Lifix - Slashdot User

Comment Re:DjVu? (Score 3, Interesting) 223

by Lifix on Wednesday April 28, 2010 @03:59PM (#32020380) Attached to: Vatican Chooses Open FITS Image Format

It might not be around as long as FITS, but isn't DjVu more suited for the digitization of manuscripts?

The Vatican isn't choosing FITS because it's more suited towards digitization of manuscripts. The church intends to be around literally forever and they're choosing FITS because it too, should be around as long as there is SCIENCE! From the FITS wikipedia article: 'FITS was designed with an eye towards long-term archival storage, and the maxim once FITS, always FITS represents the requirement that developments to the format must not render invalid existing files using older versions.'

Robo-Arm Signatures Are Legal, Gov't Buys One 154

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday April 18, 2009 @08:16AM from the precedent-set-by-the-governator dept.

AndreV writes "It's endlessly comforting to know a recently designed and implemented long-distance robotic signing arm can produce signatures legal in both the US and Canada. The aptly named LongPen replicates the handwriting from a person writing in a remote location — with the unique speed, cadence and pressure of a human pen-stroke. It started as an idea from author Margaret Atwood to help free her from grueling, multi-city, multi-country book tours, but the hard stuff was done by a bunch of Canadian haptic gurus, whose design took into consideration many factors of the human arm and how we write. How it works: from the author-end, data protocols are set up, and the pen pressure is measured on a special tablet. The data streams to the robot, while algorithms smooth out all the missed points. Complex math operations were used to help the mechatronic limb repeat the hand's motions without unnecessary jerking, and programmers had to 'scale time' or 'stretch time' by breaking down the movements, essentially tricking the eyes into thinking the robot is writing fast. It was recently adopted by the Ontario Government to sign official documents. It helps criminals sign books, too."

Comment An anonymous reader? (Score 4, Insightful) 240

by Lifix on Sunday August 13, 2006 @04:17PM (#15899306) Attached to: Dangerous Apple Power Adapters?

From his website:

"I'm currently starting up an exciting new company, Zink Foods. We are poised to revolutionize your perception of "healthy food" by combining taste and nutrition in a completely unprecedented way. Finally, real food, real taste, real nutrition!"

This sounds like a real expert that we should listen to? I guess it's not that hard to use slashdot to drive up your pageviews afterall.

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