Comment Re:Nice, put unobtainable (Score 0) 26
$10,000 will just about cover the cost of your solar panels, good luck also getting chassis, aero shell, batteries, MPPTs, wheels/tires, etc. etc. etc. for that money.
Comment Re:Doesn't seem all that hard to diff (Score 1) 170
And when a new service/process/task is installed with Windows software average users, nay nobody, even cares at all.
Comment Re:C64 DTV designer (Score 1) 224
Could you explain why you think this? I'm genuinely interested.
Comment Re:Scifi/Technical (Score 1) 363
There was a $12 (ish) surcharge to get IEEE Spectrum as a print edition instead of digital so I opted for that to get an extra tangible benefit out of my membership. I don't value digital media, possibly due to a lifetime of piracy.
4-Billion-Pixel Panorama View From Curiosity Rover 101
A reader points out that there is a great new panorama made from shots from the Curiosity Rover. "Sweep your gaze around Gale Crater on Mars, where NASA's Curiosity rover is currently exploring, with this 4-billion-pixel panorama stitched together from 295 images. ...The entire image stretches 90,000 by 45,000 pixels and uses pictures taken by the rover's two MastCams. The best way to enjoy it is to go into fullscreen mode and slowly soak up the scenery — from the distant high edges of the crater to the enormous and looming Mount Sharp, the rover's eventual destination."
Ask Slashdot: Best Tools For Dealing With Glare Sensitivity? 195
First time accepted submitter der_pinchy writes "For many years I have used a high-contrast desktop color scheme (with green text on black background) and notice more and more software uses a forced color scheme that can make it difficult to use. For web browsing I have always used Opera and its white-on-black user style sheet, but have to constantly tweak it so that certain elements and transparent images are visible. Is there anything to be done with some of the major offenders, like Office or recent versions of Visual Studio? Even recent browsers that support user style sheets still use a forced color scheme on a lot of there dialog controls."
Has Lego Sold Out? 425
Hugh Pickens writes "Matt Richtel and Jesse McKinley write in the NY Times that for generations of American children, Legos were the ultimate do-it-yourself plaything. Little plastic bricks, with scant instructions, just add imagination. But today's construction sets are often tied to billion-dollar franchises like Star Wars and Lord of the Rings and invite users to follow detailed directions, not construct their own creations from whole brick. It's less open-ended, some parents and researchers say, and more like paint-by-numbers. 'When I was a kid, you got a big box of bricks and that was it,' says Tracy Bagatelle-Black. 'What stinks about Lego sets now is that they're not imaginative at all.' Lego loyalists are quick to defend the company. Josh Wedin, the managing editor of the Brothers Brick, a Lego blog, called complaints that they are less creative 'simply ridiculous,' adding that Legos always included some instructions, though he says he misses the alternative designs that used to be on the back of the box. But Clifford Nass, a sociology professor at Stanford University who studies how people relate to the physical world versus the virtual world, says some essential qualities were lost when Lego became more like other toys. 'The genius of Lego was, you had to do the work.' Learning about frustration, Nass says, 'is a hugely important thing.'" (And watch soon for a review of The Unofficial Lego Builder's Guide, a book intended to help Lego users escape the tyranny of block-by-number instructions.)
Comment Re:missing option (Score 2) 321
I agree. The Hakko fx-888 is a great beginner temperature controlled 60W iron available for about $100.
Comment Re:Impact energy not the same for small objects (Score 2) 186
I had a quick look through some journals and this is the closest thing I could find:
Mating Behavior as a Possible Cause of Bat Fatalities at Wind Turbines, Paul M. Cryan, The Journal of Wildlife Management, Vol. 72, No. 3 (Apr., 2008), pp. 845-849, Allen Press
Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25097617
Bats are killed by wind turbines in North America and Europe in large numbers, yet a satisfactory explanation for this phenomenon remains elusive. Most bat fatalities at turbines thus far occur during late summer and autumn and involve species that roost in trees. In this commentary I draw on existing literature to illustrate how previous behavioral observations of the affected species might help explain these fatalities. I hypothesize that tree bats collide with turbines while engaging in mating behaviors that center on the tallest trees in a landscape, and that such behaviors stem from 2 different mating systems (resource defense polygyny and lekking). Bats use vision to move across landscapes and might react to the visual stimulus of turbines as they do to tall trees. This scenario has serious conservation and management implications. If mating bats are drawn to turbines, wind energy facilities may act as population sinks and risk may be hard to assess before turbines are built. Researchers could observe bat behavior and experimentally manipulate trees, turbines, or other tall structures to test the hypothesis that tree bats mate at the tallest trees. If this hypothesis is supported, management actions aimed at decreasing the attractiveness of turbines to tree bats may help alleviate the problem.
The Mating System of Tadarida brasiliensis (Chiroptera: Molossidae) in a Large Highway Bridge Colony, Annika T. H. Keeley and Brian W. Keeley, Journal of Mammalogy , Vol. 85, No. 1 (Feb., 2004), pp. 113-119, American Society of Mammalogists
Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1383984
Focal animal sampling at a highway bridge revealed an aggressive and a passive male copulation strategy that may function as adaptations to different roost conditions. During aggressive copulation, the male separates a female from a roost cluster and restricts her movements during mating while he emits characteristic calls. During passive copulation, the male moves very slowly onto a female that roosts in a dense cluster. Passive copulations occur without resistance from the female and without male vocalizations. Both males and females mate with multiple partners, suggesting that mating is promiscuous.
I'm an electronic engineering student, not a biologist, so someone else may find better information!
Zuckerberg Updates Relationship Status To "Married" 335
theodp writes "A day after taking Facebook public, CEO Mark Zuckerberg changed his Facebook status to 'married' after wedding longtime girlfriend and recent med school grad Priscilla Chan on Saturday. No word if Zuckerberg heeded Donald Trump's prenup advice."
Christmas Always On Sunday? Researchers Propose New Calendar 725
An anonymous reader writes "Researchers at Johns Hopkins University have discovered a way to make time stand still — at least when it comes to the yearly calendar. Using computer programs and mathematical formulas, an astrophysicist and an economist have created a new calendar in which each new 12-month period is identical to the one which came before, and remains that way from one year to the next in perpetuity."
India Launches $35 Tablet 203
Many readers have submitted stories about a new $35 tablet computer released today in India. The Aakash (meaning sky) has been handed out to 500 students for an initial trial run, if successful a $60 commercial version will hit the shelves later this year. The Aakash computer runs Android 2.2 (Froyo), has a 7-inch touch screen, 256MB of RAM, 32GB expandable memory slot, two USB ports, and weighs in at only 350 grams.
Comment Re:Fail (Score 1) 452
Slightly off-topic: I don't want to move away from FF 3.6.x... I don't like Chrome's UI, and I don't like how FF is just copying it. I hope somebody forks FF 3.6 to give it support for HTML5. I might if I ever find the time.
Hotfile Sues Warner Bros Over Abuse of Takedown Tool 155
schwit1 writes with a piece in Torrent Freak about ongoing litigation between Hotfile and a few movie studios. From the article: "Hotfile has sued Warner Bros. for fraud and abuse. Hotfile accuses the movie studio of systematically abusing its anti-piracy tool by taking down hundreds of titles they don't hold the copyrights to, including open source software. Among other things, Hotfile is looking for damages to compensate the company for the losses they suffered."
Near the end of the article it is mentioned that files taken down by the tool were replaced with links to legally procure similar works from Warner Bros.
Wicked Lasers Introduces Handheld One-Watt Green Laser 404
First time accepted submitter (and Slashdot coder) cogent writes "Wicked Lasers, famous for last year's 1000mW handheld blue laser, and infamous for its handling of six-month-long backorders, is now selling a green version. There are three power levels, each priced at $1/mW (300mW, 500mW, 1000mW). Since the eye is far more sensitive to green than to blue, this is pretty much the state of the art in putting-dots-on-stuff technology. Wicked Lasers sent out an email promising to handle backorders much better this time."
Adds reader whitedsepdivine: "There is currently no disclaimer that this is not a lightsaber on their site, so we can only assume that this version is."
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"Here's something to think about: How come you never see a headline like `Psychic Wins Lottery.'" -- Comedian Jay Leno
