Very true; I hadn't thought about that. Of course, if you have a lawyer on retainer or as an employee, the lawsuit doesn't cost the company anything (the lawyers get paid their salaries no matter what), so you wouldn't have to pay much;-)
. The wealthier individuals and corporations have access to better lawyers, improving their chances for a decision in their favor
Nope. If the loser is going to pay and you have a case with good merit, a high-priced (and presumably better) lawyer would still take Joe Schmoe's case against Big Bad CorporateCo. No matter what, SuperLawyer is going to get paid; why would he care who he is representing?
I've heard of people flunking or getting a D in CSI@RPI... if you can't get an A or a B, then you don't belong at RPI. Period.
Guess it's my turn for "RPI TAing experience."
CS I is required for virtually everyone on campus (at least it was when I was there, '91-'95. I undergrad TAed CS I for my last two semesters). People who were business majors (read: hockey players) or pre-med (6-year accelerated program with Albany Med) had to take a course which went pretty in-depth in C. I wouldn't expect an automatic A or B for those people; they aren't (computer) geeks. You haven't really taught a programming language until you've tried teaching pointer arithmatic to a hockey player;-) Some were good; some clearly just wanted to get through the course.
The number of cheaters in CS I is astounding. Ever since they made it a requirement and started putting everyone through it, the quality of CS@RPI has declined. Period.
I'm not excusing cheating in CS I, but I don't think you can judge the quality of RPI's CS dept by CS I, either. It'd be like judging a school's math department by the performance of the remedial algebra class.
Personally, I think the changes made to the curriculum in '94 were a serious mistake; everyone should have to suffer though two semesters of data structures and program proving;-)
Will every piece of data transmitted across the net be subjected to brute force analysis? I think it unlikely.
You're missing the point. If you've never sent a picture to person A, and you suddenly send a picture, you've changed your pattern, which would make that picture worthy of checking for hidden data.
To be safe, you'd need to make a habit of sending a picture to this person, for a long while, then send the secret message, then continue sending pictures with no data. That way, there's no way to detect there's been a change in behavior.
It wasn't an overheating problem; it was a defect in the design of the LiIon batteries Apple had purchased from Sony. Back in 1995, Apple was trying to be one of the first companies to use LiIon batteries in a laptop. Sony made the batteries for the 5300 and 190, and the rest became flaming history.
After the week-long recall, Apple replaced the LiIon battery with a NiMH one and cut the price by $100.
The PowerBook 5300 might be one of the worst computers Apple ever released. Everything that could go wrong with a design did go wrong. The original System software was so buggy, Apple posted an entire updated disk set for the 5300 up on its web site. The hinges broke, the power adapters would snap off, the casing around the screen would separate, the PC cards wouldn't eject properly...it was a mess. To top it off, performance sucked. No L2 cache meant that the CPU was constantly starved. Add in a 33MHz system bus, and you've got one heck of a problem computer.
Before my 5300 developed problems, I had been a huge proponent of them, but after my 5300 broke many, many times (something like 8 times in 18 months), I was disgusted and called Apple, demanding that they do something about it. They did. I was sent, for free, a PowerBook 1400 in exchange for that defective 5300. Apple won me as a permanent fan that day.
The 1400 is still working today. I've upgraded the CPU and hard drive, added Ethernet and Wireless cards, and it keeps on humming along well enough to prevent me from buying a new laptop to replace it (I did buy a new iMac, but portability is nice). That new iBook is looking awfully tempting, though.
I would like you to point out a single example where MicroSoft allowed anybody to use their source code in a closed-source product without returning something to MicroSoft.
First of all, I didn't mention "Source Code" at all. I mentioned licences. MS licences many things for people to use (software, data). If I clip some data out of Encarta to use in a school report, MS doesn't require that I submit my report back to Microsoft. A citation (which fits the BSD model) is required, of course, because not using one would be plagarism. But MS doesn't demand that the report must now be distributed under similar terms as Encarta. That'd be nuts. Well, the GPL does that for source code. It's nuts. I don't see much difference between source code and an encyclopedia entry. Both are data. Just because one can be compiled into a program doesn't make it special.
Too many ignorant people don't realize that code can be released under multiple licenses.
This is a red herring. We're talking about the GPL here, not multiple licences.
As far as I can tell this means you can do more with the GPL code than you can with any MicroSoft code.
So you're saying that IF you used a non-GPL licence for the code, you could then use it in closed-source? Stating a truth backwards isn't an argument. I bet you noticed that not only does 2+2=4, 4 = 2+2. I don't think you'll get a Nobel Prize for your discovery, though.
This has got to be a troll, but it's such a stupid one...
You would quote Gates on this, wouldn't you?
Why not? He's right. Deal with it.
Why are you using a computer at all?
Because I live in a first-world nation where my basic needs are met. This isn't gloating or boasting, it's a fact. Deal with it.
What are you doing to meet those "basic needs you are spouting about?
None of your damn business.
How about realizing that India is not a uniform, homogenous country?
Where did I write the word "India" in my post? I'm going to guess you're Indian.
Are starvation deaths and natural disasters the only things you first worlders deign to notice?
No, we also notice deaths by militias and man-made disasters, like Communism.
Simputers, satellite launch vehicles, satellites etc are as important to us as any other type of research.
You could research genetically modified grains that would be more nutritious. You could research improved birth control methods. Or you could research a $1.50 computer. Take your pick.
We need to leapfrog over some things to allow us to improve our conditions.
Yes, and when your country's legislature spends a few months debating whether or not Coca-Cola should be sold within its borders, I'd say you need to do lots of condition improving. I'd start with the government. You'd start with a cheap microprocessor. Priorities, I guess.
You may talk of being nerds, but most of you can't think beyond cliches.
Apple used Mach/BSD as its underpinnings for Mac OS X because NextStep had used it. That's about it. Apple's reason for existance (like any for-profit corporation) is to make money. It isn't going to give away patent rights or any other silliness.
This argument is dumb. It would be like saying, "Those evil loggers who chop down trees breathe oxygen released by trees! Those trees should stop giving oxygen to loggers." How do you plan to keep companies from using Free code (I don't consider the GPL free, as it has a licence far more restrictive than anything Microsoft has ever dreamed up) and make them give something back? In fact, doesn't the idea of forcing someone give something back to the community violate the whole concept of free-ness?
And what about all those people who have installed Linux and aren't giving stuff back to the community? I bet one or two of them have been making money at it, like those evil Google people! I haven't seen Linux patches from Google lately! Those evil, evil CAPITALISTS!
When more than half the people in the world have never even used a freaking telephone, we're going to start giving out cheap computers?
Sheesh.
As Bill Gates pointed out, the majority of the people in the world don't need techno gadgets. They need health care and education. I'd add democratic governments and a reasonable ability for people to start their own businesses and profit from their own work.
Before the flamers start, I'm not a big-L Libertarian who thinks everything should be privatized and there shouldn't be a social safety net. I just believe in free markets being the solution to many (not all) problems.
Once these basic needs are met, we can start working on computers.
Considering the state of the original Netscape source code, I wouldn't be too proud of that...
-jon
Re:This could be very interesting...
on
Sun Launches JXTA
·
· Score: 2
That's not quite what the docs say. I've got the Techincial Overview in front of me, and what it says on Pages 7-8 is that "In practice, [JXTA] uses XML as the encoding format, mainly for its convenience in parsing and for its extensibility." They do mention that "If the world decides to abandon XML tomorrow and uses YML instead, JXTA can be simply re-defined and re-coded to use the YML format." I wonder how simple "simply" really is.
The tech overview then goes on to address my concerns, which are that small devices won't have to have XML parsers (just the ability to recognize canned strings of XML) and that they are working on specifying a subset of XML called MicroXML to be the actual XML understood by JXTA.
JXTA is looking pretty good. Bill Joy has really been thinking this stuff out.
if it catches on. Using XML as the protocol works when people have relatively high bandwidth (XML metadata can start to approach the size of the actual data in the document. This doesn't matter on a T1, but it sure does at 33.6). Those embedded devices which are mentioned in the JXTA documentation don't tend to have fat pipes hooked up to them...
Not tying JXTA to Java is smart, as is Open Sourcing it. It could become a nice end-run around.NET-specific services (client-server is just a degenerate case of P2P, and on the server side, JXTA could be used to load-balance and store data).
Because efficient programmers are much, much more important than efficient software.
It is a simple, repeately proven fact that it is far quicker to develop certain classes of applications in Java than in C++.
The performance differences between the two are irrelevant; you can throw more hardware at a slow program to make it faster. Throwing more programmers at a late project (because the tools don't work for the job) make it later and probably buggier (due to incomplete understanding of what you're fixing/implementing).
You have to wonder why apple wrote in their theme system at all... it has been there for a long time and they have never made any use of it.
Apple put the Theme system in back in 1994 or 1995. It was part of Copland and their idea of a scalable user interface. There were three Themes shown: Platinum, Gizmo, and High Tech. Apple even hired one of the guys who works on Kaleidiscope (a third-party Theme switcher for the Mac).
When Steve Jobs came back to Apple, he killed Themes. The official reason was that it made tech support too hard: people would call up and it was impossible to know what and where widgets would be on their screen.
Personally, I think it was just Jobs' control-freak personality showing through. The Apple engineers implemented Aqua as a Theme in OS X (in older versions of Mac OS X, you could remove the Aqua Theme files and you get a Platinum look and feel. I don't know if this still works.), so there's some support for the concept inside the company. It's just crazy Steve Jobs again...
The bigger question is if Apple is going to try to squish any shareware developer who writes UI widgets to fix the awful problems in Mac OS X. Aqua is pretty enough, but there is such a huge usability problem with OS X, I find my WinNT box at work easier to use than OS X at home. I've been booting back into OS 9 and realizing how _simple_ and _fast_ everything used to be...
Well, we all know Compaq reverse engineered the first PC clones, and that was legal. Microsoft created J++ in a clean room environment which was legal reverse engineering.
First of all, Compaq could reverse engineer because they had the reverse engineering done by people who never agreed to the licence agreement. The ones who were "polluted" (wrote the spec based on the copywritten BOIS) couldn't reverse engineer.
Secondly, MS did NOT reverse engineer J++. They licenced Java from Sun, and then willfully tried to get around the licence and refused to implement parts of the Java spec. Sun doesn't care if you provide additional non-Sun APIs to work with Java, even ones that interact with native code (Apple has developed many over time with nary a lawsuit). Sun did care that MS violated a licence agreement.
Do you know what I think about Dave Winer having his work basically stolen by Microsoft?
He deserved it.
Back in 1997 or so, Dave was bashing Apple left and right, running as fast as he could to port every bit of his code to Windows. He wrote DaveNet missives about how well MS understands and helps developers, how Apple just screwed its developers, and how Apple was on the verge of death.
Now he gets to see what comes from trying to be a pilot fish in the jaws of the big shark. It couldn't of happened to a more deserving guy.
I smoke because I like to smoke, and I am tired of people trying to take something away from me that I like.
I've never met a real corporate tool before; I'm fascinated. What's like when they program you to actually like SOMETHING THAT'S KILLING YOU AND THE PEOPLE AROUND YOU?
Java is portable, but to compile it into a standalone app you need a compilier for each system you intend to take it to.
What are you talking about?
Java applets are portable in exactly the same way that Java applications are. Both rely on the presence of a Java Virtual Machine having been ported to the computer on which you want to run your applet|application. The only differences between applets and applications are:
1. Applets by default have fairly severe security restrictions (can't access local file system, can't make network connections to any machine other than the one they were loaded from). Signing an applet removes this restriction.
2. Applets run inside of a browser window (or an Applet Viewer) and can take advantage of some of the resources of the browser (easy to launch another browser window, for example).
I'm another "victim" of the NorthPoint shutdown, but I hardly feel like a victim. That's because I had IDSL for 3 months and paid absolutely nothing. That's right, nothing.
I signed up with Flashcom for IDSL at $50/month, free modem with one year contract. A guy from NorthPoint came out to do the installation. Everything was installed just fine and I rejoiced at being freed from my 33.6 network connection. The next day Flashcom announced they were dropping residential lines and selling the accounts on NorthPoint lines to Telocity.
I called Telocity, gave them my Flashcom account number, and they told me they never heard of me. I tried several times, always with the same response. I tried using Flashcom's on-line account number checker, and it didn't have any record of me. I called and emailed Flashcom, and they told me that they didn't own my account any more, so they didn't care.
In the meantime, no one was sending me a bill and my service just kept on working. I figured that I tried hard enough to pay SOMEONE, and stopped calling. If they don't want to take my money, so be it.
Telocity has basically gone under, Flashcom has gone under, and NorthPoint is now gone, taking my IDSL with them. I'd signed up for a backup dial-up account when I heard that Flashcom was going under, so I still have service, but I'm back at 33.6. Blah.
Maybe if any of these putzes had something resembling a billing system, this mess might have been avoided.
Slashdot Mirror
-jon
Nope. If the loser is going to pay and you have a case with good merit, a high-priced (and presumably better) lawyer would still take Joe Schmoe's case against Big Bad CorporateCo. No matter what, SuperLawyer is going to get paid; why would he care who he is representing?
-jon
Guess it's my turn for "RPI TAing experience."
CS I is required for virtually everyone on campus (at least it was when I was there, '91-'95. I undergrad TAed CS I for my last two semesters). People who were business majors (read: hockey players) or pre-med (6-year accelerated program with Albany Med) had to take a course which went pretty in-depth in C. I wouldn't expect an automatic A or B for those people; they aren't (computer) geeks. You haven't really taught a programming language until you've tried teaching pointer arithmatic to a hockey player ;-) Some were good; some clearly just wanted to get through the course.
The number of cheaters in CS I is astounding. Ever since they made it a requirement and started putting everyone through it, the quality of CS@RPI has declined. Period.
I'm not excusing cheating in CS I, but I don't think you can judge the quality of RPI's CS dept by CS I, either. It'd be like judging a school's math department by the performance of the remedial algebra class.
Personally, I think the changes made to the curriculum in '94 were a serious mistake; everyone should have to suffer though two semesters of data structures and program proving ;-)
-jon
You're missing the point. If you've never sent a picture to person A, and you suddenly send a picture, you've changed your pattern, which would make that picture worthy of checking for hidden data.
To be safe, you'd need to make a habit of sending a picture to this person, for a long while, then send the secret message, then continue sending pictures with no data. That way, there's no way to detect there's been a change in behavior.
-jon
Back when I lived in the DC area (88-91), the radio stations play lists were:
WHFS - Alternative, when that actually meant something
WWDC (DC101) - Classic/Hard rock
WCXR - Classic, 60's/70 rock with some newer Tom Petty sprinkled in
WJFK - Classic/Hard rock
WAVA - Top 40
107.3 - Top 40
97.9 (from Baltimore) - Hard rock
So there wasn't much more diversity, lots of Hard rock, 60s/70s rock when that was popular.
-jon
After the week-long recall, Apple replaced the LiIon battery with a NiMH one and cut the price by $100.
The PowerBook 5300 might be one of the worst computers Apple ever released. Everything that could go wrong with a design did go wrong. The original System software was so buggy, Apple posted an entire updated disk set for the 5300 up on its web site. The hinges broke, the power adapters would snap off, the casing around the screen would separate, the PC cards wouldn't eject properly...it was a mess. To top it off, performance sucked. No L2 cache meant that the CPU was constantly starved. Add in a 33MHz system bus, and you've got one heck of a problem computer.
Before my 5300 developed problems, I had been a huge proponent of them, but after my 5300 broke many, many times (something like 8 times in 18 months), I was disgusted and called Apple, demanding that they do something about it. They did. I was sent, for free, a PowerBook 1400 in exchange for that defective 5300. Apple won me as a permanent fan that day.
The 1400 is still working today. I've upgraded the CPU and hard drive, added Ethernet and Wireless cards, and it keeps on humming along well enough to prevent me from buying a new laptop to replace it (I did buy a new iMac, but portability is nice). That new iBook is looking awfully tempting, though.
-jon
First of all, I didn't mention "Source Code" at all. I mentioned licences. MS licences many things for people to use (software, data). If I clip some data out of Encarta to use in a school report, MS doesn't require that I submit my report back to Microsoft. A citation (which fits the BSD model) is required, of course, because not using one would be plagarism. But MS doesn't demand that the report must now be distributed under similar terms as Encarta. That'd be nuts. Well, the GPL does that for source code. It's nuts. I don't see much difference between source code and an encyclopedia entry. Both are data. Just because one can be compiled into a program doesn't make it special.
Too many ignorant people don't realize that code can be released under multiple licenses.
This is a red herring. We're talking about the GPL here, not multiple licences.
As far as I can tell this means you can do more with the GPL code than you can with any MicroSoft code.
So you're saying that IF you used a non-GPL licence for the code, you could then use it in closed-source? Stating a truth backwards isn't an argument. I bet you noticed that not only does 2+2=4, 4 = 2+2. I don't think you'll get a Nobel Prize for your discovery, though.
-jon
You would quote Gates on this, wouldn't you?
Why not? He's right. Deal with it.
Why are you using a computer at all?
Because I live in a first-world nation where my basic needs are met. This isn't gloating or boasting, it's a fact. Deal with it.
What are you doing to meet those "basic needs you are spouting about?
None of your damn business.
How about realizing that India is not a uniform, homogenous country?
Where did I write the word "India" in my post? I'm going to guess you're Indian.
Are starvation deaths and natural disasters the only things you first worlders deign to notice?
No, we also notice deaths by militias and man-made disasters, like Communism.
Simputers, satellite launch vehicles, satellites etc are as important to us as any other type of research.
You could research genetically modified grains that would be more nutritious. You could research improved birth control methods. Or you could research a $1.50 computer. Take your pick.
We need to leapfrog over some things to allow us to improve our conditions.
Yes, and when your country's legislature spends a few months debating whether or not Coca-Cola should be sold within its borders, I'd say you need to do lots of condition improving. I'd start with the government. You'd start with a cheap microprocessor. Priorities, I guess.
You may talk of being nerds, but most of you can't think beyond cliches.
Isn't "think beyond cliches" a cliche?
-jon
This argument is dumb. It would be like saying, "Those evil loggers who chop down trees breathe oxygen released by trees! Those trees should stop giving oxygen to loggers." How do you plan to keep companies from using Free code (I don't consider the GPL free, as it has a licence far more restrictive than anything Microsoft has ever dreamed up) and make them give something back? In fact, doesn't the idea of forcing someone give something back to the community violate the whole concept of free-ness?
And what about all those people who have installed Linux and aren't giving stuff back to the community? I bet one or two of them have been making money at it, like those evil Google people! I haven't seen Linux patches from Google lately! Those evil, evil CAPITALISTS!
-jon
Sheesh.
As Bill Gates pointed out, the majority of the people in the world don't need techno gadgets. They need health care and education. I'd add democratic governments and a reasonable ability for people to start their own businesses and profit from their own work.
Before the flamers start, I'm not a big-L Libertarian who thinks everything should be privatized and there shouldn't be a social safety net. I just believe in free markets being the solution to many (not all) problems.
Once these basic needs are met, we can start working on computers.
-jon
Application Service Providers. Remote hosting of mission-critical applications. They're dropping like flies
Timothy get's an F in grammar today.
And so does the Grammar Nazi.
-jon
Considering the state of the original Netscape source code, I wouldn't be too proud of that...
-jon
The tech overview then goes on to address my concerns, which are that small devices won't have to have XML parsers (just the ability to recognize canned strings of XML) and that they are working on specifying a subset of XML called MicroXML to be the actual XML understood by JXTA.
JXTA is looking pretty good. Bill Joy has really been thinking this stuff out.
-jon
Not tying JXTA to Java is smart, as is Open Sourcing it. It could become a nice end-run around .NET-specific services (client-server is just a degenerate case of P2P, and on the server side, JXTA could be used to load-balance and store data).
Fun stuff is happening.
-jon
And in the notes at the end of Snowcrash, Stephenson mentions a BBS system from the freaking Comodore 64 which had avatars.
Methinks that prior art is going to abound.
-jon
-jon
Because efficient programmers are much, much more important than efficient software.
It is a simple, repeately proven fact that it is far quicker to develop certain classes of applications in Java than in C++.
The performance differences between the two are irrelevant; you can throw more hardware at a slow program to make it faster. Throwing more programmers at a late project (because the tools don't work for the job) make it later and probably buggier (due to incomplete understanding of what you're fixing/implementing).
-jon
Apple put the Theme system in back in 1994 or 1995. It was part of Copland and their idea of a scalable user interface. There were three Themes shown: Platinum, Gizmo, and High Tech. Apple even hired one of the guys who works on Kaleidiscope (a third-party Theme switcher for the Mac).
When Steve Jobs came back to Apple, he killed Themes. The official reason was that it made tech support too hard: people would call up and it was impossible to know what and where widgets would be on their screen.
Personally, I think it was just Jobs' control-freak personality showing through. The Apple engineers implemented Aqua as a Theme in OS X (in older versions of Mac OS X, you could remove the Aqua Theme files and you get a Platinum look and feel. I don't know if this still works.), so there's some support for the concept inside the company. It's just crazy Steve Jobs again...
The bigger question is if Apple is going to try to squish any shareware developer who writes UI widgets to fix the awful problems in Mac OS X. Aqua is pretty enough, but there is such a huge usability problem with OS X, I find my WinNT box at work easier to use than OS X at home. I've been booting back into OS 9 and realizing how _simple_ and _fast_ everything used to be...
-jon
First of all, Compaq could reverse engineer because they had the reverse engineering done by people who never agreed to the licence agreement. The ones who were "polluted" (wrote the spec based on the copywritten BOIS) couldn't reverse engineer.
Secondly, MS did NOT reverse engineer J++. They licenced Java from Sun, and then willfully tried to get around the licence and refused to implement parts of the Java spec. Sun doesn't care if you provide additional non-Sun APIs to work with Java, even ones that interact with native code (Apple has developed many over time with nary a lawsuit). Sun did care that MS violated a licence agreement.
-jon
He deserved it.
Back in 1997 or so, Dave was bashing Apple left and right, running as fast as he could to port every bit of his code to Windows. He wrote DaveNet missives about how well MS understands and helps developers, how Apple just screwed its developers, and how Apple was on the verge of death.
Now he gets to see what comes from trying to be a pilot fish in the jaws of the big shark. It couldn't of happened to a more deserving guy.
-jon
I've never met a real corporate tool before; I'm fascinated. What's like when they program you to actually like SOMETHING THAT'S KILLING YOU AND THE PEOPLE AROUND YOU?
mmmmmm...mentholicious....gasp....wheeze...cough.. .
I take it that you also think that Britney Aguleria or whomever is a musical genius. After all, a large corporation said she's great!
-jon
What are you talking about?
Java applets are portable in exactly the same way that Java applications are. Both rely on the presence of a Java Virtual Machine having been ported to the computer on which you want to run your applet|application. The only differences between applets and applications are:
1. Applets by default have fairly severe security restrictions (can't access local file system, can't make network connections to any machine other than the one they were loaded from). Signing an applet removes this restriction.
2. Applets run inside of a browser window (or an Applet Viewer) and can take advantage of some of the resources of the browser (easy to launch another browser window, for example).
-jon
Royal Software released just such a thing, back in 1996 or 1997. It was pretty darn cool at the time, but I can't remember its name.
-jon
I signed up with Flashcom for IDSL at $50/month, free modem with one year contract. A guy from NorthPoint came out to do the installation. Everything was installed just fine and I rejoiced at being freed from my 33.6 network connection. The next day Flashcom announced they were dropping residential lines and selling the accounts on NorthPoint lines to Telocity.
I called Telocity, gave them my Flashcom account number, and they told me they never heard of me. I tried several times, always with the same response. I tried using Flashcom's on-line account number checker, and it didn't have any record of me. I called and emailed Flashcom, and they told me that they didn't own my account any more, so they didn't care.
In the meantime, no one was sending me a bill and my service just kept on working. I figured that I tried hard enough to pay SOMEONE, and stopped calling. If they don't want to take my money, so be it.
Telocity has basically gone under, Flashcom has gone under, and NorthPoint is now gone, taking my IDSL with them. I'd signed up for a backup dial-up account when I heard that Flashcom was going under, so I still have service, but I'm back at 33.6. Blah.
Maybe if any of these putzes had something resembling a billing system, this mess might have been avoided.
-jon
-jon