Very true. An example which I think qualifies: JDK1.3 was released for Windows NT months before Solaris. Despite the fact that more Java developers probably use NT, Sun should have delayed its NT release. Why? Because as a Solaris user, I would've expected the "perk" of getting Sun software before Windows users do.:-)
I'm sure it's because Sun is a big company, the SunOS and Java disvisions are completely separate, and the echelons of upper management can't be worried by things a minor as synchronized release schedules. In a companies as large as SMI, IBM, Microsoft, et cetera, the separate divisions really are just like different companies.
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... I think Slashdot needs to remove the +50 KarmaKap. We all know it's not supposed to be about the karma, but why bother encouraging quality posts with a reward system if you can only go so high?
Some of you may feel that without such a cap, it becomes a game (as in "karma whoring" AKA "Signal 11's life"), but I think that's irrelevent. The only "downside" to this "game" are more interesting, informative, and funny posts -- not much of a downside, eh? Some call it "karma whoring", but I think that it's simply the knowledge of how to be a good Slashdot citizen.
Yes, I check my karma totals, but not because I feel it's a game. I use it to gauge the overall effect my contributions to the site by observing the rate of karma growth. And if my karma drops suddenly one week, I know it's time to cut back on the flames and trolls.;-)
And yes, it's also fun. I'll admit that.
I understand that one of the major reasons for having such a cap is to avoid abuses like this: let's say Signal 11 post interesting, insightful, and funny things for a year. From my experience, an active, consistently good poster can, on average, easily get 100-200 in a year. This means that Signal 11 could start posting Goatse.cx links, and it'd be weeks before he loses his +1 bonus.
I have a proposal to solve this: if a user is moderated down more than 20 times in one week, he loses his +1 bonus for a week. If he is modded down more than 30 times a week, he posts at 0 for week, then at 1 for a week. If he's modded down more than 40 times a month, he posts at -1 for a week, 0 for a week, and 1 for two weeks. I think this not unreasonable, considering that most users with enough karma to get the +1 bonus won't suddenly become PBG or *syringe.:-)
Who else agrees that the +50 KarmaKap has to go?
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Geeks, it's almost October, and you know what October means -- Christmas. It's time to start collecting links for the multiple "wishlist" discussions Slashdot will have in December. These are some of the most active stories of the year, and I find them particularly fun. I believe that there were three last year, and with Slashdot's recent newbie influx, four or five such items may be warranted, even if the newbies are kiddie lusers and just want Pokeyermom for Christmas. So, starting now, when you see cool geeky toy or something, save the link. To be even more helpful, if it looks like the page may be taken down before December, mirror it.
This Public Service Annoucement was sponsored by Jesus Christ, who would like to remind you that the only thing He wants for Christmas is your love, and filthy pornography.
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I'm a huge Sun fan, but I can't believe they have the nerve to continue airing those commercials. It may not have made headlines on Slashdot (a site which generally ignores real business news in favor of kids whining about stealing copyrighted music and movies), but the a.root server which manages the.com TLD was replaced with an RS/6000 shortly after Sun started that silly marketing campaign. Consequently, IBM has been the "dot in dot-com" since April or so.
I feel like Sun has been floundering for a year or so. Java 2 rocks, Solaris 8 is awesome, but I don't see the company having a lot of direction... I just see a lot of money being spent. Like I don't understand why Sun would want to buy Cobalt, who make third-rate GNU/Linux toasters for technological neophytes. Whatever. I'd much rather see a Java 2 standard, better support for non-Linux based OSS operating systems, better hardware support for x86 Solaris, and more aggressive marketing of JavaStations and Jini. Oh, and a return to a BSD-based SunOS.:-)
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This is what you're looking for. Several years of the Bastard, from operator to manager to A/P to network admin. When you've absorbed all of that, you might be interested to know that Travaglia (sp?) has been whoring himself out to The Register for a while now. It's still hilarious stuff. You can now find BOFH merchandise at Copyleft.net. Go here, select "The Register" as a brand, and click "Submit query" to find a BOFH sticker, shirt, and hat. Isn't capitalism grand?
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I suggest that Debian take hint FreeBSD "custom/expert" installation. You are presented with a menu, from which you choose a task, such as partitioning a labeling the disk, choosing the installation media, choosing basic software sets to install, and setting startup options. Then you choose "commit", and the filesystem is created, and the base system copied over. Then you can go back and install specific software packages, configure your mouse and keyboard, chage root password -- even set up X. This tool ("/stand/sysinstall") is available to the superuser at any time, and provides a central place for many common sysadmin's tasks, with minimal loss of functionality. It's no replacement for command-line tools, but for an application as focussed as a system installation, it's great. And for experienced FreeBSD users, it allows to to do a full installation in ten or fifteen minutes. (Assuming your disks and source media aren't slow.;-)
All in all, it's similar to Debian's current installer, but less linear and allows you to easily make changes before commiting your installation.
OpenBSD's installer is my favorite of any OS, because there's no bullshit involved. Very fast, very clean, very simple.
I find Debian's current installer to be the most sane of any GNU/Linux distribution, though. Slack comes in a close second. I hope Debian isn't trying to make it more "user friendly" a la Redhat's default installs (i.e., select one of three "types" of machine uses and sit back and watch). That would be the beginning of the end... Debian seems to be more about pleasing those who know what they're doing, and I don't want to see that change.
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Here's my opinion. I spent last night online looking at "internet cafes" in the DC area, and the two most prominent (Atomic Grounds and cyberStop) are just regular cafes, with the addition of a couple (literally two to four) Windows 98 boxen hooked up to a cable modem. Sad, sad, sad.
What I envision as a cyber-cafe looks just like a normal cafe, but every seat has an Fast Ethernet port nearby. Perhaps there will be a few iMacs and such, but the focus will be on people who carry around laptops.
I like your idea of a gaming cafe/bar. Set up a few gaming boxen (PIII 500, 128MB RAM, TNT2 -- nothing special) and let people bring their own. If the place has two floors, rent out the top floor for LAN parties. Maybe even work out a deal with a local Chinese restaurant/pizza shop for these events. Could be pretty sweet.
What I'm looking for is an atmosphere like the cafe in the Barnes & Noble on M, but with a Net connection. Your cafe/bar could fulfill that too. Make it Metro-accessible and you're good as gold. I live in Silver Spring and work in Rockville, and love going downtown on the weekends to troll bookstores and get coffee and such. I suppose your biggest problem is how expensive the property will be.
I'm not sure how I could help out (build you a firewall box for the network?;-), but if you'd like to chat about this, e-mail me...
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Try the new Slashdot geek classified section, GeekRoomies. Remember: if you don't find your next roomie through GeekRoomies, he could be Rusty from kuro5hin! And no one wants that!
It won't get done it if involves adding anything to Slash. Rob hasn't done any Perl in about two years, and can't even be bothered to spell-check the two sentences a day he writes (that's his "job", by the way). So, we must improvise.
Visit my new secret story ID and post your geek-seeking-geek-but-not-in-the-biblical-sense classifieds. Check it out:
Slashdot Mirror
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
I'm sure it's because Sun is a big company, the SunOS and Java disvisions are completely separate, and the echelons of upper management can't be worried by things a minor as synchronized release schedules. In a companies as large as SMI, IBM, Microsoft, et cetera, the separate divisions really are just like different companies.
---------///----------
All generalizations are false.
Some of you may feel that without such a cap, it becomes a game (as in "karma whoring" AKA "Signal 11's life"), but I think that's irrelevent. The only "downside" to this "game" are more interesting, informative, and funny posts -- not much of a downside, eh? Some call it "karma whoring", but I think that it's simply the knowledge of how to be a good Slashdot citizen.
Yes, I check my karma totals, but not because I feel it's a game. I use it to gauge the overall effect my contributions to the site by observing the rate of karma growth. And if my karma drops suddenly one week, I know it's time to cut back on the flames and trolls. ;-)
And yes, it's also fun. I'll admit that.
I understand that one of the major reasons for having such a cap is to avoid abuses like this: let's say Signal 11 post interesting, insightful, and funny things for a year. From my experience, an active, consistently good poster can, on average, easily get 100-200 in a year. This means that Signal 11 could start posting Goatse.cx links, and it'd be weeks before he loses his +1 bonus.
I have a proposal to solve this: if a user is moderated down more than 20 times in one week, he loses his +1 bonus for a week. If he is modded down more than 30 times a week, he posts at 0 for week, then at 1 for a week. If he's modded down more than 40 times a month, he posts at -1 for a week, 0 for a week, and 1 for two weeks. I think this not unreasonable, considering that most users with enough karma to get the +1 bonus won't suddenly become PBG or *syringe. :-)
Who else agrees that the +50 KarmaKap has to go?
---------///----------
All generalizations are false.
This Public Service Annoucement was sponsored by Jesus Christ, who would like to remind you that the only thing He wants for Christmas is your love, and filthy pornography.
---------///----------
All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
I feel like Sun has been floundering for a year or so. Java 2 rocks, Solaris 8 is awesome, but I don't see the company having a lot of direction... I just see a lot of money being spent. Like I don't understand why Sun would want to buy Cobalt, who make third-rate GNU/Linux toasters for technological neophytes. Whatever. I'd much rather see a Java 2 standard, better support for non-Linux based OSS operating systems, better hardware support for x86 Solaris, and more aggressive marketing of JavaStations and Jini. Oh, and a return to a BSD-based SunOS. :-)
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
All in all, it's similar to Debian's current installer, but less linear and allows you to easily make changes before commiting your installation.
OpenBSD's installer is my favorite of any OS, because there's no bullshit involved. Very fast, very clean, very simple.
I find Debian's current installer to be the most sane of any GNU/Linux distribution, though. Slack comes in a close second. I hope Debian isn't trying to make it more "user friendly" a la Redhat's default installs (i.e., select one of three "types" of machine uses and sit back and watch). That would be the beginning of the end... Debian seems to be more about pleasing those who know what they're doing, and I don't want to see that change.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
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All generalizations are false.
What I envision as a cyber-cafe looks just like a normal cafe, but every seat has an Fast Ethernet port nearby. Perhaps there will be a few iMacs and such, but the focus will be on people who carry around laptops.
I like your idea of a gaming cafe/bar. Set up a few gaming boxen (PIII 500, 128MB RAM, TNT2 -- nothing special) and let people bring their own. If the place has two floors, rent out the top floor for LAN parties. Maybe even work out a deal with a local Chinese restaurant/pizza shop for these events. Could be pretty sweet.
What I'm looking for is an atmosphere like the cafe in the Barnes & Noble on M, but with a Net connection. Your cafe/bar could fulfill that too. Make it Metro-accessible and you're good as gold. I live in Silver Spring and work in Rockville, and love going downtown on the weekends to troll bookstores and get coffee and such. I suppose your biggest problem is how expensive the property will be.
I'm not sure how I could help out (build you a firewall box for the network? ;-), but if you'd like to chat about this, e-mail me...
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All generalizations are false.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid =geekroomies
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All generalizations are false.
Visit my new secret story ID and post your geek-seeking-geek-but-not-in-the-biblical-sense classifieds. Check it out:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid =geekroomies
Remember, GeekRoomies: because shouldn't your next roomie post goatse.cx links too?
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All generalizations are false.
I'm just curious.
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All generalizations are false.