Exactly what has your rambling dissertation on voting got to do with Protel, Mr Lomax? As self-proclaimed and self-appointed chairman of the Protel User's Group, I would think you'd have a little more respect for the purpose of this group than to use it once again for your droll, pedantic dissertations.
>-----Original Message----- >From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Abd ul-Rahman Lomax >Sent: Sunday, December 05, 2004 1:26 PM >To: Protel EDA Discussion List >Subject: Re: [PEDA] Cannot locate server initialization file:, >Answer2053 > >At 04:15 PM 12/3/2004, Bagotronix Tech Support wrote: >>BTW, this "incrementing as an unsigned integer, but treating as a >>signed integer" was the cause of some electronic voting machines >>counting up to >>32767 votes, and the next vote cast set the count back to -32768. >>Since there was no paper ballot as a backup, there was no way >to recount. >>Wonderful, eh? > >It seems to have worked for someone.... > >It would not be necessary to recount until about 65K votes had >been accumulated, since all that would be needed would be >reinterpreting the output. In fact, presumably it would be >quite simple to distinguish between >1 vote and 65537, so quite a lot of votes would have to be >accumulated before it was an unrecoverable situation. > >I would not think that the problem was with individual voting >machines but with a system used to accumulate results from >voting machines, since a single voting machine would not >ordinarily have anywhere near so many votes cast on it. And >presumably the individual machine results were preserved. >If not, truly an insane system, where any breakdown anywhere >trashes the results. No-paper-trail voting is totally insane, >and, in fact, high-tech voting not involving simple paper >ballots is likewise crazy, unless you want to be able to >manipulate the totals without making it easy to detect; >(Insane, or crazy like a fox?) > >I just look this up and, yes, the problem was with a >tabulator, not with voting machines, per se. > >What is so hard about running a marked ballot through a cheap >scanner feeding a simple computer (i.e., the kind that are >being tossed every day) in order to count them, keeping the >paper ballots if the results are challenged? > >Well, let me think.... (1) it would not create new business >for the cronies of those in power. (2) it would not make it >easier to manipulate the results. (3) newer, higher tech, is >better, isn't it? > >My town (population approx 1000) still uses paper ballots >which are then fed into a device which is essential a box with >a hand crank so that you can only put ballots in, you can't >take them out without unlocking the back of the box. I think >the device is well over a hundred years old. Votes are then >tallied by hand and reported by the town clerk. Yes, I've seen >ballot-counting problems in the town, but that is not a >function of the technology but of carelessness on the part of >town officials. The solution is not thousands of dollars for >equipment but a little thought put into how ballots are counted. > >www.beyondpolitics.org > > > > > >____________________________________________________________ >You are subscribed to the PEDA discussion forum > >To Post messages: >mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > >Unsubscribe and Other Options: >http://techservinc.com/mailman/listinfo/peda_techservinc.com > >Browse or Search Old Archives (2001-2004): >http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] > >Browse or Search Current Archives (2004-Current): >http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] > > ____________________________________________________________ You are subscribed to the PEDA discussion forum To Post messages: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe and Other Options: http://techservinc.com/mailman/listinfo/peda_techservinc.com Browse or Search Old Archives (2001-2004): http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] Browse or Search Current Archives (2004-Current): http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]
