Sylvak - Slashdot User

Simulation of Close Asteroid Fly-By 148

Posted by Soulskill on Monday December 21, 2009 @11:46AM from the close-enough-to-feel-the-vacuum-breeze dept.

c0mpliant writes "NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory have released a simulation of the path of an asteroid, named Apophis, that will come very close to Earth in 2029 — the closest predicted approach since humans have monitored for such heavenly bodies. The asteroid caused a bit of a scare when astronomers first announced that it would enter Earth's neighborhood some time in the future. However, since that announcement in 2004, more recent calculations have put the odds of collision at 1 in 250,000."

Yellowstone Supervolcano Larger Than First Thought 451

Posted by timothy on Tuesday December 15, 2009 @11:50AM from the even-superer dept.

drewtheman writes "New studies of the plumbing that feeds the Yellowstone supervolcano in Wyoming's Yellowstone National Park shows the plume and the magma chamber under the volcano are larger than first thought and contradicts claims that only shallow hot rock exists. University of Utah research professor of geophysics Robert Smith led four separate studies that verify a plume of hot and molten rock at least 410 miles deep that rises at an angle from the northwest."

Comment Re:Maybe not so new (Score 1) 113

by Sylvak on Thursday December 10, 2009 @05:09PM (#30394186) Attached to: Quebec Data Center Built In a Silo

if you think about it, it does make sense. the cold air will heat up after going through the racks, and that hot air will escape from the top. probably easier to push the hot air down once it is in the 'heat core' than it would be pushing hot air down the silo

US Air Force Buying Another 2,200 PS3s 144

Posted by Soulskill on Wednesday November 25, 2009 @05:02AM from the quick-who-knows-a-good-ps3-flight-sim dept.

bleedingpegasus sends word that the US Air Force will be grabbing up 2,200 new PlayStation 3 consoles for research into supercomputing. They already have a cluster made from 336 of the old-style (non-Slim) consoles, which they've used for a variety of purposes, including "processing multiple radar images into higher resolution composite images (known as synthetic aperture radar image formation), high-def video processing, and 'neuromorphic computing.'" According to the Justification Review Document (DOC), "Once the hardware configuration is implemented, software code will be developed in-house for cluster implementation utilizing a Linux-based operating software."

Comment Palin's Blog (Score 5, Funny) 424

by Sylvak on Thursday July 16, 2009 @11:02AM (#28717039) Attached to: Huge Unidentified Organic Blob Floating Around Alaska

She was advised to create a Blog, but heard blob

Comment Re:Silverlight (Score 2, Informative) 329

by Sylvak on Monday November 17, 2008 @06:56PM (#25788435) Attached to: Adobe Releases Preview of 64-bit Flash For Linux

Silverlight is not currently available on linux... only windows and mac. So I guess adobe beat them to that milestone.

I have been waiting for the linux flash 64bit plugin for 3 years+. I can't believe a company like adobe couldn't deliver during all this time. It seems that they had their head in the sand for all that time. If Microsoft caused them to finally face reality, then I send them my thanks.

I don't really care who wins this tech war, as long as I don't have to use windows to view a freaken web site.

(I know my 64bit linux could load flash sites, but the implementation was buggy as hell, causing me to restart firefox and cross my fingers many times. Hopefully their release will change this.)

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