I am neither a linguist nor a military strategist, but why should that stop me from having an uninformed opinion.:)
From what I've read, Japanese culture is very precise and exact. When the Japanese military issues orders, they are extremely precise and exact and Japanese soldiers are expected to obey them precisely and exactly. This is fine as long as things go as planned, but when things start screwing-up and you don't have contingency orders and your soldiers have no experience taking the initiative (indeed, are discouraged from taking the initiative), then I don't see any alternative to withdrawing and regrouping.
On the other hand, you get a bunch of American good-old-boys and there's almost no point issuing precise orders 'cause you know they're not going be obeyed precisely anyway.:) Well, ok, that's a oversimplification, but in general when things start screwing-up, low-level American troops will take the initiative and try to compensate for conditions instead of withdrawing and regrouping.
I suppose there are strengths and weaknesses to each culture, but anyway, that's my uninformed opinion.
What happens when an appliance running Embedded Red Hat Linux has a security hole?
I actually thought about this a bit (jeez, I need to get a life), and decided that, realistically, home appliances would have to be on a home intranet, and protected from the outside by a firewall/router.
On the other hand, I sincerely doubt a 'fridge with a built-in barcode scanner would be commercially viable. (Cool idea, but just too much trouble to remember to scan everything.)
On the third hand, a 'fridge that could monitor its motor, internal temperature, and power consumption. That could warn you if the motor failed, or consuming too much power (time to clean the evaporator coils), could adjust its defrosting cycle according to the humidity, just maybe more practical (or not, who knows).
Re:Why doesn't Warner Brothers sue the MPAA?
on
NYT On DeCSS Case
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· Score: 1
I'm not disagreeing with you, but I'd like to point-out that the constitution says:
"The Congress shall have Power... To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;"
My non-constitutional scholar interpretation is that Congress can pass copyright laws, but is not required to. That is, there's no constitutional right to copyrights. As opposed to, say, free speech, the *ahem* right to bear arms, etc..
I would agree that copyrights for a limited time are a good thing, but there seems to be a growing opinion among some companies they have the right to make money from copyrighted material indefinitely.
By the way, how soon after the introduction of the PS2 will we be seeing network cards for them?
Don't need'em. PS2 has USB and firewire ports. Just plug in a USB ethernet adaptor or modem. When PS2 will support ethernet or a modem is a different question.
You're right, it is less than "amazingly" useful, but consider...
If one could replace the modem module (which is replaceable) with a pair of USB ports, you could then add a USB ethernet port or modem, a keyboard, mouse, and hard-drive. Then you'd have an open-source web-TV/email box, or an open-source game development platform, or drop it in a kiosk with a touch-screen for a cheap, public web-browser, or etc...
Granted, not as good or powerful as a full computer system, but pretty slick in a dedicated application.
Which brings up the question, does anyone have the pinout for the internal modem connector?
The DC-X was renamed Clipper Graham after General Daniel O. Graham, Ret. (1925 - 1995).
"General Graham was instrumental in advocating the Strategic Defense Initiative under President Reagan."... "He founded and directed 'High Frontier', which became the leading non-government voice in support of SDI. In 1990, he established the Space Transportation Association to further the development of vehicles and systems to provide reliable and economic access to space."
But putting the DC on top of a dumb booster would have made a nifty way of getting back to the moon.
Even better, if you have a small fleet of DCs, fly the first into LEO, then send up two or three more to refuel the first, then head for the moon.:-)
Venturestar (the X-33) is having problems with the composite materials fuel tank delaminating after filled with cryogenic fuel.
The main problem with Vulturestar's tanks is that they're multilobed composite tanks. That is, three composite tanks joined together along their sides. Appearently, the joins between the tanks aren't strong enough.
Personally, I dislike the idea of having to carry fuel to land,
Remember, up to 95% of your fuel is used up just getting to LEO. A reuseable launch vehicle is much, much lighter coming down and would need much, much less fuel to land.
Plus, it's really nice to be able to land on a dime anywhere, so you don't need a 3 mile runaway out in the middle of nowhere.
(I believe the Delta Clipper was also going to have composite fuel tanks, so it would have faced the same problems).
*sigh* The problem with the Venturestar's fuel tanks is that they are multilobed. You see, conventional fuel tanks are cylindrical because the cylindrical shape is strongest (well, ok, spherical is strongest, but cylindrical is the best compromise for volume vs. strength). As I understand it, the Venturestar's tanks look like three cylindrical tanks with part of their sides cut away, then the tanks are joined (somehow) to make a "multilobed" tank that fits the shape of the Venturestar better. The key is to make the joins so they don't compromise the strength of the tanks. So far they've made two tanks, one has failed catastrophically.
Composite tanks, in general, are fairly established technology. Composite fueltanks in rockets are not used, in general, because they're more expensive and most rockets are expendable. They become more economical in a reuseable rocket because they're potentially lighter and, well, reuseable.
Most european countries (and england) have strict regulations about immigration. However most countries are less strict about contract work since it's implicitly short term. There are also tax advantages (hefty deductions and per-diem). Check out this post from Deja.com about someone with personal experience.
Excuse me, my coffee hasn't kicked in yet, but isn't this a matter of definitions? That is, levels of "trust"?
Oversimplifying a bit, a "TRUSTED" system might be "built according to a formal specification and are tested and confirmed against a formal testing and standards process", a "Trusted" system might be "tested" secure, and "trusted" might mean "no known vulnerabilities". Under those definitions, Linux might be "trusted", and OpenBSD might be "Trusted", but I know of any operating systems offhand that would be "TRUSTED".
So I think Dr. Spafford is right. Linux isn't a "TRUSTED" system under (what I interpret to be) his definition of "TRUSTED". I think your interpretation that since Linux can't be "TRUSTED', therefore it can't be "trusted" is mistaken.
Hmmm, I think I'll get another cup of coffee and reread that.
The problem for GNU Cash is that they will need to work closely with each bank they plan to support. They have to know what order data will be transfered and what type of data is being transfered. This is no easy task!!
Ummm, excuse me, but it's early and I'm appearently an idiot. What's the point of using XML (the previous comment implied OFX used XML) if it's different for each bank? What's the point of having a standard if it's different for each bank?
Re:You've gotta be kidding...
on
Napster Wars
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· Score: 1
Section 8 - Clause 8: To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;
Re:"underground" napster servers?
on
Napster Wars
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· Score: 1
However, the Movie Industry is an industry. Not a single company.
It may be controlled by the movie industry, but as far as I know, the MPAA is a single company.
Oh, that's right. You cited the WTO. You're one of those class war types. Sorry for interrupting your rant.
Whoa, someone got up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. By region coding, the MPAA controls the release and viewing of DVDs throughout the entire world. Which, arguably, brings it under the jursidiction of the WTO. As I said, they might as well do something useful.
You know the next MPAA DVD-player licensing agreement will prohibit SDI output and probably have some catch-phrase like "or equivalent digital output".
The more I think about it, the more I think the movie industry is ripe for another anti-trust suit. They control the production, distribution, and viewing of almost all DVD movies in the world. If they have their way, all movies will be encrypted all the way from the cameras to your CRT (or LCD).
Maybe someone could suggest that to the DOJ, or even the WTO (they might as well do something useful).
Years ago, they made the motion-picture studios give up their control over theaters because they found it was a violation of antitrust. There are similar issues here.
As I understand it, the principal members of the MPAA are the major motion picture studios. And the MPAA controls the licensing to produce DVDs and controls the licensing to produce DVD players. IANAL, but that does sound like a potential antitrust violation.
OTOH, who has the motivation and money to initiate a lawsuit?
What you describe is call Differential GPS (or DGPS), but it's only useful over (I'd guestimate) a few tens of square miles. It only works when the two receivers can receive roughly the same GPS satellites. So it's useless in the middle of the ocean, for example, or over (I'd guess) most of the world.
Ha, same thing happened to me with the 7.0 distro during install. I found I could move the scroll bar up and down (or visa-versa) and the checkboxes reappeared.
The only thing that bugged me (about the 7.0 install) was that it doesn't keep a running total of how much space it needs for the install in expert mode. I only have a 1GB drive on my Linux box (yup, I know, big drives are cheap, I'll get around to it) and all it says is "not enough disk space", so I go back into the package installer and remove some more packages and try again, "not enough disk space" and repeat until it fits.
IMHO, as several other people have pointed out, comparing PocketPC and Palm Pilot is kinda like comparing apples and oranges. Well, not exactly, but close.
PocketPC tries to live up to its name, a PC that fits in your pocket. It's got a color display, an operating system, file system, and apps up the yazoo. Oh, and it's also got an address book, contact manager, and todo list.
Palm Pilots excel at being address books, contact managers, and todo lists. Oh, and they also run some other cool apps. (The preceding characterizations are oversimplified to illustrate my point.)
I wouldn't say the review was "not fair", it's perfectly fair from the standpoint of someone who only needs a pocket-organizer, reviewing a pocket-computer (I delibrately didn't use the product names so as to emphasize their functions).
IMO, Palm has little to worry about as long as they stick to their "core competency"; i.e., small, energy efficient pocket-organizers (that maybe run a few other apps). IMO, the only danger is if MS decides to release a "dedicated app" version of their PocketPC (basically a stripped down PocketPC that only runs MS Outlook) then Palm might have to worry.
--- Any correspondence between my opinions and reality is purely coincidental.
I might point out that the English colonized India (shooting unarmed protestors "just isn't cricket"). Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if the Germans had colonized India instead ("please step up against that wall, Heir Gandi").
Non-violent protest only works against non-violent institutions.
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I am neither a linguist nor a military strategist, but why should that stop me from having an uninformed opinion. :)
:) Well, ok, that's a oversimplification, but in general when things start screwing-up, low-level American troops will take the initiative and try to compensate for conditions instead of withdrawing and regrouping.
From what I've read, Japanese culture is very precise and exact. When the Japanese military issues orders, they are extremely precise and exact and Japanese soldiers are expected to obey them precisely and exactly. This is fine as long as things go as planned, but when things start screwing-up and you don't have contingency orders and your soldiers have no experience taking the initiative (indeed, are discouraged from taking the initiative), then I don't see any alternative to withdrawing and regrouping.
On the other hand, you get a bunch of American good-old-boys and there's almost no point issuing precise orders 'cause you know they're not going be obeyed precisely anyway.
I suppose there are strengths and weaknesses to each culture, but anyway, that's my uninformed opinion.
If I recall correctly, Intel Coppermine chips do not use copper interconnects. Go figure.
What happens when an appliance running Embedded Red Hat Linux has a security hole?
I actually thought about this a bit (jeez, I need to get a life), and decided that, realistically, home appliances would have to be on a home intranet, and protected from the outside by a firewall/router.
On the other hand, I sincerely doubt a 'fridge with a built-in barcode scanner would be commercially viable. (Cool idea, but just too much trouble to remember to scan everything.)
On the third hand, a 'fridge that could monitor its motor, internal temperature, and power consumption. That could warn you if the motor failed, or consuming too much power (time to clean the evaporator coils), could adjust its defrosting cycle according to the humidity, just maybe more practical (or not, who knows).
I'm not disagreeing with you, but I'd like to point-out that the constitution says:
... To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;"
"The Congress shall have Power
My non-constitutional scholar interpretation is that Congress can pass copyright laws, but is not required to. That is, there's no constitutional right to copyrights. As opposed to, say, free speech, the *ahem* right to bear arms, etc..
I would agree that copyrights for a limited time are a good thing, but there seems to be a growing opinion among some companies they have the right to make money from copyrighted material indefinitely.
By the way, how soon after the introduction of the PS2 will we be seeing network cards for them?
Don't need'em. PS2 has USB and firewire ports. Just plug in a USB ethernet adaptor or modem. When PS2 will support ethernet or a modem is a different question.
You're right, it is less than "amazingly" useful, but consider...
If one could replace the modem module (which is replaceable) with a pair of USB ports, you could then add a USB ethernet port or modem, a keyboard, mouse, and hard-drive. Then you'd have an open-source web-TV/email box, or an open-source game development platform, or drop it in a kiosk with a touch-screen for a cheap, public web-browser, or etc...
Granted, not as good or powerful as a full computer system, but pretty slick in a dedicated application.
Which brings up the question, does anyone have the pinout for the internal modem connector?
The DC-X was renamed Clipper Graham after General Daniel O. Graham, Ret. (1925 - 1995).
... "He founded and directed 'High Frontier', which became the leading non-government voice in support of SDI. In 1990, he established the Space Transportation Association to further the development of vehicles and systems to provide reliable and economic access to space."
"General Graham was instrumental in advocating the Strategic Defense Initiative under President Reagan."
But putting the DC on top of a dumb booster would have made a nifty way of getting back to the moon.
:-)
Even better, if you have a small fleet of DCs, fly the first into LEO, then send up two or three more to refuel the first, then head for the moon.
Venturestar (the X-33) is having problems with the composite materials fuel tank delaminating after filled with cryogenic fuel.
The main problem with Vulturestar's tanks is that they're multilobed composite tanks. That is, three composite tanks joined together along their sides. Appearently, the joins between the tanks aren't strong enough.
Personally, I dislike the idea of having to carry fuel to land,
Remember, up to 95% of your fuel is used up just getting to LEO. A reuseable launch vehicle is much, much lighter coming down and would need much, much less fuel to land.
Plus, it's really nice to be able to land on a dime anywhere, so you don't need a 3 mile runaway out in the middle of nowhere.
(I believe the Delta Clipper was also going to have composite fuel tanks, so it would have faced the same problems).
*sigh* The problem with the Venturestar's fuel tanks is that they are multilobed. You see, conventional fuel tanks are cylindrical because the cylindrical shape is strongest (well, ok, spherical is strongest, but cylindrical is the best compromise for volume vs. strength). As I understand it, the Venturestar's tanks look like three cylindrical tanks with part of their sides cut away, then the tanks are joined (somehow) to make a "multilobed" tank that fits the shape of the Venturestar better. The key is to make the joins so they don't compromise the strength of the tanks. So far they've made two tanks, one has failed catastrophically.
Composite tanks, in general, are fairly established technology. Composite fueltanks in rockets are not used, in general, because they're more expensive and most rockets are expendable. They become more economical in a reuseable rocket because they're potentially lighter and, well, reuseable.
Most european countries (and england) have strict regulations about immigration. However most countries are less strict about contract work since it's implicitly short term. There are also tax advantages (hefty deductions and per-diem). Check out this post from Deja.com about someone with personal experience.
Excuse me, my coffee hasn't kicked in yet, but isn't this a matter of definitions? That is, levels of "trust"?
Oversimplifying a bit, a "TRUSTED" system might be "built according to a formal specification and are tested and confirmed against a formal testing and standards process", a "Trusted" system might be "tested" secure, and "trusted" might mean "no known vulnerabilities". Under those definitions, Linux might be "trusted", and OpenBSD might be "Trusted", but I know of any operating systems offhand that would be "TRUSTED".
So I think Dr. Spafford is right. Linux isn't a "TRUSTED" system under (what I interpret to be) his definition of "TRUSTED". I think your interpretation that since Linux can't be "TRUSTED', therefore it can't be "trusted" is mistaken.
Hmmm, I think I'll get another cup of coffee and reread that.
Does this mean they put X-Windows on a PDA? Ouch, is there room for anything else?
The problem for GNU Cash is that they will need to work closely with each bank they plan to support. They have to know what order data will be transfered and what type of data is being transfered. This is no easy task!!
Ummm, excuse me, but it's early and I'm appearently an idiot. What's the point of using XML (the previous comment implied OFX used XML) if it's different for each bank? What's the point of having a standard if it's different for each bank?
Copyrights have no sense serving public interest.
The Constitution disagrees:
Section 8 - Clause 8: To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;
You mean like OpenNap and Napigator?
However, the Movie Industry is an industry. Not a single company.
It may be controlled by the movie industry, but as far as I know, the MPAA is a single company.
Oh, that's right. You cited the WTO. You're one of those class war types. Sorry for interrupting your rant.
Whoa, someone got up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. By region coding, the MPAA controls the release and viewing of DVDs throughout the entire world. Which, arguably, brings it under the jursidiction of the WTO. As I said, they might as well do something useful.
You know the next MPAA DVD-player licensing agreement will prohibit SDI output and probably have some catch-phrase like "or equivalent digital output".
The more I think about it, the more I think the movie industry is ripe for another anti-trust suit. They control the production, distribution, and viewing of almost all DVD movies in the world. If they have their way, all movies will be encrypted all the way from the cameras to your CRT (or LCD).
Maybe someone could suggest that to the DOJ, or even the WTO (they might as well do something useful).
Hey, it was my inital reply. :-)
Years ago, they made the motion-picture studios give up their control over theaters because they found it was a violation of antitrust. There are similar issues here.
As I understand it, the principal members of the MPAA are the major motion picture studios. And the MPAA controls the licensing to produce DVDs and controls the licensing to produce DVD players. IANAL, but that does sound like a potential antitrust violation.
OTOH, who has the motivation and money to initiate a lawsuit?
What you describe is call Differential GPS (or DGPS), but it's only useful over (I'd guestimate) a few tens of square miles. It only works when the two receivers can receive roughly the same GPS satellites. So it's useless in the middle of the ocean, for example, or over (I'd guess) most of the world.
The error randomly rotates, so the solution you mention would not work.
Actually, it works almost exactly that way. It's call DGPS (for Differential GPS). For example, checkout a tutorial here.
In fact, DGPS can give better accuracy than even military non-DGPS receivers because it can correct for ionospheric delays. Interesting stuff.
Ha, same thing happened to me with the 7.0 distro during install. I found I could move the scroll bar up and down (or visa-versa) and the checkboxes reappeared.
The only thing that bugged me (about the 7.0 install) was that it doesn't keep a running total of how much space it needs for the install in expert mode. I only have a 1GB drive on my Linux box (yup, I know, big drives are cheap, I'll get around to it) and all it says is "not enough disk space", so I go back into the package installer and remove some more packages and try again, "not enough disk space" and repeat until it fits.
Aside from that, I was very impressed.
IMHO, as several other people have pointed out, comparing PocketPC and Palm Pilot is kinda like comparing apples and oranges. Well, not exactly, but close.
PocketPC tries to live up to its name, a PC that fits in your pocket. It's got a color display, an operating system, file system, and apps up the yazoo. Oh, and it's also got an address book, contact manager, and todo list.
Palm Pilots excel at being address books, contact managers, and todo lists. Oh, and they also run some other cool apps. (The preceding characterizations are oversimplified to illustrate my point.)
I wouldn't say the review was "not fair", it's perfectly fair from the standpoint of someone who only needs a pocket-organizer, reviewing a pocket-computer (I delibrately didn't use the product names so as to emphasize their functions).
IMO, Palm has little to worry about as long as they stick to their "core competency"; i.e., small, energy efficient pocket-organizers (that maybe run a few other apps). IMO, the only danger is if MS decides to release a "dedicated app" version of their PocketPC (basically a stripped down PocketPC that only runs MS Outlook) then Palm might have to worry.
---
Any correspondence between my opinions and reality is purely coincidental.
I might point out that the English colonized India (shooting unarmed protestors "just isn't cricket"). Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if the Germans had colonized India instead ("please step up against that wall, Heir Gandi").
Non-violent protest only works against non-violent institutions.