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Comment As a diver, all props to Gran Pere (Score 1) 30

Seriously, without Jacques Yves Cousteau (and military divers), there probably wouldn't have been nearly the early development of scuba diving that brought in the talent and creativity required to make it safer than riding a bike on the street (something else I do with great regularity at night, thank you, Cree LED lights). Scuba diving today has a fatality estimate of about 5 per 100K divers.

But other than show the effects of 31 days of 2.8 bar, what else did he do of significance that couldn't be more easily, cheaply, and probably better done using a 360 degree video camera set up with lights on an underwater drone dropped off the back of a research ship for 31 days?

Comment Re:Sue them for all they're worth (Score 1) 495

Indeed. They claim, and you have to agree that there is some substance to that claim, that giving the victims prior notice will allow them to delete the pirated software from their computer, thus destroying evidence.

I hate the BSA and their way of operation, but within the framework they work in, I cannot refute that claim.

This is irrelevant to this case.

Shachar

Comment Re:Sue them for all they're worth (Score 2, Insightful) 495

Ex parte petitions should only be used in the most extreme of circumstances and there should be a high burden of proof before a court grants them.

Again, IANAL.

Still, how can you have a high burden of proof? In an adverserial system, the only things you can prove need two opposing parties to present their case. As such, an ex-parte request does not contain proof at all (how can it?)

Instead, it contains claims backed by sworn testimony. The judge examines these claims in the light most favorable to the non-present party, but otherwise within the context of the claims presented by the moving party.

In other words, you cannot second guess the judge's decision without looking at what MS actually wrote in its TRO request. If (as likely happened) MS wrote that no-ip do not remove the offending domains, and that these domains are used on a daily basis to cause huge harm, then a reasonable judge (who, I might remind you, is not technically savvy, and may not realize the implications of granting this order are disrupting no-ip's business) might conclude that granting this Temporary Restraining Order is reasonable.

So, once again, I think MS were acting like douches. I have no idea whether the judge acted reasonably, and cannot know without looking at MS's petition.

Shachar

Comment Re:Sue them for all they're worth (Score 5, Interesting) 495

Also, apparently No-ip didn't appear when summoned. Apparently, that's kinda of a big no-no. Maybe next time they will buy their domains somewhere with proper laws.

IANAL. All of this is from following legal procedures.

Not showing up is a big no-no. A judge can, usually, assume that the party not showing up has nothing to say in the matter, and just accept the petition as is. This is, however, not what happened here. From the first link:

On June 19, Microsoft filed for an ex parte temporary restraining order (TRO) from the U.S. District Court for Nevada against No-IP.

Emphasis mine.

An Ex-Parte petition is filed without the other side being given a chance to answer. This is outrageous act by Microsoft. You ask for an ex-part hearing when there is danger that the other side, if given prior warning of your requested subpoena, will destroy evidence. Since Microsoft is claiming that no-ip are unknowingly hosting malware, this simply wrong.

Before you go to blame the judge, however, please bear in mind that he can only rule based on the petitions before him. Presumably, a two-party hearing will be held soon, and then things can, and should, go differently. Also, the judge should have ordered Microsoft to place some money in escrow, which no-ip will automatically get in case the temporary restraining order is found to be unjustified.

What I'm saying is that we don't have enough information so far to conclude that the judge did anything wrong, but the first link, written by Microsoft, clearly shows MS to be douche bags in this case.

Shachar

Comment Re:Question... -- ? (Score 1) 215

The -- end of options option is a GNU getopt extension. It is, if memory serves me correctly, not part of any standard. This means that program that were not compiled with glibc, or programs that do not use getopt/getopt_long, may or may not honor it.

Even by simply looking at the man page, it is easy to spot programs that don't use getopt. Any program that accept multi-letter options with one minus sign is, obviously, not using getopt (e.g. gcc, find).

Then there is git. Git uses -- to mean "no revisions after this point. Any remaining argument must be a file name". This is almost, but not quite, what -- means for getopt. I don't even know what underlying parsing engine they are using (could be getopt with the "no options after first argument" option set).

The "./*" feature is a more global workaround, if it is applicable.

Shachar

Comment Re:what about? (Score 1) 215

On my system (Debian GNU/Linux Jessie with Bash version 4.3.11), ls -lad *.* does not return either "." or "..". This is unlike ".*", which return both.

I have not found the precise rules of how * is expanded, but it seems pretty universal that if the pattern doesn't begin with a dot, files beginning with a dot are not matched.

Other systems (and, more to the point, shells) might behave differently, of course.

Shachar

Comment Re:Vaporware. Totally. (Score 1) 81

While I agree with a lot of what you said, it is not completely true.

Jerusalem now has an (above ground, so not technically a subway) train throughout the city. It did take longer than planned, (and I believe was over budget too), but did, finally, happen. It definitely took more than one mayoral tenure to complete.

Yes, the Tel Aviv subway is now a running joke, and has been for about two decades. Then again, so was the Tel Aviv central bus station (took 40 years to complete and is under utilized, but complete it, eventually, did).

Just because something is a running joke doesn't mean it will not, eventually, happen. See "Duke Nukem Forever".

Shachar

Comment Re:Families come first (Score 1) 370

Your drivel shows a remarkably consistent level of insightfulness. As anyone who has ever done ISO-9000 knows, consistency is a vital first step. Only once that is achieved, can one also aim for quality. Congratulations! You are half way there!

It's not all good news, I'm afraid. While I can sort of see which (or is that "whose"?) ass you pulled most of your incorrect assumptions from, I am dumbfounded in trying to figure out where you got the assumption that my current wife is a trophy wife.

This assumption is completely incorrect, but, as I said, that is no different than the rest of your comment. What is worse, and reflects really badly on your potential as a truly effective troll, is that there is nothing to suggest it.

Your comment started so well, casting doubt on my ability to be happy (at least I think that's what you said. The missing word is actually important there), my ability as a father, fear of mortality and of being insignificant. Those are universal fears, and you can't really go wrong by pushing those buttons. And then you had to put that "trophy wife" in there.

Not only is this unlikely to be true, reducing the likely hurt I'm likely to feel from your troll, but it also hurts your logic. If my wife is a trophy wife, then the age difference between her and my kid isn't so big.

Please take this comment as the constructive criticism it is meant to be. Trolling, like any other art form, requires practice to get right. Judging from your comments on other threads, I'm sure you're well on your way to perfection. Keep at it. You'll get it in the end!

Oh, and thanks for the sig comment. I've been meaning to do something about it for quite some time, but was not sure what. I just removed it altogether for the time being.

Shachar

Comment Re:Families come first (Score 1) 370

A LOT of very stupid people are waiting until they are in their late 30's or 40's to have kids.. Oh boy, the joy of having to raise children until retirement age.. I'll instead enjoy the money and spare time of being 45 and my kids gone...

As one such stupid person, I can tell you. Oh, how I wish I had the smarts to to go ahead and make a child with my !@#%!@#$ crazy first wife, instead of divorcing her, spending time looking for a right one that will be, well, right, and only then having a child.

I'm sure me, my first wife, and my hypothetical children would have been so much happier for having a younger dad. Obviously, a younger dad is preferrable to growing up in a happy family.

Shachar

Comment Re:Let gay men donate (Score 3, Informative) 172

Donating for a specific person, in particular for yourself, is a special situation where things are done differently. For example, many of the conditions that would make you ineligible to donate to another person are waived if you are donating for personal use (and the blood is tossed if you wind up not needing it). Though it also depends on what you mean 'my blood was tested...' If you mean that you were tested for blood type and anemia, things that can be done with only the blood from a finger prick, 100% of people receive those tests in any modern medical environment (and even most not so modern ones). If you mean they did a full screening for HIV and other BBPs before you were allowed to give more than a finger prick's worth, then that is a specific situation not covered by general donation rules. For general situations, the written/oral prescreening is a much less expensive solution to having to run a myriad of tests (some cheap, some not so cheap) on a lot of blood that never should have been donated in the first place.

Comment Re:Let gay men donate (Score 5, Interesting) 172

All donors ARE tested for HIV (at least in USA, Canada, and China), but the test is post-donation and not pre-donation. Donated blood is tested for far more than just HIV, as well, and failing that post-donation test can result in a temporary or permanent ban from future donations. Prescreening of donors reduces the cost of testing relative to acceptable donations, which is a useful tool for keeping the cost of the existing donor supply lower than it would be otherwise. The American Red Cross revisits this policy about every 5 years, IIRC, and goes through the math of where the percentage breakpoints are for breakeven results- when any population crosses that line the wrong way, a new question goes on the prescreening survey. Homosexually active men are no more discriminated against than people who got tattoos or ear piercings within a certain time period, or who lived in certain countries (don't be from Cameroon or Nigeria, for example). Want to change that? Try changing the incidence of disease in the indentifiable community below that break point, because manipulating only the math doesn't turn out well in any scenario.

Giving a blood test for all the possible BBPs (blood borne pathogens) and other issues prior to donating is not cheap if the number of donors goes up by any significant amount of people who wouldn't qualify, so a prescreening survey is going to remain the most cost effective way of dealing with these issues and keeping the number of people who would dilute the quality of the blood supply low.

If you don't qualify to pass the written prescreening test, and you still want to donate blood, at least in the USA you can do that. There is a box you can check to indicate that you want your blood disposed of after donation. This is most commonly used by drug users and homosexuals who are donating in the presence of family, co-workers, or friends who the donor feels are not aware of their situation. It wastes staff time and some property (collection bags, etc...), but allows an individual to maintain their privacy for a lower cost than a prescreening blood test would cost.

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