This is pretty much what I was trying to point out.
Just because Corel is a corporation doesn't mean it can't scratch it's itch. Pretty much every OSS project in existence has started because somebody wanted a program that did 'X'. And pretty much every person who develops for said projects does so because he/she wants 'X' to do 'Y'. However, usually people don't see that it is 'subverting' 'X' , because usually everybody is in agreement over features and such.
However, sometimes different people want different things. Corel wants certain things, and so they've hired a guy to help enumerate this. Sure, he doesn't have OSS experience. But like I said, if the KDE team doesn't like the ideas, it doesn't have to listen. If nothing else, having a second (informed) opinion on something can only help. At best, it will bring you new insight, and at worst you will just have to say 'no' to it.
But I have to say that this is one of the best damn articles about the recording industry as a whole I've ever seen.
When I read the initial headline that said it was the 'unedited transcript', I assumed it was going to sound like she was just stupid. I also [wrongly, I might add] assumed that she probably didn't even understand the issues.
Was I ever wrong.
She knows exactly what is going on. And she has a lot of valid points about the RIAA. I'm not going to rehash the whole article, but suffice to say her math certainly backs up the sentiment that the RIAA is raping artists of money that should be theirs. She also has refreshing views on Napster et al, and I'm glad to see that.
Anyways, an extremely good article that I think anybody interested in the whole RIAA/Napster/Gnutella/Etc deal should read.
If the KDE developers don't want to use the suggestions Corel gives it, they don't have to.
To be honest, I'd say the guy has a lot of valid points. And if he's been doing UI design for a while, I'd say he could probably bring a lot to KDE.
Contrary to popular belief, UIs are NOT easy to design so that they are intuitive for average users. The KDE team is working on it, I'm sure, but it can't hurt to have somebody help out. Christ, I'm sure there are some OSS projects that would DIE to have a professional UI guy helping out, especially one paid for by a major corporation. But instead of showing some gratitude, they write an article about how Corel might be subverting the KDE project.
To be honest, EVERY SINGLE PERSON who works on KDE is subverting it, in a sense. They are working on it because they want it to work in a way that will please THEM. Corel is no different than your average KDE developer. They want certain features, and they're going to try to get them done.
If they'd wanted to, they could've just started uploading changes to CVS, but they didn't. They filed reports about them, and gave the community the chance to discuss them. And to be honest, I agree with most of the ones listed in this article as being 'bad'. They make sense, especially considering Corel wants KDE to be ready for normal users.
Only rebuild. The only possible ways of fully recovering a cracked system are:
1. reload the entire system from a known-good backup
2. reinstall the entire system
However, #1 isn't always possible. First of all, if you don't keep backups of your system, you are SOL. Even if you do, if you don't keep backups around for long periods of time, it is possible you don't have a backup from before the initial intrusion.
If anything, you CANNOT trust ANY data/programs/etc from the cracked system. ANYTHING and EVERYTHING could have been modified by the cracker. Trying to plug the hole after its already been used is pointless, as you have no way of knowing what they've changed. If you just update whatever program was the problem and move along your merry way, you're just asking for a repeat of the initial breakin.
OK I have a lot of random thoughts to put out here. This is really late into this story's run, so I'm sure this will wallow forever at the bottom of the page at default score:)
Anyways:
First up, I don't really care for GNOME or KDE. I find them to both be clunky copies of Win9x , and although they can be customized beyond this, they don't offer anything I want in a UI. But to each his own, and I'm glad that GNOME is moving along nicely.
HOWEVER:
I am becoming increasingly disconcerted with the amount of applications that are REQUIRING gnome libs to run. I've even had apps spawn a GNOME Panel when I run them. This is just ridiculous. I do NOT use GNOME. I do not WANT to use GNOME. I just want to run an application.
I thought GNOME was supposed to be about "choice"? Then why are so many developers hell bent on making sure I don't have a choice if I want to use their application? And how is this any better than somebody writing an application for Windows only? Isn't this the same type of exclusion that the OSS community has always been against?
Sure, I have the source. And of course I could modify it to suit my needs. But it seems a bit unreasonable to have to modify every single program I run across just to run it without using GNOME.
On a related note, I have been told by friends on the gnome mailing lists that Helix isn't going to make Debian packages because they feel it is "too hard". What the hell kind of logic is this? As if it is any harder to make a.deb than it is to make a.rpm?
1. Emacs does syntax highlighting and auto-indent. I don't know what you mean by 'intellisense'. Auto-completion isn't that useful to me. I see it as a lazy man's way of not learning the damn function/variable names well enough. If you're working on a large project, you should at least be making an effort to grok the parts of the program you're working on.
2. gdb ain't that bad.
3. makefiles are useful. who needs an ide when I can type 'make' and be done with it? it also takes about 1 minute to create a makefile. although admittedly on larger projects it can get hairy. For example: I don't have a lot of free time, but I try to follow the <A HREF="http://crystal.linuxgames.com">Crystal Space</a> project , and work with the CVS code. The make system for it is pretty intense, but is having some problems right now.
Anyways, my opinion is that IDEs are useless for me. If they help you, thats fine. I just don't see the need. And yes, I've worked on large projects. Regardless, I still prefer emacs and 3 xterms for my work.
The author of this "ask slasdot" seems to think that commercial software is going to somehow kill the open source movement. Since when has this been true?
As long as there are people willing to write software and contribute to the community, we'll have open source alternatives to most if not all types of software. Thats the way it will always be. Of course, the commercial vendors have a lot of money they can toss around in order to get things out the door sooner, but thats nothing new.
Besides this, since when is commercial software bad? I love OSS, but I don't mind paying for software if it is good and there isn't a free alternative. A great example of this is games. I have bought 3 titles so far from Loki, and I'll continue to buy from them as long as they continue to offer a service I feel is valuable. (ie. good games for an OS that I like)
Anyways, I guess the point of this post is that this "ask slashdot" is pointless. Not only that, but it has been discussed more than once, and I'm sure anybody here has thought about it. What kind of answer do you want? "Lets overthrow the corporations! Outlaw commercial software!" Is that what you are looking for? Because if it is, thats pretty sad.
The fact is, there isn't really an answer to this. The companies are going to do what they feel is in their best interest, and we're not going to somehow magically decide for every corporation in the world how things will work.
How do you 'accidentally' steal GPL'd code? I find it really hard to believe that the person who took the code had no idea of the legal ramifications of it. To be quite honest, I think they knew EXACTLY what they were doing. But they did it anyways.
I'm not trying to troll here, but this really pisses me off. And I don't understand how people can be so blase about it. The fact is, they used GPL'd code in a closed source module. But instead of doing something about it, we're kissing their ass in the hopes that they'll one day update their Linux drivers so they aren't 5 years behind the Windows ones.
Face it, Nvidia is using the Linux community, and doesn't give two shits about us. And I would not be surprised if they aren't the only company that does things like this to cut down development costs.
Anyways, I'm ranting like hell, but I am pissed. They are breaking the law, but instead of doing something, we're just giving them a slap on the wrist. So at this point, Nvidia and every other company out there has been given the (correct?) indication that if they illegally use GPL'd code, they can just say "oh we're sorry, we'll fix it in a few weeks", and nothing will happen.
If we're going to be like this, might as well relicense all GPL'd code under the BSD license. Thats basically what we're allowing corporations to treat it as.
LinuxStart is my throwaway email address. ie: the address I give to places that I don't care about the spam, etc that might come from it. That includes any web bulletin boards, ecommerce sites, and anything else that requires an email address. I check it about once every month or two.
Am I the only person who hates Napster/Gnutella with a passion?
The network at my university has been maxed out at 98% outgoing or so, 80% incoming for quite some time due to Napster. How do I know? Because last Wednesday, they banned it, and this dropped to about 30% outgoing, 50% incoming.
The network here has been mostly unusable for months, and it has been because of Napster.
Now, admittedly, the biggest reason for the outgoing is most likely the fact that Napster doesn't close when you click the "X" in the upper right of the window. Instead, it backgrounds itself and goes into the system tray. This means that people who have no clue how to use a computer excepting to play mp3s and use a word processor get Napster on the advice of a more knowledgeable friend, and proceed to share out gigs of mp3s to the world 24/7. With Gnutella, this probably isn't as big of a problem.
Anyways, I can't be happier that it is banned, and I can hardly feel bad for people whining that they can't steal music with ease anymore. If you can't even take the time to browse IRC or the web for your pirated music, you're pretty pathetic. You're getting it free to begin with, so I have no sympathy for you just because you might have to actually do the smallest bit of work to get it.
I myself grew up in the Linux world on Slackware, and I agree with you that it is the best distro to use when you are learning Linux. It makes sure you really do learn what you're doing, and doesn't just hand you everything in a GUI that doesn't teach you anything. In fact, I still have Slack 3.6 on my laptop (486/66 12mb, 300MB HD:) )
However, I eventually became tired of the lack of package management, as well as the sometimes outdatededness of Slack. At that time, I looked first at Debian, and then at Red Hat. Debian's install was horrific [something akin to the FreeBSD install, where the motto seems to be "try it a few times and get it wrong, then go back and do it a fifth time to get it right"], whereas Red Hat had a fairly clean install, so I went with Red Hat. I've been on RH since.
My experience with RH has been mostly positive. I don't find it messy or unwieldy. Yes, it does occasionally do some odd things, like place config files in strange places, and I must say that linuxconf is the devil, as it has a nasty habit of overwriting handmade changes to files, but this is true of linuxconf on any distro. It just happens that RH likes to stress it (which I wish it wouldn't).
Your quick jab at RH comes with no backup of any kind. Have you used RH at all recently? For any length of time? Or are you just perpetuating the general "RH is commercial and therefore evil" fallacy that permeates the community? RH has given a lot to the community. People like Alan Cox wouldn't be able to be full-time kernel developers without RH.
Also, before a Debian guru responds with his "X easy steps to an easy Debian install", I know them already. Nowadays, people tell you to ignore the default package selection and use apt instead of dselect. It doesn't matter to me now, as it is too late. My system works beautifully, and has for coming up on 2 years with Red Hat. I have no desire to switch, although I might be putting Debian on a secondary system of mine. And the install is still pretty bad, regardless of the advances in things like apt. I will admit, however, that Debian is very easy to admin once installed, as apt does most of the work for you.
Also, to quell any obvious retorts:
Yes, I use Debian fairly frequently on systems that I do a lot of work on. I have also attempted installs as recently as a few weeks ago on test boxen that I have around.
Yes, I use Slackware quite often, ie. whenever I boot up my laptop. I'm a bit behind [3.6], but I picked up Slack 7 at LinuxWorld Expo in Manhattan, and am considering putting it on a box I have sitting around.
No, I don't use FreeBSD much. I have a couple accounts here and there on FreeBSD boxen, and have attempted the install a few times. It was BAD.
Anyways, I'm ranting. End Point: back up your comments with actual facts. Quick jabs at distros without any sort of proof are nothing more than trolls.
I have to disagree with what you've said about Shogo. Shogo was perhaps the best FPS ever (only possibly because it is hard to choose between Shogo and Half-Life). Why?
1. There is a plot. A REAL plot. An INTRIGUING plot.
2. The graphics rival Q3 and UT even though it is a year or two old.
3. The game engine is incredible!
4. The gameplay is incredible!
5. The weapons/items/etc are actually innovative and fun!
The only three drawbacks I see are:
1. The game seemed too short. At the end, you are left thinking "wait a minute... there should be more!"
2. The multiplayer wasn't the best. The whole mobile armor concept just didn't seem to lend itself too well to DM.
3. You couldn't rebind the zoom key for the sniper rifle (if you've ever played you know why this kinda sucks:()
Umm... did you READ the article? Or even the HEADLINE?
It reads:
"China to ban government use of Windows 2000" [ emphasis mine ]
How is this forcing the people to use it? The government of china has every right to dictate what computer systems and operating systems can be used within it. The US does the same thing.
Next time try reading the article before posting.
Re:uncle? what has he got to do with that?
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It's just a weird expression we have to imply a lot of people. An example:
"It used to be that only a few people had personal computers, but now everybody and their [uncle|brother|mother|cousin] has one!"
Hope that helps. English is a strange language indeed:) But then again, so is every other language.
My brother got me a Creative 6x DVD kit. He ordered it online. It is Christmas day, and I don't have it:P Why?
He ordered it the 15, and it was supposed to be there by the 18th. However, by the 22nd it STILL wasn't there, and he called the company. Apparently they didn't think it was necessary to call him or email him and tell him that there was a delay in the order. They knew this the 17th or so, but didn't send any sort of email or phone call. He had to email them, fax them, and then call them TWICE to get through to find this out. Needless to say, he canceled the order and reordered it from another dealer. Also, needless to say I will not be ordering from that place EVER.
So... online shopping can have issues, especially when you get idiots like that. If the company had half a clue they might've gotten the thing to me, but now here I am christmas day with 6 new DVDs but no player:P Kinda ironic.
Am I the only one who sees this as basically a cheap attempt at jumping on the buzzword-bandwagon? In all seriousness, this article doesn't say much, although it speaks volumes about the technical ignorance of the author.
Java was born as hype, remained hype, and fell from grace because it didn't live up to the hype. Among other things, the concepts of Java and Virtual Machines weren't exactly new; in a lot of ways, it was just an interpreted language like Lisp, excepting compiled into bytecode to make it more proprietary.
Regardless of anything Java has and has not done, Java has about jack shit to do with Linux, other than you can run Java under Linux.
This is sort of random and not quite on topic but here we go:
Why does everybody follow Microsoft's ideology when it comes to the upgrade cycle? For some reason, people seem to think that if a new kernel comes out, they MUST upgrade, and if a new Red Hat comes out, they MUST upgrade, and if a new Debian comes out, they MUST upgrade... but this is not at all true!
MS likes to push the idea that if the upgrade their OS, everybody should upgrade to that version because it is "necessary". People are taking this thinking and saying with regards to Linux things like "what if the C libraries are upgraded and it breaks something? when I upgrade, I'll be screwed!" or "what if a new kernel version doesn't work with my hardware that the previous version worked with? when I upgrade, I'll be screwed!". The thing is... YOU DON'T HAVE TO UPGRADE. If you have a server running firewalling and file sharing and mail and web servers, and it works fine, DON'T UPGRADE IT. EVER. There is NO NEED TO.
Sorry this has turned into such a rant, but it gets really annoying when people talk about a new version of a piece of software or an OS as if it is mandatory to upgrade to it the moment it is released. If it ain't broke, DON'T FIX IT!! Just because MS wants you to buy another $200 version of their OS, or Adobe wants you to buy another $800 version of Photoshop, doesn't mean you need to do it. If you don't need the features of the 2.2 kernels, and you're running 2.0.37, stick with 2.0.37. You have no need to upgrade.
If you mean to ask what the premise behind the film is, it goes like this: [assuming you haven't seen this in the trailers]
Three film students go out to make a documentary about the Blair Witch, which is an old legend centered around a town that was once called Blair. Now the town is called Burkitsville. They go out to do their documentary, and after leaving town and going into the woods, they vanish without a trace.
One year later, their film is found by some archaeology students who are doing some studies in the area they disappeared. The film is literally their unfinished documentary. There are two cameras plus sound that are used: one color handicam, one b&w 8mm camera, and then DAT used for sound. The film doesn't contain just the documentary parts, as they keep the cameras rolling even through all the weird/frightening shit that goes on, partly because it is about they only sanity they have to hang on to.
The warning may be unnecessary, but I'm not sure what I'm about to write:)
Thoughts on the Blair Witch Project:
This movie is definately one of the best horror movies that I've seen in a long time. It does so many things right that most modern horror movies do wrong. In fact, calling the Blair Witch Project a movie is wrong. It is a film. There is a difference.
Some of the more striking things about the movie:
1) The lack of music: we're so used to hearing background music (even when we don't consciously notice it) that it makes it all the more eerie to realize that there is none. All you can hear is the actors and the world around them.
2) The role the audience plays: a good friend of mine put it best I believe. What he said was this:
"the movie has seven characters. heather, the director. mike the sound guy, and josh, the cp-16 camera operator. then there is the DAT, the handicam, the cp-16, and the witch.
...
*we* play the role of the dat and the cameras. "
What is so interesting about this fact is that we never get to see exactly what is going on. Unlike most movies, it is not told in the 3rd person Omniscient. We're a very limited third person, almost a first person (as the role of the cameras and DAT). Things happen, the three main characters react, and yet we barely get to see what they're reacting to, if at all. We don't know what the heck the noises are out in the woods. We have no idea who made those rock piles outside their tents. [sure, we have some guesses, but so do they, and ours are no better than theirs]. We don't know where Josh went. There are even times where the cameras and sound are blacked out, and we are left only to guess what happened while we were away. The point is, we are in some ways a part of the story, but only as a powerless observer. We couldn't help them no matter how hard we tried or wanted to.
3) The realism of acting: this is one of the finer points of the movie. I have seen at least one review berate the amount of obscenities thrown about, but realistically, what do you think YOU would be doing in that situation? The realism comes largely from the fact that almost all of the movie was ad-libbed. There were a few key turning-point scenes that weren't, but the rest was done on the spot. The three main characters were given a GPS, the cameras, and supplies, and left out in the woods. The crew stayed far away most of the time. The crew didn't even tell the actors when they were going to do stuff like noises. Sure, the actors knew they had to happen sometime, but they didn't know when. This helped make a lot of the fear a lot more genuine. Had I been doing this movie, I would have been scared shitless myself:)
All in all, this movie was incredible. It didn't scare me as much as I thought when I saw it, but it was creepy nonetheless, and the final scene is still vivid in my memory, even though I saw it last friday. Those who dislike this movie have a high likelihood of being the type of person who only likes gory horror movies, and dislikes more subtle, and psychological films.
Rating: *****:)
Go see it. It is good. But for those of you prone to motion sickness, consider some dramamine beforehand.
somebody moderate this one down. some people read/. from work, where they scan proxy logs for things like porn sites (like the link that this asshole posted is to)
Okay, this is going to sound Ultra-Elitist, but here we go:
Why are so many people concerned with bringing Linux to the masses? Most of the people who currently use Linux use it because they found it a useful tool for what they do, or because they found it interesting, or just wanted a system that was more stable. Regardless of the actual reason, the underlying reason that exists in all these cases is that the user went to Linux because it worked for them.
Now, a lot of people are talking about how we need to make Linux "marketable" and "ready for the masses". But why? The masses are happy where they are. They don't WANT to switch. Quite frankly, they SHOULDN'T switch if what they have works for them. Just because you or I feel that there is a better OS for them out there doesn't change the fact that they are happy where they are, and until there comes a time when they express a wish to use a different OS, we should leave them alone.
I'm all for having Linux and BeOS and *BSD and any other OS visible to the general public, and available if they want to use it. However, I am very much against the idea that it is our "duty" to make Linux usable by the masses. Linux doesn't have to be incredibly difficult, but at the same time, as a programmer, I have better things to do than try to dumb down a powerful OS so people who were never really intended to use it can use it without having to learn. If they want to use Unix or Linux or *BSD, they can learn it. If they don't want to learn it, they can use an OS that is designed for them, such as Windows, MacOS, or BeOS.
It comes down to there being different OSes for different purposes. Sure, I'd like to see Linux thrive. I would love to walk into my old high school to find the Win95 machines replaced with Linux machines... but only if there was a valid reason for doing so. Putting Linux on a computer just for the sake of putting Linux on a computer is wrong. Putting Linux in my old high school to teach programming classes is a good idea. Putting Linux in my old high school just because you want to replace Windows even though the Windows machines are working fine and the students couldn't care less about an OS and they can do everything they need to do and more is a BAD idea.
Linux is not the solution to everything, and trying to make it so is going to just cause problems. I'm not saying your mom or your grandfather shouldn't be allowed to use Linux. I am saying that your mom or your grandfather should use Linux only if there is a real reason to do so, and even then, they should learn how to use it. If all they need is email and the internet, get them Windows. If there are stability issues, og with BeOS.
The bottom line is, Linux was not designed with the desktop in mind. This is not to say it cannot be used as a desktop. I myself use Linux as my desktop machine. But if all a person needs is a desktop, you'll do a far better service to them by pointing them to BeOS than to Linux. I'm not saying you have to be a power user to use Linux. However, if you aren't going to do anything but surf and read email, most of the compelling reasons to use Linux will be lost on you. At that point, you might as well be using an OS designed with a GUI and ease of use in mind from the start, like BeOS.
Your argument is flawed in that you assume that the reason that CompSci isn't split 50/50 is because women are being denied entry. It is not split 50/50 because women are not applying.
I speak from the experience of being a CS major at a technical school by saying that not many of the women there WANT to be CS majors. If they wanted to, they'd probably be good at it. But there are very few who do.
This is of course from my own limited observations... but they are valid observations when you consider that I am at a school that has a 4:1 male:female ratio, and yet the biology department has a 1:1 male:female ratio and the CS department has about a 12:1 male:female ratio. The trends I'm noticing are:
1) either women don't WANT to go to my school, or just aren't getting in. (and I don't think it is the latter, as women are just as capable as men)
2) the women who DO want to go to my school largely do NOT want to major in CS
Anyways... it seems to me the lack of women in CS is by their own volition, not by a lack of chances.
Why do so many people misspell 'kernel'? About 1/2 of the times I see people talking about the kernel, they misspell it 'kernal'. There is no 'a' in 'kernel'!:)
Slashdot Mirror
This is pretty much what I was trying to point out.
Just because Corel is a corporation doesn't mean it can't scratch it's itch. Pretty much every OSS project in existence has started because somebody wanted a program that did 'X'. And pretty much every person who develops for said projects does so because he/she wants 'X' to do 'Y'. However, usually people don't see that it is 'subverting' 'X' , because usually everybody is in agreement over features and such.
However, sometimes different people want different things. Corel wants certain things, and so they've hired a guy to help enumerate this. Sure, he doesn't have OSS experience. But like I said, if the KDE team doesn't like the ideas, it doesn't have to listen. If nothing else, having a second (informed) opinion on something can only help. At best, it will bring you new insight, and at worst you will just have to say 'no' to it.
But I have to say that this is one of the best damn articles about the recording industry as a whole I've ever seen.
When I read the initial headline that said it was the 'unedited transcript', I assumed it was going to sound like she was just stupid. I also [wrongly, I might add] assumed that she probably didn't even understand the issues.
Was I ever wrong.
She knows exactly what is going on. And she has a lot of valid points about the RIAA. I'm not going to rehash the whole article, but suffice to say her math certainly backs up the sentiment that the RIAA is raping artists of money that should be theirs. She also has refreshing views on Napster et al, and I'm glad to see that.
Anyways, an extremely good article that I think anybody interested in the whole RIAA/Napster/Gnutella/Etc deal should read.
If the KDE developers don't want to use the suggestions Corel gives it, they don't have to.
To be honest, I'd say the guy has a lot of valid points. And if he's been doing UI design for a while, I'd say he could probably bring a lot to KDE.
Contrary to popular belief, UIs are NOT easy to design so that they are intuitive for average users. The KDE team is working on it, I'm sure, but it can't hurt to have somebody help out. Christ, I'm sure there are some OSS projects that would DIE to have a professional UI guy helping out, especially one paid for by a major corporation. But instead of showing some gratitude, they write an article about how Corel might be subverting the KDE project.
To be honest, EVERY SINGLE PERSON who works on KDE is subverting it, in a sense. They are working on it because they want it to work in a way that will please THEM. Corel is no different than your average KDE developer. They want certain features, and they're going to try to get them done.
If they'd wanted to, they could've just started uploading changes to CVS, but they didn't. They filed reports about them, and gave the community the chance to discuss them. And to be honest, I agree with most of the ones listed in this article as being 'bad'. They make sense, especially considering Corel wants KDE to be ready for normal users.
Anyways, just thoughts.
Only rebuild. The only possible ways of fully recovering a cracked system are:
1. reload the entire system from a known-good backup
2. reinstall the entire system
However, #1 isn't always possible. First of all, if you don't keep backups of your system, you are SOL. Even if you do, if you don't keep backups around for long periods of time, it is possible you don't have a backup from before the initial intrusion.
If anything, you CANNOT trust ANY data/programs/etc from the cracked system. ANYTHING and EVERYTHING could have been modified by the cracker. Trying to plug the hole after its already been used is pointless, as you have no way of knowing what they've changed. If you just update whatever program was the problem and move along your merry way, you're just asking for a repeat of the initial breakin.
OK I have a lot of random thoughts to put out here. This is really late into this story's run, so I'm sure this will wallow forever at the bottom of the page at default score :)
.deb than it is to make a .rpm?
Anyways:
First up, I don't really care for GNOME or KDE. I find them to both be clunky copies of Win9x , and although they can be customized beyond this, they don't offer anything I want in a UI. But to each his own, and I'm glad that GNOME is moving along nicely.
HOWEVER:
I am becoming increasingly disconcerted with the amount of applications that are REQUIRING gnome libs to run. I've even had apps spawn a GNOME Panel when I run them. This is just ridiculous. I do NOT use GNOME. I do not WANT to use GNOME. I just want to run an application.
I thought GNOME was supposed to be about "choice"? Then why are so many developers hell bent on making sure I don't have a choice if I want to use their application? And how is this any better than somebody writing an application for Windows only? Isn't this the same type of exclusion that the OSS community has always been against?
Sure, I have the source. And of course I could modify it to suit my needs. But it seems a bit unreasonable to have to modify every single program I run across just to run it without using GNOME.
On a related note, I have been told by friends on the gnome mailing lists that Helix isn't going to make Debian packages because they feel it is "too hard". What the hell kind of logic is this? As if it is any harder to make a
Anyways, my thoughts, albeit rambling ones.
Couple things:
1. Emacs does syntax highlighting and auto-indent. I don't know what you mean by 'intellisense'. Auto-completion isn't that useful to me. I see it as a lazy man's way of not learning the damn function/variable names well enough. If you're working on a large project, you should at least be making an effort to grok the parts of the program you're working on.
2. gdb ain't that bad.
3. makefiles are useful. who needs an ide when I can type 'make' and be done with it? it also takes about 1 minute to create a makefile. although admittedly on larger projects it can get hairy. For example: I don't have a lot of free time, but I try to follow the <A HREF="http://crystal.linuxgames.com">Crystal Space</a> project , and work with the CVS code. The make system for it is pretty intense, but is having some problems right now.
Anyways, my opinion is that IDEs are useless for me. If they help you, thats fine. I just don't see the need. And yes, I've worked on large projects. Regardless, I still prefer emacs and 3 xterms for my work.
The author of this "ask slasdot" seems to think that commercial software is going to somehow kill the open source movement. Since when has this been true?
.
As long as there are people willing to write software and contribute to the community, we'll have open source alternatives to most if not all types of software. Thats the way it will always be. Of course, the commercial vendors have a lot of money they can toss around in order to get things out the door sooner, but thats nothing new.
Besides this, since when is commercial software bad? I love OSS, but I don't mind paying for software if it is good and there isn't a free alternative. A great example of this is games. I have bought 3 titles so far from Loki, and I'll continue to buy from them as long as they continue to offer a service I feel is valuable. (ie. good games for an OS that I like)
Anyways, I guess the point of this post is that this "ask slashdot" is pointless. Not only that, but it has been discussed more than once, and I'm sure anybody here has thought about it. What kind of answer do you want? "Lets overthrow the corporations! Outlaw commercial software!" Is that what you are looking for? Because if it is, thats pretty sad.
The fact is, there isn't really an answer to this. The companies are going to do what they feel is in their best interest, and we're not going to somehow magically decide for every corporation in the world how things will work.
Anyways, my $0.02
How do you 'accidentally' steal GPL'd code? I find it really hard to believe that the person who took the code had no idea of the legal ramifications of it. To be quite honest, I think they knew EXACTLY what they were doing. But they did it anyways.
I'm not trying to troll here, but this really pisses me off. And I don't understand how people can be so blase about it. The fact is, they used GPL'd code in a closed source module. But instead of doing something about it, we're kissing their ass in the hopes that they'll one day update their Linux drivers so they aren't 5 years behind the Windows ones.
Face it, Nvidia is using the Linux community, and doesn't give two shits about us. And I would not be surprised if they aren't the only company that does things like this to cut down development costs.
Anyways, I'm ranting like hell, but I am pissed. They are breaking the law, but instead of doing something, we're just giving them a slap on the wrist. So at this point, Nvidia and every other company out there has been given the (correct?) indication that if they illegally use GPL'd code, they can just say "oh we're sorry, we'll fix it in a few weeks", and nothing will happen.
If we're going to be like this, might as well relicense all GPL'd code under the BSD license. Thats basically what we're allowing corporations to treat it as.
Thats enough of my ranting.
Actually, I use pine through SSH for my email.
LinuxStart is my throwaway email address. ie: the address I give to places that I don't care about the spam, etc that might come from it. That includes any web bulletin boards, ecommerce sites, and anything else that requires an email address. I check it about once every month or two.
So basically, your argument is pointless.
Am I the only person who hates Napster/Gnutella with a passion?
The network at my university has been maxed out at 98% outgoing or so, 80% incoming for quite some time due to Napster. How do I know? Because last Wednesday, they banned it, and this dropped to about 30% outgoing, 50% incoming.
The network here has been mostly unusable for months, and it has been because of Napster.
Now, admittedly, the biggest reason for the outgoing is most likely the fact that Napster doesn't close when you click the "X" in the upper right of the window. Instead, it backgrounds itself and goes into the system tray. This means that people who have no clue how to use a computer excepting to play mp3s and use a word processor get Napster on the advice of a more knowledgeable friend, and proceed to share out gigs of mp3s to the world 24/7. With Gnutella, this probably isn't as big of a problem.
Anyways, I can't be happier that it is banned, and I can hardly feel bad for people whining that they can't steal music with ease anymore. If you can't even take the time to browse IRC or the web for your pirated music, you're pretty pathetic. You're getting it free to begin with, so I have no sympathy for you just because you might have to actually do the smallest bit of work to get it.
My rant for now,
Not to troll, but how is Red Hat messy?
:) )
I myself grew up in the Linux world on Slackware, and I agree with you that it is the best distro to use when you are learning Linux. It makes sure you really do learn what you're doing, and doesn't just hand you everything in a GUI that doesn't teach you anything. In fact, I still have Slack 3.6 on my laptop (486/66 12mb, 300MB HD
However, I eventually became tired of the lack of package management, as well as the sometimes outdatededness of Slack. At that time, I looked first at Debian, and then at Red Hat. Debian's install was horrific [something akin to the FreeBSD install, where the motto seems to be "try it a few times and get it wrong, then go back and do it a fifth time to get it right"], whereas Red Hat had a fairly clean install, so I went with Red Hat. I've been on RH since.
My experience with RH has been mostly positive. I don't find it messy or unwieldy. Yes, it does occasionally do some odd things, like place config files in strange places, and I must say that linuxconf is the devil, as it has a nasty habit of overwriting handmade changes to files, but this is true of linuxconf on any distro. It just happens that RH likes to stress it (which I wish it wouldn't).
Your quick jab at RH comes with no backup of any kind. Have you used RH at all recently? For any length of time? Or are you just perpetuating the general "RH is commercial and therefore evil" fallacy that permeates the community? RH has given a lot to the community. People like Alan Cox wouldn't be able to be full-time kernel developers without RH.
Also, before a Debian guru responds with his "X easy steps to an easy Debian install", I know them already. Nowadays, people tell you to ignore the default package selection and use apt instead of dselect. It doesn't matter to me now, as it is too late. My system works beautifully, and has for coming up on 2 years with Red Hat. I have no desire to switch, although I might be putting Debian on a secondary system of mine. And the install is still pretty bad, regardless of the advances in things like apt. I will admit, however, that Debian is very easy to admin once installed, as apt does most of the work for you.
Also, to quell any obvious retorts:
Yes, I use Debian fairly frequently on systems that I do a lot of work on. I have also attempted installs as recently as a few weeks ago on test boxen that I have around.
Yes, I use Slackware quite often, ie. whenever I boot up my laptop. I'm a bit behind [3.6], but I picked up Slack 7 at LinuxWorld Expo in Manhattan, and am considering putting it on a box I have sitting around.
No, I don't use FreeBSD much. I have a couple accounts here and there on FreeBSD boxen, and have attempted the install a few times. It was BAD.
Anyways, I'm ranting. End Point: back up your comments with actual facts. Quick jabs at distros without any sort of proof are nothing more than trolls.
I have to disagree with what you've said about Shogo. Shogo was perhaps the best FPS ever (only possibly because it is hard to choose between Shogo and Half-Life). Why?
:()
1. There is a plot. A REAL plot. An INTRIGUING plot.
2. The graphics rival Q3 and UT even though it is a year or two old.
3. The game engine is incredible!
4. The gameplay is incredible!
5. The weapons/items/etc are actually innovative and fun!
The only three drawbacks I see are:
1. The game seemed too short. At the end, you are left thinking "wait a minute... there should be more!"
2. The multiplayer wasn't the best. The whole mobile armor concept just didn't seem to lend itself too well to DM.
3. You couldn't rebind the zoom key for the sniper rifle (if you've ever played you know why this kinda sucks
Anyways, to put it simply: Shogo kicks ass!
Umm... did you READ the article? Or even the HEADLINE?
It reads:
"China to ban government use of Windows 2000" [ emphasis mine ]
How is this forcing the people to use it? The government of china has every right to dictate what computer systems and operating systems can be used within it. The US does the same thing.
Next time try reading the article before posting.
It's just a weird expression we have to imply a lot of people. An example:
:) But then again, so is every other language.
"It used to be that only a few people had personal computers, but now everybody and their [uncle|brother|mother|cousin] has one!"
Hope that helps. English is a strange language indeed
My brother got me a Creative 6x DVD kit. He ordered it online. It is Christmas day, and I don't have it :P Why?
:P Kinda ironic.
He ordered it the 15, and it was supposed to be there by the 18th. However, by the 22nd it STILL wasn't there, and he called the company. Apparently they didn't think it was necessary to call him or email him and tell him that there was a delay in the order. They knew this the 17th or so, but didn't send any sort of email or phone call. He had to email them, fax them, and then call them TWICE to get through to find this out. Needless to say, he canceled the order and reordered it from another dealer. Also, needless to say I will not be ordering from that place EVER.
So... online shopping can have issues, especially when you get idiots like that. If the company had half a clue they might've gotten the thing to me, but now here I am christmas day with 6 new DVDs but no player
Am I the only one who sees this as basically a cheap attempt at jumping on the buzzword-bandwagon? In all seriousness, this article doesn't say much, although it speaks volumes about the technical ignorance of the author.
Java was born as hype, remained hype, and fell from grace because it didn't live up to the hype. Among other things, the concepts of Java and Virtual Machines weren't exactly new; in a lot of ways, it was just an interpreted language like Lisp, excepting compiled into bytecode to make it more proprietary.
Regardless of anything Java has and has not done, Java has about jack shit to do with Linux, other than you can run Java under Linux.
Just my $.02.
This is sort of random and not quite on topic but here we go:
:)
Why does everybody follow Microsoft's ideology when it comes to the upgrade cycle? For some reason, people seem to think that if a new kernel comes out, they MUST upgrade, and if a new Red Hat comes out, they MUST upgrade, and if a new Debian comes out, they MUST upgrade... but this is not at all true!
MS likes to push the idea that if the upgrade their OS, everybody should upgrade to that version because it is "necessary". People are taking this thinking and saying with regards to Linux things like "what if the C libraries are upgraded and it breaks something? when I upgrade, I'll be screwed!" or "what if a new kernel version doesn't work with my hardware that the previous version worked with? when I upgrade, I'll be screwed!". The thing is... YOU DON'T HAVE TO UPGRADE. If you have a server running firewalling and file sharing and mail and web servers, and it works fine, DON'T UPGRADE IT. EVER. There is NO NEED TO.
Sorry this has turned into such a rant, but it gets really annoying when people talk about a new version of a piece of software or an OS as if it is mandatory to upgrade to it the moment it is released. If it ain't broke, DON'T FIX IT!! Just because MS wants you to buy another $200 version of their OS, or Adobe wants you to buy another $800 version of Photoshop, doesn't mean you need to do it. If you don't need the features of the 2.2 kernels, and you're running 2.0.37, stick with 2.0.37. You have no need to upgrade.
Well... end rant for now. Sorry about that!
If you mean to ask what the premise behind the film is, it goes like this: [assuming you haven't seen this in the trailers]
:)
Three film students go out to make a documentary about the Blair Witch, which is an old legend centered around a town that was once called Blair. Now the town is called Burkitsville. They go out to do their documentary, and after leaving town and going into the woods, they vanish without a trace.
One year later, their film is found by some archaeology students who are doing some studies in the area they disappeared. The film is literally their unfinished documentary. There are two cameras plus sound that are used: one color handicam, one b&w 8mm camera, and then DAT used for sound. The film doesn't contain just the documentary parts, as they keep the cameras rolling even through all the weird/frightening shit that goes on, partly because it is about they only sanity they have to hang on to.
Go see it. It is good.
The warning may be unnecessary, but I'm not sure what I'm about to write :)
...
:)
:)
Thoughts on the Blair Witch Project:
This movie is definately one of the best horror movies that I've seen in a long time. It does so many things right that most modern horror movies do wrong. In fact, calling the Blair Witch Project a movie is wrong. It is a film. There is a difference.
Some of the more striking things about the movie:
1) The lack of music: we're so used to hearing background music (even when we don't consciously notice it) that it makes it all the more eerie to realize that there is none. All you can hear is the actors and the world around them.
2) The role the audience plays: a good friend of mine put it best I believe. What he said was this:
"the movie has seven characters. heather, the director. mike the sound guy, and josh, the cp-16 camera operator. then there is the DAT, the handicam, the cp-16, and the witch.
*we* play the role of the dat and the cameras. "
What is so interesting about this fact is that we never get to see exactly what is going on. Unlike most movies, it is not told in the 3rd person Omniscient. We're a very limited third person, almost a first person (as the role of the cameras and DAT). Things happen, the three main characters react, and yet we barely get to see what they're reacting to, if at all. We don't know what the heck the noises are out in the woods. We have no idea who made those rock piles outside their tents. [sure, we have some guesses, but so do they, and ours are no better than theirs]. We don't know where Josh went. There are even times where the cameras and sound are blacked out, and we are left only to guess what happened while we were away. The point is, we are in some ways a part of the story, but only as a powerless observer. We couldn't help them no matter how hard we tried or wanted to.
3) The realism of acting: this is one of the finer points of the movie. I have seen at least one review berate the amount of obscenities thrown about, but realistically, what do you think YOU would be doing in that situation? The realism comes largely from the fact that almost all of the movie was ad-libbed. There were a few key turning-point scenes that weren't, but the rest was done on the spot. The three main characters were given a GPS, the cameras, and supplies, and left out in the woods. The crew stayed far away most of the time. The crew didn't even tell the actors when they were going to do stuff like noises. Sure, the actors knew they had to happen sometime, but they didn't know when. This helped make a lot of the fear a lot more genuine. Had I been doing this movie, I would have been scared shitless myself
All in all, this movie was incredible. It didn't scare me as much as I thought when I saw it, but it was creepy nonetheless, and the final scene is still vivid in my memory, even though I saw it last friday. Those who dislike this movie have a high likelihood of being the type of person who only likes gory horror movies, and dislikes more subtle, and psychological films.
Rating: *****
Go see it. It is good. But for those of you prone to motion sickness, consider some dramamine beforehand.
somebody moderate this one down. some people read /. from work, where they scan proxy logs for things like porn sites (like the link that this asshole posted is to)
Okay, this is going to sound Ultra-Elitist, but here we go:
Why are so many people concerned with bringing Linux to the masses? Most of the people who currently use Linux use it because they found it a useful tool for what they do, or because they found it interesting, or just wanted a system that was more stable. Regardless of the actual reason, the underlying reason that exists in all these cases is that the user went to Linux because it worked for them.
Now, a lot of people are talking about how we need to make Linux "marketable" and "ready for the masses". But why? The masses are happy where they are. They don't WANT to switch. Quite frankly, they SHOULDN'T switch if what they have works for them. Just because you or I feel that there is a better OS for them out there doesn't change the fact that they are happy where they are, and until there comes a time when they express a wish to use a different OS, we should leave them alone.
I'm all for having Linux and BeOS and *BSD and any other OS visible to the general public, and available if they want to use it. However, I am very much against the idea that it is our "duty" to make Linux usable by the masses. Linux doesn't have to be incredibly difficult, but at the same time, as a programmer, I have better things to do than try to dumb down a powerful OS so people who were never really intended to use it can use it without having to learn. If they want to use Unix or Linux or *BSD, they can learn it. If they don't want to learn it, they can use an OS that is designed for them, such as Windows, MacOS, or BeOS.
It comes down to there being different OSes for different purposes. Sure, I'd like to see Linux thrive. I would love to walk into my old high school to find the Win95 machines replaced with Linux machines... but only if there was a valid reason for doing so. Putting Linux on a computer just for the sake of putting Linux on a computer is wrong. Putting Linux in my old high school to teach programming classes is a good idea. Putting Linux in my old high school just because you want to replace Windows even though the Windows machines are working fine and the students couldn't care less about an OS and they can do everything they need to do and more is a BAD idea.
Linux is not the solution to everything, and trying to make it so is going to just cause problems. I'm not saying your mom or your grandfather shouldn't be allowed to use Linux. I am saying that your mom or your grandfather should use Linux only if there is a real reason to do so, and even then, they should learn how to use it. If all they need is email and the internet, get them Windows. If there are stability issues, og with BeOS.
The bottom line is, Linux was not designed with the desktop in mind. This is not to say it cannot be used as a desktop. I myself use Linux as my desktop machine. But if all a person needs is a desktop, you'll do a far better service to them by pointing them to BeOS than to Linux. I'm not saying you have to be a power user to use Linux. However, if you aren't going to do anything but surf and read email, most of the compelling reasons to use Linux will be lost on you. At that point, you might as well be using an OS designed with a GUI and ease of use in mind from the start, like BeOS.
Just my $0.02 . For now, I'm out. Flame on.
Your argument is flawed in that you assume that the reason that CompSci isn't split 50/50 is because women are being denied entry. It is not split 50/50 because women are not applying.
I speak from the experience of being a CS major at a technical school by saying that not many of the women there WANT to be CS majors. If they wanted to, they'd probably be good at it. But there are very few who do.
This is of course from my own limited observations... but they are valid observations when you consider that I am at a school that has a 4:1 male:female ratio, and yet the biology department has a 1:1 male:female ratio and the CS department has about a 12:1 male:female ratio. The trends I'm noticing are:
1) either women don't WANT to go to my school, or just aren't getting in. (and I don't think it is the latter, as women are just as capable as men)
2) the women who DO want to go to my school largely do NOT want to major in CS
Anyways... it seems to me the lack of women in CS is by their own volition, not by a lack of chances.
But I could be wrong.
Most Americans fear and despise everything that they have no knowledge of, and this usually includes all foreign countries.
...
It's silly to make blanket generalizations about the attitudes of whole countries.
Contradictory? Thanks for painting my entire country with a wide brush.
I'll go back to being my good ol' hatred filled self now. Thanks for showing me my true self.
This is a really really minor nitpick but...
:)
Why do so many people misspell 'kernel'? About 1/2 of the times I see people talking about the kernel, they misspell it 'kernal'. There is no 'a' in 'kernel'!
Oh well. Enough nitpicking for now.
Thats all I can think of in the 10 seconds I took to write this. Hope it helps!