> I don't even want to think what Unix would have been like if it had been created by Finns or Hawaiians.
I recall hearing something about a Finnish student dabbling in creating his own Unix back in the early 90's... named Linos or something... anyone know if he had any success with that? He could call it "Finnux" or something...
Well, gtkpod can make playlists, edit metainfo, and sync with an iPod in a similar way to iTunes. It also lets you copy music off of the iPod, which iirc iTunes doesn't allow. It just can't buy music online with it, which is too bad. (and admittedly it's not as pretty as iTunes)
MythTV adds an extra layer of hierarchy for the artist names, based on first letter, so it's
Artist First Letter -> Artist -> Album -> Song
Which means that you need to make 1 more choice, but in return you don't have to scroll through a list of hundreds. This isn't good for browsing (e.g. when you don't already know what you want), but it's much faster to locate songs otherwise, so it's a tradeoff.
The time it takes to scroll through a single level of hierarchy on the iPod is linear: If you double the number of artists, it will take twice as long on average to locate a particular artist. Adding levels of hierarchy makes the number of artist names you have to read closer to logarithmic --- much faster to navigate.
The ideal way to do it would be to add another level of hierarchy every time there were more than N entries in a particular level, where N would have to be determined but I suspect it's around 50.
> Menu bar at top of screen! > what the fuck are you talking about? consistant UI is FUNCTION
Well, "consistant" spelling is function, too, but keeping something around just because it's what people are accustomed to is a poor alternative to replacing it with something correct.
The Mac's menu bar behavior is a vestigial design decision from the days before multi-tasking; they keep it around because it's part of the "look-and-feel"... hence form above function. That was my point.
(Sure, it's subjective, but I'm pretty sure the vast majority of serious computer users would agree that the menu-for-each-window scheme works better.)
This is exactly what I meant by "nearly flat". Here's a breakdown:
1. genre->artist->album->song
Bad for locating particular songs, since many artists/albums can be rightly placed in any number of genres. It's nice for a "surprise me with something jazzy" scenario, but the issue we're talking about here is how easy/difficult it is to select what you want. Which leaves us with a hierarchy at best 3 deep.
2. artist->album->song
I have 324 artists on my iPod, and that's not counting albums with multiple artists. That alone is really hard to navigate with the scroll wheel. It would sure be nice to have a breakdown by first letter, but Apple would never do that because it doesn't fit their aesthetic.
3. album->song
1290 albums. Again, same problem. Granted, there would be fewer albums if I'd bought them all from iTunes, but my mp3 collection is a rag-tag combination of ripping and p2p. No iTunes for me since I'm on Linux.
4. song
Yes, this is the worst. Maybe it makes sense if you're only got a hundred songs, but worthless once you're past that.
Aside: I installed MythTV the other day. The music player doesn't use any ID3 information, but it manages to be very functional with limited input devices (e.g. remote control) and not using much more display space than the iPod. It does this by having more levels of hierarchy!
The scroll wheel is great for sorting through a list of maybe ten options -- way better than clicking "down down down down...", but it really sucks for thousands.
What the iPod's UI really, seriously lacks is the proper HIERARCHY. I mean, it's nearly flat, which forces you to scroll through sorted lists of sometimes thousands of items when you can only see ten or so on a single screen. Apple consistently places form so far above function* it's laughable.
If this kit really is open enough that anybody can take a stab at modifying it's UI, I'll buy one. Bonus points for letting us in on the OS code. Sure, it's not for everybody, but speaking on behalf of hobbyists and tinkerers, I would love to play with something like this.
* Form above function: Single button mouse! Menu bar at top of screen! iPod UI! Etc etc feh
This can be done on Linux too... Google for 'encrypted filesystem linux'. For the extra paranoid, you can then encrypt the resulting filesystem-in-a-file with your encryption of choice, burn it to a DVD, smash it in to little pieces, and swallow it. Datalicious!
I seriously think that having one of these stickers on your car would make it unsafe to park anywhere except inside of your fortified Mercer Island garage (prolly what the Republican rep. has in mind anyway).
Let's just rename the HOV lane to the "Citizenship Plus lane," and be done with it...
It is unfortunate that business in downtown Seattle has been hurt* so badly by the protests. As one who participated in Tuesday's protest, I am sincerly sympathetic to the bystanders whose lives were disrupted as a result- it was an unfortunate but necessary side effect of the protests.
HOWEVER, would you rather that the protestors had simply not been allowed their freedoms of speech and assembly**? Can you think of a MORE EFFECTIVE protest that could have been performed by the random crowd of 30,000-50,000 people? The very fact that this is being discussed on/. right now is proof of the protest's success: It made front page news across the world, and BLAM! Instant awareness.
* To be fair, business has been hurt just as badly by the Draconian police response to non-violent and violent protestors alike. People are afraid to go downtown. I was there Friday morning; it was a ghost town compared to the usual pre-holiday bustle.
** Incidentally, for those who aren't following the situation, the Mayor declared a state of civil emergency, called in the national guard (via the Governor), brought about a curfew in Seattle (after which, people downtown could be arrested for no reason at all), and imposed a "no protest zone" (punishible by immediate arrest) on 50 blocks of downtown Seattle. So after Tuesday, protestors WERE denied their rights to free speech and assembly. As of right now, around 700 people have been arrested, the vast majority for non-violent protest.
The WTO effectively has the power to overrule laws passed democratically by sovereign nations which are seen as trade barriers. Under the WTO's definition, laws enacted to protect the environment, fight child labor, and protect animal rights are considered "trade barriers." Countries which refuse to comply with the WTO's demands to remove such laws are fined heavily and subjected to sanctions. Perhaps the most disturbing fact, however, is that the WTO's decisions are made in secret, closed to the public and the media. The people making the decisions were never elected by anyone, and are not accountable to the populations of the nations over which they have power.
Examples: * U.S. forced to allow trade of Venezuelan oil, which did not meet the standards of the Clean Air Act.
* E.U. contries forced to accept genetically engineered foods and U.S. hormonally treated beef.
* The WTO has ruled that trade barriers can't target a product on the basis of how it was produced. Hence, the U.S. is not allowed to reject Tuna whose fishing technique also kills dolphins... products made by child laborers cannot be banned... products produced by sweatshop workers who earn 14 cents an hour must be accepted.
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> I don't even want to think what Unix would have been like if it had been created by Finns or Hawaiians.
I recall hearing something about a Finnish student dabbling in creating his own Unix back in the early 90's... named Linos or something... anyone know if he had any success with that? He could call it "Finnux" or something...
Well, gtkpod can make playlists, edit metainfo, and sync with an iPod in a similar way to iTunes. It also lets you copy music off of the iPod, which iirc iTunes doesn't allow. It just can't buy music online with it, which is too bad. (and admittedly it's not as pretty as iTunes)
MythTV adds an extra layer of hierarchy for the artist names, based on first letter, so it's
Artist First Letter -> Artist -> Album -> Song
Which means that you need to make 1 more choice, but in return you don't have to scroll through a list of hundreds.
This isn't good for browsing (e.g. when you don't already know what you want), but it's much faster to locate songs otherwise, so it's a tradeoff.
The time it takes to scroll through a single level of hierarchy on the iPod is linear: If you double the number of artists, it will take twice as long on average to locate a particular artist. Adding levels of hierarchy makes the number of artist names you have to read closer to logarithmic --- much faster to navigate.
The ideal way to do it would be to add another level of hierarchy every time there were more than N entries in a particular level, where N would have to be determined but I suspect it's around 50.
Data structures, yay.
> Menu bar at top of screen!
> what the fuck are you talking about? consistant UI is FUNCTION
Well, "consistant" spelling is function, too, but keeping something around just because it's what people are accustomed to is a poor alternative to replacing it with something correct.
The Mac's menu bar behavior is a vestigial design decision from the days before multi-tasking; they keep it around because it's part of the "look-and-feel"... hence form above function. That was my point.
(Sure, it's subjective, but I'm pretty sure the vast majority of serious computer users would agree that the menu-for-each-window scheme works better.)
--------
Troll me!
This is exactly what I meant by "nearly flat". Here's a breakdown:
1. genre->artist->album->song
Bad for locating particular songs, since many artists/albums can be rightly placed in any number of genres. It's nice for a "surprise me with something jazzy" scenario, but the issue we're talking about here is how easy/difficult it is to select what you want. Which leaves us with a hierarchy at best 3 deep.
2. artist->album->song
I have 324 artists on my iPod, and that's not counting albums with multiple artists. That alone is really hard to navigate with the scroll wheel. It would sure be nice to have a breakdown by first letter, but Apple would never do that because it doesn't fit their aesthetic.
3. album->song
1290 albums. Again, same problem. Granted, there would be fewer albums if I'd bought them all from iTunes, but my mp3 collection is a rag-tag combination of ripping and p2p. No iTunes for me since I'm on Linux.
4. song
Yes, this is the worst. Maybe it makes sense if you're only got a hundred songs, but worthless once you're past that.
Aside: I installed MythTV the other day. The music player doesn't use any ID3 information, but it manages to be very functional with limited input devices (e.g. remote control) and not using much more display space than the iPod. It does this by having more levels of hierarchy!
Amen!
The scroll wheel is great for sorting through a list of maybe ten options -- way better than clicking "down down down down...", but it really sucks for thousands.
What the iPod's UI really, seriously lacks is the proper HIERARCHY. I mean, it's nearly flat, which forces you to scroll through sorted lists of sometimes thousands of items when you can only see ten or so on a single screen. Apple consistently places form so far above function* it's laughable.
If this kit really is open enough that anybody can take a stab at modifying it's UI, I'll buy one. Bonus points for letting us in on the OS code. Sure, it's not for everybody, but speaking on behalf of hobbyists and tinkerers, I would love to play with something like this.
* Form above function: Single button mouse! Menu bar at top of screen! iPod UI! Etc etc feh
This can be done on Linux too... Google for 'encrypted filesystem linux'. For the extra paranoid, you can then encrypt the resulting filesystem-in-a-file with your encryption of choice, burn it to a DVD, smash it in to little pieces, and swallow it. Datalicious!
No kidding.. I just bought gf 6600, and it gets about 11800 frames per second on glxgears... why on earth would you need that for a media box?
"...he's worried that Google's plans to create digital copies of books obtained directly from libraries could hurt his industry's long-term revenues."
Yeah, and Gutenberg's press had a devastating effect on long-term revenues of the copy-manuscripts-by-hand industry.
Feh.
I seriously think that having one of these stickers on your car would make it unsafe to park anywhere except inside of your fortified Mercer Island garage (prolly what the Republican rep. has in mind anyway).
Let's just rename the HOV lane to the
"Citizenship Plus lane," and be done with it...
It is unfortunate that business in downtown Seattle has been hurt* so badly by the protests. As one who participated in Tuesday's protest, I am sincerly sympathetic to the bystanders whose lives were disrupted as a result- it was an unfortunate but necessary side effect of the protests.
HOWEVER, would you rather that the protestors had simply not been allowed their freedoms of speech and assembly**? Can you think of a MORE EFFECTIVE protest that could have been performed by the random crowd of 30,000-50,000 people? The very fact that this is being discussed on
* To be fair, business has been hurt just as badly by the Draconian police response to non-violent and violent protestors alike. People are afraid to go downtown. I was there Friday morning; it was a ghost town compared to the usual pre-holiday bustle.
** Incidentally, for those who aren't following the situation, the Mayor declared a state of civil emergency, called in the national guard (via the Governor), brought about a curfew in Seattle (after which, people downtown could be arrested for no reason at all), and imposed a "no protest zone" (punishible by immediate arrest) on 50 blocks of downtown Seattle. So after Tuesday, protestors WERE denied their rights to free speech and assembly. As of right now, around 700 people have been arrested, the vast majority for non-violent protest.
Here are a few, for starters:
The WTO effectively has the power to overrule laws passed democratically by sovereign nations which are seen as trade barriers. Under the WTO's definition, laws enacted to protect the environment, fight child labor, and protect animal rights are considered "trade barriers." Countries which refuse to comply with the WTO's demands to remove such laws are fined heavily and subjected to sanctions.
Perhaps the most disturbing fact, however, is that the WTO's decisions are made in secret, closed to the public and the media. The people making the decisions were never elected by anyone, and are not accountable to the populations of the nations over which they have power.
Examples:
* U.S. forced to allow trade of Venezuelan oil, which did not meet the standards of the Clean Air Act.
* E.U. contries forced to accept genetically engineered foods and U.S. hormonally treated beef.
* The WTO has ruled that trade barriers can't target a product on the basis of how it was produced. Hence, the U.S. is not allowed to reject Tuna whose fishing technique also kills dolphins... products made by child laborers cannot be banned... products produced by sweatshop workers who earn 14 cents an hour must be accepted.