'Tis far easier to attempt to tear down an established system, than it is to build up a better one. While I haven't read the "Interface hall of shame", I would have if you had provided a link. However, what is one man's obnoxious quirk is another's ideal behavior. Interface is a matter of taste, despite whatever Microsoft trys to say with their "Research."
Here is a person who finds a desktop, and a bunch of panels and taskbars, on the bottom of the screen handy. I say that not from my first impression aesthetically (I remember blanching when switching from win 3.1 to win 95), but from months of heavy use.
If I want to lookup a signal from, say, class QTimer (in the course of KDE app coding), I click on my desktop icon "Qt Class List", then click QTimer, and boom! I have just what I want.
If I want to install the #$%#^ old egcs from the RH CD becasue the #$%#$% new egcs is giving me errors, I pop in the CD, click on the desktop icon "cd", and boom! The window pops up, and I can find and directly type the rpm --install with one CLI command. (So I only have to take my hand off of the mouse once, rather than switching several times.) I find the desktop also a convenient place to store reminders (who needs a separate app? I plop an aptly named text file on the desktop, and save a detailed reminder in the file.
Oh, and while KDE (I know too little of GNOME to speak of it) may draw on ideas from Windows (as well as others), it doesn't blindly copy every little thing. I personally find myself FAR more efficient with KDE than I ever was with d:\winnt\explorer.exe
OK, so I thought that the Phantom Menace was the best of the 4 yet-released episodes of Star Wars.
Why should Germans care whether their government gives them permission to use cryptography? How can they be stopped?
If I memorize 3 sentences, for a total of some ungodly number of bits, and use it as a twofish key, and have it written down nowhere... then how short of torture are they going to get it out if me? So much for personal use. As far as secure communications, if two people use, say, 2048 bits for session key transfer, use a paranoid protocol, and use 256 bits for the session, what are they going to do about it?
The only way they could levy fines/impose prison terms on the USE of encryption (weak or strong) would be to admit they were routinely spying on people. Unless a police-state takover were imminent, such a revelation would not be politically popular, I would imagine.
So, I wouldn't worry about it. As far as I know, Germany's constituton has SOME basic protections, so if they did "alter the deal", Schroeder couldn't exactly apply the Vader "grip of death" on anyone using PGP. Same as with US export nonsense. The NSA may wish it could put a huge bounty on Bruce Schneier... but oh well!
Re:win95 ftp.exe and netscape
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Slashdot Tweaks
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· Score: 1
I guess my hands have been re-trained to type win98 when referring to the consumer windows release...
Funny... I did a good-old ftp ftp13.netscape.com MANY a time (as I had to re-install win98 many a time), and it never, ever failed. This was an early Win95 release, too...
I don't mean to be insulting, but getting paranoid in criticizing Microsoft can cause the other criticisms to lose credibility.
I would guess yes, so to me Eric S, Stallman are both useless pieces of trash.
Eric Raymond's contributions have already been noted, so I'll note Stallman's.
Stallman originally developed GNU emacs and gcc. GNU emacs (and its derivatives) are *widely* popular, and gcc is the compiler that free/open source software lives and breathes.
So, while Stallman's politics may seem harmful to many, including myself, I'd say that guys like he and Raymond are undeserving of the title "media whore."
Well... considering the last two games he's developed/almost developed are both best played with a mouse (Quake and Quake 2), is it really surprising?:-)
This would be equally devastating to free software.
RedHat, and other commercial distributions, are "selling" free software, and would be held responsible for the quality. Either Red Hat would go out of business, or would have to drastically reduce the amount of software in the distribution, leaving in only what it can support. (This would probably be Kernel 2.0.30something, and a bunch of basic tools.)
Re:Possible moderation DOS attack?
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· Score: 1
If someone continuously posts bad stuff... then after enough of them are moderated -1, then they'll all be 0 or -1, by default.
Besides, moderators are supposed to focus on promotion, not demotion. So, moderators who read the guidelines won't get all their points sopped up.
Just because Bush bought the domains, it doesn't mean he'll set them up to point to his campaign site... They could just point to nothing. The main goal is to prevent others from using them, not for him to use them himself.
Funny thing about planetbusters... I've played lots and lots of Alpha Centauri myself (can't quite figure out how to properly play Morgan yet...), and I've yet to see a planet buster used. Probably that's because I've never let the UN charter be repealed... Perhaps the fear of the sanctions keeps the AI at bay.
The reason the 9th circuit is the most overturned is that it has the most liberals... and the supreme court happens to be fairly conservative right now.
However, protecting "trademarks" and "copyrights" and such seems to be in vogue with judges and politicians of all types these days, so I doubt the supreme court would overturn this one.
My understanding is that the technology used in the development of "Internet2" will eventually be used for commercial purposes, just as the existing "Internet" grew from military, to educational, to commercial.
That's why Algore made such a big deal about it, and that's why MS is concerned. Eventually, everyone might be using Internet2. Thus, it's prudent for MS to be in on the development of it, to know what's coming, and to be prepared for it.
Actually, AOL doesn't require that you look at any ads, as far as I can tell... The protocol used by their Java and Tcl/Tk clients is fully documented. In fact, TiK (the tcl client) is GPL'd. I know this because I happen to be writing a KDE client for it, one that doesn't have any ads in it.
As far as I can tell, ICQ doesn't seem to, either. At least, no ICQ clients that I have tried have any actual advertising in them. Unless you call the respective company logos "advertising."
Of course, I've never used the Windows or MacOS clients for any of these services, so... take my comments with a USDA serving of sodium.
oh, and regarding advertising in OSS source code:
"Copyright 1997-1998 Transmeta Corporation -- All Rights Reserved" Where have we seen that line?:-)
Did Linus actually say that "2GB is enough"? I thought he just ruled that "if you want more than 2 GB, then get a true 64-bit processor" or something like that.
Actually, KDE has just that. Right click, and boom! I can select "NBA standings" or "Slashdot"
kfm (KDE file manager) has the beginnings, it seems, of a good browser, with integration into the GUI where it's useful. Now, if that new Mozilla layout engine is good, perhaps a kfm variant can be made which uses the Mozilla layout engine.
I just noticed that I forgot to switch it to HTML Formatted... sorry:-)
Where does software come from? It comes from the intelligence of the workers.
Naturally, creating software isn't exactly the same as creating most products, but the processes can have similarities. In manufacturing, one usually starts with raw materials, and a customer order, applies men and machines to the task, and produces something to sell to the customer. In software, one starts with a desired set of functionality, applies men and machines, and comes up with some source code.
Just as finished goods only come from raw materials when investments are made in
employee's wages
capital investment in tools and machinery
training/managing employees to do their tasks
... software in the commercial world doesn't come without somebody
paying programmers
buying workstations for coding
buying books/training classes for the programmers, plus organizing them and holding them to (reminding them of, perhaps) deadlines.
Now, it can be argued that a programmer could produce his code without the capital investment, especially since people are more likely to own their own computers than their own assembly lines. More often than not, though, substantial projects require more than one person, plus it's not coders who usually are able to write the good documentation and marketing copy that a polished commercial offering has.
Just as a guy on an assembly line can put a tire on a car at home, or at a factory, a programmer can write a good backend at home, or at a job. A fully finished car, or application, though, requires the effort of a team. And the investment of money is what usually forms this team. Thus, the finished product (the source code) should be the property of the company (the investor.)
Note that this discussion has no relevance to open-source, GPL, bazaar, or whatever you want to call it today, projects. linux, perl, Apache.. these all follow a totally different model obviously, from the type of hacks I'm describing here.
(Applying old labels, defined during the industrial revolution and such, are so fun to apply to new situations, I think...)
Where does software come from? It comes from the intelligence of the workers.
Naturally, creating software isn't exactly the same as creating most products, but the processes can have similarities. In manufacturing, one usually starts with raw materials, and a customer order, applies men and machines to the task, and produces something to sell to the customer. In software, one starts with a desired set of functionality, applies men and machines, and comes up with some source code.
Just as finished goods only come from raw materials when investments are made in
employee's wages
capital investment in tools and machinery
training/managing employees to do their tasks
... software in the commercial world doesn't come without somebody
paying programmers
buying workstations for coding
buying books/training classes for the programmers, plus organizing them and holding them to (reminding them of, perhaps) deadlines.
Now, it can be argued that a programmer could produce his code without the capital investment, especially since people are more likely to own their own computers than their own assembly lines. More often than not, though, substantial projects require more than one person, plus it's not coders who usually are able to write the good documentation and marketing copy that a polished commercial offering has.
Just as a guy on an assembly line can put a tire on a car at home, or at a factory, a programmer can write a good backend at home, or at a job. A fully finished car, or application, though, requires the effort of a team. And the investment of money is what usually forms this team. Thus, the finished product (the source code) should be the property of the company (the investor.)
Note that this discussion has no relevance to open-source, GPL, bazaar, or whatever you want to call it today, projects. linux, perl, Apache.. these all follow a totally different model obviously, from the type of hacks I'm describing here.
The reason DOSEmu runs so fast, is that it uses a feature of the x86 CPU to emulate the 8086. These virtual machines think they are running in real mode (1MB of RAM addressable). Using this feature one cannot emulate protected mode or system management mode or anything like that. And, with only real mode to work with, you get to run 1) minix or 2) DOS.
Oh yeah, and doesn't it make sense that if one writes an x86 emulator, that it should be able to run on computers other than an x86? (sorry if that sounded hostile...)
1. A free market always maximizes net societal welfare, 2. Any state of maximalization of net societal welfare is achievable through a free market.
While this is true, this doesn't mean that socialism is capitalism. It seems to me that the generally accepted definition of socialism is an economic system where the means of production are owned or otherwise controlled by the government, as opposed to communism (owned/controlled by the people) or capitalism (owned/controlled by various individuals/corporations).
And, in the case of software, I would be inclined to call source code the "means of production." And, the best way to keep the software under control, and help make sure people will pay for it, is *not* to make the software "free." And, the "freedom" of "sharing" that embodies the GPL is not compatible with requiring people to pay for software.
Thus, if you do find capitalism efficient, and like it, then you shouldn't be too outraged when a company keeps some software proprietary. Because, until a cheaper (or even free) alternative comes around, they have every incentive to keep it proprietary. (As in the case of Netscape v. Internet Explorer)
Linux needs no commercialization to "survive"... Linux's popularity and long-term viability as a server OS depend on the trust and support by those in the know: the type of people who already know what linux is, and don't need Dell and Intel's support to convince them to use linux.
When you say that "we have absoultely ZERO privacy online" are you referring to we as "that group of people who uses software whose source code is a secret"?
You see, I ask because those of us who use software whose source code we can (and actually do) examine, would not have any GUID or other ID sent in our emails and documents without our knowledge. Thus, this incident proves nothing about our privacy.
Oh, yes, and I also have the ability to change my MAC address. So, whoever it is you refer to as "we", you should try getting a new NIC and a new document processor (ditch Word in favor of LyX or something).
Slashdot Mirror
'Tis far easier to attempt to tear down an established system, than it is to build up a better one.
While I haven't read the "Interface hall of shame", I would have if you had provided a link. However, what is one man's obnoxious quirk is another's ideal behavior. Interface is a matter of taste, despite whatever Microsoft trys to say with their "Research."
Here is a person who finds a desktop, and a bunch of panels and taskbars, on the bottom of the screen handy. I say that not from my first impression aesthetically (I remember blanching when switching from win 3.1 to win 95), but from months of heavy use.
If I want to lookup a signal from, say, class QTimer (in the course of KDE app coding), I click on my desktop icon "Qt Class List", then click QTimer, and boom! I have just what I want.
If I want to install the #$%#^ old egcs from the RH CD becasue the #$%#$% new egcs is giving me errors, I pop in the CD, click on the desktop icon "cd", and boom! The window pops up, and I can find and directly type the rpm --install with one CLI command. (So I only have to take my hand off of the mouse once, rather than switching several times.)
I find the desktop also a convenient place to store reminders (who needs a separate app? I plop an aptly named text file on the desktop, and save a detailed reminder in the file.
Oh, and while KDE (I know too little of GNOME to speak of it) may draw on ideas from Windows (as well as others), it doesn't blindly copy every little thing. I personally find myself FAR more efficient with KDE than I ever was with d:\winnt\explorer.exe
A real key, and a false one.
OK, so I thought that the Phantom Menace was the best of the 4 yet-released episodes of Star Wars.
Why should Germans care whether their government gives them permission to use cryptography? How can they be stopped?
If I memorize 3 sentences, for a total of some ungodly number of bits, and use it as a twofish key, and have it written down nowhere... then how short of torture are they going to get it out if me?
So much for personal use. As far as secure communications, if two people use, say, 2048 bits for session key transfer, use a paranoid protocol, and use 256 bits for the session, what are they going to do about it?
The only way they could levy fines/impose prison terms on the USE of encryption (weak or strong) would be to admit they were routinely spying on people. Unless a police-state takover were imminent, such a revelation would not be politically popular, I would imagine.
So, I wouldn't worry about it. As far as I know, Germany's constituton has SOME basic protections, so if they did "alter the deal", Schroeder couldn't exactly apply the Vader "grip of death" on anyone using PGP. Same as with US export nonsense. The NSA may wish it could put a huge bounty on Bruce Schneier... but oh well!
I guess my hands have been re-trained to type win98 when referring to the consumer windows release...
Funny... I did a good-old ftp ftp13.netscape.com MANY a time (as I had to re-install win98 many a time), and it never, ever failed. This was an early Win95 release, too...
I don't mean to be insulting, but getting paranoid in criticizing Microsoft can cause the other criticisms to lose credibility.
I would guess yes, so to me Eric S, Stallman are both useless pieces of trash.
Eric Raymond's contributions have already been noted, so I'll note Stallman's.
Stallman originally developed GNU emacs and gcc. GNU emacs (and its derivatives) are *widely* popular, and gcc is the compiler that free/open source software lives and breathes.
So, while Stallman's politics may seem harmful to many, including myself, I'd say that guys like he and Raymond are undeserving of the title "media whore."
Well... considering the last two games he's developed/almost developed are both best played with a mouse (Quake and Quake 2), is it really surprising? :-)
This would be equally devastating to free software.
RedHat, and other commercial distributions, are "selling" free software, and would be held responsible for the quality. Either Red Hat would go out of business, or would have to drastically reduce the amount of software in the distribution, leaving in only what it can support. (This would probably be Kernel 2.0.30something, and a bunch of basic tools.)
If someone continuously posts bad stuff... then after enough of them are moderated -1, then they'll all be 0 or -1, by default.
Besides, moderators are supposed to focus on promotion, not demotion. So, moderators who read the guidelines won't get all their points sopped up.
F...I...R..E
:-)
F..I..R..E
F.I.R.E
FIRE
FIRE
great game it was.. Oregon Trail helped me learn the QWERTY keyboard.
Just because Bush bought the domains, it doesn't mean he'll set them up to point to his campaign site... They could just point to nothing. The main goal is to prevent others from using them, not for him to use them himself.
Funny thing about planetbusters... I've played lots and lots of Alpha Centauri myself (can't quite figure out how to properly play Morgan yet...), and I've yet to see a planet buster used. Probably that's because I've never let the UN charter be repealed... Perhaps the fear of the sanctions keeps the AI at bay.
KDE and GNOME are part of RH 6.0... you don't need LSL to add it for you.
The reason the 9th circuit is the most overturned is that it has the most liberals... and the supreme court happens to be fairly conservative right now.
However, protecting "trademarks" and "copyrights" and such seems to be in vogue with judges and politicians of all types these days, so I doubt the supreme court would overturn this one.
My understanding is that the technology used in the development of "Internet2" will eventually be used for commercial purposes, just as the existing "Internet" grew from military, to educational, to commercial.
That's why Algore made such a big deal about it, and that's why MS is concerned. Eventually, everyone might be using Internet2. Thus, it's prudent for MS to be in on the development of it, to know what's coming, and to be prepared for it.
It seems to me that it really doesn't hurt anyone when people get credited... and it just might make someone's day.
It just might encourage that person to submit in the future; he might submit something obscure yet interesting the second time.
Actually, AOL doesn't require that you look at any ads, as far as I can tell... The protocol used by their Java and Tcl/Tk clients is fully documented. In fact, TiK (the tcl client) is GPL'd. I know this because I happen to be writing a KDE client for it, one that doesn't have any ads in it.
:-)
As far as I can tell, ICQ doesn't seem to, either. At least, no ICQ clients that I have tried have any actual advertising in them. Unless you call the respective company logos "advertising."
Of course, I've never used the Windows or MacOS clients for any of these services, so... take my comments with a USDA serving of sodium.
oh, and regarding advertising in OSS source code:
"Copyright 1997-1998 Transmeta Corporation -- All Rights Reserved"
Where have we seen that line?
Did Linus actually say that "2GB is enough"? I thought he just ruled that "if you want more than 2 GB, then get a true 64-bit processor" or something like that.
Actually, KDE has just that. Right click, and boom! I can select "NBA standings" or "Slashdot"
kfm (KDE file manager) has the beginnings, it seems, of a good browser, with integration into the GUI where it's useful. Now, if that new Mozilla layout engine is good, perhaps a kfm variant can be made which uses the Mozilla layout engine.
I just noticed that I forgot to switch it to HTML Formatted... sorry :-)
Where does software come from? It comes from the intelligence of the workers.
Naturally, creating software isn't exactly the same as creating most products, but the processes can have similarities. In manufacturing, one usually starts with raw materials, and a customer order, applies men and machines to the task, and produces something to sell to the customer. In software, one starts with a desired set of functionality, applies men and machines, and comes up with some source code.
Just as finished goods only come from raw materials when investments are made in
- employee's wages
- capital investment in tools and machinery
- training/managing employees to do their tasks
... software in the commercial world doesn't come without somebodyNow, it can be argued that a programmer could produce his code without the capital investment, especially since people are more likely to own their own computers than their own assembly lines. More often than not, though, substantial projects require more than one person, plus it's not coders who usually are able to write the good documentation and marketing copy that a polished commercial offering has.
Just as a guy on an assembly line can put a tire on a car at home, or at a factory, a programmer can write a good backend at home, or at a job. A fully finished car, or application, though, requires the effort of a team. And the investment of money is what usually forms this team. Thus, the finished product (the source code) should be the property of the company (the investor.)
Note that this discussion has no relevance to open-source, GPL, bazaar, or whatever you want to call it today, projects. linux, perl, Apache.. these all follow a totally different model obviously, from the type of hacks I'm describing here.
(Applying old labels, defined during the industrial revolution and such, are so fun to apply to new situations, I think...)
Where does software come from? It comes from the intelligence of the workers.
Naturally, creating software isn't exactly the same as creating most products, but the processes can have similarities. In manufacturing, one usually starts with raw materials, and a customer order, applies men and machines to the task, and produces something
to sell to the customer. In software, one starts with a desired set of functionality, applies men and machines, and comes up with some source code.
Just as finished goods only come from raw materials when investments are made in
- employee's wages
- capital investment in tools and machinery
- training/managing employees to do their tasks
... software in the commercial world doesn't come without somebodyNow, it can be argued that a programmer could produce his code without the capital investment, especially since people are more likely to own their own computers than their own assembly lines. More often than not, though, substantial projects require more than one person, plus it's not coders who usually are able to write the good documentation and marketing copy that a polished commercial offering has.
Just as a guy on an assembly line can put a tire on a car at home, or at a factory, a programmer can write a good backend at home, or at a job. A fully finished car, or application, though, requires the effort of a team. And the investment of money is what usually forms this team. Thus, the finished product (the source code) should be the property of the company (the investor.)
Note that this discussion has no relevance to open-source, GPL, bazaar, or whatever you want to call it today, projects. linux,
perl, Apache.. these all follow a totally different model obviously, from the type of hacks I'm describing here.
The reason DOSEmu runs so fast, is that it uses a feature of the x86 CPU to emulate the 8086. These virtual machines think they are running in real mode (1MB of RAM addressable). Using this feature one cannot emulate protected mode or system management mode or anything like that. And, with only real mode to work with, you get to run 1) minix or 2) DOS.
Oh yeah, and doesn't it make sense that if one writes an x86 emulator, that it should be able to run on computers other than an x86? (sorry if that sounded hostile...)
1. A free market always maximizes net societal welfare,
2. Any state of maximalization of net societal welfare is achievable through a free market.
While this is true, this doesn't mean that socialism is capitalism. It seems to me that the generally accepted definition of socialism is an economic system where the means of production are owned or otherwise controlled by the government, as opposed to communism (owned/controlled by the people) or capitalism (owned/controlled by various individuals/corporations).
And, in the case of software, I would be inclined to call source code the "means of production." And, the best way to keep the software under control, and help make sure people will pay for it, is *not* to make the software "free." And, the "freedom" of "sharing" that embodies the GPL is not compatible with requiring people to pay for software.
Thus, if you do find capitalism efficient, and like it, then you shouldn't be too outraged when a company keeps some software proprietary. Because, until a cheaper (or even free) alternative comes around, they have every incentive to keep it proprietary. (As in the case of Netscape v. Internet Explorer)
Linux needs no commercialization to "survive"... Linux's popularity and long-term viability as a server OS depend on the trust and support by those in the know: the type of people who already know what linux is, and don't need Dell and Intel's support to convince them to use linux.
When you say that "we have absoultely ZERO privacy online" are you referring to we as "that group of people who uses software whose source code is a secret"?
You see, I ask because those of us who use software whose source code we can (and actually do) examine, would not have any GUID or other ID sent in our emails and documents without our knowledge. Thus, this incident proves nothing about our privacy.
Oh, yes, and I also have the ability to change my MAC address. So, whoever it is you refer to as "we", you should try getting a new NIC and a new document processor (ditch Word in favor of LyX or something).
His point is, he'd consider calling linux GNU/Linux if rms called the GNU system the X/GNU system.