I have no idea how this website became so popular. The original interface was horrible and completely unintuitive.
My guess is that it's unintuitive to us, who have a modicum of technical capability and understanding. I remember trying to find a setting on Facebook years ago and I couldn't find it. I stopped and tried to think of where an idiot would expect it and there it was! My guess is reddit's interface is designed for idiots.
Disclaimer: I haven't loaded reddit in probably 10 years. I don't plan to now.
Maddox, is that you? ["...I've chosen a black background for most of my text because it's easier on the eyes than staring at a white screen. Think about it: your monitor is not a piece of paper, no matter how hard you try to make it one. Staring at a white background while you read is like staring at a light bulb (don't believe me? Try turning off the lights next time you use a word processor). Would you stare at a light bulb for hours at a time? Not if you want to keep your vision."]
Maybe open books are the way to go. Here's a book for $13/semester (3 semester course; $50). Buy the used ones off Amazon, and you can be down to single digits.
It kind of goes with the post above about the book scanners; open books and internet and whatnot is great, but not everyone has access to a screen for reading for hours on end, and sometimes screens just suck for reading.
One thing I've noticed in some of my research on textbooks is that it seems a lot of the cost goes into publishing with shiny, thick, colorful pages. My Shigley's from the '80's very closely matches in content with my Shigley's from 2014. Verbatim, including images/figures. The major change? Physical size, some updates on a few newer methods/materials, and color and gloss and a fancy cover!!1!!1 Oh, and new copyright.
It's really not difficult, nor complicated, nor without precedent. I had a 1993 Chevy Silverado that was factory governed at 93 mph...Similar issue on a '94. I'm pretty sure my friend's '04 Ford F350 also had a governor, but I don't quite remember. I know several other vehicles I've had had them; I've had enough vehicles that I don't remember which ones specifically.
The only part of your post that I agree with is the last two sentences: there is no real incentive for automakers to (consistently) provide governors. They don't lose sales because of it.
Yea, I disagree with everything you said there. I cannot ever conclude that anyone other than the user is ever responsible for what the user does. Snapchat didn't make the girl's decision any more than Colt made Custer's decisions.
We certainly aren't going to agree on this, I can tell that now; but I AM interested in how you justify that a manufacturer/designer can be responsible for how their device is used. A common example I often use (no doubt just as inapt as my previous examples) is a bicycle: it is not the bicycle manufacturer's fault that it can be used for theft. That, as you pointed out, also has other legitimate uses. But so does the Snapchat filter (nevermind that I don't think Snapchat itself has any legitimate uses...)
On another not, thanks for "inapt". New word. I like it.
new law proposal:
for millennials to get drivers licenses, they must install a lockout mechanism in the vehicle, similar to a brethalyzer, that will disable the ignition or accelerator if a phone is active in the vehicle.
I'll ignore the conundrum of passenger phones this time...
A lockout doesn't address the actual problem, which isn't the phone. It's poor driving ability and distractedness. Removing the phone will not stop an idiot from being an idiot, it might help, but isn't a solution.
We need to make the driving tests harder. And not just for new licenses. Teach them about consequences. Perhaps even implement using a phone while on the drive test like this. Simply taking away their toys isn't going to help, they'll find more toys.
Cell phones are fine, making something other than driving your priority when you're driving is not. It's bad decision making, plain and simple. THAT'S what we need to address.
I know there can be a kneejerk libertarian argument for personal responsibility, but certainly a rational observer could reasonably entertain the idea of "contributory negligence" against Snapchat.
Obviously we need to limit speedometers.
Or cars that go so fast. And GPS that shows speed. And even tachometers (Hey, it's not my fault I blew the engine, it's Ford's because they installed a tachometer that went up to 8000). Also, anemometers; we can't have people putting those on their vehicles to determine excess speed.
Blame the manufacturers!
No. A RATIONAL observer cannot reasonably entertain that idea. Blame the PERSON. THEY used it recklessly, NOT the people who designed/built it. The ONLY person responsible for how something is being used is the person using it.
The kneejerk reaction here is trying to assign blame to anyone other than who actually committed the act. I'm sure suing Snapchat can be much more lucrative than some idiot who's stupid enough to drive 107 in a 55 while taking a picture, but that doesn't justify anything.
Aside from the whole problem of 'Pro Gaming' in general: what the heck? Why are we allowing Video Gaming to become a spectator sport? Personally I don't care about somebody's spot on a leaderboard. I go into games like World of Warcraft to immerse myself in a virtual world. Once you accept that there are 'winners' in such endeavors, you automatically become a loser.
Aside from the whole problem of "Pro Sports" in general: what the heck? Why are we allowing football to become a spectator sport? Personally I don't care about somebody's spot on a line of scrimmage. I go into games like football to immerse myself in the physical sport. Once you accept that there are 'winners' in such endeavors, you automatically become a loser.
What's with all the negative "I don't care, surely no one else does! Why is this on Slashdot?!" comments lately? Go moderate the firehose.
To respond directly to your comment, most IT professionals aren't even professionals, so it's no wonder that video game professionals don't have the necessary expertise to tune their systems properly.
A good example of this is casual gaming, where "normal" people keep playing the same game year after year even if its the shittiest of games just because it was the FIRST game they ever tried.
Funny story: roads already have things "embedded" in them that are super easy to see: lines painted with reflective paint. Also reflectors. Typically.
Line-tracking is easy. Hell, detecting the side of the road and other objects is easy. Translating these into commands to drive and steer is trivial. None of these are the problem.
The problem is the details:
Is that a tumbleweed I can run through, or is that a car coming into my lane?
Do I swerve to miss the kid? Obviously, but I'm also not supposed to cross a double-yellow. Is it even a kid? What do I do about a soccer ball? A pile of leaves?
Am I allowed to swerve for a pothole? How much? The driver in front is swerving erratically, slow down? Take another route?
Vehicle approaching quickly from the rear, do I speed up? I'm already at the speed limit, and there's a vehicle in front of me. Is that a kid or one of those tumbleweeds I can smash through? Is the shoulder sufficient to support me or am I going to roll if I have to go that way?
Should I swerve to avoid the snake or squirrel? Can I even detect them? Should I?
My maps indicate a stop sign here, but they are old, and I can't see the sign. What do I do? Stopping randomly could be hazardous.
Does my owner want to stop to help this stalled vehicle? Maybe it's actually one of those tumbleweeds. Or a bison. Could be a hitchhiker with a penchant for murder.
The sun is bright and behind me, I cannot very well see the traffic signal. Do I treat it as a 4-way stop because it might be out?
Rules of the road dictate that the car to my right go first at this 4-way stop, but that car is not going. When do I go? What's that long thing flapping out the window at me?
This residential neighborhood is 25mph, but it's a crowded lane with cars parked on both sides. Should I maintain my speed and my lane position? I'm a computer, certainly I can react quickly enough to handle things.
Also snow, rain, ice, and general slippery-ness has to be considered. Obviously things such as flat tires can easily be taken into consideration (flat tire: pull over. But there's no shoulder/I'm on a bridge/in a crowded residential street...), but there are HUNDREDS of situations that cannot all be pre-programmed for a set course. The on-board computer (or cloud system, whatever) has to be able to distinguish and make its own decisions. These are the problems. Very interesting problems, I think, but problems nonetheless. And there are no standard answers, because it all depends on the situation surrounding the vehicle: speed, road conditions, visibility, how many other cars/people/etc. are in the area.
So using a cell phone while driving and causing an accident is clearly the driver's fault, but using a cell phone while walking and causing an accident is the city's fault?
I've transitioned to having 8 or 9 Chrome windows open at a time, where I used to have only a single window with 8 or 9 tab groups...
Any tab stacking done today is still not what it was in days gone by...Vivaldi still doesn't do it quite how I like: two rows of tabs, top row is groups, second is tabs in that group. I may be mistaken on saying this came from Opera, but it was a while ago. I definitely had it with Firefox until they stopped updating the extension and it would crash my browser..man, I hate losing all my open tabs!
...disabled all of the new UX design stuff, like tab stacking...
That is the single largest reason I'm considering switching browsers! Tab stacking back in Opera 12 or 15 was great, I miss it, and haven't found a solution for Firefox (that still works) or Chrome that I like to date.
I was extracted a tarball into my home directory. I was done with it and the contents in my home directory and wanted to remove them. Knowing a tarball of foobar.tar.gz typically extracts to./foobar, I typed:
rm foo[TAB]* -rf
I expected bash to fill in to the . in foobar.tar.gz, instead, somehow I hit a space between [TAB] and *, executing the command: rm foobar */rf on my entire home directory (meant to execute rm foobar* -rf). And this was before I knew how to do data recovery.
Similar misuse of rm -rf by a friend deleted a network drive containing my movie library, but I WAS able to recover that.
I'm much more careful of the use of tab and * in the command line now.
...Most internet service provider contracts state that the contract holder is responsible for actions taken on their internet service.
What is an IP Address?
Every machine on the Internet has a unique identifying number, called an IP Address.
What is[sic] the IP Address shown does not match the IP Address on the notice?
Occasionally, your ISP may change the IP Address that your computer uses. Your ISP has verified that at the time your computer was used for copyright infringement, it was using the IP Address stated in the notice.
...the competition that results from customers having more choice about formats and having a relatively large number of competing services trying to win customers driving prices down instead of a handful of companies essentially operating a price-fixing cartel and relying on customer lock-in.
TLDR: capitalism
That you think this is a problem speaks volumes.
This is true, will be interesting to see if they try to crack down on these "somethingorother" services that are destroying the quality music industry! Or something.
The biggest "artists" right now are Adele, Taylor Swift, One Direction, Drake.
I've heard of 3 of them, and can say I'm only familiar with any songs from one of them. It might be time to accept the fact that I'm out of touch with the popular music crowd.
I've never owned an Apple product in my life, but I'm thinking about it now. It's good to see someone standing up to the growing police state...
What if the FBI already easily broke into the iPhone...what if this whole court battle is a ruse?
Picture this: the FBI loses, but very, very publicly. It will be a huge win for privacy and the public. Apple will be our champion. People will switch to Apple products, thinking they will be safe from government intrusion, "terrorists" and those wishing to do us harm will use Apple products. All while the FBI knows how to break in, giving everybody a false sense of security. Apple wins, the FBI wins, privacy loses.
We're no strangers to security theater. Just look at Homeland Security for that: they accomplish nothing, but (try to) put on a good show.
Wouldn't it make more sense for the FBI to QUIETLY admit they cannot break into something? Perhaps they did start quietly, but then Apple made it public.
Why, then, would the FBI let it remain so loud and public? Wouldn't they want to sweep their failure under the rug? Say, "We already cracked it, but just want a simpler way."
I'm not a conspiracy theorist (although it can be argued that's what I'm doing here), but this whole thing doesn't make sense to me. The FBI has basically invited anyone who wants to hide anything from them to put in on Apple devices. That can't possibly be conducive to their goals.
What?! You mean there's more to the internet than that!? Outrageous! Nobody ever told me that! Where is this mythical world you speak of? Do I search for it in the Facebook search box, or the YouTube one?
Slashdot Mirror
I have no idea how this website became so popular. The original interface was horrible and completely unintuitive.
My guess is that it's unintuitive to us, who have a modicum of technical capability and understanding. I remember trying to find a setting on Facebook years ago and I couldn't find it. I stopped and tried to think of where an idiot would expect it and there it was! My guess is reddit's interface is designed for idiots.
Disclaimer: I haven't loaded reddit in probably 10 years. I don't plan to now.
Maddox, is that you? ["...I've chosen a black background for most of my text because it's easier on the eyes than staring at a white screen. Think about it: your monitor is not a piece of paper, no matter how hard you try to make it one. Staring at a white background while you read is like staring at a light bulb (don't believe me? Try turning off the lights next time you use a word processor). Would you stare at a light bulb for hours at a time? Not if you want to keep your vision."]
Maybe open books are the way to go. Here's a book for $13/semester (3 semester course; $50). Buy the used ones off Amazon, and you can be down to single digits.
It kind of goes with the post above about the book scanners; open books and internet and whatnot is great, but not everyone has access to a screen for reading for hours on end, and sometimes screens just suck for reading.
One thing I've noticed in some of my research on textbooks is that it seems a lot of the cost goes into publishing with shiny, thick, colorful pages. My Shigley's from the '80's very closely matches in content with my Shigley's from 2014. Verbatim, including images/figures. The major change? Physical size, some updates on a few newer methods/materials, and color and gloss and a fancy cover!!1!!1 Oh, and new copyright.
It's really not difficult, nor complicated, nor without precedent. I had a 1993 Chevy Silverado that was factory governed at 93 mph...Similar issue on a '94. I'm pretty sure my friend's '04 Ford F350 also had a governor, but I don't quite remember. I know several other vehicles I've had had them; I've had enough vehicles that I don't remember which ones specifically.
The only part of your post that I agree with is the last two sentences: there is no real incentive for automakers to (consistently) provide governors. They don't lose sales because of it.
Yea, I disagree with everything you said there. I cannot ever conclude that anyone other than the user is ever responsible for what the user does. Snapchat didn't make the girl's decision any more than Colt made Custer's decisions.
We certainly aren't going to agree on this, I can tell that now; but I AM interested in how you justify that a manufacturer/designer can be responsible for how their device is used. A common example I often use (no doubt just as inapt as my previous examples) is a bicycle: it is not the bicycle manufacturer's fault that it can be used for theft. That, as you pointed out, also has other legitimate uses. But so does the Snapchat filter (nevermind that I don't think Snapchat itself has any legitimate uses...)
On another not, thanks for "inapt". New word. I like it.
new law proposal: for millennials to get drivers licenses, they must install a lockout mechanism in the vehicle, similar to a brethalyzer, that will disable the ignition or accelerator if a phone is active in the vehicle.
I'll ignore the conundrum of passenger phones this time...
A lockout doesn't address the actual problem, which isn't the phone. It's poor driving ability and distractedness. Removing the phone will not stop an idiot from being an idiot, it might help, but isn't a solution.
We need to make the driving tests harder. And not just for new licenses. Teach them about consequences. Perhaps even implement using a phone while on the drive test like this. Simply taking away their toys isn't going to help, they'll find more toys.
Cell phones are fine, making something other than driving your priority when you're driving is not. It's bad decision making, plain and simple. THAT'S what we need to address.
I know there can be a kneejerk libertarian argument for personal responsibility, but certainly a rational observer could reasonably entertain the idea of "contributory negligence" against Snapchat.
Obviously we need to limit speedometers.
Or cars that go so fast. And GPS that shows speed. And even tachometers (Hey, it's not my fault I blew the engine, it's Ford's because they installed a tachometer that went up to 8000). Also, anemometers; we can't have people putting those on their vehicles to determine excess speed.
Blame the manufacturers!
No. A RATIONAL observer cannot reasonably entertain that idea. Blame the PERSON. THEY used it recklessly, NOT the people who designed/built it. The ONLY person responsible for how something is being used is the person using it.
The kneejerk reaction here is trying to assign blame to anyone other than who actually committed the act. I'm sure suing Snapchat can be much more lucrative than some idiot who's stupid enough to drive 107 in a 55 while taking a picture, but that doesn't justify anything.
Aside from the whole problem of 'Pro Gaming' in general: what the heck? Why are we allowing Video Gaming to become a spectator sport? Personally I don't care about somebody's spot on a leaderboard. I go into games like World of Warcraft to immerse myself in a virtual world. Once you accept that there are 'winners' in such endeavors, you automatically become a loser.
Aside from the whole problem of "Pro Sports" in general: what the heck? Why are we allowing football to become a spectator sport? Personally I don't care about somebody's spot on a line of scrimmage. I go into games like football to immerse myself in the physical sport. Once you accept that there are 'winners' in such endeavors, you automatically become a loser.
What's with all the negative "I don't care, surely no one else does! Why is this on Slashdot?!" comments lately? Go moderate the firehose.
To respond directly to your comment, most IT professionals aren't even professionals, so it's no wonder that video game professionals don't have the necessary expertise to tune their systems properly.
A good example of this is casual gaming, where "normal" people keep playing the same game year after year even if its the shittiest of games just because it was the FIRST game they ever tried.
Halo comes to mind.
Seems perfectly acceptable (I'm in the US, born and raised). To those under 13, it's restricted. Try not to overcomplicate things.http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/restricted
Funny story: roads already have things "embedded" in them that are super easy to see: lines painted with reflective paint. Also reflectors. Typically.
Line-tracking is easy. Hell, detecting the side of the road and other objects is easy. Translating these into commands to drive and steer is trivial. None of these are the problem.
The problem is the details:
Also snow, rain, ice, and general slippery-ness has to be considered. Obviously things such as flat tires can easily be taken into consideration (flat tire: pull over. But there's no shoulder/I'm on a bridge/in a crowded residential street...), but there are HUNDREDS of situations that cannot all be pre-programmed for a set course. The on-board computer (or cloud system, whatever) has to be able to distinguish and make its own decisions. These are the problems. Very interesting problems, I think, but problems nonetheless. And there are no standard answers, because it all depends on the situation surrounding the vehicle: speed, road conditions, visibility, how many other cars/people/etc. are in the area.
So using a cell phone while driving and causing an accident is clearly the driver's fault, but using a cell phone while walking and causing an accident is the city's fault?
Double standard, much?
I've transitioned to having 8 or 9 Chrome windows open at a time, where I used to have only a single window with 8 or 9 tab groups...
Any tab stacking done today is still not what it was in days gone by...Vivaldi still doesn't do it quite how I like: two rows of tabs, top row is groups, second is tabs in that group. I may be mistaken on saying this came from Opera, but it was a while ago. I definitely had it with Firefox until they stopped updating the extension and it would crash my browser..man, I hate losing all my open tabs!
...disabled all of the new UX design stuff, like tab stacking...
That is the single largest reason I'm considering switching browsers! Tab stacking back in Opera 12 or 15 was great, I miss it, and haven't found a solution for Firefox (that still works) or Chrome that I like to date.
My turn.
I was extracted a tarball into my home directory. I was done with it and the contents in my home directory and wanted to remove them. Knowing a tarball of foobar.tar.gz typically extracts to ./foobar, I typed:
rm foo[TAB]* -rf
I expected bash to fill in to the . in foobar.tar.gz, instead, somehow I hit a space between [TAB] and *, executing the command: rm foobar * /rf on my entire home directory (meant to execute rm foobar* -rf). And this was before I knew how to do data recovery.
Similar misuse of rm -rf by a friend deleted a network drive containing my movie library, but I WAS able to recover that.
I'm much more careful of the use of tab and * in the command line now.
A more reputable source for the article. Not to say that TorrentFreak isn't reputable, but.... http://www.ustelecom.org/blog/making-progress-copyright-enforcement
It's all in the mouseover text, but we (should) know that here.
...Most internet service provider contracts state that the contract holder is responsible for actions taken on their internet service.
What is an IP Address?
Every machine on the Internet has a unique identifying number, called an IP Address.
What is[sic] the IP Address shown does not match the IP Address on the notice?
Occasionally, your ISP may change the IP Address that your computer uses. Your ISP has verified that at the time your computer was used for copyright infringement, it was using the IP Address stated in the notice.
Sounds legit to me!
...the competition that results from customers having more choice about formats and having a relatively large number of competing services trying to win customers driving prices down instead of a handful of companies essentially operating a price-fixing cartel and relying on customer lock-in.
TLDR: capitalism
That you think this is a problem speaks volumes.
This is true, will be interesting to see if they try to crack down on these "somethingorother" services that are destroying the quality music industry! Or something.
The biggest "artists" right now are Adele, Taylor Swift, One Direction, Drake.
I've heard of 3 of them, and can say I'm only familiar with any songs from one of them. It might be time to accept the fact that I'm out of touch with the popular music crowd.
This makes me happy.
I've never owned an Apple product in my life, but I'm thinking about it now. It's good to see someone standing up to the growing police state...
What if the FBI already easily broke into the iPhone...what if this whole court battle is a ruse?
Picture this: the FBI loses, but very, very publicly. It will be a huge win for privacy and the public. Apple will be our champion. People will switch to Apple products, thinking they will be safe from government intrusion, "terrorists" and those wishing to do us harm will use Apple products. All while the FBI knows how to break in, giving everybody a false sense of security. Apple wins, the FBI wins, privacy loses.
We're no strangers to security theater. Just look at Homeland Security for that: they accomplish nothing, but (try to) put on a good show.
Wouldn't it make more sense for the FBI to QUIETLY admit they cannot break into something? Perhaps they did start quietly, but then Apple made it public.
Why, then, would the FBI let it remain so loud and public? Wouldn't they want to sweep their failure under the rug? Say, "We already cracked it, but just want a simpler way."
I'm not a conspiracy theorist (although it can be argued that's what I'm doing here), but this whole thing doesn't make sense to me. The FBI has basically invited anyone who wants to hide anything from them to put in on Apple devices. That can't possibly be conducive to their goals.
Just food for thought.
I was thinking Extensive Firewall Monitoring and Inspection, F....I don't know, was going for EFMI-FU "eff me, eff you"..
Hey, wanna start a security and research company?
I found a job for GhostShell!
What?! You mean there's more to the internet than that!? Outrageous! Nobody ever told me that! Where is this mythical world you speak of? Do I search for it in the Facebook search box, or the YouTube one?