Domain: com.com
Stories and comments across the archive that link to com.com.
Comments · 7,252
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Re:Not really...
AMD's mid-30% market share corresponds to their maximum output.
AMD only has 15.8% market share. Still not as high as the 21% peak in 2000. -
Re:Why?
The Democrats have the best legislator on the issue, Rick Boucher. But they also have the worst, Howard Berman. There are good Republicans like Lamar Smith and bad ones like Orrin Hatch. Neither party has a stellar record on the issue.
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Re:Why?
The Democrats have the best legislator on the issue, Rick Boucher. But they also have the worst, Howard Berman. There are good Republicans like Lamar Smith and bad ones like Orrin Hatch. Neither party has a stellar record on the issue.
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Re:Why?
The Democrats have the best legislator on the issue, Rick Boucher. But they also have the worst, Howard Berman. There are good Republicans like Lamar Smith and bad ones like Orrin Hatch. Neither party has a stellar record on the issue.
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Re:Why?
The Democrats have the best legislator on the issue, Rick Boucher. But they also have the worst, Howard Berman. There are good Republicans like Lamar Smith and bad ones like Orrin Hatch. Neither party has a stellar record on the issue.
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Climate modeling
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Re:I will say one thing:Novell extends open-source push
Published: May 11, 2004, 12:42 PM PDT
By Stephen Shankland
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
Excerpt:For the second time, Novell has released the source code of a once-proprietary software package that makes it easier to substitute Linux for Microsoft's Windows.
Novell, a new power in the Linux landscape, announced last month that its YAST (Yet Another Setup Tool) installation and configuration tool would become open source. And Tuesday, it said it would make the same change with Evolution Connector, formerly known as Ximian Connector, software that lets the company's Evolution e-mail and calendar program retrieve data from Microsoft Exchange servers.
Evolution Connector previously cost $69 per computer, spokesman Kevan Barney said. It will be available as a free download by May 15, though source code is available now. -
Other formats?
Does anyone know if this thing will work with Linux?
If it did support linux, maybe it also would supports OGG. This would be an appreciated feature. This review says nothing about OGG it's support for OGG. Anyone know if it actually does support it? -
How is this news? It was announced in December '03So how is this news if it was written about in December 2003? Before Tiger or Dashboard was even annnounced.
Mac applets coming soon to Windows
Oh, I get it. The four to six weeks was extended slightly to eleven months, and that counts as news.Published: December 16, 2003, 5:08 PM PST
By Paul Festa
Staff Writer, CNET News.comA Web site that offers desktop applets for the Macintosh desktop is gearing up to provide similar gadgets for Windows.
...Now, Perry and Rose are at work on a version for Windows. That version goes to beta testers Tuesday night and is scheduled to be complete within four to six weeks.
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Re:Dude--Apple stole our idea!
We'll have to fix them. Dude! I know! We'll port the product to Windows!
Konfabulator coming to Windows is old. old news. In fact, that announcement on December 16, 2003 predates the Apple Dashboard announcement on June 28, 2004 by over 6 months. Konfabulator for Windows was even already in beta form at the time of its announcement, so the idea of porting it is definitely older than 6 months before any word from Apple.
It comes down to this: Arlo Rose was porting Konfabulator over to Windows way before Apple even announced Dashboard. The port has very little to do about Apple coming out with a product similar to Konfabulator, it's more about Arlo Rose wanting to tap into the large Windows market.
That's not to say that Arlo Rose is not bitter about the whole thing - he has made a lot of snide comments on the matter - but the fact is that "little desktop applications" have been a part of Mac OS ever since it first came out. Apple has always had Desktop Applications, small applications that take up minimal RAM and do one small thing well, such as a note pad, a calculator, a clock, etc. If anything it is likely that Rose was inspired by Apple, not the other way around. -
Re:slashdotted alreadyKonfabulator takes a Dual G5/2.0 with 1.5G of RAM and makes it run like an Apple IIc.
When there was the Dashboard brouhaha a while back over ideas being 'stolen' from Konfabulator, I got linked to an interesting comparison between the two. It's quite illuminating reading, and should explain some of the performance, um, issues of Konfabulator:Konfabulator is not a lightweight or small-footprint environment -- every Konfabulator widget runs as a separate process, with its own runtime environment in memory. Most Konfabulator widgets use more memory than typical full-blown Mac OS X applications. Not just Konfabulator as a whole -- but each widget. Install it, fire up Process Viewer, and see for yourself.
I really got the impression that one reason Apple passed over it for incorporation into MacOS X Tiger was because of the low-level architecture not being up to scratch. Instead of using the same, single instance of Safari's rendering and Javascript for all widgets, booting up some monolithic monstrosity for each sounds just... Horrid...
Oh, and the Windows port was apparently announced in December last year. :-) -
A slight snagI remembered reading this, and went back to read about Netline, and discovered this little fact in the article...
"Server software maker goes open source" :" However, Netline will keep some of the software proprietary. The open-source version lets computer users tap into its functions with Web browsers, but those wanting to use Microsoft Outlook or Novell Evolution will have to buy a separate module from Netline. "If you want to use Outlook as your preferred client, you need an add-on from our site which is not open-source," Hoberg said."
This article from May '04 on Connector and YAST talks about Novell's strategy with releasing source code with. -
Welcome to September
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Re:I like the indemnification part
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Thank god....
... that I live in Canada where this is still legal.
And you guys though that America was the home of the free. -
Re:what has the world come to
No, this is Slashdot.
Nobody takes away the God-given right of a Slashdotter to share music and movies, not to mention watch movies for free. And anybody who makes money out of anything that has anything to do with the movie or music industry is evil, and it is the right of a Slashdotter to rip them off and distribute the spoils among the poor downtrodden geeks of the Slash-wood forest.
On the other hand, when EFF suggests the same thing, these same people stay quiet and not say a word.
Bloody pirate hypocrites. ARRRRRRRR! x-( -
Re:Excessive uptime on Windows 95
Over a year? Pretty unlikely. Windows 95 crashes after no more than 49.7 days. See this . But a cdrom over dial-up is reasonable; I dowloaded all 7 disks of debian woody that way.
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Not so long ago, the EFF suggested just this.
It wasn't all that long ago that the EFF suggested that the entertainment industry should be suing infringers.
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Re:Law enforcement?I find it hard to believe that our gov't...can't get their shit together enough to start arresting people for the avalanche of fraud online.
They've started: The Federal Trade Commission has filed suit against Sanford Wallace, and U.S. District Court Judge Joseph DiClerico Jr. granted a temporary restraining order - ruling that Wallace and his businesses must refrain from exploiting Internet security vulnerabilities.
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Excellent technical managers are rare.
It's a very interesting question. Where are the people who can manage technical companies?
Apparently they are very rare. When an open source programmer named his KDE program "Killustrator", the CEO of Adobe made a fool of himself, and cost Adobe a lot in bad publicity. It was an illustration progam, and the tradition is to begin KDE programs with the letter K.
Oracle CEO Larry Ellison is widely considered unstable. For example, see the September 8, 2003 CNET article Can Oracle survive Larry Ellison?
CEOs of technical companies need a thorough understanding of technical issues. HP's Carly Fiorina has little technical knowledge and it shows. For example, HP printer drivers are often amazingly buggy. An August 13, 2004 article asks "Is Carly Toast Yet?". The article says, "HP's stock price is down 62% since she arrived at the company."
Technical companies are extraordinarily abusive. For example, look at what Ed Foster has to say about warranty fulfillment: At the Manufacturer's Discretion. One reason for the abusiveness seems to be that most managers of technical companies have little or no technical knowledge. The only way they know to increase the (short-term) profit of a company is to abuse the customer.
The manager of a technically-oriented company needs excellent communication and social skills and a thorough understanding of the business of the company. Few people have the necessary range and depth of skills. -
technology issues of rural BB are child's play...
It's the politics that leave the last "country mile" of fiber dark. For instance, here is a CNET story of a Texas misappropriation of agricultural $ub$idie$ earmarked for getting internet to farm communities that instead is bringing broadband to slightly exurban millionaire homes where the closest thing to farming is the maintenance of putting greens and fairways.
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My favourites as a sci/tech geek & newshound
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Re:Who's being sued?
The RIAA or any plaintiff in a civil action is likely to go after wherever the big money is. In this case, it's the university, not the starving students.
You must not have seen the previous lawsuits. Traditional logic doesn't really apply. They will sue anyone no matter what
This is an organization that doesn't care one bit. You can be 12 or 60. You can be a student. It doesn't matter. They're out to make an example out of people. They don't care what anyone thinks about them and they're not in it for the money. They'd be more than happy to take the $10,000 you have in your bank account.
Not that I can imagine a more effective way of getting people to buy CD's...ha -
Re:stupid FUD article
Where one has to smile and finger the device (pun intended) like an ordinary criminal to enter a free country.
I would like to point out to you, citizen, that you are exaggerating: people are not allowed to smile! C'mon get your facts straight! -
nice surpriseFrom the cnet article:
"The problem is that there are a large percentage of users that are using nongenuine software," said David Lazar, a director in the Windows Client unit at Microsoft. "A good percentage of those think they are using genuine Windows and are being cheated."
Wouldn't that be a nice surprise to boot up your computer one day only to find a message... "j00 r 0wn3d. Sincerely, Bill."
There is still no "stick," or penalty, for customers whose software is found not to be genuine. That could change, Microsoft said. -
Microsoft probably will avoid demise
Einfeldt does not address the question of whether there is anything that Microsoft can do to avoid demise.
Prof. Christensen himself recently suggested as a possible strategy that Microsoft should set up a new business using the low-cost alternative Linux on handheld devices. http://news.com.com/2100-7344-5411843.html
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Re:a graph of internet growth?
Well... it will continue to grow quite as is for a few more years... Until all pda's and cell phones are internet ready (without wifi hotspots)...
Then we are going to see in our more globally minded futures as information becomes centralized into a few trusted? areas.
While it will still be used for entertainment.
But I do believe that a globalization and releasing of files online will continue to grow with my bandwidth ;-) -
Nice Slant on Article Selection
I do not understand how the articles that are considered for posting are being filtered. I would like to know the number of "pro-Bush" versus "pro-Kerry" submissions are actually accepted. Not a single "pro-Bush" subject even shows up on the list yet I know that they are being submitted. Like this one GOP beats Dems on tech-friendliness.
Given that Slashdot is such a techie heavy site you would think that something combining tech and politics would be appropriate yet articles like these never seem to be accepted.
oh well...I'm done ranting now and am willing to accept the Offtopicness of this posting. -
Some thoughtsBy going undercover on the Shadowcrew.com Web site, investigators were able to find out which of the site's 4,000 members were actively taking part in criminal conduct, according to a Secret Service statement. The investigation led to two other Web sites--Cardplanet and Darkprofits--that the Secret Service alleges are the online portals to other financial-crimes organizations.
You'd think by now these underground websites would learn that you can't just let anyone in to your trusted network. I've actually recieved spam-style emails asking me to join CarderPlanet.com, which was one of the sites involved in the ring. Gee, how hard was it to find them? Sheesh.Nothing has connected the fraud ring to any known terrorist group, Townsend said.
Um... Yeah. Terrorists. I guess that was one of those pre-emptive statements because... you know... someone reading the article would think I hope they weren't going to use my credit card to commit some sort of terrorist act.The ShadowCrew homepage sans music
For those of you who can't see it because it was slashdotted. -
Related: SMS spam suit in 2001
Technology industry pioneer (Genuity, mailorder.com) Rodney Joffe talked about filing a class-action suit against an SMS spammer way back in 2001 article 1 | article 2 -- search for "Joffe". Very similar.
I don't know whether he ever actually filed papers, or what became of it. Anyone? -
Re:The worst thing about this...It was not chosen blindly for the Altix. It was a "we want the absolute best for this system, money no issue" decision.
Uh, you almost got that right. I think what you meant was "we want the absolute best IA-64 compatible processor for this system, money no issue."
After all, having not learned from the pain of going from 32-bit IRIX 5.x to 64-bit IRIX 6.x and issuing buffer-overflow patches for just about every command in UNIX in the mid-1990s (at which time I was an IRIX admin), SGI threw out its management in 1998, brought in a guy from Compaq, and promptly committed to a cutover from MIPS to Intel, starting with Xeon boxes that fall, and in early 2000, the Itanium. Of course there were delays and problems and more delays while SGI announced MIPS-and-someday-Itanium systems and tried one Pentium system after another, at least having the sense to drop Windows NT for Linux in the process. Finally, in early 2003, having apparently failed to ever sell even a single Itanium system, mind you, SGI shipped Itanium 2 systems.
My take? Well, I like SGI. They've always made really cool shiny toys, and I really expect them to continue doing that, regardless of CPU architecture. And I'm glad to see them at the top of the Top500 list - a position that, despite all their shiny toys and sometime ownership of Cray, they've never occupied before, I might add - since even ASCI Blue Mountain was down to something like #30 a year ago after dropping out of the top 10 in 2002 (and I don't think it was even on this spring's list; maybe it got decommissioned).
But IMO, Intel has SGI seduced, fooled, and generally whipped. Even though SGI still has more model lines with MIPS processors in them, and has committed to keeping MIPS around until at least 2006 (and good luck getting rid of it then at this rate), Intel got SGI to sell its soul for a basket full of promises. Either SGI loathes Intel for this but is afraid to do anything about it (after all, switching architectures again would be a pain, even if they are now a Linux company and Linux runs on everything), or SGI has a nasty case of Stockholm Syndrome and thinks that Intel is actually on its side. Anyway, SGI has tied itself to Itanium for over a half-decade now, even if it didn't ship jack for most of that time, and it's unwilling to change horses.
Intel, of course, doesn't care, because it knows that if it's not SGI building that 10240-Itanium2 supercomputer, it'll be Hewlett-Packard (stripped of Alpha and PA-RISC) or some other Itanium server vendor. And with Alpha gone, MIPS on the way out, PA-RISC gone or going and Sun screwing around with AMD, Intel only has to worry from competition from IBM Power and traditional supercomputers from Cray and NEC and folks like that.
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Re:The worst thing about this...It was not chosen blindly for the Altix. It was a "we want the absolute best for this system, money no issue" decision.
Uh, you almost got that right. I think what you meant was "we want the absolute best IA-64 compatible processor for this system, money no issue."
After all, having not learned from the pain of going from 32-bit IRIX 5.x to 64-bit IRIX 6.x and issuing buffer-overflow patches for just about every command in UNIX in the mid-1990s (at which time I was an IRIX admin), SGI threw out its management in 1998, brought in a guy from Compaq, and promptly committed to a cutover from MIPS to Intel, starting with Xeon boxes that fall, and in early 2000, the Itanium. Of course there were delays and problems and more delays while SGI announced MIPS-and-someday-Itanium systems and tried one Pentium system after another, at least having the sense to drop Windows NT for Linux in the process. Finally, in early 2003, having apparently failed to ever sell even a single Itanium system, mind you, SGI shipped Itanium 2 systems.
My take? Well, I like SGI. They've always made really cool shiny toys, and I really expect them to continue doing that, regardless of CPU architecture. And I'm glad to see them at the top of the Top500 list - a position that, despite all their shiny toys and sometime ownership of Cray, they've never occupied before, I might add - since even ASCI Blue Mountain was down to something like #30 a year ago after dropping out of the top 10 in 2002 (and I don't think it was even on this spring's list; maybe it got decommissioned).
But IMO, Intel has SGI seduced, fooled, and generally whipped. Even though SGI still has more model lines with MIPS processors in them, and has committed to keeping MIPS around until at least 2006 (and good luck getting rid of it then at this rate), Intel got SGI to sell its soul for a basket full of promises. Either SGI loathes Intel for this but is afraid to do anything about it (after all, switching architectures again would be a pain, even if they are now a Linux company and Linux runs on everything), or SGI has a nasty case of Stockholm Syndrome and thinks that Intel is actually on its side. Anyway, SGI has tied itself to Itanium for over a half-decade now, even if it didn't ship jack for most of that time, and it's unwilling to change horses.
Intel, of course, doesn't care, because it knows that if it's not SGI building that 10240-Itanium2 supercomputer, it'll be Hewlett-Packard (stripped of Alpha and PA-RISC) or some other Itanium server vendor. And with Alpha gone, MIPS on the way out, PA-RISC gone or going and Sun screwing around with AMD, Intel only has to worry from competition from IBM Power and traditional supercomputers from Cray and NEC and folks like that.
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Re:The worst thing about this...It was not chosen blindly for the Altix. It was a "we want the absolute best for this system, money no issue" decision.
Uh, you almost got that right. I think what you meant was "we want the absolute best IA-64 compatible processor for this system, money no issue."
After all, having not learned from the pain of going from 32-bit IRIX 5.x to 64-bit IRIX 6.x and issuing buffer-overflow patches for just about every command in UNIX in the mid-1990s (at which time I was an IRIX admin), SGI threw out its management in 1998, brought in a guy from Compaq, and promptly committed to a cutover from MIPS to Intel, starting with Xeon boxes that fall, and in early 2000, the Itanium. Of course there were delays and problems and more delays while SGI announced MIPS-and-someday-Itanium systems and tried one Pentium system after another, at least having the sense to drop Windows NT for Linux in the process. Finally, in early 2003, having apparently failed to ever sell even a single Itanium system, mind you, SGI shipped Itanium 2 systems.
My take? Well, I like SGI. They've always made really cool shiny toys, and I really expect them to continue doing that, regardless of CPU architecture. And I'm glad to see them at the top of the Top500 list - a position that, despite all their shiny toys and sometime ownership of Cray, they've never occupied before, I might add - since even ASCI Blue Mountain was down to something like #30 a year ago after dropping out of the top 10 in 2002 (and I don't think it was even on this spring's list; maybe it got decommissioned).
But IMO, Intel has SGI seduced, fooled, and generally whipped. Even though SGI still has more model lines with MIPS processors in them, and has committed to keeping MIPS around until at least 2006 (and good luck getting rid of it then at this rate), Intel got SGI to sell its soul for a basket full of promises. Either SGI loathes Intel for this but is afraid to do anything about it (after all, switching architectures again would be a pain, even if they are now a Linux company and Linux runs on everything), or SGI has a nasty case of Stockholm Syndrome and thinks that Intel is actually on its side. Anyway, SGI has tied itself to Itanium for over a half-decade now, even if it didn't ship jack for most of that time, and it's unwilling to change horses.
Intel, of course, doesn't care, because it knows that if it's not SGI building that 10240-Itanium2 supercomputer, it'll be Hewlett-Packard (stripped of Alpha and PA-RISC) or some other Itanium server vendor. And with Alpha gone, MIPS on the way out, PA-RISC gone or going and Sun screwing around with AMD, Intel only has to worry from competition from IBM Power and traditional supercomputers from Cray and NEC and folks like that.
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Re:The worst thing about this...It was not chosen blindly for the Altix. It was a "we want the absolute best for this system, money no issue" decision.
Uh, you almost got that right. I think what you meant was "we want the absolute best IA-64 compatible processor for this system, money no issue."
After all, having not learned from the pain of going from 32-bit IRIX 5.x to 64-bit IRIX 6.x and issuing buffer-overflow patches for just about every command in UNIX in the mid-1990s (at which time I was an IRIX admin), SGI threw out its management in 1998, brought in a guy from Compaq, and promptly committed to a cutover from MIPS to Intel, starting with Xeon boxes that fall, and in early 2000, the Itanium. Of course there were delays and problems and more delays while SGI announced MIPS-and-someday-Itanium systems and tried one Pentium system after another, at least having the sense to drop Windows NT for Linux in the process. Finally, in early 2003, having apparently failed to ever sell even a single Itanium system, mind you, SGI shipped Itanium 2 systems.
My take? Well, I like SGI. They've always made really cool shiny toys, and I really expect them to continue doing that, regardless of CPU architecture. And I'm glad to see them at the top of the Top500 list - a position that, despite all their shiny toys and sometime ownership of Cray, they've never occupied before, I might add - since even ASCI Blue Mountain was down to something like #30 a year ago after dropping out of the top 10 in 2002 (and I don't think it was even on this spring's list; maybe it got decommissioned).
But IMO, Intel has SGI seduced, fooled, and generally whipped. Even though SGI still has more model lines with MIPS processors in them, and has committed to keeping MIPS around until at least 2006 (and good luck getting rid of it then at this rate), Intel got SGI to sell its soul for a basket full of promises. Either SGI loathes Intel for this but is afraid to do anything about it (after all, switching architectures again would be a pain, even if they are now a Linux company and Linux runs on everything), or SGI has a nasty case of Stockholm Syndrome and thinks that Intel is actually on its side. Anyway, SGI has tied itself to Itanium for over a half-decade now, even if it didn't ship jack for most of that time, and it's unwilling to change horses.
Intel, of course, doesn't care, because it knows that if it's not SGI building that 10240-Itanium2 supercomputer, it'll be Hewlett-Packard (stripped of Alpha and PA-RISC) or some other Itanium server vendor. And with Alpha gone, MIPS on the way out, PA-RISC gone or going and Sun screwing around with AMD, Intel only has to worry from competition from IBM Power and traditional supercomputers from Cray and NEC and folks like that.
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Re:The worst thing about this...It was not chosen blindly for the Altix. It was a "we want the absolute best for this system, money no issue" decision.
Uh, you almost got that right. I think what you meant was "we want the absolute best IA-64 compatible processor for this system, money no issue."
After all, having not learned from the pain of going from 32-bit IRIX 5.x to 64-bit IRIX 6.x and issuing buffer-overflow patches for just about every command in UNIX in the mid-1990s (at which time I was an IRIX admin), SGI threw out its management in 1998, brought in a guy from Compaq, and promptly committed to a cutover from MIPS to Intel, starting with Xeon boxes that fall, and in early 2000, the Itanium. Of course there were delays and problems and more delays while SGI announced MIPS-and-someday-Itanium systems and tried one Pentium system after another, at least having the sense to drop Windows NT for Linux in the process. Finally, in early 2003, having apparently failed to ever sell even a single Itanium system, mind you, SGI shipped Itanium 2 systems.
My take? Well, I like SGI. They've always made really cool shiny toys, and I really expect them to continue doing that, regardless of CPU architecture. And I'm glad to see them at the top of the Top500 list - a position that, despite all their shiny toys and sometime ownership of Cray, they've never occupied before, I might add - since even ASCI Blue Mountain was down to something like #30 a year ago after dropping out of the top 10 in 2002 (and I don't think it was even on this spring's list; maybe it got decommissioned).
But IMO, Intel has SGI seduced, fooled, and generally whipped. Even though SGI still has more model lines with MIPS processors in them, and has committed to keeping MIPS around until at least 2006 (and good luck getting rid of it then at this rate), Intel got SGI to sell its soul for a basket full of promises. Either SGI loathes Intel for this but is afraid to do anything about it (after all, switching architectures again would be a pain, even if they are now a Linux company and Linux runs on everything), or SGI has a nasty case of Stockholm Syndrome and thinks that Intel is actually on its side. Anyway, SGI has tied itself to Itanium for over a half-decade now, even if it didn't ship jack for most of that time, and it's unwilling to change horses.
Intel, of course, doesn't care, because it knows that if it's not SGI building that 10240-Itanium2 supercomputer, it'll be Hewlett-Packard (stripped of Alpha and PA-RISC) or some other Itanium server vendor. And with Alpha gone, MIPS on the way out, PA-RISC gone or going and Sun screwing around with AMD, Intel only has to worry from competition from IBM Power and traditional supercomputers from Cray and NEC and folks like that.
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Re:The worst thing about this...It was not chosen blindly for the Altix. It was a "we want the absolute best for this system, money no issue" decision.
Uh, you almost got that right. I think what you meant was "we want the absolute best IA-64 compatible processor for this system, money no issue."
After all, having not learned from the pain of going from 32-bit IRIX 5.x to 64-bit IRIX 6.x and issuing buffer-overflow patches for just about every command in UNIX in the mid-1990s (at which time I was an IRIX admin), SGI threw out its management in 1998, brought in a guy from Compaq, and promptly committed to a cutover from MIPS to Intel, starting with Xeon boxes that fall, and in early 2000, the Itanium. Of course there were delays and problems and more delays while SGI announced MIPS-and-someday-Itanium systems and tried one Pentium system after another, at least having the sense to drop Windows NT for Linux in the process. Finally, in early 2003, having apparently failed to ever sell even a single Itanium system, mind you, SGI shipped Itanium 2 systems.
My take? Well, I like SGI. They've always made really cool shiny toys, and I really expect them to continue doing that, regardless of CPU architecture. And I'm glad to see them at the top of the Top500 list - a position that, despite all their shiny toys and sometime ownership of Cray, they've never occupied before, I might add - since even ASCI Blue Mountain was down to something like #30 a year ago after dropping out of the top 10 in 2002 (and I don't think it was even on this spring's list; maybe it got decommissioned).
But IMO, Intel has SGI seduced, fooled, and generally whipped. Even though SGI still has more model lines with MIPS processors in them, and has committed to keeping MIPS around until at least 2006 (and good luck getting rid of it then at this rate), Intel got SGI to sell its soul for a basket full of promises. Either SGI loathes Intel for this but is afraid to do anything about it (after all, switching architectures again would be a pain, even if they are now a Linux company and Linux runs on everything), or SGI has a nasty case of Stockholm Syndrome and thinks that Intel is actually on its side. Anyway, SGI has tied itself to Itanium for over a half-decade now, even if it didn't ship jack for most of that time, and it's unwilling to change horses.
Intel, of course, doesn't care, because it knows that if it's not SGI building that 10240-Itanium2 supercomputer, it'll be Hewlett-Packard (stripped of Alpha and PA-RISC) or some other Itanium server vendor. And with Alpha gone, MIPS on the way out, PA-RISC gone or going and Sun screwing around with AMD, Intel only has to worry from competition from IBM Power and traditional supercomputers from Cray and NEC and folks like that.
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Re:The worst thing about this...It was not chosen blindly for the Altix. It was a "we want the absolute best for this system, money no issue" decision.
Uh, you almost got that right. I think what you meant was "we want the absolute best IA-64 compatible processor for this system, money no issue."
After all, having not learned from the pain of going from 32-bit IRIX 5.x to 64-bit IRIX 6.x and issuing buffer-overflow patches for just about every command in UNIX in the mid-1990s (at which time I was an IRIX admin), SGI threw out its management in 1998, brought in a guy from Compaq, and promptly committed to a cutover from MIPS to Intel, starting with Xeon boxes that fall, and in early 2000, the Itanium. Of course there were delays and problems and more delays while SGI announced MIPS-and-someday-Itanium systems and tried one Pentium system after another, at least having the sense to drop Windows NT for Linux in the process. Finally, in early 2003, having apparently failed to ever sell even a single Itanium system, mind you, SGI shipped Itanium 2 systems.
My take? Well, I like SGI. They've always made really cool shiny toys, and I really expect them to continue doing that, regardless of CPU architecture. And I'm glad to see them at the top of the Top500 list - a position that, despite all their shiny toys and sometime ownership of Cray, they've never occupied before, I might add - since even ASCI Blue Mountain was down to something like #30 a year ago after dropping out of the top 10 in 2002 (and I don't think it was even on this spring's list; maybe it got decommissioned).
But IMO, Intel has SGI seduced, fooled, and generally whipped. Even though SGI still has more model lines with MIPS processors in them, and has committed to keeping MIPS around until at least 2006 (and good luck getting rid of it then at this rate), Intel got SGI to sell its soul for a basket full of promises. Either SGI loathes Intel for this but is afraid to do anything about it (after all, switching architectures again would be a pain, even if they are now a Linux company and Linux runs on everything), or SGI has a nasty case of Stockholm Syndrome and thinks that Intel is actually on its side. Anyway, SGI has tied itself to Itanium for over a half-decade now, even if it didn't ship jack for most of that time, and it's unwilling to change horses.
Intel, of course, doesn't care, because it knows that if it's not SGI building that 10240-Itanium2 supercomputer, it'll be Hewlett-Packard (stripped of Alpha and PA-RISC) or some other Itanium server vendor. And with Alpha gone, MIPS on the way out, PA-RISC gone or going and Sun screwing around with AMD, Intel only has to worry from competition from IBM Power and traditional supercomputers from Cray and NEC and folks like that.
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Re:Only 4-6 hours?
Conveniently, Sony's battery is a 3.6V 1800mA battery. Pick up a few packs of 1.2V 1800mA AA rechargables and get a 3 AA cell battery holder that connects them in series. You should be able to connect that to the battery connector somehow, and then you're set.
If you want to connect to the external connector, it probably won't be too hard to find some combination of rechargable batteries that supplies that proper voltage and current. -
Re:Cost
Since no one else has answered my question, I'll post the results of searching on my own:
http://news.com.com/Space+agency+taps+SGI,+Intel+f or+supercomputer/2100-1010_3-5286156.html
The cost is quoted in the article at $45 million over a three year period, which indicates that the "Columbia" super cluster gets a bit more than 1 teraflop per million dollars. That seems impressive to me, considering the overall performance.
It would be interesting to see how well the Xserve-based architecture held its performance per dollar when scaled up to higher teraflop levels... -
Injuction -
I've been following this case and glad to hear this. SCC has been prevented from selling their product for about 8 months now
... will lexmark have to reimburse them for their lost sales? or, how about customers, who have been deprived of a legal cheaper product? -
Not fully true
They were only using 16 of those 20 servers. With all 20 they were able to peak 61 teraflops. Check the article at CNET.
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Re:That's nothing...
when they hit the "TURBO" button on the front of the boxes they'll really scream.
They did! According to C-Net article they "quietly submitted another, faster result: 51.9 trillion calculations per second" (equivalent to 51.9 teraflops). -
Re:Can we say wow?
The main purpose of a modchip, like it or not, is to pirate games.
The main purpose of a handgun in the hands of a non-police officer, like it or not, is to kill police officers.
If you make a modchip that does not let you pirate games, but just lets you play homebrew ones, it might be legal -- but nobody would want it.
That's why they're the biggest news on the PS2 scene and why all the popular modchip makers have jumped onto the homebrew bandwagon, right? And that's why all legal XBOX modchips sold in the USA (yes, not *all* modchips are banned in the USA, just *most*) are preloaded with cromwell flash firmware, or just plain cromwell firmware, as well as a suite of popular homebrew utilites, right?
Honestly, I don't think you know what you're talking about. I make a living selling modchips legally (thank God for Canada) and there definately *is* a demand for modchips for homebrew software. There's also a larger demand for modchips for backups, and I'm happy to sell them for that purpose (thanks to our sane copyright laws). As far as a demand for pirated games, let's put it this way, I turn all customers to even mention warez away at the door, and my shop does $1/4 million+ sales per year. Seems to me there's plenty of demand for modchips for legal purposes. I would say I turn away about 1% of my customers for this reason. It's far less than I'd have to turn away if I were running a video rental store.
I've never made a dollar from piracy and I intend to keep it that way. And so do all the other places selling modchips. In the entire history of Canada, only one modchip store has ever been "shut down" for piracy. Or at least that's the only one that made the news.
Oddly enough, you'll find shops like mine MUCH more concerened with piracy than *any* other gaming store (some of which I happen to know are selling pirated games right now -- morons!), because unlike them, the corporations with big money send hired goons to my store to try to get us to sell them products for illegal purposes (this has happened to us, the hired goons that is, not the sale of illegal products) because the big money doesn't like the idea that their hardware might be used in a manner they didn't want it to be used in.
Now, I'm busy modding another PS2 so it can play imports... TTYL! -
Re:What do you think of this idea?
Here is a link to a news report of that study.
As you say, my argument is valid for a completely unpatched Windows box, which covers most PCs you buy at a large retail outlet. No, they won't open up every cardboard box they have on stock whenever there is a new patch. Which means that for the naive it is not possible to go to Walmart, buy a PC, go home, plug in and be safe.
I note that you don't try to insist on your previous point to which I replied, which said "Someone who can't keep a Windows box secure will have a harder time keeping a Linux box secure". -
Re:Opterons and PowerPC togetherSun was one of the 3 companies chosen to be in the DARPA supercomputing project, along with IBM and Cray...not exactly 'sitting on their ass'.
Face it, if it isn't bad news about Sun, Slashdot rarely posts it..hence...you don't know about it. But of course, conventional Slashdot wisdom gets moderated as "Insightful" because of the huge about of sheep-like groupthink that goes on here.
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Was Ty Pennington there with a megaphone?
From the CNET story headline:
"The fastest Mac supercomputer has gotten faster, thanks to an Xserve makeover." (http://news.com.com/Virginia+Tech+beefs+up+Mac+su percomputer/2100-1016_3-5426091.html?tag=nefd.top)
Was that neurotic TLC-to-ABC crossover Ty Pennington (http://abc.go.com/primetime/xtremehome/bios/ty_pe nnington.html) onsite to help with the installation upgrades?
Sorry -- this post was in honor of my wife, who tortures me with that damned show every Sunday night.
IronChefMorimoto -
Re:Geek Vote?
OTOH, Kerry worked to change the reviled CDA, to keep taxes off Internet business, to require telemarketers to divulge their location at the start of a call, and to promote broadband deployment (all cited in that same McCullagh article. Kerry's Congressional career has been mostly during the Gingrichian Republican majority. He has engaged in the tricky minority politics that require going along with popular bills, then changing them in subsequent legislation, after the Republican "loyalty machine" has moved on, and some sense can be talked across the aisle.
Kerry isn't a tech champion; his priorities lead him into some conflicts with some sensible tech agendas. Especially, it seems, when promoting police access to information for law enforcement: he was a successful prosecutor. But with so many heinous laws passed under Bush, we need someone who knows how to undo the damage. And that's our choice NEXT WEEK: Kerry - who knows what he's doing, who has at least a balanced tech agenda, or Bush - who doesn't understand tech or techies, who has a solely corporate agenda, when his agenda is actually in control of any situation rather than incompetence and chaos.
Others in this thread have pointed out that the DMCA isn't as important in voting as Iraq, healthcare, the Patriot Act. Of course, it all gets factored in. Kerry isn't as tech friendly as, say, *I* would be, but you can't vote me into the White House. If you vote Bush back, more of the same of his antiscience, antihuman, antiAmerican agenda will be an unacceptable alternative to Kerry, who can at least understand his own agenda. -
Re:Geek Vote?
OTOH, Kerry worked to change the reviled CDA, to keep taxes off Internet business, to require telemarketers to divulge their location at the start of a call, and to promote broadband deployment (all cited in that same McCullagh article. Kerry's Congressional career has been mostly during the Gingrichian Republican majority. He has engaged in the tricky minority politics that require going along with popular bills, then changing them in subsequent legislation, after the Republican "loyalty machine" has moved on, and some sense can be talked across the aisle.
Kerry isn't a tech champion; his priorities lead him into some conflicts with some sensible tech agendas. Especially, it seems, when promoting police access to information for law enforcement: he was a successful prosecutor. But with so many heinous laws passed under Bush, we need someone who knows how to undo the damage. And that's our choice NEXT WEEK: Kerry - who knows what he's doing, who has at least a balanced tech agenda, or Bush - who doesn't understand tech or techies, who has a solely corporate agenda, when his agenda is actually in control of any situation rather than incompetence and chaos.
Others in this thread have pointed out that the DMCA isn't as important in voting as Iraq, healthcare, the Patriot Act. Of course, it all gets factored in. Kerry isn't as tech friendly as, say, *I* would be, but you can't vote me into the White House. If you vote Bush back, more of the same of his antiscience, antihuman, antiAmerican agenda will be an unacceptable alternative to Kerry, who can at least understand his own agenda. -
Simulations
The vast majority of clusters are for simulating very complex systems that require lots and lots of calculations.
You can get a few hints by looking just at their names.
The number one "Earth Simulator Centre" is fairly self-explanatory, going to their website show they create a variety of models for things such as weather, tectonic plate movement, etc.
The number 3 LANL supercomputer "is a key part of DOE's plan to simulate nuclear weapons tests in the absence of actual explosions. The more powerful computers are designed to model explosions in three dimensions, a far more complex task than the two-dimensional models used in weapons design years ago." I imagine that most US government simulations would be doing something simmilar. -
Re:Geek Vote?
The same Kerry that fought to keep encryption a munition and unexportable?
The same Kerry that fought for the clipper chip?
The same John Kerry that wanted the government to have key escrow?
The same John Kerry that co-sponsored the Hollings bill to create government mandated copy-protection on content in 2002?[1]
That John Kerry is now supposed to be a saviour reagrding the DMCA?
If you believe that I've got a legal DVD containing all Microsoft's OS code on it for sale; with an open source license.
1: http://news.com.com/John+Kerrys+real+tech+agenda/2 010-1028_3-5291476.html