12/18   For all you MacGuyver types out there ... I have a friend who
        wants to do C programming on his WinCE or Palm device (he has
        both).  Any suggestions for pure C/C++ environments that
        work on the PDA's (as in all development is on the PDA).
        \_ Run NetBSD on the WinCE device.  Use GCC.
        \_ Development Environment is free for WinCE (Pocket PC), and is just
           like visual c/c++.  See:
           http://www.microsoft.com/mobile/developer/downloads/ppcsdk2002.asp

12/18   Math help!  I'm a software engineer who forgot how to do problems
        like this: I have a bag with 60% black marbles and 40% white.
        Drawing with replacement, how many marbles do I have to draw to
        have a 90% chance of drawing 5 black marbles (among any number
        of white)?  I'd appreciate a formula or explanation because I might
        need to change those numbers.  THANKS!
        \_ Stat 2, kids.
        \_ Couldn't you figure this out using your own logical reasoning?
           \_ No, that is why I am asking.
        \_ Likely wrong:
        * Drawing 5 black marbles on the first try is .6**5 = .07776
        You want to make the chances of 5 black marbles .9, ie,
        * .007776 * numDraws = .9
        ==> numDraws = .9 / .07776 = 11.57
        ==> rounding up, you need 12 draws.
        \_ When you can't find the right forumale, the easy backup plan
           is to write a program that will do X trials for you and find it
           empiracally.
        \_ Real answer:
           The answer is the smallest N, such that the definite integral
           of the binomial distrubution function with parameters n = N,
                \_ too bad you can't take a definite integral
                   of a binomial distribution -- it's discrete.
                   \_ What the hell are you talking about?  Of course you can.
                      Just take the sum.  You are an idiot.  Go away and kill
                      yourself now.
                   \_ So do a discrete summation instead
        \_ Too bad there are only five marbles in the bag (3 black and 2
           white) making a solution impossible. Unless you know the number
           of marbles in the bag, you can't give a reasonable answer. As it
           approaches a very high number (not infinity per se), the above
           solution becomes more valid.
           p = 0.6, taken from 5 to N >= .9.  Feel free to play around with
           many java applets of the binomial distribution to find out what
           N is.
           \_ you can also use the chernov bound to bound this integral from
              above. if you're interested in these specfific parameters,
              you should implement what the above says.
              \_ It's a poly time algorithm to find N, no need to bound.
        \_ The question is asking drawing exactly 5 out of N, so should the
           answer be just: 90% = C(N,5)*0.6^5*0.4^(N-5)?

12/19   What's the origin of "ad nauseum"? I can't remember since
        this corruption of it has been used so often.
        \- uh what are you asking? what it literally means in latin,
           how it is used in english or where it came from?
           literally "to <the point of> disgust. usually means "repetion
           to the point of being annoying" more "editorial" than ad
           infinitum. i think this is to generic to have an "origianlly
           used by juvenal" type answer. q.v. "ad libitum" --psb
           \_ ah yes, i was thinking about "ad infinitum". Is "nauseum"
              a real latin word? I thought it was just an attempt at
              humor.  ... hmm, dict says it's actually "ad nauseam"
              \- well it is latin and in turn greek. like nautical.
                 of course that is "real latin" unlike "sic ubi semper ubi"
                 which is a simple latin joke or "sic goli misdae hoc ipuc"
                                                      --psb

12/19   Does anyone have experience with oracle licensing?  My company is
        buying some oracle licenses.  We have one production server, and
        will get a 2 yr processor license on it.  We also have a backup
        database which will only be interacting with the main server.  Can
        we get the lower priced per-user license for the backup?
        \_ We threatened to go with IBM or Sybase, and they dropped the
           price from $20k to $10k per cpu (hehe).
        \_ Oracle: don't do it.  The dotcom era is over.  Use db2 or sybase
           if you want to pay money or mysql or postgres if you don't.
           \_ oh please. the fact you mention sybase says enough.
                \_ Sybase? You can still buy something from Sybase?
                \_ What's wrong with Sybase?  Curious.  -John
                        \_ many things. Limited support for partitioning, data
                           extraction (tools), fewer tuning options. Row-
                           level locking introduced only recently. Writing
                           stored procs as a way of life.
                                \_ Sure but they aren't fucking bastards like
                                   Oracle and their DB is more than enough for
                                   what most people do.  If you really need to
                                   pay Oracle on a per cpu basis, then you're
                                   either doing things wrong or you work for a
                                   bank so it's ok they're fucking you.
                                   \_ Sounds like what I was thinking--I only
                                      "ran" a few Sybase boxes for pretty
                                      ho-hum DB stuff, and aside from backups
                                      being a a PITA, things ran like a charm.
                                      -John [ reformatted - formatd ]
                                        \_ you were a sysadmin, not a developer
                                           Also try administering that baby
                                           when the database gets large.
                                \_ Sybase has its drawbacks.  But RLL has
                                   been availble since 97.  Release 11.2
                                   or something.  I wouldn't call 5 years
                                   "recently" -ex-Sybase employee.
                                        \_ are you a happy or disgruntled
                                           Slimebase employee?
                                                        -ex-Debacle employee

12/19   I know the story about Trent Lott, but what about Tom Daschle?
        someone live outside of US and still tryingto keep up
        \_ He was very quick to downplay Lott's remarks, which IMO was
           the wrong thing to do.  Since Thurmond and Helms retired, Lott
           was the last of the Dixiecrats left.  On top of that, he's the
              \- hello, you may wish to google for "Robert Byrd Klan" --psb
                 \_ touche.
           senate majority leader.  What he said was inexcusable.  The
           bigotry expressed by it (which all the analysts say this is
           not about) is also inexcusable.  TD should have taken him to
           task on this.  When Lott's own party uses stronger words with
                \- this is the product of the idiotic "comity" in the senate
                   and on many executive boards ... because of social and
                   friendly ties, people get away with murder ... why
                   actually enforce your fiduciary duty when it might get
                   you dropped from some currupt bastards xmas card list ...
                   besides, he helped your idiot progeny get into harvard
                   law school. people should have been spitting on people
                   like Jesse Helms and made him a pariah. same for Ted
                   Kennedy. ollie north for senate. --psb
           Lott than Daschle does, he shows himself as offstep. --scotsman
           \_ Note: Lott is the top Republican in Senate while Daschle is
              the top Democrat. Lots of talk of Daschle being ineffective.
           \_ Thanks scotsman. It really helped.  Gosh, I like TD too...
              I would of chose him as our president..
              \_  would _have_ chosen him....

12/18   The richest 1 percent
        http://www.washtimes.com/op-ed/20021218-363082.htm
        \_ Might have some semblance of impact if they were, indeed,
           individuals in that "millionaaires club".  They are all
           corporations and Unions.  Get a fucking clue
           http://www.opensecrets.org/parties/contrib.asp?Cmte=DPC
           \_ Ah, so the labor unions sucks out your hard-earned money for
              "union dues", and pass it to their favorite political party.  I
              get it.
              \_ Well, yes.  Under current rules.  Just as the corporation
                 you work for does.  Again, get a fucking clue.
                 \_ How exactly does the company I work for extract mandatory
                    dues from me and then give it to their favorite political
                    party?  You're babbling.  Get off the hemp.
              \_ actually they do, moron. that's why unions are the
                 phoniest, most useless and corrupt institutions around.
           \_ Don't waste your time arguing with a moron.
        \_ The richest 1% are those giving $200+. Those giving $1000+ or
           $10k+ or $1M are the .001-.1%.

12/18   Anyone use those USB "driverless" pen drives?  I've seen some selling
        for ~$100 for 256MB, which is about what I'd like.  What are the
        plusses/minuses for the brand/model you have?
        \_ I won an 8 Meg DiskOnKey from a trade show and it works great.
           Dunno the pluses or minuses.

12/19   When is the time to put the tulip bulbs back into the soil?  Do
        they need any pre-processing?
        \_ That was circa 1995-1999.  It's over.

12/19   Does anyone in the INS or the Justice dept actually believe that any
        of the people that have been arrested are terrorists?
        http://csua.org/u/712
        \_ Of course, terrorists take the time and energy to register
           with immigration authorities.  *snicker*
           \_ Idiot, the best way to blend in is to sign up with everyone
              else so you don't stick out.  Do you avoid paying the IRS so
              they won't catch you making a filing error, too?  *snicker*
           \_ why not?  there have been a bunch of al qaida terrorists
                \_ Except in this case you get arrested and thrown in
                   jail which prevents you from completing your mission.
                   \_ maybe that's on purpose. a sort of "cry for help".
           \_ why not?  there have been a bunch of terrorist-types
              who are also legal us immigrants.  a us passport is handy
              for international travel.  besides, if a terrorist could
              follow us immigration law at a low cost, why not?  why
              increase one's exposure to law enforcement?
           \_ Would you expect a terrorist to follow traffic laws?
        \_ i thought those socal fellows were arrested for things like
           visa violation.
           \_ Pretty much. They are playing the Zero Tolerance game. Any
              problems with your visa and, poof, you're in jail.
              \_ Actually it should be no visa = ass kicked out.  I don't want
                 to spend money keeping these clowns in jail.  Plane tickets
                 are much cheaper.
              \_ zero tolerance is good.
                 \_ Be sure to think that the next time you get a speeding
                    or parking ticket.
                    \_ i wish they did.  the best way to get a bad law
                       repealed is for the authorities to enforce it.
                       of course, the logic behind this idea of zero
                       tolerance on one law requires zero tolerance on
                       all laws is questionable.
                    \_ What the other guy said.  And I don't protest and
                       throw fits when I do get a speeding ticket.

12/19   From rec.humor.funny:
        For those of you who were looking for the requisite moral in
        Star Trek - Nemesis, I suppose it would be, "Always back up
        your Data."
        \_ dude that's old. along with Tashar Yar encourages Data entry.

12/19   Can someone recommend a reasonable, free tool for creating network
        diagrams under Unix (FreeBSD)/X11?  I don't feel like wasting space
        for vmware or dual-boot on a perfectly good laptop just to run Visio,
        which is a bloated POS anyway.  Unfortunately, a lot of my clients
        demand some sort of diagrams for stuff I do.  -John
        \_ define reasonable
        \_ Your time is worth more than your disk space.
                \_ Did I mention that visio is a piece of shit?  It's slow and
                   a pain.  It often exports poorly into real formats.  I want
                   something with which I can do good basic network diagrams,
                   import icons, export to pdf/jpeg without having to be a
                   master artist.  Kivio looks great, thanks!  -John
                   \_ Real formats?  Give them a printout or the visio file.
        \_ xdraw
        \_ xfig!
        \_ I like tgif.  --PeterM
           \_ Hob nob lob fob, and sod.
        \_ dia
        \_ Kivio. "Give it a network and let it explore and map out the
           network for you."
        \_ OpenOffice

12/19   I just hit this bug: open Calculator in NT, switch to scientific mode,
        press ( = ) =, crash.  Happens every time.
        \_ NT4?  What do you want, a cookie?
           \_ Yes, NT4.  It doesn't happen on my 2k and XP machines.
        \_ NT?  So what?  So you're telling us they fixed a bug in the
           NT4.0 calculator in 2k/xp?  Jeus Christ!  This crap stays on the
           NT4.0 calculator in 2k/xp?  Jesus Christ!  This crap stays on the
           motd while interesting things get censored.  Fucking ridiculous.
           \_ Yes, indeed.  The motd Propriety Censorship Daemon is tireless
              and patient.  I wish someone would take the time to figure out
              who it is so we can campaign to get his ass sorried.  =)

12/19   Follow the money:
        http://csua.org/u/70f
        \_ But your link doesn't say the important parts: who gave all this
           money to the two parties and what was the payback?
           \_ http://opensecrets.org

12/19   Newbie question - I'm not a CS or engineering or even a tech major so
        please don't jump all over this.  What I'd like to do is replace all
        occurrences of a word in an original file with a word in an infile,
                                                   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^???
        and output a new file.  I want to iterate this process for all the
        words in the infile list (the word to be replaced in the original file
        remains the same).  Greatly appreciate any suggestion on which
        utility or script would be most suitable for this kind of job.
        \- emacs, sed, perl can all do this. i dont understand precisely
           what you are trying to do, however. --psb
           \_ ED is the standard text editor.
           \_Thanks for your guys help so far.  What geordan summarized below
                is what I'm trying to do
                \_ I'm not on crack!  Yay!  ...Ohhhh -geordan
        \_ So the original file is basically a template which contains
           one or more words that needs to be replaced, and the infile
           contains a list of words that will be substituted into the
           template file?  It's late and it's hard for me to word that.
           Anyway the output is a bunch of files, one for each word in
           the infile?  I'd use perl. -geordan, who should just go to sleep
           \_ in bash:
                for i in `cat infile`;
                do
                        cat ORIGINALFILE | \
                        perl -p -i -e 's/YOURWORD/$i/g' > \
                        ORIGINALFILE.$i;
                done
              [ reformatted - formatd ]
        \_ i thought grep was the standard quickest solution for this sort of
           thing but okay the above looks fine. or you can grep using the same
           regexp 's/YOURWORD/$i/g' ?  i think
        \_ Uh you sure?  I don't think this is doing quite what the OP was
           asking but I admit I'm not sure what the OP really wanted either.
           \_ I think it's along the lines of what he wants but I'm not
              sure if the $i in the perl regexp will be properly escaped.
              \_ Replace the single quotes with double quotes and it will
                 be interpolated.  Also the -i flag doesn't really make
                 sense as you're not really modifying the file in-place.
                 -geordan

12/19   Turns out that most of Saddam's WMD came from the US:
        http://csua.org/u/713
        \_ Don't forget the krauts--they built poison gas factories in Libya
           as well.  Now they're being pissy about Dubya's chest thumping.
              axes of evil and demand a UN arms inspection backed by the
           Or the French, who built most Iraqi reactors.  Go figure.  -John
        \_ naw... really?  welcome to the '80s...  how was your nap?
           \_ Which country is US?  We should certainly include it among the
              axes of evils and demand an UN arms inspection backed up by the
              threat of war.