Links

Online Bookmark Manager Suggestions? 78

Posted by Cliff from the online-links dept.
nonLocal Bookmarks asks: "I have been looking for an online bookmark manager to allow me access to my bookmarks at various computers. There are a bunch of them out there, but most of them use the traditional tree structure. I am looking for something that lists everything cleanly on one page. The only one I can find so far that does this is SiteJot. But this site is missing a few other features I am looking for. I was wandering if any Slashdot readers could recommend a good bookmark manager?"
Data Storage

Hardware RAID 5 Performance Configurations? 62

Posted by Cliff from the how-many-drives-per-channel dept.
gandy909 asks: "I am facing the need to replace a major server in the next few months due to both EOL status and disk I/O bottleneck issues with the array containing the data. The server is configured with a 2 channel array controller. It is a RAID 5 array and has 4 drives, 2 per channel (2 data, 1 parity, and 1 hot spare). Obvious performance benefits in replacing the server are quadrupling CPU speed and doubling the memory. Other side benefits I will gain with the new drives, that I think should help my performance, are moving from u160 to u320, and going from 7200 RPM to either 10k or 15k RPM." How would you configure a larger array to best increase its performance?
Wireless Networking

WiFi Bridging? 51

Posted by Cliff from the wire-to-air-and-back-to-wire-again dept.
An anonymous reader asks: "I have a wireless network on one side of the street, and want to connect a computer on the other side of the street to it. Unfortunately this computer is behind a nice solid metal wall, and can't really be positioned near the signal. Currently I have a 20' USB cable going to a USB Linksys 802.11b unit, and a 20' RG58 cable going to a 14dB antenna and a PCI Linksys 802.11b card. Both of these cut out about once every 30 minutes, for about 5 seconds at a time. I also have an Airlink 802.11g PCI card and a Netgear 802.11b PCI card. What's the best way to connect to a kind of weak (-65db) signal? Can I use a wireless bridge in reverse, telling it an SSID and plugging the other end into an ethernet card? Which WiFi card has the most reliable software, that doesn't drop the connection all the time? I haven't been able to find much real info on this. Any help is appreciated, thanks!"
The Media

How Do You Keep Up with All of the Reading? 79

Posted by Cliff from the too-much-to-aborb-in-a-lifetime dept.
An anonymous reader asks: "As a professional working in software, my days are full as it is. Whenever possible, though, I attempt to keep up with my technical reading, whether it be IEEE or ACM journals, conference proceedings, Slashdot, or countless other sources. The problem is, there's no way to keep up! The magazines and journals that interest me alone create more material in a year than I could ever hope to absorb, and don't even get me started on the conferences. Do you, as a software professional, consider yourself up-to-speed enough when it comes to the latest and greatest in the public domain? If so, where do you draw the line?"

NeXTSTEP To Mac OS X 328

Posted by timothy from the after-all-these-years dept.
*no comment* writes "the folks over at OSviews have a nicely done article that explains the evolution of NeXTSTEP into Mac OS X. 'With the beginning of 1996, Apple realized that with the next generation PC's running Windows NT to be released within the decade, they would need a new, modern operating system to run on their machines. ... Amongst Apple's other options were to license Solaris from Sun, NT from Microsoft, or to purchase a small net services company called NeXT. Apple chose the latter.'" OSNews had another nice Mac-oriented look at NeXTSTEP last year; the Wikipedia entry is also worth looking through.
Christmas Cheer

Classic Toys For Christmas? 1085

Posted by Cliff from the fourty-two-shopping-days-left dept.
waterwheel asks: "Christmas is coming, and it's time to start planning our online shopping list for future Slashdot readers. This year I'm having a look at some of the more classic toys - and am finding that not only are some of the classic toys still around - but they are still educational and fun. Two good examples of this are the Rubik's Cube and the time honored gyroscope. The cube has been around for about 20 years, the gyroscope it seems for almost a 100. Both will be under the tree this year. Both of these toys are able to compete with video games - a true test of staying power. This begs the question - what other classic toys do you remember from your youth that are still fun enough that kids will play with them today?"
Communications

Ham and Software - Communities of Creativity? 207

Posted by Cliff from the share-your-anecdotes dept.
lgreco asks: "I've been thinking about the similarities between the community of early ham radio operators and software developers. Both communities produced a lot of useful technologies that found applications beyond the scope of a 'just a hobby'. Ham radio operators built their own equipment and experimented with modulation and propagation techniques. The results of their efforts today are used in a variety of radio communication applications, from cell phones to marine radios. Similarly, hackers developed concepts of computing that are now universally accepted tools of productivity. Both communities share an enthusiasm for technical creativity and up until recently there was even some overlap between the two groups. Are there any interesting stories about the creativity of either groups (that relate to the other group perhaps) that should be recorded and documented?"
Data Storage

Data Recovery Techniques For Dead Zip Disks? 44

Posted by timothy from the choose-a-deity-and-start-praying dept.
Lkmyst writes "Recently I had a Zip 250 disk die on me after the obvious channels were checked and found to be too expensive for a college student at $200US + I looked to see if there was perhaps another method I could use. A *nix dd looks like it might work but I thought I would ask slashdot to see if anyone out there has had luck with zip disks the drive no longer recognizes."
Games

Are Game Stats Important to You? 98

Posted by Cliff from the it's-all-in-the-numbers dept.
Nehle asks: "In almost every new multi-player game there is a way of keeping statistics about the games that are being played. Whether it's fan-based services or a service created by the game creator. Unreal Tournament 2004 can write nice HTML files for you, Bungie keep an insane amount of stats about games played over X-Box Live. For my favorite shooter - Enemy Territory, there is an application called Enemy Territory Teamstats and I wrote this little script to keep track of my games. Are stats any important to the average /. reader? Is it interesting how many times you shot 1337h4x0rg4m3r in the head, or is winning all that counts? Do you even want people to know if you lost 14 games in a row?"
Programming

Which Compiler to Extend for a Small Project? 89

Posted by Cliff from the ground-floor-of-computer-language-construction dept.
Andreas(R) asks: "While planning the design of my small programming language, and would appreciate some lessons learned from experienced programmers which have already tried this. I was investigating whether to start from an existing compiler and extend it. The compiler will be based on yacc, or bison. The programming language will be interpreted, object oriented and have higher order programming. Perl 1 seems like a decent starting point, as it's yacc based, and 5000 lines of code. Later versions of Perl are too large to get a good understanding of the whole program in a short period of time. Perl also has the right license (GPL). Is Python out of the question for such a project, since it's not GPL? What other small languages can be used instead? How do I go about designing a small programming language in practice, using what I already know about compiler theory?"
Graphics

History of "Gods Eye View" 3D Game Perspective? 70

Posted by Cliff from the eye-of-agamotto dept.
Milo_Mindbender asks: "A lot of games today feature a 2D or 3D 'instant replay' system that lets you watch the game you just played on a map or from a third person 3D view. Some multi-player games also let you watch live games in play this way. I'm trying make a time-line on the history of this feature and was hoping the Slashdot crowd could help me out with names, dates and other info on games that had replay features. I think the Army SIMNET tank simulator was the first to have this (called the 'flying carpet') sometime in the late '80s early '90s. References to games with replay are harder to find because it usually wasn't advertised. I'd particularly like to find the first game with user controlled 2D and 3D game replay/spectating and the first replay systems with automatic camera controls creating cinematic 'wide world of sports' quality real-time movies of the game."
Data Storage

USB Flash Drives for Backup/Long-Term Storage? 81

Posted by Cliff from the reliability-of-flash-media dept.
cyberdigm is curious about this issue: "I am writing two books and have just recently gone through the trauma of having my hard drive flake out (physical damage to several sectors). Fortunately, while the OS instance was trashed, the file system is still intact, so I have been able to recover my files.Given that, I am now much more aware of the needed to regularly back up my files. I'd be interested in any opinions about the suitability of USB flash drives to help me solve this problem. The idea would be to store copies of all my files on a USB drive and back them up every day. I like that USB drives are generally fairly cheap. My concern is the long-term wisdom of this approach. Are there (practical) rewrite limits for USB flash drives? Is there a chance that the data would degrade on the drive over time? Other alternatives I am considering include external/USB hard drives. Of course, an overarching concern is that I'd rather not spend a lot of money."
Software

Must-Have Pocket PC Software? 41

Posted by Cliff from the code-your-pocket-can't-live-without dept.
MBCook asks: "I just got a new Pocket PC with Windows Mobile 2003 SE on it. I haven't owned a PDA since my old HP 320LX (7 years ago, with Windows CE 1.0!). So since I've been out of the game for a while, I'd like to ask: what PocketPC software (both commercial and free) do you find essential? What little gems can't you live without? Game, productivity, utility, oddity, or other... I'd love to know what Slashdot readers find to be the best software."
GUI

Easy to Use Mice for Handicapped Persons? 36

Posted by Cliff from the alternatives-to-clicking dept.
Gavin Miller asks: "I've got a good friend with a disease that limits the use of his limbs, mainly his fingers. He says he can move a normal mouse but is no longer able to click. Does anyone know of input peripheral options that might be easier for him to use? I don't know exactly how much movement he does have in his fingers, or what he can or cannot do. I'm simply looking for some options that he can look into. Thanks!"
Data Storage

How Do You Handle Home Media? 381

Posted by timothy from the one-bit-at-a-time dept.
carpoolio writes "Yahoo's Tech Tuesday has an interesting series on bridging the PC/home entertainment gap. The solutions are fairly complicated, and very Windows-centric. As I store more media on my PowerBook, I'm finding more ways I can't listen to or view it on my stereo and TV. One example: TiVo Desktop won't stream AAC files - only MP3s - from iTunes to TiVo. That's an easy fix, but still: how do you get stuff off of your computer and onto your TV, stereo, etc.?"

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