Follow Slashdot blog updates by subscribing to our blog RSS feed

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×

Comment Re:This isn't as bad as it looks (Score 1) 741

And the UK security services are famous for literally grabbing you by the testicles and then asking a long series of questions, cf the Birmingham Six...

From a 1993 article in "The Independent" -

Gerry Hunter claimed that in the car taking them from Morecambe to Birmingham, Superintendent George Reade, who smelt of drink, punched and slapped him. Walker said that an officer called Kelly, also smelling of drink, head- butted him. Hill complained that a Sergeant Bennett whipped his testicles with the thong of his truncheon and that an Inspector Moore put a revolver into his mouth, 'said he was going to blow my fucking head off', pulled the trigger so that it clicked, then laughed. Hugh Callaghan said, 'I was in a state of shock. I do not know what I said. They said things to me. I agreed.'

Comment Re:Man that sounds like a lot of effort (Score 2) 111

>They sure as hell aren't worth thousands of dollars.

Spoken like someone who has not crawled on their hands and knees for years to master a musical instrument (or voice) and create a unique sound...

Don't punish the artists because the music industry is stupid, hidebound, and greedy: give the artists their due, for Gods' sake!

Comment Re:13 meters? (Score 1) 279

Circular Error Probability (CEP, also circular error probable, circle of equal probability)

"It is defined as a circle, centered about the mean, whose boundary is expected to include 50% of the population within it."

Basically, the size of the circle around the target inside which your shots land. The smaller, the better.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_error_probable

Comment Re:Lest we forget (Score 2, Interesting) 279

Actually, Marshall jumped Eisenhower to the top because Eisenhower impressed the hell out of Marshall during 1941 war games in Louisiana when a lot of the show was a mess from career Regular Army clowns screwing up. Eisenhower got a lot of stuff done right despite the chaos and systemic cluster-fucks.

Marshall ruthlessly cleaned house after the mess and Eisenhower got jumped over a lot of RA types. People were pissed, but it kind of worked out OK, didn't it.

Comment Re:Lest we forget (Score 1) 279

>The Cold War arose because of the Russian fear of the nuclear-armed US

Um, OK, but let's not forget that it also arose because the USSR wanted to keep all the land it could after Germany fell over, and was pretty nasty about how they kept it. Go look into how they never pulled back to the agreed-upon demarcation lines (Elbe River) in 1945 and how they grabbed Czechoslovakia in 1948 (can you say "defenestration"?) and a few other countries along the way.

I'm pretty far to the left, but let's not be naive here...

Comment Re:Wow. (Score 2, Informative) 279

The other problem is that so many think that documentation is unnecessary. And if it is done at all, 80% of the time it's slapdash at the last minute and often after the developers are gone.

How do I know? I started as a software engineer and have been writing tech docs for over 20 years. I can't tell you how many times all I had was a design spec (un-updated since the start of the project), the final product, and nowhere near enough time to document a huge product.

Don't blame me if your tech docs suck. I keep getting laid off or harassed out when I try to do it right (it costs money and time, and they don't like that).

PS If you want to find out the TRUTH about your HW and SW products, read all the appendices at the rear of the doc. That's where we wily old pros stick the data you need but that marketing, development, etc don't want you to know.

Comment Re:Why is the CIA attacking anything? (Score 1) 279

>Why is the CIA attacking anything?

Because George the First, as CIA head, decided to save money by cutting out pretty much all HUMINT in favor of cheaper ELINT, so we lost almost ANYbody on the ground in the Middle East. So now we don't know who is who or who is where, so we blow up who and what we can when we get hints. Only we miss a lot, given time lag, questionable intel data, and (apparently) bad targeting software.

Joke now popular in Pakistan: "Why did the Pakistani girl break up with her American boyfriend? Because he always launches his missiles from 10,000 feet."

Nice going, George: BOTH of you.

cf "Company Man," Mother Jones, October, 1988

Slashdot Top Deals

MESSAGE ACKNOWLEDGED -- The Pershing II missiles have been launched.

Working...