I must not be understanding the problem correctly. So help me out please. Is your set up
a) 1 desktop stretched over 3 monitors? Yes?
b) You want to move be able to movie, say Firefox, or a xterm, etc. from say monitor 1 to monitor 3 using keyboard shortcuts?
c) You think a Linux desktop environment can't handle this currently?
If this is the correct setup you have, then you must not be a KDE user. This is trivial with KDE.
alt-tab until the app you want to move has focused.
Hit the Alt+Fkey to maximize the app you want to move until it's no longer fullsize in monitor 1. In my case, I've set up Alt-F6 to maximize/unmaximize a window.
Hit the Alt-Fkey to move the window to the right until it's in monitor 3. In my case, it's alt-f4 to move to the right, alt-f3 to move to the left.
Hit the Alt-Fkey to maximize the app until it's full screen on monitor 3.
Setting the keybindings is trivial in KDE:
KDE menu -> Computer -> System Settings -> Keyboard & Mouse -> Global Keyboard Settings -> Select Kwin application -> Select Pack windows to the right -> custom -> Click on wrench -> type shortcut. Ditto on Select Pack windows to the left.
I can't tell if you're trying to troll or you're like one of the "Great Old Ones" from H.P. Lovecraft's mythos who's just awakened from your deep slumber in some forgotten forbidding city up in the mountains. FVWM?!?!?! That's like 1994?!?! Not even FVWM95?!?! I had to double check my debian box to see if you could still get fvwm installed on a system.
I mean no disrespect if you're not trolling. I'm just shocked that someone would still be using *and* preferring fvwm in 2009 when I thought the last fvwm user went extinct in 1999 with the arrival of KDE and Gnome on the scene in 1998.
I think without realizing it, you've made a fundamental assumption that is not true: # of good developers == # of bad developers. If that assumption were true, then by your logic we should expect that about a 50-50% breakdown of good/bad developers who use VS.
But, if instead, the # bad developers is much, much larger than the # of good developers we should expect that for an IDE that has a low barrier of entry that bad developers would naturally gravitate to that particular IDE, wheras good developers don't necessarily have a bias (as for example, you don't have a bias). In which case the IDE usage heavily favors the bad developers (they were the vast majority of the population already, and now they are even even more concentratrated since there are proportionally fewer good developers who use only that IDE.
As you pointed out, the IDEs that have "higher" barrier to entry (aka, vi, emacs, etc.) are naturally not going to present a problem to the good developers, but the bad developers will shy away from them. So, of course we should expect then that the percentage of good developers who use vi vs. bad developers who use vi will be (much) higher than the percentage of good developers vs. bad developers in the general population.
In other words, if Pr(Code Monkey is bad) = p, Pr(Code Monkey is good) = q (with p much larger than q), then Pr(Code Monkey is bad | Code Monkey uses VS) > p and Pr(Code Monkey is good | Code Monkey uses vi) >> q.
Intuitively, this explains why people are more likely to be impressed by someone who uses vi, emacs, etc. than someone who uses VS. It's not that VS stinks or that continual use of it melts your brains, it's just that as an indicator of your skillset, someone who uses vi,emacs, etc. is *probably* at the least competent and most likely *good*. Whereas, usage of VS indicates very little about your skillset other than the majority of VS users are "bad" which would suggest such a person *probably* is also a bad coder.
To get rid of the stench of incompetence associated with use of VS I would suggest that Microsoft come out with another IDE that is "dumbed down" from VS, sort of a "VS, junior" for those who remember the IBM PC, junior. Something that has an even lower barrier to entry than VS, so the bad Code Monkeys can gravitate to "VS, junior" and thus boosting the probabilities for the competent VS developers. Maybe they could throw in a Clippy on VS, junior or a dog with mental bubbles of suggestions.
Then I read Torvald's comment about the Linux exploit, with Torvald referring to the openBSD developers as being __like__ a "bunch of masturbating monkeys".
Ok, so is this like some kind of secret code used among OS kernel developers? Like saying "my shoe is blue but the cow is hungry" really means "Oh man, this code is leaking memory and crashing my system"? Or is this some kind of secret initiation thing, where in order to truly become a member of the OS development club, you have to first... masturbate a monkey??!! Can somebody explain it, or maybe do some investigative reporting on this?
I actually read some of the postings and I didn't see any evidence of "bitching". I did learn of an open source client called despotify that does support Linux and Mac OS X which I would be much more comfortable with. Now I'm guessing from your tone that you're not much of a Linux user or a Free(dom) software kind of guy so you might not grok why the offering of a free closed source binary is not unlike offering the free services of a prostitute who may or may not have several STDs on the condition of a) No condom allowed b) No permission to comment on the quality of the sex with anyone else. If the prostitute is "good looking enough" or a guy is desperate enough he might think it's worth the risk of having his dick fall off, but as a rule not every guy thinks some possibly good sex vs. the possibility having his dick fall off is a great bargain.
>What is it with governments and hubris? If they had just shipped all these laptops without any mention of "unhackableness", you know what would have happened?
Here are some clues for why they announced such a thing. From the article:
'There was no way we could do any of this on XP,' he said. 'Windows 7 nailed it for us.'
*and*
the cost to the NSW Department of Education is under $435 (US)
Care to make a wager as to whether or not a certain large corporation in the Pacific Northwest gave them an extra special deal on the hardware & software on the condition that they praise Windows 7 over XP? I mean, they're purchasing netbooks and running Windows 7 on them instead of the lighter weight XP? Anybody else see anything wrong with this picture?
That's exactly the problem he's pointing out. The second digit should be a UNIFORM distribution if it came from real data. If the digits are gaussian that indicates that either
there's some process accounting for a gaussian distribution that he doesn't know about (and he does consider that possibility) or
the numbers are cooked by a human being who has a preference for 8's over other digits.
>And there you go, the problem in a nutshell. Expecting end users to do stuff like this is bullshit.
Uh, did you read the posting? That wasn't a user issue, that was a SYSADMIN issue. The guy was talking about diagnosing a network service issue which is something a sys admin would worry about, not an end user, who has more important things to worry about like using a browser, or an e-mail tool.
Jeezus, don't hate Linux because it works, hate it because the other OS isn't as expert friendly, dude!
Why do I say that? Because you don't see BMW giving free training videos to car salesmen comparing their cars to say GM or Chrysler or Ford, do you? BMW lives or dies by the quality and reputation of their products; they don't need to "educate" salesmen about their products. This smells of a desperation move where Microsoft must believe their Windows 7 doesn't compare favorably with Linux on netbooks, so they have to try to convince the Best Buy personnel, who let's face it, don't know as much about hardware and software as they know about marketing products, to push the Windows 7 stuff onto customers.
There have been some studies of performance of Windows 7 beta vs. Linux on netbooks which either have not have been clear win for Windows 7 or worse, have shown Windows 7 in an unflattering light. As for citations, the web sites that I can recall are Phoronix.com, and OSNews.com.
I mean trying to "educate" Best Buy sales people and having Windows 7 "House Parties" sounds a little pathetic don't you think? Did Microsoft do something similar when XP came out or even Vista?
Interestingly, Opera, which by some measures has only a 2 per cent market share, ranked second among the kit operators, with 26 per cent.
"I think that's probably because operators have a familiarity with the web threat landscape," Royal told The Register, suggesting that many black-hat hackers take a security-through-obscurity approach to making sure they themselves don't get hit. "It makes them wary of using mainstream browsers."
Huh, and here I was thinking that maybe, just maybe, these hackers knew the security history of the various browsers and knew that Opera had a better security history than Internet Explorer?
I'm afraid I can't agree with this statment:
>Whatever you may say about Windows, at least it set a standard.
Here's why:
Whatever you may say about the Khmer Rouge, at least they set a standard.
Whatever you may say about the HIV virus, at least it set a standard.
Setting a crappy standard can be worse than useless. For example, setting a standard that all X86 hardware *must* come with Windows pre-installed and no other operating system can be allowed to be pre-installed in the '90s was certainly a Microsoft standard --- it was also a shitty standard that held back competition. Remember OS/2? BeOS? Hell, Linux and the BSDs might have had more market share if the OEM manufacturers could have been permitted to preinstall them at no extra charge due to the restrictive licensing that Microsoft foisted on the manufacturers.
I just don't see Microsoft as the mover that made computing world a better place. I see the hardware pc clones giving competition to IBM as a positive force. But Microsoft? They've done everything they can to stifle direct competition.
>Because people like me will never use open soruce if it doesn't work and play well with the realities of earning a living. If you want an entirely isolated hippie utopia commune, hey, feel free, but you'll have no effect on the world of grown-ups. If you want open source to become normal and accepted in datacenters and desktops world-wide, then this Microsoft move is a good thing. A great thing, even.
I just like point out that google, the largest datacenter in the world runs Linux. Also, the majority of the web servers, dns servers, routers, firewalls, etc, run on Linux. Seeing as how pretty much everyone on the internet sooner or later *must* touch Linux one way or another I think that on the contrary, people who have hangups about Free Software are going to find it increasingly difficult to isolate themselves from it. I don't think it's appropriate to disparage those of us who choose Free software because we believe in Freedom of use.
As a linux user, I don't run Linux because I hate Microsoft (I don't hate Microsoft anymore. What's the point? They're irrelevant to me.). I run Linux because I love Linux for its performance and how it works for me instead of me for it.
>How is this going to be different from other Linux distros and associated GUI revamp projects that have sprung up promising "we're going to be better than Windows! Really!" over the years?
The difference is this: Joe Six Pack has never heard of Ubuntu much less Linux. Everybody on the planet who has internet access knows about Google. So if google announces the creation of something called.... an...Operating...System(tm), then the Joe Six Packs pay attention. Never mind that it's the same OS that us Linux users have been using for years. There's nothing wrong with Linux. It's getting Joe Six Pack to change his frame of reference to realize that he's much better off with Linux that is the real problem. And it's going to take an entity like google to accomplish that small miracle.
F*ck you.
And the horse you rode in on. Those SOBs don't want free codecs, because they can't compete or can't control people. The argument about patent concerns is nothing more than unmitigated fermented Horse manure. That BS argument can be turned around and pointed at EVERY OTHER CODEC as well.
I read the link. In the Windows case, the issue is, well, stunning. I hadn't realized they still have problems with DLL hell.
In the article you referenced, the problem is described this way: DLL A and DLL B are updated while program foo is running. So long as foo is still running, it's using the old versions. But, any program launched after the updates that uses A or B could be hosed, because the updated DLLs might not be backwards compatible.
In the Unix world, this problem was solved a long time ago. (20+ years?). Run time libraries libA.so and libB.so are actually symbolic links pointing at the latest major,minor,revsision libraries, libA.so.major.minor.revision, libB.so.major.minor.revision. So whenever any program is linked against a runtime library with say major version 3, minor version 2 (i.e. it's compatible with versions 3,4,and 5 of libA) then that program will run with any version of the library that supports version 3. So at run time it will always be looking for libA.so.3.*. If a newer version of library comes out that is not backwards compatible with version 3, libA.so will point to it sure, but the already compiled programs will still point at the old version of the library. Read the info page for libtool for more and better information.
Unfortunately for Microsoft I think they royally screwed themselves by their dogmatic insistence that programs from 20+ years must still work, no matter how shitty, bug ridden, take-them-out-back-and-shoot-them-please they might be. Specifically, it looks like their FAT 8.3 filename has screwed them because all of their dlls are of the form "foobaz.dll". Notice that the dlls don't have versioning number? They are so screwed. As Raymond states you can move the old DLLs to a different directory, but the programs that depended on them don't know that unless you do something with their environment. I'm not a Microsoft poweruser, so someone else will have to speak about how to deal with that. I'm surprised they didn't hire some Unix guys to tell them about version numbering dlls, but then again the decision they made about how to deal with DLLs must have happened 20+ years ago when they only had the FAT filesystem, and so it would never have occurred to "them" to leave themselves some wriggle room.
From your posting and the quotes you refer to, I'm guessing the issue you seem to be having is the availability of proprietary software on Linux.
From my perspective, I couldn't care less about proprietary software. I've got linux. I've got Debian Linux. I've got 24,000+ software packages ready to go on ARM. What do I need proprietary software for? What's the smartbook for? Reading e-mail, web browsing, watching a video, maybe doing a presentation. Where's the need for proprietary software? I already have google for online searching, maps, e-mail. What need is there for proprietary software?
If you're a proprietary software developer why not save yourself some grief and pain and write your software for the iphone. Apple would be happy to review your software for its suitability to its platform. I'm also sure that if you write software for Microsoft's platforms and it's wildly successful there's a pretty good chance of being bought out by Microsoft on their terms, and if the terms aren't good enough for Microsoft they might just take your good idea and make their own inferior copy of it.
If you really want to write proprietary software for Linux, then I would encourage you to write web based software where you own the server and your clients interact with your server using a standards compliant browser. That way it doesn't matter what OS the client is running, and you don't have to deal with support issues.
be ready.
Here check out some of the lame ass reasons he gives:
2.1 No good stable standardized API for developing GUI applications (like Win32 API). Both GTK and Qt are very unstable and often break backwards compatibility.
2.4.3.2 By default most distros come without good or even compatible with Windows fonts.
3.1 No unified configuration system for computer settings, devices and system services. E.g. distro A sets up networking using these utilities, outputting certain settings residing in certain file system locations, distro B sets up everything differently. This drives most users mad.
4. It should be possible to configure everything via GUI which is still not a case for too many situations and operations.
5.1 Few software titles, inability to run familiar Windows software. (Some applications (which don't work in Wine) have zero Linux equivalents).
5.1.1 No equivalent of some hardcore Windows software like AutoCAD/3D Studio/Adobe Premier/Corel Painter/etc. Home and work users just won't bother installing Linux until they can work for real.
5.2 No games. Full stop. Cedega and Wine offer very incomplete support.
5.3.1 A lot of WinPrinters do not have any Linux support (e.g. Lexmark models). An argument that user should buy a Linux compatible printer is silly since that way Linux won't ever gain even a traction of popularity. Why should I install an OS where my printer doesn't work?
9. General slowness: just compare load times between e.g. OpenOffice and Microsoft Office. If you don't like this example, try running OpenOffice in Windows and in Linux. In the latter case it will be much slower.
9.1 Slow (libraries) linker. Braindead slow linker. Intolerably slow linker. Win32 OpenOffice being run from Wine starts in a less time than native Linux OpenOffice. Microsoft Office 2003 starts from Wine in a matter of few seconds even on 1GHz CPUs with a slow HDD.
etc., etc., etc., then there's the usual FUD BS about quality of the software, the kernel, the architecture, etc., etc., etc.
The reason, Timothy, why some of his stuff resonates with you (the audio part for example), is because spewing MASSIVE FUD is like a shotgun fired at a target from a close range -- something is likely to hit the target for you and you only pay attention to the part that "resonates" with you, instead of looking at the overall picture and realize that this is unmitigated BS.
How do I know? Replace every instance of Linux with Apple OS X and see how it reads for you.
Re:"at war with my parents over who is in control"
on
Bringing Up Bill
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
Like him or not, Bill Gates is pretty high up in the
list of people who had a large effect on the whole
computing industry.
I have to agree. The issue I have is how much warping and damage did he cause the computing industry by his desire to win and maintain his monopoly at all costs. I've heard the arguments before that if Mr. Gates hadn't been around that Steve Jobs would have been running the show. That is not an unreasonable argument. My belief is that had CP/M been chosen for the first IBM PC, we would have had a more inclusive community, and more competition based on merits of the software and not on back room deals with crap like per-cpu-licenses or not-allowing-other-OS-to-being-pre-installed, or locking-browsers-with-the-OS.
I think that it was a serious mistake of the U.S. legal system not to have broken the Microsoft monopoly into at least 2 companies:
The OS manufacturer
The software vendor
I believe that history has demonstrated that whenever the Microsoft OS has been threatened, they have resorted to using leverage from their other software to pressure people to stick with their OS (Ex. Microsoft Exchange, Office, etc). Similarly, whenever their software has been threatened they have resorted to using their OS to put pressure on people to stick with their software (Ex. the "hidden apis" that only Microsoft developers knew about in their OS that other vendors such as Wordperfect were not allowed to have or at least not until it was too late.)
By breaking the company into 2 parts it would have forced each half to compete solely on the merits of their software and certainly led to more aggressive competition and less FUD crap ("Get the Facts" campaign). I can't help but wonder if campaign contributions had something to do with Microsoft not being split up.
It should be my RIGHT to choose - ie. not to pay for Vista if I'm not going to use it.
It IS your right to choose. And when Lenovo tells you that they're selling a machine with Vista on it, and you choose to buy it, you're making your decision. I know it may sound crazy, but if you don't want a PC with Vista, you shouldn't buy a PC with Vista.
I'd be a bit more sympathetic if they didn't tell her it came with Vista, but that doesn't seem very likely. All of the machines on lenovo.com make it very clear which operating system they have installed. And when you buy a machine in a store, there's almost always a sticker on the box listing the OS, amount of memory, hard drive storage, etc.. She knew what they were selling, and she chose to buy it.
The problem for this woman unfortunately is an old problem that Linux users have had to deal with for years, namely the issue of who decides what operating system, if *any*, is to be preinstalled on PC/laptop. In the case of people who just want to run Linux, Microsoft had a history of setting up deals with OEMs that charged OEMs a Windows tax on every computer they sold regardless of whether or not it had windows installed. For that reason among others, OEMs were (and some still are) reluctant to sell a customer a PC without an operating system or with a Linux distro installed as it would be an additional cost to the OEM.
Ironically enough, in the case of this woman, she *wants* to do business with Microsoft she just doesn't want have to pay the *Vista* Tax in order to get XP preinstalled, which seems reasonable to me, as the OEMs already have a license for XP and the manufacturing set up to do XP preinstalls without additional cost to the OEM. As a Linux user I wouldn't want to pay any kind of Windows Tax, but I do believe she has a case and a reasonable expectation of winning this lawsuit.
What is the #1 website on the planet today? Answer: google.
How many machines does google have to support it's busines? Answer: tens of thousands.
What operating system does google use? Answer: Linux.
How many times has google been hacked in its 11 year history? Answer: Anybody, anybody?
What is the #1 desktop operating system today? Answer: Microsoft.
How many worms, trojans, viruses, etc. are there for Microsoft OSes? Answer: > 100,000 (source: pick you're favorite anti-virus company counting scheme.)
How many times have businesses been hosed by using Microsoft software? Answer: Too many to count. The latest blunder today? The French navy. Reference: http://www.networkworld.com/news/2009/020909-conficker-worm-sinks-french-navy.html
Now for the last and most important question: What does Microsoft think that it knows about security that Gooogle doesn't? Because comparing their security track records, it's not obvious to me that Microsoft knows anything about security.
--Johnny says when in doubt just ask Google.
The summary makes it out to be a choice between the evil, cold-blooded manager (Doug) and the warm, fatherly teamleader (Steve). As much as we all like to see the black-white picture, I'm frankly sick with it -- do we need to have Slashdot become the Cosmo Girl for Nerds?
Here's the reason why I think it is clear cut:
After Stuart got fired everyone on his team threatened to quit. And when Kelly refused to change her mind, his team followed through.
Now which kind of team manager would be better to have? I think it's very clear.
It seems you're ignoring Microsoft's exclusive licensing issues with the Major OEMS in the 90's prohibiting the OEMs from either preloading alternative OSes or prohibiting any boot menus which would allow people to choose which OS they want to boot (ref: BeOS).
You seem to also be ignoring Microsoft's practice of deliberating altering their internal APIs to prevent any other software maker from writing their own clone of DOS (ref: DRDOS). Ironically enough it was the rise of hardware PC clone makers that permitted Microsoft to flourish. Apparently Microsoft did not wish that freedom to extend to software as well.
You also seem to be ignoring Microsoft's practice of altering their APIs so certain competing applications fail to work correctly. (ref: "Dos isn't done until Lotus won't run")
And finally, if Microsoft was an inherently better competitor why then tactics like Edgie? Shouldn't their products naturally sell better solely based on their own merits?
BitTorrent is a cool technology and everything, but people need to stop being so blind as to think it will solve all problems.
But it does solve the problem of distributing software while minimizing the bandwidth on server end. That's why pretty much every Linux distro uses bittorrent to provide their software. It's a no brainer. I guess bittorrent sucks for folks who want to track (control?) downloads, but for everybody else, it's awesome.
I can understand the advantage of using distributed version control. But given all the Haskell people involved (who came in via Pugs) I'm surprised they went with Git vs. Darcs.
Does anyone know if speed is as large of an issue as it is for Linux kernel or was there another reason?
Actually, you might not know this, but the Haskell folks already moved over to git from darcs a while ago. They were having scalability issues and did a 6 month survey to determine which distributed version control they should go with and determined that git was the best of the breed. Here are the links:
Ok, just to make sure I understand the situation here:
1) The kid has his disks confiscated *illegally*
2) The teacher contacts the HeliosCD and claims those folks are doing something illegal.
3) The teacher is threatening legal action.
4) The teacher deeply insults all folks who use Linux.
5) Ken responds with restraint. Yes, that's right --restraint. No profanity, no question of her parentage, just a simple measured explanation of how wrong she is and how the problem is going to resolve itself.
And *you* think Ken is the *arrogant* one here? *You* think he's a crazed raving OSS zealot? Holy Trolling, Batman! How did you get +5 insightful?
Slashdot Mirror
I must not be understanding the problem correctly. So help me out please. Is your set up a) 1 desktop stretched over 3 monitors? Yes? b) You want to move be able to movie, say Firefox, or a xterm, etc. from say monitor 1 to monitor 3 using keyboard shortcuts? c) You think a Linux desktop environment can't handle this currently?
If this is the correct setup you have, then you must not be a KDE user. This is trivial with KDE.
Setting the keybindings is trivial in KDE: KDE menu -> Computer -> System Settings -> Keyboard & Mouse -> Global Keyboard Settings -> Select Kwin application -> Select Pack windows to the right -> custom -> Click on wrench -> type shortcut. Ditto on Select Pack windows to the left.
I can't tell if you're trying to troll or you're like one of the "Great Old Ones" from H.P. Lovecraft's mythos who's just awakened from your deep slumber in some forgotten forbidding city up in the mountains. FVWM?!?!?! That's like 1994?!?! Not even FVWM95?!?! I had to double check my debian box to see if you could still get fvwm installed on a system.
I mean no disrespect if you're not trolling. I'm just shocked that someone would still be using *and* preferring fvwm in 2009 when I thought the last fvwm user went extinct in 1999 with the arrival of KDE and Gnome on the scene in 1998.
I think without realizing it, you've made a fundamental assumption that is not true: # of good developers == # of bad developers. If that assumption were true, then by your logic we should expect that about a 50-50% breakdown of good/bad developers who use VS.
But, if instead, the # bad developers is much, much larger than the # of good developers we should expect that for an IDE that has a low barrier of entry that bad developers would naturally gravitate to that particular IDE, wheras good developers don't necessarily have a bias (as for example, you don't have a bias). In which case the IDE usage heavily favors the bad developers (they were the vast majority of the population already, and now they are even even more concentratrated since there are proportionally fewer good developers who use only that IDE.
As you pointed out, the IDEs that have "higher" barrier to entry (aka, vi, emacs, etc.) are naturally not going to present a problem to the good developers, but the bad developers will shy away from them. So, of course we should expect then that the percentage of good developers who use vi vs. bad developers who use vi will be (much) higher than the percentage of good developers vs. bad developers in the general population.
In other words, if Pr(Code Monkey is bad) = p, Pr(Code Monkey is good) = q (with p much larger than q), then Pr(Code Monkey is bad | Code Monkey uses VS) > p and Pr(Code Monkey is good | Code Monkey uses vi) >> q.
Intuitively, this explains why people are more likely to be impressed by someone who uses vi, emacs, etc. than someone who uses VS. It's not that VS stinks or that continual use of it melts your brains, it's just that as an indicator of your skillset, someone who uses vi,emacs, etc. is *probably* at the least competent and most likely *good*. Whereas, usage of VS indicates very little about your skillset other than the majority of VS users are "bad" which would suggest such a person *probably* is also a bad coder.
To get rid of the stench of incompetence associated with use of VS I would suggest that Microsoft come out with another IDE that is "dumbed down" from VS, sort of a "VS, junior" for those who remember the IBM PC, junior. Something that has an even lower barrier to entry than VS, so the bad Code Monkeys can gravitate to "VS, junior" and thus boosting the probabilities for the competent VS developers. Maybe they could throw in a Clippy on VS, junior or a dog with mental bubbles of suggestions.
I read Theo's comments and he's going on an on about Torvald's fixation with masturbating monkeys. Then some member of the openBSD crowd even offers a link to purchasing "your very own" **masturbating monkey** http://www.wellcoolstuff.com/Merchant2/graphics/00000001/20-Apr-07-05.jpg
Then I read Torvald's comment about the Linux exploit, with Torvald referring to the openBSD developers as being __like__ a "bunch of masturbating monkeys".
Ok, so is this like some kind of secret code used among OS kernel developers? Like saying "my shoe is blue but the cow is hungry" really means "Oh man, this code is leaking memory and crashing my system"? Or is this some kind of secret initiation thing, where in order to truly become a member of the OS development club, you have to first ... masturbate a monkey??!! Can somebody explain it, or maybe do some investigative reporting on this?
I actually read some of the postings and I didn't see any evidence of "bitching". I did learn of an open source client called despotify that does support Linux and Mac OS X which I would be much more comfortable with. Now I'm guessing from your tone that you're not much of a Linux user or a Free(dom) software kind of guy so you might not grok why the offering of a free closed source binary is not unlike offering the free services of a prostitute who may or may not have several STDs on the condition of a) No condom allowed b) No permission to comment on the quality of the sex with anyone else. If the prostitute is "good looking enough" or a guy is desperate enough he might think it's worth the risk of having his dick fall off, but as a rule not every guy thinks some possibly good sex vs. the possibility having his dick fall off is a great bargain.
>What is it with governments and hubris? If they had just shipped all these laptops without any mention of "unhackableness", you know what would have happened?
Here are some clues for why they announced such a thing. From the article: 'There was no way we could do any of this on XP,' he said. 'Windows 7 nailed it for us.' *and* the cost to the NSW Department of Education is under $435 (US)
Care to make a wager as to whether or not a certain large corporation in the Pacific Northwest gave them an extra special deal on the hardware & software on the condition that they praise Windows 7 over XP? I mean, they're purchasing netbooks and running Windows 7 on them instead of the lighter weight XP? Anybody else see anything wrong with this picture?
That's exactly the problem he's pointing out. The second digit should be a UNIFORM distribution if it came from real data. If the digits are gaussian that indicates that either
>And there you go, the problem in a nutshell. Expecting end users to do stuff like this is bullshit.
Uh, did you read the posting? That wasn't a user issue, that was a SYSADMIN issue. The guy was talking about diagnosing a network service issue which is something a sys admin would worry about, not an end user, who has more important things to worry about like using a browser, or an e-mail tool.
Jeezus, don't hate Linux because it works, hate it because the other OS isn't as expert friendly, dude!
they don't believe in their own product.
Why do I say that? Because you don't see BMW giving free training videos to car salesmen comparing their cars to say GM or Chrysler or Ford, do you? BMW lives or dies by the quality and reputation of their products; they don't need to "educate" salesmen about their products. This smells of a desperation move where Microsoft must believe their Windows 7 doesn't compare favorably with Linux on netbooks, so they have to try to convince the Best Buy personnel, who let's face it, don't know as much about hardware and software as they know about marketing products, to push the Windows 7 stuff onto customers.
There have been some studies of performance of Windows 7 beta vs. Linux on netbooks which either have not have been clear win for Windows 7 or worse, have shown Windows 7 in an unflattering light. As for citations, the web sites that I can recall are Phoronix.com, and OSNews.com.
I mean trying to "educate" Best Buy sales people and having Windows 7 "House Parties" sounds a little pathetic don't you think? Did Microsoft do something similar when XP came out or even Vista?
Interestingly, Opera, which by some measures has only a 2 per cent market share, ranked second among the kit operators, with 26 per cent. "I think that's probably because operators have a familiarity with the web threat landscape," Royal told The Register, suggesting that many black-hat hackers take a security-through-obscurity approach to making sure they themselves don't get hit. "It makes them wary of using mainstream browsers."
Huh, and here I was thinking that maybe, just maybe, these hackers knew the security history of the various browsers and knew that Opera had a better security history than Internet Explorer?
I'm afraid I can't agree with this statment:
>Whatever you may say about Windows, at least it set a standard.
Here's why:
Whatever you may say about the Khmer Rouge, at least they set a standard.
Whatever you may say about the HIV virus, at least it set a standard.
Setting a crappy standard can be worse than useless. For example, setting a standard that all X86 hardware *must* come with Windows pre-installed and no other operating system can be allowed to be pre-installed in the '90s was certainly a Microsoft standard --- it was also a shitty standard that held back competition. Remember OS/2? BeOS? Hell, Linux and the BSDs might have had more market share if the OEM manufacturers could have been permitted to preinstall them at no extra charge due to the restrictive licensing that Microsoft foisted on the manufacturers.
I just don't see Microsoft as the mover that made computing world a better place. I see the hardware pc clones giving competition to IBM as a positive force. But Microsoft? They've done everything they can to stifle direct competition.
>Because people like me will never use open soruce if it doesn't work and play well with the realities of earning a living. If you want an entirely isolated hippie utopia commune, hey, feel free, but you'll have no effect on the world of grown-ups. If you want open source to become normal and accepted in datacenters and desktops world-wide, then this Microsoft move is a good thing. A great thing, even.
I just like point out that google, the largest datacenter in the world runs Linux. Also, the majority of the web servers, dns servers, routers, firewalls, etc, run on Linux. Seeing as how pretty much everyone on the internet sooner or later *must* touch Linux one way or another I think that on the contrary, people who have hangups about Free Software are going to find it increasingly difficult to isolate themselves from it. I don't think it's appropriate to disparage those of us who choose Free software because we believe in Freedom of use.
As a linux user, I don't run Linux because I hate Microsoft (I don't hate Microsoft anymore. What's the point? They're irrelevant to me.). I run Linux because I love Linux for its performance and how it works for me instead of me for it.
>How is this going to be different from other Linux distros and associated GUI revamp projects that have sprung up promising "we're going to be better than Windows! Really!" over the years?
The difference is this: Joe Six Pack has never heard of Ubuntu much less Linux. Everybody on the planet who has internet access knows about Google. So if google announces the creation of something called.... an...Operating...System(tm), then the Joe Six Packs pay attention. Never mind that it's the same OS that us Linux users have been using for years. There's nothing wrong with Linux. It's getting Joe Six Pack to change his frame of reference to realize that he's much better off with Linux that is the real problem. And it's going to take an entity like google to accomplish that small miracle.
F*ck you. And the horse you rode in on. Those SOBs don't want free codecs, because they can't compete or can't control people. The argument about patent concerns is nothing more than unmitigated fermented Horse manure. That BS argument can be turned around and pointed at EVERY OTHER CODEC as well.
I read the link. In the Windows case, the issue is, well, stunning. I hadn't realized they still have problems with DLL hell. In the article you referenced, the problem is described this way: DLL A and DLL B are updated while program foo is running. So long as foo is still running, it's using the old versions. But, any program launched after the updates that uses A or B could be hosed, because the updated DLLs might not be backwards compatible.
In the Unix world, this problem was solved a long time ago. (20+ years?). Run time libraries libA.so and libB.so are actually symbolic links pointing at the latest major,minor,revsision libraries, libA.so.major.minor.revision, libB.so.major.minor.revision. So whenever any program is linked against a runtime library with say major version 3, minor version 2 (i.e. it's compatible with versions 3,4,and 5 of libA) then that program will run with any version of the library that supports version 3. So at run time it will always be looking for libA.so.3.*. If a newer version of library comes out that is not backwards compatible with version 3, libA.so will point to it sure, but the already compiled programs will still point at the old version of the library. Read the info page for libtool for more and better information.
Unfortunately for Microsoft I think they royally screwed themselves by their dogmatic insistence that programs from 20+ years must still work, no matter how shitty, bug ridden, take-them-out-back-and-shoot-them-please they might be. Specifically, it looks like their FAT 8.3 filename has screwed them because all of their dlls are of the form "foobaz.dll". Notice that the dlls don't have versioning number? They are so screwed. As Raymond states you can move the old DLLs to a different directory, but the programs that depended on them don't know that unless you do something with their environment. I'm not a Microsoft poweruser, so someone else will have to speak about how to deal with that. I'm surprised they didn't hire some Unix guys to tell them about version numbering dlls, but then again the decision they made about how to deal with DLLs must have happened 20+ years ago when they only had the FAT filesystem, and so it would never have occurred to "them" to leave themselves some wriggle room.
From your posting and the quotes you refer to, I'm guessing the issue you seem to be having is the availability of proprietary software on Linux.
From my perspective, I couldn't care less about proprietary software. I've got linux. I've got Debian Linux. I've got 24,000+ software packages ready to go on ARM. What do I need proprietary software for? What's the smartbook for? Reading e-mail, web browsing, watching a video, maybe doing a presentation. Where's the need for proprietary software? I already have google for online searching, maps, e-mail. What need is there for proprietary software?
If you're a proprietary software developer why not save yourself some grief and pain and write your software for the iphone. Apple would be happy to review your software for its suitability to its platform. I'm also sure that if you write software for Microsoft's platforms and it's wildly successful there's a pretty good chance of being bought out by Microsoft on their terms, and if the terms aren't good enough for Microsoft they might just take your good idea and make their own inferior copy of it.
If you really want to write proprietary software for Linux, then I would encourage you to write web based software where you own the server and your clients interact with your server using a standards compliant browser. That way it doesn't matter what OS the client is running, and you don't have to deal with support issues.
etc., etc., etc., then there's the usual FUD BS about quality of the software, the kernel, the architecture, etc., etc., etc.
The reason, Timothy, why some of his stuff resonates with you (the audio part for example), is because spewing MASSIVE FUD is like a shotgun fired at a target from a close range -- something is likely to hit the target for you and you only pay attention to the part that "resonates" with you, instead of looking at the overall picture and realize that this is unmitigated BS.
How do I know? Replace every instance of Linux with Apple OS X and see how it reads for you.
Like him or not, Bill Gates is pretty high up in the list of people who had a large effect on the whole computing industry.
I have to agree. The issue I have is how much warping and damage did he cause the computing industry by his desire to win and maintain his monopoly at all costs. I've heard the arguments before that if Mr. Gates hadn't been around that Steve Jobs would have been running the show. That is not an unreasonable argument. My belief is that had CP/M been chosen for the first IBM PC, we would have had a more inclusive community, and more competition based on merits of the software and not on back room deals with crap like per-cpu-licenses or not-allowing-other-OS-to-being-pre-installed, or locking-browsers-with-the-OS. I think that it was a serious mistake of the U.S. legal system not to have broken the Microsoft monopoly into at least 2 companies:
I believe that history has demonstrated that whenever the Microsoft OS has been threatened, they have resorted to using leverage from their other software to pressure people to stick with their OS (Ex. Microsoft Exchange, Office, etc). Similarly, whenever their software has been threatened they have resorted to using their OS to put pressure on people to stick with their software (Ex. the "hidden apis" that only Microsoft developers knew about in their OS that other vendors such as Wordperfect were not allowed to have or at least not until it was too late.) By breaking the company into 2 parts it would have forced each half to compete solely on the merits of their software and certainly led to more aggressive competition and less FUD crap ("Get the Facts" campaign). I can't help but wonder if campaign contributions had something to do with Microsoft not being split up.
It IS your right to choose. And when Lenovo tells you that they're selling a machine with Vista on it, and you choose to buy it, you're making your decision. I know it may sound crazy, but if you don't want a PC with Vista, you shouldn't buy a PC with Vista.
I'd be a bit more sympathetic if they didn't tell her it came with Vista, but that doesn't seem very likely. All of the machines on lenovo.com make it very clear which operating system they have installed. And when you buy a machine in a store, there's almost always a sticker on the box listing the OS, amount of memory, hard drive storage, etc.. She knew what they were selling, and she chose to buy it.
The problem for this woman unfortunately is an old problem that Linux users have had to deal with for years, namely the issue of who decides what operating system, if *any*, is to be preinstalled on PC/laptop. In the case of people who just want to run Linux, Microsoft had a history of setting up deals with OEMs that charged OEMs a Windows tax on every computer they sold regardless of whether or not it had windows installed. For that reason among others, OEMs were (and some still are) reluctant to sell a customer a PC without an operating system or with a Linux distro installed as it would be an additional cost to the OEM.
Ironically enough, in the case of this woman, she *wants* to do business with Microsoft she just doesn't want have to pay the *Vista* Tax in order to get XP preinstalled, which seems reasonable to me, as the OEMs already have a license for XP and the manufacturing set up to do XP preinstalls without additional cost to the OEM. As a Linux user I wouldn't want to pay any kind of Windows Tax, but I do believe she has a case and a reasonable expectation of winning this lawsuit.
What is the #1 website on the planet today? Answer: google. How many machines does google have to support it's busines? Answer: tens of thousands. What operating system does google use? Answer: Linux. How many times has google been hacked in its 11 year history? Answer: Anybody, anybody? What is the #1 desktop operating system today? Answer: Microsoft. How many worms, trojans, viruses, etc. are there for Microsoft OSes? Answer: > 100,000 (source: pick you're favorite anti-virus company counting scheme.) How many times have businesses been hosed by using Microsoft software? Answer: Too many to count. The latest blunder today? The French navy. Reference: http://www.networkworld.com/news/2009/020909-conficker-worm-sinks-french-navy.html Now for the last and most important question: What does Microsoft think that it knows about security that Gooogle doesn't? Because comparing their security track records, it's not obvious to me that Microsoft knows anything about security. --Johnny says when in doubt just ask Google.
The summary makes it out to be a choice between the evil, cold-blooded manager (Doug) and the warm, fatherly teamleader (Steve). As much as we all like to see the black-white picture, I'm frankly sick with it -- do we need to have Slashdot become the Cosmo Girl for Nerds?
Here's the reason why I think it is clear cut: After Stuart got fired everyone on his team threatened to quit. And when Kelly refused to change her mind, his team followed through. Now which kind of team manager would be better to have? I think it's very clear.
It seems you're ignoring Microsoft's exclusive licensing issues with the Major OEMS in the 90's prohibiting the OEMs from either preloading alternative OSes or prohibiting any boot menus which would allow people to choose which OS they want to boot (ref: BeOS).
You seem to also be ignoring Microsoft's practice of deliberating altering their internal APIs to prevent any other software maker from writing their own clone of DOS (ref: DRDOS). Ironically enough it was the rise of hardware PC clone makers that permitted Microsoft to flourish. Apparently Microsoft did not wish that freedom to extend to software as well.
You also seem to be ignoring Microsoft's practice of altering their APIs so certain competing applications fail to work correctly. (ref: "Dos isn't done until Lotus won't run")
And finally, if Microsoft was an inherently better competitor why then tactics like Edgie? Shouldn't their products naturally sell better solely based on their own merits?
BitTorrent is a cool technology and everything, but people need to stop being so blind as to think it will solve all problems.
But it does solve the problem of distributing software while minimizing the bandwidth on server end. That's why pretty much every Linux distro uses bittorrent to provide their software. It's a no brainer. I guess bittorrent sucks for folks who want to track (control?) downloads, but for everybody else, it's awesome.
Just out of curiosity why doesn't Microsoft use bittorrent to provide Windows 7 beta to lessen the load on their servers? Anybody know why?
I can understand the advantage of using distributed version control. But given all the Haskell people involved (who came in via Pugs) I'm surprised they went with Git vs. Darcs.
Does anyone know if speed is as large of an issue as it is for Linux kernel or was there another reason?
Actually, you might not know this, but the Haskell folks already moved over to git from darcs a while ago. They were having scalability issues and did a 6 month survey to determine which distributed version control they should go with and determined that git was the best of the breed. Here are the links:
1) The kid has his disks confiscated *illegally*
2) The teacher contacts the HeliosCD and claims those folks are doing something illegal.
3) The teacher is threatening legal action.
4) The teacher deeply insults all folks who use Linux.
5) Ken responds with restraint. Yes, that's right --restraint. No profanity, no question of her parentage, just a simple measured explanation of how wrong she is and how the problem is going to resolve itself.
And *you* think Ken is the *arrogant* one here? *You* think he's a crazed raving OSS zealot? Holy Trolling, Batman! How did you get +5 insightful?