Am I the only one disappointed when I found out it was a Math book after getting past the title, and not a new geeky video game in the vein of Super Mario Brothers"?
it has already been confirmed that neither WM, S^3 or Meego will have Flash Player when they launch.
The Nokia N8 is an Symbian^3 device and has Flash Lite 4.0 pre-installed (stripped down version of Flash 10.x, AFAIK. It already runs AS3 and the AVM2 which is the important thing). The N900 is a Maemo Linux (= Meego) device and runs Flash Player 10.1 no problem. There shouldn't be any problems with Meego devices running Flash. Flash Player 10.1 will skip Windows Mobile 6.5, and will be launched for WinMo7 instead. Earlier Windows Mobile devices have had Flash Lite.
You can make complete apps in single package files for deployment and redistribution for Flash & Silverlight, unlike with Javascript solutions which needs to load external media assets.
Big networks and hollywood studios will not release a lot of their content for streaming on the web without DRM protection. As much as we hate DRM, content producers & clients demand it.
Sorry, gotta pay the bills. In its current form, native HTML5 browser media players are no solution.
The only exception is hand-held devices but on those I would in fact agree with Steve Jobs, it is usually better to make the effort to create a native version.
Actually, 19 of the top 20 handset manufacturers have signed up to work with Adobe to bring native versions of Flash to their devices. (guess who the odd man out is)
Flash 10.1 is already out for Android 2.2, and is coming out on every single platform (Windows Mobile, Symbian, Meego (moblin + maemo), Blackberry, etc) except Apple's iOS. It actually already runs pretty well on the iPhone too, except that Steve Jobs banhammered Flash CS5 iPhone apps on the eve of Adobe's Creative Suite 5 launch.
But my customers actually require something that would run on (at least) 95% of all Internet connected computers without the user installing anything Flash meats that criteria, Silverlight does not and HTML5 does not even show up on the radar yet.
And that's why what Steve did is a big headache for agencies. Instead of the possibility of a write once-run everywhere solution that's good enough with Flash, you'll now have to suck up significant resources just to build an iOS port. It's good for protecting and providing business for native iPhone coders, but still, it's a headache and a resource-sink.
Badly written Javascript is just as bad or even worse than Flash.
All this AJAX-ification of the web (you too, Skashdot!) has made web browsing almost impossible for older sub-500MHz machines. Turning off both Flash & Javascript is the only way to be able to browse decently on a 400MHz One Laptop Per Child XO-1 machine, and some sites like Facebook stop functioning properly (profile wall posts no longer display, etc) when Javascript is turned off.
The new version of GFWL can run in offline mode which is a welcome change for those with flaky internet connections. That being said, it's still irritating and its only use is to record GFWL achievements in single player games.
I made a visualization of ant pixel bots wandering around a map and laying down virtual pheromone trails as an art project. The results are pretty psychedelic:)
In a gaming world now dominated by Counterstrikey FPSs, Serious Sam is a throwback to the days of Doom when waves and waves of enemies are just thrown at you. The classic running and gunning bass-ackwards is still a valid tactic in this game:)
Best of all, story mode coop play is supported, a feature missing in most games nowadays.
The price of netbooks has significantly gone up, with the older, cheaper models being phased out, leaving only the more expensive new units on the shelves. The price of most netbooks now equal those of lower-tier cheaper "real laptops" (ordinary large ones) that have more horsepower.
Dude, the OLPC folks never modified the XO to run windows. All one of their engineers did was modify the BIOS to be a little more friendly for the MS folks, that's it. Windows did not jack up the price of the OLPC XOs, so throw that FUD misconception away.
Also, it was the OLPC machine that created the entire netbook market. When ASUS saw that stripped-down OLPC laptops would be released to the market at such low prices, they leaped in and created the EEEs to take a piece of the apparently profitable pie. IMHO, for many many reasons that a lot of people agree with, OLPC should *ACTUALLY* compete with the netbook market with a retail offering to make the project more viable and succeed.
The OLPC XO-1.5 is an upgraded version of the XO-1 with a faster CPU, more RAM and more storage because as users found out, a 400MHz AMD Geode processor is no longer enough to surf today's AJAX-bloated internet or to watch HD internet videos (hi-res vids on Youtube eat up CPU, everybody else just doesn't realize it anymore because the cheapest PCs/laptops available pre-OLPC were all above 1GHz in speed). Damn you, web developers who abuse shininess and don't know how to optimize!
OLPC did not bow down to Microsoft. They bowed down to the request of governments that demanded that they be able to run whatever they bloody wanted (Windows) on the machines they purchase. Why is that a bad thing?
Isn't this the complete opposite of the evil thing that Apple is doing now with the iPhone and iPad - that you be able to run only software Steve approves of and nothing else?
This negative backlash on OLPC-Windows is twisted way out of proportion.
According to this article, it will run Adobe Flash:
At the heart of the 10.5-inch tablet lies an ARM chip. The exact chip set to be used has not been disclosed, but it is known that 2GB of memory will be present to back it up. The display is a color touchscrenn with multi-touch support. Furthermore, the configuration includes cloud storage, 10/100 Ethernet, WiFi b/g , a so-called highly-customized operating system and even support for Adobe Flash. Thus, there will be no issues regarding online videos and interactive educational content. Finally, the device comes with a digital camera and compatibility with OpenOffice.org documents, Adobe PDF and various multimedia formats.
Oh, BTW, I've been using the OLPC XO-1 I have with me as a PDF reader. A touchscreen would be amazing for scrolling, panning and zooming. The mousepad and gamepad arrow keys are pretty stifling. The touchscreen would be so intuitive for kids, and best of all, will allow them to take notes in traditional fashion and enable them to sketch diagrams for their notes, something a keyboard and trackpad won't allow you to do.
As for OLPC tech, the Pixel Qi screen is a complete game-changer and something everyone else on the market doesn't have yet (can't wait for the Notion Ink Adam android tablet which will have it). It's simply amazing how you can switch between colored backlit LCD to black and white low-power sunlight readable mode which *extends* battery life. Moreover, even the backlit LCD mode is sunlight readable. If you take your device outside or put it under very bright lights, it will show up as black and white and is still readable as opposed to normal backlit LCD screens.
The wireless mesh networking technology used by OLPC is also something I want to see perfected across the computing world. The OLPC XO machines were built so that you can chain a bunch of them across a long distance to share and piggyback an internet connection that's available to only one machine, kinda like smart dust.
Another thing, I haven't tested it, but under ideal conditions (think line-of-sight straight highway with no obstructions), the XO machines are supposed to be able to communicate across 1 kilometer. I'd believe it though as the XO picks up a *LOT* of wifi signals that my phone can't see. Something like 30:10 ratio.
This actually fantastic. The developer base left at OLPC is shockingly small and if they join forces with the India effort, they can really do a big impact with low-cost, energy efficient computing.
I really hate how the hardware world has gone into faster, faster, more, more when it should be working on cheaper and more energy-efficient. I'd rather that Moore's law went into making chips at current speeds cheaper than constantly expensive chips at faster speeds. Instead, what they do is phase out slow-cpu tech and keep selling power-hungry speed demons
On a related note, having an OLPC XO-1 unit in my hands, having gone through the internet on a Pentium 1 back in the 90s, I really hate the present AJAXification of the entire web - it's no longer possible to fully surf websites on a 400MHz machine like the XO-1 without having to turn off Javascript and Flash.
Javascript programmers are doing the very same thing that gave Flash a bad name years ago: Bloat.
OLPC did not sell out to Microsoft. OLPC's policy is simply like this: If an organization buys OLPC XO-1 & XO-1.5 machines, they are free to do with them what they want, even install Windows should they choose (unlike the iStuff Apple does not want you tinkering around with and have to be jailbroken in order to do more stuff). You buy it, you own it and are free to install whatever software you want on it (whether open or proprietary), unlike a lot of gadgets today which you only seem to license from their manufacturers due to their DMCA and DRM hooks.
Moreover, some governments requested that their machines run Windows, so how could Negroponte say no to that request from paying customers? (I don't think it ever happened though, haven't seen any XO-1s running WinXP in the wild. The XO-1.5s should be able to run Windows with their higher specs tho).
I asked, AFAIK, NO ONE at OLPC has been working on Windows stuff, it was all up to the MS folks to make Windows run on the OLPC XO machines. The only work done by OLPC folks did to support Windows was to make the BIOS more compatible. One of the engineers at OLPC said that the changes the MS folks wanted to the BIOS would even prevent booting to anything else than Windows, so what the OLPC dude did was actually fix the BIOS so that it *could be* dual booted to both Linux and Windows as opposed to the MS folks' original plans.
There's been a lot of hate thrown towards OLPC ever since the Windows thing, but really, everything they do is open source over there and nothing really came out of that Windows thing except negative public backlash.
Now about selling to small deployments and individuals, IMHO this is something they need to do to make the platform survive. The smallness of the size of the developer crew at OLPC is simply ridiculous. More geeks need to be able to get their hands on these wonderful machines to get a healthy software and application ecosystem going.
As for touchscreen, having monkeyed around with an XO-1 machine, I'd say it's a must-have when you twist the screen into tablet configuration. The gamepad buttons on it are simply not enough when you need to use the mouse.
Slashdot Mirror
Realize this: economy kills.
Am I the only one disappointed when I found out it was a Math book after getting past the title, and not a new geeky video game in the vein of Super Mario Brothers"?
Sure it is! It is a revolutionary app indispensable for burglars everywhere!
it has already been confirmed that neither WM, S^3 or Meego will have Flash Player when they launch.
The Nokia N8 is an Symbian^3 device and has Flash Lite 4.0 pre-installed (stripped down version of Flash 10.x, AFAIK. It already runs AS3 and the AVM2 which is the important thing). The N900 is a Maemo Linux (= Meego) device and runs Flash Player 10.1 no problem. There shouldn't be any problems with Meego devices running Flash. Flash Player 10.1 will skip Windows Mobile 6.5, and will be launched for WinMo7 instead. Earlier Windows Mobile devices have had Flash Lite.
You can make complete apps in single package files for deployment and redistribution for Flash & Silverlight, unlike with Javascript solutions which needs to load external media assets.
Big networks and hollywood studios will not release a lot of their content for streaming on the web without DRM protection. As much as we hate DRM, content producers & clients demand it.
Sorry, gotta pay the bills. In its current form, native HTML5 browser media players are no solution.
Actually, the Adobe Flex SDK is Open Source and Free. It runs similarly to the Java JDK.
.SWF apps for free.
All you need is any text editor of your choice and a command line, and you can build Flash
In fact, Flash Builder (the professional Flex IDE built on top of Eclipse) is free for unemployed developers and students.
The only exception is hand-held devices but on those I would in fact agree with Steve Jobs, it is usually better to make the effort to create a native version.
Actually, 19 of the top 20 handset manufacturers have signed up to work with Adobe to bring native versions of Flash to their devices. (guess who the odd man out is)
Flash 10.1 is already out for Android 2.2, and is coming out on every single platform (Windows Mobile, Symbian, Meego (moblin + maemo), Blackberry, etc) except Apple's iOS. It actually already runs pretty well on the iPhone too, except that Steve Jobs banhammered Flash CS5 iPhone apps on the eve of Adobe's Creative Suite 5 launch.
But my customers actually require something that would run on (at least) 95% of all Internet connected computers without the user installing anything Flash meats that criteria, Silverlight does not and HTML5 does not even show up on the radar yet.
And that's why what Steve did is a big headache for agencies. Instead of the possibility of a write once-run everywhere solution that's good enough with Flash, you'll now have to suck up significant resources just to build an iOS port. It's good for protecting and providing business for native iPhone coders, but still, it's a headache and a resource-sink.
Two atoms were walking down a street.
One of them goes: "Stop! I think I just lost an electron!"
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah, I'm positive!"
Badly written Javascript is just as bad or even worse than Flash.
All this AJAX-ification of the web (you too, Skashdot!) has made web browsing almost impossible for older sub-500MHz machines. Turning off both Flash & Javascript is the only way to be able to browse decently on a 400MHz One Laptop Per Child XO-1 machine, and some sites like Facebook stop functioning properly (profile wall posts no longer display, etc) when Javascript is turned off.
The new version of GFWL can run in offline mode which is a welcome change for those with flaky internet connections. That being said, it's still irritating and its only use is to record GFWL achievements in single player games.
Well, here's my take on it.
:)
:D
I made a visualization of ant pixel bots wandering around a map and laying down virtual pheromone trails as an art project. The results are pretty psychedelic
Java applet written in Processing years ago:
http://object404.com/lab/bloodlines
Interestingly, I was able to reproduce the conditions that made ants wander in weird circular loop swarms in Brazil
Clearly, this was a pre-emptive strike against his impending zombification.
Serious Sam HD 1 & 2.
:)
In a gaming world now dominated by Counterstrikey FPSs, Serious Sam is a throwback to the days of Doom when waves and waves of enemies are just thrown at you. The classic running and gunning bass-ackwards is still a valid tactic in this game
Best of all, story mode coop play is supported, a feature missing in most games nowadays.
I don't think "total kills" is something you'd want listed on your file as a doctor...
Price.
The price of netbooks has significantly gone up, with the older, cheaper models being phased out, leaving only the more expensive new units on the shelves. The price of most netbooks now equal those of lower-tier cheaper "real laptops" (ordinary large ones) that have more horsepower.
Dude, the OLPC folks never modified the XO to run windows. All one of their engineers did was modify the BIOS to be a little more friendly for the MS folks, that's it. Windows did not jack up the price of the OLPC XOs, so throw that FUD misconception away.
Also, it was the OLPC machine that created the entire netbook market. When ASUS saw that stripped-down OLPC laptops would be released to the market at such low prices, they leaped in and created the EEEs to take a piece of the apparently profitable pie. IMHO, for many many reasons that a lot of people agree with, OLPC should *ACTUALLY* compete with the netbook market with a retail offering to make the project more viable and succeed.
The OLPC XO-1.5 is an upgraded version of the XO-1 with a faster CPU, more RAM and more storage because as users found out, a 400MHz AMD Geode processor is no longer enough to surf today's AJAX-bloated internet or to watch HD internet videos (hi-res vids on Youtube eat up CPU, everybody else just doesn't realize it anymore because the cheapest PCs/laptops available pre-OLPC were all above 1GHz in speed). Damn you, web developers who abuse shininess and don't know how to optimize!
OLPC did not bow down to Microsoft. They bowed down to the request of governments that demanded that they be able to run whatever they bloody wanted (Windows) on the machines they purchase. Why is that a bad thing?
Isn't this the complete opposite of the evil thing that Apple is doing now with the iPhone and iPad - that you be able to run only software Steve approves of and nothing else?
This negative backlash on OLPC-Windows is twisted way out of proportion.
At the heart of the 10.5-inch tablet lies an ARM chip. The exact chip set to be used has not been disclosed, but it is known that 2GB of memory will be present to back it up. The display is a color touchscrenn with multi-touch support. Furthermore, the configuration includes cloud storage, 10/100 Ethernet, WiFi b/g , a so-called highly-customized operating system and even support for Adobe Flash. Thus, there will be no issues regarding online videos and interactive educational content. Finally, the device comes with a digital camera and compatibility with OpenOffice.org documents, Adobe PDF and various multimedia formats.
Oh, BTW, I've been using the OLPC XO-1 I have with me as a PDF reader. A touchscreen would be amazing for scrolling, panning and zooming. The mousepad and gamepad arrow keys are pretty stifling. The touchscreen would be so intuitive for kids, and best of all, will allow them to take notes in traditional fashion and enable them to sketch diagrams for their notes, something a keyboard and trackpad won't allow you to do.
As for OLPC tech, the Pixel Qi screen is a complete game-changer and something everyone else on the market doesn't have yet (can't wait for the Notion Ink Adam android tablet which will have it). It's simply amazing how you can switch between colored backlit LCD to black and white low-power sunlight readable mode which *extends* battery life. Moreover, even the backlit LCD mode is sunlight readable. If you take your device outside or put it under very bright lights, it will show up as black and white and is still readable as opposed to normal backlit LCD screens.
The wireless mesh networking technology used by OLPC is also something I want to see perfected across the computing world. The OLPC XO machines were built so that you can chain a bunch of them across a long distance to share and piggyback an internet connection that's available to only one machine, kinda like smart dust.
Another thing, I haven't tested it, but under ideal conditions (think line-of-sight straight highway with no obstructions), the XO machines are supposed to be able to communicate across 1 kilometer. I'd believe it though as the XO picks up a *LOT* of wifi signals that my phone can't see. Something like 30:10 ratio.
This actually fantastic. The developer base left at OLPC is shockingly small and if they join forces with the India effort, they can really do a big impact with low-cost, energy efficient computing.
I really hate how the hardware world has gone into faster, faster, more, more when it should be working on cheaper and more energy-efficient. I'd rather that Moore's law went into making chips at current speeds cheaper than constantly expensive chips at faster speeds. Instead, what they do is phase out slow-cpu tech and keep selling power-hungry speed demons
On a related note, having an OLPC XO-1 unit in my hands, having gone through the internet on a Pentium 1 back in the 90s, I really hate the present AJAXification of the entire web - it's no longer possible to fully surf websites on a 400MHz machine like the XO-1 without having to turn off Javascript and Flash.
Javascript programmers are doing the very same thing that gave Flash a bad name years ago: Bloat.
OLPC did not sell out to Microsoft. OLPC's policy is simply like this: If an organization buys OLPC XO-1 & XO-1.5 machines, they are free to do with them what they want, even install Windows should they choose (unlike the iStuff Apple does not want you tinkering around with and have to be jailbroken in order to do more stuff). You buy it, you own it and are free to install whatever software you want on it (whether open or proprietary), unlike a lot of gadgets today which you only seem to license from their manufacturers due to their DMCA and DRM hooks.
Moreover, some governments requested that their machines run Windows, so how could Negroponte say no to that request from paying customers? (I don't think it ever happened though, haven't seen any XO-1s running WinXP in the wild. The XO-1.5s should be able to run Windows with their higher specs tho).
I asked, AFAIK, NO ONE at OLPC has been working on Windows stuff, it was all up to the MS folks to make Windows run on the OLPC XO machines. The only work done by OLPC folks did to support Windows was to make the BIOS more compatible. One of the engineers at OLPC said that the changes the MS folks wanted to the BIOS would even prevent booting to anything else than Windows, so what the OLPC dude did was actually fix the BIOS so that it *could be* dual booted to both Linux and Windows as opposed to the MS folks' original plans.
There's been a lot of hate thrown towards OLPC ever since the Windows thing, but really, everything they do is open source over there and nothing really came out of that Windows thing except negative public backlash.
Now about selling to small deployments and individuals, IMHO this is something they need to do to make the platform survive. The smallness of the size of the developer crew at OLPC is simply ridiculous. More geeks need to be able to get their hands on these wonderful machines to get a healthy software and application ecosystem going.
As for touchscreen, having monkeyed around with an XO-1 machine, I'd say it's a must-have when you twist the screen into tablet configuration. The gamepad buttons on it are simply not enough when you need to use the mouse.
No, you're just racist.
Actually, they say it's going to run Adobe Flash: Indian Government Unveils Quite Powerful $10 Tablet
I don't think it'll be killing the genre.
:)
Twitch shooting was what made the multiplayer FPS genre popular in the first place (Quake, Unreal Tournament).
If you want something slower-paced and less twitchy, I recommend Operation Flashpoint & the ARMA series.
Or Fallout 3 with VATS aming