adrian_b

979 ms·

4261.
by adrian_b 3y ago
That is the Pu238 isotope that is used in thermoelectric generators. Most of the plutonium produced in nuclear reactors is Pu239. This is the isotope that is useful as nuclear fuel and for nuclear bombs. As another poster has already writte
4262.
by adrian_b 3y ago
The security problems for io_uring or for any other system calls exist only when an adversary has access to those system calls. Whenever you write an application for internal use, where there is no possibility for an adversary to interfere
4263.
by adrian_b 3y ago
I suppose that the reason for the picture may be that obesity is the form of unhealthiness that can be instantly seen just by looking at someone. Many other forms are either not visible externally or they may be noticed only when someone ha
4264.
by adrian_b 3y ago
While glucose is either used directly or it is stored as glycogen in liver and muscles, fructose is used in a different way. Fructose is mostly converted by the liver and much of the energy obtained from it is used to synthesize fat. In mod
4265.
by adrian_b 3y ago
The performance per dollar of Ryzen 7950X is many times higher than of any Epyc or Threadripper CPUs, even after adding the costs of the motherboards, coolers, cases and PSUs. The DRAM bandwidth per core is identical for Ryzen 7950X and for
4266.
by adrian_b 3y ago
The frequency of software bugs is what has allowed the hardware manufacturers to omit ECC from most computer products. Every time when a program crashes or remains stuck or data corruption is discovered, the user automatically assumes that
4267.
by adrian_b 3y ago
The power consumption is higher by an amount that is not easily detectable. The power consumed by the relatively few gates that generate and verify the ECC code is dwarfed by the power consumption needed to transport bits over the PCB trace
4268.
by adrian_b 3y ago
As I have also said above, +12.5% paid by the manufacturer of DIMM for memory chips may mean +10% in the price of DIMMs when they are not marked up excessively, like the DDR5 modules today. That +10% may become +5% after adding CPU, cooler,
4269.
by adrian_b 3y ago
Almost free means that the 12.5% extra cost for memory chips may mean 10% extra manufacturing cost for the memory modules and that may mean less than 5% of the total cost of a computer with 64 GB DRAM (not counting monitor, SSDs and other p
4270.
by adrian_b 3y ago
On a computer configured correctly, the errors are logged and the user or administrator may be notified when they happen. In my experience the most valuable benefit of ECC is the detection of aged memory modules. All modern DRAM has a limit
4271.
by adrian_b 3y ago
No memory capacity or memory throughput is lost in consumer motherboards when enabling ECC. You just need to buy ECC UDIMM modules, which, especially for DDR5, are more expensive, up to 50% more expensive for DDR5, even if this price differ
4272.
by adrian_b 3y ago
Copying or moving through tmpfs loses silently some file metadata, e.g. extended attributes or high-resolution filestamps. Copying through /tmp is a frequently used method for transferring files between users on a multi-user computer.
4273.
by adrian_b 3y ago
> while remaining safe and side-effect free Unfortunately it is not clear whether this goal is more realistic than searching for the philosopher's stone or for the elixir of life.
4274.
by adrian_b 3y ago
What you say is only partially true. One can still consume whatever is desired, but in much smaller quantities than desired. For instance, I have been obese for many years. Then I have succeeded to lose (after several failed attempts) more
4275.
by adrian_b 3y ago
Given how close the star HD 7977 was 2.8 million years ago, many times closer than any star today, it is pretty much certain that its passage has perturbed the orbits of the planets. What is uncertain is only which were the changes, i.e. wh
4276.
by adrian_b 3y ago
While this Glowdust obviously implements a query language very different from SQL, whichever differences exist between it and relational databases are not because, as it claims, "It uses functions as a model for storing data". The
4277.
by adrian_b 3y ago
No, that figure is not it. I do not remember now where to find a suitable figure, but these are the coordinates of the corners of the 2 cubes: neutrino & antineutrino: (0,0,0) electron: (-1,-1,-1) positron: (1,1,1) down quarks: (-1,0,0)
4278.
by adrian_b 3y ago
While the fact that the bacteria can convert CO2 to carbonate faster than by other means is interesting, this can solve only half of the problem of CO2 sequestering. The carbonate ions must combine with metal ions, like calcium and magnesiu
4279.
by adrian_b 3y ago
The fact that the proton has the same charge in absolute value as the electron is just a consequence of the fact that the 8 elementary particles at the lowest energy level, i.e. electron and its neutrino, the 3 up quarks and the 3 down quar
4280.
by adrian_b 3y ago
In the 19th century Tai Chi was a real martial art used by professional bodyguards, including by some of those of the emperor. However it is likely that most of its techniques have been lost and only some of its training exercises converted
4281.
by adrian_b 3y ago
Yoga is not really comparable, because it is much more static. Of course, there is nothing magic about the Tai chi sequences and many other sequences of movements executed in a similar manner should have a similar effect. A general stretchi
4282.
by adrian_b 3y ago
That is true for continuous English text. Programs have lines with a very variable length, which changes a lot the ability to locate lines. I prefer very much 132-character lines to 80-character lines. Those who claim that 80-character line
4283.
by adrian_b 3y ago
"->" is taken from the IBM PL/I language, which was an important source of various syntax elements of C (the other 2 main sources being BCPL and Algol 68). It was added because the indirection operator "*" has th
4284.
by adrian_b 3y ago
It was free as in beer to download through ftp. The money for the tape presumably covered the cost of the tape and of access to a computer and a tape drive and the time spent by someone to write the tape and handle packing and shipping, wit
4285.
by adrian_b 3y ago
The study should have compared handwriting not only with typewriting, but also with drawing, in order to reach a useful conclusion. Practicing handwriting as a child is certainly useful for developing fine control of hand movements, but pra
4286.
by adrian_b 3y ago
If that is true, then the CPU variant must be a much worse implementation of the algorithm than the GPU variant, because the true ratio of the GPU and CPU performances is many times less than that.
4287.
by adrian_b 3y ago
The problem is that what really counts for someone who purchases a CPU are the 2 optimization criteria that I have mentioned above, which determine how much money will be spent initially for buying it and how much money will be spent over i
4288.
by adrian_b 3y ago
At that time the use of radians was still uncommon in physics. The frequency of periodic events was measured at that time in cycles per second. The unit of frequency "cycle per second" has been renamed "hertz" much later
4289.
by adrian_b 3y ago
You are right, but in the context of CPU cores the normal criteria for optimization are the ratio between performance and energy consumption and the ratio between performance and price, where the price is supposed to be determined by the ma
4290.
by adrian_b 3y ago
Apple does not optimize for IPC. Apple has just designed the CPU cores with the highest IPC among all known until now. The highest IPC is the best choice for minimum energy consumption in a CPU with few cores, like a mobile phone or light

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