[Slashdot-mailer] Slashdot Daily Report (11/15/2000)
David Jacoby
jacoby@ecn.purdue.edu
Wed, 15 Nov 2000 11:00:02 -0500 (EST)
Slashdot Daily Report ( http://slashdot.org/ )
News for Nerds. Stuff That Matters.
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Unmanned (But Armed) Aircraft Experiments In 2001
A articles article from the "more-efficient-ways-of-killing-other-beings" department
sent by sengan
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/13/2036201
John Warden, architect of the Gulf war air
campaign, believes that by 2025 90% of combat
aircraft will be unmanned. Next spring, the first
armed aircraft without pilot, the X-45A UCAV will
make its maiden flight. Replacing the pilot by a
ground controller cuts the price of each unit by
two-thirds, and makes it easier to transport. The
Economist has more, and states 'the decision to
fire weapons should be made by a human, to reduce
the risk of "friendly fire."' This is not logical:
Since the planes can be networked and thus know
each other's relative positions, preventing
friendly fire is a much simpler problem than the
visual recognition required to determine what to
shoot at, unless you don't mind hitting
non-military targets. I wonder what Asimov would
think.
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What Are Advantages/Disavantages To Flex Time?
A askslashdot article from the "your-answers-to-common-questions" department
sent by Cliff
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/11/1831233
achurch asks: "I work for a fairly large Japanese
software company which runs most of its divisions
on a fixed time schedule (i.e. 9:00am-5:30pm plus
overtime). I happen to be in the one division that
has a flex-time system, but I've been hearing
rumors of late that the company is considering
getting rid of that and putting us back on shift,
too. My gut reaction to that is 'you do that, I
quit,' but I'd like to put together a viable
argument for maintaining/expanding flex here. So
I'd like to get some opinions on why flex time is
a Good Thing: What has flex done for you/your
company? Why do you (or don't you) prefer flex to
a fixed schedule? Reasons that appeal to
management types would be especially helpful." I'm
sure this question is one that is on quite a few
minds out there. Have strong feelings about this
either way, then please share them here.
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Using Your Head as a Joystick
A articles article from the "now-thats-using-your...-nevermind" department
sent by CmdrTaco
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/14/1329226
Ant sent in linkage to an article about Cybernet
Systems and their new Use Your Head gaming
peripheral that tracks head movements and uses
them as input for games. Works using a USB Cam,
and obviously its not gonna be running under Linux
any time soon, but this is pretty sweet. When they
have the version that can detect me cursing and
use that to signal a retreat, I'll be happy ;)
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Netscape 6 Is Out (Really!)
A articles article from the "good-luck-actually-downloading-it" department
sent by CmdrTaco
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/14/1533230
kvandivo writes: "It's now official. Netscape is
now shipping 6 (at least for windows, linux, and
mac..)" It'll probably be just a bit before anyone
will actually be able to download it from any of
the official servers.
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Linux Beginners Series' Final Installment
A books article from the "yellow-belt" department
sent by timothy
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/10/24/1954204
Now chromatic has stepped through another couple
of books, in addition to the nine in the previous
parts of this series on books for the Linux
newbie-to-semi-newbie. Actually, the selections
this time go on the assumption that you've taken a
few weeks (or some very intense days) to absorb
the information you need to accomplish some basic
tasks, and they take on the challenge of going
beyond the basics. Note: here are links to part
one, part two, and part three of this series.
[TABLE NOT SHOWN]
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Study of Domain Dispute Resolution System
A yro article from the "how-to-steal-domain-names-legally" department
sent by michael
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/14/1443229
yooden writes: "Milton Mueller shows in his study
that the domain name dispute resolution system
applied today has a tendency to reward providers
who deliver name transfers (ie. WIPO). While the
idea is not new, the study is." Since ICANN is
meeting today, in a session with 10 totally
unelected directors and 9 elected by business
representatives and elected by general internet
users, to decide which new TLDs will be
implemented and how (to split up the loot), it
seems somehow appropriate to review their record
of fair and impartial domain name handling over
the past few years. Mueller analyzes disputes
statistically and comes up with a few smoking
guns.
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IBM Offers Computer Recycling
A articles article from the "nice-to-mom-earth" department
sent by timothy
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/14/1717243
rjh3 writes: "IBM is offering to recycle old PC's
(monitor included) for $29.99. They've made a deal
with Envirocycle to do the recycling and UPS for
discount shipping. The old computers are assessed
and either refurbished and donated, or stripped
for usable parts, recyclable content, and the
remnants sent to disposal. Envirocycle has found a
way to recycle the highly leaded glass in CRTs and
removes much of the toxic lead content in the
electronics." Read on for more information on why
you might want to take them up on the offer.
--------------------
Even Better Than The Portable 2600
A articles article from the "more-retro-than-retro" department
sent by Hemos
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/13/1437201
Walton C. Gibson writes: "Instead of a portable
2600, how about a device that plays EVERY 2600
game ever made in hardware, and it all fits inside
a single Atari 7800 enclosure? Check out Bankzilla
-- as well as some this guy's other projects like
the NES music format, making a portable NES."
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Slashback: Election, Election, Election
A articles article from the "first-three-rules-of-democracy" department
sent by jamie
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/14/0444247
Last week I came out in favor of electronic
voting. Over the weekend, it turned out that its
opponents' worst fears came true. Not only was
some computer software buggy, but it actually
threw a state election the wrong way. And though
not very likely, it's even possible that this
state will determine our next president! Have I
changed my mind about electronic voting? No,
because the punchline is: New Mexico still uses
dead trees. The bug was in the software that
counts paper ballots. New Mexico was given to Gore
on election night by 6,800 votes because of buggy
computer software. That software "failed to read"
straight-party votes (oops!), and worse, it "also
chose at least one candidate from another party."
If computer flaws had thrown an electronic-vote
election, you'd be reading about it on the front
page of every newspaper across the country, and
pundits would be telling us (sometimes in ways
very funny) how foolish we were to trust our votes
to those nasty computers. How many presidential
elections does our 19th-century technology have to
nearly destroy before the alternatives get serious
consideration? A friend in Sweden tells me that
the U.S.A. is now being referred to as the B.R.A.,
the Banana Republic of America. Maybe by the 21st
century we can have 20th-century voting machines
installed at our polling places, what do you
think? (New Mexico could decide the election if
Florida's votes are thrown out, Oregon goes to
Bush, and one or two more improbabilities occur.)
Voting, right here in River(side) County Riverside
County, California, used touch-screen voting in
this last election. This is very different from
internet voting since there was no network to the
outside world. I think this is an important step
and certainly should be done first. ABC News's
report describes Riverside's system and shows a
photo. Randall Gardner points out that the local
paper has a great story with an overview of the
system and reactions from voters -- glitches, yes;
late tally, yes; but all in all it sounded like a
positive experience. With a capital V and that
rhymes with C and that stands for Canberra
Dracophile points out an article from the Fairfax
IT News website, which: reports that voters in the
Australian Capital Territory (in which our
nation's capital, Canberra, lies) "could be the
first in the nation to trial electronic voting at
next year's territory election", according to the
territory's Chief Minister, Gary Humphries.
They're hoping to pass legislation next month to
bring this about. Sounds cool, but the article
goes on to quote Humphries as saying, "You might
as well be doing it from your own home." Is it
just me, or does this raise the possibility of
voters being coerced into a particular vote where
this sort of thing can't be seen? I'd prefer to
see electronic voting available only from polling
booths. No grunge typefaces please User-interface
wonks should enjoy this pure-and-simple design
contest. Web Memes, Inc. is asking you to design a
ballot, preferably one as unconfusing as possible
while still using (spit) paper. You also get to
make up your own candidates and issues. (If the
competition were digital, instead of paper, it
would be a tough call between Amazon.com's new
user interface and AmIPresidentOrNot.) Busily
coding your next election... ...is Jason Kitcat,
who says "I'm working really hard on the next
release and haven't given it the PR time it
deserves." Allow me. FREE is "Free Referenda &
Elections Electronically," "the first open source
system for conducting electronic votes." We're now
jumping from mere electronic tallying of votes in
polling places to actual internet voting, so
please keep your hands inside the browser at all
times. Originally an academic thesis, FREE is now
GPL'd, written in Java, and its design background
is available in whitepapers. I haven't tried
running it. Someone let us know if the project
could be useful. See also thebell.net, which
comments: ...the majority of paper punching
systems used in the U.S. do not produce repeatable
results when ballots are tallied more than once,
which means that election officials lack the means
to objectively distinguish between fraud and error
under these circumstances. ...we should in fact be
looking to Internet voting systems in order to try
to reduce those faults and thus provide for more
security than what is available today -- not less
security. The seriously skeptical view Let's end
on a sobering note. Scoffing at The Bell's claim
to have tackled the subject a mere six months ago,
Rebecca Mercuri points out (on Dave Farber's IP
list) that others have been thinking about
internet voting for over a decade. She writes:
Internet systems indeed DO promise FAR LESS in the
way of auditability (recounts) and anonymity
(privacy) than do the paper and other manual
systems presently in place. To promote the belief
that Internet voting, in any way provides a SAFE
VOTE, is wholly erroneous. She has an intimidating
collection of links to (mostly) academic papers on
the subject on her Electronic Voting page. And in
conclusion The only viable form of government is
perl-based: we need a bicamel legislature with an
eclectoral college. Thank you and good night!
--------------------
3dfx Drops Video Card Division
A articles article from the "but-not-tossing-in-their-chips" department
sent by timothy
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/14/2338229
Uglor writes: "3dfx is getting out of the video
card market. After two years of shrinking revenue,
stock price and market share, they are going back
to a chips-only company. Will this let them
reclaim the top spot on the 3d market? Or could
this just make nVidia work twice as hard to beat
them?" So it doesn't mean that you won't be able
to buy a card whose guts are made by the 3dfx
folks, only that the box will probably have
someone else's name a whole lot bigger. And ewhac
points to an Adrenaline Vault story, which
"suggests that 3Dfx is going to move away from the
PC hardware arena and refocus toward licensing
their technology for use in visual simulation and
training systems. If true, this would basically
leave NVidia and ATI as the remaining major 3D
graphics players. (Now if NVidia would just crack
open their docs so we can support their chips...)"
--------------------
120 Gigabit Pipe To Oz Begins Operation
A articles article from the "bandwidth-bandwidth-bandwidth" department
sent by timothy
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/15/0313204
dustpuppy writes: "The new Southern Cross Cable
Network connecting Australia to the US is now
operational. Featuring 120 Gigabit capacity and
with a latency of 70 msec, the new trans-Pacific
cable is 120 times the capacity of the existing
Australasia/North America connection. Now us poor
Aussies can download our mp3s that much faster!
You can read more about it here." Interesting,
too, how it's constructed. From the article: "The
network consisted of two separate cables
configured in three self-healing rings, with all
three rings to be completed early next year. The
duplicate-ring construction gave the network
greater redundancy – if one side of the network
was damaged or became inoperable, traffic could be
transferred to the other side instantly." Neat.
--------------------
A Drive With The Works: DVD-[R,RW] And CD-[R,RW]
A articles article from the "that's-a-lotta-pictchas,-louey!" department
sent by timothy
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/15/0037201
grub writes: "The MPAA must be saying "Ho Lee
Fook." Pioneer had introduced a rewritable DVD
drive. The drive reads and writes in four formats:
DVD-R, CD-R, DVD-RW and CD-RW, has up to 4.7GB
capacity per DVD side and records on DVD-R at
twice the normal speed." With 60GB drives now at
reasonable prices, and drives three times that
size coming out on the high end, 4.7GB no longer
sounds like the mountain of bits it once did.
Still, this is a wild combination: hopefully the
world will soon agree on some nice DVD-RAM
standards worth living with.
--------------------
Squatting On Life
A science article from the "what-an-abused-system-we-have" department
sent by Hemos
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/15/1323258
Andy Smith writes "An investigation by The
Guardian newspaper has exposed the extent of human
and non-human gene patenting by private firms,
universities and charities. What stands out about
this investigation is that many of these
organisations are 'gene-squatting', ie: patenting
genes that they do not yet understand. There are
currently over 160,000 patent applications for
whole or partial human genes, with more than 20%
being from one company, Genset."
--------------------
WHO Bid To Regulate Health Sites
A articles article from the "how-this-be-implemented" department
sent by Hemos
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/11/15/1334224
Andy Smith writes "This BBC story reports on
efforts by the World Health Organisation[?] to
improve the quality of health-related web sites.
They want a new TLD -- .health -- to be
introduced. All .health sites would then be
regulated by the WHO. Here's the press release,
which predicts that 'dot health could soon be as
well known as dot com'." It's quite an issue - do
you want to be able to "trust" the health sites,
assuming that's what regulation means, or do you
worry more about the innovation of the sites being
quashed by an organization?
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The info is Rob Malda's
The code is mine
MOTD: -----------------------------------
I am no longer associated with Purdue, except for being a former
student, former employee, and active member of the Linux Users Group.
As such, I'll either be moving this service to another server or
killing it entirely. Your input is requested as to what you'd like.
Then again, when was the last time I changed the MOTD? And when was
last time it was read?