While perhaps not your style (mine tends to be a bit too verbose, with what some term "awkward" structure), the sentence as written does not violate any rules of English. Please show me, if you find otherwise.
Ah. I see. So, when you originally are challenging the reader to think of something "intelligent" before replying, we are to presume that you put your full intelligence into the question?
I did understand what you wrote. Millions of people understand what George W. Bush says when he fouls up the language in his speeches and comments to the press. And just as those millions of people place less value on Bush's words because he lacks a good command of his language, so people will place less value in your words when you do the same.
I never did any shopping at VA Linux, so I'm not sure what their entire product line was like, but which of the following most likely happened?
VA ships Linux workstations. Dells smells a market. Dell enters market to sell Linux workstations. The tiny market now split between a big company and a smaller company isn't enough for VA to continue to exist. Dell, having held out a bit longer, realizes that the market as a whole isn't big enough for them to stick with, so they exit.
Dell enters Linux workstation business just long enough to push out VA, a competitor in the server market.
Bill Gates sends Dell a check just big enough to stop them from selling Linux desktops but not big enough for them to stop selling Linux servers.:^)
Ok, this is one of the best suggestions I've seen in a long time: use a pre-existing concept of law plus a recent ruling by the Supes to provide a path to breaking the "monopoly" granted by copyright.
At some point, each of us has hated the US legal system and the evils it produces. Then you see something brilliant, simple, and reasonable like this and it all seems worth it. Maybe.:^)
"it will be possible to make a round-trip query/response using Hailstorm services without 'phoning home' to Microsoft servers." -- Gillmor describing Stutz
What exactly does this mean for me, the common Linux user?
Anyone have links to information on what source, if any, Sony has released? I'd be interested to see the PS2 kernel modifications (again, if any) added to the regular kernel, as well as having all the other bits added to standard core pieces (glibc, gcc, XFree86) so that the PS2 Linux distro could evolve with community support.
After all, once a PS2 gets obsoleted by the PS3, it becomes an abandoned platform and supporting those kinds of platforms has been one of the strengths of the open source and free software movements.
If.NET wins, Microsoft will have total power. The UN and NATO might as will surrender to it, if that happens.
Well, since they probably all use PCs with MS Windows pre-installed, they've already surrendered.;^) After all, isn't that what Linux and Mac users are preaching all day long?
Well, unless I'm mistaken, GAIM (and probably Everybuddy) have had local backups of buddy lists for a while now. Of course, they have a different set of working assumptions: they need to be able to adapt to a service that they don't control.
Of course, after this, maybe MS is realizing they don't exert 100% control over their own service.:^)
I think the distinction to make here is "several years ago". Sure, AOL may have a had a horrible rep for busy signals and crappy service.
But things have changed drastically now and expectations are higher. As services get more refined, more elaborate, and more reliable, the times when they are unavailable become all the more unacceptable.
Horrible example (i.e. I'm tired): There were no doubt times 50 years ago when roads and bridges would get flooded out, preventing you from getting where you wanted to go (by car...even by foot or horse) until it was fixed or the river level went down or what have you. Now, everyone (in the U.S.) expects to be able to drive to any public place at any time of day and at worst have to deal with a traffic jam or a short detour. Not being able to reach reasonable destinations is unthinkable, and would make the local news, if not the national news (for a large enough "outage").
I'm a bit shocked that the MSN IM service doesn't somehow have a way to store and retrieve user data on the client end for exactly this kind of situation. Heck, just do the usual thing and pile it all into the registry...that seems to be where everything else important ends up. If such a feature existed (caveat: and worked) in the MSN IM client then all those users that lost data would simply have the service send a message to the client on next connection to use the last backup and POOF! no lost buddy lists.
I realize I'm just a lowly mathematician and all, but doesn't this seem reasonable, even for people that design real-life applications?
Having held a final Xbox controller three weeks ago and having spoken to two independent developers about it, I feel fairly qualified to say that you're absolutely full of it. "excellent design"? Please. Why don't you quit spewing fanboy juice all over the unsuspecting Slashdot public and post something more meaningful than "they used their excellent lab to develop it, so it must be peachy keen!"
This means you can get Tribes2 for less than the Windows version. For once, Linux users have a leg up on the Win32 guys.
Note that I'm not taking into account the limited time special prices you can get from local stores from week to week. The price for Tribes 2 on ebgames.com is currently $45. The price for Tribes2 Linux is $50, so you can get it for $25 or less with this LUG deal.
Ok, Linux supporters...time to put up or shut up. If you truly want to help, lay out the money now.
FWIW, I put down over $100 in games from TuxGames to get my Tribes2, SMAC, and other Linux games earlier this week. Reviews forthcoming here.
Please name the time, place, and circumstances under which you said you saw MGS on Xbox. The director/producer has already said "We're working on PS2 first. We'll start working on Xbox near when PS2 is done." (paraphrasing) So, how did you manage to see it?
Further, the Xbox may cache things to the hard drive, but from what I've been able to get out of developers, the Xbox docs seem to indicate that the hard drive will house only preferences, high scores, saved games as persistent data. To get things cached onto the hard drive, you'll still have to deal with initial load times. That is, the hard drive is not some magical device that eliminates load times; it only mitigates them.
And as for "no reason to buy a PS2" here were my reasons:
Ditch my old (i.e. first generation) PS1. It had been played hard but cared for to the point that it would only skip once in a blue moon on a movie. Not bad for a first gen. I hated to see it go, but being able to play my PS1 games on the PS2 (with some speed up and texture smoothing) was great.
Continue to enjoy the robust, rich used PS1 game market while waiting for the PS2 market to mature. In the meantime, cherry pick the very best PS2 games to play. Be a realistic gamer, not an idealistic one. (Hint: Xbox probably won't have a stellar lineup at launch either. It'll be the same as all other console launches. One or two great titles, the rest are crap. Similar to the PS2 launch, no?)
Unless things have changed drastically, the SDK was never nothing more than a bunch of pieces of Linux that were already open source.
From their IESDK description:
The following API's are supported in the IESDK:
OpenGL (Mesa3D implementation included as of v0.3) [Mesa is already open source.]
OpenAL (open source implementation included as of v0.3) [Everything for OpenAL is open source, AFAIK. No doubt Mike or Joe or someone will beat me if I'm wrong. Nothing new here.]
OpenStream (open source implementation to be added in v0.9) [Note how far off this is...version 0.9! The stuff on the website is 0.3. Vapor.]
Xtrema (open source implementation to be added in v0.5) [Still very far off, but not as bad as OpenStream.]
DRI (open source implementation included as of v0.3) [Already open source. Nothing new here, except that NVIDIA hardware doesn't work with DRI (as in the DRI part of XFree86). Kind of silly.]
DRM (currently closed source version to be added in v0.9) [With NVIDIA hardware and presumably NVIDIA drivers, how else could it be? Silliness.]
I'm willing to bet that they can make good on their bet to release everything the developed as open source...there's probably nothing to release.
It sure looked like it could have been something tho.
By which I suppose you mean "A big fat embarassing something for Linux". Come on. This outfit has been stringing the Linux community along for the longest time and it's about time someone told them to put up or shut up. The only reason the community hasn't tossed them out on their asses is that you kept falling into the "but what if it succeeds and Linux wins and Billy Gates gets his ass kicked and goes home and I get to go out with a hot blonde chick that digs my cool Linux console" dream.
Stop it. Really. Just stop it.
Anyone with a lick of sense should have smelled that this thing was rotten a long time ago.
And people wonder why Loki never signed on as a developer. Sheesh. Loki may have problems, but at least they knew not to get into this sham.
One important question is how Red Hat got scammed into announcing a partnership with these guys.
A 1999 report by Alvin Cooper and Coralie R. Scherer of the California- based Marital and Sexuality Centre found that 75 per cent of those who enjoy adult Internet sites don't tell anyone about it.
Then how did the report find out?!?! I bet they were all going through the MS Passport Service.;^)
In order for the attacker to successfully attack the user via this vulnerability, she would need to be able to persuade the user to either browse to a web site she controlled or open an HTML e-mail that she had sent.
I am not a member of this man's constituency as defined geographically. But I'd consider him as a representative, if possible, given his responses here. (He may well disagree with me on everything else, but oh well.)
In the same way that businesses are feeling the effects of the global audience that the 'net brought into existence, isn't it possible that governments are going to have to deal with the same contraction?
That is to say, how much longer will we have to pick our representatives in government based on geographical location? Sure, I live in a specific city in a specific county in a specific state in a specific country, but I don't feel completely connected to the government here.
I would feel much more connected with a representative in government that shared my background and outlook based not on my location on the Earth's surface but rather on philosophical and moral grounds.
Then maybe I wouldn't have to cringe every time I think about Jesse Helms being one of my Senators.;^)
Looks like an example where Microsoft changed their business model to fit the market. That's good, and should be encouraged. There doesn't even seem to be a stink of MS muscle pushing people around, if indeed FreeBSD can't handle the features that Maxtor wanted.
As users, we should be pleased that MS is moving to meet the market needs. If you are an evangelist for OSS, this should light a fire under your ass. Time to live up to the promise of "open is better" and get those features added.
David Sheff's Game Over gives a reasonable history of Nintendo during their rise to power. It discusses how they stepped over the dead body of Atari to take over as the video game king in the mid-80s to early 90s, despite the horrible video game crash of '83-'84. And for you anti-trust fanatics out there, it also talks about some of the shady practices that Nintendo might have adopted to get things going and keep them going. There is even an updated version, which I have not had time to read. This book is available on Amazon, but I actually found it at my local library back when I read it.
Also, Leonard Herman has some reportedly great books, Phoenix: The Rise & Fall of Videogames and ABC To The VCS (A Directory of Software to the Atari 2600) about what people think of as the classic age of video games and the Atari 2600 specifically. Sadly, I have neither bought nor read these, but I hope to someday when the 25-hour day and 8-day week are implemented. You can find Herman's site here.
Slashdot Mirror
While perhaps not your style (mine tends to be a bit too verbose, with what some term "awkward" structure), the sentence as written does not violate any rules of English. Please show me, if you find otherwise.
You have finally removed all reasons for paying any attention to your posts, except for their unintended humorous value.
I did understand what you wrote. Millions of people understand what George W. Bush says when he fouls up the language in his speeches and comments to the press. And just as those millions of people place less value on Bush's words because he lacks a good command of his language, so people will place less value in your words when you do the same.
So if he wants an "intelligent" discussion, perhaps he would have been better served to choose his language carefully.
Look it up.
I'm not responsible for moronic moderators. :^D
Just rambling. :^D
At some point, each of us has hated the US legal system and the evils it produces. Then you see something brilliant, simple, and reasonable like this and it all seems worth it. Maybe. :^)
Oh, and free speech ain't too bad either. :^)
What exactly does this mean for me, the common Linux user?
After all, once a PS2 gets obsoleted by the PS3, it becomes an abandoned platform and supporting those kinds of platforms has been one of the strengths of the open source and free software movements.
Well, since they probably all use PCs with MS Windows pre-installed, they've already surrendered. ;^) After all, isn't that what Linux and Mac users are preaching all day long?
Of course, after this, maybe MS is realizing they don't exert 100% control over their own service. :^)
But things have changed drastically now and expectations are higher. As services get more refined, more elaborate, and more reliable, the times when they are unavailable become all the more unacceptable.
Horrible example (i.e. I'm tired): There were no doubt times 50 years ago when roads and bridges would get flooded out, preventing you from getting where you wanted to go (by car...even by foot or horse) until it was fixed or the river level went down or what have you. Now, everyone (in the U.S.) expects to be able to drive to any public place at any time of day and at worst have to deal with a traffic jam or a short detour. Not being able to reach reasonable destinations is unthinkable, and would make the local news, if not the national news (for a large enough "outage").
I realize I'm just a lowly mathematician and all, but doesn't this seem reasonable, even for people that design real-life applications?
Yeesh.
Note that I'm not taking into account the limited time special prices you can get from local stores from week to week. The price for Tribes 2 on ebgames.com is currently $45. The price for Tribes2 Linux is $50, so you can get it for $25 or less with this LUG deal.
Ok, Linux supporters...time to put up or shut up. If you truly want to help, lay out the money now.
FWIW, I put down over $100 in games from TuxGames to get my Tribes2, SMAC, and other Linux games earlier this week. Reviews forthcoming here.
Please name the time, place, and circumstances under which you said you saw MGS on Xbox. The director/producer has already said "We're working on PS2 first. We'll start working on Xbox near when PS2 is done." (paraphrasing) So, how did you manage to see it?
Further, the Xbox may cache things to the hard drive, but from what I've been able to get out of developers, the Xbox docs seem to indicate that the hard drive will house only preferences, high scores, saved games as persistent data. To get things cached onto the hard drive, you'll still have to deal with initial load times. That is, the hard drive is not some magical device that eliminates load times; it only mitigates them.
And as for "no reason to buy a PS2" here were my reasons:
Now stop trolling. Thanks.
From their IESDK description:
I'm willing to bet that they can make good on their bet to release everything the developed as open source...there's probably nothing to release.
By which I suppose you mean "A big fat embarassing something for Linux". Come on. This outfit has been stringing the Linux community along for the longest time and it's about time someone told them to put up or shut up. The only reason the community hasn't tossed them out on their asses is that you kept falling into the "but what if it succeeds and Linux wins and Billy Gates gets his ass kicked and goes home and I get to go out with a hot blonde chick that digs my cool Linux console" dream.
Stop it. Really. Just stop it.
Anyone with a lick of sense should have smelled that this thing was rotten a long time ago.
And people wonder why Loki never signed on as a developer. Sheesh. Loki may have problems, but at least they knew not to get into this sham.
One important question is how Red Hat got scammed into announcing a partnership with these guys.
Then how did the report find out?!?! I bet they were all going through the MS Passport Service. ;^)
In the same way that businesses are feeling the effects of the global audience that the 'net brought into existence, isn't it possible that governments are going to have to deal with the same contraction?
That is to say, how much longer will we have to pick our representatives in government based on geographical location? Sure, I live in a specific city in a specific county in a specific state in a specific country, but I don't feel completely connected to the government here.
I would feel much more connected with a representative in government that shared my background and outlook based not on my location on the Earth's surface but rather on philosophical and moral grounds.
Then maybe I wouldn't have to cringe every time I think about Jesse Helms being one of my Senators. ;^)
As users, we should be pleased that MS is moving to meet the market needs. If you are an evangelist for OSS, this should light a fire under your ass. Time to live up to the promise of "open is better" and get those features added.
Also, Leonard Herman has some reportedly great books, Phoenix: The Rise & Fall of Videogames and ABC To The VCS (A Directory of Software to the Atari 2600) about what people think of as the classic age of video games and the Atari 2600 specifically. Sadly, I have neither bought nor read these, but I hope to someday when the 25-hour day and 8-day week are implemented. You can find Herman's site here.