Did you look at those pictures? You can see the curve of it's surface from the surface. I dunno, I don't think life could have existed on a planet that small.
I've been looking all over for YET ANOTHER small OS & GUI. Geez, I mean, I'm sure these are cool projects to work on and everything, but like AtheOS and others, it's simply a small OS with very little real support.
Don't get me wrong, I don't mean to disparage the people working on this. I've done plenty of my own projects that will go nowhere. Should I start dragging them out so Slashdot can run stories on them?
Well, this makes it pretty clear that there's a niche market that could be served here. Simply need to come up with a Photoshop clone that doesn't discriminate against counterfitters. And man, I bet they'd be willing to pay a lot for that. Cash, under the table. Excellent!
If there are >0 other 'intelligent' lifeforms, then presumably there should be many others.
Define "many," and then explain your presumption.
I believe there are other intelligent life forms out there. I just don't see any way that there couldn't be. But that said, I doubt there's more than 1 intelligent species with the ambition to be spacefareing in any given galaxy, on average. That means the chance of meeting or having a conversation with an ET is very remote.
For a more complete description of my beliefs and the rationals behind them you're welcome to read this short, unfinished essay I wrote on the topic.
But it's basically based on the Fermi paradox and a very well written article in Scientific American several years back, both of which I find quite compelling. The general premise being hte first intelligent species to evolve in a galaxy will likely colonize it before another intelligent species can evolve and very likely eliminating them either on purpose or inadvertantly.
But, it's all speculation and anyone could be right.
I hear about caffeine withdrawal headaches, and I've never had them before. I drink lots of coffee and have gone for long periods where I'd drink 2 pots a day. I could quit cold turkey for months and never have a problem (other than not being quite as perky in the morning).
Cigarettes on the other hand are a mammoth burden and I can't seem to kick the damn things. They're surely going to kill me one of these days. I'd take a caffeine addiction over cigarette addiction any day. To you kids: Don't smoke! When you finally figure out it's not cool, you're screwed!
I also don't get regular headaches, though. I get migraines when I get headaches. Again, I'm really fortunate because they're treatable with Advil (in fact Advil is better than morphine for me, for any kind of pain.) I guess I'm just chemically imbalanced or something.
I think you'll find a number of Native Americans, blacks and hispanics who might disagree with you about the state of racism in America. Yes, it's deinstitutionalized to a large degree, but it's still there and there's a long way to go. Being a minority (caucasion) in Mexico, I have a much better appreciation for the subtelties of racism than I did before I lived here, and I have a much greater sympathy for minorities.
I think Indians and Asians suffer from it to a lesser degree than some other groups, though I'm not really sure why that is, and maybe people from those groups would disagree with me. Not having their point of view, I can't say.
But racism, even at its slightest, is very disturbing. At least I think so now.
As others have mentioned, Farsi and Arabic are very different languages. They do share a common script, with minor variations. For example, Arabic has a B but no P and Farsi has a P but no B (pronunciation-wise, the scripted letters are obviously different).
Because they share a similar script however, one of the hardest parts of doing a Farsi translation (a right to left script), is already done. The only thing left to do is to translate the text in the programs, which of course, is no small affair. Kudos to the guys that did it. Having done some localized versions of my own apps (English & Spanish, primarily), I have an idea of what an ordeal it can be. I can't imagine doing an OS.
First of all, I don't think Linus was lying. I was being a little flippant and didn't expect people would take it so seriously. Geez guys, take a pill.
Hell, I'm entirely behind IBM and Linus on this. SCO is so full of sh1t it's been a laughfest from day one. If I had the extra cash, believe me, I'd be shorting SCO with every dime.
I did err in saying that it was copied from Minix. That's not entirely clear and I don't feel like burning a bunch of Minix floppies from '91 to see what the differences are. But he clearly used Minix source as his starting point. That would be considered copying, in this case. Not that there's anything wrong with it, at least according to their current license.
Okay, maybe he's not lying, but he ought to check his own code. errno.h was taken from Minix, according to his comments
/*
* ok, as I hadn't got any other source of information about
* possible error numbers, I was forced to use the same numbers
* as minix.
* Hopefully these are posix or something. I wouldn't know (and posix
* isn't telling me - they want $$$ for their f***ing standard).
*
* We don't use the _SIGN cludge of minix, so kernel returns must
* see to the sign by themselves.
*
* NOTE! Remember to change strerror() if you change this file!
*/
Now, Minix was also a homegrown Unix and written completely apart from the AT&T source, so if Linus copied Minix, that's fine.
You can read all 3 or 4 sentences of the Minix license, but I think it's summed up pretty well with: For all practical purposes, MINIX can be treated as if it were in the public domain..
"I am become" is an archaic form, I'm guessing derived from the French "Je suis devenu" which is the same literally, but means: "I became"
There are a few French verbs that conjugate this way in the past tense (the Passe Compose tense to be precise). The rest are closer to our Perfect tense.
I'm just taking a guess on the French thing, but there was a good deal of French influence on English at one point.
The problem with Science on TV is they pretty much have to do it for the least common denominator, which is people who know a hell of a lot less about science than your average geek/nerd.
I don't have a T.V. and couldn't get PBS down here in Mexico anyway, so I downloaded the three part series that Nova did on String theory. While I found it mildly interesting, it was definitely dumbed down quite a bit. In fact, before I downloaded, I was thinking to myself, how could they possibly explain String theory to your average dolt. Well, they did, and because of that, I found maybe 10 minutes worth of new information in 3 hours of programming.
Don't get me wrong, I wasn't and don't expect, a channel that's going to explain string theory in detail. I mean, how many people understand that level of math anyway? But I would have liked something a bit deeper.
But that is exactly my point. They can't do that because they won't get enough viewers. I've tried explaining some potential geometries of the universe to my mother, using diagrams and concepts as simple as I could figure. It went completely over her head. In fact, I think after about 30 seconds, she just stopped listening even though she looked like she was listening intently.
I thought I could explain it in a way that made sense to a lay person, but I just couldn't. And not just physics. In many topics in science, if you want to go to a depth where I'm going to learn a lot, you're not going to get a lot of viewers. Viewers = money, and folks, money is what runs TV networks. But hey, I'm curious to see what the programming is like, and I wish I could get it down here in Mexico.
First of all to the anti-patent guys, companies need these kinds of patents to fund their R&D which is very costly. I have no real issues here. Governments can subsidize it if needed, but the companies shouldn't be blamed for trying to make their money back and then some (most of these are publicly held companies that have a duty to their stockholders to try to make a buck. Sorry, but that's real life).
Second, I don't really expect this will be a miracle cure. Too many have come and gone that didn't pan out in clincial trials. As an example, angiogensis inhibitors were a HUGE deal when they first came out. They were curing mice of many forms of cancer with almost no side effects. While angiogensis inhibitors have shown some measure of success in human trials, nothing approaches the success they had with mice. Again, real life intrude. People are not mice.
Be that as it may, I have no doubt that eventually cancer and many other diseases will be brought under control. Possibly in my lifetime (given current life expectencies I'm a bit past the half-way point, and probably a quite a bit more than that, as I'm a smoker, but I digress). This sort of continued work will eventually lead to cures for all forms cancer. I hope this is it, but I'm not holding my breath.
No, innocent until proven guilty means exactly that.
Where does "innocent until proven guilty" come into play? This isn't a court. Guilty until proven innocent does not always apply and it's also restricted to courts in only a handful of countries. For example, in Mexico (where I live), their law is based on Napoleonic code and the accused is required to prove their innocence.
Lots of people work alternating shifts that leave them with much worse schedules than this, and they get by fine. Or they go insane. No, I'm kidding. Seriously, a 40 minutes/day difference is nothing to adjust to. The hard part is just getting used to being awake and working at night if you haven't done it.
I personally work much better when I can actually see sunlight. Even cloudy days slow me down a bit (which is part of the reason I live 4 blocks from a caribbean beach in Mexico). But I've worked schedules worse than that for periods of months without any problem.
I don't get this. The description sounds, to me, like this thing I've heard of called a "computer." I can use it to "compute," but I can also use it to play games and watch television. Oooh, Aaah... In fact, I own one of these "uberdevices." And I do all of these things with it and more.
No, seriously, though, I do use my computer to watch TV. I haven't felt the need to purchase a television since I moved back to Mexico. I suppose if I decide to actually start watching TV shows with someone else (Unlikely; I have no friends.), I might consider a television.
Human bones become brittle in less than 1G environments, after extended time. The time it would take for a mars mission, given current technology, the damage to astronauts would probably be irreversible for all but a short-stay mars mission.
Bone loss in zero G is about 10% per year. 10% is a lot of bone loss.
A short-stay mars mission is where you only stay on mars 30-90 days, and total mission time runs between 400 and 650 days. This may be long enough to do permanent damage.
A long-stay mars mission has a round-trip time of about 900 days. Even with half of that spent on mars, the combination of the extended stay in low G combined with the other half in zero G will turn most people to jelly. You're probably looking at around 25% bone loss here.
Not just the bones you normally think of, but your teeth will rot and fall out as well with these kinds of trips.
Even with exercise, muscles, ligaments, and tendons will atrophy significantly.
The plain fact is, human beings weren't built for space travel. By providing an artificial gravity (which would therefore mean a larger ship to shield), you can get by this, but then you're adding weight, which adds fuel and time, and so forth.
I personally don't think we're ready for a mars mission any time soon. Probably not in my lifetime. We ought to concentrate on closer targets until we have the technology to send people to mars safely.
I don't know about you guys, but I haven't had a T.V. for the past 3 months, since I moved back to Mexico. yeah, they have T.V. here, and actually really reasonable cable rates and satellite rates. But I've discovered that I can get most of my favorite shows off of eMule.
I have no problem watch CSI or Stargate SG1 on my laptop. I could always buy a TV and plug the laptop into that as well. Let's face it, Divx does a pretty good job. So I'm finding it a little difficult to justify getting a TV or cable at this point.
I doubt that was their main course. I mean, I live in Mexico, and I like tortillas as much as the Mexicans, especially when they're warm and fresh from the tortillaria. But they hardly qualify as a meal in themselves. I mean, they're made from cornmeal (or flour, if you go for those kind). Surely they had something with their tortillas, like freeze-dried ice cream maybe.
Actually, right now, most of my customers are here. Believe it or not, there's a lot of demand for programming work here right now. Mostly small projects, but perfect for a one or two man operation.
The rest of my clients tend to be from the all over the U.S. People I've met on the internet, old co-workers sometimes need to outsource work at their current companies and they feed me leads as well. Whatever works.
Oh, and one other thing. If you think you'll be in a technological black hole here, think again. For internet connectivity, choose your mode. You have dial-up, wireless, cable modem, and DSL to choose from. I do wireless to my neighbor and we share a 512k down/256k up, DSL line. And that's within the terms of service rules here! There are two or three computer stores in town and a ton of them about 45 minutes from here in Cancun. There are internet cafes on almost every corner. This place is more connected than almost any U.S. town of comparable size.
That's what I did. I work from home. My home happens to be 4 blocks from beautifully blue Carribean waters. I live in a town called Playa del Carmen. It's a resort-type town with a good deal of tourism. My rent is $750/month (two bedroom, two floor house, so room for a roommate if I wanted). I have plenty of work, and the money goes a LOT further down here. Not to mention, there's plenty to do.
I don't get cabin fever here. If I need to get out, I can go to the beach, or I can go to a party (someone's ALWAYS having a party here), or I can go scuba diving, or kite boarding. I can go deep sea fishing. You name it. If you don't mind lots of heat (I love it), and you enjoy the beach, this place is definitely a cure for cabin fever for us telecommuters.
Unfortunately, like many other words in English, these terms have multiple meanings, some of which have absolutely nothing to do with people owning other people.
We shouldn't use the word "hard drive" because it might be taken as a sexual reference. We shouldn't use "floppy disk" because, hell, that's practically a sexual reference. And hey, "monitor" is what masters do to slaves, so let's rename those too.
It's stupid. Anyone who tries to relate it to slavery has a very small mind and is trying to make something out of nothing.
Slashdot Mirror
Did you look at those pictures? You can see the curve of it's surface from the surface. I dunno, I don't think life could have existed on a planet that small.
I've been looking all over for YET ANOTHER small OS & GUI. Geez, I mean, I'm sure these are cool projects to work on and everything, but like AtheOS and others, it's simply a small OS with very little real support.
Don't get me wrong, I don't mean to disparage the people working on this. I've done plenty of my own projects that will go nowhere. Should I start dragging them out so Slashdot can run stories on them?
Well, this makes it pretty clear that there's a niche market that could be served here. Simply need to come up with a Photoshop clone that doesn't discriminate against counterfitters. And man, I bet they'd be willing to pay a lot for that. Cash, under the table. Excellent!
How many people think that super computer centres like this, with their reasonably cheap cost should be created in more places?
Um, me? How about my place. Just need someone to pick up the tab and pay for the electricity. I'll be happy to handle the rest.
If there are >0 other 'intelligent' lifeforms, then presumably there should be many others.
Define "many," and then explain your presumption.
I believe there are other intelligent life forms out there. I just don't see any way that there couldn't be. But that said, I doubt there's more than 1 intelligent species with the ambition to be spacefareing in any given galaxy, on average. That means the chance of meeting or having a conversation with an ET is very remote.
For a more complete description of my beliefs and the rationals behind them you're welcome to read this short, unfinished essay I wrote on the topic.
But it's basically based on the Fermi paradox and a very well written article in Scientific American several years back, both of which I find quite compelling. The general premise being hte first intelligent species to evolve in a galaxy will likely colonize it before another intelligent species can evolve and very likely eliminating them either on purpose or inadvertantly.
But, it's all speculation and anyone could be right.
I hear about caffeine withdrawal headaches, and I've never had them before. I drink lots of coffee and have gone for long periods where I'd drink 2 pots a day. I could quit cold turkey for months and never have a problem (other than not being quite as perky in the morning).
Cigarettes on the other hand are a mammoth burden and I can't seem to kick the damn things. They're surely going to kill me one of these days. I'd take a caffeine addiction over cigarette addiction any day. To you kids: Don't smoke! When you finally figure out it's not cool, you're screwed!
I also don't get regular headaches, though. I get migraines when I get headaches. Again, I'm really fortunate because they're treatable with Advil (in fact Advil is better than morphine for me, for any kind of pain.) I guess I'm just chemically imbalanced or something.
I think you'll find a number of Native Americans, blacks and hispanics who might disagree with you about the state of racism in America. Yes, it's deinstitutionalized to a large degree, but it's still there and there's a long way to go. Being a minority (caucasion) in Mexico, I have a much better appreciation for the subtelties of racism than I did before I lived here, and I have a much greater sympathy for minorities.
I think Indians and Asians suffer from it to a lesser degree than some other groups, though I'm not really sure why that is, and maybe people from those groups would disagree with me. Not having their point of view, I can't say.
But racism, even at its slightest, is very disturbing. At least I think so now.
As others have mentioned, Farsi and Arabic are very different languages. They do share a common script, with minor variations. For example, Arabic has a B but no P and Farsi has a P but no B (pronunciation-wise, the scripted letters are obviously different).
Because they share a similar script however, one of the hardest parts of doing a Farsi translation (a right to left script), is already done. The only thing left to do is to translate the text in the programs, which of course, is no small affair. Kudos to the guys that did it. Having done some localized versions of my own apps (English & Spanish, primarily), I have an idea of what an ordeal it can be. I can't imagine doing an OS.
Someone moderated my original post as troll???
First of all, I don't think Linus was lying. I was being a little flippant and didn't expect people would take it so seriously. Geez guys, take a pill.
Hell, I'm entirely behind IBM and Linus on this. SCO is so full of sh1t it's been a laughfest from day one. If I had the extra cash, believe me, I'd be shorting SCO with every dime.
I did err in saying that it was copied from Minix. That's not entirely clear and I don't feel like burning a bunch of Minix floppies from '91 to see what the differences are. But he clearly used Minix source as his starting point. That would be considered copying, in this case. Not that there's anything wrong with it, at least according to their current license.
Ooops, forgot to mention, the above was taken from errno.h, Linux 0.0.1. Sorry, that was kind of critical info, wasn't it.
Also, here's the main page for Minix
Okay, maybe he's not lying, but he ought to check his own code. errno.h was taken from Minix, according to his comments
/*
* ok, as I hadn't got any other source of information about
* possible error numbers, I was forced to use the same numbers
* as minix.
* Hopefully these are posix or something. I wouldn't know (and posix
* isn't telling me - they want $$$ for their f***ing standard).
*
* We don't use the _SIGN cludge of minix, so kernel returns must
* see to the sign by themselves.
*
* NOTE! Remember to change strerror() if you change this file!
*/
Now, Minix was also a homegrown Unix and written completely apart from the AT&T source, so if Linus copied Minix, that's fine.
You can read all 3 or 4 sentences of the Minix license, but I think it's summed up pretty well with: For all practical purposes, MINIX can be treated as if it were in the public domain..
And I haven't even looked at the other files yet.
"I am become" is an archaic form, I'm guessing derived from the French "Je suis devenu" which is the same literally, but means: "I became"
There are a few French verbs that conjugate this way in the past tense (the Passe Compose tense to be precise). The rest are closer to our Perfect tense.
I'm just taking a guess on the French thing, but there was a good deal of French influence on English at one point.
The problem with Science on TV is they pretty much have to do it for the least common denominator, which is people who know a hell of a lot less about science than your average geek/nerd.
I don't have a T.V. and couldn't get PBS down here in Mexico anyway, so I downloaded the three part series that Nova did on String theory. While I found it mildly interesting, it was definitely dumbed down quite a bit. In fact, before I downloaded, I was thinking to myself, how could they possibly explain String theory to your average dolt. Well, they did, and because of that, I found maybe 10 minutes worth of new information in 3 hours of programming.
Don't get me wrong, I wasn't and don't expect, a channel that's going to explain string theory in detail. I mean, how many people understand that level of math anyway? But I would have liked something a bit deeper.
But that is exactly my point. They can't do that because they won't get enough viewers. I've tried explaining some potential geometries of the universe to my mother, using diagrams and concepts as simple as I could figure. It went completely over her head. In fact, I think after about 30 seconds, she just stopped listening even though she looked like she was listening intently.
I thought I could explain it in a way that made sense to a lay person, but I just couldn't. And not just physics. In many topics in science, if you want to go to a depth where I'm going to learn a lot, you're not going to get a lot of viewers. Viewers = money, and folks, money is what runs TV networks. But hey, I'm curious to see what the programming is like, and I wish I could get it down here in Mexico.
First of all to the anti-patent guys, companies need these kinds of patents to fund their R&D which is very costly. I have no real issues here. Governments can subsidize it if needed, but the companies shouldn't be blamed for trying to make their money back and then some (most of these are publicly held companies that have a duty to their stockholders to try to make a buck. Sorry, but that's real life).
Second, I don't really expect this will be a miracle cure. Too many have come and gone that didn't pan out in clincial trials. As an example, angiogensis inhibitors were a HUGE deal when they first came out. They were curing mice of many forms of cancer with almost no side effects. While angiogensis inhibitors have shown some measure of success in human trials, nothing approaches the success they had with mice. Again, real life intrude. People are not mice.
Be that as it may, I have no doubt that eventually cancer and many other diseases will be brought under control. Possibly in my lifetime (given current life expectencies I'm a bit past the half-way point, and probably a quite a bit more than that, as I'm a smoker, but I digress). This sort of continued work will eventually lead to cures for all forms cancer. I hope this is it, but I'm not holding my breath.
No, innocent until proven guilty means exactly that.
Where does "innocent until proven guilty" come into play? This isn't a court. Guilty until proven innocent does not always apply and it's also restricted to courts in only a handful of countries. For example, in Mexico (where I live), their law is based on Napoleonic code and the accused is required to prove their innocence.
Lots of people work alternating shifts that leave them with much worse schedules than this, and they get by fine. Or they go insane. No, I'm kidding. Seriously, a 40 minutes/day difference is nothing to adjust to. The hard part is just getting used to being awake and working at night if you haven't done it.
I personally work much better when I can actually see sunlight. Even cloudy days slow me down a bit (which is part of the reason I live 4 blocks from a caribbean beach in Mexico). But I've worked schedules worse than that for periods of months without any problem.
I don't get this. The description sounds, to me, like this thing I've heard of called a "computer." I can use it to "compute," but I can also use it to play games and watch television. Oooh, Aaah... In fact, I own one of these "uberdevices." And I do all of these things with it and more.
No, seriously, though, I do use my computer to watch TV. I haven't felt the need to purchase a television since I moved back to Mexico. I suppose if I decide to actually start watching TV shows with someone else (Unlikely; I have no friends.), I might consider a television.
This is only one of many issues.
Human bones become brittle in less than 1G environments, after extended time. The time it would take for a mars mission, given current technology, the damage to astronauts would probably be irreversible for all but a short-stay mars mission.
Bone loss in zero G is about 10% per year. 10% is a lot of bone loss.
A short-stay mars mission is where you only stay on mars 30-90 days, and total mission time runs between 400 and 650 days. This may be long enough to do permanent damage.
A long-stay mars mission has a round-trip time of about 900 days. Even with half of that spent on mars, the combination of the extended stay in low G combined with the other half in zero G will turn most people to jelly. You're probably looking at around 25% bone loss here.
Not just the bones you normally think of, but your teeth will rot and fall out as well with these kinds of trips.
Even with exercise, muscles, ligaments, and tendons will atrophy significantly.
The plain fact is, human beings weren't built for space travel. By providing an artificial gravity (which would therefore mean a larger ship to shield), you can get by this, but then you're adding weight, which adds fuel and time, and so forth.
I personally don't think we're ready for a mars mission any time soon. Probably not in my lifetime. We ought to concentrate on closer targets until we have the technology to send people to mars safely.
I don't know about you guys, but I haven't had a T.V. for the past 3 months, since I moved back to Mexico. yeah, they have T.V. here, and actually really reasonable cable rates and satellite rates. But I've discovered that I can get most of my favorite shows off of eMule.
I have no problem watch CSI or Stargate SG1 on my laptop. I could always buy a TV and plug the laptop into that as well. Let's face it, Divx does a pretty good job. So I'm finding it a little difficult to justify getting a TV or cable at this point.
I doubt that was their main course. I mean, I live in Mexico, and I like tortillas as much as the Mexicans, especially when they're warm and fresh from the tortillaria. But they hardly qualify as a meal in themselves. I mean, they're made from cornmeal (or flour, if you go for those kind). Surely they had something with their tortillas, like freeze-dried ice cream maybe.
Actually, the correct formula for the perfect game is:
1 Swedish Bikini Team, sans bikinis + Me = The Perfect Game.
Actually, right now, most of my customers are here. Believe it or not, there's a lot of demand for programming work here right now. Mostly small projects, but perfect for a one or two man operation.
The rest of my clients tend to be from the all over the U.S. People I've met on the internet, old co-workers sometimes need to outsource work at their current companies and they feed me leads as well. Whatever works.
Oh, and one other thing. If you think you'll be in a technological black hole here, think again. For internet connectivity, choose your mode. You have dial-up, wireless, cable modem, and DSL to choose from. I do wireless to my neighbor and we share a 512k down/256k up, DSL line. And that's within the terms of service rules here! There are two or three computer stores in town and a ton of them about 45 minutes from here in Cancun. There are internet cafes on almost every corner. This place is more connected than almost any U.S. town of comparable size.
That's what I did. I work from home. My home happens to be 4 blocks from beautifully blue Carribean waters. I live in a town called Playa del Carmen. It's a resort-type town with a good deal of tourism. My rent is $750/month (two bedroom, two floor house, so room for a roommate if I wanted). I have plenty of work, and the money goes a LOT further down here. Not to mention, there's plenty to do.
I don't get cabin fever here. If I need to get out, I can go to the beach, or I can go to a party (someone's ALWAYS having a party here), or I can go scuba diving, or kite boarding. I can go deep sea fishing. You name it. If you don't mind lots of heat (I love it), and you enjoy the beach, this place is definitely a cure for cabin fever for us telecommuters.
Unfortunately, like many other words in English, these terms have multiple meanings, some of which have absolutely nothing to do with people owning other people.
We shouldn't use the word "hard drive" because it might be taken as a sexual reference. We shouldn't use "floppy disk" because, hell, that's practically a sexual reference. And hey, "monitor" is what masters do to slaves, so let's rename those too.
It's stupid. Anyone who tries to relate it to slavery has a very small mind and is trying to make something out of nothing.