There's a polish idiom "pi razy oko", meaning a very rough estimate. Literally it means pi times eye (heh, pi day reference...). I find that literal meaning extremely useful for rough estimation of tasks, when not enough data is present to estimate better and/or the estimate is needed immediately.

Split the task into subtasks if possible, you'll get a better estimate. If you can't, don't - the estimate is very, very rough anyway.

Now apply the eye - using your experience give a pessimistic (important!) estimate of each subtask. Add up (allowing for parallel execution if you can allocate things to different persons). Now it's time for the "pi". Multiply the result by pi. No need to get precise, just 3 and some. What you get is the optimistic (!) estimate of time you need.

So far this failed me very rarely and not by much. The result always seems overblown to me, yet it's almost always a correct lower bound. Great tool to fight my own intuition where it tends to fail.

So.. yes, it will take longer than it seems. At least three times longer, so experience tells me.

Same here, and it works, with a large "but".

I got most of the obligatory and recommended vaccines as a child. For some reason though... not measles. Perhaps it wasn't obligatory at the time and I missed it somehow, maybe there were other reasons... I'd have to ask my mother.

Anyway, I never had measles and wasn't vaccinated. I'm perfectly healthy now. I don't have children, but most of my colleagues do, so for the past few years I had contact with people who could be carriers several times. For a grown man this virus is a much more serious problem than for a child. So, let's get vaccinated!

Nope. I lost enough energy to stop trying. One doctor laughed at me. One wasn't sure if it is at all possible to vaccinate an adult. Others were more competent but still - no. You can't just buy it, not without prescription and who will give it to you? I don't get it. Are they afraid of liability if something goes wrong? Is it the result of the public funding limits on different procedures? Maybe that, but I tried it at a private clinic, paying for the visit. Still a no: "you don't need it, don't worry".

WTF?!?

...which hasn't stopped anyone from using it - rationality is for the weak. We're wired for "eureka" moments - the curve fits so well, it MUST be right!

OTOH, technical analysis is also not a very good model of this, because economy is not a good model of anything in the real world due to an exceptionally strong positive feedback loop between the model and the modeled. A successful technical analysis "method" (meaning it worked for someone, that's statistically probable no matter how stupid the method is) may become actively used by enough investors to change the actual process, becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy. A given shape may have no meaning as such, but if enough people believe it signifies a change of trend... their reaction may cause the trend to appear, at least in short term.

In case of flu the feedback, if it exists at all, will be negative - overestimation may increase popularity of the vaccine, resulting in reduced number of cases. The reverse is also true, low estimates decrese the willingness to vaccinate. That of course completely ignores the question of how effective flu vaccine really is - we have to predict which strain will dominate; a miss would weaken the feedback.

Besides, why "on the Internet"? The assumption here is that it's somehow hard for the NSA to infiltrate an intranet - hard to believe given the wide choice of tools they have. And unencrypted MySQL on the intranet is common.

Heh... Easy question, unfortunately.

Top priority: prepare an easy and painless way out. Guns are illegal here, so it would take a bit of thinking, organizing, saving money, etc. Probably the best solution would be an international trip to a clinic that will help me, but I would need a backup plan if someone decided to stop me. Better do it early and be ready for later, with a plan simple enough to execute when the illness already has a significant effect (but before it makes me forget I have that option). Later I may not be able to do this and noone will help me. Hell, I wouldn't even ask for it, I don't want that helpful person to go to jail.

Oh, I could have other priorities, if I could achieve this just by making my wish clear. But as long as euthanasia is not legal here, I'd have to rely on myself, so waiting too long would be risky. I will not reach the final, infant-like stages if I can help it. I prefer to keep my dignity, thank you.

So, this is the most important thing. Number two is obvious too - research into current best practices and applying them (diet, activity, training, whatever). Even if it buys me just a few more months of mostly normal life, it's worth it.

Not to suggest that anyone should do the same. If your views or priorities are different, feel free to do whatever you want.

Oh, the naivety... The winners are just less clearly defined now. Unless it comes to actual combat, that clears things up. Let's hope that doesn't happen.

Anyway, it seems like history will repeat again. Just like 1938. Diplomatic pressure, discussions, etc. right until the West is under attack. Oh, wow, how could that happen? Avoid war at all costs, sure, but find a good way to stop the conflict or don't be surprised later.

Oh, and focus on the facts. This is not the time to discuss whether the political shift in Ukraine was legitimate or not. Focus on the actual territorial claim. Right now Russia is trying to tear Crimea apart from the Ukraine by military means. Focus on this fact. Maybe Crimea should be part of Ukraine, maybe not, doesn't matter at all. The use of the military is the problem. Or just ignore it, fine. Just don't be surprised if it doesn't stop there.

And why would we want it? Seriously, we have good coffee here.

I keep hearing things like "only a douchebag would take the last of the coffee without making a new pot" - seriously? You drink random drip coffee from a pot that's been heated for the last hour? I would, if I had no choice and needed some coffeine, but... come on!

My espresso machine at home is 4 years old, cheap (no auto) but good. Coffee from a nearby coffee shop, their own mix, roasted in house every second day, pure arabica of course. I grind it at home, enough for two days (yeah, I know, too much too rarely, but I'm not that much of a perfectionist). A great espresso every morning. Nowhere near as good as what I tried in Italy, but way above average here.

Let's take the cost of the machine and the one service cost when it broke last year. The cost of the grinder (a good one actually). The cost of coffee per 100g and serving size... 4 years... 4 cups daily on average (low estimate - I don't live alone)... Something like $0.43 per serving, excluding cost of electricity and water (cheap but low calcium, in large bottles, no real difference in taste from tap water, but good for the machine, doesn't require decalcification as often - my time is not free). Even with those, still under $0.5. Give me one reason to buy this.

Even at work if I need coffee it's the same coffee as at home, always fresh, made as needed, but from a drip machine. Not nearly as good, but oh, well... Two years ago we had espresso machines at work, but they were too cheap for heavy use - they slowly deteriorated and after too many problems thay were eliminated. I'm still hoping they will buy a couple of good ones. Another team bought one for themselves (legal if it stays in their kitchen), so maybe we should just do the same - except we don't have a separate kitchen, so it would have to be good enough to handle about 40 espressos per day - not the cheapest model... Maybe we could get the neighbouring teams to chip in...

I'd never buy any machine that would tie me to a single brand of coffee, because it simply is not good enough. I've searched for a good source for years and I will stick with it until I find something better. Why would I buy something that sat on the shelf, roasted and ground, for hell knows how long?

100% true. Because I spend most of my time on Linux playing high FPS games and doing other things in 3D. And X over network is simply an outdated concept noone needs.

Oh, wait...

Remote X is one of the things I find best in Linux. No cludges, no tricks - the UI is simply rendered remotely and one of the windows on my desktop is actually for an app running somewhere else. Nothing in the app to support this. No special tools in the system. Just basic X functionality. Cool! On the other hand 3D applications are mostly eyecandy for this platform. Something to play with while something else is doing the stuff you need.

Wayland is actually a great idea if Linux is ever going to be a serious gaming platform (and for several other use cases). As a separate project it makes a lot of sense. There are a lot of problems though:
- will distros carry both?
- will X be sufficiently supported when Wayland becomes mainstream?
- what about drivers?
- what about compatibility (both X on new hardware and old hardware and new versions of applications)?
The biggest problem is that the windowing system (not DE, the actual G in GUI) is a bit like init, system loader, package management, etc. - a bit hard to support more than one in the same distro (although it would certainly be possible). Meaning that Wayland might make X obsolete in too many eyes and... dead. Which means that all the missing functionality will be lost forever. Either that, or a painful split of the Linux ecosystem. In the second case, look for me in the dinosaur's garden. There are things in X I use that are intentionally not there in Wayland and nothing of value as tradeoff.

And Wayland support in any useful DE (I don't consider GNOME 3 one, but that's subjective) would be a Good Thing, if the fear that it will become the only supported option wasn't there.

Safe, perhaps. However, given the risks of decompression, heating malfunction, fire, explosion and plenty of other things that can go wrong in space, seeing an entry like:

Occupation: Astronaut
Place of death: Earth orbit
Cause of death: Drowning

out of context would probably be one of the most memorable WTF moments in my life. Yes, drowning is one of the risks for an astronaut, accidents during underwater training or after a wet landing are certainly possible... But in orbit?!? That's like getting mauled by a lion in the middle of a big city in US or Europe. It can happen, but you'd never consider it a real risk, until the unlikely chain of events actually materializes.

Not really. There are things which are obviously distracting and things that seem safe to too many drivers. That's what these specific laws are for: you don't get to argue in court whether what you were doing was distracting, the law says it is.

Best example: I've heard/read oh-so-many comments about how a phone call during driving does not impair reactions and situational awareness. People tend to think that it's just so easy, they can safely do it. And they do it A LOT. The funny thing is, they mostly do it without a hands-free set, which is explicitly illegal here - and they get mad when they get a ticket. Who cares if I'm on the phone, I'm still driving competently!

Except they aren't. Even my personal experience shows that. A car in the fast lane going 20km/h under limit? 80% chance of a phone in hand. Changing lanes right into my car? 5 out of 7 cases last year - phone in hand. Hard breaking in predictable situations, leading to dangerous situations and in one case a very light collision? Almost always phone in hand. Makes me glad that texting while driving is mostly frowned upon here and rare (texting as such is extremely popular), although I hear that in other countries it is a big problem. I find it stupid - in this case you don't look at the road, your common sense should tell you you're too distracted. A phone conversation is a less obvious problem.

We suck at judging our own concentration level. That's the whole point. The specific laws are supposed to close this hole in our reasoning with simple rules. Don't text. Don't talk on the phone. In this case - don't use Glass.

How dangerous Glass is - that's a different question. It can probably be used safely, but it can also be very distracting. How will you make sure that drivers only use it for safe purposes? That's why I don't consider it a real HUD. Install real HUDs in cars all you want, I'm cool with that. They will only have the functions that make sense. Let all drivers wear Glass... and I'm afraid of the dumbest 10%.

Post-preview final thought - you're right that a separate law with separate penalties is unnecessary if there is already a law about distracted driving. In this case the specific laws should simply specify that a given behavior is considered distracted driving regardless of circumstances. The rest is covered by the general law.

I have a PocketBook Pro 912, exactly for the use case described. Works like a charm. Large screen, A4 PDFs are easy to read. Problems are rare (under heavy use for well over a year I found just one extremely heavy PDF that basically caused the reader to hang, I couldn't even reboot it - that's it, no other problems). I don't even connect it to a computer (why waste desk space?), I just use a microSD card. My collegue has a 911 and connects it all the time, so that seems to work just as well.

Also useful during commute - e-books work very well (Adobe DRM is supported if you want it), built in sudoku is also fun, heh.

Highliting (with the highliter tool) sucks - on most PDFs it's ridiculously slow. BUT: there is another tool, pencil. That works just fine, so instead of highliting I just circle or underline the important parts - besides, it's better than highliting, because you can make handwritten notes. That's very useful. In fact, I rarely highlight anything in texts I just read, I use this while reviewing papers, theses of my students, etc. Marking corrections is very easy in this way.

In other words - a good choice in my opinion.

One important drawback though - you can't export (or print) a PDF with your markings. This really sucks. I heard you can export individual pages as bitmaps, but I haven't tried this. So, if you're going to mix using this with paper versions or with working on a computer... you have a problem. I can live with this, but if you really need this - well, I found where the notes are stored, so you could probably export them somehow, reverse engineer the format (maybe it's trivial?) and find a way to overlay it on the PDF. Maybe it's a solved problem, I didn't really look.

Anyway, if anyone found a way to do this easily, please reply, I'd love to know. Just not so much so to search for solutions. Lazeeee...

Or maybe someone knows a reader as good as this one but with this problem solved. So far I haven't found one that had an e-paper screen - and that's a showstopper. I'm not going to recharge my reader every day or even every week. (*)

(*) If you're going to connect it to a PC almost every day anyway to swap PDFs, you may want to rethink your priorities - you might not really need e-ink, just a large battery, as long as it recharges over USB. Since I rarely do this (microSD!), recharging is a separate task for me. Of course, there are other things to consider - e-ink refreshes slowly, but is better for the eyes - my eyes at least...

Wow... Just wow.

It doesn't exist because the Wikipedia page lists little research and that research is not statistically significant.

Is it just me, or is using scientific big words like "statistical significance" in an argument based solely on the contents of a Wikipedia pega is so wrong it's just funny?

Not implying that this is not true - I have no idea how much research was done on the subject. Google scholar seems to know about thousands of articles about this (about the same number as e.g. "Hawking radiation") - are any of them really good? No idea. Maybe it really is overrated.

But criticizing something as not supported by research using Wikipedia as a source? Ridiculous. Wikipedia does have its uses, but this certainly isn't one of them...

Ride a dragon? That's not at all what uncanny valley is about. This is strictly about things almost perfectly resembling humans. Riding a dragon will not cause this problem. Glitches in the physics engine... Maybe, depends. Something like a not-quite-anatomical pose. Or maybe timing glitches in movement sequence (Crispin Glover's character in Alice in Wonderland - intentional application of this).

In other words, this is a very strong but purely emotional reaction. It gets stronger as you get closer to reality. "Humans" from Shrek? No problem. Aki Ross, at least in motion? Definitely a problem. When it's at its strongest, you might actually have problems pointing out the imperfections that cause it. That's because they are not spotted by conscious reason.

Why is this distinction important? Most deviations from reality in entertainment are spotted by reason and easily covered by willing suspension of disbelief. If the entertainment is good, we will tolerate almost anything, if not, the deviations from reality will add to the list of critical comments. In short: "Yeah, it's BS, but it's fun!"

However, uncanny valley is a subconscious emotional reaction and willing suspension of disbelief does not make it subside. You may consider the movie/game/whatever really fun, but you still simply feel bad looking at it.

That's why it's a big problem for creators of "realistic" games. With simple models this feeling was not there. As models get better, consciously they seem more realistic, but "the body" starts telling us that something's wrong. So, only three solutions - stay away (keep human models imperfect enough), get it perfectly right (is it possible?) or... find a way to eliminate this problem.

A matter of language - English is not my first. I did not know that the word "company" includes non-profit organizations - the first line of the page you linked to states exaclty "non-profit and charitable organization", not company. I just checked, yes, you're right, a non-profit is also a company. A bit strange, as most EU forms I have to deal with restrict the word to for-profit companies, using only "organization" for non-profits - oh well, you learn something every day.

On the other hand, the same page - which, believe it or not, I have thoroughly read before writing the previous post - in the part about chapters states "They support the foundation (...) by collecting donations (...)". My laziness is limited to verifying the organization of the current fundraiser. It's not clearly stated anywhere in the notice or direct links in either English or my local language version, I don't know about Suomi. If it's handled entirely by the Wikimedia Foundation, you might be right (although the court should decide - the local language version of the notice may be enough to consider it aimed at Finnland, so the law applies and the matter becomes dependent on international law - I know nothing about agreements between the US and Finnland that might apply). If local chapters act as intermediaries, Wikimedia Suomi @#$%ed up and is definitely in trouble, as a 100% Finnish organization, registered in Helsinki. I guess the Finnish police might have the same sort of questions as me.

10 seconds? More like 20 minutes before previous post and 10 now. Sorry, I'm not in a habit of jumping to binding conclusions based on a glance at the first google hit like you, especially in legal matters.

Grand mystery? No, and probably very easy to solve given the right documents. But definitely not clear to me yet.

Relevant to what exactly? Not to me certainly. And not to Wikimedia Suomi, the chapter which functions in Finnland and will be knee deep in trouble, jail time included, if it ignores the Finnish law.

So easy to forget that Wikipedia is not an american site, but a global undertaking, eh?

Nice thinking, except that Wikipedia is not a company, especially not an american one.

Still, not being a lawyer and not willing to invest the time to research the legal structure of Wikimedia and the appropriate jurisdiction for this case, I will not claim that this case is clear and ignoring this is not safe. Still, unless you can present some proof of expertise in international law and deep knowledge of Wikipedia's legal structure, I find the certainty in your claim equally laughable.