I use Fedora. At some point, an upgrade to the ACPI subsystem exposed a bug in the gnome battery monitor.
I downloaded the gnome-applets srpm and installed it.
I fixed the code, created a patch and rebuilt the rpm.
I installed the rpm, and reported the bug and the patch to the gnome bugzilla.
Eventually the patch was integrated into the gnome development branch and made it into mainline Gnome 2 (IIRC).
Unless someone rewrote it, it's stil there, and probably running on every distro.
A) I was able to fix the bug without too much trouble and integrate it into the system within a few minutes.
B) It eventually made it into Gnome, and likely everyone's distro including Fedora and RHEL. While I don't use RHEL, there's no reason (AFAIK) that I couldn't have done the same thing if I was using it.
I'm not what I would consider a gnome developer, just a Linux user with some development skills. I didn't pay anyone to get the patch included. While not everyone can be expected to modify their code, an experienced Linux system administrator usually can.
There are a number of advantages to this sytem:
1) Since I have the source, it's easier to identify exactly what the problem was (in my case a botched parser)
2) I can get a fix as soon as I fix it.
3) Presumably, other people are doing the same thing, so fixes are coming in from everywhere. It's to my advantage to get the patch included, so that I don't have to keep appling it myself. This, in theory, leads to better software.
If you never plan on trying to locate problems yourself 1) and 2) don;t apply. 3) might, depending on whether you believe it.
It's also important to note that since Microsoft was considered a monopoly they have to play by different rules, at least according to federal antitrust regulations. Companies that are in competitive markets don't have this restraint. RedHat doesn't have a monopoly on anything, so they can bundle all they want.
Adding to their trouble was that Microsoft didn't hide the fact that they were out to destroy their potential competitors very well.
I didn't upgrade to run OO, which I only rarely use. 256 wasn't quite enough to run the desktop, firefox and say acroread to run smoothly. It also makes apt-rpm run about 5 times faster as well.
OO being much faster was just a side effect I noticed.
Besides they did't sell Office for Linux last time I checked. Money isn't the issue, I just prefer Linux. My comment was an observation, not a recommendation.
OO is pretty usuable, as long as you have a very large amount of RAM. I upgraded my thinkpad from 256M to 1G and openoffice load times went way down ( probably ~5x under some circumstances).
I'm not at all familiar with the architecture of OO or what the developers priorities are, but it'd be nice if a bit more time was spent on performance. Firefox could also use work here also.
I'm sure that OO wants to concentrate on features and compatability. That's certainly a worthwhile goal, but perfect compatibility seems pretty much hopeless, and you can always think of more features to add.
What the UN and its agencies say is largely irrelevant.
What's more important is that foreign governments are using this fight to create political capital. Regardless of the reasoning, this is one of many many bad signs that things have gone very seriously wrong for the US's foreign relations.
I certainly agree with you. It's like saying that the guys who paint the exit numbers are in charge of the interstates.
This issue is being used by foreign political leaders as a jumping off point for rhetoric, but the issue is really a minor one.
To me, the real news here is that the US's relationship with the rest of the world has gotten so bad that countries are starting to needlessly pick unproductive fights.
I wonder if he means a database-oriented filesystem? There's no real reason to stop there... system and application configuration data in a database would be great.
I don't know about whether DB oriented filesystems would be useful. However, as it is on most Linux systems, it seems like there are 27 different programs, all with their own poorly implemented db. It would be nice to have one DB to take care of everything, at least in theory.
On my machine I have slocate, apt-rpm, rpm and gconf, just off the top of my head.
I've played with it a bit, and Writely does save stuff automagically as you type, and allows two people to work on a doc simulaneously. It even gives you revision history. It isn't perfect and has a lot of features to implement before it's really useful as a word processor.
It's nowhere near a Word killer yet, but it's an interesting little project.
1) 99% of the time I use linux. I still need a boot loader, since I ocassionally need to use a different kernel.
2) init=/bin/sh will get you out of a lot of hairy situations. (init=/bin/ash.static can be useful to.) You need to interact with the boot loader to pass kernel parameters.
3) BIOS upgrades are often windows only. Some software only works under windows. I'm not interested in using two laptops for the job.
He's right that it would be far better to somehow magically remove software patents. Nobody is arguing with that. Unfortunatly, Perens is advocating a course of action that has been underway for ten years or more and has gotten exactly nowhere.
The reality is that the U.S. will not get rid of software patents. Even if we are able to prevent more software patents from being issued, there are still the existing patents which need to be dealt with(*).
As usual, Linus has created contovesy by suggesting we trade ideological purity for practical matters. While it's not exactly consistant to rail against patents and hold them yourself, it's a plan that at least hasn't been tried yet. Peren's plan will not work. Linus' probably won't. Which one sounds better?
(*)Imagine:
Dear Senator Smith:
I am a shareholder of Foobar Software. You voted for legislation that eliminated all software patents, reducing the assets of my company by $999 billion. Can you explain why I should vote for you in November?
There's an obvious trend for web based computing. Web based storage is fairly commonplace. There has also been quite a bit of effort to have computation centralized. After that will come graphics and sound.
The final step is to have everything; display and input devices. All web based.
Imagine not having your desk cluttered by all that unnecessary junk! When you nedd to use a computer, you'll just "log on" to the "web" and your hardware needs will be provided for.
The following data was taken by my Magellan Sportrak Map while geocaching in Rock Rimmon State forest, superimposed on google maps. It shows the drive there, the walk in the woods, and part of the drive back.
The data on the drive was better than I expected. I think the trees prevented the data from being as good on the hike, though you can see the clearing at the top of the hill near the cache in the satellite image (near Long Pond).
This would indicate to me that the data from this ~$200 GPS would be usable for some fairly decent mapping without an external computer. Since the track memory is limited to 2000 points you'd need to download from time to time.
Everyone thinks that this would be expensice. but does anyone out here actually know what OLED prices are for something like this?
If it's feasible to integrate the OLED and the display driver using all organic semiconductors, maybe this isn't as expensive an idea as people think. The first screens don't necessarily have to have super fast refresh rates.
After all, most of the tiny screens are identical, and my best guess is that OLED production costs go as the area of the screen, which isn't really that large in this case. If one manages to combine the push signal, display signal and the OLED power in two wires, the wiring wouldn't be much more complex than a standard keyboard.
Mineral oil is ignitable, but you'll have trouble lighting it unless it's sprayed somehow or gets heated to well over boiling (its flash point is 135 C). By that point it's quite hazardous for being a lot of hot oil.
Of course, there are a few stocks of GM corn that made it into the human food supply that were never approved for human use, just cattle.
You're talking about starlink.
God knows, but so does the EPA: From: http://www.ncseonline.org/nle/crsreports/agricultu re/ag-101.cfm
"The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) approved the gene-spliced variety of yellow corn in 1998 for use only as animal feed and set a zero-tolerance level for its use in human food based on the fact that this particular Bt protein does not break down easily in the human digestive system."
Starlink was banned from human consumption due to a _specific_ compound that was considered to likely be alergenic.
Your ranting sounds hysterical, and you give no references.
Well, about a year back, the my University blocked all of the BitTorrent ports. I sent an email to the help desk to complain. They ignored me. About 6 months later the unblocked it.
I suspect that something similar will happen to the submitter.
The work in this article assumes that inflation is right. People don't like inflation because they don't know how it happend, but something like it had to have happened in the early universe.
Slashdot Mirror
I use Fedora. At some point, an upgrade to the ACPI subsystem exposed a bug in the gnome battery monitor.
I downloaded the gnome-applets srpm and installed it.
I fixed the code, created a patch and rebuilt the rpm.
I installed the rpm, and reported the bug and the patch to the gnome bugzilla.
Eventually the patch was integrated into the gnome development branch and made it into mainline Gnome 2 (IIRC).
Unless someone rewrote it, it's stil there, and probably running on every distro.
A) I was able to fix the bug without too much trouble and integrate it into the system within a few minutes.
B) It eventually made it into Gnome, and likely everyone's distro including Fedora and RHEL. While I don't use RHEL, there's no reason (AFAIK) that I couldn't have done the same thing if I was using it.
I'm not what I would consider a gnome developer, just a Linux user with some development skills. I didn't pay anyone to get the patch included. While not everyone can be expected to modify their code, an experienced Linux system administrator usually can.
There are a number of advantages to this sytem:
1) Since I have the source, it's easier to identify exactly what the problem was (in my case a botched parser)
2) I can get a fix as soon as I fix it.
3) Presumably, other people are doing the same thing, so fixes are coming in from everywhere. It's to my advantage to get the patch included, so that I don't have to keep appling it myself. This, in theory, leads to better software.
If you never plan on trying to locate problems yourself 1) and 2) don;t apply. 3) might, depending on whether you believe it.
It's also important to note that since Microsoft was considered a monopoly they have to play by different rules, at least according to federal antitrust regulations. Companies that are in competitive markets don't have this restraint. RedHat doesn't have a monopoly on anything, so they can bundle all they want.
Adding to their trouble was that Microsoft didn't hide the fact that they were out to destroy their potential competitors very well.
Is it useful as a tablet?
I hadn't even considered a tablet since I thought the Linux support wouldn't be there.
How's the power management/video support?
I didn't upgrade to run OO, which I only rarely use. 256 wasn't quite enough to run the desktop, firefox and say acroread to run smoothly. It also makes apt-rpm run about 5 times faster as well.
OO being much faster was just a side effect I noticed.
Besides they did't sell Office for Linux last time I checked. Money isn't the issue, I just prefer Linux. My comment was an observation, not a recommendation.
OO is pretty usuable, as long as you have a very large amount of RAM. I upgraded my thinkpad from 256M to 1G and openoffice load times went way down ( probably ~5x under some circumstances).
I'm not at all familiar with the architecture of OO or what the developers priorities are, but it'd be nice if a bit more time was spent on performance. Firefox could also use work here also.
I'm sure that OO wants to concentrate on features and compatability. That's certainly a worthwhile goal, but perfect compatibility seems pretty much hopeless, and you can always think of more features to add.
What the UN and its agencies say is largely irrelevant.
What's more important is that foreign governments are using this fight to create political capital. Regardless of the reasoning, this is one of many many bad signs that things have gone very seriously wrong for the US's foreign relations.
I certainly agree with you. It's like saying that the guys who paint the exit numbers are in charge of the interstates.
This issue is being used by foreign political leaders as a jumping off point for rhetoric, but the issue is really a minor one.
To me, the real news here is that the US's relationship with the rest of the world has gotten so bad that countries are starting to needlessly pick unproductive fights.
Creating the OS for millions of zombie PCs to flood the world with DDOS attacks and viagra SPAM.
I wonder if he means a database-oriented filesystem? There's no real reason to stop there... system and application configuration data in a database would be great.
I don't know about whether DB oriented filesystems would be useful.
However, as it is on most Linux systems, it seems like there are 27 different programs, all with their own poorly implemented db. It would be nice to have one DB to take care of everything, at least in theory.
On my machine I have slocate, apt-rpm, rpm and gconf, just off the top of my head.
I've played with it a bit, and Writely does save stuff automagically as you type, and allows two people to work on a doc simulaneously. It even gives you revision history. It isn't perfect and has a lot of features to implement before it's really useful as a word processor.
It's nowhere near a Word killer yet, but it's an interesting little project.
1) 99% of the time I use linux. I still need a boot loader, since I ocassionally need to use a different kernel.
2) init=/bin/sh will get you out of a lot of hairy situations. (init=/bin/ash.static can be useful to.) You need to interact with the boot loader to pass kernel parameters.
3) BIOS upgrades are often windows only. Some software only works under windows. I'm not interested in using two laptops for the job.
He's right that it would be far better to somehow magically remove software patents. Nobody is arguing with that. Unfortunatly, Perens is advocating a course of action that has been underway for ten years or more and has gotten exactly nowhere.
The reality is that the U.S. will not get rid of software patents. Even if we are able to prevent more software patents from being issued, there are still the existing patents which need to be dealt with(*).
As usual, Linus has created contovesy by suggesting we trade ideological purity for practical matters. While it's not exactly consistant to rail against patents and hold them yourself, it's a plan that at least hasn't been tried yet. Peren's plan will not work. Linus' probably won't. Which one sounds better?
(*)Imagine:
Dear Senator Smith:
I am a shareholder of Foobar Software. You voted for legislation that eliminated all software patents, reducing the assets of my company by $999 billion. Can you explain why I should vote for you in November?
Why not the hardware too?
There's an obvious trend for web based computing. Web based storage is fairly commonplace. There has also been quite a bit of effort to have computation centralized. After that will come graphics and sound.
The final step is to have everything; display and input devices. All web based.
Imagine not having your desk cluttered by all that unnecessary junk! When you nedd to use a computer, you'll just "log on" to the "web" and your hardware needs will be provided for.
Wait. I don't get it.
Is the Python headed to the Perl funeral home to pay his respects to his dead buddy fortran?
The following data was taken by my Magellan Sportrak Map while geocaching in Rock Rimmon State forest, superimposed on google maps. It shows the drive there, the walk in the woods, and part of the drive back.
http://throb.netspace.org/~bperk/demo.html
The data on the drive was better than I expected. I think the trees prevented the data from being as good on the hike, though you can see the clearing at the top of the hill near the cache in the satellite image (near Long Pond).
This would indicate to me that the data from this ~$200 GPS would be usable for some fairly decent mapping without an external computer. Since the track memory is limited to 2000 points you'd need to download from time to time.
Everyone thinks that this would be expensice. but does anyone out here actually know what OLED prices are for something like this?
If it's feasible to integrate the OLED and the display driver using all organic semiconductors, maybe this isn't as expensive an idea as people think. The first screens don't necessarily have to have super fast refresh rates.
After all, most of the tiny screens are identical, and my best guess is that OLED production costs go as the area of the screen, which isn't really that large in this case. If one manages to combine the push signal, display signal and the OLED power in two wires, the wiring wouldn't be much more complex than a standard keyboard.
Intel should get the death penalty.
Have you ever looked at the MSDS for sodium chloride?
h tml
http://www.jtbaker.com/msds/englishhtml/S3338.htm
Or silicon dioxide?
http://physchem.ox.ac.uk/MSDS/SI/silicon_dioxide.
You might never go to the beach again!
Mineral oil is ignitable, but you'll have trouble lighting it unless it's sprayed somehow or gets heated to well over boiling (its flash point is 135 C). By that point it's quite hazardous for being a lot of hot oil.
Then they came for me
And I said, "Wait!" You forgot about the hippies! And I know where they're hiding!
GODISNOWHERE
Of course, there are a few stocks of GM corn that made it into the human food supply that were never approved for human use, just cattle.
u re/ag-101.cfm
You're talking about starlink.
God knows, but so does the EPA:
From: http://www.ncseonline.org/nle/crsreports/agricult
"The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) approved the gene-spliced variety of yellow corn in 1998 for use only as animal feed and set a zero-tolerance level for its use in human food based on the fact that this particular Bt protein does not break down easily in the human digestive system."
Starlink was banned from human consumption due to a _specific_ compound that was considered to likely be alergenic.
Your ranting sounds hysterical, and you give no references.
Try googling "Let us think of a computer processing unit as a juggler, and bytes as mangoes."
'should'
Funny, the word should doesn't appear anywhere in article. Who do you suppose said it?
Well, about a year back, the my University blocked all of the BitTorrent ports. I sent an email to the help desk to complain. They ignored me. About 6 months later the unblocked it.
I suspect that something similar will happen to the submitter.
But what about the Horizon problem?
The work in this article assumes that inflation is right. People don't like inflation because they don't know how it happend, but something like it had to have happened in the early universe.