champu

The VISO is not an audible altimeter, it's a digital visual altimeter. The OPTIMA is L&B's audible altimeter that has swoop beeps (which can be turned off btw.) I use both (and a protrack too actually as a second audible / logbook ... I am an L&B whore ...) Today's digital altimeters are waaaaaay more accurate than the classic alti-2, galaxy, FT-50, etc. so I wouldn't discount them outright for newer jumpers. I might, however, recommend something more along the lines of an altitrack which is a digital altimeter with a familiar analog readout. This style of readout can very quickly be polled by the eyes (i.e. which area of the face is the needle in?) and is probably easier to use for newer jumpers who already have a lot on their minds up there. As far as mounting goes, I zip-tied my VISO directly to a small pillow-mount, and I wear it on the short side of my chest strap (it doesn't easily pass over the friction adapter so that way it can't move around.)

I'm familiar with rapid prototyping, and many of the advances in the field, but that has nothing to do with creating digital copies of things that are complex enough to even resemble the situation you originally suggested as a comparison to the current IP state of affairs. Regarding my other statement, I wasn't comparing the number of times the RIAA has been reprimanded to the number of settlements the RIAA has managed to obtain, I was making an underhanded comment about how the RIAA doesn't like to actually use courts, preferring instead to do their own searching of people's computers, sequestering of information from 3rd parties, and threatening of people into paying them. There have even been situations where the RIAA went after someone, that person was forced to put a defense together, and when the RIAA realized they were going to lose, they tried to weasel out of having to reimburse the defendent for the legal fees. I don't want to go 'round and 'round over this. I think the protection of intellectual property is a serious issue, and I don't argue that copying music/software/etc. is "okay." What I am arguing is that companies like Microsoft and organizations like the RIAA are employing pig-headed and draconian measures to try and provide this protection, and in some cases they give as little regard to law in pursuit of their personal interests as those who are doing the infringing.

This argument is silly. If it came to pass that technology one day allowed us to create a digital copy of a physical object, who would honestly give a rat's ass about the implications that would have on copyright enforcement? Enforcement of IP rights is a tricky problem. Record labels know this well from the compact disc DRM fiascos a few years back. Analogies like this one do a disservice to those who recognize it to be a tricky problem and come up with more elegant solutions than trying to sue anything that represents change. If the RIAA wants to gather evidence against people and file lawsuits, and they feel it is in their long-term best interest to do so... well... that's their choice, but they need to cut out the vigilante bullshit. Storming establishments in RIAA uniforms with badges... attempts to shake down ISPs for information with no court subpoena... loading their CDs with software that trashes the computer's driver files... programs like this that (imho) call in to question their ability to really do anything in good faith... It would seem the courts are just as busy trying to keep a leash on the rabid beast that the RIAA has become as they are with hearing cases that it brings against people.

It also depends on whether you're talking about just picking up signals or actually trying to extract information from them. You might detect faint bursts of RF (or whatever frequency) energy but part of convincing yourself that they were generated by an intelligent source has to include determining to at least some level of certainty what the purpose of the signals were. Another tricky part that's fun to think about is that by the time this RF energy gets to us, it's path won't have been a straight line. In order to figure out where it actually came from, you'd need to consider all the massive bodies it passed by on the way (which, btw, are now in different locations from where they were when they exerted their pull on the transmission, and will be in still different locations if and when a return transmission is attempted) Hah... and I thought duplex communication within our solar system was a pain in the ass.

This one argument for getting a smaller reserve as your main size gets into the sub-100 range might not even be valid anymore (the relative likelihood of a two-out situation not in consideration.) I highly doubt that anything plays particularly well with a 90 sqft canopy loaded at 2:1.

Do you have a white paper or other reference you could point me to that speaks to the pinout of this connector, signaling characteristics required, and command set available? I'd be interested in reading up on it.

All of the floating point architectures that I'm aware of would call it 1 and stop as soon as the difference became smaller than the resolution of the FP register you were using. At which point I'm sure the VLSI designers said what any electrical/computer engineer says when asked to accommodate a pathological situation, "Let 'em fix it in software if they want that to work." /edited to add: It's quite possible. There are many topics in mathematics I tried to stop thinking about years ago. But even after I've taken the keys out my brain is still dieseling.

Pop: lim(sum(9*10^-m,m,1,n),n,inf) = 1 Kallend: Please stop talking about the cardinality of infinite sets, that's how brains melt. (plus I'm still bitter that they they released a new edition of Kenneth Rosen's text at the end of that semester so the bookstores wouldn't buy mine back... grumbles...)

8/10 I have no idea who anyone is in the field or what books have been written about it.

Isn't there a fancy restaurant there? Yes, but the wait is terrible. The first 10 million years are the worst.

There are very few posters on dropzone.com that could be considered subject matter experts on the handful of thread themes that go round and round here in speakers corner. And even then, the comprehensiveness of the knowledge base often leaves something to be desired. Some folks understand that, some folks masquerade in any thread they get politically charged up about.

"Usually" is a bit of an understatement. Although I suppose if you had some C-15 and O-14 they would at least last long enough for you to say, "See! Carbon is more massive!"

I think his problem is with this section. The ordinance says, "all guns must be registered to be legal... oh, btw... here's a whole bunch of rules about what we let you register..." So you'd no longer be able to purchase any handguns. And the handguns you currently own have to light up and play a song about gun safety when loaded. And (maybe I'm reading it wrong but this is a law and if you can read it wrong, you can enforce it that way) how exactly can you possibly comply with part b? The ordinance says that after effectivity, you will have to register everything. At some date, theoretically, it will become effective. It says that if you have a gun prior to that date, it must be registered before registration is mandatory, or else you won't be allowed to register it.

The M0S, M0, and MT will all hold a PDR126. My previous rig was an M0S, and it fit a 135 sabre/stiletto very nicely. You could put a 150 in it if humidity was on your side, but jumping it with a 120 I thought was a little dodgy (loose.) I currently have an MT, and have had a stiletto 107, katana 120, katana 107, katana 97, velocity 103, velocity 96, and a velocity 90 in it, and they all fit well. I've been very happy with my mirages and their customer service, and next time I'm in the market for a rig I'll be buying another one.

haha, I liked that.

As a skydiver / wingsuit flyer / photographer / physics geek, I love this cover. Very nice. Congratulations.

no....that would be the liberal thing to do. So, you equate liberalism with moral action. Somehow, I don't think that was your intended result. What actually happened there was you misrepresented his opinion. And somehow I think that was your intended result.

It would seem there is a pool of people with poor mental health out there capable of doing this kind of thing on their way out. I'm not sure proceeding directly to a gun control debate (neither passing go, nor collecting 200 dollars) is the best course of action.

The principle of operation is the same for any type of electroshock weapon. They all impair with your ability to control your muscles by interfering with your central nervous system. They all basically consist of three parts: a battery, a circuit to step up the voltage, and the interface to the person you are trying to shock. The first is pretty self-explanatory, and the last we know pretty well to be either a simple pair of electrodes you have to touch the person with, or a pair of small darts with lengths of thin wires that can be shot at the person from a short distance. The characteristics of the pulse(s) that get sent into the person is where I'm sure every manufacturer starts coming up with fancy sounding names. But in the end, it's a high-voltage (200-300kV) low-current (a few mA) pulsed output with a low duty-cycle (meaning you send a series of very short shocks with a relatively long period of time between them)

uh... what?

What troubles me the most is that there's an all too often realized risk of actually believing and living the images one seems to have to project about themselves to get into the office. The only images I'd prescribe people maintain for themselves, consequently believing and living them (the POTUS included,) would be having a sense of humor about life and being reasonable. These two things really go a long way.

For starters it is the absence of hate, anger, fear, greed, vindictiveness, dishonesty, lusts, envy, and self deification. If you valued spiritual development then you would know that humility, love, honesty, charity, reverence, peace, transparency, and joy are some of the characteristics manifested by those who do. I find it rather insulting that you would tie (in a sort of non-committal language) the absence of the former characteristics and presence of the latter to what you are calling "spiritual development." Not insulting as an individual, mind you, but insulting as a member of the human race. I've stated before on this forum, and still believe, that we are generally a bunch of imbeciles, but that doesn't mean we need a religion to be philanthropic.

It could be done, although I haven't seen it myself. As others have mentioned, you can barrel-roll the whole thing and achieve it momentarily, but to fly it stable like that would be more challenging. You'd want the head-down person to fly as slow as possible (daffy, as having your legs wide and out to the side wouldn't do anything because they'd be in the burble of the back-fliers) and have the people on their back go as fast as possible (legs tucked in, almost in a ball position) The back-fliers have to focus on looking past each other at the horizon to keep the thing on heading and not spinning and tracking all over the place, and the head-down flier has to focus on keeping his or her head and torso straight and directly above the center of the formation. edited to add: btw "anchor" is already the name of one of the randoms in the 4-way VRW dive pool

If the alphabet soup has intelligence that dispatched firefighters are responding to a location that contains a weapons cache / haz-mat / potentially combative tenants, it's irresponsible not to have a way to let them know. Firefighters have a hard enough job as it is without having to deal with that crap. As for reporting back findings after the fire is out, I'm a little divided. If the residence / location of the fire contained materials / activities that were illegal and contributed to the starting of the fire or potentially made the building unusually hazardous for the firefighters responding to the fire, I'm all for further investigations being brought up. But jeopardizing what firefighters do best by putting a bunch of non-related investigative responsibilities on their plate is a recipe for disaster.

[mechanic] Well there's yer problem. [/mechanic]