11/24   Thread was deleted out of order.  The spirit of ilyas demands
        justice!  FEAR THE ILYAS!!!
        \_ This is great, my trembling minions do my bidding, while I am
           not even around. -- ilyas

11/24   I've been ripping a lot of my CDs with iTunes, and I've noticed some
        sort of UUID number in the comment field.  Any ideas as to what these
        represent?

11/24   Anybody here have an iMac G5? How are you liking it?
        \_ The 17 is louder than the 20, very easy access to insides,
           rare for an Apple consumer machine, CPU isn't quite fast
           enuff & non-gamer graphics if that's yer thing. I give it a B.
        \_ 20 inch: beautiful screen.  Great design.  Weak speakers.
                \_ Are there any consumer desktops with *good* speakers?
                   \_ My PC is good at making the ASCII 7 startup beep.

11/24   Is Java RMI simply serializing objects and then sending/receiving
        the byte-streams on TCP/IP? Is that all RMI does, or is it
        something more than that?
        \_ No, it's more than that. You're dealing with invoking and calling
           remote objects, not simply serializing them over TCP/IP. It isn't
           as simple as what you propose.
           \_ so let me ask differently. Can RMI be implemented in Java using
              non-JNI stuff, using simple Serialization, book keeping data
              structures, etc? What is it so magical about RMI?
              \_ Technically yes, RMI can definitely be implemented not using
                 JNI. After all, RMI is a published spec, and you could write
                 it in pure Java. The reason JNI is used is because for low
                 level serialization through TCP/IP native method calls to
                 C functions is much faster. After all, OO request brokering
                 is rather CPU intensive (If you didn't know that I would
                 suggest you take an advanced course in OO and do some
                 research on CORBA). We did our own object serialization back
                 in 1.1 when Java was a much smaller language and didn't
                 have things like RMI (and of course not stuff like J2EE).
                 Object serialization isn't hard to do, although tedious
                 if you are doing it yourself. The JVM was a definite
                 bottleneck.

11/24   Have a stream of data (latency numbers for webpage requests).
        Need the running median, approximate ok.  How do I get this
        without storing all the data?
        \_ Are you the dude asking about 'variability' earlier?
        \_ Make 'bins', say 0-10ms, 11-20ms, 21-30ms, ... and store how many
           samples fall into each bin.  You can then find the median within
           <binsize> accuracy and it will use <max-latency>/<binsize> ints.
           Latencies greater than <max-latency> can be put in their own special
           bin but don't forget them when finding the median.
           \_ Thanks. -op
           Now, assuming you have this setup and know the true average, how do
           you find the standard deviation?
        \_ Try R: http://www.r-project.org

11/24   Hmm.  Reports that the Russian military is being used against the
        Ukrainian protesters.  Intereeeesting.
        http://hotline.net.ua/eng/content/view/2533/37
        http://eng.maidanua.org/static/enews/1101252011.html
        http://csua.org/u/a3k
        \_ The Russian Army.  It checks in, but it don't never leave.
        \_ With Putin appointing the governors these days, how long until
           Ukraine rejoins the Russian Federation?  In Russia, Russia
           federates you!

11/24   I have an overheating CPU on a laptop, I know this for a fact because
        when I take apart the laptop and let it run it runs fine. With the
        top assembled it will auto-shutoff. I removed the heatsink and found
        the thermal compound to have a very "plasticky" feel to it, like
        it's somewhat dried out. Does thermal compound ever dessicate?
        I've never heard of this happening before. The laptop is getting
        around 4 years old and this particular toshiba model is known to
        start acting up after a while due to overheating. I'm guessing
        it's the thermal compound because the fan leading to the heatsink
        wasn't particularly dirty with dust.
        \_ I don't think thermal compounds are water-based.  More likely it
           underwent some chemical change as a result of long-term heat
           exposure.  You could *carefuly* scrape the old stuff off and apply a\
           dab of new thermal compound.
           exposure.  You could *carefuly* scrape the old stuff off and apply
           a dab of new thermal compound.
           \_ Well, my hunch was right. I scraped off the old stuff and put
              on a fresh coat after cleaning the die top with some alcohol.
              After putting the machine back together it hasn't crashed for
              a while (used to crash after a minute).
              Guess Toshiba has a manufacturing problem...
              \_ Well more likely a bad supplier.  If it takes the compond
                 a few years to fail, quality-control might not catch it.
        \_ I've always wondered about that stock Intel thermal compound.
           It just didn't look very ... thermally conductive. -l0s3r
           \_ A real simple test would to be get a mug of hot water/coffee/tea
              put thermal goop on one finger and touch that finger and the
              opposite hand's clean finger to the mug at the same time and see
              how much hotter the greased finger feels in the first second or
              so before both get warm.
              \_ ob yermom joke
        \_ Same sit., w/ dell 1100, new. Sent it back to replace CPU fan
           It's those damn ODMs!

11/24   http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/11/24/ohio.vote.ap/index.html
        recount in Ohio denied, WHY???
        \_ "Judge James G. Carr in Toledo ruled Tuesday that the candidates
           have a right under Ohio law to a recount, but said it can wait."
           \_ Surely the recount can wait till, say late January?

11/24   For Ilyas: http://www.jpfo.org/brascard.htm
        \_ JPFO rocks.  They have the 'ask the rabbi' section and everything.
             -- ilyas
        \_ Gah.  Please tell me the recent victims of the hunting incident
           in Wisconsin weren't JPFO members.  This is messy enough already.

11/24   I was looking at the Perl CGI.pm and I noticed that most of its
        functions existed only as source code stored in a big hash of
        %SUBS = (sub_name => 'sub source')  What's the reason for doing this?
        \_ They compile the functions on demand, to reduce startup time.
           \_ So if you make repeated calls to some of these functions, will
              you see much of a performance hit?
              \_ Nope -- once CGI.pm compiles a function, it becomes an
                 ordinary perl function with no extra overhead.  On the other
                 hand, even that single compilation is a waste if you're using
                 something like mod_perl that precompiles your code, so CGI.pm
                 does have an option (-compile) to disable the hack and just
                 define everything at compile time.  --mconst

11/24   OK, I'm a WASP and I've only ever had Thanksgiving dinner with other
        WASPs.  What are some ethnic things other people like to have on
        Thanksgiving?  I'm kinda curious.
        \_ "To serve man"  -John
        \_ Thanksgiving is not an Anglo thing.  Just ask anyone from Great
           Britian. :p  It's a pure American holidy, and for the most part,
           we don't do anything other than glad to have couple days off :p
        \_ We have this dish called "turkey". It is a very big bird and
           we prepare it by roasting it in an oven. We also have corn,
           sometimes on the cobb, and there's always the smoked ham we
           get from Costco. -williamc
        \_ tamales.
           \_ We WASCatholics do much the same thing, but then we drink.
              \_ Well we put out the good wine on Thanksgiving. -opWASP
                 \_ From a bottle?
                    \_ with a cork!
                       \_ Twist off caps are going to be the hot thing soon
                       \_ oooh...
                          \_ Pff... 2 years ago we had a ~20 y.o. bottle of
                             Stag's Leap Cab. Sauv. -op
        \_ Turducken.   mmmmm
           \_ I just heard about Turducken during a recent trip to Texas,
              where are you from?
        \_ My family is traditional w/ Thanksgiving, but Persian friends of
           ours sometimes make a sweet walnut stew or sour cranberry rice.
           Both seem somewhat Thanksgiving-compatible.
           \_ See, this is the kind of thing I was asking about. -op
        \_ My family is Chinese American. Just about the only thing
           we do that's different is instead of stuffing (which we all
           think is gross), we use sticky rice.
           \_ Inside the turkey?
        \_ Navajo.  My parents make some food and we take it to the shelter
           to feed most of the homeless people who live there.  Sometimes
           when it's a wasp guy, I think, "I bet this is what it felt like
           back then."   And then I think of my slaughtered people and spit
           in their food when they're not looking.  I did that alot when I
           worked in a restaurant in high school.
           \_ Geee! Now there's a mature attitude to take! Spitting
              in someone's food plate, when you're there to help. Stupid
              fucking moron. Oh yeah, I bet the guy whose plate you spat
              on killed 100 indians, right? -non-WASP
              \_ It was really mature of the white people to give Indians
                 nice warm blankets laced with small pox back in the day.
           \_ Is this the first ever Native American race troll on the MOTD?
        \_ As a WASP you must atone for your racist imperialist
           history.
        \_ My in-laws, who are Vietnamese, just eat normal Vietnamese food.
           \_ Good to know, I'll be keeping my pets indoors today.

11/24   How does one list the tag names/branches in CVS?
        \_ $CVSROOT/CVSROOT/val-tags
         \- it's on sourceforge, now what? Also how do you list the modules? thx
            \_ cvsweb.
        \_ all the above are wrong. the correct answer is 'cvs log -t'
           and you're welcome.                          -cvs god

11/24   they don't fuck around in ukraine
        http://www.nature.com/news/2004/041122/full/041122-8.html
        \_ Take a look at him before and after the "food" poisoning:
           http://economist.com/images/20041030/4404SA4.jpg
           scary stuff..
        \_ dioxins? chlorinated organic molecules? how hard is it to
           be exposed to that through non-deliberate-poisoning?
           \_ Dioxins are common in industrial use, as are chlorinated organics
              which are also common in agriculture.
           \_ A few years ago (around 5?) large amount of dioxin was found
              in western Europes's food product and many products (Belgian
              chocolate for example) were removed from shelves temporarily.
              Food industry claimed that while it shouldn't have been there,
              it does no long term harm.  So maybe Yushchenko just decided
              to OD on stale Godiva?

11/24   Republicans are winning everything, even in Washington!!!
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/11/24/wash.governor.race.ap/index.html
        \_ If it's a state-wide hand-recount, I bet the DemocRAT wins!

11/24   Hispanic and Latino: which term(s) are politically correct?
        \_ Both are, but they refer to different things.
           \_ So a Hispanic is someone with spanish ancestry and
              a latino is someone who lives in a latin american country?
              I'm confused. Please elucidate.
        \_ I can tell you spic is not.
           \_ Yes, the preferred term is 'wetback'
        \_ similar questions: Latino vs. Chicano: What's the diff?
        \_ chicano = mexican
        \_ Both refer to the same thing, the guy who replied to you is
           wrong. Latino is more PC west of the mississippi, hisapnic
           on the East Coast. Dunno why, but that is just the way
           it is.
           \_ Uhm, no.  Hispanic is someone of Spanish descent.  Latino is
              someone from latin america.
              \_ So the only difference between these two overlapping
                 groups is Brazlians, who you claim can be called Latino,
                 and Spaniards, who you claim can be called Hispanic. Right?
                 Personally, I think you are wrong on both counts, but I
                 will ask my Brazilian and Spanish friends what they think.
                 Do you believe that Latin Americans of 100% native background
                 cannot be referred to as Hispanic? They are not of Spanish
                 descent, afterall.
                 \_ Well gosh, maybe my 30+ years as a Hispanic male have led
                    me wrong, what with having extended spanish speaking
                    family etc.  Not to mention my relatives that are still
                    living in mexico....   Hispanic is a very general term,
                    what with the Spaniards having conquered half the freaking
                    new world.  Latino is a subgroup within the domain of
                    Hispanicity; it's an ethnic grouping in a cultural sense
                    more than a racial one.  As for 100% native background
                    people, I have no idea how they group themselves.
                 \_ Well gosh, maybe my 30+ years as a Hispanic male have
                    led me wrong, what with having extended spanish
                    speaking family etc, not to mention my relatives that
                    are still living in Mexico....  Hispanic is a general
                    term, what with the Spaniards having conquered half the
                    freaking New World.  Technically, Latino is a subgroup,
                    though it only really covers Central and South America;
                    it's an ethnic grouping in a cultural sense more than a
                    racial one, but I suspect most Latinos would resent the
                    application of the Hispanic label.  Chicano is the term
                    for an American from Mexico, though I doubt a Mexican
                    living in Mexico would refer to himself as 'Chicano'.
                    As for someone of 100% Native American background in a
                    Spanish speaking country, I have no idea how they group
                    themselves.  In Argentina I suspect they'd group themselves
                    as 'rebels' and in Venezuela as 'normal' -- but now I'm
                    just being silly.
                    \_ Hmmm, why would people in South America refer to
                       themselves as "Latinos"? I thought they always
                       considerd themselves either as South Americans
                       or as people from their own country. In fact, I've
                       never heard someone from South American refer
                       to themselves as "latino" or "hispanic". I think
                       that these terms were produced by the U.S. to
                       create a false "race" of people who didn't speak
                       english but were for all practical purposes white
                       with a bit of mestizo mixed in. In fact, I've never
                       heard of anyone in Mexico refer to themselves as
                       "Latino" or "Hispanic." The only people who use
                       these terms are people in the U.S.
                       \_ *sigh*  The original question was 'which is more PC'
                          and the proper answer has *NOTHING* to do with the
                          damn Mississippi.  I've tried to explain what the
                          terms mean (not whether everyone accepts in all
                          geographical locations).  Good luck.
                          \_ Well, it's pretty apparent to me that the terms
                             mean essentially the same thing. Trying to say
                             that one term artificially means A and another
                             term artificially means B doesn't mean that
                             what you say is correct. Since they're both
                             essentially artificial constructs to denote
                             people originating from people south of the
                             people originating from south of the
                             border they're both as "pc" as you are going
                             to get. One may as well argue whether chicken
                             should be called poultry or when exactly a
                             stream becomes a river. Completely a nonsenical
                             discussion.
                             \_ I would argue that this whole thread is a
                                nonsensical discussion because pc language
                                is all bullshit anyway.  Language should be
                                used to communicate, not to express political
                                and academic trends.  If you want to know what
                                to call someone, you should just fucking ask
                                them.  I think the worst example of PC idiocy
                                I ever encountered was when I called some guys
                                "Chinese" because they were a bunch of Chinese
                                sailors on a Chinese boat who were hired in a
                                Chinese port, and an American told me I should
                                call them "Asian American."  Obviously the
                                person who said this knew there was nothing
                                *American* about these guys, but once someone
                                starts thinking in PC speak, the brain just
                                turns off.
                       \_ For the same reason a caucasian American of
                          European descent probably wouldn't refer to himself
                          as "white" or "Germanic".  All my friends who were
                          born in S. America identify themselves with their
                           countries.  -John
        \_ you're all wrong...
        http://www.elboricua.com/latino_hispanic.html
           in short: Hispanic - of Spanish heritage
                     Latin - from the geographic region of Latin America
                     Chicano - Mexican (sometimes meaning Mexican in the US)
           \_ Er?  I see at least 3 posters that are in agreement with you.
           \_ That dude is hardly an authoritative source.

11/24   Since there are a couple people here who work at snapfish, what
        exactly is the relationship between snapfish and york photo?
        \_ Snapfish is owned by District Photo. York Photo is one
           of District's brands. http://www.districtphoto.com
           And reports of a couple sodans working at Snapfish are
           greatly exaggerated. - ajani
           \_ Why so many brands, each with different pricing? Is the
              quality inferior for some of those brands?
              \_ When I interviewed with them the apparent reason conveyed
                 to me was some sort of anti-trust issue. -williamc
                 \_ interesting. So it's like M$ releasing different Win
                    versions, renaming them to different products, branch
                    off to different sister-companies, and reselling them
                    to give the image of not monopolizing the industry.

11/24   Shopping for a laptop.  How are AMD's laptop chips?  Are the
        Pentium-M's a lot better?  Don't suggest Apple unless you found one
        with a pointing-stick and 2 buttons.
        \_ why do you care what chip it uses?
        \_ 2 buttons?  not 3?
        \_ Dude, get a Dell!
           \_ better IBM.
              \_ Yeah, IBMs look like shit but they're the best you can buy
                 in terms of mainstream reliability and service.
              \_ Seconded.  Thinkpad X series if you don't mind not having
                 a built-in CD drive or floppy.  Only downside is that the
                 Atheros cards under Linux/*BSD are a bit goofy to set up,
                 but otherwise I've had nothing but these.  -John
        \_ Yes, the Pentium M is a lot better than even the new Mobile Athlons.
           Faster and lower power at the same time, but, more expensive, but
           worth it.
        \_ More criteria (weight, size, features, etc.) would help a us
           make suggestions.  -John
        \_ I recommend looking into a Panasonic Toughbook W2.
           <3lbs, 12" screen, cdrw/dvd, hd on shocks.  Got one for my mom
           (who travels extensivley) and she loves it. --darin
        \_ Anyone want to buy a used Dell Laptop (7lb hunker) for $400?

11/24   Stupid question.  Why USA complains about Ukraine's election, but
        never bother to complain about election in TW, which is extremely
        frauded?
        \_ Cuz TW is just a puppet state. As long as the motherboards keep
           coming who cares who's president. It's like worrying about the
           governor of Washington, the real power is BGates.
                \_ what happened to the taiwanese leader who had himself
                   shot? - danh
                   \_ He certified himself as the election winner and is now
                      busily rewriting TW's history textbook to remove any
                      mention of China while adding praise of Japanese
                      imperial army's heroic conduct during WWII.

11/24   Republicans are winning everything, even in Washington!!!
        http://tinyurl.com/639oc (cnn.com)
        \_ If it's a state-wide hand-recount, I bet the DemocRAT wins!

11/23   How'd this get in the Stanford Daily?
        http://tinyurl.com/6jnbr (daily.stanford.edu) - danh
        \_ Funny thing is, when I was a cal undergrad, I felt that all this
           stanford rivalry crap was stupid, and that they were pretty similar
           schools.  After being out for a few years and working with people
           from both schools I no longer feel that way.  Stanford really
           does turn out some whiners with no balls.  And ditto times five
           for the east coast snob schools--only they have *much* lower
           standards for technical education than either cal or stanford.
           Cal was not my first choice in highschool, but it sure would have
           been if I knew what I know now.
           \_ MIT grads are the only ones who have been almost uniformly
              competent in my experience.  Possibly Caltech too, but the
              sample size is too small and the 'tude was difficult to work
              with.
              \_ I noticed the Caltech attitude also.  MIT people have been
                 awesome.  I saw some pretty horrible people from Stanford,
                 and CMU before. -- ilyas
                 \_ The 'tude goes away once you've slapped them a few times.
                    They still have an unhealthy focus on the right thing vs.
                    the good enough thing though.
           \_ I worked w/ Cornell, Brown and Princeton grads and they
              were all very good. As far as Stanford is concerned, I
              knew this girl who worked at Google in mkt around when
              gmail first came out and instead of giving the accts
              away for free to customers like she was supposed to,
              she started selling them on ebay. Lost her job and her
              options, but she made $5k a week for three weeks. They
              don't teach you shit like that at Cal.
        \_ Strange--all the people from Ivy league schools with whom I've
           worked lately were very good.  Maybe the shits stay in the
           U.S.  -John
           \_ either the above statement is true, or you just suck a lot.
                \_ Yer mom thought I was pretty awesome.  -John
                \_ Yer dad thought I was pretty awesome.  -John
        \_ you're a traitor for reading the enemy's crappy biased newspaper.
           \_ Fair and Balanced.
           \_ Well try this one on for size. Their team lost this year but
              they've won most of the Big Games over the past couple decades...
              with teams composed of players who actually had to maintain GPAs,
              attend at least a few real classes and may actually go on to
              something professional after their moment of glory as a college
              athlete, assuming they don't go pro. Compare that to what most of
              us have heard about athletes at Cal. I'm not a college sports
              fan and maybe it shows but I appreciate the way Stanford does it
              much better than the way Cal does. Cal's version of the thing
              makes a mockery of its academics and those who hold Cal degrees.
                -- ulysses  P.s., I agree that Stanford grads are generally
              a bunch of overprivileged whiners. Mostly.
              \_ So Stanford holds regular students to lower standards than
                 Cal and their atheletes are held to those same standards
                 while Cal is harsher on regular students but hold their
                 atheletes to lower standards than regular students? Doesn't
                 that make Cal and Stanford atheletes about on par with
                 each other?
                 \_ Cal does not hold athletes to lower standards than
                    regular students; the rules for academic probation/
                    dismissal are exactly the same.  Athletes get more help
                    with their studies, and get a break on admissions (that
                    is also true at Stanford).  Once they're here, they have
                    to perform.   -tom
                 \_ (a < b) & (a = c) & (b > d) doesn't imply c = d .
                    \_ But it does imply ( (c>d) implies (a>d) )
                       \_ Given a lack of standard for GPA, it's hard to
                          determine c > d without knowing the persons involved.
                          Nor am I really sure that a = c.
                          \_ Geez you guys. It was just a joke. I understood
                             the whole logical fallacy when I wrote it. I just
                             didn't think anyone would attempt to get all
                             anal about it.
                             \_ ob yermom joke
              \_ Cal is much harder on its student-athletes in terms of
                 academics than Stanford is.  And both Braun and Tedford
                 seem to be very interested in academics; Cal's current
                 football team has something like 10 guys on the Pac-10
                 All-Academic team.
                   -tom
                 \_ I count 9 for Cal and 14 for Stanford in football. I don't
                    know how to compare these, though, given the difference
                    between what it takes to maintain a GPA at the two schools.
                    I am impressed by Derek Joyce. Maintaining a 3+ GPA in
                    MCB was no mean feat, even without an athletic program.
                     -- ulysses
                     \_ The only university football program that I do not have
                        contempt for is that of University of Chicago.  They
                        had the right idea.
                        \_ Care to provide any context for that?
                           \-UChi got rid of their foodball program a long
                             time ago and pissed off a lot of alumni. Their
                             former president famously said "anytime i feel
                             like exercising, i lie down until the feeling
                             goes away." uchi is a great institution ... sort
                             of like berkeley in some ways. no nonsense school
                             that sends a lot of people back into academia.
                             you can look up robert maynard hutchins. --psb
                        \_ The Caltech one is pretty cool, too.
                    \_ Oh and here's men's hoops: Stanford 4, Cal 2. -- ulysses