AltairMan - Slashdot User

Possible Treatment For Ebola 157

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday August 25, 2010 @06:59PM from the there's-a-pill-for-that dept.

RedEaredSlider writes "Researchers at the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases have found a class of drugs that could provide treatment for Ebola and Marburg hemorrhagic fever. The new drugs are called 'antisense' compounds, and they allow the immune system to attack the viruses before they can do enough damage to kill the patient. Travis Warren, research scientist at USAMRIID, said while the work is still preliminary -— the drugs have been tested only on primates — the results are so far promising. In the case of Ebola, five of eight monkeys infected with the virus lived, and with Marburg, all survived. The drugs were developed as part of a program to deal with possible bioterrorist threats, in partnership with AVI Biopharma."

The Science of Caddyshack 55

Posted by samzenpus on Friday July 30, 2010 @01:28PM from the it's-in-the-hole dept.

astroengine writes "Thirty years after the release of the cult classic comedy Caddyshack, Discovery News has geeked out and gone on the hunt for any trace amount of science they can find in the movie (video). From gopher territoriality to seismic deformation, from pool poop bacteria to the color of lightning, it turns out there's quite a lot of science to talk about..."

How Nintendo's Mario Got His Name 103

Posted by samzenpus on Monday April 26, 2010 @01:13PM from the can't-wait-for-the-origin-movie dept.

harrymcc writes "In 1981, tiny Nintendo of America was getting ready to release Donkey Kong. When the company's landlord, Mario Segale, demanded back rent, Nintendo staffers named the game's barrel-jumping protagonist after him. Almost thirty years later, neither Nintendo — which continues to crank out Mario games — nor Segale — now a wealthy, secretive Washington State real estate developer — like to talk about how one of video games' iconic characters got his name and Italian heritage. Technologizer's Benj Edwards has researched the story for years and provides the most detailed account to date."

Nearby Star Forecast To Skirt Solar System 135

Posted by Soulskill on Friday March 12, 2010 @07:36PM from the we're-doomed dept.

PipianJ writes "A recent preprint posted on arXiv by Vadim Bobylev presents some startling new numbers about a future close pass of one of our stellar neighbors. Based on studies of the Hipparcos catalog, Bobylev suggests that the nearby orange dwarf Gliese 710 has an 86% chance of skirting the outer bounds of the Solar System and the hypothesized Oort Cloud in the next 1.5 million years. As the Oort Cloud is thought to be the source of many long-period comets, the gravitational effects of Gliese's passing could send a shower of comets into the inner Solar System, threatening Earth. This news about Gliese 710 isn't exactly new, but it's one of the first times the probability of this near-miss has been quantified."

7 of the Best Free Linux Calculators 289

Posted by timothy on Saturday January 30, 2010 @08:36PM from the open-in-tabs dept.

An anonymous reader writes "One of the basic utilities supplied with any operating system is a desktop calculator. These are often simple utilities that are perfectly adequate for basic use. They typically include trigonometric functions, logarithms, factorials, parentheses and a memory function. However, the calculators featured in this article are significantly more sophisticated with the ability to process difficult mathematical functions, to plot graphs in 2D and 3D, and much more. Occasionally, the calculator tool provided with an operating system did not engender any confidence. The classic example being the calculator shipped with Windows 3.1 which could not even reliably subtract two numbers. Rest assured, the calculators listed below are of precision quality."

FreeDOS Turns 15 Years Old Today 124

Posted by Soulskill on Sunday June 28, 2009 @11:02AM from the keeps-on-ticking dept.

Jim Hall writes "The FreeDOS Project turns 15 years old today! PD-DOS (later, 'FreeDOS') was announced to the world on June 28 1994 as a free replacement for MS-DOS, which Microsoft had announced would go away the following year, with the next release of Windows. There's more history available at the FreeDOS 'About' page and my blog. Today, FreeDOS is used by people all around the world. You can find FreeDOS in many different places: emulators, playing old DOS games, business, ... even bundled with laptops and netbooks. FreeDOS is still under active development, and recently released a new version of its kernel. A 'FreeDOS 1.1' distribution is planned."

Washington State Wants DNA From All Arrestees 570

Posted by CmdrTaco on Thursday February 05, 2009 @01:04PM from the i-feel-safer-already dept.

An anonymous reader writes in to say that "Suspects arrested in cases as minor as shoplifting would have to give a DNA sample before they are even charged with a crime if a controversial proposal is approved by the Legislature. "It is good technology. It solves crimes," claims Don Pierce, executive director of the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs. Under the bill, authorities would supposedly destroy samples and DNA profiles from people who weren't charged, were found not guilty or whose convictions were overturned. Others believe that this is just another step in the process to build a national DNA database with everyone in it."

Comment Re:Rubbish (Score 2, Insightful) 245

by AltairMan on Monday June 20, 2005 @08:35AM (#12862081) Attached to: Retro Machines Key to Rescuing Old Data

The need to keep around the old hardware depends on your goals. If you're into historical preservation, then you of course would keep, restore, and maintain an old machine. If you just want to move the data and programs and exit the platform, then donate the hardware to someone who wants to use it.

I've written an emulator program that emulates an Altair 8800. Functional? Yes. Does it run old programs? Yes. Fun to use? I think so, if you like ASCII character-based games. Is it the same to operate as the real one? No, not exactly.

Once you've moved your data and programs from the old machine to the emulated machine, you don't really need the old machine. Yes, some formats are easier to move than others and don't require the original hardware, but others can't be read by modern PCs without rediculous amounts of effort. So, you use the old machine to continue to move programs to another media so that the bits can be preserved.

But, there are reasons to keep the old machine. First, it's the overall feel of operating the machine in person. Second, some programs and games just plain feel better on the original hardware. Thrid, it's preservation of computing history. Fourth, there's no better way to understand how a system works than to physically work on it. I want my kids to sit at my first computer, a VIC-20, and play the same games I played as a kid.

Along these lines, I set up an Atari 2600 along side of the Nintendo. Believe it or not, they play the 2600 as much or more than the Nintendo. Although the graphics are nothing in comparison, the games are engaging so they keep coming back.

I didn't appreciate the difference between an emulation and the real thing until I got my own Altair. There's no substitute for clicking the switches yourself, for swapping around boards, or for running tape through a paper tape reader.

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