"Just an example: Putting music on an iPhone can only be described as frustrating; particularly if you're using a computer that is not your own. On an Android or BlackBerry phone, you simply copy it over like it's a flash drive. No hassle, no "syncing", and no clunky software required. It just works."
Myth yourself. Yes, when it comes to iTunes, I agree with you. But that falls under the "corporate lock-in" category I already described; it isn't true of the products in general. (FYI, I very seldom use iTunes myself. Apple tried to stuff way too much into one program and as a result fucked up most of it. I use iTunes to play music, PERIOD. And it's not even my default program for doing most of that.) But my point is: that's a software issue, not hardware, and it's one of those Apple glitches, not the rule. You can set up your Apple to use other programs, just as you do for Android. The stock players in Android ain't much better than iTunes.
"It's a bit like the old myth "Macs are better for graphics" which has never been true."
The hell it has never been true. Ask Hollywood.
But it is also true that part of that reputation came from the fact that Macs had a GUI long before Microsoft did.
"... how good the stuff is comes a very distant second..."
See, that statement needs a qualifier. Apple products are indeed well-engineered, but your typical everyday user may not appreciate that as much as, say a "developer". (Developer in quotes because these days it's a "politically correct" euphemism for programmer. I know, because I am one.)
For a developer, an Apple machine is close to the best of all worlds. You get a very nice hardware platform, and the freedom to run everybody else's OS in a VM too. No other OS has as much flexibility in that particular regard, including Linux. Yes, you can do it in Linux too, but it's not the same. You can run Linux in a VM on a Mac far easier than you can run OS X in a VM on Linux, for example. And Windows? No contest. Apple machines are some of the best Windows machines on the market.
On a Mac, you can install Windows in a "Boot Camp" partition, and dual-boot Windows. This is officially allowed (in contrast, dual-booting a Windows machine, according to Microsoft, is NEVER allowed). And that's all good. BUT... the real beauty of the Boot Camp system is that under OS X, I can install VMware and choose my Boot Camp partition as a VM to run. And this is what is cool about that:
[1] If I want to run, just for example, graphics-intensive software (like some games) in Windows, I can boot up in windows and Just Do It. With ALL the hardware acceleration native Windows brings to the app.
[2] If I don't need top performance, but just want to do something in Windows from time to time, I can simply start VMware, and use it to run the SAME copy of windows... all the settings and programs, same same... in a window under OS X.
Microsoft doesn't allow that kind of thing at all, and Linux does not do it anywhere near as well. So from a developer's point of view, I say again: a Mac comes very close to the best of all worlds.
"Helicopter hog hunting is perfectly legal in Texas. Wild hog populations have gotten extremely out of control."
Sure, I don't doubt there are legitimate exceptions. I just meant the sort of wolf and elk hunting and the like that we've seen in films.
But if you're NOT talking about serious and harmful overpopulation and things of that nature, I put helicopter hunting right up there with clubbing baby seals.
"Based on what little info is on ByteLight's website - wouldn't you, as a customer, have to be running the store's app on your phone for this tracking to work? If so, just don't run the software."
Well, that's a good point I suppose. But because of the prior use of rather sneaky tactics (using your ",insert store name here> points card" as a way to track your purchases for example), I do tend to assume it's not obviously an opt-in.
But if it's a store-specific app, which you have the option to not run, it might not be so bad. On the other hand, if it becomes "use this app to get better prices" in exchange for privacy, I'll just be pissed off again. It's coercion, which I do not approve. Mild coercion, perhaps, but coercion nevertheless.
"No, that's not true either. either of the.355 (9mm ) and.357" diameter bullet (.38 special and.357 magnum) is used more often the.22 LR in the USA."
Used for what? See, everybody here is getting their figures all jumbled up.
First, I didn't say just U.S.
Second, again, I was referring to particular calibers, not.22 vs. everything else.
Third, I didn't say "used in crime" (which is what just about everybody is citing). I said "killed people".
Fourth, even those U.S. figures are woefully inconclusive. Most sources will give you figures that came from a single survey of Philadelphia crime (not killings) in 1985. There is another report from Philly from around '90 that also shows up a lot. But Philadelphia is hardly representative of the whole U.S. much less the rest of the world; I was referring to killings not just crime; and I did not say specifically 1985.
Fifth, I have some more recent figures too. Like "Firearms Report, Office of the Attorney General, California Department of Justice, 2009" for example. And the same kinds of problems hold. In most of the report, they reference crime, not killings. Where they do mention it, it turns out that only about 1/5 (21%) of the guns used in killings were factored into the report. Etc. It's a political document, not responsible statistics. As evidenced by its strong emphasis on "California-defined 'assault weapons'."
I will say, however, from the statistics I have seen, IT APPEARS THAT in large cities of the U.S., in RECENT years, in the commission of CRIMES (not killings): the 9mm,.380, and.40 S&W appear to be the most popular handgun calibers. Followed closely by.22.
"Buying Samsung feels good at any price and has a new feel about it."
Definitely a matter of opinion. As another/.er has pointed out, to many people Samsung products have a "plasticky, cheap" feel to them.
Case in point: I recently bought a used Samsung air conditioner. (I didn't buy it because it was Samsung; I bought it because somebody was selling a used air conditioner.) The basic mechanical (i.e., compressor, heat exchangers, etc.) are fine. But the fit and finish sucks. The whole faceplate with the air vanes etc. was cheaply made, and the internal plastic parts it mounted to bent over time, to the extent that I had to jerry-rig the "fresh air/circulate" mechanism so it would even work.
Granted, when you are a company that makes everything from backhoes to washing machines to TVs and smartphones, you probably won't make everything well. But I suspect that Samsung makes pretty much all of its products good, but not great.
"It's funny how everyone frames it as a battle against Samsung, when over time Samsung is but one of many players in China that influence how Apple sells products."
Not entirely, because Apple and Samsung have had an on-again, off-again, love-hate relationship.
The reason is that Apple has often contracted with Samsung for critical components of Apple products. However, they often compete with one another on finished products. That makes for strange bedfellows.
Apple prides itself on its engineering, and "deceptive simplicity". The "it just works" strategy is behind most all of their products. And in many ways, that is a really great thing. And if you have a Mac at home and an iPhone or iPad, everything "just works together", too.
But sadly, they've seen fit to combine the "just works" philosophy with a good bit of corporate lock-in, which does nobody any good but Apple, and probably not even Apple in the long term. It is easy to see that more people are buying Android phones now than iPhones, and if you ask them lots of them will say Android is "more open". That's a problem.
(Before anybody jumps on me, I have definitely learned, that "more open" does not necessarily mean "all open". Google has been doing its share of "lock-in" too, but not as aggressively as Apple. If you want to be completely free of lock-in, you'll probably have to go with Cyanogenmod or wait for Firefox OS. Unfortunately Cyanogenmod does not, to the best of my knowledge, work with my current phone carrier.)
"If the counter evidence is widely-available, it should be quick and easy to post a link. Or maybe you don't actually have any counter evidence, and you're just blustering?"
And I can argue just as equally and validly: *IF* it is so easily and widely available, then why are you asking ME to provide it to you? Why don't you know it already?
I didn't say.22 was used "more than larger calibers". I stated that it was used more than any other caliber. Those are two different things. Look it up yourself.
It's not exclusive to Mac applications. There are lots of applications from all major OSes that will do that. However, unique to Macs (as far as I know) is that it is built right in to the low-level printer-driver structure of the OS: anything on a Mac that will print at all, will also save to PDF.
I resent the necessity to turn off my phone when I enter a store. They are taking what might be a great tool (like product comparisons via barcode and QR code reading) and turning it into a burden and annoyance instead.
If I found out a store used this, I'd go somewhere else. I do, actually, have choices.
Write anything in almost any program on a Mac in OS X. Share it using any "collaborative" service you like. Use any math formula editors (including the one supplied by Mozilla). When you are done save it to the NOW STANDARD (as opposed to Latex, which is TOO MANY years old).PDF format with a simple "Save As...".
It's not QUITE that cut-and-dried, but almost. Trying to find LateX support in modern software is kind of like trying to find COBOL support in modern software. Well, maybe not quite as bad. But still... it's clearly outdated.
I don't necessarily agree with PDF being a standard, either, but it's a hell of a lot better supported than LateX these days. And while you might have trouble finding a way to convert Document X, written in some proprietary standard, to a final PDF, you will have a lot less problem than trying to convert it to LateX.
I strongly suggest you find something that works with the Open Document standard. Open Office (or Libre Office) is a good way to start. You can edit formulas. And it's a global standard.
"Pacific Northwest" is both a large area, and also misused. Many people consider the "Pacific Northwest" to be the big-city areas of Portland-Vancouver, and Seattle-Tacoma, and surrounds. Yet the ACTUAL Pacific Northwest is far larger, and debatably a majority, but at least a close minority, of the people live outside those areas. (You don't call just NYC and Newark "the Northeast", or Albuquerque & Los Angeles to San Diego "the Southwest", for example. Nor is Dallas "the South". Or Miami.)
"Maybe you want to claim that it's actually a very small minority of Americans that think that"
No. I was saying that someone was making over-broad generalizations about other people making over-broad generalizations. Is that so difficult to understand?
"If that's really "just the truth"... How is the evidence pretty thin? What's the counter-evidence?"
Are YOU serious? You want me to present years worth of widely-available information, that you apparently have never even heard of, in a Slashdot comment?
Really?
And you really don't recognize that the evidence that THOSE particular people really did it, is thin?
"Perhaps I should have replied to your first post which had this,"
WHOOSH...
It's only unclear because you did not take into account the context in which my comment actually appeared, and then assumed I meant something I did not.
Slashdot Mirror
"Just an example: Putting music on an iPhone can only be described as frustrating; particularly if you're using a computer that is not your own. On an Android or BlackBerry phone, you simply copy it over like it's a flash drive. No hassle, no "syncing", and no clunky software required. It just works."
Myth yourself. Yes, when it comes to iTunes, I agree with you. But that falls under the "corporate lock-in" category I already described; it isn't true of the products in general. (FYI, I very seldom use iTunes myself. Apple tried to stuff way too much into one program and as a result fucked up most of it. I use iTunes to play music, PERIOD. And it's not even my default program for doing most of that.) But my point is: that's a software issue, not hardware, and it's one of those Apple glitches, not the rule. You can set up your Apple to use other programs, just as you do for Android. The stock players in Android ain't much better than iTunes.
"It's a bit like the old myth "Macs are better for graphics" which has never been true."
The hell it has never been true. Ask Hollywood.
But it is also true that part of that reputation came from the fact that Macs had a GUI long before Microsoft did.
"... how good the stuff is comes a very distant second..."
See, that statement needs a qualifier. Apple products are indeed well-engineered, but your typical everyday user may not appreciate that as much as, say a "developer". (Developer in quotes because these days it's a "politically correct" euphemism for programmer. I know, because I am one.)
For a developer, an Apple machine is close to the best of all worlds. You get a very nice hardware platform, and the freedom to run everybody else's OS in a VM too. No other OS has as much flexibility in that particular regard, including Linux. Yes, you can do it in Linux too, but it's not the same. You can run Linux in a VM on a Mac far easier than you can run OS X in a VM on Linux, for example. And Windows? No contest. Apple machines are some of the best Windows machines on the market.
On a Mac, you can install Windows in a "Boot Camp" partition, and dual-boot Windows. This is officially allowed (in contrast, dual-booting a Windows machine, according to Microsoft, is NEVER allowed). And that's all good. BUT... the real beauty of the Boot Camp system is that under OS X, I can install VMware and choose my Boot Camp partition as a VM to run. And this is what is cool about that:
[1] If I want to run, just for example, graphics-intensive software (like some games) in Windows, I can boot up in windows and Just Do It. With ALL the hardware acceleration native Windows brings to the app. [2] If I don't need top performance, but just want to do something in Windows from time to time, I can simply start VMware, and use it to run the SAME copy of windows... all the settings and programs, same same... in a window under OS X.
Microsoft doesn't allow that kind of thing at all, and Linux does not do it anywhere near as well. So from a developer's point of view, I say again: a Mac comes very close to the best of all worlds.
"Helicopter hog hunting is perfectly legal in Texas. Wild hog populations have gotten extremely out of control."
Sure, I don't doubt there are legitimate exceptions. I just meant the sort of wolf and elk hunting and the like that we've seen in films.
But if you're NOT talking about serious and harmful overpopulation and things of that nature, I put helicopter hunting right up there with clubbing baby seals.
"Based on what little info is on ByteLight's website - wouldn't you, as a customer, have to be running the store's app on your phone for this tracking to work? If so, just don't run the software."
Well, that's a good point I suppose. But because of the prior use of rather sneaky tactics (using your ",insert store name here> points card" as a way to track your purchases for example), I do tend to assume it's not obviously an opt-in.
But if it's a store-specific app, which you have the option to not run, it might not be so bad. On the other hand, if it becomes "use this app to get better prices" in exchange for privacy, I'll just be pissed off again. It's coercion, which I do not approve. Mild coercion, perhaps, but coercion nevertheless.
"No, that's not true either. either of the .355 (9mm ) and .357" diameter bullet (.38 special and .357 magnum) is used more often the .22 LR in the USA."
Used for what? See, everybody here is getting their figures all jumbled up.
.22 vs. everything else.
.380, and .40 S&W appear to be the most popular handgun calibers. Followed closely by .22.
First, I didn't say just U.S.
Second, again, I was referring to particular calibers, not
Third, I didn't say "used in crime" (which is what just about everybody is citing). I said "killed people".
Fourth, even those U.S. figures are woefully inconclusive. Most sources will give you figures that came from a single survey of Philadelphia crime (not killings) in 1985. There is another report from Philly from around '90 that also shows up a lot. But Philadelphia is hardly representative of the whole U.S. much less the rest of the world; I was referring to killings not just crime; and I did not say specifically 1985.
Fifth, I have some more recent figures too. Like "Firearms Report, Office of the Attorney General, California Department of Justice, 2009" for example. And the same kinds of problems hold. In most of the report, they reference crime, not killings. Where they do mention it, it turns out that only about 1/5 (21%) of the guns used in killings were factored into the report. Etc. It's a political document, not responsible statistics. As evidenced by its strong emphasis on "California-defined 'assault weapons'."
I will say, however, from the statistics I have seen, IT APPEARS THAT in large cities of the U.S., in RECENT years, in the commission of CRIMES (not killings): the 9mm,
"Linux and Windows have had PDF or PS printer drivers for ages."
Of course they have. But that's not the same thing. It doesn't come built into the OS.
Honestly, I don't think so. Steve's passing seems to have caused a pretty large hiccup, but I would not start betting on their demise just yet.
"Buying Samsung feels good at any price and has a new feel about it."
Definitely a matter of opinion. As another /.er has pointed out, to many people Samsung products have a "plasticky, cheap" feel to them.
Case in point: I recently bought a used Samsung air conditioner. (I didn't buy it because it was Samsung; I bought it because somebody was selling a used air conditioner.) The basic mechanical (i.e., compressor, heat exchangers, etc.) are fine. But the fit and finish sucks. The whole faceplate with the air vanes etc. was cheaply made, and the internal plastic parts it mounted to bent over time, to the extent that I had to jerry-rig the "fresh air/circulate" mechanism so it would even work.
Granted, when you are a company that makes everything from backhoes to washing machines to TVs and smartphones, you probably won't make everything well. But I suspect that Samsung makes pretty much all of its products good, but not great.
"It's funny how everyone frames it as a battle against Samsung, when over time Samsung is but one of many players in China that influence how Apple sells products."
Not entirely, because Apple and Samsung have had an on-again, off-again, love-hate relationship.
The reason is that Apple has often contracted with Samsung for critical components of Apple products. However, they often compete with one another on finished products. That makes for strange bedfellows.
I don't know if I'd say "boutique".
Apple prides itself on its engineering, and "deceptive simplicity". The "it just works" strategy is behind most all of their products. And in many ways, that is a really great thing. And if you have a Mac at home and an iPhone or iPad, everything "just works together", too.
But sadly, they've seen fit to combine the "just works" philosophy with a good bit of corporate lock-in, which does nobody any good but Apple, and probably not even Apple in the long term. It is easy to see that more people are buying Android phones now than iPhones, and if you ask them lots of them will say Android is "more open". That's a problem.
(Before anybody jumps on me, I have definitely learned, that "more open" does not necessarily mean "all open". Google has been doing its share of "lock-in" too, but not as aggressively as Apple. If you want to be completely free of lock-in, you'll probably have to go with Cyanogenmod or wait for Firefox OS. Unfortunately Cyanogenmod does not, to the best of my knowledge, work with my current phone carrier.)
"If the counter evidence is widely-available, it should be quick and easy to post a link. Or maybe you don't actually have any counter evidence, and you're just blustering?"
And I can argue just as equally and validly: *IF* it is so easily and widely available, then why are you asking ME to provide it to you? Why don't you know it already?
I also did nott say just U.S., or any particular year.
Bullshit yourself. That's a different number.
.22 was used "more than larger calibers". I stated that it was used more than any other caliber. Those are two different things. Look it up yourself.
I didn't say
It's not exclusive to Mac applications. There are lots of applications from all major OSes that will do that. However, unique to Macs (as far as I know) is that it is built right in to the low-level printer-driver structure of the OS: anything on a Mac that will print at all, will also save to PDF.
I resent the necessity to turn off my phone when I enter a store. They are taking what might be a great tool (like product comparisons via barcode and QR code reading) and turning it into a burden and annoyance instead.
If I found out a store used this, I'd go somewhere else. I do, actually, have choices.
"word, Libreoffice, etc. make PDFs, but they are not really nice looking enough to make a book of them."
That's funny, since that's how most books are made these days.
Not Word, granted. But then I am a developer, and I have very few friends who have used Word for anything serious, for many years.
"Quite wrong. the .22 Long Rifle with hollow point, frangible, high velocity AND subsonic loads are all favored by assassins."
More people in non-military situations are killed by .22 caliber rounds than any other.
I as am against helicopter hunting as anybody.
.22.
But nobody hunts from a helicopter with a
Write anything in almost any program on a Mac in OS X. Share it using any "collaborative" service you like. Use any math formula editors (including the one supplied by Mozilla). When you are done save it to the NOW STANDARD (as opposed to Latex, which is TOO MANY years old) .PDF format with a simple "Save As...".
It's not QUITE that cut-and-dried, but almost. Trying to find LateX support in modern software is kind of like trying to find COBOL support in modern software. Well, maybe not quite as bad. But still... it's clearly outdated.
I don't necessarily agree with PDF being a standard, either, but it's a hell of a lot better supported than LateX these days. And while you might have trouble finding a way to convert Document X, written in some proprietary standard, to a final PDF, you will have a lot less problem than trying to convert it to LateX.
I strongly suggest you find something that works with the Open Document standard. Open Office (or Libre Office) is a good way to start. You can edit formulas. And it's a global standard.
"Maybe you want to claim that it's actually a very small minority of Americans that think that"
No. I was saying that someone was making over-broad generalizations about other people making over-broad generalizations. Is that so difficult to understand?
"If that's really "just the truth"... How is the evidence pretty thin? What's the counter-evidence?"
Are YOU serious? You want me to present years worth of widely-available information, that you apparently have never even heard of, in a Slashdot comment?
Really?
And you really don't recognize that the evidence that THOSE particular people really did it, is thin?
Just asking.
If this were a question, I would say yes.
Native Alaskans have been known to kill moose with a single shot from a .22.
But it takes a very good shot, from a position most people would rather not be in.
"Perhaps I should have replied to your first post which had this,"
WHOOSH...
It's only unclear because you did not take into account the context in which my comment actually appeared, and then assumed I meant something I did not.
I can't help you with this; it's your problem.
Uh... pardon the fuck out of me, but I know what the article says.