Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×

Comment I'm for changing the clock (Score 1) 613

I takes the body 1 day to adjust to a 1 hour change. So in the Spring change, just go to bed an hour earlier the night of the change.

The effect of the change is based on your latitude, and your local sunrise or noon offset from your timezone's meridian.
Close the the equater or close to the poles, it probably doesn't make that much difference. When close to the equator, the times of sunrise and sunset don't
change much. When close to the poles, well you can have 24 hour darkness or sun, so it really doesn't matter what time it is. In between, though, it can have a big effect.

Also, the more west you are in your timezone, the later sunrise and sunset occur.

Where I am, in mid-summer, the sun sets at 10pm local time, and rises at 4am local time (DST)
In mid-winter, the sun rises at around 8am local time (or after) (Standard Time), and sets around 5pm.

If we were to stay with DST all year round, then the sun wouldn't rise till 9am in mid-winter - an hour after I get into work, after kids start school, etc. Yes, we'd get a slight longer evening, but I prefer some sun in the morning. And I believe the primary reason was so that children wouldn't be going to school in the dark.

If we were to stay with Standard Time all year round, then the sun wouldn't set till 11pm in mid-summer, which is after I go to bed. (It wouldn't be dark until after midnight).

So, yeah, I'm all for shifting the clock. We shift here on the last weekend of October and March, and that's about right. I don't see any reason to change it.

Comment idle time (Score 1) 533

Most OSes have some code that runs when other processes aren't running to measure the idle time. Certainly in Windows, this is a process in it's own right.
If the CPU is only 1% utilised, then the idle time process is consuming most of the remaining 99% (with the kernel using a bit of that).

So, I would hazard a guess that it's something in this.

(Or, for Windows, the code that swaps pages out to disk.)

Comment xy chromosomes (Score 1) 772

My take is that the DNA of The Doctor is male. Regeneration will recreate his body when damaged, but should obey the programming within his DNA. It shouldn't go changing chromosomes around.

There may be a lot of bending the rules of various fields of science, but the core basic stuff should remain in order for the sci-fi element to even begin to feel plausible. When writers mess around with the basics, I certainly turn off. I hate watching sci-fi and thinking "hey, you can't do that -- that just wouldn't work!!". For me, changing the gender of The Doctor is that thing which just wouldn't work.

Comment Re:Use a programmable keyboard (Score 1) 165

I concur. I've used a Kinesis Ergo keyboard for many years. With a normal keyboard I used to find that I'd get pains in my little finger, especially on the right hand. Shortly after starting to use the Kinesis, those pains vanished.

The main keys that are normally pressed by the little finger (control, alt, backspace, enter, home, end, windows) are switched to the middle of the keyboard and used by the thumbs. Takes a little getting used to, but before long you'll be using those keys without thinking.
Shift is still in the usual spot for the little finger, however mine also came with a foot pedal that could be used for shift (or anything else, as it was also programmable). (I never used the foot pedal)

The only caveat is that they are expensive.

Comment Re:Lets just abolish speed limits everywhere alrea (Score 1) 992

It depends on the road and the location.

Have a motorway/freeway without a speed limit (like the German Autobahns) can make sense. But having a road with no speed limit through a housing estate where lots of kids live would be a recipe for disaster. People already drive too fast on such roads, and debatably the speed limit on these roads is too high (50km/h here, which is ~31mph).

Again, though, some roads here have stupid speed limits: http://www.aanewsletter.ie/edition/9/img/IMG_1325_10p.jpg

So, yes, given a good quality straight wide road with wide lanes, a speed limit shouldn't be required. Other roads should have a speed limit appropriate to the road, the width, surface, location, etc.

Comment In metric (for the rest of the world) (Score 3, Informative) 992

For those of us who don't know mph, here's some conversions to km/h:

https://www.google.com/search?q=what+is+85+mph+in+kph (etc)

100mph =~ 160.934km/h (by definition)
95mph =~ 152.9
90mph =~ 144.8km/h
85mph = ~136.8km/h (motorways in Italy, among other countries, have speed limits of 130km/h)
80mph =~ 128.7km/h
75mph =~ 128.7km/h
74.5mph =~ 120km/h (this is the motorway speed limit in Ireland)
70mph =~ 112.65 km/h (this is the motorway speed limit in the UK)

Slashdot Top Deals

"Gravitation cannot be held responsible for people falling in love." -- Albert Einstein

Working...