Is it possible to recompile from source and get OpenGL hardware acceleration under linux? I don't mind hacking the makefiles (or even the source) a bit...
To tell the truth, I don't know how Linus and his merry band manage so well -- I couldn't have stood it with C.
This is a good question. How do they manage? I can't even get my group of friends to pick a resturant.
Also, "Linus and his merry band" would be a great name for a rock group.
Media companies, in fact compaines in general, will sell you what you are willing to buy.
When a media company has bought the rights to a piece, they have the right to control every copy of that piece that was not created through fair use.
If they do not want to grant you any discount based on what you have already bought, they do not have to.
The implicit questions in all of these discussions are: 1. Does an artist have a right to control copies of his work?
2. Does an artist have a right to sell right 1. to annother party?
If you believe that both of these are natural rights, (and I do) then it follows that artists, and by extention the companies that purchase their copyrights, can place any restrictions they want (outside fair use) on those copies.
When I was taking a lot of math in college I had a dream about wrestling an equation like it was a snake. As the shape of the snake changed, the symbols that it was composed of appeared to adapt in mathematically correct ways.
Very strange.
With steganography you are hiding the fact of encryption. You can have the strongest encryption in the world, and it will not protect you from a subpoena for the (private) key. Security through obscurity isn't "bad" any more than lemurs are "bad". When security through obscurity interferes with the verification and validation of an algorithim, that will make the algorithim weaker. That could be considered bad. When you think you are hiding information and you are not, that could be considered bad. The link that I gave is to a steganography program that helps to hide the fact of seganography from stegonagraphic analysis. I should, and do, use a lock on my safe that is so good that I can put that safe on a street corner, complete with a diagram of the lock, and no one can get into it. But I think I'll put that safe (with that same strong lock) in my house, instead. Maybe behind a portrait.
Rather than using PGP, which is likely to get the undevided attention of any government agency, use steganography. Take your plaintext, encrypt it, hide it in some of the least signifigant bits in an image, attach the image to an ordinary email, and off it goes!
I don't see that there is any connection between where your code comes from and the specifications it is built to.
A benevolent dictator, acting much like Linus, could accept only code that brings the product closer to the design.
The test suite or testing procedure could be released along with the code. Sure, goals like "ISO 9000 security compliance" are less popular than "a working operating system", but that doesn't mean you have to keep your source closed. And it doesn't mean you can't accept patches that bring you closer to your goal.
Obviously, offering to store data for other people can be an ethically sticky business. Are there limits to what you are willing to store?
A holding company in the US could allow a German company to store, serve and update Nazi material (which is illegal in Germany). Similar situations could allow for storage of child pornography or copyrighted material. How do your rules deal with this?
Would this keep a programmer who adheres to the strict definitions put forth by debian from using both pure GPL and QTclause GPL code in a single app?
As I understand it, the GPL states that it must be attached, unaltered, to derivative works. I assume that the QTclause GPL would also have to be attached to derivative works.
As this is the case, I think we have something akin to the "obnoxious advertising clause" in the old BSD liscenses. For that reason, I'd have to say that this "obnoxious linking clause" is a bad thing.
On the other hand, I'm not sure why the Debian people won't include KDE in the first place. So I guess my vote is, ignore the bribe, throw the KDE in as "nonfree".
As I understand it, most monopolies are bad because they keep consumers from having a choice. But in the case of cable, there often isn't a choice. Right now in my area, I can choose between several DSL providers, bunches of dialups, and one cable company. So, even if this company owns only 1% of the cable in the country, it's still my 1% and I still don't have a choice. I think the FCC regulations, rather than AT&T, are the real target here. The FCC should force every company to show that they have real, reasonable competition in every household. (The only way I can see that they could do this is by selling bandwidth to competitiors at a reasonable price.)
According to what information my poor, physics dull brain could cull from the article:
You have to charge the particles with a certain kind of light?
You have to transmit annother certain kind of light? (or was it the same kind?!?)
So, there isn't too much information you could pass quickly through this chamber. The only thing that gets passed quickly through the chamber is the time that you shined the light on the "near" end of it?
If you could more accurately predict user behavior in a browser, you could preload links and cache more intelligently. (of course, the former is internet-community hostile, the latter internet-community friendly)
You could also do this kind of preloading on a larger scale by monitoring the server loads, and dynamically changing the content that is preloaded on web pages to anticipate user clicks.
If you really want a nonrestrictive liscence, go for FreeBSD. I see the GPL as the main reason for linux's continuing success. (aside, of course, from the cool name.)
I like the idea of SPAMtraps. Leaving an email address on a web page (and nowhere else) with explicit instructions that the use of this email address costs the sender $500. When you receive email on that account file a claim in small claims court. Either the spammer will have to defend themselves, or they will have to give you money. Both of these cost the spammer money and discourage spamming.
Listen. The opinions and actions of Amazon have not been the heinous force of evil that everyone seems to think. A business (any business) is legally required to attempt to make money for it's investors (or risk getting sued). As this is the case, Amazon had no choice but to work within a flawed system. They had to attack B&N, and they have to defend themselves now. So this is all really evidence of a fundamentally flawed patent system.
Patents aside, I actually like everything else Amazon has done. They have proven that a "new economy" business can work. (Their book division is already profitable, with their other divisions not far behind) They make a (formerly complex) aspect of my life incredibly simple.
If Amazon is smart, they will put some of those overinflated stock dollars toward fixing the broken patent system. This would, IMHO, solve all of their patent problems. Both legal-wise and PR wise.
SCI FI picked up the rights to all 112 hour-long episodes...
No, it just seems like each episode is 112 hours long.
As long as we're going for news this nerdy...
on
Happy Pi Day!
·
· Score: 3
So there we were in Topology class. The class was being taught by the "Super Texas" method, which means we are given a few premises, and we work up an entire field of mathematics through proof. Each student had to prove things on the board in front of the other students. I said "OK let's take an irrational number...umm...Pi.." when suddenly, from the back of the class came "how do you know that Pi is irratoinal?" I spent the rest of the class proving it (off the top of my head, with much help from the professor). Needless to say, from then on, we used 1.01001000100001... or 2^.5 as our favorite irrational numbers.
Slashdot Mirror
Is it possible to recompile from source and get OpenGL hardware acceleration under linux? I don't mind hacking the makefiles (or even the source) a bit...
Is this the same Peter Jackson who brought us Meet the Feebles and Brain Dead? Good God. We're doomed.
Turn me in! I'll take the watch, you can have the games!
To tell the truth, I don't know how Linus and his merry band manage so well -- I couldn't have stood it with C.
This is a good question. How do they manage? I can't even get my group of friends to pick a resturant.
Also, "Linus and his merry band" would be a great name for a rock group.
I did not anticipate the use of your "calculating machines". Nonetheless well done, you have shown fortitude and ingenuity.
--Poe
Media companies, in fact compaines in general, will sell you what you are willing to buy.
When a media company has bought the rights to a piece, they have the right to control every copy of that piece that was not created through fair use.
If they do not want to grant you any discount based on what you have already bought, they do not have to.
The implicit questions in all of these discussions are:
1. Does an artist have a right to control copies of his work?
2. Does an artist have a right to sell right 1. to annother party?
If you believe that both of these are natural rights, (and I do) then it follows that artists, and by extention the companies that purchase their copyrights, can place any restrictions they want (outside fair use) on those copies.
There was some talk of this in Kernel Traffic.
When I was taking a lot of math in college I had a dream about wrestling an equation like it was a snake. As the shape of the snake changed, the symbols that it was composed of appeared to adapt in mathematically correct ways.
Very strange.
How much software actually scales well to that many processors? I suspect quake would top out long before 31.
He also might just save the internet.
Here is a link to the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Suck is always so resplendant with useless links, they could at least have included a useful one.
For info on caffine.
With steganography you are hiding the fact of encryption.
You can have the strongest encryption in the world, and it will not protect you from a subpoena for the (private) key.
Security through obscurity isn't "bad" any more than lemurs are "bad".
When security through obscurity interferes with the verification and validation of an algorithim, that will make the algorithim weaker. That could be considered bad.
When you think you are hiding information and you are not, that could be considered bad. The link that I gave is to a steganography program that helps to hide the fact of seganography from stegonagraphic analysis.
I should, and do, use a lock on my safe that is so good that I can put that safe on a street corner, complete with a diagram of the lock, and no one can get into it.
But I think I'll put that safe (with that same strong lock) in my house, instead. Maybe behind a portrait.
Rather than using PGP, which is likely to get the undevided attention of any government agency, use steganography.
Take your plaintext, encrypt it, hide it in some of the least signifigant bits in an image, attach the image to an ordinary email, and off it goes!
..powerful programmable pixel processor..
Microsofts Meglomonical Mechanations.
Lookout Linux's Lackluster Lighting.
Quality Quake Quad.
I don't see that there is any connection between where your code comes from and the specifications it is built to.
A benevolent dictator, acting much like Linus, could accept only code that brings the product closer to the design.
The test suite or testing procedure could be released along with the code. Sure, goals like "ISO 9000 security compliance" are less popular than "a working operating system", but that doesn't mean you have to keep your source closed. And it doesn't mean you can't accept patches that bring you closer to your goal.
Obviously, offering to store data for other people can be an ethically sticky business. Are there limits to what you are willing to store?
A holding company in the US could allow a German company to store, serve and update Nazi material (which is illegal in Germany). Similar situations could allow for storage of child pornography or copyrighted material. How do your rules deal with this?
Would this keep a programmer who adheres to the strict definitions put forth by debian from using both pure GPL and QTclause GPL code in a single app?
As I understand it, the GPL states that it must be attached, unaltered, to derivative works.
I assume that the QTclause GPL would also have to be attached to derivative works.
As this is the case, I think we have something akin to the "obnoxious advertising clause" in the old BSD liscenses.
For that reason, I'd have to say that this "obnoxious linking clause" is a bad thing.
On the other hand, I'm not sure why the Debian people won't include KDE in the first place.
So I guess my vote is, ignore the bribe, throw the KDE in as "nonfree".
As I understand it, most monopolies are bad because they keep consumers from having a choice.
But in the case of cable, there often isn't a choice.
Right now in my area, I can choose between several DSL providers, bunches of dialups, and one cable company.
So, even if this company owns only 1% of the cable in the country, it's still my 1% and I still don't have a choice.
I think the FCC regulations, rather than AT&T, are the real target here.
The FCC should force every company to show that they have real, reasonable competition in every household.
(The only way I can see that they could do this is by selling bandwidth to competitiors at a reasonable price.)
According to what information my poor, physics dull brain could cull from the article:
You have to charge the particles with a certain kind of light?
You have to transmit annother certain kind of light? (or was it the same kind?!?)
So, there isn't too much information you could pass quickly through this chamber. The only thing that gets passed quickly through the chamber is the time that you shined the light on the "near" end of it?
If you could more accurately predict user behavior in a browser, you could preload links and cache more intelligently. (of course, the former is internet-community hostile, the latter internet-community friendly)
You could also do this kind of preloading on a larger scale by monitoring the server loads, and dynamically changing the content that is preloaded on web pages to anticipate user clicks.
If you really want a nonrestrictive liscence, go for FreeBSD. I see the GPL as the main reason for linux's continuing success. (aside, of course, from the cool name.)
I like the idea of SPAMtraps. Leaving an email address on a web page (and nowhere else) with explicit instructions that the use of this email address costs the sender $500. When you receive email on that account file a claim in small claims court. Either the spammer will have to defend themselves, or they will have to give you money. Both of these cost the spammer money and discourage spamming.
Listen. The opinions and actions of Amazon have not been the heinous force of evil that everyone seems to think. A business (any business) is legally required to attempt to make money for it's investors (or risk getting sued). As this is the case, Amazon had no choice but to work within a flawed system. They had to attack B&N, and they have to defend themselves now. So this is all really evidence of a fundamentally flawed patent system.
Patents aside, I actually like everything else Amazon has done. They have proven that a "new economy" business can work. (Their book division is already profitable, with their other divisions not far behind) They make a (formerly complex) aspect of my life incredibly simple.
If Amazon is smart, they will put some of those overinflated stock dollars toward fixing the broken patent system. This would, IMHO, solve all of their patent problems. Both legal-wise and PR wise.
SCI FI picked up the rights to all 112 hour-long episodes...
No, it just seems like each episode is 112 hours long.
So there we were in Topology class. The class was being taught by the "Super Texas" method, which means we are given a few premises, and we work up an entire field of mathematics through proof. Each student had to prove things on the board in front of the other students. I said "OK let's take an irrational number...umm...Pi.." when suddenly, from the back of the class came "how do you know that Pi is irratoinal?" I spent the rest of the class proving it (off the top of my head, with much help from the professor). Needless to say, from then on, we used 1.01001000100001... or 2^.5 as our favorite irrational numbers.