This isn't the '80s anymore where performance is the most critical issue and we jump platforms every time a faster architecture comes out, since we don't have a large software base anyway. Nowaways software IS the more important aspect, and only relatively few well-heeled, game-addicted geeks are going to jump on the PPC just because it's a fews ticks faster this week, and Jobs winked at them with that very special smile. Given the way this industry goes, IBM/Motorola will sit back again, wipe the sweat off their foreheads and take a breather, and before you know it, Intel/AMD will have a faster processor again.
If you have x-platform software that will compile painlessly on either architecture, go for it, switch with each faster chip. But for most others, I doubt performance rants like these will make much of a difference. After all, how many Mac users switch to the PC just for the performance during those stretches when the PC has the upper hand?
> and would say the same about the A8 (since it's a $70k car)
I would still say that the A8 paved the way, because while it didn't have huge production numbers, it can be considered a test bed of aluminum production processes, allowing Audi (and Alcoa I'm sure) to gain a lot of experience in working with the material. For example, it seems that in the long term welding will probably be out and other types of bonding--such as various glues--will be used instead. Some manufacturers (Jaguar I believe) use rivets, but not everybody finds that acceptable, for weight, strength and aesthetic reasons.
That's what I thought. For a moment there I thought I had missed a few years of my life somehow. I guess they're talking about the FUD period of.NET, when they would occasionally mention it in public, leaving you to guess whether it was a new cookie or toothpaste.
Well, for that time anyway. I doubt it would be certified street legal today. You'd have to add hundreds of pounds of safety features and exhaust scrubbers and lose the power-to-weight ratio game.
You got that one. In fact, they claim it to have been the first production all-aluminum car. But considering that most of its high cost is due to the aluminum body, they certainly hadn't perfected the process yet. In terms of perfecting mass production techniques that can make all-aluminum cars affordable to most people, Audi has contributed a lot more. Their A2 model is paving the way still further. Here is a list of aluminum-using cars, but the NSX is about as representative as the Ferrari Modena in terms of production numbers.
Yes, but (as a native German speaker) I must say that non-German speakers can always come up with much more entertaining pseudo-German than any real German could. I give him high marks for the entertainment factor. Of course, considering he did Google-translate it, he loses them again.
Since when has.NET been available for three years? Wan't v1.0 only released officially beginning of last year? Or is this one of those articles meant to justify employers requiring 3+ years of.NET experience (and no older than 12)?
I don't know how much platform independence has been a consideration, but they probably just got sick and tired of plain old Win32 and MFC. If nothing else, it gave them a chance to finally bring out a decent framework, just like everybody else already has. Must be so liberating for them to finally be able to code a dialog box dynamically without having to fool with resources and message map macros. Microsoft have finally discovered proper OOP and class frameworks. Welcome to the '90!
> it's better than the alternatives which preceded it
From Microsoft! Because there have been better alternatives on Windows for a long time--both in terms of MUCH more flexible and expressive frameworks for C/C++, and in terms of different programming languages. But as far as Microsoft products for developing for Windows are concerned, yes,.NET is their best effort so far.
> the Porsche 550 spyder had an all-aluminum engine with dual overhead cams
Well, Daimler-Benz made an all-aluminum V12 with fuel injection and 1400hp output as far back as the '30s. They used to mount them in these strange looking three-wheeled single seater vehicles with tons of machine guns and cannons up front. Aluminum engines aren't anything new really.
> but as far as a retail product, the A8 doesn't break any ground, body wise
Aluminum unibody doesn't break new ground? Only for Audi, perhaps. You don't seem to understand the HUGE difference between any-material-on-steel-frame versus bulding the whole structure, frame and crumple zones and all, from the same material. The vehicles you mentioned were about as all-aluminum as the Vette is all-fiberglass. In fact, they all share a very similar design, except for the material of the panels they bolt on the outside. The whole trick with the Audi is bonding all the extruded aluminum parts together into a single body, since it can't be welded easily like steel. And yes, Jaguar started selling a vehicle of similar construction recently, but Audi has been doing so for ten years.
> If nothing else, Python is excellent for prototyping C/C++ applications.
That's what I've been learning it for as well these last few weeks. Public methods, typeless, combined declaration/definition, all things that speed up prototyping (provided you keep in mind things that might get awkward in the final language). Another thing I've found trivial to prototype are web services; due to Python's dynamic nature, you can call remote methods as if they were real Python methods and everything gets marshalled nicely without needing fantabulous compilers. Tweaking server and client code and rerunning is almost instantaneous, much quicker than anything else I've tried so far. Heck, sometimes I even wonder why to bother implementing again in a "real" language.
The Sapphire A3-M275. Only $55 and has everthing except Ethernet, including a quite decent ATI RV100 video chip with TV out (some Radeon variety, perfect for DVD/MPEG4 and even some games), plus now standard AC97 audio. A perfect little starter HTPC mobo.
but I'm afraid (THE CHINESE COMMUNIST PARTY SUCKS!!!) that for various reasons out of my control (COMMUNISM IS EVIL!!!) you probably won't get to read it.
Still, it seems that all the prognostications regarding China's economic potential merely take into account its huge potential consumer base, but not its political reality. If the CP is willing to let itself be marginalized and eventually swept away like most eastern European governments without putting up a fight, then maybe things could turn out ok. But given its track record, that is not very bloody likely. With the increasing affluence of members of your own particular social stratum (i.e. those with enough economic wherewithal to actually post on Slashdot), a new hunger for economic and political activism and dissent will arise that your CP won't be able to tolerate. If the CP is ever swept away forcefully, I can easily see China experience a similar fragmentation to the USSR. There are plenty of groups inside China that would like nothing better than to leave the hive.
But of course (MAO WORE A FUNNY SUIT) this is not the kind of discourse you could have from your current location, even if you were not a devout apologist for the CP. I have spoken to enough Chinese expatriates (RED AND YELLOW SUCK!!!) that "changed" their views the moment they left China to know that there's no point having a political discourse with someone IN China. I know, because I spent my childhood in communist eastern Europe, and I am fully aware of the huge disconnect between what people think and what they say in a totalitarian society.
I thought the ethernut might be one cheap little board, but alas. Circuit Cellar is full of sub-$100 SBCs based on various 8 bit micros, some are even 16 bit. Of course, you could get it (fairly) cheaply if you assemble it yourself, which should be entirely possible.
> The external DSPs and related hardware are used for to process > software plugins as well as simple tasks like ADC/DAC of signals
If all you're using external DSP hardware for is as co-processors to run software on, you're fighting a losing battle--CPUs performance is increasing so quickly that you're barely done with the DSP hardware design before the next generation CPU comes out and obviates the need for it. Basically the only long-term justification for external hardware is for high-quality interfacing to the real world. Anything else is just vendor tie-in, kind of like a large expensive security dongle. I assume ProTools is an old established company, so five or ten years ago their external co-processors might very well have been required. But just the fact that they are "external DSPs" makes them in no way inherently better--if anything, worse, since you add communications latency. Remember when encoding/decoding MPEG video required actual hardware cards?
Oh, I see. Well, things might change as they're slowly losing their monopoly status. They're already bitching like mad now that you can use call-by-call plans for local calls. Will we live to see flat rate local calls in Germany in our lifetime? Nah...
I did, and I also did the "can you still hear me?" test. In the SouthEast T-Mobile has at least as good a coverage as anybody else, and often better. Here in Chattanooga for example I consistently get wider coverage with T-Mobile than my wife with Sprint. ATT is much worse here.
So who exactly covers your particular corner of Outer Podunk really well? Face it, for broadband, cable and cell that's just not the best place to be, and that won't change anytime soon.
> When was the last time you paid your rent in fame?
That's not how you bank on fame. Think of "fame" as networking--you get your name out there, people know about you and your skills. With networking you don't have hard assets either, nobody owes you anything. But one day you might get that call out of the blue from someone who needs your set of skills and turned to you first because of your reputation. It's all about improving your odds, not about anyone owing you something.
Slashdot Mirror
This isn't the '80s anymore where performance is the most critical issue and we jump platforms every time a faster architecture comes out, since we don't have a large software base anyway. Nowaways software IS the more important aspect, and only relatively few well-heeled, game-addicted geeks are going to jump on the PPC just because it's a fews ticks faster this week, and Jobs winked at them with that very special smile. Given the way this industry goes, IBM/Motorola will sit back again, wipe the sweat off their foreheads and take a breather, and before you know it, Intel/AMD will have a faster processor again.
If you have x-platform software that will compile painlessly on either architecture, go for it, switch with each faster chip. But for most others, I doubt performance rants like these will make much of a difference. After all, how many Mac users switch to the PC just for the performance during those stretches when the PC has the upper hand?
> 2. reaction mass. "Free" energy wouldn't help with #2.
Well, you could give photon drives a shot if you had energy to waste. Yet another staple of Sci-Fi.
> Your point?
None really. I thought you had referenced pounds per horsepower originally, but it was hp per liter, so my power-to-weight comment doesn't apply.
> and would say the same about the A8 (since it's a $70k car)
I would still say that the A8 paved the way, because while it didn't have huge production numbers, it can be considered a test bed of aluminum production processes, allowing Audi (and Alcoa I'm sure) to gain a lot of experience in working with the material. For example, it seems that in the long term welding will probably be out and other types of bonding--such as various glues--will be used instead. Some manufacturers (Jaguar I believe) use rivets, but not everybody finds that acceptable, for weight, strength and aesthetic reasons.
> Version 1.0 was released in January '02.
.NET, when they would occasionally mention it in public, leaving you to guess whether it was a new cookie or toothpaste.
That's what I thought. For a moment there I thought I had missed a few years of my life somehow. I guess they're talking about the FUD period of
>6. all of the above in a street legal road car.
Well, for that time anyway. I doubt it would be certified street legal today. You'd have to add hundreds of pounds of safety features and exhaust scrubbers and lose the power-to-weight ratio game.
You got that one. In fact, they claim it to have been the first production all-aluminum car. But considering that most of its high cost is due to the aluminum body, they certainly hadn't perfected the process yet. In terms of perfecting mass production techniques that can make all-aluminum cars affordable to most people, Audi has contributed a lot more. Their A2 model is paving the way still further. Here is a list of aluminum-using cars, but the NSX is about as representative as the Ferrari Modena in terms of production numbers.
> Of course, your somewhat bizarre German aside
Yes, but (as a native German speaker) I must say that non-German speakers can always come up with much more entertaining pseudo-German than any real German could. I give him high marks for the entertainment factor. Of course, considering he did Google-translate it, he loses them again.
Since when has .NET been available for three years? Wan't v1.0 only released officially beginning of last year? Or is this one of those articles meant to justify employers requiring 3+ years of .NET experience (and no older than 12)?
I don't know how much platform independence has been a consideration, but they probably just got sick and tired of plain old Win32 and MFC. If nothing else, it gave them a chance to finally bring out a decent framework, just like everybody else already has. Must be so liberating for them to finally be able to code a dialog box dynamically without having to fool with resources and message map macros. Microsoft have finally discovered proper OOP and class frameworks. Welcome to the '90!
> it's better than the alternatives which preceded it
.NET is their best effort so far.
From Microsoft! Because there have been better alternatives on Windows for a long time--both in terms of MUCH more flexible and expressive frameworks for C/C++, and in terms of different programming languages. But as far as Microsoft products for developing for Windows are concerned, yes,
> the Porsche 550 spyder had an all-aluminum engine with dual overhead cams
Well, Daimler-Benz made an all-aluminum V12 with fuel injection and 1400hp output as far back as the '30s. They used to mount them in these strange looking three-wheeled single seater vehicles with tons of machine guns and cannons up front. Aluminum engines aren't anything new really.
> but as far as a retail product, the A8 doesn't break any ground, body wise
Aluminum unibody doesn't break new ground? Only for Audi, perhaps. You don't seem to understand the HUGE difference between any-material-on-steel-frame versus bulding the whole structure, frame and crumple zones and all, from the same material. The vehicles you mentioned were about as all-aluminum as the Vette is all-fiberglass. In fact, they all share a very similar design, except for the material of the panels they bolt on the outside. The whole trick with the Audi is bonding all the extruded aluminum parts together into a single body, since it can't be welded easily like steel. And yes, Jaguar started selling a vehicle of similar construction recently, but Audi has been doing so for ten years.
> If nothing else, Python is excellent for prototyping C/C++ applications.
That's what I've been learning it for as well these last few weeks. Public methods, typeless, combined declaration/definition, all things that speed up prototyping (provided you keep in mind things that might get awkward in the final language). Another thing I've found trivial to prototype are web services; due to Python's dynamic nature, you can call remote methods as if they were real Python methods and everything gets marshalled nicely without needing fantabulous compilers. Tweaking server and client code and rerunning is almost instantaneous, much quicker than anything else I've tried so far. Heck, sometimes I even wonder why to bother implementing again in a "real" language.
The Sapphire A3-M275. Only $55 and has everthing except Ethernet, including a quite decent ATI RV100 video chip with TV out (some Radeon variety, perfect for DVD/MPEG4 and even some games), plus now standard AC97 audio. A perfect little starter HTPC mobo.
but I'm afraid (THE CHINESE COMMUNIST PARTY SUCKS!!!) that for various reasons out of my control (COMMUNISM IS EVIL!!!) you probably won't get to read it.
Still, it seems that all the prognostications regarding China's economic potential merely take into account its huge potential consumer base, but not its political reality. If the CP is willing to let itself be marginalized and eventually swept away like most eastern European governments without putting up a fight, then maybe things could turn out ok. But given its track record, that is not very bloody likely. With the increasing affluence of members of your own particular social stratum (i.e. those with enough economic wherewithal to actually post on Slashdot), a new hunger for economic and political activism and dissent will arise that your CP won't be able to tolerate. If the CP is ever swept away forcefully, I can easily see China experience a similar fragmentation to the USSR. There are plenty of groups inside China that would like nothing better than to leave the hive.
But of course (MAO WORE A FUNNY SUIT) this is not the kind of discourse you could have from your current location, even if you were not a devout apologist for the CP. I have spoken to enough Chinese expatriates (RED AND YELLOW SUCK!!!) that "changed" their views the moment they left China to know that there's no point having a political discourse with someone IN China. I know, because I spent my childhood in communist eastern Europe, and I am fully aware of the huge disconnect between what people think and what they say in a totalitarian society.
> but it is not that compelling at that price.
I thought the ethernut might be one cheap little board, but alas. Circuit Cellar is full of sub-$100 SBCs based on various 8 bit micros, some are even 16 bit. Of course, you could get it (fairly) cheaply if you assemble it yourself, which should be entirely possible.
> Nope, your nightmate was real
Alas, "nightmates" are NEVER real for slashdotters. They always turn out to be the pillow or some such.
Oh, if you meant "nightmares", you seem to actually have liked GEOS, so how was it a nightmare?
> The external DSPs and related hardware are used for to process
> software plugins as well as simple tasks like ADC/DAC of signals
If all you're using external DSP hardware for is as co-processors to run software on, you're fighting a losing battle--CPUs performance is increasing so quickly that you're barely done with the DSP hardware design before the next generation CPU comes out and obviates the need for it. Basically the only long-term justification for external hardware is for high-quality interfacing to the real world. Anything else is just vendor tie-in, kind of like a large expensive security dongle. I assume ProTools is an old established company, so five or ten years ago their external co-processors might very well have been required. But just the fact that they are "external DSPs" makes them in no way inherently better--if anything, worse, since you add communications latency. Remember when encoding/decoding MPEG video required actual hardware cards?
> No, this was when I lived in Germany.
Oh, I see. Well, things might change as they're slowly losing their monopoly status. They're already bitching like mad now that you can use call-by-call plans for local calls. Will we live to see flat rate local calls in Germany in our lifetime? Nah...
> a period of about 10 years
I wasn't aware that DT has been in that States that long, certainly not all over the country.
> my arch-enemy, Deutsche Telekom, the worst telco in the industrialized world
Why's that?
> Look at the maps. I did.
I did, and I also did the "can you still hear me?" test. In the SouthEast T-Mobile has at least as good a coverage as anybody else, and often better. Here in Chattanooga for example I consistently get wider coverage with T-Mobile than my wife with Sprint. ATT is much worse here.
> T-Mobile coverage sucks.
So who exactly covers your particular corner of Outer Podunk really well? Face it, for broadband, cable and cell that's just not the best place to be, and that won't change anytime soon.
> When was the last time you paid your rent in fame?
That's not how you bank on fame. Think of "fame" as networking--you get your name out there, people know about you and your skills. With networking you don't have hard assets either, nobody owes you anything. But one day you might get that call out of the blue from someone who needs your set of skills and turned to you first because of your reputation. It's all about improving your odds, not about anyone owing you something.