Bit the bullet put your idealism aside and install Windows and Office and get your work done.

No, I have a better idea. You should put your ignorance away, instead. Educate yourself:

  * http://vdxtosvg.sourceforge.net/

If I get a Visio doc, I just politely ask the sender to export the VDX, instead, so I can turn it into an SVG and play with it. If I don't care about modifying the diagram, I'll just ask for a PDF.

Nobody's turned me down, yet.

And, EVEN if I did run into a situation where I couldn't ask, or the sender couldn't/wouldn't give me a usable format, why in the hell should I bother installing Windows? Sign. Again, you can educate yourself:

  * http://www.codeweavers.com/

Seriously, this is pretty basic research, you should be doing this stuff, yourself. I'm not going to help you out, next time.

Everying f***ing time I hear somebody say "But I HAVE to keep Windows, for Visio!", I thank my lucky stars that I never learned that damn thing. OpenOffice Draw isn't quite as slick, but for 99% of the shit people don't think OODraw can do, the reality is that they're just to willfully ignorant to learn how OODraw can do it. And, bonus, I don't have to deal with the cognitive dissonance of justifying keeping a $200 OS for the sole purpose of running one app of dubious uniqueness.

I dunno, I think this whole "internet" thing is kind of overhyped, at this point. It's clearly peaked in the marketplace, and public opinion is already starting to turn against it. This time next year, your precious little Internet darling is gonna be so irrelevant that it'll make Vanilla Ice look like Joel Spolsky.

Damn, wow, I never realized that before. Terrible architectural choice, there. I mean, really, what self-respecting omnipotent overbeing would *intelligently*, *intentionally* design the entire ecosystem around a single-source provider like that? It's either incompetence, or it's a sign of organizational problems--maybe a lack of unified management vision from the top?

Either way, somebody fire the moron who built this crap heap infrastructure. And I don't care it it's his first goddamn time--why should our organization have to suffer through his little "learning experiences"? HR has got to filter those resumes better, or this shop is a sinking ship.

Actually, you're both ignorant. 30s on WP could have saved you.

A class-action lawsuit means multiple PLAINTIFFS (people doing the suing). If everybody who saw The Hurt Locker in theatres sued the producers for pain and suffering, then THAT could potentially be a class action lawsuit.

Also, a class action lawsuit defines those eligible to be plaintiffs are defined by membership in some qualitative class of people. As in, "Anybody who purchased Microsoft Windows XP during the calendar year 2003", or "Anybody who received a Dow Corning breast implant during the years 1980-1985", or "Any employees of Wal-Mart during 2005-2008 who worked overtime without receiving 1.5x compensation for hours beyond 40 per week". Anybody who meets the class definition can become a plaintiff by getting certified (proving their eligibility in a court filing).

The number or classification of the DEFENDANTS in a lawsuit is irrelevant to whether it's a class-action suit. The producers of The Hurt Locker meet the legal standards for a class.

Dropping a rock from space isn't as straightforward of an idea as it sounds. Apologies to the Jerry Pournelle fans out there, but there are some problems that significantly reduce the cool factor.

First of all, drop the perception that each "rod" is a cheap, unpowered, purely-kinetic weapon, because the orbital physics don't allow it. De-orbiting an object (in a stable orbit, anyway) is not a free manuever, it costs thrust and therefore fuel burn to "slow" itself down so it drops out of orbit. Usually, the object is moving at a really high velocity--in LEO, it's at least 30,000 kph, maybe more. De-orbiting quickly (within minutes) means generating a large amount of force over a fairly short time interval. Given current technology, that means a rocket engine.

So each "rod" is basically just a missile launched from orbit. Instead of using thrust to against earth's gravity, the rocket thrusts against its own orbital inertia, which is *enormous* in LEO. Yes, after a certain point, the falling object becomes purely kinetic, but that doesn't change the fact that the weapon is basically an ICBM with a kinetic warhead instead of a nuclear warhead. The rocket engine could be somewhat smaller than an ICBM's, but still big enough to be a significant launch weight expense in the first place.

Second problem: The potential energy delta from LEO to the surface of the earth isn't big enough to accelerate the rod to hypersonic velocity, taking re-entry drag into consideration. You'd get a bigger explosion from dropping a MOAB, but at 1000x the delivery postage. You could raise the launcher's orbit, which increases the impact velocity, but which also enormously increases the delay between your lauch order and weapon impact. LEO is around 400 km from the surface, but geosync is somewhere above 30,000 km. De-orbiting could take hours, unless you hugely increase the power of the re-entry rocket, which means upscaling the size, weight, and expense per shot.

Finally, there's a non-phyics problem that wasn't even really an issue back when Pournelle came up with his original ideas: The politics of the "weapons of mass destruction" label. WMD is a sloppy-shit term that will get applied *instantly* by IR commentators and the press to any weapons system that has destructive power closer to a small nuclear bomb (~500+ t) than a MOAB (~10t). The fact that this isn't a nuclear weapon, or a chem/bio agent, will be totally irrelevant, because very few of the interested parties will know the difference. All that Joe Public (or Mohammed Al-Public, overseas) will understand is that the US has invented another unstoppable, super-technology killing machine.

So if your Rods from God are less powerful than a small tactical nuke, each shot would need to be cheaper than delivering an equivalent load of conventional ordnance--call if 10-50x MOABs. I seriously doubt that the economics would work in your favor, here, because boosting shit into orbit is insanely expensive, while big bombs are relatively cheap to make and drop.

On the other hand, if your Rods from God are as powerful or more powerful than a small tactical nuke, they become unusable on the battlefield because of the political costs. And it the Rods program is relegated to only being a strategic deterrent, it had better be cheaper than ICBMs/SLBMs. Again, I really doubt that the economics will work in your favor, for the same reasons.

In other news, YHBT. HAND.

Oh, so you have an economical, reliable method for:

  * pumping millions of tons of oxygen
  * almost a mile below the ocean's surface
  * and dissolving it in trillions of gallons of water

Goddamn armchair engineers... Seriously, you're about as divorced from reality as BP's PR team.

And as we all know everyone holds itself to UN treaties ? ...

Are you sure you responded to the right comment? I think you probably clicked the wrong link, right?

Because, see, I was discussing the legal defensibility, in front of a deliberative body like the UN or an international court, of satellite weaponry. I didn't say anything about whether anybody would ever abrogate the treaty. So your whole post is totally irrelevant, to mine.

No, really: I responded directly to the parent post's 3rd paragraph, NOT his 1st and 2nd paras. I didn't say anything at all, in my post, about whether any treaties will defend anyone from anything. (I don't really give a shit, either.) Go ahead, scroll up and check, I'll wait...

Can you even read? Or does your unmedicated attention deficit disorder mean you read the first sentence, and thSQUIRREL!!!

I'm feeling pretty safe about that ADD joke, there, because if you did actually read down this far, it means you must have read the rest of my post, which means you just realized you're a dipshit, and you rationally want to avoid the further embarrassment of another inane comment.

My logic (against the UN): satellites are subject to international treaties regarding the weaponizing of space. Planes-that-work-like-satellites are less so.I

I don't think this is right. The only governing law on this topic (to date WRT the USA) is the Outer Space Treaty, which makes no distinction between planes, satellites, shuttles, etc. The method of carry isn't relevant, only the weaon's location: "stationed in outer space" and "in orbit" are both specifically banned, in addition to the surfaces of heavenly bodies.

Of course, the boundary that defines outer space is arguable. The USAF definition is 80km, but there are others. Mostly, they're arbitrary lines, kind of like defining "when life begins" when discussing abortion--some have various scientific rationales, but none are universally accepted. Since this stuff has never been tested in a court, it's all really theoretical. So it's all moot, until we see: (1) a body of established case law (plausible, in the next few decades), or (2) a clarifying amendment to the treaty (highly unlikely), or (3) a new, more specific treaty (possible, but the USA has been bricking up recent UN moves in that direction).

So could you launch a sub-orbital weapon under the OST? Dunno. Most ICBM trajectories are sub-orbital, but I suppose that if we're launching live nuclear warheads on ICBMs, treaties don't much matter. (Not much of anything would matter at that point, I guess.) Is a *really* low earth orbit, below 80km, really physically feasible? I doubt it--orbital velocity and atmospheric density are both pretty high, below that mark, so the fuel consumption and heat shielding considerations would almost certainly make the engineers laugh at you.

However, note that the OST only prohibits space-borne nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction. Most conventional weapons, HE gravity bombs, ASAT missiles, etc. should all be kosher. And I think there have been public examples of space weapons programs, implemented by OST-signatory nations, that haven't raised any OST-specific hackles. You will probably be OK if you want to:

  * Launch non-WMD missiles at satellites, either from the ground/sea, or an aircraft, or an orbital vehicle.
  * Drop FOABs or inert kinetic penetrators from spaceplanes onto ground/sea targets.
  * Launch non-WMD, self-guided "stand-off" weapons (cruise missiles/smart bombs) at ground/sea, airborne, or orbital targets.
  * Carry self-defensive weaponry, for protection against hostile aircraft or orbital vehicles.

And for the record, I believe that WMD generally means nuclear, biological, or chemical, but I don't know how legal that interpretation is. YMMV.

Oh! And I hope this goes without saying, but IANASL.

WP is a pretty good starting point for more details: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outer_Space_Treaty, or if you're brave, the full-text treaty is also available online: http://www.unoosa.org/oosa/en/SpaceLaw/gares/html/gares_21_2222.html

The language was asking for it.

That would require organization, planning, time, effort, up-front capital, etc. Which means it will have basically zero impact on the vast majority of students. A couple of nerds will probably do it, but nobody else will care.

Music file sharing didn't take off because it was free. Back in 1998-99, college kids went apeshit for Napster because it was CONVENIENT and EASY. If you told those same college kids "You can have all the music you want. For the new Eminem album: Just email John Smith, he's a junior in CS, give him $0.05, wait a week, and he'll email you the MP3s. For the new Pink album: Find Becky Lewis, she lives off-campus but works at the Union coffee shop, give her $0.05, wait a week, and she'll email you the MP3s..."

Nobody would bother with that shit, it's just too much hassle. Everybody likes free shit, in theory. But in practice, what people really want is easy instant gratification where they don't have to worry about how much each individual transactions costs.

I don't know what HS and/or college you attended, but I'm pretty sure "A textbook" is not useful to most students. Most profs expect you to read particular sections of a particular book, and possibly to answer questions listed in that particular book for assignments. If you just grab any old Calc 1 textbook off the shelf, you're still SOL.

Seriously, you thought the RIAA and MPAA were bad? Hoo boy, you're in for a surprise when you meet the textbook publishers. They aren't even human, they're like... Mind Flayers, or something. Pure evil, and smarter than you think.

Textbook pubs will never permit mass electronic distribution unless they have mandatory DRM backed by scary laws that the state aggressively enforces. When Congress passes laws authorizing copyright holders and their agents/officials to summarily arrest and imprison suspected copyright violators, without trial or notice, THEN the textbook publishers will decide that they feel confident moving into electronic distribution.

But one of these days, somebody will start selling cheap, easy-to-make/use automated book scanners (with page turning capabilities). Or maybe they'll put up an Instructable. That'll be the harpoon in the side, for the textbook industry.

I think the pyrolysis is kind of secondary, here. Kerosene becomes volatile, on its own, somewhere above 100F, depending on the specific HC composition of the sample. (The lower the average per-molecule carbon chain length, the lower the flash point, as with any non-solid HC.)

But you're probably at least partially correct, because there ought to be some amount of thermal cracking happening at that temperature. The cracking would tend to produce shorter (more volatile) carbon chains.

I just don't think that the contribution of pyrolysis is going to be very significant unless you heat the kerosene well above the flash point. And you can't really push that too far, since kerosene will auto-ignite in the 400F+ range, anyway.

Wanna do an experiment?