sk19842 - Slashdot User

Comment What's the distribution? (Score 2) 326

by sk19842 on Tuesday November 29, 2011 @06:36PM (#38207954) Attached to: Physicist Uses Laser Light As Fast, True-Random Number Generator

I agree that the numbers are random, in the sense that they're subject to chance, but how confident are they that they know the sampling distribution? That is, can you use this method to generate a random sample a with uniform distribution, or a gamma distribution, or anything else you'd like to use random numbers for?

With quantum observation errors, I wonder if they're assuming the sampling distribution is normal, in which case they'd have to do some work to convert it to give the kind of output that rand() gives. Problems would likely show up in the tails of the distribution (near 0 and 1). TFA doesn't mention any of the statistical issues, only the physics ones.

Comment Re:It is caused by (Score 4, Informative) 501

by sk19842 on Sunday March 20, 2011 @01:50PM (#35551788) Attached to: 2011 MacBook Pros Confirmed To Crash Under Load

iStat isn't necessary to cause the problem. Most people seem to be able to reproduce the issue by opening Photo Booth and trying to install/compile Boost from MacPorts (per these directions). FWIW, following these directions just crashed my 2011 15" MBP.

It seems to be an ATI graphics card issue, because some people report that they can get a stable machine by setting their graphics to integrated only with gfxCardStatus.

Drupal 7 85

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday October 20, 2010 @02:41PM from the read-all-about-it dept.

Trevor James writes "Drupal 7 is currently at beta 1 stage with 11 critical issues remaining to be fixed before an official release version. The question arises whether we should all be writing about Drupal 7 now and so soon, when it's still in its beta phase. I argue we should be writing about it. It can only help introduce new users to the Drupal application and the Drupal community and get new people involved to help test Drupal 7. This will ultimately help improve the software for its official release and on. This helps to build the Drupal community of users and developers. It helps spread the word to everyone about this flexible and robust content management system. We want Drupal to be used. So this is one way of getting it out there and in the public sphere." Read on for the rest of Trevor's review.

Drupal E-commerce With Ubercart 2.x 65

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday September 22, 2010 @02:14PM from the read-all-about-it dept.

Michael J. Ross writes "In the past, a Web developer tasked with building an online store would most likely do so using a dedicated e-commerce system, instead of a content management system (CMS), because even though the leading CMSs offered more features and flexibility, they did not provide robust e-commerce capabilities, such as product listings, bulk import, pricing in multiple currencies, a built-in shopping cart, and integration with tax and shipping information sources. Since that time, e-commerce systems have become more like CMSs, by adding features such as blogging and forums. At the same time, CMSs are continually expanding their e-commerce potential, usually in the form of developers adding plug-ins. For developers using Drupal, there traditionally have been two major e-commerce plug-ins (known as "modules"): Ubercart and e-Commerce. The former has emerged as the leader, and is explored in Drupal E-commerce with Ubercart 2.x." Read on for the rest of Michael's review.

Drupal 6 Content Administration 50

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday August 11, 2010 @02:32PM from the read-all-about-it dept.

Trevor James writes "Finally, here's a Drupal book specifically for Drupal content editors and site managers, those folks responsible for posting new content and editing existing content on a Drupal site. While many of the Packt series of Drupal books focuses on code, development and are written for Drupal developers, this title is for anyone who is dealing with management of Drupal based content and any individuals or teams responsible for the management of Drupal sites on a daily and hourly basis. This book is also perfect for introductory Drupal classes and I will not hesitate to use it in my Drupal 101 classes in the near future." Read on for the rest of Trevor's review.

Comment Re:Dupe (Score 1) 236

by sk19842 on Sunday November 18, 2007 @10:53PM (#21402851) Attached to: Cryptography Expert Sounds Alarm At Possible Math Hack

Sorta, but not quite a dupe. This post also includes speculation about what would happen if there were math errors in chips. The reference to Schneier's discovery about elliptic curve PRNG's was just to whet our appetite. But deliberate backdoors and ones created by mistake are two different things.

Slashdot Top Deals