We've all been impressed with the amount of knowledge that's been expressed on these boards. Knowledge on a huge array of topics by a huge array of people. And sometimes I've thought of a question for which I've always wondered the answer....

So, ask anything you want here. I, sure as sh*t, won't have the answer.... but someone will! I'll go first to see if I can get the ball rolling...

What's the point with "bail"? I don't understand.

A crime is committed, a person is arrested, but...what? We're willing to let them go free for awhile if they pony up some cash? Whether that bail is set high or low, isn't it still going to be the rich guy who gets out of jail for awhile and the poor guy who is stuck there?

Presumed innocent until proved otherwise (a difficult premise to swallow when the culprit is caught in flagrante)

Yep, the more money one has, the more likely one will be able to make bail.

Good morning, Marcus! I hope you're back in bed after being up so early. I'm about to breakfast down and crawl back in myself.

Well, I understand "presumed innocent", but then why not let EVERY non-threatening person back out until trial as a matter of policy. How come it seems arbitrary and financially based?

Back to bed? No way!

I've been getting up at 5AM and walking (almost) every morning! (You're not likely to see too many posts from me after 10PM, though!)

It's just that there has to be motivation to come back for trial. Money is the closest thing to a one-size-fits-all motivator. Bail amounts vary based on the circumstances, and it's not always an option, depending on the risk of flight. At least, according to Law & Order.

OK, I've got one. If a solid dissolves in a liquid, does the volume of the liquid change? My canonical example is sugar cubes in coffee. If the sugar cubes are in the mug, then the coffee is poured over them, does the total volume of stuff in the mug change as the cubes dissolve?

Post deleted by me so as to not take away from Ken's question.

Ken, I'd say as the sugar cube becomes saturated with coffee, the total volume in the cup decreases, since there are pockets of air in the sugar cube being displaced by the coffee. Once the point of saturation is reached, My guess is the volume decrease yet again when the sugar dissolves out of it's solid form into a liquid solution. I'm willing to bet the coffee-water-sugar solution can pack more molecules in a tighter space than the crystallized sugar cube.

I have no proof of this.

That was pretty much what I was thinking, but I'm usually thinking it when I'm half asleep. Much as I am now.

If you are travelling the speed of light, then turn on your headlights, what happens?

The headlights turn on like normal. The speed of light is constant relative to the observer.

I prefer my coffee black.

Mass (or volume in Ken’s example) is directly proportional to density and state of matter (solid, liquid, vapor). The liquid will be denser than the sugar cube. This assumes temperature remains constant.


My question:

What the hell was it? The chicken or the egg?

I'm going with Aristotle on that one to answer/not answer the question. He concluded, after much thought, that they must BOTH have existed from the start. I know, I know...but...

On a different note, I'm wondering why the gov't here is banning all these pesticides/herbicides for homeowners but continues to allow farmers and golf courses to apply massive amounts of them. Either these chemicals are bad for the environment or they're not, what does it matter who applies them? I do have some sympathy for the farmers, however, because they are producing crops, but there exists a double standard here. I can't imagine how much of these chemicals the thousands of golf courses are putting into the water table.

I've always (since elementary school) seen this as question of evolution vs. creationism.

If you side with evolution, then the egg came first. The two creatures which produced and fertilized the egg were not quite chickens yet, but one evolutionary step before. Although the egg they made contained a chicken.

If you side with creationism, then it was the chicken, as all the animals created were in their fully formed state, not as zygotes.

Yes, I was pondering such ideas before I was 10.

How about some questions which can actually be answered instead of just thought experiments. Although the sugar in coffee one was pretty good. Try this: if you mix a half liter of pure alcohol and a half liter of distilled water. What is the volume of the resulting mixture?

I am not sure of the exact volume but it will be less than 1 liter because the molecules of the 2 solutions are not the same.

Does anyone know what my Avatar is?

I have always wondered why there is brail on a drive through ATM

I am guessing that a lot of well educated lawmakers dictated that any sign in a bank be "accessible" to the blind.

I agree that it seems silly, but it's simply so that visually-impaired people can use them. No, of course they don't drive themselves up to one. But they can be driven to one. And the braille allows them to use the ATM just like anyone else.

I've seen it many times.

A) I once worked in a bank where we could view the outside ATM machine.

and

B) my town is home to the Illinois School for the Visually Impared, so there is a community of VI people that live here.

so, A+B=C; where C= seeing a VI person using the braille on an ATM machine.

Since pure alcohol evaporates rather quickly, less than 1 liter, for sure.

It's because they use the same parts for ATMs in drive-through and walk-up situations. Economies of scale, see?

It is the depiction of the electron shells of Argon.

Says, Neon.

Alcohol doesn't evaporate that quickly. Though, pure alcohol doesn't stay pure very long. It will eventually pull in about 5% water from the air. Ether is fun though. If you pour it on a surface, you can actually see it evaporate in front of your eyes.

But as was pointed out, it will be less than 1 liter. The molecules of the two compounds tend to fit inside each other. Another neat trick with the 50/50 alcohol/water mixture is to soak a paper napkin in it, and set it on fire. The water will keep even that thin paper below its kindling point.

Peter raises an excellent point.

For the purposes of this thread, I am just as happy to have charismatic conjecture as truth.

btw, God could have simply created the egg.

While I continue to marvel at Mark's ingenuity and the knowledge and camaraderie here, it seems to me that it's difficult to come up with questions that don't fall into one of two categories:

1. Here, let me Google that for you...
2. "Why..." (thus inciting the opinionated, divisive beasts of politics, religion and philosophy).

I think it is wonderful that the many scientists here allow people like me to learn from them.

LOL! You guys are a gas!!!

That's noble gas, to you. Otherwise you could call us nothing more than methane.

I've been called Old Methane...in a way.....

I had that happen once. I always zip up slowly now...

The golfcourse part is easy. Politicos don't like to golf on weeds.

Excellent, Excellent. Picked the nickname up in college where we used to party til we were pretty much "inert" on the couch watching TV.

Actually here in the lower 48, what chemicals the farmer's apply to their crops is regulated to the point that we import our fruits and vegetables from South American countries that still apply pesticides which have been banned from our country years and years ago, helps keep the cost to the consumer down.

I'm _assuming_ that it's believed that the chemicals used on golf courses will be filtered before they reach aquifers, while the same chemicals used on produce will obviously be ingested much more directly.

But that's just a guess.

Can't say about the golf courses or Canada's regs regarding farm use chemicals but here the regulation is probably a lot more stringent than most folks realize, I imagine Canada's laws are at least equally as stringent.

Okay, here's my question. And, I'm being serious, believe it or not. This came up at work today.

Why don't school buses have seat belts?

You guys ask a lot of questions.

Mark, since there's a legal presumption of innocence, anticipatory punishment(love it!)isn't permissible, so the guilty pricks are generally entitled to have bail set(state laws may deny it in capital cases or where it's shown that there's a danger to the public)to help ensure that he'll appear for trial(with the encouragement of his bail bondsman, if necessary).

Ken, where an insoluble substance, e.g., sand, is added to water, the volume of the sand plus the volume of water equals the volume of the mixture. Where a soluble substance is added to water the total volume of the resulting solution is typically but not always greater than the volume of the water alone, but less than the sum of the volume of the water plus the added substance. This is because water molecules have spaces between them and the ions of the dissolved substance can react with the water molecules to "squeeze" them closer together. If this effect is less than the volume of the added substance, the volume of the solution is increased above the pure water, but less than would result from simple addition. Some substances, e.g., sodium hydroxide, actually have such a strong "squeezing" effect that adding them to water actually results in a solution having a lower volume than that of the water alone. The sugar in your cup(after any air spaces are gone)results in a total volume increase, but a teensy-weensy bit less than just adding the liquid and sugar volumes.

Chris, when I was in college getting my chemistry degree I worked part-time as a bartender and learned that when guys came in and asked for 100ml of 50/50 pure alcohol and water(real popular)if I just mixed 50ml of each I'd give them just a 96ml drink and they'd yell that they'd been ripped off. So, the answer to your question is 960ml. Just kidding about the bartender bit, of course, but equal volumes of alcohol and water do add to about a 1.92 volume factor.

Argon(18), yeah you're a gas and your electron shells are gorgeous.

Now, my question: how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?

That depends. What kind of music are they dancing to?

Brahms Hungarian Dance No.5.

The answer to the angels question is none. Pins do not exist. Everyone knows that.

Peter, in line with preceding questions, I was hoping for a serious scientific or perhaps legal discussion of this issue.

If you can be disgruntled can you be gruntled?

I assume it's because they're so tough that it would take a lot for the seat belts to have any value. Notice how the Joker backed up directly into the bank in the beginning of The Dark Knight? Movies wouldn't lie to us.

Of course, it's not just school buses. Other buses deserve recognition, too.

Apparently, tests have proved inconclusive as to whether seatbelts on buses would help in the event of most accidents or not. The argument being, lap belts can actually cause more damage to the lower back and head without also having the shoulder restraint as well(not practical?). Buses are designed, for the most part, to locate the passengers ABOVE the likely area of impact(they say), however, there's always certain situations where these designs and arguments don't apply.

One of my old health teachers said a peanut butter and banana sandwich was better than sex.

Anyone agree?

Chunky or smooth?

Sex or peanut butter?

Or??? What's wrong with and?

Not I. Your old health teacher either needed a better love life or was trying very hard to convince you and your fellow classmates that premarital sex wasn't any fun.


Here's my question:

I've always wondered how flight plans work. With my only "piloting experience" coming from Microsoft Flight Simulator, I've always been curious as to what the process of "filing a flight plan" involves. I bet we have pilots around here. Do you hand someone a note? Call a phone number? Mail a letter?

You hear it when plane crashes, or disappears - always about checking the flight plan. If you're a pilot, and your intent is to just go up and fly around your 'neightborhood' to do some sight-seeing, what do you file? What does it say? Who gets it? And where do they go?

I've flown with my aunt who is a pilot several times. When we've gone we never had to say anything about where we are going...just need permission to takeoff and land.

Looks like flight plans are optional for civilians, and a damn good idea if you're not going to land at the same airport you're taking off from.

http://www.wikihow.com/File-an-FAA-Flight-Plan

I've always wondered, at least since joining this forum, what does JohnK look like?

Is this him?

That's JohnS.

I think JohnK looks like GeorgeW:

We will likely never know. He's one of those people who think people still have a right to privacy.

*Pfff* As if...

I don't know about better, but it's certainly more within my grasp.

And another thing.
How come I can't get no Tang round here ??????

OK, here's one:

JohnK always touts listening to two-channel music in multi-channel surround as your receiver will extract all the natural ambiance cues and direct them to the appropriate place in the (now surrounding) soundfield. I can understand this with orchestral and classical selections, which (almost solely) enjoys.

But what about Rock and pop recordings? There IS no natural ambiance as the instruments are close miked, recorded on different tracks (to be adjusted by panning after) or recorded on separate days.

The receiver might extract info that it sends to the surrounds, but is there really anything natural or correct about it in terms of simulating a live performance?

No. Next question.


Edit: but seriously...

If the recording engineer mixing the separate tracks has added any reverb or spatialization effects to the mix, then the receiver's software will detect it and move those spatial cues to the appropriate channels. As for trying to recreate a live performance, that's not really the ultimate goal of DP LIIx.

Resurrecting an old thread!

A John Mayer track just came up on Pandora.

Every time I think of John Mayer, I think about how so many people dislike him for some reason.

I must have missed the memo. Does he abuse animals or something?

He sleeps around and says stupid stuff

Sorry Mark, I don't hate him but I find most of his music monotonous. I respect him highly as a musician but something about his voice makes my brain want to shut down.

Plus if Tom doesn't like him, I gotta go with the cool kids.

Ya gotta be able to drive with your top down to do that.

[Whimpers quietly and shakes fist at Fred.] I miss my Jeep....

Speaking of Jeeps, don't you think that Whitney Houston's daughter looks like a Jeep (or, rather, THE Jeep)?

OK, time to drag this thread out into the sunlight again.

Two questions :

1. In hotel bars (and probably other bars too) the happy hour offerings frequently include "you call it's". I gather the idea of a "you call it" is that it is sort of the bartending equivalent of '*' but there seems to be disagreement about whether it only covers "house" or "well" liquor or whether the "call" refers to "call" drinks where you pick the brand.

2. Revolvers have a small but non-zero gap between cylinder and barrel. It seems to me that given the pressure of the gases as the back of the bullet clears the gap any self-respecting gas would go out the gap rather than continuing to accelerate the bullet down the barrel, but longer revolver barrels do seem to produce higher velocities than short ones even so.

It seems unlikely (but not impossible) that the cartridge brass stretches just enough to seal the gap temporarily, but that wouldn't cover situations where a shorter cartridge is being fired, eg .38 special ammo in a .357 mag revolver.

Some pressure is lost through the cylinder gap (which runs around 5 thou), which is why you should never index a finger down the cylinder. A .500 S&W will cut through a finger with the gas pressure alone. The Mythbusters proved that one.

Revolver brass never stretches far enough to close that gap, if it did, it would run into the forcing cone. (plus, if brass stretched that far, you'd get head separation)

So, you do lose some pressure through the cylinder gap, but unless it's out of spec, it's not the issue you'd think. One guy at the range was shooting a Smith Model 19 with a 30-thou gap beside me one day - the pressure wave and lead spalling spitting out the sides of that gun made me wonder if it would be safer to just stand in front of it. I took him off the line until he had the barrel set back and the forcing cone recut.

Bren R.

As a former bartender, no matter in what state I worked, the well liquors are the ones right in front of your sinks. In good restaurants and bars, there are no Mr. Boston's, Gilbey's, etc. In those establishments, well liquors may include the likes of Absolut and Tanqueray. "Call" liquors could be anything the customer names and they are usually on shelves behind the bartender so you can see the brands and know what's on offer.

Your questions were about guns and booze. Are you sure you don't live in Texas?

BTW, Happy Hour has been illegal in Massachusetts since the mid 80's.

No one in Massachusetts has been happy since then.

No, there were brief surges in happiness in October 2004 and October 2007, followed by a quick return to Neurosis Baseballus.

Funny, I always picture him in my mind as JohnH:



John Hodgman, that is. Bestselling author, The Daily Show's "Resident Expert", minor television celebrity, and deranged millionaire.

Last year, JohnH published That Is All, the last book in a trilogy of Complete World Knowledge. Like its predecessors, The Areas of My Expertise and More Information Than You Require, That Is All compiles incredibly handy made-up facts into brief articles, overlong lists, and beguiling narratives on new and familiar themes. It picks up exactly where More Information left off - specifically, at page 596 - and finally completes COMPLETE WORLD KNOWLEDGE, just in time for the return of Quetzalcoatl and the end of human history in 2012.

[quote=medic8r Quetzalcoatl [/quote]

Did you have to look that up for spelling, or can you channel ancient Meso-American deities?

Hey, he MEMORIZED all the dialog from Koyaanisqatsi.

I loved that film---when it was new. Never really had much use for John Cage. Sometimes, I've seen it spelt with a 'Q.'

Did YOU have to look it up so you didn't 'mispell' it?

Did you misspell misspell as mispell on purpose?

No, I just had that one in my brain. Stupid brain - always hanging on to worthless crap.

I "set it off" so no one would rag at me about it, Mr. World Gone Crazy.

Edit: But "spelt" was OK witch you's?

We had 3 slabs of St. Louis style ribs with the rib tips today. The tips were smoked for 3 hours then put in sauce in the slow cooker. The ribs were on the smoker a bit over 5 hours.

OMG, I have to go eat now. BRAVO Rick

That is making me hungry, Rick.

That really looks delicious, but you didn't show us the potato salad, and other fixings!

Gary, that was on purpose....(or Rick posted in the wrong thread!).

I've Always Wondered...... what happened to the potato salad?

I've Always Wondered.......why I keep missing out on the invite to Wid's place for dinner?



Ribs and tips look great Wid!

Mark, I can't wait any longer, I'm getting hungry, I'm off to the kitchen to make a baloney sandwich. Come to think of it though, I don't even like baloney.

Why do red colors clash but blue ones don't?

Red can go with blue
but only if your French
or a mime
or, ACK the HORRROR, a French mime.

Mime Hunt was my favorite screensaver.

Another thread resurrection:

There's been a flap over stores opening on Thanksgiving for their Black Friday sales.

I've always wondered:
Why doesn't some store just start their "Black Friday" sale on the weekend before?

They would avoid competing with everyone else (You can't be at Sears AND Home Depot AND Best Buy at 5am on Friday morning) and get "the jump" on the other stores.

Not to mention, they could actually be closed on Thanksgiving day and let their employees have the day off.

I know that Black Friday is the traditional start to Christmas shopping, but it's not like it's such a classic tradition that it can't be changed.

What's so special about great sales having to be in that 12 hour (then 24 hour and now 36 hour) time period?

Some places are taking you up on that idea, starting early this year. From Amazon.com:
----
Black Friday 2012 Deals Are Here
You shouldn't have to stand in a long line to get a great deal. We've been searching for the best Black Friday deals everywhere--including Black Friday deals other stores are planning--so we can bring them to you even earlier.
----

Newegg has been doing a Black November sale:
http://promotions.newegg.com/black-november/2012/index.html

Now, they're doing even better deals for a 72-hour pre-Friday sale.

Yes to both Amazon and Newegg; I'm talking B&M chains that "open" for Black Friday sales.

Target - the brick and mortar kind - had that Avengers Bluray for $15 as part of an early Black Friday promo, but it wasn't in 3-D, so it would have disappointed Sean and Cat.

But animated ScarJo wants you to buy it anyway.

Brick...and...mortar...? I can buy both of those things from Amazon.

I actually looked up who invented waffles because I was pretty sure -- but not 100% sure -- it wasn't Gandhi.

Probably not Aunt Jemima either. Too busy autographing boxes of pancake mix.

I've never really wondered who Norah Jones' father was, but it may supprise people who don't know...or not...or maybe a little.

Are they still estranged?

She sometimes plays in a trio called Puss n' Boots with Sasha Dobson and former GPN bassist Catherine Popper. I'm curious. Thanks for reminding me to check that out.

I think she's quite private about her and her father's relationship, her whole family actually.

A solid question.
Apparently Manitoba has Fanta pop though. I'm more of a Pop Shoppe fan myself.
So, whatever happened to them?

I still see Fanta around here every so often. I like Stewart's Orange and Cream for a treat.

Where does Red Dye #4 come from and where does it leave the body cuz i never see the red come back out...

Eat some beets!

They are still around - trying to make a comeback even - although I really don't get their website

It seems that they wound up the company in 1983 and a new guy started things up again in 2002. Details here.

To re-hijack the thread to it's original purpose:

I've always wondered if you shoot a mime, do you have to use a silencer?

No need. Just use the one built in to the mime.

You know, I've always wondered how many households that have an ant farm, also have a pet aardvark? And what the outcome of that is?

You know, I've always wondered how many households that have an ant farm, also have a pet aardvark? And what the outcome of that is?

I wonder why people post things twice?

If you lay your screen on its side and cross your eyes, you'll see only one.

That's weird, because I didn't post it twice. Last time I looked at it, there was only 1.

Must be evil web gremlins.

Murph's avatar demonstrates the other way to accomplish this.

Wacky but cool.
Can't say i've seen any around Manitoba yet.
I would buy it though.

Feeling a bit Tippy.......

More and more, restaurants are offering meals to-go. More than fast food, some of these dinners are pretty elaborate, and sometimes it's even brought out to your car when you park in a certain designated area.

So, what do you tip these people? They are certainly taking time to assemble and package your meal, yet they aren't "serving" you in multiple courses, taking away your plates, refilling drinks, etc.

I never use the drive-up...I always walk in. I routinely tip 25% at sit-down restaurants, but that just seems like an awful lot for someone who is handing you a bag.

I work with a younger guy that has worked several years as a waiter. Here's the rules according to him. At a sit down meal, it's 15 to 20 percent. 10% tells waiter it was poor service. No tips are remembered, and your meal might get spit on your next visit.

No tip for a takeout meal, unless it's processed in the bar where a 10% tip to bartender is expected.

Waiters have to pay the restraint back about 3% per table, even if no tip was left. I forgot the reason. Goes towards other workers salaries, I think.

Applebee's have those where you park at a certain spot for to go meals. I always go inside instead so I don' have to tip. I assume you''d tip for those spots, since some is assigned to serve them.

I've started to tip for to-go orders, but it's not often that it comes up. Basically, there's one place I like to go that has a schedule that conflicts with my own. On occasion, I'm able to leave work early and catch them at the end of their hours of operation, when they're no longer seating patrons, and the only option is take-out. Either that or I've clocked out for an extended dinner break, and I get that to-go as well, since I'm usually taking food back for a coworker. In any case, they're very thoughtful in how they prepare the food for transportation, and to me, that's just as valuable as refilling my water and checking up on me.

This is a bit indelicate, but an aggravating battle prompts the question.

Why are plunger heads ROUND while the toilet opening they are intended to seal so you can use the power of compressed air is OVAL?

Do plunger designers not LOOK at the toilet opening?

(Sorry - that's a double "I've Always Wondered...").

Burrito Sunday today?

Do ISPs sprinkle fairy dust on your connection to make it go faster when you upgrade your service?

After talking to two techs from my provider, that's the best explanation I can come up with. They sure couldn't answer the question (other than saying they don't use throttling to manage download speed).

Even more confusing, when I signed up with this new provider, I thought I was on a 6 Mbps 300 gb/month service, but was getting up to 14 Mbps most of the time. According to the techs, only 3 Mbps was available when I signed up, so that's what my account was set up as.

Maybe the Techs were snorting fairy dust...

Burrito? Are you kidding? With the size of Ray's appetite, you bring a burro or you go home.

I believe I could answer some of your technical questions here. However, I'm thinking they were not actually serious questions. Can't answer the varied signup speed question though. I'll leave that between you and your ISP.

To hell with that.

Where can I get a couple of pounds of fairy dust?

I asked. They wouldn't tell me.

Hey Murph. Even though I like the fairy dust explanation, I really am curious to know how you guys manage this download speed stuff.

I want Ray's question answered.

More fiber is ONE answer.

No problem Fred. I'll have to summarize a bit though as there are lots of technologies that all work slightly different.

Essentially though, any individual bandwidth setting is all done at an aggregation device somewhere within your ISP. The actual media into your home, be it fiber, DSL, cable, wireless, has a hard top cap that is it's maximum. However anything they want to set below the maximum is usually done at the aggregation device. ISPs can do pretty much anything they want at this point, depending on the technology used.

Basics oversimplified

Access Speed.
This is one term often applied to the technical, maximum speed of a solution that enters your house or business.

For instance, a fiber connection to your home might use gear that tops out at, for example, 10 Mb/sec, 100 Mb/sec or 1 Gb/sec. The speed you get can be set at any number lower than the max but an upgrade beyond this maximum throughput normally requires a change in equipment and/or it's settings.

Available Rate (there are many terms for this depending on tech)
This is the speed you care about. The speed limit that your ISP has placed on you depending on the service you purchased. It is normally controlled at the aggregation device where your home's connection reaches the ISP. It's generally the point where your connection goes from being an individual circuit to joining 'the cloud.' This point is called a "Port". The port could be physical (your unique fiber plugs into the AG (Aggergation Device) or it could be logical (many customers are already travelling through the same fiber at this point but your network is still assigned a virtual port).

Your Port can be set to control all sorts of things just for you.
- Max upload speeds
- Max download speeds (up and down are often set differently)
- Max download/upload caps (if you push or pull more traffic, the total quantity of data per month irregardless of the speed, then you may start to pay more)
- Traffic shaping (some ISPs will give priority to certain types of traffic. For instance, regular web traffic may be given more maximum bandwidth than torrent downloads.)
- Blocking traffic (you may recall a certain wireless ISP that refused thier customers the ability to use Facetime unless they paid for a premium service)
- lots of other stuff

Generally, when you purchase a particular service you are paying for a certain package deal that states service levels like download speeds, monthly maximums, etc. Often they have profiles for each service level you can buy and they just apply that profile to your port when you sign up. Buy a better or lesser service and they usually just switch your profile. However technically, they can also tweak individual items if they want/need to.

For instance services like DSL have further limitations like distance and cable quality. House A might be 1 km from the ISP's serving office and is set to sync up at a top speed of 7.5 Mb/sec. House B which is 6km away from the serving equipment and maybe has smaller gauge copper cable to work with, might be synced up at only 1.5 Mb/sec to keep it more stable in those conditions. Ideally, they tell you what your house is capable of getting and you pay appropriately for that service level.

Over-provisioned cable can be adversely effected by the number simoultanious users on a loop of cable (dependent on design.) If they can not control individual maximums.

Fiber is usually your best guarantee of getting your purchased maximum but any service type can be reliable for speeds as long as it is designed and provisioned properly. There are just less limiting factors with fiber.

I can't address your individual situation of course but hopefully the above provides an understanding of how it works behind the scenes. People may correct me for technical details based on thier particular type of service, but please remember I was trying to generalize what happens over a very wide variety of services and tech. vendors. It was not meant to be a white paper.

So that makes it a pink paper?
Because that's my next question.
I've just always wondered.

Thanks Murph, that is pretty much what I thought. I presume that the aggregation device is a switch/router of some sort.

From what I was told about my service and the speeds I get, I suspect that my provider is doing some sort of traffic 'shaping' based on system load, as I seem to get considerably higher bandwidth than I pay for at times.

The issue I was having with inconsistent download speeds was with my cable modem and, in the end, required a reboot. Given that I tell my users to do this several times a day, Its a wonder I didn't think to try this before calling my ISP.

I think I can help you. Email me.

Why does GOD keep fading in and out? Inquiring minds want to know.

Rose colored glasses

Fading in and out of, where?

it can only be in your mind, this fading...

it's in the 60's that Playboy declared officially, in one of its articles, that it was dead.

Look up...

Oh, you mean the mighty Sun God?

nope.

You're on the wrong page.

Ah, which page are you on?

13.

You were expecting 42, weren't you.

Edit: This is almost like dangling a ball of string in front of a cat.

I've heard about that number before.....

I believe it is the answer to something.

Stupid String, can never resist.

[img]insert video of cat throwing up yarn that it ate[/img]

I fixed it for you.

Why?

Because its there?