32-33 FPS HTML
69-70 FPS Canvas
23-28 FPS SVG
54-60 FPS Flash

Quad-core I5 at 3.40GHZ running Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.2; Win64; x64; rv:14.0) Gecko/20120412 Firefox/14.0a1 ID:20120412030726
GeForce GT 440

So, yes, I'm cheating by running the burning edge of the latest FF in 64-bit mode, alpha software running on Windows 8 64-bit, also alpha.

It helps that I'm the only one home now.

She rarely uses her cell. We still have a land line (and this still goes for VOIP), and we have multiple cordless phones, and two corded ones. One in the bedroom so we don't miss that special call in the night if need be, even if ALL the cordless are dead, and she has a corded speaker phone on her desk, even though she also has a cordless. Too many phone calls lasting longer than your average cordless phone will handle, and the batteries for that last a year. Especially if the old system has a few years on it, and the phones only last five minutes, and give you zero warning that they are running out. So now we have a new cordless system, 4 phones, not 3, and the base is also a speaker phone for when you can't find a phone.

Now that the kids are all out of the house, it's not a huge deal, but I think it would certainly help if you do have kids, or anybody else for that matter. This system might actually last longer, the batteries are rechargeable AAAs, so the replacements will be cheaper than replacing the system, unlike what we were looking at with the previous system. It also helps that this new system can keep a list of numbers that can be blocked. They ring once, and then nothing.

I cook her breakfast when she's ready (it takes her awhile).

Unfortunately, she doesn't really keep a morning routine, she hits her office in her housecoat, and only gets showered and dressed when I drag her out, or she has a lunch appointment with somebody.

She has no problem with cutting somebody off at the knees if they call (or God forbid knock at the door) and she's busy or expecting a phone call. Even me if I'm out and need to talk to her.

She not only has multiple monitors, she has multiple computers, a work laptop (at one point two of them) with a second bigger screen, and her home system.

She usually VPNs in with GotoMyPC (the ability for the other computer to show what she's doing, and for the other side to take over and do something as well is an absolute must for her). The laptop will go to one PC, and her home machine will go to another PC at the office. Different operating systems, one's XP, the other Win 7.

We live in Florida, her office is in New Jersey.

The FTP server is full. Why they don't upgrade with more storage is beyond me. So instead, they use Outlook's Mailbox as a way to keep things synced among machines.

Big spacecraft, at least by the technology we have currently, have one advantage. They can carry much more energy with them, to be either used for energy weapons, or to be used to accelerate kinetic weapons. Now, if you can get a terawatt reactor with fuel with all the other accoutrements that need to go into a spaceship the size of a 747, you might have something. Somehow, I doubt that you're going to get the basics of a space fighter down to the size of a 747. But you're still going to have some large structures out there for support. You're not going to fly down to Earth because you've ran out of fuel. And in your down time, you're going to want to have some kind of gravity, which today, means some kind of rotating structure, be it like the space station in 2001, or two capsules/fighters twirling around a cable.

And while smaller might be better, remember that at the distances that battles will be fought at, I doubt that any enemy that would be shot at would actually be capable of being seen by human eyes. Blinded by the darkness of space or the brightness of the sun, targeting will be by various means and completely automated. Whether something is 100 meters or 300, if you're shooting over 100K meters, it's still shooting mosquitoes.

We're already getting to the point where automated cars will be taking the road, we certainly will have that for space ships when we finally get our asses out to space.

Expect drones, and if they are spread out enough, drones with enough intelligence to do the fighting without human intervention.

Energy weapons might be workable by then. Giga or terawatt lasers might be able to get enough energy on somebody long enough to do some damage.

Missiles, nuclear or chemical, that explode on or near contact, again, self guided, may work. The trouble is if they miss, they won't have enough fuel to hit anything else close by, unless a trajectory is planned for that. And we all know what Sun Tzu says, no plan survives contact with the enemy.

The other weapon choice will be kinetic weapons, which may be not more than railguns throwing whatever mass they can at the enemy. Or as Ian Douglas uses in his Galactic Marine series, sand bags with chemical explosives (you don't want the sand to be melted) are boosted to some fraction of the speed of light and the bomb goes off, spreading the sand, killing your enemy that way.

And I would certainly add Ian Douglas as an author to read about possible space combat.

Somebody (RIAA, MPAA, or other *AA) PAID somebody to introduce this bill, a bill that the entertainment industry had already written for them, and then proceeded to pass out checks to the rest of the congresscritters to get it passed. It's all about the money in this case.

If the congresscritters had any kind of actual understanding about what this bill does (we can argue that they should, but I very much doubt that most of them actually do understand any bill that they are voting on in any kind of detail to actually make a rational decision, but it's not going to change the fact that these idiots will remain idiots in the near future, and probably in the long term future as well...), they would be up in arms about it. All it will take is a takedown notice on somebody's reelection site (you know that somebody's going to screw up and put non-cleared copyright material on their site at some point) and the idiots will find out how well and screwed they (and the rest of us citizens) are over this stupid law.

Too bad, I would have like to have seen a Lego black hole created.

Considering the meltdowns that have occurred with other AV companies (Norton being the one I always shake my head at), and MS hasn't had one yet (it probably will, it's just a matter of time, but I have a feeling there will be no signature that manages to prevent the system from booting...).

I'm running it now. Even if it isn't the default in Windows 8, I'll still download it and use it.

When I was honing my data entry skills on an IBM 3741 and a 3742, the 3742 was set like a normal keypunch machine. (the 3742 was actually two 3742s made into one machine)

029 keyboard graphic

0 was at the top, then 123, etc.

The 3741 had was called a "accounting keyboard", and had 789 at the top, with the space bar being the 0.

I learned to be just as fast as the data entry operators, even though I was just the lowly computer operator, helping them caught up when they got dumped with heavier than usual loads (twice a year inventory and accounting).

I was wondering who or what was banging on my RDP ports yesterday. My Administrator account has been renamed, and I doubt very much that they would be able to brute my login name, let alone my password, but I turned RDP off just because it was annoying.

Good grief.

  Install the Nightly Tester Tools. Just because Mozilla (actually the extension) says that it's unsupported doesn't mean it won't work. I've got a couple of extensions that are limited to 3.*, and THOSE still work. And of the ones that don't tend to work, those authors have made available beta versions that haven't broken anything for me yet.

And I'm running the 8.0A1 nightly 64-bit. The only plugin (and I do mean plugin, not extension) that won't work is the WMP plugin. The 32-bit version works just fine, even 8.0A1.