"I don't give a damn for a man that can only spell a word one way." -Mark Twain I guess you are saying he was an idiot?
Not at all. Mark Twain does it with style.
"Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spikingwerld." -- Mark Twain
But while we're throwing quotes at each other.
"Take care that you never spell a word wrong. Always before you write a word, consider how it is spelled, and, if you do not remember, turn to a dictionary." -- Thomas Jefferson
You not only deciphered his 'ramblings' but bothered to list each error and the correct spelling for each word.
Uhhh, no. That was somebody else. What a coincidence; in a discussion about poor writing ability, you demonstrate an inability to read!
Helpful hint: underneath each comment subject is the name of the author.
Now the rest of us want to get back to bashing the US for...er..what was it this time?
I think this week we're bashing Americans for having an unjustified persecution complex that they insist on complaining about at even the most inappropriate times.
Another helpful hint: we're not going to give you any sympathy no matter how often you cry.
Actually, you missed the comma after "If you write like a 4 year old child".
As I said earlier:
If you won't make an effort to write...
It's about making the effort. Perfection is impossible but he can at least try. If he's too lazy to write well then I'm not going to waste my time reading because no doubt his thoughts are just as lazy as his writing.
I wasn't complaining about it. The person I responded to was basically saying that spelling isn't important. I think that it most definitely is. His ideas and thoughts obviously aren't worth my time to read if he doesn't consider them worth his time to write.
Tell me - how many errors are acceptable, before one should no longer be dismissed, eh? Three? Fifteen? What kind of errors? Spelling? Grammar? Logic? Stylistic errors?
It's all about context. For a/. comment? I think my style shows effort and consideration for the readers. It's not perfect but it's OK for a discussion board. For a formal essay I would apply more effort. You have to use your common sense to decide how much effort is appropriate.
However I do think the sentence written by the previous person...
You have a strainge koncept of what constituutes funn.
Shows a complete lack of respect for the reader no matter what the context.
Are you saying 4 year old children are idiots?
No, I'm saying that a person significantly older than 4 years who still writes like a 4 year old is an idiot. The formal definition of an idiot is anybody with an IQ under 25. So any 16 year old who writes like a 4 year old is an idiot. It's not even about poor spelling and poor grammar; it's about poor communication.
You might know English, but that doesn't make you smart.
You might be the smartest person in the world but if you can't communicate your ideas to me then you're not worth listening to.
Getting called out after doing something hypocritical is usually difficult. I always find it interesting to see how different people react. Good luck with your approach.
That anonymous coward wasn't me. I'll respond directly to people using my/. identity if I have something to say.
The gas mileage you can get with a hybrid is far less than what you can get with a good diesel engine. Hybrids are a bad idea, twice the weight (batteries, two motors), half the interior room.
They are not twice the weight. A hybrid Civic weighs 100kg more than a non-hybrid Civic.
They are not half the interior. A hybrid Civic has the same interior as a non-hybrid Civic.
And you cannot compare diesel MPG to petrol MPG. They are different fuels with different densities.
Think of it like this. Diesel powered trains are actually HYBRID vehicles. The diesel motor turns a generator to provide electrical power to the electric engines. If hybrid was such a damn stupid idea compared to straight diesel do you think diesel-electric trains would be cost effective? The existence of diesel-electric trains should be a great big fucking clue.
Diesel-engined cars have been getting 50+ MPG for years and years.
Yes. 800kg 1.3L 3-cyl diesel cars get 50+ MPG. A family-sized sedan hybrid Prius with a PETROL engine gets 60+ MPG. This guy gets 80+ MPG with his Prius.
I'd like to see any of you sit through a silent film from the 20s or listen to old radio plays.
Anybody who likes films has a copy of Fritz Lang's Metropolis. It's one of the greatest sci-fi films of all time and it's a silent movie.
I have 3 copies (VHS, DVD, DVD remastered).
I know about 100 of you will respond and claim that you love silent films and have the worlds greatest collection of radio plays, and I say to you that you're full of shit.
Buster Keaton made some funny silent movies. So did Laurel and Hardy. I also like the Goon Show radio show and Hitchhiker's Guide radio play.
You have a strainge koncept of what constituutes funn. Being a spelling nazi is so 1992, anyway. AC trolling is where it's been at for years now.
If you won't make an effort to write clearly then I won't waste my time trying to decipher your ramblings. Proper spelling and grammar is the hallmark of an intelligent mind. If you write like a 4 year old child then people will naturally assume you are an idiot and ignore you.
I doubt the fellow believes that the way in which the world perceives the US response to the tragedy is the most important thing, only a real scumbag could be cold enough to think like that.
This is circletimessquare we're talking about. He is cold enough to think like that. Go read some of his nonsense over on Kuro5hin.
so, given the anger and grief and role hindsight plays in how people judge how their reactions would have been different, and you can see a shit storm of blame and finger pointing coming: "americans don't care if we drown"
it is most important to remember that thousands died needlessly in this event had their been a system of warning buoys in place in the indian ocean like in the pacific, and the onus is on the governemnts in the indian ocean to have done that, but considering the fashionable anti-americanism in the world right now, you can easily see how this tragedy can be spun for political ends
I can't believe it. 10s of 1000s of people are dead and all you're concerned about is how the USA will be perceived.
If you've ever wondered why the rest of the world hates Americans, it's because of people like you.
What a bizarre way of looking at it. IMO a better way to look at it is "newspapers no longer extorting $65 million per year from local residents". Or "$65 million once wasted on newspaper classifieds now available for health, education, other productive uses".
Rather than Craigslist costing newspapers $65 million per year, I think the newspapers have been costing the local residents $65 million per year. Hooray for Craigslist. Boo to the newspapers.
16. Install UDE using this menu. UDE1 supposedly works only on Really Old machines, UDE2 supposedly works on all of them except 1.6. UDE2 is therefore a safe choice. Pick PBL-Metoo for an installer, and whatever you decide for everything else.
UDE2 works on all versions of Xbox including v1.6. UDE1 works on every version except v1.6.
Be aware that UDE2 only works on region-1 encoded Xbox (ie, American) so if you have a PAL v1.6 (eg, Australian) you need to perform further trickery to change the region code from 4 to 1. Or you can try UXE which works on all regions of Xbox v1.6.
17. Marvel at the fact that your Xbox suddenly boots Linux, supposedly backs up some files to some uber-secret location, and begins flashing its BIOS.
It doesn't actually flash the BIOS, though that's an optional step you can take on older Xbox.
Older Xbox have a flash-rom called the TSOP. That's where the BIOS is kept. During the boot sequence the BIOS is copied into RAM and runs from there. Some people like to flash the TSOP, though there's some risk involved.
The default UDE1 and UDE2 installers don't flash the TSOP. They instead place a specially modified file on the hard disk. When the normal BIOS is doing its startup stuff, it reads this file and triggers a buffer overflow. The buffer overflow copies a replacement BIOS (E:\BiosLD) into RAM, overwriting the BIOS already running there.
Anyway, I'm happy the enhancement worked for you. XBMC 1.1 just got released and it really is "tits-awesome".
It's that it's a nasty scheme to harvest contacts for junk mail, telemarketing, etc.
It's not really free, it's just that you don't pay for what you get with cash. You pay for it with your time. You have to sift through legit spam, junk mailers, hassle with telemarketers who can now legally call you even if you're on the DNC list.
Your name on a telemarketing list isn't worth $40-$60. That's not the reason why these "free stuff" offers are popping up everywhere.
You only get the "free" iPod if you and 5 of your friends (your "referrals") sign up for expensive services like credit cards and magazine subscriptions. That's where the money is coming from. Companies like Visa see the potential of a new victim^Wcustomer with an overdrawn credit card. Gambling $40-$60 per victim is well worth it to them.
So the real nastiness is 6 people potentially signing up for services they didn't need and probably can't afford. The person who receives their "free" iPod doesn't seem to realise they're running the risk of harming 5 other people. That's selfish and inconsiderate behaviour. Not that I'd expect anything better from the lowlife scum that perpetuate these horrible schemes.
Some people are scamming the system by signing up for services and cancelling once they've got their "free" iPod. The service companies will not be fooled forever. They'll start requiring 18 month service agreements. I can't wait for one of these inconsiderate bastards to get stuck with a $500+ magazine subscription. That would be poetic justice.
I think the car companies are full of it. These hybrids are nothing but expensive ways to showcase technlogical superiority. What do I mean? Well my roomate has a 1997? Jetta TDI.
You're comparing diesel to petrol. Diesel has 18% more energy by unit volume than petrol, so MPG comparisons are useless. You might as well compare ethanol to uranium.
Though I think your post highlights a very important point. Has anybody else noticed a recent increase in the number of Luddites? It's as if some people are proud to be ignorant.
But not all is lost. Here are my suggestions
1) Implement a darn menu bar and clean up the menus. The right-click system sucks.
Perhaps you should first use the GIMP before offering suggestions. All image windows have their own menu bar since v2.x. Right-clicking to access the menu is entirely optional.
What chip would Slashdot suggest that I put in the thing? I'm leaning toward the v2 SmartXX, just now, mostly because XBMC supports an LCD module with it. Is there any compelling reason to choose any one over any of the others?
No chip, unless you've really got your heart set on the LCD. Install a softmod. Very easy to install. Non-intrusive. Won't void the warranty. Works fine on all versions of Xbox. Search for UDE, UDE2 and UXE. There are many tutorials on the web, if you look hard enough.
You will be very pleased with XBMC as a music jukebox. I am over the moon with mine. All my music available, all the time, without having to shuffle my CDs in and out of a stupid carousel. Configure XBMC to be the default dashboard. Will take less than 5 seconds from power-on to music playing.
For another, what does Solaris have that Linux doesn't? Large scale SMP? That monstrously large ZFS filesystem? dtrace? Okay, so that stuff gets ported. Other than that, why Solaris?
Second reply because you really had two comments in your single post:-) Solaris has a number of features that do matter to so-called "Enterprise" computing.
Containers - faster than UML or Xen, more features than BSD jails, resource management built-in, imagine testing a 3-tier app on a single development server.
Fault tolerance - Solaris can detect imminent failures in memory, CPUs, etc, and take preventative measures. Don't dismiss this feature as being trivial. It's a big deal.
Process draining - Solaris can drain all the processes off a CPU. Either in preparation for upgrades or as part of fault tolerance (Solaris will automatically offline a suspect CPU).
Vertical scaling - You can run the same binaries on anything from a $5k 1RU server to a $2mill 100+ CPU server. Linux can run on small and large servers, but not without modifications to the software.
Single vendor - You can buy the hardware, the software and the support from Sun. That's a big deal to some clients. I've observed situations where RedHat on a no-name whitebox resulted in finger pointing when things inevitably went south. Meanwhile the client is stuck with a non-functional system.
Binary compatibility - Sun guarantees that the same binaries will run without modification on any version of Solaris, on any of their Sparc servers. That's a big deal when you're running proprietary applications. I've been in situations where the Solaris guarantee meant we could easily upgrade the hardware without fear. I've had other situations where even minor revision changes in RedHat resulted in binaries failing in mysterious ways.
That was just a partial list. Some of those features might not mean much to you. Other people will be nodding their heads in agreement. There are valid reasons to go with Solaris. For certain situations you'd be crazy to pick Linux instead of Solaris.
For one thing, Linus is right about Solaris/x86 being a joke. I've been trying to run it (admittedly, halfheartedly) on my home boxes since Solaris 7 came out, and it's never recognized any of my hardware.
I don't think Sun cares about you or your hardware. Imagine everybody buys whiteboxes from Joe's Cheap Computers and runs Solaris 10 for the grand licensing fee of $0... what does Sun get out of that?
No, Sun wants you to buy their x86 hardware. A Sun branded Opteron server with Sun approved hardware is Sun's vision of Solaris/x86. The whitebox isn't even on their radar.
My opinion is that Sun's primary reason for Solaris/x86 is not to take on Linux. It's to guard against the poor performance of the Ultrasparc CPU compared to POWER and Itanium. Sun is selling Opteron servers running Solaris/x86 so they can compete in the performance computing arena.
NB: although Solaris/x86 used to be nicknamed Slowaris, I can testify that Solaris/x86 10 is quite impressive. They've really fixed things up on "lower-end" single-CPU hardware.
Am I the only one that thinks paying $999 for a computer that Dell does with a flatpanel and twice the RAM for $699 is absolutely stupid?!
Perhaps not the only one, but I think there's a strong argument for the eMac that you've missed.
The eMac comes bundled with all the software you need. iTunes. iPhoto. iMovie. iMail. Safari. AppleWorks. No mucking about. No hidden costs.
The MacOS X platform is far more pleasant to use than the Windows XP bundle with the Dell PC. And more stable. And more secure. And easier to administer.
The eMac is much more stylish than any of the Dell offerings. It's like the iPod; people pay more for the functionally limited iPod. It's all about style, ease of use, functional simplicity.
The "twice the RAM" thing is unconvincing. MacOS X doesn't need as much RAM as Windows XP. Windows XP is a hog that chews up 150MB just to get the desktop running. Compare the computers based on fitness-to-task instead of raw figures and hardware specs.
The eMac needs a real update. I'd be more than happy to pay $699 or even $799 for a G5-based 'pizza box' with which I can use my own monitor.
You are not Apple's market, so don't hold your breath. Apple is targetting the home user who has been previously ignored. The person who doesn't want to know about computers. Who doesn't want to figure out cables. Who just wants to pull it out of the box and use it. That's why it comes with the monitor built-in.
I think it's like the term FUCK it can be used in either a positive or negative way depending on what the words are proceeding it or following it.
Such as:
Fuck yeah! (positive)
I don't know if you're Indian or not, but look at what you wrote "Every programmer that comes to the USA goes through days when he/she feels that it is a curse to be so good", so good? Do you hear yourself?:)
You're flaming him for spelling and grammar? His spelling and grammar is easily 10x better than your own. Let's look at this classic paragraph from your comment.
The education system in the US leaves a lot to be desired for,
Lot to be desired for? English write you no good!
pretty much its CRAP.
Pretty much it is CRAP. The contraction would be "pretty much it's CRAP". You missed the apostrophe.
So just because you were able to land a programming job here isn't that big of a deal. I landed a job here too, I'm not Indian, but I do outperform
Should have ended "job here too" with a fullstop. Superfluous comma before the word "but".
an entire group of Indian programmers on a 10-to-1 basis, yes 1 European, out performing a group of about 28 Indian programmers by a factor of 10 each and every week, day in and day out.
Run-on sentence. There should have been a fullstop before the word "yes".
Your not that good,
You are not that good. The contraction would be "You're not that good". That was a declarative sentence so you should have ended the sentence immediately with a fullstop.
ditch the superior arrogant attitude, and people might not be so hostile towards you:)
Superfluous comma before the word "and".
You have some nerve flaming him for poor grasp of English when your command of the language is so pathetic. His writing was actually pretty good even without taking into consideration that English is likely his second or third language. You have no excuse for your sloppy spelling.
But what else would I expect from somebody who believes they're 280x better than a normal person. Pfft.
Another "Innovation" from Microsoft?
on
A .Net CPU
·
· Score: 3, Informative
Isn't this exactly like the Java CPU that Sun was selling a few years back? And it was simply a close relative of the Lisp processors from the 80s.
C#, Java..Net, J2EE. CLR, JVM..NET CPU, Java CPU. So should we expect Microsoft to simply repeat everything that Sun did with Java? If so, wake me up when they declare they're going to release CLR under an open source license.
However I have tried hard to switch to OpenOffice. Even our business people have tried to use it. And the sad truth is that it just sucks.
Really? I actually prefer OpenOffice and I have licenses for all versions of Microsoft Office, so it's not a cost-based decision.
The style handling in OO.org is simply more intelligent than in MSOffice. The Export To PDF feature is so damn handy. The fonts look better in OO.org. The OO.org layout engine actually works; it seems MSOffice has one layout engine for screen and another for printing. MSOffice has frustrating behaviour w.r.t section breaks.
Sure, OO.org has its warts, but I don't think it sucks.
The first commercial success for the Apple II, perhaps. The first spreadsheet? No. The first electronic spreadsheet? No.
Remember what I said about incremental improvement? Dan Bricklin himself says that he saw Visicalc as an incremental improvement to a Texas Instruments calculator.
The idea for the electronic spreadsheet came to me while I was a student at the Harvard Business School, working on my MBA degree, in the spring of 1978. Sitting in Aldrich Hall, room 108, I would daydream. "Imagine if my calculator had a ball in its back, like a mouse..." -- http://www.bricklin.com/history/saiidea.htm
Even then, the idea of spreadsheets didn't come from Bricklin. They have been used by accountants for 100s of years. So even from that perspective, Bricklin's contribution was an incremental improvement over pen and paper spreadsheets.
Even then, Visicalc was not the first electronic spreadsheet. That honor goes to Mattessich who wrote an electronic spreadsheet in Fortran.
In the early 1960s, Richard Mattessich (then at the University of California at Berkeley; since 1967 at the University of British Columbia) pioneered computerized spread sheets for business accounting--first in a paper "Budgeting Models and System Simulation" (The Accounting Review, July 1961: 384-397) and later in two books Accounting and Analytical Methods (Chpt. 9 which contains the mathematical proto-type model) and Simulation of the Firm Through a Budget Computer Program (both, Homewood, IL: R.D. Irwin, Inc., 1964) which contains, among others, print-out illustrations and the computer program (the latter written in FORTRAN IV by two of his research assistants, Tom C. Schneider and Paul A. Zitlau). This contribution (anticipating such best-selling spreadsheet programs for Personal Computers as VisiCalc, Lotus 1-2-3, Excel, et.) has variously been recognized in the accounting and related literature,
In any event, I think it's unhealthy to focus on "being first". Everything is built upon what was learnt before. That's why technology continues to advance, rather than starting from scratch with each generation.
Slashdot Mirror
Not at all. Mark Twain does it with style.
But while we're throwing quotes at each other.
Your turn.
Yes.
Uhhh, no. That was somebody else. What a coincidence; in a discussion about poor writing ability, you demonstrate an inability to read!
Helpful hint: underneath each comment subject is the name of the author.
I think this week we're bashing Americans for having an unjustified persecution complex that they insist on complaining about at even the most inappropriate times.
Another helpful hint: we're not going to give you any sympathy no matter how often you cry.
As I said earlier:
It's about making the effort. Perfection is impossible but he can at least try. If he's too lazy to write well then I'm not going to waste my time reading because no doubt his thoughts are just as lazy as his writing.
I wasn't complaining about it. The person I responded to was basically saying that spelling isn't important. I think that it most definitely is. His ideas and thoughts obviously aren't worth my time to read if he doesn't consider them worth his time to write.
It's all about context. For a /. comment? I think my style shows effort and consideration for the readers. It's not perfect but it's OK for a discussion board. For a formal essay I would apply more effort. You have to use your common sense to decide how much effort is appropriate.
However I do think the sentence written by the previous person...
Shows a complete lack of respect for the reader no matter what the context.
No, I'm saying that a person significantly older than 4 years who still writes like a 4 year old is an idiot. The formal definition of an idiot is anybody with an IQ under 25. So any 16 year old who writes like a 4 year old is an idiot. It's not even about poor spelling and poor grammar; it's about poor communication.
You might be the smartest person in the world but if you can't communicate your ideas to me then you're not worth listening to.
That anonymous coward wasn't me. I'll respond directly to people using my /. identity if I have something to say.
They are not twice the weight. A hybrid Civic weighs 100kg more than a non-hybrid Civic.
They are not half the interior. A hybrid Civic has the same interior as a non-hybrid Civic.
And you cannot compare diesel MPG to petrol MPG. They are different fuels with different densities.
Think of it like this. Diesel powered trains are actually HYBRID vehicles. The diesel motor turns a generator to provide electrical power to the electric engines. If hybrid was such a damn stupid idea compared to straight diesel do you think diesel-electric trains would be cost effective? The existence of diesel-electric trains should be a great big fucking clue.
Yes. 800kg 1.3L 3-cyl diesel cars get 50+ MPG. A family-sized sedan hybrid Prius with a PETROL engine gets 60+ MPG. This guy gets 80+ MPG with his Prius.
Anybody who likes films has a copy of Fritz Lang's Metropolis. It's one of the greatest sci-fi films of all time and it's a silent movie.
I have 3 copies (VHS, DVD, DVD remastered).
Buster Keaton made some funny silent movies. So did Laurel and Hardy. I also like the Goon Show radio show and Hitchhiker's Guide radio play.
Quality material outlives its original medium.
If you won't make an effort to write clearly then I won't waste my time trying to decipher your ramblings. Proper spelling and grammar is the hallmark of an intelligent mind. If you write like a 4 year old child then people will naturally assume you are an idiot and ignore you.
This is circletimessquare we're talking about. He is cold enough to think like that. Go read some of his nonsense over on Kuro5hin.
I can't believe it. 10s of 1000s of people are dead and all you're concerned about is how the USA will be perceived.
If you've ever wondered why the rest of the world hates Americans, it's because of people like you.
What a bizarre way of looking at it. IMO a better way to look at it is "newspapers no longer extorting $65 million per year from local residents". Or "$65 million once wasted on newspaper classifieds now available for health, education, other productive uses".
Rather than Craigslist costing newspapers $65 million per year, I think the newspapers have been costing the local residents $65 million per year. Hooray for Craigslist. Boo to the newspapers.
You couldn't have demonstrated your inconsiderate behaviour moreso if you had tried.
Nice tute. Two mistakes :-)
UDE2 works on all versions of Xbox including v1.6. UDE1 works on every version except v1.6.
Be aware that UDE2 only works on region-1 encoded Xbox (ie, American) so if you have a PAL v1.6 (eg, Australian) you need to perform further trickery to change the region code from 4 to 1. Or you can try UXE which works on all regions of Xbox v1.6.
It doesn't actually flash the BIOS, though that's an optional step you can take on older Xbox.
Older Xbox have a flash-rom called the TSOP. That's where the BIOS is kept. During the boot sequence the BIOS is copied into RAM and runs from there. Some people like to flash the TSOP, though there's some risk involved.
The default UDE1 and UDE2 installers don't flash the TSOP. They instead place a specially modified file on the hard disk. When the normal BIOS is doing its startup stuff, it reads this file and triggers a buffer overflow. The buffer overflow copies a replacement BIOS (E:\BiosLD) into RAM, overwriting the BIOS already running there.
Anyway, I'm happy the enhancement worked for you. XBMC 1.1 just got released and it really is "tits-awesome".
Your name on a telemarketing list isn't worth $40-$60. That's not the reason why these "free stuff" offers are popping up everywhere.
You only get the "free" iPod if you and 5 of your friends (your "referrals") sign up for expensive services like credit cards and magazine subscriptions. That's where the money is coming from. Companies like Visa see the potential of a new victim^Wcustomer with an overdrawn credit card. Gambling $40-$60 per victim is well worth it to them.
So the real nastiness is 6 people potentially signing up for services they didn't need and probably can't afford. The person who receives their "free" iPod doesn't seem to realise they're running the risk of harming 5 other people. That's selfish and inconsiderate behaviour. Not that I'd expect anything better from the lowlife scum that perpetuate these horrible schemes.
Some people are scamming the system by signing up for services and cancelling once they've got their "free" iPod. The service companies will not be fooled forever. They'll start requiring 18 month service agreements. I can't wait for one of these inconsiderate bastards to get stuck with a $500+ magazine subscription. That would be poetic justice.
You're comparing diesel to petrol. Diesel has 18% more energy by unit volume than petrol, so MPG comparisons are useless. You might as well compare ethanol to uranium.
Though I think your post highlights a very important point. Has anybody else noticed a recent increase in the number of Luddites? It's as if some people are proud to be ignorant.
Perhaps you should first use the GIMP before offering suggestions. All image windows have their own menu bar since v2.x. Right-clicking to access the menu is entirely optional.
No chip, unless you've really got your heart set on the LCD. Install a softmod. Very easy to install. Non-intrusive. Won't void the warranty. Works fine on all versions of Xbox. Search for UDE, UDE2 and UXE. There are many tutorials on the web, if you look hard enough.
You will be very pleased with XBMC as a music jukebox. I am over the moon with mine. All my music available, all the time, without having to shuffle my CDs in and out of a stupid carousel. Configure XBMC to be the default dashboard. Will take less than 5 seconds from power-on to music playing.
Second reply because you really had two comments in your single post :-) Solaris has a number of features that do matter to so-called "Enterprise" computing.
That was just a partial list. Some of those features might not mean much to you. Other people will be nodding their heads in agreement. There are valid reasons to go with Solaris. For certain situations you'd be crazy to pick Linux instead of Solaris.
I don't think Sun cares about you or your hardware. Imagine everybody buys whiteboxes from Joe's Cheap Computers and runs Solaris 10 for the grand licensing fee of $0... what does Sun get out of that?
No, Sun wants you to buy their x86 hardware. A Sun branded Opteron server with Sun approved hardware is Sun's vision of Solaris/x86. The whitebox isn't even on their radar.
My opinion is that Sun's primary reason for Solaris/x86 is not to take on Linux. It's to guard against the poor performance of the Ultrasparc CPU compared to POWER and Itanium. Sun is selling Opteron servers running Solaris/x86 so they can compete in the performance computing arena.
NB: although Solaris/x86 used to be nicknamed Slowaris, I can testify that Solaris/x86 10 is quite impressive. They've really fixed things up on "lower-end" single-CPU hardware.
Perhaps not the only one, but I think there's a strong argument for the eMac that you've missed.
The eMac comes bundled with all the software you need. iTunes. iPhoto. iMovie. iMail. Safari. AppleWorks. No mucking about. No hidden costs.
The MacOS X platform is far more pleasant to use than the Windows XP bundle with the Dell PC. And more stable. And more secure. And easier to administer.
The eMac is much more stylish than any of the Dell offerings. It's like the iPod; people pay more for the functionally limited iPod. It's all about style, ease of use, functional simplicity.
The "twice the RAM" thing is unconvincing. MacOS X doesn't need as much RAM as Windows XP. Windows XP is a hog that chews up 150MB just to get the desktop running. Compare the computers based on fitness-to-task instead of raw figures and hardware specs.
You are not Apple's market, so don't hold your breath. Apple is targetting the home user who has been previously ignored. The person who doesn't want to know about computers. Who doesn't want to figure out cables. Who just wants to pull it out of the box and use it. That's why it comes with the monitor built-in.
America, fuck yeah!
You're flaming him for spelling and grammar? His spelling and grammar is easily 10x better than your own. Let's look at this classic paragraph from your comment.
Lot to be desired for? English write you no good!
Pretty much it is CRAP. The contraction would be "pretty much it's CRAP". You missed the apostrophe.
Should have ended "job here too" with a fullstop. Superfluous comma before the word "but".
Run-on sentence. There should have been a fullstop before the word "yes".
You are not that good. The contraction would be "You're not that good". That was a declarative sentence so you should have ended the sentence immediately with a fullstop.
Superfluous comma before the word "and".
You have some nerve flaming him for poor grasp of English when your command of the language is so pathetic. His writing was actually pretty good even without taking into consideration that English is likely his second or third language. You have no excuse for your sloppy spelling.
But what else would I expect from somebody who believes they're 280x better than a normal person. Pfft.
Isn't this exactly like the Java CPU that Sun was selling a few years back? And it was simply a close relative of the Lisp processors from the 80s.
C#, Java. .Net, J2EE. CLR, JVM. .NET CPU, Java CPU. So should we expect Microsoft to simply repeat everything that Sun did with Java? If so, wake me up when they declare they're going to release CLR under an open source license.
Really? I actually prefer OpenOffice and I have licenses for all versions of Microsoft Office, so it's not a cost-based decision.
The style handling in OO.org is simply more intelligent than in MSOffice. The Export To PDF feature is so damn handy. The fonts look better in OO.org. The OO.org layout engine actually works; it seems MSOffice has one layout engine for screen and another for printing. MSOffice has frustrating behaviour w.r.t section breaks.
Sure, OO.org has its warts, but I don't think it sucks.
The first commercial success for the Apple II, perhaps. The first spreadsheet? No. The first electronic spreadsheet? No.
Remember what I said about incremental improvement? Dan Bricklin himself says that he saw Visicalc as an incremental improvement to a Texas Instruments calculator.
Even then, the idea of spreadsheets didn't come from Bricklin. They have been used by accountants for 100s of years. So even from that perspective, Bricklin's contribution was an incremental improvement over pen and paper spreadsheets.
Even then, Visicalc was not the first electronic spreadsheet. That honor goes to Mattessich who wrote an electronic spreadsheet in Fortran.
In any event, I think it's unhealthy to focus on "being first". Everything is built upon what was learnt before. That's why technology continues to advance, rather than starting from scratch with each generation.