My friend, I am not in the business of recommending browsers for Solaris users. I AM, however, literally in the business of telling people that N4.7 is an old browser. It's years old. Years, man.
I guess if I were to get into the business of recommending browsers, I'd recommend Mozilla for everyone. That's what I use on my Mac and whenever I'm around Linux (usually at work) and I enjoy, with Moz, full PNG support. Mozilla can be built on any platform.
Man, I don't know a heck of a lot about the codec details for GIF, PNG, and JPEG. I know that GIF and JPEG are lossy, and PNG is not.
I also know that I make websites. And when I decided to try out PNG, I made up a bunch of images in all three formats and compared sizes. PNG images were usually slightly larger than GIFs, and much larger than JPEGs. Don't ask me why, that's just the way the cookie crumbled.
Furthermore, Photoshop can save PNGs as 8-bit graphics. So I don't know why you think otherwise.
So what is this bozo filter about? I did tests. I shared my test results. I stand behind what I said.
That's a supreme idea. Take it the final step forward and write it up: submit to Slashdot the "Whitepaper on the 'PLAINTEXT' Encryption Scheme". Hell, I know all MY code is encoded using the PLAINTEXT Encryption Scheme, and yours probably is, too.
At the very least, it would be a great way to get a funny letter back from one of these big companies. Imagine them sending you a letter that said
"Stop distributing Code X. Under the DMCA, it is a circumvention device for our Product Y."
Send them back a letter saying
"Code X is distributed exclusively under the PLAINTEXT Encryption Scheme, which is covered under Title Z of the DMCA. Please explain how you determined our noncompliance with your intellectual property without breaking the PLAINTEXT Encryption Scheme (and thus violating the DMCA) and then we can talk."
What would you get back? They'd pretty much have to respond with "Fuck you". And you would respond back with "No, fuck YOU." In the end their lawyers would outlaw you, but the letters would be precious.
As others have pointed out, PNG graphics are supported in all modern browsers. Even old browsers such as N4.7 had partial support for PNG. My personal website (shameless plug) for instance, uses no GIF images because I decided to support the whole patent protest thing. Websites could have switched from GIF to PNG about 15 months ago and left behind only 5% of users. Why didn't they? Who knows. Maybe it's for that last 5%.
Your assertion, however, that PNG is "superior in every way to GIF" isn't quite true. First of all, PNG graphics are larger than GIF files. Sometimes the difference is only minimal (file sizes are ~5-1-% larger for images that look like advertisements/banners/few colors) but can be MUCH MUCH larger (several times as large) in photographic uses (full color).
saintlupus, i know this is offtopic, but can you tell me whether an iMac is able to be single-booted with linux? i mean, can i set up my iMac with ONLY linux, and no Mac OS at all? for the life of me i can't find the answer on the Yellow Dog or LinuxPPC websites.
So the general feeling on Slashdot seems to be that the yellow links are bad because the content owners should control the display of their information.
But that's a slippery slope. Shouldn't users have the right to install software like this? I mean, I might find it really compelling to have sites intelligently linked together. Naturally, most of us aren't fans of this being used as advertising, but it's the same thing: if that's what the customer wants (installs) they should be able to have it.
And even if you disagree with me on that point, would you argue the same about stylesheets? The CSS 1 spec states that user agent (personal web browser) stylesheets have precidence over page-specified stylesheets. So if I want, I could force my browser to display Slashdot with a pink background, orange text, and whatnot. Clearly that's okay, but Taco probably wouldn't choose those colors himself.
"The law is performing the way we hoped," said Rep. Howard Coble (R-North Carolina), chairman of the House Judiciary's subcommittee on intellectual property. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat and Coble's counterpart, said through a spokesman that she is "not looking to change" the law.
Hmmm... note to self... do not vote fore Rep. Coble
The first thing I thought was "WOW was that really the 1980s? I was NINE when that thing hit?" SO I went and looked it up. That particular virus spread in the "early 1990s" from what I can find -- still a long time ago but maybe I was twelve or something.
I saw Dan Rather talk about that virus on the news back in the day and got all scared that my Macintosh LC III would get infected. That's literally the day I learned that virii were platform dependant.
Thank God, because I've gotten like three or four Word docs mailed to me in the past few days from this damn virus, but I have neither Word nor Windows nor do I know the wags the emails come from so I'm not really scared.
I'm a Computer Science major at Dartmouth College. I'm nearing the end of my major. Here are some of the ways computer science is taught at Dartmouth:
First we're taught basic programming. CS5 is the intro class, intended for majors and nonmajors alike. It was taught in C++ when I took it a couple years ago, and now it's taught in Java. The idea is that it's an INTRO class, so you want a language that is fairly simple to learn and to use. Java is absolutely more simple than C++, you can all go and argue why to yourselves.
The next class (for majors) is CS18. CS18 is taught in a language called Dylan, which is a Lisp-like language. Dylan is fully object oriented, and has a consistent syntax. Dylan is used because it is scientifically interesting. Ignoring the fact that it is generally interpreted inside an aweful Java applet (NOODLE), it's an OK lanugage. Most notably, the class centered on teaching the students exactly what OO means and how to use it: my prof, for instance, told us all about how Java was broken from the beginning because functions aren't objects like they are in Dylan, among other things. Dylan was a fine language for this use. At the end of the course we were able to write most of a Dylan interpreter in Dylan. THAT was an interesting excercise.
One of the next classes, CS37, was taught in MIPS assembler. CS37 was a hardware class, so assembler was appropriate. Some comments have suggested assembler as an intro language, and I gag at the thought. Having a deep-down appreciation of the low levels of computing can be learned after the spark or interest has developed in a young computer scientist. If I had to write loops using JUMP and GOTO in the intro class, I might have been a (gasp!) English major.
Dartmouth's Networking class (for CS people, not for business people:) is taught using Java. That's really nice, because with the pleasant abstractions provided by Java's class heirarchy a student can get down and write a neat-o little program and not worry about Socket implementations.
I love Java now that I've learned it, and I really back it's use in intro classes. CLEARLY, Java should not be the only language used. If I were to graduate from college not knowing Java, C, C++, some form of Lisp, some form of assembler, and a few scripting languages, I wouldn't consider myself educated in the field. Dartmouth's problem is its nonuse of Perl or other such languages (I've had to learn a couple on my own). I love perl... but that's another comment altogether.
Using Mozilla now on a Mac, I can say "finally, Mozilla is good enough that I can stop using IE5." I'm happy, because the rendering finally got JUST fast enough, and the 40 second startup time is JUST fast enought. It used to be over a minute. I just couldn't wait that long to see a web page, so I had to use IE.
To the Moz team: thank you so much. I was beginning to worry that speed was never going to be addressed. I have the highest hopes now for M1.0. Go Go!
Okay. I'll tell you that. I have a rev. A iMac with 96 megs of RAM and OSX works reasonably well. (Note that the RAM requirements will hopefully drop in future releases of the software.) It's not really snappy, of course, and my 96 megs of RAM means I can't really run legacy software but all X software works fine (and there is plenty). I am buying a $110 256 RAM module so I can run legacy software, but it's not required. So your $500 estimate, for me, means $110 in RAM and $130 for OS X. And really, you don't need the RAM necessarily.
Plus, rev A iMacs were designed to run OS 8.1, not OS X. If you want a superb box for OS X, go buy one. That's what I'll do when I get too frustrated with the speed of my box.
PS Yes I'm somewhat of a developer (a monor programmer). C++ and Java, mostly, though I'm excited about the possibilities for perl on X. The dev tools work fine on my box.
I'm a Dartmouth College student and that happened here. Here's the story:
Once upon a time our math department used Mathematica. They liked it, or at least used it, because it's pretty much standard. They used "Keyserved" copies of the program, which is a little thing which allows software to work only if you log on as a validated user, and only so X number of the program can run at once. Everyone liked this setup just fine.
Then five or so years ago the Mathematica people were developing a new version of the software and Dartmouth was very, very active in the testing and debugging of it. All during the debugging process we used Keyserved copies of the beta software.
Come release time, Dartmouth bought X number of copies of Mathmatica. When they arrived, they weren't Keyserved. "Whoops" we thought "They sent us the wrong software." So we asked them about it and they said "Oh we were never planning to release the final version under Keyserve."
Dartmouth told them in no uncertain terms to stick Mathematica where the sun didn't shine, and we've been using Maple ever since.
I don't know how much money Mathematica lost due to Dartmouth switching, but think of a couple hundred copies of the software (that might be a tad high) at $1500 a piece or something (Keyserved software is generally a tad more expensive than out-of-the-box software because so many more people have access to it), plus countless copies that would have been sold to students and faculty for home use.
I think Linux people aren't the only ones that are going to be upset about this. Anyone think Mr. Gates might have something to say about theming an OS? Clearly, this is something that makes Apple look bad in our eyes, but is not something we should worry about because theming has been done for years and years.
Somehow I don't think MS will be renting out their Windows software for $2 per month. Try $45 per month.
I don't use windows at all, but I'm telling you, if Apple ever tries to put copy protection deep into their OS, or tries to rent me software, I'll finally just switch all the way to Linux.
No, no. Trademark is a publicity thing, OR a registration thing. First of all, if your project has any money whatsoever, you can officially register your name as a trademark. The actual registration is pretty cheap, though you may have to pay a lawyer if the paperwork gets too hairy.
The other way to establish a trademark is through public use. Many of you may remember that McDonald's got in a big fight with a little girl and her father who had registered the trademark "Nothing But Net" some time before all those McDonald's commercials. The problem was that the little girl (who technically held the trademark) had never used it in a very public fashion; but McDonald's had never tried to register the trademark.
So what I'd do is check to see if there is an official trademark on the name you want to use. If there is, find another; you're probably out of luck. If there isn't, just make sure you throw up a dated web page showing that you are using the name publically as of some certain date. The publicity aspect of trademark protection is thus granted, and you should be fine.
You know what really makes me happy is the fact that it's the big companies paying the bills for court decisions that otherwise the little guys might have had to fight for. Think about what would have happened if ThinkGeek had tried to use a one-click system, or FatBrain.
I'm really surprised more companies aren't fighting for the same rights we are. Why aren't the MP3 patent holders fightiing alongside Napster? There is MUCH less incentive for me to pay for MP3 software (and they get a cut of that purchase price) without Napster. Why aren't the hardware producers fighting laws saying they pay royalties to the RIAA for things like tape recorders? Why aren't DVD player makers fighting on the side of DeCSS? Why isn't Microsoft fighting Apple's assertions of control over the Aqua interface?
I mean really, a bunch of people are fighting RAMBUS! I'm surprised we don't hear more of this.
provides a reasonable level of promotional support for concerts, merchandising, radio airplay, and the like. Napster does not provide this model.
I really disagree. First of all, Napster unquestionably provides a distribution model that provides a reasonable level of promotional support for artists. It's really great how many new artists I've discovered because of MP3s. Not necessarily just because of Napster, but if a friend says (as often happens) "hey have you heard this new stuff from Boo Williams?" and I say "Boo who?" (no pun intended -- go download his music it's great) then all of a sudden Boo has an opportunity to have his music heard by someone who never would have heard it otherwise. Super!
Thankfully, MOST of the artists that I listen to have come down on the PRO NAPSTER side. This includes Ben Folds Five, Green Day, Limp Bizkit, The Offspring, Chuck D, and others. Unfortunately, some of my favorite artists have come down on the other side. These include the most vocal three: Metallica, Dr. Dre, and Eminem. That sucks.
MORALLY I get over the problem. Is it morally wrong for me to want free music? I don't think so. Is it morally wrong for an artist to produce work that I listen to for free, never buying his CD, never going to his concert, never buying his T-Shirts? Perhaps. Perhaps not. But certainly it is no worse that middlemen becoming so ridiculously rich by screwing me with $18 CDs. CDs should be between four and six dollars; about half should go to the artist (about what they get now, or a bit more).
Trust me, I sleep just fine at nite having spent the whole day listening to MP3s. And I do own CDs -- oh God do I own CDs. I counted once, and I probably gave the RIAA $4,000+ in my (short) lifetime. That's a lot. A whole lot. I figure they are still $3,500 ahead after all the free downloading I've done.
I also, by the way, have 'discovered' artists via MP3s and Napster, and subsequently bought their CDs and gone to their concerts (e.g. Cypress Hill and Lavay Smith -- don't laugh) so those artists are definately ahead because otherwise they wouldn't have seen any of my money at all.
Just fyi, the RIAA did provide evidence that CD sales were impacted by Napster. They used the report that focused on college campuses. Now, you and me both think that report was bunk, but the appealate court "agreed" in their recent decision, that the report was valid. For more info, read the recent decision. It's all in there.
Yeah I agree. I mean, if publishing were so cheap and depended mostly on the price of paper, we'd see some sort of huge coggate industry of free ezines, news websites, and individuals publishing just because they like it.
Open the command line term program that comes with OSX
Do whatever you'd do at the command line
Apple is doing everyone a service by giving us the best of both worlds. I just with the new Finder was more of a shell; I wish I could choose to boot into BSD.
Slashdot Mirror
I guess if I were to get into the business of recommending browsers, I'd recommend Mozilla for everyone. That's what I use on my Mac and whenever I'm around Linux (usually at work) and I enjoy, with Moz, full PNG support. Mozilla can be built on any platform.
Man, I don't know a heck of a lot about the codec details for GIF, PNG, and JPEG. I know that GIF and JPEG are lossy, and PNG is not.
I also know that I make websites. And when I decided to try out PNG, I made up a bunch of images in all three formats and compared sizes. PNG images were usually slightly larger than GIFs, and much larger than JPEGs. Don't ask me why, that's just the way the cookie crumbled.
Furthermore, Photoshop can save PNGs as 8-bit graphics. So I don't know why you think otherwise.
So what is this bozo filter about? I did tests. I shared my test results. I stand behind what I said.
At the very least, it would be a great way to get a funny letter back from one of these big companies. Imagine them sending you a letter that said
"Stop distributing Code X. Under the DMCA, it is a circumvention device for our Product Y."
Send them back a letter saying
"Code X is distributed exclusively under the PLAINTEXT Encryption Scheme, which is covered under Title Z of the DMCA. Please explain how you determined our noncompliance with your intellectual property without breaking the PLAINTEXT Encryption Scheme (and thus violating the DMCA) and then we can talk."
What would you get back? They'd pretty much have to respond with "Fuck you". And you would respond back with "No, fuck YOU." In the end their lawyers would outlaw you, but the letters would be precious.
Your assertion, however, that PNG is "superior in every way to GIF" isn't quite true. First of all, PNG graphics are larger than GIF files. Sometimes the difference is only minimal (file sizes are ~5-1-% larger for images that look like advertisements/banners/few colors) but can be MUCH MUCH larger (several times as large) in photographic uses (full color).
saintlupus, i know this is offtopic, but can you tell me whether an iMac is able to be single-booted with linux? i mean, can i set up my iMac with ONLY linux, and no Mac OS at all? for the life of me i can't find the answer on the Yellow Dog or LinuxPPC websites.
But that's a slippery slope. Shouldn't users have the right to install software like this? I mean, I might find it really compelling to have sites intelligently linked together. Naturally, most of us aren't fans of this being used as advertising, but it's the same thing: if that's what the customer wants (installs) they should be able to have it.
And even if you disagree with me on that point, would you argue the same about stylesheets? The CSS 1 spec states that user agent (personal web browser) stylesheets have precidence over page-specified stylesheets. So if I want, I could force my browser to display Slashdot with a pink background, orange text, and whatnot. Clearly that's okay, but Taco probably wouldn't choose those colors himself.
MyopicProwls
Hmmm... note to self... do not vote fore Rep. Coble
MyopicProwls
I saw Dan Rather talk about that virus on the news back in the day and got all scared that my Macintosh LC III would get infected. That's literally the day I learned that virii were platform dependant.
Thank God, because I've gotten like three or four Word docs mailed to me in the past few days from this damn virus, but I have neither Word nor Windows nor do I know the wags the emails come from so I'm not really scared.
MyopicProwls
Um... I don't think any good geek needs help finding the square root of 144 or the value of 2-to-the-10.
MyopicProwls
First we're taught basic programming. CS5 is the intro class, intended for majors and nonmajors alike. It was taught in C++ when I took it a couple years ago, and now it's taught in Java. The idea is that it's an INTRO class, so you want a language that is fairly simple to learn and to use. Java is absolutely more simple than C++, you can all go and argue why to yourselves.
The next class (for majors) is CS18. CS18 is taught in a language called Dylan, which is a Lisp-like language. Dylan is fully object oriented, and has a consistent syntax. Dylan is used because it is scientifically interesting. Ignoring the fact that it is generally interpreted inside an aweful Java applet (NOODLE), it's an OK lanugage. Most notably, the class centered on teaching the students exactly what OO means and how to use it: my prof, for instance, told us all about how Java was broken from the beginning because functions aren't objects like they are in Dylan, among other things. Dylan was a fine language for this use. At the end of the course we were able to write most of a Dylan interpreter in Dylan. THAT was an interesting excercise.
One of the next classes, CS37, was taught in MIPS assembler. CS37 was a hardware class, so assembler was appropriate. Some comments have suggested assembler as an intro language, and I gag at the thought. Having a deep-down appreciation of the low levels of computing can be learned after the spark or interest has developed in a young computer scientist. If I had to write loops using JUMP and GOTO in the intro class, I might have been a (gasp!) English major.
Dartmouth's Networking class (for CS people, not for business people :) is taught using Java. That's really nice, because with the pleasant abstractions provided by Java's class heirarchy a student can get down and write a neat-o little program and not worry about Socket implementations.
I love Java now that I've learned it, and I really back it's use in intro classes. CLEARLY, Java should not be the only language used. If I were to graduate from college not knowing Java, C, C++, some form of Lisp, some form of assembler, and a few scripting languages, I wouldn't consider myself educated in the field. Dartmouth's problem is its nonuse of Perl or other such languages (I've had to learn a couple on my own). I love perl... but that's another comment altogether.
MyopicProwls
To the Moz team: thank you so much. I was beginning to worry that speed was never going to be addressed. I have the highest hopes now for M1.0. Go Go!
MyopicProwls
Plus, rev A iMacs were designed to run OS 8.1, not OS X. If you want a superb box for OS X, go buy one. That's what I'll do when I get too frustrated with the speed of my box.
PS Yes I'm somewhat of a developer (a monor programmer). C++ and Java, mostly, though I'm excited about the possibilities for perl on X. The dev tools work fine on my box.
MyopicProwls
Once upon a time our math department used Mathematica. They liked it, or at least used it, because it's pretty much standard. They used "Keyserved" copies of the program, which is a little thing which allows software to work only if you log on as a validated user, and only so X number of the program can run at once. Everyone liked this setup just fine.
Then five or so years ago the Mathematica people were developing a new version of the software and Dartmouth was very, very active in the testing and debugging of it. All during the debugging process we used Keyserved copies of the beta software.
Come release time, Dartmouth bought X number of copies of Mathmatica. When they arrived, they weren't Keyserved. "Whoops" we thought "They sent us the wrong software." So we asked them about it and they said "Oh we were never planning to release the final version under Keyserve."
Dartmouth told them in no uncertain terms to stick Mathematica where the sun didn't shine, and we've been using Maple ever since.
I don't know how much money Mathematica lost due to Dartmouth switching, but think of a couple hundred copies of the software (that might be a tad high) at $1500 a piece or something (Keyserved software is generally a tad more expensive than out-of-the-box software because so many more people have access to it), plus countless copies that would have been sold to students and faculty for home use.
That's not a very sound business decision.
MyopicProwls
MyopicProwls
:-)
MyopicProwls
I don't use windows at all, but I'm telling you, if Apple ever tries to put copy protection deep into their OS, or tries to rent me software, I'll finally just switch all the way to Linux.
MyopicProwls
The other way to establish a trademark is through public use. Many of you may remember that McDonald's got in a big fight with a little girl and her father who had registered the trademark "Nothing But Net" some time before all those McDonald's commercials. The problem was that the little girl (who technically held the trademark) had never used it in a very public fashion; but McDonald's had never tried to register the trademark.
So what I'd do is check to see if there is an official trademark on the name you want to use. If there is, find another; you're probably out of luck. If there isn't, just make sure you throw up a dated web page showing that you are using the name publically as of some certain date. The publicity aspect of trademark protection is thus granted, and you should be fine.
Needless to say, IANAL.
MyopicProwls
MyopicProwls
I'm really surprised more companies aren't fighting for the same rights we are. Why aren't the MP3 patent holders fightiing alongside Napster? There is MUCH less incentive for me to pay for MP3 software (and they get a cut of that purchase price) without Napster. Why aren't the hardware producers fighting laws saying they pay royalties to the RIAA for things like tape recorders? Why aren't DVD player makers fighting on the side of DeCSS? Why isn't Microsoft fighting Apple's assertions of control over the Aqua interface?
I mean really, a bunch of people are fighting RAMBUS! I'm surprised we don't hear more of this.
MyopicProwls
I really disagree. First of all, Napster unquestionably provides a distribution model that provides a reasonable level of promotional support for artists. It's really great how many new artists I've discovered because of MP3s. Not necessarily just because of Napster, but if a friend says (as often happens) "hey have you heard this new stuff from Boo Williams?" and I say "Boo who?" (no pun intended -- go download his music it's great) then all of a sudden Boo has an opportunity to have his music heard by someone who never would have heard it otherwise. Super!
Thankfully, MOST of the artists that I listen to have come down on the PRO NAPSTER side. This includes Ben Folds Five, Green Day, Limp Bizkit, The Offspring, Chuck D, and others. Unfortunately, some of my favorite artists have come down on the other side. These include the most vocal three: Metallica, Dr. Dre, and Eminem. That sucks.
MORALLY I get over the problem. Is it morally wrong for me to want free music? I don't think so. Is it morally wrong for an artist to produce work that I listen to for free, never buying his CD, never going to his concert, never buying his T-Shirts? Perhaps. Perhaps not. But certainly it is no worse that middlemen becoming so ridiculously rich by screwing me with $18 CDs. CDs should be between four and six dollars; about half should go to the artist (about what they get now, or a bit more).
Trust me, I sleep just fine at nite having spent the whole day listening to MP3s. And I do own CDs -- oh God do I own CDs. I counted once, and I probably gave the RIAA $4,000+ in my (short) lifetime. That's a lot. A whole lot. I figure they are still $3,500 ahead after all the free downloading I've done.
I also, by the way, have 'discovered' artists via MP3s and Napster, and subsequently bought their CDs and gone to their concerts (e.g. Cypress Hill and Lavay Smith -- don't laugh) so those artists are definately ahead because otherwise they wouldn't have seen any of my money at all.
MyopicProwls
MyopicProwls
Oh wait...
MyopicProwls
Apple is doing everyone a service by giving us the best of both worlds. I just with the new Finder was more of a shell; I wish I could choose to boot into BSD.
MyopicProwls
Currently we have A < B. You're saying the only "solution" to the "problem" is to make A bigger? How about making B smaller? Duh...
MyopicProwls
MyopicProwls