July 28, 2006

I can see clearly now...

Seen over at Random Nuclear Strikes:

Since 2001, they’ve been screaming ["they" means enviromentalists - RJ] that President Bush is “rolling back the Clean Air Act,” and that the resulting increase in air pollution will kill people by the thousands. Instead, every category of air pollution has fallen during the Bush years, with 2003, 2004, and 2005 showing the lowest levels of harmful ozone and particulates in the air since the monitoring of air pollution began in the 1960s.

I'm not prepared to give President Bush all the credit for this, just like I'm not willing to bash President Clinton on the subject. There's inertia in something like changing the quality of our air, and I think that we all deserve credit for being more aware of pollution and taking better care of the environment in general. Little things add up, and Americans have made a lot of little eco-friendly things a normal part of our lives. Things like changing the type of freon used in air conditioners, using non-aerosol sprays, and developing cleaner cars and fuels. Yay us!

Follow that link above for more links and details.

Posted by: Ted at 05:22 AM | category: SciTech
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July 03, 2006

Steven Wright once said

"When I die, I'm donating my body to science fiction."

A while back I saw a television program about something that makes such perfect sense, but is so utterly revolting, that you want to retch and say 'doh!' at the same time.

There's a forensics research lab in Tennesee where they study human remains. I'm not talking about sterile anatomy and such, although some of that is done. This facility takes donated bodies and examines them as they decompose within the framework of an outdoor crime scene. In other words, they bury them in shallow graves, or cover them with leaves, or toss them into small streams, or wrap them loosely in a tarp. And leave them there. Then they watch and take notes. And by doing this under controlled conditions, law enforcement can better determine the facts when partially or wholly decomposed bodies are discovered.

Fascinating stuff, but not for the squeamish. The website is user-friendly, meaning it doesn't look like a documentary of "The Making of 'Jason the SlasherCamp Chainsaw Cannibal'". It's all rather polite actually. Positively mature.

Posted by: Ted at 08:12 AM | category: SciTech
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July 01, 2006

They would've gotten away with it if it weren't for those pesky kids

A month or so ago I crunched the screen on my trusty iPAQ. Having become rather dependent on the beastie, I let the family talk me into buying myself a new one (they ain't cheap).

I selected a very nice model with a hardcover to prevent a replay of the screen crunch and then managed to salvage 95% of the software and data on my old PDA.

But something odd was happening. The new device would completely run out of battery power overnight while just sitting on the desk. In two hours, untouched in my briefcase, it would drain up to 60% of the battery power. Problem was, it wasn't consistent, and the randomness was making me a little crazy. I could've taken it back for exchange, and at one point talked to them about just getting a new battery. But it just didn't *feel* like a battery problem. I was also hesitant to hand it over again because I'd spent quite a bit of time reloading software and setting options to make it work exactly the way I wanted it to.

Gradually I started to recognize a pattern and confirmed it a week ago. For some reason, ActiveSync would fire up on its own as if it were on a timer to check email and do other tasks, and it would sit there and run like hell, accomplishing nothing while sucking the life out of the battery. I could go in and end the task, but a short while later it would be sitting there running again.

Today I found the answer. On a bulletin board was a note about a bug in Windows Mobile5 that causes the exact problems I was seeing. There was a workaround included (no patch available yet), and after implementing it (it's not terribly kludgy) I've been monitoring the battery status to see if the problem is solved. So far, so good.

Now, this isn't entirely Microsoft's fault. I gather from my reading that HP (and Dell too) both implemented Windows Mobile5 in kind of an odd way which caused this to be a problem. There are all kinds of detailed explanations out there to be found with a couple of google searches, but my mainframe mind couldn't grasp all the concepts and terminology. We're talking real geek-speak.

Anyway, tentative thanks to those folks who actually know how this crap works at the nuts-and-bolts level. Keep your fingers crossed.

Posted by: Ted at 06:17 AM | category: SciTech
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