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Anyway the post mortem will be interesting .. and hopefully Amazon 
will have a more durable product as a result.

Last year at the startup weekend in Singapore I was showing Rebol 
to a couple of Amazon guys. They were amazed... I was proposing I 
would create a Rebol commandline tool set for them if they could 
get some donation, but nothing really happened... yet :)

By the way, S3Sync is abandoned because the guy was fed up with the 
Ruby language implementation. He wants to do a new version in Java, 
which is useless to me

maybe it's a money issue?

Kaj, the Ruby language itself is pretty clean. The *implementations* 
of the language mostly suck, and there are some problems with the 
underlying semantics that made some of the implementation problems 
inevitable. The language was designed to look pretty. However, they 
are working on making the implementation better - that's why there 
are so many implementations - and there have been some efforts to 
clean up the semantics too. It's slow going though, and they are 
slowed down in their efforts by having most of the implementations 
not run on Windows very well or at all, which cuts down on the developer 
pool drastically. It is not uncommon to have projects written in 
Ruby be converted to other languages when they get useful. Java is 
a pretty common target for these conversions - this is one of the 
reasons JRuby is relatively popular.

I have friends who program in Ruby for a living, and every one of 
them has independently asked that I redo the language from scratch, 
similar to Red or REBOL.

btw, im seeing windows guys switching to linux or mac because of 
ruby and it's higer and higer in demand, so the developer pool is 
expanding pretty well (which i can tell u as a core member of the 
singapore ruby brigade ;)

That happens a lot. What happens more is developers not being able 
to switch away from Windows for other reasons, and so using a different 
language instead. That is why Ruby gets used more for server/web 
stuff than for client-side stuff.

Web programming is still a very small percentage of programming work 
(5% as of the end of last year).

It was 4 months or so ago when I read them, so I don't have the link. 
I was looking at job stats at the time to see what to learn next. 
I wouldn't be surprised if the trend was to more web programming 
in the future, because a lot of developers are looking for excuses 
to use Linux on the servers, and ways to support the OSX laptops 
they do their audio stuff on, while the businesses they support are 
all running Windows on the client. I've seen a lot of consultants 
try to push web-based stuff because they hate Windows, but it doesn't 
work very well a lot of the time. Still, developer pressure is cumulative, 
so eventual change seems likely.

Was it a trustworthy source?

If it's true, it would hardly be a reason for MS to abandon their 
desktop toolkits and push HTML5

MS is pushing HTML5 in order to convince developers to not abandon 
IE. Programmers who have to do business work have to run their stuff 
on web browsers with no HTML5 support. Despite what MS says in the 
HTML5 presentations, they aren't abandoning desktop development tools 
or Silverlight any time soon. The HTML5 guys are in a different, 
competing department, so they have no say over whether the desktop 
development tools go away. Only the developers who are outside of 
MS and use their tools have any say.

For that matter, MS's Windows 8 plans are going to depend a great 
deal on improvements to their desktop/tablet/phone development tools, 
since it will have to support 3 platforms: x86, x64 and ARM. The 
.NET tools are critical to that, the same way that LLVM is critical 
to Apple.

I'll probably review yours again someday, but at the moment REBOL 
doesn't look like a good place for investments

I have a copy of them .. but I was never allowed to release them 
even though they are said to be open source

And Chris turned my version into a protocol

That's a showstopper, too. I need to upload CD images

As this week's events show, EC2 is not a good thing to become dependent 
on, either

Traditionally Rebol file transfers were done by reading the file 
into memory first which is a pain for large files.

Having said that, I think for my R3 ftp implementation, I stream 
the file off the file system instead of reading into a variable first

It's a 32-bit addressing issue.

Actually Brian, if you try to load a 650Mb file into R2 .. you'll 
crash as far as I recall

but they're only a few Mbs or less in size

If you port that to Syllable Desktop and downsize it one or two orders 
of magnitudes, I'm willing to have a look :-)

Is there a Syllable AMI ?

As I said, I haven't started with EC2 yet. I'd have to port Syllable 
Server to EC2. Syllable Desktop is impossible to run on EC2, unless 
you'd run it in a full emulator

And I pre-paid for a 3 year Windows instance a month or so ago :(

You could run remote desktops on a server, so I guess some people 
are also doing that on EC2

All this happening a few days after that Chinese hacker group boasting 
that they could bring down any country's infrastructure :(

Probably the smallest. They carry a way lighter load

Although now that I've said that, I'm sure the hot weather will soon 
blow out a hard disk...

I think I should setup a secondary fall back server in the Singapore 
availability zone.  Hopefully what happens in the USA does not impact 
other regions.

Just a few farms

When a hunger winter comes, yes

And here's a picture of my turbine http://www.compkarori.com/images/air403.gif

The threat of a $200,000 fine was a little too oppressive for me

here's a picture from the roof .... http://www.compkarori.com/images/karori403.jpg

I've been riding my bicycle under those really big ones in a big 
storm. Pretty impressive

I was going to short it during the night which basically puts a break 
on the whole thing.  And leave it going during the day

Even with the turbine shorted .. it still spun quite fast in a strong 
wind

True ... there's a lot of research in this area

A bit like a sun flower I guess

or a tulip?

It could be interesting to compare prices of electricity around the 
world. Also the prices, Reichart and Max give, are they total prices 
incl. all vat, tax and distribution?


In Denmark, where I live, we pay around DKK 2.00 in total per kWh, 
that's USD 0.39 per kWh. 1/5 of that is vat (danish: "moms"), almost 
half is a special tax on electricity, and the rest is split in actual 
price of electricity and its distribution. See pie diagram here:

http://www.dongenergy.dk/privat/El/omelprisen/Pages/om elprisen.aspx


In Denmark 25% of our electricity comes from wind mills, many located 
in the ocean. If some of you pay 0.075/kWh, that seems very cheap.

Geomol, you have perhaps noticed, there is a discussion of the merit 
of the wind mills, due to the enormous expense on building and maintaining 
them.

The brilliance of the electricity tax, is that it doesn't make economical 
sense to switch to solar or wind, since it's not a tax on the source, 
but on electricity in general. The best way is probably to have your 
own solar installation and use the government's program for allowing 
you to sell electricity back to the power plant by having it hooked 
up to the grid instead of using it to supply your own house. Each 
user is allowed up to a 6 kW installation.

I just noticed, we also have to pay subscriptions, DKK 12.50/month 
for el, DKK 67.50/month network (electricity network, I guess). That 
USD 15.57 per month in subscriptions.


So to get full price, I should figure out, how many kWh, I use for 
a whole year, times price per kWh, add subscriptions and divide by 
kWh, then I have full price per kWh.

Geomol, I always have thought that in 30 years, when our tax rate 
is 80-90%, we are the ones who will need food aid from Africa, once 
they launch a resource based economy.

the cost of windmills energy depends on the quality of the winds. 
 they can be amongst the most efficient power sources because the 
very low initial cost and upgrade costs.  ultimately, when we'll 
know how to harvest the sun properly, probably through chemical photosyntesis(nature 
is rarely wrong)   every other energy source will seem "dum", a part 
from fusion when we find a cost-effective way to do it.

First you'll have to find a way to do fusion in the first place - 
apart from bombs

Max, cost can only be a concern if you have enough of the energy. 
If not, then no matter how cost effective it can be, you also need 
to add other sources...

The biggest news, and most promising, seems to be around the Rossi 
process. It's amazing how something of this magnitude is not covered 
by popular press. Not surprising, because of the bad rap the field 
got at its start, but the lack of coverage says a lot about how the 
scientific establishment operates.

actually there should be a bunch more 9's after the decimal point

actually, it's close to 20 years old, but it was not revealed until 
around 2005. it has gone silent again a year ago.

polywell is kinetic fusion, not hot fusion, so it's a different process.

the technology needed is not much above what you'd see in a chemistry 
lab

They funded the early research too from 1992 to 2005, but funding 
ran out in 2005 and a lack of results could not get the research 
funding renewed. It's a near miracle that the research started again. 
this happened, because the main researcher, Robert Bussard was going 
through test data from their last burnt out prototype and discovered 
interesting numbers that suggested that the principle actually works. 
Still no funding, and Bussard went public to get funding, even setting 
up a paypal account. Bussard then died in 2007 and other researchers 
took over the funding issue. They got the US Navy to start funding 
it again, built another prototype to verify the results and they 
turned out good. After this a plan was posted for more prototypes 
and then they went silent.

What I find amusing is that Robert Bussard worked on ITER early on, 
saw that it wouldn't work and left and basically worked in a garage 
for 10 years with speaker magnets for pocket money, while ITER received 
billions for barely any progress.

Polywell is advantagous over ITER in that the design is much, much 
simpler. The output is electricity and helium, so no conversion is 
needed to put it on a grid. There are still arguments over whether 
neutron radiation will be produced, when used with the pb11 fuel, 
but if not, then none will be produced, as there will be with ITER.


The disadvantage is the requirement for size, which probably is going 
to be more than 3x3x3 meters for a small-scale system, but it's still 
small enough to put in a submarine or a ship. The other disadvantage 
is that you probably will need 1-10 MW plant in front of it to start 
it, but once the process starts, it runs on its own.


Another point is safety: If you add too much or too little fuel, 
the process simply stops.

Sounds pretty interesting, but when will we see commercial deployment? 
Rossi is planning for October, this year, for his process. A Greek 
company is investing 200 million euros in the plant.

We won't know, as the state of development is still in understanding 
the physics and there is no public device that has worked for longer 
than a few milliseconds. After that, there are still engineering 
issues to overcome to build a production device. The researchers 
last said that the first real device could be in operation within 
5-10 years, which still is 50 years before ITER.


As far as I can tell, LENR is further ahead. But from what I can 
see, they are not in direct competition with eachother and there 
is a need for real table-top fusion.

I'm not sure what the maximum output from the Rossi process can be, 
but from what I've been reading it can actually produce much higher 
output than what is planned for the initial plant. For now, it is 
being limited it in order to have it operate in a safe range. The 
demonstration done in January showed about 12-15kW. It seems it can 
be self sustaining, but that might come after the theory behind the 
process is understood. As it is, it is a controllable process that 
can generate a known amount of energy given a set of operating parameters.

Now that I looked over the wikipedia article on Polywell, I remember 
coming across it a few years back - I watched the Google talk that 
Bussard gave - but it fell off my radar when not much seemed to happen 
around the process.

the thing I like about this experiment, is that they seem to be doing 
all they can to avoid calling it a "cold fusion" device... probably 
to limit the media circus act.

Rossi is an engineer - he's spent a good amount of his life on this 
and lots of his own finances - up until now, it's been out of his 
pocket. Why doesn't it seem reasonable to want to profit from something 
like this?

the best discussion on this subject is on the vortex list. If the 
subject is of interest, start around mid-January when the news broke 
and work forwards. You'll find lots of very qualified people discussing 
Rossi. My take from what I've read is that this isn't a scam - there's 
been lots of precedent over the last two decades. Rossi has finally 
gotten a repeatable, consistent process, that's all.

http://www.mail-archive.com/[vortex-l-:-eskimo-:-com]

I'm wondering why he isn't telling how it's working. If he want to 
protect it, he has to file a patent, which makes the thing public 
anyway.

he has filed for a patent, but there's been issues as the patent 
application is way too vague

the post for the Jan conference is here. Start at page 1 and work 
forward and you'll get a very good sense for how this whole thing 
is being perceived

http://www.journal-of-nuclear-physics.com/?p=360#comments

he has had a prototype unit (about 10kW if I recall) heating a building 
for about a year prior to the public announcement. The plant(s) (there 
will be one in Greece and one somewhere else, I think) coming this 
year, hopefully, will be the validation of the process everyone is 
demanding. If you read at the above links, you'll see that his intent 
isn't to stop the technology from being used by as many people as 
possible.

I would know a dozend companies that would use it immediatly.

I guess at a few million that would ;-)

here's an interesting interview with Dr. Edmund Storms (pretty big 
name in the field) on Rossi


http://coldfusionnow.wordpress.com/2011/03/04/edmund-storms-on-the-rossi-device-there-will-be-a-stampede/

me too, I'd install a unit for myself and my neighbor. with a closed, 
permanent loop for heating and cooling.

so far, his intent is to get it into industrial applications since 
licensing for that is a lot less prohibitive than for domestic use

also, the current machine is prohibitively "under performing" because 
by his own account... they have no clue what (rather why) its actually 
working.  so they are using extremely safe levels of operation which 
have a zero chance of becoming dangerous.   

they are still trying to provide the theory behind the discovery.


the current demonstrations provide a ratio of output of about 6-7 
times output energy wrt input.   I've read that they did tests up 
to 400:1, at which point explosions always occur... but by his own 
account, they will be able to significantly improve the "reactor" 
in the next years, when they start understanding it more.


operationally safe levels could be a lot higher today, given a different 
environment in which they build the reactor so I expect tha commercial 
products will double output within a very short period of time.

the sad thing is the Pons-Fleischman debacle hadn't happened (poor 
guys basically cut their careers short as a result), the filed could 
have been at this stage in the early 90's - with proper funding for 
research

the world is just waiting for a way to make energy without the requirement 
of special geographical resources.   this might very well be it. 
  nickel is a pretty abundant resource and there are mines all over 
the world.

and well, I hope there will never be a shortage of hydrogen  ;-)

if, within a decade, it has be proven that the device is as safe 
as traditional oil furnaces are (we all accept that we have a bomb 
in our houses... so I don't see this as being any more dangerous).


I'd say that we are talking about a shift in the need for huge powerplants, 
in the long run.  if, I can use a kg of nickel for a few hundred 
bucks, to heat/cool my house and its water for a few years... why 
would I even consider using electricity/oil/gaz instead?

if everyone can basically cut his major energy costs by 90%, that 
means a sizeable reduction in grid energy requirements.

yes, there is radiation, but not to a degree that a small amount 
of shielding can't be effective at stopping it

some peope had, rightly, questioned the process being nuclear since 
there was no significant gamma radiation during the demo. Rossi explained 
somewhere that getting a radiation signature would give away the 
secret of the catalyst, so he made sure to cover up as much as possible

a CRT has significant radiation, but it is allowed in the home

wrt public acceptance isn't going to be hard.   the system instantly 
shuts off if you remove the input current, so that a simple fuse 
in the system makes it highly safe, in fact much safer than any conventional 
fossil fuel furnace in case of appliance failure..  


my own furnace had a back-fire explosion two months ago...  this 
litterally ripped off and blew the whole piping leading to the chimney 
right into the opposing wall.

I guess there is a question of home-brew, poorly shielded impementations 
that could get out of hand if the intent is to go for the biggest 
output

the real danger IMHO will be in the handling of the nickel dust. 
 so I'd bet a normalized "consumer-safe" rod will likely be built 
at some point.

I'll just wait for a blueprint in popular mechanics, before I build 
mine  ;-)

the power will really be, when we can print this with a reprap 3D 
printer :-)

speaking of Popular Mechanics above, they had a pretty negative article 
when this process was announced

current common sense in N-A would be:  "if its not fire or hot wires... 
its obviously dangerous or else its fake"

wrt printer, yeah, I REALLY hope he gets the plans out, I'll build 
one for sure.  my dad has a commercial machine shop with milling 
machine and all the rest.

He made a flute lately: http://3dhomemade.blogspot.com/

A house plus store just completely exploded here today in the Netherlands 
due to gas, so I guess Maxim is right that switching bombs would 
be acceptable

btw, the one thing I have not seen answered wrt the Rossi invention 
is if explosions are radio-actively "dirty".   

if its easy to make these systems, and then eplode on demand, (by 
a simple switch it on) it becomes a rather disturbing technology 
if the explosion itself leaves radio-active elements behind.

And it's very little matter, that's involved in the fusion (if it 
work). I don't think, it'll be a big problem, unless the process 
can run uncontrolled somehow, like a fission meltdown. It's hard 
to judge, because the claimed process isn't very well understood 
(yet).

just a note about the nickel consumption in the Rossi process - Max 
quoted 1kg/6 months for the demo reactor - the figure given by Rossi 
is closer to 100g/6 months for a 10 kW reactor. I've also seen that 
quoted as low as 65g

If you are a LastPass user:


http://blog.lastpass.com/2011/05/lastpass-security-notification.html

im using the hash-a-pass concept and i even wrote a rebol implementation 
for it:
http://onetom.posterous.com/cross-platform-hash-a-pass