rm: cannot remove `Stupid File that a window$': No such file or directory
rm: cannot remove `lu$er': No such file or directory
rm: cannot remove `created.mp3': No such file or directory
With jack this is as easy as pie, because the applications are driven by the JACK callback. So when it is
time for the soundcard to get its next buffer JACK simple calls the process() function of all the connected audio
applications.
Ok, I can see how this is good and all, but I think you're forgetting about geek culture here--on of the main draws of this API is if you don't know it...[you fill in the rest, I don't feel that I can bear the responsibility]
Re:Improved software engineering through genocide
on
ArsDigita Shut Down
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
Well, aside from the question of taste (I, for one, think you can find a good side in this--it is an excellent reminder of what can go wrong with things like "Red Cross inspection of concentration camps", etc), it also gives you interesting insight into how Greenspun views documentation--you can have anything the hell you want going on in engineering, build a completely different product if you want, as long as you make the documentation pretty.
So, if you are ever evaluating something this guy is running, make sure you don't let the SS guide you around. Ask for code examples that implement the documentation he tries to foist on you and reserve the right to do some random audits/unguided investigation...
It would be an interesting exercise to figure out how you would get around the "SS guides" if you were looking at a company and trying to evaluate its product.
I like the Gandhi quote, and I think it indicates one possible outcome. But consider pets.com--first they fund you, then they laugh at you, then the bubble bursts, then you lose. I mean, just because something is in the "laugh at you" stage doesn't mean it's going to get to the "win" stage, that's all I'm saying. Here's hoping that Linux, or at least something, does get rid of Windows. I wouldn't be sad at all if it was OSX.
But, hey, the real problem with Windows is the people that buy it. When we can get _that_ fixed I'll stand up and cheer.
Hmmm. I suspect a moderator is going to want a "-1, rambling" on this one...
until we are immortal there will always be time scarcity, so the coder is still giving something up by writing the code. When you have replicators there will still be stuff that people want--rare naturally produced unimitatable delicacies, sex, recognition, whatever. I don't think the post-scarcity world exists, even in principal, because people naturally move up to more esoteric "needs".
I am not a linux world attendee, so I have not experienced the letdown that these people are describing, but it reminds me of people lamenting the loss of the "cool" internet when it was just a bunch of random people putting up sites, before mass commercialization came in and "ruined everything".
I say the same thing to this as I do to that. There are still plenty of cool sites put up by random people. You still have to look for them just like you used to have to in the early days. YOU DON"T HAVE TO DO WHAT THE MASSES DO. YOU DON'T HAVE TO WATCH THEIR TV SHOWS OR LISTEN TO THEIR MUSIC.
Getting depressed about what the masses do with a new concept is silly and counterproductive. All that does is shows how much you are buying into what Madison Avenue is trying to sell. You get irked because some knockoff is getting all the attention. Well, why do you care who all the masses are being told to pay attention to? Why are you letting them tell YOU what to pay attention to?
Britney Spears does not annoy me--that may be because I never see her or hear her music. If I want to hear edgy, innovative, gutsy music I know where to look--off the beaten track. Lamenting the fact that it isn't on the radio is a waste of a lament.
Enterprise stuff may be getting all the industry/press/expo attention right now, but that doesn't stop a single GPL/open source product from getting done, nor should it have any bearing on our passion for the freedom, quality, and community of open source/free software.
Personally, I am thrilled to see people there to make money. And an important part of that is just the "to see people there" part. With this economy we should totally expect that a lot of the fun, innovative, exciting, and cutting edge stuff would be gone. A lot of that was funded by the pre-bubble-burst wild-eyed investment community. The fact that ANYBODY showed up this year is wonderful. And if IBM and HP are not only there, but completely bullish on linux's future, well, I'm ecstatic. It's a huge victory for us that they are there at all, and that they are as enthusiastic as they seem to be.
Linux in the enterprise might not be what excites you about Linux, but it is still an exciting possibility.
These may well be the people that create your next Linux using job--I say we welcome them with hearty handshakes and reciprocal enthusiasm.
I'm sorry, but this kind of posting is NOT ALLOWED on Slashdot. First, it is concise. Second, well reasoned. Third, you referenced and linked to BOTH "free software" definitions and "open source" definitions.
I don't think you realize what you are doing here. For one thing, you are supposed to come down hard on one side or the other. You are really going to tweak peoples' paradigms if you start bringing things up that indicate COMPATIBILITY between the Open Source and free software camps.
For another thing, you aren't supposed to be informative and clear on stuff. Look, just take a cue from the editors. They can take the simplest little news story, not read it, and post it here with one-sided innuendo and a headline implying some sinister plot. That is the very stuff that Slashdot thrives on. And here you, in all your arrogance, think that you can just post one concise informative message and defuse all that the editors and people posting replies have worked so hard to build?
I move that we create a new moderation category-- -1 unSlashdotlike. If we can't create controversy where none exists, I ask you, where would Slashdot be? Hmmm? And you, with your simple statement of the facts and links back to the sources, you are exactly the kind of element that is going to ruin this place for the rest of us.
I'm sure the moderator just slipped, and meant +1, funny instead of -1 offtopic. How come I never see these guys in meta-mod?
We need some kind of catchphrase for moderation like this. Humorless Nazi Moderator or something. Then we can reply to posts like this with "HMN Alert" or "Dude, ignore the HMN, I thought it was funny."
You are right. I didn't intend to go to the other extreme. What I should have emphasized is that visualization can often make a remarkably valuable contribution towards insight or understanding, and often it does so in places that are not traditionally approached through visualization.
I can certainly believe that there are situations or mental dispositions for which this is not the case, and they may even be the majority.
There's a mathematician who used to be quite active in developing Perl's regular expression code (Ilya za[something]) who created a Perl module that lets you use a very powerful and extensive mathematical library called PARI. I believe the extension is called Math::Pari, and it's available on CPAN.
ok, I just looked it up, here's a blurb from the documentation:
Package Math::Pari is a Perl interface to famous library PARI for
numerical/scientific/number-theoretic calculations. It allows use of
most PARI functions (>500) as Perl functions, and (almost) seamless merging
of PARI and Perl data.
One thing I would advise you--use visualization aggressively. There was a tendency in mathematics for a long time to de-emphasize the geometrical/physical aspects of systems as being sort of extraneous--i.e., it doesn't matter what the parabola looks like, just what its mathematical properties are. Well, in short, this is stupid. Your visual cortex is an amazingly powerful processor, and it's dumb to tie one of your brain's hands behind its back just because someone a few centuries back had a theoretical axe to grind.
Always ask yourself "is there some way I can visualize what's going on here?". You will leap far ahead of where you would be otherwise.
Just in case (and for any non-math people reading this) Do not write programs to do math brefore you take a
numerical mythods class, and a theory of computing class.
You need to understand the limits of numbers on computers, what the error is, and so on before you can write
a program that is worth touching.
quite to the contrary, there is no better time to experiement than the present, with your current level of knowledge. You should be messaing around, trying things, seeing what works. Maybe you shouldn't attempt to sell your work as a fast, small competitor to Mathematica, but, by all means, experiment.
The more you have played around with this stuff on your own, the more you will get out of those classes when you take them. Never let anyone succeed in scaring you away from trying.
When I was taking numerical methods, I was in there because I had to be. There was another student in there with way less "raw mathematical talent" than me, but who was doing much better at "getting it" than I was because he was going home and messing around with the stuff on his computer. In fact, during the course he noticed an interesting pattern in his graphs, and brought it to the professor. If I recall correctly they published a paper on the result.
Theory is important, too, but the real way that theory is developed is that people mess around with stuff for a long time, develop some intuition, and then try to formally show that their intuition is correct. In classes they try to do this in the opposite direction--"here's the theory, try to develop some intuition about it".
You will be way ahead of the game if you already have experience trying stuff.
"I hate to say it, but I can't think of any easy way out of this problem."
you said:
"Create employment law that protects the worker, the industry, and the community? Just a thought..."
Ok, I can think of an easy way out, too. Kill everyone. But we want easy AND good. And I'm sure you think you are proposing something good. But I don't think you are thinking about how much damage your laws can do.
I lived in Belgium for six months. Part of the time I was there I was at a hotel, where the owner was working his ass off, long hours, little vacation. Some huge fraction of his money was going to pay young, healthy kids to do nothing. He couldn't find people to work for him. Why work when you can sit around and still get enough from "the government" (read "those the government has extorted money from") to live on?
I'm not saying that there is _no_ place for regulation. I am saying, though, that you have to be very careful. Yes, a civilized society can take the edge off of the human condition, prevent you from having to spend all your time as a hunter-gatherer when you are between jobs, etc. But if you take too much of the edge off, people quit trying--and it's your fault. You have "helped" them into being completely unproductive.
Not to mention that you do this by taking the money from people who are working for it. Maybe you can do that successfully, but there will be backlash. You have to figure our the right balance, and it's not easy. "More laws" should only be the absolute last resort.
Here's what I think would go perfectly with this acquisition--put some serious resources into WINE, and then offer an "OS upgrade" (free of charge) with the next client upgrade. Keep all the user's windows apps, just run them with WINE under AOLinux. Now the whole computer is as easy to use and dependabe as AOL itself has always been...
"Would it be in their national interest to put a chemical that slowly leaches into Westerner's systems, causing cancer or just stupifying the society (i.e. lead)"
They tried this, but the effect was negligible compared to the efforts that prime time television was already making in that direction.
It is the best of news, it is the worst of news. It is another encroachment of evil corporations, it is a victory for Free Software. It is the spring of hope, it is the winter of despair. It is completely believable, it is completely incredible. It was modded down as overrated, it was modded up as funny...
(that strange sound you're hearing is Dickens spinning in his grave)
The joke was supposed to be that PETA probably wouldn't look too kindly on the production of such an animal in the first place, much less approve of using it once you have created it.
Does Win4Lin still have the annoying 64MB of RAM limit?
Yep.:). But I am pretty sure I heard that it will be gone in 4.0. It's not just the 64k, but something about how swap is handled, too. Both are addressed in the 4.0 release if I understand correctly.
...is that sooner or later we'll see a patent on it. "Method for releasing small incremental change file to propagate fixes in large distributions." or something like that.
Slashdot Mirror
...[checks usage manual]...Yep! "Stalks" is _present_ tense, just like I thought...
rm: cannot remove `Stupid File that a window$': No such file or directory
rm: cannot remove `lu$er': No such file or directory
rm: cannot remove `created.mp3': No such file or directory
sorry, couldn't resist
Ok, I can see how this is good and all, but I think you're forgetting about geek culture here--on of the main draws of this API is if you don't know it...[you fill in the rest, I don't feel that I can bear the responsibility]
Well, aside from the question of taste (I, for one, think you can find a good side in this--it is an excellent reminder of what can go wrong with things like "Red Cross inspection of concentration camps", etc), it also gives you interesting insight into how Greenspun views documentation--you can have anything the hell you want going on in engineering, build a completely different product if you want, as long as you make the documentation pretty.
So, if you are ever evaluating something this guy is running, make sure you don't let the SS guide you around. Ask for code examples that implement the documentation he tries to foist on you and reserve the right to do some random audits/unguided investigation...
It would be an interesting exercise to figure out how you would get around the "SS guides" if you were looking at a company and trying to evaluate its product.
I like the Gandhi quote, and I think it indicates one possible outcome. But consider pets.com--first they fund you, then they laugh at you, then the bubble bursts, then you lose. I mean, just because something is in the "laugh at you" stage doesn't mean it's going to get to the "win" stage, that's all I'm saying. Here's hoping that Linux, or at least something, does get rid of Windows. I wouldn't be sad at all if it was OSX.
But, hey, the real problem with Windows is the people that buy it. When we can get _that_ fixed I'll stand up and cheer.
Hmmm. I suspect a moderator is going to want a "-1, rambling" on this one...
Anyway, I really hope you're right.
Sweet! Bookmarked, thanks!
until we are immortal there will always be time scarcity, so the coder is still giving something up by writing the code. When you have replicators there will still be stuff that people want--rare naturally produced unimitatable delicacies, sex, recognition, whatever. I don't think the post-scarcity world exists, even in principal, because people naturally move up to more esoteric "needs".
I am not a linux world attendee, so I have not experienced the letdown that these people are describing, but it reminds me of people lamenting the loss of the "cool" internet when it was just a bunch of random people putting up sites, before mass commercialization came in and "ruined everything".
I say the same thing to this as I do to that. There are still plenty of cool sites put up by random people. You still have to look for them just like you used to have to in the early days. YOU DON"T HAVE TO DO WHAT THE MASSES DO. YOU DON'T HAVE TO WATCH THEIR TV SHOWS OR LISTEN TO THEIR MUSIC.
Getting depressed about what the masses do with a new concept is silly and counterproductive. All that does is shows how much you are buying into what Madison Avenue is trying to sell. You get irked because some knockoff is getting all the attention. Well, why do you care who all the masses are being told to pay attention to? Why are you letting them tell YOU what to pay attention to?
Britney Spears does not annoy me--that may be because I never see her or hear her music. If I want to hear edgy, innovative, gutsy music I know where to look--off the beaten track. Lamenting the fact that it isn't on the radio is a waste of a lament.
Enterprise stuff may be getting all the industry/press/expo attention right now, but that doesn't stop a single GPL/open source product from getting done, nor should it have any bearing on our passion for the freedom, quality, and community of open source/free software.
Personally, I am thrilled to see people there to make money. And an important part of that is just the "to see people there" part. With this economy we should totally expect that a lot of the fun, innovative, exciting, and cutting edge stuff would be gone. A lot of that was funded by the pre-bubble-burst wild-eyed investment community. The fact that ANYBODY showed up this year is wonderful. And if IBM and HP are not only there, but completely bullish on linux's future, well, I'm ecstatic. It's a huge victory for us that they are there at all, and that they are as enthusiastic as they seem to be.
Linux in the enterprise might not be what excites you about Linux, but it is still an exciting possibility.
These may well be the people that create your next Linux using job--I say we welcome them with hearty handshakes and reciprocal enthusiasm.
"The DMCA--Keeping the blind in the dark since [insert year found from google search I was too lazy to do]"
We should make up a bunch of these and send a big box to each of the offices of the law's big proponents.
I'm sorry, but this kind of posting is NOT ALLOWED on Slashdot. First, it is concise. Second, well reasoned. Third, you referenced and linked to BOTH "free software" definitions and "open source" definitions.
I don't think you realize what you are doing here. For one thing, you are supposed to come down hard on one side or the other. You are really going to tweak peoples' paradigms if you start bringing things up that indicate COMPATIBILITY between the Open Source and free software camps.
For another thing, you aren't supposed to be informative and clear on stuff. Look, just take a cue from the editors. They can take the simplest little news story, not read it, and post it here with one-sided innuendo and a headline implying some sinister plot. That is the very stuff that Slashdot thrives on. And here you, in all your arrogance, think that you can just post one concise informative message and defuse all that the editors and people posting replies have worked so hard to build?
I move that we create a new moderation category-- -1 unSlashdotlike. If we can't create controversy where none exists, I ask you, where would Slashdot be? Hmmm? And you, with your simple statement of the facts and links back to the sources, you are exactly the kind of element that is going to ruin this place for the rest of us.
Sigh. Kids these days, I tell ya...
I'm sure the moderator just slipped, and meant +1, funny instead of -1 offtopic. How come I never see these guys in meta-mod?
We need some kind of catchphrase for moderation like this. Humorless Nazi Moderator or something. Then we can reply to posts like this with "HMN Alert" or "Dude, ignore the HMN, I thought it was funny."
You are right. I didn't intend to go to the other extreme. What I should have emphasized is that visualization can often make a remarkably valuable contribution towards insight or understanding, and often it does so in places that are not traditionally approached through visualization.
I can certainly believe that there are situations or mental dispositions for which this is not the case, and they may even be the majority.
ok, I just looked it up, here's a blurb from the documentation:
One thing I would advise you--use visualization aggressively. There was a tendency in mathematics for a long time to de-emphasize the geometrical/physical aspects of systems as being sort of extraneous--i.e., it doesn't matter what the parabola looks like, just what its mathematical properties are. Well, in short, this is stupid. Your visual cortex is an amazingly powerful processor, and it's dumb to tie one of your brain's hands behind its back just because someone a few centuries back had a theoretical axe to grind.
Always ask yourself "is there some way I can visualize what's going on here?". You will leap far ahead of where you would be otherwise.
good luck.
mike
quite to the contrary, there is no better time to experiement than the present, with your current level of knowledge. You should be messaing around, trying things, seeing what works. Maybe you shouldn't attempt to sell your work as a fast, small competitor to Mathematica, but, by all means, experiment.
The more you have played around with this stuff on your own, the more you will get out of those classes when you take them. Never let anyone succeed in scaring you away from trying.
When I was taking numerical methods, I was in there because I had to be. There was another student in there with way less "raw mathematical talent" than me, but who was doing much better at "getting it" than I was because he was going home and messing around with the stuff on his computer. In fact, during the course he noticed an interesting pattern in his graphs, and brought it to the professor. If I recall correctly they published a paper on the result.
Theory is important, too, but the real way that theory is developed is that people mess around with stuff for a long time, develop some intuition, and then try to formally show that their intuition is correct. In classes they try to do this in the opposite direction--"here's the theory, try to develop some intuition about it".
You will be way ahead of the game if you already have experience trying stuff.
in reply to:
"I hate to say it, but I can't think of any easy way out of this problem."
you said:
"Create employment law that protects the worker, the industry, and the community? Just a thought..."
Ok, I can think of an easy way out, too. Kill everyone. But we want easy AND good. And I'm sure you think you are proposing something good. But I don't think you are thinking about how much damage your laws can do.
I lived in Belgium for six months. Part of the time I was there I was at a hotel, where the owner was working his ass off, long hours, little vacation. Some huge fraction of his money was going to pay young, healthy kids to do nothing. He couldn't find people to work for him. Why work when you can sit around and still get enough from "the government" (read "those the government has extorted money from") to live on?
I'm not saying that there is _no_ place for regulation. I am saying, though, that you have to be very careful. Yes, a civilized society can take the edge off of the human condition, prevent you from having to spend all your time as a hunter-gatherer when you are between jobs, etc. But if you take too much of the edge off, people quit trying--and it's your fault. You have "helped" them into being completely unproductive.
Not to mention that you do this by taking the money from people who are working for it. Maybe you can do that successfully, but there will be backlash. You have to figure our the right balance, and it's not easy. "More laws" should only be the absolute last resort.
Here's what I think would go perfectly with this acquisition--put some serious resources into WINE, and then offer an "OS upgrade" (free of charge) with the next client upgrade. Keep all the user's windows apps, just run them with WINE under AOLinux. Now the whole computer is as easy to use and dependabe as AOL itself has always been...
or something like that.
"Would it be in their national interest to put a chemical that slowly leaches into Westerner's systems, causing cancer or just stupifying the society (i.e. lead)"
They tried this, but the effect was negligible compared to the efforts that prime time television was already making in that direction.
It is the best of news, it is the worst of news. It is another encroachment of evil corporations, it is a victory for Free Software. It is the spring of hope, it is the winter of despair. It is completely believable, it is completely incredible. It was modded down as overrated, it was modded up as funny...
(that strange sound you're hearing is Dickens spinning in his grave)
The joke was supposed to be that PETA probably wouldn't look too kindly on the production of such an animal in the first place, much less approve of using it once you have created it.
...if that's not a reason to quit drinking sea water, I don't know what is!
Yep. :). But I am pretty sure I heard that it will be gone in 4.0. It's not just the 64k, but something about how swap is handled, too. Both are addressed in the 4.0 release if I understand correctly.
So, I'm guessing that this will be the end of PETA's objections to animal testing. Right? Yes?
I think the title of this was supposed to be "SmoothWall, Gopher Be"--yoda.
Doesn't he tell Anakin this in the second prequel?
he's asleep for a hundred years and wakes up to find out that they have completely changed the spelling of his name!
...is that sooner or later we'll see a patent on it. "Method for releasing small incremental change file to propagate fixes in large distributions." or something like that.
:)