Slashdot Mirror
Slashback: What Dell Knew, China's Fusion, Vista
Dell knew of battery flaw last year. digihome writes, "Dell pinpointed the problem with faulty Sony notebook batteries almost a year ago but only called for a 22,000-unit recall at the time because it believed the problem was limited in scope. Only later, after more customers reported incidents of Dell laptops overheating or catching fire, did Dell realize that millions of its notebook PCs, not just thousands, could be at risk, according to government records and interviews with Dell spokesmen."
GNU/Linux to gain from Vista WGA crackdown? An anonymous reader writes, "Linux is set to take on the Desktop PC market with gusto. It is a well-known fact that most proprietary software companies lose a significant amount of their revenue because of illegal copying of their software. By deciding to clamp down on piracy in the forthcoming Vista OS, Microsoft is sending a clear message to pay up to use the software. The article suggests that a sizable group of people — especially in emerging countries — who do not care about the ideology of free software but expect the software and OS to be free will be swayed to embrace GNU/Linux."
China's fusion test was a hoax. dptalia writes, "On September 28th, China claimed to successfully initiate a fusion reaction. It has come out that the announcement was a hoax. In fact, no attempt to generate fusion was even made."
Vista startup chime will be optional. Seier writes, "Microsoft looks to have had a change of heart regarding its start-up chime. Weeks ago it was learned that the company was considering locking the startup sound down so that it could not be turned off. Ars Technica reports that Microsoft has added the option to disable the sound in the control panel. Meanwhile, Microsoft has still not revealed the startup sound, which will reportedly based on the guitar work of Robert Fripp."
CodeWeavers running on MEPIS is going to seem like a snap to most windows users.
$30 Off All Plans: Use code TRIPLESAWBUCK
W00t! I'm going to be the first in line to purchase Vista just the new chime.
Trust me, it's going to be so popular that cell phone users will add it as a ring tone.
No wait! Someone will make DJ trance/tecno remixes of it.
OMG, I can't wait!!!
Life is not for the lazy.
Linux and the various GUI's haven't added nearly as many features as Vista? Why? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Features_new_to_Windo ws_Vista
Comment removed based on user account deletion
6-Oct Beijing, CHINA
Chinese Government Officials announced today that an elite team of Chinese PsiOps infiltrated and defeated the Bullshit Detector of a major American media company last month. As a result, news agencies around the world spread misinformation.
In related news, a spokesman for the Associated Press said today's so-called announcement could not be verified and is believed to be fake.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
one of the most annoying sounds ever made has to be the "start naviagtion" sound in XP which clicks on everything you touch, the amount of people i have met who have actually unplugged their speakers because of that sound is staggering (because they dont know how to turn it off)
start> control panel > sounds and audio devices > sounds > untick start navigation
how about in Vista having NO sounds on by default and let the user decide if they want beeps, clicks and chords every 5 seconds while doing things on their computer
Okay, if they don't care about the ideology of free software, they are not going to embrace ONLY GNU software... and since when does embrace mean the same as forced?
It is a well-known fact that most proprietary software companies lose a significant amount of their revenue because of illegal copying of their software.
Sorry but yu guys misspelled FUD.
Microsoft became the king BECAUSE of piracy. the Dos and windows 3.11 days Microsoft products sucked. but they were the easiest to copy and spread like wildfire because free = better than buying it.
so get everyone using your products and guess what.... you get to be king.
500 kids using adobe photoshop = 500 new graphic artists that will want adobe photoshop at their job.
If you have the choice of the general populace using your product from piracy or a free alternative that is your competition, you bet your ass that you end up better off having all those people using your product.
Now, companies using illigit software? that IS a real damage to sales. as are the bootleg resellers.
not the 16 year old that wants to learn autocad, premier pro, SQL2000, or server 2003.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Cool. Where can I download gusto?
The command line is 100% optional. Try Mandriva and SuSE. They contain complete GUI install and package management. Only people who wish to tweak or play with details of package management need to use the command line.
Developers: We can use your help.
I just want to say what I said last week:
"Actually, it was successful in getting plasma, usually called "first plasma" in the field. I had heard it was 200kA for 1.2 seconds. I'm would be shocked if they actually were using tritium in the system at this early stage, but I could be wrong. I'm betting that was the result of the scientist media interface."
I heard an early report of their first plasma being 200kA for 1.2 seconds. Sounds like they finished up the first go around at a bit higher current and twice the discharge length. There is also NO FUCKING WAY that they put tritium in the first week of operation. I think actually most machines don't even run with deuterium at first (which is the normal operating gas) but instead use plain old hydrogen. I don't think ITER is going to have tritium for the first 3 or 4 years of its operation. And yes, even if you are running just a deuterium plasma, you can still get DD fusion reactions.
I personally think "hoax" is a bit strong. Someone in the press got the story wrong and miscommunicated some facts. Sounds like to me China really has got their stuff together and they mean business. Hoaxes don't fit into that.
And before someone says some stupid shit about all tokamaks are going away for fusion research because z-pinches generate such hot plasmas...
Mods, please mod parent up!
Completely consistent and dead simple GUI-based ease of OS and program installation - must haves for mass acceptance of Linux.
That and driver support - which perhaps is the tougher challenge...
What is Beryl?
to be hated by lots and lots of OSS people. First he will get hacked, then he will get hacked, then he will repent, and we will forgive him.
Beryl is a fork of Compiz, a windowing/compositing manager that allows the wobbly eye candy that you see in the GLX/AIGLX videos on Youtube. Compiz was originally announced a year or so ago by Novell. I actually submitted my only story to Slashdot on that very thing, woo! Check it out here
Did you know subscribers can see articles in the future? Holy shit!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Well, right here: http://www.canadiancontent.net/tech/download/Gusto _MiniCinema.html
Seriously though, LMAO!
It will happen.
Sure, that's what they want you to believe.
Just like how that Roswell saucer turned into a weather baloon.
Here it is!
Btw, I haven't RTFL but it looks like it fits.
The command line in Windows isn't optional if you want to remain secure while Microsoft sits on their asses waiting for Patch Tuesday to fix severe flaws...
'Yes, firefox is indeed greater than women. Can women block pops up for you? No. Can Firefox show you naked women? Yes.'
Comment removed based on user account deletion
TITLE = No Hay Problema
ARTIST = Pink Martini
GENRE = ROCK
ALBUM = Sympathique
TRACKNUMBER = 2
DATE = 1997
COMPOSER = Jacques Marray
And did you know: OOBE stands for "Out Of Box Experience", not "Out Of Body Experience"
There's a bunch of weird little installer-type things in there.
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
Is there anything surprising about this? What with the amount of "high tech" BS coming out of government controlled news sources and "scientists" from there... Remember the story about the high speed CPU's "designed and fab'd" in China?
Yes, I now have to click "ok" 19 times to overwrite a file in C:\Program Files\, I had to disable three services just to activate my copy of Acrobat Professional, a bunch of apps can't write to same, and I'm generally being treated like a baby.
Go over to the other side, and wow, it's fast, and the desktop looks familiar, it's easy to see how to run an app, write a letter, get online...if only I wasn't left utterly fucked any time I wanted to install something that couldn't be found in apt (which I wouldn't have known existed if I wasn't lucky enough to have some linux guru friends)or wanted some help without the friggin' attitude.
Vista does create an opportunity for Linux to get onto the desktop, but the developers have to get it into their heads that Joe Sixpack is going to throw his monitor at your face if you start explaining that nothing works because he hasn't sorted out the correct dependancies. It's a great OS, but really, it isn't ready for the average user, and Vista is pretty, and easy, and stupid. It will do fine.
Apple's 64-bit support is going to make Microsoft look silly, since Leopard running in 64-bit mode natively runs 32-bit applications and 32-bit device drivers using no emulation or translation. As it is, 64-bit Windows, particularly 64-bit Vista, is something of a joke and really quite useless.
"Sufferin' succotash."
..was considering locking the startup sound down ..
...LOCKING DOWN THE STARTUP SOUND????????
Pardon me, but if that is what kind of development decision are going on with Vista, WTF is going on at Microsoft???????
They're talking about BELLS AND WHISTLES!!!!! LITERALLY!!!!!
If all the Advertising Dept. at Microsoft can do to flaunt the benifits of Vista is talk about whether the STARTUP SOUND will be locked down, the Vista release will be the biggest software bomb in history!!!!
Really
WTF are they thinking?
No.
The accurate statement is:
It is a well-known fact that most proprietary software companies lose some undetermined percentage of their potential revenue because of illegal copying of their software.
If it's revenue, they've already made the sale. To actually lose their revenue, you'd have to steal the money from the company.
but until that command line is 100% optional, the masses will not accept Linux, period.
Not sure why you needed the CLI, as Ubuntu has Synaptic. Plus now there is EasyUbuntu to get multimedia stuff working.
That said, I don't think "the masses" have the strong anti-CLI bent that geeks like to suggest they do. Many people who fit into "the masses" once used text-based programs--remember WordPerfect? Lotus 123? Just a few years ago all the students at my university used Pine for email, and nobody whined about how hard it was to use--maybe because it wasn't hard to use! Library catalogs all used to have text-based interfaces. Even now, many people use computer systems at work (ever heard of BPCS?) that have text-based interfaces. I've seen law librarians use the old text-based interfaces to Westlaw and Lexis.
If "the masses" hate CLI, why do they use Google? That involves formulating queries, typing them in. Why didn't they prefer the old Yahoo Directory way of picking from a menu of choices?
"The masses" have the same realization that geeks do: many GUI programs are designed for newbies. The problem is that you're not a newbie for long, but the GUI keeps you stuck in newbie mode. Long before I was a geek, I was frustrated when public libraries switched to GUI catalogs. GUI and web-based catalogs are easier to use when you're new, but you're not new for long, and after you're experienced clicking around with the mouse is very frustrating. That's why the law librarians use the text-based Lexis.
I often find CLI based programs to be easier to use, and I don't think "the masses" are any different.
Penny - plain text accounting
More info can be displayed by adjusting some configuration. In the file
vista is making things difficult enough that a guru is wanted for installing applications. since that is true in linux as well: as the story says, MS is catching linux in increasing difficulty, not the other way around.
> providing a viable alternative to Microsoft, the command line has to go.
the gui seams equal to MS XP, in most linux flavors.
IE when troubleshooting networking in XP I always hit the command prompt in windows, you may be able to get the job done in a GUI (eventually), but their is no equivilent to the command line info/speed (without additional tools.)
same with linux, almost anything can be achived playing in menus, but the online help is mostly run "xyz.cmd -ofs thingy.info"
so really the difference I see, is geeks providing the help in linux, not as true in windows.
IMHO the question being asked NOW isn't about who the target "user" should be. The question is who should is the target administrator/installer?
Vista seams to be targeting integrators more. IE you sell a pre-setup system that is hard to break (and thus equally hard to change.) Linux is ahead in that game, IMHO, so can they beat ms to the punch?
>Try Mandriva and SuSE. They contain complete GUI install and package management.
So does Ubuntu.
I read there were WMD in... oh... nevermind, I guess you have a point here.
And that kids is how I met your mother.
thanks :)
Because Google is an intuitive interface, you go to google.com and you are presented with a logo & a text box begging to be filled with what you are looking for.
For example: If i am looking for a way to make pipe bomb (no i am NOT a terrorist, i just want this comment to show up somewhere in a CIA/FBI/NSA database) and the 3rd and 4th paragraph of the 2nd link (a wikipedia article is the 1st link, thank you wikipedia) read as followed:
THAT is why people who are not use to a CLI like Google. As for the Yahoo *click*and*click*and*click*and*click*and*click*an
- You're not paranoid, they really are after you.
Ubuntu makes it easy to use the command line to quickly fix problems or in your case install software, but it is not necessary.
.deb packages, click on them and install. The command line is not needed for any of these. You do have to give your sudo password, but that is for basic security.
Ubuntu has the easy to use Add/Remove programs, plus the more powerful Synaptic, and the ability to download
OpenSUSE is free, 10.1 has some problems but 10.2 should be great
I started with Ubuntu when Warty Warthog was released. I switched because SUSE was too easy and I wanted to learn. I am now having to decide whether to switch or not again, as Ubuntu causes almost no problems that I need to fix.
Star Trek, there maybe hope.
The sad thing is that this is first thing that I've read about vista that actually made me interested in seeing it....
Qxe4
I really don't understand this point of view. I had an Atari ST - a GUI only beast and I didn't know what to do with a command line. Once I got hold of an application (gemini) which gave me a command line a lot of other things became easier. Quickly finding known text on your computer in an unknown location is difficult without some sort of text commands to let your computer know what to look for. There are alternatives to going through a maze of twisty menus that continually reorder themselves.
The article said
"It is a well-known fact that most proprietary software companies lose a significant amount of their revenue because of illegal copying of their software."
It should say
"It is a well-known fact that most proprietary software companies GAIN a significant amount of their revenue because of illegal copying of their software."
It is much more difficult to spread your user base without piracy. Piracy sometimes hurts game makers, but it is the best way to get users to test and ultimately buy(or have employers buy) non game software.
Note: Even the games issue is fuzzy. Many years ago someone gave me a copy of Dune. I loved it, and bought at least two sequels, and several "Command and Conquer" games as well. Now tell me, did Westwood(the game company) suffer or benefit from this persons illegal actions?
Yeah and Tiger isn't even fully 64-bit.
I'll believe Apple has a better 64-bit system when I see it.
No.
with so many distros, the average user can get confused very easily. I still have to explain the difference between Linux (kernel) and Linux (OS label) Sure, theyre all called linux, thats the problem. I know a lot of people who were interested but confused.
The startup noise will be as loud as the volume setting you had when you shut the computer down, AND, it no longer ever comes out of the headphone jack at all, at least on my intel macmini. Confirmation: use the nvram -p command to print your "boot-volume"
booyaka!
CS majors know the time/space tradeoff, but they never get taught the 3rd, crucial, tradeoff of the set: comprehension!
Compatibility with Windows apps.
"It ain't a war against drugs.it's a war against personal freedom" --Bill Hicks
What was that bit about the penis trap? Well, you will have to use Vista yourself to see.
God, you must be really scared of Vista if your arguments against it have descended to "It'll injure your genitals".
By summer it was all gone...now shesmovedon. --
In Vista, it is not a feature. It's an essential capability. (must... resist... saying... bug...)
It wouldn't sell at all without it.
And there is still Wine. And CeDeGa for gamers.
Ignore this signature. By order.
3rKaQa_]W8:+-KQ2?1x7t\c[+2B_C1_x*:j,216]%F|_E-378h q p Q
()_£5-_I_9\_-4-{\-QQZ1?|420`_-]D66Ad\_PKe_`-__-
ptTt78TNk1FK6I1RYL3By7ymQNpKBK9OHcjuf96150rcaF9aD
D2X5Nj1eg3Dyh9yS2xf71DbvWn6j6dXkN2fYU3f7187vEsJaC
4kyOu67mBV6cxrEzp9RJmahO4HXG8o88cNE12PPK7nu05y7Pn
That's the same combination I have on my luggage!
"Build a man a fire warm him for a day, set a man on fire and warm him for the rest of his life."
Apple has been selling 64 bit machines with a 64 bit OS for years. The trouble started when they began to sell 32 bit machines again... at least they omitted the intel inside stickers :-)
There's still things you can't do on XP without invoking a dos shell. Doesn't seem to have kept the Great Unclued from adopting it in droves.
Requiring the userbase to learn bash syntax and the whole Unix/Gnu command set, that would be a barrier to adoption. Having the occasional job that can't be easy done without a command line? They're used to that.
Don't let THEM immanentize the Eschaton!
No, it's because they learned it ages ago and have no reason to change.
Actually the whole legal "profession" (as in oldest) is mired in the past.Why do you think the office furniture and paper/folder industries piss away billions a year on "legal-sized" cabinets, forms, folders, etc.? Because the fucking troglodyte bastards in the law trade have to keep up the bullshit impression that they're "different from" (and therefore superior to) the masses.
As a *nix n00b who has tried out a Linux installation on several occasions and succeeded only once, I think (1) the two problems you pick out are actually the same thing; and (2) you still haven't quite put your finger on it.
Yes, with Ubuntu the problem I had was with having to navigate esoteric driver names and seemingly meaningless abbreviations on a command line in order to get a computer with an Nvidia card working at all. But I'd be able to navigate that territory easily if the installation process provided some guidance, instead of my having to find another computer to connect to the same monitor, the same keyboard, the same mouse, and the same phone jack to go onto the Ubuntu forums to ask what on earth I was supposed to do.
If the installation process had provided some guidance, there'd be no problem. As it is, next time I give *nix another go -- probably within a couple of years; the Authentication Hell that one has to go through with Microsoft is enough to put anyone off, so XP will be the last MS OS I use if I can help it -- I guess I'll give SUSE a go, or perhaps give Mandriva another chance.
"I was at a dinner tonight where one of my colegues was irritating our Chinese guests by making comments about the lack of a power grid in China, the chinese gentleman was getting rather defensive. I remembered this article and mentioned it is a positive light. It seems that he was very aware of, and proud of, the test. It saved the dinner party. So, this, even if it might not be a great scientific advance, was usefull to me."
I do find it interesting that while, here in China, evryone heard aboutt eh successfull test; no one seems to have heard about this correction. It seems to be, very much, a mational pride building thing. It comes as no supprise, looking in retrospect, that the initial report was released a week before the national week of celebration (the first week of October).
This is not a criticism of China. All people hear reports and news and twist it to meet what they want/hope/expect it to say. I was hoping it would be true, However, I doubted that it was. It was still a usefull thing to drop at a dinner to make the Chinese feel better.
ah yes... all those apps that you'll just have to buy all over again just to be able to run them on Vista...
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
All the major distros (I have played recently with Ubuntu and Fedora) have graphic package managers.
In Ubuntu I have yet to install an application from the command line: one opens the package installer, search fro the application providing relevant words for the search, is presented with available applications, right click on it to mark it for installation (dependencies are pointed out to you). Applications are sucked up from the Web, installed, menus are put in place.
In Fedora the process is similar, I prefered the command line there though.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
If you're looking for compatibility, you may be disappointed.
..... not that anybody would ever know about them, being closed-source and all that. Anyway, when you make it impossible for, say, a malicious website to download an application behind your back that sneakily modifies files, you also make it impossible for certain applications to interact with one another -- because they were designed to do that using the same security holes.
At the root of the problem is the fact that many Windows applications were built taking advantage of the exact same wide-open, drive-a-bus-through-sideways security holes in Windows as are used by all the viruses, spyware and rootkits
XP SP2 broke a lot of Windows 9X software just by closing the holes. Software that was properly written for non-admin use on NT doesn't need to exploit security holes, but when you consider how many developers have been using pirated development tools and inaccurate or incomplete documentation {even the official documentation is incomplete -- there are still some things that Microsoft won't tell anyone} it's not surprising that there is so much crap software out there. Remember, most software is not packaged for retail, nor downloaded as "free" / shareware. There's a huge amount of Windows software that you have never seen, because it was written especially for one particular customer. And most of it was written by self-taught chancers with a pirated copy of Visual Studio.
Vista is going to have to break a lot of software; otherwise it will never be any more secure than XP. But Microsoft speak with a forked tongue. When they say "Vista will be more secure", they aren't talking about keeping your computer secure against malicious intruders {crackers, script kiddies, virus writers, spyware, adware, botnets and so forth}. What they really mean is that the music and video files you paid to download will be secure against anyone else listening to and watching them.
The real tipping point, the straw that breaks the camel's back, will come when Vista {or the release after, or the release after that} breaks your absolute must-have Windows application. Then you will have nothing to lose by biting the bullet and going to a whole 'nother operating system.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
This is not a troll. I am asking because I am an old-skool hacker who grew up with VAX/VMS and some sort of Unix, and ended up reasonably competent with a VT220. So, I want to know,
What exactly is wrong with the command line?
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Precisely. Vista's 'compatibility with windows apps' isn't that great unless you enjoy entering your password 30 times every time the machine boots and again every time you want to actually run anything.
OK I'd tend to agree it's best to break compatibility now and have a reasonably secure system in the future, but compatibility definately isn't a strong point of vista. Heck, I'm at the stage I can't bear to use the vista machine because it's such a pig getting anything done with it.. it's used for essential testing only then I'm out of there.
lets not completly disparage synaptic package manager, select it from the administration menu search for a key word select a likely package tick the checkbox and install it.
... giving the same help via a gui isn't so easy.
when it does get complicated then it is far easier to tell someone to open a terminal window and type (or copy and paste) the following
what is a problem is introducing new users to the 'ubuntu' way of installation because of prior training on windows or osx
windows is basically download unpack click on setup or insert disk press setup.
mac download mount image and press setup or drag into apps folder.
if a package is in a repository already then its as easy. However users will want to install software from outside sources and this is a problem.
There are conflicting issues which need to be addressed. Easy installation, security and speed of deployment.
as a developer the problem of how to distribute is thorny and as a user who do you trust. Package X could be a trojan, this is blindly ignored by windows users and look at the results.
if synaptic did make it easy to add a local source how vunerable would that make a newbies installation.
I started with the thought that adding a wizard to synaptic to import outside packages was a good idea, but after considering the implications I see that as being dangerous. It is an advantage to need to seek help with installing package X since if it is malware your likely to find out.
I guess it is in the spirit of ubuntu that we learn to trust our software from our community, where the windows way is blind trust or trusting official sources only and we know how much we can trust Sony for example.
Blarney Quality Restaurant, Plants
How so? I thought once you put an AMD64 processor into 64-bit mode, some of the old 32- / 16- / 8-bit instrictions did not work anymore / behaved differently than in 32-bit mode? Was I misinformed?
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
That's nVidia's fault for having closed-source drivers, not Ubuntu's fault for obeying the law. Or you could say it's your country's Ministry of Information Technology's fault, for not mandating full disclosure of hardware specifications.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Uhh, I assume you know about synaptic, yes? The installer-thingy with a GUI...after 20 hours, you should have run across it somewhere...
Beryl is a crystal.
Apple does not use AMD chips.
Actually power grids aren't that wonderful.
Having reliable electrical power is wonderful, but power grids don't automatically mean higher reliability.
With grids sometimes instead of just one city going down due to a fault, you have an entire region going down.
Whereas that can't happen if you don't have a grid.
Come now, there is not a single copy protection method out there that hasn't been cracked. What makes people believe the "new" vista WGA tech will be any different. To believe differently is to show a fundemental misunderstanding of how computer code works on the bare metal and how these things are broken.
The new WGA will be cracked within a month or less of release (probably before release!) and everything will be exactly as it is now.
Nothing to see here, move along...
--
It's all about how much knowledge it takes to use a certain tool. MS has the 'find/search' feature for instance and people like that just fine. But if you want to specify the max or min file size of the item you're looking for, you do it through designated text boxes and check boxes in a GUI, not by entering memorized flags on the command line. If you broke the command line down that way, into a GUI with check boxes, a 'help' link or description next to each and ID tags, yeah, people would happily use the powerful features it offers. As it is, the design expects users to memorize too much, or else takes too long to use.
Likewise with yahoo. You need to click too much to get it to work, and even with that, you still don't get better results than with google (even assuming you limit your searches to key words separated by spaces)
___
It's the end of my comment as I know it and I feel fine.
There are good arguements for both approaches. however, my desire was to kill a discussion that was becoming heated and well on the way to becoming unpolite. By having a point of national pride fresh in my mind, from the original slashdot article, I was able to steer the conversation from dangerious ground.
I think the major problem with the command line isn't the interface itself -- as other people pointed out, many users who've been alive for more than a decade or two, previously used CLI systems and some still do. It's not that foreign an interface, unless you're under 20 and have spent your whole life using Windows or a Macintosh.
The problem with using a CLI versus a GUI, in my opinion, is that most CLI applications require a lot more memorization. You have to learn the command itself, but then also its flags and options, and what stuff you can pass it and generally just how to use it. There's very little context that you can use to "figure stuff out" in the manner of a GUI application.
Now some -- perhaps even many -- CLI applications are so powerful that it's worth learning how to use them, because of what they do. Just as a trivial example, sed isn't the easiest or most intuitive thing to teach someone who's idea of editing text is Notepad or Microsoft Word, but one "s/his/hers/g" run through a multi-page document will make that learning process worth your while.
However, it's getting people up and over that learning curve that's the difficulty. In general, the problem with CLI applications is that they're harder to be self-explanatory than GUI apps; at best you can make them spit out a command reference or helpfile when you run them with --help, but that's still a lot less intuitive than a GUI app with menus and tool palettes with roll-over tooltips. The latter requires you to remember vaguely what tool does what and where it's located on the screen, but IMO it's a much less memorization-intensive learning process than actually having to memorize, letter for letter, which commands you need to enter and what they all do.
For certain styles of people, the CLI application might even be easier. However, I think that many people find GUI's easier to learn, as evidenced by their rapid adoption and the decline of the CLI in all but specialist roles.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
The thing with Ubuntu's (and many other Linus distros) admin prompts is that once you've typed your password to open it up, it doesn't need it again for X minutes (where X is distro dependent, but it defaults to 15 on my Ubuntu box). That is, it's basically a GUI for sudo. I don't know if Vista can do this, or if it has to have the password box for evertything it needs to do.
Yes...I am a rocket scientist.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Ok folks, this is pathetic. You've modded the parent to -1? Because his statement is, what?, correct?
How can a system become popular in the mainstream if everytime a user applies the recommended updates (which will be the habit for Windows users), their graphics drivers are broken and they have to reinstall them? They'll just become frustrated with the tedium of going through the motions every week or two and return to Windows. I know, and you know, how to get around these things and how to reinstall the drivers quickly, but the first time it happens will scare the shit out of most desktop users. X will crash on them spitting out a few error messages, and until eventually they're dropped down to the command line. I'm not going to say that Windows is better, for most things I very much prefer Linux, but atleast their hardware drivers aren't broken on minor kernel revisions.
So I suppose I should go back to my original rant: wtf is wrong you mods? If a post is factually accurate, not offtopic (at least to the thread) then there's no good reason to mod it down. Mod down trolls, flamebait and other such crud that shows up here. If you happen to dislike the message of a post then ignore it, most people will completely miss the post.
There is no way that the average user is ready for the command line. I work for a major hardware manufacturer (the one with the flame issues) and deal with ordinary users all day long. Their capacity for ignorance is astounding and even with a GUI they manage to reach new levels of idiocy every day, let alone with a command prompt. Most confuse the monitor with the tower. Most have never seen their Add/Remove Programs list. Most have no idea who makes their antivirus software. Most cannot tell me if they have a router or a modem for their Internet service or who makes it (find the black box with the flashing lights). Many cannot even tell me what version of Windows they are running.
There is no way these kinds of people could even move around the file system using the CLI, let alone manipulate files effectively to actually use the computer.
I'll tolerate anything except intolerance.
You know, I'd love to switch over to Linux. I tried installing several different flavors of Linux recently. The newest release of Mandriva didn't even try to load on my system (Pity, it seemed just the OS for high end video editing). Kubuntu loaded but then had problems loading after the updates. Suse 10.1 86_64 loaded (I'm on it now) and updated successfully (it's supposed to be better on newer hardware and my hardware is still pretty up to date) but when I try and install from source I get the errors;
Nasm is required
Yasm is required
GCC 3.4 or greater is required.
Why doesn't the OS already have these programs? Moreover, how am I supposed to compile NASM from source (no option for SUSE Linux 10) when that requires Nasm? Is there some way to use an alternate program like Yast2?
Granted I'm a total noob with linux, but not a total idiot, technically. I'm thrilled with the improved driver support that SUSE offers. (everything but my USB harddrives and firewire digital camera seems supported)
But this difficulty installing from source is a pretty critical problem, or else I'm missing somthing that's pretty terribly obvious. Do I need to install the 32 bit versions instead of the 64 bit? Do the 64 bit versions just not work? Do I have to purchase SUSE to get a version with the proper programs installed?
Can anyone clue me in?
___
It's the end of my comment as I know it and I feel fine.
Hey, wait a second. You mean Visa won't run my favourite viruses and bots? And I'll have the privilege of buying all new software because the only thing compatible will be the name on the box. So this Vista thing will cost me a whole lot of money, lock it's self into one computer, likely a new one because my old one won't be "Vista compatible" WHAT A DEAL! Here's my credit card now bend me over.
Apple does not use AMD chips.
Maybe not now, but never say never...
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
The biggest threat to Vista is XP. Fortunately, Microsoft can fix that.
And this is both a feature and a liability -- all you need is a trojan app that binds itself to some uid, and waits for that uid to be elevated to drop its payload, and you're sunk on the security front. Conversely, that 15 minutes of grace means you have 15 minutes to do all your administrative work, which is more than enough for most things. It sure beats having to spend 30 minutes doing the same tasks because you have to type your 24 digit secure password every time you turn around.
Since the article about China mentions plasma, I was wondering if it's possible for a human to touch plasma (ionized gas). Is there a plasma that won't hurt humans?
hemi
Uh, yeah, right...
:-|
So log yourself in to a 10.4.8 system with the latest developer kit (xcode-2.4) and try building something with the "-m64" flag that needs to link to e.g. -ltermcap. Oops!
There are several important Frameworks that don't support 64 bit (either architecture).
You also can't mix and match architectures when doing dynamic loading. This is especially annoying since there can be an enormous performance increase associated with a 64-bit data model in some cases. (gmp, for example, tests for and uses -m64 because of this).
Finally, lots of opensource stuff that will build on 10.4.8 has 64-bit-mode (LP64) bugs, and autoconf/libtool both really really suck when it comes to multilibrary/fat/multiarch support.
So, yes, you can build programs that are 64 bit. You can even link to libsystem, some other standard libraries and Frameworks when you do so, and you won't hit syscall "gotchas" unless you try really really hard. However, you are likely to find yourself very restricted in terms of what you can do in 64 bit code, because of components that are NOT 64 bit (yet).
However, what is fairly common (if not quite pervasive) is the generation of 64 bit instructions (and the use of 64 bit doubleword GPRs) for the PPC970 (G5) which can help 32-bit-mode (ILP32) performance, particularly if it uses 64-bit maths (on the long long datatype). As a result, there is often little gain in moving from ILP32 to LP64 on the G5.
x86-64, on the other hand, with the extra registers and instructions, makes LP64 attractive purely for performance reasons, but the same "-m64" vs (default) "-m32" issues apply.
I've been using Linux since I got a free copy of RedHat 5.2, first as a dual boot setup, and lately stand alone. I use distros that don't require command line anything, or at least that's the way it seems to me.
My current setup is a 2nd hand Dell laptop with Fedora Core 5 on it, although I usually use Mandrake/Mandriva. I'm not much of a tech, although I'm definitely not a newbie.
I work in a government department (in Australia) and when the next auction/disposal of "end of life" hardware happens at work, I'm going to offer "a free operating system" to anyone who wants it.
Bet you I get almost no takers!
A "borrowed copy" of Windows is easier to use, because it's what they're used to.
Don't blame me, it's usually 2 in the morning when I post
The parent is unmodded; the user just has negative karma (due to abusive language in other threads.)
Doubting the existence of evolution is like doubting the existence of China: It just shows that you're uninformed.
Wow willy, looks like you picked a bad day to quit smoking crack!