They were engaged during the MS Bob project - I was there when she was showing off the ring. Strangely, we discussed bungee jumping. I used to make the joke that she lost use of her left arm having to carry that rock around all the time.
Bob was never marketed to IT buying groups. It was aimed at your typical consumer who was afraid of a PC. That's why the apps were: List maker (excel with only one column), Letter Writer (Write+/-), Something like Publisher, but not and Mail which instead of folders had an old fashioned letter desk interface where you composed and organized your mail.
Bob was for your grandmother, your non-technical Mom / Dad, etc. The problem is that it only worked well on a P90, which was a $5k computer at the time which no grandmother was going to buy. We wrote it in VB as it was a Melinda Gates / Karen Fries project and Bill's obsession was VB for reasons. VB was never able at that time to achieve the visual performance required to make Bob work on a true consumer class PC - a 486/66 or actually lower at the time.
We brought in the compiler team to try to optimize the performance without any real luck.
IIRC, when it shipped it took 17 seconds to launch on a P90 and I could crash it in 3 clicks.
My son contracted HFM at his daycare at about 6 months. While concerning, with quick treatment he was quite comfortable again in a few days. When we figured out what was wrong he was one unhappy kid.
While I am not saying it is a minimal problem, access to modern medicine would make all the difference. The question is what kind of treatment options are available to the visitors there, how many kids go and how many parents bring the disease home.
If we end up with a major outbreak here or worldwide because of it, it could become an issue because it does have the potential to be quite a big problem if not treated quickly and could be quite an economic drain as children with the infection cannot be in child care and that stops parents from working. In the US, I think that would be the larger issue.
However, there are enough bad cops, and enough other cops who will protect their own even if they are doing something clearly wrong, that *some* kind of civilian oversight is needed most places to avoid the worst abuses. That said, I think this board is a really bad idea, and is actually probably illegal.
Without any kind of citations to back that up, all you are doing is dragging the conversation down by claiming the plot to "Training Day" was a documentary. Your statements are irresponsible, inflamitory and lacking credentials.
This has nothing to do with whether your statement is true or false. You cannot, however, build an argument about what to do about this or what it means without a proper basis.
People said / say the same thing about CO2. There are plenty of people who still think that the human race isn't capable of affecting the natural balances of our ecosystem.
Diffusion is not instant. At the point you're dumping the salt, there will be an effect just the same as fresh-water entering the ocean. Crab fisheries are effected when river flows are modified because the crabs prefer slightly less salty water than the ocean.
Fantastic thought. After you spend more than a trillion dollars buying the right of way for this super train, let's get right on that.
Don't take my cynisim wrong, I really like the idea, but lets think about it:
Security would immediately be as bad as airports. Or worse - imagine someone derailing a 300+ MPH train near a dense region.
It would take a couple decades to build to the point that the first trains are running and they wouldn't be going anywhere useful yet. (Light rail in Seattle has taken nearly 10 years already and no one is riding it yet - this kind of idea is a whole different league.)
You couldn't build out on existing RR right of way. High speed trains like those in Japan require a completely different infrastrucure (obviously) and would require space that likely doesn't fit in the existing right of way.
It just goes on.
Oh - and the crossbar of your H - how do you plan to send a high speed train through the rockies?
This looks like you're trying to find something to complain about. Wireless sync'ing is slow? Well, you could hook it to a cable and have it go faster. It isn't like they are *requiring* anyone to synch via wireless.
If you just want to set your device down by your desk for 5-10 minutes while you're doing something else and have it grab the stuff you want, then what's the problem? If you're getting ready to go somewhere quick and need it now, then you're in the same boat as the 1.0 units and iPods - tether the thing.
This is all about providing options that users wanted. How can you come across as anything but a MS hater if you're simply lambasting a feature people wanted because it works like you'd expect?
IC engines in cars are hamstrung by the fact that they must have a useful RPM range of operation. This requirement comes from the way transmissions work - requiring that the engine change speed to change the speed of the vehicle.
Hybrids sidestep this issue. Just like a generator engine, a hybrid engine can (not sure if this is how the Prius currently works) be set to run at one specific RPM and tuned to do so much more efficiently than an engine in a typical car. Just like a generator, the engine would be turning a dynamo to create electricity to send to the motors driving the wheels.
Using this kind of system you can absolutely achieve better efficiency and reduced emissions, simply by using a hybrid.
Many of these advantages can also be achieved by the use of CVT transmissions, but that's another post.
I just waited on hold for 25 minutes to speak with a Verizon call center supervisor and she claims that "only" the Verizon local and long distance business units are involved in this program and that VW would not be involved over privacy concerns.
While I only take this with a grain of salt the size of the Rock of Gibraltar, it is somewhat reassuring at this time that my only phone is a cell.
If anyone has any definitive information that VW is in fact involved, I want to hear it as in that case I would be changing my service to someone who is not participating as soon as possible.
OtherComicBookGuy=on Yes, it was Star Blazers who were also referred to, both by earth command and the Gamalons, as The Star Force. OtherComicBookGuy=off
Warcraft isn't a Race war - it's a Species war. Let's be more specific: A *pretend* species war.
The lack of communication between factions definately causes tension on the PvP servers. It's always interesting when running into someone from the other faction seeing how they react. Sometimes, you wave, and people move on. Sometimes, it's a little less friendly.
You *can* communicate indirectly via/wave,/greet,/welcom,/moon etc. I suspect that the custom emotes/e are squelched, but I haven't really investigated.
Not to mention the 2001 Cobra spark knock problems or the 1999 Cobra power deficit.
(un?)Fortunately, Ford replaced my 2001 with another car so they could attempt to diagnose the knocking problem. They failed to do so and I was forced to go to an aftermarket tuning company to get a chip burned for it. Now, it runs fine - if I can find any good gas in the Seattle area, which is unfortunately difficult to do.
A buddy and I had an assignment back in college to write "a windows app". That was pretty much the long and short of the constraints and this being circa 93 or so, we were working with VS 1.0 (installed from 27 3.5" floppies, no less). This was the collegiant version with no optimizing compiler.
We decided it would be terribly cool to create a electronic version of Star Fleet Battles. So, off we went creating our SDI application.
After some blood, sweat and tears we had something which should have worked. It was correct in every way we could figure out but the damned thing kept crashing on us. (imagine that) I finally decided to take one for the team and open a support incident.
After spending hours on the phone on hold while talking to different clueless support weasels I was finally connected with a person with actuall programming experience. I don't know if he was a developer or not but he did try to help. Finally, he asked me if I could send him our source code so he could attempt to debug it because there didn't appear to be anything wrong with it. I emailed him the source package and waited.
And waited.
Waited...
Finally, I called the guy back 3 days later.
Me: "So, have you had a chance to look at our code yet?"
TS: "Yeah, neat little game you've got here - is it SFB?"
Me: "Yes, it's supposed to be - I've never seen it work."
TS: "What? It works fine. We've been playing it here in the office for the last couple of days."
Me: "But, my version doesn't work - what did you change?"
TS: "Where's it breaking again?"
Me: Tells him line number and error message.
TS: "Oh that - you're dealing with a known bug in the debug compiler. Just compile your code in release mode and you're good to go."
I 'politely' explained at this time that I was running the collegiant edition. "oh" he said. "You're screwed."
Eventually, he assisted me with determining a work around. I never did receive the free upgrade I was promised to VS 1.5 which was available at the time (though, I'll admit he started backtracking just as soon as he offered it - somebody probably slapped him).
IIRC, we got a B on the assignment. All the time we spent debugging and on the phone with MS tech support ate seriously into our plan to develop features. We were supposed to have a certain number of menu items and other metrics of functionality which we completely fell short of. Fortunately, I had email evidence of some of my communication with the TS guy so our prof was merciful.
That said, it was an excellent course in how software actually gets developed - spend huge quantities of time on the latest MS bug and fail to meet your feature requirements in the course of debugging and trying to make the stupid thing work.
Is a book which actually does a *good* job of describing the architecture and construction of proper DTDs and the syntax thereof. Anybody got a suggestion? The MSPress Books I've got don't have much other than a few scant examples ("you can produce more complicated DTDs bu that is beyond the scope of this book...").
I came to the exact same conclusion upon watching the appendicies. I've still got issues with a couple things but the explanation made the changes, in general, ok and allowed me to simply enjoy a different interpetation of the story.
Which is exactly what you'd expect (if you're from the Seattle area) from a Mercer Island representative. This is one of the higher dollar communities, though in recent years it's been overshadowed by other neighborhoods, which due to it's island location and the nature of it's freeway link would greatly benefit from an option to simply buy your way onto the HOV or express lanes.
Mercer Island is connected to Seattle and the eastside communities (Bellevue, Redmond, etc) via interstate 90 which features both Express lanes (carpool only) and HOV lanes. If the rich residents of Mercer Island could buy their way onto the higher capacity freeway lanes they would reap a huge advantage.
Unfortunately, the Seattle area HOV and express lane system is largely useless to much of the rest of the area population due to the highway layout.
This pipe dream, shared by that bastard Tim Eyman who is largely responsible for the poor state of our state government right now, evaporates in the light that says we lose Federal highway dollars if we don't have HOV lanes. These Federal highway dollars are what keeps the current (sinking) system marginally afloat. Opening the HOV lanes to all traffic is a truly short-sighted solution unless the Federal rules change.
Black holes already boil off. Hawking postulated and it was later proven that particle / anti-particle pairs are created at the peripherary of the event horizon and that *some* of these pairs paths escape anhialation because one is trapped by the black hole while the other spins off into the universe.
This matter creation increases in speed, or temperature if you will, as the black hole gets *smaller*.
As for the rest of your comment, a graviton particle / wave does not have to push something via it's interraction. We're not talking about real matter here, we're talking about virtual matter. It does not have to obey your concept of a push / pull force. It doesn't have to be anything we have an analogy for here in the non-quantum world, we still need to verify how these things work.
Seems like a neat idea, but when I just tested it with my personal web page and hotmail (which always pisses me off by framing linked click-throughs from their web based service) IE crashes with a javascript exception - permission denied. Suggestions?
My (silly) web page for reference - www.thecatranch.org (http:// left off purposely)
FWIW, I haven't delved much into this javascript stuff though I should...
Well, I find it hard to believe that copy and paste takes more time than find address, type address, and click send. You can also set up a personal POP/SMTP based mail client on your desktop which doesn't use company resources (well, the network but really...).
What with Slashdot's continued commercialization I find it more and more difficult to trust them or their parent (is it VA Linux?) completely. If they are grubbing for money bad enough to try a cheezy subscription model then they're not above selling email lists. This makes me less and less likely to update my profile email address to anything more useful to me than my stupid SPAM filled hotmail account which is too bad because it would be nice for a "community" site like this to spawn more conversations.
Why should that be implemented? All it would do is provide a way for Slashdot and it's parent company to build larger lists of valid email addresses to spam if they so choose. I never use that feature on *any* web site and chastize anyone who puts my address in one of those web forms.
Why not simply *copy* the URL in your browser and *paste* the link into an email *yourself*?
The problem is that spam isn't free for the recipient. The primary argument against spam is not simply that it's annoying or that it clogs an otherwise useful communication medium with noise but that it's a collect call that the receiver can't refuse.
If you're on the end of a pay per X pipe, like many wireless net plans, then spam actually costs the receiver money. Some internet mail hosts charge users per X of storage, once again spam costs money. There are more and better examples which other people can cite who understand the situation much better than I.
Using spam in this way shows just how out of touch the candidate is. He's ran past the "I'll buy your vote" argument all the way to "You'll pay for my sales pitch".
Baen http://www.baen.com publishing has been offering free ebooks from selected authors as a way to drum up sales for a while now. I'm not sure how well it works (I'm not associated with them) but I've found it to be a great tool, personally. Folks should check it out.
One of my favorite authors, David Weber, participates and a couple of his books are available.
That said, I don't think a Harry Potter ebook would change the world. Schoolastic isn't going to release it in that format exclusively because it would be a bad buisness decision. After the relative flop that was Stephen King's ebook foray I doubt we'll see a major publishing house try it with one of their A list authors any time soon.
As stated in the parent, I don't see any advantage for the OSS community from the release of the windows source.
Speaking as one who worked with the source tree (PowerPC NT 3.51 and 4.0), although not as a developer but rather in a white box test environment, I don't think that the OSS community as a whole would gain much from it. The really interesting things which haven't already been reverse engineered by the OSS community or simply rendered irrelevant are all in.NET. Things like the new garbage collection system are truly interesting but I don't see the rest as much fun.
Furthermore, the source itself is a wreck. It's impossible to read, there's still legacy comments from David Cutler in it which are incorrect and my opinion was they were still there because they were amusing.
Building the source is yet another nightmare. Even if you had it, actually getting it to compile is hellish even with the complete tool set, environment, and instructions. Last I saw they were still using "build" an "imake-like" tool which is only available through the DDK to compile the source. Yes this is after they switched to the VC compiler.
Realistically, what is this supposed to prove even if the source is released? The fact of the matter is that with programming *anything* is possible. If MS really wanted to remove the dependancy of IE from the system they can. We know it, they know it. It might involve major surgery on their part, but the mshtml render engine could simply exist there for the apps which use it to render text (help, IE, etc).
The correct remedy for the case has always been and remains proper regulation of a buisness which is out of control presently. Releasing the source will piss them off, not make them compliant.
Slashdot Mirror
They were engaged during the MS Bob project - I was there when she was showing off the ring. Strangely, we discussed bungee jumping. I used to make the joke that she lost use of her left arm having to carry that rock around all the time.
I've admitted it before, I worked on Bob.
Bob was never marketed to IT buying groups. It was aimed at your typical consumer who was afraid of a PC. That's why the apps were: List maker (excel with only one column), Letter Writer (Write+/-), Something like Publisher, but not and Mail which instead of folders had an old fashioned letter desk interface where you composed and organized your mail.
Bob was for your grandmother, your non-technical Mom / Dad, etc. The problem is that it only worked well on a P90, which was a $5k computer at the time which no grandmother was going to buy. We wrote it in VB as it was a Melinda Gates / Karen Fries project and Bill's obsession was VB for reasons. VB was never able at that time to achieve the visual performance required to make Bob work on a true consumer class PC - a 486/66 or actually lower at the time.
We brought in the compiler team to try to optimize the performance without any real luck.
IIRC, when it shipped it took 17 seconds to launch on a P90 and I could crash it in 3 clicks.
My son contracted HFM at his daycare at about 6 months. While concerning, with quick treatment he was quite comfortable again in a few days. When we figured out what was wrong he was one unhappy kid.
While I am not saying it is a minimal problem, access to modern medicine would make all the difference. The question is what kind of treatment options are available to the visitors there, how many kids go and how many parents bring the disease home.
If we end up with a major outbreak here or worldwide because of it, it could become an issue because it does have the potential to be quite a big problem if not treated quickly and could be quite an economic drain as children with the infection cannot be in child care and that stops parents from working. In the US, I think that would be the larger issue.
Without any kind of citations to back that up, all you are doing is dragging the conversation down by claiming the plot to "Training Day" was a documentary. Your statements are irresponsible, inflamitory and lacking credentials.
This has nothing to do with whether your statement is true or false. You cannot, however, build an argument about what to do about this or what it means without a proper basis.
People said / say the same thing about CO2. There are plenty of people who still think that the human race isn't capable of affecting the natural balances of our ecosystem.
Diffusion is not instant. At the point you're dumping the salt, there will be an effect just the same as fresh-water entering the ocean. Crab fisheries are effected when river flows are modified because the crabs prefer slightly less salty water than the ocean.
Fantastic thought. After you spend more than a trillion dollars buying the right of way for this super train, let's get right on that.
Don't take my cynisim wrong, I really like the idea, but lets think about it:
Security would immediately be as bad as airports. Or worse - imagine someone derailing a 300+ MPH train near a dense region.
It would take a couple decades to build to the point that the first trains are running and they wouldn't be going anywhere useful yet. (Light rail in Seattle has taken nearly 10 years already and no one is riding it yet - this kind of idea is a whole different league.)
You couldn't build out on existing RR right of way. High speed trains like those in Japan require a completely different infrastrucure (obviously) and would require space that likely doesn't fit in the existing right of way.
It just goes on.
Oh - and the crossbar of your H - how do you plan to send a high speed train through the rockies?
This looks like you're trying to find something to complain about. Wireless sync'ing is slow? Well, you could hook it to a cable and have it go faster. It isn't like they are *requiring* anyone to synch via wireless.
If you just want to set your device down by your desk for 5-10 minutes while you're doing something else and have it grab the stuff you want, then what's the problem? If you're getting ready to go somewhere quick and need it now, then you're in the same boat as the 1.0 units and iPods - tether the thing.
This is all about providing options that users wanted. How can you come across as anything but a MS hater if you're simply lambasting a feature people wanted because it works like you'd expect?
IC engines in cars are hamstrung by the fact that they must have a useful RPM range of operation. This requirement comes from the way transmissions work - requiring that the engine change speed to change the speed of the vehicle.
Hybrids sidestep this issue. Just like a generator engine, a hybrid engine can (not sure if this is how the Prius currently works) be set to run at one specific RPM and tuned to do so much more efficiently than an engine in a typical car. Just like a generator, the engine would be turning a dynamo to create electricity to send to the motors driving the wheels.
Using this kind of system you can absolutely achieve better efficiency and reduced emissions, simply by using a hybrid.
Many of these advantages can also be achieved by the use of CVT transmissions, but that's another post.
I just waited on hold for 25 minutes to speak with a Verizon call center supervisor and she claims that "only" the Verizon local and long distance business units are involved in this program and that VW would not be involved over privacy concerns.
While I only take this with a grain of salt the size of the Rock of Gibraltar, it is somewhat reassuring at this time that my only phone is a cell.
If anyone has any definitive information that VW is in fact involved, I want to hear it as in that case I would be changing my service to someone who is not participating as soon as possible.
OtherComicBookGuy=on
Yes, it was Star Blazers who were also referred to, both by earth command and the Gamalons, as The Star Force.
OtherComicBookGuy=off
Warcraft isn't a Race war - it's a Species war. Let's be more specific: A *pretend* species war.
/wave, /greet, /welcom, /moon etc. I suspect that the custom emotes /e are squelched, but I haven't really investigated.
The lack of communication between factions definately causes tension on the PvP servers. It's always interesting when running into someone from the other faction seeing how they react. Sometimes, you wave, and people move on. Sometimes, it's a little less friendly.
You *can* communicate indirectly via
Not to mention the 2001 Cobra spark knock problems or the 1999 Cobra power deficit.
(un?)Fortunately, Ford replaced my 2001 with another car so they could attempt to diagnose the knocking problem. They failed to do so and I was forced to go to an aftermarket tuning company to get a chip burned for it. Now, it runs fine - if I can find any good gas in the Seattle area, which is unfortunately difficult to do.
A buddy and I had an assignment back in college to write "a windows app". That was pretty much the long and short of the constraints and this being circa 93 or so, we were working with VS 1.0 (installed from 27 3.5" floppies, no less). This was the collegiant version with no optimizing compiler.
We decided it would be terribly cool to create a electronic version of Star Fleet Battles. So, off we went creating our SDI application.
After some blood, sweat and tears we had something which should have worked. It was correct in every way we could figure out but the damned thing kept crashing on us. (imagine that) I finally decided to take one for the team and open a support incident.
After spending hours on the phone on hold while talking to different clueless support weasels I was finally connected with a person with actuall programming experience. I don't know if he was a developer or not but he did try to help. Finally, he asked me if I could send him our source code so he could attempt to debug it because there didn't appear to be anything wrong with it. I emailed him the source package and waited.
And waited.
Waited...
Finally, I called the guy back 3 days later.
Me: "So, have you had a chance to look at our code yet?"
TS: "Yeah, neat little game you've got here - is it SFB?"
Me: "Yes, it's supposed to be - I've never seen it work."
TS: "What? It works fine. We've been playing it here in the office for the last couple of days."
Me: "But, my version doesn't work - what did you change?"
TS: "Where's it breaking again?"
Me: Tells him line number and error message.
TS: "Oh that - you're dealing with a known bug in the debug compiler. Just compile your code in release mode and you're good to go."
I 'politely' explained at this time that I was running the collegiant edition. "oh" he said. "You're screwed."
Eventually, he assisted me with determining a work around. I never did receive the free upgrade I was promised to VS 1.5 which was available at the time (though, I'll admit he started backtracking just as soon as he offered it - somebody probably slapped him).
IIRC, we got a B on the assignment. All the time we spent debugging and on the phone with MS tech support ate seriously into our plan to develop features. We were supposed to have a certain number of menu items and other metrics of functionality which we completely fell short of. Fortunately, I had email evidence of some of my communication with the TS guy so our prof was merciful.
That said, it was an excellent course in how software actually gets developed - spend huge quantities of time on the latest MS bug and fail to meet your feature requirements in the course of debugging and trying to make the stupid thing work.
Is a book which actually does a *good* job of describing the architecture and construction of proper DTDs and the syntax thereof. Anybody got a suggestion? The MSPress Books I've got don't have much other than a few scant examples ("you can produce more complicated DTDs bu that is beyond the scope of this book...").
Suggestions...?
Are there going to be any comments to this story which aren't modded "funny"? I mean really, what can you say?
I came to the exact same conclusion upon watching the appendicies. I've still got issues with a couple things but the explanation made the changes, in general, ok and allowed me to simply enjoy a different interpetation of the story.
Which is exactly what you'd expect (if you're from the Seattle area) from a Mercer Island representative. This is one of the higher dollar communities, though in recent years it's been overshadowed by other neighborhoods, which due to it's island location and the nature of it's freeway link would greatly benefit from an option to simply buy your way onto the HOV or express lanes.
Mercer Island is connected to Seattle and the eastside communities (Bellevue, Redmond, etc) via interstate 90 which features both Express lanes (carpool only) and HOV lanes. If the rich residents of Mercer Island could buy their way onto the higher capacity freeway lanes they would reap a huge advantage.
Unfortunately, the Seattle area HOV and express lane system is largely useless to much of the rest of the area population due to the highway layout.
This pipe dream, shared by that bastard Tim Eyman who is largely responsible for the poor state of our state government right now, evaporates in the light that says we lose Federal highway dollars if we don't have HOV lanes. These Federal highway dollars are what keeps the current (sinking) system marginally afloat. Opening the HOV lanes to all traffic is a truly short-sighted solution unless the Federal rules change.
Black holes already boil off. Hawking postulated and it was later proven that particle / anti-particle pairs are created at the peripherary of the event horizon and that *some* of these pairs paths escape anhialation because one is trapped by the black hole while the other spins off into the universe.
This matter creation increases in speed, or temperature if you will, as the black hole gets *smaller*.
As for the rest of your comment, a graviton particle / wave does not have to push something via it's interraction. We're not talking about real matter here, we're talking about virtual matter. It does not have to obey your concept of a push / pull force. It doesn't have to be anything we have an analogy for here in the non-quantum world, we still need to verify how these things work.
Seems like a neat idea, but when I just tested it with my personal web page and hotmail (which always pisses me off by framing linked click-throughs from their web based service) IE crashes with a javascript exception - permission denied. Suggestions?
My (silly) web page for reference - www.thecatranch.org (http:// left off purposely)
FWIW, I haven't delved much into this javascript stuff though I should...
Well, I find it hard to believe that copy and paste takes more time than find address, type address, and click send. You can also set up a personal POP/SMTP based mail client on your desktop which doesn't use company resources (well, the network but really...).
What with Slashdot's continued commercialization I find it more and more difficult to trust them or their parent (is it VA Linux?) completely. If they are grubbing for money bad enough to try a cheezy subscription model then they're not above selling email lists. This makes me less and less likely to update my profile email address to anything more useful to me than my stupid SPAM filled hotmail account which is too bad because it would be nice for a "community" site like this to spawn more conversations.
Why should that be implemented? All it would do is provide a way for Slashdot and it's parent company to build larger lists of valid email addresses to spam if they so choose. I never use that feature on *any* web site and chastize anyone who puts my address in one of those web forms.
Why not simply *copy* the URL in your browser and *paste* the link into an email *yourself*?
No flame, simply strong dissagreement.
The problem is that spam isn't free for the recipient. The primary argument against spam is not simply that it's annoying or that it clogs an otherwise useful communication medium with noise but that it's a collect call that the receiver can't refuse.
If you're on the end of a pay per X pipe, like many wireless net plans, then spam actually costs the receiver money. Some internet mail hosts charge users per X of storage, once again spam costs money. There are more and better examples which other people can cite who understand the situation much better than I.
Using spam in this way shows just how out of touch the candidate is. He's ran past the "I'll buy your vote" argument all the way to "You'll pay for my sales pitch".
Baen http://www.baen.com publishing has been offering free ebooks from selected authors as a way to drum up sales for a while now. I'm not sure how well it works (I'm not associated with them) but I've found it to be a great tool, personally. Folks should check it out.
One of my favorite authors, David Weber, participates and a couple of his books are available.
That said, I don't think a Harry Potter ebook would change the world. Schoolastic isn't going to release it in that format exclusively because it would be a bad buisness decision. After the relative flop that was Stephen King's ebook foray I doubt we'll see a major publishing house try it with one of their A list authors any time soon.
As stated in the parent, I don't see any advantage for the OSS community from the release of the windows source.
.NET. Things like the new garbage collection system are truly interesting but I don't see the rest as much fun.
Speaking as one who worked with the source tree (PowerPC NT 3.51 and 4.0), although not as a developer but rather in a white box test environment, I don't think that the OSS community as a whole would gain much from it. The really interesting things which haven't already been reverse engineered by the OSS community or simply rendered irrelevant are all in
Furthermore, the source itself is a wreck. It's impossible to read, there's still legacy comments from David Cutler in it which are incorrect and my opinion was they were still there because they were amusing.
Building the source is yet another nightmare. Even if you had it, actually getting it to compile is hellish even with the complete tool set, environment, and instructions. Last I saw they were still using "build" an "imake-like" tool which is only available through the DDK to compile the source. Yes this is after they switched to the VC compiler.
Realistically, what is this supposed to prove even if the source is released? The fact of the matter is that with programming *anything* is possible. If MS really wanted to remove the dependancy of IE from the system they can. We know it, they know it. It might involve major surgery on their part, but the mshtml render engine could simply exist there for the apps which use it to render text (help, IE, etc).
The correct remedy for the case has always been and remains proper regulation of a buisness which is out of control presently. Releasing the source will piss them off, not make them compliant.