Artist, government critic, blogger, Twitter pioneer. Now Ai Weiwei wants to shut down the internet for a day.
I wonder if his disappearance will be covered up as "performance art?"
It's certainly a valiant idea, I wish him the best of luck. It seems he'll need it:
... and news about the strike call has been scrubbed by censors from the most widely read sites.
I doubt it can but hopefully Twitter and word of mouth make this possible. I would probably have to take the day off and walk around town in order to avoid internet usage all day... then again, I live under a less invasive government.
I'm not clued into Chinese culture at all so all I know is that globally other news sources in other countries are criticizing this... but what is the majority feeling of the general Chinese populace? Honestly there have been other things where I know at least some of the populace supported the Chinese government's actions to "watch out for them." Ai needs to overcome those people, I have no idea if he's a lone voice or the voice of everyone's repressed thoughts.
Replying to wipe bad mod. I'm with the mob - Read your own quote.
Excellent, then my drunk dumbass post might serve some purpose. Hopefully my post ends up -1 and the system remembers your equally stupid +1 mod and metamoderation will see to it that you will never get mod points again. It's clear you don't deserve them if you can't read a post before you moderate it.
I've no clue if that's how it works, I've never gotten mod points on this site but metamoderate all the time.
BTW, it's possible someone from that staff leaked that information to the WSJ (since their source was undisclosed) prior to Job's permission.
"is now recovering well and has an excellent prognosis," according to a statement by Dr. James D. Eason, the program director of the Methodist University Hospital Transplant Institute. Jobs "received a liver transplant because he was the patient with the highest MELD score (model for end-stage liver disease) of his blood type and, therefore, the sickest patient on the waiting list at the time a donor organ became available.
"The waiting list for liver transplants was smaller than in other states, such as California," Eason said.
While Eason said the confirmation was being provided with Jobs' approval, he cited patient confidentiality in saying that he could not reveal any further information on the specifics of Jobs' surgery.
Hahahahahah! Ahahah, oh, I'm sorry. That is freaking hilarious. Doctor Eason, you better hope that Public Figure trumps HIPAA. Because from this document:
Celebrity and public figures are not subject to different standards than other patients when it comes to hospital policies for releasing information to the media.
I don't know if there's been precedence in the courts but good luck sir!
But even by Apple's standards, its handling of news about the health of its chief executive and co-founder, Steven P. Jobs, who has battled pancreatic cancer and recently had a liver transplant while on a leave of absence, is unparalleled.
Indeed, very little of the matter comprising Steve Jobs is still Steve Jobs. The man's like a rebuilt Delorian. Am I the only person that shudders when he closes all of his speeches with "Remember, there's a little piece of all of you inside me"?
I guess if I ran a cult I'd be asking for new organs from my younger zealots too.
So maybe it'll pay for itself in 12 years, but how long before those panels need to be replaced? That's what we really need to know in order to decide if he's actually saving money.
Well if you want to be a financial stickler, you might want to factor in the standard rate of inflation if it's going to be 12 years. The funny thing is that inflation has been going down in the past three months according to this site. But you need to remember the pert formula and assume that most of the time you're looking at an average of what about 3% inflation per year? On your original investment of $3800, right? So that's like a 42% increase in the value of that 2008 money assuming inflation continues at an expected yearly rate and a bank will give you that return.
I've used subversion quite a bit and we simply avoid committing Java archives and instead use Maven2 to get those. This is because it seems to take up a lot of space and time with large files. Maybe this is typical of any versioning system but I do not know enough about git. From Subversion's best practices:
Be patient with large files
A nice feature of Subversion is that by design, there is no limit to the size of files it can handle. Files are sent "streamily" in both directions between Subversion client and server, using a small, constant amount of memory on each side of the network.
Of course, there are a number of practical issues to consider. While there's no need to worry about files in the kilobyte-sized range (e.g. typical source-code files), committing larger files can take a tremendous amount of both time and space (e.g. files that are dozens or hundreds of megabytes large.)
To begin with, remember that your Subversion working copy stores pristine copies of all version-controlled files in the.svn/text-base/ area. This means that your working copy takes up at least twice as much disk space as the original dataset. Beyond that, the Subversion client follows a (currently unadjustable) algorithm for committing files:
* Copies the file to.svn/tmp/ (can take a while, and temporarily uses extra disk space))
* Performs a binary diff between the tmpfile and the pristine copy, or between the tmpfile and an empty-file if newly added. (can take a very long time to compute, even though only a small amount of data might ultimately be sent over the network)
* Sends the diff to the server, then moves the tmpfile into.svn/text-base/
So while there's no theoretical limit to the size of your files, you'll need to be aware that very large files may require quite a bit of patient waiting while your client chugs away. You can rest assured, however, that unlike CVS, your large files won't incapacitate the server or affect other users.
Really, I think he's asking for one tool to do both small files and large files when (in my mind) it makes more sense to back up ISOs and MP3s over longer periods of time than my source code or documents that I may edit and change daily.
Subversion for source control. A simple script that pushes large files to an external drive. That's all I do. Bulletproof? No way. But it sounds like he's devoting a lot of time to this. I guess he must have a lot more computers than I do.
They need water. (Hello California.) They need sunlight. You need a place to put them. They may be mildly sensitive to environmental shock when you're putting them up. They're somewhat low-density. The roots can damage structures in the vicinity. After several decades they die, and if you don't do something with the carbon they sequestered in the wood it'll make its way back to the atmosphere.
Still great, stuff, just not perfect.
In the article, they talk about "climate control" to the fullest extent. You can't turn non-synth trees "off." They'll keep pulling that CO2. These synth trees (that are equivalent to 1,000 normal trees each) can be shut off. So we pull out so much stuff that it gets a little colder? Oh well, just shut a bank or two down for the next year... repeat until you hit your human desired equilibrium point. No more "climate change."
Re:Duct Tape is a Bad Idea--Use Magnets!
on
Best eSATA JBOD?
·
· Score: 1
You attached strong magnets to your magnetic storage device? Did you intentionally want to erase your data after writing it or are you just an idiot?
Oh well, I haven't had to recover any of the files so far. At least it doesn't ruin my CRT.
Offtopic but how did you get your post to be colored rainbow? I mean, I can't even get regular bgcolor to work on Slashdot... I know, I know, I must be new here.
Yes! This is one of those often overlooked PROTIPs that you have to buy expensive trade magazines to find. I have one here from Onion Technology that says:
Duct tape the drives together in packs of two but be sure to put popsicle sticks between the drives so that the ends of the sticks stick out a little. Use the old fashioned connectors to daisy chain the power to the drives and make sure you have enough SATA ports on your computer. Then, put two or three packs of two around your chest on the outside of a swinging technical vest! You've got a mobile backup device--IN STYLE!
The last part merely involves lithium power source and form factor PC in a backpack on your back add a tiny display and you're set to go to your favorite sporting events and fly in style. Be sure to run up to the arenas to gather attention--you are the 1337 geek of everyone, after all!
Hope this helps.
Duct Tape is a Bad Idea--Use Magnets!
on
Best eSATA JBOD?
·
· Score: 5, Funny
Duct tape the drives together, then use software RAID JBOD.
That's what MacGyver would have done.
Duct tape? Oh heavens no! No, here's what I did: I went down to the local thrift store and bought a few big shelf speakers for ten dollars. Then I took them apart and got the really powerful magnets out. Using these, you can attach the drives to the outside of your case. There's one gotcha though--some cases are aluminum which means you have to attach the magnets and drives to your CRT if you have one. This usually just means a longer cable though.
The smart thing about this is that the drives are on the outside of the case so they remain cooler than they would in any enclosure.
If you think a RAID is a backup, you'll be overjoyed with the results of my advice!
Uh, I read the article and it sounds like 10 self-appointed people running the show with 12 volunteers. How in the hell is that crowdsourcing?
Don't even get me started on a who will watch the watchmen rant. Such a monitoring activity operating at all upsets me... one operating outside my elected official's jurisdiction would be a true horror show.
Perhaps both human and "ferret" anti-smuggling techniques will be used. Although, I'd be pretty pissed if I lost my job to a ferret.
According to the research site, this is going to replace dogs and dog handlers the most:
The team are developing a device that matches the sensitivity of a sniffer dog yet avoids the problems of becoming distracted, tired or confused associated with using an animal. The compact robot, or 'cargo screening ferret', will be able to navigate cargo loads, and detect multiple illegal substances, even in low concentrations, using a series of specially-developed sensors.
In this proposal we aim to develop a new approach to cargo screening where we take sensors to the contraband within cargo containers using mini-robots, providing rapid and highly sensitive detection of a range of contraband. A variety of technologies and methods are available and routinely used for the screening and detection of illegal substances and materials within cargo containers. These external screening systems are typically bulky, expensive and require ultra-high sensitivity as the sensor is remote from the cargo. Further, detailed investigation requires either time consuming unpacking of the cargo or the need for staff to enter the cargo putting them at risk of contamination from the contraband. This proposal addresses both the development of novel sensors and their delivery to the point of detection through the use of a robotic system / thus the sensing devices must be compact, low power and lightweight to be best tailored to use in this way. The development of effective sensors is designed to "make a difference" / to be able to detect specifically (and in very low concentrations) given illegal substances. The sensors developed are targeted to match the sensitivity of dogs in detecting substances, but not having the problem of distraction, tiring or confusion, with a much longer on-duty time, due to the inanimate nature of the sensor. The key advantage is that the sensors are able to detect multiple specific substances in compact devices ideally suited to mounting on the small robotic vehicle to be used for the delivery of the sensors to the region where the measurement has to be made.
So if you're a dog that relies on sniffing out cargo containers, you have about five years to look for other work.
If he were a black man writing about 3 black geeks in a white or hispanic neighborhood would you have been offended?
I don't know, what racial slur referring to African Americans would he have used to describe himself when he interacted with the residents of the Hispanic neighborhood? You substitute white with black yet you conveniently avoided the two places where he used the word "honkey." Tell me, what would have replaced "honkey?" I'm guessing whatever your answer is I would not be considering it a valid news source if I were reading it.
Did you notice how only when he interacted with locals in the neighborhood did he refer to himself as a "honkey?" How you think people view you says a lot about how you feel about them. That's all I was pointing out and is what I refer to as Us V Them mentality or latent xenophobia or whatever you want to call it.
He's free to say whatever he wants and I'm free to opine that when you're reading things on a "news for nerds" site, it's nice not to come across racial slurs regardless of the target or the person who is "reporting" the story. Mod me offtopic or consider me a liberal moron, I don't care. I think this is one of the last biases in society today and when it is ok to say (in this story) "They looked at us honkeys" or (in the case of Middle Eastern countries in conflict) "they don't like democracy" etc. You're still stereotyping people.
Us three skinny white guys walked at a rapid pace in the direction of the circle.
It talked to you in Spanish. And you saw three skinny white guys prowling in the street with a laptop computer open.
So you take off down the road, and to your shock and horror, the honkeys follow you.
Nice story and great news for iPhone users. Glad you got your phone back. I'm also glad the altercation ended without violence. I could have done without the above emphasized details. I'm not exactly sure what ethnicity had to do with the theft or why I had to be reminded that you're white... or why you would assume that the thief uses racial slurs to identify Caucasian people.
Alright! It's a good ole fashion Beatles burning! Everyone pour out into the streets with your wireless routers, modems and network cards. I'll bring the gasoline and matches! Remember not to inhale the smoke from the blue and green flames on that burning plastic. After that, we storm our local ISPs and demand all their networking gear for the same fate!
Did you know that this hardware can also be used to transmit and receive kiddie porn? I'm shocked we didn't take action long ago, it should be condemned just like any person that would send or transmit such foul material!
With coordinated strikes, the internet shall be pure and whole once again and your homes will be safe!
I think your title is a bit misleading. When you say "Linux" I think Linux kernel. Like the Linux operating system itself. What the blogger goes on to talk about are just GPL software projects that are intimately tied to Linux. That said, I could install slackware, damn small linux or any number of flavors of Linux that have none of the projects being discussed.
You can chat all you want about Gnome vs KDE and which one is bloating--trust me, that is not something I'm ever going to take a position on. I value my life too much.
I might have missed it but I didn't see anything about people wanting their changes to be seen. That's probably a big problem and you could spend days optimizing the kernel for a better experience but the average user doesn't see anything. Or you could add this awesome UI functionality to some windowing framework (compiz fusion?) and suddenly everyone's seeing it. Pretty obvious what some people might aim for...
Lastly, I've noticed that some of the more mature products like to move in a even/odd fashion where one release is to stabilize things the next is to add new features the next to stabilize then new features... ad infinitum. Even kernel development is done this way I believe. So you know people like Shuttleworth are trying hard to make this work. I think the last bit of criticism that's going to help them move forward is "You're innovating too much."
DRM has not been implemented correctly to date. While you might hope that your iTunes or Kindle--being a popular product--will have flawless DRM that will not inhibit you, this is simply not the case. It's always just a time bomb waiting to go off in your face.
If you gotta buy digital books or music, don't fall for any DRM scheme. Here's an example that even the biggest digital retailers can't get it right. I await a flawless DRM that will work on multiple pieces of hardware--hardware that I choose! I fear I will be waiting for quite some time...
And please, I'm sick of responses to my posts with some snide remark that you don't have DRM and yours is free with a link to the Pirate Bay. It's getting old. I want to support the content providers but I don't want to give up or inhibit my rights to access that content.
This is why most good programmers will stop contributing to the global community because there are those who will steal their work, pass it off as their own, never acknowledge or give credit, and then shamefully stick their head in the sand and ignore the consequences.
[citation needed]
I really don't agree with that sentiment. I mean, there have been a few recent cases (BusyBox) where the company is making money off of it but I don't think SoThink is making a ton of cash off of their plugin. I am not defending SoThink in any way and hope that FlashGot takes action but instead of opting to sue SoThink, I hope he first tries to force them to open up their own tool under the GPL if it is tangled into his code or at least realease all the modifications they have done to his code. He could always turn it over to the EFF for help if he really wants to prosecute to the fullest extent. I doubt that lawsuits are going to help this situation or deter others. They'll just get more crafty about it if they feel the need to.
No, see, you think of Ray as some sort of amazing lawyer, because he's popular around here. But he was wrong about this. Plain and simple. Lawyers from both sides, and judges, and juries, all looked at this case, and the conclusion was that she was in the wrong and had to pay. For him to claim that all those people did it wrong, and his conclusion must be the best... it's the height of arrogance (or maybe just a play for more views for his blog).
Ray's not an amazing lawyer but he's a good guy and has helped inform us on Slashdot more than once. What he did in this article is point out some rudimentary laws and facts that he thinks should have not only influenced the trial but changed the outcome drastically. I think this interesting and shows one of two things: 1) the RIAA is definitely in bed with the judicial system on many levels and/or 2) the emergence of a new technology can often have differing effects on certified lawyers and lawmakers upon its advent. In our case, we have the amazing thing that is the internet and while some people are using one set of archaic laws to deal with it and keep it under control, other peoples might use other archaic laws. Some might even go so far as to posit that no archaic laws have been made that fairly address the internet.
I think if you read Ray's posts, he may not be an amazing lawyer but he is a certified lawyer who is offering you a different professional view of the current state of things. I gotta admit, what he says makes a whole lot more than what I read about in the papers. $80,000 a song as an award in the latest trial? What?
The RIAA is just doing anything they can to stay in business, like any good capitalist business should.
Now that's funny. A "good" capitalist business should roll with the changes, should cater to their customer, should work with their customer, should take advantage of technology, etc. The RIAA is not a business. It is a lobbying group. It is comprised of businesses. A good business would sue someone who stole their property for the amount of losses they experienced. We do not have that going on here. We have a hilarious trial that stinks to high hell where you are fined $80,000 per song you downloaded in copyright violations.
The businesses that support the RIAA are past due on realizing that the RIAA has outlived itself. Now it's just a monster run amok and the consumers are the victims.
You are without help if you believe the RIAA is just another capitalist business trying to get by in tough times.
Bah, like we're going to RTFA on a Friday when there are much better...
I know you're mostly joking but this was a pretty interesting albeit lengthy opinion piece. In fact, he even busts into dialogue between two fictional characters named Simplicio & Salviati to illustrate his point. It's a very Plato/Caroll/Hofstadter sort of way to illustrate his point. Hell, I love this format so much, half my posts are in it!
Anyway, after reading this, I am really eager for vdash.org to get its wiki up and running so that can be used to build engines and homework for students. Maybe even provide a hub for teachers to discuss interesting assignments? I'm sure the discussion pages will prove interesting if real academics get in arguments about proofs and math. I don't think the real payoff would be reinstitutionalizing the teachers but instead giving the students the free online resources to go the extra mile if they so desire. Save your Turings and Erdoses if you can't help everyone!
Lockhart is definitely a dreamer and this isn't going to change public schools. But it might change how you as a parent get involved with your children and math.
This is just a simple case of some little dick trying to be a big dick and then cry about it when he got called.
Story time! You are on your way to Toronto to attend your cousin's wedding. But as you get into the airport, you realize you have no cash and haven't bought a wedding present yet! So you're not sure if the ATMs in Canada work for your bank and you approach an ATM. You're in a hurry to catch your flight which puts you in Toronto just to catch the wedding and in your haste, you accidentally hit an extra zero after punching in $500 and then hit enter. You're now holding $5,000 in nonconsecutive hundreds (this actually happened to my friend once).
Ok, you're not putting these in your luggage or jacket so you put them on your person and they make a noticeable bulge in the front pocket of your shirt but you don't want to lose them.
Guard notices the bulge as you walk through and asks you what's in your front shirt pocket. You look nervous and start to tell him a contrived story about being in a rush and having $5,000 on you--which is, of course, a hilarious mistake. TSA agent doesn't buy it and wants to know what it's really for. Guy wants to know who you work for. Sad thing is you were just laid off by Best Buy and the severance package of $7,000 is the only way that transaction to your checking account went through. So you tell him you're an unemployed guy going to Toronto with $5,000.
The TSA agent informs you they just arrested a guy with a bunch of cocaine on him in the airport and he's pretty sure you were his contact to make the deal and bring it over to Canada. You don't have any police record and were cleared to fly when you got your ticket but that doesn't matter. After missing the wedding and a night in jail, they can't make it stick and let you go.
You're a victim of better safe than sorry. When--guess what--it's not illegal for you to walk around with $5,000 cash on you.
Nice story, huh? Be a shame if it happened to you. But I'm sure I just have an overactive imagination and we all have nothing to worry about.
I really do sympathize with Lockhart. But what he's asking for is the perfect math teacher in the perfect math world with kids and their parents being tantalized by mathematics--not captain of the football team or even high achieving speech/band nerd.
From the blog:
I defy you to read and find a single sentence that isn't permeated, suffused, soaked, and encrusted with truth.
Very well, here is an excerpt from the PDF:
Mathematics is an art, and art should be taught by working artists, or if not, at least by people who appreciate the art form and can recognize it when they see it. It is not necessary that you learn music from a professional composer, but would you want yourself or your child to be taught by someone who doesn't even play an instrument, and has never listened to a piece of music in their lives? Would you accept as an art teacher someone who has never picked up a pencil or stepped foot in a museum? Why is it that we accept math teachers who have never produced an original piece of mathematics, know nothing of the history and philosophy of the subject, nothing about recent developments, nothing in fact beyond what they are expected to present to their unfortunate students? What kind of a teacher is that? How can someone teach something that they themselves don't do? I can't dance, and consequently I would never presume to think that I could teach a dance class (I could try, but it wouldn't be pretty). The difference is I know I can't dance. I don't have anyone telling me I'm good at dancing just because I know a bunch of dance words.
Now I'm not saying that math teachers need to be professional mathematicians--far from it. But shouldn't they at least understand what mathematics is, be good at it, and enjoy doing it?
Well if you're not asking for teachers needing to be professional published mathematicians, what was that paragraph about?
I'm sorry man, you're asking for the perfect math teacher. You know Robin William's character from the movie The Dead Poet's Society? You want a guy like that for math... everywhere. That art teacher that actually made you think about what 'art' is? Not going to find many of them in the political science department, are you? Of course, for any subject, someone who puts their heart and soul into the subject is the best teacher! In this respect, math is not special.
The paragraph I quote is not the truth, it's wishing for the impossible. I wish I had a math teacher like this all my life but come on. The public school system is more worried about getting someone that actualy cares about the students at all. They can't even find those people let alone people who care about the students and live/eat/sleep/bleed math.
I'm right their with you in wishing for this but the expectation is unrealistic. Passions come to people unexpectedly. We should deal with the fact that more people are passionate about topics like Art and Humanities than Math and Computer Science. It's just the reality of academia right now.
Slashdot Mirror
Artist, government critic, blogger, Twitter pioneer. Now Ai Weiwei wants to shut down the internet for a day.
I wonder if his disappearance will be covered up as "performance art?"
It's certainly a valiant idea, I wish him the best of luck. It seems he'll need it:
... and news about the strike call has been scrubbed by censors from the most widely read sites.
I doubt it can but hopefully Twitter and word of mouth make this possible. I would probably have to take the day off and walk around town in order to avoid internet usage all day ... then again, I live under a less invasive government.
... but what is the majority feeling of the general Chinese populace? Honestly there have been other things where I know at least some of the populace supported the Chinese government's actions to "watch out for them." Ai needs to overcome those people, I have no idea if he's a lone voice or the voice of everyone's repressed thoughts.
I'm not clued into Chinese culture at all so all I know is that globally other news sources in other countries are criticizing this
Replying to wipe bad mod. I'm with the mob - Read your own quote.
Excellent, then my drunk dumbass post might serve some purpose. Hopefully my post ends up -1 and the system remembers your equally stupid +1 mod and metamoderation will see to it that you will never get mod points again. It's clear you don't deserve them if you can't read a post before you moderate it.
I've no clue if that's how it works, I've never gotten mod points on this site but metamoderate all the time.
BTW, it's possible someone from that staff leaked that information to the WSJ (since their source was undisclosed) prior to Job's permission.
"is now recovering well and has an excellent prognosis," according to a statement by Dr. James D. Eason, the program director of the Methodist University Hospital Transplant Institute. Jobs "received a liver transplant because he was the patient with the highest MELD score (model for end-stage liver disease) of his blood type and, therefore, the sickest patient on the waiting list at the time a donor organ became available.
"The waiting list for liver transplants was smaller than in other states, such as California," Eason said.
While Eason said the confirmation was being provided with Jobs' approval, he cited patient confidentiality in saying that he could not reveal any further information on the specifics of Jobs' surgery.
Hahahahahah! Ahahah, oh, I'm sorry. That is freaking hilarious. Doctor Eason, you better hope that Public Figure trumps HIPAA. Because from this document:
Celebrity and public figures are not subject to different standards than other patients when it comes to hospital policies for releasing information to the media.
I don't know if there's been precedence in the courts but good luck sir!
But even by Apple's standards, its handling of news about the health of its chief executive and co-founder, Steven P. Jobs, who has battled pancreatic cancer and recently had a liver transplant while on a leave of absence, is unparalleled.
Indeed, very little of the matter comprising Steve Jobs is still Steve Jobs. The man's like a rebuilt Delorian. Am I the only person that shudders when he closes all of his speeches with "Remember, there's a little piece of all of you inside me"?
I guess if I ran a cult I'd be asking for new organs from my younger zealots too.
So maybe it'll pay for itself in 12 years, but how long before those panels need to be replaced? That's what we really need to know in order to decide if he's actually saving money.
Well if you want to be a financial stickler, you might want to factor in the standard rate of inflation if it's going to be 12 years. The funny thing is that inflation has been going down in the past three months according to this site. But you need to remember the pert formula and assume that most of the time you're looking at an average of what about 3% inflation per year? On your original investment of $3800, right? So that's like a 42% increase in the value of that 2008 money assuming inflation continues at an expected yearly rate and a bank will give you that return.
Be patient with large files
.svn/text-base/ area. This means that your working copy takes up at least twice as much disk space as the original dataset. Beyond that, the Subversion client follows a (currently unadjustable) algorithm for committing files:
.svn/tmp/ (can take a while, and temporarily uses extra disk space)) .svn/text-base/
A nice feature of Subversion is that by design, there is no limit to the size of files it can handle. Files are sent "streamily" in both directions between Subversion client and server, using a small, constant amount of memory on each side of the network.
Of course, there are a number of practical issues to consider. While there's no need to worry about files in the kilobyte-sized range (e.g. typical source-code files), committing larger files can take a tremendous amount of both time and space (e.g. files that are dozens or hundreds of megabytes large.)
To begin with, remember that your Subversion working copy stores pristine copies of all version-controlled files in the
* Copies the file to
* Performs a binary diff between the tmpfile and the pristine copy, or between the tmpfile and an empty-file if newly added. (can take a very long time to compute, even though only a small amount of data might ultimately be sent over the network)
* Sends the diff to the server, then moves the tmpfile into
So while there's no theoretical limit to the size of your files, you'll need to be aware that very large files may require quite a bit of patient waiting while your client chugs away. You can rest assured, however, that unlike CVS, your large files won't incapacitate the server or affect other users.
Really, I think he's asking for one tool to do both small files and large files when (in my mind) it makes more sense to back up ISOs and MP3s over longer periods of time than my source code or documents that I may edit and change daily.
Subversion for source control. A simple script that pushes large files to an external drive. That's all I do. Bulletproof? No way. But it sounds like he's devoting a lot of time to this. I guess he must have a lot more computers than I do.
They need water. (Hello California.) They need sunlight. You need a place to put them. They may be mildly sensitive to environmental shock when you're putting them up. They're somewhat low-density. The roots can damage structures in the vicinity. After several decades they die, and if you don't do something with the carbon they sequestered in the wood it'll make its way back to the atmosphere.
Still great, stuff, just not perfect.
In the article, they talk about "climate control" to the fullest extent. You can't turn non-synth trees "off." They'll keep pulling that CO2. These synth trees (that are equivalent to 1,000 normal trees each) can be shut off. So we pull out so much stuff that it gets a little colder? Oh well, just shut a bank or two down for the next year ... repeat until you hit your human desired equilibrium point. No more "climate change."
You attached strong magnets to your magnetic storage device? Did you intentionally want to erase your data after writing it or are you just an idiot?
Oh well, I haven't had to recover any of the files so far. At least it doesn't ruin my CRT.
... I know, I know, I must be new here.
Offtopic but how did you get your post to be colored rainbow? I mean, I can't even get regular bgcolor to work on Slashdot
Popsicle sticks between the drives, for airflow.
Yes! This is one of those often overlooked PROTIPs that you have to buy expensive trade magazines to find. I have one here from Onion Technology that says:
Duct tape the drives together in packs of two but be sure to put popsicle sticks between the drives so that the ends of the sticks stick out a little. Use the old fashioned connectors to daisy chain the power to the drives and make sure you have enough SATA ports on your computer. Then, put two or three packs of two around your chest on the outside of a swinging technical vest! You've got a mobile backup device--IN STYLE!
The last part merely involves lithium power source and form factor PC in a backpack on your back add a tiny display and you're set to go to your favorite sporting events and fly in style. Be sure to run up to the arenas to gather attention--you are the 1337 geek of everyone, after all!
Hope this helps.
Duct tape the drives together, then use software RAID JBOD. That's what MacGyver would have done.
Duct tape? Oh heavens no! No, here's what I did: I went down to the local thrift store and bought a few big shelf speakers for ten dollars. Then I took them apart and got the really powerful magnets out. Using these, you can attach the drives to the outside of your case. There's one gotcha though--some cases are aluminum which means you have to attach the magnets and drives to your CRT if you have one. This usually just means a longer cable though.
The smart thing about this is that the drives are on the outside of the case so they remain cooler than they would in any enclosure.
If you think a RAID is a backup, you'll be overjoyed with the results of my advice!
Crowdsourcing Big Brother in Lancaster, PA
Uh, I read the article and it sounds like 10 self-appointed people running the show with 12 volunteers. How in the hell is that crowdsourcing?
... one operating outside my elected official's jurisdiction would be a true horror show.
Don't even get me started on a who will watch the watchmen rant. Such a monitoring activity operating at all upsets me
Perhaps both human and "ferret" anti-smuggling techniques will be used. Although, I'd be pretty pissed if I lost my job to a ferret.
According to the research site, this is going to replace dogs and dog handlers the most:
The team are developing a device that matches the sensitivity of a sniffer dog yet avoids the problems of becoming distracted, tired or confused associated with using an animal. The compact robot, or 'cargo screening ferret', will be able to navigate cargo loads, and detect multiple illegal substances, even in low concentrations, using a series of specially-developed sensors.
From their government grant:
In this proposal we aim to develop a new approach to cargo screening where we take sensors to the contraband within cargo containers using mini-robots, providing rapid and highly sensitive detection of a range of contraband. A variety of technologies and methods are available and routinely used for the screening and detection of illegal substances and materials within cargo containers. These external screening systems are typically bulky, expensive and require ultra-high sensitivity as the sensor is remote from the cargo. Further, detailed investigation requires either time consuming unpacking of the cargo or the need for staff to enter the cargo putting them at risk of contamination from the contraband. This proposal addresses both the development of novel sensors and their delivery to the point of detection through the use of a robotic system / thus the sensing devices must be compact, low power and lightweight to be best tailored to use in this way. The development of effective sensors is designed to "make a difference" / to be able to detect specifically (and in very low concentrations) given illegal substances. The sensors developed are targeted to match the sensitivity of dogs in detecting substances, but not having the problem of distraction, tiring or confusion, with a much longer on-duty time, due to the inanimate nature of the sensor. The key advantage is that the sensors are able to detect multiple specific substances in compact devices ideally suited to mounting on the small robotic vehicle to be used for the delivery of the sensors to the region where the measurement has to be made.
So if you're a dog that relies on sniffing out cargo containers, you have about five years to look for other work.
If he were a black man writing about 3 black geeks in a white or hispanic neighborhood would you have been offended?
I don't know, what racial slur referring to African Americans would he have used to describe himself when he interacted with the residents of the Hispanic neighborhood? You substitute white with black yet you conveniently avoided the two places where he used the word "honkey." Tell me, what would have replaced "honkey?" I'm guessing whatever your answer is I would not be considering it a valid news source if I were reading it.
Did you notice how only when he interacted with locals in the neighborhood did he refer to himself as a "honkey?" How you think people view you says a lot about how you feel about them. That's all I was pointing out and is what I refer to as Us V Them mentality or latent xenophobia or whatever you want to call it.
He's free to say whatever he wants and I'm free to opine that when you're reading things on a "news for nerds" site, it's nice not to come across racial slurs regardless of the target or the person who is "reporting" the story. Mod me offtopic or consider me a liberal moron, I don't care. I think this is one of the last biases in society today and when it is ok to say (in this story) "They looked at us honkeys" or (in the case of Middle Eastern countries in conflict) "they don't like democracy" etc. You're still stereotyping people.
It was a Puerto Rican neighborhood.
Us three skinny white guys walked at a rapid pace in the direction of the circle.
It talked to you in Spanish. And you saw three skinny white guys prowling in the street with a laptop computer open.
So you take off down the road, and to your shock and horror, the honkeys follow you.
Nice story and great news for iPhone users. Glad you got your phone back. I'm also glad the altercation ended without violence. I could have done without the above emphasized details. I'm not exactly sure what ethnicity had to do with the theft or why I had to be reminded that you're white ... or why you would assume that the thief uses racial slurs to identify Caucasian people.
more people own hd-dvd players than own ps3s? really?
It's kind of tempting when HD DVDs are selling brand new on Amazon for $4. You a Monty Python fan? These will be collectables someday just like laserdisc or betamax.
It sounds like a beat up to me.
Alright! It's a good ole fashion Beatles burning! Everyone pour out into the streets with your wireless routers, modems and network cards. I'll bring the gasoline and matches! Remember not to inhale the smoke from the blue and green flames on that burning plastic. After that, we storm our local ISPs and demand all their networking gear for the same fate!
Did you know that this hardware can also be used to transmit and receive kiddie porn? I'm shocked we didn't take action long ago, it should be condemned just like any person that would send or transmit such foul material!
With coordinated strikes, the internet shall be pure and whole once again and your homes will be safe!
Does the Linux Desktop Innovate Too Much?
I think your title is a bit misleading. When you say "Linux" I think Linux kernel. Like the Linux operating system itself. What the blogger goes on to talk about are just GPL software projects that are intimately tied to Linux. That said, I could install slackware, damn small linux or any number of flavors of Linux that have none of the projects being discussed.
...
... ad infinitum. Even kernel development is done this way I believe. So you know people like Shuttleworth are trying hard to make this work. I think the last bit of criticism that's going to help them move forward is "You're innovating too much."
You can chat all you want about Gnome vs KDE and which one is bloating--trust me, that is not something I'm ever going to take a position on. I value my life too much.
I might have missed it but I didn't see anything about people wanting their changes to be seen. That's probably a big problem and you could spend days optimizing the kernel for a better experience but the average user doesn't see anything. Or you could add this awesome UI functionality to some windowing framework (compiz fusion?) and suddenly everyone's seeing it. Pretty obvious what some people might aim for
Lastly, I've noticed that some of the more mature products like to move in a even/odd fashion where one release is to stabilize things the next is to add new features the next to stabilize then new features
DRM has not been implemented correctly to date. While you might hope that your iTunes or Kindle--being a popular product--will have flawless DRM that will not inhibit you, this is simply not the case. It's always just a time bomb waiting to go off in your face.
...
If you gotta buy digital books or music, don't fall for any DRM scheme. Here's an example that even the biggest digital retailers can't get it right. I await a flawless DRM that will work on multiple pieces of hardware--hardware that I choose! I fear I will be waiting for quite some time
And please, I'm sick of responses to my posts with some snide remark that you don't have DRM and yours is free with a link to the Pirate Bay. It's getting old. I want to support the content providers but I don't want to give up or inhibit my rights to access that content.
This is why most good programmers will stop contributing to the global community because there are those who will steal their work, pass it off as their own, never acknowledge or give credit, and then shamefully stick their head in the sand and ignore the consequences.
[citation needed]
I really don't agree with that sentiment. I mean, there have been a few recent cases (BusyBox) where the company is making money off of it but I don't think SoThink is making a ton of cash off of their plugin. I am not defending SoThink in any way and hope that FlashGot takes action but instead of opting to sue SoThink, I hope he first tries to force them to open up their own tool under the GPL if it is tangled into his code or at least realease all the modifications they have done to his code. He could always turn it over to the EFF for help if he really wants to prosecute to the fullest extent. I doubt that lawsuits are going to help this situation or deter others. They'll just get more crafty about it if they feel the need to.
No, see, you think of Ray as some sort of amazing lawyer, because he's popular around here. But he was wrong about this. Plain and simple. Lawyers from both sides, and judges, and juries, all looked at this case, and the conclusion was that she was in the wrong and had to pay. For him to claim that all those people did it wrong, and his conclusion must be the best... it's the height of arrogance (or maybe just a play for more views for his blog).
Ray's not an amazing lawyer but he's a good guy and has helped inform us on Slashdot more than once. What he did in this article is point out some rudimentary laws and facts that he thinks should have not only influenced the trial but changed the outcome drastically. I think this interesting and shows one of two things: 1) the RIAA is definitely in bed with the judicial system on many levels and/or 2) the emergence of a new technology can often have differing effects on certified lawyers and lawmakers upon its advent. In our case, we have the amazing thing that is the internet and while some people are using one set of archaic laws to deal with it and keep it under control, other peoples might use other archaic laws. Some might even go so far as to posit that no archaic laws have been made that fairly address the internet.
I think if you read Ray's posts, he may not be an amazing lawyer but he is a certified lawyer who is offering you a different professional view of the current state of things. I gotta admit, what he says makes a whole lot more than what I read about in the papers. $80,000 a song as an award in the latest trial? What?
The RIAA is just doing anything they can to stay in business, like any good capitalist business should.
Now that's funny. A "good" capitalist business should roll with the changes, should cater to their customer, should work with their customer, should take advantage of technology, etc. The RIAA is not a business. It is a lobbying group. It is comprised of businesses. A good business would sue someone who stole their property for the amount of losses they experienced. We do not have that going on here. We have a hilarious trial that stinks to high hell where you are fined $80,000 per song you downloaded in copyright violations.
The businesses that support the RIAA are past due on realizing that the RIAA has outlived itself. Now it's just a monster run amok and the consumers are the victims.
You are without help if you believe the RIAA is just another capitalist business trying to get by in tough times.
Bah, like we're going to RTFA on a Friday when there are much better ...
I know you're mostly joking but this was a pretty interesting albeit lengthy opinion piece. In fact, he even busts into dialogue between two fictional characters named Simplicio & Salviati to illustrate his point. It's a very Plato/Caroll/Hofstadter sort of way to illustrate his point. Hell, I love this format so much, half my posts are in it!
Anyway, after reading this, I am really eager for vdash.org to get its wiki up and running so that can be used to build engines and homework for students. Maybe even provide a hub for teachers to discuss interesting assignments? I'm sure the discussion pages will prove interesting if real academics get in arguments about proofs and math. I don't think the real payoff would be reinstitutionalizing the teachers but instead giving the students the free online resources to go the extra mile if they so desire. Save your Turings and Erdoses if you can't help everyone!
Lockhart is definitely a dreamer and this isn't going to change public schools. But it might change how you as a parent get involved with your children and math.
This is just a simple case of some little dick trying to be a big dick and then cry about it when he got called.
Story time! You are on your way to Toronto to attend your cousin's wedding. But as you get into the airport, you realize you have no cash and haven't bought a wedding present yet! So you're not sure if the ATMs in Canada work for your bank and you approach an ATM. You're in a hurry to catch your flight which puts you in Toronto just to catch the wedding and in your haste, you accidentally hit an extra zero after punching in $500 and then hit enter. You're now holding $5,000 in nonconsecutive hundreds (this actually happened to my friend once).
Ok, you're not putting these in your luggage or jacket so you put them on your person and they make a noticeable bulge in the front pocket of your shirt but you don't want to lose them.
Guard notices the bulge as you walk through and asks you what's in your front shirt pocket. You look nervous and start to tell him a contrived story about being in a rush and having $5,000 on you--which is, of course, a hilarious mistake. TSA agent doesn't buy it and wants to know what it's really for. Guy wants to know who you work for. Sad thing is you were just laid off by Best Buy and the severance package of $7,000 is the only way that transaction to your checking account went through. So you tell him you're an unemployed guy going to Toronto with $5,000.
The TSA agent informs you they just arrested a guy with a bunch of cocaine on him in the airport and he's pretty sure you were his contact to make the deal and bring it over to Canada. You don't have any police record and were cleared to fly when you got your ticket but that doesn't matter. After missing the wedding and a night in jail, they can't make it stick and let you go.
You're a victim of better safe than sorry. When--guess what--it's not illegal for you to walk around with $5,000 cash on you.
Nice story, huh? Be a shame if it happened to you. But I'm sure I just have an overactive imagination and we all have nothing to worry about.
From the blog:
I defy you to read and find a single sentence that isn't permeated, suffused, soaked, and encrusted with truth.
Very well, here is an excerpt from the PDF:
Mathematics is an art, and art should be taught by working artists, or if not, at least by people who appreciate the art form and can recognize it when they see it. It is not necessary that you learn music from a professional composer, but would you want yourself or your child to be taught by someone who doesn't even play an instrument, and has never listened to a piece of music in their lives? Would you accept as an art teacher someone who has never picked up a pencil or stepped foot in a museum? Why is it that we accept math teachers who have never produced an original piece of mathematics, know nothing of the history and philosophy of the subject, nothing about recent developments, nothing in fact beyond what they are expected to present to their unfortunate students? What kind of a teacher is that? How can someone teach something that they themselves don't do? I can't dance, and consequently I would never presume to think that I could teach a dance class (I could try, but it wouldn't be pretty). The difference is I know I can't dance. I don't have anyone telling me I'm good at dancing just because I know a bunch of dance words.
Now I'm not saying that math teachers need to be professional mathematicians--far from it. But shouldn't they at least understand what mathematics is, be good at it, and enjoy doing it?
Well if you're not asking for teachers needing to be professional published mathematicians, what was that paragraph about?
... everywhere. That art teacher that actually made you think about what 'art' is? Not going to find many of them in the political science department, are you? Of course, for any subject, someone who puts their heart and soul into the subject is the best teacher! In this respect, math is not special.
I'm sorry man, you're asking for the perfect math teacher. You know Robin William's character from the movie The Dead Poet's Society? You want a guy like that for math
The paragraph I quote is not the truth, it's wishing for the impossible. I wish I had a math teacher like this all my life but come on. The public school system is more worried about getting someone that actualy cares about the students at all. They can't even find those people let alone people who care about the students and live/eat/sleep/bleed math.
I'm right their with you in wishing for this but the expectation is unrealistic. Passions come to people unexpectedly. We should deal with the fact that more people are passionate about topics like Art and Humanities than Math and Computer Science. It's just the reality of academia right now.
From what I can tell, they all look to be the same length and size and hopefully are not older revisions of this paper.