Slashdot Mirror

Slashdot is open source. Gawker's code is not.

I've heard of this website that would surely welcome volunteers who are good with perl and SQL. Have a look at this, I'm confident someone here would be able to contribute something useful. They have a development-related blog here

1. new people available to projects
2. old people now unavailable to project

I observe that at this time, the increase in new people on the Internet dwarfs changes in either rate. True, the loss of key players can kill a project. Just because more middle-class white males may be forces to stop working on 'F/OSS' will not mean the end of F/OSS. OpenSource is not a business in competition with proprietary software. And as long as a project is Opensource, someone can dig up the old tapes and start patching away. The pool of raw talent is growing. Invite these new people in, they might be able to help.

Inability to upgrade, leads to more intense skill sets.

I agree that manufactures have been dumbing down the documentation. This is done not only to be friendly to the Aunt Mable crowd, but also protect this new "Intellectual Property" that the marketing department has gotten the legal department worked up about.

However, real - or open - standards vs fake - de-facto / Microsoft - standards are published in their gory detail. Many many books are published today on the details of how things work, worked and will work. However, you must go to your library and read them to benefit. Today many people want instahacking sk1llz at the push of button. Unfortunately, the real world is also garbage-in/garbage-out. Those 3rd world folks are required to put in the effort to make work what is just a push-of-a-button away for 1st world people. The difference if subtle: they have to read, you ought to read.

And, to top it off, I resent the SourceForge and all such "organizations". I much enjoy and miss, the days when each project had it's off-beat web-site hanging off of some obscure computer connection, or even hosted by some free hosting site like Geocities. Greatly enhanced the fealing of individuality and added a lot of color to the Linux community. When Sourceforge came around, it so much feals corporate, institutionalized and all the horrible things that most of us hate.

Enhanced the fealing (sic) of individuality? Don't you mean ugly?

Hmmm, let's see: sourceforge provides webhosting and other tools for a project, but how many still have their own websites?

• Slashcode @ sf.net points to slashcode.org
• keepass project's site is keypass.info
• filezilla is hosted at filezilla-project.org
• The TortoiseSVN project has a nice site at tortoisesvn.net
• Clamwin uses clamwin.com
• many more...

And that was just from clicking randomly on the top 10 downloads page. (Technically I also hit sourceforge's own project, but can you really blame sourceforge for hosting at sourceforge?) I don't really see the addition of a useful 'professional' index really impacting the 'feals' (sic) of the projects. I think it's less geocites and more "it's only 100 bucks, just register the domain already."

You still end up at some obscure computer connection for many projects. Not everything is a myproject.sourceforce.com site. However, for tiny projects they get free hosting and some do fairly

What common slashdot problem pisses you off the most?

1. 404
2. Dupe
3. Roland Piquepaille
4. Broken Code
5. You can't edit your comments
6. Poor spelling (in articles) 7. Poor grammmar (in articles) 8. Stories no one cares about.

In other news slashcode offers a patch.

Dreamweaver is an impressive behemoth of a tool, no doubt whatsoever. Back in 1999/2000 it was the only possible way to edit and manage websites on a professional level. Dreamweavers wysiwyg power with the older browsers and it's HTML editing features are unmatched. The template engine completely abstracts changes to a website in your developement directory and automatically keeps track of anything you what across multiple documents. If DW doesn't crash and screw up your template dir that is - which does happen more often than you like. It's the best thing you can use ... ...if you don't have a CMS.
Which gets me right to the point:
Sorry, but it's like five years since the early dot-bomb days where dynamic server side stuff was considered exotic and people got payed for klicking static websites together. You may haven't noticed, but the world has moved on. There are something like fifteen bazillion open source content management systems out there. One better than the next.
Who the fuck needs DW nowadays? You don't want DW! DWs concepts are ancient by todays standards. The last time I used it was about 4 years ago in some project where the system team couldn't get their stuff together and set up a halfway decent JSP framework and we had to hack the webdocs by hand in record time. And my web productivity has tripled by now, since I exclusively use content management systems (as every body else does), and be it "only" to generate the html docs offline and publish the output to static webspace.

Honestly now: Ditch DW allready, it's nothing but a huge waste of time these days. Trust me, I make a living with this stuff. And take a look at one of the frameworks above. To save your time, I recommend checking out one of the following: Plone/Zope, Callisto CMS, Mambo, Typo3, Mason, Slashcode, or (forgot this one above) Xoops. Save yourself half to three quarters of webdev time in the long run.
Oh, and welcome to 2005. ;-)

You say that the perl powerhouses are left out, but both Bricolage and WebGUI are included. The only big one that's missing is Slash.

If you look at bastion of fairness, moderation, and level headed debate that is politics.slashdot.org and look down about 9 stories you will see that the "Kerry Concedes Election To Bush" story got 4961 comments. HOWEVER, if you dig deeper you will see that there are in fact 5620 Comments as of the time of this post. This is obviously a ploy by our "Evil Republican"(tm) Slashcode maintainer and moderator Pudge to quell the liberal outcry(AKA whiney trolls).

This simply cannot stand, we should have verified commenting with paper printouts that can be recounted manually if necessary.

Slashcode 3 for '08!

American politics, for better or for worse, impact the entire world. We are the only remaining SuperPower, and Slashdot was founded in America.

If you want to discuss your politics, go start your own discussion board (you can even use Slash). Just remember that without the U.S., you wouldn't be passing your TCP packets.

you have obviously not been to slashcode, have you? if you read the FAQ, you will note that there is a very serious statement there that they will not be making slashcode compatible with HTML, which one can logically extend to XHTML, but you can feel free to twiddle with the source once you download slash for your site and make it compliant. why is this? who knows?

Wait, that description, while "+1, Interesting", doesn't say what you changed to. So I guess now we'll just get used to poking around, seeing if there are any GUI changes, any structure changes. You don't mention if you're releasing the new Slashcode, and there's no mention of this upgrade in the obvious place. So how about a followup, maybe a slashback, or something useful during a longer timeframe than the downtime itself?

I agree it ought to be really simple, but searching the text of a large database just isn't. If you have some idea how to do it, I'd encourage you to get the source and impliment it. I'd like to use it even if no one else would.

May I suggest you visit http://slashcode.org.

I thought a company was not liable for unmoderated forums. Can someone clarify this.

In any case, there is always the official reason of why a company does something, and there is always an unofficial reason as well. May be, that department was just not that profitable anymore, you know good forum software is now almost dirt cheap these days (not to mention, a lot of it is also free and open source as well).

Originally, Slashcode (on Slashdot) would accept any international character. It would even accept HTML entities so you could easily enter these characters in a way that even if the database could only store 7-bit ASCII, they would still come out to the user. And I know Slashcode is capable of international characters.

Only recently has this ability been removed. It always used to be capable of international characters. I don't know why, but I would guess they decided to remove accents "due to trolls" or something. But there's no reason why Slashcode can't display or accept international characters, because it used to accept international characters.

So calling Slashdot arrogant for their removal of characters is completely warrented. They are aware of international issues, but they actually took action to remove accents and foreign characters.

(And may calling them "internation characters" is a real example of American arrogance :).)

The source

Troll 122 of 210 from the annals of the Troll Library .

I'm not interested in a language war, but your take on what CGI.pm is for is a little off. If you want to "talk CGI" (which is a very simple protocol for communicating with the Web server and ultimately with a client), you use CGI.pm to do so.

If you want to dynamically generate content for the Web, you use Bricolage, Slash or any of the other fine packages out there. Bricolage is especially nice, as it is based on HTML::Mason, a very nice templating system for HTML. Slash, you may know from some of the sites that were built with it....

You can find a nice bit of discussion on the topic, here.

Of course, if you just want to give up on Perl because you ran across CGI.pm and thought it was ugly, that's fine too.

I'm almost appaled at the fact that there is an article about weblogging (ugh, that's like Kroger and their 'krogering'. I dislike that word) without a mention of Slashcode? Of course slashcode has more features and is trickier to use than most people who use blogger probably want to deal with. It's also more geared towards news and discussion sites of course, but I have noticed several /.-ers (CmdrTaco especially) in the past reccomend it whenever they mention weblogging

[% noun = 'World';
USE date;
this_hour = date.format(date.now,'%H');
%]
Hello [% noun %],
[% IF this_hour < 12 %]
good morning
[% ELSE %]
good afternoon
[% END %]

They did

http://www.slashcode.org

Jouster

TLib recievs development award
by Coolcast

The Troll Library has recieved a major development award, the CowboyNeal Microsoft
Excellence Award for its revolutionary new trolling system. Essentially a rewrite of slashcode, the troll library was written on Microsofts' .NET platform and not only outperforms slashcode by a factor 35,
but implements a set of features that simply make it superior.

Major features of the system include:

* Automatic detection of trolling stats, with reports generated through Crystal Reports(R)
* Automatically add or remove trolls in order to reach a fixed % of trolls
* Connectivity to Microsoft SQL Server, Exchange server, Lotus Notes, Outlook and VBScript
* Front-end implemented in ASP+, back-end written in VB.NET and Managed C++ (R)
* Open sores blocking mechanism GPL-Block(TM) prevents unauthorized use of GPLed software, comments or plugins.
* Support of visitor-supplied COM add-ins to personalise content.

Please contact your local sales representive for more information.

Is this the same code that runs Slashdot?

Yes. Slashdot and Slashcode are usually running the latest development code from CVS, within a week or so.

If this is business as usual then we can expect to see a new release file announced at slashcode within a week or so. So the obvious question is, "Is this business as usual?"

i recently updated my slashdot profile preferences and started seeing these previously missed articles. sadly many others who would like to see them are probably missing them as well due to not bothering to try and customize stuff. ah well, i didn't write the shit.

There was some discussion of "web services" on Perl Advocacy list recently. I come down on the side that says Apache is all you're ever going to need. Look, Slashdot is technically an application... does that make Slashcode an n-tier application server? Purlease. It's just marketing - web servers are SOOOOO 90s, now we call 'em "web services".

a feature currently suggested on sourceforge for slashcode is to be able to filter out all funny comments... that'd solve your problem

This is a really strange thing to see - Plastic is powered by Slash, isn't it?

--

You can read it here.

Or
http://www.macslash.com/article.pl?sid=01/05/04/17 35247&mode=nested
for those worried about 'bad' links.

Here on Slashdot we have developed, as a community, and incredibally powerful tool

I respectfully disagree. Say what you want about /. moderation, but it was not developed "as a community". It was was developed by Hemos & Taco, and the rest of the team. The rest of ./ may have collectively bitched about it, and provided a live test facility, but that's a far stretch from "developing" something.

Bender is an amazing piece of software. Instead of another unappreciative rant, let's show some respect for the sheer volume and popularity of /. and the innovators who made it happen.

/asskiss>

Oh, come on yourself. There's already an entire site for promoting and supporting Slash-like sites, so we don't need any more stories. PCR is about as interesting as most of the Science stories here, but it doesn't shock me that your particular submission was rejected.

And Canada? Ca-na-fucking-duh? Even though your election didn't have any big problems like ours did, the principal difference is that nobody cares about the outcome of Canadian elections, besides of course for Canadians. You could elect a silly moron who can't speak English to be your Prime Minister, and nobody would care. (Oh wait, you already did that. Silly me.)

If you need to be able to grow to form a huge community, then you'll need slashcode.

But if you are talking about a few thousand visitors per day, you should look into any of the following slash-alikes:

• PHPslash
• Squishdot
• ThatPHPware
• scoop
• SlashJ
• sips
• localecho
• twig
• ASPslash
• phpweblog

Methinks this would have been a better question to ask on Slashcode.org instead of here on Slashdot itself.

I think it's a very good and positive thing when a government asks people for feedback and input. Maybe they should start a slash (or some other) site to ask questions like that on a regular basis. ;-)

Joshua

I don't know about you all, but I would host it everywhere I could! At work, at home. Hell, I'm going to be running a slash site soon, and I'll bloody well put it there. I can't wait till it begins to circulate (as I suspect it most certainly will).

Joshua

They use slashdots code ( slashcode ) which is written in perl.
Neat eh?

1. Ditto.
   
   
2. Ditto, except put it in the FAQ as well as posting it as a regular story.
   
   
3. I've M2'd some 'overated' posts, so I know they are getting scrutinized. But what makes it hard is that we don't know what they were rated at the time they were moderated. Maybe for Over & Under rated posts the M2 should consist of selecting what we think the appropriate rating should be, then slashcode would determine if the Under/Over was appropriate based on that.
   
   
4. I think SlashCode is a more reasonable place to request added features, then a href="http://Slashdot.Org/">SlashDot could regularly ask for input as to which SlashCode features should be implemented here.
   
   

1. Ditto.
   
   
2. Ditto, except put it in the FAQ as well as posting it as a regular story.
   
   
3. I've M2'd some 'overated' posts, so I know they are getting scrutinized. But what makes it hard is that we don't know what they were rated at the time they were moderated. Maybe for Over & Under rated posts the M2 should consist of selecting what we think the appropriate rating should be, then slashcode would determine if the Under/Over was appropriate based on that.
   
   
4. I think SlashCode is a more reasonable place to request added features, then a href="http://Slashdot.Org/">SlashDot could regularly ask for input as to which SlashCode features should be implemented here.
   
   

The Linux.com legal statement is here.

I am not a lawyer, but I don't see anything in there about the bitmaps on the site. All that is mentioned are the articles. If Linux.com decides to take some action against this guy they are probably going to be on some shaky legal ground.

One more thing, if I use Slashcode to develop a site like /., I would credit Slashcode not every site that uses it (including /.).

-D-

For adding features to Slash, go to Slashcode.org. You'll find more people interested in screwing around with the Slash code.

Re: -1 default :
I think if you have a negative karma then you're at -1 default.

Re: the -2 :
dmg was knocked down to a default -2, and he had a pretty high scores on the few posts he had at that point (4s & 5s).

Re: Metamoderation :
Those that can grep Perl can check out the rules for metamoderation on their own with the Slashcode (and please post your findings to a forum like sid=moderation.

Also try the website at www.slashcode.org for further info.

Lee

check out slashcode.org and repeat to yourself "free software is nifty.. free software is nifty..."
--

There's a huge difference between you clicking on winword.exe and how ASP's work. When your machine runs a program (winword.exe), it's copying the program to the memory of your local machine for execution. All of it's activities take resources on your machine.

In the ASP case, you run an applet (be it java, or some thin client) that connects to a central server. Your machine is merely display things. The program's activities consume resources on the server.

This is very much like the "old days" of computing where everyone sat at terminals connected to a central mini- or main-frame computer [my high school has such a system.] As technology advanced, the X windowing system was developed and people then sat at "X terminals". The concept of "run program foo on machine A and display it on machine B" has been around for decades -- in the UNIX world [I've even done this from OS-9 without X]; windows still hasn't sniffed the clue. The modern world has taken this a [insane] step further to push everything [including X] inside a web browser as "Everyone has a web browser." (Plus, "if it's on port 80, it's gotta already be secure.")

heh, you use Slashdot frequently, yet has Slashcode been "distributed to [you]"?

It's unrealistic to expect slashdot, a software-centric site to cover all stuff relating to nerds and geeks like us.

I don't know about geeky being cool; it seems cool here because we're all geeks! Out in RL it's really not as hot as hollywood makes it out to be. Yes, Jon Katz, we're still a persecuted minority! And what are YOU doing about it?

*slap*

Thanks, I needed that.

Anyhow, a couple of us /.ers have set up geeky.org running Scoop (not slashcode) for the true range of geeky stuff. Get your early #'ed account now!

Not much there yet, but we plan to fix that in the next day or so. Feel free to submit something.

-JD

In case you haven't noticed, not only does Slashot "give back to the community" by simply existing and giving us a popular forum for discussion, but they also have developed some nice code for weblogs, which they kindly give away for free under the GPL, and which many sites use.

-JD

Since I'm moderating for the next 72 hours I'll answer...

Moderators only have 5 points to throw around and they can't allocate more than one per comment. They only get allocated these 5 points for a period of three days and then have to wait a week or so before their name pops up out of the hat again. I'm not sure how metamoderation affects this, but I assume if someone hates your moderation you have to wait longer before you get moderator points again. Maybe a browse of the code at Slashcode will reveal all

However I agree that some get more [and less!] mod points than they deserve.

1. The only way I can perceive civil discussions happening on sites like this is if... people were required to post under some form of recognizable ID, and... moderators with power kept the conversation on track and kicked out people who attacked ideas or posters personally or strayed off topic.

Sidestepping the undemocratic leanings of this rant, we get to ask ourselves one question. What could be more offtopic than a nontechnical, newbie hack preaching to hackers on the net's numero uno technical weblog?

2. But remember that I express opinions more frequently than anybody on Slashdot

And more verbosely. Must have skipped the pith and wit classes at that journalism school he so clearly (anti-thesis?) never went to.

3. I read all criticism, even flames. I don't believe in many aspects of the moderation system. I set my prefs to everything. To me, steering software is the anti-thesis of community. I consider it self-censorship, a Balkanization of ideas, an effort to smother a human problem with software.

You don't like it, why not hack the source, which is freely available, and remove this offending 'Ba lkanization'. Incidentally, if it wasn't for the filtering system, more people would be exposed to your low-content name-dropping, and you would no longer be able to sustain the impausible boast that you "read all criticism, even flames."

4. I read Freshmeat every day, and marvel at it, understanding hardly anything. It's one of the most interesting places to go on the Web.

If you're too thick to understand it (what's to understand?) why do you continue to read it? Who are you trying to impress?

5. For example, I believe government should have stopped Microsoft much sooner, and should definitely halt the AOL/Time-Warner merger.

Why? I'd be particularly interested to hear what legal basis you think there is for a suit against AOL/Time-Warner, as, I'm sure, would their lawyers. For someone who describes himself as "skittish about labels and parties" and "not a political person" you sure have a sweet tooth for Big Government.

6. But I have to say that my thinking about Libertarianism is a work-in-progress. Maybe the best response is to write about it a bit, and start some discussions.

Maybe if you thought about things before engaging MSWord you might be more esteemed as a writer than a pissweak cluebie.

7. I don't believe most people on Slashdot hate me.

Let's put it to a poll. It's gotta beat "What's your favourite number?" and "Who's your favourite Khan?" anyday.

8. I have been railing against Microsoftism before most of you were programming.

I started in 1981 (with the ZX81). You've been flaming Microsoft for 19 years? Clever boy. Care to post a URL?

9. ... many of you would be mortified to know how many people come onto Slashdot to laugh at the nightmare that is Threads. [Ha Ha. Thread Derision: The world's fastest growing spectator sport. I think not.] Rob's moderation systems have definitely made this better, and he thinks quite a bit about this issue.

Compare and contrast with point 3.

10. Slashdot is hiring some professional editors.

Why doesn't it hire a professional writer while it's at it, so you can be swiftly put out of our misery? All these criticisms become null and void if you'd take your talent (everyone has it: even you) outside of this essentially technical forum. CmdrTaco is too honourable and hippyish to bludgeon you to death like a baby seal. Why don't you do the right thing and resign? I see the katzdot domains are still available...

I'm curious as to why they are advertising it as Slashcode.com when Slashcode.org works too, and fits a little better into the Open Source idea (being a .org).

Just a brief observation.

(Slashcode.net works too)

slashcode.org