Drunk in public is still an arrestable offense (assuming the same applies for Florida). Even so, a chemistry major so able to produce a competing product should be able to put out such a product anyway, it's not like it's a complicated principle. Getting the financial backing to start a company, produce units, and actually compete is another story.
Just because details on how a specific breathalyzer works gets out there doesn't mean products will be made, and just because another breathalyzer does happen to go on the market doesn't mean it's going to steal the state contract or impact the original company's sales in any way.
It's pretty much not worth spending any of my time cleaning up some stranger's computer; I'm not in that business for that reason. If I *was* in the business of providing personal tech support to people, then I'm, by default, valuing my time less than the purchase of a new computer.
In any case, someone not able to clean up their own computer isn't going to understand the technical extent of what's happened to the computer. I'm sure a tech support service could do basic virus and adware removal, clean up the services that run on start up, recommend more ram, and go through some other easy motions that leave the system running better, even if it's not a perfect, or long lasting fix.
I had exactly the same reaction, but it's rare to find articles that I'm interested in reading, so I forgave their method of more page/ad views.
The MS Keyboard 4000 has been the best keyboard I've used for coding and gaming (I own 2), and think it deserves a higher rank. It's great value for the quality, and certainly doesn't rely on bells and whistles, although the "media keys" are useful (who doesn't like having volume +/- and mute always at the ready?). I think that due to preferences, it's a failure for the author not to set aside ergonomic keyboards as a separate category.
As for dvorak key labeling, I prefer having the qwerty layout actually on the keys. Not being able to look for keys makes me a better typist, and having the keys in their normal places makes it easier for those who toggle the layout when they use the computer.
I think it's great what they've done for the kids. But I think part of the problem is that the comics themselves aren't exactly kid-friendly. It's like they go out of their way to include the F word in every strip.
That's sort of part of the point of Penny Arcade doing Child's Play. The strip isn't for children, just like a huge portion of video games aren't for children.
It's a site for adults, and a partial motivation behind Child's Play was to show that there's more to the demographic of adult gamers than the stereotype of slackers who sit around playing violent video games.
Penny Arcade has been so successful, I think, because they have managed to serve as representatives for this community so well. Gamers identify with them as gamers, and they've always been vocal in their defense of gaming as a hobby for adults, versus the traditional idea of video games being just for kids.
I see nothing wrong with a site that's central to an adult gaming community helping bring child-appropriate games and support to children's hospitals. It's adults donating to Child Play, just as it's adults that Penny Arcade is targeted at.
That's win-win; after all, adult gamers are people too. We can enjoy Penny Arcade, donate to Child's Play AND decide when the strip is appropriate for our offspring.
Anyone who flames a project for being too "original" or "bleeding-edge" is really retarding the development process
If anything, the lesson here isn't that the community needs to become more accepting of originality, it's that the people doing the flaming are retarded.
The answer, then, should be a Mac / PC ad spinoff where the "Mac" and "PC" start their banter, then "Linux" comes out as a Borg, injects itself into both, and we end up with all three as part of the Linux "community".
At least my present employer is relaxed about my having it on my work computer -- as far as my previous employer was concerned, it wasn't in list of official company software, so I couldn't have it.
I've successfully ignored all insistence regarding adhering to official software lists. Supervisors either know better and let me use the right tool for the job, or don't know better and risk revealing that, and being exposed in the process of making it more difficult to do my job efficiently.
In each case the manager is more worried about being made to look like someone who hinders efficiency than I'm worried about being labeled not a team player (low responsibilities mean little to lose).
I take a very casual attitude toward it, making the insistence seem even sillier, and if I get the higher-word passed along that company policy comes first, accepting it and then ignoring it simply compounds the manager's failure to do his/her job if it needs to be brought up again.
The face-to-face with the higher up is a nice next step. It's a good chance to discuss all the productive time lost by the long process of asking me to use a less effective tool, and face time to get chummy with someone I wouldn't normally deal with.
I imagine I'll feel and act differently if I ever find myself somewhere I actually consider a career path.
This ties into the major complaint I have with OSX Server. Just like with Windows, the options are available with the click of a mouse. You select what protocols you want to turn on, the server gives you the green light that it's on and working, and.... it either works or you're in trouble.
It's designed to "just work" and when it just didn't, I wasted tons of time paging through support and help that repeated told me how to turn those protocols on and confirm that they are running on the server.
Obviously I'm in the opposing school of thought, where set up is much closer to system level, as a convenience for debugging and unforeseen client-connection issues.
In my time in the work place, messages signed "The Management" (even when there is only 2 managers) have always been present. It's never been a firing, more like "clean up in the kitchen area, we're not your mom. - The Management." I was always quick to point to my job description, which was countered by coy threats of re-evaluating my job description (with no follow up). "The Management" looms, even if only with good intent.
With the specific complaints about the G1 missing things like Exchange compatibility and easy computer-syncing, one would think that smallish development shops would be racing to get these written.
If they're absence makes headlines, they're appearance will also, so it's like having the platforms "killer apps" already spec'd out.
I think the assumption is that DRM is invisible if a user with a legitimate license never notices it's there, as opposed to the person who pirated it.
The quote in the story is correct in that regard: Games with DRM only make the Slashdot headlines after a certain inconvenience or problem. I'm sure plenty of people who hate DRM (myself included) have happily played video games that use an unobtrusive system we never notice.
"The whole Opera had XX features first doesn't fly in my book, certainly not when argued in any environment that has a tendency to support FOSS" - by centuren (106470) on Thursday October 09, @12:08AM (#25309185) Homepage
/.'s community has an immediate BIAS against anyone that doesn't do "FOSS", and that it is ok to steal the ideas (and probably code as well) of others from what you're stating, apparently.
"The whole Opera had XX features first doesn't fly in my book, certainly not when argued in any environment that has a tendency to support FOSS" - by centuren (106470) on Thursday October 09, @12:08AM (#25309185) Homepage
/.'s community has an immediate BIAS against anyone that doesn't do "FOSS", and that it is ok to steal the ideas (and probably code as well) of others from what you're stating, apparently.
"The whole Opera had XX features first doesn't fly in my book, certainly not when argued in any environment that has a tendency to support FOSS" - by centuren (106470) on Thursday October 09, @12:08AM (#25309185) Homepage
/.'s community has an immediate BIAS against anyone that doesn't do "FOSS", and that it is ok to steal the ideas (and probably code as well) of others from what you're stating, apparently.
That's apparent if you take the opening sentence and assume that nothing following it is further explanation, yes.
If your attention span survives the paragraph, the lack of comprehension in your response is what's apparent.
One important idea behind FOSS is innovating on what's out there for the benefit of all. There's no secret that there is a high number of FOSS supports in the/. community.
Complaining the Opera had XX features first doesn't fly, because Firefox has done them much better (imho).
I finish by saying that I'll give Opera another shot if they've actually innovated again, just like I did when they first came on the market as the best.
My point is that who had what first doesn't matter: no one can expect to ride one or two innovations without continuing to maintain that lead. I used Opera when I felt it was the best browser, and I haven't used it for years. It's not even my second choice.
That's only my opinion, of course. Anyone who argues that Opera is a quality browser based on XX current features is expressing their opinion (and I'll read through their points to see if I find changes that address the issues I have with Opera).
Arguing that Opera had XX features first is a poor argument, in any environment where people are looking for quality, not a time line. If you disagree with that statement, come up with a response to it, not a wildly (or conveniently) illogical inference.
Obviously he's got to face up to what he knowingly went into, but I hope that 10000x the effort goes into ensuring the Governor's actions in using the email weren't criminal, as that seems to be more important to the country than some guy guessing at safety questions.
"Yea, small wonder that you hate Opera, you 'FF fiend', you - Especially considering FireFox took features from Opera, such as:
1.) Primarily: The tabbed browsing style of user interface in a webbrowser from Opera (who had it prior to FF &/or IE) & built it into FF as a 'native feature'
2.) Also/Secondly (& far more recently), also how the.xpi addons makers for FireFox took the Opera 'speed-dial' feature & mimicked it for FireFox, via such an addon"...
----
Yes - That simple set of truths ALWAYS 'gets the firefox fiends' goats', everytime, & simply because it IS, the truth.
And the truth is??
"Imitation IS the sincerest form of flattery!"... & there is NO question that FireFox's dev team AND their addon makers rip features from Opera...
The whole Opera had XX features first doesn't fly in my book, certainly not when argued in any environment that has a tendency to support FOSS. I must be reading the wrong articles' comments lately, since the I am not hearing the FOSS voice much standing up for these things.
Even considering that, quality does matter. I used Opera when Mozilla still a monster, and loved tabs and mouse gestures. When Firefox came, and then had those options available, I was pleased to have them in a top notch browser that was open source to boot.
That said, I am ready for something better. If the reviews are great, I'll give Opera a look, but I imagine they're on the same page as everyone else.
You've been contributing to an open source project, and now a company wants to hire you to work on a version for them. So far so good. They then want you to sign a non-competition agreement. This is a little harder.
1) Make sure it's clear just what you can and can't do under the contract (it should be limited to the codebase you've been working on, not a general *type* of product).
2) We all need to earn money. Whatever qualms you have will be a part of the job that require compensation. There's some level of pay that you will find yourself satisfied (after all, it's only one project). If that amount happens to be higher than the company is willing to pay, then your question is answered.
That is, don't take the job with strong reservations, or it's likely you're not being compensated fairly. Your wage should be what makes both you and your employer satisfied. As cynical as it may sound (from an FOSS supporter, especially), don't turn jobs down, just decide what it's worth to you. If it's something you wouldn't do for $1 million a year, ask for $2 million;)
And then Google will release a standard search engine plugin which the majority of non-technical users will then simply use by default. Plus the Google one could even be pre-installed by default.
So? This is already the case with Firefox. The point is that it's open to have the choice, and whether or not most people end up use Google's is pretty irrelevant in that regard.
Google wants to becoming Big Brother. Because with total information comes huge power (even political power) and with huge power they have the potential to earn huge amounts of money profiling everyone, to then sell that data to advertisers. But then even political campaign's need to be advertised and marketed, so Google is aiming to become litrally Big Brother.
If your point is that Google is processing more and more of data relating to our use of online services, it's true but very, very poorly stated. I can safely say you have no crystal ball that gives you claim to know the company's intentions, and the potential to do something is hardly proof they will.
I feel silly to point out the obvious, but Google IS earning huge amounts of money. There's always the possibility that all paranoia will be justified, and as consumers we can react to that. For now, I think it most fair to react to what Google has done, which, in this case, is invest their money and power into opening up the mobile platform, which can benefit us at least as much as Google.
Just like with Chrome, we can look forward to fully functional forks of Android with anything tying it to Google removed, running on unlocked handsets. That's the natural expectation of an open source release like this, and until Google steps in to prevent it, it's premature to accuse them of plotting against privacy.
I should add, learn regular expressions. It's an amazing how few programmers are comfortable with them, when they are so useful.
A modest background in Perl and Vim as my choice of text editor made me the company RegExp guru in no time. Non-Linux people can be very impressed when you do an inline cut command in vim using a regular expression (that you type quickly and flawlessly, thanks to your technical typing speed).
On the other hand, there are some universal rules:
Plan/Design everything
Document everything
Version control everything
Test everything
Deny everything
Plan/Design, Document, and Version control everything are not his responsibility as new dev (although good advice for a dev team). Run your own tests, but expect a testing process beyond your own. Deny everything is misleading. You can't always say "the problem is on the user end". The fallback is saying "okay I'll fix it", pointing out or alluding to the bug fix round being a normal and expected part of the development cycle, and, if the bugs made it live, the failure was in a different link in the chain.
Slashdot Mirror
Drunk in public is still an arrestable offense (assuming the same applies for Florida). Even so, a chemistry major so able to produce a competing product should be able to put out such a product anyway, it's not like it's a complicated principle. Getting the financial backing to start a company, produce units, and actually compete is another story.
Just because details on how a specific breathalyzer works gets out there doesn't mean products will be made, and just because another breathalyzer does happen to go on the market doesn't mean it's going to steal the state contract or impact the original company's sales in any way.
It's pretty much not worth spending any of my time cleaning up some stranger's computer; I'm not in that business for that reason. If I *was* in the business of providing personal tech support to people, then I'm, by default, valuing my time less than the purchase of a new computer.
In any case, someone not able to clean up their own computer isn't going to understand the technical extent of what's happened to the computer. I'm sure a tech support service could do basic virus and adware removal, clean up the services that run on start up, recommend more ram, and go through some other easy motions that leave the system running better, even if it's not a perfect, or long lasting fix.
I had exactly the same reaction, but it's rare to find articles that I'm interested in reading, so I forgave their method of more page/ad views.
The MS Keyboard 4000 has been the best keyboard I've used for coding and gaming (I own 2), and think it deserves a higher rank. It's great value for the quality, and certainly doesn't rely on bells and whistles, although the "media keys" are useful (who doesn't like having volume +/- and mute always at the ready?). I think that due to preferences, it's a failure for the author not to set aside ergonomic keyboards as a separate category.
As for dvorak key labeling, I prefer having the qwerty layout actually on the keys. Not being able to look for keys makes me a better typist, and having the keys in their normal places makes it easier for those who toggle the layout when they use the computer.
I think it's great what they've done for the kids. But I think part of the problem is that the comics themselves aren't exactly kid-friendly. It's like they go out of their way to include the F word in every strip.
That's sort of part of the point of Penny Arcade doing Child's Play. The strip isn't for children, just like a huge portion of video games aren't for children.
It's a site for adults, and a partial motivation behind Child's Play was to show that there's more to the demographic of adult gamers than the stereotype of slackers who sit around playing violent video games.
Penny Arcade has been so successful, I think, because they have managed to serve as representatives for this community so well. Gamers identify with them as gamers, and they've always been vocal in their defense of gaming as a hobby for adults, versus the traditional idea of video games being just for kids.
I see nothing wrong with a site that's central to an adult gaming community helping bring child-appropriate games and support to children's hospitals. It's adults donating to Child Play, just as it's adults that Penny Arcade is targeted at.
That's win-win; after all, adult gamers are people too. We can enjoy Penny Arcade, donate to Child's Play AND decide when the strip is appropriate for our offspring.
Anyone who flames a project for being too "original" or "bleeding-edge" is really retarding the development process
If anything, the lesson here isn't that the community needs to become more accepting of originality, it's that the people doing the flaming are retarded.
The answer, then, should be a Mac / PC ad spinoff where the "Mac" and "PC" start their banter, then "Linux" comes out as a Borg, injects itself into both, and we end up with all three as part of the Linux "community".
At least my present employer is relaxed about my having it on my work computer -- as far as my previous employer was concerned, it wasn't in list of official company software, so I couldn't have it.
I've successfully ignored all insistence regarding adhering to official software lists. Supervisors either know better and let me use the right tool for the job, or don't know better and risk revealing that, and being exposed in the process of making it more difficult to do my job efficiently.
In each case the manager is more worried about being made to look like someone who hinders efficiency than I'm worried about being labeled not a team player (low responsibilities mean little to lose).
I take a very casual attitude toward it, making the insistence seem even sillier, and if I get the higher-word passed along that company policy comes first, accepting it and then ignoring it simply compounds the manager's failure to do his/her job if it needs to be brought up again.
The face-to-face with the higher up is a nice next step. It's a good chance to discuss all the productive time lost by the long process of asking me to use a less effective tool, and face time to get chummy with someone I wouldn't normally deal with.
I imagine I'll feel and act differently if I ever find myself somewhere I actually consider a career path.
I'm sure my parents remember their wedding, but I'm personally very appreciative that they had a friend take some photos.
Firefox 3.1 beta ADDED NEW FEATURES to Ctrl+Tab. Those NEW FEATURES are buggy, and likely won't make it into the 3.1 final.
They didn't BREAK anything ... just the opposite. Ctrl+Tab will behave in 3.1 just as it does in 3.0.
This sounds like the definition of "breaking" somthing (in this beta release), rather than removing a feature.
The last word, usually.
This ties into the major complaint I have with OSX Server. Just like with Windows, the options are available with the click of a mouse. You select what protocols you want to turn on, the server gives you the green light that it's on and working, and.... it either works or you're in trouble.
It's designed to "just work" and when it just didn't, I wasted tons of time paging through support and help that repeated told me how to turn those protocols on and confirm that they are running on the server.
Obviously I'm in the opposing school of thought, where set up is much closer to system level, as a convenience for debugging and unforeseen client-connection issues.
In my time in the work place, messages signed "The Management" (even when there is only 2 managers) have always been present. It's never been a firing, more like "clean up in the kitchen area, we're not your mom. - The Management." I was always quick to point to my job description, which was countered by coy threats of re-evaluating my job description (with no follow up). "The Management" looms, even if only with good intent.
That said, no link on /. is ever safe to follow, duh. Or did you miss this part of Internet history?
With the specific complaints about the G1 missing things like Exchange compatibility and easy computer-syncing, one would think that smallish development shops would be racing to get these written.
If they're absence makes headlines, they're appearance will also, so it's like having the platforms "killer apps" already spec'd out.
I think the assumption is that DRM is invisible if a user with a legitimate license never notices it's there, as opposed to the person who pirated it.
The quote in the story is correct in that regard: Games with DRM only make the Slashdot headlines after a certain inconvenience or problem. I'm sure plenty of people who hate DRM (myself included) have happily played video games that use an unobtrusive system we never notice.
}
if(c != 0) {
return c;
} else {
return 0;
}
}
Fixed that last part. The sad thing is I've encountered this return logic in the workplace.
That's a good point; who keeps their laptop in checked luggage? I'd never trust it to survive the handling safely, thievery aside.
"The whole Opera had XX features first doesn't fly in my book, certainly not when argued in any environment that has a tendency to support FOSS" - by centuren (106470) on Thursday October 09, @12:08AM (#25309185) Homepage
/.'s community has an immediate BIAS against anyone that doesn't do "FOSS", and that it is ok to steal the ideas (and probably code as well) of others from what you're stating, apparently.
"The whole Opera had XX features first doesn't fly in my book, certainly not when argued in any environment that has a tendency to support FOSS" - by centuren (106470) on Thursday October 09, @12:08AM (#25309185) Homepage
/.'s community has an immediate BIAS against anyone that doesn't do "FOSS", and that it is ok to steal the ideas (and probably code as well) of others from what you're stating, apparently.
"The whole Opera had XX features first doesn't fly in my book, certainly not when argued in any environment that has a tendency to support FOSS" - by centuren (106470) on Thursday October 09, @12:08AM (#25309185) Homepage
/.'s community has an immediate BIAS against anyone that doesn't do "FOSS", and that it is ok to steal the ideas (and probably code as well) of others from what you're stating, apparently.
That's apparent if you take the opening sentence and assume that nothing following it is further explanation, yes.
If your attention span survives the paragraph, the lack of comprehension in your response is what's apparent.
One important idea behind FOSS is innovating on what's out there for the benefit of all. There's no secret that there is a high number of FOSS supports in the /. community.
Complaining the Opera had XX features first doesn't fly, because Firefox has done them much better (imho).
I finish by saying that I'll give Opera another shot if they've actually innovated again, just like I did when they first came on the market as the best.
My point is that who had what first doesn't matter: no one can expect to ride one or two innovations without continuing to maintain that lead. I used Opera when I felt it was the best browser, and I haven't used it for years. It's not even my second choice.
That's only my opinion, of course. Anyone who argues that Opera is a quality browser based on XX current features is expressing their opinion (and I'll read through their points to see if I find changes that address the issues I have with Opera).
Arguing that Opera had XX features first is a poor argument, in any environment where people are looking for quality, not a time line. If you disagree with that statement, come up with a response to it, not a wildly (or conveniently) illogical inference.
Obviously he's got to face up to what he knowingly went into, but I hope that 10000x the effort goes into ensuring the Governor's actions in using the email weren't criminal, as that seems to be more important to the country than some guy guessing at safety questions.
"Yea, small wonder that you hate Opera, you 'FF fiend', you - Especially considering FireFox took features from Opera, such as:
1.) Primarily: The tabbed browsing style of user interface in a webbrowser from Opera (who had it prior to FF &/or IE) & built it into FF as a 'native feature'
2.) Also/Secondly (& far more recently), also how the .xpi addons makers for FireFox took the Opera 'speed-dial' feature & mimicked it for FireFox, via such an addon"...
----
Yes - That simple set of truths ALWAYS 'gets the firefox fiends' goats', everytime, & simply because it IS, the truth.
And the truth is??
"Imitation IS the sincerest form of flattery!" ... & there is NO question that FireFox's dev team AND their addon makers rip features from Opera...
The whole Opera had XX features first doesn't fly in my book, certainly not when argued in any environment that has a tendency to support FOSS. I must be reading the wrong articles' comments lately, since the I am not hearing the FOSS voice much standing up for these things.
Even considering that, quality does matter. I used Opera when Mozilla still a monster, and loved tabs and mouse gestures. When Firefox came, and then had those options available, I was pleased to have them in a top notch browser that was open source to boot.
That said, I am ready for something better. If the reviews are great, I'll give Opera a look, but I imagine they're on the same page as everyone else.
You've been contributing to an open source project, and now a company wants to hire you to work on a version for them. So far so good. They then want you to sign a non-competition agreement. This is a little harder.
1) Make sure it's clear just what you can and can't do under the contract (it should be limited to the codebase you've been working on, not a general *type* of product).
2) We all need to earn money. Whatever qualms you have will be a part of the job that require compensation. There's some level of pay that you will find yourself satisfied (after all, it's only one project). If that amount happens to be higher than the company is willing to pay, then your question is answered.
That is, don't take the job with strong reservations, or it's likely you're not being compensated fairly. Your wage should be what makes both you and your employer satisfied. As cynical as it may sound (from an FOSS supporter, especially), don't turn jobs down, just decide what it's worth to you. If it's something you wouldn't do for $1 million a year, ask for $2 million ;)
Yeah, I'm thinking the Navy might count each screw in a PC as a separate piece. Anything that can be taken apart.
And then Google will release a standard search engine plugin which the majority of non-technical users will then simply use by default. Plus the Google one could even be pre-installed by default.
So? This is already the case with Firefox. The point is that it's open to have the choice, and whether or not most people end up use Google's is pretty irrelevant in that regard.
Google wants to becoming Big Brother. Because with total information comes huge power (even political power) and with huge power they have the potential to earn huge amounts of money profiling everyone, to then sell that data to advertisers. But then even political campaign's need to be advertised and marketed, so Google is aiming to become litrally Big Brother.
If your point is that Google is processing more and more of data relating to our use of online services, it's true but very, very poorly stated. I can safely say you have no crystal ball that gives you claim to know the company's intentions, and the potential to do something is hardly proof they will.
I feel silly to point out the obvious, but Google IS earning huge amounts of money. There's always the possibility that all paranoia will be justified, and as consumers we can react to that. For now, I think it most fair to react to what Google has done, which, in this case, is invest their money and power into opening up the mobile platform, which can benefit us at least as much as Google.
Just like with Chrome, we can look forward to fully functional forks of Android with anything tying it to Google removed, running on unlocked handsets. That's the natural expectation of an open source release like this, and until Google steps in to prevent it, it's premature to accuse them of plotting against privacy.
I should add, learn regular expressions. It's an amazing how few programmers are comfortable with them, when they are so useful.
A modest background in Perl and Vim as my choice of text editor made me the company RegExp guru in no time. Non-Linux people can be very impressed when you do an inline cut command in vim using a regular expression (that you type quickly and flawlessly, thanks to your technical typing speed).
foo and bar are required variable names also.
On the other hand, there are some universal rules:
Plan/Design, Document, and Version control everything are not his responsibility as new dev (although good advice for a dev team). Run your own tests, but expect a testing process beyond your own. Deny everything is misleading. You can't always say "the problem is on the user end". The fallback is saying "okay I'll fix it", pointing out or alluding to the bug fix round being a normal and expected part of the development cycle, and, if the bugs made it live, the failure was in a different link in the chain.