I am also a laptop owner, college graduate and full-time nerd. Hell, I even think we should use less paper. Despite all of that, I am an outspoken opponent of laptops in the classroom.
As a teacher/professor, you are charged with getting through to the students. Helping them understand the material involves interacting with them. I can't fathom how a teacher could be expected to do that in front of 30 kids who are staring intently at the computer screen on their desk and not at the teacher. This lack of eye contact and interaction cannot be good for the educational process. I've seen it in action: it's tough to get through to kids sometimes and giving each one a laptop is not going to help.
Also, slightly less important, but still worth noting is how crappy my hand-writing has become since I started using a computer on a daily basis (this happened for me in 1994 or 1995). I've mostly forgotten how to write in cursive, my signature is a joke and when I do have to write something it is almost entirely non legible.
Computers are really great. With access to the internet in particular, you've got a wealth of knowledge (and lies and opinionations) at your fingertips. There are valuable computer skills that can be learned (programming, graphic design, even powerpoint, etc.), however, I don't feel that incorporating computer usage into every class is practical or useful. A notebook makes a hell of a lot more sense in a chemistry lab than a laptop... unless you set it on fire. Actually, the computer is not great set on fire either, so I'll strike that last comment.
When I was in school, note-passing was all the rage. It was the way that the students had come up with to communicate with each other (about things that should be dealt with outside of school) without the teachers knowing. With a classroom full of kids that aren't looking at you and all staring at their laptops, you can bet that many of them will be doing the modern equivalent of note-passing: myspace, IM, etc.
does anyone else think it's funny that "SanDisk Releases New iPod rival" - I read the article - looks like to me more like "SanDisk Releases New MP3 Player" but what do I know - I'm just an apple fanboy
"...the ability to analyze all searches by a single user will often lead people to easily determine who the user is..."
are they predicting the future? '.. the ability... WILL often...' how do they know it will happen often? I think it takes more than an ability to analyze data to 'lead me' into finding someone's identity... maybe I'm nitpicking but the wording of that sentence is worse than this fragmental jive I'm pushing out right now....
Can you please explain, for the benefit of the group, the difference(s) between steps 3 and 4? Seems that ridicule and making fun might be the same thing. Is it that in step 4 we ridicule without shunning? I don't get why these are viewed and documented as separate steps. Please confirm. -w
So, does this mean it doesn't work with windows (meaning "my dell computer") or that it doesn't work with windows (meaning "my imac that has a windows dual-boot scenario using bootcamp") or both?
It has nothing to do with elitism - I have a myspace account and I log on from time to time. when I do, I usually find that I wander around aimless clicking on pictures of really hot girls in other people's profiles, then after wasting a bunch of time I continue with my life - I, personally, would rather have a real life where I went outside and met people that i can make eye contact with - that's just the life that's most comfortable for me - I don't like talking on the phone for much the same reason (lack of eye contact/perception of body language makes conversation, particularly with my dry wit, difficult)
I still fail to see how this is really exciting news: myspace goes down all the fucking time. therefore, i stand by my original statement, that this is a less-than-impressive slashdot post - I'm not whining about myspace or about how I never get any pussy, I'm just saying it's a lame article "myspace is down due to a power outage" you say? "whoop dee shit" I reply
I don't understand where this is considered "stuff that matters" - I guess my myspace-addicted roomate will now expect me to entertain him, so I guess I'm kinda glad I got the warning, but this is pretty weak "news for nerds" - after all, aren't we all here for speculation about what apple is going to do next?
ha - I know you were talking about a record needle, but this reminds me of the time I saw a guy shooting heroin (I assume) on route 80 (right outside of Berwick, PA) while _driving_ his car - the young lady riding shotgun appeared to be patiently waiting her turn....
In any case, I agree "at least he wasn't placing a needle... while driving"
NOT awesome - or maybe awesome, depending on how hardcore you are - I want the original cut of the film in terms of the scenes, dialog, CGI, who-shot-whom, no jabba, etc. BUT, with a modern 5.1 uber surround mix for my phat-ass home theatre (pronounced: the-ate-ur) - they're pushing it out here as the original film with the original stereo "dolby" (pronounced: lame*) surround...
*please note that I have nothing against, dolby, thomas dolby or rock albums mixed in dubly - you just can't get a real exciting surround mix from a stereo source no matter what yer damn entertainment center does
"there were only 842 help-line calls out of more than 50,000 user sessions"
Problems included....
"...being able to see receivers but not being able to connect..."
So... do all the users that attempted to connect, but were unable get counted in the user sessions? "Sessions" makes me think the user connected and was in good shape, in which case, he probably didn't have a problem. It would be interested to see how many tech-support calls there were compared against the number of attempted and/or failed connections... I think at least. -w
I'd be really curious to see what you found out - that is my real phone number, with the caveat that it's the phone that I have to have in order to use DSL - I don't give the number out except to the pizza place and the only calls I get are from telemarketers - do tell! the curiosity is killing me... and my cats -w
If the photos are pornographic, I will scan them for you. I'm not a teenager, but I'll scan pr0n for $5/hour + lemonade any day of the week - call me at 773.235.4797 to discuss the particulars - thanks!
Of course there is nothing spirtiual about software. Obviously computers don't imitate art very well. However, that's not the topic here.
With that in mind, I can't figure out what your point is here. Sounds to me like you're upset because you spent some money on some gear and it didn't make you amazing.
I used to think that when I was 'deep in the jam' that I was getting better. Participating in live improvisation (with yourself or with a group) is a great way to extend your abilities, but this will only help you improve that one aspect of your playing. If you want to work on your timing, you practice with a metronome - you don't improve your sense of rhythm in any other way (at least not effectively). If you want to work on your ear training you do singing and transcription exercises (among other things).
What I'm getting at here, is that the original poster is asking about software to help with the learning process and you go off into a mini-rant here about how "software assisted authoring is... inferior to just playing..." You are comparing apples and oranges here.
In what way is 'authoring' 'superior' to playing? And, more importantly, what does that have to do with the topic at hand? How can you compare songwriting (of any kind) which playing (of any kind) and expect to make any kind of meaningful comparison?
I write a lot of songs and I use my ability to do multi-track recording as a song-writing tool (as does almost every other composer who writes non-solo pieces). Honestly, do you think Howard Shore did the soundtrack to LOTR by just "playing his heart out"?? No. He used some instrument ( most likely a keyboard hooked up to some type of sequencer) to try a variety of melodies and ideas before completing his score and presenting it to a full orchestra. He didn't just go into the studio and ask everyone to 'just play their heart out' because that's just so much better than computer-assisted authoring.
I can gather from this post that you probably play ok, but you're not much of a songwriter - am I right?
The original poster was not asking for your opinions on software-assisted composition, so please try to stay on topic next time and save your rants for someone else who cares.
I'm honestly surprised that your post achieved a score of 4. "Insightful"? Hardly.
perhaps your time would have been better spent reading the comments rather than posting a gripe.
I started to read this article with the same impression. I have this problem and it drives me nuts. After reading the comment (all the way down to your post), I understand what causes it and have some ideas on how can attempt to solve it. I plan to keep reading though, there may be some more good information.
actually - I went to that site in firefox 1.5 and apparantly I am susceptible to the vulnerability - this is apparantly not specific to IE - can someone else verify this?
hi - at my company, we hold a lot of patents. In fact, there's a program in which people at the company can submit patent ideas and our legal department checks them out and sees if they exist/are viable/etc. I submitted one last year (that already existed - damn) and while speaking with one of the lawyers he mentioned, quite empatically, that whatever is being patented does not actually have to exist. According to him, you can patent a process or software or hardware that has no working proof of concept. I think the idea of submitting a patent on something that can never exist is pretty lame, but on the other hand, I don't think that people should be allowed to call dibs on patents just so they can wait for somebody else to do the work and then sue them. It's tough to find a same medium. how close is too close (or too far) from the realization of an idea for it to be patented?
I hate to nitpick your work, but step #2 should not be in your list. Why? I've never double-clicked on a tgz file (or a zip, or an gz or whatever) on a mac because the file opens automagically in stuffit expander when you download it. So, the average out-of-the-box mac user will download it and just double-click on the 'image' that comes out. I feel that you added this step to give the impression that the user has this virtual scavenger hunt of tasks to perform when, in fact, there are only two actions. Furthermore, the actions are closely related. Who _doesn't_ open a file after downloading it? So, you are correct that there are multiple steps, but they're common steps that almost anyone (yourself included) is likely to perform.
Additionally, I read your comments posted on the bulletin board to which you linked (the relevant ones are copied below). You make one comment that says that the virus doesn't propogate, and then another that says it tries to propogate. Am I missing some subtle distinction here? You use the phrase "self-propogate' - how else would it propogate? _it_ issues some command to spread itself. The user is certainly not going to burn it to CD and hand it out to his friends. Even propagation through a third party utility (in this case, iChat) that is instigated by the file-which-is-to-be-propagated fits the definition of self-propagation. What are you getting at with these items?
-- This should probably be classified as a Trojan, not a virus, because it doesn't self-propagate externally -- It doesn't actually do anything other than attempt to propagate itself via iChat
Who's gonna wanna buy PowerMacs for the next couple months?
Here's a better question: how many powermacs do you think apple has lying around ready for sale?
Last May, I got a replacement iPod from Apple in about 1 week. I had to get another replacement last summer and it took over a month. The day that their customer service department called me to tell me they had a replacement was the day the video ipod was released. My theory is that they didn't have any 20GB B/W iPods lying around cause they'd stopped making them in anticipation of the new product. So they stalled me for a month because they certainly couldn't upgrade me before the product was announced.
I would assume that production on any of the non-intel machines has decreased and, in some cases, stopped. I would also assume that the taper off is measured in terms of how soon the model will be replaced and, of course, how many of them sell. They probably stopped making the G5 iMac quite some time ago and just relied on warehouse stores to fill orders.
At this point, a lot of people are going to buy the new models, but an even greater percentage is thinking about either waiting for the second generation ( "let the early adopters get all the kinks worked out" ) or waiting for other models to be transitioned/revealed. The guy from the first group will buy the new laptop and the guy from the second group will be the "new powermac" in 6 months.
Apple's all set. They're going to sell a lot of computers.
The company also discussed HD-DVD, which allows for greater interaction for consumers watching DVDs. For example, users can search and find information on actors in a film while the movie is still playing.
From the simpsons:
"computers can do that?!" -Homer
seriously, am I the only one who discredited the author based on this paragraph? wow! you mean with HD-DVD I can multi-task?! WOW!
I can do that already. With my Mac or my windows machine. Without HD-DVD.
It would be neat, "real neat" even, if perhaps this company had hired someone who knew SOMETHING about computers before writing the article. Ideally, they could have used someone who has used a computer before.
yes, but we're talking about piracy here and the interweb here and most people are not pirating instrumental magic - they're pirating kelly clarkson or eminem -the doctor
Slashdot Mirror
I am also a laptop owner, college graduate and full-time nerd. Hell, I even think we should use less paper. Despite all of that, I am an outspoken opponent of laptops in the classroom.
As a teacher/professor, you are charged with getting through to the students. Helping them understand the material involves interacting with them. I can't fathom how a teacher could be expected to do that in front of 30 kids who are staring intently at the computer screen on their desk and not at the teacher. This lack of eye contact and interaction cannot be good for the educational process. I've seen it in action: it's tough to get through to kids sometimes and giving each one a laptop is not going to help.
Also, slightly less important, but still worth noting is how crappy my hand-writing has become since I started using a computer on a daily basis (this happened for me in 1994 or 1995). I've mostly forgotten how to write in cursive, my signature is a joke and when I do have to write something it is almost entirely non legible.
Computers are really great. With access to the internet in particular, you've got a wealth of knowledge (and lies and opinionations) at your fingertips. There are valuable computer skills that can be learned (programming, graphic design, even powerpoint, etc.), however, I don't feel that incorporating computer usage into every class is practical or useful. A notebook makes a hell of a lot more sense in a chemistry lab than a laptop... unless you set it on fire. Actually, the computer is not great set on fire either, so I'll strike that last comment.
When I was in school, note-passing was all the rage. It was the way that the students had come up with to communicate with each other (about things that should be dealt with outside of school) without the teachers knowing. With a classroom full of kids that aren't looking at you and all staring at their laptops, you can bet that many of them will be doing the modern equivalent of note-passing: myspace, IM, etc.
Let the little brats take notes in a notebook.
does anyone else think it's funny that "SanDisk Releases New iPod rival" - I read the article - looks like to me more like "SanDisk Releases New MP3 Player" but what do I know - I'm just an apple fanboy
"...the ability to analyze all searches by a single user will often lead people to easily determine who the user is..."
... WILL often ...' how do they know it will happen often? I think it takes more than an ability to analyze data to 'lead me' into finding someone's identity ... maybe I'm nitpicking but the wording of that sentence is worse than this fragmental jive I'm pushing out right now ....
are they predicting the future? '.. the ability
Can you please explain, for the benefit of the group, the difference(s) between steps 3 and 4? Seems that ridicule and making fun might be the same thing. Is it that in step 4 we ridicule without shunning? I don't get why these are viewed and documented as separate steps. Please confirm.
-w
So, does this mean it doesn't work with windows (meaning "my dell computer") or that it doesn't work with windows (meaning "my imac that has a windows dual-boot scenario using bootcamp") or both?
It has nothing to do with elitism - I have a myspace account and I log on from time to time. when I do, I usually find that I wander around aimless clicking on pictures of really hot girls in other people's profiles, then after wasting a bunch of time I continue with my life - I, personally, would rather have a real life where I went outside and met people that i can make eye contact with - that's just the life that's most comfortable for me - I don't like talking on the phone for much the same reason (lack of eye contact/perception of body language makes conversation, particularly with my dry wit, difficult)
I still fail to see how this is really exciting news: myspace goes down all the fucking time. therefore, i stand by my original statement, that this is a less-than-impressive slashdot post - I'm not whining about myspace or about how I never get any pussy, I'm just saying it's a lame article "myspace is down due to a power outage" you say? "whoop dee shit" I reply
... where ye shall eat naught but burning hot coals, and drink naught but burning hot cola ....
I don't understand where this is considered "stuff that matters" - I guess my myspace-addicted roomate will now expect me to entertain him, so I guess I'm kinda glad I got the warning, but this is pretty weak "news for nerds" - after all, aren't we all here for speculation about what apple is going to do next?
ha - I know you were talking about a record needle, but this reminds me of the time I saw a guy shooting heroin (I assume) on route 80 (right outside of Berwick, PA) while _driving_ his car - the young lady riding shotgun appeared to be patiently waiting her turn ....
... while driving"
In any case, I agree "at least he wasn't placing a needle
-w
no. these are the people masking a hidden agenda as your best interest, which is even scarier.
brown like poop?
my close button is in the exact same spot it always was - on the keyboard (ctrl-w)
NOT awesome - or maybe awesome, depending on how hardcore you are - I want the original cut of the film in terms of the scenes, dialog, CGI, who-shot-whom, no jabba, etc. BUT, with a modern 5.1 uber surround mix for my phat-ass home theatre (pronounced: the-ate-ur) - they're pushing it out here as the original film with the original stereo "dolby" (pronounced: lame*) surround...
*please note that I have nothing against, dolby, thomas dolby or rock albums mixed in dubly - you just can't get a real exciting surround mix from a stereo source no matter what yer damn entertainment center does
yeah - and lately it seems like they're doing a lot of "don't"
So, according to the abstract on the article
..."
... do all the users that attempted to connect, but were unable get counted in the user sessions? "Sessions" makes me think the user connected and was in good shape, in which case, he probably didn't have a problem. It would be interested to see how many tech-support calls there were compared against the number of attempted and/or failed connections... I think at least.
"there were only 842 help-line calls out of more than 50,000 user sessions"
Problems included....
"...being able to see receivers but not being able to connect
So
-w
I'd be really curious to see what you found out - that is my real phone number, with the caveat that it's the phone that I have to have in order to use DSL - I don't give the number out except to the pizza place and the only calls I get are from telemarketers - do tell! the curiosity is killing me ... and my cats
-w
If the photos are pornographic, I will scan them for you. I'm not a teenager, but I'll scan pr0n for $5/hour + lemonade any day of the week - call me at 773.235.4797 to discuss the particulars - thanks!
Of course there is nothing spirtiual about software. Obviously computers don't imitate art very well. However, that's not the topic here.
... inferior to just playing..." You are comparing apples and oranges here.
With that in mind, I can't figure out what your point is here. Sounds to me like you're upset because you spent some money on some gear and it didn't make you amazing.
I used to think that when I was 'deep in the jam' that I was getting better. Participating in live improvisation (with yourself or with a group) is a great way to extend your abilities, but this will only help you improve that one aspect of your playing. If you want to work on your timing, you practice with a metronome - you don't improve your sense of rhythm in any other way (at least not effectively). If you want to work on your ear training you do singing and transcription exercises (among other things).
What I'm getting at here, is that the original poster is asking about software to help with the learning process and you go off into a mini-rant here about how "software assisted authoring is
In what way is 'authoring' 'superior' to playing? And, more importantly, what does that have to do with the topic at hand? How can you compare songwriting (of any kind) which playing (of any kind) and expect to make any kind of meaningful comparison?
I write a lot of songs and I use my ability to do multi-track recording as a song-writing tool (as does almost every other composer who writes non-solo pieces). Honestly, do you think Howard Shore did the soundtrack to LOTR by just "playing his heart out"?? No. He used some instrument ( most likely a keyboard hooked up to some type of sequencer) to try a variety of melodies and ideas before completing his score and presenting it to a full orchestra. He didn't just go into the studio and ask everyone to 'just play their heart out' because that's just so much better than computer-assisted authoring.
I can gather from this post that you probably play ok, but you're not much of a songwriter - am I right?
The original poster was not asking for your opinions on software-assisted composition, so please try to stay on topic next time and save your rants for someone else who cares.
I'm honestly surprised that your post achieved a score of 4. "Insightful"? Hardly.
perhaps your time would have been better spent reading the comments rather than posting a gripe.
;)
I started to read this article with the same impression. I have this problem and it drives me nuts. After reading the comment (all the way down to your post), I understand what causes it and have some ideas on how can attempt to solve it. I plan to keep reading though, there may be some more good information.
just a thought
actually - I went to that site in firefox 1.5 and apparantly I am susceptible to the vulnerability - this is apparantly not specific to IE - can someone else verify this?
hi - at my company, we hold a lot of patents. In fact, there's a program in which people at the company can submit patent ideas and our legal department checks them out and sees if they exist/are viable/etc. I submitted one last year (that already existed - damn) and while speaking with one of the lawyers he mentioned, quite empatically, that whatever is being patented does not actually have to exist. According to him, you can patent a process or software or hardware that has no working proof of concept. I think the idea of submitting a patent on something that can never exist is pretty lame, but on the other hand, I don't think that people should be allowed to call dibs on patents just so they can wait for somebody else to do the work and then sue them. It's tough to find a same medium. how close is too close (or too far) from the realization of an idea for it to be patented?
I hate to nitpick your work, but step #2 should not be in your list. Why? I've never double-clicked on a tgz file (or a zip, or an gz or whatever) on a mac because the file opens automagically in stuffit expander when you download it. So, the average out-of-the-box mac user will download it and just double-click on the 'image' that comes out. I feel that you added this step to give the impression that the user has this virtual scavenger hunt of tasks to perform when, in fact, there are only two actions. Furthermore, the actions are closely related. Who _doesn't_ open a file after downloading it? So, you are correct that there are multiple steps, but they're common steps that almost anyone (yourself included) is likely to perform.
Additionally, I read your comments posted on the bulletin board to which you linked (the relevant ones are copied below). You make one comment that says that the virus doesn't propogate, and then another that says it tries to propogate. Am I missing some subtle distinction here? You use the phrase "self-propogate' - how else would it propogate? _it_ issues some command to spread itself. The user is certainly not going to burn it to CD and hand it out to his friends. Even propagation through a third party utility (in this case, iChat) that is instigated by the file-which-is-to-be-propagated fits the definition of self-propagation. What are you getting at with these items?
-- This should probably be classified as a Trojan, not a virus, because it doesn't self-propagate externally
-- It doesn't actually do anything other than attempt to propagate itself via iChat
Here's a better question: how many powermacs do you think apple has lying around ready for sale?
Last May, I got a replacement iPod from Apple in about 1 week. I had to get another replacement last summer and it took over a month. The day that their customer service department called me to tell me they had a replacement was the day the video ipod was released. My theory is that they didn't have any 20GB B/W iPods lying around cause they'd stopped making them in anticipation of the new product. So they stalled me for a month because they certainly couldn't upgrade me before the product was announced.
I would assume that production on any of the non-intel machines has decreased and, in some cases, stopped. I would also assume that the taper off is measured in terms of how soon the model will be replaced and, of course, how many of them sell. They probably stopped making the G5 iMac quite some time ago and just relied on warehouse stores to fill orders.
At this point, a lot of people are going to buy the new models, but an even greater percentage is thinking about either waiting for the second generation ( "let the early adopters get all the kinks worked out" ) or waiting for other models to be transitioned/revealed. The guy from the first group will buy the new laptop and the guy from the second group will be the "new powermac" in 6 months.
Apple's all set. They're going to sell a lot of computers.
From the article:
The company also discussed HD-DVD, which allows for greater interaction for consumers watching DVDs. For example, users can search and find information on actors in a film while the movie is still playing.
From the simpsons:
"computers can do that?!" -Homer
seriously, am I the only one who discredited the author based on this paragraph? wow! you mean with HD-DVD I can multi-task?! WOW!
I can do that already. With my Mac or my windows machine. Without HD-DVD.
It would be neat, "real neat" even, if perhaps this company had hired someone who knew SOMETHING about computers before writing the article. Ideally, they could have used someone who has used a computer before.
yes, but we're talking about piracy here and the interweb here and most people are not pirating instrumental magic - they're pirating kelly clarkson or eminem
-the doctor