Comment Re:$2 books plus shipping and handling? (Score 2, Informative) 147
Your facts will not stand in the way of my wishful thinking.
Comment $2 books plus shipping and handling? (Score 1) 147
So will all the books be $2 plus shipping?
Comment Re:Life is terminal (Score 1) 371
Like Nethack?
Comment Re:Unnecessary (Score 1) 109
Last 2 times I have flown afternoon flights on Continental from Newark to Charleston, SC...
Now there's your problem. As for it being "on-time", does it mean on-time arrival? Philly/New York flight times are padded by 60-90 minutes. So if you plane takes off less than an hour late, it will probably land "on-time."
Comment Re:Diamond dust is cheap? (Score 2, Informative) 210
according to the article, about $1/carat.
Major New Function Discovered For the Spleen 257
circletimessquare writes "The spleen doesn't get much respect — as one researcher put it, 'the spleen lacks the gravitas of neighboring organs.' Those undergoing a splenectomy seem to be able to carry on without any consequences. However, some studies have suggested an enhanced risk of early death for those who have undergone splenectomies. Now researchers have discovered why: the spleen apparently serves as a vast reservoir for monocytes, the largest of the white blood cells, the wrecking crew of the immune system. After major trauma, such as a heart attack, the monocytes are disgorged into the blood stream and immediately get to work repairing the damage. '"The parallel in military terms is a standing army," said Matthias Nahrendorf, an author of the report. "You don't want to have to recruit an entire fighting force from the ground up every time you need it."'"
Null-Prefix SSL Attacks Enabled In New sslsniff 48
An anonymous reader writes "Moxie Marlinspike, who recently published new attacks on SSL at Defcon 17, seems to have released the new version of sslsniff which supports these attacks. While the release appears to coincide with a patch from Mozilla, every product that uses the Microsoft CryptoAPI is still vulnerable, including Internet Explorer and Outlook. The new version of sslsniff also supports built-in modes for hijacking software auto-updates that depend on SSL, and apparently includes techniques for defeating OCSP as well — making the elimination of existing null-prefix certificates difficult."
Comment Re:I just got sweaty palms... (Score 1) 671
Echo the Virtual CloneDrive suggestion. How else do you watch DVDs?
Developer Stigma After a Bad Or Catastrophic Release? 223
An anonymous reader writes "We hear in the news all the time about how executives can drive a company into the ground and yet somehow become more desirable to other big companies. What we don't hear about are the grunts who implemented those decisions, and whether or not they end up resume-stained or blacklisted. Since we've got so many developers with lots of time in the trenches, I thought I would appeal to their experience. When disaster looms and sales starts pushing for development that has little chance but to end in disaster, what happens to the programmer who decides he needs his job enough to follow orders? Have they ever become unhireable?"
Comment Google does it too (Score 5, Informative) 389
Picasa defaults to change your IE search to Google.
Comment Re:blindsided? (Score 5, Funny) 411
The only thing that would make New Jersey nicer is less New Jerseyans.
Comment Re:NASA: how to get your knob out... (Score 1) 291
Strong acid plus alkali produces a lot of heat.
Comment Re:The best ESATA isn't really ESATA at all. (Score 5, Interesting) 210
Despite being at the forefront in almost all areas of number theory, Kummer was renowned for being very poor at elementary arithmetic. (A number theorist who was poor at arithmetic!) One story has him standing at the blackboard during a lecture, unable to compute 7 times 9. One mischievous student suggested 61, so Kummer wrote this on the board and started to continue. Another mischievous student shouted out that it was 69 not 61. At this, an exasperated Kummer, said "come on gentlemen, it can not be both". Later, it was rumoured that he told colleagues, he should have known the answer since it couldn't be 61 or 67, because 61 and 67 are primes and it couldn't be 65 because 65 is a multiple of 5, and he should have realized 69 was too large because 7 times 10 was only 70, so the only odd number left in the sixties was 63.
Comment Re:The best ESATA isn't really ESATA at all. (Score 1) 210
5 is not divisible by a power of 2 (duh, its prime)
Interesting way to see if 5 is divisible by 2. I think the same way:
What is 9 times 7? Well, it has to be less than 70 because 9It has to be odd since 9 and 7 are odd.
61 and 67 are prime so they're out.
65 and 69 are square-free and 9 is a perfect square.
So, 7*9 = 63.
(apologies to the actual (and funnier) version that I read but can't quite remember in Symmetry of the Primes)
G.M. Opens Its Own Battery Research Laboratory 173
Al writes "Bankrupt automaker G.M. has taken a significant step towards reinventing itself by opening a battery laboratory in Michigan on a site that once churned out internal combustion engines. The new facility lets G.M. engineers simulate all kinds of conditions to determine how long batteries will last once they're inside its vehicles. Battery packs are charged and discharged while being subjected to high and low temperatures as well as extremes of humidity. Engineers can also simulate different altitudes by placing the packs in barometric chambers. The facility has also been designed so that engineers located in New York and Germany and at the University of Michigan can perform experiments remotely. Despite its financial troubles, G.M. has committed to producing the Volt and is already working on second- and third-generation battery technology at the new lab."
