Posts by StudeJeff

Re: A solution?

It was set up to benefit we the people.

It's now being run to benefit the government officials, employees and the self anointed "elite".

Re: Just wait

The biggest threat to American's freedom and prosperity is the ever growing federal government. The Freedom Caucus is working to not just keep it in line but to get it back to something like the founders intended and the Constitution allows.

The Freedom Caucus is fighting FOR freedom and AGAINST an increasingly tyrannical federal government.

You folks on the other side of the pond have similar problems, and in many ways a lot worse.

Virus warnings

Way back before the turn of the century I was working for a really big computer company that sold business machines internationally...

Anyway, one an email came in from a vice president in the large systems storage division warning us about a new computer virus.

This guy was high enough up that had access to the corporate email list and this warning went out to everyone who worked for the company WORLDWIDE.

And he got taken in by a hoax, the virus wasn't real.

Shortly after that a VERY sternly worded warning came out from the corporate network security people NO ONE was to send out virus warnings except for them.

I expect that VP didn't get a very good review that year!

Raphael's intern was a newbie and had that as an excuse, that VP was anything but.

Re: "...the x86 giant now has a...processor...that it says will do 6.2GHz right out of the box..."

I'm old enough that when I was a kid processors were part of big machines in the basements of banks, and while my first computer had a processor in the megahertz range it was single digit megahertz... 3.25 to be exact.

Kids today don't know the struggle!

Re: Proceed at your own discretion

That's a matter of perspective. Apparently the Vogons like their poetry even though it can cause severe bodily injury in other races.

Re: glueing thin clients

I've mounted quite a few that way, it works quite well.

Then Dell, for reasons known only to them, modified the mount so you couldn't use it that way anymore... and I stopped buying them.

Re: Trigger-Happy Cops Must Take Some Blame - Machine guns?

In fact very few Americans own machine guns, the number is closer to thousands than millions.

Not only are they very expensive, starting at well over $10,000, but you have to get a even more expensive federal license to own one.

You are probably thinking of semiautomatic rifles, some versions of which, like the AR-15 (which is neither a machine gun nor an assault rifle) are sometimes called "assault weapons". An assault rifle is defined as a rifle that can be switched between semiautomatic (one pull of the trigger fires one round), and fully auto (pull the trigger and the gun keeps firing until it runs out of rounds).

The media and the left like to talk about "assault weapons", which is really a political term that can be best defined as "scary looking gun".

If you can't charge at home...

That's 100% correct. If you can't charge at home you are likely better off not buying an EV.

For the first couple of weeks I had mine it was a pain to get to a Supercharger all the time. Then the electrician did his bit and now I leave home every day with a full charge.

Re: Administrative State

The courts have ruled, properly, that if a proposed rule has a significant impact outside of what was in the law passed by Congress than it's not a valid rule.

The EPA can enact a rule limiting tailpipe emissions (to a point), but it cannot issue a rule outlawing ICE vehicles without an act of Congress authorizing it to do so. And if the automakers weren't so dependent on the feds and with their (now fading) dream of pots of gold from electric cars they would be suing the EPA for overstepping its authority.

Re: Units, Please

They never did explain why Belgium was such a dirty word.

Re: Time for full LiFePo switch

There is another advantage to LFP batteries, from what we know about them so far they will last longer than Li-ion batteries.

Another plus is that it doesn't bother them to be charged to 100%, in fact if they AREN'T charged to 100% once a week or so it's bad for them. While it's hard on the Li-ion batteries to be fully charged.

Tesla recommends only charging Li-ion batteries to 100% if you are about to go on a road trip.

When I was considering a Model 3 at first I was looking at the dual motor long range, but the real world longer range is only about 50 miles, which wasn't enough to justify the additional $7,000 price.

Re: We need the technological progress...

No, not ethanol, we can combine CO2 and hydrogen and create gasoline, Diesel, or any other hydrocarbon. All it takes is CO2 (from carbon capture or the atmosphere), hydrogen and lots of energy.

You could, theoretically, set up such an installation on a seashore, use direct solar energy to distill seawater, and then electricity from panels or windmills to make the gasoline. No input other than seawater and sunlight, and gasoline output.

More efficiently you could set up the installation over a white hydrogen well. The hydrogen could power the system as well as being feedstock for the fuel.

Porsche is has a pilot plant in operation even now. https://techcrunch.com/2022/12/20/porsche-pumps-first-synthetic-fuel-as-chilean-plant-finally-starts-producing/

Re: Interesting lines from the article

About the only thing this White House IS good at is lying.

Re: So, when are they going to quit being lazy?

I expect Google is doing both.

Nothing wrong with creation...

There is nothing wrong with creating these images, nor is there anything wrong with using them.

What IS wrong is misrepresenting them.

One example might be telling a true story about the sinking of the Titanic. As you are telling your story you include images of the ship... her sailing along in the sunshine before the collision, then the ship and iceberg, and finally the open ocean with a few life rafts.

As long as somewhere it's made clear that the images are not actual photographs there is nothing wrong with using them.

In telling a story about the current unpleasantness in Israel and Gaza again, there is nothing wrong with showing the image of a street of destroyed buildings, again, as long as you make it clear it's representative of what is happening and not an actual photograph.

Good storytelling (fact or fiction), often includes images these days, and you pick ones that best illustrate the story you are trying to tell, but if you are being honest you have to make clear they are just that, illustrative.

Re: Chrome

True enough, but when shopping for a new tablet recently I bought a Surface Pro. It's not Apple (I don't do iStuff), and unlike Android I know how to make Windows do what I want.

If I had it to do over again the only thing I'd have done differently is spring for a higher spec machine.

Re: Were there no signs indicating that the Bridge was out?

Yes, but it was also a private road. If it was a public road there would have been signs and barricades.

The landowner and the driver are responsible for this. Yes, Google should have updated its maps, but ultimately it's up to the driver to drive safely.

Communism is an ideal, and it actually does work in very small groups that are personally responsible to each other, such as a family.

It does not scale up well AT ALL, and whatever you call Red China it IS an evil, totalitarian dictatorship.

Re: Stay up late

I'm wondering when the Chicoms will try to get spaceflight banned except when done by governments.

I can easily see them pressuring some of their bought and paid for politicians and environmental groups putting pressure on the government to find excuses to shut down SpaceX. I expect we are seeing some of that in the FAA's delaying launches.

Maybe I'm being a conspiracy theorist here, but we've seen too many "conspiracy theories" come true in the past few years.

Re: Afronauts

Then there was the North Korean scheme to land the first man on the sun. Of course they planned on doing it at night...

Re: IBM

I used to be an IBMer and had a sign in my cube that said "Nunquam Permissium Opus, Interfere Per Plactium"... Internet Latin for "Never Let the Work Interfere With the Meetings"

I figure if your going to be a smarta$$ at work it's best to do it in Latin. It's classier and no one knows what it means anyway (except I'd tell anyone who would listen).

Other uses

Considering that a robot (or drone, these aren't exactly robots) could be made pretty much bulletproof it would make all sorts of sense to build in a few none lethal methods of controlling someone. So let the perp shoot at the machine all he wants as it comes up to him and uses gas, a really loud sound, a net, or whatever to incapacitate him.

No, his companies did business in Russia, but he didn't get campaign support from them. If he had you KNOW that would have been brought out in all that Russian collusion BS.