A couple weeks ago, Dell issued a recall on some of their Inspirions because of a similar problem. My sister's isn't one of them, but I noticed that the battery gets warmer than the processor does. And the powerbrick gets too hot to touch if the things been running for a few hours.
I haven't a clue what the solution to this is, but with the explosion of notebook sales, I think we're going to be seeing A LOT of these kinds of problems
And who is going to go the the trouble of spoofing your fingerprints to go on the internet at a public terminal? This streamlines things from a card and PIN. Your sign out on a register to take books out. Obviously your library isn't that large. For larger systems, more advanced technologies are neccessary. At mine, we barcode is scanned. I'd jump at the chance to use my fingerprint to take books out, I'd be able to leave the card at home and slim my wallet down a little bit.
This is just ridiculous. Why do they even care who uses the computers at the library. Around here they don't ask you for anything. You just sit down and go.
Different libraries have different policies. Mine requires you to log in with your library card number.
They do politely ask you to limit yourself to ten minutes if there's a line.
See, at mine, we get an hour. Also, the floppy drives and USB ports are disabled to keep users from uploading and downloading
There is absolutely no good reason for this and it's a clear step toward a totalitarian state.
Any library that requires a logon has a good reason for this. Considering most libraries operate autonomously from the government, what a library does has no bearing on the totalitarianism of a state.
Officials promise to protect the confidentiality of the fingerprint records.
What does that mean exactly? Doesn't the "Patriot" Act allow for law enforcement officials to easily obtain library records during investigations? I know that the ALA has spoken against the "Patriot" Act in the past but will they actually stop the LEOs from taking this information?
Considering that millions of people volunarily have themselves fingerprinted for security clearances and other reasons, is it really a big deal that the police can get your fingerprints from the library? Of course the library isn't going to stop law enforcement from gaining access, if they did, they would be breaking the law themselves.
The three-library system this week signed a $40,646 contract with a local company, U.S. Biometrics Corp., to install fingerprint scanners on 130 computers with Internet access or a time limit on usage.
Library officials say the added security is necessary to ensure people who are using the computers are who they say they are.
$313 a computer seems like an awful lot of money for this. I'm not sure what they are trying to accomplish other than wasting taxpayer dollars.
A quick Froogle search shows that fingerprint scanners cost about $80-$160 each, plus database maintenance, hardware to record the fingerprints, and ther costs sounds like it could ad up to $300 pretty easily.
Once a patron's fingerprint has been recorded, accessing a computer will require only the touch of a finger. "Right now we give you a library card with a bar code attached to it. This is just a bar code, but it's built in," West said.
So patrons used to scan their library card and they could use the computer? There is no difference now except a database of information tied to a fingerprint that can easily be looked into by employees, LEOs, and possible thieves.
I don't get this argument. Besides confirming your identity, what use is your fingerprint? The benefit is that the library gets a garuntee that the person using the computer is the person whose identification is used. The database already exists of library patrons, and if the library keeps a record of your activities (the loophole in Patriot Act compliancy for libraries is simply to not keep patron records beyond their need, i.e. when you return a book, that book is no longer in your library record so if police request your library record, it only shows what you have outstanding. This is a trick used by several libararies), this isn't changing anything.
West said the library is requiring a fingerprint to set up computer access, although patrons who object could ask a staff member to log them on to a computer.
Are they going to make this perfectly clear to all patrons with a large sign in blinking neon? I doubt it.
My library has posted next to every computer how to log in and to contact a librarian if you don't have a library card (which is neccessary to log into the internet terminals).
Unless your heckling the librarians, asking them for assistence isn't hassling them, it's what they're there for. Belive it or not, the librarians want to help you.
I don't click on the ads in the first place, why should I waste me time viewing them, or waiting for them to load?
If I don't click on the ad, nobody gets paid. So if I'm not going to click on the ad anyway, who cares if I see the ad or not? Likewise, I don't buy anything from a TV ad. So who cares if I fastforward through the commercials.
I adblock all the major advertisers, anything stupid enough to announce itself in the URL as an ad, all intellitxt, and the big ads in the middle of websites that I frequent.
I'm downloading it now. I'm planning on watching it this weekend. It isn't likely I'd have a chance to get to a theater this weekend. It's a 30 minute drive one way, so seeing a movie in the theater for me means spending an hour in a car and burning 1+ gallons of gas. I also have a life with priorities other than watching movies. Watching a movie in the theater is never an impulse activity for me because of this. I'm planning seeing RotS next weekend in the theater, but it's possible that it might not happen. This is regardless of whether or not I've seen the pirated version. In all likelihood, this will be playing through the summer like Episode I did. Almost certain that I will see it in the theater once. If not, I'll watch it again when it plays on HBO; which is what I did with Episode II.
Kangro also points out the report doesn't mention costs associated with rebooting systems after a patch is applied.
IIRC, this is one of the things Microsoft is working on for Longhorn, being able to patch and install drivers "on the fly" without a reboot.
With XP SP2, if you enable the automatic downloading of updates, it will restart the computer automatically after teh updates are installed, unless you continuously click cancel when it comes up every 5 minutes. If your not at the computer, but have web downloads going on and it does this, it can be a real pain.
DVD players are, and PS3 players will be, for the most part, limited to the living room/bedroom. I barely ever listen to music in the house, and neither to most of my friends. Mostly in the car, in the gym, at work are the places most people listen to music. I bought the Bruce Springstein album 2 weeks ago, it's a DualDisk, and it hasn't made it's way into my house yet.
Quoted from the article, I beleive the following is the definition of thin-client. It sounds a little beefier than a strict thin-client, but any time you are running "most other programs from a central server" it's pretty close.
Yes, it does, in a round-about way, define it as a thin-client. But it doesn't come out and say it, whereas a month ago, it was reported that Eiger was a thin-client class of OS. I don't think TFA uses the word "thin" a single time, and only uses the word "client" in passing.
That would be nice, but unfortunately its not likely to happen. The DVD-R vs DVD+R battle was never settled, now all DVD burners handle both. However, from looking at shelf space in electronics stores, it looks like DVD-R outsells DVD+R by at least 3-1. That's what will happen with Blue Ray vs HD-DVD. The first generation players will be cross-incompatible, then the next generation will handle both, and eventually one will be decided a winner over the other, but the other won't go away. IIRC, the sample rate for CD's was only decided by a surfing contest.
As far as SACD's and DVD-A's I think it's a matter of infrastructure and need/interest. There are very few SACD players, and neither SACD or DVD-A is inherently portable in the way that CD's are. I don't think there are ever going to be protable surround sound setups. And Joe Sixpack probably couldn't tell the diference anyway. I bet if you remixed stereo content into a mono stream and played that back, Joe Sixpack wouldn't be able to tell the difference. Heck, I wish headphones were monaural. I find it highly annoying to listen to a singer in my left ear, and the guitar in my right.
This is not correct. Any developer can license his code under pretty much any license (or even not at all). The nice thing about GPL is that this license model appeals to many people, hence it is widely used.
However, nobody forces you to use GPL
I never said otherwise. I simply pointed out the fact that the great thing about the GPL and other OSS licenses was that they are free of such restrictions, as they should be.
For gift purchases - I've bought as many DVD's as gifts as I have for myself.
For online pruchases - I've bought more DVD's online through eBay and Columbia House, than I have in a store
For reselling old DVDs - I don't care what the
MPAA wants, I don't need to copies of Shawshank Redemption. When I got the Collector's Edition, I sold the original on eBay.
For DVD rentals - rentals are a big part of the DVD space. You think Blockbuster is going to go for this?
For small resellers - Is the MPAA going to stock every mom&pop cd shack that also sells DVDs with biometric devices for this? Small time operations certainly can't afford to buy this stuff themselves.
For households where there is more than one person and the buyer actually has a life (i.e. isn't available to biometrically okay the playing 24/7
For fair use applications (not that the MPAA cares about that)
For disabled persons - what if they don't have that finger anymore for some reason, or its covered with a bandage temporaily?
On second thought, I hope the MPAA does this, so a huge class-action lawsuit against the MPAA is filed on behalf of all the people who can't use it. And another class-action suit for all the sellers who loose business because of it. And another by the EFF or whoever on behalf of consumers in general. We could be looking at several billion dollars here, all told.
I think it might not be a bad idea to amend the GPL to insist that no Communism or politically misaligned countries / organizations should be able to use it. This would help combat some of the negative sterotypes facing OSS.
But that is the "great" thing about the GPL and similar OSS licenses. Its free to anyone dispite ideological differences. If it wasn't, a F/OSS advocating developer could bar me from using their software because I also use non-Free software. A staunch pro-life developer of a scheduling package could bar an abotion clinic from using their software. If something is going to be free, it needs to be free, not "kinda-free, only when you agree with us"
The problem with a corporate environment competing in a fast paced arena like browsers is they can't keep up. Netscape 8 is based on Firefox 1.0.3 but 1.0.4 is out and has fixed some well-discussed vulnerabilities. By the time Netscape could update their engine to FF 1.0.4, 1.1 will be out, possibly 1.1.2 or even later. By the time Netscape used 1.1, 1.5 is sure to be out.
I think that's one of the biggest things Firefox has going for it. Security, extentions, stability, tabs, are all very important reasons, but Firefox is successful, because it is small. Being small, they are flexible and fast moving, able to change to meet evolving needs. Firefox will be the guerilla fighters in the upcoming browser war
Interesting that he chose the most up-to-date versions (presumably firefox is listed merely as 1.0 not 1.0.x) of the browsers, but consistently used ond versions of the operating systems. Suse 9.1 has been superceded by Suse 9.3, Mac OS X 10.3 Panther by Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger, and Windows 2000 by Windows XP SP2. Not that the versions of the OS within a platform is going to have a big impact, and presumably, the platform itself, but it just seems glaring to me. Kind of like testing MS Office 2003 and OpenOffice.org 2.0 on Windows 98 and RedHat 9 with wine
This is slashdot, we live to laugh at people catching themselves on fire because of thier own stupidity... just someone hurry and set up a camera, so we have pictures of it...
And then post the story to slashdot with a title like "MacMini's explode when plugged in"
Slashdot Mirror
I haven't a clue what the solution to this is, but with the explosion of notebook sales, I think we're going to be seeing A LOT of these kinds of problems
And who is going to go the the trouble of spoofing your fingerprints to go on the internet at a public terminal? This streamlines things from a card and PIN. Your sign out on a register to take books out. Obviously your library isn't that large. For larger systems, more advanced technologies are neccessary. At mine, we barcode is scanned. I'd jump at the chance to use my fingerprint to take books out, I'd be able to leave the card at home and slim my wallet down a little bit.
Different libraries have different policies. Mine requires you to log in with your library card number.
They do politely ask you to limit yourself to ten minutes if there's a line.
See, at mine, we get an hour. Also, the floppy drives and USB ports are disabled to keep users from uploading and downloading
There is absolutely no good reason for this and it's a clear step toward a totalitarian state.
Any library that requires a logon has a good reason for this. Considering most libraries operate autonomously from the government, what a library does has no bearing on the totalitarianism of a state.
What does that mean exactly? Doesn't the "Patriot" Act allow for law enforcement officials to easily obtain library records during investigations? I know that the ALA has spoken against the "Patriot" Act in the past but will they actually stop the LEOs from taking this information?
Considering that millions of people volunarily have themselves fingerprinted for security clearances and other reasons, is it really a big deal that the police can get your fingerprints from the library? Of course the library isn't going to stop law enforcement from gaining access, if they did, they would be breaking the law themselves.
The three-library system this week signed a $40,646 contract with a local company, U.S. Biometrics Corp., to install fingerprint scanners on 130 computers with Internet access or a time limit on usage. Library officials say the added security is necessary to ensure people who are using the computers are who they say they are.
$313 a computer seems like an awful lot of money for this. I'm not sure what they are trying to accomplish other than wasting taxpayer dollars.
A quick Froogle search shows that fingerprint scanners cost about $80-$160 each, plus database maintenance, hardware to record the fingerprints, and ther costs sounds like it could ad up to $300 pretty easily.
Once a patron's fingerprint has been recorded, accessing a computer will require only the touch of a finger. "Right now we give you a library card with a bar code attached to it. This is just a bar code, but it's built in," West said.
So patrons used to scan their library card and they could use the computer? There is no difference now except a database of information tied to a fingerprint that can easily be looked into by employees, LEOs, and possible thieves.
I don't get this argument. Besides confirming your identity, what use is your fingerprint? The benefit is that the library gets a garuntee that the person using the computer is the person whose identification is used. The database already exists of library patrons, and if the library keeps a record of your activities (the loophole in Patriot Act compliancy for libraries is simply to not keep patron records beyond their need, i.e. when you return a book, that book is no longer in your library record so if police request your library record, it only shows what you have outstanding. This is a trick used by several libararies), this isn't changing anything.
West said the library is requiring a fingerprint to set up computer access, although patrons who object could ask a staff member to log them on to a computer.
Are they going to make this perfectly clear to all patrons with a large sign in blinking neon? I doubt it.
My library has posted next to every computer how to log in and to contact a librarian if you don't have a library card (which is neccessary to log into the internet terminals).
Unless your heckling the librarians, asking them for assistence isn't hassling them, it's what they're there for. Belive it or not, the librarians want to help you.
Go ahead, I'll just start visiting a different site then.
If I don't click on the ad, nobody gets paid. So if I'm not going to click on the ad anyway, who cares if I see the ad or not? Likewise, I don't buy anything from a TV ad. So who cares if I fastforward through the commercials.
I adblock all the major advertisers, anything stupid enough to announce itself in the URL as an ad, all intellitxt, and the big ads in the middle of websites that I frequent.
I'm downloading it now. I'm planning on watching it this weekend. It isn't likely I'd have a chance to get to a theater this weekend. It's a 30 minute drive one way, so seeing a movie in the theater for me means spending an hour in a car and burning 1+ gallons of gas. I also have a life with priorities other than watching movies. Watching a movie in the theater is never an impulse activity for me because of this. I'm planning seeing RotS next weekend in the theater, but it's possible that it might not happen. This is regardless of whether or not I've seen the pirated version. In all likelihood, this will be playing through the summer like Episode I did. Almost certain that I will see it in the theater once. If not, I'll watch it again when it plays on HBO; which is what I did with Episode II.
IIRC, this is one of the things Microsoft is working on for Longhorn, being able to patch and install drivers "on the fly" without a reboot.
With XP SP2, if you enable the automatic downloading of updates, it will restart the computer automatically after teh updates are installed, unless you continuously click cancel when it comes up every 5 minutes. If your not at the computer, but have web downloads going on and it does this, it can be a real pain.
However, the fact of the matter is than everyone knows this already.
On top of that, Reuters reported this article a week ago.
Go William the Conqueror! One of my ancestors fought under him in the Battle of Hastings.
DVD players are, and PS3 players will be, for the most part, limited to the living room/bedroom. I barely ever listen to music in the house, and neither to most of my friends. Mostly in the car, in the gym, at work are the places most people listen to music. I bought the Bruce Springstein album 2 weeks ago, it's a DualDisk, and it hasn't made it's way into my house yet.
Yes, it does, in a round-about way, define it as a thin-client. But it doesn't come out and say it, whereas a month ago, it was reported that Eiger was a thin-client class of OS. I don't think TFA uses the word "thin" a single time, and only uses the word "client" in passing.
No, it's not the starter edition, it's a thin-client.
Actually, its possible that everyone did RTFA (theoretically, obviously it isn't the case) because nowhere in this crappy Washington Post writeup does it say that Eiger is actually a thin-client, although that has been reported in many places, including slashdot last month. Codenamed Eiger and Mönch, these two new releases would let you 'convert' old PC into thin-client Devices.
As far as SACD's and DVD-A's I think it's a matter of infrastructure and need/interest. There are very few SACD players, and neither SACD or DVD-A is inherently portable in the way that CD's are. I don't think there are ever going to be protable surround sound setups. And Joe Sixpack probably couldn't tell the diference anyway. I bet if you remixed stereo content into a mono stream and played that back, Joe Sixpack wouldn't be able to tell the difference. Heck, I wish headphones were monaural. I find it highly annoying to listen to a singer in my left ear, and the guitar in my right.
Not definative by any means, but when I checked last night, the c:\Windows directory of my P4 2.2GHz with 1.5GB RAM was ~2GB
I never said otherwise. I simply pointed out the fact that the great thing about the GPL and other OSS licenses was that they are free of such restrictions, as they should be.
On second thought, I hope the MPAA does this, so a huge class-action lawsuit against the MPAA is filed on behalf of all the people who can't use it. And another class-action suit for all the sellers who loose business because of it. And another by the EFF or whoever on behalf of consumers in general. We could be looking at several billion dollars here, all told.
But that is the "great" thing about the GPL and similar OSS licenses. Its free to anyone dispite ideological differences. If it wasn't, a F/OSS advocating developer could bar me from using their software because I also use non-Free software. A staunch pro-life developer of a scheduling package could bar an abotion clinic from using their software. If something is going to be free, it needs to be free, not "kinda-free, only when you agree with us"
I think that's one of the biggest things Firefox has going for it. Security, extentions, stability, tabs, are all very important reasons, but Firefox is successful, because it is small. Being small, they are flexible and fast moving, able to change to meet evolving needs. Firefox will be the guerilla fighters in the upcoming browser war
You got a better idea on what to do with that 30 min/day I'm stopped in the parking lot^H^H^H freeway?
Interesting that he chose the most up-to-date versions (presumably firefox is listed merely as 1.0 not 1.0.x) of the browsers, but consistently used ond versions of the operating systems. Suse 9.1 has been superceded by Suse 9.3, Mac OS X 10.3 Panther by Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger, and Windows 2000 by Windows XP SP2. Not that the versions of the OS within a platform is going to have a big impact, and presumably, the platform itself, but it just seems glaring to me. Kind of like testing MS Office 2003 and OpenOffice.org 2.0 on Windows 98 and RedHat 9 with wine
And then post the story to slashdot with a title like "MacMini's explode when plugged in"
unfair to the US. of course. But why would China care? It doesn't help the Chinese economy to import things from other countries.