Technology
gregladen | December 11, 2007The two most annoying kinds of "hits" from an internet search are:
1) When you find a site with your question rephrased exactly as it should be, and the first few sentences of the answer you need, but to continue ... to be able to read the answer ... you must register, and possibly even pay; and 2)
When all you can find is the answer on Yahoo Answers.
The blockbuster success of Yahoo! Answers is all the more surprising once you spend a few days using the site. While Answers is a valuable window into how people look for information online, it looks like a complete disaster as a traditional…
gregladen | December 11, 2007Sometimes, several unrelated changes come to a head at the same time, with a result no one could have predicted. The PC market is at such a tipping point right now and the result will be millions of Linux-powered PCs in users' hands.
Or so opines Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols of DesktopLinux.com.
Vaughan-Nichols sees the following changes as basic to and causal of a sea-change in the desktop world.
1) The continued maturation of dektop Linux, to the point where "no one can argue with a straight face that people can't get their work done on Linux-powered PCs
2) The development of the "$100" laptop…
gregladen | December 11, 2007From slashdot:
"I stumbled across this fascinating Microsoft tutorial entitled "How to Justify a Desktop Upgrade." It's an attempt to coach IT professionals on how to sell Windows desktop upgrades internally. Apparently the value of Vista is not readily apparent, requiring detailed instructions on how to connive and cajole into an upgrade from XP.
Here's a bit of the Microsoft Site:
How to Justify a Desktop Upgrade
...
Standardizing on the latest operating system and having enough RAM to support everyone's applications would make your life so much easier and more productive. It could also…
gregladen | December 11, 2007Check this out:
This is the IBM 350 Disk Storage Unit. It held five ... count ''em FIVE ... megabytes. That's not bytes, not kilobytes, but MEGA bytes, baby.
[source]
jlynch | December 10, 2007Presidential debates are largely meaningless. Simpleminded questions posed by simpleminded moderators who actively prevent candidates from answering in any sort of nuanced manner (were they able). In short, a microcosm of American political discourse in which snark and soundbite dominate substance every time.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could hear candidates answer questions on issues that we as scientists - and concerned public - care about? Wouldn’t it be great if we could have candidates devote an extended debate to such issues, a debate in which the environment, medicine & health, and…
gregladen | December 9, 2007... the guy who has ants in his hard drive, so he loads it up with insect spray. Kills bugs dead. And data too...
... the woman who's USB stick went through the wash. Whites whiter, brights brighter, data gonner...
... the guys who decided to test a parachute using their fancy digital camera as a weight. The parachute didn't work. But the camera did bust into tiny pieces....
... The British Scientist who got annoyed at the squeeking noise his hard drive made. So he experimented with oiling the hard drive. Hypothesis: Rejected. Data: Gone....
[source]
gregladen | December 9, 2007Have you seen the Marumushi news map?
Here is an example of the output for the category Health, showing the relative "presence" of different categories of news on Health in the US:
Here is the same topic for Canada:
And here is the national news map. For Britain:
Go here to make your own news maps!
clock | December 8, 2007My son is working on a paper for school and he picked the topic of video games and how they affect behavior. He primed himself by playing Assassin's Creed for a couple of days, so he could aggressively look for sources and he found these:
Most Middle-school Boys And Many Girls Play Violent Video GamesChildren's Personality Features Unchanged By Short-Term Video PlayStudy Examines Video Game Play Among AdolescentsSurgeons With Video Game Skill Appear To Perform Better In Simulated Surgery Skills CourseOnline Multiplayer Video Games Create Greater Negative Consequences, Elicit Greater…
clock | December 7, 2007Subscription-supported journals are like the qwerty keyboard:
Are there solutions? One reason for optimism is that changing how we pay the costs of disseminating research is not an all-or-nothing change like switching from qwerty to Dvorak keyboards. Some new open-access journals are very prestigious. Granting agencies are giving strong 'in-principle' support to open access publishing, and my last grant proposal's budget included a hefty amount for open-access publication charges. And libraries are looking for ways to escape the burden of subscription charges.
This is an interesting idea: an…
gregladen | December 7, 2007Also, know how to pronounce "primer" properly....
Hint: Skip ahead to minute two.
Omega looks like something I once saw on a button on a toilet in Japan.
gregladen | December 7, 2007In 200 6, Greg Kroah Hartman, a well known Linux Kernel expert, as able to declare that the following statement:
"Plug and Play in Linux is Still not at the Windows Level"
was not only incorrect, but that this statement:
"Linux supports more devices "out of the box" than any other operating system ever has"
If this is true, than why is it that people don't know this?
I dunno. I guess people are just dumb. I mean, recent polls showed that a very large percentage of Americans believe in fairies. Or was it witches. Whatever.
Instead of focusing on dumb things people believe, let's focus on…
gregladen | December 6, 2007This is a useful video to get the point of "wiki" across to, say, the students in your class or a group of coworkers who may not all be on the same page.
revere | December 6, 2007As an (unplanned) follow-up to today's morning post about public health use of the internet we have tonight's event in Second Life, a chance to meet and chat with wiki partner DemFromCT:
Our next installment of the Virtually Speaking interview series takes place TONIGHT, Thursday, at 6pm Pacific/9 pm Eastern.
We are very excited that DemFromCT can join us to talk about public health policy, in particular preparedness for a pandemic. He and I have been trading comments on some skepticism I have about this, so this is going to be an especially interesting discussion.
All skeptics are welcome…
gregladen | December 6, 2007Better than what you may ask? Better than:
-Older versions of LInux ... it is always improving.
-Windows. Hands down.
-Apple's operating system before Apple chose, essentially, Linux (a Unix variant) to run its eye candy and development environment on
But why, specifically, is it better?
One reason, apparently, is because the Linux Kernel does not have a stable API.
So what, you ask, is a Kernel and/or an API? Very simple: The Kernel is the guts, the most basic part, the way-down way-down of the operating system. What is the API? That stands for Application Programming Interface. The…
gregladen | December 5, 2007Go Green! Homemade Diesel - video powered by Metacafe
[hat tip: Curiosity]
gregladen | December 5, 2007Legendary designer Philippe Starck -- with no pretty slides behind him -- spends 18 minutes reaching for the very roots of the question "Why design?" Along the way he drops brilliant insights into the human condition; listen carefully for one perfectly crystallized mantra for all of us, genius or not. Yet all this deep thought, he cheerfully admits, is to aid in the design of a better toothbrush.
TED
pontiff | December 5, 2007Since I got into trouble for posting about the need for more, not less, funding for science and engineering, (and, I might add, a reengineering of our approach to what it means to produce a successful Ph.D.), I thought I'd continue the trouble by linking to a post over at the Computing Research Policy Blog, "Computer and Mathematical Science Occupations Expected to Grow Quickest Over the Next Decade."
revere | December 5, 2007Most people in the developed world think of measles as a pesky but fairly benign childhood disease. For the current generation, who has had the benefit of immunization with measles vaccine, it is also a historical curiosity. Not so for the developing world, where measles has been a major killer of children and infants. Africa has become the poster child for failed public health programs so it is nice to be able to say that when it comes to measles prevention, Africa is a special success story:
Africa, which has long had the most measles deaths, has seen the biggest drop, 91 percent. In many…