The
Instead of the "forward" approach I suggest a "back-end" approach: if the best a browser can do is hand you a boatload of possibilities, maybe the browser should supply you with tools to refine those possibilities. One idea along these lines is to consider your list of results as a series of entries in a relational database, and let you refine the list with, say, SQL-like commands. For example:
DELETE ALL ENTRY IN RESULTS IF ENTRY.sequence > 1000;
-- Limits further operations to the first 1000 results. Note this doesn't delete the actual pages (!), just the entries in the "database" of search results.
FOR ALL ENTRY IN RESULTS IF "clinton" IN ENTRY.url AND "Hillary" IN ENTRY.text THEN DELETE ENTRY;
-- Gets rid of all pages containing "Hillary" if the url contains "clinton". Yes, it's a lot of typing but the browser saves all commands and you can create a file that is auto-executed for every search result, if it means that much to you.
FOR ALL ENTRY IN RESULTS IF ENTRY.date > '2014/06/20' and ENTRY.date < '2014/12/21' THEN PASS ELSE DELETE ENTRY;
-- Removes everything except pages made in Summer/Fall of 2014. It must have been a very good year.
And so on.
About half of the
Probably what's needed is a research project that identifies what kind of properties are useful in the "results database". No need to build your own search engine -- just send a search command to Google (under program control) and harvest the results, building the "results database". It's not that hard. Building an SQL-like command parser isn't that difficult either, assuming knowledge of lex and yacc, or the like. It's a bit more difficult to figure out what properties and commands are useful. (If any!)
Summer Of Code, anyone?
> You do realize that the colour spectrum of LEDs is a solved problem, right?
But that doesn't mean MY problem is solved. It's not clear to me I'll be able to find a bulb of the right size with all the features, such as 50-100-150 3-way, good color spectrum, dimmability etc.
Imagine all the Yahoos at Home Depot who will tell you this or that bulb will work for whatever purpose you specify, when in fact they're just following their training: sell first and leave the returns for the insensitive clods at the returns desk.
BTW, What you *should* be watching today is http://animal.discovery.com/tv-shows/puppy-bowl
I did, for a few minutes. Pathetic.
As an aside, does anyone know if there exists a software package that lets you perform securely encrypted incremental remote backups?
I have EaseUS Todo Backup and it looks like it can do all that, but it costs money (~$30) and probably only runs on Windows. I've got a Linksys Slug with 3TB storage and use EaseUS for weekly full and nightly differential backups. But I don't use encryption...hmm, I wonder why?
Very nice list.
I'd like to propose home schooling aids. No, home schooling is not new. What is new is the large amount of help now available for parents who are willing and able to teach their own kids.
Also: education vouchers, where parents can choose to send their children to schools outside their district.
Both of these are politically charged innovations that try to address some problems with American education. So was Brown. Not everybody needs to approve of an innovation for it to have an impact.
[...] My point? Shakespeare possibly would get marks on his paper in a modern school for 'bad spelling.' The nattering pedants who fuss excessively about spelling are a modern phenomenon.[...]
I suspect if Shakespeare knew he had a standard to follow, he most likely would have followed it and only gotten good marks. Especially with the spelling correctors available today.
I'm sorry and I know it's not my place and I hate to be a grammer Nazi.
G-R-A-M-M-A-R
IIRC, tiny PCs use a single 1GB DRAM chip soldered (not socketed) to the mainboard. You might want to toss in a few carefully-wrapped spares. And a soldering iron if you're really concerned.
If everybody knows there's a PC with Linux / USB / SATA then you've got a good storage standard all can adhere to.
I didn't see Grammar Nazis when I read this article. I misread "gaffes" as "giraffes", and thus pictured that "grammar gaffes have invaded the office", which is quite an amusing thought when you try to envision it, especially the commotion when they walk in through the lobby yelling at everyone who ends a sentence with a preposition. My grammar giraffes might have been German nonetheless though because they were wearing kaiser helmets and spoke with a German accent. Come to think of it, now when I picture them they're wearing Nazi armbands around their legs and are sentencing office workers who confuse "lose" and "loose" to labor camps where they'll toil in the sun picking acacia leaves.
Except giraffes can't speak, except for grunts and the like
COBOL is for morons. -- E.W. Dijkstra
