2/5     Asian Frats out of Control!
        link:www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/5093117.htm
        \_ damn, this reminds me to sky and his crazy korean buddies.  We
           need a repost of those stories man.  where can I find a URL?
           \_ I miss sky's Korean gf.  Where can I find her pics again?
        \_ uptight asian frat boys with gelled hair gone wild!
        \_ They compete over grades?  Is it like "let's see who gets more F's
           without getting expelled"?
        \_ "Death Rho"?!?  areyou kidding me? what a joke.
        \_ whatEVAH! whatEVAH! i do what i want! --cartman
        \_ This sounds fun!  I wanna join!  I wanna join!  Do they have
           chapters at Berkeley?
           \_ Yes.
        \_ "When you're a pi you're a pi, all the way from your first
           cigarette to 3.1415..."
           \_ Tangent, secant, cosine, sine! 3.14159!
           \_ from memory: 3.141592653589793238462643383279502884...
              \_ wow you are so cool.  Can I suck your dick?  Please?
                 \_ can i suck yermom's?
                 \_ You're trying to calculate pi from his width and his girth,
                    right?

2/5     Missile Technology Sent to China
        http://www.insightmag.com/news/357426.html
        \_ either it's a scoop, or there's less here than meets the eye.
           thanks for introducing a new conserva-mag, though.
        \_ Bush is just as corrupt as Clinton.
           \_ But he's corrupted by good, honest, red-blooded Americans.
              Not by those ugly yellow devils.
              \_ And by "red-blooded Americans", do you mean those rich
                 terrorist-sponsoring Saudi millionaires or the red-neck
                 variety?
           \_ Not even close - Clinton is far worse than Nixon, for example.
              Clinton repeatedly sold out the security of the country for his
              own personal and his associates gain.
              \_ do you believe your own bullshit?
                \_ All you have to do is search on the net - this information
                   is very easy to find - search China / campaign
                   finance scandals 1992, 1996.  If you want to perpetuate
                   self-deception, there's nothing that can be done
                   to change your mind.
                   \_ If I write an article claiming that Clinton sold
                      secrets to China, post it on the web so that google
                      search-bots can pick it up and people like you can
                      type in "China / campaign finance scandals 1992 1996"
                      in the search box and find articles to support their
                      own forgone conclusions, does that make the article
                      true?
                        \_ LOL, so it never happened? That explains why
                           the DNC has returned millions of dollars and paid
                           comparable fines to FEC.  And why Loral Space /
                           Hughes paid fines for gross violations of
                           technology export restrictions. Thats why CLinton
                           moved oversight of technology exports from
                           the Pentagon to Ron Browns Commerce Department.
                           Like I said, stick your head in the sand and you
                           believe what you want.  This country has
                           never seen a traitor like Clinton.
                           \_ So why is Bush allowing this to continue?
                              In case you didn't read the article, this
                              was recent news.
                                \_ Because Bush is Clinton-lite, without
                                   the rampant corruption.  No one ever
                                   accused Bush of being conservative.
                                   Its a good question.
                              \_ The technology transfer took place in 1995
                                 when the operations were "duplicated in
                                 China".  The damage has been done.
                                 Be honest.  When someone scores a direct
                                 hit with a sound fact, show some humility
                                 and admit.  Even Gorbachev is on the
                                 record with the assertion that communist
                                 governments routinely lie.  In the last
                                 days of the Soviet Union, their leaders
                                 were anxious over getting enough
                                 pantyhose to the country's women.
                                 Communism/Marxism = collosial failures
                                 and the partial failures of Socialism
                                 and Liberalism and the Democratic party
                                 will also fail insofar as they cling to
                                 the ravings of the once insane Karl Marx.
                                 Marx couldn't even keep two of his sons
                                 from dying he was so stupid and absorbed
                                 by the garbage of the "struggle".

2/5     In C, the typical way to generate random numbers in the range [0, N)
        is (int) ((double) rand() / ((double) RAND_MAX + 1) * N).  What
        guarantee is there that RAND_MAX + 1 does not overflow?
        \_ RAND_MAX is 32767.
           \_ RAND_MAX is guaranteed to be at LEAST 32767.
        \_ aren't your parentheses misplaced wrt N?
           \_ no.  You generate a floating value in the range [0, 1), multiply
              by N, and cast to int.
              \_ right. as written, it's generating [0,1) and dividing by N,
                 n'est-ce pas?
        \_ Note that you're casting RAND_MAX to a double.  Standard IEEE754 has
           54 bits of significand in a double.  That's typically more than
           anything a 32-bit machine has to offer.  However there is no
           guarantee against overflow.
           By the way, rand() is a crappy generator.  The method above leads to
           non-uniform probability distribution (some values will be twice as
           likely than the rest), etc.
                \_ so can you change the seed each time, based on prev #
                   and other factors to make it distribute more evenly?
                   \_ it doesn't matter what the seed is.  most implementations
                      of rand() just suck.
                      \_ understood.  care to suggest a better way of
                         generating random numbers?
                         \_ digitize johnson noise and take the least
                            signifigant bit?  i'll bet you could make
                            a box to do this for about a dollar in electronics.
                            I think there are chips that do this, or use
                            shot noise which is also white.
                            -naive physicist
                                \_ Actually, the best way would be to
                                   to take some radioactive material
                          \_ well even just C's "random" function is better than
                            "rand". look at "man 3 rand". i would try the /dev
                            random device but then that's not very portable
                                   and measure either the amount of
                                   decay or the interval between two
                                   decay events and use that as a
                                   basis for your random numbers.
                          \_ read from /dev/(u)random
                          \_ http://www.boost.org/libs/random/index.html
                          \_ well even just C's "random" function is better
                             than "rand". look at "man 3 rand". i would try
                             the /dev random device but then that's not very
                             portable
                                \_ It works on MacOS X, Solaris (8+),
                                   L1NUX, *BSD, how much more portability
                                   do you want?
        \_ (int) (drand48() * N);

2/5     Anybody know the address of Sun Microsystems in Sunnyvale, the one
        right across Synopsis? On Corte Madera? Thanks.

2/5     An interesting critique of the whole space shuttle program
        written in 1980: http://csua.org/u/8cc
                         \- doesnt this title seem in poor taste?
                            \_ No, selling body parts on ebay is poor taste.
        \_ Hmm. With all due concern for recent events, I'd have to give
           the program more credit for how often the shuttles got through
           the entire business this article describes in one piece. It's the
           stuff they didn't notice or didn't think of that have caused
           problems...But I guess I'll have to wait and see what happened to
           Columbia to say that for sure.
           My closet hope is that this will re-focus the space program on
           earth-observing missions. They cost less than one percent of the
           manned mission costs and have actually tangible benefits. With
           American sentimentality over spaceflight to contend with, though,
           it's a long shot.
        \_ "Even as the Apollo 11 moonship was being primed for what President
           Nixon called "the most important event sine Creation"--the August
           1969 moon landing--plans for a space shuttle were being drafted."
           What?  The landing was JULY 20, 1969
           \_ http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov
        \_ The problem is NASA's monopoly on space.  Boeing, NASA's
           primary contractor is a vertically / horizontally integrated
           behemoth. The industry must be privatized to encourage
           commercial development and innovation.
           \_ before I jump all over you, could you list a few times
              that privitization of government services has benefitted
              the consumer or american citizen?
                \_ Take all the workers you see at the DMV and imagine
                   them employed at NASA.  What is with the inbred liberal
                   faith in bureaucratic institutions (you are the epitome
                   of government indoctrination).  The UN has run the Palestine
                   territories since WWII, the UN gets 40% of Iraqs oil
                   revenue.  How can you not see that unaccountable
                   bureaucracies are inherently inefficient?
                   \_ Straw men. I notice you couldn't answer the question.
                        \_ Ok how about the supremacy of the US economy
                 in places like Columbia (SOUTH AMERICA), a dirty little secret.
                           in the 20th century?  Just a minor example.
              \_ Has any federal service been privitized as yet?
              \_ actually plenty of military operations are privatized,
                 in places like Columbia (SOUTH AMERICA), a dirty little
                 secret.
                 \_ We're also about to enter into a privatized military
                    operation called the "Texaco War" with Iraq.
           \_ I tried to start my own Space Shuttle company, but the FBI
              came by, wrecked my cubicle, and kicked my ass. Damn them!
           \_ Is there any law preventing private US companies from going to
              space?  Also, doesn't NASA face competition from Russia, China,
              India and the EU over commercial customers?
              \_ Clean Air Act?

2/5     Powell's Speech was...?
        \_ over before I got up
        \_ on C-SPAN
        \_ Why is it we never made israel disarm when they violate more
           UN sec council resolutions than iraq?

2/5     I'm trying to make a 16GB partition on an 80GB IDE disc for win98
        via windows fdisk.  I did this a month ago on the same hardware.
        Now, it seems to either take over all 80GB of the disk or be
        limited to 10GB, with no option in between. Any ideas how I could
        have done this last month?  The only thing that is different is
        the addition of a non-bootable PCI scsi card for my scanner.
        \_ Could be a bad setting in BIOS.  Look at how it describes the
           disk, and whether it's using LBA or some such, or not.
        \_ I just answered my own question: use 20% to specify the size
           instead of 16000MB. Gosh, ain't M$ software smart.
        \_ hey, what's the best way to partition a 160GB hard drive?
                \_ How do you plan to use it?
                   \_ windows xp home machine. applications, games, data
                      storage, maybe some music/video editing.
                        \_ I don't know, maybe 4 x 40GB partitions?
                           \_ i guess my real question is, how bad is it
                              to have 1 huge partition and why?
                                \_ 1 huge partition is often the way to go
                                   on client machines.  The only drawback is
                                   that if you have to reinstall Windows, it's
                                   easier if you have the Windows crap on
                                   its own partition.  I would advise against
                                   partitioning unless there's something
                                   specific you're trying to accomplish. -tom
                                        \_ Don't you mean "when" you have to
                                           reinstall windows.
           \_ 5 GB windows, 35 GB apps/games, 120 GB porn.

2/5     I'm looking for a GPS device that can do the following:  Store
        4 points and calculate the surface area inside those four points.
        Actually 3 points would be nice too.  Does such a thing exist?  I'm
        trying to measure the size of a plot of land.  Thanks.
        [garbage deleted.  If it's not necessary to say, it's necessary
         not to say]
        \_ If you can't calculate the area yourself given the 4 points....
           you should turn in your degree.
           \_ Do you use a calculator?  Don't be a dumbass.  I need
              accurate answers; that's why there's technology.  Maybe you think
              we should all go back to an era before computers.
              \_ This is a problem better solved on a computer, than on the
                 GPS unit.  So few people would have a need for it.  And how
                 big an area are we talking about?  Even with SA off, I
                 wouldn't use non differential GPS for an area smaller than
                 an acre, unless you want fake precision.
                 \_ The land I'm trying to measure range from 10-300 acres.
                    I want to drive to the four corners of the land and store
                    the coordinates and then have an answer right away.
                    And do this on different plots of land.

2/5     There is hope for aspo:
        http://www.tabletnewspaper.com/vol2iss_19/features/foreskin.htm
        \_ right. an extra peice of skin on the end of my dick. just
           what I need.  When you find an article telling me how
           to surgically add a working spiked tail, please please please
           post the URL, and i'll give a shit.
        \_ actually I like being circumcised. -aspo
        \_ Hurting once is not enough and you want it to hurt again?

2/5     http://www.dailycal.org/article.asp?id=10729
        (in reference to: http://www.dailycal.org/article.asp?id=10710 )
        Esprit du Daily Cal at its best...
        \_ what? DailyCal uses ASP?
           \_ no, they just use that extension so it looks like they have
                money to afford ms software.
        \_ that's not as cool as when the daily cal printed a correction
           for mislabeling a 10 inch pizza special as a penis.
           but this was years ago, i think the daily cal had a better
           sense of humor then and now they feel picked on.  does anyone
           remember the classified ad that ran for YEARS in the daily
           cal from the guy in the wheelchair seeking sweaty muscle
           play? - danh
           \_ The pizza/penis incident was actually a paid advertisement --
              both the original and the correction. Just a really cute
              publicity stunt by Blondies from 1990. I have a copy from
              microfiche lying around my archives, you're welcome to
              it. The above, on the other hand, was a genuine fuckup. By
              the "Review" section monkeys, of all people. _I_'m amused =)
              -alexf
              \_ This sounds like you were on DC staff, alexf. Why am I
                 not surprised...
                 \_ No I wasn't. Care to explain? -alexf
              \_ Why was this such a fuckup? Seems to be just a careless
                 editing/typing error.
                 \_ Well, it shows a huge misunderstanding of history
                    and literature. Sort of like claiming that Captain
                    Ahab freed the slaves or something. Maybe a
                    science or engineering major wouldn't understand.
                    Anyone who writes for the Daily Cal should not
                    get their facts this confused.

2/5     It seems like Powell's presentation in the UN today is not as
        persuasive as that during the Cuban missle crisis.
        \_ cuz there are no missiles pointing at our heads?  no shit.
           it's not persuasive, and it's not going to be persuasive.
           the whole thing's a crock that's being powell-washed.
        \_ What kind of head-buried-in-the-sand ostrich are you?  Wake up.
           \_ somehow i'm guessing you were convinced *before* Powell
              made a presentation at the UN today, just as the above poster
              was already unconvinced.  Persuasive would imply that
              some people actually change their mind based on some new
              evindence or argument, not that people on both sides just
              dig in deeper.