I'd hope the president looks like a deer in the headlights. We don't know enough to make a response. Who did it? Was it underlings acting outside of the leaders controll, or the leaders wishes? Did foreign goverments aid in this or not?
We don't have answers and people are demanding them. What can the president do, we need to be level headed about this without destorying the emotion of the event. Not an easy task, if it is even possibal.
The different ports are becuse the hardware is different enough that the same port can't be used for all versions. Efforts are constantly made to restructure the ports to make them more intigraded, but the only code that isn't the same between ports is code that doesn't apply to anything but the one platform.
486? Mine is a 386. bought in augest of 91. Still boots from the orginional 80 mb harddrive. (everyone else was buying 40 mb harddrives at the time and finding them too small, so we went with 80)
Works great, survived y2k. I keep waiting for it to die and wondering if it will be worth the bother of fixing. I hope it keeps running though. I have better things to spend money on.
Laughing at hax0rs trying to hack your Bridge Firewall: Priceless.
Yeah, sit on irc sometime. Back when winnuke was getting a bunch of hosts he used to love watchign people winnuke him. - he had a mac sitting behind my linux firewall.
And the sad part is, my linux firewall hadn't seen an update in 3 years (at that time)! but winnuke is so easy for the script kiddies that they don't even think to try to attack it.
these attacks are irrelavent to the missile shield arguement. there are missiles outthere, and there are terrorists out there. There is no one system that can defend against all forms of attacks.
You can make the arguement that missiles are unlikely to be used, so why spend a lot to defend against them.
You can make an argument that we need to spend money on terrorists attacks (but I don't know how to do them without violating rights, while missile defense is easy from that point of view) It is in fact reasonable to prevent an attack you have seen once from occuring again.
There are many other arguements I can think of, both ways. however expirencing one attack does not make the other possibal ones go away. that something will not work against anouther attack is irrelavent to the arguement that we should build it. I find it unlikely that any terrorists hijacking defense would also work against missiles.
"Anyone who slaps a 'this page is best viewed with Browser X' label on a Web page appears to be yearning for the bad old days, before the Web, when you had very little chance of reading a document written on another computer, another word processor, or another network."
-Tim Berners-Lee in Technology Review, July 1996
I mention the above cause I'm working with a product now with a web based interface that only runs on ie 5.5 with the latest java upgrades, on windows. Of course many of our customers are unix shops.
the above aside, Java is slow, at least in our implimentation. Running across a 56k modem is an exercise in frustration. I don't know how much of this is just our implimentation, but it is at least something to watch for.
Ask this question: Is there a 20% functionality that the users spend 99% of the time with, and for the other 80% you can give a difficult to use (but quick and easy to impliment) interface. Perhaps your current interface for those who need everything, and web based for the most common things.
What I think is best is a web based interface that users can use when they are working from elsewhere. At the office use your system, when on the road or working from home use the wbe based system which will let you do everything you normally do. For the few things you can't do from the web visit the office once a month.
Identify who is likely to use this. A salemen on a different continet working from a customer site via a satalite connection (long delay) might find the web base system better if implimented right, and might need functionality that everyone else doesn't need. Work from home users probably just want an interface that works on their chosen OS (mac, beos, windows, linux all come to mind, but others are possibal), but is on a fast (ok, dsl) link so speed isn't such a issue.
Once you know who isn't well served by the current interface, then you build one to fit their needs.
Congress typically feels the need to respond after some high profile incident like this. There is no way at this time to know what accually happened, or how to prevent this. (Much less how to prevent this without trampeling your rights). Still congress wants to do something, so they appear to have the ebst attentions. Odds are this will be used to trample on your rights.
Most open source projects start as a hobby. Many key devolpers are not paid. Linus doesn't make money from Linux (he got job offers from linux companies and turned them down due to conflict of interest issues).
Of course there are companies that pay their emploiees to devolp open source, but they have other benifits. Many sell support. Doesn't change the fact that most of us do open source for free.
Yes my dad has a full time job, 4-h is a hobby. Which is exactly my point: all the people above are doing something for the community as a whole without making money on it. When offered pay they refuse it. There is no reason intellegent programers can't do the same with software. Its just that one person can only visit so many prisioners, while software can benifit millions of people.
Why does one friend of mine spend a couple hours a week visiting a couple prison? He specificlly is visiting prisoners in for life without parole, they didn't know each other before hand, and they are not relatives.
Why did one guy I work with spend one of his weeks of vacation in Mexico with habbitat for humanity building houses in Mexica? He doesn't speak spanish, has no mexican roots, Mexico is 1000 miles away, and he went in summer, not winter when you would want to leave home.
Why does my dad run the 4-h food stand at the fair, and then take the money he is paid for that and donate it back to 4-h?
Open source by comparition is easy, I need a program, and by going open source I get others to help me with it, making it better. Its not about non-programers using it (note that bug reports are useful and put you as part of the process), it is about programers doing something that alone they would take longer to do. Unfortunatly this obvous answer is wrong, open source has the same reasons at the root as the others.
Re:Beauty for beauty's sake makes crappy software
on
Software Aesthetics
·
· Score: 2
Ever designed a bridge? Do you know how long it takes? Did you know
you only get one chance to get it right during the implementation
stage?
No, I don't need to. I've seen people build bridges, and I've then seen cement trucks on top of those bridges. These are people with no engineering background who still manage to build a bridge that holds up despite not designing it at all. You don't have to know how much weight you can put on a wood beam before it will fail, you just need to use a beam big enough that it is overkill.
You can't do that with software. There is no software equivelent of overkill that an amature can design something that works.
This could be better for science than ISS. Think about it, you can go to ISS and spend half your time maintaining the stupid thing, but the odds of Nasa selecting your project to go are pretty low. (Assuming you go with, or it is big)
alternativly you buy a ticket from the russians from your grant, and spend all your time on research because the hotel staff is taking care of maintance. And because they want to make a profit and be touristy friendly you are likely to get up there within a reasonable amount of time.
Don't feel bad, they change to every few months. Your 5 diget zip code is always the same, the 4 diget version changes from time to time, and companies that do use it have to pay for the updates. Bulk mailers (magazines) send enough mail that it is worth it, but for most of us the saveings don't outweigh the hasstle.
but I am wondering if there is a form letter or boilerplate being used for responses to these issues - if that is the case, then what is even the point of writing your congresscritters?
All the better. Boilerplate responses means that they have heard of this issue enough that they wrote it. That means they are wondering if this is big enough that they need to become "un-bought" to win the next election. They are not counting all the pro and con letters they get.
Your congrescritter is still unlikely to read your letter himself, but someone is now reding enough of it to get your position, and then making a mark. Your congress critter is seeing those marks, and if there are a significant number of them he will act knowing that to now act could cost him the election.
Of course I think it is wrong to ever vote for an incumbant, so putting a check next to my letter won't help, but he doesn't know that because the ballot is seceret.
I did. slightly better then the CNN story, but only slightly. I still havn't a clue what modules are avaiable. Appearently I can snap them in and out, but nothing mroe is clear. No pictures of the aquarium, or fish in it. No pictures of any work getting done, or even hints that work could be done. No hints as to work ability.
Oh, and in floor storage sounds great except that I was flooded out of my cube this spring, and I know I'm not the only one working in a swamp. (why someone would build an office on a swamp is a different rant) Even there, they showed a storage module, but there is no way to tell how much it would hold, or what type of stuff fits.
The cube might be interesting, I'll never know, as the storywas worthless. there is appearently an aquarium, but I have no clue how it fits. There is a Hammock, but I can't tell if anyone could take a nap in it. there might be a fold down chair, which could be useful or useless, but I can't tell because it isn't shown.
In other words this is a fluff story lacking the meat any engineer would want. there are no pictures. There are some neat gimics (the coffee warme/cola cooler might be useful) but appearently no attention was paid to accually getting work done. Where is the comptuer? does it interface to the white board so I can save my notes? Does the sun simulation lighting not cause excessive glare on my screen?
whoever thought of the chair that automaticly calls your phone after it is in use too long (to get people out of teh cube) should be shot. the only people who can use this function are in customer service and will get critical calls often enough that it isn't an issue. The rest of us know the someone personally in our cube is higher priority then the phone and let voice mail take the call. (Unless we have callerID and suspect the call is a family emergency)
I don't want a mechanic flower that wilts. If I want a flower I want a real one. Depending on how green my thumb is I might or might not want the cube to take care of the flower. (some like to do the work themselves, some just want the green). And those who want flowers want a good ventalation/filtration system so that I can smell it in my cube, but he guy in the next cube won't die from allergys. (I happen to work with someone deathly allergic to some plants)
So if my boss is reading this: there are some neat ideas here that we should consider for our cubes, but it isn't the ultimate cube.
Re:Bynari Software has Linux Outlook/Exchange supp
on
KOffice 1.1 Rolls Out
·
· Score: 2
There whole day is scheduled around
their calendar. Their calendar is set by someone else's meeting
schedule. All they do is approve it and they are sent reminders of
where to be and when... If you can't do that in another client, then
the client will never be even close to replacing Outlook/Exchange.
True. Saddly exchange is a horribal calander system. I want to be reminded abotu meetings 5 mintues before they start. Everyone else wants 15 minutes. Can't be done, the meeting sets the reminder time, so I get reminded about each meeting 15 minuter before, except the ones I schedual. I've givin up on changing each one, it is too much hastle.
there are many other problems with exchange that I won't get into the reminder is the just one that has annoyed me last. It doesn't work for us, yet we have to use it.
So what? I work with people in france from time to time. I'm not going to get up at the same time they do, and they won't get up at the same time I do. Thus all our email exchanges are delayed by a day anyway. So if you work only by email, you just send a question, and then go on to something else, it doesn't matter if the 10 hour delay is in transit, so long as they respond. Now if they are working in anouther solar system I can see a problem. Indeed I would expect that someone working 45 light years away would have no contact with somewhere here. Assuming reasonabbly close levels of research odds are by the time details of a new discovery reach us we have discovered it independantly. (Of course we can perhaps direct research into different branchs if we see them ahead of time, but 45 years worth of one research path is hard to plan in advance)
Across the building, or across the world, same
on
Extreme Telecommuting
·
· Score: 2
It doesn't matter much if you are across the building form me, or across the world. We won't talk face to face so who cares. I know that I work with and talk face to face with people within 50 feet of my cube, but farther then that, I have better things to do.
Not that I'm lazy, just that Curt is across the wall, and I don't have to move to ask a simple question, and when I realize it wasn't simple I'm motivated to get up. John is a little farther, but I can look out the window on the way. I don't even know where Adam is, and the odds that he isn't there at the moment make it not worth my while to check, I send email. Bob is in Arizona (I'm in Minnesota), and I'll contact him and Adam the same way: email or phone.
When we set up this location we found some studies, that showed the above is typical. So they tried to put me and Adam o different projects (this helps, but even still I sometimes need him), while Curt should work on the same projects.
My boss has ordered me to work from home though at times. If you want something done, nothing is better then sitting at home and cranking it out. I can't solve every problem at home, but time at work is best spent with others planning how things will work.
Borders is normally big enough that face recignition won't help much. But my local record store needs this. Or to put it better, they need a system that will recignise me, and have the robotic shelves get rid of that garbage that passes for music nowadays and put in some real bluegrass.
Now I know that 99% of the population or more can't stand blueGrass, but I like it. It wouldn't be hard to impliment this system either, though the investment in $$$ is a bit high yet.
In a bookstore I want this to connect to my comptuer when I pick up a book, and my comptuer then sends a message (I don't want them to know what is on my bookshelf from a trip to Barns and Nobel) "You already own that book, but it is a worn copy." At which point I get the choice: a) buy it to replace the copy I've worn out, or B) find the copy in my bookshelf. this is a problem with some authors who have written many good books over their lifetime, which is a lot longer then mine (so far)
Yes there are privacy issues, but it can serve me too, and I'd like the benifits of it.
I've worked on projects before where the hardware was only partially stable, and the rom code was changed daily and normally couldn't boot. Those doing higher level work on the system were forced to write code for the specs, and debug latter. It isn't the best, but it works. (Yes there is simulation, but simulation tends to comment out all the hardware interaction, which changes things drasticly)
I've heard of other groups wanting to solve the same problem. Nuns in working in one village would like email to the pope, while some protistant group would like email to their leader. Various non-religion orginizations (including buisnesses) could use some access. They are all in the same boat as you.
Use that to your advantage. Most of the plans say put in short haul modems or radios (don't be afraid to combine them) from point to point, and use store and forward email. Don't be afraid to have some other group run a repeater for you. (make sure they can do it of course)
Isn't there a a fine if you call someone after being asked to be put on the do-not-call list? I thought there was, and it takes effect immeadiatly, not in 6 weeks while you circulate lists, right now.
In this computer age changing your do-not-call list can be done in real time with any half way decient comptuer and database. They should use one.
I use a cell phone exclusivly. Call me to make an unsolicitiade sales call and I will sue you, and I know the law is stronger becuse I pay for calls.
Come to think of it, I do have a cordless hammer. I avoid it, as the corded hammer is much faster. Saddly my office doesn't have an air supply, or an outlet that will run the compressor.
Is spelling impairment a disability? Maybe you should file a claim.
I've always thought so, and at times (a bug that I'd been staring at for a week) wished I didn't consider it dishonest to do so. I have better things to do with my life then sit 50 feet from the nearest window on a bright sunny day like today. Or maybe my disability is just that I don't have the right personality to be a fishing celeberty and put out on of those fish in the north woods shows...
Well, if they are ahead of us, odds are they have solved some problems that we are currently facing. If they could show us how to make sky scrappers 200 stories high cheaply, (think big apartments downtown), and how to grwo food a lot more efficantly then we do now, many population problems would be solved.
If they are behind us, it can't be far because we have just barely got the ability to communicate. We can quickly bring us up to our level, and odds are good they have discovered something that we haven't yet. 45 years isn't a lot of scientific progress. That isn't to say we won't discover something while the knowledge is in transit, but even still it is useful to exchange knowedge.
Just a warning though, if we exchange information we can't determin who is in the right in their local wars for years to come, we should therefore make sure that knowledge we transmit is avaiable to all.
Slashdot Mirror
I'd hope the president looks like a deer in the headlights. We don't know enough to make a response. Who did it? Was it underlings acting outside of the leaders controll, or the leaders wishes? Did foreign goverments aid in this or not?
We don't have answers and people are demanding them. What can the president do, we need to be level headed about this without destorying the emotion of the event. Not an easy task, if it is even possibal.
Yeah, what the other guy said. :)
The different ports are becuse the hardware is different enough that the same port can't be used for all versions. Efforts are constantly made to restructure the ports to make them more intigraded, but the only code that isn't the same between ports is code that doesn't apply to anything but the one platform.
486? Mine is a 386. bought in augest of 91. Still boots from the orginional 80 mb harddrive. (everyone else was buying 40 mb harddrives at the time and finding them too small, so we went with 80)
Works great, survived y2k. I keep waiting for it to die and wondering if it will be worth the bother of fixing. I hope it keeps running though. I have better things to spend money on.
Laughing at hax0rs trying to hack your Bridge Firewall: Priceless.
Yeah, sit on irc sometime. Back when winnuke was getting a bunch of hosts he used to love watchign people winnuke him. - he had a mac sitting behind my linux firewall.
And the sad part is, my linux firewall hadn't seen an update in 3 years (at that time)! but winnuke is so easy for the script kiddies that they don't even think to try to attack it.
these attacks are irrelavent to the missile shield arguement. there are missiles outthere, and there are terrorists out there. There is no one system that can defend against all forms of attacks.
You can make the arguement that missiles are unlikely to be used, so why spend a lot to defend against them.
You can make an argument that we need to spend money on terrorists attacks (but I don't know how to do them without violating rights, while missile defense is easy from that point of view) It is in fact reasonable to prevent an attack you have seen once from occuring again.
There are many other arguements I can think of, both ways. however expirencing one attack does not make the other possibal ones go away. that something will not work against anouther attack is irrelavent to the arguement that we should build it. I find it unlikely that any terrorists hijacking defense would also work against missiles.
I mention the above cause I'm working with a product now with a web based interface that only runs on ie 5.5 with the latest java upgrades, on windows. Of course many of our customers are unix shops.
the above aside, Java is slow, at least in our implimentation. Running across a 56k modem is an exercise in frustration. I don't know how much of this is just our implimentation, but it is at least something to watch for.
Ask this question: Is there a 20% functionality that the users spend 99% of the time with, and for the other 80% you can give a difficult to use (but quick and easy to impliment) interface. Perhaps your current interface for those who need everything, and web based for the most common things.
What I think is best is a web based interface that users can use when they are working from elsewhere. At the office use your system, when on the road or working from home use the wbe based system which will let you do everything you normally do. For the few things you can't do from the web visit the office once a month.
Identify who is likely to use this. A salemen on a different continet working from a customer site via a satalite connection (long delay) might find the web base system better if implimented right, and might need functionality that everyone else doesn't need. Work from home users probably just want an interface that works on their chosen OS (mac, beos, windows, linux all come to mind, but others are possibal), but is on a fast (ok, dsl) link so speed isn't such a issue.
Once you know who isn't well served by the current interface, then you build one to fit their needs.
Congress typically feels the need to respond after some high profile incident like this. There is no way at this time to know what accually happened, or how to prevent this. (Much less how to prevent this without trampeling your rights). Still congress wants to do something, so they appear to have the ebst attentions. Odds are this will be used to trample on your rights.
Most open source projects start as a hobby. Many key devolpers are not paid. Linus doesn't make money from Linux (he got job offers from linux companies and turned them down due to conflict of interest issues).
Of course there are companies that pay their emploiees to devolp open source, but they have other benifits. Many sell support. Doesn't change the fact that most of us do open source for free.
Yes my dad has a full time job, 4-h is a hobby. Which is exactly my point: all the people above are doing something for the community as a whole without making money on it. When offered pay they refuse it. There is no reason intellegent programers can't do the same with software. Its just that one person can only visit so many prisioners, while software can benifit millions of people.
Why does one friend of mine spend a couple hours a week visiting a couple prison? He specificlly is visiting prisoners in for life without parole, they didn't know each other before hand, and they are not relatives.
Why did one guy I work with spend one of his weeks of vacation in Mexico with habbitat for humanity building houses in Mexica? He doesn't speak spanish, has no mexican roots, Mexico is 1000 miles away, and he went in summer, not winter when you would want to leave home.
Why does my dad run the 4-h food stand at the fair, and then take the money he is paid for that and donate it back to 4-h?
Open source by comparition is easy, I need a program, and by going open source I get others to help me with it, making it better. Its not about non-programers using it (note that bug reports are useful and put you as part of the process), it is about programers doing something that alone they would take longer to do. Unfortunatly this obvous answer is wrong, open source has the same reasons at the root as the others.
No, I don't need to. I've seen people build bridges, and I've then seen cement trucks on top of those bridges. These are people with no engineering background who still manage to build a bridge that holds up despite not designing it at all. You don't have to know how much weight you can put on a wood beam before it will fail, you just need to use a beam big enough that it is overkill.
You can't do that with software. There is no software equivelent of overkill that an amature can design something that works.
This could be better for science than ISS. Think about it, you can go to ISS and spend half your time maintaining the stupid thing, but the odds of Nasa selecting your project to go are pretty low. (Assuming you go with, or it is big)
alternativly you buy a ticket from the russians from your grant, and spend all your time on research because the hotel staff is taking care of maintance. And because they want to make a profit and be touristy friendly you are likely to get up there within a reasonable amount of time.
I can never remember mine
Don't feel bad, they change to every few months. Your 5 diget zip code is always the same, the 4 diget version changes from time to time, and companies that do use it have to pay for the updates. Bulk mailers (magazines) send enough mail that it is worth it, but for most of us the saveings don't outweigh the hasstle.
but I am wondering if there is a form letter or boilerplate being used for responses to these issues - if that is the case, then what is even the point of writing your congresscritters?
All the better. Boilerplate responses means that they have heard of this issue enough that they wrote it. That means they are wondering if this is big enough that they need to become "un-bought" to win the next election. They are not counting all the pro and con letters they get.
Your congrescritter is still unlikely to read your letter himself, but someone is now reding enough of it to get your position, and then making a mark. Your congress critter is seeing those marks, and if there are a significant number of them he will act knowing that to now act could cost him the election.
Of course I think it is wrong to ever vote for an incumbant, so putting a check next to my letter won't help, but he doesn't know that because the ballot is seceret.
I did. slightly better then the CNN story, but only slightly. I still havn't a clue what modules are avaiable. Appearently I can snap them in and out, but nothing mroe is clear. No pictures of the aquarium, or fish in it. No pictures of any work getting done, or even hints that work could be done. No hints as to work ability.
Oh, and in floor storage sounds great except that I was flooded out of my cube this spring, and I know I'm not the only one working in a swamp. (why someone would build an office on a swamp is a different rant) Even there, they showed a storage module, but there is no way to tell how much it would hold, or what type of stuff fits.
The cube might be interesting, I'll never know, as the storywas worthless. there is appearently an aquarium, but I have no clue how it fits. There is a Hammock, but I can't tell if anyone could take a nap in it. there might be a fold down chair, which could be useful or useless, but I can't tell because it isn't shown.
In other words this is a fluff story lacking the meat any engineer would want. there are no pictures. There are some neat gimics (the coffee warme/cola cooler might be useful) but appearently no attention was paid to accually getting work done. Where is the comptuer? does it interface to the white board so I can save my notes? Does the sun simulation lighting not cause excessive glare on my screen?
whoever thought of the chair that automaticly calls your phone after it is in use too long (to get people out of teh cube) should be shot. the only people who can use this function are in customer service and will get critical calls often enough that it isn't an issue. The rest of us know the someone personally in our cube is higher priority then the phone and let voice mail take the call. (Unless we have callerID and suspect the call is a family emergency)
I don't want a mechanic flower that wilts. If I want a flower I want a real one. Depending on how green my thumb is I might or might not want the cube to take care of the flower. (some like to do the work themselves, some just want the green). And those who want flowers want a good ventalation/filtration system so that I can smell it in my cube, but he guy in the next cube won't die from allergys. (I happen to work with someone deathly allergic to some plants)
So if my boss is reading this: there are some neat ideas here that we should consider for our cubes, but it isn't the ultimate cube.
True. Saddly exchange is a horribal calander system. I want to be reminded abotu meetings 5 mintues before they start. Everyone else wants 15 minutes. Can't be done, the meeting sets the reminder time, so I get reminded about each meeting 15 minuter before, except the ones I schedual. I've givin up on changing each one, it is too much hastle.
there are many other problems with exchange that I won't get into the reminder is the just one that has annoyed me last. It doesn't work for us, yet we have to use it.
So what? I work with people in france from time to time. I'm not going to get up at the same time they do, and they won't get up at the same time I do. Thus all our email exchanges are delayed by a day anyway. So if you work only by email, you just send a question, and then go on to something else, it doesn't matter if the 10 hour delay is in transit, so long as they respond. Now if they are working in anouther solar system I can see a problem. Indeed I would expect that someone working 45 light years away would have no contact with somewhere here. Assuming reasonabbly close levels of research odds are by the time details of a new discovery reach us we have discovered it independantly. (Of course we can perhaps direct research into different branchs if we see them ahead of time, but 45 years worth of one research path is hard to plan in advance)
It doesn't matter much if you are across the building form me, or across the world. We won't talk face to face so who cares. I know that I work with and talk face to face with people within 50 feet of my cube, but farther then that, I have better things to do.
Not that I'm lazy, just that Curt is across the wall, and I don't have to move to ask a simple question, and when I realize it wasn't simple I'm motivated to get up. John is a little farther, but I can look out the window on the way. I don't even know where Adam is, and the odds that he isn't there at the moment make it not worth my while to check, I send email. Bob is in Arizona (I'm in Minnesota), and I'll contact him and Adam the same way: email or phone.
When we set up this location we found some studies, that showed the above is typical. So they tried to put me and Adam o different projects (this helps, but even still I sometimes need him), while Curt should work on the same projects.
My boss has ordered me to work from home though at times. If you want something done, nothing is better then sitting at home and cranking it out. I can't solve every problem at home, but time at work is best spent with others planning how things will work.
Borders is normally big enough that face recignition won't help much. But my local record store needs this. Or to put it better, they need a system that will recignise me, and have the robotic shelves get rid of that garbage that passes for music nowadays and put in some real bluegrass.
Now I know that 99% of the population or more can't stand blueGrass, but I like it. It wouldn't be hard to impliment this system either, though the investment in $$$ is a bit high yet.
In a bookstore I want this to connect to my comptuer when I pick up a book, and my comptuer then sends a message (I don't want them to know what is on my bookshelf from a trip to Barns and Nobel) "You already own that book, but it is a worn copy." At which point I get the choice: a) buy it to replace the copy I've worn out, or B) find the copy in my bookshelf. this is a problem with some authors who have written many good books over their lifetime, which is a lot longer then mine (so far)
Yes there are privacy issues, but it can serve me too, and I'd like the benifits of it.
Sure, but sometimes you have to test all at once.
I've worked on projects before where the hardware was only partially stable, and the rom code was changed daily and normally couldn't boot. Those doing higher level work on the system were forced to write code for the specs, and debug latter. It isn't the best, but it works. (Yes there is simulation, but simulation tends to comment out all the hardware interaction, which changes things drasticly)
I've heard of other groups wanting to solve the same problem. Nuns in working in one village would like email to the pope, while some protistant group would like email to their leader. Various non-religion orginizations (including buisnesses) could use some access. They are all in the same boat as you.
Use that to your advantage. Most of the plans say put in short haul modems or radios (don't be afraid to combine them) from point to point, and use store and forward email. Don't be afraid to have some other group run a repeater for you. (make sure they can do it of course)
Isn't there a a fine if you call someone after being asked to be put on the do-not-call list? I thought there was, and it takes effect immeadiatly, not in 6 weeks while you circulate lists, right now.
In this computer age changing your do-not-call list can be done in real time with any half way decient comptuer and database. They should use one.
I use a cell phone exclusivly. Call me to make an unsolicitiade sales call and I will sue you, and I know the law is stronger becuse I pay for calls.
Come to think of it, I do have a cordless hammer. I avoid it, as the corded hammer is much faster. Saddly my office doesn't have an air supply, or an outlet that will run the compressor.
Is spelling impairment a disability? Maybe you should file a claim.
I've always thought so, and at times (a bug that I'd been staring at for a week) wished I didn't consider it dishonest to do so. I have better things to do with my life then sit 50 feet from the nearest window on a bright sunny day like today. Or maybe my disability is just that I don't have the right personality to be a fishing celeberty and put out on of those fish in the north woods shows...
Well, if they are ahead of us, odds are they have solved some problems that we are currently facing. If they could show us how to make sky scrappers 200 stories high cheaply, (think big apartments downtown), and how to grwo food a lot more efficantly then we do now, many population problems would be solved.
If they are behind us, it can't be far because we have just barely got the ability to communicate. We can quickly bring us up to our level, and odds are good they have discovered something that we haven't yet. 45 years isn't a lot of scientific progress. That isn't to say we won't discover something while the knowledge is in transit, but even still it is useful to exchange knowedge.
Just a warning though, if we exchange information we can't determin who is in the right in their local wars for years to come, we should therefore make sure that knowledge we transmit is avaiable to all.