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Comment Re:Maybe in a different country (Score 1) 498

The Founding Fathers would not have allowed home inspections of firearms.

Yet wrote and passed the Alien And Sedition Acts. Owned slaves, and did other things that he modern revisionists ignore when quoting WWtFFD

No, I'm not ignoring any of that. Just pointing out that with respect to the OP of this thread which remarked about having people inspect the safety of the firearms (f.e kept in safe, trigger locks, etc) that that would have never flown with those who wrote the Consistitution - namely because they did have to live with some of that under the English Rule where soldiers could decide that you or your property needed to be searched for whatever reason they came up with. This is explicitly why we have the 4th Amendment (no Warrantless Searches) and limits on Property Seizure.

It was a civic duty to have a firearm to start with as that qualified you to be part of the militia (even if you didn't have a firearm you could still join, but then you had to find someone to give you one).

I've never seen that requirement in the definition of "militia". And your wording is odd. You must either have a firearm or have a firearm (by gift/loan) to join the militia. Seems it would be easier to say "must have a firearm to be a member of the militia." Though the current definition has no relationship to armament. And it's impossible to find a good 1776 definition, as they are all tainted by the modern gun rights war (one way or the other).

Look at how people fought at that time. If someone wanted to join in, they had to be able to fight. That typically meant they had to bring their own weapons - the military generally did not provide one for them. This was true even in the Civil War, though by that point the military did start providing some as there was more funding towards it. If you didn't have one, then you had to "borrow" one from someone else who had more than one available.

If you could't fight, or couldn't arm yourself appropriately then you were of little to no use in the militia; though you might have gotten deployed for recon, scouting, or other intelligence operations.

Comment Re:Maybe in a different country (Score 1) 498

So that brings me to how I feel about people that would use guns to harm themselves and others. Neither the protection of criminals nor the suicidal is justification for "reasonable" restrictions on anyone's rights. It's not that life isn't precious, but why should we protect those who do not value it at all?

While IANAL, in the US the legal issue is basically that you cannot remove a right (must less one specifically called out in the Constitution) to protect the minority, if only (at minimum) inconveniencing the majority.

The Founding Fathers would not have allowed home inspections of firearms. In their minds, it was not the government's business how many or what kind of firearms you had. It was a civic duty to have a firearm to start with as that qualified you to be part of the militia (even if you didn't have a firearm you could still join, but then you had to find someone to give you one).

Comment Re:Shouldn't they be after Google? (Score 1) 148

Settlements don't establish precedent.

No they don't. But they work well to load the coffers and scare everyone else into paying up, especially when the other party is gagged on the topic as part of the settlement, which is what MS tends to do - so even if they pay out (B&N) then the other party can't counter MS's story as to why, etc.

Comment Re:Shouldn't they be after Google? (Score 1) 148

Surely they have to tell the court what patents are being infringed in order to get an injunction? Does this case reveal it? I couldn't find any information though.

May be, may be not. Even so, they could do so by sealing the filing so only the parties in the case can read it; all it takes is for Microsoft to claim trade secret, harm to its business, etc for that to happen. And the judges in Seattle (or WA for that matter) are typically in their back pocket for one reason or another - it's a very friendly state towards MS, but then, MS pours a lot into funding various public things (f.e education) there too so there's the whole "don't bite the hand that feeds you" thing going on there.

Comment Summary a little misleading... (Score 0) 188

Reading the FAQ and TFA, this is more about BusyBox than the Linux Kernel.

And well, anyone dealing with a proprietary product should know better by now than to include BusyBox in their product without also providing the code for it as BusyBox has a very good history of winning court cases of this type.

Now, while the initial thing was regarding BusyBox, they are also trying to go and push against Tivoization with GPLv2 trying to gain access to "vmkernel" from VMware ESXi. Linus has had a long history of allowing Tivoization, so that might not get through the courts so clearly, but it's a second prong of attack they are using. Expect nVidia and any other proprietary driver maker to possibly join in on that prong - whether arguing for VMware's position or trying to curtail a court ruling that would expand beyond this particular case (since it's basically about an ESXi OS that uses Linux in some form) from impacting other driver manufacturers (f.e nVidia) that simply provide a binary blob for use with their hardware to customers. It should be pretty easy to make the differentiation between the two groups; but you never know what a judge will do.

IANAL, but that's what I see.

Comment Re:Installation on what machine? (Score 2) 188

But does it include "compilation and installation" on the end user's machines, or only on developer hardware available only to a select few? The latter interpretation leads to the Tivoization loophole in the GPLv2. GPLv3 tightened this by defining "Installation Information", its counterpart to GPLv2's "scripts used to control [...] installation", to require that execution be possible "in that User Product" if the work is designed for a consumer platform.

Well, having used VMware Workstation 8 and 9, I can was able to download and modify the Linux drivers provided by VMware, necessary to fix some kernel related bugs (http://clocksmind.blogspot.com/2013/04/vmware-workstation-8-and-linux-kernel-38.html) as kernels changed over time but VMware simply didn't keep up with compatibility.

So frankly, I'm a little surprised but then, may this is for a different edition or something.

Comment Re:FEO (Score 1) 375

"Fact optimization" is already behind more than one multi-billion dollar industry: advertising, political lobbying...

And this is why I fear this initiative, no matter how well intentioned, is doomed to failure. Just because something gets repeated a lot, that doesn't make it factually correct. Moreover, censoring dissenting opinions is a terrible reaction to active manipulation and even to old-fashioned gossip, because it removes the best mechanism for correcting the groupthink and promoting more informed debate, which is introducing alternative ideas from someone who knows better or simply has a different (but still reasonable) point of view.

Remember, not so long ago, the almost-universal opinion would have been that the world was flat.

My advice to save a lot of time and effort, Do not let republicans, terrorists, the religious, anyone connected with the oil companies or climate change deniers anywhere near this technology ever!

Or the democrats, liberals, communists, facists, socialists...

oh, wait...is there anyone left to use the technology?

Comment Re:diff (Score 1) 176

Education. Engineers get the engineering core education. Which is basically calculus, physics, diffEq and the first semester of all the engineering disciplines (more or less the first two years of a four year program). Only then do you start your specialized education.

Competence not guaranteed in ether case. Engineer job title means nothing.

Degree from certified engineering school is the requirement for an 'engineering' degree. 'Engineering technologist' is the weasel word version from shitty schools.

Some nations require that you pass the P.E. test (or it's local equivalent) to call yourself an engineer, some that you are qualified to take the E.I.T.

In America anybody can call themselves an Engineer.

Wrong. That is only the case with Software Engineeres, and even then if you are in Texas you have to pass a certification to do so.

In pretty much every other Engineering field you cannot call yourself an Engineer without first having passed the exams. Just like you can't call yourself a Lawyer (Esquire), CFA, CPA, or a number of other titles without passing the relevant exams either.

Comment Re:diff (Score 2) 176

And the difference between engineer and developer is.. what?

Engineers are often held personally liable for their mistakes. Tim S.

Only one state (Texas) regulates "Software Engineers". Software Engineering is perhaps the only Engineering field that that statement doesn't apply to except, perhaps, in Texas (but even then I doubt it). Typically "Software Engineer" is synonymous with "Software Developer".

On the other hand, a "Computer Engineer" is regulated in all states since it is a sub-field of Eletrical Engineering.

Comment Re:How do I get an H1B certification? (Score 1) 176

My CS professor said you can only get a CS job these days with one of them, but I can't find any information on what I have to do to get certified.

Get a job where a company will sponsor your H1-B visa. You can't apply until you have a job. The company has to justify the need to hire you over someone else for it to be approved.

Comment Re:Thank you for reminding us. (Score 1) 108

If you believe yourself to be an eternal being, then this life is but one small step in a much longer journey. It's always puzzled me why so many Christians fear death, when they claim to know they are going to a place vastly superior to this one.

Well, there are many who profess to be Christians but are not; but then, you always fear what you do not know, no matter how much you try.

And then, of course, many fear how death will come on them - do you really want to die because a sword cut off your head in one of many passes, being burned alive, etc?

$0.02

Comment Re:Credibility to rumors? (Score 1) 196

What kind of idiot would buy a cell phone with a non-replaceable battery? That would be even more stupid than if it had a proprietary data-cable port. Nobody in their right mind would but such a crippled device.

Apple Customers....did you see the original iPod? They've never had replaceable batteries. Now others (f.e. Google) are following with their high-end lines (Nexus since Nexus5 phone and Nexus 7 tablet).

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