| Computer/gaming advice for parents
Following up on my last post about how to decide how much violence in videogames is okay for your kids, here's a list of gaming/computer tips for parents that I've learned over the years. My top ten computer/game parenting tips for geek dads: Try cooperative mode on any game that offers it. Best father-child bonding ever! Make up your own mind about what's appropriate for your kids. I think Halo 2 is fine (cartoonish violence and fictional settings), and Call of Duty 3 is okay for my 9-year-old (accurate historical setting and a war-is-hell message) although not for the younger kids. But I think Gears of War, which is essentially a horror game, is too scary and full of bad language and adult themes, so they're not playing that. Other parents will come to different conclusions.
Speed Freaks Not The Only Offenders
While I think it's great that the police are putting their foot down with regards to speeders, I still wonder why nothing (or very little) is being done about other serious traffic misdemeanours. Not a day passes when I don't experience countless examples of reckless driving and a serious lack of respect for other motorists and pedestrians on the way to work. That's probably why one can spot a flattened yield sign or robot almost every morning. The mere sight of a taxi or a dropped-suspension Golf with the boombox pounding away is enough to make your neck hair stand on end. Is there something generally wrong with Namibian drivers? There must be, as I've even had foreigners ask me that question. A red robot seems to be the "Go for it!" sign. The middle of an intersection is a convenient halt zone, if waiting for the next green light is just too cumbersome.
Resolvity Ushers in Next Wave of Voice Automation
IRVING, Texas --(Business Wire)-- Resolvity Inc., an innovative provider of intelligent voice self-service solutions, takes automation of customer care phone calls to the next level with its award-winning Resolvity 1.2 speech application platform.
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Engineering students win big in Vegas
Teaching a mouse to navigate a maze may be difficult using only cheese, but UA engineering students used sensors, wheels and artificial intelligence to move their electronic "mice" quickly to the center of a labyrinth.
A competition sponsored by the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers involves building a robot that can navigate through a maze without using a remote. The "mouse" starts in one corner of a maze and must navigate to the center using trial and error. The competition was held Saturday at the University of Nevada at Las Vegas.
"In a sense, it's like navigating a wheelchair around in a room without hitting objects," said Hal Tharp, an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering and faculty adviser for the UA chapter of IEEE. "That's sort of what the mouse was having to deal with when it's navigating the maze."
The "mouse" itself was a small cubical robot that had ultrasonic sensors to identify openings in the maze.
Student-designed Hovercraft Race to Protect 'Arctic Sovereignty'
Student-built robotic hovercraft will simulate Arctic rescue and service missions in a year-end engineering challenge tomorrow. With final grades on the line, 115 UBC Mechanical Engineering students in 20 teams will race their hovercraft around the lobby of UBC’s Fred Kaiser Building in five rounds of competition: Speed: Race to the site of a "distress call" Maneuverability: Navigate through an obstacle course of "icebergs" Payload: Carry as much cargo as possible to an "Arctic outpost" Fuel-efficiency: With limited fuel, travel as many times as possible between "Arctic settlements" Power: Tug-of-war between two groups of five hovercraft. Powered by compressed gas, the radio-controlled hovercraft range in size from that of phone book to that of a VCR.
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