake that absolutely turned me off (and the other day a commercial for it's release on DVD).
To me, clear signature that the wrong suits are in charge;)
I, for one, also like to have legit software. If it happens to be by Microsoft it'll typically be a necessity or at least the path of least resistance.
Mostly, I use Freeware and/or Shareware (and have been roughly since IBM PC first introduced). After trialing a piece of software long enough to know it lets me get the job done with little/no hair-pulling I'll go ahead and register/license it.
Makes sense to do so... if Shareware author does good work he/she deserves to profit by it. Fave programs from old DOS days were written by Chris Dunford, Sammy Mitchell, Vern Buerg, et al. Will continue to support good software in this manner.
When finally broke down and bought latest computer had Win XP on it. Asked sales guy if my license of Office 97 would run on it... he said, "No", and was pushing me to get copy of Office XP (I can say "no" too).
In mean time learned Office 97 *will* install on XP, but too late... for Microsoft... as had already DL'd, installed, and appreciated OpenOffice v1.1.3
Good software. Price is right;). Some minor compatability problems when using Microsoft file formats, but nothing so out of whack to have me looking to buy Office XP (or even installing my license of Office 97 on this machine).
Why bother to rip off a license of MS Office? This deprives them *only* of bucks... they still expand user base, and expand hegemony. If cost/quality of MS software is noisome then seems this is globally self-defeating.
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I don't know how important this would be to the general audience, but as a musician what I'm waiting (and would pay good money for) are songs where I can break out individual tracks to better study what the artists were doing. This is especially useful when, for instance, a guitar player double-tracks playing slightly different riffs - I have a hard time hearing them as separate entities in the final mix. If they are developing a different standard then why not craft if so 3rd party authors can easily build 'sheet music' and tablature scores that sync in automatically with the song?
Not only do many industrial HMI products use Windows, but it is almost always the only option for PLC programming tools, motion controller software, variable speed drive and process controller configuration - you name it. Linux-based tools are few and far between.
"The Art of Electronics" is great. You might also want to look up Nuts and Volts magazine http://www.nutsvolts.com/, Steve Ciarcia's Circuit Cellar, http://www.circellar.com/ and pick up a couple of Don Lancaster's "Cookbook" series http://www.tinaja.com/. Steve and Don are hardware gurus that have been around since the beginning of home computers, and there is much insight to be gained. It is an odd thing, but often older books on 'obsolete' technology are easier to grasp, and give background no longer explained in modern volumes. For instance, I have a circa 1920's transformer handbook that speaks clearly on topics that are either glossed over, or not covered at all in many newer introductory texts.
When you say multiple strands of Cat5e adding up to 12 AWG for speaker cables ... do you mean two Cat5e (4 pair twisted pair; 8 wires each) cables in parallel? 24 AWG is ~0.0859 ohms/meter, and 12 AWG is ~0.00532 ohms/meter, so you'd need sixteen (actually, 16.15) 24 AWG wires to yield the same DC resistance as 12 AWG.
Seems it would work fine - skin effects for 24 AWG solid wire breakover at 68 KHz (that is, 100% of the wire diameter is involved with conduction up to that frequency).
It should be possible for someone to make a good Heinlein movie. These recent attempts put me in mind of the movie version of Frank Herbert's "Dune" (chock-a-block with special effects; heartplugs? wierding modules?, but missing the point) versus the vastly superior, IMHO, SciFi channel TV series.
A couple of years ago, probably after SST failed to excite me, I wrote J. Michael Straczynski (who, I believe, would do a far better job), and asked if he ever considered doing a R.A. Heinlein movie. He replied that all of the Heinlein properties are optioned ...
I just hope whoever does the next one hits the mark.
My favorite disclaimer is from a Swedish chainsaw maker: "Warning, do not attempt to stop chain with your hands or genitals."
I don't buy a lot of music, but when I do, it is usually still in CD format so I can do with it as I wish. For instance, it is necessary for me to have some tracks in WAV format when learning a song, and using WorldWideWoodshed's SlowGold utility.
Every once in a while I'll buy and download a tune from MusicMatch's service, but with full knowledge it'll be necessary to use a DRM stripper, or re-record it in some fashion if I want to use SlowGold. One black mark against DRM.
Anyway, a couple weeks back I had a failed install of the msxml4-KB925672 hotfix, and, after getting *that* to work, found MusicMatch would only play a few seconds of certain songs, but work normally on others. Found (when using Windows Media Player v10 directly) a 'secure storage protection error'.
After several hours figured out how to get the licenses back, and did so, but the more I mucked around the less impressed I was with DRM in general, and Microsoft's implementation in particular.
What I really loved reading was this snippet from KB article 810422.
"A license cannot be found for this media file. (Error code 0xC00D274D) . This issue occurs if the restore operation was unsuccessful. To resolve this issue, recopy the content from the original source (for example, the audio CD), or acquire and purchase a new license from the content provider."
Now, I'm just fine with the idea of paying a reasonable amount for songs, but this DRM crap is total insanity. If I hadn't been tenacious in researching, and fluent enough with computers to fix the problem (traits in abundance among /. readers, but less so in the general population) I'd have been out about $100 in music. DRM, in essence, may force me to go illegal ... and that doesn't make sense.
Fast forward to 2006 ... I no longer play except for my own amusement, but have noticed sheet music hasn't gotten any better, although it has become harder to find (at least, in 'brick and mortar' stores).
There are several useful programs that aid in learning songs (wish they were around back then; beats slowing down 45's to 33-1/3 RPM, and retuning) ... I use World Wide Woodshed's "Slowgold". Problem is, it needs files in WAV or MP3 in order to slow down passages, which is fine for songs ripped from CD, but blows when the song in question was purchased and downloaded from a legitimate DRM-enabled source. Of course, I can work around that by patching the sound output into a line input, and re-recording the song, but its a pain in the butt.
One of the bright spots are tablature sites and programs such as GuitarPro where users upload their interpretations of song passages and chord patterns, and share them with the community at large.
My personal opinion is RIAA should leave free lyric and tab sites alone, and allow them to comprise a "commons" tier, and, if they want to rake in cash, to develop their own standard content offering superior value-added features.
There are a wide range of things that could be done, for instance, accredited lyric sheets and tab scores vetted by the original musicians, video segments of them showing their own particular playing styles, alternative tuning, etc. (call them mini-instructional vids), notes on their instrument and sound reinforcement choices (what guitar was played, string choice, bridge setup, amplifiers, what sound FX stuff), and maybe a bit of history on how the songs came into being ... I'd buy stuff like that, especially if I knew the musicians were getting the lion's share of the proceeds.
It is too bad Microsoft allowed QBASIC to die on the vine rather than paralleling it with VB ... in my view, it is easier to program in than VB, and offers less distractions. For a while I had a copy of VB6, but I program infrequently these days, and something whacked the installation to the point where VB would no longer load. Instead of reinstalling it I looked around on the web, and found a replacement more suited to my temperament called JustBasic http://www.justbasic.com/ that does what I need it to do.
The article claims 170 TB has already been indexed. Lets say this was since Google turned on the lights - late 1997, so call it 1998, or about 7 years. 170 TB/7 years is roughly 25 TB/year. 5,000,000 TB (remaining to be indexed)/25 TB per Yr is 200,000 years give or take.
By this you'd need to index 17000TB per year to cover 5 million terabytes in 300 years.
Because without a basic understanding of technology people cannot make sound decisions. I suspect many of our public policy problems have their genesis here - how can an average person make informed choices if they are ignorant of the essentials of how things work?
That said, I suppose it would be possible to build a structure of laminated hi mu silicon steel around a residential dwelling providing both magnetic and electrostatic shielding so long as no windows were provided, the door(s) fabricated to minimize leakage, and special measures were taken at entry points for air and so forth.
EM field strength within such an enclosure would be effectively zero so long as all electrical devices of any sort (120/240V line supplies, phone lines, battery operated devices, etc.) remained outside the building.
Not much of a home. Cheaper to build a cabin in a deep wilderness setting, and become a pre-1900's farmer/hunter/gather.
Furthering that thought I'd mention that PC hardware is used in a wide range of niche applications due to it's ubiquity, and availability of many programming tools. Considered together these applications are a major force, and don't so easily fit into a 'network-uber-alle' model.
For instance, if an industrial user wants to program a PLC (Programmable Logic Controller), a robot, vision system, etc. for a particular task the configuration software is almost always written for a PC platform. For that matter, several manufacturers use PC hardware as the PLC itself.
Once the PLC has been programmed (unless the task is very rudimentary) some sort of HMI needs to be provided so the machine operator can enter setpoints, trend variables such as pressure and temperature, and the like. Especially on the higher end, many of these HMIs are built using a PC, and HMI software such as WonderWare, Lookout, or any of perhaps 50 others (or are purpose-built using a C variant, Visual Basic, et al.).
While network connectivity back to a server is a good thing I don't believe the idea it can replace PCs with modern equivalents to dumb terminals will fly.
Sci-Fi, after all, means Science Fiction - a genre considering the implications of science (both by extending known physical laws, and speculating what would happen under a different set of physical laws) upon individuals and society at large.
Space Above and Beyond closely matches, to my mind at least, a vision of Science Fiction compatible to that posited by masters of the 'golden age' - Asimov, Heinlein, A.C. Clarke, Bradbury, et al., and did a good job of exploring that realm. Too bad it was produced for only one season.
It is interesting to note that ten percent of the listed series (five of fifty) have strong linkage back to Gene Roddenbury's vision - the three Star Trek series, as well as Earth Final Conflict and Andromeda.
The typical outcome is a small shock no worse that what you get after sliding over a car seat on a cold, dry morning, and touching the car door latch on your way out.
We used to produce 50" wide x 40 mil polystyrene rollstock at 50 FPM, and it would sometimes be necessary to troubleshoot in the area. Every so often you'd get zapped ... up to 5" long "bolts" ... in this case, very uncomfortable, and nerve-rattling, but none of us exploded into flame.
The only truly dangerous ES potentials were when a worn through section of 3" diameter aluminum pipe (used in a material scrap suction system to feed roll trim back to a grinder) was replaced with PVC by someone who didn't know better. End result was a Vandergraff generator of significant potential, and ended up knocking the guy off his feet later in the day when feeding ribbon into it.
40 kV? A trail of melted carpet? C'mon!
It might make sense to put swap files, and other temp files to a regular HDD, and the OS and applications on the Flash drive. Then, when the bearings go buzzzz/head crashes into platter/etc. just format and install a replacement, recreate any necessary directory structure, etc. - no need to reload apps.
There are a fair number of industrial applications where Flash drives (or simply CF media) are used. For instance, last night I was working on one - a DOS-based CTC touchscreen HMI monitor using a 16MB CF module (made bootable to MSDOS v6.22) with DOS, and all the HMI application's binaries and config files.
I have to agree. I don't dig through them often (maybe a dozen times a year) but still refer to engineering graphics, physics, and electronics textbooks purchased in 1979!
The concept of self-destructing e-books for education strikes me as the wrong paradigm, and insanely so.
Although I'm not happy with some design changes (the cable isn't replaceable anymore; can't recall if the config DIP switches were retained) Creative Vision Technologies (comprised partially of ex-Northgate employees) builds a nearly exact replacement - the Avant Stellar - and it has the same good feel.
http://www.cvtinc.com/products/keyboards/stellar.h tm
I've averaged about 8 years hard use per Northgate keyboard, so, although the Avant Stellar costs a lot ($189) it'll be worth it in the long run.
Also read a more informative piece in http://www.drhoffman.com/page.cfm/444 which references "Strontium ranelate boosts bone density in elderly women" from N Engl J Med 2004;350:459-468. This article outlines different forms of Strontium that have been used in medicine, and their effects. Looks like Sr actually aids in increasing bone density, and tooth integrity.
BTW, Sr-90, being a good beta emitter, is used in nuclear gauging. Years ago I maintained and calibrated Betamike(TM) gauging systems measuring extruded plastic web from 0.010" up to approx. 0.100" thick (control system maintenance only; we farmed out all the 'hot' work).
Sr-90 (28.78 yr half-life, pure beta emitter) breaks down to Yttrium-90 (64.1 hour half-life, also beta), then to Zirconium 90 (stable). Does a good job, but, after 15 to 20 years, and enough of the the source has changed to Zr it is necessary to boost amplifier gain pretty high resulting in a poor s/n ratio.
While checking my facts ran across this useful page which goes into some detail on nuclear weapon physics, and what the byproducts are for a typical fission device. http://www.cartage.org.lb/en/themes/Sciences/Chemi stry/NuclearChemistry/NuclearWeapons/FirstChainRea ction/EffectsNucl/WeaponEffects.htm
Before you start doing the LED lighting conversion look into high energy capacitors (so-called "Supercaps"). I haven't run the numbers, but my guess is they aren't at a good price point yet. A design built around them would have the advantage of zero maintenance, and a working lifespan of about 10 years.
Gotta second running w/scissors analysis ... even if they meant 25 cubic meters per minute (about 883 CFM) that would be fan enough to cool a 100 HP DC motor, and use about 2 HP.
54,000 CFM ... that's more than four times the air flow needed to cool a 4000 HP DC motor! I'd hate to be in the same room with the sucker - the noise would be spectacular.
Solaia Loses, Rockwell Wins...What Does It Mean?
http://www.livejournal.com/~waltboyes/2032.html
GE Fanuc Automation agrees to Solaia patent license
http://www.manufacturing.net/ctl/article/CA510015
Rockwell sues Schneider, Solaia, law firm over patent lawsuits
http://www.manufacturing.net/ctl/article/CA269801
The shameful Solaia affair
http://www.manufacturing.net/ctl/article/CA336749
US Patent Office
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PT O2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=/netahtml/search-bool.html&r =1&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=ptxt&s1=5,038,318.WKU.&OS=PN /5,038,318&RS=PN/5,038,318
What MS needs to do is completely forget their notion of what a GUI should look like, and listen to people who use computers, and people who understand how to interact with information (Edward Tufte comes to mind).
...
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...r edir. asp?Ext=0rb
/?" forms; why do I need to scour the web to learn what command switches work with Windows programs like Explorer? Would it have freak'n killed someone to add these more 'advanced' topics to the help system?
... aghh ... burble ... aw, sorry 'bout that, my head just exploded. Gotta go clean it up now ;)
Long filenames are better than 8x3, but why squander characters uselessly? "C:\Documents and Settings\Owner\My Documents" comes to mind
Why default to having filename extensions turned off? Is giving the 'type' field "Microsoft Powerpoint Presentation" and hiding the extension really better than showing the ".PPT" extension?
What in the world was on their minds when conceiving the 'improved' file search functions in XP's Explorer? This UI is just plain wrong
If you double-click on an unknown file type Explorer now defaults to a web search to find what program is likely to open it by generating a URL like this one
http://shell.windows.com/fileassoc/0409/xml/
Problem is, if Firefox is the default browser then this doesn't do anything (haven't tried it with Opera or others, so don't know if only IE will work, but kinda suspect this is the case).
Part two of this is, if you choose the other option - "Select the program from a list" - then the next dialog box *still* defaults to "Always use the selected program to open this kind of file". I don't know how many times I've had to "fix" someone's computer where they didn't have the required program installed, said, "Yes" here, and related, for instance, a PDF file to open with "America Online".
Why have error messages become even more cryptic over the years? Why is it the embedded help is next to useless? Even DOS commands have the "HELP command" or "command
Why was it a good idea to 'integrate' IE into the OS? In IE v3 and earlier if I linked to a XLS worksheet the browser would open an instance of the program associated to that extension (Excel, in this case), and the user would get full usability.
In IE v4 and later the viewer that renders XLS file strips out Excel's print formatting capability and gives me the browser's much weaker one (I know - there are ways around it, but why take something simple, and useful, then transform it to a more complex and less useful entity)?
Why... why
I'd be interested to see JMS's take on the ST multiverse.
Years ago, asked in an email if he'd ever considered adapting R.A. Heinlein's works to the screen (he had, but there were options on everything). IMHO, every recent effort, in particular, The Puppet Masters, has missed the mark by a wide margin. Don't think the problem is that classic Heinlein tales can't translate to the big screen, but rather that his work was more about exploring the possibilities - how changes in technology effect people, and their interactions with one another. I hate to imagine what goes through "the suits" mind's when they get hold of a good Sci-Fi script, but fear it involves separating wheat from chaff, and throwing away the wheat.
Hollywood has gone stark raving, and not only in the Sci-Fi realm. One of my fave movies is 'Flight of the Phoenix' - solid cast, good writing ... the works. Saw a trailer not too long ago for an FX-heavy remake that absolutely turned me off (and the other day a commercial for it's release on DVD).
To me, clear signature that the wrong suits are in charge ;)
Mostly, I use Freeware and/or Shareware (and have been roughly since IBM PC first introduced). After trialing a piece of software long enough to know it lets me get the job done with little/no hair-pulling I'll go ahead and register/license it. Makes sense to do so ... if Shareware author does good work he/she deserves to profit by it. Fave programs from old DOS days were written by Chris Dunford, Sammy Mitchell, Vern Buerg, et al. Will continue to support good software in this manner.
When finally broke down and bought latest computer had Win XP on it. Asked sales guy if my license of Office 97 would run on it ... he said, "No", and was pushing me to get copy of Office XP (I can say "no" too).
In mean time learned Office 97 *will* install on XP, but too late ... for Microsoft ... as had already DL'd, installed, and appreciated OpenOffice v1.1.3
Good software. Price is right ;). Some minor compatability problems when using Microsoft file formats, but nothing so out of whack to have me looking to buy Office XP (or even installing my license of Office 97 on this machine).
Why bother to rip off a license of MS Office? This deprives them *only* of bucks ... they still expand user base, and expand hegemony. If cost/quality of MS software is noisome then seems this is globally self-defeating.