The Geniuses' Thread

Insect Overlord · 01-08-2011 8:02pm

Screaminmidget wrote: »

Ok, ill be honest and admit that as I was reading that I was thinking more along the lines of Itunes than the Mac OS.....

It is taken from the I-Tunes agreement.

LilMissCiara · 08-08-2011 7:25pm

I came on to my laptop today and the start menu thing is all different and I can't see the writing (pic below), I didn't change any settings or that but can someone please tell me how to fix it? The menu was always tight to the left as well..

This is the picture, it's too big to post here (and I can't resize

).

Thanks!

shadowninty · 08-08-2011 7:33pm

I got that before, cant remember how to fix it... log out?

BTW: I have a purple themed desktop too! :L

LilMissCiara · 08-08-2011 7:35pm

shadowninty wrote: »

I got that before, cant remember how to fix it... log out?

BTW: I have a purple themed desktop too! :L

It's called lovebirds, I don't think yours is the same! :L

Edit: The buttons at the bottom of the start menu are hidden so I can't log off!

Edit again: Yaaaaay for ctrl, alt, delete!

And I got it fixed!

shadowninty · 08-08-2011 7:48pm

LilMissCiara wrote: »

It's called lovebirds, I don't think yours is the same! :L

Edit: The buttons at the bottom of the start menu are hidden so I can't log off!

Edit again: Yaaaaay for ctrl, alt, delete! And I got it fixed!

I only learned all these shortcuts recently (like last week) :0
super + d is so handy, same for ctrl + alt + L

I use the power button to log off tho

Conor108 · 10-08-2011 9:16pm

If you guys need to use Windows for something do you dual-boot or run a virtual machine? I have it on dual-boot at the moment but I'm installing XP on a virtual machine. Hopefully its faster and works better than having to reboot the computer. If it's grand, I guess I'll delete my XP partition.

shadowninty · 10-08-2011 9:28pm

Dual boot should be waaay faster, its nit that bad to dual boot

RolandIRL · 10-08-2011 9:32pm

Conor108 wrote: »

If you guys need to use Windows for something do you dual-boot or run a virtual machine? I have it on dual-boot at the moment but I'm installing XP on a virtual machine. Hopefully its faster and works better than having to reboot the computer. If it's grand, I guess I'll delete my XP partition.

if you want to play any sort of games on it, don't bother with a virtual machine. it can't access the graphics card afaik so they won't work. learnt that the hard way

shadowninty · 10-08-2011 9:36pm

I found the sims 3 couldnt use my graphics card either on Ubuntu via Wine. Odd tbh as its not emu´d >.<

10-08-2011 9:36pm

The only thing I ever need Windows for is games. If you don't play PC games, you can get rid of Windows.

Conor108 · 10-08-2011 9:46pm

Nah it's not for games! Theres a program called MKV2VOB for converting certain video files so they'll play on a ps3. Can't get it to work with Ubuntu so I just pretty much need it for that! Oh and to fix my phone, can't get Nokia Ovi suite on Ubuntu either. I don't know, I think I'd just rather have it and not need it than the other way round..

shadowninty · 10-08-2011 9:47pm

Ovi Suite?

What do you need that for? Doesnt PC Suite work?

Conor108 · 10-08-2011 9:50pm

shadowninty wrote: »

Ovi Suite?
What do you need that for? Doesnt PC Suite work?

Can't remember my security code lolz. Hoping I can just re-install the firmware or something from Ovi suite or whatever its called

shadowninty · 10-08-2011 9:56pm

You need a full windows install to do that

Indiego · 13-10-2011 5:57pm

Is this where the smart peoples be?

Could someone explain how this works in stupid people language, my brain cant comprehend the complicated-ness of it... but I need to make one as a part of my BT Young Scientist entry :eek:
I just dont get how twiddling magnets over coils of wire makes energy magically appear

http://www.greenoptimistic.com/2010/03/09/build-small-scale-hydroelectric-generator/

Any sort of help in understanding this would be muchas appreciated

pljudge321 · 13-10-2011 8:43pm

Indiego wrote: »

Is this where the smart peoples be?

Could someone explain how this works in stupid people language, my brain cant comprehend the complicated-ness of it... but I need to make one as a part of my BT Young Scientist entry :eek:
I just dont get how twiddling magnets over coils of wire makes energy magically appear

http://www.greenoptimistic.com/2010/03/09/build-small-scale-hydroelectric-generator/

Any sort of help in understanding this would be muchas appreciated

Any wire with an electric current (electric field if you want to get technical) moving through a wire will generate a magnetic field that goes in a circle around it like so.

If you coil a wire, particularly around something with a low magnetic permeability like iron, you can increase this effect and create a electromagnet, like the ones used in scrapyards to lift cars.

The inverse is also true, if you move a magnetic field through a coil of wire you will induce a current in the coil. In that motor, the rotor, or the part that spins, contains two magnets which when spun will create a moving magnetic field that will pass through each of the coils in the stator (stationary out part) inducing a current. Because the magnets have a north and a south pole the direction of the magnetic field will change as the rotor rotates, meaning the current induced in the coils will change direction. If you measure the current it will be an AC with a sinusoidal waveform like so.

Can you give me any more background on the project, what are you trying to do with it?

JamJamJamJam · 13-10-2011 10:06pm

pljudge321 wrote: »

Any wire with an electric current (electric field if you want to get technical) moving through a wire will generate a magnetic field that goes in a circle around it like so.

Right, this might confuse the topic, but I never got this... Why does the field go clockwise (as you look from the top of the diagram) and not anticlockwise? I asked my physics teacher last year and he said it was because that's what the right hand grip rule stated, but I wanted to know why it has to be clockwise and not anticlockwise? How do the electrons and stuff know what way is clockwise and which is anticlockwise?!

I had the same problem with Fleming's Left Hand Rule:

Why does, say, the current travel as it does here, and not in the exact opposite direction? It's mutually perpendicular in both situations, loik!

:(

pljudge321 · 13-10-2011 10:54pm

JamJamJamJam wrote: »

Right, this might confuse the topic, but I never got this... Why does the field go clockwise (as you look from the top of the diagram) and not anticlockwise? I asked my physics teacher last year and he said it was because that's what the right hand grip rule stated, but I wanted to know why it has to be clockwise and not anticlockwise? How do the electrons and stuff know what way is clockwise and which is anticlockwise?!

I had the same problem with Fleming's Left Hand Rule:
Why does, say, the current travel as it does here, and not in the exact opposite direction? It's mutually perpendicular in both situations, loik! :(

I'm probably not the best person to answer this with any confidence, try the physics forum if you want a better answer, but if the H vector was facing the other way than Ampere's circuital law wouldn't be satisfied.

$09c075625f4b2d0b0bed94b9b964e09d.png$

Jackobyte · 13-10-2011 11:10pm

Totz just pwned a c) part in HL Maths from past exam papers on my first go. So proud... *wipes tear*

RolandIRL · 13-10-2011 11:25pm

pljudge321 wrote: »

I'm probably not the best person to answer this with any confidence, try the physics forum if you want a better answer, but if the H vector was facing the other way than Ampere's circuital law wouldn't be satisfied.

$09c075625f4b2d0b0bed94b9b964e09d.png$

But then you could ask, is Ampere's Law defined that way because the field goes clockwise or vice versa? It could just be some intrinsic property of current flow.

As above you'd probably be better off going to the Physics & Chemistry forum to find an definitive answer

johnmcdnl · 14-10-2011 1:07am

Conor108 wrote: »

Nah it's not for games! Theres a program called MKV2VOB for converting certain video files so they'll play on a ps3. Can't get it to work with Ubuntu so I just pretty much need it for that! Oh and to fix my phone, can't get Nokia Ovi suite on Ubuntu either. I don't know, I think I'd just rather have it and not need it than the other way round..

ffmpeg through the command line will convert videos for you

not the hardest program to use either

WinFF which can be found in the Software Centre is a graphical front end for it as well but I've never used that but I'll give it a bash sometime... (quick google and a ffmpeg search in the software centre found it - google is always your friend with Linux (and Windows for that matter))

if one Windows program doesn't work in any Linux distro then just assume there's another program that does the same job for you and probably better going on my experience...

Davidius · 14-10-2011 1:49am

JamJamJamJam wrote: »

Right, this might confuse the topic, but I never got this... Why does the field go clockwise (as you look from the top of the diagram) and not anticlockwise? I asked my physics teacher last year and he said it was because that's what the right hand grip rule stated, but I wanted to know why it has to be clockwise and not anticlockwise? How do the electrons and stuff know what way is clockwise and which is anticlockwise?!

I had the same problem with Fleming's Left Hand Rule:
Why does, say, the current travel as it does here, and not in the exact opposite direction? It's mutually perpendicular in both situations, loik! :

I assume it's just chosen arbitrarily and used as a convention, such that the opposite direction denotes some opposing action. The same kind of deal as cross products.

shadowninty · 14-10-2011 7:53am

Handbrake is great on Ubuntu too, shouldn't be too hard to make a PS3 playable movie

almostnever · 17-10-2011 11:48am

This is probably the most ridiculous question to ever grace this thread, but here goes...

I've a letterhead I need to use in my college email (hosted by gmail) and I can't figure out how to do it! It was sent in an email as an attachment which I've saved in google docs and downloaded to my laptop in a Word file. Any ideas on how to actually use it?

Jackobyte · 17-10-2011 5:40pm

almostnever wrote: »

This is probably the most ridiculous question to ever grace this thread, but here goes...

I've a letterhead I need to use in my college email (hosted by gmail) and I can't figure out how to do it! It was sent in an email as an attachment which I've saved in google docs and downloaded to my laptop in a Word file. Any ideas on how to actually use it?

Can you not just copy/paste in underneath the header in the file?

Richard Cranium · 30-10-2011 6:30pm

Question for any C/C++ programmers here:

Is there a handy way of writing a programme that will search for words in a text file? I haven't done any programming in a while (and it's not a college assignment either) so I'm not too concerned about efficiency, I'd just like for it to work.

So far I can read a text file into the programme, print it on screen and/or save it to an array. What I'd like to be able to do next is to search for specific words in that text.

I figure what I'll need to do is save the words I'd like to find in a separate array of strings, and then somehow compare the elements in that array to the one with the entire text file in it. However, apart from massive nested for loops or something, I don't know how to go about this.

Any thoughts?

Slow Show · 13-12-2011 8:42pm

The boiling point of water is much higher than that of ammonia, despite the fact that each ammonia molecule could form one more hydrogen bond than a water molecule could...because of the greater electronegativity of oxygen compared with nitrogen, thus the hydrogen bonds in water are stronger than those in ammonia.

The boiling point of water is also higher than the boiling point of hydrogen fluoride, but this time the greater number of possible hydrogen bonds for each water molecule is a more significant factor than the stronger hydrogen bonds in hydrogen fluoride brought about by fluorine's greater electronegativity.

OK, so I could learn this off and regurgitate it if I ever need to but I dislike that, so, I'm asking any Chemistry geniuses (or anyone with a passing knowledge, seeing as this is probably very simple)...why?? Why does the number of possible bonds work for the hydrogen fluoride example, but not for ammonia? The electronegativity difference between oxygen and nitrogen and oxygen and fluorine is almost the same, so that explains nothing, I think...

I haaaaaaate learning things off without having a clue what they mean, and I like when everything is all well-explained and clear in my mind, otherwise I just won't remember it. So errr yeah, anyone care to shed some light on this? Although I think I managed to confuse myself more by typing that out...

Indiego · 13-12-2011 8:53pm

Has anyone here ever competed in the IrEUSO?
I got picked for it and I want to do the biology section, but how much am I expected to know? :eek:

shadowninty · 13-12-2011 9:07pm

Indiego wrote: »

Has anyone here ever competed in the IrEUSO?
I got picked for it and I want to do the biology section, but how much am I expected to know? :eek:

I know three guys who got into the older one, and one for the younger one. Bet at least one of them will be going to Lithuania. Why did you waste your brains, shadow, why?

Slow Show wrote: »

The boiling point of water is much higher than that of ammonia, despite the fact that each ammonia molecule could form one more hydrogen bond than a water molecule could...because of the greater electronegativity of oxygen compared with nitrogen, thus the hydrogen bonds in water are stronger than those in ammonia.

The boiling point of water is also higher than the boiling point of hydrogen fluoride, but this time the greater number of possible hydrogen bonds for each water molecule is a more significant factor than the stronger hydrogen bonds in hydrogen fluoride brought about by fluorine's greater electronegativity.

OK, so I could learn this off and regurgitate it if I ever need to but I dislike that, so, I'm asking any Chemistry geniuses (or anyone with a passing knowledge, seeing as this is probably very simple)...why?? Why does the number of possible bonds work for the hydrogen fluoride example, but not for ammonia? The electronegativity difference between oxygen and nitrogen and oxygen and fluorine is almost the same, so that explains nothing, I think...

I haaaaaaate learning things off without having a clue what they mean, and I like when everything is all well-explained and clear in my mind, otherwise I just won't remember it. So errr yeah, anyone care to shed some light on this? Although I think I managed to confuse myself more by typing that out...

Haha, electronegativity. Much love for it. Not sure, *wrong*

Indiego · 13-12-2011 9:18pm

shadowninty wrote: »

I know three guys who got into the older one, and one for the younger one. Bet at least one of them will be going to Lithuania. Why did you waste your brains, shadow, why?

Im young enough for the younger one, but I still got picked for the older one -_- Fml :L Im at a disadvantage XD
Would be nice to go to Lithuania, but who am I kidding, not gonna happen :rolleyes:

The Geniuses' Thread

Comments