- Roundtable - muug.ca

Re: Hollerith Hijinks
by gedetil＠cs.umanitoba.ca 30 May '03

30 May '03

According to Michael Doob: > A gigabyte of punch cards? > > I just happen to have a box of cards on my desk (some guys just > *never* get around to cleaning up). I took a batch and > really squished them tight: this gave me 60 cards per centimeter. > That means 60*100*80 = 2^8*3*5^4 = 480000 bytes/meter (I never > use FORTRAN anymore :-)). So our gigabyte > of data stands > > 1024*1024*1024/480000 = 2^(22)/(3*5^4) meters = 2^(19)/(3*5^7) km ~ 2.24 km > > tall, at least without gravity to compress everything. Of course, all of you have been basing your calculations on the assumption that a gigabyte is 1024^3 (or 2^30), which I suppose would make more sense to us old timers. However, the new standard is to actually respect the old SI standards, and use kilo-, mega-, and giga- to represent powers of 1000. (I.e. 10^3, 10^6, and 10^9, respectively.) See the following... http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html This would somewhat reduce the length (or height), volume, and weight estimates given. Or, we could restate the question to ask how much a gibibyte (yuck!) of punch cards would be... > Now who is the lucky guy who has to retrieve the top one off the stack? Or who's the poor operator who has to feed them all through the card reader? -- Gilbert E. Detillieux E-mail: <gedetil(a)cs.umanitoba.ca> Dept. of Computer Science Web: http://www.cs.umanitoba.ca/~gedetil/ University of Manitoba Phone: (204)474-8161 Winnipeg, MB, CANADA R3T 2N2 Fax: (204)474-7609

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Re: Roundtable digest, Vol 1 #195 - 6 msgs
by Michael Doob 30 May '03

30 May '03

A gigabyte of punch cards? I just happen to have a box of cards on my desk (some guys just *never* get around to cleaning up). I took a batch and really squished them tight: this gave me 60 cards per centimeter. That means 60*100*80 = 2^8*3*5^4 = 480000 bytes/meter (I never use FORTRAN anymore :-)). So our gigabyte of data stands 1024*1024*1024/480000 = 2^(22)/(3*5^4) meters = 2^(19)/(3*5^7) km ~ 2.24 km tall, at least without gravity to compress everything. Now who is the lucky guy who has to retrieve the top one off the stack? Cheers, Michael ------------------------------------------------------------------ Michael Doob Telephone: (204) 474-9796 Department of Mathematics Fax: (204) 474-7606 University of Manitoba email: Michael_Doob(a)umanitoba.ca Winnipeg, MB, Canada R3T 2N2 ------------------------------------------------------------------

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Re: [RndTbl] Hey, old-timers!
by pgraham＠cs.umanitoba.ca 30 May '03

30 May '03

I just did the volume computation but don't have scales here to weigh my card boxes (yes, I still have a few since they are great for grocery lists). Sorry to not be able to provide that bit of trivia. Peter According to Gilles Detillieux: > > According to Glen Ditchfield: > > How big would a gigabyte of punched cards be? > > Well, 2^30/80 is 13,421,773 cards. Anyone remember how many cards fit > in one of those big flat boxes they came in? If it was 5000, it would > take 2,685 of these boxes to store a gig. What weight and volume that > would occupy, I couldn't say at this point. Trouble with us old timers > is our memory starts to fail. :-P Anyone still have one of those big > flat boxes of cards? > > -- > Gilles R. Detillieux E-mail: <grdetil(a)scrc.umanitoba.ca> > Spinal Cord Research Centre WWW: http://www.scrc.umanitoba.ca/ > Dept. Physiology, U. of Manitoba Winnipeg, MB R3E 3J7 (Canada) > _______________________________________________ > Roundtable mailing list > Roundtable(a)muug.mb.ca > http://www.muug.mb.ca/mailman/listinfo/roundtable > -- Dr. Peter C.J. Graham <pgraham(a)cs.umanitoba.ca> or Associate Professor <pgraham(a)acm.org> Computer Science Phone: +1 (204) 474-8837 University of Manitoba, Winnipeg MB Fax: +1 (204) 474-7609 Canada R3T 2N2 URL: http://www.cs.umanitoba.ca/~pgraham/ PGP key: http://www.cs.umanitoba.ca/~pgraham/pgp_key

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Hey, old-timers!
by Glen Ditchfield 30 May '03

30 May '03

How big would a gigabyte of punched cards be?

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Second Roundtable meeting this week
by Mike Pfaiffer 25 May '03

25 May '03

Last month Sean and I had a nice chat. There was some talk about moving it to Thursday so as not to conflict with an executive meeting. There was also the suggestion to move it to the Second Cup on Graham. Since it's getting to be about that time again, I was wondering what's up? Later Mike

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Linux kernel "Failed to calculate dependencies"
by Brian Doob 15 May '03

15 May '03

I just recompiled my kerne after changing some configurations (removed framebuffer support, changed IDE configuration, some minor things). I'm running Gentoo Linux (the 1.4, gcc3.2.2 variety) with the "gs-sources" 2.4.21_pre7-gss kernel. Now when I boot, I get the following message: * Failed to calculate dependancies My ethernet (8139too) and nvidia modules load properly. Then I run "emerge alsa-driver" (because ALSA needs to be recompiled after the kernel). Now, I can't load ethernet, sound or nvidia. Here are some of my kernel boot up messages (there are others between theese): * Failed to calculate dependancies * Failed to load 8139too * Failed to load nvidia * Failed to bring up eth0 up What do I need to do to make the kernel load its modules properly? Thanks. -Brian

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Upcoming Python Talks
by Brad Bollenbach 14 May '03

14 May '03

If anyone missed "An Introduction to Python" -- the talk I gave to the MUUG last month -- here's your chance to make up for it; May 21st, Brandon UUG, 7:30 pm. :) My proposal to talk about SQLObject at EuroPython in Charleroi, Belgium June 25-27 got accepted too. Details of the talk are online: http://www.europython.org/sessions/talks/talk?itemId=03108161107 Brandon might be the last chance I have to talk about Python in Manitoba for a long while, because I'm finally relocating to Quebec City on May 30, so if you can make it to out, or have a boss you want to be sold on Python then get out to Brandon, okay? :) -- Brad Bollenbach BBnet.ca

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Call for National Participation
by bill traynor 14 May '03

14 May '03

IMPORTANT! The Canadian Linux Users Exchange (CLUE - www.linux.ca) would like to strongly encourage LUG members across the country to take the time to participate in the following project: This is exactly the kind of project that may help the opensource industry in Canada expand, thereby creating the types of jobs that you/we all long for (if you aren't lucky enough to have an opensource-centric tech job already). *Open Source Business Opportunities for Canada - A Collaborative Fact Finding Study* Sponsored by Industry Canada, Public Works and Government Services Canada, and the Treasury Board Secretariat, the study will investigate open source business opportunities and challenges for the Canadian information and communications industry sector and what implications there may be in terms of public policy. Some key project deliverables are: -A review of open source capabilities, supply and demand in Canadian industry, government and academia. This will include a categorized listing of key open source solutions suppliers and support providers in Canada and a scan of recent world trends, including a forecast to 2010. - An assessment of barriers for the open source business model as well as concerns and conditions for acceptance. - An assessment from a business perspective of alternative open source software licenses, from the standpoint of suppliers of software and services, contributors and end-users. - A synthesis of issues, opportunities and constraints for Canadian industry and government decision-makers. To participate, go to http://www.e-cology.ca/canfloss/questions_home_en.html and complete the survey. The survey in French can be found at http://www.e-cology.ca/canfloss/questions_home_fr.html For more information see: http://www.e-cology.ca/canfloss/canfloss_en.html or in french at http://www.e-cology.ca/canfloss/canfloss_fr.html Also, see http://www.vsi-isbc.ca/eng/joint_tables/im_it/news.cfm Thanks Bill Traynor Canadian Linux Users Exchange

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Tuxracer and Sound
by Sean A. Walberg 12 May '03

12 May '03

Someone brought up a the last meeting that they were trying to play Tuxracer in RH9, but the sound wasn't working. Lo and behold, the same thing happens to me. So, I check out http://bugzilla.redhat.com, and sure enough: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=77334 "Problem is that tuxracer needs smpeg to have sounds, but smpeg was removed in 8.0 (license problem). You have to rebuild tuxracer with smpeg yourself, it will work again." Sigh. Sean -- Sean A. Walberg <sean(a)ertw.com> http://www.ertw.com

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Re: [RndTbl] Sendmail .mc file for forwarding server?
by gedetil＠cs.umanitoba.ca 06 May '03

06 May '03

I've got such a file, but it's full of RedHat-specific stuff too, so it won't do you much good as is. However, the trick to doing this is fairly simple, particularly if you're using the .mc macros. Just start off with one of the typical .mc source files, remove all MAILER definitions, and add the following instead... FEATURE(nullclient, host.to.forward.to)dnl ... where host.to.forward.to would be the fully qualified domain name of your internal mail server. The nullclient feature sets up special mailer definitions so that all mail, whether local or not, goes to the forwarding host. According to Scott Balneaves: > Does anyone have a .mc file kicking around for sendmail that > creates a forwarding only server? I'd basically like to set > up an OpenBSD 3.3 firewall box running the new spamd, and a > sendmail daemon that basically forwards all mail received onto > our internal mail server. > > I know I could write a pf rule that would forward port 25 to our > internal mail server, but I like the chroot sendmail on OpenBSD, > and would prefer to have it exposed to the big, bad innurnet. > > Scott -- Gilbert E. Detillieux E-mail: <gedetil(a)cs.umanitoba.ca> Dept. of Computer Science Web: http://www.cs.umanitoba.ca/~gedetil/ University of Manitoba Phone: (204)474-8161 Winnipeg, MB, CANADA R3T 2N2 Fax: (204)474-7609

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