Posts by John Smith 19

Astonishing that such thin films have so *many* layers of cells in them.

Makes you wonder how many layers there are sitting on the average human skin layer.

Butt his does sound like just the thing for a toilet that has not had proper attention for a while, does it not?

Worlds most expensive CASE tool?

Just asking.

It looks like the UK will be playing "Enemy of the State" for real.

There's at least one Jon Voigt character at the back of this s**t.

They are professional *bureaucrats*, not intelligence staff.

Sadly no one is penciled in for the Will Smith role.

Which will make *everyone* an EOTS.

Interesting indeed.

TBH given the size of the whole graph and the error bands on that I'm not quite sure you can say that quite so unequally. Those peaks go up an awful *long* way.

Perhaps Hansen et all might dust off their old data sets?

But good point.

Anything equivalent from the denialist camp?

The usual definition of "influencing" is > 20% stake.

So 41% is *more* than enough to say that while they do not *control* BSkyB they certainly have a big say in *any* decisions made.

I doubt this govt have the collective b***ocks to take the boy Murdoch down and Rebekah (?) Brooks is there to act as his personal human shield.

"Chording" ? Block caps titles? B&W color scheme?

It's a little appreciated fact that the reason that Windows (prior) to 3.0 did not allow overlapping windows was because Xerox's UI research *said* it was inefficient.

It seems MS have now moved on and had a go at implementing the editor that Bell Labs designed for Plan 9, one of whose ideas was to see what happens when you assume mice are *everywhere* rather than a special order item (and the terminal supports them). IIRC this was 3 button job and (bit like the one on the Alto PC at Xerox) used chording, *again* because UI research indicated it was more efficient (I can't remember if keyboard short cuts even *exist* in this), allowing you to do more powerful "stuff" for the same effort *provided* you're put in the effort to learn the moves (and accept Windows is your *sole* development environment).

Bell Labs editor does not seem to be used much outside of their environment.

self replicating tinkers toys were frist demonstrated in the late 1950s

Hopefully this tech will be incorporated into something more useful.

server + multiple serial port card(s) + decent OS = dumb terminal server

And in fact Wyse hardware is *considerably* smarter than early era dumb terminals (which usually needed a "terminal controller" effectively time sharing a chunk of RAM and a *very* simple processor between a group of them).

Now the $64m question is..

Wyse had a pretty good rep for it's hardware. Will this new Dell division inherit it? Or will the new div inherit Dell's rep?

Which I'd suggest is a bit more Adam Sandler than Mark Whalberg.

excellent choice

I'll admit i was on the verge of *considering* going to see this one.

Sounds like I had a *very* lucky escape.

TBH when Adam Sandler is firing on all cylinders he can be pretty good. Little Nicky, Anger Management and The Water Boy all score highly.

But when he doesn't man does it pong bad. ..

Thumbs up for the Razzies spot on taste. And I'd like to start some early "buzz" on "Battleship," which IDK why is giving a distinct whiff of FAIL already.

A BOFH for the new Millenium?

Could be.

Steve Bong indeed.

7 children rescued in 2 years. And how *exactly* can you report seeing CP without

getting arrested for seeing CP?

IIRC CEOP's budget is around £4m per year so that's about £1.14m per child saved (not all of them in the UK).

Meanwhile the average rate at which children die at their hands of their parents in England and Wales remains (according to an NSPCC report) around 1-2 a week, as it has done for 30 years. Not molested. Murdered.

Naturally CEOP/IWF funding will *never* be cut due to the media stoked resulting outcry ("Last line of defense against Internet pervs to be closed! No child will be safe online!" yadda yadda).

What is the *real* objective? Looking like you're doing something? Stopping people viewing this stuff? Saving the children whose abuse provides the raw material?

How about *several* causes for declines in bee nubers/species/colonies

But for a somewhat similar situation (and the agri-chemicals industries handling) you might like to look up the effects of organ-phopherous (also non-lethal, to farmers) sheep dips and the actual effects on some of them.

Curiously similar to those of Gulf war veterans exposed to nerve gases.

A good question *might* be what kills the Verona mite?

So make people more obediant to propoganda or teach critical thinking and analsysis.

Anyone remember the phrase "The right to think for yourself is the only freedom anyone really has."

Whenever I see an FEL why do I think

Smith Purcell radiation?

Nice little planet

Needs a bit of work but in a very up and coming area. Bags of potential for future growth.

Reasonable terms are available.

This *could* be huge for Europe.

Here's why.

To lower the cost of return from Earth orbit you want to land it in your back yard. Europe is densely populated. Perhaps surprisingly ballistic capsules making lifting re-entries can be *very* accurate.

They are called ICBM warheads.

Unfortunately they only work because they use *substantial* amounts of ablatives to burn off and carry the heat away (and they are never going to land).

Outside Ablatives the *only* other candidate is Reinforced Carbon Carbon, which Germany is *very* good at (they were doing the nose cone for the cancelled X38 research vehicle).

But RCC is normally moulded in 1 piece. It's a PITA to mfg and somewhat fragile. essentially it's designed to fit *one* vehicle and nothing else. As the shape expands/contracts the Silicate protective coating has a tendency to crack.

The German development is to make "uncommitted" *sheets* of RCC, cut it into tiles and fit them to a shape (conceptually it's *exactly* like a computer graphics simulation of a 3d object by choosing the right polygons) which despite it's *very* angular looking nature has actually very good L/D characteristics, giving (potentially) good cross range without wings. It's also *lots* easier to grow the oxidation protection coats on 2d shapes (Carbon + O2 ->CO2, or "designer coal" as people have called it without the coat).

Want it bigger? Add more rings of polygons.

Want wings. Add new sections as appropriate.

But RCC is *heavy* relative to Shuttle tiles (that's 1 reason why it' s use was limited to *very* high temperature areas on the Shuttle) so going with active cooling lets them go with thinner tiles.

The Germans have pursued re-usable space transporters since the 1960's (Dornier & Messerschmidt were active) but heat was *always* the issue and RCC does curves *badly*

Frankfurt to *anywhere* within 90 mins (you have to go the long way round for *close* destinations. To the other side of the world it's nearer 45). anyone?

For some the idea underlying Eugen Sangers Silverbird have never been forgotten.