Hopefully someone else has made this point already:
If you want your students to write well, you must do things to get them to read well. For engineers, this means having them read several technical reports, business memos, product specifications, etc. It is very much a "learn by example" situation.
Oh come on, the idea of using Rip-Maps have been around for *ages*
I'm sure they have. I'm simply saying the patent in question appears (in light of scant information from the party doing the suing) to apply to a particular dusty corner of the jpeg standard, one probably not used in mainstream implementations. I have no idea whether it's actually a valid patent or not (other than having the general opinion that most patents are bunk).
Sounds like progressive JPEG to me, in which case the patent would apply to browsers.
Perhaps. Though progressive, as I understand it, isn't really a diff of images. It's one image where, at each stage of refinement, more data is displayed. Ie, it's simply a way of displaying a subset of the pixel information on-the-fly. See What is progressive JPEG?
After perusing the comp.compression faq for an overview of jpeg (see question [75]), I don't think this patent, even if valid, will affect JPEG as we know it. As the parent post points out, the patent covers compression via diff's between images. (This is, as I understand it, a major component of MPEG encoding, so I'm curious why they're not the ones getting sued.) JPEG, as your web browser uses it, likely doesn't use such a technique. From the FAQ:
The hierarchical mode represents an image at multiple resolutions. For example, one could provide 512x512, 1024x1024, and 2048x2048 versions of the image. The higher-resolution images are coded as differences from the next smaller image, and thus require many fewer bits than they would if stored independently. (However, the total number of bits will be greater than that needed to store just the highest-resolution frame in baseline form.) The individual frames in a hierarchical sequence can be coded progressively if desired. Hierarchical mode is not widely supported at present.
My take is that this "hierarchical mode" extension is the part covered by the patent. The problem is that, assuming the FAQ article is correct, most implementations of JPEG decoding we encounter won't support it, meaning most people aren't going to be encoding their JPEG's this way since it would be incompatible with mass-market JPEG implementations. It sounds more like something a company would use as part of a proprietary format built on JPEG.
Bottom line: don't expect this to have any ramifications for Mozilla, IE, etc.
Had a 14" monitor where the "push-on, push-off" power button had become stuck in the off position. Opened the case, tried to get it unstuck, no dice. So I decided to wire around it and use the power strip it plugged into as my on/off switch (I was going to buy a new system soon anyway). Naturally, I wired it wrong. When I turned it on, POP went the monitor, and trip went the breaker. Opened it back up, re-wired it (correctly this time) and it worked fine ever after.
is what functional programming does. and i like it. it's the most fun way to program in existence.
part of the reason we don't use it is that programming is taught as a means to an end (ie, to write programs) which implies C/C++/Java. not that this is necessarily bad -- it's where the $$ is, after all. if academic institutions were more concerned with the mathematics/theories behind computational machines, most likely they'd use functional languages more (it's my understanding that MIT does this). but about all you can use it for, in the real world, is writing emacs extensions.:)
the sad part, though, is that, in small doses, fp's can be quite useful in real-world apps. they certainly are powerful when dealing with complex data structures (imagine doing in 5 lines of Lisp or SML what it'd take 50 lines to do in C). it'd be nice if API's existed for C/C++/Java that could take in-lined fp code and integrate it with the larger program, when such would be useful. and maybe those API's are out there already.
Is, first of all, schools are spending big bucks to throw computers at kids so they'll have "21st century classrooms." And, most of the time, have no real clue what to do with them. This same money could be spent increasing teacher salaries (thus attracting better teachers to the field, thus raising teaching standards, thus turning out better students, and on and on...) But instead we have mediocre teachers who know nothing about computers teaching rooms full of kids and pc's (both of which will be obsolete in 5 years...)
A decent book on the subject is (AI researcher) Roger Schenk's Cognitive Computer. He makes a case that the only useful thing a computer has in education is learning problem-solving techniques via programming. You don't need a pc for every child to do that. An hour or two a week in the computer lab is plenty for gradeschoolers. Maybe offer a daily class in high school. But as far as the bulk of education goes, the old-fashioned ways involving books, essays, and pencil-and-paper math are just as good today as they were 100 years ago. Don't bow to corporate america's warnings that our kids "aren't ready for the workplace of tommorrow." They're 10-year olds, for heaven's sake.
Man In Black (rushing into bedroom, where couple is having unprotected sex): Mr. and Ms. Smith, under the Gene Pool Trademark Law (GPTL) of 2003, I'm placing you under arrest.
Mr. Smith: WTF?!
MIB: As you have been informed before, sir, any offspring produced by you and your wife has an 85% chance of conforming to a genotype patented by ScruYu International. This is well above the 30% chance allowable by law. Under the law, you may not produce offspring without paying royalties to said organization.
Ms. Smith: WTF?!
MIB: Mr. Smith, you are further charged with violating the GMCA [the Genetic Millenium Copyright Act], by reversing the vasectomy you were required to undergo when obtaining your marriage license. This is a direct infringement upon ScruYu's right to protect their property. You have the right to remain silent...
In a sense, you paid for a service that they were restricting without giving you the option of saying "no thanks".
Perhaps. Using my school as an example, where labs were walk-in (after learning that checking id's was mostly useless), it would be difficult to keep those who had not paid their access fee out of the labs. Not that many students could get by without it, anyway. Classwork usually demanded internet access to some degree. And don't even start talking about metering internet use per person (like a phone line). Whether you were informed or not (and all policies concerning internet use in schools should be available for perusal), it's a moot point. You need access for academic work, and that's what you're paying for. Opt out doesn't happen, unless you can find a school that doesn't have internet these days (good luck.)
At my old college, the students paid for a majority of the internet access through manditory "Computer fees"
I've heard that one before. Are you implying that you have the right to do anything you want with the bandwidth because you paid a fee? Hardly. I had to pay one, too, and guess what? I couldn't play network DOOM in the labs, either. (Network DOOM?! Gads, I'm showing my age...) Were they supposed to let me because I paid them $100 a semester?
In a bizarre 180 degree turn from cars being rejected due to noise, let's talk about leaf blowers, lawn mowers, etc. I've heard (on no real authority, but it fits my understanding of corporate mindsets) that they actually engineer leaf blowers to be *noisier*, as supposedly a noisy machine = a powerful machine (in the eye of the consumer). It's actually easier to make them quieter, but apparently quiet doesn't sell as well.
As far as my computer is concerned, well, since I live in an 8' x 12' dorm room and my PII-450 is approximately 3' from the head of my bed, yes, I turn it off at night. No 3-year Linux uptimes for me. (On the bright side, the tower *does* make a good nightstand...)
Not all, but then again I don't have any NUCLEAR SECRETS on my hard drive.
I have some VICTORIA'S SECRETS on my hard drive...
...err, umm, I guess I love my computer too much.
Re:Can someone please explain: Why?
on
Pilot Synthesis
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· Score: 1
According to rumor, when Billy Joel would come up with a ditty in his head (say while in a restaurant), he'd call up his answering machine (from a payphone) and sing it "after the beep." Long-live lo-tech!
I've been hired many times, and never have I given my SSN out during the interview process. Only once I'd been offered and had accepted the job and started filling out paperwork was I ever asked for it. So, assuming the check occurred prior to her actually being hired, the company probably didn't have her SSN.
Another thought just occurred to me along this line of thought... Mechanical computers have been thought to show much promise in nano-technology, right? Maybe I could get research funding to build a macro-scale mechanical computer as a prototype for nano-tech cpu's... hee hee. now that'd be a trip.
Actually, decent bulk sets have been available for a couple years now. I just bought a 1200-piece basic brick assortment back in February for about $20 from Wally World. At Lego's bulk pricing, that would cost approximately $84. (1200 bricks * $7 / 100 bricks). The only downside being you can't pick and choose sizes, colors, etc, and that many of the bricks were smaller than the ones listed on the web site (1- and 2-stud blocks, etc.)
Actually, I've been thinking about this for a while now. Not particularly with legos, but if one could come up with some basic, easy-to-construct AND/OR/NOT/Flip-flop primitives that operated mechanically/pneumatically/hydraulically, you could make a really cool "computing sculpture". (Imagine watching compute elements switch as a computation is taking place.) I could design the CPU, but the mechanics are beyond me. Any mechanical engineers out there want to collaborate?
Of course, there's always Holerith's Tabulator, the difference engine, adding machines, electromechanical Turing machines, etc...
not exactly sure what you mean by 2.5d layout... but some people in my lab are working on a design that involves layering processors one on top of the other, and using optical interconnects (instead of wire) to pass information int the z-direction.
anyhow, something I've not heard mentioned, but that is extremely important when dealing with wires this size is the propagation delay through the wires. under current technology, transistor speeds have already outstripped wire speeds (ie, how fast an electron can move along a wire). as wires decrease in diameter, they get slower (more resistance). definitely will be a problem if they're planning on using this technology to simply miniaturize existing hardware styles.
Consider the absurdity of the following contract, absurd because I haven't got the vaguest hint of a clue who is subject to it: By reading the following sentence, the reader agrees to send his credit card number to carl@donath.org.
By your reasoning, anyone replying to the above post becomes legally "aware" and subject to its terms...
oops. umm, nevermind. excuse me while I cancel my VISA card...
How can I possibly be held to a contract by someone who has absolutely no idea who I am?
Exactly what's been bugging me. How can a contract hold up in court without a signature by both parties? "By accessing this web site you agree to..." "Click this button to accept..." "By opening this box..." Yadayadayada. IANAL, but I just don't see this holding water. Otherwise, we're going to have EULA's on the door of the local S-Mart: "By stepping through these doors, you absolve S-Mart of all liability stemming from injury by rogue shopping cart, wet floors, faulty wiring, overloaded shelves, alien invasion, nuclear war, and any other injury not mentioned in this EULA..."
[Remember, Shop Smart, Shop S-Mart!]
Re:Spread the message, brothers
on
Copyrant
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· Score: 1
This is more likly to succede when dealing with yout local (smallish) clone builder though
Agreed. And as an individual, that's my preferred way to get the hardware I want (ie, no integrated motherboards, no cruddy quantum harddrives).
This just highlighted what a pain any NT admin is going to be dealing with. Imagine a 100-machine network (most likely built from dell's, compaq's, or gateway2k's), where *every* machine has its own "recovery" disk! (Of course, I suppose she could always spring for a non-machine-specific license and use wininstall...)
Re:Spread the message, brothers
on
Copyrant
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· Score: 1
Hmmm... I'm been all for bug liability falling to developers for some time now (ie, the death of shrink-wrap). I hadn't considered its implications for non-commercial (OSS, etc) programmers. I suppose one route is to keep shrink-wrap, but tweek the GPL so that it becomes binding to anyone who *uses* the software (otherwise, the warranty disclaimer in sections 11 and 12 won't have any teeth). I'd hate to have to do that, though. Would it be possible to remove liability in the case of software distributed free-of-charge? Ie, the commercial developers are responsible for their product, but if you get something for free, you're on your own?
Slashdot Mirror
Hopefully someone else has made this point already:
If you want your students to write well, you must do things to get them to read well. For engineers, this means having them read several technical reports, business memos, product specifications, etc. It is very much a "learn by example" situation.
Yesterday: a titanium ThinkPad!
/. for keeping us on the cutting-edge!
Today: brighter backlight for the GBA SP!
Man, the innovation these days is truly mind-blowing! Kudos to
Tommorrow: Logitech announces a dodecahedron-shaped trackball! Woot!
Oh come on, the idea of using Rip-Maps have been around for *ages*
I'm sure they have. I'm simply saying the patent in question appears (in light of scant information from the party doing the suing) to apply to a particular dusty corner of the jpeg standard, one probably not used in mainstream implementations. I have no idea whether it's actually a valid patent or not (other than having the general opinion that most patents are bunk).
Sounds like progressive JPEG to me, in which case the patent would apply to browsers.
Perhaps. Though progressive, as I understand it, isn't really a diff of images. It's one image where, at each stage of refinement, more data is displayed. Ie, it's simply a way of displaying a subset of the pixel information on-the-fly. See What is progressive JPEG?
After perusing the comp.compression faq for an overview of jpeg (see question [75]), I don't think this patent, even if valid, will affect JPEG as we know it. As the parent post points out, the patent covers compression via diff's between images. (This is, as I understand it, a major component of MPEG encoding, so I'm curious why they're not the ones getting sued.) JPEG, as your web browser uses it, likely doesn't use such a technique. From the FAQ:
The hierarchical mode represents an image at multiple resolutions. For example, one could provide 512x512, 1024x1024, and 2048x2048 versions of the image. The higher-resolution images are coded as differences from the next smaller image, and thus require many fewer bits than they would if stored independently. (However, the total number of bits will be greater than that needed to store just the highest-resolution frame in baseline form.) The individual frames in a hierarchical sequence can be coded progressively if desired. Hierarchical mode is not widely supported at present.
My take is that this "hierarchical mode" extension is the part covered by the patent. The problem is that, assuming the FAQ article is correct, most implementations of JPEG decoding we encounter won't support it, meaning most people aren't going to be encoding their JPEG's this way since it would be incompatible with mass-market JPEG implementations. It sounds more like something a company would use as part of a proprietary format built on JPEG.
Bottom line: don't expect this to have any ramifications for Mozilla, IE, etc.
Had a 14" monitor where the "push-on, push-off" power button had become stuck in the off position. Opened the case, tried to get it unstuck, no dice. So I decided to wire around it and use the power strip it plugged into as my on/off switch (I was going to buy a new system soon anyway). Naturally, I wired it wrong. When I turned it on, POP went the monitor, and trip went the breaker. Opened it back up, re-wired it (correctly this time) and it worked fine ever after.
part of the reason we don't use it is that programming is taught as a means to an end (ie, to write programs) which implies C/C++/Java. not that this is necessarily bad -- it's where the $$ is, after all. if academic institutions were more concerned with the mathematics/theories behind computational machines, most likely they'd use functional languages more (it's my understanding that MIT does this). but about all you can use it for, in the real world, is writing emacs extensions. :)
the sad part, though, is that, in small doses, fp's can be quite useful in real-world apps. they certainly are powerful when dealing with complex data structures (imagine doing in 5 lines of Lisp or SML what it'd take 50 lines to do in C). it'd be nice if API's existed for C/C++/Java that could take in-lined fp code and integrate it with the larger program, when such would be useful. and maybe those API's are out there already.
A decent book on the subject is (AI researcher) Roger Schenk's Cognitive Computer. He makes a case that the only useful thing a computer has in education is learning problem-solving techniques via programming. You don't need a pc for every child to do that. An hour or two a week in the computer lab is plenty for gradeschoolers. Maybe offer a daily class in high school. But as far as the bulk of education goes, the old-fashioned ways involving books, essays, and pencil-and-paper math are just as good today as they were 100 years ago. Don't bow to corporate america's warnings that our kids "aren't ready for the workplace of tommorrow." They're 10-year olds, for heaven's sake.
Mr. Smith: WTF?!
MIB: As you have been informed before, sir, any offspring produced by you and your wife has an 85% chance of conforming to a genotype patented by ScruYu International. This is well above the 30% chance allowable by law. Under the law, you may not produce offspring without paying royalties to said organization.
Ms. Smith: WTF?!
MIB: Mr. Smith, you are further charged with violating the GMCA [the Genetic Millenium Copyright Act], by reversing the vasectomy you were required to undergo when obtaining your marriage license. This is a direct infringement upon ScruYu's right to protect their property. You have the right to remain silent...
My money's on this one being the Red Hat-Andover.net-Fox Television-KB Toys-Sony Records merger that will occur in late 2010.
Perhaps. Using my school as an example, where labs were walk-in (after learning that checking id's was mostly useless), it would be difficult to keep those who had not paid their access fee out of the labs. Not that many students could get by without it, anyway. Classwork usually demanded internet access to some degree. And don't even start talking about metering internet use per person (like a phone line). Whether you were informed or not (and all policies concerning internet use in schools should be available for perusal), it's a moot point. You need access for academic work, and that's what you're paying for. Opt out doesn't happen, unless you can find a school that doesn't have internet these days (good luck.)
I've heard that one before. Are you implying that you have the right to do anything you want with the bandwidth because you paid a fee? Hardly. I had to pay one, too, and guess what? I couldn't play network DOOM in the labs, either. (Network DOOM?! Gads, I'm showing my age...) Were they supposed to let me because I paid them $100 a semester?
Meta-slashdotting! I love it!
As far as my computer is concerned, well, since I live in an 8' x 12' dorm room and my PII-450 is approximately 3' from the head of my bed, yes, I turn it off at night. No 3-year Linux uptimes for me. (On the bright side, the tower *does* make a good nightstand...)
I have some VICTORIA'S SECRETS on my hard drive...
...err, umm, I guess I love my computer too much.
According to rumor, when Billy Joel would come up with a ditty in his head (say while in a restaurant), he'd call up his answering machine (from a payphone) and sing it "after the beep." Long-live lo-tech!
I've been hired many times, and never have I given my SSN out during the interview process. Only once I'd been offered and had accepted the job and started filling out paperwork was I ever asked for it. So, assuming the check occurred prior to her actually being hired, the company probably didn't have her SSN.
Another thought just occurred to me along this line of thought... Mechanical computers have been thought to show much promise in nano-technology, right? Maybe I could get research funding to build a macro-scale mechanical computer as a prototype for nano-tech cpu's... hee hee. now that'd be a trip.
Actually, decent bulk sets have been available for a couple years now. I just bought a 1200-piece basic brick assortment back in February for about $20 from Wally World. At Lego's bulk pricing, that would cost approximately $84. (1200 bricks * $7 / 100 bricks). The only downside being you can't pick and choose sizes, colors, etc, and that many of the bricks were smaller than the ones listed on the web site (1- and 2-stud blocks, etc.)
Actually, I've been thinking about this for a while now. Not particularly with legos, but if one could come up with some basic, easy-to-construct AND/OR/NOT/Flip-flop primitives that operated mechanically/pneumatically/hydraulically, you could make a really cool "computing sculpture". (Imagine watching compute elements switch as a computation is taking place.) I could design the CPU, but the mechanics are beyond me. Any mechanical engineers out there want to collaborate?
Of course, there's always Holerith's Tabulator, the difference engine, adding machines, electromechanical Turing machines, etc...
anyhow, something I've not heard mentioned, but that is extremely important when dealing with wires this size is the propagation delay through the wires. under current technology, transistor speeds have already outstripped wire speeds (ie, how fast an electron can move along a wire). as wires decrease in diameter, they get slower (more resistance). definitely will be a problem if they're planning on using this technology to simply miniaturize existing hardware styles.
By your reasoning, anyone replying to the above post becomes legally "aware" and subject to its terms...
oops. umm, nevermind. excuse me while I cancel my VISA card...
Exactly what's been bugging me. How can a contract hold up in court without a signature by both parties? "By accessing this web site you agree to..." "Click this button to accept..." "By opening this box..." Yadayadayada. IANAL, but I just don't see this holding water. Otherwise, we're going to have EULA's on the door of the local S-Mart: "By stepping through these doors, you absolve S-Mart of all liability stemming from injury by rogue shopping cart, wet floors, faulty wiring, overloaded shelves, alien invasion, nuclear war, and any other injury not mentioned in this EULA..."
[Remember, Shop Smart, Shop S-Mart!]
Agreed. And as an individual, that's my preferred way to get the hardware I want (ie, no integrated motherboards, no cruddy quantum harddrives).
This just highlighted what a pain any NT admin is going to be dealing with. Imagine a 100-machine network (most likely built from dell's, compaq's, or gateway2k's), where *every* machine has its own "recovery" disk! (Of course, I suppose she could always spring for a non-machine-specific license and use wininstall...)
Hmmm... I'm been all for bug liability falling to developers for some time now (ie, the death of shrink-wrap). I hadn't considered its implications for non-commercial (OSS, etc) programmers. I suppose one route is to keep shrink-wrap, but tweek the GPL so that it becomes binding to anyone who *uses* the software (otherwise, the warranty disclaimer in sections 11 and 12 won't have any teeth). I'd hate to have to do that, though. Would it be possible to remove liability in the case of software distributed free-of-charge? Ie, the commercial developers are responsible for their product, but if you get something for free, you're on your own?