"While the conquest of space began with the colonization of the Moon by the joint Eurasian Space Agency, a little known fact is that the United States of America actually was the first government to land a man on the Moon in the latter part of the 20th century. Although the USA was first to visit the Moon, it did not have the resources or the vision to stay and make a enduring presence there (Moon jeeps notwithstanding)."
This is basically what the history books say about the Vikings and North America--technically first, but who cares. Columbus and the English (and French, Spanish Germans, Dutch in descending order) get the recognition.
That, of course, begs the question as to what indeginous Moon people Eurasia will replace when they do colonize the Moon, but let's not go there, shall we?
Kleenex is dead, long live paper tissue! To anyone in the midrange computer market (user, buyer or supplier) UNIX is a defined term with loaded meaning, i.e., it is a registered trademark referring to a branded product.
Just because Texans refer to all soft drinks as "Coke" doesn't mean Pepsi sold out. (Ask a Texan for a Coke and they will respond, "What kind? I've got Pepsi and 7-Up for y'all.")
UNIX is obviated to most users needing UNIX-type services thanks to Linux. *BSDs are interesting but don't have the mindshare Linux does.
There is a new project called TarTroller. It doesn't stop trolling but it slows posts from suspected Trollers and gathers them into a known trolling profile. Basically, a loop is created by posting the same story often on Slashdot which disorients the trolls and causes them to focus on the duplicate "mistake" instead of attacking other aspects of Slashdot. As a benefit, those trollers who take the bait enter into lengthy threads with other trollers on different ways of poking fun at the/. editors. Finally, troll posts become very easy to spot and habitual trollers easy to identify and ignore. If this really works, and is carried out enough on Slashdott, it could work. 144,000 trolls so far today. Anything would be an improvement.
Speaking of the BBS days, when using my Mac Classic and the terminal software of the day (the name of which I forget) whenever the string NO CARRIER+++ was displayed beginning in position 0 (left to right) the modem connection dropped. I made the mistake of sharing this newfound knowledge with my friends who proceeded to disconnect me at every possible opportunity. Of course, today I could have them arrested under the anti-terrorism laws for their purposeful denial of service attack. Hmmm...is the law retroactive??
you probably need a pretty big hard drive just for the swap space...
[I basically wrote this to test my Toshiba Tablet with pen writing. Pretty cool. Although I did have to resort to the keyboard for the paragraph tag.]
now I'm testing the ability of the Toshiba Tablet in the listening department during dictation. Not bad!
It's good to give people the benefit of the doubt. In this case, however, one has to suspend belief. On the issue of making a Closed Source application using Qt one does need to purchase the commercial license from Qt. However, the poster makes it sound as if he has to pay for the license each time a client project needs Qt and needs to be Closed Source. As a consultant you may need to spend money on tools; once I buy a tool, say Qt or MS Visual Studio, I can create programs for many clients off the one license. It's the Cost of doing business and it's tax deductable (CYTA). If the project is for my clients' use only--end of story. However, if I am creating a program on behalf of a client that the client intends to resell themselves, then they may need to buy a license also.
In either case the license payor is directly making money (or, intending to do so) from the payee's product. If a $1500 license breaks the budget of a project ment for commercial redistribution. ..it probably doesn't deserve much attention as a test case. Even if the resulting application is meant to be sold for $5 a license, it would be an insignificant project if it could not recoup a paltry $1500. As such I doubt seriously the consultant could be afforded (unless said consultant is working pro-bono). Even so, it is a toolset fee, not a per-application fee.
If the project is meant solely for internal use and the resulting application is built by a consultant but the company wants to maintain it then they will need their own license to Qt. If this is the ONLY project that requires Qt, that may be a steep bill (assuming a small project size; most projects are large enough to swallow such a small fee). In such a case one would consider alternative development toolsets. But how many companies need just ONE small project in which they intend to maintain the source code? I would venture a guess they don't have the sophistication to do so, anyway. Like I said: this test case is really insignificant.
Yes, this was an important lesson when I learned C/C++ -- only academically-- but gained special prominence when ultimately I started my career as a COBOL application programmer.
For, instance, anytime memory was not specifically "initialized" it would reliably contain junk that could be data from previous transactions. One especially spectacular failure was revealed a few years ago when the kooky State of California had to scrap its Deadbeat-Dad system -- due to "phantom data" showing up in non-dead-beat-dad's accounts. Oops.
Re:White House blames terrorists for snow
on
Build Your Own Snow Gun
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Factions such as the Weather Underground . . . are high on his list of targeted terrorist groups.
This is funnier than you might have thought -- the Weather Underground was a name for a violent terrorist group in the 1960's. They started out as Students for Democratic Society. Interesting reading, BTW. (As an aside, many of the anti-war protest leaders can trace their roots to this organization.)
Love the Apple ][ you're getting for Christmas this year (I did, eventually)
Trust me: ignore Lynn Stafford
Your parents are going to divorce; steel yourself; they will not abandon you, though; it's for the best
Don't abuse your little brother; you will regret this as you lie awake at night; he annoys you because he wants your attention and approval -- give it to him
Keep exercising; it is the best means of stress control; you will regret getting overweight
Don't attempt quick weightloss if you do get fat--it only makes matters worse.
All in all, I like where you've taken me; follow your instinct and pay attention to the long term impacts of your decisions.
I love Google because it sends people looking for John Howard Taylor to the appropriate location (hint: John is my son). It also does a nice job on rjamestaylor.
Just becareful of hotel accomodations not being as advertised. Someone (either Orbitz or the MGM Grand) made a mistake and I got a lower quality room than I booked. The hotel stood firm that they would not honor the description I printed off from the Orbitz reservation, but Orbitz said all I needed to do was requst a refund and fax the bill. Maybe a one-time glitch. Maybe a consistent scam.
But for flying Orbitz is very good. consistently low priced. Also check iflyswa.com -- Southwest Airlines. You can only book on their site, but they've got good rates for flights and vacations.
Always use a credit card and have more than enough available credit not only for purchases but also for the "holds" put on your card when a hotel/car rental company "authorizes" your card. The credit hold surprises many people because they do not automatically expire if you pay cash at the end of your stay/rental. It's best to have a couple of cards available to you because you do not know what might happen, as the parent to this post related.
I have friends who use priceline exclusively for travel and they swear by it. But knowing my temper if anything went wrong in the tight, constricting parameters defined by priceline, I'd be swearing AT it.
P.S., I know about the credit holds and the inconveniences therein from my time as the maintainer of the credit card subsystem to a major car rental company in the US. Most travel related business (hotels, car renters, entertainment avenues) will put a significant credit hold on your account ($200 to $500 dollars) each time you "auth" with one of them. Then, when you pay cash at the end of the transaction, you'd expect that the credit hold would be removed -- it isn't. Even if the T&E company sends the code to remove the credit hold, your bank decides when to really release the funds for use. Many times we received calls from escalated complaints saying an important customer was declined at their hotel or at the airport ticket counter because of a credit hold (or series of credit holds) placed at the car rental counter. Yikes! Even though an authorization doesn't take money from your account it DOES reduce your available credit. Do not forget this!
P.P.S. If your curious, yes, I was responsible for millions of dollars every day ("settlements", that is completed transactions that are submitted for payment). And, yes, *twice* I was partially responsible for double billing an entire day's run (thousands of people). One of those times I used a field defined in the API for voiding/reversing a transaction only to find out that the credit card processor didn't honor the field and the double charge became a triple. Yes, it was too stressful messing up people's finances. Of course now I'm the author of a drug dispensing control system. At least I won't have ANGRY customers. . .:)
Re:Speaing of the Super Bowl. . .
on
Superbowl XXXVII
·
· Score: 1
money was not the intention. To forestall similar comments I added the "current bid price" to my.sig.
Speaing of the Super Bowl. . .
on
Superbowl XXXVII
·
· Score: 0, Offtopic
Speaking of Super Bowl, perhaps this is as good a time as any to promote the sale of my domain name (a homonym parody of Super Bowl legend Joe Namath's arthritis info site NamathKnows):
Re:Forgive the obvious question...
on
Superbowl XXXVII
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
The fact that it's posted on/. during the Super Bowl AND that it has posts is PROOF that this IS NEWS for Nerds. Think of it as a polite gesture to keep the director of marketing at bay tomorrow when you, otherwise, would have said, "Super Bowl? Was that this weekend?" They're just looking out for us, man.
No doubt people were miffed. And, of course people can feel bad that a good deal (really good -- much cheaper than other similar deals; we just needed to dump the product and I'm tired of wasting time on it) disappears from under them. But initiating the inquiry (privately; remember, there is no feedback to cancelled auctions) with "this is bullshit!!" is a BAD TACTIC. Other people were upset, too (and I did agonize about pulling the auction, but it was beyond my control), and they asked me what was up with a modicum of decency. They ended up happy.
All this reminds me of something Dave Winer wrote when Frontier (a great name if there ever was one) was released commercially and he had to remind users (or just gadflies, not sure) that business is conducted politely, not with flaming demands. When you yell, curse and damn others, what do you (not you, personally) expect to happen?
Yelling and cursing have their place in business: after a good rapport is established -- then the other person will be motivated to return the relationship to the positive feeling should you start complaining. Starting out blaring, even when justified, provides no motivation except terminate the relationship.
Slashdot Mirror
- Wonder if Europe and China will start a "king of the hill" by knocking over the U.S. flag and posting their own when they get there.
Not sure, but dollars to doughnuts they hotwire the Lunar Rovers for some joy riding.This is basically what the history books say about the Vikings and North America--technically first, but who cares. Columbus and the English (and French, Spanish Germans, Dutch in descending order) get the recognition.
That, of course, begs the question as to what indeginous Moon people Eurasia will replace when they do colonize the Moon, but let's not go there, shall we?
Just because Texans refer to all soft drinks as "Coke" doesn't mean Pepsi sold out. (Ask a Texan for a Coke and they will respond, "What kind? I've got Pepsi and 7-Up for y'all.")
UNIX is obviated to most users needing UNIX-type services thanks to Linux. *BSDs are interesting but don't have the mindshare Linux does.
There is a new project called TarTroller. It doesn't stop trolling but it slows posts from suspected Trollers and gathers them into a known trolling profile. Basically, a loop is created by posting the same story often on Slashdot which disorients the trolls and causes them to focus on the duplicate "mistake" instead of attacking other aspects of Slashdot. As a benefit, those trollers who take the bait enter into lengthy threads with other trollers on different ways of poking fun at the /. editors. Finally, troll posts become very easy to spot and habitual trollers easy to identify and ignore. If this really works, and is carried out enough on Slashdott, it could work. 144,000 trolls so far today. Anything would be an improvement.
Speaking of the BBS days, when using my Mac Classic and the terminal software of the day (the name of which I forget) whenever the string
NO CARRIER+++ was displayed beginning in position 0 (left to right) the modem connection dropped. I made the mistake of sharing this newfound knowledge with my friends who proceeded to disconnect me at every possible opportunity. Of course, today I could have them arrested under the anti-terrorism laws for their purposeful denial of service attack. Hmmm...is the law retroactive??
You only do one shareware project??
Roarkk Computer's -- Home of the 30 second burn-in!
[I basically wrote this to test my Toshiba Tablet with pen writing. Pretty cool. Although I did have to resort to the keyboard for the paragraph tag.] now I'm testing the ability of the Toshiba Tablet in the listening department during dictation. Not bad!
In either case the license payor is directly making money (or, intending to do so) from the payee's product. If a $1500 license breaks the budget of a project ment for commercial redistribution. . .it probably doesn't deserve much attention as a test case. Even if the resulting application is meant to be sold for $5 a license, it would be an insignificant project if it could not recoup a paltry $1500. As such I doubt seriously the consultant could be afforded (unless said consultant is working pro-bono). Even so, it is a toolset fee, not a per-application fee.
If the project is meant solely for internal use and the resulting application is built by a consultant but the company wants to maintain it then they will need their own license to Qt. If this is the ONLY project that requires Qt, that may be a steep bill (assuming a small project size; most projects are large enough to swallow such a small fee). In such a case one would consider alternative development toolsets. But how many companies need just ONE small project in which they intend to maintain the source code? I would venture a guess they don't have the sophistication to do so, anyway. Like I said: this test case is really insignificant.
Shut down, eh? Yeah, right--what's the real story they're trying to hide??
[hint]
only academically-- but gained special prominence when
ultimately I started my career as a COBOL application programmer.
For, instance, anytime memory was not specifically "initialized" it would
reliably contain junk that could be data from previous transactions. One
especially spectacular failure was revealed a few years ago when the
kooky State of California had to scrap its Deadbeat-Dad system
-- due to "phantom data" showing up in non-dead-beat-dad's accounts. Oops.
Nubs rule!
- Factions such as the Weather Underground . . . are high on his list of targeted terrorist groups.
This is funnier than you might have thought -- the Weather Underground was a name for a violent terrorist group in the 1960's. They started out as Students for Democratic Society. Interesting reading, BTW. (As an aside, many of the anti-war protest leaders can trace their roots to this organization.)All I'm missing is some snow! (Being in Orange County, CA doesn't help)
I love Google because it sends people looking for John Howard Taylor to the appropriate location (hint: John is my son). It also does a nice job on rjamestaylor.
It's not everyday you see a particularly brilliant flameout as this. My. . .
In that case, please don't tell us about your honeymoon!
Just becareful of hotel accomodations not being as advertised. Someone (either Orbitz or the MGM Grand) made a mistake and I got a lower quality room than I booked. The hotel stood firm that they would not honor the description I printed off from the Orbitz reservation, but Orbitz said all I needed to do was requst a refund and fax the bill. Maybe a one-time glitch. Maybe a consistent scam.
But for flying Orbitz is very good. consistently low priced. Also check iflyswa.com -- Southwest Airlines. You can only book on their site, but they've got good rates for flights and vacations.
Always use a credit card and have more than enough available credit not only for purchases but also for the "holds" put on your card when a hotel/car rental company "authorizes" your card. The credit hold surprises many people because they do not automatically expire if you pay cash at the end of your stay/rental. It's best to have a couple of cards available to you because you do not know what might happen, as the parent to this post related.
I have friends who use priceline exclusively for travel and they swear by it. But knowing my temper if anything went wrong in the tight, constricting parameters defined by priceline, I'd be swearing AT it.
P.S., I know about the credit holds and the inconveniences therein from my time as the maintainer of the credit card subsystem to a major car rental company in the US. Most travel related business (hotels, car renters, entertainment avenues) will put a significant credit hold on your account ($200 to $500 dollars) each time you "auth" with one of them. Then, when you pay cash at the end of the transaction, you'd expect that the credit hold would be removed -- it isn't. Even if the T&E company sends the code to remove the credit hold, your bank decides when to really release the funds for use. Many times we received calls from escalated complaints saying an important customer was declined at their hotel or at the airport ticket counter because of a credit hold (or series of credit holds) placed at the car rental counter. Yikes! Even though an authorization doesn't take money from your account it DOES reduce your available credit. Do not forget this!
P.P.S. If your curious, yes, I was responsible for millions of dollars every day ("settlements", that is completed transactions that are submitted for payment). And, yes, *twice* I was partially responsible for double billing an entire day's run (thousands of people). One of those times I used a field defined in the API for voiding/reversing a transaction only to find out that the credit card processor didn't honor the field and the double charge became a triple. Yes, it was too stressful messing up people's finances. Of course now I'm the author of a drug dispensing control system. At least I won't have ANGRY customers. . . :)
money was not the intention. To forestall similar comments I added the "current bid price" to my .sig.
"Try your hand at NamathNose.com! Pick NamathNose for your next homonym parody site!"NamathNose.com
The fact that it's posted on /. during the Super Bowl AND that it has posts is PROOF that this IS NEWS for Nerds. Think of it as a polite gesture to keep the director of marketing at bay tomorrow when you, otherwise, would have said, "Super Bowl? Was that this weekend?" They're just looking out for us, man.
What? That really happened? [Exit stage left toward sound of football game]
All this reminds me of something Dave Winer wrote when Frontier (a great name if there ever was one) was released commercially and he had to remind users (or just gadflies, not sure) that business is conducted politely, not with flaming demands. When you yell, curse and damn others, what do you (not you, personally) expect to happen?
Yelling and cursing have their place in business: after a good rapport is established -- then the other person will be motivated to return the relationship to the positive feeling should you start complaining. Starting out blaring, even when justified, provides no motivation except terminate the relationship.