I was just wondering that, too. TFA specifically says "they say these lakes lie some 2,300 feet below compressed snow and ice, too deep for environmental temperature to reach," so how the heck does Global Warming affect this? It it was global warming, the ice on TOP would melt - not the ice on BOTTOM! I would more likely suspect it's due to friction of the sliding ice or heat generated from within the Earth (such as volcanic activity).
This would work great using a device with one hand. It's much easier to hold while typing than the conventional method. However, it doesn't fare so well with a two-handed device. I tried to turn my Blackberry upside down to see if it had the same benefit - nope, it's very awkward. Since you have nothing above it to hold the device (where you would normally use your index, middle, and ring fingers), the "natural" thing to do is use the sides of your thumbs to hold it up. But since you use your thumbs to type, it would then easily be dropped while typing. In this position, you have to support the device on your pinkys to type. It feels like nothing is really supporting the phone while typing. In additon, your thumbs cross the screen making it difficult to see.
I teach my 11 year old daughter with an Oopic controller. It's simple, programmable in BASIC, Java, or C++. It's simple and fairly easy for her to understand. It's also affordable!
How do you heat/cool a 3000 sqft house in NJ for 80-100/month? My house, which is quite a bit smaller can easily costs over $300/month during the middle of Winter or Summer. I'm guessing he would probably spending $350/month of power/gas/propane (depending on the system his house would use). Given that, however, it would still take 119 years to pay it off.
I've been programming since I was 7, when my dad bought me a Sinclair computer. I wrote really simple programs (like Choose Your Own Adventure games) because we didn't have any games. Fortunately, my dad understood enough about programming to help me out when I got stuck. By the time I was 12, I was writing "real" games (shooting helicopters flying around in a graphical game).
My advice to you is the same I took:
Dive right in. Don't "think" too much about the problem as a whole. Break your problem down into managable steps. Think about where you need to go to get to the end of that step, then go to the next step. I didn't build a game with helicopters flying around from start - I created a cool looking helicopter, then a missle, then the land, etc
Google is your friend (of course, it didn't exist when I was 7, but it sure helps out now.)
Don't go to school for a CS degree if you want to be a programmer. They get too detailed about the hardware, flip flops, and other nitty gritty that you'll never use. A MIS degree or something other than CS is probably better.
[I'm going to make some people mad here...] Don't learn the "language of the day". Learn the "art" of programming. Learn Perl, Basic, Pascal (don't laugh), C, and possibly C++ - these are fundamentals that other languages build from. In other words, don't learn C#, php, and ruby. This will allow you to see how all languages are alike. It makes it easier to change flavors down the road and makes you much more valuable to work. You can always Google the syntax for the language you're using. You'll realize that when you learn the ones above that I suggest, you probably already know "the language of the day".
Don't be afraid to break it. The biggest thing I see in beginner programmers was a paralizing fear of breaking the system. This SERIOUSLY holds them back. As long as you aren't working for a hospital or a nuclear reactor where peoples' lives are in danger if you screw up, play around with the system/programs. Don't be scared to try things - especially if want to try a novel way to do something simple.
Take a few minutes every week to play around with new ideas - even if they're unrelated to your job. If you get some creative idea on how to do something, stop what you're doing and try it. For example, I found out you can change colors of images by placing transparencies over them using CSS (like creating thuderstorms in backgrounds of static images) - something totally useless to my job and tacky as hell. You'll find out that you end up learning more in 30 minutes than you do all week. It's even better is when someone says "too bad you can't..." and you've already done it. Make sure you save all these "experiments" because you'll definately need them at some point.
Have you tried to restore an 8mm tape from 10-15 years ago. I had a really old 8mm backup tape in a cabinet - when I pulled it out, the tape was all crumbly and the black magnetic stuff was literally falling off the tape.
I'm not sure what format they were using back then, but seeing how this happened so long ago, even if they did have it, it probably would be no good anyways.
This past centry was warmer than the past 12 centries. If you scale it down, that's like saying "yesterday was the warmest it's been in 12 days!". That's not so bad....
Show me where it's warmer than it's been in, say 12,000 years (or 120 centries), then we may have something...
Our UPS was some foriegn piece of crap built in the mid 90s that didn't have a way to notify our systems that the power was off. I raised all sorts of hell...
After I complained and begged for money for 2 years (and we picked up a billing system that crashed once), they finally forked up the money for a really large UPS (to hold 30+ servers for 3+ hours) - we didn't have physcal room for a generator. My production stuff was configured to shut down automatically, but due to them being cheap on the software end, I didn't have enough software licenses to put on non-critical systems.
I ended up writing a script on one of my production machines that watched for power outages reported from the software, then issued a "shutdown now" to the other boxes.
Our office used to be located in an older area where the power wires and phone lines were above ground. At an extremely busy intersection nearby, a car would hit the pole at least once a month and knock out our power and/or phones.
Our UPS would only last a few hours, which wasn't enough time to fix the pole in many cases. I can't tell you how many times I've had to restore a database or fix a crashed disk due to some drunk idiot...
I've been programing for most of my life and have only documented about 3 peices of my work where things got so complex, it was making my head hurt. Even then, my comment says "I feel sorry for the next person who has to figure this out..." or "Don't ask what I was thinking here...".
IMO, if someone comes up and asks for documentation, they need to be fired! They obviously either 1) don't know how to read code and shouldn't be programming; 2) Don't understand the problem the code is trying to solve.
Code is like a foreign language - you either know it or you don't. Comments are for people who don't know it; and if they don't know it, they need to find another job or learn the language.
When I program, I get in this "state" where I can't stop. When I get to that state, I am a VERY FAST programmer. If I were to document my coding, it would take me 5 times as long to write it because I would never get in that "state". On the rare occassion that I look at code and can't figure it out, I rewrite it because, obviously, the code sucks. To keep my code from sucking, I have very strict guidlines that I use when programming (in order of importance):
1. MOST IMPORTANT - use tabs in routines to show where routines start and stop
2. use tabs in routines to show where routines start and stop
3. If I do comment (yea right), Don't put parenthesis, squiglys, or brackets in the comments - it screws up vi's % command.
4. use tabs in routines to show where routines start and stop
5. Make variables' and functions' names intutive.
6. use tabs in routines to show where routines start and stop
and last, use tabs in routines to show where routines start and stop
If you use these rules and have a decent progrmamer, there's probably very little need for comments.
FYI, you cannot calculate taxes based on county. There are some counties that have multiple tax rates. For example, Fulton county in Georgia. The part of the county that's INSIDE Atlanta city limits has an addition +1% tax.
Here's a message from the county asking to report companies who charge the wrong rate based on the location.
I've worked on Sun machines for about 10 years. It still drives me nuts trying to switch between my PC keyboard and my Sun keyboard. Only a few keys changed between these two: the CTRL and Caps Lock; the Escape and tilde; the Pipe and Backspace.
I couldn't imagine trying to switch between qwerty and abcdef.
I run my own DNS server at home because I have a bigger fear that my ISP's DNS may be hijacked rather than my bank. It seems like that would be the easiest hole to crack for hackers.
I would hope that if my bank's DNS servers were hijacked that they would work with me to get any money I lost back. However, if my ISP's DNS servers were hijacked, I don't know that the bank would be as cooperative.
My company bought 120 of these Dell PCs. Of the 120, we've had 115 of these stop working after a reboot due to a leaking capacitor. We are waiting for the last 5 to "pop" too.
Fortunately, Dell's been pretty good at getting us replacement motherboards. I wish they would just recalled them instead of us having to wait for them to break. It seems pretty pathetic that 100% of them break, yet they don't do anything about it.
Keith
Slashdot Mirror
I was just wondering that, too. TFA specifically says "they say these lakes lie some 2,300 feet below compressed snow and ice, too deep for environmental temperature to reach," so how the heck does Global Warming affect this? It it was global warming, the ice on TOP would melt - not the ice on BOTTOM! I would more likely suspect it's due to friction of the sliding ice or heat generated from within the Earth (such as volcanic activity).
Keith
This would work great using a device with one hand. It's much easier to hold while typing than the conventional method. However, it doesn't fare so well with a two-handed device. I tried to turn my Blackberry upside down to see if it had the same benefit - nope, it's very awkward. Since you have nothing above it to hold the device (where you would normally use your index, middle, and ring fingers), the "natural" thing to do is use the sides of your thumbs to hold it up. But since you use your thumbs to type, it would then easily be dropped while typing. In this position, you have to support the device on your pinkys to type. It feels like nothing is really supporting the phone while typing. In additon, your thumbs cross the screen making it difficult to see.
Keith
I teach my 11 year old daughter with an Oopic controller. It's simple, programmable in BASIC, Java, or C++. It's simple and fairly easy for her to understand. It's also affordable!
Here's the website: http://oopic.com/
Keith
How do you heat/cool a 3000 sqft house in NJ for 80-100/month? My house, which is quite a bit smaller can easily costs over $300/month during the middle of Winter or Summer. I'm guessing he would probably spending $350/month of power/gas/propane (depending on the system his house would use). Given that, however, it would still take 119 years to pay it off.
Keith
My advice to you is the same I took:
Thanks, and good luck!
Keith
The shuttle was designed in the late 70s. Where do you find a fully charged battery built in the late 70's on such short notice?
KeithI'm not sure what format they were using back then, but seeing how this happened so long ago, even if they did have it, it probably would be no good anyways.
Keith
This past centry was warmer than the past 12 centries. If you scale it down, that's like saying "yesterday was the warmest it's been in 12 days!". That's not so bad....
Show me where it's warmer than it's been in, say 12,000 years (or 120 centries), then we may have something...
I wonder what caused the "global warming of 800"?
KeithOur UPS was some foriegn piece of crap built in the mid 90s that didn't have a way to notify our systems that the power was off. I raised all sorts of hell...
After I complained and begged for money for 2 years (and we picked up a billing system that crashed once), they finally forked up the money for a really large UPS (to hold 30+ servers for 3+ hours) - we didn't have physcal room for a generator. My production stuff was configured to shut down automatically, but due to them being cheap on the software end, I didn't have enough software licenses to put on non-critical systems.
I ended up writing a script on one of my production machines that watched for power outages reported from the software, then issued a "shutdown now" to the other boxes.
KeithOur office used to be located in an older area where the power wires and phone lines were above ground. At an extremely busy intersection nearby, a car would hit the pole at least once a month and knock out our power and/or phones.
Our UPS would only last a few hours, which wasn't enough time to fix the pole in many cases. I can't tell you how many times I've had to restore a database or fix a crashed disk due to some drunk idiot...
KeithI've been programing for most of my life and have only documented about 3 peices of my work where things got so complex, it was making my head hurt. Even then, my comment says "I feel sorry for the next person who has to figure this out..." or "Don't ask what I was thinking here...".
IMO, if someone comes up and asks for documentation, they need to be fired! They obviously either 1) don't know how to read code and shouldn't be programming; 2) Don't understand the problem the code is trying to solve.
Code is like a foreign language - you either know it or you don't. Comments are for people who don't know it; and if they don't know it, they need to find another job or learn the language.
When I program, I get in this "state" where I can't stop. When I get to that state, I am a VERY FAST programmer. If I were to document my coding, it would take me 5 times as long to write it because I would never get in that "state". On the rare occassion that I look at code and can't figure it out, I rewrite it because, obviously, the code sucks. To keep my code from sucking, I have very strict guidlines that I use when programming (in order of importance):
1. MOST IMPORTANT - use tabs in routines to show where routines start and stop
2. use tabs in routines to show where routines start and stop
3. If I do comment (yea right), Don't put parenthesis, squiglys, or brackets in the comments - it screws up vi's % command.
4. use tabs in routines to show where routines start and stop
5. Make variables' and functions' names intutive.
6. use tabs in routines to show where routines start and stop
and last, use tabs in routines to show where routines start and stop
If you use these rules and have a decent progrmamer, there's probably very little need for comments.
Keith
FYI, you cannot calculate taxes based on county. There are some counties that have multiple tax rates. For example, Fulton county in Georgia. The part of the county that's INSIDE Atlanta city limits has an addition +1% tax.
Here's a message from the county asking to report companies who charge the wrong rate based on the location.
Keith
More like:
By clicking "OK" below, you agree to the terms of this EULA.
[OK]
(and the X in the corner of the window is missing)
Keith
I've worked on Sun machines for about 10 years. It still drives me nuts trying to switch between my PC keyboard and my Sun keyboard. Only a few keys changed between these two: the CTRL and Caps Lock; the Escape and tilde; the Pipe and Backspace.
I couldn't imagine trying to switch between qwerty and abcdef.
KeithI run my own DNS server at home because I have a bigger fear that my ISP's DNS may be hijacked rather than my bank. It seems like that would be the easiest hole to crack for hackers.
I would hope that if my bank's DNS servers were hijacked that they would work with me to get any money I lost back. However, if my ISP's DNS servers were hijacked, I don't know that the bank would be as cooperative.
KeithSure, a rat brain can fly a plane, but can it do the laundry?
KeithMy company bought 120 of these Dell PCs. Of the 120, we've had 115 of these stop working after a reboot due to a leaking capacitor. We are waiting for the last 5 to "pop" too. Fortunately, Dell's been pretty good at getting us replacement motherboards. I wish they would just recalled them instead of us having to wait for them to break. It seems pretty pathetic that 100% of them break, yet they don't do anything about it. Keith
This sound like some kinnda anti-trust issue.