That is why most software patents contain language like "Methods and apparatus to...", followed by what the software will do. You can't patent 2+2=4, but you can patent an apparatus and methods that would compute 2+2=4. The problem I have with software patents is that they are patenting the results, and not the process and mechanisms to achieve the results. My example above would cover any implementation of a calculator, without having to actually "innovate" a calculator, meaning you don't have to figure out how to perform the calculation, you just patent a device that can do it and wait for someone else to implement such a device, then sue them for their hard work.
I think software patents would be beneficial to society if their lifetime were representative of the fast pace of software evolution (meaning less than the current 20 years), and if the submitter were required to include the "blueprints" for the methods and apparatus like they do for patents on physical objects, meaning the source code implementation of the methods, and the hardware implementation of the apparatus. This would mean that patent trolls would have to actually create an implementation of what they are trying to patent, and let everyone know how they did it. The provided material would also go a long way towards showing whether a patent is obvious or not.
"Gran Paradiso" is the development codename for Firefox 3, not just the MacOSX port. It is not a re-write, infact there won't be that much changed since Firefox 2, mostly all in the Gecko rendering engine. Though you are right that is it supposed to use native Cocoa form widgets.
The Java issue I think was a license problem, not a technical problem. Ubuntu 7.04 includes Java 6 with a compatible license, it may install and work by default now.
Color preference depends largely on local culture. For us westerners who find the orange/brown theme unattractive, there is the blubuntu package, try it out.
Blur strives to be easier on the GPU by taking advantage of caching techniques and having many different shaders of variable strength to allow lower end cards to work more smoothly. Blur can even be used on cards without pixel shaders.
Can Linux nerds everywhere stop overselling Beryl?
We're not overselling, it really is that good:)
until this moment it seems to have been more about useless desktop chrome--ooh, look BURNING WINDOWS, BITCHES!--than about a stable, usable working environment.
I have found a lot of usability improvements actually, the zoom to/from the taskbar, scale to desktop (aka, expose), ring switcher (aka, Flip3D), taskbar preview are all very handy. Desktop zoom has become something I use very often, so I don't have to squint at my monitor to see small details. All of these things make the desktop experience more appealing to me.
New users who have no clue about how their system works should not be converted to a new OS because of a admittedly Beta-class desktop bling.
Which is exactly why it is not enabled by default on Ubuntu 7.04.
Beryl and its kind aren't bad per se. They just aren't ready for prime-time. I'd still direct new users to GNOME/Metacity or KDE/kwin.
Sure, and I'd still direct windows users to WinXP. But for people who want the shiny desktop effects, Beryl is head and shoulders above the stock Vista effects, which was my original complaint about the article saying they are similar.
I still cant figure out why ubuntu runs so slow on this machine when xp runs great.
Maybe because XP is 5 years old, and Ubuntu 7.04 is 2 weeks old. How well do you think Vista would run on that laptop?
On a non-critical note, try Ubuntu 6.06 LTS (Dapper Drake), it might work better on your older hardware, and it's only 1 year old. If you really care about speed, ditch Gnome for XFCE.
Your software problems sound odd, I don't think I've ever heard of someone having incorrectly compiled programs in a default Ubuntu install. I haven't had to compile anything since I started using Ubuntu 6.06 last year.
I was tempted to compare Vista's Aero interface to the Beryl window manager (which has a similar palette of visual effects)
If the author means that Beryl has all the same effects that Aero does, then I'd agree. But if he's implying that Aero has all the visual effects that Beryl has, he's lost his f-ing mind.
MXML compiles into.swf (which runs in the normal Flash runtime). You won't get open-source Flash runtimes, but the compiled.swf files will be 100% open-source whereas right now,.swf files compiled from MXML still contain statically linked, non-FLOSS components in the same binary as your own (FLOSS) code.
Now that Sun has finally decided to open-source Java, we suddenly have the "Flash Trap". Cue RMS.
Customers in locations where the emergency center is not equipped to receive your telephone number and address have basic 911. With basic 911, the local emergency operator answering the call will not have your call back number or your exact location, so you must be prepared to give them this information. Until you give the operator your phone number, he/she may not be able to call you back or dispatch help if the call is not completed or is not forwarded, is dropped or disconnected, or if you are unable to speak.
and
Certain customers do not have access to either basic 911 or E911. If you don't have access to basic 911 or E911 your 911 call will be sent to the Vonage national emergency call center. A trained agent at the emergency call center will ask for the name, telephone number and location of the customer calling 911, and then contact the local emergency center for such customer in order to send help.
Honest question: can someone explain how this means that Intel is taking AMD as a serious threat?
More precisely, Intel is taking AMD's HyperTransport seriously. AMD has already made HyperTransport available to other hardware manufacturers to build add-on chips for specialized processing or whatever else. Think of it like the Cell processor, only you and mix and match different "cells" and each "cell" is designed for a specific task (video encoding/decoding, encryption, compression, etc), making it much faster at that task than a generic CPU. Intel is worried that the "next big thing" in computers will be designed on AMD chipsets. They want those innovators to be innovating on Intel chipsets instead.
Re:Ruby as a first language?
on
Beginning Ruby
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· Score: 2, Funny
Me too, but strangely I think it helped more than it hurt. By the time I was fluent in Perl, every other language seemed easy to grasp. It also taught me proper object-oriented programming by punishing me mercilessly for having a poor design. I guess it's kind of like the school of hard knocks for programmers.
Positive reinforcement is for spoiled Ruby programmers.
I did not know that, but you're right, that's about all I have too. Huh, guess I don't reboot often enough to really know. I thought upstart was going to be replacing more of the init scripts in Feisty.
Start off by calling something other than one of the stupid code names that have become the fashion for Linux builds.
What's up with that. It's bad enough I can't get my parents over the interface differences enough to use it. Now I have to also tell them they're running an OS called Feisty Fawn?!?!
Quite right, this whole naming thing just makes Linux look unprofessional. Instead Linux should emulate the professional sounding names like Windows Vi...uh, I mean Max OSX Ti...wait...
Seriously though, do you tell your parents they're running "Vista" or that they're running "Windows"? Do you say "Mac OSX" or "Tiger"? If you don't like calling it "Feisty Fawn", just call it "Linux", or even "Ubuntu 7.04".
* Automatic codec installation is new and very helpful for multi-media. * Restricted driver manager, helpful for those who need proprietary drivers (helped me with nvidia). * Upstart, makes boot time much faster. * Upstream upgrades for Linux Kernel, Gnome, Evolution, OpenOffice, Xorg, Gaim (I think) and many others.
Maybe not as big a difference as there is upgrading from WinXP to Vista, but then again Ubuntu 6.10 (Edgy) was only released 6 months ago, not 6 years ago like XP.
Ok, now I'm even more confused, the Vista 'Administrator' account is not analogous to the Unix 'root' account? There can be multiple 'Administrator' accounts on Vista that can all perform system changes without having to escalate their permission? Does that mean than any application running as such a user can do the same? Or anybody who walks up to your computer while you're in the bathroom can make system changes without having to know the password to your 'Administrator' account?
If this is the case, I wouldn't award Microsoft the "caught up" award just yet.
Ok, I'm confused now, is the "cancel or allow" going to escalate your privileges if you click "Allow"? I thought it would still run the process under your usual permissions, it just wanted to make sure you wanted to do what you were doing. If it's going to run something as root (or Administrator I guess), wouldn't it need a password first?
My only experience thus far has been on a friend's new Toshiba laptop. I clicked the Toshiba games bundle that had an icon on the desktop, and was given the "cancel or allow" dialog to run the games application. This doesn't strike me as something that would require Adminsitrator permissions. Strangely, even though I click "Cancel", the games application loaded anyway.....
Nevermind, I thought you were talking about an Apple product. After a quick google search I now know that this is Microsoft Office for Mac. Still more than a year out though.
OpenOffice, and all the other non-license paying software that support.DOC format do so through reverse engineering the format. Their accuracy in importing and exporting that format varies, because they don't know for sure what the format actually is, and MS seems to change it slightly with every new version of Office.
We need ODF so that we can have more than one office suite available to choose from, and still be able to exchange documents accurately. It's the same reason we have standards for anything, computers or otherwise.
OpenXML on the other hand can not be accurately implemented by anybody other than Microsoft and is controlled by nobody other than Microsoft. On top of that, it's a badly written format that even requires that implementors perform miscalculations so that Microsoft doesn't have to actually fix their own product.
Even more compelling is this list of ODF implementors:
OpenOffice.org/StarOffice KOffice Abiword Gnumeric Lotus Notes Google's Documents Apple's TextEdit (in Leopard) Corel WordPerfect (mid-2007) Microsoft Office XP/2003/2007
As opposed to the list of Office OpenXML implementors:
Microsoft Office 2007 Corel WordPerfect (mid-2007)
So if you want to use anything other than Windows, ODF is your only choice.
Apt uses a system-wide database of applications installed on your system. Installing or upgrading through apt will have an effect on your system and possibly other users on your system, which is why you need privileges to register an application in it's database. You can install anything that can run in user space without root permission the same way you do it in windows, you use a supplied installer, or just unpack it into a directory of your choosing. Apt just makes it much easier at the expense of having to give it your password.
Again, I'm not a Vista user so I don't know when it does or does not prompt you for administrator access. I do however know that Vista will prompt you to "cancel or allow" the execution of user space processing that do not need administrator privileges to run.
I understand what you are saying, I wasn't talking about XP style permissions. What I was talking about was Vista's attempt to restrict admin access to only be asserted when required. Suddenly you are getting popups all the time asking for admin access.
This makes sense, however, as does the way you explained sudo. But the problem is that many people who complained about Vista's continual prompting, aren't realizing that typing sudo all the time is the same exact thing.
It's different in the fact that you are only prompted by sudo when the changes you are trying to make will effect the system or other users on the system. Things like installing system-wide software and services should require proof that you have permission to do this. From what I have heard about Vista's prompts (I don't use it), they are used for user-only preferences changes too, or running (not installing, running) user-space applications. The one time I played with someone else's Vista install, I tried to run a pre-installed game and was prompted with the "Cancel or Allow?". That is what makes no sense.
As for the security hole issue. I don't know the way apt-get works, but it seems to me that when it installs something it is executing some kind of a script. That script is most likely running as root. If I'm wrong, or if the scripting language is weak enough that it can't cause a problem, please let me know.
Even if apt is running system shell scripts (an example, I really don't know), how is this insecure? You don't give install permission to people who might install bad software, and let apt check their permissions before installing. Yes, someone with root access can possibly cause security issues, but they don't need apt for that. Bottom line hasn't changed in decades, don't give root access to people you don't trust to have root access.
Also, if this is the case and apt-get is completely safe to run as admin, why not just set it's SUID/SGID flag and be done with it?
Because SUID would let anyone run apt as root, potentially giving anyone on your system root access. Again, don't give root access to people you don't trust.
Not that apt-get is not the ONLY time I type SUDO either, it seems to be that I have to give up admin access a few times a day for some reason or another.
I'm not sure what you're doing to require so much root access, but I'd bet that every time you're asked for your password, you're doing something you wouldn't want your web server (an example, could be any non-root user) doing without your permission. Next time you're prompted for your password, ask yourself if you want to let someone else do that same thing on your box without having to ask you.
If you get in the habit of doing something like this all the time, you might as well be running as admin all the time (At least that was the complaint many people had with Vista)
From my Ubuntu experience, you only run as root when you need to run as root. If you're doing more than system administration and still being prompted by sudo all the time, chances are you need to re-think what you're doing. There is probably a better (read: more secure) way.
How much time does he spend applying patches and updating software?
On this Ubuntu Laptop at least, very little. It tells him there's updates and asks if he wants to install them. He says "yes", gives the machine his password, and he's done.
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That is why most software patents contain language like "Methods and apparatus to ...", followed by what the software will do. You can't patent 2+2=4, but you can patent an apparatus and methods that would compute 2+2=4. The problem I have with software patents is that they are patenting the results, and not the process and mechanisms to achieve the results. My example above would cover any implementation of a calculator, without having to actually "innovate" a calculator, meaning you don't have to figure out how to perform the calculation, you just patent a device that can do it and wait for someone else to implement such a device, then sue them for their hard work.
I think software patents would be beneficial to society if their lifetime were representative of the fast pace of software evolution (meaning less than the current 20 years), and if the submitter were required to include the "blueprints" for the methods and apparatus like they do for patents on physical objects, meaning the source code implementation of the methods, and the hardware implementation of the apparatus. This would mean that patent trolls would have to actually create an implementation of what they are trying to patent, and let everyone know how they did it. The provided material would also go a long way towards showing whether a patent is obvious or not.
"Gran Paradiso" is the development codename for Firefox 3, not just the MacOSX port. It is not a re-write, infact there won't be that much changed since Firefox 2, mostly all in the Gecko rendering engine. Though you are right that is it supposed to use native Cocoa form widgets.
Heh, and people complain about having to use bash and vi to configure Linux...
The Java issue I think was a license problem, not a technical problem. Ubuntu 7.04 includes Java 6 with a compatible license, it may install and work by default now.
Color preference depends largely on local culture. For us westerners who find the orange/brown theme unattractive, there is the blubuntu package, try it out.
You mean like this: http://www.beryl-project.org/images/blur_full.jpg (http://www.beryl-project.org/features.
Thanks for playing, please try again.
Maybe because XP is 5 years old, and Ubuntu 7.04 is 2 weeks old. How well do you think Vista would run on that laptop?
On a non-critical note, try Ubuntu 6.06 LTS (Dapper Drake), it might work better on your older hardware, and it's only 1 year old. If you really care about speed, ditch Gnome for XFCE.
Your software problems sound odd, I don't think I've ever heard of someone having incorrectly compiled programs in a default Ubuntu install. I haven't had to compile anything since I started using Ubuntu 6.06 last year.
If the author means that Beryl has all the same effects that Aero does, then I'd agree. But if he's implying that Aero has all the visual effects that Beryl has, he's lost his f-ing mind.
Now that Sun has finally decided to open-source Java, we suddenly have the "Flash Trap". Cue RMS.
Probably because that's the version of MySQL they wrote it for?
and
More precisely, Intel is taking AMD's HyperTransport seriously. AMD has already made HyperTransport available to other hardware manufacturers to build add-on chips for specialized processing or whatever else. Think of it like the Cell processor, only you and mix and match different "cells" and each "cell" is designed for a specific task (video encoding/decoding, encryption, compression, etc), making it much faster at that task than a generic CPU. Intel is worried that the "next big thing" in computers will be designed on AMD chipsets. They want those innovators to be innovating on Intel chipsets instead.
Me too, but strangely I think it helped more than it hurt. By the time I was fluent in Perl, every other language seemed easy to grasp. It also taught me proper object-oriented programming by punishing me mercilessly for having a poor design. I guess it's kind of like the school of hard knocks for programmers.
Positive reinforcement is for spoiled Ruby programmers.
I did not know that, but you're right, that's about all I have too. Huh, guess I don't reboot often enough to really know. I thought upstart was going to be replacing more of the init scripts in Feisty.
Quite right, this whole naming thing just makes Linux look unprofessional. Instead Linux should emulate the professional sounding names like Windows Vi...uh, I mean Max OSX Ti...wait...
Seriously though, do you tell your parents they're running "Vista" or that they're running "Windows"? Do you say "Mac OSX" or "Tiger"? If you don't like calling it "Feisty Fawn", just call it "Linux", or even "Ubuntu 7.04".
* Automatic codec installation is new and very helpful for multi-media.
* Restricted driver manager, helpful for those who need proprietary drivers (helped me with nvidia).
* Upstart, makes boot time much faster.
* Upstream upgrades for Linux Kernel, Gnome, Evolution, OpenOffice, Xorg, Gaim (I think) and many others.
Maybe not as big a difference as there is upgrading from WinXP to Vista, but then again Ubuntu 6.10 (Edgy) was only released 6 months ago, not 6 years ago like XP.
Ok, now I'm even more confused, the Vista 'Administrator' account is not analogous to the Unix 'root' account? There can be multiple 'Administrator' accounts on Vista that can all perform system changes without having to escalate their permission? Does that mean than any application running as such a user can do the same? Or anybody who walks up to your computer while you're in the bathroom can make system changes without having to know the password to your 'Administrator' account?
If this is the case, I wouldn't award Microsoft the "caught up" award just yet.
Ok, I'm confused now, is the "cancel or allow" going to escalate your privileges if you click "Allow"? I thought it would still run the process under your usual permissions, it just wanted to make sure you wanted to do what you were doing. If it's going to run something as root (or Administrator I guess), wouldn't it need a password first?
My only experience thus far has been on a friend's new Toshiba laptop. I clicked the Toshiba games bundle that had an icon on the desktop, and was given the "cancel or allow" dialog to run the games application. This doesn't strike me as something that would require Adminsitrator permissions. Strangely, even though I click "Cancel", the games application loaded anyway.....
Nevermind, I thought you were talking about an Apple product. After a quick google search I now know that this is Microsoft Office for Mac. Still more than a year out though.
I wasn't aware of that, Mac Office 2008 will support Office OpenXML? Will it also support ODF? Which format will be the default?
OpenOffice, and all the other non-license paying software that support .DOC format do so through reverse engineering the format. Their accuracy in importing and exporting that format varies, because they don't know for sure what the format actually is, and MS seems to change it slightly with every new version of Office.
We need ODF so that we can have more than one office suite available to choose from, and still be able to exchange documents accurately. It's the same reason we have standards for anything, computers or otherwise.
OpenXML on the other hand can not be accurately implemented by anybody other than Microsoft and is controlled by nobody other than Microsoft. On top of that, it's a badly written format that even requires that implementors perform miscalculations so that Microsoft doesn't have to actually fix their own product.
Even more compelling is this list of ODF implementors:
OpenOffice.org/StarOffice
KOffice
Abiword
Gnumeric
Lotus Notes
Google's Documents
Apple's TextEdit (in Leopard)
Corel WordPerfect (mid-2007)
Microsoft Office XP/2003/2007
As opposed to the list of Office OpenXML implementors:
Microsoft Office 2007
Corel WordPerfect (mid-2007)
So if you want to use anything other than Windows, ODF is your only choice.
Apt uses a system-wide database of applications installed on your system. Installing or upgrading through apt will have an effect on your system and possibly other users on your system, which is why you need privileges to register an application in it's database. You can install anything that can run in user space without root permission the same way you do it in windows, you use a supplied installer, or just unpack it into a directory of your choosing. Apt just makes it much easier at the expense of having to give it your password.
Again, I'm not a Vista user so I don't know when it does or does not prompt you for administrator access. I do however know that Vista will prompt you to "cancel or allow" the execution of user space processing that do not need administrator privileges to run.
On this Ubuntu Laptop at least, very little. It tells him there's updates and asks if he wants to install them. He says "yes", gives the machine his password, and he's done.
I can't speak for the Windows boxes though.