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Comment My Schedule (Score 1) 287

In at 8 AM, lunch usually at my desk.

Gone at 3 PM, like clockwork, maybe stay later once or twice a month.

Occasionally work an hour or two from home, usually once or twice a week.

NOTE: Hours working != Actual work accomplished.

My company knows the above inequality and leaves me alone, since I am the most productive worker here. More productive than those who put in 50 hours a week, and we are all salaried employees.

Comment Re:Excellent (Score 1) 128

This might work for nerve deafness.

However, if it is tinnitus (ringing of the ears) you are concerned with, you should check out the work of Dr. Raphael Yoesh at the University of Michigan.

Also read some of the papers written by Geoffery A Manley on the subject.

It seems that birds can regrow the hairs (cilia) in the inner ear, but mammals cannot.

Now if only I could get the hair growing out of my ears to grow in my inner ear, I would be okay. (What?) (What?)

Comment Re:Bing is an ad server. (Score 1) 514

I thought heterodyning was the process of adding the sound wave to the radio wave. I guess it also means adding one radio wave to another. (Thanks.)

When searching "simultaneous radio transmission" in SCIRUS, I do get answers about destructive wave interference. Some suggested solutions have the receiver controlling the senders, effectively multiplexing their transmissions.

There are some other interesting articles about unintentional hetrodyning of two bluetooth signals causing RF outside of the FCC allowed bandwidths. Interesting stuff.

Comment Bing is an ad server. (Score 1) 514

Well, then again so is Google.

When I want a scientific answer, not a bunch of ads. I go to SCIRUS.

http://www.scirus.com/srsapp

Try any search engine to find out why a third walkie talkie gets feedback when two walkie talkie's "talk" keys are pressed. EVERY site will try to sell you walkie talkies. SCIRUS has the answer. (But it is so scientific I cannot figure out what the answer means.)

I bet it has something to do with destructive interference in the electromagnetic waves, and synchronizing the two walkie talkies would allow the third to hear both voices.(?) Maybe?

Comment in the database with all the "bad people" (Score 1) 103

OK, if you have EVER been printed, then you are in the database.

But that data is subdivided into many categories. There are arsonists, murders, kidnappers, organized crime members and many other sections of the database.

This is simply for faster searching. If you have a latent print at an arson scene, it would be faster to search the arsonists section FIRST, then if you do not get a match, only then do you bother searching the rest of the database.

If every search searched the entire database, all seaches would slow to a crawl and the queue to do a search would be unbearable.

Comment Re:fingerprinting (Score 1) 103

The system you used had no human being screening the results, and what you experienced was "similar fingerprints" and probably not exact matches.

For crimes at least, no person has ever been convicted on the testimony of an AFIS computer.

AFIS returns "possible matches" with in a list of most similar matches to least similar. Then a latent fingerprint examiner (a real live person) determine which print (if any) is the real match.

Also, when you watch CSI and the prints are flashing on one side of the screen while the other side of the screen displays the unknown print, is total bollocks. Fingerprints are reduced to numerical representations and THAT DATA is compared to obtain the list.

BTW, I helped create AFIS.

Comment Half life (Score 1) 266

Data on a DVD/CD doesn't all crap out at once. In normal usage, scratches cause some data loss. However for long term storage significant loss would happen when the plastic reflective surface itself degrades. Still, when properly stored, a DVD/CD should last 30 years. To increase the odds of your data lasting, and to spend the least amount of cash, simply make multiple copies of your most precious data. That way, hopefully, each DVD/CD will retain SOME data and it can all be pieced back together from the multiple copies. The more precious the data, the more copies you should make. I think 5 copies stored in a climate controlled safe should last at least 100 years, if not, longer.

Comment It's the bandwidth (Score 1) 46

It is really easy to make a web crawler in Java. (Look at java.net.http or maybe java.awt.net.http) I made a decent one by myself in about a week. Okay, so my web crawler only does TEXT/HTML. No images, no Active X, no video. From experience, an average web page is about 10Kbytes. Now, anyone's specific application will probably be looking for key words, or else you are just re-creating Google. A key word data crawl would return a LOT less information, but would still require a lot of bandwidth and processing power to do the work. So bandwidth and processing time is what they are selling -- the place where this company's services would be most useful.

Comment Re:This is not a concern (Score 1) 465

Wrong.

The houses in my neighborhood were built around 1980.

All have copper pipes in the slab.

All the houses are developing leaks IN THE SLAB and have to be completely re-plumbed through the attic. My house was re-plumbed about 5 years ago. Next door, they had it done last summer, only after extensive water damage.

Copper pipes in concrete slabs = bad idea.

It may or may not be electrolysis, but something IS damaging ALL the piping in ALL the houses in my neighborhood.

Comment Drinking Game (Score 1) 293

In cities with a lot of TV stations -- everyone bring an old analog TV to the party. Each TV gets tuned to a different station. As each station blinks out, everyone slams a drink. By midnight, all channels should be gone. By midnight, everyone should be snockered.

Comment Think Sideways. (Score 1) 695

Switch to Ubuntu. Create a guest account and let them use that.

If you or the people you lend to really need Windows...

Install QEMU, on Ubuntu, it is a nice virtual machine. Take your old Windows CD and install as a FILE in your QEMU Virtual machine.

Keep a couple copies of the Virtual Windows FILE on your hard drive.

When someone wants to borrow your laptop, start up your Virtual Windows Machine in QEMU and lets them play. If the screw up that Windows copy (or if you just don't trust them), delete the FILE and use a new copy of the FILE on your Virtual Machine.

Comment Too Late (Score 1) 1092

Applied Digital Solutions has had something like this for years.

I think it is in the "vapor ware" stage and always will be, the company seems to be going nowhere.

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

When I first saw this about a decade ago, I thought, "That is diabolical, I want in." So I bought some stock watched it tank and sold it.

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