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Technology

Hark! I Hear a Dropped Packet! 276

Posted by timothy from the wacky-ideas-are-good-ideas dept.
aarondsouza writes "The New Scientist has an article about Chris Chafe, a cellist and director of the Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics at Stanford University in California, who has the idea that one can use sound as an audible measure of the health of an internet connection. By sending a bunch of sound pulses across the line and measuring echo time, an average ping time of 10ms would be heard as a 100Hz tone. The idea is that the human ear is much more sensitive to variations in pitch, and thus "listening" to the connection would be a better indicator of its health. The article is short on technical specs but the project page (SoundWIRE) has more."
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Hark! I Hear a Dropped Packet! More

Hark! I Hear a Dropped Packet!

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  • Dupe? (Score:3, Informative)

    by jptxs ( 95600 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:16PM (#4778012) Journal
    http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/11/28/123820 9&mode=thread&tid=95

    • Re:Dupe? (Score:3, Informative)

      by Tomble ( 579119 )
      Yeah. At first it sounded like it was a different story with a very coincidentally similar idea, but then looking again, I realised that no, they even seem to be referring to exactly the same article in New Scientist!

      It's one thing when you see a story that had run maybe a few weeks earlier, but earlier on the same day? Ouch.

    • Dupe Detection Code? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by cjsnell ( 5825 ) on Friday November 29, 2002 @03:31AM (#4778792) Journal

      It shouldn't be too hard to add some dupe prevention code to Slash. It seems that you could snag all URLs out of a story and compare them to URLs from the last 60 days or so and if there is a match, present a warning to the editor.
  • What is this?! A Jerry Lewis Dupe-a-Thon?
  • atleast wait until it leaves the front page before reprinting the same story

  • dupe! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Jucius Maximus ( 229128 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:18PM (#4778027) Journal
    What is this, the fourth dupe in the last week?

    The original is still on the homepage! http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/11/28/123820 9&mode=flat&tid=95 [slashdot.org]

  • Didn't I see this before? (Score:3, Informative)

    by dj28 ( 212815 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:19PM (#4778031)
    Oh, yea. Right HERE [slashdot.org] on the FRONT PAGE.

    • Meanwhile, this [bbc.co.uk] gets rejected.

      I've decided that from now on I'm going to submit every story at least three times. I figure that if something that hasn't been on the front page is in the system 3 times, it has 3 times as much chance of making it onto the front page as a dupe. Since we all know when articles have been posted before, and the editors don't, maybe we should all submit everything at least three times. It's a very crude way of reducing the dupes, but it can't be worse than what we have now.

      Of course, then three editors all approve the story at once and we get three consecutive dupes on the front page...

      Hopefully if the eds' workload tripled someone would get off their ass and sort this dupe thing out.

  • we only have enough money to run a story once a day.... seriously, is there something wrong with the slashcode or a virus or something? These dupes are getting out of hand here...
  • "....sound as an audible measure..."

    What other options do we have as an audible measure? Hmmm?

  • I have tried this and... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Rogs ( 625889 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:21PM (#4778045)
    ...my ping time is so high only my dog can hear it.

  • The human ear (Score:2, Interesting)

    by recursiv ( 324497 )
    The human ear (and the corresponding piece of driver code in the brain) is very sensitive to regularities and irregularities in sounds. If you convert something to sound and get used to it, you can very easily spot how it "sounds wrong" when something changes.

    Seismographists used to convert earthquake vibration patterns to human-audible sounds; this way it became very easy for a trained ear to distinguish between natural quakes and Soviet nuclear tests. On a screen, both looked like a jumble of lines.

    Of course, a clever piece of software can do this too - but you already have this clever piece of software installed for free in your brain.
    (Unfortunately it is free-beer, as the source is not available. Hmmmm, I guess rms should target God as the largest producer of closed-source software in the Universe?)
    • Hmmmm, I guess rms should target God as the largest producer of closed-source software in the Universe?)

      We've done a good job of reverse-engineering it for the most part; hopefully He doesn't slap the human race with a DMCA lawsuit.

    • Re:The human ear (Score:4, Funny)

      by Twirlip of the Mists ( 615030 ) <twirlipofthemists@yahoo.com> on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:29PM (#4778083)
      Unfortunately it is free-beer, as the source is not available. Hmmmm, I guess rms should target God as the largest producer of closed-source software in the Universe?

      As much as I hate RMS, I have to say that he works pretty much the same way God does; compare, for example, the source code to Emacs with the human genetic code. Both are available to anybody who wants to look at them, both are vast, and both are completely incomprehensible without doing a huge amount of analysis, deduction, and plain old guessing.

      Maybe RMS is on to something after all. Release the source, but make sure before you do that it's utterly useless to anybody but yourself. After all, if the code were well documented and easy to understand, there'd be no need for the author of it.

      (Hmm. If the world were well documented and easy to understand, there'd be no need for God. Uh-oh. Dangerously close to being profound here. Better bail out while there's still time.)
      • So, are you saying God obfuscated the world's code to insure those support contracts? Makes sense. Seems to have worked too, look at all religions and stuff.
        The big revelation here is, God is a computer geek.
        No wonder the world is buggy. Bet it's written in C++.
      • Emacs is hardly incomprehensible. It's broken into small packages, each of which can be pretty easily understood and extended.

    • Obligatory dupe comment (Score:4, Funny)

      by TeknoHog ( 164938 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:54PM (#4778199) Homepage Journal
      > Of course, a clever piece of software can do this too - but you already have this clever piece of software installed for free in your brain.

      Not everyone has clever software in their brain. I'm still doing a Search for Terrestrial Intelligence. But maybe /. isn't the place for it.

      But at least I try and double-check the data.

    • Where have I read this comment before? Oh, right, here [slashdot.org].

      Word for word. Do you reckon karma gets you laid or what?

    • Re:The human ear (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Jimmy_B ( 129296 ) <<gro.hmodnarmij> <ta> <mij>> on Friday November 29, 2002 @08:55AM (#4779379) Homepage
      Plaguarism for karma is extremely dishonest. You didn't change a single word of YE's post [slashdot.org] on the previous version of this story. Looking at your posting history, this would seem to be a new low for you.

  • Thanksgiving day turkey! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Cubeman ( 530448 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:22PM (#4778049)
    Slashdot has bowled three strikes today...err duplicates:

    1. Duplicate [slashdot.org] Original [slashdot.org]

    2. Duplicate [slashdot.org] Original [slashdot.org]

    3. Duplicate [slashdot.org] Original [slashdot.org] Happy turkey slashdot!

    • Tripes (Score:4, Funny)

      by helix400 ( 558178 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:56PM (#4778205) Journal
      Are 3 dupes in a day worse than 1 tripe?

      The quark matter/stranglets hitting earth story was covered on May 12 [slashdot.org], Nov 22 [slashdot.org], and Nov 25 [slashdot.org]

      • Are 3 dupes in a day worse than 1 tripe?

        Yea, and if you read drudgereport.com and the Register, you'll find that another 1/3 of Slashdot posts are copied with little creative discovery.

        CmdrTaco may claim that most slashdot readers only come in for the headlines and the discussion value is minimal, but for his sake per the total lack of effort in finding Slashdot stories, I pray he's wrong...

        *scoove*

    • Re:Thanksgiving day turkey! (Score:5, Informative)

      by Col. Klink (retired) ( 11632 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:59PM (#4778222)
      You missed a few:

      4. Duplicate [slashdot.org] Original [slashdot.org]

      5. Duplicate [slashdot.org] Original [slashdot.org]

      6. Duplicate [slashdot.org] Original [slashdot.org]

      (PS, this list is a duplicate [slashdot.org].)

    • It seems you Slashdot editors definately smoke too much or have fall into the darkside!

      And I don't talk about all this OSNews FUD you relay. Now I bet the next step is to post LinuxGram newsletters to the frontpage.
    • I suspect this is a test. Users who actually read both copies of each story will be exempted from the normal ad rotation, so that the site can maximize its revenue by showing the same banner over and over.

      "Wow, an X-10 camera!" (click)

      "Wow, an X-10 camera!" (click)

      "Looks like Redhat 4 is out already!" (click) ...

      A few hundred repetitions of this, and the money really starts to add up.

    • Slashdot has bowled three strikes today...err duplicates

      Must be the tryptophan.

      Is it just a coincidence that the "busiest shopping day of the year" follows directly after the country ingests large amounts of a sedative? I smell a conspiracy.

    • And so what!

      I don't remember having duplicates is anything. Read some serious newspapers.and you will notice they duplicate news as well, everytime maybe a bit from another view point, maybe a bit another focus, but the news is duplicated, do I want it? Yes, I want to see an important event from different views, different focuses as events propergate.
    • You don't expect the people who "edit" this site to actually read it do you?

  • Today (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It's GROOOUNDHOG DAAAY

    enjoy the trip

    trips

    tripping
  • Methinks Slashdot needs a system to audibly alert the editors when they are about to post a dupe. The closer together, the higher the noise. And if the original is still on the main page, it plays a very load klaxon.

    :D

  • Does this mean... (Score:5, Funny)

    by InspectorPraline ( 584557 ) <mbalmer&ibiblio,org> on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:29PM (#4778079) Homepage Journal

    ...sysadmins will begin carrying metronomes and tuners?

    "I'm sorry, but your NIC seems to be running a quarter-step sharp."

    *hides*

  • hhuuhh?? (Score:2, Funny)

    by C0D3X ( 300627 )
    I don't see any dupes. wtf are you talking about?

    --C0D3X

    I don't see any dupes. wtf are you talking about?

    --C0D3X

    I don't see any dupes. wtf are you talking about?

    --C0D3X

    I don't see any dupes. wtf are you talking about?

    --C0D3X

    I don't see any dupes. wtf are you talking about?

    --C0D3X

  • The Secret.... (Score:2, Funny)

    by ebob ( 220513 )
    To getting a story posted on /. Pick one and send it in again!

  • Ratio (Score:4, Insightful)

    by McCarrum ( 446375 ) <.moc.liamg. .ta. .grubmil.kram.> on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:32PM (#4778104)
    Lets look at ratios. Three dupes from slashdot, thirteen thousand, four hundred and twelve dupes from idiots bitching about slashdot duping. It's hard to bitch about duping AND be taken seriously, when the bitch is a dupe. Atleast the stories are more interesting ...
    • Lets look at ratios. Three dupes from slashdot, thirteen thousand, four hundred and twelve dupes from idiots bitching about slashdot duping. It's hard to bitch about duping AND be taken seriously, when the bitch is a dupe. Atleast the stories are more interesting ...

  • Mirror (Score:3, Funny)

    by PDHoss ( 141657 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:32PM (#4778107)

    In case this gets Slashdotted...

    Mirror [slashdot.org]

    • LOL LOL LOL.

      this thread has turned into a real dupe o rama.

      seriously though, the bars in the sourceforge banner ad kinda look like vu bars, going up an down. does this mean the new sourceforge real-time metrics reporting system is audible too..

  • Homestar Runner (Score:3, Funny)

    by kilonad ( 157396 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:36PM (#4778122)
    I nominate Homestar Runner [homestarrunner.com] as new slashdot editor-in-chief. Admit it, he'd do at least as good of a job. And I don't care if he's animated and not real!

  • What gives? (Score:3)

    by pla ( 258480 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:37PM (#4778124) Journal
    First the Onion, now Slashdot?

    Have the collective editors of online content decided to play "lets see who really pays attention" this week?

    C'mon. Enough.
  • salkfalkjsgdfklasdfljkasdljfasjldglhjsagjlkafsghll sdafhlkashlgkasljkglahksgljkasflg;ajlksgkjlsfagjkl asfglh!!!!!!!!!!!!
    Make it stop!!

  • Used in Nuclear Facilities (Score:4, Interesting)

    by jfroot ( 455025 ) <darmok@tanagra.ca> on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:42PM (#4778142) Homepage
    I remember reading about something similar a few years ago. Basically they took all the different readings from a nuclear reactor control room and extrapolated a tone from them somehow. If any of the readings went outside of nominal the done would sound much different. Because the human ear is sensitive to this, the operators would know something is amiss.

  • My 2 (sic) cents (Score:5, Funny)

    by TeknoHog ( 164938 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:42PM (#4778146) Homepage Journal
    PING slashdot.org (66.35.250.150) from 127.0.0.1 : 56(84) bytes of data.
    64 bytes from slashdot.org (66.35.250.150): icmp_seq=0 ttl=64 time=144 usec
    64 bytes from slashdot.org (66.35.250.150): icmp_seq=0 ttl=64 time=144 usec (DUP!)
    64 bytes from slashdot.org (66.35.250.150): icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=133 usec
    64 bytes from slashdot.org (66.35.250.150): icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=133 usec (DUP!)
    64 bytes from slashdot.org (66.35.250.150): icmp_seq=2 ttl=64 time=134 usec
    64 bytes from slashdot.org (66.35.250.150): icmp_seq=2 ttl=64 time=134 usec (DUP!)

    PP..SS.. DDoonn''tt ffoorrggeett ttoo ttuurrnn oonn llooccaall eecchhoo!!

  • I know we're joking about the dupes, but... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anthony Boyd ( 242971 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:47PM (#4778161) Homepage

    ...this is really, really, sloppy work. I'm bored of this. Can I get the URLs of some other geek-friendly news/info sites? Ones that have a bit more QA?

  • Slashdot... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Jippy_ ( 564603 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:48PM (#4778167)
    News for amnesiacs. Stuff that's forgetful.

  • No Thanks... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by chrisleonard ( 523594 ) <slashdotter@databaseguy . c om> on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:49PM (#4778172) Homepage Journal
    I have a degree in music and a graduate degree in MIS ... and we've all heard all the talk about "how many musicians make good computer people" ... but please, in this case, the MIS concerns need to trump the musical intuition.
    • I do not want every machine on my network sending 100 pings every second.
    • I do not want people calling for support because "the Internet went down an octave"
      (meaning the pings changed from 100Hz to 50Hz; that is, from 10ms to 20 ms).
    • I do not want to hear a 100Hz buzz coming out of my computer. When this happens now, I start wapping my external drives to get them to quiet down.

    No thanks.

    [so the post's a dupe ... I don't care, I wasn't home to see the original!]

  • Shh! Do you hear that? It sounds vaguely like Celine Dion... Egads, we're being DDos'd. Oh the humanity, make it stop!
  • Firstly, I notice there is a certain reactance to the apparent duplication of stories. Maybe dashslot should introduce a story category of "update" of "extention" for further info on a previous topic... Just a thought.

    Anyhow I was meaning to point out that the stringent set of requirements mentioned in the article does not include a requirement for latency. Don't mean to be a dickhead, but you can get really high quality sound it you're prepared to wait long enough for it to transfer. Have I missed something? (Just been at the pub for a while, so it's likely) Baaarf

  • Play nice. (Score:2, Funny)

    by chenzhen ( 532755 )
    I'd be real impressed if one of you could effectively argue how a duplicate story has so injustly wronged you so as to demand this sort of wanton, sociopathic outrage. What's more ridiculous than a few duplicate stories is a bunch of duplicate children screaming at mommy for serving the same lunchtime sandwich two days in a row. I'm sure you all work hard and are model citizens in need of fresh news quarter-hourly, but if you don't have anything worthwhile to say, then be a man and shut it.

    Patrick
    • How right you are. I'm glad they don't complain to the same degree about DUPLICATE COMMENTS cos this thread is just about 99% whinging. Pretty Piss Poor Performance. (I'm sorry, this is a bit of a whine also, but at least it has a different target :-)
    • Yeah, god forbid the paid editors actually do something like editing.

  • Link Found to Tomorrow's Slashdot Home Page: (Score:5, Funny)

    by Snork Asaurus ( 595692 ) on Thursday November 28, 2002 @11:59PM (#4778219) Journal
    It's right here [slashdot.org]

    We don't need no steenking flux capacitor.

  • luser1: PING!
    PING... Ping... ping...
    luser2: ACK!
    ACK... Ack... ack...

    luser1: Cool, I can hear echo replies on the network now.

    luser2: No, those are just slashdot dupes.
  • I'm listening to the sound of my laptop connecting to slashdot. I hear these three patterns twice in quick succession. Any ideas?
  • Let's talk about other things! The ainme series Berserk is awesome, especially the out takes. Who can forget the Whitney Houston song? "I don't really wanna go, very much farther..." And Metroid Prime has to be the best game ever! I am hooked. Seeing as I have the whole of next week off (burning those vacation days before the end of the year), I may actually get my $6 dollars worth out of this Blockbuster rental.
  • trashes his computer because of the fucking siren sound of a bad connection that constantly adjusts?

    waaa-WAAA-waa-WAAA-waaa-WAAA-waaa
  • I realize that the holidays are here, on ed is getting married, one is recovering from a fire, and one left. The servers have moved, there are a few new features.

    Great.

    If I did this at my job I would be fired or hollered at.

    Come on already. I love /. I spend too much time reading it as it is. Why must I have duped stories to wade through?

    Moderation and the Friend/Foe system are supposed to make /. easier to read, by filtering out trolls and crapflooders. Perhaps it's time to allow the STORIES to be moderated. I enjoy reading all /. stories, because invaribly, I learn something, or get a new perspective on an issue or idea. Having valuable front page space taken up by something that was already discussed (on the same day!) only annoys the readers and surely affects the advertisers effectiveness.

    I am only a reader and poster of rants and one-liners, sure, but I happen to like /. I hate to see it like this.

    Perhaps I should have assumed there was a lack of attention to the site, when I sent a fixed flag icon to Taco, and never got a response - email or otherwise. I'd guess that Taco gets many emails asking questions, ranting about features, moderations, trolls, and plenty of spam. My note was purely friendly and included the new icon.

    No response. No 'Thanks but no thanks', automated "Yoyre emial iz impotent to us". Nothing

    That's it. Have a good Thanksgiving. Turkey ....taking effect... sleeeeepy...so sleeeepy.... must fall to ... floor....

    *snore*

  • It's fair game for meaningful posts 'eh?

    So - a joke:

    At the Miss World Pageant in Nigeria a girl puts on a skimpy bikini and asks her manager "Does this make me look Fatwa?"

    Laugh. It's funny...

  • Ahh, the good ole days... (Score:5, Funny)

    by suricatta ( 617778 ) on Friday November 29, 2002 @12:23AM (#4778313)
    When I was just a lad, these Slashdot dupe things where a rare occurance. Boy they were a big occasion! Whole families used to go and see them, it was like a day trip. But now, now you see them everywhere! Whereever you look there are Slashdot dupes! You young folk have it easy. You don't need to remember things anymore, because everything you need to know on Slashdot is duplicated without failure every couple of hours!

  • Sound is just another effective method to provide instant feedback to the user. Use of colour and shapes are also excellent methods.

    I think more software should integrate sound, colour, and shapes as informational cues than they do. Less text to read, and yet instant recognition because of the amazing properties of our brains.

    The best examples I've seen that use these techniques are games which have lots of options and feedback - like simulated war games, etc... The biggest challenge with those games is coming up with an easy to use and intuitive interface. Sound, colour, and shapes play a crucial role in their design.
  • Sounds like Peep, the Network Auralizer [auralizer.com], which I learned about from a Slashdot story from almost a year ago [slashdot.org]. I haven't looked at this Soundwire project much beyond the links above, but from a quick glance, Peep is a lot further along, a lot more flexible, and wider-reaching.

  • man nc (Score:3, Funny)

    by nakaduct ( 43954 ) on Friday November 29, 2002 @01:21AM (#4778503)
    I, for one, look forward to the advent of ping music [google.com]. Ludwig van's been rendered on some pretty fancy [ebay.com] instuments, none so expensive as an OC-192.
  • i don't think we need a story system like kuro5hin, but howabout this: since we already metamoderate the moderators, why not metamoderate the editors? if the problem is that you can identify the editor who posted the story, well, start hiding the editor's identity on the original story so things don't get stupid and personal.

    hide the story submitter's identity as well. i think the editors can handle the blow to their egos, having their little tags removed from the story post. and as someone who has had 2 stories posted here, i can handle not having my name appear on the story i posted, what do i friggin' care?

    oh boo hoo hoo! i live to see my name on slashdot! lol

    and by the way, in the spirit of slashdot, this post of mine is a dupe, copied verbatim from a previous post just last week... i thought for a second about doing this, but then i don't really want to change things here after all ;-P

  • Personally, I'm all for the Dupe! (Score:3, Informative)

    by rMortyH ( 40227 ) on Friday November 29, 2002 @03:40AM (#4778802)
    This one had better links and stuff,
    like the CCRMA home page.

    WWWeeee! We got ./'d!

    Of course I'm biased 'cuz I WORK there and
    Chris Chafe is an awesome guy and the project
    is super cool...

    'skyooz me while I go watch our webserver get
    CRUSHED!

    Seiously though, the page may be kinda dry, but if you dig you'll find some great stuff. There are links to all the top sound software for Linux and ways to optimize your system for sound and music. Check out

    http://www-ccrma.stanford.edu/guides/planetccrma /

    It's an amazing lab, doing great work and producing some amazing open source sound software, as well as testing and distributing the work of many others in the field. And there isn't a windows box in the entire place!

    =mortimer
  • Another Dupe?

    I'm really not trying to bait flame, but IMHO Slashdot has been slipping more and more recently. Yup, I realise it's free, but that doesn't mean it doesn't need standards.

    Anyway, this will be my last post here. If anyone is looking for an /. account with excellent karma, feel free to take over mine.

    Name: BoBaBrain
    Password: password


    Be gentle with it.

  • Noises from tape drives (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Shade, The ( 252176 ) on Friday November 29, 2002 @06:26AM (#4779092) Homepage
    When I was younger, we used to have a Dragon 32 microcomputer, which loaded up external data through cassette tapes. If I remember correctly, the tape recorder's line out was plugged into a port onto the computer. So to load up a game, you played the tape, which made a whole host of squeakings and gratings. But you could tell, with some practise, when the loading was going well, and when it was going to fail. Kinda like with this article, though in this case, it's with a network.
  • Geesh, this makes it 3 dups in one week on the FRONT page??

    Too much turkey and wine? :)

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