Apple: Cool... will they open source it? Sun: What kind of liccens will they use?
The responce is SOO predictable... and yet...
Apple: Closed source Apple only with no way to port to Linux... Microsoft finnaly cons Apple to port to Windows and Linux gets bashed for lacking feature....
Sun: It's Open Sorce and free... send $19.95 for CD with binarys... sign contract and send blood sample to get source...
We are so predictable becouse they are so predticable... We allready know what will happen... yet we feel compelled to post telling everyone else what they allready know... I guess it's the smart users "first post":)
Hehe Microsoft has this reputation for such things as BSOD. A very desered one.
What will be done with this technology? How will it be used.
Will it work effectively or will we have Ms.ADD..
I can see Windows going insain becouse my hair is in wild flopy mode (hair standing up like a well know scientist.. relitively speaking) or cat jumps on my lap and gets my attention computer is confused becouse I am no longer focused on it
Running a application.. even a wordprocessor... under an emulation adds an unnessisary layer.
Back when Dos was brand new it's only applications came from CP/M. This was done by using a simple CP/M emulation layer. This was made easy by the fact that the 8088/8086 is fuctionally identical to the 8080/Z80/8085 and Dos is functionally identical to CP/M. When I say functionally identical I mean it dose everything the preveous dose exactly the same way... the emulation is a braindead converter. The result is a binary of the original program rearanged to run on the new environment.
But even this simplistic conversion results in software running slower on the PC than it dose on CP/M.
CP/M and Dos are identical environments but an emulation ends up giving slower results.
[Side note the advantage of the 8088 was it had 16 bit functions. It was itself an 8 bit chip carrying 16 bit logic. Translated CP/M code dosn't take advantage of that logic... other than that a 4.77mzh PC clone and a 4mzh CP/M box looks about the same... ok the PC has more ram...]
Linux and Windows are compleatly alien...
A Windows emulation is a heavy interface later allowing software expecting Windows realitys to work under Linux realitys. The diffrence is day and night.
The result is the software runs slower, needs more memory and more resorces.... It makes Linux look defective and dosn't take advantage of the way Linux works. Instead it must force Linux to work the way Windows works.
As an Amiga user once said of this (Irronicly refering to WordPerfict for Amiga back when WordPerfict for Windows didn't exist) "If I wanted Dos I'd use Dos" Just as Amigas can emulate PCs and boot Dos Linux boxes can run Windows (Not even emulate anything.. just dual boot).
Tacking on unnessisary layers makes Linux slow down and look bad to users who don't know what is going on.
First: Du!!! Second: There is a dark side to open source... this aint it.... Third: Three posts? Are we doing a running dialog here?
I think this may have hit Slashdot where it hurts...
Slashdot may be doing a running dialog becouse they want to get out each responce and retort... I guess Slashdot needs a "old forum" feature where folowups get the OLD forum instead if a new one and then the conversation can continue where it left off...
Anyway this ones a daily becouse Slashdot wants to folow all the comments outthere in medialand...
I do hope that Slashdot reserves itself a tad....
I mean maybe Meow could post a rant on the topic and get Slashdotted:) I think not.....
The reporter got paid well no doupt. But the crackers most likely just wanted to tell the story. Crackers often have a message and deface websites with it. "What message is that?" you ask? Dammed if I know.. Crackers are uniquely unable to communicate. Back on BBSes crackers would post what they are thinking. Why they crack. Yet having read such posts I make no clame to understand,
Occasionally a cracker finds a reporter who is willing to lissen. The reporter wants a story and the craker wants his story told.
So far the reporter ends up with an agenda so the story ends up being "Evil hacker.. bad bad" instead of what the cracker accually said.
The crackers got what the wanted out of the reporter. Part of that was for the reporter to not reveale who they are.
In the case of Andover it is in the intrest of shareholders to LAY OFF... Andover isn't Forbes... Slashdot and other websites must remain indupendent if Andover is to continue....
If Andover pressured CmdrTaco to turn tell the corts who posted a message CmdrTaco (and staff) would most likely quit.. Why? Becouse at that point it's not CmdrTacos Slashdot...
People like you fear this allready... if it were ever proven true Slashdot would die and CmdrTaco wouldn't want to be part of it.
But thats not where the story ends...
Scoop of FreshMeat wouldn't stick around eather. He also operates under the idea that HE runs FreshMeat not Andover and if that were to change he'd walk.
This gose for vertually all the websites Andover aquired...
There are far to many compeating websites that wouldn't give up sources. Quite a few would make a big deal if Slashdot had.
I think Slashdot should stand on princaple and Andover stockholders would stand behind it. If Andover didn't stand behind it.... there would be no Andover...
Posts can be Mod -1 to mod 5 there is no Mod -5. You can get mod -2 IF you set your user prefrences to automaticly mod down short posts. So short Mod -1 posts become Mod -2... thats the ONLY way that can happen and I'm not sure that feature exists anymore.
So all posts are readable unless you chouse otherwise.
As for hitting refresh.... That don't work to well on Slashdot:)
Sun has been very hostile tword open source and has allready inspired quite a bit of undeserved antiLinux sentiment and some GPL bashing.
Back with rummors of Ms Linux people responded with fear shock and horror. I think a little of that is deserved here.
I don't know if Sun has changed it's mind tword open source or not.
What I do know is Sun for a while has become a pain.
It's been suggesting that StarOffice can be scrapped for code. I don't care HOW good StarOffice is or how much easyer it would be to fix StarOffice and make it better. Scrap the code...
I won't have anything to do with a product that has Suns name on it... not even Java... (As if that was a hard choice.....)
I must admit this a bit more than personal for me... I lost a friend over this... The short end of it... the friend is a bit nieve and it wouldn't have been an issue if this friend didn't take Sun marketting as gosple... It's really her fault not Suns... but it leaves me a bit bitter tword Sun...
>>One last thing, is the GPL really considered to be the free-est license around? >No, public domain is the freeest (sp?!?). The GPL only guarantees that derivatives will be just so free as the original was; no more and no less.
Public Domain isn't a license... It's more free becouse it isn't a license at all...
However far to often Public Domain code is turnned into a commertal product and the original PD author basicly gets screwed over...
Note that companys making money off of Linux are not specalising in Linux distros. VA Linux sells computers with Linux preinstalled. Ideally they save money by using a free operating system. At one time they installed it by hand and costummised the system for you. Today they just sell RedHat CDs.
While RedHat is losing money as far as I can tell WC Cdrom is doing pritty well. Unlike RedHat however CdRom dosn't specalise in Linux. They sell free software of all types. It's a service. For $20 to $30 you get a CD with megs of free software. (Stometimes it's easyer to buy a CD than download software). As such they do not put any risk on a single product. Supporting Dos, OS/2, Linux, BSD, Windows and yes at one time they even put out a CP/M CD.
The reason so many open source companys fail or lose money is becouse they have bad busness plans to start with. That will kill you in ANY market. Also Open Source confuses people as it dosn't conform to the simplifyed rules. But then many markets don't conform to simplifyed rules. Open source plays by the same rules as everyone else. It's just not layed out the same. But then the whole software market is diffrent from any other market. Software is diffrent from other products. How many inventions qualify as poetry? Think about it. Software is both poetry and tool.... And as such the software market has no choice but to establish whole new rules for busness... For now people have to be smart about where the money comes from. Once repeatable successes are known then we can slap together a busness based on proven busness plans. But for now... none of the proven busness tactics work with open source... Sorry I'm a bit off topic here:)
For a LONG time restrants etc have been fearful of reviewers. A bad review could stink you so they believe. But historicly reviewers have had the decentcy to refuse to be bribed. People who abuse the position lose respect and (unless it dosn't matter to the editor) a job.
1980s... Shortly after Commodores Founder left Commodore for Atari lot's of things got messed up. One thing was Commodore sent press releases to mags. One mag reported that the press releases looked more on the vain of "say this or we'll cut you off" and a lot of mags took the treat sereously. This one mag however said how much the product itself stunk and accually ripped other mags for what was obveously inaccurate data. Did Commodore carry out the threat? No.. It could have even been a compleate missunderstanding.
I do not believe this ever happend at Commodore again. (One time deal). But later it did seem like a few "press release" reviews did start showing up in mags. I rember one reviewer saying he WILL NOT review from demo relases games like to issue and many reviewers seem to throw away press releases. (CmdrTaco comes to mind but hardly alone in this). It makes sence.. press releases DO NOT give the revewer an honnest grasp of the product. (By the way Mandrake 7.1 sucks.. I got a free copy and THAT is my review... I hear good things about 7.0 but thats not what I had)
Then there is Windows 95 Beta. Someone gave a really nasty review. Microsoft desided to cut short the reviews by not sending him anymore CDs.
The short version of the review.. Win95 didn't match the hype.
So the short story... Linux gives away free software to people to BEG for reviews while Microsoft threatons to cut off reviewers if they don't get the reviews they like... Linux is bribing reviewers... Microsoft isn't...
Ummmmmm yeah....
At least Linux is being original.... Bribing people with something anyone can get for free.... Thats pritty dang smart...
Softare reviewer meets with Linux advocate in dark ally. Advocate talking in deep hushed voice wearing a trenchcoat...
"Got the goods?" asks the reviewer The Linux advocate pulls out a laptop with CDrw drive... Linux advocate: Got the disk? Reviewer produces a blank Eraseable CDr.
The advocate puts the CD in his laptop... a few moments later the laptop spits out a new Linux CD.
Advocate: For your review... Reviewer: Thanks... How did you get this?
Advocate: Oh I downloaded it from the FTP site...
Back at the revewers office someone delivers a free copy of Windows 2001 and drops it in his "Free review copy" box.
>Linux users force themselves to play catch up by using Linux.
Windows 95 was designed for the 386 in 1995... now in 2000 Win 95 (Same os) requires a Pentium. Who is forced to play catch up?
Linux still runs on the 386 and has sence been ported to 286es.
Yes 386s and 286s are obsolete. But then Osborns are even more obsolete... people still use them becouse they don't need anything more than a wordprocessor.
And obsolete 3B2s were used up to last year (Y2K bug) and people still play with Commodore 64s. (Lunix.. Unix for the C64.. was last updated a few months ago)
Linux develupers are playing catchup.. Linux users need only download updates secure in the knowladage that they need NEVER update hardware... Windows users have no such luck...
>Didn't Netscape do the same in the early days of browsers (i.e. when they still enjoyed a dominant place in the market)? IIRC, this is what brought us blinking text....
Yes... Netscape had to "crush" Mosaic... The IBM preinstalled a webbrowser in OS/2. Thats when Netscape said "We can not compleate with a preinstalled browser" and discontinued Netscape for OS/2.... Then comes IE..... Microsoft has attempted this trick for a LONG time... and failed... You can argue the increasing popularity of "Not Windows" as a good reason to not develup for the 90% wops I mean 85%... and dropping... It's all well and fine to develup for the majority but Windows is a decresing majority.
True Windows has greater marketshare... But compare that to the marketshare of Win2K vs the latest Linux distros... Most people stick with 95 or 98 but upgrade to the latest Linux... It can be argued that Windows isn't moving forward...
Wops... Not Moasic... Mosaic stopped develupment when HTML 2 specs were being made... I'm thinking KDE.. But just slap any HTML4 browser in place of Mosaic in my post.. it's all the same... I also use Arachnie... It's all the same:)
It's not an unreasonable consern. Netscape was the badguy for getting webpage authors to make "Netscape enhanced" pages that don't work on the standard Mosaic and Lynx browsers (of the time) to push the commertal product. It made sence.. why would anyone pay for Netscape when they can download Moasic for free? So Netscape had to trump Moasic on the market.
Then IE came. With ActiveX and MsJava Microsoft has tried for the IE Enhanced pages but so far web authors havn't bit.
It's a fear... My mother runs into IE pages all the time but I don't seem to have her bad luck and I rarely even need Netscape being able to surf using Mosaic.
Still there are pricks out there "Get a real OS" whom I want to just punt "Support a real OS and I'll consider it".
But the vast majority don't have access to IE anyway....
Netscape Enhanced pages may still outnumber IE enhanced pages...
When a webpage author dosn't have access to IE he can only test against Netscape.
It is the norm to test a website against Netscape OR IE to see if it works. However with websites usually running Linux or BSD and MSCE saying that diffrent operating systems can't co-exist (BS*) managers are being forced to pick between NT and *nix systems. With people successfully premoting Linux while NTs flaws become painfully clear NT quickly becomes a NON-answer. Macs user friendly legend (Not BS but heavy on the myth side **) putting it out of the running *nix systems become the solution.
What this boils down to is. If the website is develuped on-site chances are good Windows is banned by management becouse "Operating systems can not co-exist". This means no testing for compatability on IE. If the feature dosn't exist on IE then it dosn't work. "IE supports more standards than Netscape" Well apparently even this too is a load of BS. But as long as website authors believe this one and can't access IE then they might as well test against Netscape becouse if it works on Netscape it works on IE right?
Microsoft may yet fud themselvs out of the market.
* Mac, Unix, OS/2 and Dos co-existed before NT existed. There was a time when a LAN could contain Macs, and Dos machines with the network server being a Sun i386 or an OS/2 box. LANs being the WORST setting for standards and compatability. Internet servers being the in the "IDEAL" catagory.
** Mac is know as "The computer for the rest of us" as yes it is very easy. But people came to believe Mac wasn't for "Power users". Quite the opposate. Macs strongest userbase is in the power user segment. Just as "Linux can't be user friendly" Mac "Can't be powerful". We have seen recently user friendly Linux distrobutions comming out. Simmilerly Mac has been a power tool sence day one and more so over time.
To prove the point.... I discovered my webcam dosn't work on IE... Well it works becouse I made a workaround but it works as well as the KDE browser. I use a perl script (I didn't write it) that lets Netscape load the new image as soon as it's uploaded. I didn't know it didn't work on IE at first. Later I read the source code. Whops...
The workaround displays the image.. sans update... hit refresh...
The way I normally go about splicing and editing audio files is I'd record the main body of my stuff using a simple recording program. Save that. Then load up a totally diffrent program.
That program I load in the origial file. An intro music file. Save in a diffrent format than the first two files and everything is as if it was originally recorded with the program I used for editing. No specal magic... I didn't even TRY to make verything match. It dose simply becouse the whole file comes from one utility.
It's the most likely way they'll create such files..
Yes there ARE ways but they rely entirely on errors or technical diffrences. With TV the TV show and the ads are on diffrent tapes and it's no easy matter to make everything "match up" finding the technical diffrences are a mindless effort. But when the ad and the music exist on the same medium (an MP3 file) it is posable to clean the diffrences out. With digital formats like MP3 the whole process could itself be automated. It may be a tit for tat game but I doput an automated removal system would exist for more than 24 hours before it's rendered useless. Just test the new encoder against the latest stripper.
Ferther more I doput Napster would implement an automated system like this leaving it to end the end user. Like the system that zaps TV ads not many people care enough to bother.
It's not significantly diffrent from what is allready happening with RealPlayer. Only the ad is litteraly a second connection and it's not much of an issue to "zap" passed the ad and get right to the content. But people are to lazy.
The advertisers however are not. They'll make any effort to make it work.
Finnaly.. and this one really puzzles me... Whats wrong with this anyway? No.. it's not an issue.. it dosn't matter if an ad is tagged on an MP3. It's been done... and yes on MP3s.. and yes it's all harmonious and not very easy to strip... Geeks In Space... It was done in ONE Geeks In Space Eppisode.. (Linux Confrence and Expo) No one noticed or even cared... and it seems CmdrTaco here FORGOT...
Unfortunatly I had to restore my GiS MP3 collection from the Sync archives and the archived version dosn't have the ad (Makes sence.. the confrence is long sence over).
So yeah... let's go beat up the real pionear of this technology.. CmdrTaco.. No let's not.. It's a great idea.. I don't mind it in my Geeks In Space and I won't mind it Napsterised music.
"This music brought to you by Coke..." "This music brought to you by RedHat Software"
And hay consider it... Microsoft is usually behind the curve on things by about 1 ot 2 years... We could like TOTALLY cover the MP3 space with ads for Linux hardware venders like VA... Have a whole Unix ad war... "This MP3 brought to you by Walnut Creek CDrom... Want power? Get BSD... The original Internet operating system. Only $35 at Walut Creek CDrom". or "This MP3 brought to you by Sun. We put the DOT in DotCom". "Power, preformence, and all the software you need.. Debian" "Bloat Begone... Slackware..."
>The Linux zealots don't have much room to brag over this incident.
No matter what os you use if you don't run things right you are in for a world-o-hurt... I mean why do you think people call on you in the first place? It's becouse you get the job done right.
The deal is when you don't do backups you recreate EVERYTHING from memory. That sucks. There are many other stupid things you can do (Like not setting up a proper redundency cluster so you never go down to start with) that can really hurt your ability to go back on-line.
It's unfair to gasp and point at a single case and say "See.. problem..." you can screw up anything. Rember E Bay a while back? They use Sun UltraSparcs running Solarus. Top of the line hardware. A tiny mistake on E Bays part and BOOM hard crash. The fault? Was it The SQL server? No... Was it the hardware? No.. it was (and E Bay admits this) E Bays own mistake. They set it up wrong and they took themselvs down.
Honnestly you can make NT reliable with work. It's just no simple matter. Linux has more ways to solve it when something really horrably wrong is found in the operating system.
With BSD the chances of finding something really horrably wrong are low. You can patch it quickly yourself. Chances are good an offical bug fix will be out shortly but not soon enough.
With Solarus the chances of finding something really horrably wrong are slim. You won't be able to patch it unless you got a source code liccens and Sun's not doing well in the timely bugfix department anymore.
With Windows NT the chances of finding something really wrong are pritty up there. You can't fix it. But Microsoft is getting better at timely bugfixes. In the mean time you can simply disable the defective feature. Not exactly the kind of thing you want to do.
With Linux the chances of finding something really sereously defective is fair. It's more likely you'll hear someone ELSE found it first and fixed it. But people have this habbit of not updating Linux software much and that's really not smart. Linux boxes should be updated as often as posable.
When you get into hardware problems the first question to ask is "why no redundency"... any delays to getting back on-line can usually be attributed to poor managment not poor os.
Slashdot Mirror
Apple: Cool... will they open source it?
:)
Sun: What kind of liccens will they use?
The responce is SOO predictable... and yet...
Apple: Closed source Apple only with no way to port to Linux... Microsoft finnaly cons Apple to port to Windows and Linux gets bashed for lacking feature....
Sun: It's Open Sorce and free... send $19.95 for CD with binarys... sign contract and send blood sample to get source...
We are so predictable becouse they are so predticable...
We allready know what will happen... yet we feel compelled to post telling everyone else what they allready know...
I guess it's the smart users "first post"
Hehe Microsoft has this reputation for such things as BSOD. A very desered one.
What will be done with this technology?
How will it be used.
Will it work effectively or will we have Ms.ADD..
I can see Windows going insain becouse my hair is in wild flopy mode (hair standing up like a well know scientist.. relitively speaking) or cat jumps on my lap and gets my attention computer is confused becouse I am no longer focused on it
Running a application.. even a wordprocessor... under an emulation adds an unnessisary layer.
Back when Dos was brand new it's only applications came from CP/M.
This was done by using a simple CP/M emulation layer. This was made easy by the fact that the 8088/8086 is fuctionally identical to the 8080/Z80/8085 and Dos is functionally identical to CP/M.
When I say functionally identical I mean it dose everything the preveous dose exactly the same way... the emulation is a braindead converter. The result is a binary of the original program rearanged to run on the new environment.
But even this simplistic conversion results in software running slower on the PC than it dose on CP/M.
CP/M and Dos are identical environments but an emulation ends up giving slower results.
[Side note the advantage of the 8088 was it had 16 bit functions. It was itself an 8 bit chip carrying 16 bit logic. Translated CP/M code dosn't take advantage of that logic... other than that a 4.77mzh PC clone and a 4mzh CP/M box looks about the same... ok the PC has more ram...]
Linux and Windows are compleatly alien...
A Windows emulation is a heavy interface later allowing software expecting Windows realitys to work under Linux realitys. The diffrence is day and night.
The result is the software runs slower, needs more memory and more resorces....
It makes Linux look defective and dosn't take advantage of the way Linux works.
Instead it must force Linux to work the way Windows works.
As an Amiga user once said of this (Irronicly refering to WordPerfict for Amiga back when WordPerfict for Windows didn't exist) "If I wanted Dos I'd use Dos"
Just as Amigas can emulate PCs and boot Dos Linux boxes can run Windows (Not even emulate anything.. just dual boot).
Tacking on unnessisary layers makes Linux slow down and look bad to users who don't know what is going on.
First: Du!!!
:)
Second: There is a dark side to open source... this aint it....
Third: Three posts? Are we doing a running dialog here?
I think this may have hit Slashdot where it hurts...
Slashdot may be doing a running dialog becouse they want to get out each responce and retort...
I guess Slashdot needs a "old forum" feature where folowups get the OLD forum instead if a new one and then the conversation can continue where it left off...
Anyway this ones a daily becouse Slashdot wants to folow all the comments outthere in medialand...
I do hope that Slashdot reserves itself a tad....
I mean maybe Meow could post a rant on the topic and get Slashdotted
I think not.....
The reporter got paid well no doupt.
But the crackers most likely just wanted to tell the story.
Crackers often have a message and deface websites with it.
"What message is that?" you ask? Dammed if I know.. Crackers are uniquely unable to communicate.
Back on BBSes crackers would post what they are thinking. Why they crack.
Yet having read such posts I make no clame to understand,
Occasionally a cracker finds a reporter who is willing to lissen.
The reporter wants a story and the craker wants his story told.
So far the reporter ends up with an agenda so the story ends up being "Evil hacker.. bad bad" instead of what the cracker accually said.
The crackers got what the wanted out of the reporter. Part of that was for the reporter to not reveale who they are.
In the case of Andover it is in the intrest of shareholders to LAY OFF...
Andover isn't Forbes...
Slashdot and other websites must remain indupendent if Andover is to continue....
If Andover pressured CmdrTaco to turn tell the corts who posted a message CmdrTaco (and staff) would most likely quit.. Why? Becouse at that point it's not CmdrTacos Slashdot...
People like you fear this allready... if it were ever proven true Slashdot would die and CmdrTaco wouldn't want to be part of it.
But thats not where the story ends...
Scoop of FreshMeat wouldn't stick around eather.
He also operates under the idea that HE runs FreshMeat not Andover and if that were to change he'd walk.
This gose for vertually all the websites Andover aquired...
There are far to many compeating websites that wouldn't give up sources. Quite a few would make a big deal if Slashdot had.
I think Slashdot should stand on princaple and Andover stockholders would stand behind it.
If Andover didn't stand behind it.... there would be no Andover...
It is as simple as that
Posts can be Mod -1 to mod 5 there is no Mod -5.
:)
You can get mod -2 IF you set your user prefrences to automaticly mod down short posts. So short Mod -1 posts become Mod -2... thats the ONLY way that can happen and I'm not sure that feature exists anymore.
So all posts are readable unless you chouse otherwise.
As for hitting refresh....
That don't work to well on Slashdot
>That's a big accusation, where did I get it from? Well, if you'll recall we never heard anything more about the Slashdot vs MS thing
What do you want them to post?
The legal stratagy so Microsofts legal team can read it?
Sun has been very hostile tword open source and has allready inspired quite a bit of undeserved antiLinux sentiment and some GPL bashing.
Back with rummors of Ms Linux people responded with fear shock and horror.
I think a little of that is deserved here.
I don't know if Sun has changed it's mind tword open source or not.
What I do know is Sun for a while has become a pain.
It's been suggesting that StarOffice can be scrapped for code.
I don't care HOW good StarOffice is or how much easyer it would be to fix StarOffice and make it better.
Scrap the code...
I won't have anything to do with a product that has Suns name on it... not even Java... (As if that was a hard choice.....)
I must admit this a bit more than personal for me...
I lost a friend over this...
The short end of it... the friend is a bit nieve and it wouldn't have been an issue if this friend didn't take Sun marketting as gosple...
It's really her fault not Suns... but it leaves me a bit bitter tword Sun...
>>One last thing, is the GPL really considered to be the free-est license around?
>No, public domain is the freeest (sp?!?). The GPL only guarantees that derivatives will be just so free as the original was; no more and no less.
Public Domain isn't a license...
It's more free becouse it isn't a license at all...
However far to often Public Domain code is turnned into a commertal product and the original PD author basicly gets screwed over...
Nothing prevents PD "theft"....
Thats sad...
Not quite....
:)
In order to get Linux for free you need to allready have a reliable internet ready operating system installed.
If you allready have an internet ready operating system installed chances are pritty good you don't need/want Linux to start with.
If you have no OS or your OS dosn't work then your only hope is to buy a Linux CD.
As far as how hard it is to install....
Linux WAS hard to install when there were no distrobutions and you basicly had to create your own Linux system by hand...
Now there is even a project to make it easy to install Linux from source code...
Linux from scratch
Note that companys making money off of Linux are not specalising in Linux distros.
VA Linux sells computers with Linux preinstalled. Ideally they save money by using a free operating system. At one time they installed it by hand and costummised the system for you. Today they just sell RedHat CDs.
While RedHat is losing money as far as I can tell WC Cdrom is doing pritty well. Unlike RedHat however CdRom dosn't specalise in Linux. They sell free software of all types.
It's a service. For $20 to $30 you get a CD with megs of free software. (Stometimes it's easyer to buy a CD than download software). As such they do not put any risk on a single product. Supporting Dos, OS/2, Linux, BSD, Windows and yes at one time they even put out a CP/M CD.
The reason so many open source companys fail or lose money is becouse they have bad busness plans to start with. That will kill you in ANY market. Also Open Source confuses people as it dosn't conform to the simplifyed rules. But then many markets don't conform to simplifyed rules. Open source plays by the same rules as everyone else. It's just not layed out the same.
But then the whole software market is diffrent from any other market. Software is diffrent from other products. How many inventions qualify as poetry?
Think about it. Software is both poetry and tool....
And as such the software market has no choice but to establish whole new rules for busness...
For now people have to be smart about where the money comes from. Once repeatable successes are known then we can slap together a busness based on proven busness plans.
But for now... none of the proven busness tactics work with open source...
Sorry I'm a bit off topic here
For a LONG time restrants etc have been fearful of reviewers. A bad review could stink you so they believe.
But historicly reviewers have had the decentcy to refuse to be bribed. People who abuse the position lose respect and (unless it dosn't matter to the editor) a job.
1980s... Shortly after Commodores Founder left Commodore for Atari lot's of things got messed up.
One thing was Commodore sent press releases to mags. One mag reported that the press releases looked more on the vain of "say this or we'll cut you off" and a lot of mags took the treat sereously. This one mag however said how much the product itself stunk and accually ripped other mags for what was obveously inaccurate data.
Did Commodore carry out the threat? No.. It could have even been a compleate missunderstanding.
I do not believe this ever happend at Commodore again. (One time deal).
But later it did seem like a few "press release" reviews did start showing up in mags.
I rember one reviewer saying he WILL NOT review from demo relases games like to issue and many reviewers seem to throw away press releases. (CmdrTaco comes to mind but hardly alone in this).
It makes sence.. press releases DO NOT give the revewer an honnest grasp of the product.
(By the way Mandrake 7.1 sucks.. I got a free copy and THAT is my review... I hear good things about 7.0 but thats not what I had)
Then there is Windows 95 Beta. Someone gave a really nasty review. Microsoft desided to cut short the reviews by not sending him anymore CDs.
The short version of the review.. Win95 didn't match the hype.
So the short story... Linux gives away free software to people to BEG for reviews while Microsoft threatons to cut off reviewers if they don't get the reviews they like...
Linux is bribing reviewers... Microsoft isn't...
Ummmmmm yeah....
At least Linux is being original....
Bribing people with something anyone can get for free....
Thats pritty dang smart...
I say we get a patent on that....
Softare reviewer meets with Linux advocate in dark ally. Advocate talking in deep hushed voice wearing a trenchcoat...
"Got the goods?" asks the reviewer
The Linux advocate pulls out a laptop with CDrw drive...
Linux advocate: Got the disk?
Reviewer produces a blank Eraseable CDr.
The advocate puts the CD in his laptop... a few moments later the laptop spits out a new Linux CD.
Advocate: For your review...
Reviewer: Thanks... How did you get this?
Advocate: Oh I downloaded it from the FTP site...
Back at the revewers office someone delivers a free copy of Windows 2001 and drops it in his "Free review copy" box.
IE sucks as well.
Give me a standard HTML4 complient web browser anyday.
>Linux users force themselves to play catch up by using Linux.
Windows 95 was designed for the 386 in 1995... now in 2000 Win 95 (Same os) requires a Pentium.
Who is forced to play catch up?
Linux still runs on the 386 and has sence been ported to 286es.
Yes 386s and 286s are obsolete.
But then Osborns are even more obsolete... people still use them becouse they don't need anything more than a wordprocessor.
And obsolete 3B2s were used up to last year (Y2K bug) and people still play with Commodore 64s.
(Lunix.. Unix for the C64.. was last updated a few months ago)
Linux develupers are playing catchup.. Linux users need only download updates secure in the knowladage that they need NEVER update hardware...
Windows users have no such luck...
>Didn't Netscape do the same in the early days of browsers (i.e. when they still enjoyed a dominant place in the market)? IIRC, this is what brought us blinking text....
... and failed...
Yes...
Netscape had to "crush" Mosaic...
The IBM preinstalled a webbrowser in OS/2. Thats when Netscape said "We can not compleate with a preinstalled browser" and discontinued Netscape for OS/2....
Then comes IE.....
Microsoft has attempted this trick for a LONG time
You can argue the increasing popularity of "Not Windows" as a good reason to not develup for the 90% wops I mean 85%... and dropping...
It's all well and fine to develup for the majority but Windows is a decresing majority.
True Windows has greater marketshare...
But compare that to the marketshare of Win2K vs the latest Linux distros...
Most people stick with 95 or 98 but upgrade to the latest Linux...
It can be argued that Windows isn't moving forward...
Wops... Not Moasic... Mosaic stopped develupment when HTML 2 specs were being made... I'm thinking KDE.. :)
But just slap any HTML4 browser in place of Mosaic in my post.. it's all the same...
I also use Arachnie... It's all the same
It's not an unreasonable consern.
Netscape was the badguy for getting webpage authors to make "Netscape enhanced" pages that don't work on the standard Mosaic and Lynx browsers (of the time) to push the commertal product.
It made sence.. why would anyone pay for Netscape when they can download Moasic for free? So Netscape had to trump Moasic on the market.
Then IE came. With ActiveX and MsJava Microsoft has tried for the IE Enhanced pages but so far web authors havn't bit.
It's a fear... My mother runs into IE pages all the time but I don't seem to have her bad luck and I rarely even need Netscape being able to surf using Mosaic.
Still there are pricks out there "Get a real OS" whom I want to just punt "Support a real OS and I'll consider it".
But the vast majority don't have access to IE anyway....
Netscape Enhanced pages may still outnumber IE enhanced pages...
When a webpage author dosn't have access to IE he can only test against Netscape.
It is the norm to test a website against Netscape OR IE to see if it works. However with websites usually running Linux or BSD and MSCE saying that diffrent operating systems can't co-exist (BS*) managers are being forced to pick between NT and *nix systems. With people successfully premoting Linux while NTs flaws become painfully clear NT quickly becomes a NON-answer. Macs user friendly legend (Not BS but heavy on the myth side **) putting it out of the running *nix systems become the solution.
What this boils down to is. If the website is develuped on-site chances are good Windows is banned by management becouse "Operating systems can not co-exist". This means no testing for compatability on IE. If the feature dosn't exist on IE then it dosn't work.
"IE supports more standards than Netscape"
Well apparently even this too is a load of BS. But as long as website authors believe this one and can't access IE then they might as well test against Netscape becouse if it works on Netscape it works on IE right?
Microsoft may yet fud themselvs out of the market.
* Mac, Unix, OS/2 and Dos co-existed before NT existed.
There was a time when a LAN could contain Macs, and Dos machines with the network server being a Sun i386 or an OS/2 box.
LANs being the WORST setting for standards and compatability. Internet servers being the in the "IDEAL" catagory.
** Mac is know as "The computer for the rest of us" as yes it is very easy.
But people came to believe Mac wasn't for "Power users". Quite the opposate. Macs strongest userbase is in the power user segment.
Just as "Linux can't be user friendly" Mac "Can't be powerful". We have seen recently user friendly Linux distrobutions comming out. Simmilerly Mac has been a power tool sence day one and more so over time.
To prove the point....
I discovered my webcam dosn't work on IE...
Well it works becouse I made a workaround but it works as well as the KDE browser.
I use a perl script (I didn't write it) that lets Netscape load the new image as soon as it's uploaded. I didn't know it didn't work on IE at first. Later I read the source code. Whops...
The workaround displays the image.. sans update...
hit refresh...
The way I normally go about splicing and editing audio files is I'd record the main body of my stuff using a simple recording program. Save that. Then load up a totally diffrent program.
That program I load in the origial file. An intro music file. Save in a diffrent format than the first two files and everything is as if it was originally recorded with the program I used for editing.
No specal magic... I didn't even TRY to make verything match. It dose simply becouse the whole file comes from one utility.
It's the most likely way they'll create such files..
Just throw in some silent noise.. The stuff that is usually removed from an MP3...
Worse yet...Not all mp3s are music...
Some songs stop in the middle
That little trick as a pandoras box waiting to scrap lagit MP3s....
Yes there ARE ways but they rely entirely on errors or technical diffrences.
:)
With TV the TV show and the ads are on diffrent tapes and it's no easy matter to make everything "match up" finding the technical diffrences are a mindless effort.
But when the ad and the music exist on the same medium (an MP3 file) it is posable to clean the diffrences out. With digital formats like MP3 the whole process could itself be automated.
It may be a tit for tat game but I doput an automated removal system would exist for more than 24 hours before it's rendered useless.
Just test the new encoder against the latest stripper.
Ferther more I doput Napster would implement an automated system like this leaving it to end the end user. Like the system that zaps TV ads not many people care enough to bother.
It's not significantly diffrent from what is allready happening with RealPlayer. Only the ad is litteraly a second connection and it's not much of an issue to "zap" passed the ad and get right to the content. But people are to lazy.
The advertisers however are not. They'll make any effort to make it work.
Finnaly.. and this one really puzzles me... Whats wrong with this anyway?
No.. it's not an issue.. it dosn't matter if an ad is tagged on an MP3.
It's been done... and yes on MP3s.. and yes it's all harmonious and not very easy to strip...
Geeks In Space...
It was done in ONE Geeks In Space Eppisode.. (Linux Confrence and Expo)
No one noticed or even cared... and it seems CmdrTaco here FORGOT...
Unfortunatly I had to restore my GiS MP3 collection from the Sync archives and the archived version dosn't have the ad (Makes sence.. the confrence is long sence over).
So yeah... let's go beat up the real pionear of this technology.. CmdrTaco.. No let's not..
It's a great idea.. I don't mind it in my Geeks In Space and I won't mind it Napsterised music.
"This music brought to you by Coke..."
"This music brought to you by RedHat Software"
And hay consider it... Microsoft is usually behind the curve on things by about 1 ot 2 years... We could like TOTALLY cover the MP3 space with ads for Linux hardware venders like VA...
Have a whole Unix ad war... "This MP3 brought to you by Walnut Creek CDrom... Want power? Get BSD... The original Internet operating system. Only $35 at Walut Creek CDrom".
or "This MP3 brought to you by Sun. We put the DOT in DotCom".
"Power, preformence, and all the software you need.. Debian"
"Bloat Begone... Slackware..."
You get the idea
>The Linux zealots don't have much room to brag over this incident.
No matter what os you use if you don't run things right you are in for a world-o-hurt...
I mean why do you think people call on you in the first place? It's becouse you get the job done right.
The deal is when you don't do backups you recreate EVERYTHING from memory. That sucks.
There are many other stupid things you can do (Like not setting up a proper redundency cluster so you never go down to start with) that can really hurt your ability to go back on-line.
It's unfair to gasp and point at a single case and say "See.. problem..." you can screw up anything.
Rember E Bay a while back? They use Sun UltraSparcs running Solarus. Top of the line hardware. A tiny mistake on E Bays part and BOOM hard crash.
The fault? Was it The SQL server? No... Was it the hardware? No.. it was (and E Bay admits this) E Bays own mistake. They set it up wrong and they took themselvs down.
Honnestly you can make NT reliable with work. It's just no simple matter. Linux has more ways to solve it when something really horrably wrong is found in the operating system.
With BSD the chances of finding something really horrably wrong are low. You can patch it quickly yourself. Chances are good an offical bug fix will be out shortly but not soon enough.
With Solarus the chances of finding something really horrably wrong are slim. You won't be able to patch it unless you got a source code liccens and Sun's not doing well in the timely bugfix department anymore.
With Windows NT the chances of finding something really wrong are pritty up there. You can't fix it. But Microsoft is getting better at timely bugfixes. In the mean time you can simply disable the defective feature. Not exactly the kind of thing you want to do.
With Linux the chances of finding something really sereously defective is fair. It's more likely you'll hear someone ELSE found it first and fixed it.
But people have this habbit of not updating Linux software much and that's really not smart. Linux boxes should be updated as often as posable.
When you get into hardware problems the first question to ask is "why no redundency"... any delays to getting back on-line can usually be attributed to poor managment not poor os.
Whats there ever any doupt?
[Bet ya didn't expect THAT...]
*Maniacle laughter*
Why dose the best reply to my suggestion have to be the greatest argument against it.
Your right of course...