I realize your panicked post was just to gain karma, and I realize DirectX will allow alot of people to develop for the X-Box, but please: Microsoft will NOT corner the gaming market, not if they handle things with the same skill they used to "corner" the handheld market with WinCE.
Uh gee thanks. Truth is its a genuine concern. My current machine has a 13 GB hard drive for Linux. There is a 3.7 for Windows on here too. The only reason I keep windows around is that I like games like Half Life and Quake 3. But wait you say! Quake 3 is published by Loki and it runs under Linux!!! That it does. In fact I own a Loki copy in the metal Linux box. Trouble is, I bought a Matrox G400 Max because of the Utah GLX project. I am running a Celeron 300A @ 450 and I have 192 MB of ram. I get 21 FPS on average in Quake 3, this is with all the options turned off and at 640x480 and some added speed optimizations from planetquake in my autoexec.cfg.
Under windows at 640x480 with no speed optimizations, I get an average of 67 FPS. 1024X728 again no optimizatons yields 25 FPS. Guess which OS gives me an easier time being a LPB bastard with the railgun?
I know XFree 4.0 is out and hey thats great. I bought the G400 with the plan to support Linux compatible hardware. The truth is, most games support windows and not Linux. (And if you can get Half Life to run under Wine let me know because I can't.)
Will Blizzard code for the X-Box? Will Bungie? Will Square? Will Capcom? Who are the awesome 2nd and 3rd parties that will make Microsoft stand out?
No, but I doubt that they will need to. I think that the design of the X box will most likely allow backwards compatiblility with current game structures, I mean, look at the hardware in it! Its a condensed PC! I don't mean that MS will become a gaming juggernaut (but look, they have already snapped up a few gaming houses...) Rather I mean that they will create a market that makes it more favorable to continue coding games for Windows. I mean, what OS does Blizzard code for now? Bungie? Square? Its not Linux.
(Albeit Blizzard has hinted at a Linux port for Starcraft and Diablo II if Loki game sales are strong.)
You are correct in that there is no need to panic, but we cannot just sit back and say "Ooh look at the silly X-Box!" Slow, bloated, and propritary they may be, MS is not stupid. Sure, I think that they will take a beating in the handheald market. (They already are.) It is however idiotic to assume that they don't have a chance in the console arena. Because they DO have a chance. Not a great one, and this is a threat to multiple platform games as a whole.
There is no need to base a console on windows. MS is doing it because its the software that they have already (code reuse) and because it gives them tht opportunity to expand their monopoly with out appearing to do so directly. Mind you, given their marketshare where the hell ELSE could they expand to?
There is no doubt that MS will push DirectX and all their other game API's on this system. I doubt that it will be designed to implictly support OpenGL. (But I bet it runs quake anyhow...)
The danger that this poses is the integration of the PC into a gaming machine. Now don't get me wrong, I play plenty of games on this machine. The danger comes in the form of more games for a single platform -Windows-. Will the games for the MS box run on a Mac or a Linux box? No. (Maybe under VMWare.) If MS corners this market then they have a great opportunity to control the game market. If they do this the odds of people choosing an alternate OS (Linux, Beos, BSD et al.) is slim.
If all the good games, or just a majority of them are run under Windows (as they are now) or on this box MS has a very good leverage point over the desktop market again. Think about this: Some parent buying a home computer. The child says "don't get the one with Linux on it! It can't run Bozo Spacewars XXVII!!" Now, Linux could dual boot as we know, but its the percetion or as they like to say "mindshare" that is important here.
Microsoft is trying to kill two birds with one stone here. They are trying to generate a viable gaming market for their OS/Firmware, and they are trying to mantain/expand their monopoly grip on software.
If this becomes a success I can only see games that are developed across multiple platforms to decrease.
Without detailed specs it is hard to say. I would assume that if the box had genuine PC hardware (chip, graphics etc) as it certanly seems too, MS would be IDIOTIC not to include LAN support. Of course, if it supports high speed internet it supports TCP/IP. It would be brainless to hook one of these up to a LAN. I just hope it uses the win2k method of network configuration. (Hey wow! you don't need to reboot to change your IP settings! What Innovation! (Now where have I seen THAT before???))
My guess is that the box will self-configure on an IP network. If it comes with a full keyboard and a full windows OS I cannot see this box making it far in the console market though. Why? Game boxes are simple. You plug in a cartrige or CD and you play. They get about as complex as a full featured toaster.
If this box is indeed complex the simpler gameboxes will destroy it.
From the article: Klobuchar added: "It's a crime to steal, whether it's done the old-fashioned way or with new technology. And it's a crime regardless of whether the stolen item is physical property or intellectual property."
Given that L0pht Crack works on NT (New Technology), and lockpicks are the old fashioned way. Is it a crime to use say, qcrack on the passwords on a Unix box? Or would that be considered "the old fashioned way"? (j/k)
On a separate note: They said that the user IDs and passwords provided access to proprietary information valued in millions of dollars, and they estimated the cost of issuing new user IDs and passwords at approximately $12,500.
L0pht Crack is an excellent tool, but I can only assume that the security at the company was lax as a whole. It looks like Bell use social engineering on Brelje to get an account, which is always a weakness. Still, on a system that has "millions of dollars" of information, you would think that they would use strong passwords and change the passwords on a regular basis. (I know how L0pht Crack gets the passwords) My point is that the company claims that it will cost $12,500 to issue new passwords. WTF? This is something that they should be doing on a regular basis!!!!
Not that this guy should not be nailed -he should- he broke the law. I just think that the claim issued over the cost of issuing new passwords is malarky.
Gibsons first system was an Apple IIe I believe. When he first got it home he phoned the store after he had set it up to complain about the "noise". It turns out that it was the floppy drive making all the noise, this shocked Gibson who always had assumed that computers were totally silent in their operation.
(You should hear the fans on my overclocked system... All seven of them...)
I saw this on an interview with Gibson on local TV sometime back (I live in BC).
Carmacks latest .plan mentions an important point, Slades development was remotely wrecked. That is not what we need. We don't need vigilantie justice (as much as I admit I got a smile from some of the comments on Slashdot as to what was going on with his system.) This is NOT the way to promote the GPL.
Full text of Carmack's.plan follows: ------------------------------------------------ --
2/24/00 ------- Some people took it upon themselves to remotely wreck Slade's development system. That is no more defensible than breaking into Id and smashing something.
The idea isn't to punish anyone, it is to have them comply with the license and continue to contribute. QuakeLives has quite a few happy users, and it is in everyone's best interest to have development continue. It just has to be by the rules. ------------------------------------------------ --
Quake 2 probably used some of the source for Quake1. Maybe it only used 1 line. So now it's a derivative work, and I can demand source.
Quake 3 probably used some of the source from Quake 2. Again, maybe it only used 1 line. That would make it a derivative work.
I demand source for Quake 3!
You have misread the GPL.
You see, Carmack owns the copyright to the quake 1 source. He can do whatever he pleases with it. He can take his original source and re-release it as Quake 1 1/2 if he wants to. No one can stop him. This is because he is the copyright holder on the orgininal code, he can release the original code under another licence too if he wants. What he CANNOT do is take already released GPL code that has been changed and close it.
So even though Quake 2 and 3 may be derived from Quake 1, because Carmack owns the source he can do whatever he damn well pleases with it. He just cant do whatever he pleases with someone elses GPL'ed code.
I don't like John Carmack all that much. Particularly after that bit about forwarding information about people's computers to Id whenever they used Quake3.
This was an oversight read bug or error if you want to. The "feature" was documented in early releases of the Q3Test bin's, it was all in the readme files. Due to an oversight, John admitted that this feature was NOT documented in further readme files. In the first few he documents it and tells you how to turn it off.
It was a mistake, and John even posted his first ever series of posts to slashdot to apologizes for the mistake. (I cannot find the link right at this moment.)
John is greatly admired around here because he has great integrity. Read his.plan files sometime, you will come around.
Apple and OS X. I know they are using open source software in their OS but I have no idea if they actually did release the modified source.
AFAIK their source is based on the *BSD licence and *BSD software, which is not covered by the GPL. I believe that OS X will be open source (at least this is what I have heard).
If I am incorrect in this the raging hordes of slashdotters will sweep down upon me and flame me to ashes with their corrections......
I am not so much of a Unix geek as you, I am not old enough to be one, I got my first system at the age of 7 and it was a TRS-80, there was no way I could have used Unix at that age, the only things that had it were servers. I never got into Unix until relativly recently (4 years ago) using Solaris at college.
I understand where you are coming from, and how much it must suck for newbies like myself to come along and mess up Unix. Still, I dont think it will go away completly, BSD is still more Unix like than Linux (because it is a Unix in its own right.)
I still know a guy that *REFUSES* to code in C because it "creates too much bloat". He codes in assembly. He does not code overly fast, but his programs ARE fast.
To each their own I guess. Unfortunatly changes favoring the masses will happen whether we want them to or not. I *LIKE* a CLI interface, but from what I can tell I expect to see a voice-activated interface very soon. I say this because people want it. If they want that then system specs must increase, and bloat will increase too.
What can we do if people want this? Not much I guess, but we are in the minority.
As a UNIX user, I notice that you are trying to give Linux an MS Window like GUI.
I don't like that.
You don't have to. If you don't like a particular GUI don't use it. No one is trying to force a particular user interface on anyone. The thing with Linux is that anyone who can code can change it as they see fit.
Why does a "Geek" need a "file manager" (or whatever you call it, what you're crying for) ?
It would be fun, thats why. I don't need a reason, its my opinion.
If you don't like the MIT's X System, you're not a "geek" or "nerd".
I never said I disliked it. I never said that I would even be using this window manager at all. I think that something needs to change with the UI for Linux before more people will begin to adopt Linux.
I may be wrong, but you sound resistant to the changes that are occuring with Linux. I admit that its not nearly as much of a tighly-knit group of users as we used to have. Still, some of us are beginning to sound like Amiga users, which is unfortunate (one of the reasons that the Amiga unfortunatly died). It does us no good to staunchly stand and proclaim that "Linux is unchangeable!" Linux is open, openness is about change. As soon as we begin to resist change we begin to die, we fail to adapt, we fail to be open.
I think that a newbie GUI is needed for the people who just want a stable OS that allows you to browse the web, Email, word-process, edit pictures/make cards, and play the occasional game. Its not fair to subject my mother to a CLI. She just does not understand it. All she wants to use her system for is mentioned above.
I guess the comment would then be that she does not need Linux, True! She does not, and that's why she has Windows on her machine. However, if we want to see some large scale adoption of Linux amongst the masses an easier method of interaction (one that the users are familiar with) is needed.
But it's not something that a real UNIX pro would use.
Well, I am not looking for JUST that, but a total 3D environment. Imagine a small quake level, that had say, icons on the walls of the level, if you were to place your crosshair over the Icon and "shoot" it, it would load the said program. You could move around the level a-la Quake, when a program Launched it would appear fullscreen (or close to that) in a window in front of your vision.
Pressing say, the 3rd mouse button would disengage you from the window, and leave a floating (semi-transparent w/ GL extensions?) window hovering in the level. You could then move around this window, and open other windows in the same way. Or, the walls themselves could be textured with the programs themselves: Imagine Netscape as a "texture" on one wall. Again "shooting" the wall or floating window would bring it into a "zoom" mode (i.e. normal desktop apperance of the window)
And just like that doom process manager, imagine zombie processes REALLY becoming zombies! It would be great to beat them down or gib them!
I got this crazy idea because of an article in an old boot mag. It was written by Alex St.John. He mentioned how Bill Gates was thinking about buying id Software because he imagined that the 3D environments that Carmack was creating would be a potential threat to the 2D windows interface, and that a 3D "virtual" window manager would be more intuitive and easier to use.
Just a thought anyways. I would love to start trying to code something like this myself, but my programming skills are laughable at best.:/
Still, if I was going to code anything large this would be it, this is the only "itch" that I can think of that would need scratching.
This is one of the things that is needed for Linux. Its pretty well known though. I suppose that people will complain even more that there are too many WM/GUI's for Linux...
Even if this does not take off, (and I think it will, no SHOULD) it creates more "competition" which results in more choice. This is great.
--------------------------
Slight divergence:
A "GUI" that I would love to see for Linux would be one based on the Quake 1 source, a true 3D environment that interacts like quake. Bringing up windows would bring up 3D windows in the world which you could move around or have on "walls" of the level.
Just something I thought would be cool (although I cannot see it being as user-friendly as this "Mac" GUI idea) Still, it would be very geeky cool.
(I know that SGI had a similar thing for IRIX as seen in Jurassic Park, but there is AFAIK nothing like this for Linux.)
Search on Altavista, you are bound to find something. (For some reason the HTML tags do not seem to be working for links right now.... Wierd, good thing for previews.)
They may be a more difficult target. MS has long denied ping packets, one would assume that they are prepared for this type of attack. (The DDoS was not using ping I know...) Despite how much people here (myself included) hate MS they employ some excellent sysadmins (they can afford to!) And although they are running NT which we are so happy to bash, their servers are probably watched over 24-7 by compitent people. They probably have control of their own internet backbone-routers etc... So maybe the attacks were tried, and failed?
If you have the money you can pay people to guard your system night and day. This is what MS does, it would be very very hard IMO to take out Microsoft.com.
Of course that MS has an OS that requires such viglilance does not bespeak the OS very well...
There is one estimate that the nano circuts could be running as fast as current processors are now within five years. How long will it be before they become usable? My guess is twenty years, sure I may be off its just a guess.
What I would like to see in the meantime is chip technology moving into a three dimensional arrangement. As it stands now, most chips are basically flat. Imagine the power that could be built into a chip that is not 1cm^2 but 1cm^3 in area! (I worry about heat dissapation though).
This nanotech is a step in the right direction, for as far as I know circuts cannot be made any smaller than this (due to quantum uncertanty).
Now imagine the same idea as above, taking these atoms and building them on a tier-level as opposed to a plane. Imagine the power of a 1cm^3 cube built in this manner!
For a more interesting perspective on nanotechnology I reccomend: ENGINES of CREATION The Coming Era of Nanotechnology by K. Eric Drexler. (I just started reading it thats why I posted this:)
I disagree. I think that he is a monster and a murderer, there can be no disputing that. My point is that people who are on "his side" would not see him as evil.
Think about it, of the aprox. 100,000 Iraqis that died in the Gulf War, their remaining families probably think that George Bush and the U.S. are evil. Do you consider the U.S. to be evil? Probably not if you live there. That is the crux of my point. I am by NO MEANS defending or approving of saddams actions. I am merely stating my opinion as to the non-existance of an emperical evil.
I don't think that the previous poster was targeting any one country in general, and was probably using Lebanon as an example. There are many other examples:
Why is it that the UN lept to help Kuait with such zeal? Yet, conflicts break out in eastern Europe and the UN shuffles its feet... Ethnic Cleansing? *Cough*Mass*Cough*Murder*Cough* Thats ok...
[b]JUST DON'T TOUCH OUR OIL!!!![/b]
Lets face it the UN has a long way to go, but it is still better than nothing.
(What follows below is slightly offtopic...) On the topic of Saddam Hussien being evil IMO, he is not evil. He is human. He is a human that I detest, but not evil. How dare I say such a thing? I say this because I do not believe in an emperical evil. If you are in a war, the enemy is "evil" and your side is "good". Switch sides, and the "evil" side and the "good" side switch too.
Its sad but too many people fail to realize this and blindly follow "good" leaders without questioning thier morals or integrity because their leaders are "good". Remember: World Leaders are only human. There are despicable people and wonderful people, and all variables in between. Just try to pick the wonderful ones. (And avoid the ignorant ones at any cost.)
Slashdot Mirror
Go here and you shall find the answers you seek.
I realize your panicked post was just to gain karma, and I realize DirectX will allow alot of people to develop for the X-Box, but please: Microsoft will NOT corner the gaming market, not if they handle things with the same skill they used to "corner" the handheld market with WinCE.
Uh gee thanks. Truth is its a genuine concern. My current machine has a 13 GB hard drive for Linux. There is a 3.7 for Windows on here too. The only reason I keep windows around is that I like games like Half Life and Quake 3. But wait you say! Quake 3 is published by Loki and it runs under Linux!!! That it does. In fact I own a Loki copy in the metal Linux box. Trouble is, I bought a Matrox G400 Max because of the Utah GLX project. I am running a Celeron 300A @ 450 and I have 192 MB of ram. I get 21 FPS on average in Quake 3, this is with all the options turned off and at 640x480 and some added speed optimizations from planetquake in my autoexec.cfg.
Under windows at 640x480 with no speed optimizations, I get an average of 67 FPS. 1024X728 again no optimizatons yields 25 FPS. Guess which OS gives me an easier time being a LPB bastard with the railgun?
I know XFree 4.0 is out and hey thats great. I bought the G400 with the plan to support Linux compatible hardware. The truth is, most games support windows and not Linux. (And if you can get Half Life to run under Wine let me know because I can't.)
Will Blizzard code for the X-Box? Will Bungie? Will Square? Will Capcom? Who are the awesome 2nd and 3rd parties that will make Microsoft stand out?
No, but I doubt that they will need to. I think that the design of the X box will most likely allow backwards compatiblility with current game structures, I mean, look at the hardware in it! Its a condensed PC! I don't mean that MS will become a gaming juggernaut (but look, they have already snapped up a few gaming houses...) Rather I mean that they will create a market that makes it more favorable to continue coding games for Windows. I mean, what OS does Blizzard code for now? Bungie? Square? Its not Linux.
(Albeit Blizzard has hinted at a Linux port for Starcraft and Diablo II if Loki game sales are strong.)
You are correct in that there is no need to panic, but we cannot just sit back and say "Ooh look at the silly X-Box!" Slow, bloated, and propritary they may be, MS is not stupid. Sure, I think that they will take a beating in the handheald market. (They already are.) It is however idiotic to assume that they don't have a chance in the console arena. Because they DO have a chance. Not a great one, and this is a threat to multiple platform games as a whole.
There is no need to base a console on windows. MS is doing it because its the software that they have already (code reuse) and because it gives them tht opportunity to expand their monopoly with out appearing to do so directly. Mind you, given their marketshare where the hell ELSE could they expand to?
My fear:
This gamebox becomes a sucess.
Now let me explain why.
There is no doubt that MS will push DirectX and all their other game API's on this system. I doubt that it will be designed to implictly support OpenGL. (But I bet it runs quake anyhow...)
The danger that this poses is the integration of the PC into a gaming machine. Now don't get me wrong, I play plenty of games on this machine. The danger comes in the form of more games for a single platform -Windows-. Will the games for the MS box run on a Mac or a Linux box? No. (Maybe under VMWare.) If MS corners this market then they have a great opportunity to control the game market. If they do this the odds of people choosing an alternate OS (Linux, Beos, BSD et al.) is slim.
If all the good games, or just a majority of them are run under Windows (as they are now) or on this box MS has a very good leverage point over the desktop market again. Think about this: Some parent buying a home computer. The child says "don't get the one with Linux on it! It can't run Bozo Spacewars XXVII!!" Now, Linux could dual boot as we know, but its the percetion or as they like to say "mindshare" that is important here.
Microsoft is trying to kill two birds with one stone here. They are trying to generate a viable gaming market for their OS/Firmware, and they are trying to mantain/expand their monopoly grip on software.
If this becomes a success I can only see games that are developed across multiple platforms to decrease.
No sir. I don't like it.
Without detailed specs it is hard to say. I would assume that if the box had genuine PC hardware (chip, graphics etc) as it certanly seems too, MS would be IDIOTIC not to include LAN support. Of course, if it supports high speed internet it supports TCP/IP. It would be brainless to hook one of these up to a LAN. I just hope it uses the win2k method of network configuration. (Hey wow! you don't need to reboot to change your IP settings! What Innovation! (Now where have I seen THAT before???))
My guess is that the box will self-configure on an IP network. If it comes with a full keyboard and a full windows OS I cannot see this box making it far in the console market though. Why? Game boxes are simple. You plug in a cartrige or CD and you play. They get about as complex as a full featured toaster.
If this box is indeed complex the simpler gameboxes will destroy it.
Sorry, it was not a social engineering job but a crack with the assistance of an insider. Hence inside job.
From the article:
Klobuchar added: "It's a crime to steal, whether it's done the old-fashioned way or with new technology. And it's a crime regardless of whether the stolen item is physical property or intellectual property."
Given that L0pht Crack works on NT (New Technology), and lockpicks are the old fashioned way. Is it a crime to use say, qcrack on the passwords on a Unix box? Or would that be considered "the old fashioned way"? (j/k)
On a separate note:
They said that the user IDs and passwords provided access to proprietary information valued in millions of dollars, and they estimated the cost of issuing new user IDs and passwords at approximately $12,500.
L0pht Crack is an excellent tool, but I can only assume that the security at the company was lax as a whole. It looks like Bell use social engineering on Brelje to get an account, which is always a weakness. Still, on a system that has "millions of dollars" of information, you would think that they would use strong passwords and change the passwords on a regular basis. (I know how L0pht Crack gets the passwords) My point is that the company claims that it will cost $12,500 to issue new passwords. WTF? This is something that they should be doing on a regular basis!!!!
Not that this guy should not be nailed -he should- he broke the law. I just think that the claim issued over the cost of issuing new passwords is malarky.
Gibsons first system was an Apple IIe I believe.
When he first got it home he phoned the store after he had set it up to complain about the "noise". It turns out that it was the floppy drive making all the noise, this shocked Gibson who always had assumed that computers were totally silent in their operation.
(You should hear the fans on my overclocked system... All seven of them...)
I saw this on an interview with Gibson on local TV sometime back (I live in BC).
this is propaganda.
:)
No it isn't. Propaganda is a really cool set of tiled wallpaper!
I wonder what Kennedy has to say on the topic of MP3's (I know I am way offtopic!
Carmacks latest
.plan mentions an important point, Slades development was remotely wrecked. That is not what we need. We don't need vigilantie justice (as much as I admit I got a smile from some of the comments on Slashdot as to what was going on with his system.) This is NOT the way to promote the GPL.
.plan follows: - --
- --
Full text of Carmack's
-----------------------------------------------
2/24/00
-------
Some people took it upon themselves to remotely wreck Slade's development system. That is no more defensible than breaking into Id and smashing something.
The idea isn't to punish anyone, it is to have them comply with the license and continue to contribute. QuakeLives has quite a few happy users, and it is in everyone's best interest to have development continue. It just has to be by the rules.
-----------------------------------------------
Quake 1 was GPL'd
Quake 2 probably used some of the source for Quake1. Maybe it only used 1 line. So now it's a derivative work, and I can demand source.
Quake 3 probably used some of the source from Quake 2. Again, maybe it only used 1 line. That would make it a derivative work.
I demand source for Quake 3!
You have misread the GPL.
You see, Carmack owns the copyright to the quake 1 source. He can do whatever he pleases with it. He can take his original source and re-release it as Quake 1 1/2 if he wants to. No one can stop him. This is because he is the copyright holder on the orgininal code, he can release the original code under another licence too if he wants. What he CANNOT do is take already released GPL code that has been changed and close it.
So even though Quake 2 and 3 may be derived from Quake 1, because Carmack owns the source he can do whatever he damn well pleases with it. He just cant do whatever he pleases with someone elses GPL'ed code.
I don't like John Carmack all that much. Particularly after that bit about forwarding information about people's computers to Id whenever they used Quake3.
.plan files sometime, you will come around.
This was an oversight read bug or error if you want to. The "feature" was documented in early releases of the Q3Test bin's, it was all in the readme files. Due to an oversight, John admitted that this feature was NOT documented in further readme files. In the first few he documents it and tells you how to turn it off.
It was a mistake, and John even posted his first ever series of posts to slashdot to apologizes for the mistake. (I cannot find the link right at this moment.)
John is greatly admired around here because he has great integrity. Read his
Apple and OS X. I know they are using open source software in their OS but I have no idea if they actually did release the modified source.
AFAIK their source is based on the *BSD licence and *BSD software, which is not covered by the GPL. I believe that OS X will be open source (at least this is what I have heard).
If I am incorrect in this the raging hordes of slashdotters will sweep down upon me and flame me to ashes with their corrections......
I can understand that.
I am not so much of a Unix geek as you, I am not old enough to be one, I got my first system at the age of 7 and it was a TRS-80, there was no way I could have used Unix at that age, the only things that had it were servers. I never got into Unix until relativly recently (4 years ago) using Solaris at college.
I understand where you are coming from, and how much it must suck for newbies like myself to come along and mess up Unix. Still, I dont think it will go away completly, BSD is still more Unix like than Linux (because it is a Unix in its own right.)
I still know a guy that *REFUSES* to code in C because it "creates too much bloat". He codes in assembly. He does not code overly fast, but his programs ARE fast.
To each their own I guess. Unfortunatly changes favoring the masses will happen whether we want them to or not. I *LIKE* a CLI interface, but from what I can tell I expect to see a voice-activated interface very soon. I say this because people want it. If they want that then system specs must increase, and bloat will increase too.
What can we do if people want this? Not much I guess, but we are in the minority.
So it goes.
As a UNIX user, I notice that you are trying to give Linux an MS Window like GUI.
:)
I don't like that.
You don't have to. If you don't like a particular GUI don't use it. No one is trying to force a particular user interface on anyone. The thing with Linux is that anyone who can code can change it as they see fit.
Why does a "Geek" need a "file manager" (or whatever you call it, what you're crying for) ?
It would be fun, thats why. I don't need a reason, its my opinion.
If you don't like the MIT's X System, you're not a "geek" or "nerd".
I never said I disliked it. I never said that I would even be using this window manager at all. I think that something needs to change with the UI for Linux before more people will begin to adopt Linux.
I may be wrong, but you sound resistant to the changes that are occuring with Linux. I admit that its not nearly as much of a tighly-knit group of users as we used to have. Still, some of us are beginning to sound like Amiga users, which is unfortunate (one of the reasons that the Amiga unfortunatly died). It does us no good to staunchly stand and proclaim that "Linux is unchangeable!" Linux is open, openness is about change. As soon as we begin to resist change we begin to die, we fail to adapt, we fail to be open.
I think that a newbie GUI is needed for the people who just want a stable OS that allows you to browse the web, Email, word-process, edit pictures/make cards, and play the occasional game. Its not fair to subject my mother to a CLI. She just does not understand it. All she wants to use her system for is mentioned above.
I guess the comment would then be that she does not need Linux, True! She does not, and that's why she has Windows on her machine. However, if we want to see some large scale adoption of Linux amongst the masses an easier method of interaction (one that the users are familiar with) is needed.
But it's not something that a real UNIX pro would use.
I doubt it is intended for this audience.
Cheers
Yes, thats exactly what I was thinking of, but I wonder if the Quake engine would be better suited to the task, after all it is optimized for speed.
I suspect that the Link you provided would be made to run as an extension to explorer, or intendet to replace explorer in windows...
I have to believe that Carmacks coding is more precise in this matter. (Not intended to be flamebait, just IMHO.)
Well, I am not looking for JUST that, but a total 3D environment. Imagine a small quake level, that had say, icons on the walls of the level, if you were to place your crosshair over the Icon and "shoot" it, it would load the said program. You could move around the level a-la Quake, when a program Launched it would appear fullscreen (or close to that) in a window in front of your vision.
:/
Pressing say, the 3rd mouse button would disengage you from the window, and leave a floating (semi-transparent w/ GL extensions?) window hovering in the level. You could then move around this window, and open other windows in the same way. Or, the walls themselves could be textured with the programs themselves: Imagine Netscape as a "texture" on one wall. Again "shooting" the wall or floating window would bring it into a "zoom" mode (i.e. normal desktop apperance of the window)
And just like that doom process manager, imagine zombie processes REALLY becoming zombies! It would be great to beat them down or gib them!
I got this crazy idea because of an article in an old boot mag. It was written by Alex St.John. He mentioned how Bill Gates was thinking about buying id Software because he imagined that the 3D environments that Carmack was creating would be a potential threat to the 2D windows interface, and that a 3D "virtual" window manager would be more intuitive and easier to use.
Just a thought anyways. I would love to start trying to code something like this myself, but my programming skills are laughable at best.
Still, if I was going to code anything large this would be it, this is the only "itch" that I can think of that would need scratching.
This is one of the things that is needed for Linux. Its pretty well known though. I suppose that people will complain even more that there are too many WM/GUI's for Linux...
Even if this does not take off, (and I think it will, no SHOULD) it creates more "competition" which results in more choice. This is great.
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Slight divergence:
A "GUI" that I would love to see for Linux would be one based on the Quake 1 source, a true 3D environment that interacts like quake. Bringing up windows would bring up 3D windows in the world which you could move around or have on "walls" of the level.
Just something I thought would be cool (although I cannot see it being as user-friendly as this "Mac" GUI idea) Still, it would be very geeky cool.
(I know that SGI had a similar thing for IRIX as seen in Jurassic Park, but there is AFAIK nothing like this for Linux.)
He is a figure skater.
Search on Altavista, you are bound to find something. (For some reason the HTML tags do not seem to be working for links right now.... Wierd, good thing for previews.)
They may be a more difficult target.
MS has long denied ping packets, one would assume that they are prepared for this type of attack. (The DDoS was not using ping I know...) Despite how much people here (myself included) hate MS they employ some excellent sysadmins (they can afford to!) And although they are running NT which we are so happy to bash, their servers are probably watched over 24-7 by compitent people. They probably have control of their own internet backbone-routers etc... So maybe the attacks were tried, and failed?
If you have the money you can pay people to guard your system night and day. This is what MS does, it would be very very hard IMO to take out Microsoft.com.
Of course that MS has an OS that requires such viglilance does not bespeak the OS very well...
Sorry, please try again.
LOL! FINALLY a funny Natalie/Grits post.
There is one estimate that the nano circuts could be running as fast as current processors are now within five years. How long will it be before they become usable? My guess is twenty years, sure I may be off its just a guess.
:)
What I would like to see in the meantime is chip technology moving into a three dimensional arrangement. As it stands now, most chips are basically flat. Imagine the power that could be built into a chip that is not 1cm^2 but 1cm^3 in area! (I worry about heat dissapation though).
This nanotech is a step in the right direction, for as far as I know circuts cannot be made any smaller than this (due to quantum uncertanty).
Now imagine the same idea as above, taking these atoms and building them on a tier-level as opposed to a plane. Imagine the power of a 1cm^3 cube built in this manner!
For a more interesting perspective on nanotechnology I reccomend: ENGINES of CREATION The Coming Era of Nanotechnology by K. Eric Drexler. (I just started reading it thats why I posted this
I disagree. I think that he is a monster and a murderer, there can be no disputing that. My point is that people who are on "his side" would not see him as evil.
Think about it, of the aprox. 100,000 Iraqis that died in the Gulf War, their remaining families probably think that George Bush and the U.S. are evil. Do you consider the U.S. to be evil? Probably not if you live there. That is the crux of my point. I am by NO MEANS defending or approving of saddams actions. I am merely stating my opinion as to the non-existance of an emperical evil.
I don't think that the previous poster was targeting any one country in general, and was probably using Lebanon as an example. There are many other examples:
Why is it that the UN lept to help Kuait with such zeal? Yet, conflicts break out in eastern Europe and the UN shuffles its feet... Ethnic Cleansing? *Cough*Mass*Cough*Murder*Cough* Thats ok...
[b]JUST DON'T TOUCH OUR OIL!!!![/b]
Lets face it the UN has a long way to go, but it is still better than nothing.
(What follows below is slightly offtopic...)
On the topic of Saddam Hussien being evil IMO, he is not evil. He is human. He is a human that I detest, but not evil. How dare I say such a thing? I say this because I do not believe in an emperical evil. If you are in a war, the enemy is "evil" and your side is "good". Switch sides, and the "evil" side and the "good" side switch too.
Its sad but too many people fail to realize this and blindly follow "good" leaders without questioning thier morals or integrity because their leaders are "good". Remember: World Leaders are only human. There are despicable people and wonderful people, and all variables in between. Just try to pick the wonderful ones. (And avoid the ignorant ones at any cost.)