It doesn't have a pretty installer. It doesn't come with a book that explains what a shell is and why root is a bad thing to use 24/7.
That's funny... the first distribution I used (in 96? something like that) was an old Slackware version, (3 or something) that was part of an informix(?) set of a bunch of distros. And it DID come with a book that said you shouldn't use root 24/7. It even told this fun story about how root is a magical hat that can destroy cities.
Ahh... but can I watch Dark City, the Crow, and/or Fear and Loathing [widescreen] in nice crystal clear video and stunning 5.1 sound RIGHT NOW over the net? And will it cost me big $$$ each time I watch it? That can add up a lot when you watch the Thrill Kill Kult scene in the Crow over and over again...
I though not. I'll stick with DVD for a while then.
That is your problem then. Gibson uses a very modern technique in his writing style, of not telling you all the details you need to know. One must read the entire story, parse it carefully, and understand later. It requires a lot of thought and analysis.
I personally believe one needs to read Neuromancer three times:
Once for shock value.
Again for true plot comprehension. (as the things you learn at the end can explain the beginning)
And a third time for understanding
Anyway, even if one never reads any of his other works, Neuromancer is worth it...
WTF? The movie being better? Are we talking about the same story here?
And I'm not talking about the piece of @#$% that they released after the move. (story->movie->story; that's a lot of chance to decrease your S/N ratio...)
That was one of the best short stories I've ever read. (With the others in Burning Chrome just as good) The movie was nothing more than a half-hazard conglomeration of various tidbits from all his stories, with only a bit from the original short story.
The one thing that I've always thought was missing from such tools, is a small butane lighter! I've seen cigarette cases that had lighters built in, so it shouldn't be hard to do. Think about it. I've been EXTREMELY glad I carried a lighter around, as having light/heat/fire handy has saved more situations than I can remember. And this doesn't even count the times I needed to start various things on fire...
Picture a Swiss Army Knife, with several knives, openers, screw drivers, and FIRE!
WTF? How could the soundtrack POSSIBLY be considered good, when, after seeing the movie four times, I STILL can't find the MINISTRY song! Only on the CD soundtrack you say? But WHY! Arrrrg!
Re:Civil Rights in the UK
on
Dear Mr. Straw
·
· Score: 1
Imprisonment for not retrieving the key is where American and UK law start to diverge. INAL, but I belive the governement can still imprison you under some sort of conspiracy law...
Wouldn't this fall under some sort of 'obstruction of justice' type law?
Just this friday, I was helping an anthropology grad student (where I'm the comp tech) use the scanner, the subject came up that I use Linux most of the time, for it's stability.
It had apparently only been recently, in her use of computers, that she had noticed that all of the crashing of Windows was (usually) not her fault! Apparently, for YEARS, every time her computer would crash, she would be guilt ridden that she had done something wrong! Now, I guess I can understand this, as she studies Anthropology, and doesn't really use computers that much, but still. Has Microsoft/Apple/etc really convinced everybody that everything should work perfectly, and always take no more than 3 mouse clicks to do anything?
Anyway, it would be nice to have that world. And maybe Linux/BSD/whatever can achieve that dream, as they have a good foundation to start with, but for now, the common opinion that computers are like toasters, and should always work that easily, needs to change!
One point: pot is not PHYSICALY addictive. That is, it doesn't have withdrawl symptoms when you stop using it.
It is QUITE psycologicly addictive, though. The thing is, anything at all can be psycologicly addictive. Chocolate, linux, slashdot...
While if you are strong willed, that is easy to deal with (and it is easier with pot than some things. just try to get me to stop reading slashdot), it IS something one has to deal with at some time, and should not be ignored.
well, the second cdrwin is able to copy DVDs, I'd say probably, but given that such hardware doesn't really exist yet (at the consumer level, I suppose), don't hold your breath.
Maybe you should take a trip to Hong Kong or some such. I'm sure they'll find a way around it. They always have in the past.
Unfortunetly I don't remember exactly (it's been something like 8 years or so...), but I seem to remember the official explanation being one of two possibilities (they couldn't decide which one they liked better):
1 - There are refrences to 'great animals' in the middle of the old testiment (around joshua, I believe). They were the dinosaurs. Unfortunetly, they don't explain how they became extinct.
2 - The bones are fake. They never existed. god simply put them there when the world was created. (why? to mess with us?)
Anyway, it was something like that. (this was from a Missouri Synod Luthren pastor)
An environment changes a bit; a species adapts to fit it. Then, a while later the environment changes again. And the species adapts again. Then, a while later...
How does the fact that a Chinese-based character appear differently in a different font differ from the fact the the Roman "A" appears differently in TimesRoman than in Helvetica?
It's that there are so many characters in these Chinese-based languages, that they don't all fit in the encoding scheme. Say you were looking at the letter "A" in font1, and changed to font2, the letter might change to "B".
It's not a good thing when you change fonts, and the text changes meaning.
Choosing the correct font is annoying, and not very accuate.
Sure, it hasn't happened. Why would you if you could use a gun? My point is that it doesn't take a gun to kill someone. If all guns disappered tomorrow, people would still kill people, just not quite as easily.
So when I show up to class with my extreemly sharp (you could shave with it) katana and wakazashi (japanese swords), you think I couldn't kill AT LEAST 10-20 people? What about with the set of throwing knives I have?
What's the solution to that? Ban all knives! Ya, that's it! Well, what about that nice one you cook with...
Well, not really... all it does is strip the extra strong signal that is present durring the virtical retrace. I've seen schematics for one that use $10 worth of hardware, if you build it yourself. I just bought one from the 'damark' catalog (a 'video clarifier') for $30, and it works great! (havn't seen a tape yet that it wouldn't let me copy)
Sure, it's only 800Mbit/sec, instead of 1000 (or is it 1200? I forgot), but that's AFTER the headers...
And having nice features, like NO MTU is quite nice. I remember sending 40MB packets over our switches straight to a frame buffer... now THAT was sharp animation...
And seeing an network of Suns (with my companies SBus cards and switches!) and Crays, that had, in 3 years of running, NEVER dropped a single IP packet.
Sure, the cable (in the copper inplementation) is over $300 for a 3 meter one, and you need two of those for a full connection, but it sure was a well-engineered technology.
I only wish I had stayed there long enough to see the HIPPI64 stuff...
Indeed, please name names, as this sounds like a network driver that I wrote once, for a company called Gigalabs. I wouldn't happen to be their GigaPipe NIC, would it?
Obviously you have never written a real program spanning several million lines of code with subroutines written by someone other then you.
That is rather assuming... and self contradictory. [snip - some example of program design]
My point is exactly that. If you have bad program design, GC is necessary, but well thought out design makes it unnecessary. In your example, all you need is some sort of semaphore between the threads, or maintain your own refrence counts internally, or some such.
If the library blindly mallocs such structures, and gives the user a pointer to them, I have a few things to say about the library as well. I guess that could be ok, if the library never touched it again, and there was an equivilent destruct funtion in the library (it becomes another malloc/free pair). If the library returns a pointer, and continues to modify it, you not only have a GC problem, you will be clobbering data!
I guess the point is, that while GC can be a time-saver (in having to not re-design sections of badly written code), it is also a crutch bad programmers use far too often to cover their own lazyness, and for really complex programs, doesn't solve the problem reliably! (I really hate it when structures and code change behind my back (hence my hate for C++) )
Garbage collection for those who find it to lazy or dificult to call free()...
I have NEVER seen a place where, if you were careful (as you should be) in designing your code, you couldn't have nice matching malloc()/free() pairs.
(Yes, I know in LISP and such GC is a must, but those languages don't even have the same concept of variables as a normal imperitive language such as C)
-The Code Nazi (now you see why some friends of mine gave me that nickname...)
MP3 won't die just because some other audio format comes out. It will only die if another audio format comes out that is free, significantly smaller, and the same or better level of quality.
One must also remember that not only must a new format be better in all of the above ways, but it must be SIGNIFICANTLY better, such that it will justify converting all my old mp3s to this new format. I'm not going to go through that much work for a measly 5% space savings...
Slashdot Mirror
It doesn't have a pretty installer. It doesn't come with a book that explains what a shell is and why root is a bad thing to use 24/7.
That's funny... the first distribution I used (in 96? something like that) was an old Slackware version, (3 or something) that was part of an informix(?) set of a bunch of distros. And it DID come with a book that said you shouldn't use root 24/7. It even told this fun story about how root is a magical hat that can destroy cities.
Ahh... but can I watch Dark City, the Crow, and/or Fear and Loathing [widescreen] in nice crystal clear video and stunning 5.1 sound RIGHT NOW over the net? And will it cost me big $$$ each time I watch it? That can add up a lot when you watch the Thrill Kill Kult scene in the Crow over and over again...
I though not. I'll stick with DVD for a while then.
That is your problem then. Gibson uses a very modern technique in his writing style, of not telling you all the details you need to know. One must read the entire story, parse it carefully, and understand later. It requires a lot of thought and analysis.
I personally believe one needs to read Neuromancer three times:
Anyway, even if one never reads any of his other works, Neuromancer is worth it...
WTF? The movie being better? Are we talking about the same story here?
And I'm not talking about the piece of @#$% that they released after the move. (story->movie->story; that's a lot of chance to decrease your S/N ratio...)
That was one of the best short stories I've ever read. (With the others in Burning Chrome just as good) The movie was nothing more than a half-hazard conglomeration of various tidbits from all his stories, with only a bit from the original short story.
Ministry!
Or sometime, for variation, some Xorcist or Sisters of Mercy...
The one thing that I've always thought was missing from such tools, is a small butane lighter! I've seen cigarette cases that had lighters built in, so it shouldn't be hard to do. Think about it. I've been EXTREMELY glad I carried a lighter around, as having light/heat/fire handy has saved more situations than I can remember. And this doesn't even count the times I needed to start various things on fire...
Picture a Swiss Army Knife, with several knives, openers, screw drivers, and FIRE!
^_^
WTF? How could the soundtrack POSSIBLY be considered good, when, after seeing the movie four times, I STILL can't find the MINISTRY song! Only on the CD soundtrack you say? But WHY! Arrrrg!
Wouldn't this fall under some sort of 'obstruction of justice' type law?
> "computers are easy to use!"
OT, I know, but anyway...
Just this friday, I was helping an anthropology grad student (where I'm the comp tech) use the scanner, the subject came up that I use Linux most of the time, for it's stability.
It had apparently only been recently, in her use of computers, that she had noticed that all of the crashing of Windows was (usually) not her fault! Apparently, for YEARS, every time her computer would crash, she would be guilt ridden that she had done something wrong! Now, I guess I can understand this, as she studies Anthropology, and doesn't really use computers that much, but still. Has Microsoft/Apple/etc really convinced everybody that everything should work perfectly, and always take no more than 3 mouse clicks to do anything?
Anyway, it would be nice to have that world. And maybe Linux/BSD/whatever can achieve that dream, as they have a good foundation to start with, but for now, the common opinion that computers are like toasters, and should always work that easily, needs to change!
> Marijuana is NOT addictive. Period.
One point: pot is not PHYSICALY addictive. That is, it doesn't have withdrawl symptoms when you stop using it.
It is QUITE psycologicly addictive, though. The thing is, anything at all can be psycologicly addictive. Chocolate, linux, slashdot...
While if you are strong willed, that is easy to deal with (and it is easier with pot than some things. just try to get me to stop reading slashdot), it IS something one has to deal with at some time, and should not be ignored.
well, the second cdrwin is able to copy DVDs, I'd say probably, but given that such hardware doesn't really exist yet (at the consumer level, I suppose), don't hold your breath.
Maybe you should take a trip to Hong Kong or some such. I'm sure they'll find a way around it. They always have in the past.
Arrrg! What was that? The Konami code is simply L-R-L-R-U-U-D-D-b-a... (except if you had one of their original games, where it was a-b-b-a...)
^_^
Unfortunetly I don't remember exactly (it's been something like 8 years or so...), but I seem to remember the official explanation being one of two possibilities (they couldn't decide which one they liked better):
1 - There are refrences to 'great animals' in the middle of the old testiment (around joshua, I believe). They were the dinosaurs. Unfortunetly, they don't explain how they became extinct.
2 - The bones are fake. They never existed. god simply put them there when the world was created. (why? to mess with us?)
Anyway, it was something like that. (this was from a Missouri Synod Luthren pastor)
If the "war" on drugs is so bad, then why the
hell haven't I been able to get acid for the
last four months or so...
Hmmm... let me see here...
An environment changes a bit; a species adapts to fit it. Then, a while later the environment changes again. And the species adapts again. Then, a while later...
Wait a minute. Isn't that evolution? ^_-
It's that there are so many characters in these Chinese-based languages, that they don't all fit in the encoding scheme. Say you were looking at the letter "A" in font1, and changed to font2, the letter might change to "B".
It's not a good thing when you change fonts, and the text changes meaning.
Choosing the correct font is annoying, and not very accuate.
Sure, it hasn't happened. Why would you if you could use a gun? My point is that it doesn't take a gun to kill someone. If all guns disappered tomorrow, people would still kill people, just not quite as easily.
Hey, I'm not boasting... just trying to make a point: it's not just guns...
>Without a gun you can't shot anyone
So when I show up to class with my extreemly sharp (you could shave with it) katana and wakazashi (japanese swords), you think I couldn't kill AT LEAST 10-20 people? What about with the set of throwing knives I have?
What's the solution to that? Ban all knives! Ya, that's it! Well, what about that nice one you cook with...
-The Code Nazi
> decoder->framebuffer->encoder
Well, not really... all it does is strip the extra strong signal that is present durring the virtical retrace. I've seen schematics for one that use $10 worth of hardware, if you build it yourself. I just bought one from the 'damark' catalog (a 'video clarifier') for $30, and it works great! (havn't seen a tape yet that it wouldn't let me copy)
Sure, it's only 800Mbit/sec, instead of 1000 (or is it 1200? I forgot), but that's AFTER the headers...
And having nice features, like NO MTU is quite nice. I remember sending 40MB packets over our
switches straight to a frame buffer... now THAT was sharp animation...
And seeing an network of Suns (with my companies SBus cards and switches!) and Crays, that had, in 3 years of running, NEVER dropped a single IP packet.
Sure, the cable (in the copper inplementation) is over $300 for a 3 meter one, and you need two of those for a full connection, but it sure was a well-engineered technology.
I only wish I had stayed there long enough to see the HIPPI64 stuff...
Indeed, please name names, as this sounds like a network driver that I wrote once, for a company called Gigalabs. I wouldn't happen to be their GigaPipe NIC, would it?
-The Code Nazi
That is rather assuming... and self contradictory.
[snip - some example of program design]
My point is exactly that. If you have bad program design, GC is necessary, but well thought out design makes it unnecessary. In your example, all you need is some sort of semaphore between the threads, or maintain your own refrence counts internally, or some such.
If the library blindly mallocs such structures, and gives the user a pointer to them, I have a few things to say about the library as well. I guess that could be ok, if the library never touched it again, and there was an equivilent destruct funtion in the library (it becomes another malloc/free pair). If the library returns a pointer, and continues to modify it, you not only have a GC problem, you will be clobbering data!
I guess the point is, that while GC can be a time-saver (in having to not re-design sections of badly written code), it is also a crutch bad programmers use far too often to cover their own lazyness, and for really complex programs, doesn't solve the problem reliably! (I really hate it when structures and code change behind my back (hence my hate for C++) )
-The Code Nazi
Garbage collection for those who find it to lazy or dificult to call free()...
I have NEVER seen a place where, if you were careful (as you should be) in designing your code, you couldn't have nice matching malloc()/free() pairs.
(Yes, I know in LISP and such GC is a must, but those languages don't even have the same concept of variables as a normal imperitive language such as C)
-The Code Nazi
(now you see why some friends of mine
gave me that nickname...)
One must also remember that not only must a new format be better in all of the above ways, but it must be SIGNIFICANTLY better, such that it will justify converting all my old mp3s to this new format. I'm not going to go through that much work for a measly 5% space savings...