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I've used wxWidgets before, and it's ok, but awkward. It's based on MFC, which is archaic and difficult.

It's not really based on MFC - it's a clean source base - but its design is definitely ... MFCish ... mostly due to the use of macro-driven message dispatch maps.

I am interested though, what was your own language like

A concise description would be "BASIC with classes".

There used to be a project called Rapid-Q which was basically that - it was a bytecode interpreter written in Delphi that, effectively, exposed large parts of VCL to its interpreted code. It also attached the bytecode to the interpreter binary, so you ended up with fairly small (~300kb) programs, and it was pretty slick for writing small one-off utility programs, prototyping etc. But then its author got hired to work on RealBASIC, and his project was bought out (it was never FOSS). A few fans set off to write their own replacements, mine being one of them. Ah, those were the days :)

It's kinda scary, but my original website for that thing is still around. I've lost the password to it long ago, and all emails etc there are long gone, as well. Even more scary is that someone else picked up the code (compiler was under GPL, libs under BSDL), and there is still a project on Sourceforge with some activity - ten years after.

Well, it sure did teach me a lot about writing parsers.

It's a joke. ^_^ Then again, after the whole Amish Paradaise, Gangsta Paradise, Pastime Paradise debacle, it's not that unreasonable. Heck, I almost modded you informative without doing the fact checking...

Or even better, with a new Lucy Liu!

Big deal. Any old holophone can play movies, it's just a matter of how smart the operator is.

The facts are: US law does not universally apply, and Copyright is not some sort of divine right. If you will look around a bit you will see some of the countries with the least restrictive copyright laws have very outstanding artistic histories.

Once again you lot confuse commerce with art. Artists have traditionally sought benefactors and relied on individual sales and performance contracts to generate income. The people who benefit from US copyright law.. blah blah blah blah... we've heard it before

So I'll say it again: look around. Russia has a very loose copyright system and yet they are far from being devoid of artists - nor of plastic pop has-beens. And, in fact, some of the brightest artistic moments from that part of the world came when artists were most persecuted - nor have their very liberal policies cost them their share of post-modern innovation.

I'm not saying we should abuse artists (well, except mimes) but the simple fact is these russian (and Ukrainian - another FSU state that is slated to join the EU) websites are simply exploiting the weakness of the oppression existent in our own economy - no different than when we exploit the labors of those kids who work for a buck a day rolling beedies, assembling hundred dollar sneakers, or putting overpriced plastic dolls in boxes.

So... how does it feel to be exploited by the foibles of your own beliefs?

Of course this just drives the networks to the binary.pgp groups, the zip groups, etc - but that sure cuts a hole in circulation. You go from "free for all" to "free for me and you" - essentially killing the entire concept of usenet.

Frankly, I don't think people who post top40 type stuff (the type of music most likely to be policed by this software) are helping "the cause." All they're doing is helping hype the people who have been running the show the last century - if those people want their stuff off the channels, I say more power to'em and I hope this lets them finally shoot off that last leg they have left standing. Let's see'em try to serve a takedown notice when I post Shiva in Exile or Brad Sucks... or even Linda.

This is probably the US part of the big raid in Europe where some Fairlight sites went down.. rumors have said that sites in both .nl och .us got busted.

Some pictures from Utwente Campus:

http://undying.by.ru/flt.JPG
http://mjrider.student.utwente.nl/gallery/politie
http://www.swecheck.net/bust/index1.html

(Courtesy of some guy.)

"In the year 199X, a secret command, Saber Tiger, is engaged in a savage war with the Demon's Batallion. The Saber Tiger's youngest leader, "Bang", played a very large role in the fight to the admiration of his fellow commanders. After the completion of one campaign, Bang and his girlfriend, Mary, are enjoying a longawaited vacation at the beach. Suddenly, they recieve an urgent communication from head quarters. It reads 'EMERGENCY CODE NO. 2568623. The inventor of the Doomsday Bomb, Professor Plum, is being held by the enemy, atop Demon's Head Mountain, and it appears the the world is doomed unless Earth surrenders. If the bomb explodes, the Earth will be a dead planet. A mass attack on Demon Head is impossible for the enemy vows to detonate the bomb on sight. Our colleague, Joe, has failed to return from a reconnaisance mission. Bang, only you can rescue Professor plum and save the planet. Now, you've got to get to Demon's Head Mountain at once!'

In the ruins of Demon Head, there dwells a fearsome demon that has terrified generations of people. Bang, and Bang alone, must set out on a daredevil mission to these unknown lands and seek to rescue Plum and deactivate the Doomsday Bomb.

As Bang sets off on his perilous journey to destroy the Demon's Batallion, Mary must remain behind deeply concerned for his life."

Despite what I just said, the point of the game must be to rescue your girlfriend, or else why would she be on the cover... with the flying guy on the motorcycle and the shard of electric glass? Wait... Isn't the point to rescue the professor? Collect the seven coins from the seven swirly bad guy thingies? Why do you need so much money? What happened to the bomb? It's so confusing!

I don't have a degree in Obscure Japanese Mythological Symbology systems! Why is the mushroom with black dancers protecting the talisman of the sun? What did I do to offend the teeth with blue hair? Who the heck are these guys anyway? What's that thing doing? NGYAAAAA!

Funny that you would mention the 24 Hours series of books.

Sams Teach Yourself GIMP in 24 Hours

Or online here.

I'm not entirely sure about the legal status of that second link when you're inside the US. If it's illegal for you to view it, then don't go there. It was also distributed in PDF form with Mandrake Linux for a while.

first, get a copy of the xp pro cd. Dont worry if you dont have a cd key.

second, download
this
and run it on a fairly fast computer. Set it for windows xp corporate, find key, and the number of searches to 100. Let it run for an hour or two, and it should find you at least one working cd key. The cd key produced disables the bullshit activation. I've personally have tested this and it works wonders.

For the whiners who will scream piracy.....this has ABSOLUTELY legitimate uses for people who legally own win xp and dont want to have deal with M$ bullshit activation. Its really no different then bypassing css on a dvd you own.

And thus you point out a great problem with the provisions of law - the need for interpretation.
...
If a law gets passed and then gets clarification in the court system no one goes back and re-writes the law for easier reading.

Justice is lost
Justice is raped
Justice is gone
Pulling your strings
Justice is done
Seeking no truth
Winning is all
Find it so grim, so true, so real

Some bands may choose to cater to that core audience and "stay small" - but I doubt many would turn down the chance at a major tour if one of their "indie releases" suddenly turned into a popular download.

I personally have zero use for iTunes - I don't have a Mac and even if i did I'm not gonna pay a dollar a goddamn track for RIAA label downloads locked into a DRM'd format. But if Apple can sign a bunch of bands and release them in a more consumer friendly format (ie >256kbps MP3) then I'd be all over that. What would really rock is if they'd sign some of the international artists and DJs I've grown attached to but who get little to no respect in the US - like Garmarna, Linda, NOME, Oceania, Juno Reactor, Natacha Atlas, Digiweed, etc. If I could pay a buck a track to download HQ tracks from artists I like and I knew with some certainty the artists were getting a significant benefit from my purchase, my opinion of iTunes would change dramatically - and likely would for many, many others as well.

Where do I sign up?

Joe gearhead posts "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" to a newsgroup. I download "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" FROM that newsgroup. Where have I made anything at all publicly available?

More importantly, how have I even infringed copyright? I already purchased "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" - thrice, in fact: on 8 track, LP, and CD.

the RIAA is in deep shit because those old farts like me, who have bought the same goddamn music on three or four formats, no longer have to do it. My MFSL print of Dreamboat Annie is but a wall decoration now, and the CD version sounds like shit; might as well enjoy the MP3 and call it a day. And I really don't need "pristine CD quality" to enjoy the Sex Pistols and the Dead Kennedys.

But I'll burn in hell before I buy a fifth copy of "Sgt. Pepper's."

Great music doesn't have to come from the US, or even an RIAA member.

And it damn sure doesn't have to cost ten grand a track to produce quality music. I doubt Jonatha spent that much to produce the DVD!

Zen Fascists will control you
100% natural
You will jog for the master race
And always wear the happy face
Close your eyes, can't happen here
Big Bro on white horse is near
The hippies won't come back you say
Mellow out or you will pay...

California Uber Alles
Uber Alles California...

free() itself is the last thing. It scans the free list, starting at freep, looking for the place to insert the free block. This is either between two existing blocks or at the end of the list. In any case, if the block being freed is adjacent to either neighbor, the adjacent blocks are combined. The only troubles are keeping the pointers pointing to the right things and the sizes correct.

NOTE for MSVC users: As in any C application, the standard C calls malloc() and free() may be used to manage memory. If you are using the Microsoft Visual C++ compiler, it is VERY IMPORTANT to note a scarcely documented fact of the Win32 API, in that free() does not actually free the memory that is being accessed (as it does in most standard C compilers). MSVC will free the pointer to the memory but will not actually release the physical memory. To release the physical memory a call to the Windows extension function _heapmin() must be made. This function should be documented in Win32 API documentation but it may be noted that it is difficult to find a reference to it otherwise. If the application uses free() and malloc() but not _heapmin() then virtual memory issues will arise during extended use of the application.

Note [New feature hides ugly bug]In Visual C++ Version 4.0, the underlying heap structure was moved to the C run-time libraries to support the new debugging features. As a result, the only Win32 platform that is supported by _heapmin is Windows NT. The function returns -1 and sets errno to ENOSYS, when it is called by any other Win32 platform. [But what happens if you run an old VC < 4.0 compiled binary? Probably the old function gets called]

Man, I remember putting a SB16 into my 486 dx2 just to play doom.

Am I the only one that thinks the SB16 wasn't such a bad card? I don't mean the late-model single-chip crap ones, I mean the old first generation big ass ISA cards with the Creative/Panasonic (or SCSI if you were lucky) interface on them! I mean they have pretty decent audio quality, an actual 4 watt amplifier so you could use a cheap $10 pair of unamplifed speakers, or plug in your headphones and blast your brains around in your head. The bass, treble and volume settings were not controlled by a DSP mixer, so you had to actually exceed the onboard amplifier to cause distortion. The card had jumpers... None of this bullshit plug and play crap... You plugged it in and it fscking kept its IRQ, DMA and hex address settings. Perfect compatibility with old DOS games, Windows 3.1, OS/2, Linux, and hell even WinXP still!

I mean, seriously... Modern sound cards suck... All the outputs are line-level so if you plug in your headphones you can't hear shit, there's either NO DOS compatibility or drivers that don't work, crash your game, or use almost all of your conventional memory. The volume and tone levels are all digitally controlled inside the DSP... If you max out your EQ or volume and play a MP3 that's been normalized to 99% of the available dynamic range, the stupid DSP will do dynamic range compression on the output. And let's not forget hardware-based wave mixing. The SB16 didn't support it, so if you were listening to a MP3, there'd be no annoying sounds playing over it.

The only thing that sucks about the SB16 is lack of 48KHz playback support... But you know what? I am going to find a way to write my own realtime downsampling driver, I can't hear the difference between 48KHz and 44.1KHz anyway.

It's a shame the fastest motherboard I have that still has ISA is an Asus P2-99. But you know what? With a BIOS update and a slot 1 Tualatin adapter, I can upgrade it to 1.4GHz and still keep using my SB16. Muahahahahahahahah! SB16 forever!