Comment Of course the answer is Blue.. (Score 1) 272
And the stop lights too...
Comment Testability (Score 1, Insightful) 822
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/scientific%20method
and the formulation and testing of hypotheses
So, in what way is Anthropomorphic Climate Change testable? It is a hypothesis, yes. How can it be tested?
Basically. ACC is not science at all. It is philosophy or rather, politics, until it is made testable.
Submission + - Lily Allen fights against piratism, pirates hersel (torrentfreak.com) 1
sopssa writes: "TorrentFreak reports how in recent days Lily Allen has been campaigning a lot against piracy. She even started her own blog to fight it. "The debut post on the blog includes a criticism of 50 Cent, who just a couple of weeks ago had the temerity to suggest that piracy and file-sharing are all part of marketing music. However, aside from the critique of Fiddy, the rest of the blog post — put there by Lilly herself — is someone else's work. Arrr mateys, Long John Allen lifted the entire post from another site — Techdirt.com — effectively pirating the work of the one and only Mike Masnick."
"The fact that she is trying to claim that such copying is bad, while doing it herself suggests something of a double standard, unfortunately. Also, for someone so concerned about the impact of 'piracy' I'm quite surprised that she neither credited nor linked to our post. Apparently, what she says and how she acts are somewhat different. Still, Lilly, glad we could help you make a point... even if it wasn't the one you thought you were making," Mike added."
"The fact that she is trying to claim that such copying is bad, while doing it herself suggests something of a double standard, unfortunately. Also, for someone so concerned about the impact of 'piracy' I'm quite surprised that she neither credited nor linked to our post. Apparently, what she says and how she acts are somewhat different. Still, Lilly, glad we could help you make a point... even if it wasn't the one you thought you were making," Mike added."
Open Source Search Engine Benchmarks 62
Sean Fargo writes "This article has benchmarks for the latest versions of Lucene, Xapian, zettair, sqlite, and sphinx. It tests them by indexing Twitter and Medical Journals, providing comparative system stats and relevancy scores. All the benchmark code is open source."
Morality of Throttling a Local ISP? 640
An anonymous reader writes "I work for a small (400 customers) local cable ISP. For the company, the ISP is only a small side business, so my whole line of expertise lies in other areas, but since I know the most about Linux and networking I've been stuck into the role of part-time sysadmin. In examining our backbone and customer base I've found out that we are oversubscribed around 70:1 between our customers' bandwidth and our pipe. I've gone to the boss and showed him the bandwidth graphs of us sitting up against the limit for the better part of the day, and instead of purchasing more bandwidth, he has asked me to start implementing traffic shaping and packet inspection against P2P users and other types of large downloaders. Because this is in a certain limited market, the customers really only have the choice between my ISP and dial-up. I'm struggling with the desire to give the customers I'm administering the best experience, and the desire to do what my boss wants. In my situation, what would you do?"
Comment Re:Numerous factual errors in article and summary (Score 1) 184
I concede that the bylaws of the ASF state "To be eligible for membership, a person or entity must be nominated by a current member..." however as a matter of practice the current membership of the ASF consists solely of people, and to the best of my knowledge no company/organization has ever been a member (or even been nominated to be a member)
It doesn't change anything about my underlying point: Microsoft did not join the ASF, and it is not Microsofts first code contribution to an ASF project.
Comment Numerous factual errors in article and summary (Score 5, Informative) 184
"Several months after joining the Apache Foundation, Microsoft has made its first code contribution to an Apache project."
Corporations can not join the Apache Software Foundation (ASF). Microsoft became a "sponsor" of the ASF last summer, but only individual people can join the ASF.
This is also not the first time Microsoft has contributed code to an Apache project, pulling one quick example out of google...
Tech-Related Volunteer Gigs 252
jeffomatic writes "Here's a question for Service Day: what kind of volunteer opportunities are available out there for the technologically-inclined? I'm a software developer and I'm wondering if there's anyone in the field engaged in pro-bono work, like IT or teaching or web design or whatnot. I'm not at all above rolling my sleeves up and working at shelters or the local park, but it occurs to me that my professional skills might be usefully applied in the service context as well. I'd like to hear about what other people are doing, in terms of projects, time commitments, organizations, etc." Or just commit a patch to your favorite project.
So Who's Running Apple Now? 399
An anonymous reader writes "With Steve Jobs stepping down from heading Apple for at least six months who's running the company that he resurrected? This article names the three people who will try to keep things running. But you have to wonder whether they'll have the charisma needed to keep Apple cool..."
The Secret Origins of Microsoft Office's Clippy 263
Harry writes "Most folks think that Microsoft Office's Clippy, Microsoft Bob, and Windows XP's Search Assistant dog were perverse jokes — but a dozen years' worth of patent filings shows that Microsoft took the concept of animated software 'helpers' really, really seriously, even long after everyone else realized it was a bad idea. And the drawings those patents contain are weirdly fascinating." The article, a slide show really, spreads over 15 pages.
Comment related perlmonks thread (Score 1) 517
once upon a time there was a vigorous discussion on perlmonks about non-perl books that have made people better programmers...
http://perlmonks.org/?node_id=508862
my reply...
http://perlmonks.org/?node_id=509146
* CLR
* The Dragon Book
* The Visual Display of Quantitative Information
* AI: A Modern Approach
* Catcher in the Rye
-- I've been asked about this one. This book is all about perceptions: our perceptions of others, and our concerns about the perception other people have of ourself. Realizing your own hangups, and when you/others are being "phoney" can vastly reduce the amount of bullshit you waste time on in your life/work.
Good Open Source, Multi-Platform, Secure IM Client? 308
Phil O. writes "I work for a company with 30+ locations across North America. Some offices have hundreds of employees; some only a dozen. We're looking for a secure, multi-platform IM client we could implement across the organization. One group is pushing for Microsoft's solution, but it has a number of drawbacks (including cost). What other options are out there, and what has worked well in similar situations? Security is a big concern for the company."
Submission + - National Federation of Blind & Target settle s
wwsmith writes: Last week, the widely publicized lawsuit between the National Federation of the Blind and Target Stores was settled. The issue involved a class-action lawsuit of blind individuals that could not use the Target Stores web site. In other words, the web site was "not accessible" according to the NFB. As part of the settlement, the NFB is going to test the site quarterly, partly using software and partly using blind individuals. More details are located at http://www.dralegal.org/cases/private_business/nfb_v_target.php
Submission + - Secure on-line/ATM banking in US?
An anonymous reader writes: Given some recent dissatisfaction with the predatory manner in which Bank of America forces its services upon its customers, and a growing weary regarding the state of financial institutions in the USA, I am looking for a nice bank with a good internet services package. To be fair, BoA had fairly decent web-based banking, and security appeared to be good at the surface. However, their ATM manufacturer is none other than... Diebold. I mostly use on-line banking and the ATM to deposit cash/checks, so where would be the wise place to bank in today's uncertian market? Wachovia, WaMu, or a local Bank/CU perhaps?
Submission + - SPAM: Anti-Israel Google map markings to be filtered
Anti-Globalism writes: "Google was criticized in recent months for a series of orange markings overlaying the satellite map of Israel that were labeled "Nakba — The Palestinian Catastrophe." These were placed by Jenin resident Thameen Darby, and clicking on them led to the anti-Israel Web site Palestine Remembered.
Google may also be facing a libel suit in the US by the city of Kiryat Yam, which the map incorrectly claimed was built on the remains of the Arab village of Ghawarina.
While Google has defended its willingness to accept user-generated content placed over the satellite maps, the new layer, which was announced earlier this month, has made it dramatically more difficult for a single person to change the default information appearing on the program's satellite maps."
Link to Original Source
Google may also be facing a libel suit in the US by the city of Kiryat Yam, which the map incorrectly claimed was built on the remains of the Arab village of Ghawarina.
While Google has defended its willingness to accept user-generated content placed over the satellite maps, the new layer, which was announced earlier this month, has made it dramatically more difficult for a single person to change the default information appearing on the program's satellite maps."
Link to Original Source
