Here's a good ars-technica article comparing the various mp3 encoders. The summery is that bladeenc outdoes xing at high bitrates but read the whole article yourself to get the full picture.
I don't think the hassles are all that bad, myself. Chances are the programmer is already using indentation to make blocks of code more readable, so why not use that information rather than force the programmer to duplicate block-marking effort? This could pose a problem for non-monospaced editors, but I don't think a lot of programmers use those.
Python is whitespace-sensitive, but I think it's a misconception that this will cramp your style unecessarily. As long as you remain consistant, Python doesn't care if your blocks are indented 1 space or 10. There's still a lot of leeway for individuality.
As for the usefulness, a semi-consistant style makes reading other peoples' code easier and it means less characters onscreen (such as { and }) for marking the starts and stops of blocks - leaving more room for code.
It's not for everyone, I'll admit, but it didn't take me long before I'd forgotten about the indentation rules entirely. Now I don't even think about them unless someone reminds me.
On the surface this looks good for Python, however with all that horsepower behind the dollars, I can't help but fear that the focus of the Python projects is goining to be tainted and rolled into just being a part of AboveNet or Metromedias product offerings as "exclusinve" and the Open Source beacon that Python was will come to an end.
That's certainly a valid concern, but the nature of an open source project will undoubtedly keep the language on track. If, as you suggest, it starts moving down an unpopular path, anyone can fork the language ("Monty 1.0!") into something people prefer to use. I doubt such a drastic step will ever be necessary, but we have the power to take it if we need to.
Why why why... the rest of the world charges ahead and the open source community spends it's time duplicating effort. We have a very nice scripting language called Python laready, why must these closed minded short sighted people spin their wheels with Perl. Okay.. so I know their are some fans of Perl out there, but seriously, if Larry and his merry band of coders had put their blood sweat and tears into helping Python just imagine where we would be today.
I'm not bashing Perl, but I really think it's an ego trip for these guys. Lets put forth our efforts into Python and leave this perl nonsense alone.
...better known as: "competition and choice are good things"
According to Amazon, System Shock 2 is #25 on their software bestsellers list. Daikatana, OTOH, is #69 - right between Windows 2000 Professional Upgrade and JumpStart Typing. Ouch.
Is there an X server for it?
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The list of software seems to be hosed, so I thought I'd ask.
It's nice that they're planning a remote-able GUI, but until it gets an X server (presumably as an app - as opposed to merging the X server with the main GUI) for all my existing X clients to talk to, it's not going to do me much good. If there isn't an X server, perhaps writing one might ease the transition for a lot of people who want to try something new.
Check here for info on how to get the old Infocom classics on CDROM. I've got this disk myself and the z-code runs great under various Linux z-machine interpreters.
And here is another site that's bristling with cool Infocom info.
The more I think about it, the crazier this seems. Metallica finds thousands of people online willing to donate their disk space and bandwidth to share their music with others - presumably because these people enjoy the music - and their first response is to have them thrown off the service ASAP.
Surely such energy could've been harnessed for the betterment of everyone involved. Why not work with the fan community rather than against it?
If the Playstation games look better on the Dreamcast than on the PSX2, it might provide incentive for a different upgrade path than Sony had planned. Even if the titles look equally good, if both the PSX2 and Dreamcast can play old Playstation games that particular benefit is eliminated from the PSX2's favor.
I think how easy a system is to use depends largely on the sorts of systems one has already used. In my case, I went directly from an Apple][ to a Sparc Solaris box and never used the DOS/Win3.1 interface until I'd already learned X and FVWM (& friends). For me, the notion of using key combos for copying and pasting was completely counterintuitive versus mouse button presses. Windows felt weird, DOS felt brain-dead compared to tcsh and to this day I still don't like having to point & click my way through Windows.
Is Linux hard to use? For me, no. For most people, probably. Conversely, is Windows hard to use? Probably! Just look at all the odd little conventions, icons and little "rules" people learn to get around Windows most efficiently. The fact is, it's not as easy to use as it's made out to be and therein lies the problem.
We need a system that's truly easy to use and not Yet Another Mac/Windows Derivative. I'm hopeful that Eazal can bring us there and give us real ease of use without alienating the power users.
I'm pretty sure percentage-based widths are part of the standard for many individual elements (hr and the like) - though I'm uncertain if CSS supports them. Heights are more tricky since pages can, in effect, have infinite heights. Perhaps "height of the browser window" would make more sense in that regard.
Being able to select sizes in terms of characters is an interesting idea, but I don't think it should really be necessary. Just give out percentage of widths (say 10%) to each of the table columns and let the browser figure it out based on content.
Still, I wholeheartedly agree that pixel-based anything on the web is just plain evil.
I found this article about the difficulties PS2 developers have had with the system. Given how unconventional the PS2's design is, I'm going to wait and see until some games arrive before plunking down cash on it. Call me skeptical, but I don't see what all the drooling is about at present. Let's see how the launch titles shape up first.
Okay, maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration, but I didn't keep it on my Palm very long. The refresh rate of the LCD screen just isn't there, the only way to tell if you're shooting is to watch the ammo gauge decrease and the only way to tell if you're doing damage is when your enemy explodes. I won't even get started on the nasty Palm buttons for control.
Dreadling is an interesting maze demo and the 3D effect isn't half bad, but I can't imagine playing it for any length of time without getting a massive headache.
The PostgreSQL user guide is supplied in the distribution as a postscript file which you can print on your local line printer; it runs to 216 pages and is extremely detailed. Of course, you don't get a glossy cover...
I like the acrobats better for online reading, myself. But MySQL's online docs weigh in at almost 450 pages and the book is about 750. Even adding the tutorial, admin and programming docs to the PostgreSQL total doesn't bring it that high:\
I'm seriously giving PostgreSQL a try, but I think having more available documentation - especially dead tree editions - would be a big help.
It should, but it seems everybody supports the SQL standard in their own way with their own pile of added extras. By adding an extra layer I can keep the ugly work of dealing with them away from my fancy UI code.
If the differences in SQL servers are small, I won't have to change my middle layer much to switch. And if an SQL server is missing features (MySQL), a middle layer can transparently implement them for me.
I've recently had the task of creating an in-house database driven app. By splitting it into a three tier system with a layer between the DBM (initially MySQL) and the web code, I have the option of swapping out SQL servers with only a fraction of the effort of rewriting the whole system for a new database.
It may not run as blazing fast as an app tied directly to the DBM, but I consider not being tied to a specific DBM to be a Very Good Thing. Does anyone else think this is a good idea?
MySQL just released a very nice book detailing its assorted innards with plenty of in-depth coverage. I've yet to find a book anywhere on PostgreSQL (though one is being written). Online docs are nice, but I need more info before switching from a known (no matter how feature-poor) to an unknown. One book would make a world of difference.
The idea that Microsoft could take the Samba team to court is both plausable yet sickening. Aren't they presumed innocent until proven otherwise? And how would it look for their PR? "Samba team taken to court over implementation of 'open' specification"
The O'Reilly book works well enough for Python use and is a fairly good book overall. The bigger problem is Python's database unification is still pending which leaves it at a disadvantage for database work. The "official" MySQL module for Python is woefully outdated, unfortunately.
Still, much of this book's MySQL reference material can be applied to the Python module which makes it all the more useful - and the administrator stuff is priceless. I highly recommend it.
If what's being linked to isn't illegal in the country it's in, is it still illegal to link to it from Japan where it is illegal? I don't know how they're going to enforce this one...
I wouldn't hope to see Sony fail, myself. But I see far too many "Sony will crush everyone!" posts for my liking and that worries me. The console market needs competition in order to grow and thrive. If the PSX2 becomes the only game in town, I think we'll all wind up the losers in the process.
IMHO, let's cheer for market equity rather than market dominance or failure.
Slashdot Mirror
Here's a good ars-technica article comparing the various mp3 encoders. The summery is that bladeenc outdoes xing at high bitrates but read the whole article yourself to get the full picture.
Over at dumbentia. Perhaps life does imitate art.
I don't think the hassles are all that bad, myself. Chances are the programmer is already using indentation to make blocks of code more readable, so why not use that information rather than force the programmer to duplicate block-marking effort? This could pose a problem for non-monospaced editors, but I don't think a lot of programmers use those.
As for the usefulness, a semi-consistant style makes reading other peoples' code easier and it means less characters onscreen (such as { and }) for marking the starts and stops of blocks - leaving more room for code.
It's not for everyone, I'll admit, but it didn't take me long before I'd forgotten about the indentation rules entirely. Now I don't even think about them unless someone reminds me.
That's certainly a valid concern, but the nature of an open source project will undoubtedly keep the language on track. If, as you suggest, it starts moving down an unpopular path, anyone can fork the language ("Monty 1.0!") into something people prefer to use. I doubt such a drastic step will ever be necessary, but we have the power to take it if we need to.
I'm not bashing Perl, but I really think it's an ego trip for these guys. Lets put forth our efforts into Python and leave this perl nonsense alone.
According to Amazon, System Shock 2 is #25 on their software bestsellers list. Daikatana, OTOH, is #69 - right between Windows 2000 Professional Upgrade and JumpStart Typing. Ouch.
It's nice that they're planning a remote-able GUI, but until it gets an X server (presumably as an app - as opposed to merging the X server with the main GUI) for all my existing X clients to talk to, it's not going to do me much good. If there isn't an X server, perhaps writing one might ease the transition for a lot of people who want to try something new.
And here is another site that's bristling with cool Infocom info.
Surely such energy could've been harnessed for the betterment of everyone involved. Why not work with the fan community rather than against it?
If the Playstation games look better on the Dreamcast than on the PSX2, it might provide incentive for a different upgrade path than Sony had planned. Even if the titles look equally good, if both the PSX2 and Dreamcast can play old Playstation games that particular benefit is eliminated from the PSX2's favor.
Is Linux hard to use? For me, no. For most people, probably. Conversely, is Windows hard to use? Probably! Just look at all the odd little conventions, icons and little "rules" people learn to get around Windows most efficiently. The fact is, it's not as easy to use as it's made out to be and therein lies the problem.
We need a system that's truly easy to use and not Yet Another Mac/Windows Derivative. I'm hopeful that Eazal can bring us there and give us real ease of use without alienating the power users.
Being able to select sizes in terms of characters is an interesting idea, but I don't think it should really be necessary. Just give out percentage of widths (say 10%) to each of the table columns and let the browser figure it out based on content.
Still, I wholeheartedly agree that pixel-based anything on the web is just plain evil.
Then how about this article from Ars-Technica that supports much of the detail in the MSNBC one?
I found this article about the difficulties PS2 developers have had with the system. Given how unconventional the PS2's design is, I'm going to wait and see until some games arrive before plunking down cash on it. Call me skeptical, but I don't see what all the drooling is about at present. Let's see how the launch titles shape up first.
Dreadling is an interesting maze demo and the 3D effect isn't half bad, but I can't imagine playing it for any length of time without getting a massive headache.
I like the acrobats better for online reading, myself. But MySQL's online docs weigh in at almost 450 pages and the book is about 750. Even adding the tutorial, admin and programming docs to the PostgreSQL total doesn't bring it that high :\
I'm seriously giving PostgreSQL a try, but I think having more available documentation - especially dead tree editions - would be a big help.
If the differences in SQL servers are small, I won't have to change my middle layer much to switch. And if an SQL server is missing features (MySQL), a middle layer can transparently implement them for me.
It worked for me, anyway.
It may not run as blazing fast as an app tied directly to the DBM, but I consider not being tied to a specific DBM to be a Very Good Thing. Does anyone else think this is a good idea?
MySQL just released a very nice book detailing its assorted innards with plenty of in-depth coverage. I've yet to find a book anywhere on PostgreSQL (though one is being written). Online docs are nice, but I need more info before switching from a known (no matter how feature-poor) to an unknown. One book would make a world of difference.
The idea that Microsoft could take the Samba team to court is both plausable yet sickening. Aren't they presumed innocent until proven otherwise? And how would it look for their PR? "Samba team taken to court over implementation of 'open' specification"
The scary part is, it wouldn't surprise me.
Still, much of this book's MySQL reference material can be applied to the Python module which makes it all the more useful - and the administrator stuff is priceless. I highly recommend it.
If what's being linked to isn't illegal in the country it's in, is it still illegal to link to it from Japan where it is illegal? I don't know how they're going to enforce this one...
It's a nice touch for helping gamers with the transition, but they're going to need some new games if they want to sell new systems, IMHO.
IMHO, let's cheer for market equity rather than market dominance or failure.