Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/March 2005 II

Photo of woman with hat

I'm trying to find that picture of a woman wearing a hat... you know the one. She's naked, but you only see her from the shoulders up (though there's apparently an "original" in which she's all naked). It's often used to demonstrate image manipulation software, etc. Thanks.

Lenna, also [1] and [2]. --Tagishsimon (talk)

Thank you! That's exactly what I was looking for.

Dear me, that's eerie that you knew what heshe meant from that description. Methinks that needs to be added to WP:UA... grendel|khan 20:06, 2005 Mar 11 (UTC)

Egyptian cat

It's probably an odd question, but I'd really like to know. Ancient Egyptian could simply use the drawing of a cat to represent the word cat, but suppose they used the hieroglyphs to represent the sounds of the ancient word for cat, what glyphs would they use? Mgm|^(talk) 11:28, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

The hieroglyphs for cat, miw, combine the glyphs for m, i and w with a picture of a cat. For a picture, see here (search for "picture of a cat"). - Nunh-huh 01:58, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Thank you. Much appreciated! Mgm|^(talk) 10:05, Mar 12, 2005 (UTC)

I thought I'd chip in that Wikipedia can deal with Egyptian hieroglyphs: the word for cat is:

which must have sounded remarkably like 'miaow'! Gareth Hughes 23:32, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Oh, btw, the signs are a milk jug with a net over it, a reed, a quail chick and a cat. I'm not sure about the reed, but my cat would love the other two...Gareth Hughes 23:37, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

the tallest rolercoaster

• Hi, 198.234.202.131. It's apparently the Top Thrill Dragster at Cedar Point, though the Kingda Ka at Six Flags Great Adventure (456 feet, 139 m) will be taller when it opens this spring.[3] 68.81.231.127 19:05, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The Kingda Ka at Six Flags Great Adventure, NJ will be the tallest rollercoaster in the world when it debuts this year. The current record holder (for the next couple of months anyways) is the Top Thrill Dragster at Cedar Point outside of Sandusky, Ohio. --DaveC 19:08, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

protien hydrolysis

When hydrolyzing protein with alkali (or acid), is the hydrolysis of the peptide bonds completely random, or are the bonds between certain amino acids more (or less) susceptible to lysis? ike9898 18:40, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

Different bonds have different energies. Also, different areas are exposed and more vulnerable according to the tertiary structure of the protein. alteripse 03:14, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If the concentration and amount of acid or base is large enough you may just break the thing down to its individual amino acids. Certain bonds are indeed more susceptible to breaking, but as Alterprise said, which part of the protein is exposed to it plays a role as well. Mgm|^(talk) 15:33, Mar 12, 2005 (UTC)

Indices and surds(a maths)

Please help me with these questions and explain each step to me....

1.Find the square roots of (i)6 - 4*2^½ (ii)7 + 2*6^½ (iii)17 - 4*15^½

Ans: (i) ±(2 - 2^½)
     (ii) ±(1 + 6^½)
     (iii) ±(5^½ - 2*3^½)

(a + b^½)^2 = (a^2 + b) + 2a*b^½

So for example, in the first question, solve 6 = a^2 + b and -4*2^½ = 2a*b^½

-Fangz 10:58, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

2(a) If (a - b*5^½)² = 49 - 12*5^½ , find the values of a and b.

Ans: a= ±2, b=±3

(b) Find the square roots of 19 + 6*2^½

Ans: ±(1 + 3*2^½)

--Sasuke1990Sasuke

Who is the Author?

Can you tell me the author or authors of the page on "Articles of Confederation" and "Declaration of Independence"? I would like to cite these works, by author, if possible in a bibliography. My paper is due in 10 days, so a timely response would be appreciated.

Thank you.

cindi.mitchell cox.net

Please see Wikipedia:Citing Wikipedia, but keep in mind that many professors discourage the use of Wikipedia as a source for papers. You should independently verify the accuracy of the articles you cite. Rhobite 06:41, Mar 12, 2005 (UTC)

Emailed. 119 06:44, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

"Silver badge" - Yes, Minister

In the Party Games (Xmas special) of Yes, Minister, the minister said theat he got away with drunk driving because he had a "silver badge". What is (or was) a "silver badge"?

A silver badge probably designates a police officer, don't you think?alteripse 15:04, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If only I hadn't left the DVDs at home this term... From hazy memory, it'd be a badge, or card, or something similar they're given to identify themselves as a minister, the idea being that there may be times when a Minister of the Crown might need to encourage the local police force to be helpful and, eg, help get them somewhere fast. Whilst it almost certainly isn't intended to wave the police away once you get caught drunk-driving, showing it will have much the same effect... the average police officer is likely reluctant to arrest a senior politician unless there's not much option to do otherwise (in this case, a blind eye and a "mind how you go, sir"), since it tends to get embarassing and involve a lot of paperwork. Shimgray 15:20, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Yes, it's a badge given to Cabinet Ministers to identify themselves to police officers. If a police officer wanted to identify themself, they would show their warrant card, as the helmet badge is purely symbolic. Gareth Hughes 15:32, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The Boston (Evening) Transcript

From when to when was the Boston Evening Transcript published? Was this indeed an afternoon-only newspaper, colloquially referred to as the Boston Transcript, or were there separate papers? (I'm not talking about the collection of genealogy columns extracted from it, which is also called the Boston Transcript). JRM 14:54, 2005 Mar 12 (UTC)

• According to the catalog records of the Library of Congress and in the OCLC WorldCat database, the paper was published from July 24, 1830, to April 30, 1941, under slightly varying names, e.g. the Boston Evening Transcript, the Boston Daily Transcript, etc. The catalog also turns up a history of the paper: The Boston Transcript: A History of the First Hundred Years by Joseph Edgar Chamberlain, published by Houghton, Mifflin in 1930 which has been reprinted subsequently. There was also a short lived monthly magazine in 1946 called The Boston Transcript. PedanticallySpeaking 15:11, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

Which Governor or Connecticut proposed merging all New England states?

I'm told that a few years ago a governor of Connecticut proposed that all the New England states should join into one big state. It was rejected because there is strength in differences. I am asked: which governor? RJFJR 19:00, Mar 12, 2005 (UTC)

You may be thinking of the colonial Dominion of New England? Rather locally unpopular.

In a modern sense, it's not so much strength-in-differences as the fact that under the US political system merging states would reduce their power - each state would lose a large chunk of its voice in the Senate. Shimgray 21:27, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

This is disputable. If those states merged and they were a "swing state" presidentially, they would have a tremendous power (I'd expect presidential candidates to pander to the new entity). David.Monniaux 10:34, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

But they wouldn't be a swing state. They'd lean strongly Democratic. The main result would be the loss of ten senators, not all of them Democrats, but none of them currently (that I can think of) being much right of center. It would push the Senate hard to the right. -- Jmabel | Talk 01:14, Mar 16, 2005 (UTC)

And since electoral votes are allotted to the states in proportion to their representation in congress, they'd lose 10 electoral votes as well as 10 senators. Merging states quite clearly would reduce their political power, both in Congress and in elections. - Nunh-huh 01:19, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Greek "thiokol" - sulphur and glue?

I read that the name Thiokol is a portmanteaux of the greek words for sulfur and glue. What are the greek words for sulfur and glue (I'm hoping to add this to the article)? Thanks. -- John Fader (talk | contribs) 20:37, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Well, sulfur is Θειο -- theio -- and glue is κολλα (I think), "kolla", as in "collagen" or "colloid". --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 21:45, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Thanks awfully. It's amazing the gravitas that a few letters in an alien alphabet lends an article :) -- John Fader (talk | contribs) 21:56, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The theion + kolla theory is certainly a reasonable and plausible one, but we can't know for sure because trademarks don't have definitive etymologies. --Gelu Ignisque

I guess I'm missing your point; some trademarks do have definitive etymologies, and Thiokol is one of those. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 19:05, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

VC holders who are Olympic Gold Medalists

There appears to be conflict between the entries for Philip Neame and Albert Hill. The Neame entry states that he is the only VC recipient to win an Olympic Gold Medal. The Hill entry shows him as winning 2 Olympic Gold Medals (four years earlier than Neame).

My understanding is that Albert George Hill the Olympian is not the same person as Albert Hill the VC winner though they both served during WWI. See Talk:Albert Hill. Geoff/Gsl 23:23, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Using the GIMP or another such tool for a crazy idea...

Hey guys,
I recently discovered a fantastic origami model. It is a modular origami work made of simple line units which connect together to form 60 degree angles. The units are used to create five interlocking tetrahedra (triangular pyramids) which together form a dodecahedron.
Here [4] is a picture because the shape is hard to imagine.
Now what I want to do (because I'm crazy ;-) is to make a picture on each face (A pentagonalisation of the Wikipedia logo, most probably). As the faces are not formed from a 2d surface, you cannot just print the picture onto the dodecahedron. Instead, you would have to take the picture and break it up into the different sections and print each onto the parts of the units which constitute the face. However, as the units are at angles and as such parts of the unit which form the face are further than others, you need to distort the sections of the picture so that when viewed from the correct angle and distance the composite image is formed.
Mathematically/Logically, I can see that there is no reason this isn't possible, all it would take is some mathematical transformation of the sections based upon the geometry of the model. However, I can't think how to begin solving the problem. Do me proud, Wikipedians!
nsh 23:58, Mar 12, 2005 (UTC)

I did some stuff about a year ago on how the geometry of shapes changes when viewed from different angles. Basically you need to draw up some diagrams of whatever is being rotated or transformed, looking along the axis of rotation, and then (insert trig here). Alphax ^τεχ 05:26, Mar 16, 2005 (UTC)

Citation

I found an excellent definition and I want to cite the website. Where can I find this information? -Cortney

Assuming you mean you want to cite Wikipedia, see Wikipedia:Citing Wikipedia. If you mean to say that you are writing a Wikipedia article and want to make a citation in it, see Wikipedia:Cite sources. -- Jmabel | Talk 21:24, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

Cleopatra: great beauty or seductress?

I read up on Cleopatra on Wikipedia and did not find anything about her legacy as a great beauty/seductress - maybe something about that should be added by someone who is knowledgable about Egyptian history etc. BUT my question is was she a great beauty? I have heard that she was quite plain and not very attractive but that she was seductive and confident and therefore exerted sex appeal and THAT alone is what has made her so famous for her looks. Does anybody know which is true was she beautiful or did she just have sex appeal?

Yes. Alphax ^τεχ 23:48, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

I can't find a good source, but I believe that archaeologists have found out (though how I don't know) that she was pretty short and overweight. However, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. To give a classic example, Rubens nude models are, by contemporary standards, pretty chubby. At one time Chinese men thought that women with feet bound so tightly that they became deformed were incredibly attractive. To take a contemporary example, to some "Supermodels" are supposed to be the epitome of beauty and/or sexual attractiveness, but generally they have very small breasts for the size of their bodies - and to other women larger breasts are so important that they'll have surgery to create them! And then there are innumerable factors other than that make women (or men) attractive to some, in completely different ways. Compare the appeal of, say Marilyn Monroe with Mae West. Heck, some men fantasize over Condoleezza Rice in boots [5] (Washington Post article, safe for work), or Margaret Thatcher back when she was Prime Minister. Beauty, sex appeal - who can say? --Robert Merkel 06:48, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If memory serves, Cleopatra was famed for her nose as much as anything else... however, accurate portraiture wasn't common in those days, so all we have to go on for her beauty are contemporary descriptions (by people who arguably had a vested interest in making her look good) and a couple of busts (no, not like that...). [6] mentions a couple of descriptions and has photographs of two of the carvings accepted to be of her. I'll leave you to draw your own conclusions... Shimgray 12:07, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Green skinned oriental woman painting

What's the name of , and/or who is the artist who painted, that picture of an oriential woman with green skin that was very popular in the 1970s? Jooler 22:07, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think that you are thinking of The Chinese Girl, by Vladimir Tretchikoff. See http://www.tretchikoff.co.uk/, and fix that red link! —AlanBarrett 18:49, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

That's the one, link to picure - it was either that or Constable's Hay Wain on everybody's wall in the 70s. Jooler 22:47, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

That picture... on everybody's... wall... huh. The reference desk tells me everything. This morning, for example, it tells me why not having lived through the 1970s is probably a net positive. :-) Shimgray

It sure wasn't on my wall. AFAICR, that's the first time I've even ever seen that picture before! RickK 23:02, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

I remember seeing it many times. After a little research I've discovered that the Chinese Girl print used to be sold in Boots during the 1960s and 70s. This painting was apparently the biggest selling print in the world, but maybe this phenomenon was greatest in the UK. Jooler 23:30, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Ratio of new Scouts V/S Eagle Scouts In 2004

In the Boy Scouts of America, about 4% of Boy Scouts earn the rank of Eagle Scout. Scouting.org Fact Sheet

French empire

How big was the French colonial empire at its peak, like in terms of square km and population? Not as big as the British one, thats for sure--Wonderfool (talk) (contribs) (email) 11:46, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• By 1914, France had amassed an empire incorporating over 10,000,000 km2 (4,000,000 mi2) and 60 million people from [7] --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 18:58, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

European Script : Torma Zsofia

To Whom It May Concern, Recently I edited "European Script" changing "Romanian archaeologist Torma Zsófia" to "Hungarian archaeologist Torma Zsófia" without naming my sources.

Here they are: Uj Magyar Életrajzi Lexikon (Neues ungarisches biographisches Lexikon in 6 Bd. Bd.4 (ISBN 9635478917); also please see Hungarian Science and Technical workshop: Torma Zsófia (Magyar Tudomány és Tecnikatörténeti Mühely: Torma Zsófia)

The confusion is probably due to the fact that Transylvania today belongs to Romania while at the time of her working was still part of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. Her last name actually has a meaning in Hungarian (horseradish), and still a pretty common name in Hungary. More data about Torma Zsófia: Born in Csicsókeresztúr in 1840. She started excavating the area of the Maros (Mures) flood zone in 1875, extended her work later to the caves of Nándor. In 1876 she was asked to organize and supervise the "Archeological Artifacts found in Hunyad County" for the International Conference of Archaeology and Anthropology held in Budapest, 1876. She found at Tordos the remains of a cca. 4500 years old prehistoric culture, with the well-known written tablets. See her article about this in the "Ethnographische Analogien, Jena 1894.” She had a role in founding the Kolozsvári (Cluj-Napoca) Muzeum, which inherited her archeological findings after her death. (called the Torma Zsófia Collection) She is considered to be the first Hungarian female archaeologist, although a self-made. Her life is well documented and published in 1941 by Márton Roska archaeologist and ethnographist. Her letters was collected and published by Pál Gyulai (1972).

Judith v. Hetenyi JVHxy@aol.com

Why don't you use that information to create an article on her: Torma Zsófia. Rmhermen 14:14, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

A for 'orses

I saw a spelling-alphabet (similar to the NATO phonetic alphabet) that had letters such as the one above. Can anyone explain?--212.100.250.208 17:22, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It's an old joke. Each letter sounds like a line from a child's alphabet, but also has another meaning. So

• A for 'orses (Hay for horses)
• B for mutton (Beef or mutton?)
• L for leather (Hell-for-leather, probably the only one that actually works as an alphabet entry)

DJ Clayworth 18:12, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[8] has a version. "T for two" also works. Shimgray 19:22, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I reckon U for mism would've been lost on the kids.--Wonderfool (talk) (contribs) (email) 12:38, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, but I don't get all of them. Could someone please write an explanation of all of the letters from this website? Sorry to cause trouble.--anon

1. Hay for horses
2. Beef or mutton?
3. See for miles (alternative Sea forth Highlanders or Sea for Ships)
4. Teeth or dentures (alternative D for mation)
5. Evening Standard (alternative E've a brick)
6. Effervescence
7. G4 Police
8. Age for consent
9. Ivor Novello
10. Jaffa oranges
11. Cafeteria
12. Hell for leather
13. Emphasis
14. Antelope (alternaive Envelope)
15. Oh for the wings of a dove
16. Performing seals (alternaive P for relief)
17. Cue for snooker
18. "Half a mo" (moment)
19. Es formidable!
20. Tea for two
21. Euphemism
22. Vive la France!
23. Double you or quits -- I think that's "double or nothing" in American
24. Eggs for breakfast
25. Wife or mistress?
26. Zephyr breezes

--jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 19:17, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

There's also <z> for the doctor, where the British name of the letter, zed, sounds like a nasalized pronunciation of send: "Send for the doctor." --Gelu Ignisque

I think that would be:

• Chief of Police (not G4 Police)
• Envelope (not Antelope - it works better with the British pronunciation)

(both of them stretching the pun N for lope a bit). DJ Clayworth 15:16, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

One-child law in China

Where will I find a WP article on the one-child law in China (modern day)?--anon

• Some searching in the China article led me to One-child policy. Mgm|^(talk) 18:24, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

Warhol: Desacralizing The Scream and the Mona Lisa?

I was reading about The Scream and how Andy Warhol made a series of silk prints in the 80's of many of the works of Edvard Munch. The page stated that "The idea was to desacralize the painting by devaluating its originality and making it into a mass-reproducible object." Why would Warhol want to devalue or desacralize such a great work? I can understand wanting to mass-reproduce the painting so that the masses could enjoy it but why would Warhol want to desacralize and devalue such a great work?

Also, on the page about the Mona Lisa it said: "Warhol thus consecrated her as a modern icon, similar to Marilyn Monroe or Elvis Presley. At the same time, his use of a stencil process and crude colors implies a criticism of the debasement of aesthetic values in a society of mass production and mass consumption. Today the Mona Lisa is frequently reproduced, finding its way on to everything from carpets to mouse pads." So Warhol criticized degrading great works by mass production and mass consumption but then he directly contributed to the degradation of many great works of art? I don't understand. Since Wikipedians are smart people, could somebody clarify all the questions I brought up - I hope it wasn't too hard to follow. Thanks! --anon

Well, two things: for one thing, that's kind of the point of pop art - everyone's an artist, great art does not exist, a can of Campbell's soup can be a greater work of art than the Mona lisa depending how you look at it (which is of course debatable, but it was obviously Warhol's opinion). The other thing is that criticism, devaluation and irony of course go hand in hand in this process - saying that Warhol's use of stencils implies a criticism of mass reproduction assumes that this criticism is taking itself entirely seriously, and i doubt that thta is really the case -- Ferkelparade π 10:03, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Not strictly relevant, but interesting none the less - at the National Gallery of Victoria there is currently an exhibition of what could best be described as random junk hoarded by Warhol [9], of which I attended the opening of last night. Amongst the news clippings, happy snaps, endless photos of the Beatles and Stones, ticket stubs to Bette Midler, weird fan mail, and other assorted guff, were some random jottings by Warhol. One of a list of dot points was "What is art?????" or something to that effect. Maybe in his private moments Warhol himself wasn't exactly sure what he was on about :) --Robert Merkel 23:46, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Warhol was often maddeningly ambiguous, much more a poser of questions (or a pointer to questions... or an outright poser, for that matter) than a giver of answers. His works repeatedly raise interesting questions about the philosophy of art. They do not tend to answer them. The same could be said of his words. Interviewers learned that they could always get a new answer for Warhol if they asked him "what is art?" They most famouse Warhol answer? "Art is anything you can get away with." My favorite? "'Art' is a man's name." -- Jmabel | Talk 01:22, Mar 16, 2005 (UTC)

Small rolling printer

This is probably a long shot, but here goes: has anyone ever heard of a small handheld printer machine that you can roll over some text, and it will copy it and print it out right there? (From a small roll that is part of the machine). I swear I heard about something like this years ago and I'm wondering if the idea caught on or not.

Cheers me dears, Mjklin 21:42, 2005 Mar 14 (UTC)

I've heard of scanners that work that way, but never one with an integrated printer. Doesn't mean they don't exist though. -- Cyrius|✎ 07:47, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

There was a product in the early 1990's, but it came out at the end of the Thermal Printer, so was doomed from the get go. Its other downfall was that it was essentially an image scanner so it could not OCRscan text. Computerss 'only' had one or two Mbytes of RAM at the time.... Schlüggell | Talk 20:53, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

First usages of the word "creationism"

(Originally mis-posted to the talk page.)

I'm curious to know when the word "creationism" was first used in its modern sense. Creation beliefs date to time immemorial, but it seems to me that the idea of creationism must be post-Darwin. --FOo 21:59, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure, but it would be worth finding out if it was in common use at the time of the Scopes "Monkey Trial". -- Jmabel | Talk 06:56, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

The OED cites the following quotations:

1847 BUCH tr. Hagenbach's Hist. Doctr. II. 1 The theory designated Creationism..was now more precisely defined. 1872 LIDDON Elem. Relig. iii. 102 The other and more generally received doctrine is known as Creationism. Each soul is an immediate work of the Creator. 1880 GRAY Nat. Sc. & Relig. 89 The true issue as regards design is not between Darwinism and direct Creationism.

Taco Deposit | Talk-o to Taco 13:01, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

See history of creationism. Advocacy of God the creator of souls as opposed to ... was used up til the 1920s, when the usage of the word was changed to god the creator of everything. I think it slightly post-dated the Scopes trial. Dunc|☺ 16:30, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Go and fractal

Do anyone ever done anything that mixed fractals and Go? I am wishing to do something like that someday (any year now, no rush). --Alexandre Van de Sande 22:34, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You could try turning a Koch snowflake into a Go board. Alphax ^τεχ 08:48, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

Since a traditional Go board is only 19 x 19, I'm not sure that it would be possible to represent a fractal in an interesting way. Of course, you could always remove that constraint. --DaveC 14:59, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You know that Go has been solved? Well, partially at least. Alphax ^τεχ 07:04, 27 Mar 2005 (UTC)

solved says "Solved for board sizes up to 4×4. The 5×5 board is weakly solved for all opening moves. Humans usually play on a 19×19 board." Go on 5x5 is NOT "Go"; but a DIFFERENT game played with Go rules on a small board. The distinction is trite when the small board is used for learning purposes in that it being easier is the POINT. But in counting up successes at "solving" games, I know all human knowledge (that can be represented in two bits). It misses the point altogether. 4.250.33.254 19:52, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Like I said, only partially. The thing is, using a 19×19 board wouldn't allow fractals. So a fractal-shaped board would likely have quite different gameplay to standard Go. Alphax ^τεχ 16:42, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Loosely related: you might enjoy researching Conway's Game of Life -- it's a good bet that someone has addressed the idea of fractals in that context. — Catherine\^talk 08:49, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Linux Partition sizes

This thread or question has been resolved and is ready for archiving. If you wish to make further comments, please leave them on the users talk page.

I've recently installed Red Hat Linux (with many other GNU tools), and was told that "40GB is more than Linux needs". Mind you, this is spread over 4 partitions - root (/), /swap, /home and /usr - so how much do I need for each? What will each have in it? Does Linux need that much? For reference, the partition sizes are:

• /(root): 5GB
• /swap: 2GB (with 1GB of RAM)
• /usr: 12GB
• /home: 20GB

with 80GB left over for use by Windows (which is on a seperate HDD; the extra 80GB is for more programs). What should I do? Alphax ^τεχ 05:18, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

Mind you, "/root" is different from "/". "/swap" should be large and 2G should be sufficient. "/usr" should also be large, but probably should be larger than "/home", which will have your files and other stuff. Now, be mindful that directories such as "/etc" and "/bin" will go under "/" if they have no other partition - this should be fine. Since "/etc", "/bin", "/var", etc. will not be necessarily big (unless you want to do server-type stuff), you shouldn't need to make "/var" so large. So, you shouldn't need to dedicate a lot of stuff for "/". HTH Dysprosia 10:14, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Whoops. OK, so:

• 2GB for /swap
• x+y, y > 0 for /usr - packages go here, right?
• x for /home - where personal files go (1 GB be enough?)
• z for / (5GB or so?)

Next question: How do I resize the partitions? Alphax ^τεχ 10:41, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

What, have you created them already? I don't actually use Linux (BSD), so I wouldn't know if it's possible under Linux. But the way BSD-based systems work is that you have a general partition for the whole of your BSD install, which you divide up into "slices", also called "partitions" (confusing, huh ;). Once you've created your slices, I think it is nontrivial for you to resize them, afaik. :(

But if you haven't, you can use a partition resizer (backup first!), then the install program should step you through it. Dysprosia 22:05, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I installed it on Saturday. If I do re-install, I won't lose anything. The next problem is to get a dual boot working. Alphax ^τεχ 05:34, Mar 16, 2005 (UTC)

Usually the installer will step you through installing a bootloader. You can also do this manually, but it is more fiddly. Have a look at GRUB, but if your distribution installs lilo, it will be possible to dual boot with this also, but I believe GRUB is more flexible. Dysprosia 12:24, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I'm going to try and re-install SUSE. Alphax ^τεχ 22:53, Mar 20, 2005 (UTC)

If you haven't already---swap partitions are not strictly necessary. I can't find a link for it, but I remember someone on the kernel mailing list saying that using a swap file is now just as fast as using a swap partition. And doing so would (obviously) be way, way more flexible. Instructions for making a swap file are here, under the ones for making a swap partition. grendel|khan 16:06, 2005 Mar 25 (UTC)

Thanks! Oh, and my SUSE install died, so I'm going to ask again. In a new thread. Alphax ^τεχ 07:20, 27 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Please do not edit this section.

something to do with sound

With all these recent developments towards hypersonic speeds many articles were printed in news papers. not one of them explained SONIC BOOM.can anybody tell me what it is?

---

Rohan

See sonic boom. Frencheigh 07:02, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Don't you love the easy ones? -- Cyrius|✎ 07:45, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

History Project-1985-HELP!

Hallo

I'm in Grade 10 and I'm currently doing a history project where I have to make a Canadian and world timeline of the year 1985. I've found Wikipedia very useful in doing this but I need more specific dates. For example, Wiipedia gives the grammy winners for this yead but doesn't give the exact date on which the grammy's were actually held. Here's an example of what I need:

-The exact date of sports events such as the day when the Stanley Cup Final (Hockey) took place -The release date of music albums by artists -The day of the Grammy's and Oscars

Thanks for your time-Uzair

Does 1985 help? -- ALoan (Talk) 16:16, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• The 57th Academy Awards were held at 6 PM on Monday, March 25, 1985, at the Dorothy Chandler Pavillion in Los Angeles, California. The host was Jack Lemmon. Remember that the awards for 1984 were presented that night, so the best picture was Amadeus. PedanticallySpeaking 16:39, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

We have 1985 in Canada for Canada-specific events as well. Adam Bishop 22:51, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Moderation

I have just been to a presentation on "Change Management". In one part of the session the presenter mentioned a technique called "Moderation" which seemed to be a form of leadership training designed to help elicit better information either from meetings or the workforce in general. Unfortunately I did not have an opportunity to ask the presenter for more information and I have not had any luck with search engines etc. Can anyone out there help point me in the right direction??? question asked by Philipn

Moderation is another name for "facilitation". The Wikipedia article Moderation system takes a very narrow view of this topic: restricted to its application to internet websites. Its use as a technique for soliciting opinions from "the workforce in general" can only be effected through meetings (be they actual or virtual). Essentially, facilitation/moderation is a managed discussion technique. --Theo (Talk) 14:50, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)

List of Jewish American business figures

I do not think Larry Ellison should be listed as a Jew...

Why not? He's Jewish by adoption. Does he practice his religion? RickK 22:55, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

"Jewish American" is an ethnic designation, not a religious one. Jewish law and tradition considers someone adopted by Jewish parents (more precisely, by a Jewish mother) to be fully a Jew, and whether they practice the religion is actually irrelevant to the ethnic inclusion. -- Jmabel | Talk 02:12, Mar 16, 2005 (UTC)

well...

$B4_{i}{\sqrt {u}}{RU \over 16?}$

• And what exactly is the question? Mgm|^(talk) 13:15, Mar 16, 2005 (UTC)
  • "Are you over 16?", obviously. Kiddie stuff, with a Wiki twist. --John Owens (talk) 13:23, 2005 Mar 16 (UTC)
    • Er, John, getting to the root of the matter, somehow I don't think that's the "root" that was intended there... and somehow I don't think this question is really suited to the resources of the Reference Desk... Mindspillage (spill yours?) 15:46, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)
      • Ummm...if he's asking the whole of Wikipedia, I'm afraid we're not old enough to be consentually rooted :P -- Ferkelparade π 09:23, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)
      • Are you suggesting he might think 4 is old enough? I dunno, a four-year-old might be kinda too mature for his/her tastes. --John Owens (talk) 10:19, 2005 Mar 17 (UTC)
        • Well, he either read meta:Help:Formula, or The Not So Short Introduction to LaTeX2e. Alphax ^τεχ 15:08, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)
          • Let us hope that is not the only latex with which he is familiar. -- Jmabel | Talk 08:16, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)

Ham County, Germany reference/genealogy

Moved from village pump by Trilobite 16:38, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC).

Where to I find any reference to "Ham County, Germany?"

Whereabouts is this place supposed to be? Where have you heard the name? I can find no evidence that such a place exists, and in any case, Germany doesn't really have an equivalent to the concept of a county as used in either the UK or USA. Is it a Kreis or Gemeinde that you are looking for perhaps? If so there doesn't appear to be one by the name Ham. Could you make your question a little more specific maybe? — Trilobite (Talk) 16:38, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

There's a landkreis called Hamm in Northrine-Westphalia, maybe that's what you're looking for? -- Ferkelparade π 12:09, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Ah, that's probably the mystery solved then. — Trilobite (Talk) 13:00, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Might also be a mangled reference to Hamburg which is similar to a county and a major emigration port for Europe. Rmhermen 13:11, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

TV star, who is this

This TV Guide cover has a lady in it, as you can plainly see. What is her name? I know that I know her, but I'm too young to remember the show. She isn't Mary Tyler Moore, but that's the only name that comes to mind. -- user:zanimum

What makes you think she isn't Mary Tyler Moore? I may be wrong, but she looks a lot like Mary Tyler Moore to me. She starred in the "Mary Tyler Moore Show" from 1970-1977. --Nadsat 16:04, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

I believe it is MTM too. Here's the list of those 50 characters from TV Guide and Mary Richards is listed at #21. -- John Fader (talk | contribs) 16:12, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Michael Richards as Cosmo Kramer from Seinfeld, Leonard Nimoy as Mr. Spock from Star Trek, Mary Tyler Moore as Mary Richards from The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and Larry Hagman as J.R. Ewing from Dallas. PedanticallySpeaking 16:35, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

Okay, that all! I always get her and some other 1970s American female comedian with her own show mixed up, but I guess I didn't this time. -- user:zanimum

Who's the other one? Marlo Thomas (That Girl) had a similar brunette flip; her show was 1966-71. I'm drawing a blank on someone else who resembles MTM. Just curious. — Jeff Q (talk) 07:26, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Wine Maturation

Although I don't really have the palate for such things, it seems like common knowledge that wine, particularly red, continues to mature after it's been bottled. What process is at work here, and does it work for other alcoholic beverages? It doesn't seem like I should be able to turn my 12 year old Scotch into 18 year old Scotch with nothing but patience, and many beers are not worth drinking a couple of months after purchase. --DaveC 20:28, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The analogy to scotch is misleading, as it matures only in the cask (indeed, maturation of whisky really means interaction with the cask and little else). Consequently whisky remains at the "age" it was when it was bottled - so you'll see "18 year old" on the bottle, whereas you'll see a calendar date on wine. In contrast, wine is bottled immediately after production and "maturation" is a self-contained reaction. -- John Fader (talk | contribs) 21:02, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Not true. Much wine is initially aged in wooden barrels -some specifically in used whiskey barrels. Wine also ages after it is bottled. This includes interaction with and through the cork but is mainly chemical redox reactions among the various organic compounds present. Distilled beverages contain far less of these coumpounds and so are less subject but not immune to bottle ageing. Rmhermen 16:04, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)

Louis Pasteur based his theories of stereoisomers on observing the production of winesalts - (tartaric acid) from aged, bottled wine. Also, too much air present in casked/bottled wine will allow it to ferment into vinegar. Distiling is a method of purifying that entails removing yeasts and other microbe (as above). This is also why red wines are generally accepted to be aged longer than white(there is more organic compounds being activated upon so the wine must mature to come to a stability). You can judge this by holding a glass of red wine up to an orange, the lack of a "brownish"-layer at top edge shows its degree of maturity. Schlüggell | Talk 20:22, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

NCAA b-ball tournament

Which conference has the most teams participating in the NCAA men's tournament? The only one I know for sure is the PAC 10 Conference with 4 out of 10 teams in the tournament (Arizona, Stanford, Washington, and UCLA).

You can find a list here and count them yourself. I haven't done a complete tabulation but the Big East, with six teams, is probably the highest. JamesMLane 08:46, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. After counting... I found the Big 12 Conference and Big East Conference have six teams apiece in the tourment. Atlantic Coast, Southeastern and the Big Ten Conference each have 5. ike9898 01:55, Mar 20, 2005 (UTC)

new owner

i have gotten a new dog from a friend I want to know is there any way to change his name. If so how do I go about doing this.

Well, assuming your dog is already licensed where you live, you could re-license him with a new name. If this dog is purebred, I you could probably contact whatever organization he was registered with (most likely the American Kennel Club if you live in the US) and re-register him there too. (Note that both these measures would probably be wastes of money as licensing and purebred registries usually rely on some sort of serial number to track the dog rather than the name). On the other hand, if you just want to call your dog something else, there's nothing to stop you from doing that without filling out any documentation whatsoever. If your dog isn't a puppy, though, be prepared for at least a little bit of confusion. Most full grown dogs recognize their own names and will not understand when you start calling them by some other name. --DaveC 00:36, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[10] -- John Fader (talk | contribs) 00:42, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If the new name is similar to the old one it helps. A friend got a dog who'd been given the name Rex which they didn't like. It didn't take the dog too long to get used to being called Reg and then Reggie. Jooler 12:22, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Math questions

A few math questions I'm having trouble with. Can you explain how do them, and explain their answers? Thanks. --Anon

---

Simplify.

1. ${\sqrt {1}}8-3{\sqrt {5}}0+5{\sqrt {8}}$
2. $2{\sqrt[{3}]{x}}=16$
3. $3x^{2/3}+1=10$
4. $8^{2x}={1 \over 16}$
5. ${\sqrt {2}}7-27^{x}$

---

Expand

1. $log{x \over y^{2}}$

---

Solve for x

1. ${\log _{5}7}+0.5{\log _{5}4}={\log _{5}x}$

Remember, root(a x b) = (root a) x (root b)

So... ${\sqrt {1}}8-3{\sqrt {5}}0+5{\sqrt {8}}$ can be rendered as ${\sqrt {9}}{\sqrt {2}}-3{\sqrt {2}}{\sqrt {2}}5+5{\sqrt {2}}{\sqrt {4}}$

then ${\sqrt {2}}({\sqrt {9}}-3{\sqrt {2}}5+5{\sqrt {4}})={\sqrt {2}}(3-(3*5)+(5*2))={\sqrt {2}}(3-15+10)=-2{\sqrt {2}}$

For two, three and four, you should be able to reduce it to x = something (or x^2 = something) by simple algebraic manipulation, and then solve for x. Five, I may be missing something, but I don't see how to solve it - if it's "that equation = zero", then it's simple - remember that the square root of [number] means the same as [number]^(1/2), and an answer should be immediately apparent.

It's 5.30am and I don't feel up to logarithms, so that's all you get for now :-) Shimgray 05:30, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Simplification #2:

$2{\sqrt[{3}]{x}}=16\,\!$	$\Rightarrow \;\,\!$	${\sqrt[{3}]{x}}\,\!$	$=8\,\!$
	$\Rightarrow \;\,\!$	$x\,\!$	$=8^{3}\,\!$
			$=512\,\!$

I am right in correcting #3? Is it 3 times x to the 2/3, or 3 times x squared, on three? Alphax ^τεχ 14:46, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)

$x^{1 \over n}={\sqrt[{n}]{x}}$, so that; $x^{m \over n}=x^{m}\times {\sqrt[{n}]{x}}$ Dunc|☺ 16:08, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I'll do it for you;

$3x^{2/3}+1=10$

$3x^{2/3}=9$

$x^{2/3}=3$

now cube both sides:

$x^{2}=3^{3}=27$

$x={\sqrt {3^{3}}}$

Did you also want #4 to be $8^{2x}={1 \over 16}\,\!$?

If so, take the log of both sides, which by $\ln {a^{b}}=b\ln {a}\,\!$ gives:

$2x\ln {8}=ln{1 \over 16}=-\ln {16}$

$x=-{1 \over 2}{ln{16} \over \ln {8}}$

Alphax ^τεχ 07:03, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)

Questions about SPAM and forwarding in Gmail

1. If I have message forwarding enabled, does SPAM still get forwarded?
2. Is there a way to disable the SPAM filter?
3. Is there a way to forward an entire thread in Gmail?

Thanks, Alphax ^τεχ 05:16, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)

• You can make personal filters and decide what to do with a message on a case by case basis (which I believe includes forwarding). Also, if you forward all the messages in a thread, you are effectively forwarding the entire thread. Why would you want to disable the spam filter? Mgm|^(talk) 09:51, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)

1. No. Messages matched as spam are not forwarded, or downloaded over POP3.
2. No. Why would you want to?
3. As per Mgm. -- Jordi (Anárion)^¿…? 10:15, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

One might want to disable the spam filter if there were too many false positives. I've personally found many instances where Gmail put valid messages of mine (even after they were labelled by my filter!) into the spam folder. Of course, false positives do occur in most anti-spam systems. -- Sundar 10:31, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)

Good point. I had one mailing list which Gmail labelled as spam, after clicking 'not spam' once however it never marked it as such again. Likewise I've so far had one false negative. All spam filters must be trained. -- Jordi (Anárion)^¿…? 10:37, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

1. Just checking through my mailing lists... I think that everything gets forwarded.
2. If it was having lots of false positives, and this was preventing forwarding, it would be very annoying, as there is no "forward to address" option in the Inbox view.
3. Again, it's quite difficult and annoying to forward 20+ messages one at a time.

Alphax ^τεχ 13:58, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)

Download problems

This week I've been trying to download the video from the video section of Sclubbers.com (the current file is for the song "Back off" by Jay Asforis from S Club 8 in the television program "I dream"). Somehow downloading isn't working. While I have a cable connection, it takes ages to download ca. 30% when the download times out. Is it a connection or site problem?

If it's a site problem, could someone provide me with a video of the song, I have it on video already, and it's not otherwise available here in the Netherlands.

It's the site that's having problems; and major ones at that. Look at these wget outputs to see that they're performing really poorly:

$ wget sclubbers.com
--20:15:41--  http://sclubbers.com/
           => `index.html'
Resolving sclubbers.com... 12.168.33.202
Connecting to sclubbers.com[12.168.33.202]:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: unspecified [text/html]

    [      <=>                            ] 12,740       647.36B/s

20:16:17 (647.36 B/s) - `index.html' saved [12740]

$ wget sclubbers.com/videos/idream012.zip
--20:20:32--  http://sclubbers.com/videos/idream012.zip
           => `idream012.zip'
Resolving sclubbers.com... 12.168.33.202
Connecting to sclubbers.com[12.168.33.202]:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 18,850,710 [application/x-zip-compressed]

 1% [                                     ] 225,267        1.24K/s  ETA 3:25:10

The speed DOES seem to be increasing slowly, so I'll leave this download running for a while to see how much of it I'm able to get. --Pidgeot (t) (c) (e) 19:25, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Update: So far, it's been about 10 minutes since I posted that above. My speed is pretty much unchanged, and I'm up to 1.2MB. I suggest trying the site tomorrow, or maybe Monday, if they still have what you want at that time. --Pidgeot (t) (c) (e) 19:37, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

That breed of cat that likes the water

I seem to remember that there's a particular breed of domestic cat that actually enjoys swimming and water in general. If this is true, could you tell me what breed(s) that is? Thanks much. -- — I. Neschek | talk 21:29, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Bengal cats and Turkish Vans are both known for swimming. -- Cyrius|✎ 21:42, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Hot dog! It was the Turkish Van I was thinking of, but good to know there's more than one. Thanks a whole bunch. -- — I. Neschek | talk 22:20, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Free "Take A Rest Break" Software?

Can someone recommend some free software that will remind me to take periodic breaks from my screen and keyboard etc? --bodnotbod 23:39, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)

OK, you need a wife, a kid or a dog. You may also move to a country where there are plenty secret cops who are willing to knock your door any time of the day.

One way to build a software that does it without the re-re-re-re-election of GWB is to write a HTML page that contains a REFRESH command and a noisy multimedia file (QuickTime, AVI, MPEG, ...; have to use a plug-in). You load that local web page in a browser window. The file is loaded and played for the first time. You go on with your work. Then in 10 minutes (you can set the time), the page is reloaded and the noise file is played again. You know what to do. You smash your computer and live a happy and meaningful life ever after. -- Toytoy 01:38, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)

Well, it's a solution. But I'd like to hear other ideas. It's just that I appear to be getting early signs of Repetitive Strain Injury. I've moved some of my equipment and my chair to "safer" positions, but I need to get a new chair and things it seems. Thanks. --bodnotbod 03:27, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)

Isn't WorkPace a free program? It should help in all regards. Mgm|^(talk) 08:20, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)

Shame on me: I appear to have found some options through our very own article on RSI. I'll come back if I don't like them. --bodnotbod 11:57, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)

If you're using a Unix or Unix-like operating system, GNOME provides some periodic-break software built in. Dysprosia 12:22, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

How about buy yourself a cuckoo clock that cuckoos each hour? It's more expensive than a shareware but more entertaining. Maybe you need a hot water bag to keep your right hand from injury. -- Toytoy 14:53, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)

Friends of mine have strongly recommended Workrave in the past. Shimgray 15:15, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I found WorkRave through our article. Been using it for a day, and it seems absolutely perfect. Highly recommended to anyone else too. Thanks everyone. --bodnotbod 11:18, Mar 20, 2005 (UTC)

The Homestar Runner website has a delightful take-a-break.exe program that can be found here.

Birthday cake picture patent

The U.S. patent no. 6,319,530 teaches a "Method of photocopying an image onto an edible web for decorating iced baked goods". In plain English, this invention enables one to inkjet print a food-grade color photograph on a birthday cake's surface.

I think we can write an article for this interesting technology. -- Toytoy 01:41, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)

Whether it is interesting or not is irrelevant to its importance and hence its worthiness for inclusion in an encyclopedia. If it becomes widespread, then maybe, but wikipedia is reactive, not proactive. (imagine having an entry for every US patent...) Dunc|☺ 13:04, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Armed forces

An anon left this question on Jimbo's talk page, but I said I'd copy it to here: Do you know where I can find a List of countries by size of military? JamesMLane 05:12, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You can get the top 5 or so from this search. --bodnotbod 12:03, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)

That's amusing -- the search does give some useful information, but just on the first page of hits you can get nine of the top five. (Nine different countries are named as being in the top five, some of course in different years.) I hope someone can point the anonymous inquirer to an authoritative listing that covers more countries. JamesMLane 13:23, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

One has to distinguish between the top military spender (the United States, as a guess the other four are UK, France, Russia and PROC in some order) and the size by number of personel (PROC, I guess followed by Russia, India the USA and someone else). You then might want to look at %GDP spent on military budget, $$ per capita, %GDP per capita. So to answer the question one needs to know what the question is. Dunc|☺ 11:30, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

China spends a surprisingly small amount, as does Russia - large armies, but cheap by Western standards. IIRC the top few in terms of spending also include Germany and Japan; Japan is second. With regards to size... well, that can fluctuate wildly. Canada once had the world's third largest navy, and Iraq used to have the (numerically) fourth-largest army in the world. Shimgray 13:39, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Longest word in English language

What, please is longest word in english language?--anon

There really is no "longest word". Several disciplines have well-defined ways to form words to describe certain things, such as the rules in chemistry for the canonical names of molecules. These can generate almost arbitrarily long words.

Aside from technical scientific terms, a classic example of very long English word is the 28-letter word "antidisestablishmentarianism" (opposition to the disestablishment of the Church of England). I'd be interested in seeing something longer that was neither a technical scientific term nor made up for the purpose of deliberately creating a long word. -- Jmabel | Talk 08:14, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)

Try Longest word in English.-gadfium 08:19, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

A linguist would tell you that great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-...grandmother counts as a word :-) ... --Gelu Ignisque

Which is another instance of what I remarked: a word formed according to a technical rule rather than based on normal usage. -- Jmabel | Talk 06:23, Mar 20, 2005 (UTC)

Some recent searching popped up a new longest word: Methionylalanylthreonyl...leucine which is around about 64K ;-) Kim Bruning 19:23, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Some Others

PNEUMONOULTRAMICROSCOPICSILICOVOLCANOCONIOSIS (45 letters; a lung disease caused by breathing in certain particles) is the longest word in any English-language dictionary. (It is also spelled -koniosis.) the longest in second edition of the Oxford English Dictionary.

FLOCCINAUCINIHILIPILIFICATION (29 letters; an estimation of something as worthless) is the longest word in the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary.

HONORIFICABILITUDINITATIBUS (27 letters) is the longest word used by Shakespeare. It appears in Love's Labor's Lost, Act V, Scene I, and is spoken by Costard:

   O, they have lived long on the alms-basket of words.
   I marvel thy master hath not eaten thee for a word;
   for thou art not so long by the head as
   honorificabilitudinitatibus: thou art easier
   swallowed than a flap-dragon.

SMILES is supposed to be the longest word in the dictionary because "there's a mile between the two S's." Randal J. --The above from [Word Trivia].

"Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyll Llantysiliogogogoch" Now it has been officially shortened to LlanfairPwll. It translates as:

  "Saint Mary's Church in the hollow of the white hazel near a rapid whirlpool
  and the Church of St. Tysilio of the red cave." 

This is a railway stop in Wales, UK. (Image) Schlüggell | Talk 20:57, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Civil War Navy Jacks

(Moved here from Wikipedia:Village pump.)

I need some info on the Union navy Jacks from the civil war. The ones i need are the 34 star navy jack, the 35 star navy jack, and the 36 star navy jack. Can you give me info or point me towards a goood site to find info. Thanks

Flags of the World is a good web site to look for information about flags. It has pages on the 34-star, 35-star and 36-star flags. According to the U.S. Naval Historical Center the U.S. naval jack (with the exception of the First Navy Jack) is identical to the canton of the U.S. flag. Gdr 12:01, 2005 Mar 19 (UTC)

What species of duck is this?

I took this photograph today at Narrabeen Lake, a lake near where I live in Sydney, Australia. Can anyone identify what species of duck it is? DO'Иeil 12:56, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)

• This couldn't simply be a Domestic Duck (Anas Domesticus)? Because they're very common here in Europe, but maybe not in Oz. See e.g. here and here. 82.210.114.171 18:11, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Yep. I believe white ones are called Pekin Ducks (not Peking), but there's just the same species (A.Domesticus) as mallards etc. - its a different breed, not a different species. -- John Fader (talk | contribs) 18:16, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)
    • Hmm? Mallards are A. platyrhynchos. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 18:35, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)
      • Domestics are termed A. platyrhynchos domesticus; they have been bred from the Mallard. The photo shows a Pekin domestic duck. -R. S. Shaw 07:22, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Definately a domestic breed, which means you are unlikely to find it in a birdwatcher's field guide. It might also be an Aylesbury Duck. There is some good information on UK domestic breeds at Ashton Waterfowl, though some of the pictures are a little rough. A further alternative might be the White Campbell duck, as shown here. I'm pretty sure that's a separate breed, but domestic breeds seem to be given different names in different areas so it can be confusing.

  In general, these ducks are quite common in parks and gardens, so many people must have trouble identifying them. I spot the opportunity for a domestic ducks article. -- Solipsist 07:50, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

  • I notice that the dabbling duck page which lists the species makes no mention of domestic ducks. Rmhermen 14:15, Mar 21, 2005 (UTC)

Cut and pasteing

Hello

I hope you can help I am looking to set up my own website and I would like to add your map of the London Boroughs to it please could you let me know if this would be ok.

Best wishes

L

In a word, yes. In another word, look at [11]. In yet another word, read [12].--Fangz 17:45, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

what is the relationship of atom to electricity

You might be looking for ion. JRM 15:39, 2005 Mar 20 (UTC)

Um, at what level do you want the question answered? Have you read the Wikipedia article on electricity? --Robert Merkel 11:32, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Martin McGuinness vandalism

Sorry, I did not find how to reach a person, so I guess this will. Please, check the entry "Martin McGuiness" and notice the photo. To me (I have no British or Irish connections) this seems an inoffensive joke. But to others it might not, and it is obviously misleading to people who did not read much about Northern Ireland. I suggest you look into the matter.

The image in question has been deleted, so I have no way of gauging the level of offensiveness of the joke. I wonder though, it was corrected almost a day and a half before your comment. Perhaps caching was involved. Send future reports of vandalism to Wikipedia:Vandalism in progress. -- Cyrius|✎ 08:00, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

From the filename, I guess that we're looking at the very slight (and it is only very slight) resemblence between Mr. McGuinness and Colm Meaney. Chris 19:56, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Kasey Chambers's "The Captain"

What is some thought on the meaning of Kasey Chambers's "The Captain"? Neutrality^talk 06:56, Mar 20, 2005 (UTC)

Linux / Unix folder structure

It seems most flavours of Unix/Linux/BSD etc have a similar folder structure in root: I always see folders called /etc, /usr/, /bin, and so on. What do these all mean? Is there a standard for this, and if so, what? -- Tarquin 13:37, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Google reveals http://www.pathname.com/fhs/ Also see article the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard.--Fangz 13:55, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I knew we'd have an article explaining this somewhere... I just couldn't find it from articles on file systems in general or linux. Thanks! -- Tarquin 15:15, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

christ's bread

I've heard bout special bread, nicknamed "christ bread" wich was some sort of eadible fungus in ressemblance of a bread. Every morning you ate half of it (baked I guess) and pour some milk (or sugar, i am not sure) on the remaining. On the enxt morning, you shall find the bread grown to the original size. It seem to work lot like home grown yogurt. I've found greek bred called christ's (Christopsomo), but I don't think it's the same thing.

Thanks --Alexandre Van de Sande 20:00, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The odds of getting a "6" in six faced dice after rolling it six times?

I've learnt in probability that you turn AND in multiplication nd OR in addition. Like:

• The chance of getting a "6" in six faced dice any time if you rolled two times (in the first OR the second roll) is 1/6 + 1/6 = 2/6 = 0.33333
• The odds of rolling two times and getting number 5 or lower in both (AND) times is 5/6 * 5/6 = 25/36 = 0.69444..

Well I've learnt something wrong, as those numbers don't add 1. Then, The odds of getting a "6" in six faced dice after rolling it six times?

• 1/6 + 1/6 + 1/6 + 1/6 + 1/6 + 1/6 = 1 (of course this is wrong, as there IS a chnce of never getting it.
• 1 - ( 5/6 * 5/6 * 5/6 * 5/6 * 5/6 * 5/6 * 5/6 )= 1 - 0.3348.. = 0.6651../

I should have paid more ttention to some classes when i ws in high school... thanks again --Alexandre Van de Sande 20:00, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Try ${1 \over 6}*{1 \over 6}*{1 \over 6}*{1 \over 6}*{1 \over 6}*{1 \over 6}={1 \over 60466176}$ Smoddy (_t^g_e^c) 20:15, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

No, that's the probability of getting all throws to read 6. That doesn't seem to be the question asked. To the original poster: your second computation is correct, and it needs six more terms to be added to it to become one. (The first computation is incorrect, so disregard it). A general approach is to find the probability of getting k sixes in n throws. See Bernoulli distribution and Binomial distribution, with p = (1/6) and q = (5/6). Evaluate the probability for all k from 0 to n, and add them up. You should get 1. -- Brhaspati (^talk_contribs) 20:45, 2005 Mar 20 (UTC)

Whoops. RTQ, Sam. Smoddy (_t^g_e^c) 20:52, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The chance of getting at least one 6 in 6 rolls of the dice is (1 - the chance of always getting something else). The chance of getting something else is 5/6 for each roll, and for all six rolls, its (5/6)^6, which is just over 1/3. The answer then is just under 2/3. If you're submitting this for an assignment, you should use greater accuracy in your figures than this.-gadfium 23:55, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

and now I see that you already have this answer above.-gadfium 23:57, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Recursive structure of sentances in English

How is a sentance in the English language constructed? I remember reading somewhere that a sentance consisted of bits (eg. phrases) that the smaller bits were either themselves or a smaller bit. For example,

The cat sat on the mat

has a descriptor, noun, verb, descriptor, and another noun. Alphax ^τεχ 23:44, Mar 20, 2005 (UTC)

Can't give you a web reference, but refer "Gödel, Escher, Bach" by Douglas Hofstadter. It describes a recursive sentence block diagram, used for parsing natural language programs. -- Brhaspati (^talk_contribs) 01:16, 2005 Mar 21 (UTC)

also, and more urgently: sentence. sentence. from sententia. Never mind about descriptors and what not, orthography comes first. To the point of your question, have a look at Syntax and Syntactic category (although these are not too helpful, so far) dab (ᛏ) 17:46, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

One might look up "diagramming sentences" to help out. Also, try this for word order: Subject + Verb is basic: "Susan reads". Here's another: Article [The], adjective[small], subject[girl] + verb [hit], article [the], object [baseball], adverb[hard].

That's right! [Article] ([Adjective] + [Subject]) [verb] [article] ([Adjective] + [Subject]) + [Adverb] sounds about right. Alphax ^τεχ 05:21, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

author of the jeffrey dahmer article?

I am doing a paper for psych & downloaded your article on jeffrey dahmer as my sk of choice & want to know who wrote this article so i can ref it correctly? nikki. i know you don't want email addy's but i need the answer quick & wondered if you mind emailing it to me as its only a one liner? thanks Nikki.... nikaubrey@yahoo.com.au

It's written by lots of people. Info about the right way to cite a wikipedia article is at Wikipedia:Citing Wikipedia. -- John Fader (talk | contribs) 00:28, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Association of Wikipedians who dislike genuine redlinks in signatures

Is there such a thing? Alphax ^τεχ 01:31, Mar 21, 2005 (UTC)

Errr... No. You're free to start one, of course... Though I don't know why you would bother. Is it important to you that someone have a user page?
Oh, and I suppose I can start the Association of Wikipedians Who Dislike Templates, Markup and Other Gizmos in Signatures? JRM 02:05, 2005 Mar 21 (UTC)

Some names have reputations behind them that "jump out at you". Some people like to fake that effect --Alterego 02:43, Mar 21, 2005 (UTC)

That's why I said a genuine redlink, not just a fake one. It is important to me that either no redlinks appear in signatures, or a link to a talk page appears. That's why I created this template. Alphax ^τεχ 06:44, Mar 21, 2005 (UTC)

JRM, what do you mean by "markup"? --Gelu Ignisque

Well, I could have this as my signature: $\alpha \sigma \,\!x\,\,\!^{\tau }\,\!_{\epsilon }\,\!^{\chi }$. Alphax ^τεχ 05:22, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

Hesse-Kassel Vital Records

I am researching my family history. I know that my Greatgrandfather was born in Hesse-Kassel. Is there a web page that I can go to, to find an address to write to try to obtain his birth record?

Dana Williams user124501@aol.com

Hesse-Kassel is in Germany. Dunc|☺ 11:06, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Before 1871 there was no unified germany so you will need to know at least the town where he came from and the region. In your case the region is Hesse, however Kassel can be the district de:landkreise, or the free city de:Kreisfreie Städte. The majority of town registers are collated from the local churches, so you should also know his religion. These registers are Ortsfamilien-Datenbank, or the Ortsfamilien Bucher [Try This] , Familienforschung, Stammbaum. Hesse was known for many emigrating Germans, particulary as mercenaries in global conflicts from the 1600's on. Additionally, this region had many priests from Ireland and Scotland pass through, so if the name sounds [English]... Schlüggell | Talk 18:27, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Gmail hacked

Has anyone got an idea why I'm getting redirected to http://www.www.gmail.com.org when I try to reach my email? Are they the victim of hackers or is the computer network I'm using infected by spyware? Mgm|^(talk) 11:37, Mar 21, 2005 (UTC)

Since I get to the normal site, it is probably an issue on your end. Either your web browser is over-eager and appending www.SITE.org to all sites, or your PC or your network has fallen victim to an attack. Contact your network administrator. Jordi·✆ 12:13, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If you are using IE, it is normal behavior for it if it can't find a requested site, in case you are one of those people who only type "yahoo" instead of "yahoo.com" (to give an example. If it can't find the site you requested, it often tries prepending www. and appending various TLDs (.com, .org, etc.) to the domain name, in case you forgot to write those. --Pidgeot (t) (c) (e) 20:01, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

This can actually be happening on several levels, the client-side, the server-side or even the ISP side. There is some basic information at Typosquatting#"Catchall" typosquatting. --DropDeadGorgias (talk) 21:37, Mar 29, 2005 (UTC)

Mammals and swimming

I've heard it said that all mammals can swim. Is this true? Are there any that can't and which? (bats spring to mind) - Tarquin 13:19, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• I've recently heard in a quiz that even elephants can swim a considerable distance, and if they can do it... Mgm|^(talk) 13:25, Mar 21, 2005 (UTC)
  • There were some quite impressive photographs of swimming elephants in National Geographic sometime in the last couple of years - it looks pretty crazy, but they certainly can swim, full submergence and everything. (Admittedly, many of them may not know this). Here's an example. Shimgray 15:50, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The first rule of biology is that there is an exception to every rule... so my hunch is no. (chinchillas can't their fur wet, though they might be able to swim in an emergency). Then again, all species of mammal were once fish. Dunc|☺ 17:31, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC) although by that argument most mammals should be able to breathe underwater too. alteripse 18:32, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Chinchillas may indeed come to grief if submerged, but I would imagine that they're sufficiently water-resistant to withstand the occasional rain (and, according to my understanding, it's hardly more than occasional in their native habitat). --Smack (talk) 00:34, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I'm a mammal, and I can't swim.-Mr Adequate 00:13, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I saw a documentary on a no fence zoo with Gorillas on a viewable island. Show said gorillas can't swim. They DON'T swim off the island at any rate, and its only a dozen feet or so. 4.250.33.254 20:27, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Its true about the gorillas. Most apes detest water, in fact humans are one of the only primates that can stand, and even enjoy water. We have a sub-cutaneous layer of fat and are quite waterproof, which has led some to subscribe to the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquatic_ape_hypothesis 72.12.72.138 (talk) 19:11, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

how generators produce elecriciy

See Electrical generator. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 16:54, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

How do I upload non-image files?

I would like to upload the following file types:

• .doc
• .pdf
• .xls

But when I try to upload, they are not recognized as valid "Image" files.

Thanks in advance!

jdemello@bluedevils.org

Wikipedia only allows certain file types to be uploaded. These include: .gif (recommended for animations), .jpg (recommended for photos), .png (other images), and .ogg (sound files). This is not (as far as I am aware) a conclusive list, but the three types you list above are definitely not allowed. .xls and .doc are not normal web documents, and probably have copyright issues as they are commercial file types. Some viewers will also not have the capability to edit these files. The latter two arguments also apply to .pdf files, as they can only be edited with a commercial program. Smoddy (_t^g_e^c) 20:59, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Does Wikicities? Alphax ^τεχ 05:26, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

So far as I can tell, no. Smoddy (_t^g_e^c_k) 21:54, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Moths wings - dust? What is it

What is the "dust" on their wings made of? Any kind of moth is OK, but your generic brownish New England moth is OK, too.

Would it be considered toxic to eat? (Accidental ingestion). Non-nutrative stuff that would not harm you? Silica? Organic?

Just a trivia question, not a medical emergency.

Thanks! --Inquiryworks 22:21, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Scales made mainly of protein. Probably downright nutritious. No toxic elements to people. Most insects that contain poison are dosed for the size of the usual bird or small animal predator, and are brightly colored to boot (presumably the selection bias is stronger if the predator gets a chance to learn to recognize and avoid them). So, as (I presume) you are a lot bigger than their usual predators you can eat moths to your hearts content... alteripse 04:07, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

PS, you can take comfort in the fact that your brain contains the usual cultural programming about moths: [13] Downright spooky. alteripse 04:11, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

A few years ago lepidopterists used to eat moths to see if they were distateful to birds, without thinking that birds might have a different sense of taste... Dunc|☺ 11:18, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

County seat/State capital

Are there any state capitals in the United States that are not also the county seats of the county that they are located in? --Neutrality^talk 02:47, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

Well, if this is a trick question, than Juneau and Baton Rouge since neither Alaska nor Louisiana have counties. Rmhermen 03:22, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

Carson City, Nevada and Richmond, Virginia are independent cities, not part of counties. Rmhermen 03:29, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

Also Rhode Island does not have county seats, not sure if Connecticut does or not. Rmhermen

Lansing, Michigan is in two counties and is the county seat of neither. Rmhermen 03:51, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

Part of Oklahoma City is in Canadian County. The county seat of Canadian County is El Reno. But Oklahoma City is also in Oklahoma County, and it is the county seat of that county. RickK 06:24, Mar 24, 2005 (UTC)

Frederick Locker

I have to correct the content of Frederick's work as I have an original London Lyrics and it is complete at only 33 pages. I have also read online at poet history sites that there are actually 12 editions of London Lyrics.....including one that is a single edition illustrated by an artist and kept for himself. This one that I have is special in that it is illustrated with four pages based on water color drawings by W. Hatherell, R.I., End-papers by Robert Hope, David McKay, Philadelphia is the publisher I believe and the printer was T and A Constable, Edinburgh. The original cover clearly has green leafed vines going up both sides with an oval in the upper center showing a man carrying a lady in a forested/flowery scene.

contents to my copy of this London Lyrics are:

• Geraldine Green
• To My Grandmother
• Piccadilly
• My Neighbour Rose
• Pilgrims Of Pall Mall
• Bramble Rise
• Reply to A Letter

(I've redrafted the syntax above to save screen space - apologies to anyone who objects, feel free to change back. Text is unaltered)

Firstly, bear in mind that different editions will have different page counts - different typefaces, for example, or different page sizes can cause this, even if the text itself is unchanged. Looking on COPAC, a general catalogue for UK university libraries, I find all sorts of page lengths for different editions - xxv,196pp in 1904, x,199 in 1878, vii,134 in 1868, xi,146 in 1885 (which declared "The present is the tenth edition published in England. There have been also three American editions, and a fourth privately printed by the Bookfellows' Club, New York.", so there's certainly more than twelve published editions, although there may be twelve revisions of the text)... There are two entries for an 1857 edition, but neither give a page length, merely octavo size.

I'm going to assume the cited edition in the Britannica (where that article came from) is the first edition; we don't have a size for this, but ninety pages seems plausible looking at the known lengths given in COPAC and considering that he apparently later expanded the book. I'd suggest leaving it, or removing the number and just describing it as a "slim volume". Not sure why yours is so small - is it unusually outsize, or has small type?

Hmm. There is, however, an entry for a London lyrics and country pieces, by one Anna Airy; it's 32 pages long. Might this be it? Shimgray 18:21, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Latin Grammar

Latin uses the following grammar:

<ACTOR/ACTEE> <ACTION>.

For example, in Latin one would write:

"Femina Marcum videt"

Which means "a woman sees Marcus"

Is it true that sanskrit also uses a similar grammar?

Which other languages also use this sort of word order?

I'm no linguist, just curious.

davidzuccaro 06:48, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Latin doesn't use any fixed word order at all. You can pretty much arrange the words to your liking, which is one of the reasons why translating Latin seems to be such a problem for a lot of students... ;) Nightstallion 09:47, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

in general, the more clearly inflectional a language, the less restricted word order will be. There will still be a default/unmarked word order, though. Languages with practically free word order include Sanskrit, Latin and Greek. German is pretty free, too, but its inflection is less ambiguous than that of the classical languages, so some arrangements are avoided. In fact, English is a pathological case, its (all but) frozen syntax being due to having lost most inflectional markers in the transition to Middle English. In this respect, English should be grouped with Chinese rather than with the "average" Indo-European languages :o)

This is also the reason why, imho, the classification of languages by (default) word order, such as VSO, VOS, OSV, OVS, SOV, SVO, popular among synchronic linguists, are of very little merit, since they are a quite superficial feature of a language, and may change easily over time. dab (ᛏ) 13:27, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

When we talk about Sentence word order, do we mean simple sentences alone? I get this question because, Tamil is fairly inflectional and hence the meaning is not affected with word order for simple sentences (although people seldom use word orders other than SOV in places other than poetry), but with complex and compound sentences, I find that we can't have arbitrary word orders without affecting the meaning. I hope you get the point. -- Sundar (talk · contribs)

I may have been a little too polemic. Even in languages with entirely "free" word order, many arrangements will seem awkward, and would, as you say, be used in poetry almost exclusively. Also, two different arrangements will have different meanings, no doubt, mostly differing in emphasis (i.e. the part that comes first is usually the most emphasized), in this sense, no two sentences are the same, unless they are literally the same. dab (ᛏ) 08:49, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for your clarification, Dab. With the above, I can change some stuff in Tamil language#Sentence structure. Thanks. -- Sundar 09:15, Mar 24, 2005 (UTC)

Indeed, the word order in Latin isn't wholly free. While Latin poetry is very flexible in word order, the same is true of English poetry. Latin prose mostly uses a mixture of SOV and SVO. Gdr 01:57, 2005 Mar 25 (UTC)

greek soldiers

please tell me the attire of the late greek soldiers when they go to war...what they wear and what they don't wear...please also give some pictures of them or tell me what website i can go to view them...

--Sasuke1990Sasuke

What do you mean by "late greek"? Traditional periods for which we have some written or material evidence of attire are perhaps Homeric, Classical, Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, Ottoman/medieval, early modern (war of independence), and then basically european of the last 175 years. This is an oversimplification, but you could find illustrations for each. alteripse 10:33, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

We don't seem to have an article on Ancient Greek military, but there is lots of relevent information in Ancient Greece and in the articles in the categories Category:Ancient Greece, Category:Ancient warfare and Category:Ancient military units, including articles on Hoplites and the Macedonian phalanx (no pictures though). — Asbestos | Talk 10:42, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

if by "late" you mean "latest", it would look something like this: [14] dab (ᛏ) 21:09, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

governig dynamics

governig dynamics: what is it? the movie was not complete.

I assume the movie you are referring to is A Beautiful Mind. Governing Dynamics is the term John Nash used for his theories on non-coopertive games (in the movie at least). It is now referred to as Nash equilibrium. You can find more information on the topic there. Kenj0418 05:23, Apr 2, 2005 (UTC)

"There she goes" version

Does anyone know if the version of "there she goes" by Sixpence None the Richer is the only version to be sung by a woman? As far as I know, there are other versions sung by The La's, Velvet Underground and REM, none of which I believe were sung by a woman (though could be wrong in the case of VU). Thanks! — Asbestos | Talk 11:35, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If it helps, Lou Reed sings "There She Goes" in VU's version. DO'Иeil 08:09, Mar 31, 2005 (UTC)

I don't know the answer, but be careful: you are conflating two different songs with similar titles. The Velvet Underground song "There She Goes Again" was later covered by REM. It is a different song to the La's "There She Goes" (which song Sixpence None the Richer covered, I don't know). --Camembert 16:31, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Error in Bill of Rights

I was printing a copy of the United States Bill of Rights and found Amendment VIII is obviously not correct. Please review and update. Thank you.

Sorry, GW, it's not that easy to make what you are doing in Guantanamo Bay legal. -Key45 00:59, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Vandalism fixed. Thanks. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 17:49, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

What animal is this

What animal is this image:Gangtokzoo.jpg. Please let me know cause I'd like to add it in a relavent page. Nichalp 20:01, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

It looks like a Lemur. Also, that image needs a copyright tag. Alphax ^τεχ 23:41, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

Don't worry about the copyright tags. I've taken the pic on my camera. I have a high resolution (1840x1232) of the animal & its habitat on my PC. I'll delete this image if a zoomed one is preferred. Nichalp

Tasmania and Incest

Why is the Australian state of Tasmania always associated with incest? --Alexs letterbox 07:29, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Is it? Never heard about it. 131.211.71.55 08:05, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Probably the same reason that West Virginia in the U.S. is: the allegation of incest is a metaphor for a place that the alleger considers small, backward, and isolated. --FOo 15:44, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

And the same reason as New Zealand is. Isolation. Alphax ^τεχ 04:17, Mar 24, 2005 (UTC)

See also convict ;) Dunc|☺ 22:42, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

MECHANICAL GEAR BOXES

HOW DO YOU FIND GEAR BOX RATIO IF ID PLATE IS MISSING ON A MACHINE?

Drive some fixed distance at some fixed rpm, for each gear (try 1 Km at 2000 rpm). You can then figure out the ratio. (I'm too lazy to think up a formula though, anyone else up to it?) Kim Bruning 18:59, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

What machine are we talking about? If it's a vehicle of some sort the manual should mention it in the technical specifications section. If it's something else, then you could try these:

1. Examine it closely for any sort of marking (serial number, model number, anything). Then search Google for that and locate the manufacturer and brand. Read the corresponding technical manual.
2. If the gears are exposed or easily removable, then just count the teeth and divide to get the ratio. Or if the machine can't be shut down and the rpm is fairly low, you could try to measure the rpm visually and take the inverse ratio of that. In some cases you can hold a stiff plastic card or equivalent object against each gear wheel for 10-15 seconds and count the clicks. The ratio of clicks will give you the gear ratio.
3. If the gears are not exposed but the shafts they are mounted on *are* exposed for a brief section, then you can estimate their rpm by tying a string around the shaft with a weight suspended and letting the machine run slowly. From the length of string wound, the time and the diameter of the shaft you should be able to estimate rpm. This assumes you can run the machine slowly and that a suspended weight is not a safety hazard (no whipping or anything). If you have access to a portable laser rpm gauge, you could paint a mark on the shaft and use the rpm gauge on it.
4. I'm out of ideas for now. Provide more details on what machine it is. -- Brhaspati (^talk_contribs) 07:52, 2005 Mar 24 (UTC)

Copyright during French Revolution

I read once that during the French Revolution all copyrights on published works were rescinded (assumedly in the name of égalité), but there followed such a decline in quality that the authorities were forced to reinstitute it. Does this have any basis in fact? Mjklin 18:45, 2005 Mar 23 (UTC)

I recall reading this too. I believe it was in Virginia Postrel's economics column in The New York Times, but I don't have the citation before me. As I recall, she said that the only books published were pornography, which is always in demand. 66.213.119.98 15:43, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Italy - transferred from Help desk

I am trying to find a city in Italy Provincia di Matera I am traveling to Europe in September and I am trying to locate this town because this is where my grandparents came from with my father aunt and uncle they arrived in the United states in 1923 my dad was 2 yrs old and has never been back. I am trying to see if I can figure out how to travel there but I keep running up against many road blocks. My dad is not in the best of health and my aunt and uncle are also requesting that I find the house my grandfather built but he died and my grandmother turned the house over to her sister Vincenza Motta, my family is very bad about names and I keep running into road blocks on how to find anyone from the old country and I am not even sure if we have any living relatives but I am hoping to find a contact to see if through records I can find the town take some pictures to show my family, I want nothing more than to see the place where it all started. I am hoping you can point me in some direction as to how I can locate this city. Anything you can do would be greatly appreciated. Sincerely Danette Fornabaio. you can e-mail me at fornabiod@bellsouth.net

Matera, Italy, perhaps? -- John Fader (talk | contribs) 16:16, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

four types of wind fronts

The four front types are warm, cold, stationary and occluded. See wind and weather front for a complete answer. -- FP 04:10, Mar 24, 2005 (UTC)

Do Jalaali calendar (Persian calendar) watches exist?

I want to know where I can get a wristwatch which shows the date in the Jalaali calendar (that is, the Persian calendar). -Juuitchan

Raymond V. Damadian

Can anyone tell me Raymond V. Damadian's full middle name? Thanks in advance. -- FP 04:12, Mar 24, 2005 (UTC)

Hmm, Google doesn't have much on him apart from the MRI/Nobel controversy. But yes, he did start the company FONAR, and that's where he is currently as listed on his CV. So you might just be able to contact FONAR and ask their founder's middle name for an encyclopedia project. It's a last resort option if you don't find his name anywhere else. -- Brhaspati (^talk_contribs) 08:09, 2005 Mar 24 (UTC)

Thanks for the help, I'll do that. -- FP 09:30, Mar 24, 2005 (UTC)

His middle name is Vahan, according to his executive assistant. (And his DOB is March 16, 1936.) -- FP 01:14, Mar 29, 2005 (UTC)

holes in grass lawn

i live in sydney australia and have a hole in my lawn approximately 50 mm (2 inches) in diameter and 400 mm (16 inches) deep can anyone give me an answer to what kind of creature may have created this before my kids discover it for me

tim

Hrm... if it were a larger diameter, I'd say Echidna or even Wombat. Is it vertical? Does it open out at the bottom? Alphax ^τεχ 08:56, Mar 25, 2005 (UTC)

When I was a child in Australia we had little holes like that in our garden. I was told they were made by cicadas. adamsan 10:17, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

50 × 400 sounds awfully big for a cicada. Is it vertical? Could be someone running around with a post digger... Alphax ^τεχ 03:47, Mar 26, 2005 (UTC)

Phrase with name Fritz

i would like to make a phrase with name Fritz

Not sure what the questionner really wants, but "Fritz" rhymes with Ritz. The phrase "On the Fritz" is a common saying[15]. Samw 22:33, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Sophocles' play "Antigone"

I just read the play "Antigone" and was wondering if there is any historical accuracy in it. For instance, did the character Antigone really exist? -Rhudrediel

The story of Oedipus and Antigone, adapted by Sophocles for his three Theban plays, is a Greek myth. Like other myths, there may be a foundation of truth on which a superstructure of myth has been erected — or it may be wholly invented. There's some discussion of the relationship of this myth to history in our article on Thebes, Greece. Gdr 14:15, 2005 Mar 24 (UTC)

Online C++ tests

Does anyone know of any links to online C++ proficiency tests? I'm been a C++ programmer for years, but I'm looking for a new job at the moment. I went for an interview today where they gave me a written C++ test and much to my embarrassment I found myself floored by some basic tests, designed to trip you up with the kind of errors that you rarely encounter when programming in the real world. Jimying 17:18, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I know people who speak highly of Brainbench (not specifically in C++, but in various programming and IT skills in general) and some employers are sufficiently familiar with it to take it into account. -- John Fader (talk | contribs) 17:24, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Searching for

Mothers name of William Thomas Terry Jr. ,born September 12, 1854 in Mississippi. Mother was member of Choctaw Nation. Where and or how do find this information. Thank you, Judy and Joyce May (Terry and Perry family names)

Unless they are notable, not an encyclopedia. You need to look at the external links in genealogy or go through Google:genealogy Dunc|☺ 22:45, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Star Wars remix

OK, here's the situation. I am a fan of Star Wars, and like some things about the SE, but not all (obviously). I have ripped all three of the OT movies onto a hard disc from DVD in both editions, so I have, for example, Episode IV in original, and in special edition. I would like to go through them, scene by scene, and create my own edit based on which scenes I prefer. What is the best software to use for this? Is there any free software I could use? Thanks!

Depends on what operating system you're using. I believe the latest versions of Windows and Mac OSX come with basic, but limited editing software, but it may not be sophisticated enough for your purposes. For Linux, there is the free Kino, but, again, I don't think it's that full-featured yet - there may be others for Linux, do a search at freshmeat. If you're using Windows and don't mind spending money, Adobe has a couple of well-regarded video editors, a low end version called Premiere Elements, and the full-featured but more expensive Premiere. There are other commercial packages available, of course. --Robert Merkel 07:30, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Difference in "G-D" and "God"

In reading about Jewish people, I often see "G-D" and wonder if this is different from "God." Can anyone help me understand the difference in these two terms? Thanks.

              Steve Clark

This is explained at Names_of_God_in_Judaism at 1.1.1 Pronouncing the tetragrammaton. --Auximines 18:54, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Presidential Succession Act and The West Wing

Last night on The West Wing, one of the episodes with John Goodman as acting president, a character says the Speaker of the House is next in line after the Vice President in the current law because "Harry Truman liked to drink bourbon with Sam Rayburn." It was my understanding Truman pushed for the change--previously the Secretary of State was next after the Veep--because he believed the job ought to be held by an elected official. Truman's first SecState, Edward R. Stettinius, Jr., had never held elective office, one reason Truman replaced him with James Byrnes. Anyone know if The West Wing dialogue has any basis in fact or is just some screenwriter blowing smoke? PedanticallySpeaking 18:59, Mar 25, 2005 (UTC)

I don't know the answer, but just one thought: Secretary of State isn't elected... Smoddy (_t^g_e^c_k) 23:27, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• But Byrnes had previously held elective office as governor of South Carolina. Sorry I didn't make that clear. PedanticallySpeaking 20:00, Mar 26, 2005 (UTC)

From the U.S. Senate's own website:

"When the 1945 death of Franklin Roosevelt propelled Vice President Truman into the presidency, Truman urged placing the Speaker, as an elected representative of his district, as well as the chosen leader of the “elected representatives of the people,” next in line to the vice president. Since one could make the same argument for the president pro tempore, Truman’s decision may have reflected his strained relations with seventy-eight-year-old President Pro Tempore Kenneth McKellar and his warm friendship with sixty-five-year-old House Speaker Sam Rayburn. After all, it was in Rayburn’s hideaway office, where he had gone for a late afternoon glass of bourbon, that Truman first learned of his own elevation to the presidency."

[16]

Mwalcoff 09:53, 26 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Thanks for that link. I should also note that from what I read, nobody had anything but strained relations with Kenneth McKellar. PedanticallySpeaking 20:02, Mar 26, 2005 (UTC)

Maths puzzle

ABCDE+ABCDE+ABCDE+ABCDE=EDCBA

I've been blocking on this puzzle for about an hour now, and I'm obviously missing something. As soon as I need to carry over tenths things start to fall apart, because my starting assumption is that A =< 2, but that isn't true if that's dependant on another calculation. How should I go about solving this thing? -- Mgm|^(talk) 22:39, Mar 25, 2005 (UTC)

This site has some hints regarding your problem, although stated in reverse. --CVaneg 23:26, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

On second thought, Dr. Math wasn't all that helpful. I bet he's not even a real doctor. Not totally useless, though:

1. Since we know the outermost digits, we also know that B must be odd, since, as DM points out BE (de in his example) must be a multiple of 4 (i.e. 12, 32, 52, 72, 92)
2. We also know that 4B + carry_hundreds is less than 10 since we've established that the last digit in our product requires no carry over.
3. Given the previous two facts, B=1, as every other value is greater than 10 when multiplied by 4.
4. At this point I brute forced the problem, but let's see if there's a more logical way.
5. So we know that 4 * 1 + carry_hundreds = D
6. We also know that all carry values will be less than 3 (when multiplying single digits by 4) and greater than or equal to 0
7. So 4 <= D <= 7
8. Also 4D + 3 = 10*carry_tens + 1
9. Restated 4D = 10*carry_tens - 2
10. With just a little bit of brute force we know that 4D is either -2, 8, 18, or 28
11. Since D must be a whole number >= 4, that means that D = 7 and carry_tens = 3
12. Now that we know all the other values the final equation is fairly easy.
13. 4C + 3 = 30 + C
14. Restated 3C = 27 or C = 9

So the answer is

21978*4=87912

--CVaneg 00:40, 26 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Side note. Since I'm no mathematician, I solved the problem numerically as an optimization problem. (Don't ask!). FYI, 66661/16666 and 79991/19997 also come remarkably close to 4. The only exact solution is however 21978. -- Brhaspati (^talk_contribs) 04:46, 2005 Mar 26 (UTC)

• Thanks! -- Mgm|^(talk) 09:22, Mar 26, 2005 (UTC)

Custom VMs for software

I am developing a freeware SHMUP game and will release it as open source, however I still want to separate the enemy AI and other gameworld specific tasks into a separate module for easy modification (and neatness -- so it doesn't ALL have to be stuffed into one central executable), but don't have the experience to decide how to structure this virtual-machine setup based on other factors (ie, should I go for text-based script interpreting or a compiled dynamic library, etc). Many games nowadays use this architecture but there must be many ways to structure it, and I want to know the right one -- I've seen games use a LISP interpreter, .DLL files, threaded processes, and even Java for their virtual machine AI systems, but deciding (and implementing into the existing framework) is the hard part.

Could anyone recommend some literature for software programming that covers, extensively, the creation of custom scripting and/or virtual machines for software development (specifically game and simulation development)? I am 6 and a half years into a computer science major, so I am past the "(noun) For Dummies" stage in my life, but still not yet quite fluent enough to "get" highly-theoretical writings written for eggheads with Ph.Ds. So preferably literature that's written for college-level educated programmers :). I looked at some GameDev.net articles and forums but none of the sources on that site dig as deeply into this subject as I would like. --69.234.183.71 05:26, 26 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Have you considered using something off the shelf like Lua? -- Cyrius|✎ 06:16, 27 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Oh very cool -- "Lua is also used as the module scripting language for Bioware's Neverwinter Nights Computer Role Playing Game..." -- so I've unwittingly been using Lua for a while, then! :) Seems to be a pretty solid language for modular game development from my experience with it in NWN. Thanks for the heads up! --69.234.183.71 01:03, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think the reason you can't find much written is that it's not a subject that's been properly analysed, with most companies chosing a variety of ad-hoc solutions. In addition to Lua, there was QuakeC, UnrealScript, Java (the "vampire the masquerade game", and some others), and goodness knows what else. The following are some things you'll need to think about, all engineering tradeoffs based on your problem space (note, dear language bigots, if you find I've made a mistatement in the capabilities of your favorite language, cut me some slack - it's the basic principles I'm taling about, not whether v1.5.2b has monoid generators or whatever):

• Security. This is only an issue if you want to allow third-party (community) created extensions, and want to offer the player of your game some degree of protection against malware being included in the extension. This was one of John Carmack's motivations for QuakeC, as he felt people wouldn't trust opaque C extensions. It turns out people seem to be willing to run native-language extensions, even closed-source ones. If you do want to permit 3rd party extensions, and want to offer security (essentially "sandboxing") you need to look at the sandboxing capabilities of your chosen language. Many (perl, python) have modest capabilities in this regard, but their creators don't put too high a value in that task, so the sandboxes aren't great. Java (and I assume C#) has a proper permissions model and (crucially) a verifier to back it up. Taking advantage of that properly, and stopping your code being duped into doing something it shouldn't, takes care.
• Embedability. From a distribution perspective, some languages are easier than others. Java and C#.NET in particular are a pain, as their vendors don't want you integrating them into your program; they instead want you to ship the whole platform installer as a separate install. That can make your installer, and your subsequent support thereof, a pain. Python and lua certainly are embeddable, and I doubt you'll have much bother with Ruby or Perl either. And the advantage of an open-source embeddable language is you can (if you know what you're doing) chuck out all the bits of the language-runtime that you don't need.
• Deciding on the locus of the API. Inevitably some stuff will be down in "the engine room", written in C++ or whatever. You want the "high level" stuff to be up in "the bridge" written in python (purely for example). Deciding where to put the boundary is a major issue. Some stuff seems high level but, for performance reasons, needs to be down near the engine's datastructures in a really highly-optimisable language. Examples of this include:
  • if I fire a laser at solid-angle X, what is the first object it hits?
  • if a footstep sound of volume P occurs here, which actors can hear it?
  • what is the shortest unobstructed route from A to B?

This is a tradeoff. You'll avoid many performance pitfalls if you move that kind of stuff down, but the more stuff you move down the less flexible the high-level stuff becomes. This was an ongoing issue for the Half-life sourcebase - extension developers constantly wanted access to features that were buried in the engine, that the original API designer hadn't considered would be needed ("we don't want gravity to be a vector, we want it to be a mutable vectorfield", they cried). The performance issue is mitigated if your highlevel language has a performant runtime (C# and java in particular, python to a reasonable degree). Security and third-party extensability make API design particularly hard (for example, if you expose too much of the network code, will this allow people to write cheatbots too easily).

• Interlanguage issues. Can the highlevel language see the low-level language's datastores, and to what extent (and vice versa). How expensive are upcalls and downcalls (particuarly how is the call-stack managed, and what data is copied). Interlanguage exception handling is a doosie (if the "find the route" native code throws an exception, you need to make sure the Ruby code that calls it can unpack the native exception and rethrow it as a RUby exception instead). I've done this, and it is hard.
• Who is writing code for the high-level component? This makes language choice an issue. Perl might make writing complex textual adventures quick, but at the expense of lowering your author pool. Infocom adventures, by contrast, were designed to be written by proper (eng-lit) authors, who could pick up the infocom language without much effort - but who were seriously constrained if they wanted to do anything advanced. This is comparable to the API design tradeoff - more power == more complexity.
• Problem domain. If you're doing a lot of AI, you probably don't want to be doing that in C#, but rather in scheme or haskell or (yeah) prolog. If you plan on hiring five russian math Ph.Ds you write your physics engine, you just know they're going to want to code in fortran.

Best of luck. -- John Fader (talk | contribs) 02:21, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

To answer the orginal question, the AI Game Programming Wisdom series (edited by Steve Rabin, published by Charles River Media) contain good articles on a variety of subjects to do with AI programming. Gdr 20:19, 2005 Mar 28 (UTC)

Robert Fagles

When and where was Robert Fagles born? Neutrality^talk 07:22, Mar 26, 2005 (UTC)

You can contact him and ask the man himself. Try Google. --Theo (Talk) 16:17, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)

check your e-mail --Alterego 07:35, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)

i'll post here too. He was born in Philadelphia in 1933 --Alterego 20:57, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)