When Windows Phone was newer, Microsoft paid everyone to write apps for it. As such, people were giving it tons of half-hearted lipservice calling it the "legitimate 3rd platform" to the exclusion of anything else (that didn't have as big of a bank account behind it).
Now that they've stopped the payouts, and still keep changing the APIs, support is dropping and a lot of that lipservice is starting to fade away.
Everyone on Slashdot keeps saying things like this. But in the real world, the degree everyone actually doing software engineering gets is... Computer Science.
That's not going to change until Software Engineering (or similar) is an actual degree offered by a large number of schools, and sought by companies overtly when doing college hiring. (Yes, I know some schools offer a degree with that name, but its not the common mainstream standard degree for software development.)
And the people who put wires in the wall (or make the intermediary systems those wires connect through) were still putting in VGA a decade after it make sense to do so.
Unfortunately, for some reason, most navigation-oriented GPS systems seem to be explicitly designed to keep you as geographically ignorant as they possibly can. They only show a map that displays not much more than your visual field of view, and only tell you about turns when you're almost on top of them. Want to actually know your full course, ON A MAP, in advance? Forget it. Even if they have the ability, its too frustrating and laggy to access it.
This is why I love how Tesla has designed their navigation system. You get the typical GPS-nav-type view on the dashboard, but the center console shows a big Google Maps view of your route. The center console map also has a list of your next few turns overlaid on it, so you're not caught unaware by what to do next.
The Windows phones combined some of the worst features of iOS (e.g. closed ecosystem and monoculture)
Don't forget the lack of multitasking with UI apps. You know, and also seeing "Resuming..... ......" every friggin time you switch between apps, visit the file picker, unlock the screen, etc.
Unfortunately, they've discontinued enough forward-looking development and laid off enough people that it would probably be very difficult to get BB10 going again. Also, their ability to have a useful Android runtime (a necessary compatibility crutch) continues to become more and more difficult as Google (necessarily) retakes control of Android from the AOSP.
BlackBerry OS basically did die when BlackBerry 10 was launched (though it was only 3 years ago). However, they made a lot of marketing mistakes during the launch of BB10. One of these was not trying hard enough (or at all) to actually tell people that BB10 was not BBOS. As a result, many of the valid criticisms against ancient BBOS were frequently flung like poo into any discussion of modern BB10.
I'm pretty sure "entry-level" is meant "meets minimum specifications for adequate VR performance," which includes a fairly high-end graphics card. (You know, like $300+ at a minimum just for that component.)
If "Configurable via GUI" in Windows means you "add some arcane registry key via the registry editor", then *maybe*.
Yes, that case actually counts. In Windows, you actually can do all sorts of user-unfriendly configuration-tweaking without having to open a command prompt or hand-edit a text file. This is a big part of why Windows is far more accessible to a certain level of "power user" who isn't quite comfortable with hacking their way across configuration files, but can manage the rest of it.
I keep saying the Linux community focuses far too much on two extreme user stereotypes: A notional "grandparent" who is afraid of any options and can use a simplistic already-configured-for-her system and The uber-geek who isn't scared of compiling their own kernel.
They keep forgetting about the notional "grandchild" who is "good with computers" but not to our level. This under-served segment is who actually acts as tech support for the notional "grandparent," and who probably makes the majority of the actual tech decisions.
No. They specifically cited the only fields of science where women have significant representation, while ignoring all the other fields where they're an extreme minority.
The way they seem to treat those water bottles at the checkpoint, is proof positive that they didn't even consider them dangerous for a millisecond. Seriously, they just toss them in a bin next to the X-Ray machine. Oh, and with the shoes, its also obvious they don't consider those potentially dangerous either. If they did, then why do they exempt anyone under or over certain ages from the rule?
Basically, they make the process as annoying as possible, with specific exceptions for anything that's resulted in an incident the media has made a big deal about.
I'm also not even sure what those millimeter wave scanner machines actually look for. The last time I flew, it detected something on my back that turned out to just be a patch of sweat from the backpack I was wearing.
And yet, whenever the healthcare reform debate comes up in the US, it seems as if *both* sides of the political isle managed to *completely* ignore everything you just said when formulating their respective outrages and talking points. If only this problem was actually dealt with (and the situation would likely be illegal in any other industry), people wouldn't be so financially dependent on health insurance providers in the first place.
Actually, the Tesla does not have a transmission. Its a simple reduction gear on the motors, and that's it. They did experiment with a 2-speed transmission in the early days of the Roadster, but gave up on it. Transmissions in cars are mostly do deal with the speed/torque curve of internal combustion engines, which isn't really a problem with electric motors.
Only if you can recharge at least 50% in about the same amount of time as it takes to refill a car with gas.
This is one place where everyone seems to miss the point. For every day use, as everyone has already said, you charge overnight. The car has enough range for any reasonable day trip. (To all of you who insist that you need to drive round-trip 400 miles every day, uphill to the mountains, while towing a boat... Shut the hell up and stick with your pickup truck. You are not most people.)
For road trips, you don't "wait at a charger for the car to recharge." Everyone, please stop assuming this. Its wrong. Rather, you park your car at a supercharger when making the *normal* rest stops you'd make on a road trip anyway.
Think of it this way... With a gas car: Drive for a while, stop somewhere to use the bathroom, perhaps get something to eat, spend 5 minutes at a gas station, get back on the road. With a Tesla: Drive for a while, stop at a supercharger (and plug in), go use the bathroom, perhaps grab something to eat, and get back on the road. The total length of time you spend at one of these stops really isn't all that different.
Yeah, when anyone else does it, this is the normal way software is maintained and supported in the modern connected world. But when Microsoft does it, we scream bloody murder!
So many things these days seem to have these sorts of double-standards.
In other words, the "eXtensible Emoji Protocol" (or XEP) that I keep joking about around the office:-)
The problem with emoji is that there are so many, but not enough to cover every possible symbol someone might want to send. As such, people see the gaps a bit too easily, and are constantly demanding "just one my symbol." (Not to mention that most people don't realize they're part of a universal standard, and not something each individual IM service decided to include/exclude.)
Eventually, you'll either wind up with an unmanageable bazillion emoji (rather than just hundreds), or there will be a backlash where we reduce to a minimum set necessary to represent all possible concepts. (Hey, isn't that called an alphabet?)
Except that I'm not sure people want to have to keep a drawer of "snap-on templates" for all their configurations. Its just yet another thing to lose, and inevitably have a hard time replacing. This will become especially true when the next product revision breaks compatibility with the older snap-ons.
Now when/if they can make the configuration software-controlled, it may have real potential. That's much harder, of course.
As a result, iOS users enjoy a relatively malware-free system.
Considering that its a foregone conclusion that every version of iOS will be jailbroken, I have to wonder if this has more to do with software distribution controls than actual system security.
Except that was during an era when most users only had 4MB of RAM, maybe 8MB if they were lucky. Oh, and RAM was actually expensive back then. Like more expensive than a whole smartphone is today.
To me, Google+ was the social network for your one friend who refuses to use Facebook.
Since every social circle only has one of these people, perhaps two at most, there was never enough of a critical mass for it to gain relevancy.
Unfortunately, the real problem is that social networks are very much silo-ed places, so its not really practical to combine more than one of them into anyone's feed of interest. Thus, if one person uses Facebook and the other uses Google+, they're not really going to interact in a convenient fashion.
The problem is that because Google does it first and/or best and/or "sufficiently free for adoption", there tend to not be any well known competing products. As such, everyone ends up relying on Google offerings "by default" and doesn't scramble to create replacements until their hands are forced.
Of course maybe this means that its a good investment to build alternatives to all of Google's offerings, just waiting to take an onrush of new business the moment Google loses interest in them. Then again, that's probably far easier in theory than practice.
Having previously worked in that industry, you could also say that gov't contracting provides a picture of what a tech company would look like if you kicked out all the H-1Bs. Having a general "US Citizen" requirement on an industry commonly populated by anything but, tends to shift things a lot.
Another thing that industry shows, is what things would look like if you removed the "specific known-to-the-west-cost top schools" bias that seems to be commonplace.
Sure, the average level of ability is far lower than what Silicon Valley is accustomed to. But on the other hand, the few high performers tend not to be limited to the groups that Silicon Valley seems to limit their hiring to.
Why is it that Elon Musk and Tesla seem to be the only car maker that can produce appealing electric vehicles? even though they are overpriced, I think that problem will go away as Tesla continues to get more established etc.
Probably because they're the only car maker that is fully committed, and doesn't have any other competing product lines. It is in their best interest to make the most desirable EVs they possibly can, and to do anything less would be bad for their business.
Slashdot Mirror
When Windows Phone was newer, Microsoft paid everyone to write apps for it. As such, people were giving it tons of half-hearted lipservice calling it the "legitimate 3rd platform" to the exclusion of anything else (that didn't have as big of a bank account behind it).
Now that they've stopped the payouts, and still keep changing the APIs, support is dropping and a lot of that lipservice is starting to fade away.
Everyone on Slashdot keeps saying things like this. But in the real world, the degree everyone actually doing software engineering gets is... Computer Science.
That's not going to change until Software Engineering (or similar) is an actual degree offered by a large number of schools, and sought by companies overtly when doing college hiring. (Yes, I know some schools offer a degree with that name, but its not the common mainstream standard degree for software development.)
And the people who put wires in the wall (or make the intermediary systems those wires connect through) were still putting in VGA a decade after it make sense to do so.
Unfortunately, for some reason, most navigation-oriented GPS systems seem to be explicitly designed to keep you as geographically ignorant as they possibly can. They only show a map that displays not much more than your visual field of view, and only tell you about turns when you're almost on top of them. Want to actually know your full course, ON A MAP, in advance? Forget it. Even if they have the ability, its too frustrating and laggy to access it.
This is why I love how Tesla has designed their navigation system. You get the typical GPS-nav-type view on the dashboard, but the center console shows a big Google Maps view of your route. The center console map also has a list of your next few turns overlaid on it, so you're not caught unaware by what to do next.
The Windows phones combined some of the worst features of iOS (e.g. closed ecosystem and monoculture)
Don't forget the lack of multitasking with UI apps. .. . ... .." every friggin time you switch between apps, visit the file picker, unlock the screen, etc.
You know, and also seeing "Resuming...
Unfortunately, they've discontinued enough forward-looking development and laid off enough people that it would probably be very difficult to get BB10 going again. Also, their ability to have a useful Android runtime (a necessary compatibility crutch) continues to become more and more difficult as Google (necessarily) retakes control of Android from the AOSP.
BlackBerry OS basically did die when BlackBerry 10 was launched (though it was only 3 years ago).
However, they made a lot of marketing mistakes during the launch of BB10. One of these was not trying hard enough (or at all) to actually tell people that BB10 was not BBOS. As a result, many of the valid criticisms against ancient BBOS were frequently flung like poo into any discussion of modern BB10.
I'm pretty sure "entry-level" is meant "meets minimum specifications for adequate VR performance," which includes a fairly high-end graphics card. (You know, like $300+ at a minimum just for that component.)
If "Configurable via GUI" in Windows means you "add some arcane registry key via the registry editor", then *maybe*.
Yes, that case actually counts.
In Windows, you actually can do all sorts of user-unfriendly configuration-tweaking without having to open a command prompt or hand-edit a text file.
This is a big part of why Windows is far more accessible to a certain level of "power user" who isn't quite comfortable with hacking their way across configuration files, but can manage the rest of it.
I keep saying the Linux community focuses far too much on two extreme user stereotypes:
A notional "grandparent" who is afraid of any options and can use a simplistic already-configured-for-her system
and
The uber-geek who isn't scared of compiling their own kernel.
They keep forgetting about the notional "grandchild" who is "good with computers" but not to our level. This under-served segment is who actually acts as tech support for the notional "grandparent," and who probably makes the majority of the actual tech decisions.
No. They specifically cited the only fields of science where women have significant representation, while ignoring all the other fields where they're an extreme minority.
The way they seem to treat those water bottles at the checkpoint, is proof positive that they didn't even consider them dangerous for a millisecond. Seriously, they just toss them in a bin next to the X-Ray machine.
Oh, and with the shoes, its also obvious they don't consider those potentially dangerous either. If they did, then why do they exempt anyone under or over certain ages from the rule?
Basically, they make the process as annoying as possible, with specific exceptions for anything that's resulted in an incident the media has made a big deal about.
I'm also not even sure what those millimeter wave scanner machines actually look for. The last time I flew, it detected something on my back that turned out to just be a patch of sweat from the backpack I was wearing.
And yet, whenever the healthcare reform debate comes up in the US, it seems as if *both* sides of the political isle managed to *completely* ignore everything you just said when formulating their respective outrages and talking points. If only this problem was actually dealt with (and the situation would likely be illegal in any other industry), people wouldn't be so financially dependent on health insurance providers in the first place.
Actually, the Tesla does not have a transmission. Its a simple reduction gear on the motors, and that's it. They did experiment with a 2-speed transmission in the early days of the Roadster, but gave up on it. Transmissions in cars are mostly do deal with the speed/torque curve of internal combustion engines, which isn't really a problem with electric motors.
Only if you can recharge at least 50% in about the same amount of time as it takes to refill a car with gas.
This is one place where everyone seems to miss the point.
For every day use, as everyone has already said, you charge overnight. The car has enough range for any reasonable day trip. (To all of you who insist that you need to drive round-trip 400 miles every day, uphill to the mountains, while towing a boat... Shut the hell up and stick with your pickup truck. You are not most people.)
For road trips, you don't "wait at a charger for the car to recharge." Everyone, please stop assuming this. Its wrong. Rather, you park your car at a supercharger when making the *normal* rest stops you'd make on a road trip anyway.
Think of it this way...
With a gas car: Drive for a while, stop somewhere to use the bathroom, perhaps get something to eat, spend 5 minutes at a gas station, get back on the road.
With a Tesla: Drive for a while, stop at a supercharger (and plug in), go use the bathroom, perhaps grab something to eat, and get back on the road.
The total length of time you spend at one of these stops really isn't all that different.
Yeah, when anyone else does it, this is the normal way software is maintained and supported in the modern connected world.
But when Microsoft does it, we scream bloody murder!
So many things these days seem to have these sorts of double-standards.
In other words, the "eXtensible Emoji Protocol" (or XEP) that I keep joking about around the office :-)
The problem with emoji is that there are so many, but not enough to cover every possible symbol someone might want to send. As such, people see the gaps a bit too easily, and are constantly demanding "just one my symbol." (Not to mention that most people don't realize they're part of a universal standard, and not something each individual IM service decided to include/exclude.)
Eventually, you'll either wind up with an unmanageable bazillion emoji (rather than just hundreds), or there will be a backlash where we reduce to a minimum set necessary to represent all possible concepts. (Hey, isn't that called an alphabet?)
Yet Emoji actually came from Japan.
You do know that New Horizons took nearly 10 years to get to Pluto, right?
Except that I'm not sure people want to have to keep a drawer of "snap-on templates" for all their configurations. Its just yet another thing to lose, and inevitably have a hard time replacing. This will become especially true when the next product revision breaks compatibility with the older snap-ons.
Now when/if they can make the configuration software-controlled, it may have real potential. That's much harder, of course.
As a result, iOS users enjoy a relatively malware-free system.
Considering that its a foregone conclusion that every version of iOS will be jailbroken, I have to wonder if this has more to do with software distribution controls than actual system security.
Except that was during an era when most users only had 4MB of RAM, maybe 8MB if they were lucky. Oh, and RAM was actually expensive back then. Like more expensive than a whole smartphone is today.
To me, Google+ was the social network for your one friend who refuses to use Facebook.
Since every social circle only has one of these people, perhaps two at most, there was never enough of a critical mass for it to gain relevancy.
Unfortunately, the real problem is that social networks are very much silo-ed places, so its not really practical to combine more than one of them into anyone's feed of interest. Thus, if one person uses Facebook and the other uses Google+, they're not really going to interact in a convenient fashion.
The problem is that because Google does it first and/or best and/or "sufficiently free for adoption", there tend to not be any well known competing products. As such, everyone ends up relying on Google offerings "by default" and doesn't scramble to create replacements until their hands are forced.
Of course maybe this means that its a good investment to build alternatives to all of Google's offerings, just waiting to take an onrush of new business the moment Google loses interest in them. Then again, that's probably far easier in theory than practice.
Having previously worked in that industry, you could also say that gov't contracting provides a picture of what a tech company would look like if you kicked out all the H-1Bs. Having a general "US Citizen" requirement on an industry commonly populated by anything but, tends to shift things a lot.
Another thing that industry shows, is what things would look like if you removed the "specific known-to-the-west-cost top schools" bias that seems to be commonplace.
Sure, the average level of ability is far lower than what Silicon Valley is accustomed to. But on the other hand, the few high performers tend not to be limited to the groups that Silicon Valley seems to limit their hiring to.
Why is it that Elon Musk and Tesla seem to be the only car maker that can produce appealing electric vehicles? even though they are overpriced, I think that problem will go away as Tesla continues to get more established etc.
Probably because they're the only car maker that is fully committed, and doesn't have any other competing product lines. It is in their best interest to make the most desirable EVs they possibly can, and to do anything less would be bad for their business.