rootbear

32 ms·

1. 421.▲
   by rootbear 9y ago

   This is a common problem with modern supercomputers, which are all clusters of some sort. We have a supercomputer at NASA Goddard, much smaller than Pleiades, that gets new "Scalable Units" every few years. The first parts of it a
2. 422.▲
   by rootbear 9y ago

   I enjoyed reading it, but I agree that the title is misleading to the point of being insulting.
3. 423.▲
   by rootbear 10y ago

   I didn't know that Mr. Mossberg lived in Maryland. I'll have to keep an eye out for that car!
4. 424.▲
   by rootbear 10y ago

   I had much the same reaction. I learned Unix on a PDP-11 running sixth edition AT&T. I was also using the University's UNIVAC 1108 and the elegance, simplicity and orthogonality of the Shell vs the EXEC-8 command language was a joy
5. 425.▲
   by rootbear 10y ago

   The low cost and low power consumption make it useful for home automation tasks that can't be handled by something simpler, like an Arduino. I've starting thinking about what I'd like to automate and I think the Pi ZW may be
6. 426.▲
   by rootbear 10y ago

   Could this be a reflection of the increasing gulf between RAM speed and HD speed? Even with NVMe drives, which one probably shouldn't be swapping to anyway, RAM is orders of magnitude faster.
7. 427.▲
   by rootbear 10y ago

   You beat me to it. I was answering my own question when one of my users came in with a problem. Stupid users...
8. 428.▲
   by rootbear 10y ago

   Here is the answer: https://www.gnu.org/software/libc/manual/html_node/TZ-Variab... The third format looks like this: :characters Each operating system interprets this format differently; in th
9. 429.▲
   by rootbear 10y ago

   Is there a reason why the path to the timezone file is prefixed with a colon? TZ=:/etc/localtime I've set TZ sometimes without the colon and it seem to work. I did a quick online search and didn't find anything relevant.
10. 430.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    Thanks to arthritis and some nerve damage, unless I write very slowly, even I can't read my writing anymore. It's very annoying.
11. 431.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    Honestly, I think it might cost less to terraform Venus into something more reasonable than it would to build a rover that could operate there today.
12. 432.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    Yeah, well, I was young and inexperienced... my first programming languages were BASIC and FORTRAN...
13. 433.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    But don't forget that defining define is undefined!
14. 434.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    While we're discussing abuse of switch, here's my personal best effort at misusing this feature, from over thirty years ago. /* * A program to print The Twelve Days of Christmas * using the C fall through case state
15. 435.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    Four, my g-g-grandfather Luby.
16. 436.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    Yes, Menv, for Modelling ENVironment, although it was a full animation package, not just a modeler. It has a new name now and has been extensively rewritten.
17. 437.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    I don't know or recall the details well enough to be sure, but it's possible that they were, in fact, testing the backups but had never before exceeded the 2GB limit. Knowing that your test cases cover all possible circumstances,
18. 438.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    They got it done by killing everyone, working multiple shifts, 24/7, no days off, etc. Some people left after it was over, due to burn out. Surviving TS2 was a test of Pixar's resilience that they passed, but at a cost.
19. 439.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    The original version did have Woody being stolen by a toy collector and being rescued by the other toys. I don't think many of the specifics beyond that survived the rewrite, but I don't know for sure. There are links elsewhere in
20. 440.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    Almost. TS2 was originally a direct to video film. But Disney liked the work-in-progress so much that they approved making it a feature film. And Pixar management at the time wasn't really thrilled with the idea of having an "A&qu
21. 441.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    I don't work in the manned space part of NASA and the software I deal with isn't critical, so I can't say. Most of what I know about Flight software development comes from co-workers who've done that work. They speak of
22. 442.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    I was at Pixar when this happened, but I didn't hear all of the gory details, as I was in the Tools group, not Production. My memory of a conversation I had with the main System Administrator as to why the backup was not complete was t
23. 443.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    What I found interesting is that, while any given modern human has no more than about 4% Neanderthal DNA, it isn't the same 4% in everyone. About 20% of the Neanderthal genome is found in humans. I'm not sure what this says about
24. 444.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    That's hilarious. And a perfect example of why trigger words need to be broadly customizable.
25. 445.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    This is my general complaint about all of these voice controlled services. I want to be able to set my trigger word. I will not be unpaid brand promotion for Google, Amazon, etc. I can mostly deal with "Alexa" or "Siri"
26. 446.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    "C++ isn't a language. It is a laboratory where some people work out ways to do poorly what other languages do well." Amen! I studied PL/I, in the University of Maryland dialect called PL/UM, in the 70s as a student
27. 447.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    Did Neanderthals build dwellings or similar structures? I don't think I've heard that before.
28. 448.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    I've had similar experiences with embedded PCs. I keep a copy of FreeDOS handy for just such situations.
29. 449.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    Thanks, I'd like to read both.
30. 450.▲
    by rootbear 10y ago

    Thanks. Maybe I can get to it over the Holidays.