Not trolling (though if I were, this would be the thread to do it in;-) ) but I wonder: if you would have been on OS X in 2010, would you have switched to Windows? (I'm also curious why you jumped to Linux in 2008. Better tools for coding?) All the code and SSH-related things are already built in, and sound, sleep/wake, etc. have also worked in OS X since forever.
I strongly preferred Win95/98/2k to Mac OS 7/8/9 (I started working with computers full-time in 1995 and spent equal amounts of time with each) but then OS X and Windows XP came out, and XP started getting worse and worse and worse, while at the same time OS X was getting better and better and better. (Bias: I had also been using Linux since 97/98, and I really liked the CLI stuff in OS X. Doing web stuff, talking to servers with SSH and SCP *natively* is great for me; as is the ability to run Adobe and MS apps.) By 10.2/10.3 I was happy with OS X (plus the big apps from Adobe and MS were finally native) and since then I've slowly gotten rid of Windows at home. Not actively--they just get outdated and/or die and I replace them with Macs. Plus Macs running on Intel means I can keep a copy of XP alive for occasional use as needed.
I've spent some time with Windows 7 and UGH, I can't stand any of it. I'm sure the drivers and performance are fine but the UI just kills me.
> This is why it's always surprised me that MS pushed into console gaming. > People keep Windows on their home PC because they and/or their kids use it for games.
The Xbox came out in 2001, when MS was at their height of desktop dominance. They weren't worried back then about needing to keep people on Windows. They were simply looking for ways to grow, and getting into consoles was one way.
"Somehow, in all the excitement over the iPad 2, OEMs have apparently forgotten that netbooks became popular precisely because they didn't cost as much as full size noteboooks."
Technology-wise, it looks like a great little device, but I just don't see it selling in worthwhile numbers. $499 for the tablet itself puts it squarely in "Why should I buy this instead of an iPad?" territory, and $650 for the tablet and keyboard puts it into "Why should I buy this and not a regular laptop?" land.
True. Unfortunately, the problem was never that Flash was inherently evil--the problem was developers overusing it.
I very much liked having all the bad kids in the "Flash" room and being able to close the door on that room with a Flash blocker. Now we're going to see a ton of badly-made sites with HTML5, and I don't think we'll ever see a "craptastic HTML5 blocker".:-( I'm already having a hard time with sites who think it's cool to cram a 100mb H.264 movie into a page.
> The so-called 'landrush' phase signifies the true launch
> of.xxx websites, following the Sept. 5 date when ICM
> Registry began accepting.xxx applications from
> trademarked companies — those looking to use
> a.xxx address and those seeking to prevent their
> company from appearing on a.xxx website
... which is, in turn, known as the "extortion" phase.
I've been hanging out on YouTube too much...
on
Firefox 8.0 Released
·
· Score: 2
... watching old music videos.
Thumbs up if you're still running Firefox 3.6 in 2011!
The majority of federal library program funds are distributed through the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) to each state. The Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) is part of the annual Labor, Health and Human Services and Education Appropriations bill... While the majority of funding for libraries comes from state and local sources, federal funding provides critical assistance, giving libraries across the country the financial support they need to serve their communities...
On April 14, 2011, after vigorous partisan debate, behind-the-scenes haggling and a nation wondering if the federal government would shut down, Congress finally approved the FY2011 budget for its final five months, ending September 30. Congress made a.2 percent across-the-board cut to all federal programs and made $38.5 billion in cuts to both mandatory and discretionary spending compared to FY2010.
IMLS received a 10.7 percent cut from FY2010 levels. Its FY2011 funding is $237,393,262, down $28 million from the FY2010 total of $265.8 million, which does not include the $16 million IMLS lost with the elimination of all federal earmarks from the FY2011 budget.
Every time I go into a library I thank God they're around and think about what it would be like to try to create them now if they didn't already exist.
Hi, Congress and the **AA. We want to make a big place--several of them, actually, in your typical metropolitan area--where any local resident can walk in empty-handed and walk out with both arms full of books, magazines, CDs, and DVDs, for free. Oh, and the government will pay for it all. Ideally, they'll look like this.
Just imagine trying to get that done today. Go out and patronize your local library, before it's too late!
> The day they do, is the day OS X leaves the > Unix fold and becomes something else. And > if that happens, you can bet your sweet ass > that Apple will be dead within 3 years.
Apple? No. The Mac? Perhaps.
Apple already makes the majority of their money from iOS devices. As long as eager developers have a way to keep making apps for those, selling nothing but locked-down devices poses no threat to Apple (no longer Computer) Inc.
That said, I don't think they'll do that. There is no reason to make the Mac into an appliance. Are there benefits to doing so? Yes. Downsides? Also yes. Is it necessary? No. Are there benefits to leaving it open? Yes. Are there strong downsides to leaving it open? None, at the moment, that haven't been addressed for the last two decades.
I'm not overly concerned with how depreciation works w.r.t properly taxing a business, but a Mac Mini bought today for $700 will probably sell in 4 years for $200-300. A MacBook Air, probably $500. Plus, you can do other things with the computer. It's not just an app-developing appliance. You probably own a computer already, and if you can replace whatever you have with your app-developing Mac, cut that number even further.
In any case, the investment needed to become an iOS app developer is trivial when compared to just about anything other than a lemonade stand.
Plus, God knows, news from higher-ups never comes in an email itself. Instead, we get emails from the CEO's secretary that say "Please read the attached message from the CEO." I've gotten plenty, so yeah, if I got one, I'd open it. I might know it's a fake if there were grammatical errors or if the secretary's name (which I happen to know) wasn't on there, but otherwise, yeah, it wouldn't be unusual at all.
- Vista ships with the "All Programs" item in the Start menu. - OS X ships with the "Applications" folder in the Dock. - iOS devices ship with every single needed icon in front of you on the screen. - And Ubuntu ships with SEVERAL menus at the top of the screen--they just aren't as populated as they used to be, for reasons unknown, which is my complaint.
> Ubuntu Founder Mark Shuttleworth defended Unity today, arguing > that even 'cool' power users should like usability and ease of use.
>... 'There is going to be a crowd that is just too cool to use something > that looks really slick and there is nothing we can do for them'
Long-time computer guy here. Also, owner of several Apple products. Slick is just fine. Slick done well is great. Unity sucks out loud. I used to use Linux quite a bit but I don't much anymore. For the last several years, Ubuntu (since about 5.06 or so) been my "go-to" distro when I just need to put something Linux-y together in a hurry. I did that for the first time in a while a few weeks ago and HOLY FUCKING SHIT I can't believe what they've done. Why has ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING been removed? Why isn't there even a shortcut to Terminal in the default menus anymore? Luckily I figured out I could use the Spotlight-esque search thingie to bring it up, but FUCK... no wonder everyone is complaining.
Mr. Shuttleworth, in your first few years with Ubuntu you did some fantastic work, but you've really gone off the deep end in the last few releases. You don't HAVE to change everything every six months. And if you think you're going to beat Android (with a 3-year headstart and the backing of Google) with Ubuntu on handheld devices, I'm sorry but you're fucking high.
Apple has managed to have a nice, slow, steady progression to dominance over the last decade by steadily releasing and refining their products. The one thing they do NOT do is drastically change direction every six months like a scalded cat.
Once I realized a couple years ago how much (little) space my whole collection (about 200 CDs) would take up when ripped losslessly compared to how big my hard drives were, I re-ripped all my CDs as ALAC and I'll just transcode as needed. I had previously ripped them all as 192kbps MP3. It's not so much "I can hear the difference" as much as it is "there's no reason not to and I'm an anal-retentive neatnik and I like knowing that what I have is as good as it can possibly be." My whole collection is only about 60 GB in ALAC.
This way I can have songs as 128k AAC for my phone and fit 50% more than I used to, and another copy of my collection is at 96k so I can stream it out of my house on my low-end DSL. (Yes, the quality at that level is noticeable, but it's for those "I really want to hear this one random song right now" times.) I use AAC for use on my iDevices but I can make them MP3s for use anywhere else. Note that listening to ALAC on a disk-based iPod will run through battery faster than usual because the hard disk will have to spin up for pretty much every song.
> People didn't want the iPhone before it was out there.
Sometimes it's also a case of doing things extremely well. Plenty of people DID want smartphones before they were out. (Basically, everyone who owned both a PDA and a cell phone.) I wanted a smartphone before the iPhone came out but all the smartphones that existed at the time were overpriced and underpowered and came with crap software. I had a high-end Axim--with TWICE the resolution of the original iPhone, comparable CPU, and 2 kinds of removable storage--and it sucked out loud in many ways. (Details supplied upon request.) Sure, it was only a PDA, but there were similar phones, and all the smart phones of the day sucked equally.
Another thing Steve was good at was assembling lots of different pieces--bringing it ALL together and making a good PACKAGE, not just a lone good gadget. The iPhone would not have been the success it was if he hadn't pushed AT&T to offer a cellular data plan at a reasonable price. Why didn't I own a smartphone before the iPhone? Because they lacked both reasonable data plans and had crap browsers. If they would have had one or the other, they STILL would not have been compelling. It takes someone with the big-picture vision like Jobs to make it all happen.
Tell them that game design is LOTS of math for collision detection, gameplay physics, etc., and it's really, really hard. Explain how it's much easier and more rewarding to make database-backed CMSs for porn sites.:-)
"Negotiations between the companies broke down just hours before Jobs' dramatic unveiling of the product..."
Apple knew of the name, they were in negotiations with Cisco about how to handle it, an agreement was not met before Steve planned to show it, he said "Fuck it" and went ahead anyway, Cisco sued the next day, and it was all settled 6 weeks later.
Apple: "Hi Cisco, here's a large check, thanks for letting us use the name." (And I guarantee you they were in discussions with Cisco BEFORE the Apple iPhone was launched. The name was settled shortly thereafter.)
RIM: whine, whine, whine.
Come on RIM, a freaking GOOGLE SEARCH would have shown you on Page 1 that someone else was using 'bbx' for another piece of software. You're not that helpless.
Firefox already went through this twice with Phoenix (the BIOS) and Firebird (the database.)
Yup, they've done some amazing work.
on
Ubuntu Turns 7
·
· Score: 1
It's pretty fantastic. And I'm holding on to my several-versions-old CD, from just before they messed it all up.
Slashdot Mirror
Not trolling (though if I were, this would be the thread to do it in ;-) ) but I wonder: if you would have been on OS X in 2010, would you have switched to Windows? (I'm also curious why you jumped to Linux in 2008. Better tools for coding?) All the code and SSH-related things are already built in, and sound, sleep/wake, etc. have also worked in OS X since forever.
I strongly preferred Win95/98/2k to Mac OS 7/8/9 (I started working with computers full-time in 1995 and spent equal amounts of time with each) but then OS X and Windows XP came out, and XP started getting worse and worse and worse, while at the same time OS X was getting better and better and better. (Bias: I had also been using Linux since 97/98, and I really liked the CLI stuff in OS X. Doing web stuff, talking to servers with SSH and SCP *natively* is great for me; as is the ability to run Adobe and MS apps.) By 10.2/10.3 I was happy with OS X (plus the big apps from Adobe and MS were finally native) and since then I've slowly gotten rid of Windows at home. Not actively--they just get outdated and/or die and I replace them with Macs. Plus Macs running on Intel means I can keep a copy of XP alive for occasional use as needed.
I've spent some time with Windows 7 and UGH, I can't stand any of it. I'm sure the drivers and performance are fine but the UI just kills me.
> This is why it's always surprised me that MS pushed into console gaming.
> People keep Windows on their home PC because they and/or their kids use it for games.
The Xbox came out in 2001, when MS was at their height of desktop dominance. They weren't worried back then about needing to keep people on Windows. They were simply looking for ways to grow, and getting into consoles was one way.
I'll do exactly that just so I can laugh at you for not issuing "sudo apachectl graceful" instead. :-)
"Somehow, in all the excitement over the iPad 2, OEMs have apparently forgotten that netbooks became popular precisely because they didn't cost as much as full size noteboooks."
Technology-wise, it looks like a great little device, but I just don't see it selling in worthwhile numbers. $499 for the tablet itself puts it squarely in "Why should I buy this instead of an iPad?" territory, and $650 for the tablet and keyboard puts it into "Why should I buy this and not a regular laptop?" land.
True. Unfortunately, the problem was never that Flash was inherently evil--the problem was developers overusing it.
I very much liked having all the bad kids in the "Flash" room and being able to close the door on that room with a Flash blocker. Now we're going to see a ton of badly-made sites with HTML5, and I don't think we'll ever see a "craptastic HTML5 blocker". :-( I'm already having a hard time with sites who think it's cool to cram a 100mb H.264 movie into a page.
> The so-called 'landrush' phase signifies the true launch .xxx websites, following the Sept. 5 date when ICM .xxx applications from .xxx address and those seeking to prevent their .xxx website
... which is, in turn, known as the "extortion" phase.
> of
> Registry began accepting
> trademarked companies — those looking to use
> a
> company from appearing on a
... watching old music videos.
Thumbs up if you're still running Firefox 3.6 in 2011!
Welcome to Slashdot, where even the submitters don't RTFA.
... the already-exisitng, easily-hackable previous Nook Color is now $50 less--just US$199. Nice! Very tempted...
There's a lot of libraries out there. We'd need a lot of rich guys to make that happen.
http://www.ala.org/ala/issuesadvocacy/libfunding/fed/index.cfm
The majority of federal library program funds are distributed through the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) to each state. The Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) is part of the annual Labor, Health and Human Services and Education Appropriations bill... While the majority of funding for libraries comes from state and local sources, federal funding provides critical assistance, giving libraries across the country the financial support they need to serve their communities...
On April 14, 2011, after vigorous partisan debate, behind-the-scenes haggling and a nation wondering if the federal government would shut down, Congress finally approved the FY2011 budget for its final five months, ending September 30. Congress made a .2 percent across-the-board cut to all federal programs and made $38.5 billion in cuts to both mandatory and discretionary spending compared to FY2010.
IMLS received a 10.7 percent cut from FY2010 levels. Its FY2011 funding is $237,393,262, down $28 million from the FY2010 total of $265.8 million, which does not include the $16 million IMLS lost with the elimination of all federal earmarks from the FY2011 budget.
Every time I go into a library I thank God they're around and think about what it would be like to try to create them now if they didn't already exist.
Hi, Congress and the **AA. We want to make a big place--several of them, actually, in your typical metropolitan area--where any local resident can walk in empty-handed and walk out with both arms full of books, magazines, CDs, and DVDs, for free. Oh, and the government will pay for it all. Ideally, they'll look like this.
Just imagine trying to get that done today. Go out and patronize your local library, before it's too late!
> The day they do, is the day OS X leaves the
> Unix fold and becomes something else. And
> if that happens, you can bet your sweet ass
> that Apple will be dead within 3 years.
Apple? No. The Mac? Perhaps.
Apple already makes the majority of their money from iOS devices. As long as eager developers have a way to keep making apps for those, selling nothing but locked-down devices poses no threat to Apple (no longer Computer) Inc.
That said, I don't think they'll do that. There is no reason to make the Mac into an appliance. Are there benefits to doing so? Yes. Downsides? Also yes. Is it necessary? No. Are there benefits to leaving it open? Yes. Are there strong downsides to leaving it open? None, at the moment, that haven't been addressed for the last two decades.
I'm not overly concerned with how depreciation works w.r.t properly taxing a business, but a Mac Mini bought today for $700 will probably sell in 4 years for $200-300. A MacBook Air, probably $500. Plus, you can do other things with the computer. It's not just an app-developing appliance. You probably own a computer already, and if you can replace whatever you have with your app-developing Mac, cut that number even further.
In any case, the investment needed to become an iOS app developer is trivial when compared to just about anything other than a lemonade stand.
Plus, God knows, news from higher-ups never comes in an email itself. Instead, we get emails from the CEO's secretary that say "Please read the attached message from the CEO." I've gotten plenty, so yeah, if I got one, I'd open it. I might know it's a fake if there were grammatical errors or if the secretary's name (which I happen to know) wasn't on there, but otherwise, yeah, it wouldn't be unusual at all.
- Vista ships with the "All Programs" item in the Start menu.
- OS X ships with the "Applications" folder in the Dock.
- iOS devices ship with every single needed icon in front of you on the screen.
- And Ubuntu ships with SEVERAL menus at the top of the screen--they just aren't as populated as they used to be, for reasons unknown, which is my complaint.
> Ubuntu Founder Mark Shuttleworth defended Unity today, arguing
> that even 'cool' power users should like usability and ease of use.
> ... 'There is going to be a crowd that is just too cool to use something
> that looks really slick and there is nothing we can do for them'
Long-time computer guy here. Also, owner of several Apple products. Slick is just fine. Slick done well is great. Unity sucks out loud. I used to use Linux quite a bit but I don't much anymore. For the last several years, Ubuntu (since about 5.06 or so) been my "go-to" distro when I just need to put something Linux-y together in a hurry. I did that for the first time in a while a few weeks ago and HOLY FUCKING SHIT I can't believe what they've done. Why has ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING been removed? Why isn't there even a shortcut to Terminal in the default menus anymore? Luckily I figured out I could use the Spotlight-esque search thingie to bring it up, but FUCK... no wonder everyone is complaining.
Mr. Shuttleworth, in your first few years with Ubuntu you did some fantastic work, but you've really gone off the deep end in the last few releases. You don't HAVE to change everything every six months. And if you think you're going to beat Android (with a 3-year headstart and the backing of Google) with Ubuntu on handheld devices, I'm sorry but you're fucking high.
Apple has managed to have a nice, slow, steady progression to dominance over the last decade by steadily releasing and refining their products. The one thing they do NOT do is drastically change direction every six months like a scalded cat.
Once I realized a couple years ago how much (little) space my whole collection (about 200 CDs) would take up when ripped losslessly compared to how big my hard drives were, I re-ripped all my CDs as ALAC and I'll just transcode as needed. I had previously ripped them all as 192kbps MP3. It's not so much "I can hear the difference" as much as it is "there's no reason not to and I'm an anal-retentive neatnik and I like knowing that what I have is as good as it can possibly be." My whole collection is only about 60 GB in ALAC.
This way I can have songs as 128k AAC for my phone and fit 50% more than I used to, and another copy of my collection is at 96k so I can stream it out of my house on my low-end DSL. (Yes, the quality at that level is noticeable, but it's for those "I really want to hear this one random song right now" times.) I use AAC for use on my iDevices but I can make them MP3s for use anywhere else. Note that listening to ALAC on a disk-based iPod will run through battery faster than usual because the hard disk will have to spin up for pretty much every song.
> People didn't want the iPhone before it was out there.
Sometimes it's also a case of doing things extremely well. Plenty of people DID want smartphones before they were out. (Basically, everyone who owned both a PDA and a cell phone.) I wanted a smartphone before the iPhone came out but all the smartphones that existed at the time were overpriced and underpowered and came with crap software. I had a high-end Axim--with TWICE the resolution of the original iPhone, comparable CPU, and 2 kinds of removable storage--and it sucked out loud in many ways. (Details supplied upon request.) Sure, it was only a PDA, but there were similar phones, and all the smart phones of the day sucked equally.
Another thing Steve was good at was assembling lots of different pieces--bringing it ALL together and making a good PACKAGE, not just a lone good gadget. The iPhone would not have been the success it was if he hadn't pushed AT&T to offer a cellular data plan at a reasonable price. Why didn't I own a smartphone before the iPhone? Because they lacked both reasonable data plans and had crap browsers. If they would have had one or the other, they STILL would not have been compelling. It takes someone with the big-picture vision like Jobs to make it all happen.
> What do you think we can do to
> convince ISPs to start rolling out
> IPv6 [i]before[/i] there is a crisis?
Slashdot editors: they put the 'k' in 'quality'. :-)
Tell them that game design is LOTS of math for collision detection, gameplay physics, etc., and it's really, really hard. Explain how it's much easier and more rewarding to make database-backed CMSs for porn sites. :-)
Here you go, my anonymous friend:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17268277/ns/business-us_business/t/cisco-apple-settle-over-right-iphone-name/
"Negotiations between the companies broke down just hours before Jobs' dramatic unveiling of the product..."
Apple knew of the name, they were in negotiations with Cisco about how to handle it, an agreement was not met before Steve planned to show it, he said "Fuck it" and went ahead anyway, Cisco sued the next day, and it was all settled 6 weeks later.
The difference is in the response.
Apple: "Hi Cisco, here's a large check, thanks for letting us use the name." (And I guarantee you they were in discussions with Cisco BEFORE the Apple iPhone was launched. The name was settled shortly thereafter.)
RIM: whine, whine, whine.
Come on RIM, a freaking GOOGLE SEARCH would have shown you on Page 1 that someone else was using 'bbx' for another piece of software. You're not that helpless.
Firefox already went through this twice with Phoenix (the BIOS) and Firebird (the database.)
It's pretty fantastic. And I'm holding on to my several-versions-old CD, from just before they messed it all up.
Yeah, that was my first thought (former resident here) too.
> Apple retails stores do seem profitable.
You don't know how right you are. They are, in fact, more profitable per square foot than any other retail store, period. "... more than six times the revenue per square foot at Neiman Marcus, four times that of Best Buy, and about one and a half times that at Tiffany's"