Mac OS X is 3D. The frontmost app's windows are closer to you than all the other windows. All the background windows are stacked on each other and everything casts a shadow of the right depth.
I think you've misunderstood. We were talking about 3D GUIs, not 3D effects on a 2D "desktop metaphor" GUI. The Aqua interface is still based on the concept of overlapping windows on a flat desktop. It's not "3D like a trophy case". It's simply 2D with some 3D-looking enhancements. The fact that Aqua uses 3D hardware to achieve those fancy effects is irrelevant.
And yes, I know how Aqua achieves some of its effects. You might be aware that there are hacked versions of XFree86 that do something similar; all windows are rendered to texture memory and composited on-the-fly using the 3D hardware. Using one of those hacked XFree86 servers wouldn't transform KDE into a 3D GUI. Do you agree?
However, those who like to run bleeding-edge workstations, and customize their configurations like crazy are the ones that I think Gentoo is aimed at.
This used to be true; Debian focussed so heavily on stability that it trailed the bleeding edge by several years. But thanks to unofficial apt sources (which are now surprisingly common) it's possible for your servers to be stable and your desktops to be bleeding edge.
For example, I'm an exclusive Debianite now running Evolution 1.2.4, Galeon 1.3.4, XFree86 4.3.0, Nautilus 2.2.3.1, etc. I haven't had to compile a package for my desktop since dumping Slackware back in 1994. Not regretting it for a moment.
Okay, 3d is a neat thing. It's really neat because it creates entire new genres of video games. And it also make really cool animation for movies and such possible. However, for user interfaces 3d is bad unless it's a hologram, and we're still talking flat monitors here.
No, I disagree. I know it's the conventional wisdom to say "3D GUIs aren't practical" but I'd like to think that reality isn't constrained by our collective imaginations. Just because you're unable to conceive of a practical 3D GUI doesn't mean one doesn't exist. To be fair, I can't imagine what would work either. But before 1962 there was a similar amount of uncertainty about 2D interfaces.
If I was to extend my imagination - something I'm not very good at - I would like to see a feature where I can "spin" my point of view to see windows that are virtually sitting to my left or behind me. I think that'd be far more useful than multiple virtual desktops; the ON-OFF nature of virtual desktops is painful and it means you need "Move to Desktop 3" buttons, and sticky pushpins, and other stupid concepts. I would prefer a single 3D space that was essentially a large virtual desktop where you only see the windows directly in "front" of you.
If you don't like that idea then don't bother pointing out the flaws. The poor example I've given isn't the point. The point is that there are benefits to a 3D desktop that you and I can't begin to imagine. It's easy to say "that'll never work". It's harder to actually invent something new. This is what distinguishes an inventor (dare I say... an innovator) from the boring masses of cynics.
You do realise that since XFree86 4.0 seperated the drivers from the server, there is no reason why something other than X could not use the X display drivers?
It's not quite that simple. I've helped write some of the XFree86 drivers. There are many strings tying them to the XFree86 architecture.
I'll voice an opinion that'll surely prove to be unpopular around these parts: I like Windows Update.
I like the concept even if I don't like the implementation.
Sure, like any given piece of software, you may run into glitches and bugs at some point. But, overall, Windows Update has provided me with an extremely easy and painless way to keep my systems updated.
Did you read the article? The whole point is that Windows Update is telling you that your system is updated when it is not. It is crashing during the tests, but instead of printing an error message (which would _scare_ the users) it says "everything is OK".
This isn't a glitch. It's an outright failure of the product to do what it claims to do. Would you trust a pest inspector who missed termites? This is a patch inspector that tells you all the patches are installed even when they aren't. You should not be defending this piece of crap!
Because XFree86 is the largest collection of decent high-performance video drivers for Linux.
If you produce a bundle of high-performance video drivers with a decent API and full 2D/3D acceleration then you'll have a means for Linux desktops to drop X11. There have already been a few attempts (eg, Berlin+GGI) but so far nobody has managed to topple XFree86. Despite the warts it's still the best we have.
while i admire your insight nathanh i feel that your comment about the xbox tanking is completely wrong. there is no way that microsoft will allow this to happen and besides, with games like doom 3, counterstrike, fable, perfect dark zero, project gotham 2, half life 2, ninja gaiden, Knights of the old rebublic
As James Bond said, never say never. Dreamcast had Grandia2, Shenmue, Powerstone, MSR, Dead or Alive, Crazy Taxi, and... look what happened to it. Good games don't make a console survive. And to be honest, the Xbox games lineup reads like a list of PC games. The non-exclusive nature of the lineup is a huge strike against it. Would you play HL2 on Xbox or PC? I know I'd play that on PC. Counterstrike? Same deal. It's a PC game because of the strong mod community.
Xbox live network is a point in Xbox's favour. Especially with the very decent pricing. But it doesn't influence me because I'm not in the USA. HALO2 promises to be more of the same damn boring game as HALO1. Neither of those points are trump cards for Xbox.
The battle is far from won. If we were going purely on technical specs the Xbox has the market all sewn up. However Microsoft didn't do their homework on signing up games developers. They've missed the boat on EA, for crying out loud! If that doesn't say "you've fucked up" then nothing does. Xbox isn't a clear winner. But if they keep pulling in the Doom 3s and the Splinter Cells then they stand a good chance of winning the war.
Any time you find yourself in a battle, the more you posture, the more you undermine your position by exposing your weaknesses through your bravado. It is better to approach a battle quietly, and then destroy your opponent completely. IBM knows this.
Damn right. It's like in poker. You don't let anybody know your cards. You just keep a poker face until it's time to show then you completely destroy your opponents with a full house.
IBM is big. They're huge. They've got more lawyers than I've got clean pairs of underwear. They're not stupid; you don't get and stay that big by being stupid. IBM is going to demolish SCO in court. I've no doubt about that.
Oh yes, I agree, the Xbox the dullest, least innovative lineup of all hte major consoles so far. I think Doom3 and Fable pretty much sum up how sucky the games will be.
Your sarcasm will probably be missed by 90% of the Americans reading/.:-)
Doom3 is possibly the game that will convince me to buy an Xbox. I refuse to return to the PC upgrade mill: it is far too expensive considering how few games I play. But with Splinter Cell and Doom3 the Xbox is looking very tempting. It's a shame that the original Xbox lineup was so poor - and that's not flamebait! 5 fucking snowboarding games! - because the hardware is fantastic. I would have loved to have seen FFX on the Xbox.
Still holding back though. I think the Xbox is going to tank within the next 6 months and they'll be dumping them for $100. Fingers crossed. I want to add an Xbox to my Dreamcast in the "dead as a dodo" console collection:-D
I must say, this has been the best decade for gamers. The hardware is cheap and powerful. The games are cinematic and diverse. And the budgets are comparing with movies! It is really a great time to "be alive" in the gaming community. It's so much better than the 80s! It wasn't any fun when it was SNES vs... nothing. The "big 3" console wars have really made the market come alive. I hope it doesn't end soon. I'm enjoying things far too much.
Strange, I hard interpret...
as showing enthusiastic support.
You followed that with "and I can assure you, that's better poetry". But I'll let it go. You don't like the lyrics either. OK. Let's move on.
Let me rephrase thus: Song lyrics have comparable value to poetry. The fact that you dislike certain song lyrics does not make them any 'less good' than poetry
I already told you that my dislike has nothing to do with it. The lyrics I quoted simply aren't any good. You can disagree with the content of an essay while still admiring the quality of the argument. Similarly you can judge the quality of lyrics and poetry without being influenced by personal likes and dislikes.
My personal perspective is that I don't really like the precise lyrics you quoted, but that I do find them more approachable and meaningful than I do the words of (e.g.) Dylan Thomas.
Your personal preference of Christina Aguilera over Dylan Thomas does not mean that her lyrics are "better" than anything Dylan Thomas has ever written. Dylan Thomas was one of the great modern poets. Your personal dislike of his material does not change that fact. That's an argument you should easily agree with; it's your own!
If you'd like to continue this discussion, please switch to email.
No thanks. Stick to the board or end the discussion.
It did suck. Yes, the graphics were very good. Yes, the features were plentiful. Unfortunately the game was PLAIN BORING. The problem is that XBox fanboys assume that criticism of Halo is either jealousy or anti-Microsoft sentiment. No, sorry, it was SIMPLY A BORING GAME.
Don't get me wrong. It's not a *bad* game. It's up there with other second-rate first-person shooters like Max Payne and Red Faction. It's simply not as great as the Halo fanboys would have us believe. It definitely isn't as good as Doom, or Unreal, or Duke3D. Those were all *great* first person shooters. Halo is a "play it and trade it" game. It's simply not a keeper.
The Halo fanboys remind me of the Marathon fanboys back a few years ago. They were just as deluded.
Why shouldn't he? "lyrics" and "music" and "poetry" are all protected by copyright. For the purposes of this discussion, they are interchangeable.
Books and software are also protected by copyright but that doesn't mean you can conflate all five (lyrics, books, music, software and poetry) during a discussion. For example, I can legally make a single backup copy of software but I can't make a backup copy of a music disc. I can legally photocopy part of a book for class discussion but I can't photocopy any portion of sheet music. You cannot "interchange" different forms of copyrighted works halfway through a discussion; copyright is not applied equally to them all.
Just because you don't appreciate it doesn't make it less good.
On the other hand, it's not good just because I don't appreciate it. Face it. It's SHITHOUSE. It's amusing that your rebuttal was basically "hey that is great poetry! you just don't grok it!". I think perhaps you should read it again.
equate easy credit with pronography with miracle diets
I think the Lord was listing 3 types of spam, not claiming they were equal.
Clueless humor, I suppose, but humor.
Actually I think it was just dry British wit that went right over your head. Americans apparently don't understand humor unless there's a cream pie or a "boing" noise involved.
Lyrics are basically poems, and no one would argue that poetry isn't covered by copyright.
Poetry? Let's read an example of modern music and the "poetry" within.
Ahh, heat is up
So ladies, fellas, drop your cups
Body's hot from front to back
Now move your ass - ha, I like that
Tight hip huggers (low fo' sho')
Shake a little somethin' (on the floor)
I need that (uh) to get me off
Sweat until my clothes come off
Any law which makes it illegal to copy crap like that is OK by me.
Why is it people think music is somehow different from other forms of art and can be readily and freely stolen?
I like how you jump from "lyrics" to "music" without even changing gear. If I tried something like that I think I'd ruin the synchro.
If you've flown in USA recently, international or domestic, then you might have had your property seized *and not returned*, body search on multiple occasions before *and after* the flight, and strip searches aren't unheard of.
Airlines have been treating their customers very much like criminals. I daresay the RIAA is looking to them for guidance.
Apple has done in a few years what many in the Linux community have been trying to do for ages..
Seeing as the first serious desktop project (KDE) only formed in 1996 I dispute your insinuation that Linux is failing to deliver; 6.5 years from concept to what we have today is bloody impressive.
If I'm in a room where someone's talking and scribbling equations on a blackboard, I can do a much better job of recording what's important with pencil and paper than I could ever fantasize about punching into a laptop, and I'm a touch typist.
The problem here is that you've been trained to believe that you're learning when you write down everything the lecturer writes on the blackboard. I must admit most of my lecturers were like that too, with one exception. In physics the professor would handout photocopies of slides at the start of his lecture. You could annotate the slides but the majority of the time was spent INTERACTING with the lecturer. There was enough time in a lecture to ASK QUESTIONS. You didn't have to furiously scribble down his notes before he wiped them off the board. If he said something that wasn't in the notes then you'd write it down; I think perhaps I wrote down less than an A4 of "extra" information in a semester. Yet I learnt more in physics than from 100s of lectures where you'd write down 5 pages of indecipherable notes and develop a cramp in your writing hand. I think that it was all due to the style of teaching.
My hope is that they're not trying to use the computers as a dictation device. My hope is that they intend to distribute electronic slides for each class. The student can then use the computer for research and collaboration and discussion and interactive education. If they're just going to develop RSI as they furiously record notes into a keyboard then I'd say that the whole value of a computer has been wasted.
Of course when it happens to Intel, then EVERYBODY knows about it. My question is, how prevelant is this sort of thing throughout the cpu industry?
Very prevalent. A recent/. story spoke of MMU bugs in the 68K series. Ultrasparc CPUs have had cache corruption bugs. I know somebody who was frustrated (for several weeks!) by a register corruption bug in a microcontroller. These bugs are sometimes "fixed" by changing code-generators (eg, compilers) to avoid problematic sequences.
I'm not very familiar with Intel or x86 but my general feeling is that they are better than average.
Your point is valid, however some of us 'elders' had to actually sit down with a book, a pen(cil), a calculator and a piece of paper to do our homework. This simple process is what gives young minds the necessary abilities to NOT rely on a machine to do their thinking for them (calculator exception). Can you possibly imagine what the scientists and engineers of Saturn I had to go through? The first space flights (and even now, to a certain extent) had to have actual charts and graphs on board to help them figure out complex mathmatical compuitations; along with a pen & paper. I'm not saying that current technology shouldn't be relied upon, but not at the sacrifice of good old fashioned learning.
Do you realise you sound like an old fogey? Think about your same attitude as applied to medicine:
Damn kids of today, got it so easy with their disinfectant and penicillin. In my day we made do with leeches and blooding and we were thankful if all we got was an amputation! I'm not saying that modern medicine shouldn't be relied upon, but not as the sacrifice of good old fashioned agony and disease!
Why make the arbitrary distinction of "computer bad, calculator good"? They're both technology. Imagine if your "elders" had forced you to use a slide rule[1]. Imagine if even the pencil had been too advanced and you were forced to use a slate, or an inkwell, or a stone tablet. Also you haven't justified your claim that computers will impede the child's ability to learn. Idiots will always be idiots, but smart people will use a computer to learn faster than if they were tied down by the limitations of their tools.
[1] I used a slide rule for many years and god damn I wished I had a calculator. Using a slide rule did not help me one iota. It was just a huge hinderance and a source of errors.
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I think you've misunderstood. We were talking about 3D GUIs, not 3D effects on a 2D "desktop metaphor" GUI. The Aqua interface is still based on the concept of overlapping windows on a flat desktop. It's not "3D like a trophy case". It's simply 2D with some 3D-looking enhancements. The fact that Aqua uses 3D hardware to achieve those fancy effects is irrelevant.
And yes, I know how Aqua achieves some of its effects. You might be aware that there are hacked versions of XFree86 that do something similar; all windows are rendered to texture memory and composited on-the-fly using the 3D hardware. Using one of those hacked XFree86 servers wouldn't transform KDE into a 3D GUI. Do you agree?
This used to be true; Debian focussed so heavily on stability that it trailed the bleeding edge by several years. But thanks to unofficial apt sources (which are now surprisingly common) it's possible for your servers to be stable and your desktops to be bleeding edge.
For example, I'm an exclusive Debianite now running Evolution 1.2.4, Galeon 1.3.4, XFree86 4.3.0, Nautilus 2.2.3.1, etc. I haven't had to compile a package for my desktop since dumping Slackware back in 1994. Not regretting it for a moment.
No, I disagree. I know it's the conventional wisdom to say "3D GUIs aren't practical" but I'd like to think that reality isn't constrained by our collective imaginations. Just because you're unable to conceive of a practical 3D GUI doesn't mean one doesn't exist. To be fair, I can't imagine what would work either. But before 1962 there was a similar amount of uncertainty about 2D interfaces.
If I was to extend my imagination - something I'm not very good at - I would like to see a feature where I can "spin" my point of view to see windows that are virtually sitting to my left or behind me. I think that'd be far more useful than multiple virtual desktops; the ON-OFF nature of virtual desktops is painful and it means you need "Move to Desktop 3" buttons, and sticky pushpins, and other stupid concepts. I would prefer a single 3D space that was essentially a large virtual desktop where you only see the windows directly in "front" of you.
If you don't like that idea then don't bother pointing out the flaws. The poor example I've given isn't the point. The point is that there are benefits to a 3D desktop that you and I can't begin to imagine. It's easy to say "that'll never work". It's harder to actually invent something new. This is what distinguishes an inventor (dare I say... an innovator) from the boring masses of cynics.
It's not quite that simple. I've helped write some of the XFree86 drivers. There are many strings tying them to the XFree86 architecture.
I would be whinging, loudly.
I know it's trendy to pretend that there's a double standard. Shame that it doesn't exist anywhere except in the minds of trolls.
I like the concept even if I don't like the implementation.
Did you read the article? The whole point is that Windows Update is telling you that your system is updated when it is not. It is crashing during the tests, but instead of printing an error message (which would _scare_ the users) it says "everything is OK".
This isn't a glitch. It's an outright failure of the product to do what it claims to do. Would you trust a pest inspector who missed termites? This is a patch inspector that tells you all the patches are installed even when they aren't. You should not be defending this piece of crap!
Because XFree86 is the largest collection of decent high-performance video drivers for Linux.
If you produce a bundle of high-performance video drivers with a decent API and full 2D/3D acceleration then you'll have a means for Linux desktops to drop X11. There have already been a few attempts (eg, Berlin+GGI) but so far nobody has managed to topple XFree86. Despite the warts it's still the best we have.
As James Bond said, never say never. Dreamcast had Grandia2, Shenmue, Powerstone, MSR, Dead or Alive, Crazy Taxi, and... look what happened to it. Good games don't make a console survive. And to be honest, the Xbox games lineup reads like a list of PC games. The non-exclusive nature of the lineup is a huge strike against it. Would you play HL2 on Xbox or PC? I know I'd play that on PC. Counterstrike? Same deal. It's a PC game because of the strong mod community.
Xbox live network is a point in Xbox's favour. Especially with the very decent pricing. But it doesn't influence me because I'm not in the USA. HALO2 promises to be more of the same damn boring game as HALO1. Neither of those points are trump cards for Xbox.
The battle is far from won. If we were going purely on technical specs the Xbox has the market all sewn up. However Microsoft didn't do their homework on signing up games developers. They've missed the boat on EA, for crying out loud! If that doesn't say "you've fucked up" then nothing does. Xbox isn't a clear winner. But if they keep pulling in the Doom 3s and the Splinter Cells then they stand a good chance of winning the war.
Until the next round of consoles, anyway :-)
Damn right. It's like in poker. You don't let anybody know your cards. You just keep a poker face until it's time to show then you completely destroy your opponents with a full house.
IBM is big. They're huge. They've got more lawyers than I've got clean pairs of underwear. They're not stupid; you don't get and stay that big by being stupid. IBM is going to demolish SCO in court. I've no doubt about that.
Your sarcasm will probably be missed by 90% of the Americans reading /. :-)
Doom3 is possibly the game that will convince me to buy an Xbox. I refuse to return to the PC upgrade mill: it is far too expensive considering how few games I play. But with Splinter Cell and Doom3 the Xbox is looking very tempting. It's a shame that the original Xbox lineup was so poor - and that's not flamebait! 5 fucking snowboarding games! - because the hardware is fantastic. I would have loved to have seen FFX on the Xbox.
Still holding back though. I think the Xbox is going to tank within the next 6 months and they'll be dumping them for $100. Fingers crossed. I want to add an Xbox to my Dreamcast in the "dead as a dodo" console collection :-D
I must say, this has been the best decade for gamers. The hardware is cheap and powerful. The games are cinematic and diverse. And the budgets are comparing with movies! It is really a great time to "be alive" in the gaming community. It's so much better than the 80s! It wasn't any fun when it was SNES vs... nothing. The "big 3" console wars have really made the market come alive. I hope it doesn't end soon. I'm enjoying things far too much.
You followed that with "and I can assure you, that's better poetry". But I'll let it go. You don't like the lyrics either. OK. Let's move on.
I already told you that my dislike has nothing to do with it. The lyrics I quoted simply aren't any good. You can disagree with the content of an essay while still admiring the quality of the argument. Similarly you can judge the quality of lyrics and poetry without being influenced by personal likes and dislikes.
Your personal preference of Christina Aguilera over Dylan Thomas does not mean that her lyrics are "better" than anything Dylan Thomas has ever written. Dylan Thomas was one of the great modern poets. Your personal dislike of his material does not change that fact. That's an argument you should easily agree with; it's your own!
No thanks. Stick to the board or end the discussion.
It did suck. Yes, the graphics were very good. Yes, the features were plentiful. Unfortunately the game was PLAIN BORING. The problem is that XBox fanboys assume that criticism of Halo is either jealousy or anti-Microsoft sentiment. No, sorry, it was SIMPLY A BORING GAME.
Don't get me wrong. It's not a *bad* game. It's up there with other second-rate first-person shooters like Max Payne and Red Faction. It's simply not as great as the Halo fanboys would have us believe. It definitely isn't as good as Doom, or Unreal, or Duke3D. Those were all *great* first person shooters. Halo is a "play it and trade it" game. It's simply not a keeper.
The Halo fanboys remind me of the Marathon fanboys back a few years ago. They were just as deluded.
You did say it "doesn't make it less good". I'm finding it difficult to interpret those words as anything other than your enthusiastic support.
Actually I'm finding it difficult to interpret those words at all. Would you care to rephrase?
Books and software are also protected by copyright but that doesn't mean you can conflate all five (lyrics, books, music, software and poetry) during a discussion. For example, I can legally make a single backup copy of software but I can't make a backup copy of a music disc. I can legally photocopy part of a book for class discussion but I can't photocopy any portion of sheet music. You cannot "interchange" different forms of copyrighted works halfway through a discussion; copyright is not applied equally to them all.
On the other hand, it's not good just because I don't appreciate it. Face it. It's SHITHOUSE. It's amusing that your rebuttal was basically "hey that is great poetry! you just don't grok it!". I think perhaps you should read it again.
Did KDE copy from Windows or did they both copy from the experts.
I think the Lord was listing 3 types of spam, not claiming they were equal.
Actually I think it was just dry British wit that went right over your head. Americans apparently don't understand humor unless there's a cream pie or a "boing" noise involved.
Poetry? Let's read an example of modern music and the "poetry" within.
Any law which makes it illegal to copy crap like that is OK by me.
I like how you jump from "lyrics" to "music" without even changing gear. If I tried something like that I think I'd ruin the synchro.
If you've flown in USA recently, international or domestic, then you might have had your property seized *and not returned*, body search on multiple occasions before *and after* the flight, and strip searches aren't unheard of.
Airlines have been treating their customers very much like criminals. I daresay the RIAA is looking to them for guidance.
Airlines.
No shit?
Seeing as the first serious desktop project (KDE) only formed in 1996 I dispute your insinuation that Linux is failing to deliver; 6.5 years from concept to what we have today is bloody impressive.
The problem here is that you've been trained to believe that you're learning when you write down everything the lecturer writes on the blackboard. I must admit most of my lecturers were like that too, with one exception. In physics the professor would handout photocopies of slides at the start of his lecture. You could annotate the slides but the majority of the time was spent INTERACTING with the lecturer. There was enough time in a lecture to ASK QUESTIONS. You didn't have to furiously scribble down his notes before he wiped them off the board. If he said something that wasn't in the notes then you'd write it down; I think perhaps I wrote down less than an A4 of "extra" information in a semester. Yet I learnt more in physics than from 100s of lectures where you'd write down 5 pages of indecipherable notes and develop a cramp in your writing hand. I think that it was all due to the style of teaching.
My hope is that they're not trying to use the computers as a dictation device. My hope is that they intend to distribute electronic slides for each class. The student can then use the computer for research and collaboration and discussion and interactive education. If they're just going to develop RSI as they furiously record notes into a keyboard then I'd say that the whole value of a computer has been wasted.
Very prevalent. A recent /. story spoke of MMU bugs in the 68K series. Ultrasparc CPUs have had cache corruption bugs. I know somebody who was frustrated (for several weeks!) by a register corruption bug in a microcontroller. These bugs are sometimes "fixed" by changing code-generators (eg, compilers) to avoid problematic sequences.
I'm not very familiar with Intel or x86 but my general feeling is that they are better than average.
Do you realise you sound like an old fogey? Think about your same attitude as applied to medicine:
Why make the arbitrary distinction of "computer bad, calculator good"? They're both technology. Imagine if your "elders" had forced you to use a slide rule[1]. Imagine if even the pencil had been too advanced and you were forced to use a slate, or an inkwell, or a stone tablet. Also you haven't justified your claim that computers will impede the child's ability to learn. Idiots will always be idiots, but smart people will use a computer to learn faster than if they were tied down by the limitations of their tools.
[1] I used a slide rule for many years and god damn I wished I had a calculator. Using a slide rule did not help me one iota. It was just a huge hinderance and a source of errors.