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Comment Re:Sounds like win-win to me! (Score 0) 666

by galaad2 (#40935243) Attached to: Man Orders TV On Amazon, Gets Shipped Assault Rifle

I didn't read if there was ammo to go with the rifle. No ammo the rifle is not much better then a baseball bat or golf club. Both of which are legal to have in DC and make a better club then the rifle does.

Ammo is relatively easy to get, the rifle had no ammo in the box because the rifle uses standard 7.62 X 51 mm NATO rounds. You can load it with commercial .308 Winchester rounds if NATO-standard rounds are not available.
http://www.sigsauer.com/CatalogProductDetails/sig716-patrol-rifle.aspx

WARNING: NEVER USE THEM THE OTHER WAY AROUND! Never use NATO rounds in rifles made only for regular Winchester ammo. A 7.62 X 51 mm NATO round is slighlty thicker, packs more explosive powder than a .308 civilian round and might jam and shatter the chamber of a regular weapon, leading to serious injuries for the user.

see: http://www.303british.com/id36.html
(source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.308_Winchester )

Comment Re:Easy.... (Score 5, Informative) 288

by galaad2 (#40927539) Attached to: Legitimate eBook Lending Community Closed After Copyright Complaints

in this case it's simple to prove the "knowingly materially misrepresent". The contract that those authors SIGNED with Amazon explicitly says in very BOLD LETTERS:
https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/help?topicId=APILE934L348N

5.2 Marketing and Promotion; Kindle Book Lending Program.
[...]
5.2.2 Kindle Book Lending Program. The Kindle Book Lending program enables customers who purchase a Digital Book to lend it subject to limitations we establish from time to time. All Digital Books made available through the Program are automatically included in the Kindle Book Lending program. However, for Digital Books that are in the 35% Royalty Option (as described in the Pricing Page), you may choose to opt out of the Kindle Book Lending program. This will disable lending of the Digital Book by customers who purchase it after you have opted it out, but this will not affect the right of customers who purchased it when lending was enabled to continue to lend it. You may not choose to opt out a Digital Book if it is included in the lending program of another sales or distribution channel. If we become aware that a Digital Book you have opted out is included in the lending program of another sales or distribution channel, we may enable it for lending. Digital Books that are in the 70% Royalty Option (as described in the Pricing Page) cannot be opted out of the lending feature.
[.... and a bit below...]
KDP Select Option Terms and Conditions.
[...]
2.2 Inclusion in Kindle Owners’ Lending Library Program. Digital Books included in KDP Select will be automatically included in the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library Program described in more detail here. ( https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/help?topicId=200798990#KOLL )

Q.E.D.
Programming

How To Deal With 200k Lines of Spaghetti Code 236

Posted by Soulskill from the make-sure-it's-al-dente dept.
An anonymous reader writes "An article at Ars recaps a discussion from Stack Exchange about a software engineer who had the misfortune to inherit 200k lines of 'spaghetti code' cobbled together over the course of 10-20 years. A lengthy and detailed response walks through how best to proceed at development triage in the face of limited time and developer-power. From the article: 'Rigidity is (often) good. This is a controversial opinion, as rigidity is often seen as a force working against you. It's true for some phases of some projects. But once you see it as a structural support, a framework that takes away the guesswork, it greatly reduces the amount of wasted time and effort. Make it work for you, not against you. Rigidity = Process / Procedure. Software development needs good processes and procedures for exactly the same reasons that chemical plants or factories have manuals, procedures, drills, and emergency guidelines: preventing bad outcomes, increasing predictability, maximizing productivity... Rigidity comes in moderation, though!'"
Google

Google+ Account Suspended? You Won't Find Out Why 341

Posted by Soulskill from the it's-a-mystery dept.
jfruh writes "Dan Tynan is a tech writer and blogger who discovered, while trying to post links to his writing on his Google+ profile, that his account had been suspended. This despite the fact that he used his real name and didn't violate the terms of service in any other way. Upon appeal his account was reinstated, just as mysteriously as it was shut down, but along the way he discovered a rash of people with suspended Google+ accounts who can't figure out what they did to anger the Google gods."

Comment Re:This doesn't surprise me... (Score 1) 126

by galaad2 (#40856589) Attached to: Security Expert: Huawei Routers Riddled With Vulnerabilities

many Vodafone-branded devices across the entire Europe are actually huawei devices, especially those usb 3G+ hsdpa/hsupa wireless modems that look like fattened usb drives.
If you have one look on its back and it's almost guaranteed to see the label that says it's made by huawei.
Also, the installation package for Vodafone Mobile Connect (their connectivity management software) has most of its drivers made by huawei.
Earth

World Population Grows Beyond 7 Billion 349

Posted by samzenpus from the bigger-is-nor-better dept.
First time accepted submitter assertation writes in with a LA Times feature about the booming world population and the strain it puts on the environment and governments. "After remaining stable for most of human history, the world's population has exploded over the last two centuries. The boom is not over: The biggest generation in history is just entering its childbearing years. The coming wave will reshape the planet, and the impact will be greatest in the poorest, most unstable countries."
Robotics

US Regaining Manufacturing Might With Robots and 3D Printing 475

Posted by Soulskill from the finally-something-we-can-exploit-for-cheap-labor-again dept.
For years, the U.S. has been hemorrhaging manufacturing jobs to China because of the vastly cheaper labor pool. But now, several different technologies have ripened to the point where U.S. companies are bringing some operations back home. 3D printing, robotics, AI, and nanotechnology are all expected to dramatically change the manufacturing landscape over the next several years. From the article: "The factory assembly that the Chinese are performing is child’s play for the next generation of robots—which will soon become cheaper than human labor. Indeed, one of China’s largest manufacturers, Taiwan-based Foxconn Technology Group, announced last August that it plans to install one million robots within three years to do the work that its workers in China presently do. It found Chinese labor to be too expensive and demanding. The world’s most advanced car, the Tesla Roadster, is also being manufactured in Silicon Valley, which is one of the most expensive places in the country. Tesla can afford this because it is using robots to do the assembly. ... 3D printers can already create physical mechanical devices, medical implants, jewelry, and even clothing. The cheapest 3D printers, which print rudimentary objects, currently sell for between $500 and $1000. Soon, we will have printers for this price that can print toys and household goods. By the end of this decade, we will see 3D printers doing the small-scale production of previously labor-intensive crafts and goods. It is entirely conceivable that in the next decade we start 3D-printing buildings and electronics."

Comment Re:Europe, bad? (Score 2) 38

Except this is already policy in the United States. All computer programs that are "works of the United States Government" enter the public domain upon publication.

maybe that was wishful thinking but then why is the Federal Reserve Bank/ US Treasury prosecuting and convicting people and getting them to admit to "theft" of public domain stuff (some accounting program)?

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/29/usa-crime-fed-idUSL1E8GTBG120120529
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-18/man-said-to-be-charged-by-u-s-in-federal-government-computer-data-theft.html

Comment Re:That Moment (Score 4, Informative) 414

by galaad2 (#40133567) Attached to: 350-Year-Old Newton's Puzzle Solved By 16-Year-Old

I'd reserve your hosannas until this kid's magic formula gets published, along with a formal statement of the problem.

the formula has already been published, here: https://www.jugend-forscht.de/images/1MAT_67_download.jpg
(photo of the formula taken on May 18th)

article source:
https://www.jugend-forscht.de/index.php/projectsearch/detail/6038.4568
and
http://www.jufo-dresden.de/projekt/teilnehmer/matheinfo/m1

i can't find the full paper yet though, but on reddit some users claim that the formula works in Maple
e.g.
http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/u7551/teen_solves_newtons_300yearold_riddle_an/c4szejb

where f is constant on the path the particle makes in the space of velocities:
f:=(g^2 /(2*u^2 ) + a*(g/2)*(v*sqrt(u^2 +v^2 )/(u^2 ) + arcsinh(v/u)));

Comment Re:That is cool, but... (Score 3, Informative) 194

by galaad2 (#40097745) Attached to: Axis, Yahoo's New Browser

I do that, but it is limited in its usefulness because there is not a simple way of then killing off one of those addresses that you have made up on the spot. Eventually if spam to all these made up addresses becomes a problem, you have to turn off the catch-all address to stop the spam coming through. Which then means you have to actually set up another account or group in Google Apps each time you want an extra address, which is a lot less quick and easy.

point taken but i don't usually give such an address to any site. I use mailinator.com / bugmenot.com for random junk like reading nytimes.com or stuff like that.

The Gmail wildcard is useful for sites you want to receive stuff from but these sites are not trusted/appreciated enough to give them a proper email address. Also, in order not to fill up my main email account, i have a separate, dedicated account@my domain and that one is the target of the wildcard, not my main account.
To access that quickly, I set up account access delegation rights between the wildcard-reception account and my main account.

If one of the made-up addresses starts receiving spam i can always set a filter to delete that email as soon as it arrives (usually i just filter it with a label for sending to spamcop) and (usually) the owner of the site it was initially intended for will get a spam & abuse complaint sent on all contact email addresses i can find (via whois and their site)

Comment Re:That is cool, but... (Score 5, Informative) 194

by galaad2 (#40097331) Attached to: Axis, Yahoo's New Browser

This feature is worthless as a spam decoy strategy, as anyone can use it to find your real address. I would be amazed if spammers don't already strip off the "+whatever" from gmail addresses,
[...]
I wonder why Google hasn't stepped up to supply actual disposable email addresses yet

oh, but they do have that but it's a bit hidden and it's only available via Apps for hosted domains. (even free apps has it).
The way to set this up is to host your domain (or at least the mail receiving functions of it) with Google Apps and then you can set up the email service to accept wildcard emails, *@your-domain-hosted-on-google-apps_dot_anything.

Now whenever you give out an address just invent one on the spot @your domain and it will be valid. I do this and i got into the habit of throwing a date stamp and the name of whoever it is for into the email address itself so that if i start receiving spam for that address i know who leaked it and when they were assigned that address. Such an address usually looks like: mail-for-my-name-from-slashdot-org-20120524@example.com

And since my domain is set up at Gmail with a wildcard catch-all address, that will be routed to my actual mailbox (only if it passes Gmail spam filtering tests).

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