But that is essentially a third party who figures out what has been changed and writes it up. Shouldn't the providers of the kernel be able to provide that information more readily?
I don't think you get it. ALL kernel hackers are "third party" except Linus himself. Now, it takes a certain kind of genius to code, and maybe that genius doesn't feel like writing docs. But a different kind of genius, maybe one who could never have written the code to begin with, can look at it, understand it, and write it up. This particular third party is no different than any other third party contributing to the kernel, except that he contributes words.
Remember: "Official" is not something Linux has. The best you'll get is some third party summary. And that summary could easily be as good as Linux could provide.
The answer to #1, from a moderate "Microsoft is evil" zealot:
What I'm after from Linux is the breaking of the stranglehold MS has on the market. I *know* Linux isn't the best replacement, but I still advocate toppling MS Windows at any cost and by any means.
Once Microsoft is toppled all you have left are a few piddling players and, as you observe, the new monopoly: Linux. But Linux is truly ill-suited to be a monopoly, and certainly unlikely to be an authoritarian monopoly.
In fact, Linux is so poor at being a good system (kernel excepted, because it actually is pretty good) that it will *very quickly* be overtaken by the Next Thing, which will also be F/OSS. (There's a good reason why it just wont be closed source, but it is relatively self evident and takes too long to explain--yes, it involves Freedom!).
I expect Linux-the-monopoly to be dead within three or four years after marginalizing Windows. And that's not bad, speaking as a Linux zealot. Becase after all, it's not Linux we like, but it's freedom and choice. And when the choices are Linux, or somethintg new and better, we'll choose new and better. The reason we cannot bypass Linux and go straight to new and better are: (a) new and beter does not exist as yet (b) New and better can be migrated to from Linux fairly easily, but you cannot migrate easily from Windows to new and better. Windows is being deliberately hard to ditch, whereas Linux will release users gracefully.
Gnumeric is a much better spreadsheet program than OOo Spread. It's also better than Excell in all ways in which it competes, except for charting . (And they'll be fixing that *real soon now*). Enough of this crappy OOo stuff and commerical stuff. Use Gnumeric! This is not SIAG or some krappy Koffice attempt, it's teh best Excel-styel spreadsheet program you can get.
This article is not a review of the GIMP from a photoshop perspective. Instead, it is a MacHat reacting to a different UI.
70% of the article is "Wah wah, it doesn't look like I expect, the menus are all in non-Mac places, it doesn't use native widgets, it doesn't use native dialogs, waaah!"
Admittedly some criticisms were constructive: perhaps there should be some kind of grouping to the tool icons in the tool selector. I, for one, have never liked the "icon only" approach and would welcome some labels.
The context menu in the canvas acting as your main menu thing/is/ somewhat jarring, but also not important. A real review is not "This does not let me to jump in and use it precisely as I use another program, so it's no good!" a real review starts by LEARNING the program, and then reviewing whether or not it can get work done.
A review of Linux which stated "There wasn't a button labeled 'Start' anywhere!" or something would be laughed at, as this 'review' should be.
So the scripts were sub par. A valid criticism. When I've used the GIMP they've always seemed to be handy, useful things. Perhaps a mention of what scripts SHOULD have been included would help?
This person seems largely hung up on the GIMP being not-Mac and not-Photoshop. "Some features in different places" is called "disorienting". Well you know what? Different programs are different. This is not news.
The slowness criticism was good, the notes about line-jaggedness and antialiasing were good. I disagree, but that was some good reviewing.
The misrepresentation of the GIMP as an app which can either be built by hand from sources (which it is implied is too hard for an average person to do) or purchased for an outrageous amount is simply a lie. The GIMP can be had in a precompiled for for OSX from a couple of different sources.
I'll bet a GIMP pro who had never used Photoshop or OSX would be almost as annoyed and baffled if they were plunked in front of OSX, given an installer, and old "Tell us how you think this compares to the GIMP."
The problem isn't lack of originality, it's too much originality.
You can both produce an original and base it on a video game, just look at the Super Mario Bros. movie. It's "based" on the game only superficially and is largely a figment of its author's imagination. If he'd changed all of the names it would have been a fun movie.
Which is just the problem. The author took a stupid kids toy with some cheesy characters, and reinvented it to be whatever he wanted. The right approach is to craft a movie which, although obviously not a straight copy of the game (that's impossible; the media are too different) still has the essence of the game.
This means embellisment is strictly out: we're taking our video game characters and their world and duplicating it as closely as possible, alterations for the difference in story telling excepted. There are some flash movies floating around which are doing the kind of thing I'm talking about when it comes to Mario Bros.. It's still using game graphics, but you could take it live action without too much effort. I'll see if I can dig up the link.
But the things that make Zelda great are not, ypically, related to story. Until Ocarina of Time Zelda games didn't even have a story outside of a few pages in the manual, and I'd say the first Zelda game with a truly interesting story was Wind Waker, which has an absolutely incredible ending.
This is where you're wrong. Dead wrong. It's a common mistakes that simple video games, such as Zelda 1 and Super Mario Bros. do not have stories. This is completely wrong. What they have is stories expressed in videogame form. Many modern video games try to either have stories in book form or stories in movie form grafted on to a video game, and most often the games suffer (slightly or greatly) as a result. Because you cannot see a book-style or movie-style story doesn't mean there isn't a story, it just means you can't see it.
There's a rather epic story hidden in plain sight in Zelda 1. I think I could extract the essence of it and transmute it to a movie form (although possibly not a book form.) in fact, most video games that seem to have no story have great stories, even stories which could be exploited on film, if only film makers would look deeply enough to see them.
Let's take the Mario Bros. movie for example: The characters of Mario and Luigi are pretty well done, and more or less what you'd expect from a pre-Mushroom kingdom encounter. The movie plot? Relates NOT AT ALL to the plot of any of the games. A perfect example of game plot being disregarded as not worthy.
Huh? None of the Mario games had a plot beyond "save the princess".
And it's that kind of simplistic view which leads to a movie that is merely a "save the princess" flick, loosly based on names and ideas from a video game.
Let's look at the first game, Super Mario Bros.. The plot as I see it (there could be certain variations):
Mario is a plumber. Mario is for reasons explained in The Super Mario Bros. Super Show, but never to my knowledge explained anywhere else, a sometime resident of the Mushroom Kingdom. The mushroom kingdom's residents are all humanoid, animate Mushroom people. The Mushroom Kingdom is ruled by the Princess (who may be called Daisy or Peach, depending on your preference in these matters). Despite the names, there does not appear to be any other royal family. Slightly outside the Mushroom Kingdom is another land, this one controlled by turtles known as Koopa's. Their King is named Bowser. The Koopa kingdom and the Mushroom kingdom are not friends. One day, King Koopa invades the Mushroom Kingdom and attempts to annex it. He captures the military instillations, the castles, from the Mushroom people, who are not terribly good fighters. He sets up minions in seven of the great castles of the land, and takes the eighth for himself. There he keeps the Princess, to help assure her peoples obedience. This has been a relatively bloodless takeover. Enter Mario. By whatever means he does, he enters the Mushroom Kingdom (probably via a warp pipe to the world as we know it). Finding the land overrun with marauding forces of the Koopa kingdom, he questions some mushroom villiagers as to what is going on. They inform him of the evil Bowser and the way he's attempting to take over the kingdom. Maio, having a kind of a thing for the Princess, not to mention a thing for being heroic, decides to set off to rescue her and restore her to the Mushroom throne. No one knows quite which castle she is kept in, so he sets off to visit each one, defeat its forces and commander, and rescue any princesses present. Along the way he uses the wacky plantlife of the Mushroom Kingdom and the help of concerned mshrom citizens to enhance his already cosiderable power. He is opposed by various minions of Bowser, including Koopa Troopas, traitorous Mushroom citizens (whom Bowser has formed into a secret police, known as the Goomba), as well as relatively innocent animals (fish, squids, etc.) and the native foliage. He meets with frustration at every turn as each castle he visits has no Princess. Bowser becomes alarmed with his progress and the rebellion it is stirring, and deploys more forces to block Mario and his brother Luigi, who has by this time joined in the fight. Eventually Mario wins his way to the final castle, engages Bowser, a frighteningly large dinousar-like creature, in a battle to the death, and mannages to dodge fire breath long enough to drop him into the lava.
(Of course, Bowser survives his fall and lives long enough to plot about a sequel.)
Is this "Mario saves the Princess"? Yes. But not all plots which can be summarized as "Mario saves the Princess" are valid Mario Bros. plots, or have anything to do with Mario Bros. games.
Nintendo often does versions of their game music for full orchestras, and they're great. I particularly liked some of the Zelda music they did. You'll have to scrounge around eBay to find a CD of it, though.
The orchestral versions are good, no doubt there, but my intention was to comment on how unlikely writers and directors (who can't even deign to recognize the value of original video game plot) are to use that shitty video game music that they just KNOW is shitty, because video games just ARE, in a movie.
The reason mortal Kombat worked is that they stuck to some semblance of the ORIGINAL PLOT. People get together, fight tournament for control of planet.
As long as movie makers think that videogames have little or no plot, the adaptations will suck. Games all have GREAT plot, it's just usually not normal Movie-style plot.
Early games, for example, are not about characters. That is to say, they ARE about characters (what would Super Mario Bros. be without the Mario brothers?) but what's important is not so much/who they are/ as/what they do/.
Let's take the Mario Bros. movie for example: The characters of Mario and Luigi are pretty well done, and more or less what you'd expect from a pre-Mushroom kingdom encounter. The movie plot? Relates NOT AT ALL to the plot of any of the games. A perfect example of game plot being disregarded as not worthy.
In any video-game-to-movie, one of the primary and oft overlooked factors is the/setting/. Movie makers perhaps cannot grasp that what people remember most about a game after staring at it endlessly for hours upon hours is how it/looks/. And while it may not be possible or advisible to reproduce some of the cheesy graphics of (especially early) games on the big screen, any movie made from a game should visually at least evoke a sense of the game.
(Of course, the thing most remembered about most games is the music, but I don't expect to be hearing any of that (even well ReMixed) in a movie theater any time soon.)
A true Metroid movie with a plot like that in the first game, focusing on the going and the killing and not on the trials and tribulations of a woman warrior trying to find herself while earning a living at a brutal trade (which will be the ineviable plot), would be good.
Almost any video game, even the ones with relatively simple plots, could work if done as a movie... so long as they DID THE GAME AS A MOVIE and didn't just steal the name, the characters, and maybe (but who really cares!) the setting to craft some formulaic Hollywood story which will immediately be forgotten even as it disappoints a foolish, trusting audience of You's and Me's.
I, personally, want to see a LOLO movie. Think about it. Remember the plot? That would make an excellent movie. But only if done with the same light style of colors and music, and only if done in absolute seriousness.
The same has also been done for Super Mario Bros... sort of. Meet Super Luigi World. It's all about Luigi and what he does when Mario is saving the world. A quite good comic if I do say so myself.
Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with Super Luigi World, except that I know the guy who makes it and I want to kill his bandwidth.
I'm having the same problem as the grandparent, and DMA is on for me. Preemption is also on (I made sure of that). Unlike some people, it's not arts causing the problem, or a fragmented disk: My mp3s are on a nice ext3 partition, and under a 2.4 kernel I needed MASSIVE system loads before getting brief pauses in playing. Now, regardless of player (juk, rythmbox, xmms, mplayer, mpg123, ogg123, etc, etc) my audio files skip when I do practically anything.
I know for sure it's not related to processor load (with seti@home running, the problem gets no better and no worse) though it may be that sudden spikes in IO can do it (not tried to verify this, just a feeling). I suspect a misconfiured ALSA, since I did make the oss->alsa switch for the first time with 2.6.
But can I get it fixed? Can I find docs on alsa which suggest things to tweak to fix problems such as I am having? No. I can't even find someone willing to talk about it who knows more about alsa than I do.
Incidentally, I'm using a SB Live card, which I've heard others report having no problems with under 2.6, so I'm guessing it's not the driver.
"Question about Debian and its automatic upgrades: since I am likely to go on using laptops, would Debian eventually evolve to the point hardware won't support it if I just keep running a stable system, or would it respond more by installing only the refinements to the version compatible with that generation of hardware?"
You want to run Debian stable.
Debian doesn't worry about hardware, so it might upgrade you to some software which would run unacceptably slow on your machine. However, if you run Debian stable (and use the name 'woody' instead of 'stable') then your system will always pull from that one archive, which after about four years is generally left alone and no longer updated (except perhaps for security fixes, I don't know for how long those continue). This means you could have a perfectly stable system which keeps running just fine regardless of how Debian evolves. The down side is you don't get the newest stuff and are stuck with old versions, but if your hardware can't handle teh requirements of newer programs than perhaps you'll want it that way.
They've tried to define objective morality within the context of an atheistic worldview. It's no wonder they failed, because you'd have to claim an objective view of reality to claim to know an 'objective morality'.
My impression is that they attempted to justify their own christian beliefs in very scientific and objective ways, though you'd right about the need for objecticve reality.
A well-schooled atheist recognizes that he has to be a humanist to be consistent with his own worldview and he realizes that humanism doesn't jive with his own intuition...lets say...what he 'feels' inside of him. I think you called it 'personal morality'. He know there are certain things that are simply wrong because they are, not because society has drilled those things into his skull and not simply because it perpetuates the species. That's why it's critically important that, for the atheist to reconcile his philosophy with his intuition that he logically conclude that there exists an objective morality that is NOT governed by society.
I am not as well read on atheists as I'd like, as much as I deride them. I don't think I can properly contest your point, though I don't think I agree.
Hey! I'll bet you even believe in absolute truthfulness.
The very nature of truth is that it is exclusive and absolute.
If you allow that the chance of anyone knowing any truth is astronomical, then I would tend to agree.
You've established nothing of the sort,
I know, but I was having so much fun! In fact, my argument is seriously flawed in several ways that I was hoping no one would notice.
but you do raise an insightful question. The Bible answers it, as well. Satan will not violate his nature as God will not violate his. The Bible also exhorts to examine anything supernatural as to figure out whether it is 'of God' or not.
I am not terribly familiar with that aspect of the bible, either. This does raise the problem of humans now being not only able but required to know the nature of god, and the nature of satan. Or at least able to determine whether something is "of god" or not. This, if true, means that those "Is this of god?" checks are rules by which even god is bound, which seems a curious anomoly to me.
I hope you don't take my post as an attack on your post, as it was interesting and you obviously have read "a thing or two". I also hope you don't take offense to my interjection into the conversation.
Not at all. I was afraid my time writing the post was going to go completely to waste, since I had a suspicion that the parent was not in a debating mood.
I have nothing against humanists. I said I had no love for them, and I don't. My point was to counter the claim that I was a humanist, and I am not. This is not to say I dissagree with them, it's just to say that I do not love their philosophies.
"You're absolutely right - let's put Saddam back in power, apologise, and let him get back to killing and terrorizing his citizens. How could we be so mean as to deny him his rights??"
Sigh. There's a difference between "Ought not have done it, it was wrong," and "Let's just undo what we did."
Carter was a quite good person, and did as good a job at being president as the circumstances were likely to permit. Painting him as a bad president is misleading at best. On the other hand, I wont dispute that he's commonly *believed* to be the worst president. It's just that I don't rank a failure to bring around the economy and the lack of any spectacular public events during his term are quite as bad as treason, which is what King Gorge II is guilty of twice over.
The only reason they wouldn't do that is if it were (gasp!) illegal to ban it.
Actually, gay marriage IS banned. It's NOT legal for a government official to issue a marriage license to anyone other than a couple composed of a man and a woman. No Adam and Steve, no girl and her pony, no man and his sixteen vestal virgins.
I was refering to the recent decision in Kerry's home state. Barring corruption, what a court says is what is legal, because it is the court's business to know the law. In that state they think it's legal. After that Bush and others complained of activist judges, and my post was a reaction to that.
However, some communities have expressed an interest in changing this law. Some communities want to give gay couples marriage licenses. That's not okay, right now, because all states have to recognize all legal documents issued by all other states. Which means that if Adam and Steve get a "marriage license" in East Bumblefuck, the great state of Missoura has to honor it. Which ain't right or lawful.
Sure it is. The fundamental law of the land says that contracts must be honored regardless of where they were issued. Therefore it certainly IS legal, though whether it's "right" will depend on your and my moral opinions, which I feel certain do not agree.
The proposed amendment would give the town of East Bumblefuck the legal authority to issue marriage licenses to anybody it wants, as long as Missoura doesn't have to honor them.
A marriage license that has no legal weight is worthless. Therefore this amendment does nothing but backhandedly ban gay marriage.
What part of FULL faith and credit do you not understand?
Evidently I understand it considerably better than you do. Why did you feel that it was more appropriate to be glib than to be clear and correct?
Because, having made my argument already, I felt I needed to only mention that passage by name briefly. It was more fun to cite it in a barbarous fashion.
In fact, I do know precisely why the amendment has been proposed,and I oppose it two ways: Once because it is the wrong way to go with regards to gay marriage, and a second time becase it makes a mockery of a good constitutional law.
Guns would be illegal by now if not for old white men.
And this little thing called the Second Amendment, huh? But I guess the Constitution is only important as long as it's giving you what you want. As soon as it turns the other way, ignore it. Right?
Not at all. I am assuming you are FOR having guns, and I am taking (briefly, for the sake of argument) the position AGAINST guns. I am saying that Democrats would have gotten guns made illegal by now if the courts hadn't been arbitrarily acting in what is probably YOUR favor. Thus making an opposition to old white men on your part hypocritical. Sorry if I did not make that clear.
i suppose the same should be said about a group of 5 loving people, and yet I wouldn't be surprised if you were against polygamy
You say this like it's supposed to sound ridiculous. In fact, I for one have no problem with polygamy on moral grounds.
The major argument against polygamy is historical, it being the case that multi-partner marriages have seldom been wholly consensual. It is wrong for a man to keep five women as much as it is for him to keep one, if keeping is what he is doing. With two people the chances that the relationship is less harmful is greater. None of this says that polygamy should be illegal or is immoral. In todays world it might even be possible to have perfectly workable polygamous marriages, given our fairly good legal and social system. I think we could do it in this day and age without it being harmful.
And heck if you love your brother or sister?
In principle there is nothing wrong with sexual contact of some kind between siblings, but I agree that it should be generally illegal on genetic grounds. And again, the possability of abuse is rather greater with a member of ones own family. So, while it's possible to have a safe icestuous relationship, I don't think the practice should be legal as at this time I do not believe such a relationship has a good enough chance of being safe.
As for incestuous marriage... why not? Apart from the sex issue, it seems fine to me.
I mean you love each other, or your dog for that matter.
The only reason to ban beastiality is health reasons, both yours and the animal's. Thereis some chance of disease, for one. And I have heard of reports of harming the animal by means of the act itself. The major argument against it is that there are curently no laws of enough specificity on any books (of which I am aware) to protect the animal in such situations.
As for marriage... you can already leave posessions to pets, and you can already sleep with them (more or less). While it may be necessary to exclude such unions from certain aspects of marriage (how would health benefits work?) and thus make the process more of a legal fiction than anything else, I see no problem with it.
The problem is you have no objective morality
I've got news for you, in case you slept through your philosophy classes: There is no objective morality. A few people have tried to define objective morality, and "community standards" are about as close as you can come.
Give me one reason I should trust your judgment?
Give me one reason you need to trust my moral judgements. If I married (say) a goat, it would in no way involve you and thus your moral perspective would be irrelevent.
Why is your view more right than mine?
Why is your view more right than mine? I know, majority opinion, right? Well anyone can see how quickly majority rule gets screwed up. "It's always been that way!"? This veneration of the past, while amusing, does not hold any moral weight. We don't keep slaves any longer, though it is a venerable practice. Give me some real argument as to why your opinion on marriage has any impact on anyone other than yourself and your spous (if any).
Why should any of this be illegal or legal? What buisness does the government have telling anybody what they can and can not do.
None at all, insofar as what people do does not cause particular harm to other people or the government. And maybe not even then.
How does a government decide wht is moral or immoral if the electrical impulses going through their brains are nothing more than chance?
Ah, that's jsut it, y'see.You've hit the nail on the head: The government doesn't decide what is moral, the government decides what is/legal/. Government should prohibit only minimally, as necessary, and let churches wring their hands over whether things are moral.
Your views of right and wrong are abitrary and have no
We're trying to amend the Constitution to allow states to define marriage however they choose. Right now, the definition of marriage is in the hands of three old white men sitting behind a bench. The amendment will put that decision back in the hands of the people.
If anyone is likely to react incorrectly and ban gay marriage, it is old white men. The only reason they wouldn't do that is if it were (gasp!) illegal to ban it.
As for why states shouldn't be allowed to define it seperately: What part of FULL faith and credit do you not understand?
I'm so terribly sorry that you don't appreciate democracy.
The old white men are part of our democratic system. One of those brilliant checks and balances: They'll follow the law, regardless of popular opinion. This makes nasty things hard to do quickly, thus making it less likely that wrong things will be done in haste. If they're right things, eventually they will be done.
People complain about judges only when the check/balance is not working for them. Guns would be illegal by now if not for old white men.
Slashdot Mirror
But that is essentially a third party who figures out what has been changed and writes it up. Shouldn't the providers of the kernel be able to provide that information more readily?
I don't think you get it. ALL kernel hackers are "third party" except Linus himself. Now, it takes a certain kind of genius to code, and maybe that genius doesn't feel like writing docs. But a different kind of genius, maybe one who could never have written the code to begin with, can look at it, understand it, and write it up. This particular third party is no different than any other third party contributing to the kernel, except that he contributes words.
Remember: "Official" is not something Linux has. The best you'll get is some third party summary. And that summary could easily be as good as Linux could provide.
The answer to #1, from a moderate "Microsoft is evil" zealot:
What I'm after from Linux is the breaking of the stranglehold MS has on the market. I *know* Linux isn't the best replacement, but I still advocate toppling MS Windows at any cost and by any means.
Once Microsoft is toppled all you have left are a few piddling players and, as you observe, the new monopoly: Linux. But Linux is truly ill-suited to be a monopoly, and certainly unlikely to be an authoritarian monopoly.
In fact, Linux is so poor at being a good system (kernel excepted, because it actually is pretty good) that it will *very quickly* be overtaken by the Next Thing, which will also be F/OSS. (There's a good reason why it just wont be closed source, but it is relatively self evident and takes too long to explain--yes, it involves Freedom!).
I expect Linux-the-monopoly to be dead within three or four years after marginalizing Windows. And that's not bad, speaking as a Linux zealot. Becase after all, it's not Linux we like, but it's freedom and choice. And when the choices are Linux, or somethintg new and better, we'll choose new and better. The reason we cannot bypass Linux and go straight to new and better are: (a) new and beter does not exist as yet (b) New and better can be migrated to from Linux fairly easily, but you cannot migrate easily from Windows to new and better. Windows is being deliberately hard to ditch, whereas Linux will release users gracefully.
So yes, it matters.
I think I've covered all of your points.
In what way is it better? I like wget, it seems to work. How is curl superior? Maybe I should switch.
Those screenshots are out of date. By about 6 years. Try some newer ones.
Gnumeric is a much better spreadsheet program than OOo Spread. It's also better than Excell in all ways in which it competes, except for charting . (And they'll be fixing that *real soon now*). Enough of this crappy OOo stuff and commerical stuff. Use Gnumeric! This is not SIAG or some krappy Koffice attempt, it's teh best Excel-styel spreadsheet program you can get.
This article is not a review of the GIMP from a photoshop perspective. Instead, it is a MacHat reacting to a different UI.
/is/ somewhat jarring, but also not important. A real review is not "This does not let me to jump in and use it precisely as I use another program, so it's no good!" a real review starts by LEARNING the program, and then reviewing whether or not it can get work done.
70% of the article is "Wah wah, it doesn't look like I expect, the menus are all in non-Mac places, it doesn't use native widgets, it doesn't use native dialogs, waaah!"
Admittedly some criticisms were constructive: perhaps there should be some kind of grouping to the tool icons in the tool selector. I, for one, have never liked the "icon only" approach and would welcome some labels.
The context menu in the canvas acting as your main menu thing
A review of Linux which stated "There wasn't a button labeled 'Start' anywhere!" or something would be laughed at, as this 'review' should be.
So the scripts were sub par. A valid criticism. When I've used the GIMP they've always seemed to be handy, useful things. Perhaps a mention of what scripts SHOULD have been included would help?
This person seems largely hung up on the GIMP being not-Mac and not-Photoshop. "Some features in different places" is called "disorienting". Well you know what? Different programs are different. This is not news.
The slowness criticism was good, the notes about line-jaggedness and antialiasing were good. I disagree, but that was some good reviewing.
The misrepresentation of the GIMP as an app which can either be built by hand from sources (which it is implied is too hard for an average person to do) or purchased for an outrageous amount is simply a lie. The GIMP can be had in a precompiled for for OSX from a couple of different sources.
I'll bet a GIMP pro who had never used Photoshop or OSX would be almost as annoyed and baffled if they were plunked in front of OSX, given an installer, and old "Tell us how you think this compares to the GIMP."
Real reviews concentrate on function.
#include
int main(void) {
for (;;) {
fputs(stdout,"My code is more flexible!\n");
}
return 0;
}
The problem isn't lack of originality, it's too much originality.
You can both produce an original and base it on a video game, just look at the Super Mario Bros. movie. It's "based" on the game only superficially and is largely a figment of its author's imagination. If he'd changed all of the names it would have been a fun movie.
Which is just the problem. The author took a stupid kids toy with some cheesy characters, and reinvented it to be whatever he wanted. The right approach is to craft a movie which, although obviously not a straight copy of the game (that's impossible; the media are too different) still has the essence of the game.
This means embellisment is strictly out: we're taking our video game characters and their world and duplicating it as closely as possible, alterations for the difference in story telling excepted. There are some flash movies floating around which are doing the kind of thing I'm talking about when it comes to Mario Bros.. It's still using game graphics, but you could take it live action without too much effort. I'll see if I can dig up the link.
But the things that make Zelda great are not, ypically, related to story. Until Ocarina of Time Zelda games didn't even have a story outside of a few pages in the manual, and I'd say the first Zelda game with a truly interesting story was Wind Waker, which has an absolutely incredible ending.
This is where you're wrong. Dead wrong. It's a common mistakes that simple video games, such as Zelda 1 and Super Mario Bros. do not have stories. This is completely wrong. What they have is stories expressed in videogame form. Many modern video games try to either have stories in book form or stories in movie form grafted on to a video game, and most often the games suffer (slightly or greatly) as a result. Because you cannot see a book-style or movie-style story doesn't mean there isn't a story, it just means you can't see it.
There's a rather epic story hidden in plain sight in Zelda 1. I think I could extract the essence of it and transmute it to a movie form (although possibly not a book form.) in fact, most video games that seem to have no story have great stories, even stories which could be exploited on film, if only film makers would look deeply enough to see them.
You just didn't buy the right accessory.
In eleven minutes? That was quick.
Let's take the Mario Bros. movie for example: The characters of Mario and Luigi are pretty well done, and more or less what you'd expect from a pre-Mushroom kingdom encounter. The movie plot? Relates NOT AT ALL to the plot of any of the games. A perfect example of game plot being disregarded as not worthy.
Huh? None of the Mario games had a plot beyond "save the princess".
And it's that kind of simplistic view which leads to a movie that is merely a "save the princess" flick, loosly based on names and ideas from a video game.
Let's look at the first game, Super Mario Bros.. The plot as I see it (there could be certain variations):
Mario is a plumber.
Mario is for reasons explained in The Super Mario Bros. Super Show, but never to my knowledge explained anywhere else, a sometime resident of the Mushroom Kingdom.
The mushroom kingdom's residents are all humanoid, animate Mushroom people.
The Mushroom Kingdom is ruled by the Princess (who may be called Daisy or Peach, depending on your preference in these matters). Despite the names, there does not appear to be any other royal family.
Slightly outside the Mushroom Kingdom is another land, this one controlled by turtles known as Koopa's. Their King is named Bowser.
The Koopa kingdom and the Mushroom kingdom are not friends.
One day, King Koopa invades the Mushroom Kingdom and attempts to annex it. He captures the military instillations, the castles, from the Mushroom people, who are not terribly good fighters.
He sets up minions in seven of the great castles of the land, and takes the eighth for himself. There he keeps the Princess, to help assure her peoples obedience. This has been a relatively bloodless takeover.
Enter Mario. By whatever means he does, he enters the Mushroom Kingdom (probably via a warp pipe to the world as we know it).
Finding the land overrun with marauding forces of the Koopa kingdom, he questions some mushroom villiagers as to what is going on. They inform him of the evil Bowser and the way he's attempting to take over the kingdom.
Maio, having a kind of a thing for the Princess, not to mention a thing for being heroic, decides to set off to rescue her and restore her to the Mushroom throne.
No one knows quite which castle she is kept in, so he sets off to visit each one, defeat its forces and commander, and rescue any princesses present.
Along the way he uses the wacky plantlife of the Mushroom Kingdom and the help of concerned mshrom citizens to enhance his already cosiderable power. He is opposed by various minions of Bowser, including Koopa Troopas, traitorous Mushroom citizens (whom Bowser has formed into a secret police, known as the Goomba), as well as relatively innocent animals (fish, squids, etc.) and the native foliage.
He meets with frustration at every turn as each castle he visits has no Princess. Bowser becomes alarmed with his progress and the rebellion it is stirring, and deploys more forces to block Mario and his brother Luigi, who has by this time joined in the fight.
Eventually Mario wins his way to the final castle, engages Bowser, a frighteningly large dinousar-like creature, in a battle to the death, and mannages to dodge fire breath long enough to drop him into the lava.
(Of course, Bowser survives his fall and lives long enough to plot about a sequel.)
Is this "Mario saves the Princess"? Yes. But not all plots which can be summarized as "Mario saves the Princess" are valid Mario Bros. plots, or have anything to do with Mario Bros. games.
Nintendo often does versions of their game music for full orchestras, and they're great. I particularly liked some of the Zelda music they did. You'll have to scrounge around eBay to find a CD of it, though.
Obviously you are unfamiliar with OCRemix.
The orchestral versions are good, no doubt there, but my intention was to comment on how unlikely writers and directors (who can't even deign to recognize the value of original video game plot) are to use that shitty video game music that they just KNOW is shitty, because video games just ARE, in a movie.
The reason mortal Kombat worked is that they stuck to some semblance of the ORIGINAL PLOT. People get together, fight tournament for control of planet.
/who they are/ as /what they do/.
/setting/. Movie makers perhaps cannot grasp that what people remember most about a game after staring at it endlessly for hours upon hours is how it /looks/. And while it may not be possible or advisible to reproduce some of the cheesy graphics of (especially early) games on the big screen, any movie made from a game should visually at least evoke a sense of the game.
As long as movie makers think that videogames have little or no plot, the adaptations will suck. Games all have GREAT plot, it's just usually not normal Movie-style plot.
Early games, for example, are not about characters. That is to say, they ARE about characters (what would Super Mario Bros. be without the Mario brothers?) but what's important is not so much
Let's take the Mario Bros. movie for example: The characters of Mario and Luigi are pretty well done, and more or less what you'd expect from a pre-Mushroom kingdom encounter. The movie plot? Relates NOT AT ALL to the plot of any of the games. A perfect example of game plot being disregarded as not worthy.
In any video-game-to-movie, one of the primary and oft overlooked factors is the
(Of course, the thing most remembered about most games is the music, but I don't expect to be hearing any of that (even well ReMixed) in a movie theater any time soon.)
A true Metroid movie with a plot like that in the first game, focusing on the going and the killing and not on the trials and tribulations of a woman warrior trying to find herself while earning a living at a brutal trade (which will be the ineviable plot), would be good.
Almost any video game, even the ones with relatively simple plots, could work if done as a movie... so long as they DID THE GAME AS A MOVIE and didn't just steal the name, the characters, and maybe (but who really cares!) the setting to craft some formulaic Hollywood story which will immediately be forgotten even as it disappoints a foolish, trusting audience of You's and Me's.
I, personally, want to see a LOLO movie. Think about it. Remember the plot? That would make an excellent movie. But only if done with the same light style of colors and music, and only if done in absolute seriousness.
The same has also been done for Super Mario Bros... sort of. Meet Super Luigi World. It's all about Luigi and what he does when Mario is saving the world. A quite good comic if I do say so myself.
Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with Super Luigi World, except that I know the guy who makes it and I want to kill his bandwidth.
I'm having the same problem as the grandparent, and DMA is on for me. Preemption is also on (I made sure of that). Unlike some people, it's not arts causing the problem, or a fragmented disk: My mp3s are on a nice ext3 partition, and under a 2.4 kernel I needed MASSIVE system loads before getting brief pauses in playing. Now, regardless of player (juk, rythmbox, xmms, mplayer, mpg123, ogg123, etc, etc) my audio files skip when I do practically anything.
I know for sure it's not related to processor load (with seti@home running, the problem gets no better and no worse) though it may be that sudden spikes in IO can do it (not tried to verify this, just a feeling). I suspect a misconfiured ALSA, since I did make the oss->alsa switch for the first time with 2.6.
But can I get it fixed? Can I find docs on alsa which suggest things to tweak to fix problems such as I am having? No. I can't even find someone willing to talk about it who knows more about alsa than I do.
Incidentally, I'm using a SB Live card, which I've heard others report having no problems with under 2.6, so I'm guessing it's not the driver.
But are they backported to potato? If you want longer than a ~4 year lifespan, then you'd need that.
"Question about Debian and its automatic upgrades: since I am likely to go on using laptops, would Debian eventually evolve to the point hardware won't support it if I just keep running a stable system, or would it respond more by installing only the refinements to the version compatible with that generation of hardware?"
You want to run Debian stable.
Debian doesn't worry about hardware, so it might upgrade you to some software which would run unacceptably slow on your machine. However, if you run Debian stable (and use the name 'woody' instead of 'stable') then your system will always pull from that one archive, which after about four years is generally left alone and no longer updated (except perhaps for security fixes, I don't know for how long those continue). This means you could have a perfectly stable system which keeps running just fine regardless of how Debian evolves. The down side is you don't get the newest stuff and are stuck with old versions, but if your hardware can't handle teh requirements of newer programs than perhaps you'll want it that way.
"sigh...I'll keep yelling, but I'm not sure how much good it'll do."
Only the fool stops doing what is right because it is futile. You are in good company.
They've tried to define objective morality within the context of an atheistic worldview. It's no wonder they failed, because you'd have to claim an objective view of reality to claim to know an 'objective morality'.
My impression is that they attempted to justify their own christian beliefs in very scientific and objective ways, though you'd right about the need for objecticve reality.
A well-schooled atheist recognizes that he has to be a humanist to be consistent with his own worldview and he realizes that humanism doesn't jive with his own intuition...lets say...what he 'feels' inside of him. I think you called it 'personal morality'. He know there are certain things that are simply wrong because they are, not because society has drilled those things into his skull and not simply because it perpetuates the species. That's why it's critically important that, for the atheist to reconcile his philosophy with his intuition that he logically conclude that there exists an objective morality that is NOT governed by society.
I am not as well read on atheists as I'd like, as much as I deride them. I don't think I can properly contest your point, though I don't think I agree.
Hey! I'll bet you even believe in absolute truthfulness.
The very nature of truth is that it is exclusive and absolute.
If you allow that the chance of anyone knowing any truth is astronomical, then I would tend to agree.
You've established nothing of the sort,
I know, but I was having so much fun! In fact, my argument is seriously flawed in several ways that I was hoping no one would notice.
but you do raise an insightful question. The Bible answers it, as well. Satan will not violate his nature as God will not violate his. The Bible also exhorts to examine anything supernatural as to figure out whether it is 'of God' or not.
I am not terribly familiar with that aspect of the bible, either. This does raise the problem of humans now being not only able but required to know the nature of god, and the nature of satan. Or at least able to determine whether something is "of god" or not. This, if true, means that those "Is this of god?" checks are rules by which even god is bound, which seems a curious anomoly to me.
I hope you don't take my post as an attack on your post, as it was interesting and you obviously have read "a thing or two". I also hope you don't take offense to my interjection into the conversation.
Not at all. I was afraid my time writing the post was going to go completely to waste, since I had a suspicion that the parent was not in a debating mood.
I have nothing against humanists. I said I had no love for them, and I don't. My point was to counter the claim that I was a humanist, and I am not. This is not to say I dissagree with them, it's just to say that I do not love their philosophies.
"You're absolutely right - let's put Saddam back in power, apologise, and let him get back to killing and terrorizing his citizens. How could we be so mean as to deny him his rights??"
Sigh. There's a difference between "Ought not have done it, it was wrong," and "Let's just undo what we did."
Carter was a quite good person, and did as good a job at being president as the circumstances were likely to permit. Painting him as a bad president is misleading at best. On the other hand, I wont dispute that he's commonly *believed* to be the worst president. It's just that I don't rank a failure to bring around the economy and the lack of any spectacular public events during his term are quite as bad as treason, which is what King Gorge II is guilty of twice over.
It's all in how you define "bad."
The only reason they wouldn't do that is if it were (gasp!) illegal to ban it.
Actually, gay marriage IS banned. It's NOT legal for a government official to issue a marriage license to anyone other than a couple composed of a man and a woman. No Adam and Steve, no girl and her pony, no man and his sixteen vestal virgins.
I was refering to the recent decision in Kerry's home state. Barring corruption, what a court says is what is legal, because it is the court's business to know the law. In that state they think it's legal. After that Bush and others complained of activist judges, and my post was a reaction to that.
However, some communities have expressed an interest in changing this law. Some communities want to give gay couples marriage licenses. That's not okay, right now, because all states have to recognize all legal documents issued by all other states. Which means that if Adam and Steve get a "marriage license" in East Bumblefuck, the great state of Missoura has to honor it. Which ain't right or lawful.
Sure it is. The fundamental law of the land says that contracts must be honored regardless of where they were issued. Therefore it certainly IS legal, though whether it's "right" will depend on your and my moral opinions, which I feel certain do not agree.
The proposed amendment would give the town of East Bumblefuck the legal authority to issue marriage licenses to anybody it wants, as long as Missoura doesn't have to honor them.
A marriage license that has no legal weight is worthless. Therefore this amendment does nothing but backhandedly ban gay marriage.
What part of FULL faith and credit do you not understand?
Evidently I understand it considerably better than you do. Why did you feel that it was more appropriate to be glib than to be clear and correct?
Because, having made my argument already, I felt I needed to only mention that passage by name briefly. It was more fun to cite it in a barbarous fashion.
In fact, I do know precisely why the amendment has been proposed,and I oppose it two ways: Once because it is the wrong way to go with regards to gay marriage, and a second time becase it makes a mockery of a good constitutional law.
Guns would be illegal by now if not for old white men.
And this little thing called the Second Amendment, huh? But I guess the Constitution is only important as long as it's giving you what you want. As soon as it turns the other way, ignore it. Right?
Not at all. I am assuming you are FOR having guns, and I am taking (briefly, for the sake of argument) the position AGAINST guns. I am saying that Democrats would have gotten guns made illegal by now if the courts hadn't been arbitrarily acting in what is probably YOUR favor. Thus making an opposition to old white men on your part hypocritical. Sorry if I did not make that clear.
i suppose the same should be said about a group of 5 loving people, and yet I wouldn't be surprised if you were against polygamy
/legal/. Government should prohibit only minimally, as necessary, and let churches wring their hands over whether things are moral.
You say this like it's supposed to sound ridiculous. In fact, I for one have no problem with polygamy on moral grounds.
The major argument against polygamy is historical, it being the case that multi-partner marriages have seldom been wholly consensual. It is wrong for a man to keep five women as much as it is for him to keep one, if keeping is what he is doing. With two people the chances that the relationship is less harmful is greater. None of this says that polygamy should be illegal or is immoral. In todays world it might even be possible to have perfectly workable polygamous marriages, given our fairly good legal and social system. I think we could do it in this day and age without it being harmful.
And heck if you love your brother or sister?
In principle there is nothing wrong with sexual contact of some kind between siblings, but I agree that it should be generally illegal on genetic grounds. And again, the possability of abuse is rather greater with a member of ones own family. So, while it's possible to have a safe icestuous relationship, I don't think the practice should be legal as at this time I do not believe such a relationship has a good enough chance of being safe.
As for incestuous marriage... why not? Apart from the sex issue, it seems fine to me.
I mean you love each other, or your dog for that matter.
The only reason to ban beastiality is health reasons, both yours and the animal's. Thereis some chance of disease, for one. And I have heard of reports of harming the animal by means of the act itself. The major argument against it is that there are curently no laws of enough specificity on any books (of which I am aware) to protect the animal in such situations.
As for marriage... you can already leave posessions to pets, and you can already sleep with them (more or less). While it may be necessary to exclude such unions from certain aspects of marriage (how would health benefits work?) and thus make the process more of a legal fiction than anything else, I see no problem with it.
The problem is you have no objective morality
I've got news for you, in case you slept through your philosophy classes: There is no objective morality. A few people have tried to define objective morality, and "community standards" are about as close as you can come.
Give me one reason I should trust your judgment?
Give me one reason you need to trust my moral judgements. If I married (say) a goat, it would in no way involve you and thus your moral perspective would be irrelevent.
Why is your view more right than mine?
Why is your view more right than mine? I know, majority opinion, right? Well anyone can see how quickly majority rule gets screwed up. "It's always been that way!"? This veneration of the past, while amusing, does not hold any moral weight. We don't keep slaves any longer, though it is a venerable practice. Give me some real argument as to why your opinion on marriage has any impact on anyone other than yourself and your spous (if any).
Why should any of this be illegal or legal? What buisness does the government have telling anybody what they can and can not do.
None at all, insofar as what people do does not cause particular harm to other people or the government. And maybe not even then.
How does a government decide wht is moral or immoral if the electrical impulses going through their brains are nothing more than chance?
Ah, that's jsut it, y'see.You've hit the nail on the head: The government doesn't decide what is moral, the government decides what is
Your views of right and wrong are abitrary and have no
We're trying to amend the Constitution to allow states to define marriage however they choose. Right now, the definition of marriage is in the hands of three old white men sitting behind a bench. The amendment will put that decision back in the hands of the people.
If anyone is likely to react incorrectly and ban gay marriage, it is old white men. The only reason they wouldn't do that is if it were (gasp!) illegal to ban it.
As for why states shouldn't be allowed to define it seperately: What part of FULL faith and credit do you not understand?
I'm so terribly sorry that you don't appreciate democracy.
The old white men are part of our democratic system. One of those brilliant checks and balances: They'll follow the law, regardless of popular opinion. This makes nasty things hard to do quickly, thus making it less likely that wrong things will be done in haste. If they're right things, eventually they will be done.
People complain about judges only when the check/balance is not working for them. Guns would be illegal by now if not for old white men.