This is what I'm being told to do!
My wife is due to have our first child around christmas, and she keeps "reminding" me my mass of wires and plugs needs to go.
But I don't want to let go of the control have all the plug switches exposed gives me!
Surely there is some plugs strip that has USB control?
Then I can hide the cables to stop baby coming to harm (or causing damage!).
At the moment this look like it will have to be self build.
We can't predict how they will read them, only try and help them do so.
If the shit hits the fan, they might have to rebuild a primitive dvd reader to read our old data to help them rebuild more of our technology.
Or maybe in their towers of crystal they'll use some kind of insanely powerful, multispectrum digital camera and extract the data from the image.
Or maybe their genetically enhanced eyes and minds do it all for them in their subconscious, so they don't even see the disc, just the data.
We can't know, but we should try and make it as easy as possible for the data to be retrieved as long into the future as we can.
Now, if everyone understands DRM and closed formats are hopelessly short sighted, maybe we can avoid the current day being the future's digital dark age. We can leave a legacy of storage media still readable in formats whose workings are widely known.
Some would leave their descendants a tangled mess of data hidden with secrets on media not designed to last longer than a decade. Which is not really seeing the bigger picture.....
and the technical linux people market is how many % of the market?
I think technical linux people are the people normal people go to ask about Linux. If they say it's bad, it won't help it's PR at all.
normal users will be getting it with a new machine, not installing it themselves. normal people already don't get to "run a lot of apps they want" depending on what machine they chose - buy a windows PC and you don't get iLife, for example. buy a Mac and you don't get to run... most games:-)
If non-game Windows apps didn't matter much, more people would buy Macs. Besides this isn't what I want. I think they should be able to buy what ever computer they want and be able to run any software. I want them to compete properly. Both Mac and Windows lock you in! Software should run on more then one type of OS!
how did you think MS got to the market share it has now?
People not understanding the problem with monopolies and they do in fact have a option. People in fact not even caring about computers at all or what the nerds say, if they see it "working" that's enough for them. But now the world is getting more technically savy, more people are waking up and saying hang on a minute! We all loose in this kind of monopoly market.
you're looking at it all wrong. ease & speed of adoption + demand is a LOT more important than "current market players". primary evidence being the iphone - before the iphone introduction, number of iphone apps was zero. look at how many there are now. just because there aren't really the kind of "web based apps" out there that can make you imagine what life would be like with a primarily web-based-app ecosystem doesn't mean there won't be, if Google can put enough machines out there in the hands of enough people.
Keep the faith. I just see this whole thing as a re-run of the old thin client "future". It wasn't the future then, I'm not convinced it will be the future now. Then, as now, it wasn't just about performance, but control.
You say that but Corel was my introduction to Linux. I left it then because I was only interested in 3d modelling and 3d game programming at the time. The Linux then isn't the Linux now, now my younger self we be quite happy with Linux just as my current self is.
I don't think you need to closed done a Unix system to make it so grandma can use it. Anyone can use Ubuntu, sure it's not quite as productized as OSX, but that's because it's not got the money behind it, not because it's open. Dumming and closing down the whole system for grandma when she is only just about getting to use a web browser anyway? HELL NO.
If Google have taken out X and are creating a new locked in Unix system I will think MUCH less of them both technical and morally. My gut says Google are trying to do an Apple, but I hope I'm wrong. MS must be crossing their fingers for another Unix war, if there is, again they win and we all loose.
I feel Apple did this as much to lock applications in to just their platform more than anything else. The technical reasons given I feel are old unix hater fluff to justify it.
Glad to hear some sane X11 commenting. There is much uninformed X11 hate around.
Most people that complain about developing on X are talking about XLib not it's replacement XCB, so it's a bit unfair...
At the moment I have this sinking feeling the do mean an X11 replacement. This would separate ChromeOS from being just another distro, it won't be able to run many apps, only ChromeOS apps. I think that is what they want. They might bring out the usual false Unix hater X11 arguments, but I feel that's what it really will be. It's a way of locking down a Unix, like Apple before them.:-(
Yer, someone no will do a X11 for ChromeOS, but the fragmentation will be done.
I guarantee, if you can do local apps, someone will do a X server for compatibility. Why not just include as default unless you don't want to take part in the large world of X apps.
If you are bothered about the client/server overhead (which is debate in itself, but for me that's microkernel vs monothithic), push for a X that doesn't have client/server (like MicroXwin or XDirectFB), at least not by default.
X suffers much critism, much of it at XLib which XCB is meant to replace. But X has survived to date, and what's happening in Wayland and Gallium3D I find very interesting. Plus, I find X forwarding from the desktop really useful for the craptop.;-)
This is a Linux distro that can't run any non-google-SDK software. No X server wipes out being able to run most of the GUI software in the ecosystem. You locked to google. Why would I want this? Technical Linux people aren't going to want it. Normal users won't dare install any thing called an operating system. And everyone, will want to be able to run the apps they want, not only google approved ones. All this pain just for browser? This seems to be built on the dream of a thin client that runs nothing but a browser and all software is web software. It's an old dream, the world only needs five real computers, etc etc. Thing is, we don't want to be controlled, never have. I want to run what I want, how I want thank you very much Mr mainframe. If I'm right about the web app stance, this is a stupid idea come up with by people who think they can see the future but aren't looking at the past.
The best google could have done is done yet another standard Linux distro, with X in some form, so they can tap into the existing software ecosystem. They can quality control the software with a repository. That way they can take advantage of much of the existing Unix software. Then they can use their brand, and Linux speed, security, software base, etc etc, to make it big in the OS world.
If you have the money to burn, and your both of the science/extreme-sport persuasion, this is a great thing to do. Added to that, they are the first. I say good luck to them, and I hope neither is sick.
Don't know about anyone else but polywell is far more interesting to me. IF it works, then it will be much better then tokamak. At this rate, IF it works, it could also beat tokamak to net energy production. I have a dream of cheap energy! Nearly all the worlds problems come down to energy! I'll keep dreaming.;-)
Sure you can buy a cheap crappy one, but it will break quickly and you have to buy another and another and so on. Depending on the item, that policy can quickly get more expensive than buying a good one in the first place. It's a con to make you spend more. It's actually in a company's interest to make something crappy that breaks, but make you think it's good so you buy another when it does. What I think I've noticed is a company making a good product, then cashing in on the brand name they have built up. This of course compromises the brand name in the long run, but when it does, repeat! I think there should be a stated life span for the item, that if enough items don't make, the company gets into trouble with regulators, that means we can compared on life span and price. Other measures of quality are more subjective....
Given the number of museums scattered around the UK, it's clear that the British government understands this in many cases; the question is why they don't get it in this particular one.
Because it's a computer, so of course it doesn't matter. Just like anything else the nerds bang on about like open standards and competition, copyright and patent reform, etc etc. We're just noise to them. I mean what do nerds know?
Only been converted in the last two years, in steps.
Long live MacOS - you get what you pay for.
LOL! How can you say that! MacOS is built on BSD! (and NextStep)
Apple just grabbed it, that's the whole problem with BSD. MS did the same on a small scale years ago, the original TCP/IP stack was BSD's. Apple's grab has meant they could catch up, but they will fall behind again because they aren't working in an open source manner (though I admit, some things they do seam to be playing nice with). They will have to do it again a few years down the line, but BSD is being left behind by Linux, and that's GPL. The GPL stops companies like MS and Apple just taking and not giving back. It's sticky, that's why Linux is snowballing.
And don't come with that "Free" is not "free"
kwap. In PRACTICE free and Free have turned
out to be the same thing.
Oh you so don't get it. Read some RMS. If you're not interested in that kind of thing you're on the wrong site. The difference is why this thread is about Linux not BSD.
I only managed to get halfway down before I just couldn't be bothered. He lost me straight away really when he said Linux and free software would never be used for complicated software like databases. WHERE THE HELL HAS HE BEEN?!
This is yet another semi-tech person who tried to use Linux as a drop in replacement to Windows, couldn't, read Unix hater or something and wrote a article.
GNU/Linux is here now, it's on your router, it's on your set-top box, it's on the web server you browsing, controls countless DBs you access, and no doubt the software you are using has at least some lib ported from the GNU/Linux platform. It's heading for your car, your phone, your camera and endless devices and servers. It's coming up from the embedded market and down from the server market, and it terrifies MS. Distros like Ubuntu are beginning to do a good job of making GNU/Linux into a easy desktop. Like any OS, get hardware where the manufacturer supports the OS and if the hardware doesn't work with the OS, blame the hardware manufacturer.
If you can't use it on your desktop, maybe it's you who is not ready. If that's not the case already, it really isn't long before it is. Sorry, but deal with it.
Re:The Achilles heel of this...
on
Phoenix BIOSOS?
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· Score: 1
If an open source driver doesn't work it's because not enough people care about it for it to be fixed. A fraction of the users are programmers, a fraction of those care enough to fix it, and a fraction of them have the time and skill. So the pool of users has to be a certain size for it to be maintained. If your lucky in a small pool, there is one, and they care enough to keep the driver running. This is a better model then closed source, because with closed source a device can be forced into obscelecence regardless of the size of pool of current users. Which is why Linux supports more devices then any other operating system. I've run kit under Linux just fine where there isn't any drivers for the current version of Windows anymore.
On top of that, because many are looking at drivers, the driver APIs has pressure on them to be simple and there are real world code driver programmers can copy or even reuse. This makes for small, better drivers.
If people can be paid to care and find time to maintain drivers, you have the best of both worlds, which happens right now with some open drivers.
Re:Great Idea ... M$ will kill it
on
Phoenix BIOSOS?
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· Score: 1
Is that the kind of anti-competitive behaviour that just got Intel into trouble with the EU?
After the size of the fine, I doubt MS would dare try that, at least in Europe.
And what about when it's your machine and it's an app you need to use and are being prevented from using? Maybe for work machines, but I will not buy hardware for home with this. I won't use services that require me to have this. Built it yourself from source, maybe modified/customized it? Then you can't use it. Could you get more locked in? I'm not going to just walk into this cage, or even go near it. I won't give up my freedoms so easily.
The EU is showing it has some balls to deal with anticompetitive practices.
From my perspective this is good ammo against the Euro-skeptics in my own country. Big multinational companies like Intel couldn't care less about what a EU member state says, but if the EU works together it's a heavy hitter.
They can't stop computers talking to computers. Every time they block a method, a new one will be found. So your ISP only allows port 8080 with HTTP, fine, there'll be a p2p standard that converts every packet to look like a HTTP packet and send/receive them via 8080. They next step would be to allow only IP connections to IP address in a approved list. At which point people would give up on the normal internet and create some kind of mash up wireless web like can be done with OLPC.
It's just not possible to stop file sharing. They can only slow it down for short periods. People want to share, and that's what it boils down to. These people aren't stealing they are sharing, the clouds wouldn't work if everyone was taking more than they where giving.
Slashdot Mirror
This is what I'm being told to do!
My wife is due to have our first child around christmas, and she keeps "reminding" me my mass of wires and plugs needs to go.
But I don't want to let go of the control have all the plug switches exposed gives me!
Surely there is some plugs strip that has USB control?
Then I can hide the cables to stop baby coming to harm (or causing damage!).
At the moment this look like it will have to be self build.
We can't predict how they will read them, only try and help them do so.
If the shit hits the fan, they might have to rebuild a primitive dvd reader to read our old data to help them rebuild more of our technology. Or maybe in their towers of crystal they'll use some kind of insanely powerful, multispectrum digital camera and extract the data from the image. Or maybe their genetically enhanced eyes and minds do it all for them in their subconscious, so they don't even see the disc, just the data. We can't know, but we should try and make it as easy as possible for the data to be retrieved as long into the future as we can.
Now, if everyone understands DRM and closed formats are hopelessly short sighted, maybe we can avoid the current day being the future's digital dark age. We can leave a legacy of storage media still readable in formats whose workings are widely known. Some would leave their descendants a tangled mess of data hidden with secrets on media not designed to last longer than a decade. Which is not really seeing the bigger picture.....
and the technical linux people market is how many % of the market?
I think technical linux people are the people normal people go to ask about Linux. If they say it's bad, it won't help it's PR at all.
normal users will be getting it with a new machine, not installing it themselves. normal people already don't get to "run a lot of apps they want" depending on what machine they chose - buy a windows PC and you don't get iLife, for example. buy a Mac and you don't get to run ... most games :-)
If non-game Windows apps didn't matter much, more people would buy Macs. Besides this isn't what I want. I think they should be able to buy what ever computer they want and be able to run any software. I want them to compete properly. Both Mac and Windows lock you in! Software should run on more then one type of OS!
how did you think MS got to the market share it has now?
People not understanding the problem with monopolies and they do in fact have a option. People in fact not even caring about computers at all or what the nerds say, if they see it "working" that's enough for them. But now the world is getting more technically savy, more people are waking up and saying hang on a minute! We all loose in this kind of monopoly market.
you're looking at it all wrong. ease & speed of adoption + demand is a LOT more important than "current market players". primary evidence being the iphone - before the iphone introduction, number of iphone apps was zero. look at how many there are now. just because there aren't really the kind of "web based apps" out there that can make you imagine what life would be like with a primarily web-based-app ecosystem doesn't mean there won't be, if Google can put enough machines out there in the hands of enough people.
Keep the faith. I just see this whole thing as a re-run of the old thin client "future". It wasn't the future then, I'm not convinced it will be the future now. Then, as now, it wasn't just about performance, but control.
You say that but Corel was my introduction to Linux. I left it then because I was only interested in 3d modelling and 3d game programming at the time. The Linux then isn't the Linux now, now my younger self we be quite happy with Linux just as my current self is.
I don't think you need to closed done a Unix system to make it so grandma can use it. Anyone can use Ubuntu, sure it's not quite as productized as OSX, but that's because it's not got the money behind it, not because it's open. Dumming and closing down the whole system for grandma when she is only just about getting to use a web browser anyway? HELL NO.
If Google have taken out X and are creating a new locked in Unix system I will think MUCH less of them both technical and morally. My gut says Google are trying to do an Apple, but I hope I'm wrong. MS must be crossing their fingers for another Unix war, if there is, again they win and we all loose.
I feel Apple did this as much to lock applications in to just their platform more than anything else. The technical reasons given I feel are old unix hater fluff to justify it.
Glad to hear some sane X11 commenting. There is much uninformed X11 hate around.
:-(
Yer, someone no will do a X11 for ChromeOS, but the fragmentation will be done.
Most people that complain about developing on X are talking about XLib not it's replacement XCB, so it's a bit unfair...
At the moment I have this sinking feeling the do mean an X11 replacement. This would separate ChromeOS from being just another distro, it won't be able to run many apps, only ChromeOS apps. I think that is what they want. They might bring out the usual false Unix hater X11 arguments, but I feel that's what it really will be. It's a way of locking down a Unix, like Apple before them.
I guarantee, if you can do local apps, someone will do a X server for compatibility. Why not just include as default unless you don't want to take part in the large world of X apps.
;-)
If you are bothered about the client/server overhead (which is debate in itself, but for me that's microkernel vs monothithic), push for a X that doesn't have client/server (like MicroXwin or XDirectFB), at least not by default.
X suffers much critism, much of it at XLib which XCB is meant to replace. But X has survived to date, and what's happening in Wayland and Gallium3D I find very interesting. Plus, I find X forwarding from the desktop really useful for the craptop.
This is a Linux distro that can't run any non-google-SDK software. No X server wipes out being able to run most of the GUI software in the ecosystem. You locked to google. Why would I want this? Technical Linux people aren't going to want it. Normal users won't dare install any thing called an operating system. And everyone, will want to be able to run the apps they want, not only google approved ones. All this pain just for browser? This seems to be built on the dream of a thin client that runs nothing but a browser and all software is web software. It's an old dream, the world only needs five real computers, etc etc. Thing is, we don't want to be controlled, never have. I want to run what I want, how I want thank you very much Mr mainframe. If I'm right about the web app stance, this is a stupid idea come up with by people who think they can see the future but aren't looking at the past. The best google could have done is done yet another standard Linux distro, with X in some form, so they can tap into the existing software ecosystem. They can quality control the software with a repository. That way they can take advantage of much of the existing Unix software. Then they can use their brand, and Linux speed, security, software base, etc etc, to make it big in the OS world.
Please read: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/10/22/linux_v_windows_security/ Most of it is still relevant. The consequences of security model used must be taken into account in any cost analysis.
Surely an OS only needs a handful of formats, all closed and patent encumbered so no one else can read them? Oh wait, that sucks.....
If you have the money to burn, and your both of the science/extreme-sport persuasion, this is a great thing to do. Added to that, they are the first. I say good luck to them, and I hope neither is sick.
Don't know about anyone else but polywell is far more interesting to me. IF it works, then it will be much better then tokamak. At this rate, IF it works, it could also beat tokamak to net energy production. I have a dream of cheap energy! Nearly all the worlds problems come down to energy! I'll keep dreaming. ;-)
Sure you can buy a cheap crappy one, but it will break quickly and you have to buy another and another and so on. Depending on the item, that policy can quickly get more expensive than buying a good one in the first place. It's a con to make you spend more. It's actually in a company's interest to make something crappy that breaks, but make you think it's good so you buy another when it does. What I think I've noticed is a company making a good product, then cashing in on the brand name they have built up. This of course compromises the brand name in the long run, but when it does, repeat! I think there should be a stated life span for the item, that if enough items don't make, the company gets into trouble with regulators, that means we can compared on life span and price. Other measures of quality are more subjective....
Given the number of museums scattered around the UK, it's clear that the British government understands this in many cases; the question is why they don't get it in this particular one.
Because it's a computer, so of course it doesn't matter. Just like anything else the nerds bang on about like open standards and competition, copyright and patent reform, etc etc. We're just noise to them. I mean what do nerds know?
Long live MacOS - you get what you pay for.
LOL! How can you say that! MacOS is built on BSD! (and NextStep)
Apple just grabbed it, that's the whole problem with BSD. MS did the same on a small scale years ago, the original TCP/IP stack was BSD's. Apple's grab has meant they could catch up, but they will fall behind again because they aren't working in an open source manner (though I admit, some things they do seam to be playing nice with). They will have to do it again a few years down the line, but BSD is being left behind by Linux, and that's GPL. The GPL stops companies like MS and Apple just taking and not giving back. It's sticky, that's why Linux is snowballing.
And don't come with that "Free" is not "free" kwap. In PRACTICE free and Free have turned out to be the same thing.
Oh you so don't get it. Read some RMS. If you're not interested in that kind of thing you're on the wrong site. The difference is why this thread is about Linux not BSD.
I only managed to get halfway down before I just couldn't be bothered. He lost me straight away really when he said Linux and free software would never be used for complicated software like databases. WHERE THE HELL HAS HE BEEN?!
This is yet another semi-tech person who tried to use Linux as a drop in replacement to Windows, couldn't, read Unix hater or something and wrote a article.
GNU/Linux is here now, it's on your router, it's on your set-top box, it's on the web server you browsing, controls countless DBs you access, and no doubt the software you are using has at least some lib ported from the GNU/Linux platform. It's heading for your car, your phone, your camera and endless devices and servers. It's coming up from the embedded market and down from the server market, and it terrifies MS. Distros like Ubuntu are beginning to do a good job of making GNU/Linux into a easy desktop. Like any OS, get hardware where the manufacturer supports the OS and if the hardware doesn't work with the OS, blame the hardware manufacturer.
If you can't use it on your desktop, maybe it's you who is not ready. If that's not the case already, it really isn't long before it is. Sorry, but deal with it.
If an open source driver doesn't work it's because not enough people care about it for it to be fixed. A fraction of the users are programmers, a fraction of those care enough to fix it, and a fraction of them have the time and skill. So the pool of users has to be a certain size for it to be maintained. If your lucky in a small pool, there is one, and they care enough to keep the driver running. This is a better model then closed source, because with closed source a device can be forced into obscelecence regardless of the size of pool of current users. Which is why Linux supports more devices then any other operating system. I've run kit under Linux just fine where there isn't any drivers for the current version of Windows anymore.
On top of that, because many are looking at drivers, the driver APIs has pressure on them to be simple and there are real world code driver programmers can copy or even reuse. This makes for small, better drivers.
If people can be paid to care and find time to maintain drivers, you have the best of both worlds, which happens right now with some open drivers.
Is that the kind of anti-competitive behaviour that just got Intel into trouble with the EU? After the size of the fine, I doubt MS would dare try that, at least in Europe.
And what about when it's your machine and it's an app you need to use and are being prevented from using? Maybe for work machines, but I will not buy hardware for home with this. I won't use services that require me to have this. Built it yourself from source, maybe modified/customized it? Then you can't use it. Could you get more locked in? I'm not going to just walk into this cage, or even go near it. I won't give up my freedoms so easily.
The EU is showing it has some balls to deal with anticompetitive practices.
From my perspective this is good ammo against the Euro-skeptics in my own country. Big multinational companies like Intel couldn't care less about what a EU member state says, but if the EU works together it's a heavy hitter.
What about using the war chest to give away Windows7 for a bit? Make sure this time it the new version takes.
No! We want competing package management systems too! They should never be any "one to rule them all".
They can't stop computers talking to computers. Every time they block a method, a new one will be found. So your ISP only allows port 8080 with HTTP, fine, there'll be a p2p standard that converts every packet to look like a HTTP packet and send/receive them via 8080. They next step would be to allow only IP connections to IP address in a approved list. At which point people would give up on the normal internet and create some kind of mash up wireless web like can be done with OLPC.
It's just not possible to stop file sharing. They can only slow it down for short periods. People want to share, and that's what it boils down to. These people aren't stealing they are sharing, the clouds wouldn't work if everyone was taking more than they where giving.