Re:Looks... pretty much the same as everything els
on
Review: Darkwatch
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· Score: 1, Interesting
"With the increasing price of oil, I can't help wondering what the face of computing is going to look like five or ten years down the line. The average computer uses as much as 1¾ Titanics worth of coal to run on any given day."
"No. Hybrids are successful mostly because they recapture braking energy and allow the engine to be shut down when it is making more power than necessary."
Partially. Getting 55mpg milage is nothing new. Infact early 90's Geo Metros could hit 55+ no problem. The problem with 55mpg cars is that they have absolutely no balls. When you have an engine that only develops 80ft/lbs of torque and a set of highway gears that keep crank speeds under 3k on the interstate, you have a car that will take about 3 miles to get to 60mph.
Hybrids improve on this in a few ways. First, they turn the engine off when it's not being used. Less waste, more milage, especially in town. Second, they use the braking to recapture energy for the batteries. And Third, they use an electric motor to assist/replace the engine acceleration. That means that you can run a very efficient but very week engine, and still be able to hit 60 in under 20 seconds (12.7 for the Prius). The Prius, running on it's electric motor develops 295ft/lbs of torque up to 1200rpms. That's more off the line grunt power then most cars on the road, and better then most muscle cars. Most performance engines can beat 295ft/lbs, but they do it at slightly higher rpms, which means the new Prius should have some very impressive trap times and 0-25 performance.
"If option one is that I ham not a murderer, and option two is that I am not a rapist (and in this particular case options one and two could overlap), and *IF* we were to hypothetically pass on both options one and two, then YES, in fact the ONLY REMAINING POSSIBILITY would be that I am a murdering rapist."
My point being that wether or not I refute you claims of not being a rapist or a murderer, you are (with all likelihood) not a rapist or a murderer.
"TYou proceed to describe a DRM system that will prohibit you from playing your files on any pre-existing devices. A system that will prohibit you from playing your files on any hardware/software that has not been approved. That will prohibit you from playing them on a device or with software you yourself built/wrote. That will prohibit you from playing your files in any way other than how the approved devices happen to be designed to allow them to be played."
Wrong. First, go pick up an 8 track. No plug it into your DVD player. That DVD player is incapable of playing that medium, that doesn't make DVD players evil. Second, as I specificly noted, the DRM is authenticated via an API. so you could write an interface for windows, linux, unix, BSD,.Net, Java or any other language that can interact with C based libraries.
"And even if a court did decide to ignore the blatant text of the law and just MAKE UP STUFF to leave the DMCA intact, well I don't see what you imagine the court could do that would be any different than the DMCRA. The DMCRA says that people who do not commit copyright infringement are not criminal. Your stated position is that people who are not copyright infringers should not be criminals."
If the DMCA never goes to court, there will never be presidence, which means even after the DMCRA were passed Sony/RIA would continue to send collection letters, and people could still be fined for breaking the DMCA. In the end someone would HAVE to go to court to force the RIA to stop. At that point the judge would clarify the presidence and limitation of the DMCA. If the DMCRA exists, it would be slightly easier, but it would not have any effect once everything was done. IF the judge found on behalf of the DMCA overriding Fair Use, THEN the DMCRA should be passed. Until then, lets just have someone do something with the law we have.
"What sort of wording would you suggest would be better than the DMCRA?"
First I would clarify that the breaking of security that does not create a copywrite infringement to specify that it only applies to copywritten material. I know, it sounds redundant, expecially given the name of the bill. I would consider it a safe precaution. Other then that, I'd have a few lawyers both DA's who have used the DCMA and ACLU lawyers who have fought against it review your document. don't be happy until their both pissed off.
"There has always been copyright protection. You presumably mean you want DRM protection on top of copyright protection."
Let me correct myself, I want to secure content.
"Great! Lets get rid of the DMCA entirely and abandon DRM. The DMCA does not punish people who DISTRIBUTE content illegally."
Drunk driving laws don't punish Copywrite infringers either, but I'm not about to request them to be abandoned. You are thinking way to black and white.
"It is a logical imposibility. If you have full access to the data then you can trivially copy and distribute it... You want a legally enforced DRM system that somehow magically removes people's ability to commit infringment while somehow magically not interfering with legal uses."
Never speak in absolutes. Let's imagine (stick with me here) that my API based DRM idea takes off. For the next 5 years all content is released on a double standard, with a DRM and the ability to play on nonDRM-API devices. After 5 years all content sold plays only on DRM enabled devices. The DRM is authenticated by de
"Many engines have no spark advance, and some small engines have no spark at all, they work by using a glow plug."
We've already been through this. A Lawnmower engine is a "single speed" engine, you are adjusting it's power level which allows it to overcome more friction which allows it to speed up, to a set point. You can increase the speed over this by advancing ignition, diesel engines (the ones with glow plugs and no timing to advance nor throttle body to limit air flow) do this by adjusting the amount and timing of fuel delivery straight to the combustion chamber.
Air flow will help you to a set point, once you hit that RPM any extra power you create is wasted out the exhaust because it takes too long to generate it. At that point, the only way to make the engine spin faster is to ignite the mixture sooner.
So we are agreeing on everything but symantics, and the importance of spark timing. Your description of how air flow effects engine speed is exactly how I described airflow adjusting the speed of a 'fixed speed' engine (ie: 2 stroke lawn mowers, model airplanes engines, etc). Limiting air flow reduces engine power and opposing friction reduces net torque to 0. (I'm sorry I misrepresented that to start with, I didn't know you (or other readers) where up on their physics). But you still run into the restriction where as the manifold vaccuum approaches 0, the engine is unable to suck more air, at that point the only way to further adjust the speed is by igniting the spark earlier which will increase the power, accelerating the engine causing it to suck more air in (increasing the manifold vaccuum).
Advancing the spark won't help if the air flow is limited, the engine will accelerate, but have no torque (thus why 750cc motor cycle engines spin at 10,000rpms with only a tiny amount of torque). If you increase the air flow, but don't advance the spark, the engine will hit it's max efficient rpm at a much lower RPM but have significantly better torque (a 6.6l gas generator for example, tons of torque, but no way for it to spin over 1800 rpms)
In any case, in breaking any idleling you are not running the engine in it's most efficient form and a lot of energy is shot straight out the exhaust. that is the energy the device is trying to "recapture" by forcing the engine to run more efficiently.
"The PRIMARY reason your engine has more force is because YOU'RE BURNING MORE FUEL.
When you open the valve, the engine can suck in more air mass per unit time. The carb/efi senses this and adds more fuel."
You can burn more fuel over time, but you can not burn more fuel per cycle. More air/fuel is the RESULT of acceleration, not the cause.
A cylinder that displaces half a liter of space will only ever be able to burn.5l of air/fuel mixture. Period. You can not magically "burn more fuel". You can only burn.5l per cylinder per cycle. In order to burn more air you have to accelerate the engine. You accelerate the engine by improving the efficiency of the engine (advancing timing).
"Using spark advance as a means of controlling your idle would be silly and is not the way it is done."
Base spark advance does control your idle, That's how you set your timing. You set set the timing to the manufacture specs of degrees before top-dead-center. So at idle my car sparks at 4 degrees advance. When I step on the gas it can advance to 20+ degrees before top dead center.This is what control acceleration. When the combustion occurs at higher pressure, it creates a greater force which gets you more force, which accelerates the engine.
" adjust to amont of air and fuel entering the engine via the bypass air control valve"
An engine is a pump, it sucks air in, it pumps exhaust out. A 350 will suck in 350 cubic inches of air and expell 350 cubic inches of exhaust every cycle. Wether that air comes in through the throttle body, exhaust gas recovery, or air bypass, it still is only going to suck 350 cubic inches of air.
"To see this from another viewpoint, consider a turbocharged engine. These often need to have the ignition retarded WHILE they are accelerating. If spark advance is the cause of acceleration, this simply would not work."
You have to look at TOTAL advance. Turbos create super high pressures in the combustion chamber, so high that igniting it too early will cause the explosion to push the piston in the wrong direction, causing Ping (pre-det). When the boost controler retards timing, it reduces the advance, but the combustion still occurs before top dead center.
There is one thing you need to realise, a.5liter cylinder can only burn.5l of air/fuel mixture per revolution. That's it. No matter how much power the engine is capable of, no matter how fast it's spinning, no matter how far down you have the gas, that cylinder will ONLY burn.5l of air fuel mixture.
-Rick
I put it off to long. Book should be rated 3 of 10
on
Best Software Writing I
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· Score: 2, Informative
I bought and read this book, I have been meaning to write up a full review, but never have the time, so here is a short jist. It was a waste. The few gems on social software design and humorous cartoons are the only redeming quality. Joel's intros are fine, but his choice in articles is pretty poor.
The worst part is that the only article that actually dealt with software development/design/writing is a 2 page jib at microsoft about their window search system interface. The rest is mostly filled with management info that has nothing to do with software writing. There were three or four articles on performance metrics for 'knowledge workers' that all said the same thing ("They suck"). There was one delusional article that talked about how only Python coders were real coders and all other coders are fake pansies. That same author talk about how to recruit "hackers" (ie: Python coders). His basic jist was to offer a work environment just like your mother's basement and the uber python coding hackers will beg you to let them work for you.
A better title would have been "Mangerial info and other crap from people loosely related to computers: Final Volume"
" didn't say CARS, I said engines. There is no reason for me to limit myself to cars to point out your obvious total failure to understand the subject. A simple, bare bones lawnmower engine is all it takes to show how completely off base you are here."
I already posted on this. A lawnmower engine is a single speed 2 stroke engine. The throttle on it is a power throttle, it alters the air flow into the combustion chamber. By having the handle pointed at "rabbit" you are providing it the 'correct' amount of air/fuel mixture for the combustion chamber size and stroke (ie: a 20cc 2stroke will intake 20 cubic centimeters of air/fuel mixture per cycle). When you point the handle at "tortoise" you are reducing the air flow to say, 15cc. This doesn't alter the speed of the lawnmower so much as it makes it weaker, it goes from having 5hp to 3.5hp. And if it takes 5hp to keep that blade spinning at 500rpm, and you drop the power down to 3.5hp then the engine will slow down to what ever speed the net forces (+3.5hp coming from the engin, -3.5horses coming from torquing the blade, air resistance, and grass resistance) cancel out at.
"BY CHANGING THE AMOUNT OF AIR AND FUEL YOU'RE BURNING!
Man, you've got no freakin clue. Keep digging, this is great!"
A 4 cylinder 2.4l engine has 4 cylinders that displace.6l each. No matter how fast that engine is turning, on each intake stroke each cylinder will suck in.6l. Period. That's it. No more. you can not change the amount of air/fuel mixture being burnt each cycle (with out the aid of a turbo or super charger). You can change how much air is taken in per minute, but for every 2 rotations the engine will be burning 2.4l of air/fuel mixture. At 1000rpms that's 1200l of air/fuel mixture, at 6000rpms that's 7200l of air/fuel mixture, but each 2 rotations is still only 2.4l
"This is nonsense again. It you add all your forces together and there's some left over, SOMETHING'S going to accelerate. This is really basic physics. It may be true that there's no reason you would want the engine to spin any faster than it currently is, but that doesn't change the fact that it WILL change speed in the presence of unbalanced forces."
This is why partial armchair physics rairly works. You are not adding ALL of the energy in this equation, you have left out heat. Which is the hum duzzie! That "extra" energy is piped out the exhaust system. Again, check my other post in this thread.
"Okay, here's one for you guys. If I put my car in neutral, and put the gas half way to the floor, it will spin up to 4000+ rpms.
Which means that *gasp* IT ACCELERATED!"
Correct, when I step on the gas, the throttle body butterfly valve opens, increasing pressure in the manifold which causes the spark to advance, so that the explosion will occur earlier, have more force and accelerate the engine, which will suck in more air/fuel mixture which will provide more power at that RPM.
"I'm trying to explain a very simple concept to someone who isn't getting it. It's called "Newton's First Law". (You may have heard of it.)"
I have, and you have two. I have been purposfully glancing over the physics of this because it is vastly deeper then you are thinking. Like I said, you are applying "partial armchair physics." You have applied Newtons first law to part of the equation, but you are completely ignoring gas dynamics. We are dealing with expanding gas. That is the premise that gas engines opperate under. When gasious gas oxidizes, it expands rapidly. If there is nothing opposing that force, then the energy is wasted in the form of heat. But when you enclose that explosion, you can make the energy produce a directional force. When your tranny is in nuetral, there is no load on the engine, so the only force opposing the explosion of gas is the engine friction you guys mentioned, and the force it takes to spin the torque converter. The rest of the energy is lost as heat right out the exhaust.
Once you put a load on the engine, it becomes more efficient in that it has to expend more force to move the piston and there is less wasted energy going out the exhaust. That is what this device is doing, when your engine has no load (ie: while breaking or in nuetral) it puts a small load on the engine to recover some of the energy that would have been lost to exhaust.
So, my engine spinning at 4000rpms is as you say, producing a net 0ft/lbs of torque, but it's capable of producing 200ft/lbs if a 200ft/lbs load was placed on it. If a 250ft/lbs load was placed on it, it would deccelerate until it either produced 250ft/lbs, or started turning backwards (rut roh!)
I can't find the damn numbers on gas combustion speeds, but lets say (completely hypothetical numbers) that it takes ~.1 seconds to burn a half liter of 14:1 air fuel mixture. And lets say you have a 4 cylinder naturally asperated (no turbo) 2.4l engine (.6l / cylinder). Stroke 1 will suck in.6l, stroke 2 will compress that.6l to lets say.06l (10:1 compression). Just as the piston hit's top dead center, the spark is ignited, the gas begins it's expansion right at TDC. for ~.1 seconds the gas tries to expand at X ft/second, any thing that limits that expansion will increase the force applied against the piston. But at the end of that.1 seconds, the gas is spent. But it only takes.06 seconds per rotation (at 1000rpms). So what happens to the extra.04 seconds of burn? tossed out the exhaust when the exhaust valves open at the end of the power stroke. stroke 4 then pushes the spent and unspent fuel out the exhaust.
But then what? You advance the spark timing. Advancing the spark timing by.01 second allows you to have the combustion starting before TDC, which means you will have expansion occuring while the combustion chamber is at the smallest size, which means more pressure (force) which accelerates the engine. The engine spins faster, sucks more air per minute, but still sucks the exact same amount of air/fuel per rotation that it always did.
The flywheel, by the way, is designed to keep just enough momentum to make sure that the engine doesn't try to switch directions when the spark occurs before the cylinder hits top dead center. The flywheel(on modern cars) will not help in any measurable way if you drop the clutch to fast.
" If you have more gas and more O2, it will produce more energy when it burns."
Correct, more air/fuel mixture, more energy. But that energy is still released at the same rate.
"Diesel engines don't even use sparks, and they work fine."
Diesels use heat and pressure to ignite the air/fuel mixture. They use high preasure fuel injectors to shoot fuel directly into the combustion chamber under preasure. They accelerate by injecting the fuel earlier.
"Lawnmower engines don't have spark advance, and they manage to accelerate (from zero) just fine."
Lawnmowers (the push kind) don't have spark advance, correct. But they are 2-stroke engines. These cheap little motors are technically single speed but have a "speed" adjustment. What that actually is, is a power adjustment, you are allowing more air/fuel mixture into the cylinder which gives it more power to turn the blade. In this case it's not a matter of you increase the speed of the motor, but a matter of the resistance from the blade forcing it to slow down. As you increase the air/fuel flow, the mower developes more power and can turn the blade faster. Even if you put a turbo charger on a lawn mower, it would only accelerate up to a set point, at which point it could not burn all of the fuel available in one cycle (any you would start shooting flames out your exhaust). But if you give it a shot of Nos it'll speed up because Nos burns faster then gas.
Man, I just can not find the expansion rate of gasoline today. But I assure you, gas will always expand at so many feet per second. Wether you have 1 ml of gas or 10 gallons of gas, it will always expand at a set rate of ft/s. The only way to make an engine accelerate is to alter the ignition timing of the air fuel mixture. With the exception of torque limited 2-stroke engines where the speed of the engine is controled by the available power vs the resistance.
Increased air/fuel consumption is the RESULT of an engine turning faster, not the CAUSE.
Your car likely high high ratio final gears. (aka Highway gears), good for cruising at speed, bad for low end torque. Take my wife's truck for example, designed for off roading. It has extremely low gearing, I can put it in first, slowly let of the clutch and it will go with out a flinch in the rpms. It's a mid 80's and the engine is carbed, not fuel injected. There is not air bypass, nor any other system that magically increases power at idle because it's in gear.
Go out and look at some old classics, find an old military truck, a beefy straight 6 with no more electronics then the spark plugs and tach. Load that truck up with a half ton of gear stick it in first, drop the clutch and watch it walk away.
Also, you're forgetting about this thing called the flywheel, which stores momentum to help keep you from stalling when you try to take off.
Given that logic a vehicle may be able to start moving, but as soon as the momentum from the flywheel was effectively countered the car would stop moving. But the car will continue moving. The car will then accelerate up to the rpm as it is limited by the amount of torque it takes to overcome all power loss in the drivetrain and friction.
Okay, here's one for you guys. If I put my car in nuetral, and put the gas half way to the floor, it will spin up to 4000+ rpms. But if I hold my foot steady, the rpms wont rise. Are you saying my car puts out 0ft/lbs of torque at 4000rpm!?!?! No, it's putting out plenty of torque, but that torque is being wasted on spinning the output shaft on the torque converter. That drive gear has probrably 200+ ft/lbs of torque spinning it at 4000 rpms, but it's not connected to anything since the car is in nuetral.
You guys are both trying to apply partial armchair physics.
Spark advance is a mere optimization of the combustion. There are plenty of engines out the that DON'T EVEN HAVE spark advance and still manage to accelerate.
LOL! That is the funniest thing I have ever heard!!! Even the oldest of the old cars had spark advance. Every single car in the world with a variable speed engine has some form of spark advance. Wether it's points with springs and centrifical force, vaccuum advance, mechanical advance, computer controled, or any other system, spark advance is what allows an engine to accelerate. How else could the engine accelerate? Gas burns at the same rate wether you have 1 part fuel or 20 parts fuel. The only way to change the speed of the engine is to change the point in time that the combustion begins.
If you have extra torque (after subtracting all your frictional losses) the engine is going to accelerate.
That is incorrect. If you have extra torque at the WHEEL the car will accelerate, if you have extra torque at the CRANK the force is wasted by spining the torque converter.
"We hypothethicaly now have you advocating DRM, but with absolutely no DRM system that does not require a law imprisoning innocent people to be effective. If we remove the double negative from that... we hypothethicaly now have you advocating DRM, and it is a DRM system that *does* require a law imprisoning innocent people to be effective."
What the?!?! Hypothetically, You are not a murderer and you have not raped anyone. But if we remove both of those negatives, you are a murdering rapist? That makes no sence. That's like "Chewebaka can not live on Endor" logic!?!
"Current law, the DMCA, says that innocent people go to prison. You seem to strongly agree that innocent people should not face prison, if so, well that pretty much means the DMCRA should be passed."
Another fatally flawed piece of logic. I do not want people to goto prison for innocent infringments. But I also think the DMCRA is a poorly worded unnecesary piece of garbage. There is nothing it does (other then the label requirements) that a good court battle couldn't solve. Even with a new law like DMCRA, it would still be worthless until someone was willing to fight it. We don't need more laws, we need judicial clarification of presidence.
"You want to protect DRM, but you do not want noninfringing people facing prison. Well, those are the two opposite sides of the issue. They are in conflict."
I disagree. I want to protect content. I want to punish people who DISTRIBUTE content illegally. No new laws, no imprisonment of innocent infringers. So far as I know, other then DVD Jon and his cohorts, no one in the US has actually made it to trial for decrypting a DVD they own to play it on Linux. People have been sued for illegally distributing content on peer2peer networks, but we've already established that those people are not innocent infringers.
My desire is two fold. First, to protect content to ensure developing content remains a profitable market. If developing content fails to be profitable, quality will drop, options will drop, and consumers will be left with the aformentioned 2nd cousin's amature soap operas. And Second, to make content readily available online and improve the consumer's experience. Online delivery is a growing field, and the market is there for it. Providing a quick and easy way for consumers to get legal high quality content online.
"This is the "wishing for a magic carpet" option. I believe this option is physically impossible. I invite you to prove me wrong."
Linus once declared himself the worlds best programmer and created Linux. While I'm not brash enough to claim to be as uber as he, I'm atleast will to work towards and help in creating such a system. A system where a person has full access to the content they own/rent. A system that limits illegal distribution. I may not have the perfect plan, but I'd much rather work to help the perfect plan get created then have to worry about the next round of blueray/hd dvd DRMs that hobble my fair use and might get me into legal trouble for decoding.
As for my 'perfect' plan (which I admit, is not perfect!). If I were the media industry here's what I would do. First, I would work on getting a standardized DRM that uses a simple API to authenticate the user/machine. I would work closely with vendors to try to get this technology in every DVD player, OS, CD/DVD-Rom, sterio, head unit, iPod, etc... Then I would begin providing online content that was DRM'd with this system. Anyone with the DRM enabled system could then play any content that is either not DRM'd or DRM'd that can be authenticated. Who cares if you can't decrypt the DRM if you can play it on every device you own. You could copy your content as much as you like, but it always need to authenticate to either the machine it's on, or the user. For example, if you set the default key on the computer to your personal key, then anything you download should play fine. If your buddy brings over a new CD with DRM'd files on
Uh, having torque does not make an engine accelerate. In order for a gas engine to accelerate the spark needs to advance. When the spark advances the combustion starts earlier bringing more force to the piston which makes then engine turn faster which sucks in more air, which makes for a larger explosion which gives you more torque, etc...
An engine puts out torque at idle, it's that simple. If not, how would it turn the water pump? the altinator? the torque converter? If including those things is still net'd 0 ft/lbs what happens when you turn your AC on. Your car still idles at the same RPM (if everything is in good working order and efficient)? what happens if your battery is low? The altinator takes more force to turn.
As for why old cars drop to 650rpms when you put them in gear, it's because when you have your foot on the break you are not allowing any of the torque the engine produces to go to the wheels. all that energy has to be released someplace, and that's where the torque converter comes in. The torque converter is kind of like a clutch, in that it allows the engine to spin with out turning the tranny. When the torque converter raises it's rpms, it slips less. So at 500rpms the torque converter is freely spinning, at 800rpms it is maybe 30% (imaginary number for point only). But the engine can't pass 30% of it's torque to the drive train because your foot is still on the breaks, so it still spins the torque converter. But spinning the torque converter takes force since it's 30% locked at 800rpms, that opposing torque reduces the engine speed by 150rpms.
That's not exactly accurate. If that where true, an engie would put out 0ft/lbs of torque at it's idle rpm (~800rpm). You know this is false because if you put your car in drive/first and leave you foot off the gas, (slow clutch release on manuals), the car will move, usually at about 3-5mph. If an auto tranny loses anywheres from 10%-40% efficiency, you are looking at a significant amount of energy.
This thing could help recapture some lost energy. By charging while the car is idling or breaking, it uses the energy that the engine would be wasting.
As for power output? with a 42volt source I can't see this thing putting out more then 50ft/lbs at the crank (notice the reduction in pully size from the crank to the motor). Most likely less then that.
That power is also only available for short periods of time. But that does make it good for accelerating.
So, what I see this as a good idea for is vehicles like the "Smart Car". Those things rock. Specificly the 2 seat roadster. Anyways, those cars come with a turbo 3-cylinder engine that puts out a whooping 85hp. That is pretty pathetic, except that the car itself weighs in at only 1700lbs. That means that it's got an pretty exceptable power/weight ratio, but it's probrably a bit slow off the line (turbo lag), or if you have a second person in the vehicle. By tacking on an extra say 25ft/lbs of torque for 10 seconds, you could have a pretty dramatic effect on 0-60 times.
For beefier vehicles, specificly those with plenty of low end torque, this won't help a bit.
It also won't help at all for highway cruising. In a gas engine you need to keep the air/fuel mixture as close to 12.8 (Err was it 14? I'm getting my ratios screwed up) as possible to keep the engine running efficient. Too rich, and you waste fuel, to lean and you can have pre-det and damage the engine. And if you are going 60mph, your tranny will be spinning (depending on your gear ratios) 2500-3500 rpm, which means your engine will also be spinning that fast. And since the engine is spinning at that speed, it's sucking air at that speed (a gm 350 will suck 350 cubic inches of air every cycle), and fuel will have to be injected to match. Wether you are getting power from an electric motor, or the engine, that fuel is getting injected. Some engines are smart enough these days to turn off unused cyclinders though, so if it was integrated enough, there's a possibility it could help.
I'm waiting for the dyno's to make up my mind on it. But from what I've seen/can figure, this could be a great performance add on to light weight, high RPM vehicles.
It's not using regenerative breaking. It's capturing the wasted energy the engine create while you are breaking. Unless you are power breaking any energy the engine creates is lost. Same with idling, the engine continues to run even though you are not using that energy.
The implication here is NOT passwords. It's key logging with out running a key logger. Theoretically I could "accidentally" leave my PDA on my boss's desc after a meeting and have it record a gig or two of his typing. come back a while later, grab the PDA, download the audio, run it through a machine learner, and viola! All of his correspondence. Even better, I could just run it over the wireless network and get a constant stream of his typing.
To clarify your loaded question. You said, "please please please explain to me how and why you justify the position that noninfringing people should be imprisoned"
That implies that I do justify the imprisonment of the innocent. Thus a loaded question which I have no desire to answer, any more then you have a desire to answer my question about your wife beating habbits.
As for the communication break down between what you are calling "noninfringers" and what I am calling "innocent infringers". Making a copy of copywriten is an infringment on that copywrite, HOWEVER, fair use entitles us to one personal backup, HOWEVER, if you break encryption to make that back up you are INFRINGING on the DMCA. That person has technically broken one law will obeying another. That is what I call an Innocent Infringer. What they have done is technically illegal (in the US), but they have not done anything that could be considered outside of fair use.
These are the people I want to protect. People who decode DVDs so they can view them on a Linux based system, or other new technology. People who want to loan their content out to a friend or two. In other words, I want a person to be able to do everything that they should be able to do under fair use.
Then there are those I don't care about protecting. People who download content with out paying for it. People who distribute content with out a license/contract to do so. People who post movies to the internet the day before they screen. People who run thousands of copies of pro quality black market copies. IMO, the movie industry has every right in the world to crucify(figuratively) these people. These are also the people who will do their damndest to get arround DRMs, but many of them, and their customers will move to legal means if the system is simple, easy, and intuitive.
...DVD Jon...Well duh, because he did nothing illegal.
Woh, there is a big difference between "nothing illegal" and Convicted. DVD Jon has never been CONVICTED of a crime. Then again, so far as I've heard so far, none of the RIAA sueies have been CONVICTED of copywrite infringment. It doesn't mean they haven't broken the law, it just means they weren't found guilty. And I totally agree that the goal of DeCCS (to create a linux based DVD Player) was valid and should not have been taken as a DMCA violation, I am not a DA, so that's not my call. Releasing the code, or even the specific knowledge of the weekness however, that was a risky move. I know, I know, it's linux, it's open source, blah blah blah. Not all code is ment to be shared.
"If Jon were to chew bubble gum, do you imagine that he could or should be extradited to Singapore? (Yes, gum is illegal in Singapore.)"
Let's say you run an online book company in the US. You have a library of 10,000 books online. Now lets say someone in Sweden figures out your security, grabs a copy of your entire library, then sells them all for half your price, your multi-million dollar company goes under, publishers loose money and authors go hungry. Should you be able to sue them? Or are they protected by the magical invisible man made borders? No, they have damaged your company and you have every right to sue them either in their location, or to try to talk the USDA into extriditing them to the US to stand trial here. Extridition laws are well beyond my scope of knowledge, but if some DA can claim it's a felony (ie: DMCA violation) they may be able to.
Fair Use is clear in some cases, and muddy in others. Personal use, back up copy, intropolerity(sp?) are all covered. Loaning the content to friends, Showing the content large groups of people, donation requests, etc, all start to get in to shaky territory.
I'm not a fan of petitions, and online political petitions are a complete waste of time. If you want a petition to be worth something, do it locally. Get signatures from the areas your local and state representatives represent. I can get 10
The nice thing about electricity though is that you can make your own. Solar cells, integrated roofing, wind generators, etc.
And a 55mpg vehicle @ a 40mile commute 250 times a year would be $1455/year at $8/gal. Assuming electric also jumped x2 1/3 I would pay 22.7 cents per kWh would still only by $908/year($1308 including 3yr batteries).
At $5 gas would run $909/year. Electric would be $567 (967 w/ 3yr batteries). So bargin basement style, you are better off going for an old super cheap geo metro. But look at the other side costs. An oil change every 6 months will run you $30 or so (if you do it yourself). Yearly maintenance can easily hit $100. And a 12 year old geo will likely have a high milage engine, not to mention exhaust, ignition system, coolant, etc that are specific issues for combustion engines. I would say at $5 you are probrably pretty even given total cost of ownership.
True. If you can get a 55mpg vehicle for $1000 (rough guess on what a good condition 94 metro would go for), it would take a long time to repay the difference to make an electric cheaper. Likely longer then the life of either vehicle. And a low end el cheap-o DC conversion would probrably perform similarly to a geo metro, with a shorter range.
The issue is oil futures. At some point, world wide demand will out pace world wide supply. Even before that point hits, gas will continue to rise in costs. At $3, a cheap old Geo will be cheaper for a realistic time frame. But what about $5? $7? What if shortages occur? Then the efficiency of the gas engine doesn't matter. But that's all just speculation.
The thing that I'm interested in is that AC Propulsions is rummoring at joining up with Suzuki(?) on the Scion lines to offer a factory full plug in battery powered vehicle in the US. If they can introduce their system into a Scion for under $20k, I think it could totally shake up the compact car market.
Plug it in. The TZero has a gas generator trailer that can increase range on even the cheap batteries have a range of 700 miles. Many people opt for home solar arrays also to provide "off grid" power.
"What is FLA?"
Flooded Lead Acid. IE: Cheap batteries. A 144volt system (standard highend for DC systems) in FLA batteries will likely be close to $1200.
"Is there an easy way to compare mileage w/ electric vehicles?"
The most accurate calculation is BTUs, but that requires plenty of math. I'm lazy and found someone else who had already done the math. DC systems get arround.4kWh/mile and ACs get about.2kWh/mile. My last electric bill was $0.085/kWh which means running a DC electric 30miles would be about $1.02 vs a Gas 30mpg vehicle at about $3.00. Going to an AC system like the one AC Propulsion offers would drop that down to $0.51 per 30 miles.
"What do the $250k T-Zero's offer that the $25k model don't?"
The $25k option is just the motor, charger, control circuitry, regenerative breaking, contactor, etc. No car, no batteries, no tranny, no frame, etc. They can make a tranny for you, but it's about $5-6k. You'd still have to provide either a donor car, or build a tube frame of your own.
"What's the battery lifetime on these?"
Lead Acid (el cheapo) you'll get 3-5 years. LiIons I've heard can last for up to 10years.
That's good to know. I don't know any Prius drivers, just one friend who has been very disappointed in his honda hybrid. I thought he said the batteries were warentied for 3 years (in Wisconsin)
Slashdot Mirror
"With the increasing price of oil, I can't help wondering what the face of computing is going to look like five or ten years down the line. The average computer uses as much as 1¾ Titanics worth of coal to run on any given day."
Coal is cheap, and produced locally.
-Rick
"No. Hybrids are successful mostly because they recapture braking energy and allow the engine to be shut down when it is making more power than necessary."
Partially. Getting 55mpg milage is nothing new. Infact early 90's Geo Metros could hit 55+ no problem. The problem with 55mpg cars is that they have absolutely no balls. When you have an engine that only develops 80ft/lbs of torque and a set of highway gears that keep crank speeds under 3k on the interstate, you have a car that will take about 3 miles to get to 60mph.
Hybrids improve on this in a few ways. First, they turn the engine off when it's not being used. Less waste, more milage, especially in town. Second, they use the braking to recapture energy for the batteries. And Third, they use an electric motor to assist/replace the engine acceleration. That means that you can run a very efficient but very week engine, and still be able to hit 60 in under 20 seconds (12.7 for the Prius). The Prius, running on it's electric motor develops 295ft/lbs of torque up to 1200rpms. That's more off the line grunt power then most cars on the road, and better then most muscle cars. Most performance engines can beat 295ft/lbs, but they do it at slightly higher rpms, which means the new Prius should have some very impressive trap times and 0-25 performance.
-Rick
"If option one is that I ham not a murderer, and option two is that I am not a rapist (and in this particular case options one and two could overlap), and *IF* we were to hypothetically pass on both options one and two, then YES, in fact the ONLY REMAINING POSSIBILITY would be that I am a murdering rapist."
.Net, Java or any other language that can interact with C based libraries.
My point being that wether or not I refute you claims of not being a rapist or a murderer, you are (with all likelihood) not a rapist or a murderer.
"TYou proceed to describe a DRM system that will prohibit you from playing your files on any pre-existing devices. A system that will prohibit you from playing your files on any hardware/software that has not been approved. That will prohibit you from playing them on a device or with software you yourself built/wrote. That will prohibit you from playing your files in any way other than how the approved devices happen to be designed to allow them to be played."
Wrong. First, go pick up an 8 track. No plug it into your DVD player. That DVD player is incapable of playing that medium, that doesn't make DVD players evil. Second, as I specificly noted, the DRM is authenticated via an API. so you could write an interface for windows, linux, unix, BSD,
"And even if a court did decide to ignore the blatant text of the law and just MAKE UP STUFF to leave the DMCA intact, well I don't see what you imagine the court could do that would be any different than the DMCRA. The DMCRA says that people who do not commit copyright infringement are not criminal. Your stated position is that people who are not copyright infringers should not be criminals."
If the DMCA never goes to court, there will never be presidence, which means even after the DMCRA were passed Sony/RIA would continue to send collection letters, and people could still be fined for breaking the DMCA. In the end someone would HAVE to go to court to force the RIA to stop. At that point the judge would clarify the presidence and limitation of the DMCA. If the DMCRA exists, it would be slightly easier, but it would not have any effect once everything was done. IF the judge found on behalf of the DMCA overriding Fair Use, THEN the DMCRA should be passed. Until then, lets just have someone do something with the law we have.
"What sort of wording would you suggest would be better than the DMCRA?"
First I would clarify that the breaking of security that does not create a copywrite infringement to specify that it only applies to copywritten material. I know, it sounds redundant, expecially given the name of the bill. I would consider it a safe precaution. Other then that, I'd have a few lawyers both DA's who have used the DCMA and ACLU lawyers who have fought against it review your document. don't be happy until their both pissed off.
"There has always been copyright protection. You presumably mean you want DRM protection on top of copyright protection."
Let me correct myself, I want to secure content.
"Great! Lets get rid of the DMCA entirely and abandon DRM. The DMCA does not punish people who DISTRIBUTE content illegally."
Drunk driving laws don't punish Copywrite infringers either, but I'm not about to request them to be abandoned. You are thinking way to black and white.
"It is a logical imposibility. If you have full access to the data then you can trivially copy and distribute it... You want a legally enforced DRM system that somehow magically removes people's ability to commit infringment while somehow magically not interfering with legal uses."
Never speak in absolutes. Let's imagine (stick with me here) that my API based DRM idea takes off. For the next 5 years all content is released on a double standard, with a DRM and the ability to play on nonDRM-API devices. After 5 years all content sold plays only on DRM enabled devices. The DRM is authenticated by de
"Many engines have no spark advance, and some small engines have no spark at all, they work by using a glow plug."
We've already been through this. A Lawnmower engine is a "single speed" engine, you are adjusting it's power level which allows it to overcome more friction which allows it to speed up, to a set point. You can increase the speed over this by advancing ignition, diesel engines (the ones with glow plugs and no timing to advance nor throttle body to limit air flow) do this by adjusting the amount and timing of fuel delivery straight to the combustion chamber.
Air flow will help you to a set point, once you hit that RPM any extra power you create is wasted out the exhaust because it takes too long to generate it. At that point, the only way to make the engine spin faster is to ignite the mixture sooner.
-Rick
So we are agreeing on everything but symantics, and the importance of spark timing. Your description of how air flow effects engine speed is exactly how I described airflow adjusting the speed of a 'fixed speed' engine (ie: 2 stroke lawn mowers, model airplanes engines, etc). Limiting air flow reduces engine power and opposing friction reduces net torque to 0. (I'm sorry I misrepresented that to start with, I didn't know you (or other readers) where up on their physics). But you still run into the restriction where as the manifold vaccuum approaches 0, the engine is unable to suck more air, at that point the only way to further adjust the speed is by igniting the spark earlier which will increase the power, accelerating the engine causing it to suck more air in (increasing the manifold vaccuum).
Advancing the spark won't help if the air flow is limited, the engine will accelerate, but have no torque (thus why 750cc motor cycle engines spin at 10,000rpms with only a tiny amount of torque). If you increase the air flow, but don't advance the spark, the engine will hit it's max efficient rpm at a much lower RPM but have significantly better torque (a 6.6l gas generator for example, tons of torque, but no way for it to spin over 1800 rpms)
In any case, in breaking any idleling you are not running the engine in it's most efficient form and a lot of energy is shot straight out the exhaust. that is the energy the device is trying to "recapture" by forcing the engine to run more efficiently.
-Rick
"The PRIMARY reason your engine has more force is because YOU'RE BURNING MORE FUEL. When you open the valve, the engine can suck in more air mass per unit time. The carb/efi senses this and adds more fuel."
.5l of air/fuel mixture. Period. You can not magically "burn more fuel". You can only burn .5l per cylinder per cycle. In order to burn more air you have to accelerate the engine. You accelerate the engine by improving the efficiency of the engine (advancing timing).
.5liter cylinder can only burn .5l of air/fuel mixture per revolution. That's it. No matter how much power the engine is capable of, no matter how fast it's spinning, no matter how far down you have the gas, that cylinder will ONLY burn .5l of air fuel mixture.
You can burn more fuel over time, but you can not burn more fuel per cycle. More air/fuel is the RESULT of acceleration, not the cause.
A cylinder that displaces half a liter of space will only ever be able to burn
"Using spark advance as a means of controlling your idle would be silly and is not the way it is done."
Base spark advance does control your idle, That's how you set your timing. You set set the timing to the manufacture specs of degrees before top-dead-center. So at idle my car sparks at 4 degrees advance. When I step on the gas it can advance to 20+ degrees before top dead center.This is what control acceleration. When the combustion occurs at higher pressure, it creates a greater force which gets you more force, which accelerates the engine.
" adjust to amont of air and fuel entering the engine via the bypass air control valve"
An engine is a pump, it sucks air in, it pumps exhaust out. A 350 will suck in 350 cubic inches of air and expell 350 cubic inches of exhaust every cycle. Wether that air comes in through the throttle body, exhaust gas recovery, or air bypass, it still is only going to suck 350 cubic inches of air.
"To see this from another viewpoint, consider a turbocharged engine. These often need to have the ignition retarded WHILE they are accelerating. If spark advance is the cause of acceleration, this simply would not work."
You have to look at TOTAL advance. Turbos create super high pressures in the combustion chamber, so high that igniting it too early will cause the explosion to push the piston in the wrong direction, causing Ping (pre-det). When the boost controler retards timing, it reduces the advance, but the combustion still occurs before top dead center.
There is one thing you need to realise, a
-Rick
I bought and read this book, I have been meaning to write up a full review, but never have the time, so here is a short jist. It was a waste. The few gems on social software design and humorous cartoons are the only redeming quality. Joel's intros are fine, but his choice in articles is pretty poor.
The worst part is that the only article that actually dealt with software development/design/writing is a 2 page jib at microsoft about their window search system interface. The rest is mostly filled with management info that has nothing to do with software writing. There were three or four articles on performance metrics for 'knowledge workers' that all said the same thing ("They suck"). There was one delusional article that talked about how only Python coders were real coders and all other coders are fake pansies. That same author talk about how to recruit "hackers" (ie: Python coders). His basic jist was to offer a work environment just like your mother's basement and the uber python coding hackers will beg you to let them work for you.
A better title would have been "Mangerial info and other crap from people loosely related to computers: Final Volume"
-Rick
" didn't say CARS, I said engines. There is no reason for me to limit myself to cars to point out your obvious total failure to understand the subject. A simple, bare bones lawnmower engine is all it takes to show how completely off base you are here."
.6l each. No matter how fast that engine is turning, on each intake stroke each cylinder will suck in .6l. Period. That's it. No more. you can not change the amount of air/fuel mixture being burnt each cycle (with out the aid of a turbo or super charger). You can change how much air is taken in per minute, but for every 2 rotations the engine will be burning 2.4l of air/fuel mixture. At 1000rpms that's 1200l of air/fuel mixture, at 6000rpms that's 7200l of air/fuel mixture, but each 2 rotations is still only 2.4l
I already posted on this. A lawnmower engine is a single speed 2 stroke engine. The throttle on it is a power throttle, it alters the air flow into the combustion chamber. By having the handle pointed at "rabbit" you are providing it the 'correct' amount of air/fuel mixture for the combustion chamber size and stroke (ie: a 20cc 2stroke will intake 20 cubic centimeters of air/fuel mixture per cycle). When you point the handle at "tortoise" you are reducing the air flow to say, 15cc. This doesn't alter the speed of the lawnmower so much as it makes it weaker, it goes from having 5hp to 3.5hp. And if it takes 5hp to keep that blade spinning at 500rpm, and you drop the power down to 3.5hp then the engine will slow down to what ever speed the net forces (+3.5hp coming from the engin, -3.5horses coming from torquing the blade, air resistance, and grass resistance) cancel out at.
"BY CHANGING THE AMOUNT OF AIR AND FUEL YOU'RE BURNING! Man, you've got no freakin clue. Keep digging, this is great!" A 4 cylinder 2.4l engine has 4 cylinders that displace
"This is nonsense again. It you add all your forces together and there's some left over, SOMETHING'S going to accelerate. This is really basic physics. It may be true that there's no reason you would want the engine to spin any faster than it currently is, but that doesn't change the fact that it WILL change speed in the presence of unbalanced forces."
This is why partial armchair physics rairly works. You are not adding ALL of the energy in this equation, you have left out heat. Which is the hum duzzie! That "extra" energy is piped out the exhaust system. Again, check my other post in this thread.
-Rick
"Okay, here's one for you guys. If I put my car in neutral, and put the gas half way to the floor, it will spin up to 4000+ rpms.
.1 seconds to burn a half liter of 14:1 air fuel mixture. And lets say you have a 4 cylinder naturally asperated (no turbo) 2.4l engine (.6l / cylinder). Stroke 1 will suck in .6l, stroke 2 will compress that .6l to lets say .06l (10:1 compression). Just as the piston hit's top dead center, the spark is ignited, the gas begins it's expansion right at TDC. for ~ .1 seconds the gas tries to expand at X ft/second, any thing that limits that expansion will increase the force applied against the piston. But at the end of that .1 seconds, the gas is spent. But it only takes .06 seconds per rotation (at 1000rpms). So what happens to the extra .04 seconds of burn? tossed out the exhaust when the exhaust valves open at the end of the power stroke. stroke 4 then pushes the spent and unspent fuel out the exhaust.
.01 second allows you to have the combustion starting before TDC, which means you will have expansion occuring while the combustion chamber is at the smallest size, which means more pressure (force) which accelerates the engine. The engine spins faster, sucks more air per minute, but still sucks the exact same amount of air/fuel per rotation that it always did.
Which means that *gasp* IT ACCELERATED!"
Correct, when I step on the gas, the throttle body butterfly valve opens, increasing pressure in the manifold which causes the spark to advance, so that the explosion will occur earlier, have more force and accelerate the engine, which will suck in more air/fuel mixture which will provide more power at that RPM.
"I'm trying to explain a very simple concept to someone who isn't getting it. It's called "Newton's First Law". (You may have heard of it.)"
I have, and you have two. I have been purposfully glancing over the physics of this because it is vastly deeper then you are thinking. Like I said, you are applying "partial armchair physics." You have applied Newtons first law to part of the equation, but you are completely ignoring gas dynamics. We are dealing with expanding gas. That is the premise that gas engines opperate under. When gasious gas oxidizes, it expands rapidly. If there is nothing opposing that force, then the energy is wasted in the form of heat. But when you enclose that explosion, you can make the energy produce a directional force. When your tranny is in nuetral, there is no load on the engine, so the only force opposing the explosion of gas is the engine friction you guys mentioned, and the force it takes to spin the torque converter. The rest of the energy is lost as heat right out the exhaust.
Once you put a load on the engine, it becomes more efficient in that it has to expend more force to move the piston and there is less wasted energy going out the exhaust. That is what this device is doing, when your engine has no load (ie: while breaking or in nuetral) it puts a small load on the engine to recover some of the energy that would have been lost to exhaust.
So, my engine spinning at 4000rpms is as you say, producing a net 0ft/lbs of torque, but it's capable of producing 200ft/lbs if a 200ft/lbs load was placed on it. If a 250ft/lbs load was placed on it, it would deccelerate until it either produced 250ft/lbs, or started turning backwards (rut roh!)
I can't find the damn numbers on gas combustion speeds, but lets say (completely hypothetical numbers) that it takes ~
But then what? You advance the spark timing. Advancing the spark timing by
The flywheel, by the way, is designed to keep just enough momentum to make sure that the engine doesn't try to switch directions when the spark occurs before the cylinder hits top dead center. The flywheel(on modern cars) will not help in any measurable way if you drop the clutch to fast.
" If you have more gas and more O2, it will produce more energy when it burns."
Correct, more air/fuel mixture, more energy. But that energy is still released at the same rate.
"Diesel engines don't even use sparks, and they work fine."
Diesels use heat and pressure to ignite the air/fuel mixture. They use high preasure fuel injectors to shoot fuel directly into the combustion chamber under preasure. They accelerate by injecting the fuel earlier.
"Lawnmower engines don't have spark advance, and they manage to accelerate (from zero) just fine."
Lawnmowers (the push kind) don't have spark advance, correct. But they are 2-stroke engines. These cheap little motors are technically single speed but have a "speed" adjustment. What that actually is, is a power adjustment, you are allowing more air/fuel mixture into the cylinder which gives it more power to turn the blade. In this case it's not a matter of you increase the speed of the motor, but a matter of the resistance from the blade forcing it to slow down. As you increase the air/fuel flow, the mower developes more power and can turn the blade faster. Even if you put a turbo charger on a lawn mower, it would only accelerate up to a set point, at which point it could not burn all of the fuel available in one cycle (any you would start shooting flames out your exhaust). But if you give it a shot of Nos it'll speed up because Nos burns faster then gas.
Man, I just can not find the expansion rate of gasoline today. But I assure you, gas will always expand at so many feet per second. Wether you have 1 ml of gas or 10 gallons of gas, it will always expand at a set rate of ft/s. The only way to make an engine accelerate is to alter the ignition timing of the air fuel mixture. With the exception of torque limited 2-stroke engines where the speed of the engine is controled by the available power vs the resistance.
Increased air/fuel consumption is the RESULT of an engine turning faster, not the CAUSE.
-Rick
To put this in software terms, They are multithreading the connection.
-Rick
So is this 240mbps bandwidth total as in everyone shares, or is it 240mbps dedicated? -Rick
No, my car will stall out and die.
Your car likely high high ratio final gears. (aka Highway gears), good for cruising at speed, bad for low end torque. Take my wife's truck for example, designed for off roading. It has extremely low gearing, I can put it in first, slowly let of the clutch and it will go with out a flinch in the rpms. It's a mid 80's and the engine is carbed, not fuel injected. There is not air bypass, nor any other system that magically increases power at idle because it's in gear.
Go out and look at some old classics, find an old military truck, a beefy straight 6 with no more electronics then the spark plugs and tach. Load that truck up with a half ton of gear stick it in first, drop the clutch and watch it walk away.
Also, you're forgetting about this thing called the flywheel, which stores momentum to help keep you from stalling when you try to take off.
Given that logic a vehicle may be able to start moving, but as soon as the momentum from the flywheel was effectively countered the car would stop moving. But the car will continue moving. The car will then accelerate up to the rpm as it is limited by the amount of torque it takes to overcome all power loss in the drivetrain and friction.
Okay, here's one for you guys. If I put my car in nuetral, and put the gas half way to the floor, it will spin up to 4000+ rpms. But if I hold my foot steady, the rpms wont rise. Are you saying my car puts out 0ft/lbs of torque at 4000rpm!?!?! No, it's putting out plenty of torque, but that torque is being wasted on spinning the output shaft on the torque converter. That drive gear has probrably 200+ ft/lbs of torque spinning it at 4000 rpms, but it's not connected to anything since the car is in nuetral.
You guys are both trying to apply partial armchair physics.
-Rick
Spark advance is a mere optimization of the combustion. There are plenty of engines out the that DON'T EVEN HAVE spark advance and still manage to accelerate.
LOL! That is the funniest thing I have ever heard!!! Even the oldest of the old cars had spark advance. Every single car in the world with a variable speed engine has some form of spark advance. Wether it's points with springs and centrifical force, vaccuum advance, mechanical advance, computer controled, or any other system, spark advance is what allows an engine to accelerate. How else could the engine accelerate? Gas burns at the same rate wether you have 1 part fuel or 20 parts fuel. The only way to change the speed of the engine is to change the point in time that the combustion begins.
If you have extra torque (after subtracting all your frictional losses) the engine is going to accelerate.
That is incorrect. If you have extra torque at the WHEEL the car will accelerate, if you have extra torque at the CRANK the force is wasted by spining the torque converter.
-Rick
"We hypothethicaly now have you advocating DRM, but with absolutely no DRM system that does not require a law imprisoning innocent people to be effective. If we remove the double negative from that... we hypothethicaly now have you advocating DRM, and it is a DRM system that *does* require a law imprisoning innocent people to be effective."
What the?!?! Hypothetically, You are not a murderer and you have not raped anyone. But if we remove both of those negatives, you are a murdering rapist? That makes no sence. That's like "Chewebaka can not live on Endor" logic!?!
"Current law, the DMCA, says that innocent people go to prison. You seem to strongly agree that innocent people should not face prison, if so, well that pretty much means the DMCRA should be passed."
Another fatally flawed piece of logic. I do not want people to goto prison for innocent infringments. But I also think the DMCRA is a poorly worded unnecesary piece of garbage. There is nothing it does (other then the label requirements) that a good court battle couldn't solve. Even with a new law like DMCRA, it would still be worthless until someone was willing to fight it. We don't need more laws, we need judicial clarification of presidence.
"You want to protect DRM, but you do not want noninfringing people facing prison. Well, those are the two opposite sides of the issue. They are in conflict."
I disagree. I want to protect content. I want to punish people who DISTRIBUTE content illegally. No new laws, no imprisonment of innocent infringers. So far as I know, other then DVD Jon and his cohorts, no one in the US has actually made it to trial for decrypting a DVD they own to play it on Linux. People have been sued for illegally distributing content on peer2peer networks, but we've already established that those people are not innocent infringers.
My desire is two fold. First, to protect content to ensure developing content remains a profitable market. If developing content fails to be profitable, quality will drop, options will drop, and consumers will be left with the aformentioned 2nd cousin's amature soap operas. And Second, to make content readily available online and improve the consumer's experience. Online delivery is a growing field, and the market is there for it. Providing a quick and easy way for consumers to get legal high quality content online.
"This is the "wishing for a magic carpet" option. I believe this option is physically impossible. I invite you to prove me wrong."
Linus once declared himself the worlds best programmer and created Linux. While I'm not brash enough to claim to be as uber as he, I'm atleast will to work towards and help in creating such a system. A system where a person has full access to the content they own/rent. A system that limits illegal distribution. I may not have the perfect plan, but I'd much rather work to help the perfect plan get created then have to worry about the next round of blueray/hd dvd DRMs that hobble my fair use and might get me into legal trouble for decoding.
As for my 'perfect' plan (which I admit, is not perfect!). If I were the media industry here's what I would do. First, I would work on getting a standardized DRM that uses a simple API to authenticate the user/machine. I would work closely with vendors to try to get this technology in every DVD player, OS, CD/DVD-Rom, sterio, head unit, iPod, etc... Then I would begin providing online content that was DRM'd with this system. Anyone with the DRM enabled system could then play any content that is either not DRM'd or DRM'd that can be authenticated. Who cares if you can't decrypt the DRM if you can play it on every device you own. You could copy your content as much as you like, but it always need to authenticate to either the machine it's on, or the user. For example, if you set the default key on the computer to your personal key, then anything you download should play fine. If your buddy brings over a new CD with DRM'd files on
Uh, having torque does not make an engine accelerate. In order for a gas engine to accelerate the spark needs to advance. When the spark advances the combustion starts earlier bringing more force to the piston which makes then engine turn faster which sucks in more air, which makes for a larger explosion which gives you more torque, etc...
An engine puts out torque at idle, it's that simple. If not, how would it turn the water pump? the altinator? the torque converter? If including those things is still net'd 0 ft/lbs what happens when you turn your AC on. Your car still idles at the same RPM (if everything is in good working order and efficient)? what happens if your battery is low? The altinator takes more force to turn.
As for why old cars drop to 650rpms when you put them in gear, it's because when you have your foot on the break you are not allowing any of the torque the engine produces to go to the wheels. all that energy has to be released someplace, and that's where the torque converter comes in. The torque converter is kind of like a clutch, in that it allows the engine to spin with out turning the tranny. When the torque converter raises it's rpms, it slips less. So at 500rpms the torque converter is freely spinning, at 800rpms it is maybe 30% (imaginary number for point only). But the engine can't pass 30% of it's torque to the drive train because your foot is still on the breaks, so it still spins the torque converter. But spinning the torque converter takes force since it's 30% locked at 800rpms, that opposing torque reduces the engine speed by 150rpms.
-Rick
That's not exactly accurate. If that where true, an engie would put out 0ft/lbs of torque at it's idle rpm (~800rpm). You know this is false because if you put your car in drive/first and leave you foot off the gas, (slow clutch release on manuals), the car will move, usually at about 3-5mph. If an auto tranny loses anywheres from 10%-40% efficiency, you are looking at a significant amount of energy.
-Rick
This thing could help recapture some lost energy. By charging while the car is idling or breaking, it uses the energy that the engine would be wasting.
As for power output? with a 42volt source I can't see this thing putting out more then 50ft/lbs at the crank (notice the reduction in pully size from the crank to the motor). Most likely less then that.
That power is also only available for short periods of time. But that does make it good for accelerating.
So, what I see this as a good idea for is vehicles like the "Smart Car". Those things rock. Specificly the 2 seat roadster. Anyways, those cars come with a turbo 3-cylinder engine that puts out a whooping 85hp. That is pretty pathetic, except that the car itself weighs in at only 1700lbs. That means that it's got an pretty exceptable power/weight ratio, but it's probrably a bit slow off the line (turbo lag), or if you have a second person in the vehicle. By tacking on an extra say 25ft/lbs of torque for 10 seconds, you could have a pretty dramatic effect on 0-60 times.
For beefier vehicles, specificly those with plenty of low end torque, this won't help a bit.
It also won't help at all for highway cruising. In a gas engine you need to keep the air/fuel mixture as close to 12.8 (Err was it 14? I'm getting my ratios screwed up) as possible to keep the engine running efficient. Too rich, and you waste fuel, to lean and you can have pre-det and damage the engine. And if you are going 60mph, your tranny will be spinning (depending on your gear ratios) 2500-3500 rpm, which means your engine will also be spinning that fast. And since the engine is spinning at that speed, it's sucking air at that speed (a gm 350 will suck 350 cubic inches of air every cycle), and fuel will have to be injected to match. Wether you are getting power from an electric motor, or the engine, that fuel is getting injected. Some engines are smart enough these days to turn off unused cyclinders though, so if it was integrated enough, there's a possibility it could help.
I'm waiting for the dyno's to make up my mind on it. But from what I've seen/can figure, this could be a great performance add on to light weight, high RPM vehicles.
-Rick
It's not using regenerative breaking. It's capturing the wasted energy the engine create while you are breaking. Unless you are power breaking any energy the engine creates is lost. Same with idling, the engine continues to run even though you are not using that energy.
-Rick
The implication here is NOT passwords. It's key logging with out running a key logger. Theoretically I could "accidentally" leave my PDA on my boss's desc after a meeting and have it record a gig or two of his typing. come back a while later, grab the PDA, download the audio, run it through a machine learner, and viola! All of his correspondence. Even better, I could just run it over the wireless network and get a constant stream of his typing.
-Rick
To clarify your loaded question. You said, "please please please explain to me how and why you justify the position that noninfringing people should be imprisoned"
...DVD Jon...Well duh, because he did nothing illegal.
That implies that I do justify the imprisonment of the innocent. Thus a loaded question which I have no desire to answer, any more then you have a desire to answer my question about your wife beating habbits.
As for the communication break down between what you are calling "noninfringers" and what I am calling "innocent infringers". Making a copy of copywriten is an infringment on that copywrite, HOWEVER, fair use entitles us to one personal backup, HOWEVER, if you break encryption to make that back up you are INFRINGING on the DMCA. That person has technically broken one law will obeying another. That is what I call an Innocent Infringer. What they have done is technically illegal (in the US), but they have not done anything that could be considered outside of fair use.
These are the people I want to protect. People who decode DVDs so they can view them on a Linux based system, or other new technology. People who want to loan their content out to a friend or two. In other words, I want a person to be able to do everything that they should be able to do under fair use.
Then there are those I don't care about protecting. People who download content with out paying for it. People who distribute content with out a license/contract to do so. People who post movies to the internet the day before they screen. People who run thousands of copies of pro quality black market copies. IMO, the movie industry has every right in the world to crucify(figuratively) these people. These are also the people who will do their damndest to get arround DRMs, but many of them, and their customers will move to legal means if the system is simple, easy, and intuitive.
Woh, there is a big difference between "nothing illegal" and Convicted. DVD Jon has never been CONVICTED of a crime. Then again, so far as I've heard so far, none of the RIAA sueies have been CONVICTED of copywrite infringment. It doesn't mean they haven't broken the law, it just means they weren't found guilty. And I totally agree that the goal of DeCCS (to create a linux based DVD Player) was valid and should not have been taken as a DMCA violation, I am not a DA, so that's not my call. Releasing the code, or even the specific knowledge of the weekness however, that was a risky move. I know, I know, it's linux, it's open source, blah blah blah. Not all code is ment to be shared.
"If Jon were to chew bubble gum, do you imagine that he could or should be extradited to Singapore? (Yes, gum is illegal in Singapore.)"
Let's say you run an online book company in the US. You have a library of 10,000 books online. Now lets say someone in Sweden figures out your security, grabs a copy of your entire library, then sells them all for half your price, your multi-million dollar company goes under, publishers loose money and authors go hungry. Should you be able to sue them? Or are they protected by the magical invisible man made borders? No, they have damaged your company and you have every right to sue them either in their location, or to try to talk the USDA into extriditing them to the US to stand trial here. Extridition laws are well beyond my scope of knowledge, but if some DA can claim it's a felony (ie: DMCA violation) they may be able to.
Fair Use is clear in some cases, and muddy in others. Personal use, back up copy, intropolerity(sp?) are all covered. Loaning the content to friends, Showing the content large groups of people, donation requests, etc, all start to get in to shaky territory.
I'm not a fan of petitions, and online political petitions are a complete waste of time. If you want a petition to be worth something, do it locally. Get signatures from the areas your local and state representatives represent. I can get 10
The nice thing about electricity though is that you can make your own. Solar cells, integrated roofing, wind generators, etc.
And a 55mpg vehicle @ a 40mile commute 250 times a year would be $1455/year at $8/gal. Assuming electric also jumped x2 1/3 I would pay 22.7 cents per kWh would still only by $908/year($1308 including 3yr batteries).
At $5 gas would run $909/year. Electric would be $567 (967 w/ 3yr batteries). So bargin basement style, you are better off going for an old super cheap geo metro. But look at the other side costs. An oil change every 6 months will run you $30 or so (if you do it yourself). Yearly maintenance can easily hit $100. And a 12 year old geo will likely have a high milage engine, not to mention exhaust, ignition system, coolant, etc that are specific issues for combustion engines. I would say at $5 you are probrably pretty even given total cost of ownership.
-Rick
True. If you can get a 55mpg vehicle for $1000 (rough guess on what a good condition 94 metro would go for), it would take a long time to repay the difference to make an electric cheaper. Likely longer then the life of either vehicle. And a low end el cheap-o DC conversion would probrably perform similarly to a geo metro, with a shorter range.
The issue is oil futures. At some point, world wide demand will out pace world wide supply. Even before that point hits, gas will continue to rise in costs. At $3, a cheap old Geo will be cheaper for a realistic time frame. But what about $5? $7? What if shortages occur? Then the efficiency of the gas engine doesn't matter. But that's all just speculation.
The thing that I'm interested in is that AC Propulsions is rummoring at joining up with Suzuki(?) on the Scion lines to offer a factory full plug in battery powered vehicle in the US. If they can introduce their system into a Scion for under $20k, I think it could totally shake up the compact car market.
-Rick
AC Propulsion: http://www.acpropulsion.com/
5 3
.4kWh/mile and ACs get about .2kWh/mile. My last electric bill was $0.085/kWh which means running a DC electric 30miles would be about $1.02 vs a Gas 30mpg vehicle at about $3.00. Going to an AC system like the one AC Propulsion offers would drop that down to $0.51 per 30 miles.
If you want to race on a paved surface, I'm sure you can find some takers. For some other great electric race vids, check these links: http://chicagotalk.net/forums/showthread.php?t=10
"How are those vehicles being recharged?"
Plug it in. The TZero has a gas generator trailer that can increase range on even the cheap batteries have a range of 700 miles. Many people opt for home solar arrays also to provide "off grid" power.
"What is FLA?"
Flooded Lead Acid. IE: Cheap batteries. A 144volt system (standard highend for DC systems) in FLA batteries will likely be close to $1200.
"Is there an easy way to compare mileage w/ electric vehicles?"
The most accurate calculation is BTUs, but that requires plenty of math. I'm lazy and found someone else who had already done the math. DC systems get arround
"What do the $250k T-Zero's offer that the $25k model don't?"
The $25k option is just the motor, charger, control circuitry, regenerative breaking, contactor, etc. No car, no batteries, no tranny, no frame, etc. They can make a tranny for you, but it's about $5-6k. You'd still have to provide either a donor car, or build a tube frame of your own.
"What's the battery lifetime on these?"
Lead Acid (el cheapo) you'll get 3-5 years. LiIons I've heard can last for up to 10years.
-Rick
That's good to know. I don't know any Prius drivers, just one friend who has been very disappointed in his honda hybrid. I thought he said the batteries were warentied for 3 years (in Wisconsin)
-Rick