"...and you can accomplish day-to-day tasks without too many hassles is an advantage in itself."
I suppose that depends on your definition of 'too many', I guess.
I'm not posting this as flamebait -- I just avoid Linux like the plague because it's a major pain in the ass to get set up and running.
Mac OS X, on the other hand, works out-of-the-box, and hasn't been the headache that Linux was. (And with Apache, PHP, Ruby, and Perl all preinstalled, why do I need Linux?)
Oh yeah, and you have to be a rocket surgeon to even get over the hump and get the shit working. Joe Average computer user is going to be absolutely fuxored trying to even find, much less install, a Linux distro. (No, this isn't flamebait, this is watching a couple of my siblings make the attempt.)
ARM for a new handheld, perhaps? If they can get something that has the same specs as the LifeDrive that runs a stripped-down version of OS X, I'll be on that thing on opening day.
Again, someone pointed out the concept of having a handheld running Apache, with a copy of the Wikipedia on it. Holy p00p, can you imagine?
I suppose my first question was really, "Are you fucking kidding me?"
But I didn't think that a giant software monopoly would have much of a sense of humor.
So I guess the question is going to grow out of this statement -- it seems to me that everything tacked onto the kernel of an operating system, while necessary, adds a lot of kruft. That kruft produces instability. In Linux, you have thousands of coders working on the system every day, but you have a system in place for keeping the sloppy shit to a minimum. It's a pretty tight piece of code. On the Mac OS X side of the house, they've started with a proven kernel and started a whole new OS from pretty much scratch, which again, results in a pretty stable, tight OS. The question is: why is a kruft-laden OS like Windows superior to younger, faster, more stable operating systems and is your plan to hold on to a doomed market share and try and survive until Linux and Mac OS X become as kruft-laden as Windows?
Why has MGM forsaken my widescreen theatrical release of Bio-Dome? WHY???? All I ever wanted was Pauly Shore and Stephen Baldwin in all their big-screen glory!
Exactly. I'd prefer not to torch my iPod on the bike or while climbing, so a cheap-o $99 iPod shuffle is definitely getting added to my arsenal of geektoys.
Real life will do that, too. I got back into rock climbing about a year ago...and now everything I see with a vertical surface, I start visualizing the line I'd take climbing it.
Christ, I was at the Macaroni Grill the other day, and they had this archway made of rough shale-looking bricks, and I was thinking, "Hey, that's got to be about a V2 or V3 bouldering problem. I could send that bitch."
The point is, it's not limited to just video games. Anything you can get obsessed with is fair game for this sort of behavior. Pun semi-intended.
1. You don't like it? Buy a mini. 2. The iPod gets 12 hours now. The iPod Photo gets 15. Whaddaya want? A micro-fusion-reactor? 3. Only in fantasyland, buddy. DRM is pretty much necessary to keep Apple from getting sued out of business by the RIAA. You don't want DRM? Start a lobby group and make it illegal. 4. It's a portable music player, not a home stereo. Remotes are available as part of the Bose SoundDock and there's a third-party IR remote available. 5. The device is compact...where the hell are you going to cram a digital I/O (TOSLink) port?
You may not have 80GB of music, but those of us with hundreds of gigs' worth are drooling over the idea of an 80GB iPod.
Let's see...I've had three general categories of Side Jobs since I started in the IT field about five years ago:
Bike Shop - as one of the geekiest sports out there, cycling has been a long-held fascination of mine. Have held dual-role jobs spinning wrench and doing sales work at a trio of shops.
Outdoor Gear - worked at everyone's favorite co-op for a few months. I'd consider this an outgrowth of the cycling thing.
Computer Retail - this is my current gig, and I enjoy it quite a bit.
...is it just me or is Creative Labs declaring war on Apple in the MP3 player market a bit like the Polish Calvary declaring war against the German Panzer Divisions in 1939?
It's definitely the case thus far. We have three cats in a one-bedroom apartment, and we've gone through shed season already, and it's still going strong. Seriously, the geek in me is in love with the vacuum. Best $500 I ever spent on household goods.
It's too bad there wasn't a landmine perched atop the Roomba, because, really, these things are both fuck-all useless.
The Roomba doesn't do anything special compared to my Dyson vacuum, and really, how much time does vacuuming the house take? Half an hour? And the Dyson's much more thorough than the Roomba ever could be.
As for the Segway -- you might as well just buy yourself a fucking Lark. At least then you can sit on your ass while you putz around town looking like a total dork.
Like Windows needs another memory-hog kludgy piece of bloatware.
I ran Konfabulator on my iBook (G3/500, 640MB RAM) for all of about two days -- the amount of time it took me to realize that it was more of a resource drain than Adobe Photoshop.
That whole chapter should have been nothing more than a warning regarding the "Gay Batmobile Effect"...which can only be explained by example. In this case, the example is a kid who lived not far from my now-ex-girlfriend when I lived out in Philly.
Specifically, a Hydundai Tiburon. Metalflake purple, with ground effects. Gold rims. Big non-functional scoop on the hood. Type-R stickers everywhere. And two -- yes, two spoilers, stacked one on top of the other. Some sort of bad airbrush art on the hood. When I first saw the thing, my first words, were, "Jesus Christ! It's the Gay Batmobile!"
"Not to mention $600 (and $500 for that matter) is really reaching, considering we are just talking about music and pictures"
Based on that statement, I'd guess that you probably don't own an iPod. I bought one two years ago -- a 20-gigabyte 2nd-generation model -- and it's as much a part of my life as my wallet and keyring. It's that simple. This thing has done for music what TiVo has done for TV. If I can carry my entire porn^H^H^hoto library with me, along with my entire music collection, that's worth investing a bit more than I spent two years ago.
Quite frankly, I think 60GB is about perfect, given that my music collection is about 40GB in size.
My downloading habits have tapered off because I've already downloaded everything I want from the past, and there's not enough good music coming out that necessitates being downloaded. I've reached a break-even point where it simply makes sense for me to buy the 1 or 2 tracks off an album that are worth listening to. (Thank you, iTMS.)
Did you not read the press release closely? The wilderness is being redesigned as we speak to accomodate this thing.
That said, the first time someone tries to pass me on one of these while I'm mountain biking, I'm giving them the shoulder. Hard.
Snow Crash - Past and Present
on
Ask Neal Stephenson
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
As someone who switched majors from Comp Sci to English (Creative Writing), after reading Snow Crash, I'm interested to know how you view the novel in hindsight. In reading it the first time, I was blown away -- at the time it felt very much like that world was only a few decades a way, at most -- now, I re-read the book (about a dozen times now) simply for the fun factor and to study your style and the construction of your story, and I'm struck by the fact that I view a world like that as being highly highly unlikely. I'd be curious as to your opinion as to how the novel has stood the test of time, and what you'd do differently this time around.
Slashdot Mirror
...approach that IBM says could make Microsoft's Longhorn obsolete upon arrival...
You mean it's not already?
"...and you can accomplish day-to-day tasks without too many hassles is an advantage in itself."
I suppose that depends on your definition of 'too many', I guess.
I'm not posting this as flamebait -- I just avoid Linux like the plague because it's a major pain in the ass to get set up and running.
Mac OS X, on the other hand, works out-of-the-box, and hasn't been the headache that Linux was. (And with Apache, PHP, Ruby, and Perl all preinstalled, why do I need Linux?)
Oh yeah, and you have to be a rocket surgeon to even get over the hump and get the shit working. Joe Average computer user is going to be absolutely fuxored trying to even find, much less install, a Linux distro. (No, this isn't flamebait, this is watching a couple of my siblings make the attempt.)
ARM for a new handheld, perhaps? If they can get something that has the same specs as the LifeDrive that runs a stripped-down version of OS X, I'll be on that thing on opening day.
Again, someone pointed out the concept of having a handheld running Apache, with a copy of the Wikipedia on it. Holy p00p, can you imagine?
Sure, it's a great form of birth control, too. Trojan's going to buy out Dell.
And sadly, six years ago, if he'd taken the idea to a venture capital firm, they'd have probably dropped a check for $10 million in his lap.
I suppose my first question was really, "Are you fucking kidding me?"
But I didn't think that a giant software monopoly would have much of a sense of humor.
So I guess the question is going to grow out of this statement -- it seems to me that everything tacked onto the kernel of an operating system, while necessary, adds a lot of kruft. That kruft produces instability. In Linux, you have thousands of coders working on the system every day, but you have a system in place for keeping the sloppy shit to a minimum. It's a pretty tight piece of code. On the Mac OS X side of the house, they've started with a proven kernel and started a whole new OS from pretty much scratch, which again, results in a pretty stable, tight OS. The question is: why is a kruft-laden OS like Windows superior to younger, faster, more stable operating systems and is your plan to hold on to a doomed market share and try and survive until Linux and Mac OS X become as kruft-laden as Windows?
So how long until we have the plans for an open source anti-satellite missile? Seems like an open source solution to a societal problem.
Why has MGM forsaken my widescreen theatrical release of Bio-Dome? WHY???? All I ever wanted was Pauly Shore and Stephen Baldwin in all their big-screen glory!
Bzzzt! It comes with a one-year AppleCare warranty, and can be extended to two years for $59.
Exactly. I'd prefer not to torch my iPod on the bike or while climbing, so a cheap-o $99 iPod shuffle is definitely getting added to my arsenal of geektoys.
Real life will do that, too. I got back into rock climbing about a year ago...and now everything I see with a vertical surface, I start visualizing the line I'd take climbing it.
Christ, I was at the Macaroni Grill the other day, and they had this archway made of rough shale-looking bricks, and I was thinking, "Hey, that's got to be about a V2 or V3 bouldering problem. I could send that bitch."
The point is, it's not limited to just video games. Anything you can get obsessed with is fair game for this sort of behavior. Pun semi-intended.
No, because the Energia has never flown, and at the rate the Russian space program is going, it never will, either.
1. You don't like it? Buy a mini.
2. The iPod gets 12 hours now. The iPod Photo gets 15. Whaddaya want? A micro-fusion-reactor?
3. Only in fantasyland, buddy. DRM is pretty much necessary to keep Apple from getting sued out of business by the RIAA. You don't want DRM? Start a lobby group and make it illegal.
4. It's a portable music player, not a home stereo. Remotes are available as part of the Bose SoundDock and there's a third-party IR remote available.
5. The device is compact...where the hell are you going to cram a digital I/O (TOSLink) port?
You may not have 80GB of music, but those of us with hundreds of gigs' worth are drooling over the idea of an 80GB iPod.
Let's see...I've had three general categories of Side Jobs since I started in the IT field about five years ago:
Bike Shop - as one of the geekiest sports out there, cycling has been a long-held fascination of mine. Have held dual-role jobs spinning wrench and doing sales work at a trio of shops.
Outdoor Gear - worked at everyone's favorite co-op for a few months. I'd consider this an outgrowth of the cycling thing.
Computer Retail - this is my current gig, and I enjoy it quite a bit.
...is it just me or is Creative Labs declaring war on Apple in the MP3 player market a bit like the Polish Calvary declaring war against the German Panzer Divisions in 1939?
Don't forget Foamy over at Ill Will Press -- that shit is available on DVD, too.
It's definitely the case thus far. We have three cats in a one-bedroom apartment, and we've gone through shed season already, and it's still going strong. Seriously, the geek in me is in love with the vacuum. Best $500 I ever spent on household goods.
It's too bad there wasn't a landmine perched atop the Roomba, because, really, these things are both fuck-all useless.
The Roomba doesn't do anything special compared to my Dyson vacuum, and really, how much time does vacuuming the house take? Half an hour? And the Dyson's much more thorough than the Roomba ever could be.
As for the Segway -- you might as well just buy yourself a fucking Lark. At least then you can sit on your ass while you putz around town looking like a total dork.
Like Windows needs another memory-hog kludgy piece of bloatware.
I ran Konfabulator on my iBook (G3/500, 640MB RAM) for all of about two days -- the amount of time it took me to realize that it was more of a resource drain than Adobe Photoshop.
That whole chapter should have been nothing more than a warning regarding the "Gay Batmobile Effect"...which can only be explained by example. In this case, the example is a kid who lived not far from my now-ex-girlfriend when I lived out in Philly.
Specifically, a Hydundai Tiburon. Metalflake purple, with ground effects. Gold rims. Big non-functional scoop on the hood. Type-R stickers everywhere. And two -- yes, two spoilers, stacked one on top of the other. Some sort of bad airbrush art on the hood. When I first saw the thing, my first words, were, "Jesus Christ! It's the Gay Batmobile!"
"Not to mention $600 (and $500 for that matter) is really reaching, considering we are just talking about music and pictures"
Based on that statement, I'd guess that you probably don't own an iPod. I bought one two years ago -- a 20-gigabyte 2nd-generation model -- and it's as much a part of my life as my wallet and keyring. It's that simple. This thing has done for music what TiVo has done for TV. If I can carry my entire porn^H^H^hoto library with me, along with my entire music collection, that's worth investing a bit more than I spent two years ago.
Quite frankly, I think 60GB is about perfect, given that my music collection is about 40GB in size.
My downloading habits have tapered off because I've already downloaded everything I want from the past, and there's not enough good music coming out that necessitates being downloaded. I've reached a break-even point where it simply makes sense for me to buy the 1 or 2 tracks off an album that are worth listening to. (Thank you, iTMS.)
Did you not read the press release closely? The wilderness is being redesigned as we speak to accomodate this thing.
That said, the first time someone tries to pass me on one of these while I'm mountain biking, I'm giving them the shoulder. Hard.
As someone who switched majors from Comp Sci to English (Creative Writing), after reading Snow Crash, I'm interested to know how you view the novel in hindsight. In reading it the first time, I was blown away -- at the time it felt very much like that world was only a few decades a way, at most -- now, I re-read the book (about a dozen times now) simply for the fun factor and to study your style and the construction of your story, and I'm struck by the fact that I view a world like that as being highly highly unlikely. I'd be curious as to your opinion as to how the novel has stood the test of time, and what you'd do differently this time around.