Firms really are attracted to the latest buzzwords and hot topics like a fly to a shit are they not?
Just in case this is the latest "Netscape moment"*, the latest hot technology that might prove useful so they will carve up a slice of it for themselves and smother innovation with a deluge of patents and FUD. Stamping their branding irons into the body of development to get their logo and product into every corner.
I'm careful to avoid mentioning any specific firm here - because this goes for them all I think.
*by which I refer to the fact that initially the web was ignored by firms until it was clear it was a big thing at which point they all waded in with monopolistic behavior, fired up their legal teams and petitioned for more control of it from us miscreants and wasters in case we created something they could not profit from and lock down. I think nobody won that one, I would say there is too much DRM and monitoring, others would argue the other way.
early warning system is much cheap then numerous artificial islands.
rebuilding is much cheaper then numerous artificial islands.
most people will detect, warn, evacuate and rebuild - this kind of (very very) expensive prevention simply does not make sense on a 1 in 100 year (if not much more) disaster prevention.
it is like putting in bullet proof glass in all the windows of your house just in case the couple next door decide to have a son who might want to buy a bb gun later on in life...
It was launched in 1990 for a 15 year mission, extended to 20 after some servicing. It was expected to last until 2010 (the year we make contact? sorry I could not help it) so its already done its job very well.
As I understand it Interferometry can largely do a better job from the surface, please correct me if I am wrong...
And as pointed out elsewhere they are short on shuttle flights and 700Bn down, so its not looking good for Hubble.
Re:Every time I read an article like this
on
OS X On the MSI Wind
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
I thought about that a while back.
Suppose they did it this way...
1. published a list of exactly what hardware they supported, ie. a restricted driver model not the windows model of anybody can create anything they want and sell it for windows.
2. allowed OEMs to choose that supported hardware and display a "Apple Ready" sticker
3. allowed home builder to choose from that list and be "Apple Ready"
4. then anybody could buy and install Apple OS - if during boot up it detected unsupported hardare it would either refuse to install or warn the user that some hardware would not be support
I would expect them to release a free tool that would allow you to confirm if your platform was supported.
If this was done then OEMs could sell apple OS PCs, you'd see PC with "ready for windows" and "apple ready" label you'd know you could dual boot.
But let's face it, this is pure fantasy. Apple restrict the OS because they want money from the HW and they want to enforce a beautiful uniform image for their equipment. They very last thing they was is an ugly square chinese box proclaiming to be an apple.
Well thats exactly the point I was trying to make - I have no problem with H1B (in the UK we have a similar scheme) as such.
But only as a tool to fill jobs that cannot be filled with local resources.
Otherwise you stuff your own job market at the same time as you save money on wages - and this is not sensible long term though I imagine businesses desire it short term. Sorry, I have nothing against H1B holders, the ones I have met have been highly skilled and dedicated - but I happen to think the best think for the country is low unemployment and promotion of own skilled labor base.
That is my opinions, and apparently flamebait here as well. Oh well, naturally I have no problem with people holding alternative viewpoints - debate is great.
well in the UK "Jammy" is slang for "Lucky" - and yes, she is.
so what does this mean for the other **AA cases on the go? whilst its good news for Jammy, having legal weight behind the concept that "making available" is flawed no doubt helps everybody else as well.
so she is facing retrial, but already the previous damages award is dismissed as "wholly disproportionate". I wonder if the **AA will offer her a lower fine, something negligible to admit liability and end the case? I mean, its a dirty tactic - but probably well within their remit. they make the money from people who fold and they try to avoid court cases they think they may not win - but they obviously thought they'd win this one first time round and the evidence is unchanged.
when the asus ee came out it heralded a revolution in computing - a genuine low cost device that would perform all the simple tasks asked off it with a long battery life and portable.
in the same way I like linux as it removes the vast majority of the worthless eye candy from a modern operating system.
vista (for me) is the sum of everything I hate about modern operating systems - far too much eye candy and not enough substance. it is ludicrous to believe that you need a P4 + 2GB of RAM to read email and browse the net, but you do need it to run aero. but do you need aero to read emails and browse the net? of course not.
windows 7 looks to be more of the same, and I will be just as disinterested.
and to be fair, its not just windows that has the same issue..
the newer aus ees and sub-notebooks are once again in a performance and features war. now 10" screens, now HDD not flash, battery life is shortening. and the price is rising. i find this very disheartening indeed - I would of been much more impressed if they had set the boundary on price (i.e. the sub $300 range) and then people had attempted to fit whatever they could into that price range and let competition take care of the rest.
also the new distros have the same issue - I'm sure that KDE4 is the mutts nuts, but to me it is more eye candy that will slow my PC down and get in the way of what I want to do. but here the flexibility of linux rules out, if you do not like the WM then simply install another. with MS you get windows shoveled down your throat if you want it or not.
I can categorically state that there is no way I will willingly buy or run Vista at home, and the same looks to apply to Win7 based on what I have seen.
for all the new technology and better software I would much rather see the focus on delivering more stable, faster, leaner systems that run on cheaper hardware more reliably on longer. I am totally disinterested in eye candy, effects, and features that add nothing in the way of functionality yet remove a lot in the way of performance. I just think their focus is seriously wrong.
haha! nice dream, but alas like most/. readers I fear I lack the grace, fearlessness and coordination required leaping around window sills on the 50+ floor. perhaps lion taming would be more my forte!
fair comment. but that "hammering on keys in a chair" I actually meant as a working place! sorry I guess I should of specified that I meant the change in the working demographic from the 50s. doh! it was clear in my head anyhow....
so people suffer from depression and substance abuse when they spend most of their time indoors by themselves and most of their friends are virtual?
in what fashion is this news?
any doctor from the 50s could of predicted this given the symptoms/way of life of a hard core gamer. they'd of been horrified to learn that most of us sit in a chair for hours at a time hammering like poor possessed souls on little rows of buttons. as for junk food and long range commutes - who knows what they would of thought?
This seems to be doing the same thing better with much more realistic reactions and interface (of course Phantasmagoria had no choice as it used filmed section on 7 CDs) - and what is really noteworthy is that they are moving away from forcing the character down set pathways and decisions and allowing the player to choose their own route more.
I wonder if the 360 is up to this? Smaller disc drive and less processing.
It's a definite improvement over previous versions, and brings a lot to the table that Firefox requires extensions for.
That may be true. But given the speed that developments and innovations get put into FF and the general convenience of the plugin system I think I'll stage with the Fox. If there is anything amazingly good and useful you can be sure we'll all have it very soon indeed.
No really they were, I used to program/build CD players for my job for >5 years.
The old mechanisms were lovely metal framed affairs will bushed bearings, metal worm drives or fast moving arms for the optics. The optics were proper optics on well balanced, nicely made actuators and the whole thing just stank of quality components and care and attention. Because they were well made, the characteristics of the system was consistent from one unit to the next, and the analogue servos were all tuned to match the system. They could play CDs with horrible scratches on them much better then modern ones and the sound quality was generally better because they had a proper DAC.
When I left that field we were using "low cost" mechanisms. This mean moulded plastic gears, one single senser fits all (if you know how long it takes to reach the end of the disc, why bother with a sensor? just ram it against the end stop) The lens is bubble of resin, the actuators were often horrible. On top of this the tolerance in manufactruing was bloody awful. The resonances, the bandwidth changed considerably between units so the SW was expected to compensate and that was almost impossible with any degree of succcess. They'd hobble through a CD painfully, but put on a scratched disc or one with defects and all bets were off. Thats what a $15 CD player gets you. And do not even get me started on "1-bit bitstream DAC" rubbish.
Then there is the cost reduction on CDs themselves. Old CDs were nice thick well pressed affairs made of quality layers. They has a nice satisfying gap between songs (incidently this allowed the original analogue CD systems to jump from track to track looking for a certain signal from the subcode in the pretrack gap as it skipped across the disc surface - on the datapath/audio was digital in those days).
Last but not lesat is CD cop yprotection that erodes the CIRC scratch protection systems, if I start on that I'll begin ranting - thank god thats dying a death.
When I get a CD these days, when it is shiny and new I rip it, MP3 it, and then put it on the shelf where I look at it wistfully. I'm afraid, I'll scratch it and rended it paperweight.
i think us developed nations need a two pronged attack. on one side we need to mandate energy efficiency and maximum power consumption for a wide range of consumer goods. second we need to promote green target into production and buildings in general.
for example, building a new house? then by law it should have evacuated solar tube heating, be well insulated with grey water storage built in for toilets and non consumable water needs.
buying a TV? then you should have a choice between real low power 12V smaller systems (the technology has been used in camping for years) or higher consumption, larger mains powered devices with a real, physical off switch.
as well as tacking end up of power, then it should be mandated that energy collection/storage should be built in as standard, perhaps as interlocking solar "tiles". the technology is not quite there yet, but there are prototypes and companies looking at this.
wind power is problem, governments like it but in general when it is cold and there is least wind then people want to use most power and there is no efficient infrastructure to store/release power on a such a large scale yet.
of course this will never happen, because no government has the balls to attempt is and collectively society is always looking for the cheapest ticket. in the UK there are slow, slow trends that look encouraging..
1. the energy bills have nearly doubled in two years - i think this is a good thing as it forces people to consider energy consumption serioisly for the 1st time.
2. ever stricter building regulations
3. grants and more permissive planning for green projects: insulation, wind turbines, solar heating etc.
there are some encouraging signs, but not enough and too slow.
That's impressive. Though there seem to be scant details on efficiency and cost comparisons (I'm assuming this is more environmentally friendly to make as well as much cheaper).
Of course, it would of been more impressive if full details were diclosed online for people to take advantage of.
Is it possible to have your patent cake and eat it? The woman is clearly a brilliant engineer and deserves full credit for her work, she also states a worthwhile desire to help people across the world. So is it possible for her to obtain full commercial protection for her invention and then release all the details free for non-commercial use and reduced license fees for the third world? This would be ideal.
After all, no technology is going to change the lifestyles of poor people if they cannot afford to buy/license it.
On the other hand it would be unfair if she learned the Trevor Bayliss lesson the hard way - really clever little gadget swamped by low cost clones from asia from which he gained not a penny. As always I guess the big winners were the lawyers.
python seems to be the new perl - ie. a general purpose, scripting glue language. its small number of keywords and simple layout make it easier for the less technical minded to learn quickly.
of course, many people will prefer to use perl because of its larger amount of add-ons and clever tricks.
at work I use PHP a lot for many of my simulations and quick fixes, its really good for processing 2M line data files (try doing that with excel). I know its not what it was originally designed for, but it works for me.
look on the bright side, perl will no longer be learnt by many people and in a few years legacy "perl coders" can command higher wages to work on "legacy system" - much like COBOL programmer do now (though there are less of them every year).
I think this is the way it will always be, there will always be a simpler language to replace the old standards, and a new shiny technology that those who have managerial power but less technical knowledge can mandate from on high.
so, what happened to java? I liked it, it never went away but seems to hover on the edge.
Slashdot Mirror
Firms really are attracted to the latest buzzwords and hot topics like a fly to a shit are they not?
Just in case this is the latest "Netscape moment"*, the latest hot technology that might prove useful so they will carve up a slice of it for themselves and smother innovation with a deluge of patents and FUD. Stamping their branding irons into the body of development to get their logo and product into every corner.
I'm careful to avoid mentioning any specific firm here - because this goes for them all I think.
*by which I refer to the fact that initially the web was ignored by firms until it was clear it was a big thing at which point they all waded in with monopolistic behavior, fired up their legal teams and petitioned for more control of it from us miscreants and wasters in case we created something they could not profit from and lock down. I think nobody won that one, I would say there is too much DRM and monitoring, others would argue the other way.
its a sad,sad state of affairs when this is modded "funny".
its is naive to label them a bunch of C&nts and then hope they are nice to you later on.
I had a hunt on the net - but did not find anything.
did *anybody* ever get hit by a falling satellite?
or radiation damage?
or property damage?
anybody know?
early warning system is much cheap then numerous artificial islands.
rebuilding is much cheaper then numerous artificial islands.
most people will detect, warn, evacuate and rebuild - this kind of (very very) expensive prevention simply does not make sense on a 1 in 100 year (if not much more) disaster prevention.
it is like putting in bullet proof glass in all the windows of your house just in case the couple next door decide to have a son who might want to buy a bb gun later on in life...
In case anybody was wondering, because I was...
It was launched in 1990 for a 15 year mission, extended to 20 after some servicing. It was expected to last until 2010 (the year we make contact? sorry I could not help it) so its already done its job very well.
As I understand it Interferometry can largely do a better job from the surface, please correct me if I am wrong...
And as pointed out elsewhere they are short on shuttle flights and 700Bn down, so its not looking good for Hubble.
I thought about that a while back.
Suppose they did it this way...
1. published a list of exactly what hardware they supported, ie. a restricted driver model not the windows model of anybody can create anything they want and sell it for windows.
2. allowed OEMs to choose that supported hardware and display a "Apple Ready" sticker
3. allowed home builder to choose from that list and be "Apple Ready"
4. then anybody could buy and install Apple OS - if during boot up it detected unsupported hardare it would either refuse to install or warn the user that some hardware would not be support
I would expect them to release a free tool that would allow you to confirm if your platform was supported.
If this was done then OEMs could sell apple OS PCs, you'd see PC with "ready for windows" and "apple ready" label you'd know you could dual boot.
But let's face it, this is pure fantasy. Apple restrict the OS because they want money from the HW and they want to enforce a beautiful uniform image for their equipment. They very last thing they was is an ugly square chinese box proclaiming to be an apple.
Well thats exactly the point I was trying to make - I have no problem with H1B (in the UK we have a similar scheme) as such.
But only as a tool to fill jobs that cannot be filled with local resources.
Otherwise you stuff your own job market at the same time as you save money on wages - and this is not sensible long term though I imagine businesses desire it short term. Sorry, I have nothing against H1B holders, the ones I have met have been highly skilled and dedicated - but I happen to think the best think for the country is low unemployment and promotion of own skilled labor base.
That is my opinions, and apparently flamebait here as well. Oh well, naturally I have no problem with people holding alternative viewpoints - debate is great.
well on the plus side, if more people take it up then there might be a reduction in these....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H1B_visa
yeah, riiight.
well in the UK "Jammy" is slang for "Lucky" - and yes, she is.
so what does this mean for the other **AA cases on the go? whilst its good news for Jammy, having legal weight behind the concept that "making available" is flawed no doubt helps everybody else as well.
am I right?
the main link is already dead (for me) but you can see more here..
http://news.google.co.uk/news?q=Jammy+Thomas&ie=UTF-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&hl=en&sa=X&oi=news_result&resnum=1&ct=title
so she is facing retrial, but already the previous damages award is dismissed as "wholly disproportionate". I wonder if the **AA will offer her a lower fine, something negligible to admit liability and end the case? I mean, its a dirty tactic - but probably well within their remit. they make the money from people who fold and they try to avoid court cases they think they may not win - but they obviously thought they'd win this one first time round and the evidence is unchanged.
of course, the lawyers will win regardless...
when the asus ee came out it heralded a revolution in computing - a genuine low cost device that would perform all the simple tasks asked off it with a long battery life and portable.
in the same way I like linux as it removes the vast majority of the worthless eye candy from a modern operating system.
vista (for me) is the sum of everything I hate about modern operating systems - far too much eye candy and not enough substance. it is ludicrous to believe that you need a P4 + 2GB of RAM to read email and browse the net, but you do need it to run aero. but do you need aero to read emails and browse the net? of course not.
windows 7 looks to be more of the same, and I will be just as disinterested.
and to be fair, its not just windows that has the same issue..
the newer aus ees and sub-notebooks are once again in a performance and features war. now 10" screens, now HDD not flash, battery life is shortening. and the price is rising. i find this very disheartening indeed - I would of been much more impressed if they had set the boundary on price (i.e. the sub $300 range) and then people had attempted to fit whatever they could into that price range and let competition take care of the rest.
also the new distros have the same issue - I'm sure that KDE4 is the mutts nuts, but to me it is more eye candy that will slow my PC down and get in the way of what I want to do. but here the flexibility of linux rules out, if you do not like the WM then simply install another. with MS you get windows shoveled down your throat if you want it or not.
I can categorically state that there is no way I will willingly buy or run Vista at home, and the same looks to apply to Win7 based on what I have seen.
for all the new technology and better software I would much rather see the focus on delivering more stable, faster, leaner systems that run on cheaper hardware more reliably on longer. I am totally disinterested in eye candy, effects, and features that add nothing in the way of functionality yet remove a lot in the way of performance. I just think their focus is seriously wrong.
just my 2$, sorry if I rambled.
haha! nice dream, but alas like most /. readers I fear I lack the grace, fearlessness and coordination required leaping around window sills on the 50+ floor. perhaps lion taming would be more my forte!
Monty Python had it right: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMOmB1q8W4Y
fair comment. but that "hammering on keys in a chair" I actually meant as a working place! sorry I guess I should of specified that I meant the change in the working demographic from the 50s. doh! it was clear in my head anyhow....
good comment about couch potatoes..
so people suffer from depression and substance abuse when they spend most of their time indoors by themselves and most of their friends are virtual?
in what fashion is this news?
any doctor from the 50s could of predicted this given the symptoms/way of life of a hard core gamer. they'd of been horrified to learn that most of us sit in a chair for hours at a time hammering like poor possessed souls on little rows of buttons. as for junk food and long range commutes - who knows what they would of thought?
but does it ru....
oh whats the point?
seriously, if it browses the net, reads email, and allows me to use office 'ware I'm happy. games are what I have a PS3 for.
Immersive story/puzzle games are nothing particularly new.
Remember Phantasmagoria? Spent weeks finishing that one.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantasmagoria_(computer_game)
This seems to be doing the same thing better with much more realistic reactions and interface (of course Phantasmagoria had no choice as it used filmed section on 7 CDs) - and what is really noteworthy is that they are moving away from forcing the character down set pathways and decisions and allowing the player to choose their own route more.
I wonder if the 360 is up to this? Smaller disc drive and less processing.
will they include the front page?
you know, the bit that goes "to my darking Wendy, all names and places in this book are entirely fictitious and any resemblance to real.."
See! I told you that dendrochronology was more accurate!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dendrochronology
I pity the man who has to interrupt two scientists arguing about decay rates and tell them they were both right.
so.. we all know what would happen if Microsoft designed a motor car, but what would happen if the Rover Team designed one?
(I don't know about you, but I think still working after 4 years is damn impressive)
I'm kinda bemused....
...does this make a roomful of avid gamers actually interesting or fun to be with?
(or are they just as boring when they are off their tits?)
It's a definite improvement over previous versions, and brings a lot to the table that Firefox requires extensions for.
That may be true. But given the speed that developments and innovations get put into FF and the general convenience of the plugin system I think I'll stage with the Fox. If there is anything amazingly good and useful you can be sure we'll all have it very soon indeed.
this is what happens when you have a site that pushes data data that everybody wants to take a look at, but nobody wants to pay for.
and, of course, its hard to argue you are working for ethical reasons when you are charging money for it as well.
seems like a flawed business model from start to finish really, but many other websites suffer the same.
the only reason this is noteworthy is the nature of the information that they proffer.
No really they were, I used to program/build CD players for my job for >5 years.
The old mechanisms were lovely metal framed affairs will bushed bearings, metal worm drives or fast moving arms for the optics. The optics were proper optics on well balanced, nicely made actuators and the whole thing just stank of quality components and care and attention. Because they were well made, the characteristics of the system was consistent from one unit to the next, and the analogue servos were all tuned to match the system. They could play CDs with horrible scratches on them much better then modern ones and the sound quality was generally better because they had a proper DAC.
When I left that field we were using "low cost" mechanisms. This mean moulded plastic gears, one single senser fits all (if you know how long it takes to reach the end of the disc, why bother with a sensor? just ram it against the end stop) The lens is bubble of resin, the actuators were often horrible. On top of this the tolerance in manufactruing was bloody awful. The resonances, the bandwidth changed considerably between units so the SW was expected to compensate and that was almost impossible with any degree of succcess. They'd hobble through a CD painfully, but put on a scratched disc or one with defects and all bets were off. Thats what a $15 CD player gets you. And do not even get me started on "1-bit bitstream DAC" rubbish.
Then there is the cost reduction on CDs themselves. Old CDs were nice thick well pressed affairs made of quality layers. They has a nice satisfying gap between songs (incidently this allowed the original analogue CD systems to jump from track to track looking for a certain signal from the subcode in the pretrack gap as it skipped across the disc surface - on the datapath/audio was digital in those days).
Last but not lesat is CD cop yprotection that erodes the CIRC scratch protection systems, if I start on that I'll begin ranting - thank god thats dying a death.
When I get a CD these days, when it is shiny and new I rip it, MP3 it, and then put it on the shelf where I look at it wistfully. I'm afraid, I'll scratch it and rended it paperweight.
good points.
i think us developed nations need a two pronged attack. on one side we need to mandate energy efficiency and maximum power consumption for a wide range of consumer goods. second we need to promote green target into production and buildings in general.
for example, building a new house? then by law it should have evacuated solar tube heating, be well insulated with grey water storage built in for toilets and non consumable water needs.
buying a TV? then you should have a choice between real low power 12V smaller systems (the technology has been used in camping for years) or higher consumption, larger mains powered devices with a real, physical off switch.
as well as tacking end up of power, then it should be mandated that energy collection/storage should be built in as standard, perhaps as interlocking solar "tiles". the technology is not quite there yet, but there are prototypes and companies looking at this.
wind power is problem, governments like it but in general when it is cold and there is least wind then people want to use most power and there is no efficient infrastructure to store/release power on a such a large scale yet.
of course this will never happen, because no government has the balls to attempt is and collectively society is always looking for the cheapest ticket. in the UK there are slow, slow trends that look encouraging..
1. the energy bills have nearly doubled in two years - i think this is a good thing as it forces people to consider energy consumption serioisly for the 1st time.
2. ever stricter building regulations
3. grants and more permissive planning for green projects: insulation, wind turbines, solar heating etc.
there are some encouraging signs, but not enough and too slow.
That's impressive. Though there seem to be scant details on efficiency and cost comparisons (I'm assuming this is more environmentally friendly to make as well as much cheaper).
Of course, it would of been more impressive if full details were diclosed online for people to take advantage of.
Is it possible to have your patent cake and eat it? The woman is clearly a brilliant engineer and deserves full credit for her work, she also states a worthwhile desire to help people across the world. So is it possible for her to obtain full commercial protection for her invention and then release all the details free for non-commercial use and reduced license fees for the third world? This would be ideal.
After all, no technology is going to change the lifestyles of poor people if they cannot afford to buy/license it.
On the other hand it would be unfair if she learned the Trevor Bayliss lesson the hard way - really clever little gadget swamped by low cost clones from asia from which he gained not a penny. As always I guess the big winners were the lawyers.
python seems to be the new perl - ie. a general purpose, scripting glue language. its small number of keywords and simple layout make it easier for the less technical minded to learn quickly.
of course, many people will prefer to use perl because of its larger amount of add-ons and clever tricks.
at work I use PHP a lot for many of my simulations and quick fixes, its really good for processing 2M line data files (try doing that with excel). I know its not what it was originally designed for, but it works for me.
look on the bright side, perl will no longer be learnt by many people and in a few years legacy "perl coders" can command higher wages to work on "legacy system" - much like COBOL programmer do now (though there are less of them every year).
I think this is the way it will always be, there will always be a simpler language to replace the old standards, and a new shiny technology that those who have managerial power but less technical knowledge can mandate from on high.
so, what happened to java? I liked it, it never went away but seems to hover on the edge.