I think its important that we be able to communicate without the government knowing what we say. I wasn't aware that this made me a terrorist!! I'm so upset! And I thought I loved my country! Where do I go to turn myself in? Could you help me out with directions on Mapquest maybe?
Also, something else I just realized - I haven't told my employer about some of the thoughts I've been having lately. I got a really neat idea, having to do with encrypted processing and secure software sales - shit I shouldn't say much more, cause I guess my employer owns my ideas and someone else might see them here and run us out of business! Then we're *all* fucked!
my girlfriend had a friend in one of the airplanes that went down. anyone who calls for forgiveness and not retaliation for this act should have to pick one of their friends to be killed and then see how they feel. fucking barbarians.
Do you think innocent people aren't going to die when we retaliate? Do you think innocent people aren't going to die when the terrorists respond to our retaliation?
If our retaliation were to consist of 30 bullets to the heads of all terrorist leaders, thats great - I'm all for it. But I'm very weary of the words I'm already hearing from the pentagon - threats against any nation that harbors terrorists. That doesn't mean we're targeting terrorists, specifically, you know.
The obvious mechanical response to violence is more violence... but violence doesn't solve violence - you don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out.
And I don't think anyone has read it. Its sitting 3 levels down in some thread next to 5 other comments with the same subject (I should have retitled mine - duh!)
So, here is my take on this whole issue, in response to the comments in italics.
Just becuase your "art" is useless and mine is functional does not make us any different.
Having gone through 6 years of intense programming, and followed it with 3 years of intense music production, I'm in a somewhat unique position to comment on the above paragraph.
I agree that programming and music are both art. However, I take serious offense to your comment about music being a "useless" art.
Are you ready to read?
I can't write a song that will add any two numbers. I can't write a song that enables the listener to run through corridors and chase other listeners down with rocket launchers.
I can, however, write a song that helps give a person insight into their relationships with other people. I can write a song that makes someone laugh, or smile.
At this point, it still might not be so obvious to you that music is important. Why do you think people bother to make music, anyway? Lets look to one of my biggest musical inspirations. Bjork, in a recent interview, talked a little bit about why she began producing solo CD's (at the age of 26 or 27 - she's 35 now). You can watch the entire interview here: damnit, the site couldn't handle the traffic but just in case someone comes through with a mirror, check out http://63.67.107.43/bjork/. I'll have to paraphrase: She explained that very often a book, a song, a movie, or a story, would be exactly what she needed to feel better about something that was bothering her. Something of a magical cure, I guess? She looked at the names of people on CD's and books, and realized how much they had sacrificed just to create their works and have them distributed. All that work just to make her feel better. She set out on a mission to do the same for others, and 4 CD's later she's far along that path.
I look back on my obsession with programming, and its quite clear to me why I devoted so much time to it - its a perfect creative outlet and a very effective escape from reality. When you're 72 consecutive hours into a coding binge, you're in a different world. The unpredictability of social situations are at a safe distance. You don't think about things like your appearance, your odor, whether or not people like you, whats happening in asian sweatshops, or what sort of evil is being planned in those 12 levels of management above you. You are in control of the world - there's you, your keyboard, mouse, data structures, control statements, functions, registers, libraries, memory, a video card, a sound card, some speakers, and a monitor. There is nothing else. (And people wonder why ego-centrism is a characteristic commen to so many coders, heh)
I got a job in the industry, and quickly learned that when someone is paying you to code, your creative options are a bit more limited. Unless you're the lead programmer, the best you can hope to do is come up with a creative way to solve whatever problem is being put in front of you. For me, this amount of creative control wasn't enough. It wasn't fun. Programming, which had been my ultimate creative outlet, was now just a chore. Sure I was making money and could pay my rent, but I lived at the office. Whats more, I worked at a computer all day on things related to my job - the last thing I wanted to do when I got home was spend more time at the keyboard working - even if it was on personal projects. There's only so much time one can spend sitting at one of these things. I was no longer able to enjoy programming as I once had, so I returned to college and got back on my parents payroll. (A side note, overaggressive intellectual property clauses in employee contracts make outside-the-job coding projects even more difficult.)
When you throw something like an intense addiction to programming into the garbage can, there is no escape from reality. You've got to fucking figure it out. This is when books, paintings, music, and other traditional art forms came into my life. They helped! I was trying to deal with the fact that some girl wasn't calling me back or (gasp) responding to my emails, and Bjork sang to me "Give her some time, give her some space", and everything was better. I was sad about something so intangible, that it took Beck's "Mutations" to turn my frown into a grin. I was so upset with everyone in America being so goddamn *motionless* - I wanted to move! So I immersed myself in the aggressive dancefloor rhythms that are collectively known as "Jungle" or "Drum and Bass". I don't suppose you understand the therapeutic value of dancing until you're dripping with sweat?
A more generic example: Some people simply feel better when they hear a beautiful voice.
My father used to play classical music for me as a child, and I would pretend to be the conductor (plastic straw in hand, flowing with the beat). I spent some time in high school (coincidentally the same time I began programming) writing music with Cakewalk 2.0 and a midi-based synth workstation (Korg X5). However, music never really stirred me deeply until after I began confronting the reality of my life, in college, on the planet earth.
The difference is that I have to go to work for hours and create art every single working day of the week. You on the other hand are only asked to create art for a few hours every so often. You have ZERO right to make money just because you think you deserve it. You have to earn it just like the rest of us.
I've come to realize that, through music, I have the ability to effect people's lives in a positive way - and in such a unique way! I enjoy it immensely, its fufilling for me as well as others, and (fuck you!) its challenging! I'm not Britney Spears - I don't work on music "every so often" - I *live* in my studio. I'm writing music just about every day - to the point where I go through withdrawal when I'm on vacations (like this weekend, for instance).
Schlockmeisters in LA and New York can cookie-cut and sell over a million pop album's in a matter of months - but that music is fast food garbage. Its filler. Its an advertisement for itself. And for some strange reason, the only thing that ever seems to be gleaned from it is that the most important things in life are sex, money, and being cool. How convenient for the rest of the entertainment industry, which specializes in these products.
The real problem is, organizations like the RIAA have built up the notion in your (and my, and the whole world's) head that being "creative" is some magical ability that few people possess in any quantity.
In my entire life, I've met about 10 other people who take music as seriously as I do, and who devote as much time to it as I do. I've met about 10 million other people. Being creative is not a magical ability, you are right - and it could even be argued that making music is not a magical ability. There *is* something special about everyone - but not everyone devotes themselves to music so wholeheartedly that their incomes depend on it. Those who chose to are entitled to do so, though you may believe they are not.
Nevermind that for hundreds of thousands of years humans have been artistic just fine without the need for superstardom. Today you we taught that musicians/actors/artists/etc. are so special and rare that we must pay a hefty percentage of our GDP to thier masters simply because who knows when such talent will ever been seen on this earth again, right? Well, I'm sorry to break it to you, but we are all talented, we are all artists. We can't help it.
The ones who teach "celebrity" have always been the ones selling it. Most of the "superstar musicians" you're exposed to in American pop culture aren't really musicians anyway - they're puppets. You can't blame musicians for that sick circus.
Making money off of art is like making money of of breathing. Everybody does it, no one has some "right" because they happen to have asthma. By trying to make a living off of music, you are simply perputrating the notion that music is something that is rare enough or difficult enough to make a living doing. You are contributing to the death of music and humanity's musical soul far more effectivly than any sort of "Open Music License", my friend.
As I said earlier, everyone has the right to chose their profession, so long as it doesn't infringe upon the rights of others. Given that this is a country defined by its capitalism, none of us will be able to make any money unless we sell something. Our programming skills, maybe. Our salesmanship. Our unique ability with scissors and hair.
Both the GPL and OAL licenses are absolutely great for stimulating interest and creativity in the fields they apply to. However, neither will help pay the rent.
I do plan on releasing some music under the OAL (now that I've heard about it) and when I get back into coding, I'll probably release some code under the GPL too. I've released code before too [rwth-aachen.de], you know - before I really knew what the GPL was all about.
My advice to musicians? Work your fucking heart out and sell the fruits of your labor. If you end up with lots of experiments gone wrong, or just lots of doodles, or you just don't really give a shit about what happens to a particular piece of your music, don't let it sit in your vault - release it under the OAL. Someone, somewhere, will learn something from it. Just make sure you don't plan on using any samples of it in future works for sale:).
Just becuase your "art" is useless and mine is functional does not make us any different.
Having gone through 6 years of intense programming, and followed it with 3 years of intense music production, I'm in a somewhat unique position to comment on the above paragraph.
I agree that programming and music are both art. However, I take serious offense to your comment about music being a "useless" art.
Are you ready to read?
I can't write a song that will add any two numbers. I can't write a song that enables the listener to run through corridors and chase other listeners down with rocket launchers.
I can, however, write a song that helps give a person insight into their relationships with other people. I can write a song that makes someone laugh, or smile.
At this point, it still might not be so obvious to you that music is important. Why do you think people bother to make music, anyway? Lets look to one of my biggest musical inspirations. Bjork, in a recent interview, talked a little bit about why she began producing solo CD's (at the age of 26 or 27 - she's 35 now). You can watch the entire interview here: damnit, the site couldn't handle the traffic but just in case someone comes through with a mirror, check out http://63.67.107.43/bjork/. I'll have to paraphrase: She explained that very often a book, a song, a movie, or a story, would be exactly what she needed to feel better about something that was bothering her. Something of a magical cure, I guess? She looked at the names of people on CD's and books, and realized how much they had sacrificed just to create their works and have them distributed. All that work just to make her feel better. She set out on a mission to do the same for others, and 4 CD's later she's far along that path.
I look back on my obsession with programming, and its quite clear to me why I devoted so much time to it - its a perfect creative outlet and a very effective escape from reality. When you're 72 consecutive hours into a coding binge, you're in a different world. The unpredictability of social situations are at a safe distance. You don't think about things like your appearance, your odor, whether or not people like you, whats happening in asian sweatshops, or what sort of evil is being planned in those 12 levels of management above you. You are in control of the world - there's you, your keyboard, mouse, data structures, control statements, functions, registers, libraries, memory, a video card, a sound card, some speakers, and a monitor. There is nothing else. (And people wonder why ego-centrism is a characteristic commen to so many coders, heh)
I got a job in the industry, and quickly learned that when someone is paying you to code, your creative options are a bit more limited. Unless you're the lead programmer, the best you can hope to do is come up with a creative way to solve whatever problem is being put in front of you. For me, this amount of creative control wasn't enough. It wasn't fun. Programming, which had been my ultimate creative outlet, was now just a chore. Sure I was making money and could pay my rent, but I lived at the office. Whats more, I worked at a computer all day on things related to my job - the last thing I wanted to do when I got home was spend more time at the keyboard working - even if it was on personal projects. There's only so much time one can spend sitting at one of these things. I was no longer able to enjoy programming as I once had, so I returned to college and got back on my parents payroll. (A side note, overaggressive intellectual property clauses in employee contracts make outside-the-job coding projects even more difficult.)
When you throw something like an intense addiction to programming into the garbage can, there is no escape from reality. You've got to fucking figure it out. This is when books, paintings, music, and other traditional art forms came into my life. They helped! I was trying to deal with the fact that some girl wasn't calling me back or (gasp) responding to my emails, and Bjork sang to me "Give her some time, give her some space", and everything was better. I was sad about something so intangible, that it took Beck's "Mutations" to turn my frown into a grin. I was so upset with everyone in America being so goddamn *motionless* - I wanted to move! So I immersed myself in the aggressive dancefloor rhythms that are collectively known as "Jungle" or "Drum and Bass". I don't suppose you understand the therapeutic value of dancing until you're dripping with sweat?
A more generic example: Some people simply feel better when they hear a beautiful voice.
My father used to play classical music for me as a child, and I would pretend to be the conductor (plastic straw in hand, flowing with the beat). I spent some time in high school (coincidentally the same time I began programming) writing music with Cakewalk 2.0 and a midi-based synth workstation (Korg X5). However, music never really stirred me deeply until after I began confronting the reality of my life, in college, on the planet earth. The difference is that I have to go to work for hours and create art every single working day of the week. You on the other hand are only asked to create art for a few hours every so often. You have ZERO right to make money just because you think you deserve it. You have to earn it just like the rest of us.
I've come to realize that, through music, I have the ability to effect people's lives in a positive way - and in such a unique way! I enjoy it immensely, its fufilling for me as well as others, and (fuck you!) its challenging! I'm not Britney Spears - I don't work on music "every so often" - I *live* in my studio. I'm writing music just about every day - to the point where I go through withdrawal when I'm on vacations (like this weekend, for instance).
Schlockmeisters in LA and New York can cookie-cut and sell over a million pop album's in a matter of months - but that music is fast food garbage. Its filler. Its an advertisement for itself. And for some strange reason, the only thing that ever seems to be gleaned from it is that the most important things in life are sex, money, and being cool. How convenient for the rest of the entertainment industry, which specializes in these products. The real problem is, organizations like the RIAA have built up the notion in your (and my, and the whole world's) head that being "creative" is some magical ability that few people possess in any quantity.
In my entire life, I've met about 10 other people who take music as seriously as I do, and who devote as much time to it as I do. I've met about 10 million other people. Being creative is not a magical ability, you are right - and it could even be argued that making music is not a magical ability. There *is* something special about everyone - but not everyone devotes themselves to music so wholeheartedly that their incomes depend on it. Those who chose to are entitled to do so, though you may believe they are not. Nevermind that for hundreds of thousands of years humans have been artistic just fine without the need for superstardom. Today you we taught that musicians/actors/artists/etc. are so special and rare that we must pay a hefty percentage of our GDP to thier masters simply because who knows when such talent will ever been seen on this earth again, right? Well, I'm sorry to break it to you, but we are all talented, we are all artists. We can't help it.
The ones who teach "celebrity" have always been the ones selling it. Most of the "superstar musicians" you're exposed to in American pop culture aren't really musicians anyway - they're puppets. You can't blame musicians for that sick circus. Making money off of art is like making money of of breathing. Everybody does it, no one has some "right" because they happen to have asthma. By trying to make a living off of music, you are simply perputrating the notion that music is something that is rare enough or difficult enough to make a living doing. You are contributing to the death of music and humanity's musical soul far more effectivly than any sort of "Open Music License", my friend.
As I said earlier, everyone has the right to chose their profession, so long as it doesn't infringe upon the rights of others. Given that this is a country defined by its capitalism, none of us will be able to make any money unless we sell something. Our programming skills, maybe. Our salesmanship. Our unique ability with scissors and hair.
Both the GPL and OAL licenses are absolutely great for stimulating interest and creativity in the fields they apply to. However, neither will help pay the rent.
I do plan on releasing some music under the OAL (now that I've heard about it) and when I get back into coding, I'll probably release some code under the GPL too. I've released code before too, you know - before I really knew what the GPL was all about.
My advice to musicians? Work your fucking heart out and sell the fruits of your labor. If you end up with lots of experiments gone wrong, or just lots of doodles, or you just don't really give a shit about what happens to a particular piece of your music, don't let it sit in your vault - release it under the OAL. Someone, somewhere, will learn something from it. Just make sure you don't plan on using any samples of it in future works for sale:).
I wasn't talking about removing the watermark. Its obvious that the SDMI coalition is having the contest because they want to
1) learn about any hackable flaws in their watermarking system
2) fix them before setting the standard
My point was that its pointless anyway because even if they accomplish #1 and #2, there are still going to be ways around their silly little format (removing watermarks or not).
In the off-chance that SDMI does create a file format that is not hackable, there are things they still won't be able to get around:
1) A bogus.dll/.vxd that implements the Win32 WaveOut() API and writes raw audio to disk. (similar things can be done on all OS's)
2) Connecting line-out to the line-in.
In fact, I'm surprised #1 doesn't exist already. Granted, these aren't true solutions because at least 1 person, somewhere, will have to buy the SDMI encrypted file and play it into the device driver.. but after that, ta-da.
Furthermore, who's to say that some hacker won't just hack the SDMI player they provide and force it to play unauthorized copies? In that scenario, they wouldn't even have to bother decoding or detecting watermarks..
Everyone reading this knows that few things in the digital domain can be considered "property". Everything is inherently copyable. Big corporations still have it in their head that there's some magical way to apply the old buy/sell model but eventually they're going to realize that it just doesn't work that way with
digital content.
This is a scary fact because once that becomes common knowledge, there will be a huge corporate push to eliminate what we now call the Internet (where free exchange of data is possible via ftp, http, et all) in favor of a closely-controlled network where all transactions are monitored, and all data accounted for. Don't act surprised either - politics are owned by the company now. It might sound ridiculous (to us) to enact a law making ftp illegal. However, it makes perfect sense to a corporation.
This is why all of you should be voting for Ralph Nader in November. www.nader2000.org
Obviously, going to college to learn something you already have a mastery of is a waste of your time and money, as well as a waste of the school's resources.
Something I've noticed about the cream-of-the-crop coders is that we teach ourselves more than schools do anyway. I've dropped out (for the 2nd time now) because at this point, the CS department isn't going to teach me anything I can't learn on my own.
I can honestly say that the amount of computer-related knowledge I aquired (and retained) at school would have taken me less than a month to learn on my own time. HOWEVER, I shudder to think about what sort of person I'd be had I not gone to college for 6 months in 1996, and a a year and a half in 98-99.
I am considering returning to school to study something else - psychology perhaps. One of the posts joked about making sure you go to a school with lots of women - a perfectly valid suggestion, especially given that plenty of us techies have a level of social skills that approach absolute 0. College is good for more than teaching you what you need to know to get a job.
This is a good question and.. really the only way to answer it is to write the be-all-end-all audio software application, port it to all OS's, and pick the winner.
I've been working on this be-all-end-all audio software since March.
I am actually designing what could be considered an "Audio Software Operating System" or an "Electronic Music Studio Simulator". It has its own graphics library, user input interfaces, audio interfaces, midi interfaces, file interfaces, etc. One can think of audio applications as "modules", which have their inputs and outputs routable to any other module in the system (this routing is determined GRAPHICALLY, similar to the interface found in the Nord Modular software and the Reaktor soft-synth software). I have a simple "Acid"-like module already working, and soon I'll begin working on the more bread-and-butter modules like oscillators, filters, samplers, effects, etc.
Developing for my software requires learning its API's - this is always a stubmling block for programmers. However, it is essential in order to achieve portability. The nice thing about writing audio software to my API's is that your applications can be run on any OS that my system has been ported to (MacOs, Beos, and QNX ports are planned). Only a recompilation of your module is required (no rewriting).
I am developing on Win32 because it is the development platform I've been using for 4 years. I've implemented my graphics API with both DirectDraw and GDI (user selectable). I've implemented my sound API with ASIO and MME (also user selectable). Menu's, fonts, controls, Windows, and the like, have been written from scratch, making use of my graphics API for drawing, and the Win32 WindowProc() for distributing mouse/keyboard messages.
More info on the software/os is at www.treyharrison.com. If you'd like to help contribute to the software, my email is on the site. I'm working by myself right now, but will
soon be looking for people to contribute modules.
Lets face it. Sony can't buy the internet. They can't firewall our individual PC's. But Heckler is right - they WILL DO ANYTHING to protect their revenue stream. Here are some hypothetical situations to be aware of:
Everyone, eventually, buys new hardware. It doesn't happen too often.. but it does happen. Everyone upgrades. What is to stop Sony and/or other manufacturers from selling us hardware that is based on censoring or encrypting data? Suppose they DO come up with a scheme to encrypt music and video all the way to the electron gun or the D/A convertor, and suppose further that they intentionally price these products substantially lower than competition (because they can afford to). Then what? Even though you and I know better than to buy these things, Joe Blow America doesn't, and its only a matter of time before it becomes impossible or extremely cost-inefficient to purchase "open" hardware.
Encrypted processing:
Its also only a matter of time before company X develops a consumer-level processor that executes encrypted code. Imagine a public key / private key setup (lengthy private key stored inside the processor, *NOT* accessible). This architecture could be used to encrypt downloadable software: The website dynamically creates encrypted exe's from the public key you submit when you buy it. Instructions are decrypted and executed in CPU memory (*NOT* accessible) - imagine trying to hack CSS without being able to read the code. To saturate the market with these things, all company X has to do is price their processor lower than everyone elses (and what software and/or IP-oriented company wouldn't be willing to subsidize such a scheme if it meant guaranteed protection of their data?).
So -- don't think that just because everything is open now, it can't be closed later. Just about anything is possible, period. Never forget that. Its up to us to make sure that the "right" things happen. Corporations can do everything in the world to protect their revenue stream - but they can't survive if we don't buy from them.
DO NOT SUPPORT COMPANIES WHOSE GOALS ARE TO CENSOR, BLOCK, OR RESTRICT ACCESS TO INFORMATION. If you do that, you open the censorship door just a smidgen. If we all do that, we fuck ourselves. It might cost you more to buy the "right" products. Don't let that stop you.
How eager will Sony be to include censoring / blocking hardware in the US PSX2 or PSX3 if millions of geeks undertake the fairly simple task of NOT buying it. In the end, no company can dictate what their customers will and won't buy - as consumers we have to be aware of who tries to take advantage of us, and not give them our money.
I did some searches of the more common rom extensions (fig, smc, sfc) - apparently RomNet shares your entire hard drive. Just about everyone seems to have a C:\windows\default.sfc - and I'm pretty sure thats not a rom. Someone else had stuff in a directory called \lotus\ which looks like it contains some sort of database stuff..
It sounds to me like he's one of the few people more interested in his own interests than the typical capitalist nirvana (more money at the expense of everything).
Why isn't he as big and bad and rich as Bill Gates? Probably because he *really* doesn't care. Some of the posts expressed concern that its not fair or its unfortunate that he hasn't been as financially sucessful as some of the other pioneers - I doubt he wants or needs our pity. He surely has enough money to continue doing the things he wants, and thats really all a person needs when it comes down to it.
One of the horrible side effects of capitalism is that it becomes very easy for people to lose site of (or never even discover) what actually interests them and brings a smile to their face. Its not too surprising if you think about it:
The core of capitalism is the open market. Anyone can compete. So, whats always in everyones faces? Advertising. "Buy our products. YOU WANT OUR PRODUCTS. YOU ARE NOT COMPLETE WITHOUT OUR PRODUCTS." Look no farther than the advertising strategy of the more successful companies - its a brainwash. People are tricked into thinking that having things equates with being successful and happy (aka materialism). Being rich becomes the ultimate goal. Often in rich communities thats exactly the mentality children are raised on (followed by fraternities, sororities, and businesses). Its quite unfortunate - especially now that the execs at MTV have figured out how brainwash all the teenagers. Anyone else notice that MTV is 1 never-ending commercial now? Anyone else feel like we're in a downward spiral?
I don't use C/C++ because I think its the greatest language in the world - I use it because other than writing in ASM, its my best bet for speed-critical code. (I guess its only fair to mention that I'm the sort of programmer who thinks just about everything is speed-critical.) Processors of today (and tomorrow) inherently lend themselves to executing code instruction-by-instruction (step-by-step). Not functionally. In order to target a functional language to our processors, a lot of behind-our-back work has to be done - and I despise anything that does a significant amount work (in software) behind my back.
Functional languages are interesting and useful enough for me to not have a "throw them all away" attitude. But at the same time, if someone told me I should be programming in one, I'd laugh at them.
Your advice almost made me throw up. The last thing anyone *needs* to do is find a well-paying job with an established company. Established companies are the laziest of them all - they don't innovate, they don't create, they don't do anything much except sit on their bank account and buy out the occasional competitor.
If someone's goal is to use their programming to help others, then they need to take their best ideas and turn them into free software.
How can anyone say something like this: - "Today we are learning the language in which God created life." Maybe. Or maybe we are just trying to steal his job. " - and still take themselves seriously?
If you pay close attention to what that guy said, what he's done is *define* the words "Trusted System" to mean a system which has been verified as trustworthy by some well-defined producedure or test.
He can bake up any definition for "Trusted System" he wants - it doesnt mean he's right.
Something about using a source control system when you're the only person on the project seems.. really freaking weird.
I maked zipped archives of my source tree every few weeks for backup purposes, and on *very* rare occasions I go back in to look at some code that I'd gotten rid of. I don't have multiple versions of my software so managing source tree versions isn't important. oh well =)
I do all of my programming in Win32. The only reason I *ever* would be interested in programming under linux is because it doesn't crash and I would save a fair amount of rebooting and waiting time. Advantage: linux.
Source Control? I don't care, I work by myself. Advantage: none.
IDE? I have MSVC absolutely memorized. I never touch the mouse, and moving to something like.. well.. anything else.. would be a waste of time because there is nothing I feel like I need my IDE to do that MSVC doesnt. Advantage: MSVC.
Debugger? This has always been a joke of an issue. There is no debugger/ide combo on linux (that I'm aware of) that works as well as MSVC. Honestly, I'd say the MSVC debugger is the most impressive piece of software Microsoft has ever done. Advantage: MSVC.
Libraries/Support? I make it a point to use as few libraries/outside code as possible. And when I do, I put an abstraction layer between it and my code so that when it comes time to port to another platform, I'm not left staring at 10,000 TreeView_Message() calls that need to be rewritten. Advantage: none.
There *IS* more free code available on linux - but if I just want to look at it I can do that in windows. If I want to use it, well then I'm screwed - but I tend not to use other people's code anyway so its not a big issue. Advantage: none.
MSVC is the right environment for me - but whats best for me isn't best for everyone, obviously.
If someone is comfortable developing on something other than linux, and their job or their interests don't direct them to switch over - they shouldn't. By the same token if someone IS comfortable developing on linux, and their job or their interests don't direct them to switch to something else, they shouldn't switch either. I guess my point is: We don't all have to use the same development environment - so why be concerned about it? Because its fun to get into Emacs debates? =)
I read these "language wars" frequently and wonder why people actually think learning C++ would be significantly easier than learning, say, anything else. Don't you guys even remember school? The hardest thing about learning isn't what you're learning - its having the interest and perseverence to actually let knowledge into your head and keep it there. Historically, computer programming has been taught by people who don't know how to teach. They're programmers - they didn't study the learning process, they went to grad school and spent their time doing research. I believe anyone can learn anything so long as they have a genuine interest in learning, and a teacher genuinely interested in teaching them - even something as "complicated" as computer programming. Whether the teacher decides to start with Python, C, or BASIC is beside the point. Just about every "learn C/C++" book I've seen makes the same mistake - they ignore the obviously natural way to learn which is by asking questions and getting answers. The books just present the information by chapter by chapter and expect people to read and absorb. I love the hairbrained examples they often use to introduce object oriented programming and object heirarchies (VehicleClass -> CarClass -> FordClass -> ExplorerClass) - how the fuck is that a useful example? This book is probably one of the best books for newbie programmers to look at because of the informal approach and attention it gives to the question-answer format. If he'd tried to teach her MIPS assembly I'm sure he'd have had similar success.
How difficult would it be to engineer a worm that sneaks its way into everyones winsock32.dll file and then (one day) starts sending a ridiculous amount of http requests to amazon.com.
If you are reading this and saying "What the hell is that?", allow me to introduce you to the fucking coolest genre of music ever created - www.breakbeat.co.uk
Slashdot Mirror
I think its important that we be able to communicate without the government knowing what we say. I wasn't aware that this made me a terrorist!! I'm so upset! And I thought I loved my country! Where do I go to turn myself in? Could you help me out with directions on Mapquest maybe?
Also, something else I just realized - I haven't told my employer about some of the thoughts I've been having lately. I got a really neat idea, having to do with encrypted processing and secure software sales - shit I shouldn't say much more, cause I guess my employer owns my ideas and someone else might see them here and run us out of business! Then we're *all* fucked!
* Jews attack the Arabs.
* Arabs attack the Jews.
* We don't give money to the Jews.
* Arabs wipe Israel of the planet.
* Arabs praise Allah.
Now we're the good guys?
Which of the following would you prefer:
1) We keep giving just enough money for Israel to fight, thus perpetuating the war until the end of time.
2) We give enough money to Israel so that they can wipe the Arabs off the planet.
3) We stop giving money and let the Arabs wipe Israel off the planet.
Its multiple choice. Tell me which one you like best, then justify your answer.
my girlfriend had a friend in one of the airplanes that went down. anyone who calls for forgiveness and not retaliation for this act should have to pick one of their friends to be killed and then see how they feel. fucking barbarians.
Do you think innocent people aren't going to die when we retaliate? Do you think innocent people aren't going to die when the terrorists respond to our retaliation?
If our retaliation were to consist of 30 bullets to the heads of all terrorist leaders, thats great - I'm all for it. But I'm very weary of the words I'm already hearing from the pentagon - threats against any nation that harbors terrorists. That doesn't mean we're targeting terrorists, specifically, you know.
The obvious mechanical response to violence is more violence... but violence doesn't solve violence - you don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out.
Who would be surprised to find out that the attack was coordinated via encrypted communication on the internet?
I shudder to think how reactionary the authorities will be.... "Shut down the net!!"
And I don't think anyone has read it. Its sitting 3 levels down in some thread next to 5 other comments with the same subject (I should have retitled mine - duh!)
:).
So, here is my take on this whole issue, in response to the comments in italics.
Just becuase your "art" is useless and mine is functional does not make us any different.
Having gone through 6 years of intense programming, and followed it with 3 years of intense music production, I'm in a somewhat unique position to comment on the above paragraph.
I agree that programming and music are both art. However, I take serious offense to your comment about music being a "useless" art.
Are you ready to read?
I can't write a song that will add any two numbers. I can't write a song that enables the listener to run through corridors and chase other listeners down with rocket launchers.
I can, however, write a song that helps give a person insight into their relationships with other people. I can write a song that makes someone laugh, or smile.
At this point, it still might not be so obvious to you that music is important. Why do you think people bother to make music, anyway? Lets look to one of my biggest musical inspirations. Bjork, in a recent interview, talked a little bit about why she began producing solo CD's (at the age of 26 or 27 - she's 35 now). You can watch the entire interview here: damnit, the site couldn't handle the traffic but just in case someone comes through with a mirror, check out http://63.67.107.43/bjork/. I'll have to paraphrase: She explained that very often a book, a song, a movie, or a story, would be exactly what she needed to feel better about something that was bothering her. Something of a magical cure, I guess? She looked at the names of people on CD's and books, and realized how much they had sacrificed just to create their works and have them distributed. All that work just to make her feel better. She set out on a mission to do the same for others, and 4 CD's later she's far along that path.
I look back on my obsession with programming, and its quite clear to me why I devoted so much time to it - its a perfect creative outlet and a very effective escape from reality. When you're 72 consecutive hours into a coding binge, you're in a different world. The unpredictability of social situations are at a safe distance. You don't think about things like your appearance, your odor, whether or not people like you, whats happening in asian sweatshops, or what sort of evil is being planned in those 12 levels of management above you. You are in control of the world - there's you, your keyboard, mouse, data structures, control statements, functions, registers, libraries, memory, a video card, a sound card, some speakers, and a monitor. There is nothing else. (And people wonder why ego-centrism is a characteristic commen to so many coders, heh)
I got a job in the industry, and quickly learned that when someone is paying you to code, your creative options are a bit more limited. Unless you're the lead programmer, the best you can hope to do is come up with a creative way to solve whatever problem is being put in front of you. For me, this amount of creative control wasn't enough. It wasn't fun. Programming, which had been my ultimate creative outlet, was now just a chore. Sure I was making money and could pay my rent, but I lived at the office. Whats more, I worked at a computer all day on things related to my job - the last thing I wanted to do when I got home was spend more time at the keyboard working - even if it was on personal projects. There's only so much time one can spend sitting at one of these things. I was no longer able to enjoy programming as I once had, so I returned to college and got back on my parents payroll. (A side note, overaggressive intellectual property clauses in employee contracts make outside-the-job coding projects even more difficult.)
When you throw something like an intense addiction to programming into the garbage can, there is no escape from reality. You've got to fucking figure it out. This is when books, paintings, music, and other traditional art forms came into my life. They helped! I was trying to deal with the fact that some girl wasn't calling me back or (gasp) responding to my emails, and Bjork sang to me "Give her some time, give her some space", and everything was better. I was sad about something so intangible, that it took Beck's "Mutations" to turn my frown into a grin. I was so upset with everyone in America being so goddamn *motionless* - I wanted to move! So I immersed myself in the aggressive dancefloor rhythms that are collectively known as "Jungle" or "Drum and Bass". I don't suppose you understand the therapeutic value of dancing until you're dripping with sweat?
A more generic example: Some people simply feel better when they hear a beautiful voice.
My father used to play classical music for me as a child, and I would pretend to be the conductor (plastic straw in hand, flowing with the beat). I spent some time in high school (coincidentally the same time I began programming) writing music with Cakewalk 2.0 and a midi-based synth workstation (Korg X5). However, music never really stirred me deeply until after I began confronting the reality of my life, in college, on the planet earth.
The difference is that I have to go to work for hours and create art every single working day of the week. You on the other hand are only asked to create art for a few hours every so often. You have ZERO right to make money just because you think you deserve it. You have to earn it just like the rest of us.
I've come to realize that, through music, I have the ability to effect people's lives in a positive way - and in such a unique way! I enjoy it immensely, its fufilling for me as well as others, and (fuck you!) its challenging! I'm not Britney Spears - I don't work on music "every so often" - I *live* in my studio. I'm writing music just about every day - to the point where I go through withdrawal when I'm on vacations (like this weekend, for instance).
Schlockmeisters in LA and New York can cookie-cut and sell over a million pop album's in a matter of months - but that music is fast food garbage. Its filler. Its an advertisement for itself. And for some strange reason, the only thing that ever seems to be gleaned from it is that the most important things in life are sex, money, and being cool. How convenient for the rest of the entertainment industry, which specializes in these products.
The real problem is, organizations like the RIAA have built up the notion in your (and my, and the whole world's) head that being "creative" is some magical ability that few people possess in any quantity.
In my entire life, I've met about 10 other people who take music as seriously as I do, and who devote as much time to it as I do. I've met about 10 million other people. Being creative is not a magical ability, you are right - and it could even be argued that making music is not a magical ability. There *is* something special about everyone - but not everyone devotes themselves to music so wholeheartedly that their incomes depend on it. Those who chose to are entitled to do so, though you may believe they are not.
Nevermind that for hundreds of thousands of years humans have been artistic just fine without the need for superstardom. Today you we taught that musicians/actors/artists/etc. are so special and rare that we must pay a hefty percentage of our GDP to thier masters simply because who knows when such talent will ever been seen on this earth again, right? Well, I'm sorry to break it to you, but we are all talented, we are all artists. We can't help it.
The ones who teach "celebrity" have always been the ones selling it. Most of the "superstar musicians" you're exposed to in American pop culture aren't really musicians anyway - they're puppets. You can't blame musicians for that sick circus.
Making money off of art is like making money of of breathing. Everybody does it, no one has some "right" because they happen to have asthma. By trying to make a living off of music, you are simply perputrating the notion that music is something that is rare enough or difficult enough to make a living doing. You are contributing to the death of music and humanity's musical soul far more effectivly than any sort of "Open Music License", my friend.
As I said earlier, everyone has the right to chose their profession, so long as it doesn't infringe upon the rights of others. Given that this is a country defined by its capitalism, none of us will be able to make any money unless we sell something. Our programming skills, maybe. Our salesmanship. Our unique ability with scissors and hair.
Both the GPL and OAL licenses are absolutely great for stimulating interest and creativity in the fields they apply to. However, neither will help pay the rent.
I do plan on releasing some music under the OAL (now that I've heard about it) and when I get back into coding, I'll probably release some code under the GPL too. I've released code before too [rwth-aachen.de], you know - before I really knew what the GPL was all about.
My advice to musicians? Work your fucking heart out and sell the fruits of your labor. If you end up with lots of experiments gone wrong, or just lots of doodles, or you just don't really give a shit about what happens to a particular piece of your music, don't let it sit in your vault - release it under the OAL. Someone, somewhere, will learn something from it. Just make sure you don't plan on using any samples of it in future works for sale
Just becuase your "art" is useless and mine is functional does not make us any different.
Having gone through 6 years of intense programming, and followed it with 3 years of intense music production, I'm in a somewhat unique position to comment on the above paragraph.
I agree that programming and music are both art. However, I take serious offense to your comment about music being a "useless" art.
Are you ready to read?
I can't write a song that will add any two numbers. I can't write a song that enables the listener to run through corridors and chase other listeners down with rocket launchers.
I can, however, write a song that helps give a person insight into their relationships with other people. I can write a song that makes someone laugh, or smile.
At this point, it still might not be so obvious to you that music is important. Why do you think people bother to make music, anyway? Lets look to one of my biggest musical inspirations. Bjork, in a recent interview, talked a little bit about why she began producing solo CD's (at the age of 26 or 27 - she's 35 now). You can watch the entire interview here: damnit, the site couldn't handle the traffic but just in case someone comes through with a mirror, check out http://63.67.107.43/bjork/. I'll have to paraphrase: She explained that very often a book, a song, a movie, or a story, would be exactly what she needed to feel better about something that was bothering her. Something of a magical cure, I guess? She looked at the names of people on CD's and books, and realized how much they had sacrificed just to create their works and have them distributed. All that work just to make her feel better. She set out on a mission to do the same for others, and 4 CD's later she's far along that path.
I look back on my obsession with programming, and its quite clear to me why I devoted so much time to it - its a perfect creative outlet and a very effective escape from reality. When you're 72 consecutive hours into a coding binge, you're in a different world. The unpredictability of social situations are at a safe distance. You don't think about things like your appearance, your odor, whether or not people like you, whats happening in asian sweatshops, or what sort of evil is being planned in those 12 levels of management above you. You are in control of the world - there's you, your keyboard, mouse, data structures, control statements, functions, registers, libraries, memory, a video card, a sound card, some speakers, and a monitor. There is nothing else. (And people wonder why ego-centrism is a characteristic commen to so many coders, heh)
I got a job in the industry, and quickly learned that when someone is paying you to code, your creative options are a bit more limited. Unless you're the lead programmer, the best you can hope to do is come up with a creative way to solve whatever problem is being put in front of you. For me, this amount of creative control wasn't enough. It wasn't fun. Programming, which had been my ultimate creative outlet, was now just a chore. Sure I was making money and could pay my rent, but I lived at the office. Whats more, I worked at a computer all day on things related to my job - the last thing I wanted to do when I got home was spend more time at the keyboard working - even if it was on personal projects. There's only so much time one can spend sitting at one of these things. I was no longer able to enjoy programming as I once had, so I returned to college and got back on my parents payroll. (A side note, overaggressive intellectual property clauses in employee contracts make outside-the-job coding projects even more difficult.)
When you throw something like an intense addiction to programming into the garbage can, there is no escape from reality. You've got to fucking figure it out. This is when books, paintings, music, and other traditional art forms came into my life. They helped! I was trying to deal with the fact that some girl wasn't calling me back or (gasp) responding to my emails, and Bjork sang to me "Give her some time, give her some space", and everything was better. I was sad about something so intangible, that it took Beck's "Mutations" to turn my frown into a grin. I was so upset with everyone in America being so goddamn *motionless* - I wanted to move! So I immersed myself in the aggressive dancefloor rhythms that are collectively known as "Jungle" or "Drum and Bass". I don't suppose you understand the therapeutic value of dancing until you're dripping with sweat?
A more generic example: Some people simply feel better when they hear a beautiful voice.
My father used to play classical music for me as a child, and I would pretend to be the conductor (plastic straw in hand, flowing with the beat). I spent some time in high school (coincidentally the same time I began programming) writing music with Cakewalk 2.0 and a midi-based synth workstation (Korg X5). However, music never really stirred me deeply until after I began confronting the reality of my life, in college, on the planet earth.
The difference is that I have to go to work for hours and create art every single working day of the week. You on the other hand are only asked to create art for a few hours every so often. You have ZERO right to make money just because you think you deserve it. You have to earn it just like the rest of us.
I've come to realize that, through music, I have the ability to effect people's lives in a positive way - and in such a unique way! I enjoy it immensely, its fufilling for me as well as others, and (fuck you!) its challenging! I'm not Britney Spears - I don't work on music "every so often" - I *live* in my studio. I'm writing music just about every day - to the point where I go through withdrawal when I'm on vacations (like this weekend, for instance).
Schlockmeisters in LA and New York can cookie-cut and sell over a million pop album's in a matter of months - but that music is fast food garbage. Its filler. Its an advertisement for itself. And for some strange reason, the only thing that ever seems to be gleaned from it is that the most important things in life are sex, money, and being cool. How convenient for the rest of the entertainment industry, which specializes in these products.
The real problem is, organizations like the RIAA have built up the notion in your (and my, and the whole world's) head that being "creative" is some magical ability that few people possess in any quantity.
In my entire life, I've met about 10 other people who take music as seriously as I do, and who devote as much time to it as I do. I've met about 10 million other people. Being creative is not a magical ability, you are right - and it could even be argued that making music is not a magical ability. There *is* something special about everyone - but not everyone devotes themselves to music so wholeheartedly that their incomes depend on it. Those who chose to are entitled to do so, though you may believe they are not.
Nevermind that for hundreds of thousands of years humans have been artistic just fine without the need for superstardom. Today you we taught that musicians/actors/artists/etc. are so special and rare that we must pay a hefty percentage of our GDP to thier masters simply because who knows when such talent will ever been seen on this earth again, right? Well, I'm sorry to break it to you, but we are all talented, we are all artists. We can't help it.
The ones who teach "celebrity" have always been the ones selling it. Most of the "superstar musicians" you're exposed to in American pop culture aren't really musicians anyway - they're puppets. You can't blame musicians for that sick circus.
Making money off of art is like making money of of breathing. Everybody does it, no one has some "right" because they happen to have asthma. By trying to make a living off of music, you are simply perputrating the notion that music is something that is rare enough or difficult enough to make a living doing. You are contributing to the death of music and humanity's musical soul far more effectivly than any sort of "Open Music License", my friend.
As I said earlier, everyone has the right to chose their profession, so long as it doesn't infringe upon the rights of others. Given that this is a country defined by its capitalism, none of us will be able to make any money unless we sell something. Our programming skills, maybe. Our salesmanship. Our unique ability with scissors and hair.
Both the GPL and OAL licenses are absolutely great for stimulating interest and creativity in the fields they apply to. However, neither will help pay the rent.
I do plan on releasing some music under the OAL (now that I've heard about it) and when I get back into coding, I'll probably release some code under the GPL too. I've released code before too, you know - before I really knew what the GPL was all about.
My advice to musicians? Work your fucking heart out and sell the fruits of your labor. If you end up with lots of experiments gone wrong, or just lots of doodles, or you just don't really give a shit about what happens to a particular piece of your music, don't let it sit in your vault - release it under the OAL. Someone, somewhere, will learn something from it. Just make sure you don't plan on using any samples of it in future works for sale
SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!@!!! Lets keep this little secret between you and me, got it?
Could this be the beginning of the next big scare tactic that the government will use to fund big missiles?
I wasn't talking about removing the watermark. Its obvious that the SDMI coalition is having the contest because they want to
1) learn about any hackable flaws in their watermarking system
2) fix them before setting the standard
My point was that its pointless anyway because even if they accomplish #1 and #2, there are still going to be ways around their silly little format (removing watermarks or not).
In the off-chance that SDMI does create a file format that is not hackable, there are things they still won't be able to get around:
.dll/.vxd that implements the Win32 WaveOut() API and writes raw audio to disk. (similar things can be done on all OS's)
1) A bogus
2) Connecting line-out to the line-in.
In fact, I'm surprised #1 doesn't exist already. Granted, these aren't true solutions because at least 1 person, somewhere, will have to buy the SDMI encrypted file and play it into the device driver.. but after that, ta-da.
Furthermore, who's to say that some hacker won't just hack the SDMI player they provide and force it to play unauthorized copies? In that scenario, they wouldn't even have to bother decoding or detecting watermarks..
Everyone reading this knows that few things in the digital domain can be considered "property". Everything is inherently copyable. Big corporations still have it in their head that there's some magical way to apply the old buy/sell model but eventually they're going to realize that it just doesn't work that way with digital content.
This is a scary fact because once that becomes common knowledge, there will be a huge corporate push to eliminate what we now call the Internet (where free exchange of data is possible via ftp, http, et all) in favor of a closely-controlled network where all transactions are monitored, and all data accounted for. Don't act surprised either - politics are owned by the company now. It might sound ridiculous (to us) to enact a law making ftp illegal. However, it makes perfect sense to a corporation.
This is why all of you should be voting for Ralph Nader in November. www.nader2000.org
Obviously, going to college to learn something you already have a mastery of is a waste of your time and money, as well as a waste of the school's resources.
Something I've noticed about the cream-of-the-crop coders is that we teach ourselves more than schools do anyway. I've dropped out (for the 2nd time now) because at this point, the CS department isn't going to teach me anything I can't learn on my own.
I can honestly say that the amount of computer-related knowledge I aquired (and retained) at school would have taken me less than a month to learn on my own time. HOWEVER, I shudder to think about what sort of person I'd be had I not gone to college for 6 months in 1996, and a a year and a half in 98-99.
I am considering returning to school to study something else - psychology perhaps. One of the posts joked about making sure you go to a school with lots of women - a perfectly valid suggestion, especially given that plenty of us techies have a level of social skills that approach absolute 0. College is good for more than teaching you what you need to know to get a job.
This is a good question and.. really the only way to answer it is to write the be-all-end-all audio software application, port it to all OS's, and pick the winner.
I've been working on this be-all-end-all audio software since March.
I am actually designing what could be considered an "Audio Software Operating System" or an "Electronic Music Studio Simulator". It has its own graphics library, user input interfaces, audio interfaces, midi interfaces, file interfaces, etc. One can think of audio applications as "modules", which have their inputs and outputs routable to any other module in the system (this routing is determined GRAPHICALLY, similar to the interface found in the Nord Modular software and the Reaktor soft-synth software). I have a simple "Acid"-like module already working, and soon I'll begin working on the more bread-and-butter modules like oscillators, filters, samplers, effects, etc.
Developing for my software requires learning its API's - this is always a stubmling block for programmers. However, it is essential in order to achieve portability. The nice thing about writing audio software to my API's is that your applications can be run on any OS that my system has been ported to (MacOs, Beos, and QNX ports are planned). Only a recompilation of your module is required (no rewriting).
I am developing on Win32 because it is the development platform I've been using for 4 years. I've implemented my graphics API with both DirectDraw and GDI (user selectable). I've implemented my sound API with ASIO and MME (also user selectable). Menu's, fonts, controls, Windows, and the like, have been written from scratch, making use of my graphics API for drawing, and the Win32 WindowProc() for distributing mouse/keyboard messages.
More info on the software/os is at www.treyharrison.com. If you'd like to help contribute to the software, my email is on the site. I'm working by myself right now, but will soon be looking for people to contribute modules.
trey
Lets face it. Sony can't buy the internet. They can't firewall our individual PC's. But Heckler is right - they WILL DO ANYTHING to protect their revenue stream. Here are some hypothetical situations to be aware of:
Everyone, eventually, buys new hardware. It doesn't happen too often.. but it does happen. Everyone upgrades. What is to stop Sony and/or other manufacturers from selling us hardware that is based on censoring or encrypting data? Suppose they DO come up with a scheme to encrypt music and video all the way to the electron gun or the D/A convertor, and suppose further that they intentionally price these products substantially lower than competition (because they can afford to). Then what? Even though you and I know better than to buy these things, Joe Blow America doesn't, and its only a matter of time before it becomes impossible or extremely cost-inefficient to purchase "open" hardware.
Encrypted processing:
Its also only a matter of time before company X develops a consumer-level processor that executes encrypted code. Imagine a public key / private key setup (lengthy private key stored inside the processor, *NOT* accessible). This architecture could be used to encrypt downloadable software: The website dynamically creates encrypted exe's from the public key you submit when you buy it. Instructions are decrypted and executed in CPU memory (*NOT* accessible) - imagine trying to hack CSS without being able to read the code. To saturate the market with these things, all company X has to do is price their processor lower than everyone elses (and what software and/or IP-oriented company wouldn't be willing to subsidize such a scheme if it meant guaranteed protection of their data?).
So -- don't think that just because everything is open now, it can't be closed later. Just about anything is possible, period. Never forget that. Its up to us to make sure that the "right" things happen. Corporations can do everything in the world to protect their revenue stream - but they can't survive if we don't buy from them.
DO NOT SUPPORT COMPANIES WHOSE GOALS ARE TO CENSOR, BLOCK, OR RESTRICT ACCESS TO INFORMATION. If you do that, you open the censorship door just a smidgen. If we all do that, we fuck ourselves. It might cost you more to buy the "right" products. Don't let that stop you.
How eager will Sony be to include censoring / blocking hardware in the US PSX2 or PSX3 if millions of geeks undertake the fairly simple task of NOT buying it. In the end, no company can dictate what their customers will and won't buy - as consumers we have to be aware of who tries to take advantage of us, and not give them our money.
(vote for Nader)
trey
www.treyharrison.com
I did some searches of the more common rom extensions (fig, smc, sfc) - apparently RomNet shares your entire hard drive. Just about everyone seems to have a C:\windows\default.sfc - and I'm pretty sure thats not a rom. Someone else had stuff in a directory called \lotus\ which looks like it contains some sort of database stuff..
It sounds to me like he's one of the few people more interested in his own interests than the typical capitalist nirvana (more money at the expense of everything).
Why isn't he as big and bad and rich as Bill Gates? Probably because he *really* doesn't care. Some of the posts expressed concern that its not fair or its unfortunate that he hasn't been as financially sucessful as some of the other pioneers - I doubt he wants or needs our pity. He surely has enough money to continue doing the things he wants, and thats really all a person needs when it comes down to it.
One of the horrible side effects of capitalism is that it becomes very easy for people to lose site of (or never even discover) what actually interests them and brings a smile to their face. Its not too surprising if you think about it:
The core of capitalism is the open market. Anyone can compete. So, whats always in everyones faces? Advertising. "Buy our products. YOU WANT OUR PRODUCTS. YOU ARE NOT COMPLETE WITHOUT OUR PRODUCTS." Look no farther than the advertising strategy of the more successful companies - its a brainwash. People are tricked into thinking that having things equates with being successful and happy (aka materialism). Being rich becomes the ultimate goal. Often in rich communities thats exactly the mentality children are raised on (followed by fraternities, sororities, and businesses). Its quite unfortunate - especially now that the execs at MTV have figured out how brainwash all the teenagers. Anyone else notice that MTV is 1 never-ending commercial now? Anyone else feel like we're in a downward spiral?
I don't use C/C++ because I think its the greatest language in the world - I use it because other than writing in ASM, its my best bet for speed-critical code. (I guess its only fair to mention that I'm the sort of programmer who thinks just about everything is speed-critical.) Processors of today (and tomorrow) inherently lend themselves to executing code instruction-by-instruction (step-by-step). Not functionally. In order to target a functional language to our processors, a lot of behind-our-back work has to be done - and I despise anything that does a significant amount work (in software) behind my back.
Functional languages are interesting and useful enough for me to not have a "throw them all away" attitude. But at the same time, if someone told me I should be programming in one, I'd laugh at them.
Your advice almost made me throw up. The last thing anyone *needs* to do is find a well-paying job with an established company. Established companies are the laziest of them all - they don't innovate, they don't create, they don't do anything much except sit on their bank account and buy out the occasional competitor.
If someone's goal is to use their programming to help others, then they need to take their best ideas and turn them into free software.
How can anyone say something like this: - "Today we are learning the language in which God created life." Maybe. Or maybe we are just trying to steal his job. " - and still take themselves seriously?
If you pay close attention to what that guy said, what he's done is *define* the words "Trusted System" to mean a system which has been verified as trustworthy by some well-defined producedure or test.
He can bake up any definition for "Trusted System" he wants - it doesnt mean he's right.
Something about using a source control system when you're the only person on the project seems.. really freaking weird.
I maked zipped archives of my source tree every few weeks for backup purposes, and on *very* rare occasions I go back in to look at some code that I'd gotten rid of. I don't have multiple versions of my software so managing source tree versions isn't important. oh well =)
I do all of my programming in Win32. The only reason I *ever* would be interested in programming under linux is because it doesn't crash and I would save a fair amount of rebooting and waiting time. Advantage: linux.
Source Control? I don't care, I work by myself. Advantage: none.
IDE? I have MSVC absolutely memorized. I never touch the mouse, and moving to something like.. well.. anything else.. would be a waste of time because there is nothing I feel like I need my IDE to do that MSVC doesnt. Advantage: MSVC.
Debugger? This has always been a joke of an issue. There is no debugger/ide combo on linux (that I'm aware of) that works as well as MSVC. Honestly, I'd say the MSVC debugger is the most impressive piece of software Microsoft has ever done. Advantage: MSVC.
Libraries/Support? I make it a point to use as few libraries/outside code as possible. And when I do, I put an abstraction layer between it and my code so that when it comes time to port to another platform, I'm not left staring at 10,000 TreeView_Message() calls that need to be rewritten. Advantage: none.
There *IS* more free code available on linux - but if I just want to look at it I can do that in windows. If I want to use it, well then I'm screwed - but I tend not to use other people's code anyway so its not a big issue. Advantage: none.
MSVC is the right environment for me - but whats best for me isn't best for everyone, obviously.
If someone is comfortable developing on something other than linux, and their job or their interests don't direct them to switch over - they shouldn't. By the same token if someone IS comfortable developing on linux, and their job or their interests don't direct them to switch to something else, they shouldn't switch either. I guess my point is: We don't all have to use the same development environment - so why be concerned about it? Because its fun to get into Emacs debates? =)
I read these "language wars" frequently and wonder why people actually think learning C++ would be significantly easier than learning, say, anything else. Don't you guys even remember school? The hardest thing about learning isn't what you're learning - its having the interest and perseverence to actually let knowledge into your head and keep it there. Historically, computer programming has been taught by people who don't know how to teach. They're programmers - they didn't study the learning process, they went to grad school and spent their time doing research. I believe anyone can learn anything so long as they have a genuine interest in learning, and a teacher genuinely interested in teaching them - even something as "complicated" as computer programming. Whether the teacher decides to start with Python, C, or BASIC is beside the point. Just about every "learn C/C++" book I've seen makes the same mistake - they ignore the obviously natural way to learn which is by asking questions and getting answers. The books just present the information by chapter by chapter and expect people to read and absorb. I love the hairbrained examples they often use to introduce object oriented programming and object heirarchies (VehicleClass -> CarClass -> FordClass -> ExplorerClass) - how the fuck is that a useful example? This book is probably one of the best books for newbie programmers to look at because of the informal approach and attention it gives to the question-answer format. If he'd tried to teach her MIPS assembly I'm sure he'd have had similar success.
Microsoft isn't innovative. It says so on my resume! =) (www.treyharrison.com/resume.html)
How difficult would it be to engineer a worm that sneaks its way into everyones winsock32.dll file and then (one day) starts sending a ridiculous amount of http requests to amazon.com.
If you are reading this and saying "What the hell is that?", allow me to introduce you to the fucking coolest genre of music ever created -
www.breakbeat.co.uk
Also, check out some work I'm doing in the jungle arena -
My software synthesizer page
trey