Paradise Pete wrote:

Well, line 10 is wrong. Day 366 should not change the year for leap years. Also, days is the number of days since 1980, and you're not dealing with that. What you have to do is walk forward through the years so that you land on the proper year and day.

Sorry for being unclear. I was using "days" as a variable to mean basically the julian date (resetting it to "0" on the first day of each year), not the total number of days since a specific year. In the same way, I was thinking of "years" as a separate variable indicating the current year.

To clarify, essentially leap years would start on day 0, non-leap years would start on day 1, each year would end on day 365, and on 1 Jan the calendar would show day 366 which would then prompt the system to change the year and then set the day to 1 or 0 (depending on whether the new year is a leap year or not).

Paradise Pete wrote:

The Zune was in effect sold with a predictable and correctable flaw

And if you look at the bug in the code (line 259) it's atrocious. Something a junior programmer would be embarrassed about.

When days is 366 it causes an infinite loop. And also note that simply changing line 263 to use 365 causes a different bug. So the whole approach is wrong. It ought to simply be

while (days > daysInYear(year))
{
days -= daysInYear(year);
year += 1;
}

I'm not a C programmer, but why not do the following (in basic, I'm sure it could be easily translated into C):

• 10 if days = 366 then years = years + 1
• 20 if years = 2100 then goto 70
• 30 if years = 2200 then goto 70
• 40 if years = 2300 then goto 70
• 50 if (years/4)*4 = int(years) then days = 0
• 60 goto 80
• 70 days = 1
• 80 end

I'm sure lines 20 through 40 could be compressed into a single line to accomodate the century years.

For me, Colin Baker was the best Doctor. His quirkiness and harsh attitude was a refreshing change from Davison's Doctor, and he brought forth the entertaining aspects of his previous personas. Sadly, his Doctor wasn't given adequate time to develop.

larryau wrote:

If I remember that question was asked a long time ago. If I remember correctly the producers answered by reminding people about the "Keepers of Traken" story. It was with the introduction of Nysaa's character. I think it was episode 18. The story had the "Master" returning and he had used up all of his 12 regeneration but found a way to extend his regenerations. So I think the good Dr. has a way.

The way the Master extended his life (his decayed appearance in the first series before his apparent regeneration was because [1] he was at the end of his last life or [2] a half-failed attempt at a 13th regeneration) was due to him taking over the body of another (much like he did in the Fox Dr. Who movie), so it wasn't a true regeneration although it does give him a way to extend his life indefinitely.

One thing that has cut the Doctor's life short is that he has been using up his regenerations much more rapidly than a typical timelord (since the First Doctor was 650 years old when he first appeared, he could have lived least 8,450 years). The story "Silver Nemesis" (the 25th anniversary story) indicated that there is far more to The Doctor than we know, so it is likely that this will give the writers a way to give him a new set of regenerations.

One thing I'm looking forward to is the future appearance of The Valyard.

Thinking about it, this does have some superficial similarities to the episode "Android and I," where a number of androids of a specific model commit suicide. I wonder if Section 9 will look into the issue with the Zune's too?

FredFredrickson wrote:

I agree with you there, that's the main reason I'm a Batman fan. I don't mind spiderman, but I just can't stand to watch superman- since there are many circumstances where they have to find ways to make him not super to make a story. It's always pointless.

When they rebooted Superman in 1986, one of the best things they did was to reduce his power level by a significant degree. He went from being powerful enough to move the Earth with hardly anyone who is a significant threat to him, to being one of the toughest heroes around but with many who could give him a good fight and even defeat him).

Samah wrote:

Perhaps if they removed the .org from the end of the product name, I (and I think many newcomers) might take it more seriously. That part belongs in a domain name, not in a product name. Actually, the name of the .NET framework bugs me too.

According to the OpenOffice.org page on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenOffice.org/), the name "OpenOffice" was trademarked by another company. This prevented the makers of "OpenOffice.org" from using the name.

This brings to mind another series Video Girl Ai. Both the manga and the anime tell the same story to a specific point. Then at that point the stories go in two different directions, with the anime going to a quick conclusion, and the manga going on for several more volumes, including a sequel series.

When it comes to translating the manga or comic to the screen, I don't expect a clone of the original work, but something that remains true to the original work. This is one of the strengths of the recent Batman movies.

interstellar_donkey wrote:

Right. And some harsh realities have to be realized by the AF or any DOD department.

1) The Internet does not belong to America. Period. It is a global network of good guys and bad guys, and the rest of the world won't, nor should they abide by our rules.

2) The Internet does not belong to the military. It has far more to do with domestic and international trade and information than it does to various arms of the DOD.

If the USAF wants a secure network, then they should create their own isolated network completely divorced from the civilian Internet. I'm sorry if that means generals can't look at porn sites from their office, but that's the way things go.

I agree, and to piggyback on this I think that the Air Force needs to go to non-commercial software (including an OS) of its own creation (that way they own and control it), rather than using the same software used in the civilian world. In the short run it might be more expensive to do this, but it is likely to be much more secure than using the same software that anyone can buy off the shelf, and security can be built into the software at its creation (and as a prime consideration in its design) rather than having to be added to software that was not designed for security from its outset.

This would also save money in the long run since:

• It can be issued to users as needed without having to pay recurring licensing fees.
• Software could be upgraded based on the needs of the Air Force and its users, rather than requirements forced on them by non-Air Force agencies.
• Software could be designed so that it doesn't render obsolete many already-in-use-and-perfectly usable computer systems.