Yeah... There's a headline (no story) in the most recent Onion:
Jenna Bush's
Federally Protected
Wetlands Now Open
For Public Drilling
Now to me this is a little OTT. They're college kids -- of course they're going to be a bit wild. And nobody is going to say that they're not hot. But I don't know...
The thing about using Frenchisms, though, is that even if they do have English equivalents there's a certain shade of meaning captured there. For example, there's a lot more snob factor in saying "nouveau riche" than there is in "new rich" -- the English way of saying says you just got money, but to use the French equivalent indicates that you're shoving it down other people's throats.
I don't really screw around with my shell prompts much; the last time I did anything to a shell prompt was to get rid of a quirk in OpenBSD (something about counting upwards every time you enter a command). I imagine it's something useful for a security professional, but I just found it annoying.
The idea being that Smalltalk (which is what Squeak is) was doing basically the same thing as Java and.NET 30 years ago with virtual machines and GUI primitives -- the only difference is that it took Apple to throw a metaphor on the GUI and Smalltalk lost out because it didn't evolve. It's actually a somewhat legitimate comment, even if it shows the person saying it to be a bit of a fanatic...
I will not send someone a Word doc. I don't have the tools or the inclination to generate MSOffice-format files -- I'll be happy to send HTML or PDF or just plain text, but Office is a waste of my time (and probalby theirs too).
The cube was essentially a G4 iMac with no monitor. Apple, in their infinite wisdom, failed to market it as such, and took a bath on it because of it. If they'd marketed it as the system they'd developed, we wouldn't be having this situation right now.
I look at MOSR like this (as I'm sure its keepers do as well) -- unfiltered possibilities. Even they admit not everything they say is true, and I'm sure they'd be the first to tell you that not everything they say is to be taken as gospel.
So I still read it -- I just don't count on seeing everything they talk about appearing at my local MicroCenter.
That was the generic name for programs like Illustrator once upon a time. Though I don't doubt there's a principle here -- there's a running thing on the Register about a company called EasyGroup that's been cracking down on Easy*.com sites.
Funny, back in middle school I wrote an OS shell for the Commodore 128 called EasySys -- am I in violation?
It's like this -- you run an open relay, you're essentially creating a sort of hot zone that can contaminate downstream systems. What ORBS and successors are doing is essentially spanking people for being careless. Yes, it's a bit ham-handed, but the logic is essentially that the ISPs in question are going to get bitched at by their customers (who won't know why, but the ISPs probably will) and therefore need to do something about it.
If you've got a better solution, put up or shut up. It certainly wouldn't be a bad idea to try.
This is one of those situations that strikes me as being a misguided application of civil liberties thinking. Fact is, this is a technical and financial problem, not a freedom-of-speech problem. Spam annoys people and cuts bandwidth. I really don't think freedom of speech extends to dumping junkmail by the grocerybag-full in my backyard, which is essentially what spam is. A spammer makes a mess of my mailbox, I have to clean it up (maybe pay for it if I'm using a service like Palm.net -- there are still services that charge for downloads), and this is protected speech? There's a gap missing in the logic here.
Just out of curiosity, what's Gilmore's take on junk fax? I'm sure even he realizes that that's an issue...
You know, first time I ever heard a high-speed CD-ROM I thought the computer had some sort of turbofan in it. It was a little weird when I finally realized what it was.
My current systems are an interesting mix -- 24x CDRW and 12x CD-ROM on my Mac, and a high-speed CD-ROM of unknown speed on my PC. It does get a little noisy. The curious thing is this: a PC I replaced recently had a 40x added aftermarket, but I could never find the correct mounting hardware for it so it was pretty much just plugged in and unanchored. Curiously, I never noticed a single case of Maytag Mode on it, though a poorly pressed MacAddict CD (readable, but visible moire patterns on the recording surface) once did a number on an older Mac CD-ROM of mine...
Which just points out the idiocy of obsessing over fanlessness. I find it particularly hilarious that they tried to do this with something that was essentially intended to compete with the IBM PC, but not particularly surprising. Steve Jobs has never been very good at marketing (he's gotten much better since returning to Apple, mind you, but as marketing goes he's still a legend in his own mind), and I think he really failed to understand that there were certain things that should have taken priority.
The fact is that the Sara project (Apple///) was a failure for a very good reason, and the fanlessness thing was it. It's different with the iMacs -- they're essentially personal workstations designed for people who need a computer NOW. If you're an iMac person, the most you're likely to expand your system is a couple of external drives, maybe a new mouse (if you're a 2-button junkie like me -- I love the new Apple mouse but I've been using a 2-button since OS 8). If you're a Cube user, you're a poser who doesn't deserve a Real Computer anyway, so who cares what you need?
The whole issue of silent PCs is IMHO a hack value thing, mostly of interest to those who live in studio apartments that have been reincarnated as network closets with beds (which I suspect is rather a large percentage of the/. community). It's all good.
the moral of the story: Make sure you have a minitower case that can stand up to being dropped on its side:-)
Simmer down, buddy. Bringing the iMac into this discussion is perfectly legitimate.
Truth is, Apple, for whatever reason, threw a lot of resources into the problem and the Kihei iMacs (and the cube as well) were what came out. If you want to know how to make a fanless computer system, you could do a lot worse than to study the construction details on an iMac.
(Incidentally, I think having a lot of unrestricted empty space inside the case was a big part of what made it work, though I don't think that applies to the cubes...)
The fact remains that it's rather pointless of them not to make the code for the whole system available -- Solaris can hardly be much of a profit center for them anymore.
/Brian
All extremists may fuck off now. Thank you.
on
USENIX Reports
·
· Score: 2
(I think that puts it rather nicely; a touch of irony as trollbait, y'know...)
The vast majority of Linux and BSD zealots are either idiots or doing a massively effective job of trying to look like it. This is the same sort of reason that I respect politicians like John McCain and Jim Jeffords -- principles are all well and good, but they aren't going to get things done when an agreement has to be reached.
The fact is that the BSD people are sharing because they feel like sharing, and the GPL people are sharing to make a point. I side more with the GPL people myself (mostly because I don't want my own code abused) but I really have no problem with either side.
The technical issues involved are not at issue here, are they, really (except when dealing with Windows)? Okay, Linux is obnoxiously ad hoc in places. Okay, *BSD so far lacks SMP support (except in Darwin/MacOS X). Neither one fits an OS guru's idea of "purity" (again, except for Darwin/X and xMach). The fact is that technical arguments are as bad as political arguments for being vague -- a little PR can turn any stupid design into a feature with enough mindbending (witness Apple's proud declaration of the early 90s that they didn't like DMA, or old-line DOS zealots talking about being able to replace memory managers as if there wasn't actually a need to do so).
I don't think the zealots are getting us anywhere. RMS has essentially shot his mouth off into irrelevance; ESR (though I don't consider him a zealot, really) is close to doing the same thing. Theo De Raadt puts out an excellent OS, but he's fast becoming a laughingstock for his attitude. Meanwhile we've got companies like Apple and Sun who are in fact contributing back and instead of praising them for getting a start and politley encouraging them to get in step with the community they're serving, the zealots rip into them for biting the hands that feed them.
(Let me let you in on something: of course they've got an agenda. It's called making money. Shut up, take what they'll let you take, and tell them (not us) what else you want. Enough pressure, they will listen.)
The fact is that I support both Linux and BSD, and it's not just because I'm Mac/Unix bytesexual. At the end of the day, these two sides will be the survivors when everything else has gone to hell, simply because they're the only ones guaranteed to still be out there in a form that someone can pick up and run with ten, twenty, fifty years down the road.
One rant from a rabid middle-of-the-roader,
/Brian
Re:Hi, you're full of shit
on
USENIX Reports
·
· Score: 2
I see where you're coming from. I do think Open Source will eventually wipe out the business value of day-to-day software (if it hasn't already).
Folks, here's the thing: if you're going to create a software startup, here's where I think your profits are going to come from in the future:
First off, I think there was more stupidity than gouging involved (approximately, "we thought we'd satisfied the market"), which indicates that Sun is clearly lacking a clue when it comes to Open Source. This isn't news.
The other thing about the Sun situation that I suspect most people don't consider -- they don't necessarily own all the source code to Solaris. A lot of it is probably still Unix System V (which, last time I checked, was owned by Caldera, another notably less-than-clueful company); there are probably restrictions on just what they can do with the code.
I do think in general that Sun is one of those companies that has no particular interest in keeping the source code closed per se, though. I think they made that perfectly evident by making Solaris and StarOffice (which should be their flagship products if software was really a focus for them) free downloads. Sun's problem here is that they're doing a very sloppy job of adapting to the realities of the modern Unix world in which Open Source is a force that simply can't be ignored or written off (I hesitate to say it dominates, since there's a lot of Motif work and such still being done out there in the trenches).
What Sun has just done unfortunately probably doesn't signify anything in the way of a change of heart; they're merely responding to a miscalculation in their market analysis that would have gotten them unnecessary bad press if they'd followed through with it. (Might wake them up, though, you never know...)
I remember the end of the Usenet glory days (mid-90s, unfortunately just after the September That Never Ended), before it was swallowed by spam. Usenet IMHO is the place where net.culture grew up, even if it wasn't part of the Internet in the beginning. No offense to the/. community, but to those of you who never experienced it, Usenet back in the day was a place the likes of which we probably won't see again.
Places like/. and k5 still have an echo of the old Usenet, and you likewise still get some of it on mailing lists now, but take a look through Google Groups now -- too much garbage, and the community that's there is somewhat isolated because Usenet isn't as integral to the net experience as it once was.
Two taps and a v-sign for the man -- not everyone can claim to have created a true community single-handedly.
So really the only people who need to get excited about this stuff are the driver writers and their brethren who write plugins for things like Photoshop is what you're saying.
The thing about Sony's systems is that they're so proprietary that getting Linux on them is something of a challenge. It's a psychological thing -- by buying a LavenderPlasticBox and throwing Linux on it, some people probably feel that they're repudiating proprietary business models in their own way.
Me, personally... now that the PC subnotebook market has opened up again, I'd just as soon buy one from Gateway if I was going to. Theirs are just as slick and a lot less proprietary. (Though I'd go for the iBook first, just like you...)
The thing about laptops that surprises me -- how is it that we don't see partially-assembled systems with power circuits and such where all you need to do is add a motherboard and hard drive? (Or do we? I never see such things in Computer Shopper...) It would seem like a pretty obvious thing to do.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah... There's a headline (no story) in the most recent Onion:
Jenna Bush's
Federally Protected
Wetlands Now Open
For Public Drilling
Now to me this is a little OTT. They're college kids -- of course they're going to be a bit wild. And nobody is going to say that they're not hot. But I don't know...
/Brian
The thing about using Frenchisms, though, is that even if they do have English equivalents there's a certain shade of meaning captured there. For example, there's a lot more snob factor in saying "nouveau riche" than there is in "new rich" -- the English way of saying says you just got money, but to use the French equivalent indicates that you're shoving it down other people's throats.
/Brian
I don't really screw around with my shell prompts much; the last time I did anything to a shell prompt was to get rid of a quirk in OpenBSD (something about counting upwards every time you enter a command). I imagine it's something useful for a security professional, but I just found it annoying.
/Brian
The idea being that Smalltalk (which is what Squeak is) was doing basically the same thing as Java and .NET 30 years ago with virtual machines and GUI primitives -- the only difference is that it took Apple to throw a metaphor on the GUI and Smalltalk lost out because it didn't evolve. It's actually a somewhat legitimate comment, even if it shows the person saying it to be a bit of a fanatic...
/Brian
I will not send someone a Word doc. I don't have the tools or the inclination to generate MSOffice-format files -- I'll be happy to send HTML or PDF or just plain text, but Office is a waste of my time (and probalby theirs too).
/Brian
The cube was essentially a G4 iMac with no monitor. Apple, in their infinite wisdom, failed to market it as such, and took a bath on it because of it. If they'd marketed it as the system they'd developed, we wouldn't be having this situation right now.
/Brian
I look at MOSR like this (as I'm sure its keepers do as well) -- unfiltered possibilities. Even they admit not everything they say is true, and I'm sure they'd be the first to tell you that not everything they say is to be taken as gospel.
So I still read it -- I just don't count on seeing everything they talk about appearing at my local MicroCenter.
/Brian
They're toast, then?
They're idiots, one way or the other. Still can't crack mine though... anyone know how to get past the QNX login prompt when there's no passwd file?
/Brian
That was the generic name for programs like Illustrator once upon a time. Though I don't doubt there's a principle here -- there's a running thing on the Register about a company called EasyGroup that's been cracking down on Easy*.com sites.
Funny, back in middle school I wrote an OS shell for the Commodore 128 called EasySys -- am I in violation?
/Brian
I still haven't figured out how to crack my iOpener. I think my passwd file has been hacked...
But hey. Live by the loss-leader, die by the loss-leader.
/Brian
It's like this -- you run an open relay, you're essentially creating a sort of hot zone that can contaminate downstream systems. What ORBS and successors are doing is essentially spanking people for being careless. Yes, it's a bit ham-handed, but the logic is essentially that the ISPs in question are going to get bitched at by their customers (who won't know why, but the ISPs probably will) and therefore need to do something about it.
If you've got a better solution, put up or shut up. It certainly wouldn't be a bad idea to try.
/Brian
"there's a gap missing..."
:-)
didn't quite mean to put it that way, but y'all know what I mean
/Brian
This is one of those situations that strikes me as being a misguided application of civil liberties thinking. Fact is, this is a technical and financial problem, not a freedom-of-speech problem. Spam annoys people and cuts bandwidth. I really don't think freedom of speech extends to dumping junkmail by the grocerybag-full in my backyard, which is essentially what spam is. A spammer makes a mess of my mailbox, I have to clean it up (maybe pay for it if I'm using a service like Palm.net -- there are still services that charge for downloads), and this is protected speech? There's a gap missing in the logic here.
Just out of curiosity, what's Gilmore's take on junk fax? I'm sure even he realizes that that's an issue...
/Brian
You know, first time I ever heard a high-speed CD-ROM I thought the computer had some sort of turbofan in it. It was a little weird when I finally realized what it was.
My current systems are an interesting mix -- 24x CDRW and 12x CD-ROM on my Mac, and a high-speed CD-ROM of unknown speed on my PC. It does get a little noisy. The curious thing is this: a PC I replaced recently had a 40x added aftermarket, but I could never find the correct mounting hardware for it so it was pretty much just plugged in and unanchored. Curiously, I never noticed a single case of Maytag Mode on it, though a poorly pressed MacAddict CD (readable, but visible moire patterns on the recording surface) once did a number on an older Mac CD-ROM of mine...
/Brian
Which just points out the idiocy of obsessing over fanlessness. I find it particularly hilarious that they tried to do this with something that was essentially intended to compete with the IBM PC, but not particularly surprising. Steve Jobs has never been very good at marketing (he's gotten much better since returning to Apple, mind you, but as marketing goes he's still a legend in his own mind), and I think he really failed to understand that there were certain things that should have taken priority.
///) was a failure for a very good reason, and the fanlessness thing was it. It's different with the iMacs -- they're essentially personal workstations designed for people who need a computer NOW. If you're an iMac person, the most you're likely to expand your system is a couple of external drives, maybe a new mouse (if you're a 2-button junkie like me -- I love the new Apple mouse but I've been using a 2-button since OS 8). If you're a Cube user, you're a poser who doesn't deserve a Real Computer anyway, so who cares what you need?
/. community). It's all good.
:-)
The fact is that the Sara project (Apple
The whole issue of silent PCs is IMHO a hack value thing, mostly of interest to those who live in studio apartments that have been reincarnated as network closets with beds (which I suspect is rather a large percentage of the
the moral of the story: Make sure you have a minitower case that can stand up to being dropped on its side
/Brian
Simmer down, buddy. Bringing the iMac into this discussion is perfectly legitimate.
Truth is, Apple, for whatever reason, threw a lot of resources into the problem and the Kihei iMacs (and the cube as well) were what came out. If you want to know how to make a fanless computer system, you could do a lot worse than to study the construction details on an iMac.
(Incidentally, I think having a lot of unrestricted empty space inside the case was a big part of what made it work, though I don't think that applies to the cubes...)
/Brian
Ah, was not aware.
The fact remains that it's rather pointless of them not to make the code for the whole system available -- Solaris can hardly be much of a profit center for them anymore.
/Brian
(I think that puts it rather nicely; a touch of irony as trollbait, y'know...)
The vast majority of Linux and BSD zealots are either idiots or doing a massively effective job of trying to look like it. This is the same sort of reason that I respect politicians like John McCain and Jim Jeffords -- principles are all well and good, but they aren't going to get things done when an agreement has to be reached.
The fact is that the BSD people are sharing because they feel like sharing, and the GPL people are sharing to make a point. I side more with the GPL people myself (mostly because I don't want my own code abused) but I really have no problem with either side.
The technical issues involved are not at issue here, are they, really (except when dealing with Windows)? Okay, Linux is obnoxiously ad hoc in places. Okay, *BSD so far lacks SMP support (except in Darwin/MacOS X). Neither one fits an OS guru's idea of "purity" (again, except for Darwin/X and xMach). The fact is that technical arguments are as bad as political arguments for being vague -- a little PR can turn any stupid design into a feature with enough mindbending (witness Apple's proud declaration of the early 90s that they didn't like DMA, or old-line DOS zealots talking about being able to replace memory managers as if there wasn't actually a need to do so).
I don't think the zealots are getting us anywhere. RMS has essentially shot his mouth off into irrelevance; ESR (though I don't consider him a zealot, really) is close to doing the same thing. Theo De Raadt puts out an excellent OS, but he's fast becoming a laughingstock for his attitude. Meanwhile we've got companies like Apple and Sun who are in fact contributing back and instead of praising them for getting a start and politley encouraging them to get in step with the community they're serving, the zealots rip into them for biting the hands that feed them.
(Let me let you in on something: of course they've got an agenda. It's called making money. Shut up, take what they'll let you take, and tell them (not us) what else you want. Enough pressure, they will listen.)
The fact is that I support both Linux and BSD, and it's not just because I'm Mac/Unix bytesexual. At the end of the day, these two sides will be the survivors when everything else has gone to hell, simply because they're the only ones guaranteed to still be out there in a form that someone can pick up and run with ten, twenty, fifty years down the road.
One rant from a rabid middle-of-the-roader,
/Brian
I see where you're coming from. I do think Open Source will eventually wipe out the business value of day-to-day software (if it hasn't already).
Folks, here's the thing: if you're going to create a software startup, here's where I think your profits are going to come from in the future:
-games
-vertical-market applications
-consulting
Linux is just fine for any of those settings.
/Brian
First off, I think there was more stupidity than gouging involved (approximately, "we thought we'd satisfied the market"), which indicates that Sun is clearly lacking a clue when it comes to Open Source. This isn't news.
The other thing about the Sun situation that I suspect most people don't consider -- they don't necessarily own all the source code to Solaris. A lot of it is probably still Unix System V (which, last time I checked, was owned by Caldera, another notably less-than-clueful company); there are probably restrictions on just what they can do with the code.
I do think in general that Sun is one of those companies that has no particular interest in keeping the source code closed per se, though. I think they made that perfectly evident by making Solaris and StarOffice (which should be their flagship products if software was really a focus for them) free downloads. Sun's problem here is that they're doing a very sloppy job of adapting to the realities of the modern Unix world in which Open Source is a force that simply can't be ignored or written off (I hesitate to say it dominates, since there's a lot of Motif work and such still being done out there in the trenches).
What Sun has just done unfortunately probably doesn't signify anything in the way of a change of heart; they're merely responding to a miscalculation in their market analysis that would have gotten them unnecessary bad press if they'd followed through with it. (Might wake them up, though, you never know...)
/Brian
Yeah -- didn't the old kremvax joke become a reality because it was vectored through Usenet?
/Brian
I remember the end of the Usenet glory days (mid-90s, unfortunately just after the September That Never Ended), before it was swallowed by spam. Usenet IMHO is the place where net.culture grew up, even if it wasn't part of the Internet in the beginning. No offense to the /. community, but to those of you who never experienced it, Usenet back in the day was a place the likes of which we probably won't see again.
/. and k5 still have an echo of the old Usenet, and you likewise still get some of it on mailing lists now, but take a look through Google Groups now -- too much garbage, and the community that's there is somewhat isolated because Usenet isn't as integral to the net experience as it once was.
Places like
Two taps and a v-sign for the man -- not everyone can claim to have created a true community single-handedly.
/brian
So really the only people who need to get excited about this stuff are the driver writers and their brethren who write plugins for things like Photoshop is what you're saying.
Somehow I'm not shocked.
/Brian
The thing about Sony's systems is that they're so proprietary that getting Linux on them is something of a challenge. It's a psychological thing -- by buying a LavenderPlasticBox and throwing Linux on it, some people probably feel that they're repudiating proprietary business models in their own way.
Me, personally... now that the PC subnotebook market has opened up again, I'd just as soon buy one from Gateway if I was going to. Theirs are just as slick and a lot less proprietary. (Though I'd go for the iBook first, just like you...)
The thing about laptops that surprises me -- how is it that we don't see partially-assembled systems with power circuits and such where all you need to do is add a motherboard and hard drive? (Or do we? I never see such things in Computer Shopper...) It would seem like a pretty obvious thing to do.
/Brian
Pretty impressive, but you've still got, y'know, Hotmail to deal with.
/Brian