No, it's not, it's a useful word. It generally refers to a hobbyist who has the money/dedication to use genuinely professional equipment. For example, I don't play guitar for a living, but I do own a guitar and amplifier that would be more than suitable for a professional session musician. None of "amateur, hobbyist, enthusiast" conveys that. The marketing side of it is that companies have started to target those people as a sector in their own right, for instance Canon tend to make a range of cameras that have the same features as their high-end professional models, but with plastic rather than alloy bodies so not really suitable for a photojournalist in the field. Prosumer describes that quite nicely.
Turning a steering wheel right to go right is intuitive, because the wheel is on the end of the pinion of a rack and pinion steering system, which directly (perhaps power-assisted) moves the wheels relative to the chassis. Yokes and rudders work by directing airflow and water flow respectively, hence appear reversed in comparison to a steering wheel.
The difference, of course, is that windowing systems are generally metaphors rather than extensions of concrete concepts, so could be arranged any way we want. I'm not sure studies are "nonsense", though, clearly there are metaphors that make sense to the majority of people and therefore stick, and it makes sense to build windowing systems around those metaphors. Like, most people can understand putting files into a trash can, which stay there until you empty the trash and then they're gone forever. Most people can't understand the concept of a page file and a page fault, even though in computer science terms they're not really any more complex than a trash can.
_NATIVE_ email. Goodness, people that get their email from websites won't care about native email support on the Playbook. People that do, expect IMAP and/or POP3. And probably Exchange too.
I thought it was sad that Microsoft had to put little messages at the beginning and end of the video in case the viewer didn't get the point. They still totally don't get postmodern media.
No, "native email" means IMAP and POP3 to the vast majority of people. The general public buying a tablet expect to be able to use a desktop-like email client on their tablet.
Yep, that's my pet peeve. Just as bad is the non-modal window that steals focus every time it updates the progress bar or little report saying what it's currently loading.
It's a holdover from the days of single and co-operative multitasking, where you had to wait for an application to load before doing anything else. I want to click on an application icon, and continue doing what I'm already doing. I don't want a splash screen stealing focus every time it loads another plugin, or - even worse - be in the foreground with no option to hide it. Most OSs have a system for acknowledging an application is loading - on OSX the dock icon bounces, on other systems you see a cursor+eggtimer or something similar. I want an app to stay silent until it loads, and only give a message if there's a problem.
Every printer I've plugged into my Mac has worked without requiring driver installation or downloading any software. I don't know what printer you're using, but that must be an isolated example.
Thanks for describing the OSX print subsystem. It's only in the Windows world that this isn't the case. Linux is variable, depending on how well CUPS is set up in the distro you're using.
Thanks for translating. I'm presuming that you're aware of the manufacturing pedigree of the computer on which you're typing your comment, and that every component has come from a factory where workers have Western-style rights, working conditions, pay, sick leave, vacation etc..
I'm pleased to hear that Apple products come from factories where conditions are far better than the norm in the prevailing culture. I hope that standards can be raised in all factories. I'm pretty sure that none of the workers are slaves.
Yeah, I'm sure I'll enjoy using a digital camera when I'm up to my 60th photo on my monthly paperwork clear-out. It's a million times easier to pull the staple out of a stack of papers and feed them into the scanner than to manually go through every page. Also, unless you set up a jig with a tripod and light source, you'll end up with half the photos at a funny angle and/or flash fringes on the scanned images.
I think you've got a duff one. I've scanned literally thousands of pages with mine, and digitised years worth of wage slips, tax returns, bank statements etc.. It's probably worth trying spare parts. I don't think your device is representative of the usual quality of this product- bad luck:(.
At risk of being another "me too" - the ScanSnap is fantastic. I've been using it for nearly 3 years, together with DevonThink on the Mac. I showed it to my father-in-law, he went and bought one the next day, he's using it with Windows 7 and the supplied freebie software.
The killer feature is OCR'd PDFs, which you can search with text strings, but bring up the hi-res jpeg when you want to email or print a copy.
I/have/ made the ScanSnap jam, but only when I've been stupid enough to feed in far too many sheets. The software even helps you sort out the mess and carry on where you left off. The fold detection system is pretty good too, so if the paper snarls and doesn't scan properly it's let you know.
I think the BBC did the country, and computing in general, a massive service by choosing the Acorn machine. The BBC Micro really was the pinnacle of 8-bit micro computing, and it's a shame it didn't get the world-wide recognition it deserved. My school finally started replacing their BBC micros with PCs in something like 1993, at which time we had something like 40 machines all networked with central file storage and printing. All the machines were diskless with network logon to a fully-hierarchical file system. There was even crude station to station messaging and screen sharing. Probably the Apple ][ is the only machine to match the BBC and I'm not sure that had the same networking abilities.
It lost massively against all of the systems you mention, in almost every aspect. It won on three counts: it was early; it was small; it was incredibly cheap. It didn't have the words "don't panic" written on the case, but it might as well have. Here are a few highlights: monochrome RF-modulated video output only; no sound at all*; terrible membrane keyboard; 1K RAM (total, not all available to user); character-based display (no pixel-based graphics)**; edge-connector only expansion; very ropey cassette interface; "fast" and "slow" modes in BASIC - fast mode blanked the screen (ugly flickering grey) whilst executing the program, slow mode was- well, slow.
* actually, you could get sound output by slightly detuning the TV and using a machine code loop to mess with the RF modulator output
** I think there were also processor-intensive machine code hacks to get a graphic display but you couldn't do much else at the same time
Why is it a "lie" that dropbox is a backup? With dropbox I have a secure, offsite copy of all of my files, with automatic versioning so that I can rollback deletes or accidental changes. How is that not a backup?
"What happens..." is that the dropbox server effectively has a version control system, and files can be rolled back including deletes. It's a totally valid replacement for local backup procedures, with different pros and cons as for any solution. What happens when someone drops the backup tape in their cup of coffee? There are always failure points, but it's silly to say dropbox is "not a valid replacement" because you can conceive of a [mitigated] point of failure.
Yes I got that wrong, it's the USB/data cable and charger for the Galaxy Tab that is a deliberate clone of the Apple equivalents. It's a bit ridiculous to think that Samsung are not deliberately trying to be a poor man's Apple, whether it's illegal/actionable or not is a different matter. It's not a bad thing - I drive a Ford car that clearly set out to mimic features and overall style of higher-end vehicles, but it's not obviously a copy of any one vehicle. When you get a Samsung Galaxy Tab out of the box you can see that they were going for iPad in a way that other manufacturers weren't.
This is a silly blog post. The briefing is simply pointing out that there were many options that the Samsung designers could have taken to differentiate their device, but didn't. Any one of those (like giving the front surface a slightly curved profile) would have moved the design away from an iPhone clone. I can tell a Blackberry apart from any other brand of phone from a distance, because they choose a distinctive style. Samsung were deliberately cloning Apple down to the shape of the charger, and Apple would be neglecting their duty to their shareholders not to persue legal remedy if it's available.
I'm not keen on deleting, but archiving and putting elsewhere is a good idea, otherwise you end up with thousands of hits when you do a search for something. If I know I want something from 5 years ago I can always open the archives.
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No, it's not, it's a useful word. It generally refers to a hobbyist who has the money/dedication to use genuinely professional equipment. For example, I don't play guitar for a living, but I do own a guitar and amplifier that would be more than suitable for a professional session musician. None of "amateur, hobbyist, enthusiast" conveys that. The marketing side of it is that companies have started to target those people as a sector in their own right, for instance Canon tend to make a range of cameras that have the same features as their high-end professional models, but with plastic rather than alloy bodies so not really suitable for a photojournalist in the field. Prosumer describes that quite nicely.
Turning a steering wheel right to go right is intuitive, because the wheel is on the end of the pinion of a rack and pinion steering system, which directly (perhaps power-assisted) moves the wheels relative to the chassis. Yokes and rudders work by directing airflow and water flow respectively, hence appear reversed in comparison to a steering wheel.
The difference, of course, is that windowing systems are generally metaphors rather than extensions of concrete concepts, so could be arranged any way we want. I'm not sure studies are "nonsense", though, clearly there are metaphors that make sense to the majority of people and therefore stick, and it makes sense to build windowing systems around those metaphors. Like, most people can understand putting files into a trash can, which stay there until you empty the trash and then they're gone forever. Most people can't understand the concept of a page file and a page fault, even though in computer science terms they're not really any more complex than a trash can.
_NATIVE_ email. Goodness, people that get their email from websites won't care about native email support on the Playbook. People that do, expect IMAP and/or POP3. And probably Exchange too.
I thought it was sad that Microsoft had to put little messages at the beginning and end of the video in case the viewer didn't get the point. They still totally don't get postmodern media.
I don't think that can be right. Otherwise, you would damage the car by switching off the engine at the top of a long, steep hill.
Er... no, OSX uses BSD userland.
No, "native email" means IMAP and POP3 to the vast majority of people. The general public buying a tablet expect to be able to use a desktop-like email client on their tablet.
Yep, that's my pet peeve. Just as bad is the non-modal window that steals focus every time it updates the progress bar or little report saying what it's currently loading.
It's a holdover from the days of single and co-operative multitasking, where you had to wait for an application to load before doing anything else. I want to click on an application icon, and continue doing what I'm already doing. I don't want a splash screen stealing focus every time it loads another plugin, or - even worse - be in the foreground with no option to hide it. Most OSs have a system for acknowledging an application is loading - on OSX the dock icon bounces, on other systems you see a cursor+eggtimer or something similar. I want an app to stay silent until it loads, and only give a message if there's a problem.
Every printer I've plugged into my Mac has worked without requiring driver installation or downloading any software. I don't know what printer you're using, but that must be an isolated example.
Thanks for describing the OSX print subsystem. It's only in the Windows world that this isn't the case. Linux is variable, depending on how well CUPS is set up in the distro you're using.
Thanks for translating. I'm presuming that you're aware of the manufacturing pedigree of the computer on which you're typing your comment, and that every component has come from a factory where workers have Western-style rights, working conditions, pay, sick leave, vacation etc..
I'm pleased to hear that Apple products come from factories where conditions are far better than the norm in the prevailing culture. I hope that standards can be raised in all factories. I'm pretty sure that none of the workers are slaves.
The thing that bothers me about paperless (online) billing, is that if I ever have a major dispute with my
Yeah, I'm sure I'll enjoy using a digital camera when I'm up to my 60th photo on my monthly paperwork clear-out. It's a million times easier to pull the staple out of a stack of papers and feed them into the scanner than to manually go through every page. Also, unless you set up a jig with a tripod and light source, you'll end up with half the photos at a funny angle and/or flash fringes on the scanned images.
I think you've got a duff one. I've scanned literally thousands of pages with mine, and digitised years worth of wage slips, tax returns, bank statements etc.. It's probably worth trying spare parts. I don't think your device is representative of the usual quality of this product- bad luck :(.
At risk of being another "me too" - the ScanSnap is fantastic. I've been using it for nearly 3 years, together with DevonThink on the Mac. I showed it to my father-in-law, he went and bought one the next day, he's using it with Windows 7 and the supplied freebie software.
The killer feature is OCR'd PDFs, which you can search with text strings, but bring up the hi-res jpeg when you want to email or print a copy.
I /have/ made the ScanSnap jam, but only when I've been stupid enough to feed in far too many sheets. The software even helps you sort out the mess and carry on where you left off. The fold detection system is pretty good too, so if the paper snarls and doesn't scan properly it's let you know.
I think the BBC did the country, and computing in general, a massive service by choosing the Acorn machine. The BBC Micro really was the pinnacle of 8-bit micro computing, and it's a shame it didn't get the world-wide recognition it deserved. My school finally started replacing their BBC micros with PCs in something like 1993, at which time we had something like 40 machines all networked with central file storage and printing. All the machines were diskless with network logon to a fully-hierarchical file system. There was even crude station to station messaging and screen sharing. Probably the Apple ][ is the only machine to match the BBC and I'm not sure that had the same networking abilities.
It lost massively against all of the systems you mention, in almost every aspect. It won on three counts: it was early; it was small; it was incredibly cheap. It didn't have the words "don't panic" written on the case, but it might as well have. Here are a few highlights: monochrome RF-modulated video output only; no sound at all*; terrible membrane keyboard; 1K RAM (total, not all available to user); character-based display (no pixel-based graphics)**; edge-connector only expansion; very ropey cassette interface; "fast" and "slow" modes in BASIC - fast mode blanked the screen (ugly flickering grey) whilst executing the program, slow mode was- well, slow.
* actually, you could get sound output by slightly detuning the TV and using a machine code loop to mess with the RF modulator output
** I think there were also processor-intensive machine code hacks to get a graphic display but you couldn't do much else at the same time
Serious fail. I hope you were trying to be funny...
Why is it a "lie" that dropbox is a backup? With dropbox I have a secure, offsite copy of all of my files, with automatic versioning so that I can rollback deletes or accidental changes. How is that not a backup?
"What happens..." is that the dropbox server effectively has a version control system, and files can be rolled back including deletes. It's a totally valid replacement for local backup procedures, with different pros and cons as for any solution. What happens when someone drops the backup tape in their cup of coffee? There are always failure points, but it's silly to say dropbox is "not a valid replacement" because you can conceive of a [mitigated] point of failure.
It's the fault of the idiots using a word processor document for form filling. That's what PDF is for.
Yes I got that wrong, it's the USB/data cable and charger for the Galaxy Tab that is a deliberate clone of the Apple equivalents. It's a bit ridiculous to think that Samsung are not deliberately trying to be a poor man's Apple, whether it's illegal/actionable or not is a different matter. It's not a bad thing - I drive a Ford car that clearly set out to mimic features and overall style of higher-end vehicles, but it's not obviously a copy of any one vehicle. When you get a Samsung Galaxy Tab out of the box you can see that they were going for iPad in a way that other manufacturers weren't.
This is a silly blog post. The briefing is simply pointing out that there were many options that the Samsung designers could have taken to differentiate their device, but didn't. Any one of those (like giving the front surface a slightly curved profile) would have moved the design away from an iPhone clone. I can tell a Blackberry apart from any other brand of phone from a distance, because they choose a distinctive style. Samsung were deliberately cloning Apple down to the shape of the charger, and Apple would be neglecting their duty to their shareholders not to persue legal remedy if it's available.
I'm not keen on deleting, but archiving and putting elsewhere is a good idea, otherwise you end up with thousands of hits when you do a search for something. If I know I want something from 5 years ago I can always open the archives.