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Comment What's to stop blinding reflections? (Score 1) 482

by markh1967 (#32970608) Attached to: Warships May Get Lasers For Close-In Defense
Isn't this laser going to produce lots of instant retina frying reflections from the target that are going to play randomly over anything nearby? If a 250mw laser is a serious blinding hazard a 32kw laser must be a much more serious problem even after the reflections have bounced off several reflective surfaces.
Image

Doctor Slams Hospital's "Please" Policy 572

Posted by samzenpus from the paging-doctor-manners dept.
Administrators at England's Worthing Hospital are insisting that doctors say the magic word when writing orders for blood tests on weekends. If a doctor refuses to write "please" on the order, the test will be refused. From the article: "However, a doctor at the hospital said on condition of anonymity that he sees the policy as a money-saving measure that could prove dangerous for patients. 'I was shocked to come in on Sunday and find none of my bloods had been done from the night before because I'd not written "please,"' the doctor said. 'I had no results to guide treatment of patients. Myself and a senior nurse had to take the bloods ourselves, which added hours to our 12-hour shifts. This system puts patients' lives at risk. Doctors are wasting time doing the job of the technicians.'"

Comment Re:Interval arithmetic (Score 1) 359

by harshaw (#32067608) Attached to: What Every Programmer Should Know About Floating-Point Arithmetic

Everyone's comment in this thread is correct per se, "you need precise language to describe math", "you didn't work hard enough to read the article", "you are lazy", "wikipedia is not for teaching", etc.

You are all correct.

However, I would like a resource that helps me understand the math *without* becoming an expert. Or at least better tools. Look - it's been 13 years since College. I don't remember all the terminology. However, there are many times when I would like to dive deep into a field of mathematics, or at least refresh my knowledge (stats is a good example). I find wikipedia less than helpful in this regard -or least that grokking the page takes a ton of time and effort.

Comment Re:Interval arithmetic (Score 4, Insightful) 359

by harshaw (#32065454) Attached to: What Every Programmer Should Know About Floating-Point Arithmetic

Gah. Yet another unintelligible wikipedia mathematics article. For once I did like to see an article that does a great job *teaching* about a subject. Perhaps wikipedia isn't the right home for this sort of content, but my general feeling whenever reading something is wikipedia is that the content was drafted by a bunch of overly precise wankers focusing on the absolute right terminology without focusing on helping the reader understand the content.

Comment get a ZvBox (Score 1) 194

by harshaw (#25905845) Attached to: Blockbuster's Movie Download Box Runs Linux

Ok, so I know it isn't cool to on slashdot to pimp your own products, but you might try getting a ZvBox (http://zeevee.com) if you want to get any content to your TV. This works because it snarfs the your video output and transmits HD quality video to your HDTV. And yes, it requires a PC. And yes, it is expensive (we are working on lowering the price). But, since a PC can play any content it truly is a universal solution.

Comment Tech names used to be meaningful....mostly (Score 1) 247

by markh1967 (#25731613) Attached to: How 10 Iconic Tech Products Got Their Names
It seems that these days tech names don't have to mean anything and, in fact, the more meaningless the better; if you make up a new word you can be sure that searches for it will only return sites relevent to your product. I miss the old days where tech names were generally meaningful, if a bit obscure, but there were some noteable exceptions that sounded meaningful but weren't. A couple that spring to mind are KERMIT (an old BBS file transfer protocol) which had several theories about what it was an acronym for before its creator finally admitted he just named it after the muppet and TWAIN (scanner data protocol) which stands for 'Technology Without An Interesting Name'.
Handhelds

VMware Promises Multiple OSs On One Cellphone 90

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the just-make-sure-i-can-strip-it-off-if-i-want dept.
superglaze writes to tell us that VMware has announced a large effort behind their Mobile Virtualization Platform, promising the possibility of multiple operating systems on mobile devices. "The company described MVP as a 'thin layer of software' that will be embedded in handsets and 'be optimized to run efficiently on low-power-consuming and memory-constrained mobile phones.' Asked whether MVP would offer something different from the abstraction already provided by mobile Java, VMware's European product director Fredrik Sjostedt told ZDNet UK that MVP would require less recoding. 'If you want to have an application run on a Java-specific appliance, you need to code it for Java,' Sjostedt said. 'What we're introducing with MVP is an [embedded] abstraction layer below that, between the physical hardware and the software layer.'"
Privacy

Vista is Watching You 458

Posted by CmdrTaco from the also-up-is-higher-than-down dept.
greengrass writes "Are you using Windows Vista? Then you might as well know that the licensed operating system installed on your machine is harvesting a healthy volume of information for Microsoft. In this context, a program such as the Windows Genuine Advantage is the last of your concerns. In fact, in excess of 20 Windows Vista features and services are hard at work collecting and transmitting your personal data to the Redmond company."

Firefox Accepting Feature Suggestions for Version 3 422

Posted by Zonk from the i-would-like-a-pony dept.
Krishna Dagli writes to mention an article over at Ars Technica discussing the Firefox team's call for feature suggestions. Version 3 of the software is already in the works, and the team members are looking to the community for ideas on where to go next. From the article: "The wish list is long indeed, and it provides an insight into the desires of the browser community, and a look at the open source development process. While closed-source projects often ask their user community for feedback on requested features, the process is not usually open to the public. For Firefox 3, anyone can both suggest new features and comment on other people's suggestions. The feature requests are divided into categories, such as browser customization, privacy features, security, history, download manager, and other areas. There are suggestions for features found in other competing browsers, such Safari, IE 7 beta, and Opera. IE7 seemed to be featured most prominently, with requests for "low-rights mode," as well as more cosmetic features like skins that mimic Microsoft's browser."

UnBox Calls Home, A Lot 252

Posted by Zonk from the it's-lonely dept.
SachiCALaw writes "It turns out that to use UnBox, the user has to download software from Amazon that contains a Windows service (ADVWindowsClientService.exe). Tom Merritt over at C|Net reports that the service tries to connect to the internet quite frequently. Even tweaking msconfig could not prevent it." From the article: "So, in summary, to be allowed the privilege of purchasing a video that I can't burn to DVD and can't watch on my iPod, I have to allow a program to hijack my start-up and force me to login to uninstall it? No way. Sorry, Amazon. I love a lot of what you do, but I will absolutely not recommend this service. Try again."

Microsoft Changes Office 2007 Interface Again 300

Posted by Zonk from the tweaking dept.
daria42 writes "Microsoft has modified its interface for Office 2007 yet again, after complaints from beta testers that the 'ribbon' system took up too much space on screen. The article discusses the resistance the new interface is likely to prompt in old users of the software, both at a personal and corporate level. From a format perspective, there are other changes to expect as well." From the article: "Hodgson also confirmed that Microsoft is working on tools to help enterprises automatically translate existing documents into new file formats being introduced in Office 2007. 'We've been asked by a lot of customers to provide tools to do mass migrations,' he said. 'There will be tools that will take a million documents and migrate those to the new formats.' One likely incentive for that migration will be reduced storage costs. Microsoft claims that file sizes for the new Office 2007 XML-based formats are up to 75 percent less than existing Office formats."

Microsoft's 'Naughty or Nice' Patent Application 125

Posted by CowboyNeal from the diff'rent-strokes dept.
theodp writes "Those of you worried about Microsoft's stance on network neutrality won't find much comfort in the software giant's just-published patent application for systems and methods to facilitate self regulation of social networks through trading and gift exchange, which classify users as good or bad and call for network bandwidth to be reduced for those deemed 'less desirable.'"

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