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Thursday, June 29, 2000
Extreme Telecommuting
Why be tied to an office desk, why even be tied to anything at all. Follow some extreme telecommuters around Europe for a year.
All About Extreme Telecommuting
"Extreme Telecommuting is when you telecommute from everyplace all the time. Not only are you not tied to the corporate office, you're not even tied to a house. You fire up the laptop, grab the international power adapters, jump onto a plane (or train), and head out on the highway."
posted at 6/29/2000 11:25:35 PM
A comprehensive list of European Megaliths. Europe is absolutely littered with them. Where did the ancient Eoropeans find all the free time ? I find it interesting just to find an old hundred year old cemetary, or a crumbling rock wall when I am hiking. I wish I could stumble on some of this stuff.
There are several QuickTime VR movies of various megalithic sites, with zooming and 360 deg scanning.
Stone Pages - A guide to European megaliths
"Stone circles, dolmens, standing stones, cairns, barrows and hillforts: welcome to the first and most comprehensive online guide to European megaliths and other ancient sites."
posted at 6/29/2000 09:56:24 PM
Wednesday, June 28, 2000
Here are construction details for building nests for regular, leaf-cutter and tree-living ants. Much better than the plastic toy ant farms. There is also a section on how to get hold of an ant colony. The instructions are also available at the site in pdf format for printing on a color printer.
Ant-Farm
Instructions for building artificial nests and about how to get hold of an ant colony.
posted at 6/28/2000 11:51:58 PM
This interesting site contains maps detailing regional differences in pronunciation in the US. Surveys were done checking for similarity or differences in the pronunciation of various phonemes. Some of the maps include sound files so you can hear what they are talking about. You can easily see the boundaries of various accents on the maps.
Phonological Atlas of North America
posted at 6/28/2000 07:10:42 PM
Tuesday, June 27, 2000
Let's see, Democrats, Republicans, any others ? How about over a hundred, from the Communist, fascist Falangist and Nazi parties to the Pot party and the Free Pony and Ice Cream Party, they are all here. Check out their platforms, stands on the issues and their logos.
DARKHORSE2000 - SOME SORT OF INTRODUCTION
"We're building the Web's best resource for non-partisan political and election information - a place where you can get the information you want and have a little fun along the way."
Our focus is on the Independent and Third Party candidates because we think you should know that there are alternatives to the two most boring presidential candidates since Calvin Coolidge - and because we'd like to see a revival of the Great American Dream. You know...the one that says every kid has a chance to grow up to become President someday."
posted at 6/27/2000 01:10:43 AM
Sunday, June 25, 2000
Database of Terrestial Impact Structures
"To-date, approximately 150 impact craters have been identified on Earth. Almost all known craters have been recognized since 1950 and several new structures are found each year."
Also see this Terrestrial Impact Craters site.
posted at 6/25/2000 01:41:46 AM
Saturday, June 24, 2000
Mars Global Surveyor MOC2-234 to MOC2-245 Releases
"Gullies seen on martian cliffs and crater walls in a small number of high-resolution images from the Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) suggest that liquid water has seeped onto the surface in the geologically recent past."
"The relative freshness of these features might indicate that some of them are still active today."
posted at 6/24/2000 03:03:14 PM
Frequently updated imagery of current large scale environmental events.
Operational Significant Event Imagery
The Operational Significant Event Imagery team produces high-resolution, detailed imagery of significant environmental events which are visible in remotely-sensed data available at the NOAA Science Center in Suitland, Maryland.
posted at 6/24/2000 12:07:24 AM
Friday, June 23, 2000
MIT Oxygen Project
"Bringing abundant computation and communication, as pervasive and free as air, naturally into people's lives."
"In the future, computation will be freely available everywhere, like batteries and power sockets, or oxygen in the air we breathe."
posted at 6/23/2000 11:53:41 PM
No sleep for 39hrs, drunken co-workers, interesting quotes like "It is two days later and I am still at the office. I did not go and chase coots. There is too much work to do. I want to die." They just don't make software like they used to ( or do they ? ).
Netscape Developer's Journal Excerpt
"Here are some excerpts from my diary during the first few months of the existence of Netscape Communications (All Praise the Company), back when we were still called Mosaic. Back when there were only 20 or 30 of us, instead of however-many thousands of people there are today. Back before we had any middle managers."
posted at 6/23/2000 05:35:40 PM
Wednesday, June 21, 2000
Spend your next vacation in a smelly claustrophobic run-down room with a great view.
MirCorp Home page
Imagine waking up and rolling out of bed, as you do every morning of your life. Slowly, you rise and look out your window, preparing for another average day.
But instead of seeing the green of your lawn and the blue of the sky, you awake to the green of entire continents, and the blue of entire oceans with the deep expanse of space as the background. Looking through the glass portal, you don't even care what is going on in your house, in your city, in your country, in the entire world.
MirCorp will make that dream possible.
posted at 6/21/2000 12:05:35 AM
Tuesday, June 20, 2000
Get your own personal luxury submarine here. These look just like cabin cruisers on the surface. Just the thing for the up and coming smuggler. They have some nice pdf brochures you can download.
U.S. Submarines Personal Luxury Submarines Mainpage
Powered on the surface by twin turbocharged marine diesels, all of our luxury submarine models, with the exception of the small Triton 650, have extended surface range and are capable of diving to 305 meters (1000'). Bad weather? Simply close the hatch and dive, cruising effortlessly far below the waves in air conditioned comfort. The submarines' battery capacity and life support systems allow you to stay submerged for days at a time.
posted at 6/20/2000 11:52:23 PM
This could be quite useful for perl cgi development.
DynamicPerl Home Page
DynamicPerl is a binary build of Perl 5.6 for Win32 with an integrated Apache webserver for testing and developing CGI scripts.
DynamicPerl is free. It includes a browser based GUI Package Manager for installing pre-built binary packages from repositories. The package manager can also be used to build and install CPAN source modules.
posted at 6/20/2000 11:26:03 PM
Monday, June 19, 2000
Here is the state-of-the-art in spud gun technology. Way,way beyond the ones I used to make out of old beer cans.
The Spudgun Technology Center-Cutting edge spudgun and potato launcher technology.
Welcome to the Spudgun Technology Center, a premiere information resource pertaining to the conception, construction, safe operation, optimization, and promotion of spudguns.
Coming Soon: Rigorous Pneumatic Mathematical Model!
posted at 6/19/2000 11:41:45 PM
Sunday, June 18, 2000
Project the outside scene on your wall. This site shows how to make a very simple camera obscura. I've always wanted to make one, but where do you find the appropriate lenses ? This site recommends having an optician make an eyeglass sized lens for you, but what I really want is a 4 to 6 inch lens.
The Sky in a Room
This time, we will deal with an optical experiment easy to do, but which, in spite of its simplicity, is able to give you a continuous marvel. What you have to do is simply mount a lens on the bedroom window. In this way, when you wake up in the morning, you will admire the outside scene projected on a wall of your bedroom
posted at 6/18/2000 06:02:04 PM
A good concise and readable introduction to the construction of logical arguments. It could be useful in your next flamewar.
Constructing a Logical Argument
Although there is much argument on Usenet, the general quality of argument found is poor. This article attempts to provide a gentle introduction to logic, in the hope of improving the general level of debate.
posted at 6/18/2000 03:09:58 PM
Check out the footage of actual blasts and watch what would happen to your house, or map out the zones of destruction for your area.
The American Experience | Race for the Superbomb | Special feature
Map a Nuclear Blast
Would you survive a nuclear blast? Enter any location within the U.S. and we'll map out a hydrogen bomb's "zones of destruction" for that location.
posted at 6/18/2000 02:59:13 PM
Saturday, June 17, 2000
Nice Trebuchet ( similar to a catapult ) site. There is a page on a small tabletop model that can thow a marble around 24 meters. There are also links to a Danish site with some awesome full size trebuchets.
The Grey Company Trebuchet Page
Here you'll find a lot of pictures and a few words about these amazing pieces of "leverage artillery" - strange machines referred to variously as trebuchets, traction trebuchets, perriers, petrarias, war wolves, coulliards, bricoles or even "the witch from whose head the ropes hang like hair".
posted at 6/17/2000 11:25:19 PM
Interesting Elián González story story focusing on life expectancy in Cuba vs the US.
Long Live Elián González - Juan Miguel's choice. by Jefferson Morley
According to the United Nations Statistical Division, the average life expectancy of a 6-year-old boy living in the United States is 66.5 more years (or 72.5 total). Unless he is relocated to Cuba, where the average life expectancy of a 6-year-old boy is 67.5 more years (73.5 total).
posted at 6/17/2000 10:02:08 PM
Just strap it on and fly away. I want one of these.
SoloTrek Exo-Skeletor Flying Vehicle by Millennium Jet Inc.
posted at 6/17/2000 07:59:28 PM
Thursday, June 15, 2000
At home I use an old P200 running OpenBSD as a firewall for my ADSL connection. It was very easy to set up, and is possibly the most secure operating system available.
OpenBSD 2.7 Release
Three years without a remote hole in the default install!
Two years without a localhost hole in the default install!
The OpenBSD project produces a FREE, multi-platform 4.4BSD-based UNIX-like operating system. Our efforts emphasize portability, standardization, correctness, proactive security and integrated cryptography.
Also see the Slashdot discussion.
posted at 6/15/2000 09:02:15 PM
Wednesday, June 14, 2000
Calculus students today have it so easy.
This site also sells Mathematica for Students and Calculus Wiz.
The Integrator "Powered by Mathematica."
posted at 6/14/2000 10:44:15 PM
Courtney Love gives an interesting and thoughtful view of big record companies versus Napster. Conclusion ? The big record companies are the real pirates.
Salon.com tech | Courtney Love does the math
posted at 6/14/2000 09:18:26 PM
Wow, it's surprisingly noisy out there in the ocean, but I could hear the whales over the white noise.
WhaleLink - orca fm
WhaleLink is a research and conservation project with an aim to monitor the underwater vocalizations of killer whales through a network of remote listening stations. Each listening station is located at a strategic coastal location, where whales frequently pass at close range.
ORCA FM is part of a larger project called "WhaleLink", which provides opportunities for scientists and the interested public to remotely monitor the underwater communication of wild killer whales.
posted at 6/14/2000 08:50:37 PM
Tuesday, June 13, 2000
Position the cursor in field of stars and hold down the left mouse button. Then move the cursor. The stars will be attacted to the mouse cursor.
Gravilux
"Gravilux attempts to address the notion of drawing with stars. A field of individual masses is simulated, such that gravitational attraction is computed between the cursor position and all of the individual stars' positions."
posted at 6/13/2000 11:50:45 PM
This site is full of interesting information.
h2g2 - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
"h2g2 is the Official Earth Edition of The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy - an all-encompassing reference work consisting of thousands of Entries on subjects ranging from Aerosol Deodorants to Zoos.
h2g2 is not simply a collection of Guide Entries, it's a gathering of tens of thousands of Guide Researchers who read and write Entries, have discussions in Forums and write their own Journals and Personal Home Pages for everyone else to see.
And it's fun. Most definitely fun."
posted at 6/13/2000 08:16:18 PM
Sunday, June 11, 2000
Top Ten Algorithms
"Great algorithms are the poetry of computation,"
Also see the Slashdot discussion.
posted at 6/11/2000 09:52:41 PM
Commercial Pizza recipes from Japan. Particularly interesting is the pizza with Kimchi and double cheese, or maybe the cod roe with squid pizza. There is a whole world of pizza I haven't even imagined.
Pizzas from the dark side
posted at 6/11/2000 09:45:19 PM
Friday, June 09, 2000
A page of links to lots of HTML Style Guides.
Web / HTML / Style Guides - webreference.com
posted at 6/9/2000 04:02:57 PM
This is an interesting site focusing on regions of the earth where there is permanent frozen water. There areas are very sensitive to climate changes.
The State of the Cryosphere
"The cryospheric regions, or regions where water is found in solid form, are among the most sensitive to temperature change. Average temperatures in snow and ice-covered areas typically remain below 0° C much of the year. Unlike other substances found on Earth, ice and snow exist relatively close to their melting point and frequently change phase from solid to liquid and back again. Consequently, consistent and prolonged warming trends should result in observable changes to the Earth's cryosphere."
posted at 6/9/2000 11:26:12 AM
Wednesday, June 07, 2000
This site provides an image of the auroral oval, superimposed on a map of the northern hemisphere. It will be a useful site for the next few years. At this moment it appears that I would be able to see some good Northern Lights, if Halifax was not shrouded in fog.
Northern Hemisphere Enlarged View
This plot shows the current extent and position of the auroral oval in the northern hemisphere, extrapolated from measurements taken during the most recent polar pass of the NOAA POES satellite.
posted at 6/7/2000 10:10:24 PM
The very funny Clintons Final Days video.
AdCritic.com: President Clinton - Final Days
"The presidents schedule is just as busy as ever, he's just doing different things."
posted at 6/7/2000 09:33:00 PM
With the approaching interplanetary shockwave on it's way today, it may be interesting to watch real time images of the sun with this screensaver.
SOHO real time images screen saver
NOW SHOWING: LIVE FROM THE SUN ... TO YOUR COMPUTER
A new computer screen saver made available by the European Space Agency now allows computer users to watch spectacular, almost real-time images of our Sun.
The images, coming directly from 1.5 million kilometres away in space, will flash on your computer screen courtesy of ESA's Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO).
posted at 6/7/2000 05:43:22 PM
Apparent ancient relics from an extremely advanced civilization. I'm not sure if this is for real. I'm sure Muldur and Scully are already on the job.
WingMakers
Nearly 27 years ago, mysterious artifacts were found that led to one of the most intriguing scientific and anthropological discoveries ever made. A secret, unacknowledged department of the NSA -- responsible for extraterrestrial contact and technology assimilation -- took the discovery into their laboratory for the purposes of their own agenda.
posted at 6/7/2000 11:09:38 AM
Tuesday, June 06, 2000
Here is an ongoing diary of the recovery of the Hunley, a 30 ton, 40 foot Confederate submarine made out of old locomotive boilers. It was the first submarine in history to sink an enemy ship. Amazingly, it was propelled by human power.
HUNLEY - Special Report - Charleston, S.C. - The Post and Courier
See also: Friends of the Hunley
posted at 6/6/2000 05:39:47 PM
Select a set of characteristics from drop down menus and it will show you a list of birds with those characteristics.
mybirding.com
Red head? Yellow breast? Fill in what you know. For best results, fill in only a few fields.
posted at 6/6/2000 01:52:27 PM
Find the black dot!
posted at 6/6/2000 01:23:38 PM
Monday, June 05, 2000
This is an interesting variation on a kalidoscope. It sounds like it might scare little kids.
SCIENCE HOBBYIST PROJECT: The Disgusto-scope
posted at 6/5/2000 11:00:34 PM
Internet - Revving the new Engines
posted at 6/5/2000 07:43:26 PM
A good report on the [ab]use of hidden file extensions in Microsoft's products.
Power Win2000: The Danger of Hidden File Extensions - May 31, 2000 - by Serdar Yegulalp
posted at 6/5/2000 09:37:24 AM
Friday, June 02, 2000
No rust problems with these bikes.
Amazing Wooden Bike Company Home Page
"Each bike is hand-crafted from solid teak - one of the most durable hardwoods available. The bikes are teak throughout, except for the running gear wheels and tyres."
posted at 6/2/2000 01:34:48 PM
These may have made things a bit clearer way back when I took the dreaded Calculus 101.
Calculus Animations
Many has been the student to say "I need to visualize it in order to understand it." This paper contains a collection of animations to help students in visualizing mathematics, particularly Calculus.
posted at 6/2/2000 01:28:13 PM
Interestingly, this site seems to exist only to provide this definition.
Definition of Copacetic
posted at 6/2/2000 12:28:03 PM
Thursday, June 01, 2000
Leonardo On-Line: The Wonderful Caddis Worm
"Since the early 1980s, artist Hubert Duprat has been utilizing insects to construct some of his "sculptures." By removing caddis fly larvae from their natural habitat and providing them with precious materials, he prompts them to manufacture cases that resemble jewelers' creations."
posted at 6/1/2000 04:58:15 PM
This looks like it could turn out to be very useful. A new approach to searching the web. Right now it seems to be just an idea. See also the Slashdot discussion.
openCOLA™ software
"What openCola does is treat the Internet like a raging river, coursing with new documents. openCOLA locates new documents for you and figures out if they're any good. If Altavista is a treasure-map, openCOLA is an industrial-strength sieve."
"Indeed, to adequately capture and catalog all the resources on the Internet, you'd need a computer as powerful as the Internet itself. So that's what we use."
posted at 6/1/2000 11:29:08 AM
A very useful resource. Good in-depth answers to why things work.
Welcome to How Stuff Works!
"Have you ever wondered how the engine in your car works or what makes the inside of your refrigerator cold? Then How Stuff Works is the place for you! "
posted at 6/1/2000 10:09:13 AM
