I love my netbook as a compliment to my desktop. I don't want a full-powered laptop, because it's not expandable enough for me and the really powerful ones with lots of screen real estate are often quite huge. My netbook makes for a nice very portable device that's great for remote work.
I don't want to replace a netbook with a tablet because I use it for real work (and I don't mean you can't use a tablet for real work... depends on the work, of course), and I see a tablet as a consumer device that does a lot of things very well that previously only computers could do. I'd still have a tablet, for sure, but not to replace my netbook or my desktop computer. And I'd still have my Android phone to have in my pocket anywhere I go.
For me, each device serves a specific purpose very well... I'd really miss my netbook, even if I had a tablet, since for me they are different devices that are each very good at different things.
I've actually had the opposite experience. At work, we've standardized on WRT54GLs for our wireless access points (using DD-WRT) and remote VPN routers (using OpenWRT + OpenVPN). We've had excellent results. We have 15+ in use, and have maybe had 2 of them go bad (one was after years of use, and the other was a refurb anyway that we'd picked up on sale).
Everyone seems to have different experiences with wireless equipment. For example, I feel about D-Link the same as you feel about Linksys, based on my experience with them. I don't think anyone would bother lying about their experience, so I find it interesting that so many people have so many different results with different brands. Based on my experience, I always recommend Linksys to friends and family, and tell them to avoid D-Link.
We'll keep on using the Linksys WRT54GLs here, because they continue to be excellent for our needs.
If those things cause your application to collapse under unmanageable complexity, then those things probably weren't the right tool for the job, or you didn't know how to use them.
It sounds like you don't understand dependency injection or beans, so you're very likely to end up hating it all and losing control of your project. If you do understand those things, then you know when they are appropriate to use and when not to, so you don't end up hating something without a valid reason simply because you didn't understand how to use it.
This really simple application of making informed, logical decisions applies to all areas of programming (in any language) and most other things in life. You'll learn that as you mature.
Sounds like the API version problem that would affect any language. If the API changes, you have no choice but to use a specific version that matches your app (without modifying/recompiling the app, that is). Java is the same, and Java apps can specify jar dependencies and versions of those.
But what we're talking about here isn't even that. We're talking about just one application (the app server) that runs multiple, sandboxed pieces of code (by "sandboxed" here I mean keeping these pieces of code separate from each other and potential conflicts, not running in a security-restricted area). You'd have to sandbox this in C or anything else too if it's all running in the same process. What happens if Apache mod_a requires libfoo 1.5 but Apache mod_b requires a more recent and incompatible libfoo 2.0? It's all in the same process. The OS's linker isn't going to just load multiple (potentially conflicting) versions of the same thing into the same process. If you're sharing libs, you'd still have to sandbox the modules within your runtime environment so that the right module hooked up to the right library code and didn't interfere with other modules.
(Someone please correct me if I'm wrong here and operating systems have evolved the ability to automatically know what parts of your code are "pluggable" and need to be sandboxed, or if multiple conflicting libraries can be loaded into a single process with no conflicts... I haven't done systems programming for a few years)
Basically, what you're saying applies to applications using shared libraries, and it's not much different in Java, other than the fact that Java ClassLoaders do the work instead of the OS's shared library subsystem. And when you're talking about one application that loads multiple modules/plugins/applets/whatever you'll have to sandbox them since it's still all running in the same process. This is where OSGi comes in.
(disclaimer: this isn't a Java vs. anything post... just trying to describe why OSGi is useful and why that fact doesn't necessarily mean anything good or bad about Java itself... as for the imports... yep, the language wasn't designed to support "import... as..."... I don't mind that though, since I can count on one hand the number of times it would've been useful to me in my 12 years of Java development... ymmv)
OpenVPN uses standard UDP (or TCP) on any port you want, so it's very difficult for anyone to block. Android (using CyanogenMod firmware) supports this through the standard VPN GUI, and it could probably be set up on the Nokia N900 and maybe WebOS with some command line work. My carrier does block IPsec and PPTP for VPN unless you pay extra, but I have successfully used OpenVPN with no trouble.
Yeah, it sucks for your average user who has no idea where to even start setting any of that up. But it's still what I'll be doing if my carrier ever starts this crap.
Just my personal preference, but I'd prefer to press shift with my left hand and hit insert with my right, rather than try to get the fingers on my left hand into the right position to press shift-ctrl-v. But that's just me, and it's a good example of why having the choice of these different keys is a good thing.
As a programmer, the first thing I think of when I hear "bug" when related to computers is a flaw or defect... but I think in this case they mean a more traditional bug, like when you say someone's phone is "bugged." A tracking or listening device.
I've even heard some users refer to viruses/malware as "bugs" (like having a flu "bug")... confuses the hell right out of me as a programmer until I realize what they really meant.
Online forums and chats have been blocking URLs for years. People simply get around it by changing characters, breaking the URL up with spaces, or other things. Each system of blocking always has some way to get around it that's quite easy for a human to still understand, even non-tech people. I don't like them doing this either, but it's never been a real problem for anyone who actually wants to pass a URL along on other sites.
Oh I remember those days. Dialing up using MacSLIP or InterSLIP (not even PPP!), searching Gopher... using Mosaic (and later, Netscape 1.0), Eudora for mail...
In some ways, I'm glad we're far beyond all that now. In other ways, I wish we'd stayed there.
Mozilla didn't get Firefox where it is by being morons. Just the fact that it's Mozilla tells me that if this is ever an official release, it's going to have some kind of user confirmation before allowing access to these things (if it doesn't already). The backlash would be too great if there wasn't, and this is just common sense for Mozilla. Bugs could show up that might allow some kind of malware to do it, but it's crazy to think that Mozilla would knowingly allow any site to just access your camera and mic without permission if this was meant to be widely used by regular people.
Without any RAID, my WD Black Caviar 7200 RPM SATA2 drive can sustain close to this speed. I've copied very large files to it at over 100 MB/sec, and this is just a consumer desktop drive. A 10,000 RPM SAS (or SATA, if they make them that fast) drive could do 120 and beyond I'm sure.
I know, I'd been using strings to also look for the Flash version string in the binary, so I just used it for this since it worked in this scenario as well.
Yes, I'm sure. It might not have stopped you from having smooth video, but according to Adobe, the Linux plugin uses OpenGL. And looking at the 32-bit plugin, we see:
The 64-bit plugin for Linux has never had hardware acceleration enabled. The 32-bit version does... maybe they've finally enabled it in this new version. I'll switch to this if that's the case... otherwise, I'm happy with my 32-bit plugin and smooth full screen video.
Most online video is currently H.264. IE9 supports HTML5 video. DirectShow supports H.264 out of the box starting with Windows 7, and that takes advantage of hardware acceleration where available (such as the full H.264 decoding offered by my nvidia card - 1080p H.264 movies use about 1% of my CPU when played in WMP, compared to 45% or more in VLC). IE9 would be using DirectShow for HTML5 video. Therefore, the video is accelerated.
Other formats would be accelerated too if the installed codecs support it.
Agreed. I only have one app that doesn't work on wifi, and that's an app specific to my carrier that shows me my current data and voice usage for the month. It requires EDGE/3G so it knows who I am. I suppose they could make it work over wifi using a login, but it wouldn't even make sense to run an app like that on a non-phone anyway.
Other than that, every app I've ever used doesn't care what my connection is. It just uses whatever is available, whether that's wifi or EDGE/3G. I once needed to move the SIM card to another phone for a while, and used it with no SIM at all and everything worked exactly as expected (other than phone calls and SMS of course). GPS even works, even if it might take a little extra time to determine my position.
Not really sure what they're talking about with all this.
I would definitely have all three. I currently have a full powerful desktop, and a netbook. The netbook is great for taking places easily and doing some work. I do real things (real work, games, etc) on my desktop with all its memory, disk space, video card, etc.
I currently use the netbook for some things I'd rather have a tablet for. Quickly picking it up to read some news or check Facebook or Google Reader. Sure I can do that with my netbook, but for me a tablet is better suited. I can treat it like a newspaper or magazine and keep it on my coffee table. Or easily pass it off to a friend, etc...
Basically, I'd use the tablet for more personal-related things where I'm mostly consuming information. I'd use the netbook for something very portable to do some actual work on the go. And the desktop for the real heavy stuff.
Do I *need* all three? No, but in an ideal world I'd have all three since each does the job I want it to in the best way for me.
This is great news. Not long ago, ATI (AMD) was considered horrible among users. Windows drivers were full of massive bugs, and Linux was complete garbage, and on most platforms, nvidia was the way to go. I've been an nvidia user for years now (both Linux and Windows, having switched from ATI actually), and my GTX260 will continue to serve me for a while yet, but developments like this will make me seriously consider my next video card purchase, and I could see myself ending up with an AMD card as much as another nvidia card.
If nothing else, maybe with both Intel and AMD embracing open source, nvidia will end up doing it too without their binary blobs. Whether you're a fan of nvidia or AMD or whoever else, this is definitely a good thing.
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I love my netbook as a compliment to my desktop. I don't want a full-powered laptop, because it's not expandable enough for me and the really powerful ones with lots of screen real estate are often quite huge. My netbook makes for a nice very portable device that's great for remote work.
I don't want to replace a netbook with a tablet because I use it for real work (and I don't mean you can't use a tablet for real work... depends on the work, of course), and I see a tablet as a consumer device that does a lot of things very well that previously only computers could do. I'd still have a tablet, for sure, but not to replace my netbook or my desktop computer. And I'd still have my Android phone to have in my pocket anywhere I go.
For me, each device serves a specific purpose very well... I'd really miss my netbook, even if I had a tablet, since for me they are different devices that are each very good at different things.
I've actually had the opposite experience. At work, we've standardized on WRT54GLs for our wireless access points (using DD-WRT) and remote VPN routers (using OpenWRT + OpenVPN). We've had excellent results. We have 15+ in use, and have maybe had 2 of them go bad (one was after years of use, and the other was a refurb anyway that we'd picked up on sale).
Everyone seems to have different experiences with wireless equipment. For example, I feel about D-Link the same as you feel about Linksys, based on my experience with them. I don't think anyone would bother lying about their experience, so I find it interesting that so many people have so many different results with different brands. Based on my experience, I always recommend Linksys to friends and family, and tell them to avoid D-Link.
We'll keep on using the Linksys WRT54GLs here, because they continue to be excellent for our needs.
If those things cause your application to collapse under unmanageable complexity, then those things probably weren't the right tool for the job, or you didn't know how to use them.
It sounds like you don't understand dependency injection or beans, so you're very likely to end up hating it all and losing control of your project. If you do understand those things, then you know when they are appropriate to use and when not to, so you don't end up hating something without a valid reason simply because you didn't understand how to use it.
This really simple application of making informed, logical decisions applies to all areas of programming (in any language) and most other things in life. You'll learn that as you mature.
Sounds like the API version problem that would affect any language. If the API changes, you have no choice but to use a specific version that matches your app (without modifying/recompiling the app, that is). Java is the same, and Java apps can specify jar dependencies and versions of those.
But what we're talking about here isn't even that. We're talking about just one application (the app server) that runs multiple, sandboxed pieces of code (by "sandboxed" here I mean keeping these pieces of code separate from each other and potential conflicts, not running in a security-restricted area). You'd have to sandbox this in C or anything else too if it's all running in the same process. What happens if Apache mod_a requires libfoo 1.5 but Apache mod_b requires a more recent and incompatible libfoo 2.0? It's all in the same process. The OS's linker isn't going to just load multiple (potentially conflicting) versions of the same thing into the same process. If you're sharing libs, you'd still have to sandbox the modules within your runtime environment so that the right module hooked up to the right library code and didn't interfere with other modules.
(Someone please correct me if I'm wrong here and operating systems have evolved the ability to automatically know what parts of your code are "pluggable" and need to be sandboxed, or if multiple conflicting libraries can be loaded into a single process with no conflicts... I haven't done systems programming for a few years)
Basically, what you're saying applies to applications using shared libraries, and it's not much different in Java, other than the fact that Java ClassLoaders do the work instead of the OS's shared library subsystem. And when you're talking about one application that loads multiple modules/plugins/applets/whatever you'll have to sandbox them since it's still all running in the same process. This is where OSGi comes in.
(disclaimer: this isn't a Java vs. anything post... just trying to describe why OSGi is useful and why that fact doesn't necessarily mean anything good or bad about Java itself... as for the imports... yep, the language wasn't designed to support "import ... as ..." ... I don't mind that though, since I can count on one hand the number of times it would've been useful to me in my 12 years of Java development... ymmv)
OpenVPN uses standard UDP (or TCP) on any port you want, so it's very difficult for anyone to block. Android (using CyanogenMod firmware) supports this through the standard VPN GUI, and it could probably be set up on the Nokia N900 and maybe WebOS with some command line work. My carrier does block IPsec and PPTP for VPN unless you pay extra, but I have successfully used OpenVPN with no trouble.
Yeah, it sucks for your average user who has no idea where to even start setting any of that up. But it's still what I'll be doing if my carrier ever starts this crap.
Just my personal preference, but I'd prefer to press shift with my left hand and hit insert with my right, rather than try to get the fingers on my left hand into the right position to press shift-ctrl-v. But that's just me, and it's a good example of why having the choice of these different keys is a good thing.
I was hoping for Naughty Nymph myself.
As a programmer, the first thing I think of when I hear "bug" when related to computers is a flaw or defect... but I think in this case they mean a more traditional bug, like when you say someone's phone is "bugged." A tracking or listening device.
I've even heard some users refer to viruses/malware as "bugs" (like having a flu "bug")... confuses the hell right out of me as a programmer until I realize what they really meant.
http://www.google.ca/search?q=%22spring+dynamic+modules%22
Very first result (of 646,000) is: http://www.springsource.org/osgi
Online forums and chats have been blocking URLs for years. People simply get around it by changing characters, breaking the URL up with spaces, or other things. Each system of blocking always has some way to get around it that's quite easy for a human to still understand, even non-tech people. I don't like them doing this either, but it's never been a real problem for anyone who actually wants to pass a URL along on other sites.
There's an exception to every rule.
That's hilarious. I'd love to see this. Have a link to an example?
Oh I remember those days. Dialing up using MacSLIP or InterSLIP (not even PPP!), searching Gopher... using Mosaic (and later, Netscape 1.0), Eudora for mail...
In some ways, I'm glad we're far beyond all that now. In other ways, I wish we'd stayed there.
Mozilla didn't get Firefox where it is by being morons. Just the fact that it's Mozilla tells me that if this is ever an official release, it's going to have some kind of user confirmation before allowing access to these things (if it doesn't already). The backlash would be too great if there wasn't, and this is just common sense for Mozilla. Bugs could show up that might allow some kind of malware to do it, but it's crazy to think that Mozilla would knowingly allow any site to just access your camera and mic without permission if this was meant to be widely used by regular people.
Java installs its own updater on Windows. Unless you completely disable it, it will notify you of updates and install them for you.
Without any RAID, my WD Black Caviar 7200 RPM SATA2 drive can sustain close to this speed. I've copied very large files to it at over 100 MB/sec, and this is just a consumer desktop drive. A 10,000 RPM SAS (or SATA, if they make them that fast) drive could do 120 and beyond I'm sure.
I know, I'd been using strings to also look for the Flash version string in the binary, so I just used it for this since it worked in this scenario as well.
Just to update: I downloaded this new Flash plugin, and this one does indeed link to libGL. Excellent!
Thanks! On my way to download it now...
Yes, I'm sure. It might not have stopped you from having smooth video, but according to Adobe, the Linux plugin uses OpenGL. And looking at the 32-bit plugin, we see:
$ file /usr/lib/flashplugin-installer/libflashplayer.so
/usr/lib/flashplugin-installer/libflashplayer.so: ELF 32-bit LSB shared object, Intel 80386, version 1 (SYSV), dynamically linked, stripped /usr/lib/flashplugin-installer/libflashplayer.so|grep libGL
$ strings
libGL.so.1
$
But with the 64-bit plugin:
$ file libflashplayer.so
libflashplayer.so: ELF 64-bit LSB shared object, x86-64, version 1 (SYSV), dynamically linked, stripped
$ strings libflashplayer.so|grep libGL
$
But if you're getting smooth video anyway, that's awesome :)
The 64-bit plugin for Linux has never had hardware acceleration enabled. The 32-bit version does... maybe they've finally enabled it in this new version. I'll switch to this if that's the case... otherwise, I'm happy with my 32-bit plugin and smooth full screen video.
Most online video is currently H.264. IE9 supports HTML5 video. DirectShow supports H.264 out of the box starting with Windows 7, and that takes advantage of hardware acceleration where available (such as the full H.264 decoding offered by my nvidia card - 1080p H.264 movies use about 1% of my CPU when played in WMP, compared to 45% or more in VLC). IE9 would be using DirectShow for HTML5 video. Therefore, the video is accelerated.
Other formats would be accelerated too if the installed codecs support it.
Correct me if I'm wrong here.
Agreed. I only have one app that doesn't work on wifi, and that's an app specific to my carrier that shows me my current data and voice usage for the month. It requires EDGE/3G so it knows who I am. I suppose they could make it work over wifi using a login, but it wouldn't even make sense to run an app like that on a non-phone anyway.
Other than that, every app I've ever used doesn't care what my connection is. It just uses whatever is available, whether that's wifi or EDGE/3G. I once needed to move the SIM card to another phone for a while, and used it with no SIM at all and everything worked exactly as expected (other than phone calls and SMS of course). GPS even works, even if it might take a little extra time to determine my position.
Not really sure what they're talking about with all this.
I would definitely have all three. I currently have a full powerful desktop, and a netbook. The netbook is great for taking places easily and doing some work. I do real things (real work, games, etc) on my desktop with all its memory, disk space, video card, etc.
I currently use the netbook for some things I'd rather have a tablet for. Quickly picking it up to read some news or check Facebook or Google Reader. Sure I can do that with my netbook, but for me a tablet is better suited. I can treat it like a newspaper or magazine and keep it on my coffee table. Or easily pass it off to a friend, etc...
Basically, I'd use the tablet for more personal-related things where I'm mostly consuming information. I'd use the netbook for something very portable to do some actual work on the go. And the desktop for the real heavy stuff.
Do I *need* all three? No, but in an ideal world I'd have all three since each does the job I want it to in the best way for me.
This is great news. Not long ago, ATI (AMD) was considered horrible among users. Windows drivers were full of massive bugs, and Linux was complete garbage, and on most platforms, nvidia was the way to go. I've been an nvidia user for years now (both Linux and Windows, having switched from ATI actually), and my GTX260 will continue to serve me for a while yet, but developments like this will make me seriously consider my next video card purchase, and I could see myself ending up with an AMD card as much as another nvidia card.
If nothing else, maybe with both Intel and AMD embracing open source, nvidia will end up doing it too without their binary blobs. Whether you're a fan of nvidia or AMD or whoever else, this is definitely a good thing.