Wow there's a lot of MS supporters on this article marking everything anti MS a troll. I guess the US and the EU findings of MS being a monopoly doesn't matter to those people. Besides, your car analogy was spot on.
This has been plaguing Slashdot (and a few other sites) lately, which smacks of an astro-turfing campaign.
The ratio of pro-MS moddings to anti-MS moddings is seriously out of whack with people's perception of MS as a company (most people *buy* MS products, but few actually *like* MS). This is doubly true for a site like Slashdot with its natural Linux and Apple (i.e., geek) demographics.
I'm mildly curious as to how this post will fare. This isn't a troll, nor is it flamebait. It might be insightful (but far be it for me to say so), at the very least it ought to be interesting.
Just because MS isn't forcing people to use IE in the, "MS is pointing a gun at your head" sense, that doesn't mean they aren't forcing IE onto people.
They are forcing IE onto the computers people are buying and are forcing IE into the position of default browser. So while they aren't forcing people to use IE, they don't have to, they've already gotten into that position by force, so they don't have to take that last step, which makes for a convenient, "hey, they aren't forcing people to use IE!" defense.
Forcing a company to ship its competitors with its own product is ridiculous and anti-capitalism.
Microsoft is anti-capitalism. Forcing MS to do things is generally done to minimize MS's negative impact on the market.
I'm using "capitalism" here in the idealistic "free market, competition is good for the consumer" sense. Modern American-style capitalism is often more MS's style of "greed is good, take whatever you can, damn the consequences."
If you're using "capitalism" in the same sense as I am, you should be for the sanctions imposed on MS. If you mean the other kind of capitalism, then I sure as hell hope these measures are anti-capitalism!
If you would actually bother to read my comment you might find that neither was I...
Then explain:
"Let's face it. Decent code is decent code. Even if it isn't the best code, if it's open sourced and useful enough, someone out there is going to improve on it. Everyone wins."
Your point was clearly to refute his claim on the basis that "good code is good code, no matter who it's from"
However, that's not what he was arguing. He wasn't arguing whether the code was good or bad, but whether the use for it was good or bad.
>however I think Linus really does have the interests of the kernel and the greater linux community at heart
Somewhere in the world a fat, hairy old man is muttering "it's GNU/Linux! GNU/Linux I tell you!"
Does putting others down make you feel better? Does it make it easier to live with people who you disagree with? Really, what's the point of a post like that, other than insecurity?
"That's the sexiest thing to come from the Linux community in forever."
Which I why I will recite it, but certainly not buy into it. Without the "politics" of defending freedom, technology is reduced to a weapon against freedom.
Let's face it. Decent code is decent code.
He's not arguing against the quality of the code, he's arguing against the utility of the code. It's number one purpose is to promote non-free software.
Because people like me will never use open soruce if it doesn't work and play well with the realities of earning a living.
Fortunately, it works well with the "realities of earning a living" (whatever that's supposed to mean). Open Source software, btw, is not the topic at hand. Free Software is. You might think I'm splitting hairs here, but the distinction is important. The Open Source crowd agrees with you. In fact, they were formed specifically in order to promote the use of free software, instead of promoting software freedom in and of itself, in direct response to what they saw as ideologically based shortcomings of the Free Software Foundation.
Look at the Open Source crowd as being the pragmatists (as you appear to be) and the Free Software crowd as being the idealists (who you deliberately insult throughout your post--a clue, ad hominem does not make your assertions any more correct).
If you want an entirely isolated hippie utopia commune, hey, feel free, but you'll have no effect on the world of grown-ups.
Define "grown-ups". It sounds like you're just bitter that you had to mortgage your soul to live the lifestyle you've chosen, and so need to put down those that managed to do just fine with their souls intact.
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.
For Open Source proponents, but not for Free Software proponents.
That sounds pretty ridiculous if you ask me. The Intel i8x0 graphics and sound drivers (just to name some drivers that are supposedly 'free' and 'open') are in the kernel to be able to use Intel graphics and sound chips. Last time I checked these weren't 'free' in any sense (you have to buy the chips and the IC designs are not open/free), so I fail to see why a 'free' driver for 'non-free' software would have to be excluded from the linux kernel.
What's ridiculous is not seeing a difference between software and hardware. The FSF is the Free Software Foundation for a reason.
Then again, I always get lost when people go over the top in their RMS-like fetish for 'pure and unquestionable freeness' of all the bits and pieces running on their systems.
Stallman has made it abundantly clear that his view isn't that you must use only free software, but that you should use free software when there is an actual free alternative. In the case you mentioned about sound chips, there are no free sound chips (or if there are, they aren't reasonably available on motherboards). In that case, while he would wish it didn't have to be the case, Stallman would state that it's OK (in his view) to use the non-free sound chip.
While I don't follow the same ideals, they do seem much more reasonable than people seem to believe.
It's just like with the Nvidia binary-only drivers. Finally a leading GPU company decided to offer full support for their hardware, not watered down and on par with the feature set supported on Windows, and still people complain how the source code isn't open.
That's not "full support". It's only partial support. Full support, for a free software advocate, would be for the driver itself to be free. Freedom is a feature of a free operating system, and the Nvidia drivers do not support that feature.
Of course it would be nice if every piece of software and hardware on earth was 'free', but things aren't like that, just live with it. It's not like we have attained world peace, eliminated poverty and created an ecologically sustainable world economy yet, but that doesn't mean initiatives to get closer, even a little bit, are impure, wrong and should be rejected because they aren't perfect or don't apply to yourself.
I always sense a bit of hypocrisy in someone who says "quit complaining about something you don't like", in a post where they are complaining about something they don't like.
Why do you get to complain about Stallman, or free software advocates in general, but they don't get to complain about non-free software?
Freedom is the ability to take action. Choice is the ability to choose from options. You can have a million non-free choices, or just one truly free choice. The two might seem similar, but really are not.
Semantically, you might confuse the issue by stating "freedom is the ability to choose what you want to do", but that's not the context here. Choice isn't being used to refer to the options of what you can do with something, but the ability to choose from various distinct somethings.
The purist seeks to change the world to fit him, whereas the pragmatist changes himself to fit the world.
Precisely.
Ergo all progress relies on the purists.:-)
No, you have it backwards. All true change depends on the pragmatist. While the purist is seeking a way to fix everything that's wrong (because it's all or nothing), the pragmatist is adapting himself/herself enough to actually solve as many problems as is practical, one at a time.
Not really, because the pragmatist will generally not make the effort to change the world, because it's not practical, not worth the effort.
It takes an idealist to change things.
Just off the top of my head, a random example of an idealist would be Friedrich Nietzsche.
As Nietzsche put it (I think), before you can change the world, you must first change yourself. As long as you're on the outside looking in, you cannot effectively cause change. All you can do is spew rhetoric. Only when you come to accept that you can't save the world can you begin to save individuals within it, and in so doing, actually make the world better.
Nietzsche was very idealistic man, so your uncertain paraphrasing of something you're not even sure he said is probably misleading.
But even taken on face value, it can be paraphrased as:
In order to be a successful idealist, you must make use of pragmatic decisions. Which I think is fairly apt. The difference is the idealist can make pragmatic choices, but they are all focused on an idealistic goal. The pragmatist won't go through the effort. The pragmatist will change himself for himself. The idealist will change himself for his ideals.
BTW, I used the word "idealist" instead of "purist" because I think it's really more appropriate to the way people are treating the dichotomy being discussed.
progress to what end? show me a purist that can actually give you a straight answer and i'll show you a pragmatist in hiding.
Progress to whatever end you choose. The "purists" (actually, the term "idealists" seems more appropriate throughout many of the threads here) may have given us the GUI (i.e., progress), but they aren't the ones that define the ends.
I could turn the tables on you and ask to what ends do the pragmatists work? The ends of a pragmatist tend to be more individual, some specific end. The ends of an idealist tend to be more broad in scope. In general, it would seem that idealists are more responsible for actual progress and pragmatists are more responsible for keeping things running.
He wasn't defining the word "pragmatist", he was stating what pragmatists often do.
It's like saying, "an ostrich will stick it's head in the sand to hide from danger". You don't get to just come in and say, "I hate to break it to you, but the definition of ostrich..."
By extension, you're suggesting that a Pre owner is "not allowed" to use iTunes and their Pre together. Bullshit.
Not "by extension". That's exactly what I'm saying. Palm devices aren't allowed to sync with iTunes. Not officially anyway, although they are clearly "allowed" to sync, in spite of Apple's efforts otherwise.
I'm not stating it's a legal or a technologically intrinsic restriction, it's a policy restriction on the part of Apple. I don't agree with it, either. But it exists, and to claim otherwise is a bit silly.
Writing a capable music player/syncing app is not the trivial task you make it out to be. And even if it was, obviously making a *good* app of that type is not trivial
I'm not making it out to be easy in any way whatsoever. That's exactly the point. Palm is trying to ride on Apple's iTunes coattails. If they want to make an iPhone competitor, they should bring with it all the parts needed. Blackberry does it. Windows Mobile does it. Android, SonyEricsson, etc, etc, etc, do it. If Palm wants to play, they should bring their own equipment to the field, and not scrap off of Apple's. It's pathetic.
Now, that's not an excuse for Palm, but why *shouldn't* they support iTunes sync support if they can?
Because iTunes belongs to Apple. If Apple wants to support the Pre, then good. If not, then all attempts by Palm to bypass Apple's wishes is pretty lame. It's similar to the whole Real/iTunes debacle. It makes Palm look needy and clingy.
Look at it this way: we all like open standards and common protocols, right? Well, I wouldn't bet that Apple will embrace one, ever.
Were I to list all of the open standards Apple supports (a large number of them, Apple invented), would push this post over into "Read the rest of this comment..." realm.
But if Palm can tire Apple out enough so they give up and "allow" (having to use that word grates on me) the Pre to interoperate with iTunes, that's better for the community as a whole.
What "community as a whole" would that be? Not the open source community. Not the generic "consumers" community. The only community is the Palm Pre owners community, which has, at best, a tenuous connection to any sort of "the community as a whole".
My only issue with Palm is that is that using Apple's vendor/product IDs seems a bit sketchy, but, frankly... what harm does it actually do?
I never said it caused any harm (others have, though, although I don't agree much with them--particularly stating that the Palm could mess up the iTunes library if their syncing is buggy, which is true, but if that happens, I suspect that would harm Palm's image far more than Apple's). What it is, though, is pathetic. It further shows how lame Palm is. Instead of boldly putting forth their own system, they have to resort to mimicking their competitor? Lame, lame, lame.
On the other hand, if you own a Pre device, and you are able to sync with iTunes today, and the only thing that changes is an iTunes update, there's a chance the consumers will blame Apple. Palm is banking on this, and most-assuredly they will have tech support tell them *not* to upgrade to the latest version of iTunes (or to downgrade).
No one is going to think there's a problem with iTunes. They're going to think there's a problem with Palm.
It's not an amateurish play on Pre's part, but a very, very risky one
It's both. But it's amateurish in the fact that they can't use their own software but instead are reporting their device, to Windows/OS X (not just iTunes), as being an Apple device.
This is only a good idea if the standard included a communication bus and spec for voltage, polarity, and amperage negotiation.
That's electricity. All that matters here is frequency and amplitude. It'll be up to the receiving device itself to manage voltage and polarity. Amperage is a matter of the transmitter having a sufficient amplitude at its particular frequency, nothing more (power = amps x volts).
First off: I own a Pre. I own a TX. I own some Palm stock. I don't want my company wasting their time doing anything but making what I bought from them better -- that's time better spent on implementing standards.
iTunes isn't an open standard. If Palm wants to add music syncing to their product, they can do it themselves, or use another product that they're allowed to use.
Sheesh. My wife has a Sansa music player. Do you mean I have to suddenly go and download software from Sansa, and not just use whatever the f-- I want to move the stuff over?
Yes. Or use a product that allows Sansa interoperability, like (I assume) WMP.
This goes WAY beyond just "we don't support that". This is Apple going out of their way to break it.
No shit, captain obvious.
Bull crap. This isn't DRM, this has nothing to do with DRM.
I wasn't the one who brought up DRM. Learn to parse quote tags.
Palm was never mighty -- they were popular. Big difference.
Palm was the PDA maker at one time. That sounds pretty mighty to me, but if you prefer, use whatever adjective you want for a company that Palm once was but is no longer. It doesn't change the facts, just the words.
Whatever words you choose, what I wrote still stands. Palm was once a great company, now they're playing amateur-hour with their iTunes hacks. They are a sad caricature of their former self.
Perhaps. But those of us with *FOUR* braincells, and a little experience actually writing software, can knock holes in your argument pretty easily.
Clearly four is the upper limit...
The most obvious being, what if I chose to manually manage the music on my device? iTunes has no issue with this, but Palm would have to write their own GUI that would read the iTunes XML and then allow drag-n-drop sync.
Um, yeah. That's the point. Let Palm write their own GUI. That's what everyone else does. Is Apple the only company capable of writing GUI-based software or something?
Second, as a user, the last thing I need is another iTunes. I like the software. I know the software. It does its job well. If I want to buy a Pre, I as a consumer would just much rather use what I'm currently using.
Again, that's the point. If you want to stick with iTunes, buy an iPhone. If you want a Palm, you're going to have to use Palm's software (which currently consists of the Pre using Apple's USB vendor ID in violation of the USB standard).
Third, there are about a trillion edge cases with your suggestion. Like, multiple XML files. How will I know which XML file the user is using? I could have one in my All Users and one in my personal profile. iTunes has a simple option under the File menu to load a library. What would Palm do if they went gui-less and implemented your suggestion.
A preference in the Palm software? Time stamp? Four brain cells indeed!
Finally, Palm isn't complaning that Apple updated their app. They just updated the Pre to match it. Why on Earth does it bother you so much? Apple are treating the iPod is hardly more than a hardware dongle for iTunes. Fine.
They'll complain if Apple succeeds in locking them out entirely.
But no reason to bunch-up your panties just because Palm circumvents their DRM. And don't kid yourself, that's exactly what a dongle is. DRM.
It's amateur. Palm should write their own software, unless they aren't confident in their ability to do so. You raise DRM in order to elicit the standard reflexive response, but most people seem to draw the line at commercial interests. It's ok, and in fact often seen as "noble", to break DRM as a consumer. But to violate DRM for financial interests is generally looked down upon. It's also a bit pathetic when a once mighty corporation like Palm has to resort to such tactics.
Yes, Palm could conceivably read the full iTunes XML, allow the user to create playlists, and sync from there, but that would involve more work for the user, instead of allowing them to easily sync already created playlists.
Slashdot Mirror
Wow there's a lot of MS supporters on this article marking everything anti MS a troll. I guess the US and the EU findings of MS being a monopoly doesn't matter to those people. Besides, your car analogy was spot on.
This has been plaguing Slashdot (and a few other sites) lately, which smacks of an astro-turfing campaign.
The ratio of pro-MS moddings to anti-MS moddings is seriously out of whack with people's perception of MS as a company (most people *buy* MS products, but few actually *like* MS). This is doubly true for a site like Slashdot with its natural Linux and Apple (i.e., geek) demographics.
I'm mildly curious as to how this post will fare. This isn't a troll, nor is it flamebait. It might be insightful (but far be it for me to say so), at the very least it ought to be interesting.
Just because MS isn't forcing people to use IE in the, "MS is pointing a gun at your head" sense, that doesn't mean they aren't forcing IE onto people.
They are forcing IE onto the computers people are buying and are forcing IE into the position of default browser. So while they aren't forcing people to use IE, they don't have to, they've already gotten into that position by force, so they don't have to take that last step, which makes for a convenient, "hey, they aren't forcing people to use IE!" defense.
Forcing a company to ship its competitors with its own product is ridiculous and anti-capitalism.
Microsoft is anti-capitalism. Forcing MS to do things is generally done to minimize MS's negative impact on the market.
I'm using "capitalism" here in the idealistic "free market, competition is good for the consumer" sense. Modern American-style capitalism is often more MS's style of "greed is good, take whatever you can, damn the consequences."
If you're using "capitalism" in the same sense as I am, you should be for the sanctions imposed on MS. If you mean the other kind of capitalism, then I sure as hell hope these measures are anti-capitalism!
If you would actually bother to read my comment you might find that neither was I...
Then explain:
"Let's face it. Decent code is decent code. Even if it isn't the best code, if it's open sourced and useful enough, someone out there is going to improve on it. Everyone wins."
Your point was clearly to refute his claim on the basis that "good code is good code, no matter who it's from"
However, that's not what he was arguing. He wasn't arguing whether the code was good or bad, but whether the use for it was good or bad.
It's hard to believe 9.1 out of 10 PCs over $1K are Apple's.
That's not what the study said. It says that $9.1 out of every $10, at retail, on computers over $1,000 goes to Apple.
Maybe Microsoft will start selling the Windows 7 "I Am Rich" Edition for installation on Apple hardware?
Snow Leopard upgrade is $29, Snow Leopard is $129. Windows 7 Home Premium upgrade is $119, Windows 7 Home Premium is $199.
It seems MS already has the "I Am Rich" edition of Windows, and it's the their entry-level home edition!
>however I think Linus really does have the interests of the kernel and the greater linux community at heart
Somewhere in the world a fat, hairy old man is muttering "it's GNU/Linux! GNU/Linux I tell you!"
Does putting others down make you feel better? Does it make it easier to live with people who you disagree with? Really, what's the point of a post like that, other than insecurity?
"That's the sexiest thing to come from the Linux community in forever."
Which I why I will recite it, but certainly not buy into it. Without the "politics" of defending freedom, technology is reduced to a weapon against freedom.
Let's face it. Decent code is decent code.
He's not arguing against the quality of the code, he's arguing against the utility of the code. It's number one purpose is to promote non-free software.
Because people like me will never use open soruce if it doesn't work and play well with the realities of earning a living.
Fortunately, it works well with the "realities of earning a living" (whatever that's supposed to mean). Open Source software, btw, is not the topic at hand. Free Software is. You might think I'm splitting hairs here, but the distinction is important. The Open Source crowd agrees with you. In fact, they were formed specifically in order to promote the use of free software, instead of promoting software freedom in and of itself, in direct response to what they saw as ideologically based shortcomings of the Free Software Foundation.
Look at the Open Source crowd as being the pragmatists (as you appear to be) and the Free Software crowd as being the idealists (who you deliberately insult throughout your post--a clue, ad hominem does not make your assertions any more correct).
If you want an entirely isolated hippie utopia commune, hey, feel free, but you'll have no effect on the world of grown-ups.
Define "grown-ups". It sounds like you're just bitter that you had to mortgage your soul to live the lifestyle you've chosen, and so need to put down those that managed to do just fine with their souls intact.
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.
For Open Source proponents, but not for Free Software proponents.
That sounds pretty ridiculous if you ask me. The Intel i8x0 graphics and sound drivers (just to name some drivers that are supposedly 'free' and 'open') are in the kernel to be able to use Intel graphics and sound chips. Last time I checked these weren't 'free' in any sense (you have to buy the chips and the IC designs are not open/free), so I fail to see why a 'free' driver for 'non-free' software would have to be excluded from the linux kernel.
What's ridiculous is not seeing a difference between software and hardware. The FSF is the Free Software Foundation for a reason.
Then again, I always get lost when people go over the top in their RMS-like fetish for 'pure and unquestionable freeness' of all the bits and pieces running on their systems.
Stallman has made it abundantly clear that his view isn't that you must use only free software, but that you should use free software when there is an actual free alternative. In the case you mentioned about sound chips, there are no free sound chips (or if there are, they aren't reasonably available on motherboards). In that case, while he would wish it didn't have to be the case, Stallman would state that it's OK (in his view) to use the non-free sound chip.
While I don't follow the same ideals, they do seem much more reasonable than people seem to believe.
It's just like with the Nvidia binary-only drivers. Finally a leading GPU company decided to offer full support for their hardware, not watered down and on par with the feature set supported on Windows, and still people complain how the source code isn't open.
That's not "full support". It's only partial support. Full support, for a free software advocate, would be for the driver itself to be free. Freedom is a feature of a free operating system, and the Nvidia drivers do not support that feature.
Of course it would be nice if every piece of software and hardware on earth was 'free', but things aren't like that, just live with it. It's not like we have attained world peace, eliminated poverty and created an ecologically sustainable world economy yet, but that doesn't mean initiatives to get closer, even a little bit, are impure, wrong and should be rejected because they aren't perfect or don't apply to yourself.
I always sense a bit of hypocrisy in someone who says "quit complaining about something you don't like", in a post where they are complaining about something they don't like.
Why do you get to complain about Stallman, or free software advocates in general, but they don't get to complain about non-free software?
You're confusing choice with freedom.
I laughed. Hard.
And, apparently, missed the point.
Freedom is the ability to take action. Choice is the ability to choose from options. You can have a million non-free choices, or just one truly free choice. The two might seem similar, but really are not.
Semantically, you might confuse the issue by stating "freedom is the ability to choose what you want to do", but that's not the context here. Choice isn't being used to refer to the options of what you can do with something, but the ability to choose from various distinct somethings.
Because more choice is better than less. Isn't that the FOSS way?
Not really. Choice is the Open Source way. Free is the Free Software way.
"FOSS" is a sort of amalgam of two similar, but fundamentally different, philosophies.
Precisely.
No, you have it backwards. All true change depends on the pragmatist. While the purist is seeking a way to fix everything that's wrong (because it's all or nothing), the pragmatist is adapting himself/herself enough to actually solve as many problems as is practical, one at a time.
Not really, because the pragmatist will generally not make the effort to change the world, because it's not practical, not worth the effort.
It takes an idealist to change things.
Just off the top of my head, a random example of an idealist would be Friedrich Nietzsche.
As Nietzsche put it (I think), before you can change the world, you must first change yourself. As long as you're on the outside looking in, you cannot effectively cause change. All you can do is spew rhetoric. Only when you come to accept that you can't save the world can you begin to save individuals within it, and in so doing, actually make the world better.
Nietzsche was very idealistic man, so your uncertain paraphrasing of something you're not even sure he said is probably misleading.
But even taken on face value, it can be paraphrased as:
In order to be a successful idealist, you must make use of pragmatic decisions. Which I think is fairly apt. The difference is the idealist can make pragmatic choices, but they are all focused on an idealistic goal. The pragmatist won't go through the effort. The pragmatist will change himself for himself. The idealist will change himself for his ideals.
BTW, I used the word "idealist" instead of "purist" because I think it's really more appropriate to the way people are treating the dichotomy being discussed.
progress to what end? show me a purist that can actually give you a straight answer and i'll show you a pragmatist in hiding.
Progress to whatever end you choose. The "purists" (actually, the term "idealists" seems more appropriate throughout many of the threads here) may have given us the GUI (i.e., progress), but they aren't the ones that define the ends.
I could turn the tables on you and ask to what ends do the pragmatists work? The ends of a pragmatist tend to be more individual, some specific end. The ends of an idealist tend to be more broad in scope. In general, it would seem that idealists are more responsible for actual progress and pragmatists are more responsible for keeping things running.
Short, Simple and Correct. Choose any two.
Well, that statement is both short and simple, so...
BSD wasn't free while Linux was first getting started. If it were, Linux would likely have not become the dominant free Unix clone.
But even that entirely misses the point being made, that Linux relied on GNU for its success.
He wasn't defining the word "pragmatist", he was stating what pragmatists often do.
It's like saying, "an ostrich will stick it's head in the sand to hide from danger". You don't get to just come in and say, "I hate to break it to you, but the definition of ostrich..."
By extension, you're suggesting that a Pre owner is "not allowed" to use iTunes and their Pre together. Bullshit.
Not "by extension". That's exactly what I'm saying. Palm devices aren't allowed to sync with iTunes. Not officially anyway, although they are clearly "allowed" to sync, in spite of Apple's efforts otherwise.
I'm not stating it's a legal or a technologically intrinsic restriction, it's a policy restriction on the part of Apple. I don't agree with it, either. But it exists, and to claim otherwise is a bit silly.
Writing a capable music player/syncing app is not the trivial task you make it out to be. And even if it was, obviously making a *good* app of that type is not trivial
I'm not making it out to be easy in any way whatsoever. That's exactly the point. Palm is trying to ride on Apple's iTunes coattails. If they want to make an iPhone competitor, they should bring with it all the parts needed. Blackberry does it. Windows Mobile does it. Android, SonyEricsson, etc, etc, etc, do it. If Palm wants to play, they should bring their own equipment to the field, and not scrap off of Apple's. It's pathetic.
Now, that's not an excuse for Palm, but why *shouldn't* they support iTunes sync support if they can?
Because iTunes belongs to Apple. If Apple wants to support the Pre, then good. If not, then all attempts by Palm to bypass Apple's wishes is pretty lame. It's similar to the whole Real/iTunes debacle. It makes Palm look needy and clingy.
Look at it this way: we all like open standards and common protocols, right? Well, I wouldn't bet that Apple will embrace one, ever.
Were I to list all of the open standards Apple supports (a large number of them, Apple invented), would push this post over into "Read the rest of this comment..." realm.
But if Palm can tire Apple out enough so they give up and "allow" (having to use that word grates on me) the Pre to interoperate with iTunes, that's better for the community as a whole.
What "community as a whole" would that be? Not the open source community. Not the generic "consumers" community. The only community is the Palm Pre owners community, which has, at best, a tenuous connection to any sort of "the community as a whole".
My only issue with Palm is that is that using Apple's vendor/product IDs seems a bit sketchy, but, frankly... what harm does it actually do?
I never said it caused any harm (others have, though, although I don't agree much with them--particularly stating that the Palm could mess up the iTunes library if their syncing is buggy, which is true, but if that happens, I suspect that would harm Palm's image far more than Apple's). What it is, though, is pathetic. It further shows how lame Palm is. Instead of boldly putting forth their own system, they have to resort to mimicking their competitor? Lame, lame, lame.
On the other hand, if you own a Pre device, and you are able to sync with iTunes today, and the only thing that changes is an iTunes update, there's a chance the consumers will blame Apple. Palm is banking on this, and most-assuredly they will have tech support tell them *not* to upgrade to the latest version of iTunes (or to downgrade).
No one is going to think there's a problem with iTunes. They're going to think there's a problem with Palm.
It's not an amateurish play on Pre's part, but a very, very risky one
It's both. But it's amateurish in the fact that they can't use their own software but instead are reporting their device, to Windows/OS X (not just iTunes), as being an Apple device.
This is a seriously amateur hour move.
Reading your trolling obviates how entirely out of touch with reality you are.
Disagreeing with me does not mean I'm a troll. I'm putting forth my honest opinion.
Additionally, I suggest looking up the word "obviate" before using it again in the future.
Also, how the hell did you convince yourself that there are any standards being violated?
The Palm Pre uses Apple's USB vendor ID.
This is only a good idea if the standard included a communication bus and spec for voltage, polarity, and amperage negotiation.
That's electricity. All that matters here is frequency and amplitude. It'll be up to the receiving device itself to manage voltage and polarity. Amperage is a matter of the transmitter having a sufficient amplitude at its particular frequency, nothing more (power = amps x volts).
First off: I own a Pre. I own a TX. I own some Palm stock. I don't want my company wasting their time doing anything but making what I bought from them better -- that's time better spent on implementing standards.
iTunes isn't an open standard. If Palm wants to add music syncing to their product, they can do it themselves, or use another product that they're allowed to use.
Sheesh. My wife has a Sansa music player. Do you mean I have to suddenly go and download software from Sansa, and not just use whatever the f-- I want to move the stuff over?
Yes. Or use a product that allows Sansa interoperability, like (I assume) WMP.
This goes WAY beyond just "we don't support that". This is Apple going out of their way to break it.
No shit, captain obvious.
Bull crap. This isn't DRM, this has nothing to do with DRM.
I wasn't the one who brought up DRM. Learn to parse quote tags.
Palm was never mighty -- they were popular. Big difference.
Palm was the PDA maker at one time. That sounds pretty mighty to me, but if you prefer, use whatever adjective you want for a company that Palm once was but is no longer. It doesn't change the facts, just the words.
Whatever words you choose, what I wrote still stands. Palm was once a great company, now they're playing amateur-hour with their iTunes hacks. They are a sad caricature of their former self.
When tunes are stored on an ipod they are stored in a way that creates a speedbump to just trasnfering them off. basically the names are munged.
Into index numbers, which provides a non-negligible increase in performance.
Maybe they mess with the id3 tags--don't know.
They don't, but good job on making things up.
Perhaps. But those of us with *FOUR* braincells, and a little experience actually writing software, can knock holes in your argument pretty easily.
Clearly four is the upper limit...
The most obvious being, what if I chose to manually manage the music on my device? iTunes has no issue with this, but Palm would have to write their own GUI that would read the iTunes XML and then allow drag-n-drop sync.
Um, yeah. That's the point. Let Palm write their own GUI. That's what everyone else does. Is Apple the only company capable of writing GUI-based software or something?
Second, as a user, the last thing I need is another iTunes. I like the software. I know the software. It does its job well. If I want to buy a Pre, I as a consumer would just much rather use what I'm currently using.
Again, that's the point. If you want to stick with iTunes, buy an iPhone. If you want a Palm, you're going to have to use Palm's software (which currently consists of the Pre using Apple's USB vendor ID in violation of the USB standard).
Third, there are about a trillion edge cases with your suggestion. Like, multiple XML files. How will I know which XML file the user is using? I could have one in my All Users and one in my personal profile. iTunes has a simple option under the File menu to load a library. What would Palm do if they went gui-less and implemented your suggestion.
A preference in the Palm software? Time stamp? Four brain cells indeed!
Finally, Palm isn't complaning that Apple updated their app. They just updated the Pre to match it. Why on Earth does it bother you so much? Apple are treating the iPod is hardly more than a hardware dongle for iTunes. Fine.
They'll complain if Apple succeeds in locking them out entirely.
But no reason to bunch-up your panties just because Palm circumvents their DRM. And don't kid yourself, that's exactly what a dongle is. DRM.
It's amateur. Palm should write their own software, unless they aren't confident in their ability to do so. You raise DRM in order to elicit the standard reflexive response, but most people seem to draw the line at commercial interests. It's ok, and in fact often seen as "noble", to break DRM as a consumer. But to violate DRM for financial interests is generally looked down upon. It's also a bit pathetic when a once mighty corporation like Palm has to resort to such tactics.
Yes, Palm could conceivably read the full iTunes XML, allow the user to create playlists, and sync from there, but that would involve more work for the user, instead of allowing them to easily sync already created playlists.
Playlists are included in the iTunes XML file.